Extremist Accuses Australian 'Sister' City Plan Of "Supporting Hamas"

Mayor Hoped Marrickville's Twinning With Bethlehem Would Not Be Controversial

Marrickville Council thought creating a sister city relationship with Bethlehem would lead to a better understanding of the problems Christians face in the Middle East, in the midst of an Israeli occupation and surrounded by violent anti-occupation groups like Hamas and Fatah.

But the decision, unanimously popular with councillers and locals, has been stained by a campaign of "outrage" fermented by the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies and accusations by the board's chief executive that Marrickville will be supporting terrorism by opening an international relationship with the Christian-dominated council of Bethlehem.

From news.com.au :

Marrickville Council, in Sydney's inner west, has had an in-principle agreement since 2001 with the Palestinian city believed by some Christian scholars to have been the birthplace of Jesus Christ.

Councillor Sam Iskandar said the city had been chosen as a symbol of love, peace and harmony, but the Jewish community says it is anything but.

NSW Jewish Board of Deputies chief executive Vic Alhadeff said Bethlehem Council was controlled by members of the terrorist organisations Hamas and Islamic Jihad, which support the killing of Jews.

In late August, Bethlehem Council will send a delegation to Sydney to meet with Marrickville Council and officially sign the sister city agreement.

This news sent Vic Alhadeff into meltdown. Forget the Christians, he announced in a wave of media releases and interviews, we could see Hamas militants being given a stage in Sydney spread anti-Jewish propaganda.

"This means an international guest could address a public meeting hosted by this council and call for the destruction of Israel and death to the Jews."

Mr Alhadeff was given another opportunity to ramp up the extreme rhetoric in the Sydney Morning Herald :

"Their raison d'etre, as clearly expressed in Hamas's charter, is the destruction of Israel and, worse than that, to kill every Jew."

Haskell Musry attended the council meeting last week where the sister city plan was unanimously passed. As a Jew, Musry didn't think Alhadeff's claims to be protesting on behalf of Sydney's Jewish community were accurate.

Mr Musry told the Herald : "I think most of the Jewish community would be unconcerned..."

Perhaps Mr Alhadeff is more concerned by the opportunity provided through the sister city deal for Bethlehem councillors, and the Catholic mayor, to address the media when they visit Sydney in late August. The Bethlehem delegation will no doubt be asked to explain what it is like to live as a Christian under Israeli occupation and to have had their city divided by the deeply unpopular separation wall Israel is using to carve up historical Palestine.

Mr Alhadeff seems most upset that his 'alternative plan' wasn't followed by Marrickville Council, or that they didn't bow to his claims that the Jewish community was "outraged" by the sister city plan.

He said the council should choose a politically neutral middle-eastern city to foster relations with.

"If councils like Marrickville wanted to get involved and promote peace and reconciliation why not choose an Arab-Israeli town, so it's not a partisan position?" Mr Alhadeff said.

According to this story, the choosing of Bethlehem to be Marrickville's sister city was made by locals, and passed by the council by a vote of 11 to 1. Marrickville Councillor Sam Iskander said Bethlehem was chosen because :

"...it was the city which symbolised love and peace and harmony," he said.

"We look at this relationship between Marrickville and Bethlehem to be a very good relationship between the two communities, and we want to send a message that people can work with people and they can have good relations ... and that is the spirit of the sister city movement."

From the Sydney Morning Herald :

A delegation from Bethlehem led by (Mayor and practising Catholic) Dr Batarseh will visit Australia for a fortnight in August. Marrickville plans to present the delegates with gifts, host two dinners and hold a reception for the signing of a sister cities agreement.

Bethlehem already has sister city arrangements with 39 cities.

Marrickville's deputy mayor, Peter Olive, said he did not think Hamas controlled Bethlehem. "I have heard concerns there's a dwindling number of Christians but I think that's attributable to things like the whacking great wall the Israelis have built around the city," Cr Olive said. "So one could ultimately say the council is controlled by Israel."

Mr Olive told AAP :

"It is my clear understanding that there isn't a Hamas domination on the Bethlehem council, that the mayor is in fact not a member of Hamas - he's a Christian, for what that is worth," Mr Olive told AAP.

"I also understand that eight out of the 15 councillors are fellow Christians.

Mr Olive also accused the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies of being "out of step" with the broader community, saying the sister-city move would promote cross cultural understanding, and that money would not change hands.

"I would have liked it not to have been such a controversial issue but you get some people who want to play global politics."

Or people who want to keep the Christian perspective of life under Israeli occupation as far away from getting a direct audience with the Sydney media, and community, as possible.

Sydney "Spared"

Come dawn and the storm was, well, it was over. I've lost count of how many morning news bulletins and on-the-spot reporters told us we had been "spared" the worst of the "storm's fury".

The rain was hard, the winds were strong, a few trees came down, there were car accidents, some roofs lifted off, but we weren't 'Katrina'd'. Did God really intervene and "spare" us, or was it more of a case of the media over-hyping some reasonably serious weather warnings?

Channel 7 seemed to have a reporter stationed in just about every suburb, and when the live crosses began at 5am, some reporters had trouble hiding their disappoint that they weren't standing waist deep in floodwaters dotted with old people on makeshift rafts cuddling their pets. The Sunrise breakfast show team was left shocked. Shocked by the non-event.

So where were the celebrations? The weather forecasters and the media had been mostly wrong. Storm damage was minimal. Nobody died, thousands didn't lose their homes or possessions. Wasn't this good news?

A large storm has passed off the coast south of Sydney, leaving the city largely unscathed after earlier grim warnings from forecasters that "cyclonic winds" would batter homes overnight.

Winds of up to 125km/h had been predicted by the Bureau of Meteorology but the worst of the weather stayed far enough off the coast to leave most affected areas able to cope. Winds of up to 90km/h were reported.

Couple of road closures, a few leaky roofs, but Sydney survived. Hundreds of thousands of people woke to discover that buses and trains were mostly running on time and that their planned day off at home, tucked up under blankets in front of a few DVDs, had been cancelled due to good weather :

Sydney has escaped a battering from predicted hurricane force winds as a huge storm in the Tasman Sea eased and started edging away from the NSW coast, the Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) says.

Senior forecaster Peter Zmijewski says winds up to 55kmh from southern Sydney to the south coast are expected to lessen.

The storm's threat would likely have passed by midday.

Maybe next time...

Sydney Battens Down For Massive Storm

Category Two "Cyclonic" Winds Hit Sydney, East Coast

UPDATE : The State Emergency Service has taken more than 650 calls for help. Trees are down across roads in at least nine suburbs from the south to north coast of New South Wales. Blizzard conditions were expected in the Blue Mountains, above 1200 metres. Winds across the Sydney basin hit gale force after midnight. Storm surges of three to five metres are expected to cause significant beach erosion along parts of the northern coast of New South Wales. The rain falls around Sydney are steady, but still classed as "moderate" by meteorologists. Is it over? Or is the worst still to come?

UPDATE II : Wow, that was wild. The rain just stopped. The wind dropped. Went out on the balcony to take a look at Sydney Harbour. Boats in the small bay near here were bobbing around, tree branches and leaves sprinkled across the yard. It was so quiet. And then this sound came. A blood-chilling howl. A wall of wind hit, rain cut horizontally, falling so heavy for a solid minute that visibility decreased to barely a metre. Amazing stuff. I don't think this is over yet....


