onetrack

Corruption is rife in every State, and it was blatant in earlier decades, but became more hidden as corruption commissions were set up. In W.A., Brian Burke was certainly corrupt and went to jail for it. He was called the "four on the floor" Premier for his mateyness with the scumbags of the "W.A. Inc" era - Alan Bond, Laurie Connell, et al. Former Premier Ray O'Connor was almost certainly as corrupt as they came, but managed to avoid any official scrutiny. Several Police Commissioners in W.A. were almost certainly corrupt, but were "protected" by power groups, possibly Freemasons and others. There was reported to be a "Purple Circle" inside the W.A. Police heirarchy, and at least 2 senior W.A. Police officers are incriminated in unsolved murders - the murder of Shirley Finn, a Madam who was paying Police protection, and the murder of bikie, William "Billy" Grierson at Ora Banda, N of Kalgoorlie.

The Victorian Libs need to stop fighting over who has the steering wheel, and start concentrating on where the car is actually going. While they have major infighting and a lack of policies and direction, they will be forever consigned to the opposition benches as a minor political party with little relevance. The times the Liberals led the country, they had good leaders who sorted out infighting and who knew what the electorate actually wanted, and where their direction was going as regards satisfactory living conditions for the average voter. As a farmer friend said to me many years ago, we need more Statesmen and Stateswomen, not politicians. Statesmen and Stateswomen have a clear vision of what the country needs, and a plan of how to achieve it.

Imagine what we could do if the $380B was kept here, and invested into Australian defence manufacturing. I reckon conventional subs will become obsolete, as tanks have become in this age of drone warfare, and remotely-controlled unmanned mini-subs such as the Huntingdon version will become the norm for underwater stealth activities. They can't get sub crews at the best of times, it's the next best thing to a kamikaze mission during wartime. We have the Australian-designed Ghost Shark mini-sub under development here, the Govt need to wake up and understand that buying war equipment now, for delivery in 20 or 30 years time, is about on a par with ordering a hundred Sopwith Camels in 1919 for use in WW2. We had enough of a problem with obsolete equipment in 1939. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghost_Shark_(submarine) https://www.defensemirror.com/news/33048/Huntington_Ingalls_Unveils_Remus_620_UUV

"Working From Home".

And in the meantime, the U.S. is talking about building a new breed of diesel-powered submarines that are superior to the nuclear ones. Li-ion batteries are providing the impetus to better (and much cheaper) diesel-electric subs.

They're not game to end the NW Shelf gas production, because it's a golden goose for both the W.A. and Federal Govts.

All Americans suffer from some level of paranoia - unreasonable fear of strangers, conspiracy theories, distrust of Govt and Govt-mandated authorities, and distrust in civilian social order without keeping themselves armed to the teeth. I put it down to the amount of lead they've ingested. Lead from IC-engine exhausts, and lead from the copious amounts of armaments they own, and fire off at random. It's well known that lead levels in Americans in general went through the roof in the 1960's and 1970's. Over half of Americans still have unhealthy lead levels in their bodies. So, yes, they are basically insane, and following in the path of the Romans to a decaying and decadent society. https://www.acamh.org/blog/20th-century-lead-exposure-damaged-american-mental-health/

I remember a lot of that section of the M4, from Sept 1988, when I was living with an Auntie in Reading for about a month. I had a little hired Vauxhall, and used to go into London on a lot of days to have a look around. I went straight in via Hammersmith and Earls Court. Vegetation is a bit higher than I recall, and a lot of big new buildings are along the route, that weren't there in 1988! I remember how the traffic flowed smoothly until a few kays out of London, then it all came to a halt with congestion getting into London. The Pommy drivers were pretty courteous, and the road layouts were very well thought out, with turning lanes everywhere, unlike here. I don't know how you do that 160+ miles drive and back on a regular basis, it must take up 6 hrs of your day? I drive 130kms out to my block in the wheatbelt about 3 times a week, it takes me an hour and 20 mins, and no traffic lights once I leave the city, and only one small town on the trip. Road Trains are about the only holdup, there aren't enough passing lanes, further out past the divided carriageway - but most of the Road Trains are doing a pretty good speed, 90-100kmh.

I'd just start a new account. I thought it could be a hacker scam, but it's apparently true that FB is using facial recognition videos. There's no way I'd provide that to a faceless, soulless, ruthless website operator, that only communicates with you when it suits them. https://www.waka.com/2024/11/25/what-the-tech-locked-out-of-your-facebook-account-use-your-face-to-get-back-in/#:~:text=While Meta assures users that,between security and user experience.

What started this off? I give FB bugger-all, and they've never made a demand like that to me. Yet I can log in, post, sell and buy, message and interact with people on there, no problem. I don't even use my real name or even a photo of myself. I trust FB and it's grubby owner, like I trust a cornered black snake.

One of the factors in the Bradfield Scheme that may not have been taken into account, is ensuring reliability of food production and reducing losses to growers by moving food production inland. I don't know how many times we've seen massive production losses and intolerable grower losses when natural weather events on the East side of the GDR have decimated crops and vegetation - cyclones especially in Northern Qld. During WW2, substantial amounts of vegetables and fruit were grown in inland areas, especially along the Stuart Hwy in the N.T. These increased levels of food production were responsible for Australia becoming the primary food supplier to ALL Allied forces, especially the U.S. Forces, during the course of the War. https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/015464 https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/C34614 https://viewer.slv.vic.gov.au/?entity=IE149973&mode=browse

Well, it's coming up 60 years since decimal coinage appeared! Just thinking about that frightens me as to how quickly old age has raced up on me. It seem like only yesterday we were all discussing the major drama of changing to a new currency.

Peter's talking about buying fruit when he was a boy.

The fossil fuel Farm Boy is going to get a shock soon. "Twiggy" Forrest has just purchased 360 huge battery-powered dump trucks, 55 battery-powered giant excavators and 60 new battery electric bulldozers from Liebherr, with the intention of being fossil-fuel free on his iron ore mines by 2030. That's really putting your money where your mouth is. Farm Boy is going to end up whingeing (they're good at that) about how he can't compete with his fossil-fuel tractors, when farmers with battery-powered tractors are running rings around him with lower operating costs. https://reneweconomy.com.au/fortescue-strikes-4-billion-deal-for-electric-trucks-and-dozers-to-eliminate-fossil-fuels-at-giant-mines/