Submission to the Independent Media Inquiry

One person's attempt to rectify basic falsehoods doesn't seem to be acceptable to the Murdoch press.

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Chris Curtis
Posted Thursday, November 10, 2011 at 2:36 pm | Permalink

I am not at all surprised that the Baillieu government is so far in front. Whenever there is a change of government, there is a group of voters dissatisfied with the previous government but unable to trust the Opposition. When a new government is elected, those voters see that life goes on as normal, lose their fear and switch to the new government.

The fact that the Baillieu government hasn’t done much is neither here nor there. Look at yesterday’s Herald Sun, in which the Baillieu government gets banner headlines for basically re-announcing the previous Labor government’s plans for Melbourne (City lifestyle out in the suburbs, John Masanauskas, 9/11/2011). Of course, if Labor had done a better job with Melbourne, it would still be in power.

Then there is the blogosphere, in which all sorts of completely untrue claims can be made. I spent a lot of time correcting false claims when Labor was in government; e.g., that it had increased state taxation, that debt was unsustainable, that it would run deficits, that it was overly generous to the public sector, that it had done nothing about schools, that it had built nothing. The list goes on. Again and again, I would correct false claims regarding federal Labor’s promises re computers; e.g., that they were laptops, that every child or every student would be given one, that the ratio of 1:1 had been backed away from, that there was no money for replacements. Most letters to the editor to correct false claims are refused publication, so the false claim stands in the public mind. Most blog comments are published, but that does not stop the false claims being repeated.

It is a full time job just ensuring the facts are known, and that job has become harder. Below are my most recent efforts:

Andrew Bolt Forum 2011 10 22 1
(Tips for Saturday, October 22)
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/commen...

Actually, Bill, you do not have to get legislation for a constitutional referendum through the Parliament at all. Under Section 128 of the Constitution, you need only one House to agree to it. Given that referendum questions agreed to by both Houses and by both major parties (e.g., breaking the nexus and simultaneous elections, both opposed by the DLP and supported by the major parties) have been defeated by the people, getting only one House on side would probably ensure defeat, but nonetheless it is legal to do it that way.

Anyone who wants to introduce a referendum to determine ordinary legislation would have to get a constitutional amendment up first, something that Tony Abbott does not seem to have proposed.

IN RESPONSE TO:

Andrew, there can never be a real democracy while the ALP will not let us have referandums.
Acushla (Reply)
Sat 22 Oct 11 (07:37am)
Bill O Tas replied to Acushla
Sat 22 Oct 11 (10:34am)
The ALP will let you have referenda, at least they did in 1984 and 1988 and many times before that. Trouble is you have to get the legislation for a referendum through the parliament first and that’s not easy for a minority government. Only 8 of 44 referenda in our history have been agreed to by the people, we don’t change the constitution without a lot of support. What in the constitution do you think Australians want to change?
bruce of melbourne replied to Acushla
Sat 22 Oct 11 (11:09am)
You mean like the referendums the Liberals and Nats are always giving the people?

(Not published.)

Andrew Bolt Forum 2011 10 27 1
(Tips for Thursday, October 27)
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/commen...

Kevin Rudd never promised anyone a free laptop. He promised a computer at school for every year 9-12 student, the promise to be delivered over four years. When he held up a laptop, it was during his announcement of the education tax rebate.

Here is the actual election promise yet again:
‘A Rudd Labor Government will invest $1 billion over four years to turn every secondary school in Australia into a digital school.

‘Federal Labor’s National Secondary School Computer Fund will allow every Australian student in years 9-12 to have access to their own school computer….

(Kevin Rudd, Federal Labor’s Education Revolution – A School Computer For Every Student In Years 9-12, Media Statement – 14th November 2007)

This promise will be delivered by the end of this year; i.e., within four years of its start in the 2008 budget.
(http://www.theaustralian.com.au/australian-it/schools-on-target-to-meet-...
Schools on target to meet digital deadline, Fran Foo, The Australian, 18/10/2011
and
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/australian-it/government/every-high-scho...
Pupils to get computer by year end (print title), Fran Foo, The Australian, 25/10/2011)

The article linked to shows that schools in Queensland are charging parents to take the school computers home, not to use them at school.

IN RESPONSE TO:

Free Laptops
So that’s what happened to the free laptops promises in Queensland.
Another failure from saint Kevin
MS of Q (Reply)
Thu 27 Oct 11 (06:52am)

(Not published.)

Andrew Bolt Forum 2011 11 04 1
(Tips for Friday, November 4)
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/commen...

