tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31127480378185998502024-03-12T18:25:54.460-07:00WOMAN in LABOURA Personally Political Journey as
an Ordinary Member of the
Australian Labor Party (and then a former Member).Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.comBlogger67125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-30834300402003837502015-11-13T05:24:00.000-08:002015-12-19T00:55:18.241-08:00WHITE AUSTRALIA and TOM ROBERTS 2015<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
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<span style="color: purple; font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><b>One can choose to be superstitious. Today is Friday the 13th. but I am not going to believe it is unlucky.</b></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">How could I forget arriving in Melbourne at </span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Tullamarine Airport, our family were the last of the ten pound poms(actually by then it was 300 pounds a family!), on Friday 13th, 1978. </span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">Unlucky for some, not for me: I have the priviledge of being White. Little did my 14year old self know I was perfect for maintaining white Western Civilisation...</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /><i>I had experienced a little of the fear generated by National Front thugs at a teenage disco in Birmingham, a good excuse for a young man to steer me away from their assault into the hall to cause strife to get closer to him in the long grass where nobody would see us....</i></span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><b><i>I came away intact and the National Front which was forming in Australia was out of my outer-suburban radar. Link: </i></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><b><a href="https://hatfulofhistory.wordpress.com/category/britishness/" target="_blank">National Front of the Commonwealth</a></b></span><br />
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<b>Kyneton, Victoria - First home-owners thanks to Victorian State Government loan for low-income</b></div>
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<b>citizens (like writers and puppeteers!)</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><b>I didn't know anything about the first indigenous people of Australia - they weren't mentioned in the film shown to us at Australia House in Manchester to prepare us for emigrating. </b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><b>Mum had told me about Yvonne Goolagong - a Wimbledon champion.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><b>In later years Mum said when she was sent to a New South Wales orphanage at Thurgoona near Albury in 1950. </b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><b><i>It was a brutal experience, but at least they were white...the aboriginal kids got it worse...</i></b></span></div>
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<b style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-large;"><i>What all the black and white "orphans" of Church and State were useful to White Australia for, was their hard labour around local hearths and farms.</i></b></div>
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<b style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-large;"><i>(which they received no wage for).</i></b></div>
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<b style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-large;"><i><u>CLEAN SKINS</u></i></b></div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-xOzbtyDRqNY/VkXbO-3qiWI/AAAAAAAAUq4/OJ8aprqAnQA/s1600/Tom%2BRoberts.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-xOzbtyDRqNY/VkXbO-3qiWI/AAAAAAAAUq4/OJ8aprqAnQA/s1600/Tom%2BRoberts.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Shearing the Rams by Tom Roberts - special exhibition at National Gallery Canberra<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://mpegmedia.abc.net.au/rn/podcast/2015/09/bbg_20150906_0805.mp3" target="_blank">PODCAST ON STOLEN WAGES - WA 2015</a></span></b><br />
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<span style="color: red; font-size: large;">ALL QUIET ON THE OPPOSITION BENCH - NO WORDS OF CONCERN FOR THE PREVENTABLE DEATH OF AN IRANIAN REFUGEE ON CHRISTMAS ISLAND THIS WEEK.</span></div>
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<span style="color: red; font-size: large;">LEST WE FORGET WE ARE A SIGNATORY TO THE UNITED NATIONS HUMAN RIGHTS CONVENTIONS - Hang on isn't that where Fremantle MP used to work? <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/nov/12/melissa-parke-labor-cannot-support-the-deliberate-cruelty-of-current-asylum-seeker-policy" target="_blank">LABOR'S LONE VOICE against cruel refugee treatment, Melissa Parke.</a></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "courier new" , "courier" , monospace;"><b> <span style="background-color: #f3f3f3; color: #333333; font-size: 1.465em; line-height: 27px;">Australia's treatment of asylum seekers has been heavily criticised by the United Nations' Human Rights Council in Geneva.</span></b></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "courier new" , "courier" , monospace;"><b>It coincides with a renewed push within the Federal Opposition to close the detention centres on Nauru and Manus Island.</b></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "courier new" , "courier" , monospace;"><b>Labor MP Melissa Parke will present a motion to today's caucus meeting in Canberra, demanding an end to offshore processing unless an appropriate standard of care can be provided.</b></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "courier new" , "courier" , monospace;"><b>Melissa Parke joins Fran Kelly on <span style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">RN Breakfast</span>.</b></span></i></div>
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One less Labor MP not a bastard.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-pBRDZ6XLT_8/VkVB9tAaLJI/AAAAAAAAUp8/VRuU1VR4ZfE/s1600/Laura.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="331" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-pBRDZ6XLT_8/VkVB9tAaLJI/AAAAAAAAUp8/VRuU1VR4ZfE/s640/Laura.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">15,000 years ago Aboriginal people started to paint and commemorate their lives, leaving a legacy of Rock Art at Laura (Quinkan), near Cooktown, Qld.</td></tr>
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This Friday morning Fran from ABCRN Breakfast Radio reminded me it was the last day to submit (in 50 words or less) which Australian artist I would get to paint an Australian politician and I could get a trip to Canberra for the TOM ROBERTS exhibition at the National Gallery.<br />
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THE ABC is my artery delivering factual, intelligent discussions, and cross-fertilisation of the arts.<br />
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THIS IS WHAT I WROTE:<span style="color: purple; font-size: large;"><i> My fantasy is Canberra, with Catherine Abel, Painter of sensually bold women to study the Senator for S.A. Penny Wong, a consummate politician and leader for gay marriage.</i></span><br />
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<span class="s1"><span style="color: purple; font-size: large;"><i>Tom Roberts would approve of contemporary representation of a State noted for its artistic and progressive values.</i></span></span></div>
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LINK TO<br />
<a href="http://www.pennywong.com.au/maiden-speech/" target="_blank">PENNY WONG MAIDEN SPEECH</a> <br />
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Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-39466289077078971132015-10-09T15:14:00.000-07:002016-02-10T18:11:40.155-08:00BILL SHORTEN & I<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>READING DAVID MARR'S QUARTERLY ESSAY ABOUT LABOR LEADER<br />BILL SHORTEN - FACTION MAN </b></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">I spent the late teenage years in suburban Melbourne transitioning from Pom to Australian citizen, which is why I liked reading about the Labor Leader Bill Shorten's formative years.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">I WANT TO LIKE HIM. David Marr says Shorten scored Brownie Points for his rapport and recruitment of young people at Monash University. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">The energy and idealism of youth, yes! I was a Pied Piper too - at school was voted Student Rep and organiser for live bands and discos!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">While Bill was recruiting a new generation of ALP members and attracting Prominent and Influential Party figures to his fundraising events, I was a new Australian oblivious to all which wasn't in front of me...I booked </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">La Femme to play Huntingdale High in 1980 </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">after seeing them perform in Melbourne's </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">thriving new wave/ pub /music scene(no ID then).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">ACTU President Bob Hawke wanted to be my man too, as I was turning 18 and could vote for the first time.</span><br />
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Uvo1lstvFqI/VrvW58LdqRI/AAAAAAAAWLs/ZOfPshv3I7E/s1600/Bob_Hawke_Portrait_1983.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Uvo1lstvFqI/VrvW58LdqRI/AAAAAAAAWLs/ZOfPshv3I7E/s200/Bob_Hawke_Portrait_1983.jpg" width="134" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">1982 was a defining year - suffering from undiagnosed Depression, I left an office job which I thought was killing my soul. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">My tears of despair at hearing it would take 6 weeks to receive the dole, created compassion in the Centrelink officer and I kept a roof over my head.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">I heard the call to action by Bob Hawke. His message was hopefull, but I was turned away as I hadn't registered to vote! Nobody had told me, but I still had some benefit from a Labor Government in the Commonwealth Employment Scheme.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">THE BUZZ WORD OF THE 1980'S - NETWORK! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">On the tight-rope of a fringe existence in St.Kilda I was attracted to a theatre poster which led me into helping form a Youth Arts component of <span style="color: red;">Fringe Network, </span></span><br />
<span style="color: red; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">a resource for artists.</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: small;">IDENITITY POLITICS AS MELOURNE FRINGE</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">Based in Brunswick St. Fitzroy the C.E.P. provided 6 month wages, and sent off to learn how to touch-type!</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-1xqYmFznx0A/VrvEbL8YpqI/AAAAAAAAWLU/cnbrp24OL7g/s1600/flying%2Bfringe.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-1xqYmFznx0A/VrvEbL8YpqI/AAAAAAAAWLU/cnbrp24OL7g/s1600/flying%2Bfringe.jpeg" /></a></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">I was flying high as Fringe Network Secretary/Board Director/Arts administrator and Festival Programmer and Performance Poet!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="color: red;">Shorten created NETWORK too, a youth faction of Young Labor at Monash. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="color: red;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-size: large;">ALL THAT GLITTERS IN THE IRISH DNA from the Goldfields of Ballarat to the Coal Mines of Ipswich.</span><br />
I met my husband at the first Melbourne Fringe Festival of 1983 and we became Partners in Puppetry. link here:<br /><br />
When Premier Joh and his cronies had left main stage in Queensland and Wayne Goss was the Labor man in charge we headed North for health and economic prospects. We felt at home in working-class Ipswich, but moved out into the Brisbane Valley because Roy wanted to plant trees.<br />
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THEN, Pauline Hanson scared us....We had to do our bit to fight Racism and Right wing haranguing by force of Reason and Humanism.<br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">Something which was a revelation was ALP/DLP history. Many local branch ALP members were Roman Catholics like Bill Shorten. </span><br />
<span style="color: red; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">I went to Frank Hardy's<i> Power without Glory </i>for a literary summary of those post-war clashing of ideologies!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif; font-size: large;">Bill's often going on about talking up Labor values for working people/families, but I was always puzzled by the Party not winning the participation of Unemployed workers.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">Treasurer Wayne Swann ruled out the unemployed getting an extra $50.00 per week and Bill doesn't see that social democracy means building the party with victims of the worst of Capitalism.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">Journalist David Marr opens his essay with the most important word in Politics, </span><span style="color: red; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">The Numbers.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">I wouldn't read Machievelli's </span><span style="color: red; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">The Prince</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;"> until Tory Tony Abbott became Prime Minister so now as I read the </span><span style="color: red; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">Quarterly Essay </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">I wonder if Leader of the Opposition Shorten has a knot of guilt about anything, and I guess that's what the Royal Commission into Trade Unions has been trying to find out with $80million of tax-payers money for Tory Tony's dirty digging.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">How corrupted does an M.P's Conscience get?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">I<i>f the means justify the ends, the silence by The Left and Right of the ALP on human rights violations towards asyslum seekers is abhorrent.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i> Australia's Immigration "Border Force" actions and contracted Security operators off-shore detention behaviour is something they can live with for the pay packet, power and privileges, from Superannuation to gifting each other thousands of dollars for each others campaigns.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i> Silence is sinister not golden.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>Right Faction Labor man Bill Shorten with a Docklands political pedigree has been given the schooling and entre to the business networks via Unions and marriage.</i></span><br />
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<i style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif; font-size: x-large;"> Becoming a <span style="color: red;">Friend of Israel </span>is something I didn't learn about in the elective of HSC Politics. but I have learned about it via observations with my local MP Shayne Neumann when he was part of a debate about ALP policy on Palestine.<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-NgpKSWaBoWo/Vrvedty9tFI/AAAAAAAAWL8/mEPBK-RZe7I/s1600/Shorten%2Band%2Bshayne.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-NgpKSWaBoWo/Vrvedty9tFI/AAAAAAAAWL8/mEPBK-RZe7I/s320/Shorten%2Band%2Bshayne.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">What does it take to be a Politician? And to what end do you use the Power for?<br />Shayne Neumann MP for Blair and Bill Shorten MP in Ipswich Queensland during a Flood Insurance Inquiry.<br /></td></tr>
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<i style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif; font-size: x-large;">Kurt Vonnegut </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #351330; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 23.25px;"> author of </span><em style="background-color: white; color: #351330; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 23.25px; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px;">God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater</em><span style="background-color: white; color: #351330; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 23.25px;"> (aka </span><em style="background-color: white; color: #351330; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 23.25px; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px;">Pearls Before Swine</em><span style="background-color: white; color: #351330; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 23.25px;">), wasn't on my reading list either. My husband has read widely and offered this relevant to our understanding.</span><br />
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“The what?”</div>
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The Money River, where the wealth of the nation flows. We were born on the banks of it. We can slurp from that mighty river to our hearts’ content. And we even take slurping lessons, so we can slurp more efficiently.</div>
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“Slurping lessons?”</div>
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From lawyers! From tax consultants! We’re born close enough to the river to drown ourselves and the next ten generations in wealth, simply using dippers and buckets. But we still hire the experts to teach us the use of aqueducts, dams, reservoirs, siphons, bucket brigades, and the Archimedes’ screw. And our teachers in turn become rich, and their children become buyers of lessons in slurping.</div>
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“It’s still possible for an American to make a fortune on his own.”</div>
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Sure—provided somebody tells him when he’s young enough that there is a Money River, that there’s nothing fair about it, that he had damn well better forget about hard work and the merit system and honesty and all that crap, and get to where the river is. ‘Go where the rich and powerful are,’ I’d tell him, ‘and learn their ways. They can be flattered and they can be scared. Please them enormously or scare them enormously, and one moonless night they will put their fingers to their lips, warning you not to make a sound. And they will lead you through the dark to the widest, deepest river of wealth ever known to man. You’ll be shown your place on the riverbank, and handed a bucket all your own. Slurp as much as you want, but try to keep the racket of your slurping down. A poor man might hear.</div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="color: red;">Another thing Bill Shorten and I have is visiting Victorian State MP for Oakleigh, Race Matthews.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="color: red;">I had been to his office as a 17 year old homeless student in fear I wouldn't be able to stay at school. He put me in touch with a local youth worker and not long after I had a room in a house which supported my Year 12 study.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">I would have been a good candidate for being a mere member of the ALP, even to hand me a pamphlet.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">Bill Shorten showed more promise. He had formed a </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i> In the school holidays I worked with Mum and the middle-aged, menopausal Greek women clocking on already in a sweat! </i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>Didn't see any Union organisers promising better working conditions in the heat of the metal sheds around Clayton.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>Marr shows what a men's club Shorten has risen from.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-15436660031305965082015-09-06T01:16:00.001-07:002015-09-15T16:31:19.791-07:00SWAN SONGS - Bomb the World w/lyrics<span style="font-size: large;">ALL I HEAR is the penetrating silence between bird chatter, and I am spooked - no harsh Super Hornet Jets flying over our house, test piloting, running fossil fuels, costing a fortune. </span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">On the <i>Insiders</i> Barrie Cassiday asks if Australia is going to bomb Syria and the Cabinet Member doesn't know, can't say...</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">I know, because my air-space is peaceful, which means theirs won't be.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">FLEE now, families of Syria. The psycopathic leaders have the God of Abraham snapping at their macho, hides. Go back to the Goddess origins or be a Humanist and free.</span><br />
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HAPPY FATHER'S DAY - TO ALL RAINBOW WARRIOR'S OUT THERE IN FORCE!<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">From the day I became an active member of the ALP I was alerting the influential to make our party more attractive to young people, then there was Kevin 07...popular by young and the baby-boomers(even though he did the Sunday church PR).</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">The Greens shouldn't be slagged off, that is an insult to members like me, who are Green Labor - care about inhumane treatment of other sentient beings. </span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">There was no agreement from the office blokes of the Right, didn't agree with me, including then Queensland State Secretary Anthony Chisolm who is now comfortably heading for the Senate.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">Too many times, I shook my head in disbelief. I respected them as comrades, but sensed the ambition for power was widening the gap between us.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">I have been inspired by leaders Bob Brown, Christine Milne and now the new Leader making his mark: This interview should have been coming from a Labor Leader.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">Signing off into the baby boomer bolshie radical rainbow, secular humanist Enlightened GREEN band-wagon...</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">Based on the polling indicators I have a healthy gut feeling.</span></b></div>
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<a href="http://www.crikey.com.au/2015/09/07/poll-bludger-why-the-ageing-population-is-about-to-decimate-the-coalition/" target="_blank"><b><span style="font-size: large;">poll-bludger-why-the-ageing-population-is-about-to-decimate-the-coalition/</span></b></a></div>
<b><span style="font-size: large;">http://www.crikey.com.au/2015/09/07/poll-bludger-why-the-ageing-population-is-about-to-decimate-the-coalition/</span></b><br />
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">P.S. Human Rights Lawyer, Julian Burnside far more Honourable than the currient Parliamentarians of the Old Parties. <a href="http://www.julianburnside.com.au/refugee-resettlement-getting-the-facts-straight/#comment-13143" target="_blank">refugee-resettlement-getting-the-facts-straight</a></span></b><br />
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<br />Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-50488797356268689572015-07-22T16:51:00.001-07:002015-09-06T19:13:16.163-07:00POWER WITHOUT GLORY<div class="p1">
<span class="s1" style="font-size: large;">30 June 2015 - To Queensland Labor State Secretary - </span></div>
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<span class="s1" style="font-size: large;">(re-edited version)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span class="s1"></span> </span> <span style="color: purple;"><i><span style="font-size: large;"> </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Wished I'd voted for Albanese.</span><span style="font-size: large;">..</span></i></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-StLpXZMtAcA/VbCnUiurU0I/AAAAAAAASP8/7kREdxEYirI/s1600/%2Bmeeting%2BBill%2BShorten.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="236" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-StLpXZMtAcA/VbCnUiurU0I/AAAAAAAASP8/7kREdxEYirI/s320/%2Bmeeting%2BBill%2BShorten.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ipswich Trades Hall, with Bill Shorten.</td></tr>
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<span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Dear Evan, </span></div>
