An open thread where, at your weekend leisure, you can discuss anything you like.
Life, Culture and Politics from BrisVegas
Larvatus Prodeo was an Australian group blog which discussed politics, sociology, culture, life, religion and science from a left of centre perspective. more»
Frist, so I can apologise for mis-scheduling this week’s Salon. Oops.
It’s June 4. “我們無權遺忘。”
third…I like thirds btw. After all if you work an average job in this country and you pay rent to live a third of what you earn is about what you are left with after the taxman and rent. That ballpark equation always reminds me of my place in the scheme of things, it’s kinda comforting…
Is there a thread on LP, that is discussing the Govt asylum in Malaysia plan?
i would genuinely like to hear peoples opinions.
I typed Malaysia into the search box at the top-right of the page, and the first result was this post from a few weeks ago.
Which government is seeking asylum in Malaysia, and why?
(insert relevant smiley of flippancy here)
That post was also the first result in the Politics » Policy » Immigration subcategory, which I clicked on via the Archives page.
Thank tigtog
With all the talk in the news in this issue recently , i thought it would be discussed here more heavily.
I’m surprised by the silence.
Are you referring to tianamen square commemorations, MH?
@jumpnmcar #8, that post did get 186 comments. That’s hardly silence.
tigtog
last post on ” The endless cycle of asylum seeker politics 2″ was May 18th,
a lot has happened in the last 17 days.
I’m not shit-stirring, just surprised.
@sg, yes. And the quote is an evocative expression from one of the leaders of the student protest movement, meaning something like, “We are powerless to forget” or “we have no right to forget.”
Hey, Jumpnmcar, it’s a Salon Thread. You can talk about whatever you like. Go on, knock yourself out.
But I think you’ll find the copious comments on the previous thread (and its prologue before it) have already covered everything that people had to say on the issue.
That would be the reason for the “silence”. You see, unlike news websites, which feel it necessary to fill the 24-hour void with endless redundant chatter, going over old ground and returning like dogs to their own vomit; quality blogs like LP are quite capable of moving on with issues. We’re not stuck like deer in the headlights, blinded by the bullshit that news sites spew round the clock.
Which probably explains why you can’t keep away, despite yourself.
Thanks for that Mercurius.
Keep spreading the love.
FWIW, there’s two reasons why I personally have not posted on the issue.
1. I’m waiting (and hoping against hope) that the final announced policy is less awful than the rumoured versions.
2. I’m so pissed-off about the whole thing – at both major parties *and* the majority of the Australian populace – it’s hard to find the enthusiasm to post what would turn into nothing more than an angry rant.
Not comfortable with the whole asylum solution as is (but acknowledge it’s a pratical nightmare).
Mercurious, there has been lots of discussion but what is a sensible solution?
(I use sensible across the all options and opportunities)
LP Challenge: Can we come up with a (simple) plan that meets UNHCR?
How innovative can we truly be?
Fascinated, the simple and obvious solution is to detain reffos for exactly as long as it takes to make sure they aren’t carrying any nasty diseases, then release them into the community on some sort of restricted visa until their claims are assessed. (I’m sure you’d agree, pretty much.)
Unfortunately, that won’t play well in western Sydney which, as we know, is the home of all real Australian values and virtues.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2011/06/04/3235588.htm?section=justin
Aussie croc meat bound for Chinese kitchens.
A fantastic opportunity for Aboriginal communities in the north.
IMHO.
New add from GetUp!:
https://www.getup.org.au/campaigns/climate-action-now/video/fund-solutions-not-pollution
Robert @ 15,
I’m a bit in the same boat in terms of my apathy towards politics lately. I’m so very disappointed in this supposed Labor govt due to not only this appalling ‘Malaysian solution’ but their disgraceful treachery of the poor on welfare in the budget.
Only a Labor govt could have the temerity to describe kicking people under the age of 35 off of the disability pension, making it even harder to claim the DSP with more stringent criteria, beating up on the long-term unemployed by increasing their ‘mutual obligation’ activities and sinking the boot into teenage mums as great things. All with unemployment below 5% something a lot of economists consider “full-employment”.
Apologies for the rant people but I’m so disgusted by this Labor govt I actually can’t see myself voting for them ever again.
DI(NR) Pretty much what you said with a few security qualifications.
