Throwing stones from the glasshouse

When someone gives us a small gift, it’s nice. When someone gives us a moderately expensive gift, we feel quite flattered and we don’t quite know what to say. But when someone gives us an extremely expensive gift, we feel a bit embarrassed and not too willing to accept it. When a gift is that expensive, we feel that the other person may want something in return.

Australian Defence Minister, Joel Fitzgibbon, is being pressured to resign over associations he has had for many years with Chinese-Australian businesswoman Helen Liu. There is absolutely nothing illegal about his associations with this woman, nor is Mrs.Liu under any police interest or investigation in Australia. It is simply the matter of what gifts he has accepted and how that could be seen as affecting his decision making in the future.

Firstly, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd seems to be making strong advances towards China. The Chinese have for decades been watched very carefully, for fear that they may be plotting something. And since China is one of the world’s last communist strongholds, a snuggling up to China may be seen by the more conservative elements of society as a sign that Rudd intends to take us down a communist, or at the very least, socialist path.

So when we hear that Helen Liu paid for two of Mr. Fitzgibbon’s trips to China, while at the same time making handsome financial contributions to the Australian Labor Party in Sydney, no one can be blamed for thinking that the China link is becoming all too familiar. Mrs. Liu is said to be devastated over allegations of impropriety, and former New South Wales Premier, Bob Carr, has described the accusations levelled at Mrs. Liu as ’shameful’.

My concerns have nothing to do with any ‘communist/socialist’ hidden agenda. That is silly, mid 1950’s witch hunt talk and I won’t entertain it. What I will entertain is this. Helen Liu paid for a politician to go to China, twice. Yes, Mr. Fitzgibbon was in Opposition at that stage, but he was still in the inner sanctum of a party on the verge of governing the country. She should not have offered to pay and he should not have accepted. He is now Defence Minister. He claims that the Liu family have been close friends for over 15 years. It’s not the friendship that is of concern, it is how Mr. Fitzgibbon is benefitting from that friendship. And when we hear that Mrs. Liu is donating to the New South Wales Labor Party on a regular basis, it is seriously not in her interests, or the interests of Mr. Fitzgibbon, to have this form of association.

It compromises her position as well as his. Criminal elements within the Chinese community could see Mrs. Liu as someone who can get to the Minister of Defence, which in turn could cause problems for her personal safety and that of her family. I believe Helen Liu is as clean as a whistle, as is Joel Fitzgibbon, that isn’t the issue. It is the perceived impropriety that will hurt them both. Neither of them saw that generous gifts could be seen as ‘pay offs’ or ‘ bribes’ in exchange for favourable decisions and someone with an ear to the Prime Minister.

It’s a case of not thinking, but it’s also a case of gross naivete. With the push for a stronger link to China being a big part of Australian foreign policy, Mr. Fitzgibbon’s innocence in all this will be hard to prove. The ‘hidden agenda’ I spoke of before will be seen to have been proven beyond doubt.

But what this issue is also bringing up is the promise Kevin Rudd made in the lead up to the 2007 election. If his ministers did not perform, they would be sacked, simple as that. Some say Rudd is not doing what he said he would do. But this is lack of judgement based on a personal issue, not Mr. Fitzgibbon’s performance as a Defence Minister. Is he a good Defence Minister? His department don’t think so, but they are being accused of trying to slander his name to get rid of him, purely because he wishes to enact sweeping reforms into the department. How do you stop your job being axed, or at the very least downsized? You slander the boss, to take the heat off your own incompetence.

The trips came under scrutiny after allegations surfaced that the Defence Department had conducted a secret investigation into their relationship over concerns she may be a security risk.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/03/30/2529398.htm

If he is performing well as a minister in the portfolio that he has been given, then he should stay and continue his work. Rudd has done the right thing. He has admonished Fitzgibbon for failure to be more prudent, more alert to the consequences of his actions. If impropriety happens again, then yes, Fitzgibbon should go.

But those in the Department of Defence should also be put in their place, if they have been deliberately targetting the minister and breaching his privacy in order to create a scandal and see him removed. Such an action is even more malicious than anything Mrs. Liu and Mr. Fitzgibbon have done.

Within the Defence Department, the investigation is continuing into the report that sparked it all.

The department’s secretary, Nick Warner, is reported to have sent an email to all personnel asking them to come forward if they know of anyone in Defence accessing the Minister’s computer accounts or in any other way collecting information about him.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/03/31/2530631.htm

Whichever way you approach it, it is a warning to all of us just what perceptions ’associations’ can present, and just how careful we need to be.