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<span class="s1" style="color: purple; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>Regretfully, I wish to resign from the ALP and request you stop the direct debit on my membership (2006-2015). </b></span><br />
<span class="s1" style="color: purple; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>On the whole I have enjoyed the experience, and would suggest to any person it is worthwhile being a participant in the political system.</b></span><br />
<span class="s1" style="color: purple; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b><br /></b></span></div>
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<span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I had to leave with failing mental ill health; haven’t got a tough enough shell to deal with my growing horror of the treatment of asylum seekers and refugees, breaching UN Conventions we signed in good faith(as a response to turning the Jews in the boats back to the Nazi's).</span><br />
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<span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">To not correct the Conservatives(Lib/Nats) on these principles is to be part of the breaches of international law on torture, and rights of the child. The Greens Senator Sara Hanson Young’s voice never fails to ease my bleedin’ Labor heart. </span><br />
<span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Maybe I'd be better with the Freemantle tribe? <a href="http://www.melissaparke.com.au/latest-news/694-fate-of-asylum-seekers-ignored-in-boats-turn-back-policy.html" target="_blank">http://www.melissaparke.com.au/latest-news/694-fate-of-asylum-seekers-ignored-in-boats-turn-back-policy.html</a> </span><br />
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<span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">When I was a member of the Federal Electoral Council(FEC Ipswich) I discovered our M.P. Shayne Neumann might be a terrific, hard-working member locally, but he was expressing views as hard-line as the Tories - discarding the rights of the individuals fleeing. </span><br />
<span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I spoke up, </span></div>
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<span class="s1" style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>“I know if I was stuck in an Indonesian camp with daily suffering and assaults on my body and dignity for more than a couple of years with no hope of a decent future I would take the gamble on a boat, wouldn’t you?” </b></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><i><br /></i></span></div>
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-e1hCP6gT2jo/VbIEJVxnAGI/AAAAAAAASTo/_Z9VjAVGt9U/s1600/Me.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-large; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="150" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-e1hCP6gT2jo/VbIEJVxnAGI/AAAAAAAASTo/_Z9VjAVGt9U/s200/Me.jpg" width="200" /></a><span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"></span><br />
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<span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">We cannot claim to have a foundation based on social justice whilst staying silent about the authoritarian regime growing like an invasive weed, a destructive Tory terror on our Egalitarian principles. </span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-0z9z56Ay51U/VbU_MsTE7OI/AAAAAAAASUs/ftnsUXODWIw/s1600/edit_parke.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="236" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-0z9z56Ay51U/VbU_MsTE7OI/AAAAAAAASUs/ftnsUXODWIw/s320/edit_parke.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: small;">Resilience & Courage admired in Freemantle MP Melissa Parkes speaking oath to Gov. General</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-size: small;">Mrs. Bryce, and PM Gillard.</span></b><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><br />Our racist White Australia Policy belonged to the 19th & 20th century. How do we tell our children it doesn't have a current influence? </span><a href="http://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=27196#.VbSEoROqqko" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-large;" target="_blank">OUT OF SIGHT OUT OF MIND ESSAY</a><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"> Highly Commended EUREKA award</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">How do politicians expect respect from voters when they show by their actions, <span style="color: red;">If you have money, even ill-gotten you can fly in and be free.</span></span><br />
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<span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Boat people are sub-human, demons - daring to defy our Sovereign Borders so we can persecute the persecuted, outa sight outa mind. </span><br />
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<span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Labor 4 Refugees soften the tyrannical edges, but not enough to contaminate the current ideologues of <i>deterrance via fear.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large; text-align: justify;">My capacity to push on regardless, continuing to be a solar light on the hill in the Brisbane Valley was finally done in by a deepening depression and disatisfaction of certain expectations on my role as Branch Secretary. </span></div>
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<span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-eX3CGPPQ2Kc/T54Ng_B5z5I/AAAAAAAAA9M/AbT5YPPWCF4/s1600/Top.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="263" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-eX3CGPPQ2Kc/T54Ng_B5z5I/AAAAAAAAA9M/AbT5YPPWCF4/s320/Top.jpg" width="320" /></a></span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Premier Bligh visits Fernvale After the Floods </td></tr>
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<span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Crikey, I was even censored, told to </span><br />
<span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">close the Somerset branch face book page - a wee bit paranoid about me speaking out of turn! We really needed some younger members... </span><br />
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<span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">The straw that broke me to the core was the thwarting of plans(by men) who were new and ambitious, changing the dynamics of the Branch. </span><br />
<span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I was perceiving their inputs as hurdles/barriers to my pure vision of shining only Labor women's light for an International Women's Day event - especially as Labor leader Annastacia Palaszczuk had accepted the invitation to come to Fernvale on that special day.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Like the turns of a kaleidescope I was stunned by the shifting hues taking place, until I became exasperated, and threw my Secretarial tools and papers in the air with histrionic effect. Why go out with a wimper? I was fuming.</span><br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-zqOk0x1YQI8/VbIJheBGPII/AAAAAAAASUA/iDLWmavz43w/s1600/zoonation-mad-hatter-41.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="176" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-zqOk0x1YQI8/VbIJheBGPII/AAAAAAAASUA/iDLWmavz43w/s200/zoonation-mad-hatter-41.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: large;">Shit happens in any group but there was a bit of history repeating itself. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Let me say that 80per cent of time has been great being a Labor Party member - many like minds with the goal for a brilliant Labor Government. </span></span><br />
<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">It was interesting to campaign for Fiona MacNamara for Wright, Neumann for Blair, Wayne Wendt in Ipswich West, then making sure every vote counts in the booth.</span></span><br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-s4iP8QCucwQ/VbIKjx4-1SI/AAAAAAAASUI/7n4RY2HPI-A/s1600/%2Bclimate%2Bfeb09.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="204" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-s4iP8QCucwQ/VbIKjx4-1SI/AAAAAAAASUI/7n4RY2HPI-A/s320/%2Bclimate%2Bfeb09.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Feb 2009 Fernvale Futures: Learning about Climate Change<br />
with Karey Harrison, Senator Claire Moore, Wayne Wendt MP</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: large;">Running a regular branch stall at our popular Fernvale Market meant getting to know the news and view of my neighbours, and helping them to solve their problems with their Parliamentary representative.</span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-tvSVQER4Lh8/T0hlgW9CsOI/AAAAAAAAA4I/pyHEDctXdqo/s1600/Mobile%2Boffice.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-tvSVQER4Lh8/T0hlgW9CsOI/AAAAAAAAA4I/pyHEDctXdqo/s320/Mobile%2Boffice.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Fernvale Markets</td></tr>
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<span style="font-size: large;">I would still recommend becoming an active member of the social democratic ideal of the Australian Labor Party. You learn about political process, and meet some inspiring people. </span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-E8wUcW1XUVY/VbIMicCCkbI/AAAAAAAASUU/RPEgGWMM8os/s1600/Dough%2BCameron%252C%2Bhousing.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="238" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-E8wUcW1XUVY/VbIMicCCkbI/AAAAAAAASUU/RPEgGWMM8os/s320/Dough%2BCameron%252C%2Bhousing.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: small;">Senator Doug Cameron in Ipswich for talks on Housing crisis</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-size: small;">though he shied away from removing the tax perk of Negative Gearing which had been shown not to work for the purpose it was designed for. Yes, he shied away, champion of the Left, entrenched in Power plays, and a comfortable office - his rhetoric on refugees now a ghost of his radical self...</span></b></td></tr>
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<span style="color: purple; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">Of course there is still so much to do - even with polling suggesting the population at large is of the view for autonomy in reproductive rights and access the best of us are thwarted by control my conscience freaks.</span><br />
<span style="color: purple; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><i>I regularly brought up the separation of powers principle where our Parliament should stop voting on social issues like theocrats. </i></span><br />
<span style="color: purple; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">The abortion case where Deputy Roman Catholic Premier Paul Lucas were firm - don't let the Cairns couple who used the safe self-administering abortion pill open Pandora's Box. </span><br />
<span style="color: purple; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">It was a blight on the Bligh Government.</span><br />
<span style="color: purple; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">The policy platform is secular - abortion should be out of the criminal code - it is a health issue.<a href="http://www.theage.com.au/it-pro/abortion-case-proves-need-for-law-change-20101017-16p0u.html" target="_blank">pro/abortion-case-proves-need-for-law-change-2010</a></span><br />
<span style="color: purple; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: purple; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">I thought it was great to participate in regional conferences and meet, ask questions of various ALP MP's and apparatchik: At Ipswich Trades Hall, during the Bligh Labor Governance, The Deputy Premier and <i>Minister for my Health,couldn't be convinced that as women who manage our own reproductive issues from 10-60, it was an insult to be under the Criminal Code from England in the 1860's! </i></span><br />
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<span class="s1"><span style="color: purple; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Chaplains should be in Sunday schools not State schools. Or is there a secret Christian army being built for the end of times?</span></span><br />
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<span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I felt so much better when I made the decision to quit the party. My conflicting inner-self was less inflamed. I'm a cheer-leader for Premier Annastacia but disappointed on the Gallilea Basin coal con- job, proposed by the Adani company.</span><br />
<span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">We now discover Adani has employed former Labor party staff and members to lobby Ministers on their behalf! The company had misled everybody by it's 10,000 jobs headliner, which apparently was going to be worth sacrificing the Great Barrier Reef for. </span><br />
<span class="s1" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">It smells like rotten eggs. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">The self-interest cycle perpetuates itself and we all suffer by it. </span></div>
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<span class="s1" style="font-size: large;">I will sign off now and wind down my blogging as a former apparatchik.</span></div>
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<span class="s1" style="font-size: large;">Julie McNeill</span><br />
<span class="s1" style="font-size: large;">former Secretary, Wivenhoe/Somerset branch</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"> </span>my editorial for The Gatton Star</div>
<span class="s1" style="font-size: large;"> </span><span class="s1">and sewing improvisations</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ZhGjyDg6DR4/UQxSGLXnvZI/AAAAAAAAJ1w/p-mjh72_sN0/s1600/Wivenhoe%2BALP.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ZhGjyDg6DR4/UQxSGLXnvZI/AAAAAAAAJ1w/p-mjh72_sN0/s320/Wivenhoe%2BALP.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Labor Day Ipswich March - to show our solidarity - all of our branch members were proud<br />
Unionists, except me, being unemployed.<br />
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<span style="font-size: small;">Wivenhoe branch founder Virginia Clarke campaigning for Nanango</span></td></tr>
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Branch meetings on Saturday arvo at member's homes and roving along the valley between Fernvale and Esk.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-toRhTLfixZc/UFHA5BRKQCI/AAAAAAAABME/RZ6zOOKsg8c/s1600/Meeting%2Bat%2BCraig%2BHoopers%2BApril%2B09.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-toRhTLfixZc/UFHA5BRKQCI/AAAAAAAABME/RZ6zOOKsg8c/s320/Meeting%2Bat%2BCraig%2BHoopers%2BApril%2B09.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">At front is Life Member Stan in company with visitors & neighbours Hon. Bill Hayden</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">& Dallas Hayden, They shared many campaigns together in the former Oxley.</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: red;">Convivial, stimulating conversations among</span></span><br />
<span style="color: red; font-size: large;"> Comrades.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-PDL--jevoLQ/UFAJhwI_WrI/AAAAAAAABJk/F7zxu_S2vL4/s1600/VIP%2527s.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-PDL--jevoLQ/UFAJhwI_WrI/AAAAAAAABJk/F7zxu_S2vL4/s320/VIP%2527s.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Fed MP Shayne Neumann with President Peter Arndt & State MP Wayne Wendt<br />
at monthly branch meetings.</td></tr>
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Wivenhoe branch meetings convivivial comraderie.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-hGrL3JmTsgs/UFAKCYrzFoI/AAAAAAAABJs/5RcMV5WsfkE/s1600/Members%2BWivenhoe%2B09.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="214" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-hGrL3JmTsgs/UFAKCYrzFoI/AAAAAAAABJs/5RcMV5WsfkE/s320/Members%2BWivenhoe%2B09.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Wivenhoe branch Founding member VIP Kim Travers swan-song to new CPSU<br />
organiser job in Melbourne.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-FcD2796lnnk/VbFiNxN1pQI/AAAAAAAASSU/Oqf0G1Dtmsg/s1600/%2B2%253A12%253A09.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="256" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-FcD2796lnnk/VbFiNxN1pQI/AAAAAAAASSU/Oqf0G1Dtmsg/s320/%2B2%253A12%253A09.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Dinner for Wayne Goss anniversary of Labour return to Qld Govt.<br />
with Brisbane branch member Paleni Thevar</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-HFuu_6FsT50/VbFhp41JALI/AAAAAAAASSM/Q7nDJ0IHV5M/s1600/%2BGatton%2Bn%2BWivenhoe%2Bbranch.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="241" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-HFuu_6FsT50/VbFhp41JALI/AAAAAAAASSM/Q7nDJ0IHV5M/s400/%2BGatton%2Bn%2BWivenhoe%2Bbranch.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">From the Lockyer and Brisbane Valley, Janet and John and Julie<br />
JJJ</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-4pxnMvkRYEw/TxjJ1qyDb6I/AAAAAAAAA0c/h3YSrwzSNQQ/s1600/DSCF2523.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-4pxnMvkRYEw/TxjJ1qyDb6I/AAAAAAAAA0c/h3YSrwzSNQQ/s400/DSCF2523.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: small;">Fernvale Markets on a Sunday morning.</span></b></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-zp5qFpvdSUs/Vezw0Hsj7VI/AAAAAAAASzI/757eFZQHdjU/s1600/%2BSen.%2BMark%2BFurner.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-zp5qFpvdSUs/Vezw0Hsj7VI/AAAAAAAASzI/757eFZQHdjU/s320/%2BSen.%2BMark%2BFurner.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: small;">"Pollies, Pies & Poets" at Fernvale Bakery. Thom the Poet from Austin Texas reminisces<br />in Poetry being a Chermside Kid with fellow Chermside kid Senator Mark Furner.</span></b></td></tr>
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<span style="font-size: large;">M.P. for Ipswich West MEETING his <i>favourite </i>local constituent, Labor member and pro-choice activist outside Qld Parliament!</span><br />
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-U0EGJcolRQA/VbDEXTqmbgI/AAAAAAAASR4/-ZflXaTDR2Q/s1600/%2Bapology%2Bfor%2Bchild%2Bmigrants.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"></a><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Abortion debate. Qld Parliament with Anna Bligh as Premier.</td></tr>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-bn4U0ogo54E/TtLG2UhQAdI/AAAAAAAAApM/hkDP-ECHosA/s1600/IMG_1725.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-bn4U0ogo54E/TtLG2UhQAdI/AAAAAAAAApM/hkDP-ECHosA/s320/IMG_1725.JPG" width="320" /></a><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-YztdTjmR2nI/UFAMjGooyPI/AAAAAAAABKE/08spedMyvd4/s1600/Top.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="265" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-YztdTjmR2nI/UFAMjGooyPI/AAAAAAAABKE/08spedMyvd4/s400/Top.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">more wordsmithing for free - local news-papers:</span><br />
<br />
<b style="color: red; font-size: x-large;">KNOWLEGE IS POWER</b><br />
<span style="color: red; font-size: small;"><b><br /></b></span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-tnCFQY5r0TQ/Tu6gmsPxHnI/AAAAAAAAAuw/mgNAuU2cPlo/s1600/Paul%2BKeating.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-tnCFQY5r0TQ/Tu6gmsPxHnI/AAAAAAAAAuw/mgNAuU2cPlo/s320/Paul%2BKeating.jpg" width="216" /></a><br />
<br />
Remember when we had visionary politics?</td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: small;">A Creative Nation and Republic, plus a good fundraising dinner</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-size: small;">for Premier Anna Bligh. and an autograph for my poem!</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://woman-in-labour.blogspot.com.au/p/poetry-platter.html" target="_blank">ARTISTS FLIGHT FROM KENNETTS VICTORIA</a></span></b></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-KezQHcX-C6M/UGDRn_l-bkI/AAAAAAAABV0/N3GEFGQWw4g/s1600/Frederika%2BSteen%2Bon%2BRefugee%2BPolicy%2BMarch%2B2011.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-KezQHcX-C6M/UGDRn_l-bkI/AAAAAAAABV0/N3GEFGQWw4g/s320/Frederika%2BSteen%2Bon%2BRefugee%2BPolicy%2BMarch%2B2011.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">The truth about Refugee Policy with former Immigration officer, now refugee</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">advocate, Frederika Steen.</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-size: large;">Guest speakers</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Somerset Cr Jim Madden now Ipswich West M.P clarifies the Newman Govt.<br />
anti-Bikie laws at Esk meeting.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Q_Cm3Tv31ho/VbFz7QMI9lI/AAAAAAAASS0/Sv9NvL8sCIc/s1600/%2B2%2Bstate%2Bsolution%2Bpolicy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="267" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Q_Cm3Tv31ho/VbFz7QMI9lI/AAAAAAAASS0/Sv9NvL8sCIc/s320/%2B2%2Bstate%2Bsolution%2Bpolicy.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">David Ford bringing facts to the 2 State Solution Israel & Palestine policy branch table.<br />
at ALP Life Member Stan Walkers home.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">FERNVALE BOOTH with Greens volunteer</td></tr>
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<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"> THE LAST WORDS - THE AWFUL SILENCE AND SHAME OF IT ALL </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: red; font-size: large;"><b> REFLECTIONS OF A BLEEDIN' WATERMELON VIA WORTHY MEDIA TYPES.</b></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-3D2TptlisbU/VevxjzsekaI/AAAAAAAASyg/qXV98cQazAs/s1600/%2Bfascist.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-3D2TptlisbU/VevxjzsekaI/AAAAAAAASyg/qXV98cQazAs/s400/%2Bfascist.jpg" width="281" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">CALL IT FOR WHAT THE TORIES ARE MANIFESTING! IF NOT WHY NOT?</td></tr>
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<ol>
<li><span style="font-size: large;">CRIKEY</span>- Bernard Keane <a href="http://www.crikey.com.au/2015/07/23/labor-on-turnbacks-moral-conundrum-political-no-brainer/" target="_blank">National Conference Muse/labor-on-turnbacks-moral-conundrum-political-no-brain</a></li>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-LnKfjk6NSjA/VevySEDBToI/AAAAAAAASyo/8pOHj0Q0DAI/s1600/Dog%2Bon%2Bmoon.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-LnKfjk6NSjA/VevySEDBToI/AAAAAAAASyo/8pOHj0Q0DAI/s1600/Dog%2Bon%2Bmoon.jpg" /></a></div>
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<li><a href="http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-opinion/youve-been-misled-on-boat-people-here-are-the-facts-20130718-2q5rv.html" target="_blank">JULIAN BURNSIDE QC http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-opinion/youve-been-misled-on-boat-people-here-are-the-facts-20130718-2q5rv.html</a></li>
<li><br /></li>
<li><a href="http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2015/jul/24/fractured-factions-to-shortens-speech-five-things-to-watch-at-labor-conference" target="_blank">http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2015/jul/24/fractured-factions-to-shortens-speech-five-things-to-watch-at-labor-conference</a></li>
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<li><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Barry Jones, former MP and ALP President writes on the Oligarchy of the ALP</span></li>
<li><div class="p1">
<i><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://theconversation.com/the-decay-of-the-political-process-6079" target="_blank">https://theconversation.com/the-decay-of-the-political-process-6079</a></span></i></div>
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<a href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jul/30/labor-are-you-ready-to-clean-up-the-coming-asylum-seeker-trainwreck?CMP=soc_568" target="_blank">http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jul/30/labor-are-you-ready-to-clean-up-the-coming-asylum-seeker-trainwreck?CMP=soc_568</a><br />
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7.<span style="color: red; font-size: large;"><b> <a href="https://au.lifestyle.yahoo.com/marie-claire/news-and-views/world-reads/a/29167977/when-you-silence-doctors-and-nurses-you-re-getting-into-dangerous-territory/?cmp=st" target="_blank">when-you-silence-doctors-and-nurses-you-re-getting-into-dangerous-territory/?cmp=st</a></b></span><br />