For the third time in 11 days, the east coast of New South Wales is preparing for huge storms.

There's been some very nervous meteorologists and emergency service spokesmen on the news in the last two hours, warning of a massive storm front expected to smash into Sydney, Wollongong and Newcastle over the next 12 to 24 hours.

Winds are expected to hit 12o-140kmh an hour. Waves could reach ten metres in height. We're being told to stay indoors, and away from windows. They're calling the expected winds "cyclonic".

The huge coal freighter that ran aground last week, on a Newcastle beach, is feared to be on the verge of breaking up.

Blizzard conditions for the highlands, damaging winds, dangerous surf, flash flooding. Here's some of the early warnings :

Emergency crews stand ready tonight as residents of NSW coastal areas brace for what threatened to be the most dangerous of three major storms to hit the state this month.

Cyclonic winds up to 125km/h and huge waves are forecast to batter the coastline from tonight and into tomorrow, starting at Moruya in the state's south and moving north.

Forecasters warned of cyclone-strength winds whipped up by an intense low pressure system.

It's just after 7.30pm in Sydney right now. The rain's coming down, the winds are picking up. Here's a rain and weather map :



Updates to follow through the night.

Culture Wars? Who Cares?

We Want The Australian Renaissance

Endless editorials, opinion pieces and book reviews have filled Australian newspapers in recent months spilling boring, irrelevant twaddle about the Australian 'Culture Wars', and whether or not 'The Left' have outlived their usefulness.

Firing back from 'The Left', whatever that is supposed to be in this day and age of wide ranging, non-traditionally aligned political and social views, comes equally boring and pointless counter-attack and self-defensiveness.

None of it, from 'The Left' or 'The Right' means much to the vast majority of Australians. Few of the people involved in rehashing decades old arguments have any real relevance to the generations moving out of high school into the workforce and those entering their second decade of mortgage payments.

It's all from another age, and it's all so old and tired. You read some of these editorials and it sounds like nothing more than a bunch of 5o-and-60-somethings trying to drag themselves, and their old enemies, back into the spotlight of today's headlines and coffee table chat zones. They're all still stuck there, back in their student days of the 1960s and early 1970s, and they dwell in the illusion zone that the unresolved conflicts from their leisurely free-education days actually mean anything anymore. Something about Marxists, something else about arts grants, something else about commies, something about 'balance' at the ABC.

Like so many of the Howard-era politicos and media, they're used to people sitting up and listening when they get down and get into it. But they caught the national attention, and agenda, in the days when Australia was relatively isolated, and incubated, from the outside world, and when the daily newspaper and the ABC News and current affairs ruled the national attention span.

It's an age already long gone. Few care about their nostalgia trips.

Prime minister John Howard tried to thrust the 'Culture Wars' into the national arena, and the majority attention zone, when he gave a fiery speech at the 50th anniversary of Quadrant magazine. The Culture Wars are worth fighting, Howard said, because Australia needed to be pulled from its Leftie-socialist past, as though he hadn't noticed it happened years ago.

When it suits the Howard government, they will trawl back through three decades old political positions of all-but-forgotten one-time Labor Party heroes, and bore international visitors to the Australian Parliament senseless all the way through Question Time, when they're not demanding praise and attention for doing the jobs they should feel honoured to be doing.

But ask Howard's boys about the lies and distortions that led to the Iraq War, the AWB scandal, or why they didn't tell the voters about Workchoices before the 2004 elections and they will tell you we mustn't dwell in the past, "let's look to the future".

But what is the Howard future? Where is it? All they talk about is the past. Thirty years ago, 12 years ago, nine months ago.

90% of Australians couldn't give a tinkers about the 'Culture Wars'. Most don't even know what it is, or what it is supposed to be a war over. They are concerned about climate change and how much their children are going to be paid, and what sort of conditions they might have to work under, because these are issues about what awaits us in the future.

Australians want to look to the future, and in many ways we can't wait to get there. The fact that Australia's boom economy is based around a two thousand year old power source and we have internet speeds that are laughed at by nine year old kids in South Korea are two examples of how far behind we are in a world rapidly speeding up, and moving ahead. We know we are being left behind, and it's making us edgy.

But we don't get much in the way of vision statements or inspirational future dreaming from the federal government. All we hear about is how they are desperately trying to patch up the holes in all the promises they made, but never delivered on, while their bulldogs shout at us from Parliament via the evening news about how we've "never had it so good."

While many Australian journalists and opinion writers pretend to be mystified as to why the Labor Party remains so high in the polls, long after the Rudd honeymoon was supposed to end and Howard Corp. was to get their supposedly long overdue surge, Australians are anything but confused.

They want to know what the future holds. They want to know what's coming, and not just how good their broadband may or may not be in three years time. They want to feel like somebody is making the big plans, dreaming the big dreams and thinking of the long-term future, not just how to win the next election.

Don't tell me what you've done, Mr Howard. Tell me what kind of Australia we will be living in in ten years time, in twenty years time, in fifty years time.

The Labor Party has won a lot of support in the past eight months because its front benchers, from leader Kevin Rudd, to deputy Julia Gillard to environmental Buddha Peter Garrett, are not shouting about the past, or wailing about how unfair those across the Parliament are being, but because they keep coming out with speeches, interviews and sound bites that talk about where Australia is going, how we can get there and who we can be, if we aren't afraid to undergo some reinvention and vision-making, and are willing to shake off the old prejudices and 1950s-era 'values' thinking.

The latest Labor vision statement comes from Julia Gillard, and it's not a bad one. Why can't Australia have a cultural Renaissance, she asks. Aren't we all due for a creative overhaul? A fresh start on the world stage that continually shakes its collective head in disbelief at the extraordinary quality of the actors, writers, directors, musicians, painters, sculptors and dramatists this country produces, but who are always forced to go overseas to make their dreams come true.

Here's some excerpts from a speech Julia Gillard gave last night :

Instead of leading a culture war, our Government should be leading a great Australian cultural renaissance - one that celebrates excellence and encourages all our people to understand the importance of our culture to our future.

We need to get a real conversation going between our cultural producers and the public. This isn't just about elites; it involves all of us. It's time to end the culture wars.

...this isn't just about governments. It's a challenge to all sorts of cultural decision makers - newspaper editors, radio station managers, heads of our arts and research funding bodies, vice-chancellors and the heads of publishing houses - to invest in cultural production.

There are encouraging signs that outside the Howard Government many Australians are putting their money where their mouths are and backing great cultural ventures.

This great Australian cultural renaissance could be one of the most important national investments we could make, because Australian culture is ideally suited to the challenges of today. As we confront global economic competition and inequalities, our idealism and resourcefulness are what the world needs.

We should never forget Australia's indigenous culture is one of the longest-surviving cultures in the world and we should never forget to be proud of that fact. We can also learn from it. Climate change is giving us an urgent interest in doing so.

We need to develop a new respect for the reality of our harsh physical environment and adapt to its changes. Aborigines were never passive occupiers of the land. As we have, they moulded the land as it moulded them.

