Still very quiet on the polling front, but speculation of a federal election later this year has given scribes plenty to work with over the quiet season:
• A report in the Age/Herald concludes the most likely months are October and November, with Liberal Party officials being told to have their act together at least by August. However, it is noted that “the pandemic could derail any possible plan for an early poll”.
• The above report also relates that the Queensland Liberal National Party’s Senate ticket is to be decided by May 1. This presents the Coalition with a difficulty, in that second position is reserved for the Nationals and duly assured for Matt Canavan, leaving Liberal up-and-comers James McGrath and Amanda Stoker in a high-stakes battle for first and third. The loser will at least be able to console themselves with the knowledge that the Coalition has won at least three Senate seats in Queensland at each of the seven elections since 2001.
• Also noted in the report is a fact that escaped my notice amid the excitement of events in the United States — namely, that the Western Australian Liberals finalised their Senate ticket in early November. This occurred at the same time that Ben Small, a logistics manager at Woodside Energy and owner of a bar and restaurant in Bunbury, was chosen to fill the vacancy created by Mathias Cormmann’s retirement. Small will take third position on the ticket behind Michaelia Cash and Dean Smith, both of whom have gone up a notch in Cormann’s absence. Smith had to overcome a bid by religious conservatives to dump him in favour of Albert Jacob, mayor of Joondalup and former state member for Ocean Reef. Peter Law of The West Australian reported the move was “perceived by some within the party as retribution for the eight-year Senator’s very public campaign for marriage equality in 2017”.
• There are a whole bunch of redistribution processes in train at the moment. At federal level, draft boundaries for Victoria and Western Australia are due to be published by the end of March, respectively to be finalised on July 26 and August 2. The redistributions will increase Victoria’s representation from 38 seats to 39, and reduce Western Australia’s from 16 to 15. A state redistribution process also began in Victoria last month, with draft boundaries due at the end of June and final boundaries to be published on October 14. In New South Wales, submissions are being weighed up to draft boundaries that were published in November, and while no date is set for their finalisation, it could roughly be guessed that it will happen in March or April.
Good morning Dawn Patrollers
Lisa Visentin writes that advocacy groups are backing a new campaign to force social media companies to keep a list of popular material shared on their platforms to help combat misinformation.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/push-for-new-laws-to-tackle-covid-19-misinformation-ahead-of-vaccine-rollout-20210124-p56wg3.html
Bevan Shiels reports that world leaders will be urged to look beyond the coronavirus crisis and refocus on climate change during the first major economic summit held since the pandemic began and Donald Trump left the White House and he says all eyes will be on Xi Jinping
https://www.smh.com.au/world/europe/all-eyes-on-xi-jinping-as-elite-davos-forum-urges-renewed-focus-on-climate-change-20210122-p56waa.html
And Rob Harris tells us that ahead of the above summit Australia will join Britain and more than 100 countries in a global push for increased urgency for nations to adapt to climate change and the increased droughts, heat waves, cyclones, devastating storms, floods and rising sea levels that come with it.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/australia-to-join-100-nations-in-climate-resilience-pledge-ahead-of-un-summit-20210124-p56wg8.html
Ross Gittins is less than impressed with the Coalition’s attitude to public servants and that of Morrison in particular.
https://www.theage.com.au/business/the-economy/pm-s-trust-and-respect-for-public-servants-vital-for-the-economy-20210124-p56wea.html
According to Paul Karp, Anthony Albanese has signalled Labor will take improved workplace bargaining policies to the next election to boost wages but will defer a 2035 emissions reduction target until the Coalition shows its hand.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/jan/24/anthony-albanese-signals-possible-return-to-labors-2019-workplace-policies
Scott Morrison says he will meet Chinese President Xi Jinping only if there are no conditions for restarting dialogue, as he warned that Beijing’s global outlook had become “more inconsistent” with Australia’s sovereign interests, writes The Australian’s Greg Brown.
https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/china-talks-only-if-there-are-no-conditions-scott-morrison-says/news-story/5ccc2490da78cc2cee8969aa3284f277
And Phil Coorey reports that Anthony Albanese has written to Scott Morrison suggesting he enlist the support of two of his predecessors, Howard and Rudd, to end the damaging stand-off with China.