‘Two men look out a window. One sees mud, the other sees the stars.’ – Oscar Wilde

Enjoy your day

Do you notice  that since his inauguration, US President Barack Obama has barely mentioned Iraq, but has said a lot about Afghanistan, as well as Pakistan? For the first time since the September 11 attacks in 2001, we see a US President concentrating his efforts, and that of his administration on the area where terrorists are most active. It is also where Osama Bin Laden has been supposedly living all these years. Logic has finally come to the White House.

Continuing any war is something that we do not want to hear, but if we must put our energies into a war, and committ troops, I would rather it be in an area that we can justify. Iraq was never justifiable. Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld tried desperately to tell us that the United States invaded Iraq because Saddam Hussein was a threat. Firstly, he wasn’t a threat. Secondly, the weapons he supposedly had were a myth, and most importantly, the terrorists who destroyed 3,000 lives in the September 11 attacks were first of all from Saudi Arabia, and their leader, Osama Bin Laden, lives in the hills between Pakistan and Afghanistan. I don’t see a link to Iraq there at all. If nothing else, President Obama is making a direct link between who he is targetting and the exact geographical area where Bin Laden lives. As I said, we don’t want either the Iraq war or the war in Afghanistan to go on any further, but I am happy to have our troops in Afghanistan rather than Iraq. A Taliban controlled Afghanistan would be far worse than anything Saddam Hussein could have cooked up. They have proven that.

Also, for the first time in many years, the Afghan and Pakistani leadership is being put well and truly under the pump. Afghan President Hamid Karzai struts around in his Afghan national dress and waxes lyrical about anything and everything, but he has done little to unite his people, let alone put in place real strategies of finding Bin Laden, who is effectively living on his doorstep. Pakistan has had years of a military coup leader who has been treated with kid gloves by the US. Now it finds itself with an ineffectual leader, Asif Ali Zadari, who is doing even less than Karzai. What I want to see is President Obama putting the squeeze even more on these two gentlemen and make them work for their own security. If they are secure countries, then the world will be a more stable place as well.

I think we are still all in shock knowing that we have an articulate, intelligent President at the helm in the United States. Yes, he is being picked apart about his economic stimulus packages, but like I have said before, no one knows how to fix things. They all think they do. He can defend Afghanistan far more than Bush could ever defend Iraq. If anything, he is putting the focus back onto Afghanistan, which was the original miltary action soon after September 11th 2001.

Maybe if Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld had concentrated their efforts in Afghanistan and Pakistan more since 2001 and made the leaders there more accountable, we may have seen Osama Bin Laden hang from the noose, and not Saddam Hussein. A lot of time has been wasted, and it’s now time to think more cleverly, act more strategically and achieve some type of workable result without thousands of innocent men and women dying for the sake of oil and strategic position in the Middle East.

I do find it amazingly amusing, but also downright insulting, when I hear opponents of President Obama criticising every little thing he does. I am quite well aware that politicians need to be made accountable and they deserve to be pulled up when they are not performing. But please remember that this current situation, whether it be financial, military, or domestic, is so much more than any other sitting US President has ever had to deal with, probably with the exception of Franklin Roosevelt. The armchair critics weren’t there when George W Bush took his country to war on a whim, vetoed a children’s health bill, whilst promoting his ‘No Child Left Behind’ policy, and destroyed the chance to  further research the benefits of embyonic stem cells.

To the right wing, all that was a recipe for a superb Presidency.

Enjoy your day

As Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd wraps up his visit to Washington for talks with US President Barack Obama, I hope that the relationship between the two countries is elevated to a much higher level of mutual respect than it was under former President George W Bush and his ‘man of steel’, former Australian Prime Minister John Howard. Bush, but more likely Cheney, bullied Australia and John Howard just rolled over onto his back to get his tummy rubbed. That’s not what a healthy alliance is all about. Hugh Grant played a British Prime Minister in the movie ‘Love Actually’ and in his response to the US President (Billy Bob Thornton), he summed up what a true friendship and an alliance based on respect should be all about:

 I love that word “relationship.” Covers all manner of sins, doesn’t it? I fear that this has become a bad relationship; a relationship based on the President taking exactly what he wants and casually ignoring all those things that really matter. A friend who bullies us is no longer a friend. And since bullies only respond to strength, from now onward I will be prepared to be much stronger. And the President should be prepared for that.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0314331/quotes

John Howard never said anything vaguely like that to his buddy George. I cannot remember once in the 7 years that they had a professional association, that I ever heard Howard so much as have a different opinion on the weather, let alone anything stronger than that. At least Kevin Rudd is making stronger overtures:

Rudd believes that “the United States alliance is overwhelmingly in Australia’s strategic interests.” But he doesn’t want Australia to be seen as a camp follower.