Rick,

Labor never promised anyone a free laptop and it never promised a computer of any sort for year 5s or year 7s. It promised a computer at school for every year 9-12 student, the promise to be delivered over four years. When Kevin Rudd held up a laptop, it was during his announcement of the education tax rebate, which allows you to claim a rebate on the expense you incur in paying for your child’s laptop.

Here is the actual election promise yet again:
‘A Rudd Labor Government will invest $1 billion over four years to turn every secondary school in Australia into a digital school.

‘Federal Labor’s National Secondary School Computer Fund will allow every Australian student in years 9-12 to have access to their own school computer….

(Kevin Rudd, Federal Labor’s Education Revolution – A School Computer For Every Student In Years 9-12, Media Statement – 14th November 2007)

This promise will be delivered by the end of this year; i.e., within four years of its start in the 2008 budget.
(http://www.theaustralian.com.au/australian-it/schools-on-target-to-meet-...
Schools on target to meet digital deadline, Fran Foo, The Australian, 18/10/2011
and
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/australian-it/government/every-high-scho...
Pupils to get computer by year end (print title), Fran Foo, The Australian, 25/10/2011)

IN RESPONSE TO:

What ever happened to the Labour’s pledge to supply free laptops to every child?
Next year I have one child starting in grade 7 and they will get a new laptop – great – except I have to pay. ?Next year my other child will be in year 5 and they get an iPad – great – except I have to pay….
so much for a policy.
Rick of Croydon Hills (Reply)
Fri 04 Nov 11 (08:15am)
mike of the shire replied to Rick
Fri 04 Nov 11 (08:57am)
That money may be going to Europe Rick..?

(Not published.)

Andrew Bolt Forum 2011 11 05 1
(Tips for Saturday, November 5)
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/commen...

old44,

Your maths is wrong. The 18. 5 per cent the nurses want is for the next four years and has nothing to do with past inflation. Nurses were concerned under Labor and campaigned to get pay increases, which they won. The last Labor government gave them increases above inflation and a guaranteed nurse-patient ratio:

“The union said nurses had won pay rises between 3.6 and 6.1 per cent depending on their classification.
“Graduate nurses will gain a 23 per cent rise over the next four years to encourage more people into the profession.
“A graduate’s first year pay will rise from $39,536 to $48,724 in 2011. Nurses with five years’ experience will see their pay jump from $47,315 to $56,289….
“Before yesterday’s agreement, Victoria’s nurses had been Australia’s lowest paid.”
(http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/nurses-pay-tonic-with-pay-rise/story-e6...
Nurses’ pay tonic with pay rise, John Masanauskas, Grant McArthur and Ellen Whinnett, Herald Sun, October 26, 2007)

Sorry to supply actual facts!

IN RESPONSE TO:
The nurses want 18.5%, inflation since the Liberals got in 3.5%, which means they were underpaid 15% by Labor. Why weren’t the unions concerned then?
old44 (Reply)
Sat 05 Nov 11 (03:21am)

(Not published.)

Andrew Bolt Forum 2011 11 06 2
(Yet the powerful must be open most to criticism)
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/commen...

TSM,

So when did you first have this sense of “déjà vu”. Was it when the Howard government passed essentially the same law, or did it remain dormant until Labor did?

From John Howard’s IR law:

“(5) A person commits an offence if:
(a) the person publishes a statement; and
(b) the statement implies or expressly states there was misconduct by a member (whether identified or not) of the Commission in relation to the performance of the functions, or exercise of the powers, of the Commission; and
(c) there was not such misconduct as implied or stated by the statement; and
(d) the publication is likely to have a significant adverse effect on public confidence that the Commission is properly performing its functions and exercising its powers.
Penalty: Imprisonment for 12 months.’
(http://www.comlaw.gov.au/Details/C2007C00182
814 Offences in relation to Commission, Workplace Relations Act 1996, as of 29 March, 1997)

I won’t ask if the Liberals and their National friends have also read “The Third Reich in Power” because such comparison are odious and have nothing to do with the issue. Laws such as those above are common in judicial and quasi-judicial bodies.

Why are people on this site so ill-informed?

IN RESPONSE TO:

Excuse me, but I’m getting a sense of deja vu here. Germany, October 3rd 1933, a new “Editors Law” was passed. It made editors personally responsible for the content of their papers, removed their powers of dismissal and laid down content rules. These rules included the inability to print anything “which is calculated to weaken the strength of the German Reich abroad or at home, the community will of the German people (a not so subtle catch all that one), German defence, culture or the economy……”. Membership of the “Reich Association of the German Press” also became compulsory; i.e., no membership, no legal right to write or publish. Perhaps the Labor party and their little Green friends have also read “The Third Reich in Power” by Richard J Evans ???
The Silent Majority of Melbourne. (Reply)
Sun 06 Nov 11 (11:51am)

(Not published.)