https://www.afr.com/politics/federal/pm-should-enlist-howard-rudd-on-china-albanese-20210124-p56wer
The editorial in the AFR says that Canberra and the Biden administration are natural allies on trade – if awkwardly out of step on climate.
https://www.afr.com/world/north-america/biden-restores-a-sense-of-ease-to-our-core-alliance-20210122-p56w2e
As Joe Biden moves to double the US minimum wage, Australia can’t be complacent says Van Badham.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jan/25/as-joe-biden-moves-to-double-the-us-minimum-wage-australia-cant-be-complacent
The British government is stretching out the gap between first and second shots of the Pfizer vaccine as it seeks to ensure as many people as possible can be given some protection from an initial vaccine dose.
https://www.afr.com/world/europe/uk-vaccine-strategy-under-fire-as-death-toll-nears-100-000-20210124-p56whe
Paul Karp writes that a coalition of health experts is saying tech companies should be forced to reveal the most viral Covid-19 material online to bring misinformation to the surface where it can be refuted.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/jan/25/tech-companies-should-be-forced-to-reveal-viral-covid-19-material-health-experts-say
The campaign to change the date of Australia Day from January 26 is supported by fewer than a third of Australians although half believe the contentious date will be shifted within 10 years, writes Jewel Topsfield.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/almost-half-oppose-campaign-to-change-australia-day-date-poll-20210124-p56wfw.html
Amanda Vanstone chimes in with this contribution headlined, “On Australia Day in the lucky country, let’s focus on achievements”. Actually, it’s not culture warrior stuff.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/on-australia-day-in-the-lucky-country-let-s-focus-on-achievements-20210124-p56wf1.html
The SMH editorial believes Australia should respect our past, present and future in national celebration.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/respect-our-past-present-and-future-in-national-celebration-20210124-p56whr.html
Australia Day used to be an obvious and uncontroversial occasion for brands to endear themselves to Australian consumers. No longer, say these contributors to The Conversation.
https://theconversation.com/its-not-just-cricket-australia-day-isnt-the-commercial-winner-it-used-to-be-153633
Kevin Rudd has changed his mind about January 26. He writes why it cannot stand as our national day and suggests we should change the day to celebrate the triumph of Mabo.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/a-date-for-our-shared-destiny-let-s-move-australia-day-to-mark-the-triumph-of-mabo-20210124-p56wee.html
Tim Wilson has some ideas about refreshing our honours system.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/the-case-for-remaking-our-honours-system-with-the-help-of-our-indigenous-traditions-20210124-p56wf8.html
William Olson writes about the Senate inquiry’s bumpy ride that awaits, given the tech giants’ “blackmail” tactics.
https://theaimn.com/inquirys-bumpy-ride-awaits-after-tech-giants-blackmail-tactics/
Alan Kohler says Google is not bluffing and wonders if Bing come to the government’s rescue.
https://thenewdaily.com.au/news/2021/01/25/alan-kohler-google-bing-search/
Alan Tudge says that digital vaccination certificates could provide a pathway to bringing large numbers of international students into Australian universities, without a need for quarantine.
https://www.theage.com.au/politics/federal/digital-vaccine-certificates-could-enable-international-students-to-return-minister-20210124-p56weq.html
Australia’s outmoded electoral system must change if we are to see the end of dirty tactics like branch stacking, writes Dr Klaas Woldring.
https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/our-political-culture-is-rotting-at-its-core,14716
Republican divisions over Donald Trump’s second impeachment trial came into clearer focus on Sunday, as the former president spent his first weekend out of office plotting revenge against those he says betrayed him. Popcorn time?