According to Rudd, “Labor (now the ruling party) does not believe in an alliance which mandates automatic compliance with every aspect of US foreign policy.”

http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2008/04/18/kevin-rudd039s-china-diplomacy-turbulance.html

And again this week his response to troop committment in Afghanistan:

Mr Rudd emphasised that Australia’s commitment “is not a blank cheque”.

http://www.theage.com.au/national/no-blank-cheque-on-afghan-war-says-rudd-20090324-98y3.html

It’s a healthy sign. While Americans have spent the last eight years hanging their heads in shame and saying to the world that they were Canadian, Australians too have had to endure our pride and self respect being trodden on, because John Howard was convinced that sucking up to the United States is how an alliance is kept intact. Howard got that wrong, but yet he also thought he would win another election after 11 and a half years in office. He was very wrong there too.

Do we feel Rudd means what he says? Well, yes, because the way he spoke to the Chinese last year about Tibet means that he isn’t scared of anyone. He was able to tell the Chinese government that their stance on Tibet is wrong, and then still be able to do deals with them. Remember, Rudd was a diplomat. He knows how to charm, while kicking you in the head.

Speaking up for what we believe is tough. If you want the ‘Most Popular staff member’ award, don’t speak up. Howard didn’t stand up for anything, let alone the people of the nation he led, but it got him the highest civilian honour a US President can bestow. Being  the ‘good boy’ for George definitely had its perks.

But standing up for one’s ideals and beliefs, and not wavering on the core things that matter has its benefits. The most important one is respect and admiration. People may not like you, but they respect you. They can at least see you believe in something and you will see it all the way till the end. I fully realise that the United States and China are massive countries with way more power and influence than us, but that does not mean we cannot command to be a respected nation who has firm beliefs and ideals.

Helen Clark, former New Zealand Prime Minister has that respect.

…she is regarded internationally as someone of real substance. Her name opens doors which are closed to others. And international media admire her because she 1) is accessible, 2) talks thorough sense, and 3) does so in a clear, forthright manner.

http://pundit.co.nz/content/helen-clarks-oe

New Zealand is a small country, and it has very little sway in world events. But Ms. Clark has just scored a job with the United Nations, and she wouldn’t have got it by brown-nosing the Secretary-General. That’s not Helen Clark’s style. She is a bit of a bare-fisted Labor Party brawler, and she has been called the best ‘man’ for the job, but you know where she stands. You didn’t see her chumming up to Bush when the Iraq War loomed on the horizon. She was with the Europeans on that one, and thought the whole thing was a stupid idea. She was right then, and she is right now. The United Nations Development Committee better get ready for some action.It would have been an interesting alliance if Helen Clark remained Prime Minister and worked more closely with Kevin Rudd. She didn’t have much time for John Howard and she let him know it.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with two business partners, two friends, two colleagues disagreeing. A solid friendship, business relationship or politicial alliance must be able to withstand the odd tense moment. All of us do things wrong, and need to be told. It’s commonly called constructive criticism.

Let’s hope Rudd has got Australia back on the ‘mutual respect’ footing with the new US administration. If he hasn’t, and succumbs to the easy ’submissive’ position, then I think we may find Australia very quickly losing its grip as a credible, intelligent and confident member of the world community.

Enjoy your day

We are constantly scratching our heads trying to think of a solution to the never ending Israeli-Palestinian problem. We want both sides to live together side by side in peace. We tend to become consumed and obsessed with Jews and Arabs reconciling, when neither side has that much real power in the world.

Arab oil producers are awash in wealth. They have never been so rich. But the paradox is that, in spite of their great and growing wealth, their political weight in the world remains small, even derisory. They have not — or at least not yet — converted their wealth into political influence on a global scale.

http://www.middle-east-online.com/english/?id=25838

If Israel did not have the United States nailed to its side, then it would be extremely weak indeed. So why are we spending so much time with this region? The talk by experts always comes down to the western world having some form of presence in the region to stop it turning into a raging ultra-superpower that will take over the world and turn us all into Islamic terrorists. That sounds very dramatic, but you know what I mean. In reality, the Middle East is a disparate group of tribespeople, religious zealots, and everyday citizens. Even in religious terms, Muslims and Jews don’t come together as a united group. With Jews, there are your Zionists, Hasids and liberal Jews. With Arabs, there are Christians, as well as Sunni, Shi’a and Sufi Muslims. This is a group of people that cannot even unite as a race or religious group, let alone become some sort of deadly superpower with one steady clear voice.