But the whole point of the Malaysian solution is to shut down the people trafficking trade by returning the people who are paying for it, the asylum seekers, not only to where they came from when they commenced their vovage, Indonesia, but further back to, if they ever went there at all, Malaysia.
Then putting them forever at the back of the line in ever hoping to enter our country.
Who’d ever be willing to fork over $10,000 on that basis.
Meanwhile Malaysia will be able to offload some many thousands of Burmese refugees who they most definitely don’t want in their country onto Australia.
On the other hand, it may give asylum seekers even more incentive to travel here by plane.
“Then putting them forever at the back of the line …”
But it seems conditions in that line are not even basically satisfactory. If there were facilities in Malaysia, Indonesia, East Timor etc run by the UNHCR and funded by the region in some fair manner – according to GDP per capita? – it might be more acceptable.
But that is the whole point. They have no chance at all of coming here on plane, which requires a visa, so they come by boat. The penalties for airlines which import people into Australia without visas are punitive so they don’t do it.
@16 See, Fascinated? Solution had already been thrashed out — as mentioned by Di(NR) and GregM — and stated in detail on the two asylum seeker threads from earlier this month.
We don’t need an “innovative” solution, we just need to go back to the pre-mandatory detention regime. Thousands of asylum seekers came during the pre-mandatory days, were held for health checks, released into the community, claims assessed, accepted or rejected, and there you go. The sky stayed up.
Solution done and dusted — it’s redundant to talk further. This Labor government, so scared of its own shadow, can’t do anything so sensible as go back to the humane solution that worked, and they aren’t going to. So the talk would not only be redundant, it would also be futile. Hence the “silence” on the issue.
FFS, Russell the whole point of this policy is not that it is basically satisfactory. It is not that there are “facilities in Malaysia, Indonesia, East Timor etc run by the UNHCR and funded by the region in some fair manner”.
The whole point of the policy is that there are not.
The whole point of the policy is to tell asylum seekers who rely on people smugglers that if you want to rely upon them then don’t waste your time. You’ll have wasted your money. You’ll end up in a camp in another country that doesn’t recognise the Refugee Convention and you’ll never get into Australia.
In short what it is telling them is “You can rot in Hell”.
What you consider might be more acceptable is the least of their concerns.
The Government have a political problem in Australia to fix (the security of our borders, a perennial since 1856 and the Crimean War, at least, and long before our signing up to the Refugee Convention, which must have seemed a good idea at the time) and they intend to fix it.
For the benefit of jumpnmcar at this point, can I just emphasise that everything said about the Malaysian solution above was already threshed out on the asylum seeker threads as already linked?
If you really want to keep on threshing it out, why not continue the arguments there? Although this is an open thread, it’s not good netiquette to use it for discussion on topics with existing threads. Take it there.
For the benefit of tigtog at this point, can i emphasise , i got off that subject @18.
Another bruising conversation on a big moral question of our time. Little wonder many have likened it to the live animal slaughter process, as an example of the natural or character flaws involving the human being. Greg thought to answer from a realist position so am glad he has not been jumped on, what he says is spot on, as far as it goes.
DINR suggests a practical solution, but the time has long passed since this issue could be dealt with in rational ways, its politicised beyond recall.
Mercurious, I understand your frustration with it, it is unnecessary as well as brutal.
But I suspect the general public has never lost its suspicions of bosses and politicians when it comes to labor influxes during times of uncertainty. Plenty of example as to its cynicism in the contrast between asylum seekers and visa workers imported to shit kick rather than pay a fair wage to locals, from the time of Howard onwards.
And why has nothing been done to rein in the Americans and their disgusting little wars, to obviate the need for millions of poor and traumatised victims to flee war zones and poverty traps?
I, for one, resent being required to help clean up the American’s messes up after they’ve created them. They do the harm, let them aid the world’s refugees and the other billions of victims of their neocolonialism- they don’t want West Asian refugees helped, because they’d have to behave in a responsible manner toward people in their own region, like the Haitians.
It appears that things are still rather pear-shaped in Fukushima.
Pure racism
@jumpnmcar, my last comment was not saying that you were involved in the rehashing, just that all we were seeing on the topic was rehashing, which is why there has been “silence” (your word) recently – there’s not much new to say.