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/24/donald-trump-impeachment-trial-senate-republican-party-romney-rubio
The former US coronavirus response coordinator Deborah Birx has said people in the Trump White House considered Covid-19 a hoax.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/24/deborah-birx-trump-white-house-covid-deniers
Donald Trump is gone but his big lie is a rallying call for rightwing extremists, warns Ed Pilkington.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/24/donald-trump-big-lie-american-democracy
Robert Reich tells Americans not to believe the anti-Trump hype as corporate sedition still endangers their country.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jan/24/donald-trump-twitter-facebook-corporate-sedition
Cartoon Corner
Matt Davidson
Peter Broelman
Matt Golding
David Rowe
Mark David
John Shakespeare
Reg Lynch
Glen Le Lievre
Johannes Leak
From the US
D&M
Even the countries that P1 consider to be shitholes have declining birthrates. Even there the population is behaving rationally, the survival rates has not increased as quickly as in western counties. The aids pandemic hit Africa hard.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HIV/AIDS_in_Africa
An article today noting the consequences:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/24/as-birth-rates-fall-animals-prowl-in-our-abandoned-ghost-villages
On the whole early election thing…
Yes, it may happen. Yes, Labor – as well as all the other parties out there – needs to be prepared for one.
However, this is also something which gets rolled out at this time of the election cycle going back as long as I can remember, because an early election is always a possibility, so of course all parties need to be prepared for one, and of course preselections must be held just in case, and of course the AEC starts checking out whether or not booths are available, etc etc etc.
Despite this kind of discussion happening every time we reach this stage of the election cycle, early elections are a rare thing.
Unless Scott Morrison thinks he’ll lose unless he goes early (and he’s a smug bastard, so he won’t believe that) — or he gets a message from God, which is a bit of a wild card – – it won’t happen.
One of the drivers against an early election is, of course, nervous back benchers, who also drive leadership challenges. They want to face as few elections as possible.
Morrison might be personally popular (or just better known than the other guy) but that hasn’t translated into either a substantial lead for the Coalition (and, seriously, no one in politics knows what to make of polling nowadays…) or any surprising electoral gains.
Alas, like everyone else, I’ll prepare for an early election, but I expect that the actual one will be called about as late as possible, as it usually is.
We’ve all heard endlessly about the Trump Wall from the far left. Trump’s Wall is evil.
It turns out that Xi is busy building walls between China and its southern neighbours. What do we hear from the far left about Xi’s Wall?
Silence.
I’ve posted this before, but it’s worth watching if you’re interested in the whole over population discussion — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYTnrd0LnTc
Basically, there’s nothing coming we can’t manage.
As for ‘sustainability’, the devil is in the definition. If it’s living without impact upon the world around you, no human population has achieved that (there were extinctions after Aborigines came to Australia – the thrush only went extinct here 5000 years ago; extinctions are a marker world wide for human settlement).
The closest I can get to is ‘keeping ourselves alive in perpetuity whilst doing as little damage as we can’ but I don’t think there can be human populations and no damage.
boerwar
Hope he does a better job than trump
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ToFk0kwrN9k
Thank BK, love today’s Rowe.
Hope all’s well in your neck of the woods with that bushfire.
The Nine/Fairfax Ipsos poll on the date of Australia Day, linked by BK, has a table breaking down responses by age and voting intention (but no voting intention figures). Maybe voting intention comes tomorrow as Fairfax likes to spread out poll results over two or more days.
https://www.theage.com.au/national/almost-half-oppose-campaign-to-change-australia-day-date-poll-20210124-p56wfw.html#comments
zoomster
Australian Megafauna, all extinct after humans arrived.
I suppose we will never know if it was climate change ( the end of the ice age) or hunting.
https://donsmaps.com/megafaunakill.html
citizen @ #8 Monday, January 25th, 2021 – 8:00 am
‘almost half oppose…’
Great, so more than half support.
frednk
The same thing happens wherever humans arrive, and is used as a marker for the start of human settlement.
As human settlements are separated by tens of thousands of years, the climate change theory doesn’t really hold up.
For example, Australia was settled at least 60,000 years ago, the Pacific Islands around 3000 years ago, yet the same loss of fauna happens in both cases.
Shorten will be on 774 with Virginia this morning. His quest to reclaim the leadership is starting to heat up.
Good morning and thenks BK for the Dawn Patrol.
frednk
The lesson of extinction history is that most are the result of the “unlucky” coincidence of two or more factors. The megafauna had survived earlier severe climate changes. The arrival of the First Peoples altered more factors than just by hunting.
mundo says:
.
https://www.theage.com.au/national/almost-half-oppose-campaign-to-change-australia-day-date-poll-20210124-p56wfw.html#comments
‘almost half oppose…’
Great, so more than half support.