We watch the Middle East with both eyes, and glance across at China, just to see what that country is up to. I say glance, because we know what China does and how powerful China is, but we are too scared to touch them. We can pick on the Middle East because even though there is a threat of suicide bombings from the extreme elements of the Islamic world, the rest of the Middle East will not fight back. We pick on a soft target.

South Africa this week refused a visa to the Dalai Lama, as they did not want to offend China. Burma could release its stranglehold on its people, Tibet would be free, and North Korea would emerge from a  communist regime rooted firmly in the 1950’s , if countries around the world stood up to China, made them accountable, and hit them with sanctions and made them work for the good of humankind. But China is too strong and we know we cannot hurt them. They know this too. China can be brought to its knees, we just need to unite to make that happen.

The shift in focus in the Middle East has moved to Afghanistan, the supposed ‘fight we can win’ as opposed to ‘the fight we can’t win’. The Soviets spent ten years there and achieved nothing. Afghanistan is very tribal. You’re lucky if two villages next to each other agree on anything. Centralised government is what we all want for them, but it is not what they want for themselves.

So here we are, hitting our heads against the proverbial brick wall, whilst China stands with arms crossed and a smile, standing over countries and getting what they want. Now I do realise that a trade deal with China is way more important than whether the Dalai Lama comes to town, but South Africa is a nation that rejected apartheid and fought long and hard for justice for all, black and white. Now the government is rejecting fairness, freedom and justice by going with the easy answer and not the right one. Australia has a trade deal with China too, but we welcome the Dalai Lama all the time, and let China know it.

China gives the impression it is assisting the world in many areas:

In the past six years, China has helped drive multilateral negotiations to reduce nuclear proliferation in North Korea and Iran; and promoted itself in Africa with a promise in 2006 to provide $5 billion in loans and credits and to double development aid by this year. In Southeast Asia, it is working to create a free-trade zone that would eliminate levies covering 93 percent of its imports from the region.

But what I see is strategic placement in some of the world’s most powerful organisations:

China’s new place at the global table is underscored by the appointments of Margaret Chan of Hong Kong as head of the World Health Organization in 2006 and Justin Lin, originally of Taiwan, as chief economist of the World Bank last year: They are the first Chinese to hold top positions in such prominent international organizations.

(both quotes- http://www.iht.com/articles/2009/02/17/asia/letter.php)

China is immensely powerful, even as one solitary country. They have a lot to offer, plenty of money to throw around, and all the resources that the rest of the world wants and needs. But if we as a global community allow China to become more powerful at the expense of human rights, then is that justifiable? Burma is a corrupt regime, as is North Korea. China has their finger in the Sudanese pie as well, and we have all heard about their President being up on war crimes.  China can end the suffering of many with but a word.

But China cannot possibly put any pressure on Sudan, North Korea and Burma, because China is guilty of the exact same deprivation of liberty. It’s a classic case of ‘pot calling the kettle black’. China agrees with all these countries and the way they treat their people, so why should they feel obliged to pressure them?

Malaysian journalist Eddin Khoo has been recently quoted as saying that ASEAN (Association of South East Asian Nations) is an entity that is, by and large, useless. They act to protect their individual sovereignty, and not the collective interests of the region of South East Asia. I actually think that ASEAN as a group of nations is a small example of what all of us in the larger global community are like. We think of ourselves, and our nations, first. The collective betterment of our international brothers and sisters can go jump off the nearest cliff.

It’s time the world turned the spotlight off the Middle East. This constant search for Osama Bin Laden is ridiculous. How can we not find a very tall distinctive looking man who has liver problems, walks with a limp and who lives in a very small area of the Pakistani/Afghan mountains? We all know where he is, but he has been sitting there waiting for us since 2001. Al-Jazeera television have actually been to his cave, and we still do not know where he is. Time to give it up boys and girls and starting turning the screws on China.

Let me leave you with the words of Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd. The proof of China’s power is in this statement.

Mr Rudd said the International Monetary Fund would need more resources to deal with such an emerging crisis.

“So the question is, where do you get that more from? And part of the answer must lie in China,” he said.

Mr Rudd is pushing for China to be given a bigger role in the IMF and says that should happen if the world is to turn to the Asian giant for help.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/03/24/2525077.htm

Enjoy your day

Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd today embarks on yet another of his overseas jaunts. He is overseas so much, people are starting to call him Pope John Paul II. He is off to meet the new US President, Barack Obama, and I am sure is thinking that it is now his turn to get all palsy walsy with a US President. John Howard got a Presidential Medal of Freedom out of sucking up to one. Kevin’s got to be thinking there is something in it for him if he plays his cards right.