Our culture, and the advantages it gives us, is endangered. I find it bizarre that when our culture has so much to offer our country, some want to undermine it through a vindictive, short-sighted and imported culture war.

Their attempts to denigrate such people as our philosophers, artists, writers and even climate scientists as out-of-touch, inner-city elites, and to claim our egalitarian values are unsuited to new economic necessities, risks subsuming us into the blancmange of an emerging global monoculture.

Let me end this call for an Australian cultural renaissance by referring to one of the great contemporary Australian cultural figures: the Academy Award-winning producer, George Miller, who has had a huge effect on world culture, from TV series such as Bodyline to movies such as Mad Max and Babe. Most recently he's given us Happy Feet.

You might think I'm pulling a long bow in drawing conclusions from an animated film about a dancing penguin named Mumble. But Mumble is a man - or should I say, a penguin - for our times. He won't conform. Instead of singing like everyone else, he dances. And along the way he uncovers some important truths about the need to change our ways.

Australians are a bit like Mumble. In terms of world culture, we're unique: young, unusual, at times exotic and usually undermining authority. We can choose our path. We shouldn't feel we have to sing along in harmony with the rest of the world to have a positive effect on it. But we can dance like no one else. The last thing we need is culture warriors trying to force us to conform.

And that's it right there. C0nformity. The Howard-era media and politicians don't want to know what Australia will become, or is already becoming. They want it to stay the way it was, when they were young. They are still fighting to reshape the nation into what they wanted it to be when they were 23 years old. The 'Culture Wars' are locked in an almost forgotten era of Australian history, because that's the only era these 'warriors' really understand.

Whoever wants to declare victory in the 'Culture Wars' may as well go ahead and do it now. Nobody, but the tiniest percentile, will care, and it will be a hollow victory. The rest of Australia has already moved on.

We want to know what's coming. Who will be be in 20 years? Where will be? Who's going to give us the future we're dreaming of now?

A federal election should always be about the future, but right now we're not getting much from Howard & Friends on that front.

Gillard all but gave the federal government a plan to win back some of their lost disciples. But are they visionary enough to realise it?

Howard Out Of The Loop On US Troop Surge Facts

Says US Presence In Middle East Constrains Iran And Israel

Australia Refuses UN Demands To Send Troops To Fight In Darfur Conflict

Don't let anybody tell you that prime minister John Howard isn't on top of what's going on in Iraq, particularly when it comes to the final round of deployments in the US troop "surge" that is supposed to rein in all the death and destruction :

Mr Howard said "evidence about the success so far of the surge is mixed", but he had not given up hope.

"The surge has not reached its peak and it won't reach its peak for some weeks yet," he said.

According to the US Defence Department, who'd you expect to know the facts :

The full contingent of new U.S. forces being sent to Iraq -- what military leaders call a "surge" of troops to improve security and stability in the capital -- was completed by Friday, with 28,500 additional troops now posted in the country, a U.S. military spokesman said.

Howard often cites his friendship with President Bush, and his contact with the inner circle of the White House, as being evident of how the Bush administration cherishes Australia's troop commitment to the Iraq War. Clearly, they're not getting on the phone to him as often as they used to.

Howard is also disappointed with the democratically elected leader of Iraq. Not just disappointed, but "quite unhappy" :

The Prime Minister, John Howard, believes the Iraqi Government is not pulling its weight to help end violence in the country...

In an interview with the Herald yesterday, Mr Howard said the Iraqi Government, led by the Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki, was not doing enough to rein in the sectarian violence.

"I'm still quite unhappy with the reconciliation process inside Iraq," he said.

"The Maliki Government should be doing more on that. They should be doing a lot more. It's absolutely critical; I made that clear when I saw him three months ago, and [the US President George] Bush makes that clear to him every week."

Mr Howard said the US presence in Iraq was all that was preventing it from descending into chaos and saving the rest of the Middle East from becoming "even more of a tinder box".

Mr Howard said if the US left the Middle East, constraints on both Iran and Israel could be lifted. "If the atmospherics alter, if the threat increases, the Israelis could go for a more hard-line government," he said.

Also yesterday, Mr Howard said Australia had rejected a United Nations request to send troops to Sudan because it was heavily committed elsewhere.

Of course, if Australian troops were deployed to the Darfur conflict they would very likely find themselves in military situations far more out of control, and deadly, than they now face in the relatively calm south of Iraq where the majority of Australian troops have been stationed since the war began.

Howard knows that he would have an even harder time winning the federal election at the end of the year if coffins wrapped in Australian flags are being unloaded on air force base tarmacs too close to polling day.

The Australian government is spending hundreds of millions of dollars on advertising and recruitment campaigns to boost the ranks of Australia's armed forces, but widespread labour shortages and the extreme unpopularity of the Iraq War has seen little success on the recruitment front.

The Great Australian Art Heist

A painting worth an estimated $1.3 million has "disappeared" from a wall of the Art Gallery of New South Wales, in what is expected to be the biggest Australian art heist since the early 1990s.

The missing painting is the 17th century self-portrait A Cavalier, by Dutch master Frans van Mieris I, and some media reports claim at least five other paintings are missing from the gallery.

The painting was small, 20 by 16 centimetres, but it's not yet known whether the famous art work was stolen during opening hours, slipped inside a jacket or coat perhaps, or whether the heist took place after the gallery had closed to the public :

Police sources said they suspected it was an inside job. Police have spent three days interviewing gallery staff and examining security footage.

While Aboriginal art is a popular target for thieves, the theft of European works from public art institutions in Australia is rare.

UPDATE : The painting is now believed to have been stolen when the gallery was open to the public, and the thief was able to :

flee unnoticed with it after "expertly removing it from its mounting", police said today.

Police say the thief struck between 10am and 12.30pm, when the gallery would have been open to visitors.

Gallery spokeswoman Susanne Briggs said the entire work – including the timber frame – had been carefully unscrewed from the wall.

National Security Demands Widespread Dobbing

But Religious Leaders Unite In Their Vow To Keep Quiet About Confessions

Australian Christian, Jewish and Muslim leaders have all vowed they will not betray their followers by passing information they may learn through confessions to national security authorities, unless there were direct threats that impacted on the safety and wellbeing of other people.

Radical religious views and beliefs, however, are unlikely to be viewed by the leaders of Australian faiths as worthy of supply "tip-offs" to anti-terror investigators.

How could they betray "the trust of their followers", they argue, when the protection of confidential information was their "bread and butter" :

The Jesuit Social Services associate director, Peter Norden, told The Australian he would be prepared to give police information only if the tip-off was crucial for the safety of others.

But he said he would make sure the information given did not identify the person who provided it.

"You would be entitled to take some steps to protect human life but you need to do that in such a way that it was of a general nature and wouldn't identify the person concerned."

"If you were (to betray confessors), you would have to do away with the profession for minister of religion."

The Rabbinical Council of Victoria president Meir Shlomo Kluwgant said rabbis were bound to the same confidentiality procedures as counsellors, but were able to tip-off the authorities if the information they received suggested someone's life was in danger.

"Certainly the very first thing that a rabbi would do would be to dissuade their congregant from committing a crime," he said.