Most couldn’t care less. The headline suggests the age has a barrow to push.
My own view. It is supposed to be a day to unite. There is a large portion of the population that finds the chosen day offensive, change the day.
Sarcasm alert.
zoomster, frednk
I tend to agree, we are a very aggressive and wasteful ape.
VPN.
This is Douglas and Milko’s reply to Player One from the previous thread in case you haven’t read it:
‘Douglas and Milko
Monday, January 25th, 2021 – 12:15 am
Comment #2120
Player 1,
I am curious about your comments on an article that reports that modelling shows that the world population will peak in circa 2070, and then plateau, and gradually decline: https://www.bbc.com/news/health-53409521
Your comments piqued my interest because you have frequently said that you will not give your first preference vote to party that does not have a sustainable population policy for Australia.
You have never been explicit about the number of persons you believe can inhabit Australia with it being sustainable,but the rhetoric you use is that of parties that believe that Australia’s population should be frozen at the circa 25 million we currently have.
So, to the article and your comments:
frednk @ #1912 Sunday, January 24th, 2021 – 3:43 pm
Haven’t you caught up yet; birth rates are below 2 in most counties. We are in for a population crunch but it is not overpopulation.
https://www.bbc.com/news/health-53409521
Player 1
Sure, birth rates are below 2 … unless you include all those countries where the birth rate is above 2.
You know, the shithole countries …
What about Africa?
The population of sub-Saharan Africa is expected to treble in size to more than three billion people by 2100.
And the study says Nigeria will become the world’s second biggest country, with a population of 791 million.
Prof Murray says: “We will have many more people of African descent in many more countries as we go through this.
“Global recognition of the challenges around racism are going to be all the more critical if there are large numbers of people of African descent in many countries.”
I just want to go back to your comment above:
Sure, birth rates are below 2 … unless you include all those countries where the birth rate is above 2.
You know, the shithole countries …
What about Africa?
For those who want the context to my questions to Player 1, read the article on the
BBC: https://www.bbc.com/news/health-53409521 and then consider my questions to P1.
Firstly, what do you have against people in Africa, and why do you describe them as shithole countries?
I cannot think of a single reason why you would think African countries are worse than European countries, once you remember that all the white, European countries only came to dominate Africa in the last 200 years- a tic of history – almost all humanity lived in villages without power or a water supply only 100 years ago. If white Europeans were so superior to Africans, how come they missed out on showing their superiority for all but 0.2% of the last 5000 years since humanity discovered intensive agriculture and population growth took off.
Second, from the article: As a result, the researchers expect the number of people on the planet to peak at 9.7 billion around 2064, before falling down to 8.8 billion by the end of the century.
The 2060-2080 peak for the number of humans on the planet at a bit under 10 billion, is a fairly stable prediction, given that it has been mirrored in many statistically valid studies.
Are you saying you disagree that the population peak will occur as above, after which the world’s population will decline? Do you think the world’s population will keep growing?
Are you saying, that because of shithole countries such as Africa, where women have too many children, the world population will keep rising without limit?
Or are you saying that the population peak of circa 9.7 billion people will occur around 2070, and after that, the population will plateau and then start to gradually decline, but the majority of the population will be made up of people from shithole countries like those of sub-saharan Africa, and that this will be a bad thing?’
I do hope Player One has the guts to answer, actually answer and not just come up with some more of their trademark smart-arsery, deflection and distraction, the very pertinent questions D&M has put to them.
dave @ #17 Monday, January 25th, 2021 – 5:26 am
Yeah, that’ll fool ’em (Google that is).
lizzie @ #15 Monday, January 25th, 2021 – 8:22 am
Yep, Bill Shorten had Mearsey. 🙂
Owners of the privately built Wellcamp airport near Toowoomba are pitching a proposal to State and Federal governments to build a large Covid-19 quarantine facility next to their airport.