Still, Brian has put up a new post on the latest developments in our national debate on asylum seekers. The new parliamentary enquiry into the policy of mandatory detention might give us all the chance to have a mature conversation about it.
Agree with Robert Merkel, Jacques and others re the Malaysia situation. Though once Gillard’s gone, there might, stress might, be a real choice between Labor and the Greens. Though I doubt it.
Now, re crocodile meat. I’be always wanted to try it but at $15 a small slab such indulgence is perhaps extravagant. The only time I did have some extra cash, the only butcher shop in Armidale that sold it had shut down. For that matter, I haven’t tried kangaroo, snake or wombat yet either.
On a vaguely related matter, for months now I’ve been trying to pick up some rabbit at the major supermarkets to make a rabbit stew. No luck. May I should try the smaller butchers, (whose presence here in Armidale is rapidly declining.) No luck with duck, either. Though thoughts of all the fat having to be drained off with the latter has put me off some.
Here we are on Sunday, and buried away in the news are the Climate change rallies happening all over the country.
http://www.watoday.com.au/wa-news/climate-change-rallies-held-around-the-nation-20110603-1fk84.html
Leaked US diplomatic cables reveal that very few people were killed in Tiananmen Square in 1989.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/wikileaks/8555142/Wikileaks-no-bloodshed-inside-Tiananmen-Square-cables-claim.html
Yet Western governments were content to propagate the now well-known simplistic myths in the weeks, months and years after these events.
A noble lie is still a lie.
An there is nothing noble in falsifying facts.
Whatever, Katz. You might want to read some authoritative accounts. It is well-known that the square was evacuated by the protesters through the night of June 4, so that by the time the soldiers moved in it was largely empty. But then the army went on its rampage through the streets of Beijing, killing hundreds, probably thousands.
Try lecturing 丁子霖 on your “simplistic myths”.
http://www.hrichina.org/content/4622
So why not tell that story instead of simplistic lies?
That story has been thoroughly told. I guess you weren’t listening.
http://www.tsquare.tv/
But not by any western government.
I guess you don’t understand the significance of this.
Don’t bother with crocodile, PB. It has the taste and texture of rubber.
DI (nr) @ 40.
Oh, well that’s no good. I got false teeth.
Plutonium found in soil 1.7 kms from Fukushima.
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20110607a4.html
On a happier note than Live Exports in the other thread … today is the 52nd anniversary of the day of my birth. That I will pass this evening too in the company of those I love, and hopeful for the future is surely to count myself as rich, in at least a cultural sense.
That I can also share this moment with another community, to whom I also feel quite close, here at LP, is not the least of my riches. Thank you all for enduring my periodically stentorian, curmudgeonly and pedantic commentary.
Happy birthday, Fran.
Happy Birthday Fran. I hope you have a lovely evening with your family and the school kids aren’t too much of a PITA today.
Have a lovely evening, Fran.
Happy birthday, Fran.
gemini born in the year of the pig boasts the double blessing of versatility and scrupulousnes… for more see Suzanne White’s New Astrology. Ha! happy birthday Fran.
Belated Birthday wishes. May the stoushes continue for decades to come.
Happy birthday, Fran.
Thank you so much DI(NR), Mindy, Fine, Terangeree, Zorronsky, Razor, and Paul Burns.
My schoolkids are fine most days Mindy, and thankfully today was no exception.
Year of the pig eh Zorronsky? I suppose that’s good — I must have counted wrongly last time I looked (I thought it was the year of the Dog — which for me would have been apt, given my interest in dog welfare and all) You are using 1958 right?
It’s rather a shame there isn’t a year of the gazelle or the flamingo, or even an owl. I suppose if I have that in my stars, I’d better go easy on the cake.
god i’m slow. i only just found out barry o’farrell has dumped his err, dumping of the 60c solar thingy.
while i think 60c IS overgenerous (yes i receive it), his way of breaching these contracts seemed iron fisted, dishonest and very conservative.
i also think his backbenchers that opposed this move should be recognised and bought forward to the FRONT bench. we need more honest, fair and common sensical pollies up front.
as a recipient, i’d be willing to drop the buy back to 40c, or even 30c IF barry continued the scheme so more people could sign up. they last 25 odd years, so it just means they’d pay for themselves over about 12 years rather than 6.
oh and happy b’day to all. mine’s on the 15th
I quite like the idea of equivalence, Jusme, which AIUI, the industry is pushing. The idea is that the tariff for energy purchased = what it would be sold for if the supplier was buying it just at that moment.