Muslim clerics were revealed, last week, to have not alerted federal police when they had been asked about the rights and wrongs of joining the international jihad.

Tim Dunlop, at Blogocracy :

Maybe all this means is that they are willing to be prosecuted rather than disclose all the information they have, though Norden’s further comments—that “If you were (to betray confessors), you would have to do away with the profession for minister of religion”—seems wide of the mark. Why would that be the case? And I’m really not sure why informing authorities of a crime should even count as “betraying confessors”.

...it’s interesting that all the major religions line-up on the issue...

Maybe the leaders of Australia's major religions have got a gut feeling that the violations of human rights and civil liberties that are becoming the "bread and butter" of the 'War on Terror' are not always going to be confined to the followers of the Islamic religion.

The Sad Love Story Hidden Inside A Painting


Arthur Streeton's 1890 masterpiece 'Spring', which revealed a secret love story under x-ray

For more than 120 years, a secret love story lay hidden behind layers of paint inside landscape of one of Australia's most famous paintings, by renowned artist Arthur Streeton :

Spring, which was completed in 1890, depicts an idyllic rural Australian scene, with a group of naked boys bathing in a hillside stream.

But when Michael Varcoe-Cocks, a conservator with the National Gallery of Victoria, examined it under a microscope, he discovered the words "Florry Walker's my sweetheart", inscribed several times. The gallery then X-rayed the work and found a nude female figure, which had been painted over.

The declarations of love, invisible to the naked eye, were inscribed using a fine point when the paint was still wet. The discovery intrigued gallery staff, who set off to establish the identity of the object of Streeton's romantic attention.

From the Melbourne Age :

The conservator later found that Streeton had inscribed "Florry Walker is my sweetheart" into the wet paint using a pin or needle, and her name several more times. The words are invisible to the naked eye.

Mr Varcoe-Cocks' investigations led to the finding that another artist, Lucy Walker, had a sister called Florence, who would have been 17 at the time. Streeton was 22.

Using public records, he was able to track down Florence's descendants. They told him that Streeton had given her a painting as a gift, Flight of Summer, dedicated to F. Walker, and now estimated to be worth several hundred thousand dollars. It is painted on a wooden veneer panel, with a smoking cigarette beside a dead match at the foot of the painting. A thorny rose branch, adorned with rosehips, is interwoven with smoke from the cigarette that forms into a female figure at the top.

Florry's granddaughter, who wishes to remain anonymous, said the family had always known there was some sort of romance. "After all, Streeton gave the painting to gran."

Recent Stories From Darryl Mason's Blog Network

Sopranos : The Movie? Was The Finale Just An Extended Tony Dream?
Don't Put Your Carbon Footprints On The Furniture
When Bird Flu Infections Becomes Invisible
Will These Two Madmen Get Their Apocalyptic War?
Australian Religious Leaders Refuse To Rat On Followers
The Etiquette Of Jihad - Who You Can Bomb And Why

Allow Poker Machines In Retirement Homes?

Nah, Just Move The Elderly Into The Clubs

Australians are gambling less than they were a few years ago. More importantly, elderly Australians are spending less money on poker machines.

The club industry and the government are losing revenue, through decreased patronage and gambling taxes. So now the government and the club industry have conspired to lock the dwindling customer base for society-destroying poker machines into a daily cycle of gambling and loss.

How?

By allowing the construction of elderly care facilities adjacent to massive clubs, and, soon, on land owned by the clubs in which the aged will be encouraged to gamble away their pensions and supernnuation earnings until they day they slide lifelessly off a poker machine stool.

The target audience is not the World War 2 generation already filling aged care facilities. The target audience for this disgustingly cynical exploitation is the millions of baby boomers who will be leaving the work force in the next decade.

I mean, seriously, WTF is going on?

How is the following story in any way an example of genuine care and concern being shown by government for some of the most vulnerable members of our society :

Clubs will develop housing for seniors on their sites under a State Government plan, but gambling experts fear it will create a captive market for poker machines.

Of course it will. That is the entire point.

The Minister for Planning, Frank Sartor, has tabled draft legislation that encourages clubs to expand into aged care by streamlining planning laws. Mr Sartor said it was driven by demand for seniors' accommodation but agreed clubs stood to benefit.

Note that it is not the clubs alone that are directly appealling to the state government to make this fetid fantasy a reality. The government "encourages" the clubs to target those seeking aged care facilities by "streamlining planning laws".

"Streamlining" of course means all but tossing the rules and regulations straight out the window and saying "Hell, do what you want. You think we give a shit about these non-workers anymore?"

...many clubs have been hindered by zoning that prohibits retirement villages. Under Mr Sartor's plan, the default zoning would permit aged care facilities...

Clubs NSW said it would be a boon to the industry...

Clubs NSW can't believe it.

They can't believe the government is actually allowing them to do this. Gambling related revenue and taxes for the clubs and the government are going to shoot through the roof in the coming decade, and they all know it. Hell, they openly admit it.

Professor Alex Blaszczynski, co-director of Sydney University's gambling research unit, said: "The question is, what are the safeguards for some of the elderly who may be in the early stages of dementia or lonely or depressed, who are losing control and finding the poker machines more to their satisfaction than eating or entertainment?"

Perhaps the poker machines could spit out meal tickets occasionally? Just one meal ticket a day should be enough. A ticket for boiled potatoes and carrots, and a choice of desicated fish or rissoles, and some strong tea or coffee, so they can gamble away their retirement years without losing focus, or too much weight.

Dee Why RSL, and a number of other NSW clubs, already run "senior units".

The government ignored the plummeting availability of housing for elderly people until it reached a crisis point, and now claims it has no choice but to allow the widespread privatisation of caring for those who cannot care for themselves, or afford to live in their own homes.

The chief executive officer of Dee Why RSL, Grant Easterby, said the the club had 145 people on a waiting list for 93 seniors' units, which would be right next door to the club. He hoped it would increase patronage.

"We believe it will be profitable," he said...

Rob Lynch, an expert in leisure sport and tourism at the University of Technology, Sydney, said that while clubs provide valuable community services, "they also raise a lot of revenue for themselves and for the government through gambling".

In the late 1980s, before poker machines moved out of the clubs and into the pubs, there used to be plenty of jokes about how poker machines would eventually allow the elderly to simply insert their pension cheques straight into the machine, without having to go to the trouble of withdrawing money from banks and changing it into coins.

Letting private corporations take control of the housing and care of elderly people and then allowing them to directly target the vulnerable for gambling exploitation, by presumably providing the only meal service in these retirement and aged care facilities, is that very joke becoming a dire reality.

Perhaps they will also be allowed to 'volunteer' kidneys in exchange for gambling credits?

The State government clearly doesn't care. They just want to get millions of costly old people out of their care and responsibility, and if gambling-orientated corporations want to take on the duties once provided by the state, in exchange for all-but-direct access to their bank accounts, then so be it.

The extra tax income for the government from the rise in poker machine gambling revenue will be all cream.

Older Men May Need To Be Registered, "Like Cars", And Forced To Undergo A Yearly "Service"

Australian men, over 50 years old, regularly neglect their health, we are constantly told, and not enough of them undergo yearly medical check-ups.