This might suit the Queensland government because its proposal to use mining camp facilities near Gladstone was cynically criticised by Morrison last week.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-01-25/wagners-flag-covid-quarantine-facility-west-of-brisbane/13087738
Trump greeted with a flying banner trolling him over Mar-a-Lago
Unlike during former President Donald Trump’s presidency, no one much cares what he’s doing on Sunday. He was said to be golfing like he typically did during his tenure in the White House, but there were no sneaky photos from a press pool.
Flying over Mar-a-Lago Sunday was a massive banner calling the former White House resident the “worst president ever” and a “pathetic loser.”
Meanwhile, more members of Mar-a-Lago’s club are quitting. Most of that likely is due to Trump not having any influence in government anymore. Schmoozing a former president doesn’t generally result in government contracts or profits for CEOs.
https://www.rawstory.com/donald-trump-trolled-maralago/
I’m shocked. Rowland grown a spine?
As above in America in the Conservative Right, so below in Australia’s Fossil Fool Right Wing government and their media shills:
(From Media Matters for America)
lizzie @ #23 Monday, January 25th, 2021 – 8:43 am
His interview with Simon Birmingham last week was a cracker. Sadly all the best bits were edited out subsequently by the ABC News division and carefully curated to leave in only Birmingham’s talking points.
And his stock standard response in taking to Twitter to froth his cult followers is no longer an option 😀
Rioters set fires in the center of the southern Dutch city of Eindhoven and pelted police with rocks Sunday at a banned demonstration against coronavirus lockdown measures, while officers responded with tear gas and water cannons, arresting at least 55 people.
Police in the capital of Amsterdam also used a water cannon to disperse an outlawed anti-lockdown demonstration on a major square ringed by museums. Video showed police spraying people grouped against a wall of the Van Gogh Museum.
It was the worst violence to hit the Netherlands since the pandemic began and the second straight Sunday that police clashed with protesters in Amsterdam. The country has been in a tough lockdown since mid-December that is due to continue at least until Feb. 9. The government beefed up the lockdown with a 9 p.m. to 4:30 a.m. curfew that went into force on Saturday.
‘frednk says:
Monday, January 25, 2021 at 8:02 am
zoomster
Australian Megafauna, all extinct after humans arrived.
I suppose we will never know if it was climate change ( the end of the ice age) or hunting.
https://donsmaps.com/megafaunakill.html‘
With respect to Australian megafauna, correlation is not causation. There is virtually zero evidence of megafauna bones in middens.
Climate change may have been a driver. Changes to fire regime could well have been critical
IMO a major extinction driver that is generally under-rated is pathogens. These might well have been brought in by first arrivals, including on their clothing, tools and dogs.
Climate change, changes to fire regimes, and pathogens may all have contributed to Australian megafauna extinctions.
OTOH, there is nothing nearly mysterious about Australia’s current massive contribution to the Anthropocene Extinction Event.
(The case for Maori role in being major players in the extinction of NZ megafauna is much stronger.)
Fran’s back.
boer
It’s the pattern that counts, not one experience.
Everywhere – South America, North America, the Pacific Islands, Europe, Australia – where humans have settled, major extinction events have followed.
As I have already said, these population events were separated by tens of thousands of years, so it’s hard to find other factors in common.
Humans are not always directly to blame – the rats brought by humans to Easter Island are now being blamed for the collapse of the ecosystem there – but their arrival always appears to correlate with extinction events and then ongoing extinctions during their habitation.
The best we can do is to tread as lightly as we can.
An interview with Fauci on the Trump years. I expect there’ll be more accounts like this from govt officials over the years.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/24/health/fauci-trump-covid.html?referringSource=articleShare
‘… changes to fire regimes, and pathogens may all have contributed to Australian megafauna extinctions.’
All the result of human settlement.
I’ve been careful (I hope) to distinguish human settlement causing extinctions from simply humans causing extinction.
One double entendre which resonates as a hashtag is #RupertRooter – as it assumes an understanding of both Australian and US idioms.
This article drips of the mutual conflict of interest which the hashtag alludes to….
‘For those on holidays last week, news about the relationship broke after the pair were photographed at the checkout of Wodonga Bunnings sharing a joke but sans masks – despite a Victorian Health ruling. Feminist activists Mad F***ing Witches circulated the image on social media and attacked the maskless McKenzie. But they initially failed to identify her shopping buddy Benson, whose day job is The Australian’s national affairs editor. Of course if they had masked up, no-one would have been the wiser.