But Kevin has not played his cards right, even though he was a career diplomat before entering politics. On the eve of the G20 Summit in the UK, Rudd must surely have a bad taste in his mouth over the last time he talked about the G20. It was to former President George W Bush. It was a private phone conversation between two world leaders, as it should be. But Rudd, in very undiplomatic fashion, decided that it would be good to ridicule the President by letting it slip that Bush asked him what the G20 was.

Now we all like to heap scorn and ridicule onto George W Bush. We are all missing how fun it was to watch him, hang our heads in shame and think ‘you idiot.’ Not only did he not know what the G20 was, he didn’t know much of anything. It is amazing that the country survived those eight years. But this is not the point. Kevin Rudd needed to keep that conversation between him and….him. Sure, if he was so amazed at Bush’s stupidity, then have a laugh with the wife just before bed in the privacy of your own bedroom, but it is wrong and inappropriate to divulge the details of a private conversation with a world leader. Rudd was very wrong. For his troubles, this is the reception he got from George Bush when they met shortly after that fateful phone chat.

For once, and I mean once, I am with George W Bush. You don’t reveal conversations, and you especially do not use those conversations to beat your opponent over the head with. This is going to have massive repercussions for Kevin Rudd whenever he is talking to world leaders from now on. There has to be that element of trust that what is said over the phone, at a function, or anywhere else where it is a one on one, never goes any further.

Rudd goes to Washington thinking that it’s a new President and all will be forgotten. No it won’t and neither it should be. Barack Obama would be wise to keep Kevin Rudd at arm’s length and be very careful what he tells him, as Obama would be feeling the same as I am. He did it to one person, he can easily do it again.

One of the greatest assets a person can have is depth of character. What builds depth of character is trust, honesty, sincerity, genuineness, strong beliefs and a rock solid understanding of confidentiality. All professions have it, but refer to it differently. Doctors and therapists call it ‘Doctor/Client confidentiality’. Priests call it the ’seal of silence’ in regard to hearing confession. Whatever it is called, it must be adhered to if important matters are to be dealt with. Without it, all trust goes out the window, and we are nothing better than the old lady who gossips on the street corner about everyone who lives in the town.

Rudd was a diplomat. Rudd knows the score. Rudd wanted this job of Prime Minister, but what comes with this job is not simply the right to sit on the government side of the parliamentary chamber, or fly all around the world big noting oneself. World leaders at the G20 may look on him with some element of suspicion, and the conversations may well be polite at best. He is trying to be the cool ‘with it’ PM, but all he seems to be achieving is coming across as the nerd who thinks he’s cool, and thinks it’s cool to share a laugh about a US President and how stupid he was.

Kev needs to sit back and think about how lucky he is that he is getting phone calls from a US President or any President for that matter.

If Rudd gets a warm reception from President Obama, he needs to thank his lucky stars that he hasn’t cut of his nose to spite his face.

Enjoy your day

Stimulus packages are are all the rage. Every swish, forward thinking government has one. If you don’t have one you simply must get one. The simple fact here is that if your country needs one, then it’s a country one step away from heading towards the financial shitter. The encouraging thing is, almost every country is in that same shitter, and if the ship goes down, we might as well all go down together.

An interesting, sometimes amusing, but even more disturbing aspect to all this, is the amount of critics that judge these stimulus packages as either being very good or very bad. We hear everything, from the packages being seen as too small, and nowhere near big enough to stimulate a fly, let alone an economy, to cries that governments are spending way too much and will make the problem worse. It gets back to the old saying ‘You can’t please all the people all the time.’ It also begs me to wonder that if these so called ‘critics’ have harsh words to say about how things are being handled, then why aren’t they clever enough to get inside the ear of those that govern and put in practical measures to get us all on the right track?

Why aren’t they? Because, in truth, no one has the foggiest idea of what the hell is going on here, because no one has even seen a world economy go through freefall like this in eighty years. We all ‘think’ we know how to fix it, but in essence, we don’t know. Gordon Brown, Barack Obama, Nicholas Sarkozy, Angel Merkel, Kevin Rudd, and every other government leader knows that if they don’t do something then their economies will tank, and tank very quickly. They know that their respective economies are like someone who has just lapsed into unconsciousness, and they need to get some life back into them before they die, so they use their basic ‘CPR’ skills to resucitate. Will it work? It may, it may not. But they are happy in the knowledge that everyone else in the world has no clue either and they are all fighting over which straws to clutch.