Professor John McDonald thinks he's got a solution to that problem. Fifty-plus year old males could be registered and forced to undergo a medical every year.

But only if "attempts to change the culture" don't work first.

Medical professionals should develop a system in which once men reached 50, they should be serviced, like cars, Professor McDonald said.

“I wouldn’t want to put men in jail and I wouldn’t rush into compulsory check-ups.

Not yet, anyway.

“Before we get to the compulsory stage, we should try to make cultural changes.”

One very important cultural change could be for governments and medical authorities, and pharmaceutical companies, to stop scaring the hell out of people with endless shock-and-fear based advertising blitzes, parading endless scenarios of how likely it is that anyone over the age of 20 is going to develop chronic or terminal illnesses.

Eating healthy, getting regular exercise, enjoying close circles of friends and family, working the brain and the imagination and encouraging an optimistic, positive mind always makes for a vastly healthier society, anywhere in the world.

The first "cultural change" that needs to be made is to stop trying to convince every person over 50 that it is only a matter of time before they develop cancer.

Incredible Survival Stories, And Tragic Tales, Emerge From East Coast Flood Zones


A 40,000 tonne bulk freighter run aground at Nobby's Beach. More than 730 tonnes of fuel oil and diesel could leak from the freighter, causing an environmental catastrophe.

The Sydney, Newcastle and Hunter Valley regions of Australia's east coast copped an absolute pasting in the past 48 hours, with near cyclonic winds cutting off power to hundreds of thousands of people, huge rainfalls causing flash floods and swollen rivers and terrible stories of people being swept away to their deaths by washed out roads and walls of water tearing through their cars.

The rains are easing, but the rivers in the Newcastle and Hunter regions are still reportedly rising. More than 3000 homes are believed to have been flooded during the night. At least 1000 people have been evacuated. More than 200,000 people are expected to be without power for four or five days. The town centre of Wallsend, near Newcastle, has been "gutted" according to some reports.

Most media reports claim the rains, flooding and storm damage in Newcastle and the Hunter is the worst in more than 35 years.

Here's a few of the survivor stories, and tales of tragedy, that are in the media this morning :

Hundreds of people in Newcastle were forced to abandon their cars when flash floods swept through the streets. The force of the water was so strong, car doors were torn off. Two backpackers inflated a dinghy and rescued people from stranded taxis.

Only two weeks after the local business people of Wallsend met to discuss the future of their town, flooding has "ripped the heart" out of the working class community. A 1.5 metre high wall of water tore through the town centre, destroying nearly every business in the main street.

A young couple and three children were killed when a section of highway collapsed beneath their vehicle, plunging them more than 10 metres into a swollen river. The 30 year old father was reportedly swept away to his death during rescue attempts.

A 225 metre long coal ship is probably going to wind up as an unwelcome tourist attraction on a beautiful stretch of beach outside of Newcastle, as the 6 metre high swells push the freighter deeper into the sand, making it all but impossible to 'refloat' the vessel and use tugs to drag it back out to sea.

People have been discovering, to their horror, that their four wheel drives can't do what the ads say they can when it comes to flooded roads and rising rivers. A recently retired couple are believed to have died when their LandCruiser was hit by rising waters and swept off a bridge.

A local junior surf champion and his mate put on their wetsuits and swam through deep water in the centre of Newcastle, checking abandoned cars and rescuing people stranded by the rapidly rising floodwaters. One woman was surprised to see two "frogmen" pop up out of the water near her, asking if she was okay.

And this amazing tale :

Daniel Hocking, of Maryville, rescued a woman and her baby from a fast-sinking car in Hamilton on Friday evening. Mr Hocking, 19, dragged the frantic mother through a window then rescued her eight-month-old daughter from the back seat after they drove into a flooded area off Beaumont Street. "The mum was in quite a state at the time but she was really grateful afterwards," Mr Hocking said yesterday. "I was just glad I could help out where I could."

Plan To Ban Music After 10pm

No More Parties After Midnight

How can the police be anything but totally annoyed by plans to introduce widespread noise restriction laws that could see musicians and music lovers getting busted for playing tunes above a whisper, two hours before midnight?

If this all becomes law, any person who doesn't like the family next door, can get on the phone to the cops because some teenager is playing music in their bedroom loud enough to seep outside.

Truly ridiculous, and over the top. As if the paltry number of police in New South Wales don't already have enough to do, now they are expected to be out arresting otherwise innocent people for such minor infractions?

Of course, it should prove a great way to broaden the DNA and fingerprint database, with all the extra, non-criminals being arrested :

Musicians who play their instruments after 10pm on a weeknight could face an on-the-spot fine of up to $200 under the legislation.

Under the proposal, residents whose sound systems are too loud after 10pm during the week can expect a knock on their door by police.

Parties that continue after midnight at weekends will also be shut down.

The law states a stereo or musical instrument is deemed "offensive" if it can be heard next door in a habitable room.

"We want to give the community the chance to have their say on how the Government can help make their neighbourhoods and communities more peaceful," she said.

"The current review will ensure our laws continue to reflect community standards on what degree of noise from things like amplified music, air conditioners, power garden tools ... are acceptable in residential areas."

It is estimated 1.5 million Sydneysiders are exposed to outdoor noise levels that affect their quality of life.

In a 2004 department survey, one in seven people said they had made a noise complaint in their lifetime.

And what about the people who use loud music to block out the sounds of ear-splitting jet airliners because they happen to live under the flight path?

It's pretty surprising to learn just how many people complain about noisy neighbours.

We really have become a bunch of truly intolerant dobbers.

Tony Abbott Attacks Australians For Demanding The Very Best From Their Politicians

It's almost enough to make you cry. Almost.

The federal health minister, Tony Abbott, claims to be absolutely perplexed as to why his government is doing so poorly in poll after poll when they have done so much for Australians, and asked for so little in return. Aaawww :

The Health Minister told the Sydney Institute he was confused that the Government risked being deprived "of the usual reward for being good at its job".

"There is no conclusive explanation for the Government's poor run in the opinion polls..."

Oh, but there are conclusive explanations, Tony, and plenty of them.

Most Australians don't trust prime minister Howard, nor do they trust most of the government front benchers, like you. Not only do they no trust you, they don't really like you either.

They have reached a point of saturation over your government's continual disinformation campaigns, your spectacular advertising splurges to remind us all of how awesome you lot think you are, and the endless attempts to distort the truth for your political advantage, even on the most minor of issues.

They are also sick to death of the way your government continually drags its feet on shifting Australia into the 21st century, whether it be national broadband for all, stem cell research, solar power, or other renewable energy resources.

Your government lets problems fester, and national infrastructure decay, until it all becomes something close to a national emergency - water, dental health, Aboriginal health, climate change, energy - and then, when it's time for another election campaign, you make hundreds of promises you have no intention of keeping once you have conned, fear-mongered and disinformed your way back into power.

Australians know your drill now. We know your game plan. We've got your number. We know what to expect, and why you won't deliver what you promise, and why you will deliver what you won't tell us about before it comes time to enter the voting booth.

It's a tired old game the government plays as it heads towards a shattering election defeat later this year. But it is the only game it knows how to play. Install the Threat, pump up the Fear, then promise deliverance.

