The Brown Note

Scott Morrison - The Shame Of Australia

The election of a person of the character, capabilities and honesty of Scott Morrison, to the highest office in Australia, lays bear the great shame Australia's news media and his pliant colleagues bear in ever letting this happen. As his previous employer at Tourism Australia has now publicly stated, he was always like this and everyone knew. Yet from his hugely controversial appointment to politics against an opponent that roundly beat him, to his re-invention as daggy dad and man of the people over a decade later - he has always been supported by our press and tolerated by colleagues that routinely bad mouthed him behind the scenes. Never again must someone so low be so enabled by the system.

The Truth About Andrew Tate

The media circus around around the apparent misogynist king, Andrew Tate, is getting an awful lot wrong and this does us no service at all. Like the fact that Andrew Tate creates 13 year old misogynists - no he doesn't, they already ARE 13 year old misogynists, that's why they love him. We need to much better in understanding a systemic problem, than simply playing whack-a-mole with anyone we don't like. There's always another mole.

The Mishandling Of Donald Trump

America has mishandled Trump from day one but it's getting worse. The endless stream of accusations and inquiries and trials, that take years to complete, foster in his fan base the idea that he is relentlessly persecuted and guilty of nothing. Lock him up. It's the only way. If Julian Assange can be de-facto locked up for ten years (in a foreign country no less) for releasing an entirely truthful video of war crimes, because he is a threat to the state - how the hell is someone that just tried to overthrow democracy and caused a riot in the seat of power, not one hundred times more of a threat to America? The USA is sleepwalking into totalitarianism against an enemy that block votes the exact same way 100% of the time that they can't rely on outnumbering them again.

Scott Morrison: Everyone Everywhere All at Once

Good old Scott Morrison, no longer being in power is no impediment to his calamities still dominating the county. Perhaps the ex-Aussie PM grew jealous at John Barilaro stealing his thunder! Now the utterly bizarre spectacle of him appointing himself to multiple roles in secret. If only someone had warned us about his character or competence before he was elected...

 

*Note - at the start I misread the April/May appointments as being this year, not last year as they were (live radio I'm afraid - and please don't expect me to know what year it is)

From Salman Rushdie to Donald Trump: America’s Role In Fomenting Extremism

A few days before a radicalized extremist charged the stage and stabbed fatwa'd author, Salman Rushdie - another radicalized extremist, present at the Jan 6 riots, attacked an FBI office and was killed, in defence of Donald Trump. They both had something in common, both the Islamic extremist and the right wing Trump supporter were born and bred Americans, both radicalized on home turf. A look at how the USA fostered extremism abroad for decades by often supporting hard-line Islamic extremists over more moderate options, and how the wildly aggressive tenor of America's right wing news media and politicians has brought this extremism home to roost.

James Franco: Should An Actor Only Play Who They Are

No, absolutely not. I have a lot of problems with modern activism and its focus on small things but the rally only have an actor play a role to which they are assigned is simply upside down, wrong head and self destructive. Equality is not only a trans, gay, disabled or ethnic minority being able to play those roles, its trans, gay, disabled or ethnic minority actors having equal opportunity to play any role.

Taiwan Vs China Vs USA: China Don’t Fall For It And Why You Are Wrong

After decades of America "politely" ignoring Taiwan, because they were doing massive business with China, Prominent Democrat Nancy Pelosi chose now to visit Taiwan. Now, in middle of the Russian war in Ukraine and all the global impacts that's having, she chooses to stick her finger in China's eye. It's a moment so pointless and reckless, it recalls Aussie PM Scott Morrison's equally clunk headed attack on China two years ago. China don't fall for it, just ignore her, there doesn't seem to be any plan here at all. And also China, given I'm a white Westerner and I'm sure you are desperate to hear my opinion - why you are wrong on Taiwan and what you should be doing.

John Barilaro: Caligula Would Have Blushed

Five weeks ago I posted about how ex-NSW political leader, John Barilaro, had just taken down the Dominic Perrottet led NSW state government, in the time since we've witnessed the unfurling of a seemingly endless web of corruption and self reward from the most bare-faced grifters ever to grace Australian politics. This saga has already accounted for the deputy leader of the state but the focus must be on ALL politically appointed positions - Barilaro, with one of the most brazen uses of the victim card in modern history, has already had to field questions about his own girlfriend being forwarded for another role to his own ex-member of staff, who for some reason is on SIX HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLARS A YEAR. Have you heard these people speak? Competence and intelligence do not radiate from them, so how are they all worth so much money? I've said before, the Liberal party is the only place you are guaranteed a pay rise on losing your job. Every trade appointment, department head and ambassadorship appointed by this disgusting gravy train needs investigation - Barilaro is just the start.

Climate Change: It’s Too Late - We’re All Gonna Die

It's time we admitted the ball we keep punting down the road, long since went off a cliff. We have left it too late, acted too little and it's already happening worse than we predicted. Decades of a cabal of the fossil fuel industry, shonky scientists for hire and the right wing media combining to attack action on climate change - which may go down as the worst crime by impact in human history, these people should be in jail - real science always erred on the side of caution to appease them. Turns out the cautious modelling was way off and what's already happening is much closer to the extreme end and getting worse quicker than even those models predicted. Those 30 year off predictions that may happen if we don't take action are definitely going to happen in the next few years whatever we now do. We must still act but have already changed the world beyond recognition - to quote the poet bard Sufjan Stevens - we're all gonna die.

Ukraine: Was This Putin’s Plan All Along

I've always ignored the ridiculous attempts by the Western media to paint Putin as some comic book villain, it serves no purpose and is in fact dangerous to misrepresent one of the cleverest and savviest political animals of the modern era. You don't stay in charge of Russia this long by being an idiot. So I've been perplexed, why then did he get the invasion of Ukraine so wrong? Why did he not time a likely two month conflict closer to the US midterms to sow chaos in their economy and likely return a more favorable Republican house? Did he really underestimate the volume of international condemnation, crippling sanctions, pariah status and Western backing for Ukraine? Even the further bolstering of NATO and the EU - the thing that led to the war in the first place. Now several months in and Putin is looking far more stable, the Western worlds economies are in unsustainable free-fall as a result of the war, Putin has a much stronger hand and most telling of all, is opening up Ukrainian grain shipments to the third world, containing as much as possible the fallout of the war to the West. I thought the West's decision to start a proxy war with Russia by fueling the conflict in Ukraine was insanity - now I'm starting to wonder if it was Putin who started a proxy war with the West by invading in the first place, and knew exactly where we would be now. We willfully underestimate this man at our peril.