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Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-62755139941127780902015-07-16T05:53:00.002-07:002015-07-18T15:57:38.292-07:00THE D.S.P. <b><span style="color: blue; font-size: large;"></span></b><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Patron Saint of Australia, Michael Leunig<br /></td></tr>
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<b><span style="color: blue; font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">APPLICATION FOR DISABILITY SUPPORT PENSION(DSP)</span></b></div>
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SHELL-SHOCKED</div>
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<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-large;"><i><br /></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In the post-psychosis after-life,</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I dissolved, so my husband </span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Supports me in sickness and </span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In health till death by a deep</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Depressive catastrophic sea-level </span></i></b><br />
<b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Rise,</span></i></b><br />
<b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Perhaps...</span></i></b></div>
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<b style="font-size: x-large;"><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></i></b></div>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">No malingerer, yet never good enough;</span></b></i><br />
<i><b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Tried to work as factory fodder, shop-girl,</span></b></i><br />
<i><b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Girl-Friday but after a time my mind</span></b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i>Was washed up on a different shore.</i></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i><br /></i></b></span>
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>My armour plates were shed </i><i> </i></span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>To sad/istic souls, feelings sunk</i></span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>Like buried news of crustaceans in our</i></span></b></div>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> Acid ocean, burned by brutal care-less Capital.</span></b></i></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I have to be a house-wife contained </span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As a sensitive flower, no longer an </span></i></b><br />
<b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angel </span></i></b><b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">of the house, </span></i></b><b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">or the morning,</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Bereft of protection against an overload</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Of Reason, critique and bullying tactics,</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Expectations everywhere like poisoned darts.</span></i></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b><i><br /></i></b></span></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So, I require poetry, beauty, and a </span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Garden, with landscape as if I was </span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Entitled through DNA, my birth-right,</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To feebly step, corseted, fragile</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Lady of aristocratic lineage</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Dependant on Man or Minister.</span></i></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b><i><br /></i></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i>If I'm sent off the grid to pauper status</i></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i>Resilience limited, reclusive in my</i></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i>Green valley, perpetual convalescence</i></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i>Shelled to an inch of flesh and heart,</i></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i>I curse the radio news</i></b></span><br />
<span style="color: red; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i>You Christian MP's will be damned and go to Hell!</i></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i><br /></i></b></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i>A Silent curse when a Commonwealth safety-net</i></b></span><br />
<b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>Is begrudgingly given in it's redistribution to those</i></b><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i>Of us damaged, at a disadvantage by Providence.</i></b></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-OyixS-H-YJ4/VPQjQ4tOfgI/AAAAAAAAPF8/mweBQmuSD4k/s1600/DSCF5050.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="152" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-OyixS-H-YJ4/VPQjQ4tOfgI/AAAAAAAAPF8/mweBQmuSD4k/s200/DSCF5050.JPG" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Protected Species on a</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Queensland mountain top.</span></td></tr>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-fzT5qgNJYDY/T_-sk7X-LEI/AAAAAAAABEU/n1sFi43RSAY/s1600/Mastering%2Bbipolar.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-fzT5qgNJYDY/T_-sk7X-LEI/AAAAAAAABEU/n1sFi43RSAY/s400/Mastering%2Bbipolar.jpg" width="265" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Australian voices contribute to this guide</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;"> including mine!</span></td></tr>
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<b style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><i>(c)copyright J.McNeill July 2015</i></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b><i>Shell-shocked poem</i></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b><i>all rights reserved</i></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b><i><br /></i></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b><i>BUILDING RESILIENCE</i></b></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; font-family: helvetica, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 18px; text-align: left;"><b>BITE BACK i</b><span style="font-size: 14px;">s an evolving space for you to discover ways to amplify the good stuff in life, share real, personal stories with</span></span><span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #141823; display: inline; font-family: helvetica, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; text-align: left;"> others, check out videos, blogs and interviews of interesting people, read up on important issues, check and track your mental fitness, and enter awesome comps.</span><br />
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; color: #141823; display: inline; font-family: helvetica, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; text-align: left;"><br /></span>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b><i><br /></i></b></span>Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-24959402471591015012015-07-16T02:22:00.001-07:002015-07-16T02:22:48.639-07:00CRADLE TO GRAVE CITIZEN WELFARE<a href="http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2015/s4262911.htm#"><span style="font-size: large;">Tighter disability support pension rules are hurting, say welfare groups - 26/06/2015</span></a><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">My husband has retired at 65years - after 30 years as a self-employed professional Puppeteer and 20years as a Disability Support Worker for the Queensland Government, (with a negotiated Award thanks to the Australian Workers Union).</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">His body and brain were showing signs of stress and strain leading up to his birthday. Worsening osteo-arthritis, needing new knees and then a mini-stroke alarm. Politicians were talking about extending retirement and not being able to access the Aged Pension or Superannuation.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">The Commonwealth is getting mean-spirited and mean with money. If he didn't retire now he would be at risk of injury at work. Retirement was something necessary - stay home and cultivate the garden and rainforest.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">My GreenMan looks after me too as I have a chronic mental illness which is episodic in the severity of the Bi-polar mood affective disorder. I have been economically dependent on Roy's wage so now he is retired it is necessary to apply for some social security of my own. </span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">As the Minister of </span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">With some anxiety I went for an interview at Centrelink today to be assessed for NEW START which sounds ridiculous to a 52 year old who has had many experiences in the mainstream workforce but failed to keep a job.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;">All Welfare Reports on Mental Health and Work show the common discriminations, stigma and barriers of work flexibility which lead to blows to self-esteem and ending up Poor in old age, and reliant on the tax payers for a decent standard of living.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;">The Australian Medicare system where every citizen has a right to health care including subsidised medicines is much valued(except by stingy, selfish Conservatives of course).</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;">Our monthly Pharmaceutical bill has been over $250.00 so now our income is reduced a Health Care Card enables us to keep functioning in society; top example is looking after the grandchildren to enable our daughters to keep up with their nursing and teaching profession.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">This medical expense does not include disintegrating eyes and teeth. Be warned kids, prepare for fifty - care for your health so you don't fall in a heap! The public health system can't be relied on when Parliament regards welfare recipients as "Malingerers"(Minister Morrison), or should not have a sense of "entitlement"(Treasurer Joe Hockey). </span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">THE DRUM: <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-07-16/dunlop-a-strategy-to-end-egalitarian-australia/6624180" target="_blank">Tim Dunlop writes of -strategy-to-end-egalitarian-australia</a></span><br />
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"The Abbott Government's game plan for the nation is pretty obvious by now: it is a three-pronged attack on what we might call Egalitarian Australia.</div>
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Egalitarian Australia can be defined as the idea that government has a role in managing the risks associated with the inevitable problems that arise in a globalised, capitalist economy." (ABC The Drum)</div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-qPZL-DdW_d4/Vad3DptmQTI/AAAAAAAASOs/jLhGUiqV5Yg/s1600/%2BJenny%2BMacklin.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-qPZL-DdW_d4/Vad3DptmQTI/AAAAAAAASOs/jLhGUiqV5Yg/s320/%2BJenny%2BMacklin.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Source Sans Pro', sans-serif; font-size: 18px; line-height: 24px;">Jenny Macklin is the Member for Jagajaga and Shadow Minister for Families and Payments and Disability Reform. This link leads to a discussion about Social Policy Renewal.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/jmacklin/pages/39/attachments/original/1405502584/Social_Capital_Worth_the_Cost.pdf?1405502584" target="_blank">HON.MP JENNY MACKLIN ON SOCIAL CAPITAL REFORM</a></span><br />
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<br />Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-3615993557514888852015-07-01T05:32:00.000-07:002015-07-01T06:05:36.302-07:00STOCKTAKE AUSTRALIA with ACOSS<br />
Once upon a time, there was a lucky country where a lot of people wanted to live because it had great weather, the best wages and employment opportunities, so a better chance to own your own home and have a family.<br />
There was plenty of room for everybody to thrive and when Gough Whitlam was Prime Minister it got even better because women and indigenous people were paid respect with liberating policies.<br />
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Working class people called Australia the "Workers Paradise" as the Labor movement negotiated for health and safety, and a decent minimum wage and standard of living. The Proletariat could finally move above the station their ancestors had been kept in by the worst of capitalism.<br />
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Australians could expect to build a dream home, and if the Mrs got a part-time job they could also build an in-ground swimming pool....for their first generation Aussie kids.<br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-3VXvJvvurMY/UY2nRAZ3JrI/AAAAAAAAJHI/EVSIsSzdLG0/s1600/Xmas%2Bat%2BMargarets%2Bwith%2BAuntie%2BJoyce%252C%2BNancy%2Band%2BPaul%2B1990.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="276" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-3VXvJvvurMY/UY2nRAZ3JrI/AAAAAAAAJHI/EVSIsSzdLG0/s400/Xmas%2Bat%2BMargarets%2Bwith%2BAuntie%2BJoyce%252C%2BNancy%2Band%2BPaul%2B1990.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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From Yorkshire to Frankston , Victoria - & jobs at Target and Myers.</div>
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.Let's see how citizens are faring on the scale of egalitarian ethos and a Fair Go! The Politicians still express these values as enduring. PLEASE PLAY<br />
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THANKS <a href="http://acoss.org.au/" target="_blank">acoss.org.au</a></div>
Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-21983646826236097282015-06-27T22:20:00.001-07:002015-06-30T13:46:00.103-07:00 YOUTH HOMELESSNESS<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">IT'S THE END OF THE 2014-2015 FINANCIAL YEAR, and the good news is: </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><a href="http://www.smh.com.au/victoria/overwhelming-response-to-story-about-homeless-schoolgirl-alicia-living-under-a-bridge-20150604-ghg6ov.html">Overwhelming response to homeless schoolgirl story</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">The tragedy is I was in the same situation in Melbourne in 1980(though not under a bridge). We were studying <span style="color: red;"><u>Macbeth</u></span> by the 17th century Bard, Will Shakespeare and it spoke to me across the centuries.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I felt at home with the language;</span><br />
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<span style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #1f1f1f; font-family: 'Open Sans', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-weight: 700;">Macbeth:</span><br />
<span style="color: red; font-family: 'Open Sans', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: large;">To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="color: #1f1f1f;">Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /><span style="color: #1f1f1f;">To the last syllable of recorded time;</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /><span style="color: #1f1f1f;">And all our yesterdays have lighted fools</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /><span style="color: #1f1f1f;">The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /><span style="color: #1f1f1f;">Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /><span style="color: #1f1f1f;">That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /><span style="color: #1f1f1f;">And then is heard no more. It is a tale</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /><span style="color: #1f1f1f;">Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /><span style="color: #1f1f1f;">Signifying nothing.</span></span></div>
<cite style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #1f1f1f; font-family: 'Open Sans', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 22.3999996185303px;"><a href="http://www.enotes.com/macbeth-text/act-v-scene-v" style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #39aeda; text-decoration: none;">Macbeth Act 5, scene 5, 19–28</a></cite><br />
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<span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">The Seeds of my Disability</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-iUY5wIg2bk8/VY-JtxSB1PI/AAAAAAAAR9M/oW6NjEQojW4/s1600/%2BDr%2BPimples.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="411" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-iUY5wIg2bk8/VY-JtxSB1PI/AAAAAAAAR9M/oW6NjEQojW4/s640/%2BDr%2BPimples.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Lead role as 'Dr. Pimples' in Huntingdale High School Play - Yr 12. 1980</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><a href="http://woman-in-labour.blogspot.com.au/p/ingredients-in-mix.html" target="_blank">Link here to further reading of looking back: WELFARE FOR THE COMMON YOUTH</a></span></div>
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<span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">So what student support progress has been made in these 35 years? Not as much as there could have been!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">There is an independent living Youth Allowance, there are Government funded youth welfare agencies - always under threat of cuts - no matter the success of the program.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">It doesn't make common-sense to damage people in the short fiscal term or the long-term.</span></div>
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<br />Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-16189520946185746892015-06-21T01:06:00.001-07:002015-06-21T21:21:50.213-07:00CARE & PROTECTION FOR THE RIGHTS OF ALL CHILDRENFIGHTING INHUMANE PRACTICES WITH PERSECTION AND CENSORSHIP - J'ACCUSE AUSTRALIA - WORLD REFUGEE DAY<br />
IS COMING FROM FORTRESS OF AUSTRALIA<br />
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<li><a href="http://www.abc.net.au/local/stories/2015/06/19/4258214.htm#.VYZvj1Uvp1o.blogger" style="font-size: x-large;">Paediatrician may face prison for speaking out about Nauru - ABC North Coast NSW - Australian Broadcasting Corporation</a></li>
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2. Welfare case worker for Save The Children speaks of sexual crimes on our Prison Island: </h3>
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<a href="http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2015/jun/20/guards-nauru-paid-sex-refugees-taped-it-court?CMP=ema_632" target="_blank">http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2015/jun/20/guards-nauru-paid-sex-refugees-taped-it-court?CMP=ema_632</a></h3>
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<b><span style="color: red;">Please Contact your MP - in my region I am on the margin being less outraged by the treatment of Cattle and Greyhounds compared to refugees. </span></b></h3>
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<b>Why is it so easy to see swift action against brutality of animals, proclaimed by Premiers and Prime Ministers, but there is no compassion, only punitive, deterrant, secretive policies towards asylum seekers who arrive by boat? </b></h3>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b><u>UN Convention Australia signed on the Rights of the Child</u></b></span></div>
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<br />Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-7555201525485157322015-06-10T20:54:00.001-07:002015-06-21T13:08:20.976-07:00Peter Greste: I would be a prime candidate to have my nationality stripped – video | Media | The Guardian<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;">Hear Ye! Hear Yee, and see,</span><br />
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<a href="http://www.theguardian.com/media/video/2015/jun/11/greste-citizenship-terrorism-australian-law-politics?CMP=ema_632"><span style="font-size: large;">Peter Greste: I would be a prime candidate to have my nationality stripped – video | Media | The Guardian</span></a><br />
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<i><span style="font-size: large;">Australians are better educated than the 1920's when the fascist threat to peace and democracy was on show at the opening of the Sydney Harbour Bridge. </span></i><br />
<i><span style="font-size: large;"> By voting for the current Lib/Nat. Abbott Government and it's Machievellan tactics people obviously needed to see and feel the threat for themselves to change their vote - WRONG! - the polls say 80% of Australians support what the Blue Ties are doing and what the Opposition are not doing.</span></i><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Human Rights Lawyer</td></tr>
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<i><span style="color: red; font-size: large;"><b>This is my Countdown to the big hit and misses which will lead me to write to the State Secretary of Queensland Labor Party(ALP), and resign.</b></span></i><br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-d4iLYOmnsN8/U5AidO3VnXI/AAAAAAAAJN0/shPwhNS4yRY/s1600/Leunig.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="282" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-d4iLYOmnsN8/U5AidO3VnXI/AAAAAAAAJN0/shPwhNS4yRY/s400/Leunig.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: large;">It is incredible how swift these ruling Tories, New Barons, New Guards of Australia can persuade themselves sometimes they will have to do things "by hook or by crook" (P.M. Abbott on methods to turn back the boats).</span></i><br />
<i><span style="font-size: large;">The 'National Interest' requires the weeds of fascism to grow above the paddock fences and grab those 'suspected' terrorists without trial because they threaten our way of life! <span style="color: red;">Who thought Tony Abbott would transform into Voldemort - I did! </span></span></i><br />
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<i><span style="font-size: large;">Being a Labor voter since Bob Hawke came to power, I hate the 'silence' of the ALP in Opposition, State and Federal - who is speaking up for the Commonwealth? Labor should not let legislation pass which encourages miscarriages of justice and untold harm...and raiding the Treasury to do so.</span></i><br />
<i><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></i>
<i><span style="font-size: large;">The ALP loves to reference historical Labour reminding themselves how the oppressed masses got organised, learned to read and write, reckoned they were morally principled as a Puritan Parliament...but we know how unsupportive of the actions of Julian Assange were and how nothing ever done to give the truth-teller, his Liberty. <a href="https://justice4assange.com/" target="_blank">https://justice4assange.com/</a> Where was the Labor Government's stand on arbitary detention?</span></i><br />
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<i><span style="font-size: large;">The shining light of equality and opportunity which shone with P.M. Julia Gillard, was the National Disability Scheme and the Gonski Reforms of Education. We would make our society even better.</span></i><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>Tory Tony lied to dismiss the real truth of the Coalition intentions.</i></span><br />
<i><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></i>
<i><span style="font-size: large;">Not so long after all the commemorations of the world wars against Fascist Governments Tory Tony is creating one of his own.</span></i><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Go on, say the word, Bill Shorten, call them for what their Government is displaying - educate the people, not leave them in the dark. Remind yourselves in this commemoration of the 800 year Magna Carta, </span><br />
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Last year, George Brandis had this to say about the document: “We can trace our constitution back some 800 years to the fundamental principles enshrined in the Magna Carta: limiting arbitrary power, holding the executive to account, and affirming the rule of law.”</div>
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Which is presumably what Gillian Triggs had in mind this week, when on the evening of Dutton’s attacks she criticised the government’s proposals to empower a minister to revoke sole Australian citizenship from those suspected of terrorism. Triggs said: “Supremacy of the law over the sovereign – or in today’s parlance, executive – government is under threat in our democracy.</div>