That would mean that if one thought power prices were going to rise in real terms, buying a solar panel would be a hedge. Those who would do best would be those who had low demand during peak and shoulder while demanding power during the off-peak.
If 1958 is your year Fran you are indeed a Gem/Dog. The ’52nd’ anniversary threw me, my apologies.
I was diagnosed with fatty liver disease a few months ago, and I’ve had to change my diet somewhat. I’m trying to eat a salad once a day, and I have aloe vera, from my garden, in a smoothie every second day. I think my problem was the amount of fatty meat I’ve been consuming. A few days ago I got The Paleo Diet, and I’ve started reading that. I’ve already upped the proportion of veges and oily fish in my diet, and I’ve cut out commercial fruit juices. I want to get hold of grass-fed beef, because it’s high in omega-3s, but I don’t know where to find it. (Grass-fed beef is also good for the environment too.) I’m not sure about lamb, whether it is grass-fed or not. Today I was in Woolies and I picked up about half a kilo of kangaroo meat – I presume it is high in omega-3s – and I’m preparing some tonight. Don’t think I could stomach crocodile, but I’d happily eat snake if I could get hold of it.
PS. HB, Fran.
Not a problem Zorronsky … thanks for the thought.
Ta Silky …
Happy Birthday Fran, you’re a legend.
Silkworm as long as you continue to have animal fats in your diet it will defeat the result you aspire to.
Check this out. Fatty Degeneration.
this paragraph is copied from a book by Udo Erasmus: “Fats that Heal, Fats that Kill”
Fatty degeneration involves a lack or imbalance of essential fatty acids, the presence of altered (toxic) fatty materials (such as trans-fatty acids, oxidized fatty acids, double bond-shifted fatty acids, cross-linked fatty acids, otherwise altered fatty acids, fat-derived polymers, and fat oxidation products), and/or an excess of non-essential fatty materials (fats, oils, cholesterol) in places or quantities in which they are not normally found.
Most of the common degenerative diseases, including cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes, obesity, multiple sclerosis, premenstrual syndrome, arthritis, FATTY DEPOSITS IN INNER ORGANS, and even some behavioral problems, involve fatty degeneration.
Also check out The Gawler Foundation and prof George Jelinek’s website http://www.overcomingmultiplesclerosis.org.
Paul, snake is worse than croc, similar meat, same chicken-fish taste with rubbery texture but more bones. Croc is ok if minced in a burger or dim sim, but I prefer skippy, marinated with red vine, ginger, garlic and soy sauce. I imagine Wombat to be similar to Rabbit or Bandicoot.
Happy Birthday Fran, many periodically stentorian, curmudgeonly and pedantic commentaries to come, hip hip …..
So its roo for me, Ootz.
Paul, Roo is, in my opinion, nutritionally, ecologically and humanely probably the safest red meat. However, it is a game (wild) meat it does require adjustment of the taste registers, hence my suggestion to marinate it, use a strong herb like rosemarie, coriander or ginger and a dash of vino. You can buy a pre-marinated roast, never tried it. Do not over cook steaks, if you like your meat well done probably better do a stew, that cut is cheaper too. Roo fillet used to be $6 a kilo now it is up with Lamb in price. However, as I don’t eat much meat, I am prepared to pay the price.
Fukushima did not have meltdowns.
Fukushima had melt THROUGHS.
http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/T110607005367.htm
@silkworm – I could help you out with the name of a grassfed beef producer if you live near Canberra. I don’t have an $$ interest in their business but I am a very happy customer.
OOtz,
I don’t mind game. I;ve tried venison and quail and enjoed them both, though the small bones in the quail drove me nuts. Thanks for cooking tips.
A victory for the treatment of the four legged animals!
Now we need the whistleblower of the century to do a bit of filming of what life is like for children in a detention centre.
Did anyone see Leigh Sales report on the town of Woodside and its Inverbrackie detenton centre on 7.30 on Monday?? It was very sobering on a number of counts. One was the government’s refusal to allow even very restricted media access to the centre. Sales noted that she had been allowed into Guantanamo Bay, but not Inverbrackie.
And I’ll add that Serco’s control of so many outsourced public sevices and facilities – detention centres and prisons and other things – is a bloody worry.