Many Europeans say a U.S. failure to oversee and regulate its financial system more carefully was the factor that led to the global economic crisis, and they now bristle at being told what policies their governments should follow.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=101777051

President Barack Obama had probably the quickest political honeymoon in history, but then again, I don’t think he wanted a honeymoon. Europe is already sneering at the US ahead of the G20 Summit, and Obama must be feeling like he is back in the school yard when the kids give you that look for something you didn’t do and you say’ “What did I do?” Arms will be crossed, frowns will be permanently in place, and attitudes will be thick with ridicule. But to say it is all America’s fault is a little precious. All of us had something to do with this, and from what I hear over and over again, this mess was basically a result of under-regulation, and a severe lack of oversight. Newer governments are being blamed for the mess left by their predecessors, and political opponents are always the ones with the amazing ideas and the best policies…when they are in opposition. Things change when you win government.

I personally believe that each individual government has a chance to prove their worth in all this. If the finance and treasury teams can pull us out of this mess, then as far as I am concerned, they deserve every accolade that we can give them. People that we should not be listening to are former finance and treasury officials who have overseen proceedings over the last 10 years. They saw this coming and they did nothing. This is particularly true of former Australian Treasurer Peter Costello and US Treasury spokesperson, Henry Paulson. Paulson drove the first, and the Bush administration’s last ‘bailout’, which was to the banks, but it was that simple concept of not regulating these institutions that caused Paulsen to act in the first place. As for Peter Costello, he was Australian Treasurer from 1996-2007. Costello definitely saw this coming, but was silent on the issue for all of those 11 and a half years. He sat on a budget surplus and spent very little, and now we need to spend money to save our bacon. We can at least thank him for hiding all that cash under the bed. We need it now as we jump start this ailing economy.

The politics of fear are alive and well, and the stories of woe are big. The media love to beef up the bad stuff, but what we should take from all this is a three step key to keeping ourselves financially stable.

1. Spend only what you can afford.

2. Invest wisely.

3. Self regulate.

These seem to be the ‘big three’ when it comes to this crisis. We all spent more than we could afford, investments were not wise ( i.e Bernie Madoff) and no one was watching the register; we failed to regulate. Although if you belong to Texas Congressman Ron Paul’s theory, then let’s do away with regulation all together and let everything crumble. Out of the ashes we will survive. See what I mean, everyone has a different idea.

While things in the economy truly are bad, this is not simply about reporting the truth; it’s about representing that truth in the most responsible way. A media that is too much in love with stories that bleed is capable of making the recession worse than it has to be.

http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/0204/p09s02-coop.html

Very true. This thing is bad enough. Don’t make it worse.

Enjoy your day

When is the Catholic Church heirachy ever going to be called to account for their own crimes against humanity. This week saw a Catholic Cardinal excommunicate the mother and the doctors of a nine year old girl, after they went ahead with aborting the foetuses that grew inside of her as a result of rape.

Cardinal Giovanni Batista Re believed that the unborn twins being carried by the nine year old, and I quote, “had the right to live and could not be eliminated.” If you are not shocked and appalled by the decision by now, you are simply not human.

Brazil only allows abortion in the case of rape and when the pregnancy poses a threat to the mother and/or the child. This couldn’t be more clear. The girl was raped by her stepfather and doctors had obvious concerns about what carrying twins full term would do to the child’s health. What this case demonstrates is the humanity and compassion of the doctors and the lack of any humanity on the part of Cardinal Re, and the heirachy of the Catholic Church. To say I am angered is an understatement and this form of public condemnation is the least I can do.

The girl was raped by her stepfather. Was he excommunicated? Of course not, and here is why:

Jose Cardoso Sobrinho, the conservative regional archbishop for Pernambuco where the girl was rushed to hospital, has said that the man would not be thrown out of the Church, because although he had allegedly committed “a heinous crime”, the Church took the view that “the abortion, the elimination of an innocent life, was more serious”.

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/world-news/church-excommunicates-mother-of-9yearold-rape-victim-ndash-but-not-accused-rapist-14218389.html

Rub your eyes and read it again and again if you have to. Those words are there in black and white. A rapist stays within the fold of the Catholic Church, but a doctor who cares deeply about the health and wellbeing of a little girl is excommunicated and shut out from his church. It doesn’t get any more pathetic and embarrassing for the church than this.