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“The overreach of executive power is clear in the yet-to-be-defined proposal that those accused of being jihadists fighting against Australian interests will be stripped of their citizenship if they are potentially dual nationals… Not only may this idea violate Australia’s international obligation not to render a person stateless, but also the detention may be at the discretion of a minister without recourse to judicial processes.” (The Saturday Paper 13/6/15).<br />
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AND TO MAKE IT EVEN CLEARER, from Overland e-zine <a href="http://0.0.0.5/a-child-is-not-a-child-if-she-is-a-refugee/" target="_blank">5/a-child-is-not-a-child-if-she-is-a-refugee/</a> <br />
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<br />Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-65427828433341068302015-05-30T23:12:00.001-07:002015-06-11T23:40:56.380-07:00Is the Abbott Government fascist? Tell Tale SignsGRANDMOTHERS PROTEST INDEFINITE MANDATORY DETENTION AGAINST THE RIGHTS OF THE CHILD: <span style="color: red;">I'M WITH YOU IN SPIRIT!</span><br />
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<a href="http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2015/feb/28/grandmothers-against-detention-of-refugee-children-rally-for-gillian-triggs" target="_blank">http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2015/feb/28/grandmothers-against-detention-of-refugee-children-rally-for-gillian-triggs</a><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Australia is a UN signatory for the rights of all children.</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">In a forceful speech, the president of the Australian Human Rights Commission argued parliaments had failed to protect democratic rights and many politicians were “breathtakingly inconsistent” in supporting the rule of law. </span></div>
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<span style="color: red; font-size: large;">WARNING SIGNS OF TYRANNY - 'over-reaching executive powers'...</span><br />
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<span style="color: red; font-size: large;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-340cRYUthaY/VXoEWvS5AzI/AAAAAAAARwI/o3XQY6_KFyA/s1600/%2BTriggs.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="192" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-340cRYUthaY/VXoEWvS5AzI/AAAAAAAARwI/o3XQY6_KFyA/s320/%2BTriggs.jpg" width="320" /></a></span></div>
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Divert from the evidence, attack personal, the really Honourable Gillian Triggs who ought to be like "Caesar's Wife"(Brandis).<br />
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<li>Minister for Immigration Dutton would like all discretionary power to strip Australian Citizenship from 'suspected' terrorists/foreign fighters. (Unsure of humanitarian workers).<a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-05-27/decision-to-revoke-citizenship-should-be-based-on-conviction/6499582" target="_blank">http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-05-27/decision-to-revoke-citizenship-should-be-based-on-conviction/6499582</a></li>
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2. Minister for the Arts George Brandis takes wads of dollars from peer reviewed arts funding via The Australia Council - for his own little fiefdom of favoured artists and companies. Back to Menzies way of doing things - political interference par la excellence.<br />
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3. The Prime Minister appoints himself Minister for Women and Indigenous Affairs and is like an absentee landlord - lots of things need fixing but it's not important enough.<br />
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<span style="color: red; font-size: large;">DEFENDING DEFENSE - DENYING CLIMATE THREAT</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1.2em;">The total cost of sending Australian troops to the most recent Iraq war was about $2.5 billion.</span><br />
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The total commitment to operations in Afghanistan was far more expensive, at $9.3 billion.<br />
Women and children of Australia can suffer: We want to bomb the Muslims to pieces, even though it costs so much!</div>
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<span style="color: red;">DOOMED TO REPEAT</span></div>
<span style="font-size: 1.2em;">Alerting us from Crikey media, is Senior reporter Bernard Keane - about signs of more military adventures. Thunderbirds are go, Tory Tony?</span><a href="http://www.crikey.com.au/2015/06/03/keane-australian-neocons-on-the-march-back-to-iraq/" target="_blank"><span style="color: red; font-size: large;">http://www.crikey.com.au/2015/06/03/keane-australian-neocons-on-the-march-back-to-iraq/</span></a></div>
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Thousands of civilian lives have been lost, and new lives born deformed. Forget what you learn at school - Maslow's hierarchy of needs is destroyed by the Coalition invaders and their allies, corporate<span style="font-size: 1.2em;"> profiteers of war. Who wins any war? </span><a href="http://costsofwar.org/article/growth-corporate-power-and-profiteering" style="font-size: 1.2em;" target="_blank">http://costsofwar.org/article/growth-corporate-power-and-profiteering</a></h4>
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<span style="color: blue;"><span style="font-size: 1.2em;">You've gotta laugh or you'll cry. Don't listen to the radio so much - dismantle the ABC! Protect your mental health yourself.</span></span><br />
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<span style="color: blue;"><span style="font-size: 1.2em;">Fascists love a starched ironed uniform - In post-WW1 MP Moseley from the West Midlands gathered a few London thugs together, coloquially called </span><i style="font-size: 1.2em;">The Black Shirts. </i></span></div>
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<i style="font-size: 1.2em;"><span style="color: blue;">Today in Australia Prime Minister Abbott's crew share the pride in Liberal blue, but they are not Liberals</span></i></div>
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<i style="font-size: 1.2em;"><span style="color: blue;"> - they are Conservative. </span></i><br />
<i style="font-size: 1.2em;"><span style="color: blue;">Queensland Labor calls themTories. </span></i><br />
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<a href="http://www.someadventures.com/2014/08/27/tony-abbott-and-the-half-blue-tie/" target="_blank">http://www.someadventures.com/2014/08/27/tony-abbott-and-the-half-blue-tie/</a><br />
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<span style="color: red; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: large;">Flying High to Amberley.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 19.2000007629395px;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Who needs to wait in long lines of traffic on the highway for Amberley's Open Day - we don't!</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">As my husband and I cultivate the garden hearing the bird sounds of kookaburra, double-barred finches, rainbow lorikeets and willy wigtails our peace is shattered by protectors of home security: F1-11's, Super Hornets, Caribou...</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Reminds me of a sunny morning with a potential boy-friend in my Elwood/St. Kilda days. I was only 19 and didn't understand why the sound of airforce craft overhead made his body freeze, terror on his face.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">He told me it was because he had been in the Israeli army. It was beyond my comprehension, 35 years ago.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: 1.2em;">AND THE WARS ON MOTHER EARTH demand 'fight or flight' response). Airplanes fly over my house stirring me to write poetry, and play Donovan.</span></div>
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SO,</div>
<span style="font-size: large;"><a href="http://www.tasmaniantimes.com/index.php/article/is-the-abbott-government-fascist">Is the Abbott Government fascist? | Tasmanian Times</a> asked in 2014. This May Day 2015 saw racist Nationalist men in Melbourne baying for a brawl against recent Muslim immigrants and refugees, encouraged by the rhetoric from Parliamentarians.</span><br />
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<i style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="color: red;"><b>What about the Truth of daily horrendous abuses evidenced in the Human Rights report and others? No Conscience for breaking international law on torture, children's rights, refugees - only about same sex couples getting married!</b></span></i><br />
<span style="color: red;"><b><br /></b></span>
<i style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="color: red;"><b>Are The Greens now the only decent human beings who will shine the solar lights on the hill to alert injustice to our planet, our people, who would prevent the plight of human victims of persecution and wars?</b></span></i><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #666666; font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif, 'Trebuchet MS', Arial; font-size: 13px; letter-spacing: 0.1px; line-height: 19px;">The allegation that Wilson Security spied on Senator Sarah Hanson-Young is deeply troubling and must be investigated immediately by the AFP.</span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.1px;">To spy on a Senator is obviously wrong on every level, including legally seeing as it's a serious offence to interfere in the duties of a Federal Parliamentarian</span></div>
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If this alleged spying on Senator Hanson-Young is the work of rogue Wilson employees then they should be sacked and legal proceedings initiated against them.</div>
<span style="color: red;"><b><span style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>A Growing concern for me as a tight-rope walking member of the ALP is the bi-partisan slow waltz between the two "old" parties on so called National Security/border control/mandatory indefinite detention... </i></span></b></span><br />
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<tr><td><strong style="font-size: 32px; line-height: 34px;">Asylum seeker whistleblowers muzzled by harsh penalties, metadata access</strong></td></tr>
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<tr><td><a href="http://www.crikey.com.au/" style="color: #333333; font-weight: bold; position: relative; text-transform: uppercase; z-index: 0;" target="_blank">MYRIAM ROBIN</a><br />
<em><em>Crikey </em>media reporter </em>in cases of legitimate whistleblowing in the public interest, <a href="http://www.lawcouncil.asn.au/lawcouncil/images/2969_-__Final_Submission_Border_Force_Bills_2015.pdf" style="color: #99ca3c; position: relative; z-index: 0;" target="_blank">the Law Council's submission stated,</a> such a provision gave employees no protection:<br />
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"The Law Council is concerned that the heightened secrecy provisions, as well as the broader powers to dismiss staff and contractors, may discourage legitimate whistle-blowers from speaking out publicly. To aid transparency, there should ... be a public interest disclosure exception to the secrecy provisions where the disclosure would, on balance, be in the public interest."</div>
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This recommendation was championed by Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young in her speech against the bill. "The bill entrenches secrecy by making it a criminal offence, punishable by two years imprisonment, for Department of Immigration employees to disclose information," she said, noting that employees could be "summarily fired" for leaking, with no right to pursue unfair dismissal. Hanson-Young said:<br />
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"This is an issue that is going to impact on 15,000 employees of the Department of Immigration. Those people deserve proper protections by this Parliament. Those people deserve to know that if there is something being done that is wrong, and which it is in the public interest to know, that the Senate has their backs. Those staff who we ask to go out onto the high seas to carry out these dangerous operations and to work in our detention centres to deal with the human misery of this policy, deserve to know that the Australian parliament has their backs. When there is a matter that is in breach of the law or in breach of government policy, or when there is a matter that is in breach of what is considered to be morally acceptable, those people deserve the opportunity to have a proper public interest test applied before they are simply thrown out on their ears."</div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When Julian Assange Wikileaked footage of war-crimes by U.S.A. soldiers like gunning down civilians and children etc and the then Labor Government under Rudd and Gillard shunned the principles of his actions I was baffled. </span></i><br />
<i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Even my local branch of left-leaning union and social activists were against the whistle blowing Australian citizen. Fortunatley we have Independent Tasmanian MP former intelligence officer and whistle-blower against Howards foray into the Iraq invasion based on lies who will speak with integrity inn Parliament.</span></i><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i>
<i>With the Liberal backbenchers supporting an authoritarian approach to foreign fighters and populism a favourite political sport, how are we not stealthily stepping towards an Australian fascism?</i></span><br />
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<i><span style="font-size: large;">WHO'S GONNA SAVE US?</span></i><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><i>THE LIVING END </i></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><a href="http://winstonclose.me/2015/05/31/australian-democracy-at-a-tipping-point-written-by-paul-g-delitt-aim-network/" target="_blank">http://winstonclose.me/2015/05/31/australian-democracy-at-a-tipping-point-written-by-paul-g-delitt-aim-network/</a> </span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;"><b>LEST WE FORGET</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;"><i>First world's floral fields fertile with human waste</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Dictated, fucked up by well-paid diplomats, </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Poweful politicians playing pre-Risk board games</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Then duty done, suffering by neglect except free</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">School dinners to nourish next generation of soldiers.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Down the road from Westminster angry men gather </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Wearing black shirts, infamous new uniform, and</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">In New South Wales, plenty of New Guards on the Harbour</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Making Humanist's disappear, leading to growing </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Mussolini hybrids in clubs with cigars and whores.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Hypnotised by Empire poppies, freed from</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Blood and bone soil. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Was it worth it? What about a series of Duels instead?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Olympiad rules of war call, On Guard Hitler!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">By Christ, those big boats of Jews in May 1939</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Were not part of the plot of </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Canberra or Cuba.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Fleeing Nazi death camps trying to keep afloat,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Left to wonder if they would starve to death</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Or survive as left-overs of another man's </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Obsession to conquer and steal the crown jewels!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">The Hebrew race scape-goats again, such a </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Cryptically damned fate.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">The Status Quo commemorates slaughters, the</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Honourable members lapel pins flag flawed</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Patriotism, turning back boats again -</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Too many fleeing victims.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Censorship is a means to a murderous end, </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Out of sight out of minds - bodies are </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Sacred if they belong to you, the War- Lords</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">And P.M's whilst our cousins of the rest of</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">The human race make voyages of the damned.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Driven insane in tent towns we will forget them,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Send Chaplains to schools in case kids see the</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">News, to be assured in the trust of God and</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Country, rationalise hypocracy.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">(c)copyright 2015 JMcNeill </span><br />
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Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-92219209424877359092015-04-15T19:50:00.001-07:002015-04-15T19:50:15.296-07:00An open letter to the Prime Minister: 31 deaths in 15 weeks requires urgent action<a href="http://www.womensagenda.com.au/talking-about/top-stories/an-open-letter-to-the-prime-minister-31-deaths-in-15-weeks-requires-urgent-action/201504165608#.VS8jWJOxsfg.blogger">An open letter to the Prime Minister: 31 deaths in 15 weeks requires urgent action</a>Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-84453649101570531822015-03-26T18:04:00.000-07:002015-04-13T18:13:24.577-07:00LABOURING WOMEN AND SOME POWER<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">MARCH IN MARCH - with Melissa Parkes MP Fremantle.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">A Work in slow Progress is my book; Love in an English Republic. Like my page and share in what I learn about the 17th century: <a href="http://www.facebook.com/englishrepublicans" target="_blank">http://www.facebook.com/englishrepublicans</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">It will be a dream fulfilled to have it published and read widely, even make the High School reading lists! Aswell as a good yarn set during the 1642-1649 English Civil War, when the Crown and Parliament tugged at the bloody ropes of war over their Powers, it will show the reader how our own Australian Westminister Parliaments came from, and the reason why the Monarch has to respectfully knock on the door to the House of Commons.</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">IN YOUR DREAMS! 17th century women with progressive ideas at Whitehall, Westminster Palace.</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-size: large;">During the English Commonwealth(1649-1660) with Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell, the House of Lords was abolished and the King had his head cut off...In Queensland they don't have an Upper House either.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">Queensland is notorious for it's absolutist zeal (and populist leaders), like the corrupt but Godly Bjelke Petersen National Government and the short but not sweet Newman LNP Government. With an incredible belief in Union Jack and Monarch symbols, they had no qualms to dis-respect the Separation of Powers between Parliament's Executive and JudiciaryCourts).</span><br />
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<a href="http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/opinion-separationofpowers-debate-is-not-unique-to-queensland/story-fnihsr9v-1226753052781" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: large;">http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/opinion-separationofpowers-debate-is-not-unique-to-queensland/story-fnihsr9v-1226753052781</span></a><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">WHEN IT WAS PROPOSED BY A PETITION OF 10,000 WOMEN TO HAVE AN EQUAL VOTE POLITICIANS MOCKED AND SATIRISED THE ABSURD IDEA: JUST IMAGINE <strong style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12.960000038147px; text-align: start;">The Parliament of women</strong></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;">With the merrie Lawes by them newly</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Enacted. To live in more Ease, Pompe, Pride,</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">and wantonnesse: but especially that they might have su-</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">periority and domineere over their husbands : with a new way</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">found out by them to cure any old or new Cuckolds, and</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">how both parties may recover their credit</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">and honesty againe</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;">London, Printed for W.Wilson and are to be sold by him in</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Will-yard in Little Saint Bartholomews. 1646.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">extra reading at:</span></div>
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<a href="http://www.evacox.com.au/node/17" style="font-size: x-large;" target="_blank">http://www.evacox.com.au/node/17</a><span style="font-size: large;"> THE NEXT 100 YEARS a speech by Feminist and Economist Eva Cox</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">Comedienne Judith Lucy brought together some of the best talent to sing the famous song I am Woman by Helen Reddy. Cool........after considering how little she will Superannuation she will have to get by in her old age.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">ABCTV March</span>Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-73858417786839837072015-02-02T15:27:00.003-08:002015-02-04T00:20:01.803-08:00OOPS! "ABSENT-MINDED VOTERS"<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">National Press Club 2/22015</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;">The current Australian Prime Minister was at the Press Club deflecting the huge swing away from his conservative counterparts in Queensland (and still counting. He said all who voted ALP were 'absent-minded'...Oops another cock-up... even Dum and dummer;</span></h3>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>I focus on my Grandchildren and other's Great grandchildren.</b></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><b>Off the top of my head what would motivate the electorate away from the conservatives(I can't call them Liberal),convince them our grandchildren's future is in jeopardy.</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><b>The intergenerational effect which Abbott becomes impassioned about is exactly why I would not vote for the right-wing Tories. It would be like going back to the 19th century with their anti-union/collective negotiating, acceleration to a further unequal and unjust society. </b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><b> In the Sunshine State of Queensland renewable energy has been relegated behind Coal, contributing to green-house gasses - acidification of the ocean, sea rise and frequent, intense storms, but why believe the experts over the coal and mineral lobby?</b></span></div>