“We are in a happy relationship and have been open about it,” McKenzie and Benson told CBD in a joint statement, which was news to some of their colleagues.
A bit of a pickle for The Australian’s editor in chief Chris Dore to deal with when he returns from leave.
Now CBD can reveal that apart from DIY work that requires a trip to Bunnings, Benson has another project on the go. He is writing a political book and has been spending a lot of time with Prime Minister Scott Morrison, and meeting with senior Morrison aides, including principal private secretary Yaron Finkelstein and chief-of-staff John Kunkel.
Benson was uncharacteristically tight-lipped about the details when CBD inquired on Sunday, as was Sydney-based publishing house Pantera Press, which published Benson’s previous effort, Betrayal: The Underbelly of Australian Labor. Confidentiality clauses have prevented CBD from gleaning any more about the book, which we assume will bring readers insights into the Morrison government. But we are sure it will sit incongruously beside Pantera’s progressive titles such as Vegan Living and Darkness is Golden: A Guide to Personal Transformation and Dealing with Life’s Messiness.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/minister-s-squeeze-pens-book-about-the-pm-20210124-p56whl.html
boerwar
There is good evidence of hunting of megafauna.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lancefield_Swamp
They write this as though everyone should know who Benson is and what he looks like. Is this common knowledge? There’s no way I’d be able to pick him out of a line-up of Oz columnists even if I had seen him before, simply because all Murdoch clackers look the same: men of a certain age and ethnic origin.
The only way not to impact on any environment, is to not interact with it.
sprocket_
‘“We are in a happy relationship and have been open about it,” McKenzie and Benson told CBD in a joint statement, which was news to some of their colleagues…’
According to a post she made on MFW, it was news to Benson’s wife.
“Houses in order”
Certainly a hit and miss affair in regard to Parliament as Parliament doesn’t fit well with Morrison and co.
The Morrison LNP presidential style, executive edicts, unsubstantiated proclamations, nontransparent financial irregularities and undemocratic decision making the basic tenets of a skewed and unfair government, are all in place.
Houses however play a significant role in deciding the timing of an election.
Howard said without the slightest facial movement that no one likes to see house prices go down.
Morrison needs an invigorated housing market to tickle the economy along but more importantly for the upwardly mobile Morrison, to plan his next move to a waterfront.
“Jen and the girls” a most convenient marketing tool, adopted by a marketing “tool” will be used in prime time.
The apartment/unit style of housing is not in order in the bigger cities.
Employment is always linked to housing as is wage levels.
And the bloody virus!
“bugger” signs Morrison as he signs up the other Scot, the toilet man, Paul Hogan and Tina Arena for extended contracts for the second half of 2021.
And those polls! The first sign of a downward arrow and the oversized goofy boy from Bronte, together with his lopped sided smirk, will trot out the girls, give a few pardons(of sorts) and begone.
Job done!
So, the Trumps next move is, after they couldn’t win the American election the way it is construed now, to change the way the elections in America are conducted, via the States, so they CAN win going forward into the future:
https://thenewdaily.com.au/news/world/us-news/us-election/2021/01/25/donald-trumps-next-move/
Or, in other words, he is devising ways to make America a One Party State. His.
Bit more on the french deal with google –
Google seals content payment deal with French news publishers
PARIS (Reuters) – Google and a French publishers’ lobby said on Thursday they had agreed to a copyright framework for the U.S. tech giant to pay news publishers for content online, in a first for Europe.
The move paves the way for individual licensing agreements for French publications, some of which have seen revenues drop with the rise of the Internet and declines in print circulation.
The deal, which Google describes as a sustainable way to pay publishers, is likely to be closely watched by other platforms such as Facebook, a lawyer involved in the talks said.
Alphabet-owned Google and the Alliance de la presse d’information générale (APIG) said in a statement that the framework included criteria such as the daily volume of publications, monthly internet traffic and “contribution to political and general information”.
