Use The Force, Kevvo
Saturday April 21st 2007, 6:37 am

image: Peter Nicholson for news.com.au
image: Peter Nicholson for News.com.au

No, Kevin- the way to The Lodge is not paved with imitation HoWARd policies.

Labor is mainly depending on the votes of working Australians to win goverment- and none want anything to do with a government which schmoozes non-voting entities like corporations while leaving workers and their families to twist in the wind.

Business will exploit any loophole you give them. There’s got to be proper unfair dismissal laws in place which cover all workers for the entire time they’re working for a certain employer. If Kevvo’s IR plan allows companies with under 15 employees to escape unfair dismissal laws for 6 months, you can bet that there will be a lot of sackings of people who have been on the job 5 months and 29 days.

Labor must use The Force to defeat HoWARd. That force is the numbers of voting workers who don’t want an American-style ‘take-it-or-rack-off’ employment basis… and there’s a lot more of those votes than there are votes from business owners.

-weez



One last puff on an unfiltered Pall Mall…
Thursday April 12th 2007, 8:24 pm

so long, Kilgore
Kurt Vonnegut Jr, 1922-2007

(more…)



Parrot not roasted over Cronulla riot incitement- only slightly warmed
Wednesday April 11th 2007, 8:23 am

but any publicity is good Parrot publiscity, isn't it?

Mine was one of numerous complaints to ABA (now ACMA) about The Parrot’s falsely driven incitements of Anglo-Aussies to riot in Cronulla in December, 2005.

Thus quoth The Parrot:

I’m the person that’s led this charge here. Nobody wanted to know about North Cronulla, now it’s gathered to this.”

Yeah, but mainly with your help, Jonesy.

ABC Radio’s The World Todaypodcast with Jones clips, MP3.

ACMA, which fearfully treads around Jones, has somewhat astonishingly found that Jones did in fact incite and invite bogans to raise hell in Cronulla.

The Australian Communications and Media Authority has found that the licensee of commercial radio service 2GB Sydney, Harbour Radio Pty Ltd, breached the Commercial Radio Codes of Practice 2004 (the code) by broadcasting material that was likely to encourage violence or brutality.

ACMA has also found that the licensee breached the code by broadcasting material that was likely to vilify people of Lebanese background and of Middle-Eastern background on the basis of their ethnicity. While ACMA has found that the material was presented for a purpose in the public interest, being discussion of factors contributing to unrest in the Cronulla area of southern Sydney in December 2005, ACMA was not persuaded that the relevant comments were presented reasonably and in good faith.

This is 2GB’s third licence violation with a basis in the vilification provision of the broadcasters’ code in the last 6 months, but 2GB and Jones are still on the air. The ‘sentence’ for this infraction is sure to be weak as fish piss, just like every other ACMA judgment against Jones/2GB.

2GB may have a licence condition added requiring them to use a time-delay so that Jones’ most offensive garbage doesn’t go to air. But be a 2GB employee for a moment; remember that Jones is a part owner of 2GB. How long would your job last if you were the board operator who hit the ‘dump’ button on The Parrot? Probably less time than it took to hit the button.

The radio and TV airwaves are the property of the people of Australia. Licences are granted on the proviso that the airwaves are used to benefit the people. I fail to see how Alan Jones’ abuse of Australian radio spectrum benefits anyone but Alan Jones.

-weez



Isn’t that conveeeeeeeeeeeeeeeenient
Sunday April 01st 2007, 1:46 am

image: Bill Leak for The Australian

Hicks gets nine-month sentence

A US military tribunal has sentenced confessed terrorism supporter David Hicks to seven years in jail but he will only have to serve nine months.

The tribunal judge accepted Hicks’s guilty plea as part of an agreement that limited his sentence to seven years in prison, in addition to the five years he has been held at the US base at Guantanamo Bay.

The deal allowed all but nine months of the sentence to be be suspended.

So, that means Hicks is released from an Australian prison on or about 31 December, 2007… about a month later than the 2007 federal election could possibly be. Well planned, Johnny! At least you didn’t give away the date of the election directly. 😆

Johnny reckons this kangaroo court proved Hicks is a terrorist. (more…)