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<li><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Health cut-backs by Qld Minister Springborg: Frontline Services slashed so people lose jobs and the domino effect of that on families, and people can't get the necessary medical service which would make them recover quickly and be productive, or just valued as a human being.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;">All the impetus created by the Julia Gillard for a National Disability Insurance Scheme, leaving individuals and carers in limbo, and putting the screws on by expecting poor people to pay for necessary items such as incontinence aids. </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Three teenagers who were being treated in the only Mental Health facility appropriate for their daily needs became so stressed by the Newman Government's threats and eventual close of the Barrett Centre - committed suicide. Money saved from the destruction of life and effective mental health service was more important.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;">My own recovery of a debilitating Bi-polar depression is drawn out due to a lack of Psyciatric care to meet the demands of the West Moreton region.</span></li>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Scott from Fernvale absentmindly determined to vote LNP into oblivion after watching the deterioration of front-line services in hospital from lack of Cleaners to Nurses overloaded with work that hygeine and timely medications not on time.</span></td></tr>
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<li><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;">THE ECONOMICS OF CLIMATE CHANGE is being ignored by all Conservative Governments at our peril - they must have a secret get-away to Mars...because the scientific evidence and modeling is dismissed(great role-modelling for our students). </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;">COAL is KING and COSTLY TO all Life on Earth. Money is everything. De-invest in Solar Energy. </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Local Government Minister Jeff Seeney ordered 'Climate Change' considerations in planning for housing and other projects deleted! Responsibility to community based on sea-rise predictions is negated. </span></span></li>
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<span style="color: red; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;">SIGNS of a return to the Joh Bjelke-Petersen regime triggered memories - lack of accountability, transparency, authoritarian approach, up goes the Monarchial symbols, down go the Westminster Parliamentary separation between State and Law via the Vlad Laws, and creation of a Star Chamber!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Supremo Monarchist Tony Abbott also thinks what is good for the Australian people is to return to Imperial honours and Elitism. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Workchoices - Australia is the best place to live and work because of the UNIONS collective bargaining for it's members and the good of society.</span></div>
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<span style="color: red; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;">WHAT ELSE IS THERE? <b>Forgive me for being so absent-minded. Obviously the Tories don't think their austere policies which make the poor desperate and the rich wealthier experience as REFORMS and a work-in-progress!</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b><u>On the Periphery of politicians vision.</u></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b>A Minister for Women? Officially under the Prime Minister's wing: Cuts to front-line services which directly relate to women's lives: Domestic violence, housing, insecure work, legal aid etc etc etc. </b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b>Old People - </b>Queensland still has below standard aged care facilities; Overworked, underpaid staff and profitable owners, and no thorough program of care for dementia sufferers and their carers! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I could write an effective policy of employment, training for dementia care but you don't want to spend any money on old people beyond their useful date, do you Prime Minister?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b>Theocratic - what's good for us - Dum and Dummer</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Children: De-value Scientific Endeavour and de-value qualified children's counsellors to exploit Christian evangelical Chaplains. Prayers win over cognitive and family therapies.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Women's autonomy; abortion and reproductive health starved and criminilised </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: center;">by 19th century English Laws.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Until Mr. Abbott slides all the way down the Snake on the board game I will distract my self with </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">SIR TIM MINCHIN OF THE COMMONWEALTH </span></h2>
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Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-37571537696215483102015-01-31T17:44:00.001-08:002015-01-31T17:44:19.952-08:00Queensland Election INTERLUDE with Tim Minchin - Confessions - Feminism, Poverty (Altruism), Environment<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="270" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/wmnxF_WTOgg" width="480"></iframe>Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-72883643586542475162015-01-30T21:15:00.001-08:002015-03-30T22:00:30.316-07:00UNBEARABLE POLITICS OF BEING <h3>
This Queensland State Election campaign has been a big KISS - Keep It Simple Stupid. DON'T MENTION CLIMATE CHANGE, KILLING COAL, GRASPING JOBS FROM THE GIFT OF THE SUN...</h3>
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I did say this to Jim at pre-polling and of course he agreed!</h3>
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<a href="http://www.qt.com.au/videos/madden-and-pollie-ticket/26024/" target="_blank">IN A MINUTE COMPETITION LINK FOR CANDIDATES </a></h3>
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<br />The LNP Premier Newman did call the election as parents prepared the Preps for primary and high schools, and workers holiday avoiding political machinations from the Media. </h3>
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Did he really think the voters were stupid - not saving up their powerful franchise?<br />Politicians rely on short memories of what voters didn't like and the Opposition try to remind them. Even so, it is all very shallow with little detail of HOW things will be achieved. SOLAR INVESTMENT - GRANDKIDS - EASY PEASY</h3>
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<br />Being a political passionista I remember the tearing down of Labor's legislation which protected the environment against the rapacious addiction of making money at any cost.</h3>
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From the day the LNP went into mass majority government they Repealed laws to permit LAND CLEARING, pollute pristine rivers, damage coral reefs. Somerset Councillor Jim Madden had joined our Somerset branch(formerly Wivenhoe). He was on the Healthy Waterways board, had a Science degree aswell as being a local Lawyer.<br />
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Somerset branch held a meeting devoted to the Attourney General's autocratic dismissal of Parliamentary tradition and principles with the VLAD laws. </h3>
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Loving their Union Jack flag and Monarchy the Attorney-General attacked the integrity of the processes and separations between the State and Law; Westminster Parliamentary tradition had evolved involveing struggles in blood. </h3>
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We were all reminded and frightened about the return of the Bjelke Peterson regime which toppled in the early 1980's after 3 decade. Now the current government of the LNP was showing they acted more like the 15th century PRINCE by Machievelli.</h3>
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Then we have those Dissenters of the LNP party machinary.</div>
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KATTERS<br />HANSONS<br />PALMERS</h3>
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Going to Pre-poll at Brassall Hanson got my attention on a bill-board - her candidate and her red head surrounded by a halo of stars (of course from the flag). How Brazen!So thoroughly hateful as her candidate points out their mantra for election: no Mosques, No Halal, No Burqua!<br />
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This provocative and hateful woman inciting division in a region which is so White!<br />
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WITH A POLITICAL PEDIGREE, THIS IS THE WOMAN and the SMARTEST CHOICE TO LEAD THE STATE OF QUEENSLAND.<br />
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LEADING LABOR<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">What is behind so much distrust in Politicians when they deflect from the evidence to back up policy action - like paying deference to the appetite of the coal and minerals industry at the expense of the environment, indeed the planets weather! Perhaps a course in Buddhism CAUSE AND EFFECT!</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">SOMERSET Branch of the ALP in the Brisbane Valley, campaigns for<br />
Ipswich West with Jim Madden, and Nanango electorates..</td></tr>
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<span style="font-size: large;">I will be hoping for a win for </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Linux Libertine', Georgia, Times, serif; font-size: large; line-height: 1.3;">Annastacia Palaszczuk in Inala and to</span><span style="font-size: large;"> lead a Queensland Labor Government. Naturally, instinctively, I agree with the majority of their ALP Party Platform but it's damn slow to put it into action!</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">(eg. repealing abortion law which has been in the platform for over 10 years).</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">I<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> might be a little bit too Left for some, but the 2012 landslide to the LNP gave them a taste of returning to an authoritarian, Joh Bjelke-Peterson style Government, denigrating ordinary people and creating a Police State and Private business era corruption, reminding us of how quickly it can go back.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i>The Ego's are so large in many Politicians(testesterone fuelled?). I perceive they do believe they have a Divine Right once they have the People's vote even in a Secular Westminister tradition, (although the Chaplains in schools enthusiasm shows more theocracy than democracy).</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span><span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">So down to the Fernvale booth I go, mulling over my ideas to reform the system.<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ltvZfAyEmdY/VM2R6FHlV7I/AAAAAAAAOng/--8y3KTTAJ4/s1600/%2Balp%2Bvoters%2BPaul%2Bwilliams.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ltvZfAyEmdY/VM2R6FHlV7I/AAAAAAAAOng/--8y3KTTAJ4/s1600/%2Balp%2Bvoters%2BPaul%2Bwilliams.jpg" height="297" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Fernvale booth presents a civil society - Paul from Fernvale up with the Sun to set up the booth<br />
before the LNP get there! Well done.</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">ELECTORAL proposals from me : Lead the change, show your ethical back-bone: legislate a maximum of dollars each Party can use for an election campaign. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">It will make them more creative. They could hire artists to show them how to get the wow factor out of the box! Hire my husband and I to do a puppet show for YouTube...Yes you can change things.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span><span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i>It's the end of the Labor line membership for hubby and I. Handing out how to vote for a return to Labor Government, then Scrutineering. </i></span><br />
<span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="color: lime; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i>GREENS FIRST, LABOR SECOND</i></span><br />
<span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
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<span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">My Mental Health requires Peace, and hearing Christine Milne et al the words I believe in - taking the reality and moral challenge up to the population and major 'old' parties with the facts. </span></i></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><i><span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></i></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><i><span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I've enjoyed the experience and met some lovely Labor members, but I can't handle the increasing inner conflicts on the outsider view.</span></i></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><i><span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></i></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><i><span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">No sneaky machinations - the FACTS. Climate and human rights matter. I wrestle with my Soul and the ALP which requires an increase in medication.....Fact.</span></i></span><br />
<span style="color: red; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-WYu1g0CNLAw/T3AmOXUFmtI/AAAAAAAAA6s/oAjgDRDpftI/s1600/DSCF2621.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-WYu1g0CNLAw/T3AmOXUFmtI/AAAAAAAAA6s/oAjgDRDpftI/s1600/DSCF2621.JPG" height="206" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">3 years ago I had a vision of a Labor/Green alliance!</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">But the State Secretary didn't agree </span><br />
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<span style="color: lime;"> <b style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Every time I hand out how to vote flyers I imagine how good it would be to have a digital board at each gate where Party Preferences can be read. One poster in each electoral booth to consult and you would stop the WASTE of colour glossy printing reams of trees that have a 5 minute benefit.</span></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b></b></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>Will report back after the tally.....on the STAMINA, INTELLIGENCE and GRASS-ROOTS CAMPAIGNING on 3 hours sleep is what candidates do to make a difference for the community, and themselves.</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b><br /></b></span>
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<span dir="auto"><span style="font-size: large;">Annastacia Palaszczuk & Jim Madden of the Somerset branch and candidate for Ipswich West will do a much better job than the authoritarian LNP.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-14745517962219059942014-12-12T05:57:00.001-08:002014-12-12T07:12:53.526-08:00Labor for Palestine and Israel <br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">Listening to Lior, on my Queenslander verandah, my Safe Haven home, retreat and recovery centre for my Soul ~</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">IT OCCURRED TO ME, NOT A DAY GOES BY WITHOUT MY SWITCHING TOO AND FRO ABOUT THE INTEGRITY OF LABOR'S PARTY PLATFORM.</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">How was the party I had joined in 2004 progressed on the social justice issues which for some innate reason, were my passionate concern? As if the cruelty and breach of International Law in regard to Refugees and off-shore detention wasn't enough, </span></i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">the plight of the Palestinians occupy my thoughts. </span></i></div>
<i style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></i>
<i style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Every time I hear or read</span></i><i style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"> about another Jewish family occupying the homes of Palestinians it is incomprehensible. It is exactly what the Nazi's did to the Jews. </span></i><br />
<i><br /></i><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I happened upon WIVENHOE BRANCH whose MEMBERS FELT similarly. WE HAD A PRESENTATION OF THE SITUATION AT A MEETING AND ALSO WENT INTO BRISBANE TO LISTEN TO POINTS OF VIEW FROM DIFFERENT STAKEHOLDERS.</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;">I DISCOVERED ALP MEMBER FOR BLAIR SHAYNE NEUMANN WAS A "Friend of Israel". I didn't understand what this meant. I assumed he would be a friend of Palestine too to be fair.</span></div>
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;">Labor's policy is to support the Two State Solution, but I also perceived that he was more one sided or lop-sided towards the arguments of Israel. </span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">In deed, during these years two massive military attacks on the Palestinian people and increasing settlements of Jews on Palestinian land and occupation of their homes makes our Labor MP's go quiet.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;">I can only think it is about money river. MP's receive donations for campaigns or paid trips to Israel. It's a guess this impedes the political and humanitarian impetus to speak out against the destruction and sanctions of Israel towards Palestinians.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;">Labor really has to rethink and debate this policy. I'm not the only one! Today, Crikey published this welcome contribution: </span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://newmatilda.com/2014/12/11/labor-palestine-its-about-time">Labor for Palestine: It's About Time</a></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-SDlCCsmz6X8/VIr46lom7II/AAAAAAAAMks/XSxuukljEhs/s1600/%2BBanksy%2B.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-SDlCCsmz6X8/VIr46lom7II/AAAAAAAAMks/XSxuukljEhs/s1600/%2BBanksy%2B.jpg" height="472" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Banksy street artist Christmas card.</td></tr>
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<span style="color: red;"><b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'Segoe UI', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;">The Australian Labor Party’s (ALP’s) policy on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, when it won the November 2007 federal election, is best represented in the party’s </span><i style="border: 0px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'Segoe UI', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 16px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">National Platform and Constitution 2007:</i></b></span><br />
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<span style="color: red;"><b>Labor is convinced that all Australians seek a lasting and equitable solution to the problems that have worked against stability and development in the Middle East. Labor will pursue a sustained Australian engagement in the Arab/Israeli conflict based on the rights of all people in the Middle East to peace and security and livelihood .... Labor believes that urgent attainment of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the best way to reduce violence and conflict across the Middle East.<a href="http://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/pubs/BN/2012-2013/AustraliaIsraeliPalestinianConflict#_ftn2" name="_ftnref2" style="background-color: transparent; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">[2]</a></b></span></div>
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<br />Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-27805013245655093202014-11-06T18:12:00.002-08:002020-08-10T00:27:01.351-07:00LANDING ON MULTICULTURAL AUSTRALIA TARMAC <span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">I embraced the public policy of 'Multiculturalism' when I emigrated to Melbourne January 1978 - aged nearly 15yrs, with my family. Whilst Mum and step-dad entered the manufacturing industries of outer suburban Clayton, my sisters and I took steps to aquaint ourselves with our Australian way of of life.</span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Tfer1AZFxvA/U9uASGYxSzI/AAAAAAAAKn8/rL4JCJXOn5o/s1600/coat-of-arms.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><br /><br /></a></div>
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">Kerribree Court was part of a new housing development and indicative of the ongoing arrival of New Australians: Unlike the Neighbours yet to grace our screens, there was one Anglo-Australian mum, dad with a truck and two kids, one Indian family, and 4 Greek families who worked in the sweltering factories. I'm sure there was an Italian family living there too. </span><br />
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">I was accustomed to migrant communities as I had grown up in a terrace-housing street filled with post-war Irish Catholic families, and at school my friends were from Jamaica, India, Pakistan, Germany and a few like me with roots going back into the Industrial cradle of the 'Black Country'.</span><br />
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">The Conservative M.P. Enoch Powell was stirring up race hatred but I discovered the speech of Martin Luther King Jnr in my primary school library, so I shared his Dream.</span><br />
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">The first hospitality I felt was from a Greek-Australian girl at Huntingdale High who invited me to her family home for a feast of fish caught by her father and friends. It was my first Greek Salad which would become my favourite for Aussie BBQ's.</span><br />
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">It was a Saturday afternoon, my friend had already been to Greek School. Once the women had finished in the kitchen it was time to dance, chairs to the side of the living room and the hosts taking to the floor for the first waltz.</span><br />
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">Unlike my freedom to roam, my classmate had to have a big brother chaperone before going to the Milk Bar! It was also accepted she might have an 'arranged' marriage, that is somebody approved by her parents. Of course the Greek boys of the neighbourhood who I sometimes hung out with at the local school ground at night smoking cigarettes and debating issues with, were absolutely in agreement this tradition of control with females wasn't over the top. Aussie girls were sluts and it was their duty to protect their second-generation women from corruption of "Skippy" culture.</span><br />
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">It wasn't much different to many of the Indian and Pakistani immigrant communities in England. Everything was fine until the daughter wanted to define her own life without the law of the Patriarch. I've known so many lovely young women be rejected by parents because they have integrated with their new country.</span><br />
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">Today it is women from Muslim countries who face conflicting values and strictures. </span><br />
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">In recent times I have learned how much the recently departed, former Prime Minister Gough Whitlam meant to Greek-Australians. The first was when my husband and I were in Athens, and our first night was greeted by a class mate who recognised me walking down ancient Plaka!</span><br />
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">She had been living and working in Athens in publishing after completing her Archeology and Arts degrees at Monash University. Greek parents may have been strict but they supported their daughters in their pursuit of education (the closest I got to tertiary study was with my parents drinking Jugs of Beer at the Uni Bar at the Notting Hill Hotel).</span><br />
<br />
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b>link about my Greek sojourn:</b></span><br />
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b> <a href="http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/10737f/663f2/" target="_blank">Huntingdale High students meet in Greece 30 years later</a></b></span><br />
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<br />
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">It was May 2010 when my Melbourne classmate and I started to talk about our lives, and asking about the regular protests taking place against public service cuts nearby I told her I was a Branch Secretary in the ALP. </span><br />
