Critical Times

By Humphrey McQueen

Dare Australia’s Labor government gaol Adelaide builders’ labourer, Ark Tribe? Tribe’s crime is that he refuses to attend a secret hearing of the Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC). His failure to appear renders him liable to six months in prison or a fine of $22,000. Similar penalties apply if he turns up but refuses to answer, or if he answers but then tells anyone what the questions were.

Source: Vanguard

1. Human rights in Australia are poorly defined and not well protected. There is no national Bill of Rights and international conventions and treaties on human rights to which Australia is a signatory are not enforceable under Australian law.

By Renfrey Clarke

For governments and vehicle corporations, the charm of biofuels used to be the promise they held out of a ready-made solution to transport-related greenhouse gas emissions – a solution that might simply be dropped in, while changing almost nothing else.

Freeways, suburban sprawl, four-wheel-drive family cars – everything could remain. Only the fuel on sale at the service stations would be different.

Source: Vanguard Leaflet given out to the ACTU 2009 Congress

Unemployment, the loss of working conditions and union rights, casualisation, cuts to working hours, and general economic insecurity is hitting the working class hard. Many workers are looking for union leadership to continue the fight against WorkChoices, still enshrined in Labor’s ‘Fair Work Australia’.

The militancy and mass mobilisation of workers that characterised the struggle to defeat WorkChoices, powerfully demonstrated what can be achieved with united and strong leadership dedicated to the working class.

Source: Vanguard May Issue

In the first decade of the 21st Century, scientists of different disciplines are alerting people and governments to a second crisis of capitalism, a crisis bigger than the current economic crisis. That crisis is the destruction of the environment caused by the ‘growth at all costs’ logic of capitalism. The enormity of the crisis is summarised in the following statement by the Swedish Talberg Foundation 2008 Report, Grasping The Climate Crisis; A Provocation:
“The world at present faces a breakdown of the global financial system.

By Humphrey McQueen

A Review of the National Portrait Gallery – first published in the May edition of the Australian Book Review

When the National Portrait Gallery (NPG) opened in Canberra last December more thoughtfulness was evident in its bookshop than the hang. The volumes are arranged by subject and in alphabetical order: the images accord to no principle beyond decor. Here are five writers; there, four scientists.

By retired Lieutenant-Colonel Lance Collins (former head of Military Intelligence under INTERFET), who presented this speech to the “ANZAC EVE (Denis Kevans Memorial) PEACE FESTIVAL” – LEICHHARDT TOWN HALL, Sydney.

I have deployed on two overseas military operations. The first was a brief deployment to Kuwait in February 1998, a precautionary defence against Saddam Hussein during the weapons inspection crisis.

By Renfrey Clarke

“One hundred percent renewable electricity generation in Australia by 2020!” That was the bold call, endorsed by representatives of more than 100 climate action groups, that went out from the national Climate Summit held in Canberra in February.

By and large, the established media have ignored this summons – or else, dismissed it as green wish-dreaming. Renewable energy sources, the mainstream press generally has it, are incapable of replacing fossil fuels, especially coal, in providing the 24-hours-a-day “base-load” power that is the bedrock of electricity supply systems.

By Renfrey Clarke

Sometimes you have to hand it to capitalism. It’s sheer magic, the way the system takes promising concepts, steeps them in the transformative power of the market – and turns them into howling social and environmental disasters.
Take biofuels, for example.

The Pinnacle Education Consortium has been selected by the Government of SA as its preferred bidder for the six PPP “Super Schools”. Two other consortia have been rejected.

The Public Private Partnerships process involves a radical departure from traditional methods of Government infrastructure procurement.

LETTER TO THE EDITOR
SYDNEY MORNING HERALD
SENT WED 25/3/09

Editor,

Remember the poem “Who Built Thebes…. and The Great Wall of China”? Watching the worthy tributes to Jorn Utson on ABC television today, (25/3/09), I could not help but notice there was no acknowledgement for the thousands of Builders Laborers who built the difficult structure, one of whom is celebrated in verse by the late Denis Kevans, Australia’s under-celebrated “poet lorikeet”.