And as for being treated unfairly by voters :

"...they are demanding masters," said Mr Abbott.

"They expect their MPs to be celebrities and, at the same time, just like them; to be content with a fraction of the earnings of corporate high-flyers, while working seven days a week in a hyper-responsible job..."

"Nothing but the best is good enough from Australian politicians and, the better it becomes, the more zealously voters reserve their right to raise their expectations."

Oh stop, you're breaking the nation's heart. Whatever happened to politicians being happy to sacrifice to serve their country, and their people?

You're a public servant, Tony, with retirement, pension and superannuation benefits that are far beyond the realm of about 95% of Australian workers.

You think you're getting a rough trot? Go be a doctor in an outback rural town where extremely frustrated, and very sick, people have to drive three hours to seek your help.

Go work four 12 hour shifts in a row in a slaughterhouse or a canning factory.

Go drive a road train from Darwin to Adelaide in one bleary-eyed trip for less than what you get for a day sitting on your arse in air-conditioned comfort in Parliament.

You've had it so good for so long, down there in Canberra, you have no comprehension of how tough life now is for millions of Australian families and workers.

Australians expect the best from their politicians because we live in the best country in the world, and we want it to keep it that way.

If you don't like how demanding Australians are of their politicians, then leave.

No-one's got a gun to your head, mate.


Abbott supplies another perfect example of why Australians are growing so tired of this government in a speech he gave last night.

Abbott offers no vision for the future, no acknowledgement of how the economy is doing so well because so many Australians are working so hard they barely have a social or family life left.

Abbott offers no inspiration, just more self-praise, more "lookit, we are so wonderful" propaganda, and more insipid, petulant fearing and smearing of opposition leader, and favoured prime minister, Kevin Rudd, the man who has Abbott, and the prime minister, so thoroughly rattled they are melting like butter in the heat of the voters desire for change, and a new beginning.

For the majority of Australians, the next federal election, and the next change of government, can't come soon enough.

Is A Serial Killer Posting Comments About A Murder Investigation On An Australian Crime Blog?

By Darryl Mason

This is pretty weird. Gary Hughes writes an excellent crime blog for 'The Australian' newspaper. He has written a number of stories about the 'Claremont Murders', a series of unsolved slayings of young women, back in 1996 and 1997, that are believed to be the work of a serial killer.

Somebody calling themselves 'Dr Phibes' has been posting comments about the case on Hughes' blog, and the person appears to be either providing clues as to where the bodies of two other missing girls can be found, or trying to taunt the apparently baffled Perth police 'Zodiac' style.

Gary Hughes explains :

Has WA’s Claremont serial killer been contributing to this blog while police continue their unsuccessful hunt for him? According to a new book on the long-running saga by crime author Debi Marshall, it’s possible. She quotes Robin Napper, a lecturer at Perth’s Centre for Forensic Science and a former police detective, as describing the contributions to Gotcha from a mysterious figure using the name “Dr Phibes” as “seriously spooky”. “Whoever this blogger is, he has more than a passing interest in the subject and is teasing us with his knowledge of all three victims,” says Mr Napper.

Dr Phibes started contributing his detailed knowledge about the Claremont killings after we posted on the saga in October last year. In one comment he revealed how he had met one of the victims, Sarah McMahon, and claimed police had bugged his phone and flown a helicopter over his property with heat-seeking ground radar in the search for her body.

Dr Phibes has continued contributing to the blog, along with others for the past eight months. His most recent comment was just 10 days ago.

'Dr Phibes' also appears to have a deep interest in what he calls the "satanic" involvement and influence of Freemasonry in Perth, and the various pyramids that can be found in the city :

There is a recurring theme with Compass bearings etc with the bodies etc. Sarah Mc Mahon, Claremont girls, Freemasons involvement & satanic circles reaching into High Govt. in Western Australia. You can see that by the Pyramid shaped water feature at perth`s Belltower, as well as the Pyramid conservatory nearby. Even a former Perth premier has been involved in the Satanic,lay lines/come Secret circle Buildings about the place.

'Dr Phibes' is, probably, just be a true-crime enthusiast who pretends to know more about the case than he/she actually does.

In any event, and as numerous commenters to Gary Hughes' blog have pointed, there is something uniquely creepy and unnerving about the comments 'Dr Phibes' is leaving.

'Dr Phibes' also has the curious ability to be able to post comments in completely different writing styles, as though there were more than one person leaving comments under this moniker (see quotes below).

And this person is not just posting comments at Hughes' blog. A 'Dr Phibes' has been posting cryptic comments all over Australian news websites when the 'Claremont Murders' case comes up for discussion.

Some examples of 'Dr Phibes' comments at Gary Hughes' blog :

I believe Sarah Spiers is in water either in Ankatel (south)or north of Wanneroo.And Sarah Mc Mahon is near Mundaring Wier.Just a feeling i get.

I met Sarah Mc Mahon in early nov 2000. She came to my place for a visit with 2 friends on a Friday.I saw her on the Sunday afterwards. She disappeared on the day after Melbourne Cup in Nov 2000. The Police flew their chopper (Polair 61) over my 1/2 acre place near the Swan Valley, as cause i had met her. They bugged my phone for a while. I have had a woman giving me probs for ages. Don`t ya hate that, ppl accusing ya of bopping sum 1 off then annoying ya to hell thinking they can do that & sleep ok

Some more comments at PerthNow by somebody posting as 'Dr Phibes' :

you said Julie Cutler`s car was found in Swan View,It wasn`t !!; it was found in cottesloe in the surf. Sarah Mc Mahons car was found in Swan Districts Hosp near here. I met her twice in the w.end b4 she disappeared.I know the aunt of Deborah Anderson. I have been working on both cases albeit coincidental linkages re myself in both cases...

this lance character is way too stupid to be the Claremont Serial Killer. Any 1 who drives past a woman 20 to 30 times is definately asking to be caught. He needs some excitement in his life. The young woman attacked in Karrakatta Cemetry, the woman attacked at coles loading dock, another in Davies Rd on the other side of the Railway stn... these could all be by the same person.

And another one here :

The Claremont Serial Killer is not able to abduct women for some time due to illness. The position of the bodies was deliberate to within 10 to 15 metres.They indicate to where Sarah Spiers can be found.

The lovers of crime fiction would naturally conclude that as 'Claremont Murders' took place in 1996 and 1997, the uncaught killer would be both bored and surprised to find the police still can't track him/her down, and would presume that this 'Dr Phibes' is the person responsible and is now trying to revive interest in the case, and themselves, by coming over all cryptic and mysterious.

Or 'Dr Phibes' could be a private investigator or undercover detective trying to flush out some more facts from the public by purposely stirring up comment.

Anyway, the WA police claim they are still investigating the murders, and plenty of Perth locals cry out "what investigation", while other locals say they have tried to give police information that might be helpful and gotten no response at all.

The 'Claremont Murders' remains unsolved a decade later, and police still refuse to release information about how two of the victims were killed.

Note : A 'Dr Phibes' showed up in May on a Vogue discussion board, under the topic 'Perth Girls : Where Do You Go Out?' That Dr Phibes provided some advice to Perth women about how to get into a nightclub for free, and appears to have an interest in women's jewelry.