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">Her eyes shone. So many of the Greek migrants like her parents were passionate about Labor. Post-war emigration was huge under Prime Minister Chifley(and Calwell). Their hard work in corner shops and takeaways, agricultural labours and building meant a standard of living their own country couldn't provide.</span><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/proxy/AVvXsEiuQh_0oM5FyXpPdcI_rdL34fc-Hg5kJVps77HG9SUBRz2T-17kN2lKBXoRA59lktxvlLGeulE2qK1kZc_izI9jtIMRry-LbrmRSWRfbhGbJ6ZdkZ-jfr2wvZx_yEUsch-b-FTCcglySIow4DP0XnCzIpCR9u3caLFC43WK9iPmNDfxnRMTrIzEUxlW5F9B9KSmz59KWKRsvA=" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://www.whitlam.org/__data/assets/image/0006/471903/Telephone_interpreter_service.jpg" /></a><span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br />
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"></span>
<span face="" style="font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">The early memories of the 1972 It's Time campaign and the excitement of her parents and their friends for the election of Gough Whitlam was vivid.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Farewell 'great man'" src="http://neoskosmos.com/news/sites/default/files/imagecache/preview/2014/October/gough_whitlam_gc_1975.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Whitlam with Greek community Melbourne 1975<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;">FAREWELL GREAT MAN -</span><br />
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<span class="date-display-single" style="font-size: large;">27 Oct 2014</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">JOHN PYRROS FORMER greek community president remembers:</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">Edward Gough Whitlam - the man who championed multiculturalism during his time in power from 1972-75 - passed away early last week.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">An icon in the eyes of many immigrants, Whitlam had an unprecedented love for the Greek culture, never before seen by an Australian prime minister.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">That love, on most accounts, continues to be reciprocated within the Greek Australian diaspora.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">George Fountas, who served as the president of the Greek Orthodox Community of Melbourne and Victoria (GOCMV) from 1990 to 2008, described Whitlam as a "great man" and a "great leader" when he spoke to Neos Kosmos.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">"He was against racism and he was so fond of Greece," he said.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">"He was very fond of Greek history, and the Greeks - all migrants."</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">Fountas was involved with Whitlam in his post-political career. He explained that Whitlam served as the patron of Melbourne's Antipodes festival for "many years".</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">"He would attend the festival in Lonsdale Street every March and he was always speaking in favour of Greece.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">"I remember once he was giving a speech at the World Trade Centre in Flinders Lane and he was talking about the Parthenon Marbles and Greek history, without having anything written down."</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">"He had sent me a card when they had the referendum in Australia (in 1974), written in Greek, saying 'long live Australian democracy'. (Zito Australiani Dimokratia)."</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">Fountas' sentiments were sounded throughout the country following Whitlam's passing. Both sides of politics paid their respects, including two prominent Liberal figures. In his column for the Herald Sun, former Victorian premier Jeff Kennett said:</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">"... my relationship with Gough Whitlam began because of our common respect for Greece, the Greeks and the desire to have the Elgin Marbles returned to Greece from Britain. Quite simply, we were Grecophiles. We met on many occasions, in particular on Greece's National Day March celebrations, March 26 [sic], during which Gough was received with something approaching reverence."</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">And the feeling was resonated in federal parliament on the day of his passing, when an emotional Malcolm Turnbull spoke about the strong bond Whitlam shared with wife Margaret, over 70 years of marriage. The communications minister said:</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">"If Gough is in Olympus, I have no doubt that he's there with Margaret ... in some respects one of the things we can be happiest about today is the fact that that old couple are no longer apart."</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">Whitlam has been, and will continue to be, a figure championed throughout Australia's Greek community.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">A Whitlam snapshot:</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">July 11, 1916</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">born in Kew, Victoria.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">22 April, 1942</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">marries Margaret Elaine Dovey in Sydney (they have four children).</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">1942-1945</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">serves in the Royal Australian Air Force.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">1945</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">joins the Australian Labor Party (ALP).</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">13 November, 1972</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">delivers his 'It's Time' speech.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">5 December, 1972</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">becomes Australia's 21st prime minister after leading Labor to its first election victory in 23 years.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">11 December, 1972</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">announces the withdrawal of Australian personnel from Vietnam.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">15 December, 1972</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">the Whitlam government announces a judicial enquiry into the legal recognition of Aboriginal land rights.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">19 December, 1972</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">upgrades the Office of Aboriginal Affairs to ministerial level.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">December, 1972</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">introduces the Equal Pay Case for women and ends conscription.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">31 October, 1973</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">becomes the first Australian prime minister to visit the People's Republic of China, transforming Australia's trading landscape.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">1 January, 1974</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">tertiary fees abolished.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">11 June, 1975</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">enacts the Racial Discrimination Act.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">12 June, 1975</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">enacts the Family Law Act, providing for the Family Court of Australia.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">1 July, 1975</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">introduces Medibank.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">16 September, 1975</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">Papua New Guinea becomes independent of Australia.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">11 November, 1975</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">dismissed by Governor General Sir John Kerr and Upper and Lower Houses of parliament dissolved.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">31 July, 1978</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">resigns his parliamentary seat.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">21 October, 2014</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">dies, aged 98.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">Source: Sydney Morning Herald and National Archives of Australia.</span></div>
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<span face="" style="color: red; font-family: "helvetica neue", arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Member for Calwell, Maria Vamvakino continues the theme of Multi-cultural Melbourne directed by Prime Minister Whitlam.</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><b>Here we are at Ipswich Trades Hall - launching Shayne Neumann for Blair. I voted for you being a Labor member since 2007, branch secretary and Labor Women's Policy Committee in Queensland. It's the kind of participation I joined for. </b></i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><b>Mingling with the Labor loyalists, I had to inform you I was becoming disillusioned with our out of sight out of mind refugee policies. I said you shouldn't damn the Greens as they are the one voice on the national stage which speak for me. </b></i></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b> When I read and hear the ALP being endorsed as a 'Values Party'(Qld Labor Times Spring issue 2014), you must mean except asylum seekers. Why are you not saying it is wrong to call people by number than name akin to the very regimes these people are fleeing from?</b></span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Please explain how we value our VALUES in the National Party platform of the ALP on human rights and our obligations under International Law of which we once were a proud signatory to.</span></b><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b><br />
As our former dearly departed former Labor Leader said: <span style="background-color: white; color: #8899a6; font-size: 14.4444446563721px; line-height: 18px; white-space: pre-wrap;">"Punters know the horse named Morality rarely gets past the post, whereas the nag Self-Interest always runs a good race." Gough Whitlam</span></b></span><br />
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Please read this, thanks to the Saturday Paper, worthy of subscription just for being there to receive this link to: <a href="http://www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/opinion/topic/2014/10/25/open-letter-living-the-hell-called-nauru/14141556001165#.VE3LTevbaxw.blogger">Open letter: Living in the hell called Nauru | The Saturday Paper</a></b></span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>Is this humane? Is this worth billions, when they could come and stay at my place? There is more moral outrage and action by Parliament when Cattle are treated cruelly than our supposed Party of Compassion - so silently sweeping the corridors claiming there is less harm keeping kids in concentration camps with men made to be torturers.</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b><br /></b></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>Seven years of membership - reminding those who should know it is not a crime to seek asylum in a boat, or in a plane, or on a train! According to our signed alliances we all have Human Rights. It's enshrined in our National Party Platform.</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>Why did our join? Was it because the ALP was the lesser of two evils? I am cursed with believing the best of all possible worlds will be fulfilled, but everybody speak with forked tongue...</b></span><br />
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<b><span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">ALP National Platform:</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Labor is a party of human rights. Labor believes in a just and tolerant society that fully protects the </span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">rights and freedoms of all people in Australia. Labor supports the Universal Declaration of Human </span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Rights and the international treaties to which we are a signatory.</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Human rights</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">26 Labor believes a Human Rights Framework that reflects our international obligations is necessary in </span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">reflecting our commitment to fundamental rights across social and economic policies. We are committed </span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">to promoting the awareness and understanding of human rights, supporting the international human </span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">rights instruments to which Australia is a signatory, and properly funding the Australian Human Rights </span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Commission. Labor will adhere to Australia’s international human rights obligations and will seek to have </span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">them incorporated into the domestic law of Australia, and have them taken into account in administrative </span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">decision-making and whenever new laws and policies are developed.</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">27 Labor has introduced a new Human Rights Framework that:</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">● is investing in a comprehensive suite of education initiatives to promote a greater understanding </span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">of human rights across the community</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">● through the National Action Plan on Human Rights requires each new Bill introduced into Parliament </span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">is accompanied by a statement of compatibility with our international human rights obligations</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">● establishing a new Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights to provide greater scrutiny of </span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">legislation for compliance with our international human rights obligations</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-size: large;">● develops federal anti-discrimination laws into a single Act to remove unnecessary regulatory </span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-size: large;">overlap and make the system more user-friendly</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-size: large;">● provides for a review of legislation, policies and practices for compliance with the seven core UN </span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-size: large;">Human Rights treaties to which Australia is a party (which are listed in the framework).</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-size: large;">28 Labor will review its Human Rights Framework legislation in 2014 and that review will consider </span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: red; font-size: large;">whether the Human Rights Framework could be enhanced through a statutory charter of human rights or other similar instrument</span></b></div>
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<span style="color: red; font-size: large;"><b><img alt="After 30 Years, New Matilda's Lindsay Foyle Finally Scoops A Walkley Nomination | newmatilda.com" src="http://media-cache-cd0.pinimg.com/736x/30/70/41/3070419238d8d0233e370fd3f87327bc.jpg" /></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><b>I am informed by the Australian Guardian about the actions of the Minister for Immigration Scott Morrisson:</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large; line-height: 1.357;"><b>The high court case in December concerns a Pakistani boat arrival </b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><b>who has been in immigration detention on Christmas Island since </b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><b>May 2012.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><b>He is an ethnic Hazara and a Shia Muslim. Australia has found he is a refugee, with a well-founded fear of persecution by Sunni extremists in his home country.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><b>He has passed all security and character checks.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><b>It is illegal for Australia to send the man back to Pakistan. Immigration authorities are obliged to grant him a visa, the high court said.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><b>The man was initially allowed to apply for a visa, but legislative changes and Morrison’s imposed cap on visa numbers have stalled the process.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><b>After the high court ruled the government was “bound to … grant him a protection visa”, Morrison issued a “conclusive certificate” – which cannot be appealed – ruling it was not in the “national interest” for him to have a visa.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><b>The man remains in immigration detention.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><b>“The issue at the heart of this proceeding is whether the minister may achieve by administrative fiat the outcome presently denied to the minister through the parliament,” Stephen Lloyd, acting for the Pakistani man, told the high court.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><b>“The minister seeks to use mechanisms under the Migration Act to attain an unlawful end.”</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><b>Stephen Donaghue, for the government, <a href="http://www.hcourt.gov.au/assets/cases/s297-2013/Plf-s297-2013_Ann-Def.pdf" style="background-repeat: no-repeat; border-collapse: collapse; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none;">told the high court</a> Morrison did have the power to limit the number of visas to be granted, and that the government must keep “unlawful non-citizens” in detention while a visa determination was made.</b></span></div>
<span style="font-family: 'Courier New', Courier, monospace; font-size: large; line-height: 1.357;"><b>Donaghue told the court there was “no duty” on Morrison to grant a visa to a person found to be a refugee and requiring Australia’s protection. Morrison was able to insist upon additional criteria to be met before granting a visa, he said.</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><b>(And most of these MP's stand <span style="color: red;">up and say Jesus is their Saviour!)</span></b></span><br />
<span style="color: red; font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><b>Laugh till we cry - Watch Shaun Macallef <a href="http://youtu.be/3vd4WV2Fotw?list=PLF0XanJyzLxeOuOx-aB6Sb0bioZwNwFyK" target="_blank">Mad as Hell - on National Security</a></b></span><br />
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<span style="color: red; font-size: large;"><b>NEWS FLASH FROM NEW MATILDA: <a href="https://newmatilda.com/2014/10/28/teen-asylum-seekers-fear-their-lives-after-weekend-violence-nauru#comment-78977" target="_blank">teen-asylum-seekers-fear-their-lives-after-weekend-violence-nauru#comment-78977</a></b></span></div>
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Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-322424517028596412014-10-20T19:31:00.001-07:002014-10-21T16:27:31.955-07:00AWESOME LEGACY OF A GREAT AUSTRALIAN <br />THANKYOU GOUGH -<br />
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I learned about the death of former Prime Minister Gough Whitlam not long after reading The Australian Guardian's Lenore Taylor's obituary on my IPhone(passed down from my daughter). It was 6a.m. At 98yrs the Great Gough was dead.<a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/oct/21/gough-whitlam-dies-at-age-98" target="_blank">WHITLAM OBITUARY </a><br />
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<span style="color: lime;"><u>The Political is Personal every day.</u></span><br />
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<span style="text-align: justify;">My husband had used me as a walking frame out of the bathroom and gone back to bed with prescribed pain-killers. After a week of visits to the bulk-billing G.P. a Sunday dash to hospital casualty, an MRI on his hip and spine, and sick certificates for work we acknowledge GOUGH and his able Minister for Social Security BILL HAYDEN for their work on UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE, MEDIBANK.</span><br />
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Before Medibank, the government provided tax concessions to encourage adoption of private health insurance. However, these arrangements were grossly inequitable, with high income earners paying less than low income earners for the same health insurance coverage.<sup style="border: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">4</sup> </div>
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The introduction of the system was met with ferocious opposition from many in the medical profession, the General Practitioners’ Society, the Australian Medical Association and the private health funds.<sup style="border: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">5</sup> Opponents argued that the system constituted a socialist takeover, and that the freedom of Australian citizens was at stake.<sup style="border: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">6</sup> Some doctors opposed the reforms because of their concerns that the system would reduce their income.<sup style="border: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">7</sup> </div>
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<span style="font-size: 11px;"> </span><b> ADVANCED AUSTRALIA FAIR!</b></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Labor Lights on the Canberra Hill - Kim Beasley, Paul Keating, Bob Hawke, Bill Hayden, Gough Whitlam. </td></tr>
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<a href="http://whitlam.org/#.VEW718CUk1Y.blogger">Home | Whitlam Institute</a> <br />
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THE END OF 23 yrs of CONSERVATIVE GOVERNMENT'S IN AUSTRALIA changed women's lives and mine<br />
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<a href="http://media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/b4/26/50/b42650c42f5c873406aefb5b50ea7238.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Whitlam and Haydne Medibank - Google Search" border="0" src="http://media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/b4/26/50/b42650c42f5c873406aefb5b50ea7238.jpg" /></a>IN THREE YEARS Prime Minister Whitlam enacted a progressive 'programme which listened to women and the evidence of scientific research. THANKYOU....</div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #575757; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: justify;">Planned Parenthood. Children by Choice.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #575757; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: justify;">The oral contraceptive pill was one of the most important developments in women health </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #575757; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: justify;">care. It gave women an easy and affordable way of controlling their fertility. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #575757; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: justify;"> During its first week in power, the Whitlam Government removed the Commonwealth sales tax that had been applied to the contraceptive pill, and made oral contraceptives available through the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, in order to provide more affordable, equitable access.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #575757; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: justify;"><a href="http://www.smh.com.au/comment/we-owe-it-to-single-mothers-to-ward-off-a-return-to-pennypinching-20130323-2gmt4.html" target="_blank">Single Mothers could keep their babies!</a> The Nuns still tried to take the new-born illegitimate babies off my sinful friends but they were saved by knowing they could apply for the single parent pension.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #575757; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white;">Appointment of the first Women's Advisor to the Prime Minister:</span></span></div>