Google has so far only signed licensing agreements with a few publications in France, including national daily newspapers Le Monde and Le Figaro. These take into account the framework agreed with APIG, a Google spokesman said.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-france-google-publishers/google-seals-content-payment-deal-with-french-news-publishers-idUSKBN29Q0SC
phylactella
A single heavily contested archaeological site with the reportage very heavily laced with qualifiers is not, IMO, enough evidence to demonstrate that Indigenous people hunted the megafauna to extinction.
China’s Growing Power Is Scaring Ordinary Savers Out of Hong Kong
It was the freezing of bank accounts that changed Dan’s mind.
The Hongkonger, a finance worker in his early 50s, watched China tighten its grip on the city over the past few years with growing nervousness. Yet as a self-described apolitical person — he hadn’t attended any of the protests that hit the city in 2019, for example — he wasn’t really worried about being personally affected.
Then last month, banks including British lender HSBC Holdings Plc froze the account of former lawmaker Ted Hui after he went into exile in the U.K. with his family. A church that helped protesters also had its account suspended.
“It’s a game changer,” Dan, who asked that only his first name be used because he is fearful of repercussions of speaking publicly, said.
He’s now in the process of moving about $100,000 — most of his savings — to an account in Canada, leaving only a small amount in Hong Kong to cover daily expenses.
The Hong Kong police cited money laundering as the reason for requesting the accounts be frozen, putting into sharp focus just how vast the powers wielded by police could be in the wake of the sweeping national security law imposed on the city last year.
“The security law allows freezing of assets for matters endangering national security, which are not specified,” said Philip Dykes, former Chairman of the Hong Kong Bar Association, adding that Hong Kong is “unusual in the breadth of potential offences that ‘endanger national security.’”
Imposed on the city without debate in the local legislature, the full text of the national security law was revealed for the first time at midnight on June 30 — the same moment it took effect.
It wasn’t the first time that accounts linked to the protest movement were frozen. In 2019, HSBC shut down the bank account of Spark Alliance — a group that raised funds to provide legal assistance to protesters — after it spotted activity differing from the company account’s stated purpose.
But what further shocked Hongkongers in the Ted Hui case was the fact that the accounts of his family members had also been frozen, prompting worries that people could be held responsible for the actions of their relations.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-01-24/china-s-growing-power-is-scaring-ordinary-savers-out-of-hong-kong?srnd=premium-asia
‘Barney in Tanjung Bunga says:
Monday, January 25, 2021 at 9:28 am
The only way not to impact on any environment, is to not interact with it.’
Yep. There is plenty of evidence that Indigenous burning regimes have been key in determining our biodiversity. In other words what Cook saw along the east coast was not a series of pristine wildernesses but a series of anthropogenic landscapes.
Health Minister Greg Hunt said Australia was on track to have the majority of the population vaccinated against COVID-19 by October.
“The commencement remains on track for February, as the Prime Minister has said. The completion remains on track for October,” he said.
“This approval by the TGA is one of the earliest in the world for a full approval. We know that the European Medicines Agency and the Swiss have already made such an approval but Australia is amongst the earliest.”
Mr Hunt said international supplies of the AstraZeneca vaccine will commence “slightly earlier” than anticipated.
“With regards to AstraZeneca, the international AstraZeneca supplies in Australia are likely to commence slightly earlier than had previously been anticipated. Early in March and if there is more guidance on that, we will provide it,” he said.
“That is subject to TGA approval and to shipping. That’s important and the domestic AstraZeneca production via CSL is likely to see supplies of approximately one million doses per week commencing in late March.”
Test
dave
Xi can freeze the account of any chinese person any time. And the accounts of their families.
One wonders what the impact of all this has on Chinese-Australian citizens who still have extensive familial links back home?
The weight of the sadness of the First Nations people is weighing me down today.
Thank you, BK
‘Scott Morrison says he will meet Chinese President Xi Jinping only if there are no conditions for restarting dialogue,…’
Xi has invited Morrison to meet with him? Really?
Morrison should just pick up the phone and…
…oh, waiting, waiting, waiting…
C@tmomma @ #18 Monday, January 25th, 2021 – 8:30 am
I have answered this on the previous thread, where it was raised. Go look.
For some reason, I cannot copy that answer to this thread.