Interview With The Author Of A New Book On The Claremont Murders



Darryl Mason is the author of the free, online novel ED Day : Dead Sydney. You can read it here

Sydneysiders Told To "Leave Town" During World Leaders Summit

APEC Security To Cost A Mind-Boggling $24 Million Per Day

Staggering New Police Powers To Be Introduced To Prevent World Leaders Coming Into Contact With The Public

The APEC summit of world leaders is coming to Sydney in September, and locals have been told to "leave town", as the stunning array of security measures that will be deployed will see a huge area of the city undergo a near total lockdown, for at least three or four days.

If you thought the shutdown of the Harbour Bridge when US Vice President Dick Cheney was in town, was way over the top - just so Cheney could be whisked over to the north side of the harbour to dine with the prime minister - that was a mere preview of what's coming in September.

In the heart of Sydney today, a security rehearsal for the APEC world leaders summit will get a "dry run".

Some 200 health ministers are converging on a Sydney hotel for a conference on pandemic bird flu, and as this is the last major event of its kind before the APEC summit, security officials have determined it's a good opportunity to try out some of the "stringent security measures" they intend to inflict upon the people of Sydney when world leaders gather here later this year :

This week will also see the introduction to State Parliament of new police-state level security legislation, all supposedly tied to September's APEC summit of world leaders.

The new legislation will give police the ability to :

Declare restricted security zones.

Conduct random searches.

Ban troublemakers from entering restricted zones.

Stop those arrested for violent acts from getting bail until APEC is over.

Apparently any protester deemed to be a "trouble maker" who dares show their face during the first days of the APEC lockdown can be held without charge.

And anyone caught during any of the days of the APEC summit with devices that can injure police horses, injure people or blow out the tyres of police cars and motorbikes will face an
extraordinary 14 years in jail.

The first two weeks of September would be an extremely bad time to be subjected to a random body search on a Sydney street if you happen to be carrying a bag of marbles.


Newspapers over the weekend expressed a measure of surprise that the costs for the stunning levels of security needed to lock down Sydney for APEC have already "blown out" to almost $180 million.

Security costs for APEC are already more expensive than those needed for the 2000 Sydney Olympics, and will cost taxpayers a mind-boggling $24 million per day to prevent the leaders of the free world from coming into contact with the public.

Surely then it will come as no surprise to the media when the security costs again "blow out" to more than $250 million closer to the date of the summit :

The costs far outstrip those of the Sydney Olympics, which featured hundreds of dignitaries and lasted more than two weeks.

During the get-together, heads of government, including US President George W. Bush and Russia's Vladimir Putin, will cruise the city in a fleet of armoured limousines provided by Australian taxpayers at a cost of $4 million.

Although meetings involving officials are scheduled to last a full week, most leaders will stay only two days.

But they revealed the Federal Government's security bill for APEC 2007 was $169 million, compared with previous estimates of $143 million.

Security for the 2000 Olympics is estimated to have cost $152 million.

As well as limousines, the money is being used to secure venues and implement "airspace management".

It is also funding extra border-control measures, intelligence gathering and counter-terrorism response.

The biggest single allocation has been handed to NSW Police, who received $78 million in federal cash to secure "marine area command" - Sydney Harbour - and conduct traffic control, dignitary protection, dog squad and mounted police operations.

The money will also fund aviation, State Surveillance Branch, intelligence and advanced technical support.

The main security event is Leaders' Week, during which 21 heads of government will descend on Sydney.

Previously on this blog :

For up to two weeks in September, a huge area of Sydney's central business district, and tourist shopping mecca, will be blockaded by hundreds of police, security guards and Australia's military. Soldiers, armed with assault rifles, will allegedly be given "shoot to kill" rules of engagement to deal with security threats.

Black Hawk helicopters will patrol the skies, snipers will be positioned on the rooftops of some of Sydney's landmark buildings, train stations will be closed down and checkpoints will screen each and every person who tries to enter 'The Zone'.

In a quick series of announcements earlier this week, the state and federal government unveiled the first slab of details revealing just how severe the ultra-security will be when more than 20 world leaders, including Presidents Bush and Putin, descend on Sydney for the APEC summit in September this year.

The publicly released plans read like scenarios culled of the Orwellian police state portrayed in the movie 'V For Vendetta', and Sydneysiders are already expressing their anger and frustration at an event that they know will paralyse the city centre, while they still have to go to work and try to live their lives.

While news that Australian soldiers carrying assault rifles will be patrolling the streets of Sydney was jaw-dropping enough, we've also now learned that special legislation will be introduced, allowed under anti-terror laws, to allow police to pull people they deem to be a possible security threat off the street and detainee them without charge, for days at a time. Other Sydneysiders can look forward to the possibility of being subjected to random full body searches.

Naturally the notorious, odious Piers Ackerman, a stunningly biased full-time John Howard propagandist, thinks there is nothing at all wrong with APEC being held in Sydney, instead of in Canberra or an island resort. And he loves the idea that the summit will allow the 21 APEC world leaders a forum to continue working out ways to morph their nations into a virtually borderless free trade zone encompassing about a third of the world's surface, which will probably be called Oceania in a decade or two :

APEC is more, much more than a tourist stopover for 21 world leaders, top business figures and senior public servants, let alone a photo opportunity in a funny shirt.

It will place Australia squarely in the role of Asia-Pacific powerbroker with a very serious business agenda that could set the agenda for major changes in the way the economies in this part of the world work.

There is also an APEC nations business travel card which will act as a visa for preferential travel across the borders of 17 of the 21 APEC economies.

A system of APEC-wide standards is also being worked on to simplify trade, a huge step at a time when some member nations don’t even have their own internal standards organisations.

The APEC nations even consider it possible that their Sydney talks may help break the free trade stalemate that has deadlocked the Dohar rounds of talks, cutting red tape and producing a free trade area in the Asia-Pacific region. If Dohar falls over, or more realistically, when, APEC could be the essential basis for a free trade zone.

Of course, Ackerman has nothing to say about the expected half-trillion dollar losses to local businesses when Sydney is shut down for the best part of two weeks later this year. Give him a few months and he will blame the shut down of Sydney on the threats posed by all those nasty protesting, freedom-loving, anti-globalisation 'terrorists' and big puppet heads.

For power groupies like Ackerman, inconveniencing millions of people, inflicting staggering financial losses on small businesses, milking the taxpayers for hundreds of millions of dollars and subjecting innocent people to draconian police-state security measures just goes with the territory of establishing a mammothic 'free trade' zone in our part of the world.

Australians should feel blessed, you see, and Sydneysiders in particular, that supreme powers have deigned us mere mortal Australians worthy of paying the bill for a world leaders talk fest, where they will sit down to work out how they can further carve up the world and its natural resources for the alleged betterment of all.

And be whisked around the city in bomb-proof limousines while the unworthy sit in gridlock for two or three hours, while being buzzed by Black Hawk helicopters.

It's a small price to pay to have our city graced by the likes of such admired and respected world leaders like President George W. Bush.