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<img alt="Elizabeth Reid" src="http://www.whitlam.org/__data/assets/image/0006/478518/Elizabeth_Reid.jpg" />NO FAULT DIVORCE was introduced putting an end to more grief , financial and emotional which any break-up of a relationship engenders. By many accounts women in particular were less hindered in making an application to divorce, although Private detectives bemoaned their business down-turn for evidence of adulterous partners.</div>
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As it the UK play/film 'Educating Rita' wives going to University turned their Western patriarchal world upside down: Institutions would become more democratic - Social Democratic.</div>
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THEN THERE'S THE ARTS OF THE PEOPLE: <a href="https://theconversation.com/gough-whitlam-young-people-and-public-support-for-the-arts-33232" target="_blank">Public support for Australian artists</a></div>
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like my husband and I...immigrant 'poms' who grew up with Whitlam's legacy unfolding...including free University to enhance our lives and relieved of a cultural cringe...</div>
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THE WHITLAMS - AUSTRALIAN MUSIC for the biggest and longest WAKE.....of many reflections in a wonderful life.</div>
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<br />Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-86196237805682065172014-10-07T16:28:00.002-07:002014-10-20T23:01:07.542-07:00Indecent Haste: The Rush To Erode Our Freedoms<span style="background-color: #f9f9f9; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: 15.4545450210571px; line-height: 20.0009994506836px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="color: #111111; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><i>Labor believes that observing human rights and civil liberties is central to the continued strength of our democracy. Labor will have regard to those rights when taking action to safe-guard the security of our country in order to ensure that those rights are not unnecessarily infringed. Labor will also monitor and review the implementation of laws relating to national security to ensure that human rights and civil liberties are not unnecessarily infringed. (National ALP Party Platform - Chapter 11)</i></b></span></span></span><br />
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<strong style="background-color: #f9f9f9; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 20.0009994506836px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;"><em style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="color: #111111;">Never has an Australian government talked so much about freedom while doing so much to undermine it. When it comes to national security and refugees we are increasingly pathetic, writes Ben Saul. </span><span style="color: red;"> <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-10-07/saul-the-light-of-human-rights-is-fading-in-australia/5794640" target="_blank">On THE DRUM</a></span></em></strong><br />
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READ A SUMMARY BY WENDY BACON OF 'NEW MATILDA' ON THE LAWS PASSED BY THE AUSTRALIAN PARLIAMENT WITH HARDLY A DEBATE.<br />
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<a href="https://newmatilda.com/2014/10/07/indecent-haste-rush-erode-our-freedoms">Indecent Haste: The Rush To Erode Our Freedoms</a></h2>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">As a Labor member I am so disheartened by the SILENCE</span></i></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b><i>OF THE ALP CENTRE LEFT - it's like their Left wing has been clipped.</i></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b><i>Every day the Leadership of the Greens speak for what I feel about the Environment and Human Rights, but there is one woman in the ALP who stands apart,</i></b></span><b><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"> Melissa Parkes MP for Fremantle(who must have confidence in her electorate supporting her).</span></i></b></div>
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<b style="color: #333333; line-height: 20px;"><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Labor Leader Bill Shorten's strategy to be partners with the Conservatives on sending in the planes to Iraq again, pass security legislation(see above article), avoids being seen as unpatriotic, lacking in military might so the dominant Right wing flys. </span></i></b><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 20px;"><b><i>So What is the Bloody, Damned Point Repeating History Over and Over - our Politicians and their Advisors are supposed to be well read....wish they would sit and read this from a Master Truth-teller <a href="https://newmatilda.com/2014/10/09/pol-pot-isis-anything-flies-everything-moves?page=1#comment-77367" target="_blank">JOHN PILGER ON THE WAR CYCLES</a></i></b></span></span><br />
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<b style="color: #333333; line-height: 20px;"><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">One hundred years ago the panic was over Irish terrorists and the 'Wobblies"(International Worker's Union), so Prime Minister Billy Hughes wrote laws to stop those Irish Republicans in Australia committing terrorism. </span></i></b><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 20px;"><b><i>Why are our politicians so bloody minded about giving ASIO whatever they want when many of the comrades had ASIO files from the days of Santamaria & Co when they were working out a pathway to a fairer society? <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/oct/20/australian-government-metadata-requests-far-higher-than-disclosed?CMP=ema_632" target="_blank">THE GUARDIAN ON NEW INTELLIGENCE LAWS</a></i></b></span></span></div>
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<b style="color: #333333; line-height: 20px;"><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I keep waiting to hear the voice of my Australian Labor Party over ABC Radio National about the effect of these laws on immigration and intelligence are only going to represent and activate cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment on individuals and a blight on our international reputation and committments. </span></i></b></div>
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<b style="color: #333333; line-height: 20px;"><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Can't our politicians see and hear the ghost of George Orwell's book 1984?</span></i></b><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjntWB8L3q6Sj8UUvO0TQbY_9XqzFEMSJA57nC74Wv36g3n_PFqeqTN9Q2Onu5h81iIFhl5iu9Bj8kowTICRB_KYef-Tyuu9tITR-_Jm7MqS6wZpb66XJtuOZ_HvELESWel2WZCAxBHLieF/s320/newspeakpledge.jpg" height="320" width="239" /></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></i></b><b><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The subtext of all this Islamophobia creeping into our legislation is 'It's a means to an end'. This is why M.P.s work 24/7 - the Power will be theirs! The fear and desire is to maintain a White Christian majority Australia, just like the comrades before them. read more at</span></i></b><br />
<b><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/legal-experts-criticise-scott-morrisons-use-of-draconian-law-20141008-10rwn3.html" target="_blank">DRACONIAN MEANS TO AN END 2014</a></span></i></b><br />
<b><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></i></b><b><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Labor and Liberal have joined in exploiting the sincerity of Chaplains in State schools without argument or Principles of Enlightenment, because when it comes down to it The program is cheap as chips, and having Christians in State school is not going to be harmful, right?</span></i></b><br />
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Meanwhile Scientists and journalists are sacked, advocates of the poorest in society are crushed with lack of funding. It wouldn't be so harsh under Labor...will it? </span></i></b><br />
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KNOWLEDGE IS POWER</div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Internet technology has made Governments anxious over dissenters on blogs and social networks. Spies and media officers are on the ascendency battling freedom of expression and search for Truth and Public accountability.</span></i></b><br />
<b><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">When politicians want to keep secrets so much you know there in injustice to be found - I mean acts of Treason. </span></i></b><br />
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">When Labor was in Government I couldn't believe how they denounced the role of whistleblowers like Julian Assange, seeking to denounce him rather than support him. </span></i></b><br />
<b><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Our embarassed and angry allie hadn't wanted us to know the callous disregard for civilians resulted in helicopter shots on kids and their dads. </span></i></b><br />
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.blogger.com/%3Ciframe%20src=%22https://embed-ssl.ted.com/talks/julian_assange_why_the_world_needs_wikileaks.html%22%20width=%22640%22%20height=%22360%22%20frameborder=%220%22%20scrolling=%22no%22%20webkitAllowFullScreen%20mozallowfullscreen%20allowFullScreen%3E%3C/iframe%3E" target="_blank">Australian JULIAN ASSANGE talks to TED</a></span></i></b><br />
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">'Collatoral damage' It's obviously in the major parties interests to see journalists/whistleblowers in gaol where they can't google and fraternise.</span></i></b><br />
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Power really does corrupt. Tony Abbott told us we have to surrender freedoms for the greater good. Both parties have been complicit in eroding human rights when Julian Assange and now Edward Snowdon dared to challenge Governments doing very bad, unethical, immoral stuff. </span></i></b><br />
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I bet they wish for the good old days of Nixon and Kissinger bombing Cambodia to bits and pieces.</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Abbott and Brandis puffed up self-righteousness is wicked. And not forgetting the other commandant Morrisson and his cruel, degrading, inhuman policy of boat refugees and contempt for UN Universal Human Rights.</span></i></b><br />
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">There is one person in the ALP who I dips me lid to:</span></i></b></div>
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MELISSA PARKES Labor Woman and MP for Fremantle WA TOOK A STAND - warning against complacency and abuses of power by the State. Hear Hear! Here is a Youtube clip of </div>
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<a href="http://youtu.be/2SqjDVxNxY0" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: large;">Melissa Parke MP House of Representatives 2014</span></a><br />
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Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-38342767667517814252014-09-05T16:26:00.001-07:002014-10-16T18:04:52.105-07:00September 21 - Global Day of Climate Action<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="270" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/GG0JI3mSsgU" width="480"></iframe><br />
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<br />Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-90668859057144555742014-06-10T18:18:00.001-07:002014-07-05T17:27:30.900-07:00 HANGING ON THE OLD BARBED WIRE <br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"> WORLD WAR ONE CENTENARY PREPARATIONS are taking place in communities across Australia. The Past is always with us - and so are the WARS...</span></div>
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<b>James Brown, former ADF soldier and military scholar at the Lowy Institute said</b><br />
<b><br /></b><span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><b><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 17.02400016784668px;">Though we are absolutely right to mark the significance of the centenary of the First World War, Australia will outspend the United Kingdom's centenary program by 200 per cent.</span></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><b><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 17.02400016784668px;">Anzac remembrance on this side of the Tasman will cost nearly 20 times what our New Zealand colleagues have allocated. Rather than letting silent contemplation be our offering to those who served and died for us, we are embarking on a discordant and exorbitant four-year festival, that looks like an Anzacs arms race of sorts.</span><span style="border: 0px; line-height: 17.02400016784668px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /><br />Read more: <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/national/ww1/excess-in-the-anzac-centenary-overlooks-other-military-endeavours-20140225-33foj.html#ixzz34UDkjuFY" style="border: 0px; color: #003399; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">http://www.smh.com.au/national/ww1/excess-in-the-anzac-centenary-overlooks-other-military-endeavours-20140225-33foj.html#ixzz34UDkjuFY</a></span></b></span><br />
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<b>Singing by CHUMBAWAMBA: a song written by soldiers in the trenches in the First World War.</b></div>
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<b>Designed to be sung while marching. </b><br />
<b>FORTUNATE then, and GRATEFUL to live in a country where PEACE reigns. No call up.</b></div>
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Being born in England I got to learn about the WAR OF THE ROSES at school, and WW2 on TV. about War was often through television screening black and white films about World War 2.<br />
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In 1978 arriving in Melbourne, Australia and starting High School in Year 10 we read a play by Alan Seymour called "One Day of the Year", which questioned the role of Anzac Day.<br />
It was performed in 1960. Our Drama teacher took us to see an amateur production of the play. A thought provoking start to Australian literary and cultural studies at the start of life as a New Australian!<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">THEN our English Teacher Mr. Taylor, respectfully introduced us to the words written in WW1 by soldier and poet, Wilfred Owen, then acted like a spring from my own poetic depths. </span><br />
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My English Heritage was not of being sent to Wars. My Grandmother said her Father shot himself in the foot so he didn't have to go! In Truth?<br />
my parents were born during the height of Hitler's Blitz as their parents made aircraft at Longbridge and Munitions at Ladywood.<br />
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My husband's family dug for the coal to fuel the industry, and the bombs fell around them, or I wouldn't be here!<br />
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How did I grow up to think about war? What information struck a chord that still resonates? Why am I more likely to be on the cynical side, challenging, not trusting authority figures and their agendas?<br />
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Those Aussie youth who went parading onto the ships at the call-up often saw it as a chance to get off the farm or their mundane lives and see a bit of the world. They thought, and so did Prime Minister Fisher they were being deployed to help Mother England in France, but Defence Minister Winston Churchill had other plans.</div>
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When do you hear the teacher, politician or parent inform the kids about the decisions of Politicians like Churchill to send the young like lambs to the slaughter? In recent years there has been increased encouragement to participate in Anzac services.<br />
They wave the Australian flag flying the Union Jack to remind us we are not an independent Nation. Now there are Chaplains in State Schools to learn about the God of Abraham. </div>
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Thus we have the Trifecta - God, Queen and Country. With a populist opinion that the previous generation of kids today don't have any respect (and thus won't be as forthcoming volunteering for the battles of the future), financial and educational incentives are distributed to join the armed forces.</div>
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Being a former Colonial country(with the British Monarchy at its Head of State), it was my observation that the Imperial brain washing was more intense on the population. The legacy of Empire Day still has its influence, especially in my home State of Queensland. In England you hardly ever see a Union Jack flying and certainly not on a school flag pole to be raised at school assembly.<br />
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<b>I was fortunate to experience the Dramas of war through T.V. in Britain because it was too cold or wet or snowing. One series which left an early impression was "The Family at War" which kept me awake whilst babysitting my cousins.</b><br />
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screened 1970-1972.<br />
With an empty nest I had the time to research the family tree and found my maternal line full of Celtic Kin employed by the British Army throughout the centuries. This came as a shock because I had grown up assuming the Irish in the Republic of Ireland were all Catholic and anti-British.<br />
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The public didn't have the full story from both sides in the centuries old war because of the censorship in the media.<br />
Growing up in Birmingham in the early 1970's where I had my bags checked for bombs at the Children's Library in town, I still had sympathy towards the under-dogs...My 10 year old brain believed there must be a good reason why they were fighting against the Government.<br />
The distrust of Church and State must have been passed on by my mother who grew up in Catholic Orphanages in England and Australia.<a href="http://cockneyclarkclan.blogspot.com.au/2010/10/boomerang.html" target="_blank">http://cockneyclarkclan.blogspot.com.au/2010/10/boomerang.html</a><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">THE IRISH SOLDIERS </span><br />
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First cousin 3 x removed: A Roman Catholic Dubliner who died in France when he could have died at home where another Irish rebellion was taking place.<br />
<img alt="James Fagan CWGC Memorial" src="http://mediasvc.ancestry.co.uk/v2/image/namespaces/1093/media/45b82e08-e545-4848-9461-54d238451041?client=TreesUI&maxSide=500" /><img alt="Somme Map" src="http://mediasvc.ancestry.co.uk/v2/image/namespaces/1093/media/9e333f5b-2f38-47a5-a543-72d6c5463429?client=TreesUI&maxSide=500" /><br />
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I'll be adding to this collage of cultural learnings of a military nature by the by - as my little contribution to the realities and fictions of Wars. It was supposed to <i>be the war that ended all wars! (</i>Yeah right)<br />
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<b>Australia's Tory Prime Minister visited the WW1 memorials in the region this week for the commemoration of the D-Day landing of the second world war. In his government's austerity budget for the already disadvantaged which is likely to cause more homelessness, he announced they will buy</b><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1.25em; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.3334;">"58 more F-35 Joint Strike Fighters (JSF) at a cost of more than $12 billion" ABC News </span><br />
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The extra aircraft will bring Australia's total Joint Strike Fighter force to 72 aircraft, with the first of them to enter service in 2020.</div>
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The $12.4 billion price tag makes the Joint Strike Fighters Australia's most expensive Defence asset.</div>
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The Government says it will also consider the option of buying another squadron of the next-generation fighter jets to eventually replace the RAAF'S F/A-18 Super Hornets(and as they fly over my house I hope they are less noisy when I'm getting the grandson to have a peaceful sleep).</div>
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No matter how poor Government's claim they are to deny their population basic health needs they always find the money for the latest killing machines.</div>
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You learn as you grow up everything is a double-edged sword and Defence R&D brought us the Internet technology.</div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><b>LATELINE FRIDAY 13TH FULL MOON - IRAQ INVASION SO FAR COST THE U.S.A. around 1.3 TRILLION DOLLARS.</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;">This does not include any decent services for their returned maimed soldiers.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"><u>Machine Gunner Corps, Royal Irish Fusiliers</u></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;">AGED 24 Sgt. James Ross, cousin to the deceased Private James Fegan,19, was returned home to Dublin from France(on medical discharge), and awarded the Star Medal.</span><br />
<a href="http://mediasvc.ancestry.co.uk/v2/image/namespaces/1093/media/b02ed2f9-3020-46e2-b042-6d66c73541f7?client=TreesUI&maxSide=500" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="James Robert Ross" border="0" src="http://mediasvc.ancestry.co.uk/v2/image/namespaces/1093/media/b02ed2f9-3020-46e2-b042-6d66c73541f7?client=TreesUI&maxSide=500" height="320" width="205" /></a><span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;">Grt Grand Uncle James Ross was married later in the year and worked at the Pay Office at Dublin Castle.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;">His sister Christina had also married at British soldier (my Great Grandparents).</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;">Rather than being sent to France from his home in London Thomas Clark was sent to Dublin as reinforcements against the rebellious Irish Republicans!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: large;">It was an extended family living in a tenement building at Great Longford St. Dublin South. Their home town had voted overwhelmingly for Sinn Fein to form Ireland's 1st Parliament and not sitting </span><span style="font-family: 'Courier New', Courier, monospace; font-size: large;">in London's House of Commons.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: 'Courier New', Courier, monospace; text-align: justify;">THE WELL-FARE STATE IN BRITAIN also arose from the analysis of war, including how fit and resilient were a population going to war! There were many comparisons between the physiques of the colonial Australians and those of Her Majesty's troops at Home!</b><br />
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><b>Background to free school dinners from the British Archives web site:</b></span></div>
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<i>In 1900 there was a great deal of anxiety about the health of the people of Britain.</i></div>
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<i>The government and the armed forces had been shocked by the physical health of the young men of Britain when they were trying to recruit for the Boer War (1899-1902). They had found that many of the young men were too small or under-nourished to join up. As a result of this, a 'Committee on Physical Deterioration' was set up.</i></div>
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<i>The government had worked hard to deal with conditions such as cholera and passed laws to ensure everyone had access to a clean water supply, better houses and education. These efforts however did not do anything to help with people's nutrition. Approximately a quarter of the people in London did not have enough money to live on, even if they had a permanent job and spent their wages wisely.</i></div>
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<i>Seebohm Rowntree carried out a survey of working class families in the city of York in 1901. He found that even if they had jobs, wages were often too low to ensure a decent standard of living. Children did not get the good diet they needed - partly because their parents were too poor and partly because parents generally did not understand what was needed for a healthy diet. Medical care cost money and parents did not call a doctor for their children unless they were desperate.</i></div>