I submit the poem to your readers for them to decide whether a separate memorial event should be organized for “Paddy” ? Maybe Paul Robeson, the very first Opera singer at the Opera House (1960?) could get the gig instead of Neil Finn and Our Kate ?

The Ghost of Sydney Opera House

There’s a ghost in Sydney Opera House,
Who sings in all the shows,
The glittering tiaras sometimes
Tumble on their toes,
The ghost he was a rigger,
And he’d sing up in the shell,
And we sank a fleet of schooners
In the First and Last Hotel.

So, what is a quadrillion? It’s a thousand trillion, or one million billion. A bit later in this article, I’ll direct you to an amazing series of graphics that tries to give some sense to these terms.

For the moment, let us just note that the Bank of International Settlements has recently reported that global outstanding derivatives have reached 1.

Source: Global Research

By José Miguel Alonso Trabanco

Eurasia is currently experiencing serious problems derived from financial and economic difficulties such as unemployment, GDP negative growth, currency depreciation, overall economic slowdown and so on. Several members of both the European Union and NATO (Poland, Hungary, Iceland come to mind) are already dealing with a considerable deal of domestic discontent. Some States from the Former Soviet Union (notably Ukraine, Belarus and the Central Asian Republics) and even Russia itself are facing similar problems.

by Jefferson Lee (written 9/3/09 as my initial contribution to this website)

On Friday 24th April 2009 (Anzac Eve) at Leichhardt Town Hall in Sydney’s inner-West will be the “Inaugural Denis Kevans Memorial Anzac Eve Peace Concert” from 6pm-11pm as a fund-raiser for Leichhardt Council’s “Friends of Maliana” friendship city project.

The significance of this event is that it will be the first time in a decade and a half that the cultural hegemony of increasing militarism surrounding Anzac Day celebrations has faced a direct and conscious challenge from progressive forces in Sydney – outside of the marginalized sloganeering of a few predictable the ultra lefty.

Flash back to Australia and Anzac Days of yesteryear.

Source: Green Left Weekly

Graham Matthews
14 February 2009

In a 7000-word essay published in the February Monthly magazine , Prime Minister Kevin Rudd blames neoliberalism for the global economic crisis.

He promises to deliver a new “social democratic state” that will “save capitalism from itself”, while protecting working people’s interests.

However, while Rudd’s prescription may provide relief for bankers, industrialists and developers, it is working people who will pay in the end.

See Mark Fiore’s animated satire on Wall Street’s approach to overcoming economic stagnation and socialism!

Source: The Guardian 4 February, 2009

By Bob Briton

Australian of the Year for 2009, Mick Dodson, might have predicted that his comments about the appropriateness of celebrating January 26 as our national day would set off a flurry of comment in the media. He probably didn’t anticipate just how personal and hostile some of the backlash would be. Along with many Indigenous — and non indigenous — Australians yearning for social justice, he would be disappointed that a “conversation” about January 26 and the significance of that date for Aboriginal people is still simply beyond the guardians of the status quo.

Source: Published by Nigel on February 5, 2009

While the Australian Greens purport to represent the interest of the environment and Australians, there is substantive evidence to suggest this is not quite the truth. This article suggests the Australian political party which should be voicing key issues of concern, is not, and in a parliamentary democracy, when the minority parties fail in their brief all Australians have great reason for concern.

Currently, an expanding network of concerned Australians are raising critical issues and publishing these, in the hope that Australians will make demands upon the elected representatives charged with the responsibility of ensuring a sustainable future for Australia.

Source: Climate Emergency Network – South Australia

Dear Michelle and Barack,

We write to you as fellow parents concerned about the Earth that will be inherited by our children, grandchildren, and those yet to be born.

Barack has spoken of ‘a planet in peril’ and noted that actions needed to stem climate change have other merits. However, the nature of the chosen actions will be of crucial importance.

Source: Monthly Review
by Rick Wolff

In Marxian terms, the current crisis emerged from the workings of the capitalist class structure. Capitalism’s history displays repeated booms and busts punctuated by bubbles. Capitalism’s cycles range unpredictably from local, shallow, and short to global, deep, and long.