APEC Summit Might Be A Good Time To "Leave Town", Sydneysiders Told

Armed Troops To Fill City During APEC Fortnight - The "Creeping Militarisation Of Australia"

Sydney To Become "Mini-Police State" - Army Will Be Deployed On Streets With Assault Rifles For APEC Summit

Sydneysiders Fleeing APEC Lockdown May Lead To "Highways From Hell"

Interview With The APEC Boss : Global Warming And Regional Emmissions To Be Focus Of Talks

Plans To Use Super Tankers To Ship Fresh Water From Tasmania To East Coast Cities

When bottled water can sell for $3 dollars a litre, filling supertanker with 40 or 50 millions of litre of water from Tasmania and shipping it up the coast to parched cities like Sydney and Brisbane not only becomes a reasonable part-solution to looming water shortages, but an extremely profitable one :

A number of companies, including one chaired by former prime minister Bob Hawke, are negotiating to capture excess water from swollen rivers on the state's high-rainfall west coast.

(Tasmanian state) Water Minister David Llewellyn told The Weekend Australian he now believed the idea stacked up economically -- and could be used to benefit Tasmanians as well as mainland consumers.

Mr Llewellyn said a proposal from Solar Sailor, a NSW company chaired by Mr Hawke, to export 50 billion litres of water a year from Tasmania, was just one of a number before the Government.

Mr Llewellyn said Tasmania's fresh water supplies were equivalent to two Murray-Darling systems. The state has a population of about 485,000, or 2.3 per cent of Australia's total, yet it has 12 per cent of the nation's water.

Mr Llewellyn said revenue from the sale of water otherwise flowing from rivers into the sea could be invested in dams and irrigation infrastructure in the state's dry north and east.

Tasmania's west coast, home to wild mountains and swollen rivers, often complains of an excess of rain while parts of the state's east and north are in drought.

Although only one of a number of proposals, Solar Sailor is understood also to be in discussion with several mainland states as potential customers for Tasmanian water.

The company's chief executive, Robert Dane, who has held talks with Tasmania's Department of Primary Industries and Water, has flagged using several supertankers to ferry water to centres along the eastern seaboard, including Sydney, Melbourne and Queensland.

Even if the exported water was sold in bulk for a few cents a litre to East Coast cities, exporting 50 billion litres of it a year is going to make some people extremely wealthy.

Maybe the supertankers should load up on melting ice from the Antarctic. Not only will the resulting water be cleaner, wouldn't scooping up all that melting ice and shipping it to Sydney help slow the supposed sea level rises that are likely to result from global warming?

Millions Of Australians Demand The Return Of The 40 Hour Work Week

Howard's Claim That Australians "Have Never Had it So Good" Will Haunt Him Into The Election

Some 2.5 million Australians are working more than 40 hours a week and they're sick of it. They want their lives back, they want to spend more time with their family and friends. But under changes to the wages and working conditions of most Australia, prime minister John Howard has created a reality where millions of Australians will be working more hours, for less pay.

It will be interesting to see how Howard tries to convince these millions of aggravated Australians that they've "never had it so good", as he infamously stated a few months back, when this is clearly not the case for millions of Australians, struggling with heavy mortgages, longer work weeks and rising fuel, energy and food costs :

Men now put in more than 45 hours a week on average, but more than a third would prefer 38 to 40 hours. Women without dependent children want to work between 32 and 35 hours, not their current average of 40. And women with children favour working 28 hours.

"People have said it's good to have diversity and flexibility in work hours but Australian workers just crave the old standard working week that's been lost over the last two decades," said Brigid van Wanrooy, a post-doctoral fellow at the Workplace Relations Centre at the University of Sydney.

This week the Australian Bureau of Statistics revealed almost a third of Australians work unsocial hours and 37 per cent do extra hours, about half of them for no extra pay.

Dr van Wanrooy said 38 per cent of full-time workers - or 2.5 million people - wanted to work fewer hours, according to the biggest survey. "The trend to long hours has not been a result of workers' preferences."

Australians work some of the longest hours in the industrialised world. Thirty-five per cent of male full-time workers and 19 per cent of full-time working women put in 50 hours or more a week.

The true battle John Howard has to face in the coming election is how to convince the people that working longer hours, and experiencing wealthier lives, with all the trappings of financial success, is better than whatever passes for true happiness. Because there appears to be plenty of Australians who are doing well, but are not all that happy with their lives, mostly because they spend less time with their friends and/or family :

Australians are richer and healthier than ever but busier lives have forced us to re-evaluate what makes us happy.

Increasing numbers of Australians are discovering that despite the booming economy and rampant consumerism, work and wealth may not be the true twin paths to bliss.

Surveys published this week erode traditional ideas about hard work and sacrifice getting you ahead; the Australian Bureau of Statistics says nearly one in five works unpaid overtime. A Housing Industry Association report put housing affordability at its lowest in 23 years nationally, with mortgage repayments accounting for more than 30 per cent of an average first home buyer's income. A typical monthly repayment now tops $3000.

Once a financial problem, the disconnect between salary and the Australian dream of owning a home has become a sociological phenomenon that has erupted into a political pain that spills across generations, creating tensions and regrets and forcing a re-evaluation about what constitutes happiness.

Paul Shepanski, the co-author of a report on the connection between working hours and family breakdown for the Relationships Forum, says there is deep concern about the impact of economic change on relationships. The report found a strong link between long and unpredictable work hours and the breakdown of family and other relationships.

"People are feeling that, despite all this wealth, there is something rotten in the system," says Shepanski, a former partner of Boston Consulting Group. "There's a sense that the pressure just keeps mounting but there is no pay-off for increasing productivity in the workplace and all the labour-saving devices that we have at home."

The Relationships Forum research, published in March, showed Australia is the only high-income country that combines very long average working hours with a high level of work at unsocial times - during weeknights and weekends - and a significant proportion of casual employment. After incremental change in working patterns over 30 years Australia has emerged as one of the world's most intensely work-focused countries, but it has created a human tragedy.

"The past three decades of prosperity experienced by Australia have come at an unexpected price," Shepanski says.

More than 20 per cent of employees work 50 hours or more each week, and more than 30 per cent regularly work on weekends. About 2 million people now lose at least six hours of family time to work Sundays, and those hours are not fully compensated for during the week.

"The cold statistics provide vital clues to the thousands of relationships in crisis across our country. Long and atypical working patterns are associated with dysfunctional family environments," Shepanski says.

All this is causing huge problems for Howard, who is happy to push the line "you've never had it so good" as a pre-election reminder to supporters to hold fast.

Howard, who has undisputed claim to the economy card, is punting that voters will focus on his economic management advantage closer to the election, as voters have tended to do. But Howard cannot be sure the tide against him can be so turned.

Both Howard and Rudd are pitching that the good times will continue to roll, but ordinary Australians are shouldering the burden of paying for the good times. With health, education, welfare and superannuation increasingly privatised, risks once borne by government and business have been transferred onto households. The International Monetary Fund is worried about this global trend. The household sector "has increasingly and more directly become the shock absorbers of last resort in the financial system", it warned in 2005.

The Last Days Of Prime Minister John Howard - Faces Devastating Election Defeat

Millions Of Australians Work Overtime For No Extra Pay