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My husband and I were fortunate to have my childhood in pre-Thatcherite Britain as we were grateful for a hearty warm subsidised school dinner during those cold, windy years. Puddings were awesome too, and sometimes there was seconds!</div>
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Little did we know the original purpose was to feed us little piggies up for successful breeding optimum and potential slaughter fields when words and intelligence and incompetence had failed us. At my school in Selly Oak, Birmingham we were fortunate to have the philanthropic Cadbury factory at Bourneville nearby, so we received a packet of 2 chocolate wheaten biscuits, scrumptious with our Milk!</div>
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Of course none of this wide-scale government intervention would have been necessary if the minimum wage rose to meeting decent living standards - but then I am an Australian citizen of humanist Labor values and principles. HIGGINS was my maiden name so it was easy to remember the landmark decision of </div>
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<span style="background-color: #e6ecf7; color: navy; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-style: italic; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">1907 "Harvester Judgement" that established the concept of the "sufficient wage" for unskilled workers. The "sufficient wage" soon became known as the "basic wage". Justice Henry Higgins, Federal Court of Australia.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #e6ecf7; color: navy; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-style: italic; line-height: 18px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Here is a gem of industrial and war-time history in my husband's family tree of Yorkshire miners who collectively organised against Capitalist exploitation.</span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #e6ecf7; color: navy; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-style: italic; line-height: 18px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">GRAND UNCLE ISAAC CHURM'S WAR:</span></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Cjsp2tjRujk/U5uERRA9q2I/AAAAAAAAJfs/PJD49GpT-PQ/s1600/+Churms+war.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Cjsp2tjRujk/U5uERRA9q2I/AAAAAAAAJfs/PJD49GpT-PQ/s1600/+Churms+war.jpg" height="640" width="353" /></a><br />
Issac Born Castleford Yorkshire,1885 - 1942 age 57yrs.</td></tr>
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<span style="font-size: small;">Following the Court case he returned as Private to the York and Lancaster Regiment, and went to France and returned home - Lucky chap of the working-class.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Isaac Churm's twin brother, DAVID was discharged from the army due to injuries from working as a coal miner since he was 14yrs. He died in 1941 age 56yrs.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">Both buried in Rotherham Yorkshire FOR FASCINATING FILM HISTORY ABOUT COAL MINING CLICK - <a href="http://www.screenonline.org.uk/history/id/1198219/" target="_blank">British Film Institute online</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">THE FRANCHISE</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">When my Irish kin went to World War 1, they had not been given the vote by Westminster Parliament due to an entrenched class system. </span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">Finally in 1918 as a reward to the men who had gone to war for the British political system and Empire a reform to the Electoral laws were passed which made ALL MEN over 21 the right to vote.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">Typically the long fought for franchise was passed into law for fear the returned soldiers might instigate a revolution like that taking place in Russia!</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">Women had been campaigning for the franchise well before the War and still had a battle to win equal voting rights. Women were given some concession by allowing over 30 with property to go first! </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #414a51; color: #cccccc; font-family: 'Franklin Gothic Medium'; font-size: 14px;"><span style="color: orange;">Constance Georgine Markievicz </span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #414a51; color: #cccccc; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;">4 February 1868 – 15 July 1927.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #414a51; color: #cccccc; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;">was an Irish Sinn Féin and Fianna Fáil politician, revolutionary nationalist, suffragette and socialist. In December 1918, she was the first woman elected to the British House of Commons, though she did not take her seat and along with the other Sinn Féin TDs formed the first Dáil Éireann. She was also one of the first women in the world to hold a cabinet position (Minister for Labour of the Irish Republic, 1919–1922).</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #414a51; color: #cccccc; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;">She was born Constance Georgine Gore-Booth at Buckingham Gate in London, the elder daughter of the Arctic explorer and adventurer Sir Henry Gore-Booth, 5th Baronet, an Anglo-Irish landlord who administered an 100 km2 (39 sq mi) estate, and Lady Georgina née Hill. During the famine of 1879–80, Sir Henry provided free food for the tenants on his estate at Lissadell House in the north of County Sligo in the north-west of Ireland. Their father's example inspired in Gore-Booth and her younger sister, Eva Gore-Booth, a deep concern for the poor. The sisters were childhood friends of the poet W. B. Yeats, who frequently visited the family home Lissadell House, and were influenced by his artistic and political ideas. Yeats wrote a poem, In Memory of Eva Gore-Booth and Con Markiewicz, in which he described the sisters as "two girls in silk kimonos, both beautiful, one a gazelle". Eva later became involved in the labour movement and women's suffrage in England, although initially the future countess did not share her sister's ideals.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #414a51; color: #cccccc; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;">from the authors of</span><br />
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<span style="color: #cccccc; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: #414a51; font-size: 14px;">http://www.warrelics.eu/forum/discussions/eiri-amach-na-casca-165860/</span></span><br />
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<br />Julie McNeillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09784054500938725234noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3112748037818599850.post-51536546274101878572014-05-23T23:16:00.002-07:002014-06-02T17:35:26.896-07:00FINANCIALLY PLANNING SWINGS AND ROUNDABOUTS<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">(re-worked blogging)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I watched Question Time(26 May 2014) where Prime Minister Tony <i>Tory</i> Abbott misguided the Parliament when he said everybody would be better off from this Budget!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i>Better the pain now or worse cuts in the future... It's shared pain he</i> <i>said</i>. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">The figures show the Rich will continue to find tax loop-holes, financial planners don't have to have to serve their clients interests and the PM is taking a pay freeze! </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">We know this is a lie. Anybody will tell you this punishment of the poor will see increased homelessness, mental illness, suicides, domestic violence, euthanasia and abortions.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Before the election this Government promised refugees a cruel regime, second, blame the sick, disabled, unemployed, single parents for being parasites. Thankfully their deceipt and deflections are found out and reported by some ethical media - click here</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><a href="https://newmatilda.com/2014/05/24/frances-abbott-chosen-%E2%80%98-merit%E2%80%99-help-lobby-fed-govt-regulators" target="_blank">New Matilda investigates:PM daughter in secret scholarship good fortune</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I know the experiences of being young, homeless and unemployed with little government support. It can add kindling to future mental illness which you never fully recover from, and will see me needing to apply again for the Disability Support Pension which Minister Andrews for Human pittance Services is going to make more of an ordeal than it already is, and make me sicker. Bastard.</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">My first foray into political expression as a voluntary contributor whilst on the Under 18 dole<br />
when John Howard was Treasurer: $36.00 per week - further info on title bar tabs.</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">I've depended on welfare off and on over my 50years. I empathise with people who are being targeted in this budget.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">The Government does not pay any regard for facts from professionals with evidence. Purely punitive for being poor. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">The reality of life for the poorer citizens was confrontational this week, when a 67 year old female pensioner shared her experience and anxieties over Hockey's fairly taxing budget:</span><br />
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<a href="http://www.theage.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/meet-gloria-the-sex-worker-grandma-who-made-tony-abbott-wink-20140522-38rf7.html" style="text-align: justify;" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">http://www.theage.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/meet-gloria-the-sex-worker-grandma-who-made-tony-abbott-wink-20140522-38rf7.html</span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Will Prime Minister Abbott and Treasurer Joe Hockey be inspired to send us over 50's who've nurtured family units, volunteered in communities, done a bit of this and a bit of that, have no superannuation to supplement a pension, put us on New Start payments till we're 100years old?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">How come the "infrastructure" Prime Minister isn't producing affordable rental housing for people with casual, insecure work, supplemented by survival pennies from Parliament?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">As the Cabinet have foregone any moral authority, I wouldn't be surprised if they suggest the only job training is for a career in the sex industry! Still be able to work from home, safely on the phone.</span><br />
<span style="color: red; font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>What's your experience? I was a voluntary telephone counsellor when I was on the dole at 19yrs. I've been a performer for most of my life. We have nothing for you except helping men to masturbate. Easy. You won't even need a condom, so perfect for Roman Catholics!</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">The old Madonna and Whore paradigm articulated by Dr. Anne Summers who set up Prime Minister Paul Keating's Office for Women, will need a republication of her book about the lack of choices women are increasingly facing.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">There's no news about job creation, only job axing - only begging and being exploited for your time and labours.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">If you are a Christian you probably will perceive the news of increased funding for Chaplains in State schools as beneficial.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: large;">To alleviate the burden all our children can praise the Lord and learn about Divine Providence! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">This is a bi-partisan policy. Cuts to single parent incomes, removal of scientific projects to contain human induced climate change catastrophes. Halt development of new jobs in renewable energy. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Suffer little children, prayer is free and if your parents face eviction because their unemployment safety net has been cut, the Chappie may well say</b></span><b style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i> Trust in God's will</i></span></b><br />
<b style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i>It's meant to be.</i></span></b><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><span style="color: purple; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">“Religion is excellent stuff for keeping common people quiet. Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich.”</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Great insight from Napoleon Bonaparte 1769-1821 France</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">LINK TO EXCELLENT ARTICLE ON RON WILLIAMS CHALLENGE TO FEDERAL GOVT. FUNDING CHAPLAINS HERE - </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="http://www.kingstribune.com/index.php/weekly-email/item/2007-school-chaplaincy-the-high-court-and-the-constitution" target="_blank">http://www.kingstribune.com/index.php/weekly-email/item/2007-school-chaplaincy-the-high-court-and-the-constitution</a></span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px;"><b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i>Bugger the Budget says the Pirate Queen Grannie who is fed up begging for the DSP - We can sail to the Gold Coast where there are other Pirates who are devilishly clever at finding Treasure! It'll be like in the olden days!</i></span></b><br />
<b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i>We don't need school, all we Pirates need is swimming lessons to survive the rising sea-levels! </i></span></b></td></tr>
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<span style="color: red; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><i>RAGE RAGE AGAINST THE DYING OF THE LIGHT! (Long days journey into Night) - a person can only wait for so long.</i></b></span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A TALE OF TWO SISTERS<br />
at Frankston Sculpture Park.</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><i>Take your anti-depressants, and smile please!</i></b></span></div>
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Here is my Melbourne sister who was encouraged to leave school at 14 to work in a factory, never had a problem with getting a job.<br />
I completed Year 12, had many barriers to finding and keeping a job.</div>
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I have wept during Centrelink interviews, my self-esteem knocked about by questioning, of my needing support because nobody will give me an interview, or a job that lasts, or makes me ill with bullying.</div>
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Now my sister is a public servant with Super and stress from men, mainly men trying to shirk financial support for their children.</div>
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She has good Union negotiated wages, but half the workers have been let go so she does the work of three until she collapses....</div>
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THE LIES - BOLD AS AN ABBOTT SEEKING POWER - HERE IS OUR PRINCE TONY.</div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b><i>Section 3:<span style="font-size: large;"> </span></i></b><em style="background-color: white; color: #181818; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;"><span style="font-size: large;">Therefore it is unnecessary for a prince to have all the good qualities I have enumerated, but it is very necessary to appear to have them. And I shall dare to say this also, that to have them and always to observe them is injurious, and that to appear to have them is useful; to appear merciful, faithful, humane, religious, upright, and to be so, but with a mind so framed that should you require not to be so, you may be able and know how to change to the opposite.</span></em></span><br />
<em style="background-color: white; color: #181818; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">The promise given was a necessity of the past: the word broken is a necessity of the present.</span></em></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Recent protests in Melbourne against unfair budget measures.</td></tr>
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<b style="text-align: justify;"><i><span style="font-family: inherit;">I remember what it was like to not have enough cash for a litre of milk until the next dole payment. I remember when I went into a Medical centre to see a Doctor because I was going insane and anxious I was turned away because it was not bulk-billing and I had no health-care card; not poor enough, not rich enough, only worried I wasn't well enough to drive home.</span></i></b></div>
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Tony Abbott's daughters don't seem to be suffering from any form of nepotism guilt - perhaps they don't know what it means - having their special sense of entitlement being Tony Abbott's daughters.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">ARE WE GETTING THE WRONG PICTURE?(from the Fairfax Press)</span><br />
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<span style="color: blue; font-family: inherit;">Some Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade staff are annoyed Prime Minister Tony Abbott's daughter Louise is working at Australia's embassy in Geneva, which is headed by former Coalition staffer Peter Woolcott.</span></div>
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<span style="color: blue; font-family: inherit;">But a spokesman for DFAT said the job helping represent Australia to the United Nations was awarded on the basis of merit.</span></div>
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<span style="color: blue; font-family: inherit;">Jealousy over plum jobs in overseas locations was a staple of workplace life at DFAT, but departmental insiders said there were concerns over Ms Abbott being hired in Geneva, given the political connections of the mission's boss.</span></div>
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<span style="color: blue; font-family: inherit;">On Friday morning, the Prime Minister was on the defensive over reports <a href="http://www.canberratimes.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/tony-abbott-admits-wink-was-a-mistake-defends-daughter-over-scholarship-controversy-20140522-38ppk.html?rand=1400801630886" sl-processed="1" style="border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">daughter Frances received a $60,000 scholarship</a> from the Whitehouse Institute of Design and that she was recommended by Les Taylor, a Liberal Party donor and chairman of the institute's board of governors. </span></div>
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<span style="color: blue; font-family: inherit;">Mr Abbott said <a href="http://www.canberratimes.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/tony-abbott-says-he-was-not-lobbied-on-government-grants-by-head-of-institute-that-gave-daughter-a-scholarship-20140523-38t42.html#ixzz32VBXaUwd" sl-processed="1" style="border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Frances had been awarded the scholarship on merit</a> and that family should be kept out of the frontline of politics. </span></div>
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<span style="color: blue; font-family: inherit;">He said he had not been lobbied by a friend to allow private colleges access to government subsidies. The budget introduced direct financial grants for students taking courses in private colleges.</span></div>
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<span style="border: 0px; color: blue; font-family: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Read more: <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/dfat-anger-over-louise-abbotts-foreign-affairs-job-20140523-zrloo.html#ixzz32abjUo1P" style="border: 0px; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/dfat-anger-over-louise-abbotts-foreign-affairs-job-20140523-zrloo.html#ixzz32abjUo1P</a></span><br />
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<span style="color: red;">PRIME MINISTER, WHERE ARE ALL THE JOBS AND WORTHWHILE COURSES YOU PROMISE FOR THE UNDER 30'S. NOT EVERYBODY HAS PARENTS WHO CAN SUPPORT THEM WHEN THEY HAVE NO SOURCE OF INCOME?</span><br />
<span style="color: red;">IF YOU HAVE A DEGREE BUT CAN'T FIND A JOB WHAT COURSE ARE YOU GOING TO MAKE THEM DO?</span><br />
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IN PARLIAMENT THE OPPOSITION RAISED THE NEW COST OF DEGREES IF THE BUDGET PASSES THE SENATE - ENGINEERING UP TO $100,000 - AT A TIME WHEN YOU MAY HAVE A MORTGAGE AND KIDS...</span><br />
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<span style="color: blue;">THE PRIME MINISTER WILL PAY approx. $7,000 for her Design degree. She must have a generous guardian angel.</span><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/proxy/AVvXsEj2uXQgVK-zbhln0jZ1caPTuA_biO5p_qQJ2PVt2sGv92r1Ff5QiESWl2DxYnWarW3xiJP_NEC0YiJ0gg9sUKQcTkEpDaT62DtCmnmdcypNW6GN5sPd92OIZnFfTZwn02VgKSNxRi-a3pHrLphoDokaZ_7TMiEBU39NDIutcZIxGhnLt14Y9VsWqA=" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="Louise Abbott pictured with mother Margaret and father Prime Minister Tony Abbott, has attracted the ire of some DFAT staff for her role at Australia's embassy in Geneva." border="0" src="http://images.smh.com.au/2014/05/23/5450035/1400822094552.jpg-620x349.jpg" height="111" width="200" /></a><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small; text-align: justify;">Did people really believe To</span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small; text-align: justify;">ny Abbott and the rest of them would make Australia a fairer policy place? Did it ring true the Liberals would really go ahead with Gonski reforms and the NDIS?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">At least the Minister for Women(& Prime Minister)Tony Abbott's daughters didn't have to do lap dancing to pay for their rent and books, or medicines when they caught a cold...</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">It seems Tony doesn't want his daughter's to experience 'character building' austerity.</span><br />
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<a href="https://fbcdn-sphotos-d-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-prn1/t1.0-9/p600x600/10341565_288801914621543_8631473859864814128_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="Photo: It's time to wake up.
Via The Blue Street Journal" border="0" height="320" src="https://fbcdn-sphotos-d-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-prn1/t1.0-9/p600x600/10341565_288801914621543_8631473859864814128_n.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small; text-align: justify;">It's government sanctioned exploitation. </span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small; text-align: justify;">When the kids are feeling their parents stress at being evicted Scripture Union will have room under their tents.</span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small; text-align: justify;"> That solves the child-care issue in the school holidays.</span></h2>
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<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small; text-align: justify;">AUSTRALIAN'S ARE ENVIED FOR THE WORKER'S PARADISE WE CREATED. Conservatives want to return us to a pre-Whitlam Australia. Nobody should feel entitled to anything from the coffers of the Commonwealth. If you don't have enough money you're scum.(MONEY HOWEVER YOU GET IT IS WHAT GIVES YOU RESPECT)</span></h2>
<b style="font-size: x-large;">For your information, this link looks at the Budget consequences for women. </b><b style="font-size: x-large;"><a href="http://www.emilyslist.org.au/images/stories/pdf/Publications/womwnsbudget2014.pdf" target="_blank">Publications/womwnsbudget2014.pdf</a> and more reading at the </b><br />
<b style="font-size: x-large;"><a href="http://inequalitiesblog.wordpress.com/2013/10/10/the-psychology-of-poverty-and-welfare-reform/#comment-11735" target="_blank">INEQUALITIES BLOG </a></b><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b><br /></b></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Write to the Government Ministers and back bench or GET SUPER CREATIVE WITH YOUR PROTEST......</b></span><br />
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GO GIRLS!</div>
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