Now, there is a reason for this:

MODERATOR NOTE: Use of surnames is now banned on this blog. Posts using surnames may be deleted automatically
Tips for Sunday, June 26)

However, maybe the rule has now ended or a moderator was not paying attention:

Andrew Bolt Forum 2011 11 09 1
(Tips for Wednesday, November 9)
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/commen...

The US Federal Reserve is not privately owned. Like other central banks throughout the world, it is a government entity. It has a Board of Governors appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate. No privately owned institution has its Board appointed by the executive government and confirmed by the legislature. Privately owned bodies have their boards elected by their shareholders.

The 12 regional Federal Reserve Banks are privately owned (by other banks), but they do not own the Federal Reserve, and they do not choose the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve. Even the owners of the 12 regional Federal Reserve Banks do not get to elect the whole of their Boards: they elect six, while the Federal Reserve Board of Governors appoints the other three. Even the private ownership of the 12 regional Federal Reserve Banks is not like the private ownership of a normal corporation because their shares cannot be freely traded and their owners cannot receive whatever profit is made. Only banks can own shares in them and the dividend is set at 6 per cent. The Federal Reserve itself pays its profits to the US Treasury, something privately owned bodies do not do.

IN RESPONSE TO:

Today’s credit crisis is very similar to that facing Herbert Hoover and Franklin Roosevelt in the 1930s. In 1932, President Hoover set up the Reconstruction Finance Corporation (RFC) as a federally-owned bank that would bail out commercial banks by extending loans to them, much as the privately-owned Federal Reserve is doing today. But like today, Hoover’s ploy failed. The banks did not need more loans; they were already drowning in debt. They needed customers with money to spend and invest. President Roosevelt used Hoover’s new government-owned lending facility to extend loans where they were needed most – for housing, agriculture and industry. Many new federal agencies were set up and funded by the RFC, including the HOLC (Home Owners Loan Corporation) and Fannie Mae (the Federal National Mortgage Association, which was then a government-owned agency). In the 1940s, the RFC went into overdrive funding the infrastructure necessary for the U.S. to participate in World War II, setting the country up with the infrastructure it needed to become the world’s industrial leader after the war.
The RFC was a government-owned bank that sidestepped the privately-owned Federal Reserve; but unlike the Pennsylvania provincial government, which originated the money it lent, the RFC had to borrow the money first. The RFC was funded by issuing government bonds and relending the proceeds. Then as now, new money entered the money supply chiefly in the form of private bank loans. In a “fractional reserve” banking system, banks are allowed to lend their “reserves” many times over, effectively multiplying the amount of money in circulation. Today a system of public banks might be set up on the model of the RFC to fund productive endeavors – industry, agriculture, housing, energy—but we could go a step further than the RFC and give the new public banks the power to create credit themselves, just as the Pennsylvania government did and as private banks do now. At the rate banks are going into FDIC receivership, the federal government will soon own a string of banks, which it might as well put to productive use. Establishing a new RFC might be an easier move politically than trying to nationalize the Federal Reserve, but that is what should properly, logically be done. If we the taxpayers are putting up the money for the Fed to own the world’s largest insurance company, we should own the Fed.
Proposals for reforming the banking system are not even on the radar screen of Prime Time politics today; but the current system is collapsing at train-wreck speed, and the “change” called for in Washington may soon be taking a direction undreamt of a few years ago. We need to stop funding the culprits who brought us this debacle at our expense. We need a public banking system that makes a cost-effective credit mechanism available for homeowners, manufacturing, renewable energy, and infrastructure; and the first step to making it cost-effective is to strip out the swarms of gamblers, fraudsters and profiteers now gaming the system. ?.
why the banks are guilty of enfield (Reply)
Wed 09 Nov 11 (12:01am)

(Published.)

We will see via future attempts to post.

This is just an illustration of how many people believe total rubbish and how hard it is to get them to look at basic facts. I’m not even dealing with opinions here.

This is what actually existing capitalist looks like.

Free reign to control every last newspaper, TV and radio station in Australia -- Rupert Murdoch’s fantasy could become a frightening reality unless we stand in his way right now.

A government review is recommending we eliminate ownership limits -- exactly what Murdoch asked for. But we have two weeks to flood the review with objections to their plan during the public comment period before they finalise the report. Unless thousands of us speak out, the recommendations could go forward unchallenged.

Nobody -- especially not Rupert Murdoch -- should be allowed to own all of our media. Let’s wake up the review with our call -- and prevent the Murdoch Mafia from growing even larger. Send your urgent message directly to the review.

https://secure.avaaz.org/en/stop_rupert_murdochs_dream_come_true/