Or maybe it can. The current Pope, Ratzinger I, has also made his own faux pas this week, by reinstating a number of Bishops from the ultra right wing group ‘St Pius X’. This is a group of priestly nutters who still believe that we should be attending Mass in Latin, and that it is still 1945. The Second Vatican Council meant nothing to them, and they have refused to tow the party line. Pope John Paul II excommunicated them and their founder Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, twenty years ago. Now we find that this pontiff wants them back in. Surprise surprise. Whilst he was Cardinal, Joseph Ratzinger was nothing short of an inquisitor who made it his place to witchhunt every dissenting voice he could find, and used his powers freely. Now we find, as Pope, he is rewarding those who have done nothing but divide communities and offend people at every turn. What makes this reinstatement even more potent is that one particular Bishop, Richard Williamson, has denied certain aspects of the holocaust, which therefore goes against what the Second Vatican Council said in 1964:

Furthermore, in her rejection of every persecution against any man, the Church, mindful of the patrimony she shares with the Jews and moved not by political reasons but by the Gospel’s spiritual love, decries hatred, persecutions, displays of anti-Semitism, directed against Jews at any time and by anyone.

‘Nostra Aetate ‘ (Declaration on the Relation of the Church with Non-Christian Religions) , Vatican Council II, 1965

Surely a Pope with a history of being in the Hilter Youth would steer well away from someone like that. But instead he embraces him and all his views. Makes us all now wonder whether we really do believe that Joseph Ratzinger was forced into the Hilter Youth or whether he actually had a jolly good time there.

The Vatican said Saturday that Benedict rehabilitated the four as part of his efforts to bring Lefebvre’s Society of St. Pius X back into the Vatican’s fold.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/01/24/bishop-richard-williamson_n_160598.html

Isn’t it amazing how certain favoured sections of the Catholic Church, namely the ultra right wing, have generously been cut some slack in relation to their transgressions. This Pope has obviously bent over backwards to grant them concessions and do anything he can to get them back snuggled beneath the bosom of Mother Church. But those with more liberal, or should I say, human views, are cut loose by the church and made a spectacle of. It is a crime, even according to the definition of ‘Crimes Against Humanity.’

“are particularly odious offences in that they constitute a serious attack on human dignity or grave humiliation or a degradation of one or more human beings.

This girl, if the Cardinal had his way, would have been forced to go through a pregnancy at nine years old, which in itself would have irreparably damaged her young body internally, not to mention the fact that she would always know that what is inside her is the result of abuse, which would scar her mentally if the rape itself has not done that already. She would then have to go through the pain of giving birth to not one, but two children. To even suggest that she go through that, and to disregard her physical and mental wellbeing, is ‘humiliation’ and ‘degradation’, and a ’serious attack on human dignity.’

 In essence, I am at a loss to understand the logic of this entity called the Catholic Church, but I do find this present Pontiff the absolute wrong choice to lead the church into the 21st Century. I had close associations with the church some twenty years ago, and I find it more conservative now than it was then, and that is frightening. Pope John XXIII commenced the Second Vatican Council back in 1962 and firmly believed that he needed to ‘open the windows of the church and let some fresh air in.’ What we have seen since, especially in the last twenty years, and in particular since the election of ‘God’s Rottweiler’ as head of the church, is a massive effort to close all the windows Pope John opened up. It is a shame, not to mention a snub, to all those courageous men and women who stepped up to the challenge in the the conservative late 1950’s and early 1960’s, and stood up for progress and forward thinking.

Just like it is not inappropriate to say to Israel that what they did to the Palestinians in Gaza a month ago was wrong, it is also time we made serious complaints to human rights groups about how the Catholic Church treats its people. In Matthew’s Gospel there is a very simple quote attributed to Jesus.

“Whatsoever you do to the least of these, you do unto me.’ (Matthew 25:40).

Put these two incidences into the context of the words of Jesus and see where you sit.

Enjoy your day

Please remind me, there is an economic downturn, yes? Economic stimulus packages are being put together quicker than I can make a sandwich. Banks and financial institutions are being slammed day after day for creating what has become the biggest financial mess since God knows when. So what do we hear in the last couple of days? CEO’s of two major corporations being rewarded with the very thing that got us all into this mess in the first place; massive retirement packages and pay rises that could buy a small island nation. Something tells me we ain’t learning nothing here.

A few days ago, we received the news that the CEO of Pacific Brands, Sue Morphett, is to receive a 170% pay rise. No, I haven’t got it wrong. I did write 170%! Now that wouldn’t be so bad, except Pacific Brands has just made a whole heap of people redundant. Why? Well, I suppose they couldn’t afford to keep employing them. Things are tough, you know. But hang on. If the company can’t afford to keep paying people, then where did Sue Morphett’s pay rise come from? No, you don’t need to have a Ph.D in Economics to see that, at the expense of her employees, Ms. Morphett has pocketed the money she couldn’t pay them!