Further to the masterchef theme: I’ve found marinating roo in olive oil with ginger, chilli and garlic is pretty damn tasty as well. The oil helps ameliorate the smell while you’re cooking it.
“A victory for the treatment of the four legged animals!”
What makes you so jubilant Anita? Ethics in meat production does not start nor stop at the point of kill. Have a close look at the pork and chicken ‘industry’, I hope you’re not going to choke on your ‘cheap’ drumstick or chop. Respect your food by only eating the quantity and quality your body needs, from a source that is reliable and well compensated for their care of the animal or plant you are consuming. Like most good things it does not come cheap though.
For those of you wandering what Pauline Hanson has been up to since the NSW election.
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/pauline-hanson-wants-warrant-against-electoral-official/story-e6freuy9-1226071620960
Tis indeed a most mysterious piece of madness.
Ootz at 67: I find your ad hominem response to my comment offensive. My main thrust was whistleblowing and broad public opinion.
Having said that, you seem to assume I know bugger all about quite a few things. Why? Who are you when you’re at home, Chips Bloody Rafferty?
My family was ‘on the land’ and among other things had beef cattle. I’ve been to an abattoir, seen calves crying for their mothers when they were about to be slaughtered because the cattle price had crashed due to oversupply. I’ve seen intensive farming and free range farming, people who care for their animals and people who don’t. My father bought a heifer for breeding; when her dam walked 50 kilometres to be reunited with her offspring my father, was so impressed that he bought the mother for a permanent family reunion. He was proud of his steers.
The livestock industry is increasingly corporatised and less an option for small stockowners: this in many ways poses a new threat to animal welfare. All becomes profit and risk management, and humaneness and a sense of personal investment in the animals does not get a look in.
Anita, don’t take it personal, my main thrust was directed to the broad public opinion you expressed, which so self righteously celebrates the ‘whistleblowing’ by pushing all responsibility to the ‘Indos’, the graziers, the meat and livestock industry, the govmint the corporates et al and meanwhile completely ignore the collective role of consumers in the whole sorry affair.
Regarding your last paragraph, let me assure you we are singing from the same song sheet. Have you seriously pondered why that is so what you are describing, what fundamentally sustains that trend and what you personally can do about it?
I do not know what you are alluding to with that Chip Rafferty reference, even by me googling it up. So I can’t really answer your question. However, I am a simple person, I’d like to be the same whether at home or anywhere else. Further, I commit myself to do what I say, it avoids embarrassing situations. I am aware that at times these principles make me a stick in the mud, so what.
Some times other sticks get caught on that stick though, which then collect more sticks drifting by and so on it goes, islands build up, trees start grow, birds start to nest, dung builds which supports more live forms, clouds form above, fish start to breed, heh isn’t nature is magic, given half a chance?
Two comments of interest were submitted on other threads where they were off-topic. I’m reproducing them here:
harleymc Submitted on 2011/06/09 at 12:14 am
Not a whimsy but I couldn’t see where else we have a round-table discussion.
Theres’ a critique by Khalil Issa, of certain elements of the Lebanese left and in particular the Lebanese Communist Party’s position on the Syrian uprising.
http://www.jadaliyya.com/pages/index/1786/the-lebanese-left-fails-in-syria
Wantok Submitted on 2011/06/09 at 6:50 am
Grog problem in NT is disturbing and distressing particularly the fact that Centrelink ( that’s you & me) are funding the self destruction. I notice that in the NT supermarkets sell grog as is the case in NSW and possibly elsewhere. In Qld supermarkets cannot sell grog and it is only available through licensed premises and designated bottle shops which at least gives the state government very direct control and the ability to regulate when necessary. Perhaps this is one measure that the NT can adopt: any others that spring to mind ?
For people with Austar, At 6.30 pm,”An intimate account of the Bin Ladin operation”
From planning to execution.
*Check your local guides
Oops,add to 72
Channel 608
John Faulkner’s brutal assessment of the ALP:
http://www.news.com.au/national/john-faulkner-delivers-assessment-of-labor-party/story-e6frfkvr-1226072521722
Jacques: Faulkner is only half right. I’m still waiting for the left of the ALP to reread Marx in order to understand that the material conditions that gave rise to an acculturated working class have irrevocably changed in Australia. This is what underpins the ALP crisis. It doesn’t represent progressive class forces anymore because those forces have effectively been reconfigured by changes in material/cultural and therefore political conditions. Time to move on. Not that the working classes were ever the universal liberatory forces that Marx envisioned. In fact, absent adequate intellectual leadership what you get is what we have now – unbridled self interest from a rump.