Australia’s top union boss has launched a scathing attack on the chief executive of Pacific Brands, labelling her 170% pay hike last year “obscene” and a “corporate crime”.

It’s been revealed the total remuneration for Pacific Brands’ 13 directors more than doubled last year as the company planned to sack more than 1800 workers.

Chief executive Sue Morphet’s pay jumped from $685,775 to $1.86 million.

http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/articles/2009/02/27/1235237880074.html

But hold on. Ms. Morphett’s employees are not going away empty handed. They will get a handsome redundancy package. One such employee was ever so willing to share his financial joy.

FORTY-THREE years ago Ray Wade started work on the knitting machine at the Bonds factory in Wentworthville. This week, he was made redundant. His whole working life ended, unexpectedly, reduced to a payment of $200,000.

http://www.smh.com.au/national/ray-wade-43-years-200000-payout-20090226-8j9b.html

That’s alright isn’t it? Morphett receives $1,174, 225 and Mr. Wade receives $200,000. Gee, I don’t know why people are jumping up and down! Sounds fair to me! This is simple hard proof that the high end of town still do not care less about the little guy, and the economic problems affecting ordinary citizens does not even register on their radar. Unions are up in arms, as they should be, and are preparing some tough action to bring this CEO to her knees. But she will just wipe that off as union thuggery. Well, it’s no different from the corporate thuggery that she has demonstrated in accepting this massive pay rise.

But enough of Ms. Morphett. Let’s turn our gaze to Mr. Sol Trujillo, CEO of Telstra. Mr. Trujillo has been heading Telstra since 2005 and is now heading back to the United States to live a happy and contented retirement. That will be very easy for him once his $20,000,000 cheque clears.

OUTGOING Telstra boss Sol Trujillo will head home to the US with a payout estimated at more than $20 million.

The man who boasted about personally axing 10,000 Telstra jobs will quit as CEO in June.

Telstra’s share price has slumped from just over $5 when Mr Trujillo took over the company in 2005 to yesterday’s price of $3.68 – a decline of more than 25 per cent.

Mum and dad shareholders who bought T2 shares for $7.40 are way below the price they were enticed to buy the shares and barely breaking even on the $3.60 T3 float.

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,25113002-664,00.html

If a ‘golden handshake’ is meant to be a reward for what one has done for the company, then what has Trujillo done, apart from axe jobs, destroy shareholder profits and watch the share price plummet by 25%?

US President Barack Obama’s stimulus package, as with Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s, centres around creating jobs. I am no economist, but the word ’stimulus’ conjures up images of ‘arousal’, ’stirring’, and ‘awakening’. It was the greed of the corporate world and their hunger to keep as much money for themselves, or to create as much personal wealth as they could, that got us into this mess in the first place. Governments all around the world are now patching up the mismanagement of the past and, God forbid, making the wealthy start to pay a little more, as they have the funds to take up the slack more than the average worker.

What these two CEO’s in particular are showing to us is that they still don’t care. But what is more frightening is the conservatives of the political world are jumping up and down and arguing against putting money into infrastructure such as Health and Education. They want to see a continuation of tax cuts for the wealthy, as they see a ‘trickle down’ effect, which will eventually get to the less fortunate. Well, you tell me how a 170% pay rise and a golden handshake of $20 Million is going to trickle down to anyone except the immediate family of both these CEO’s.

Just like the latest efforts to reduce carbon emissions are landing on critical ears of the wealthiest businesses, so it seems is their role in stimulating our economy. The wealthy are looking after the wealthy, and the poor and middle class are left to fend for themselves.

“It’s obscene,” ACTU(Australian Council of Trade Unions) president Sharan Burrow told ABC Television.

“Corporate Australia, it would seem, has lost its moral compass.”

Ms Burrow said the Bonds owner was cynically moving offshore to increase profits, despite receiving $15 million from taxpayers over the past two years to reskill and retool.

“It’s a crime, it’s a corporate crime, there’s no doubt about that.”

http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/articles/2009/02/27/1235237880074.html

The rot needs to stop. And only governments and lawmakers can make that happen. President Obama rode in on a wave of ‘changing the way things are done in Washington.’ Corporate heads need to be put on notice, no matter how powerful they are, and be made to justify any form of pay rise or retirement pay out. If our governments don’t do this for us, then, as former Australian Prime Minister Paul Keating stated in 1986, we are in danger of becoming a Banana Republic, because the elite will call the shots and will continue to have control over the lives and the financial future of not only this country, but many others.

If that happens, then God help us.

Enjoyyour day