In the light of the recent (last 48 hours) evidence now coming out of Japan about radiocative pollution post Fukushimma meltdown I’m expecting some of the pro-nuke obfuscators here on LP to come on out …
”An intimate account of the Bin Ladin operation”
I suspect this will be interesting and factual, though not simultaneously.
akn, just out of interest… you mentioned new evidence that the meltdown may have occurred within 5 hours of the tsunami (in another thread I think). Do you have any idea whether this happened before or after PM Kan cancelled the flooding operation? Apparently he cancelled it for 45 minutes or so at about 7pm, because he had been told that sea water would cause a meltdown. This created a lot of fuss here. But when the operation resumed, they had added boron to the water. So I wonder if Kan’s actions caused the meltdown (because he was panicking and reacting unnecessarily) or if there was some kind of horrible interaction between TEPCO and the nuclear safety agency, with the latter telling the former they were going to cause a meltdown, TEPCO saying “Bugger that, we want to save our asset” and the safety agency eventually having to beg Kan to intervene?
In the latter case, Kan’s actions were impeccable (though maybe too late) and TEPCO will look very bad (as will the nuclear regulatory regime here in general). In the former case, he’s in deep doo-doos.
Akn, a few weeks ago the US revealed their recommendation of an 80km exclusion zone for US citizens was based on modelling indicating their was a full meltdown and exposure of fuel to the atmosphere within hours of the failure of the cooling system. What I would like to know is how the so-called nuclear experts in Australia who publicly downplayed the situation can hold their heads up in public as they are either professionally incompetent or blatantly untruthful hacks or a little of both. I imagine there was a conscious decision by Government officials not to admit the seriousness of the situation so as to avoid panic in an already disastrous situation, and that is understandable, though the pace at which people have been evacuated from the worst sites of contamination leaves a lot to be desired, but the very least I would expect from outside industry commentators who must have known what was really happening as the Austrian researcher did and as both the Australian and American governments clearly did, is to issue extremely circumspect statements that they were unable to determine the exact nature of the situation, instead of which we had the frankly outrageous and even at the time, unbelievable cheerleading by Brooks and Co. Not only has Fukushima shown how psychologically incapable humans are of managing the current technology, and the enormous financial and human cost of that inability, it has shown that industry advocates cannot be trusted. At all.
BTW, we cross posted sg, in case it looks like I’m being provocative. Must hit refresh more often.
the refresh thingy is pissing me off, su.
I read in the Japan Times about a week ago that the nuclear regulatory framework in Japan is voluntary. I don’t know if that’s true but if so that’s crazy bad. I’ve also seen maps of the estimated contamination zones and they’re incompatible with an 80km radius exclusion zone, which would be an over-reaction. The main area of contamination is a 40km long, quite narrow elipse with the plant at one end (based on prevailing winds). At the other end is Iitate. But areas within 20km of the plant in other parts of the coast have barely-elevated radiation levels.
I doubt that the people modeling the exclusion zone knew more than the locals did – remember this is a plant where they couldn’t find their own dead for 2 weeks, it’s doubtful that the information they had within a few days of the event was very useful. What’s more likely is that the American modeling assumed the worst and was (fortunately, as it were) correct.
I’m very interested in whether TEPCO cocked up in the first 7 hours and had a huge argument with the nuclear safety agency, that got escalated to the PM himself.
sg @78: can’t find the reference at the moment but there was a suggestion of a rupture of the floor of the reactor vessel … otherwise I don’t know at this time…
su @79: impeccably well put. In my view we could free up quite a lot of money for renewable energy R+D by shutting down Brooks’ research programs and all others associated with nuclear energy. Isotopes we already either buy from overseas or get from Lucas Heights. There is no future now in nukes; the academic and professional integrity of all those officials in Australia who acted as propagandists for the industry, most notably Barry Brooks, by with holding information and otherwise misleading the Australian public about the reality of the Fukushima incident is in such poor standing that it is questionable whether they ought to be in public employ.