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In the last couple of months, Belarus has experienced rigged elections, mass protests, and severe violence carried out by the security forces.

Union leaders, members of the Belarusian Independent Trade Union (BITU), have been arrested and imprisoned for participating in protests and strike action.

Over the last 6 years or so, I've gotten really into policy analysis and data-driven politics. The things is, everything I've learned feels totally useless because we've entered into a post-policy era in American politics. Everything is going to be determined by arbitrary discretion of a few individuals at the top. Your average representative and senator have no power. All power is held by the President, the Speaker, and the Majority Leader—three individuals. Policy analysis only matters in a democratic world and this isn't a democracy anymore, at least not at the federal level.

And all of the claims and counter-claims I find I rather prefer data. Then I came across this:

www.theguardian.com/world/2020/oct/22/white-supremacists-rightwing-domes...

In partnership with the Federation of Garment Workers Myanmar.

After the VIP 1 and 2 factory unions demanded Covid-19 safety measures inside the factory, the factory dismissed all union members in both factories and the VIP 2 factory union president was stabbed by company thugs. It is a clear, brutal case of union-busting. The factories make sporting goods for Mizuno, CCM, Evil Bikes, and Pivot Cycles. Despite months of direct outreach from the unions, the brands have refused to intervene or mediate whatsoever.

As a dual-citizen and member of the Labo(u)r Party in both countries, this a delicious result. Especially after the ludicrous character assassination attempts by the Murdoch-Tory media in AU, and the attempted dumb-populism politics of Judith Collins.

National Party will be in the wilderness for a while. The libertarian-propertarian wing will find themselves heading to ACT, the conservative uglies maybe towards the New Conservative Party. Whilst will be left will be a corporatist shell, with most of the middle-class already in the left-leaning big tent of Labour.

Australia is based on a number of assumptions which have nothing to do with facts and figures. You can think of these assumptions as a form of ‘nation think’ and they stop us from moving forward and developing a different culture, political system and social network which deal with the basic necessities of Australian life.

The first assumption is that indigenous Australians did not resist colonisation of their land. Accompanying this assumption is that they had no form of land ownership, they lived a nomadic lifestyle and they had nothing to offer Australian society.

With a month to go, this is how I think it will play out on current predictions and trends.

Keep an eye on Georgia, especially. Not a critical state (that's Penn, Wisc, etc, the "rust belt"), but rather a litmus on how much Trump will lose by.

I remember in the 2008 election contacting a US Dem pollster and suggesting that was winnable in the longer term. They didn't think it was quite ready, yet.

If I were the Dems, I'd be looking hungrily at Texas in the future as well.

Once again, a company has taken advantage of the Covid-19 pandemic to attack workers' rights.

This time, it's coal miners in Colombia who have had to go on strike.

Workers at the Cerrejón coal mine are in the middle of bitter dispute with three multinational mining companies, Anglo American, BHP and Glencore.

When the pandemic broke out back in February the union, in good faith, withdrew its list of demands and suspended collective bargaining negotiations.

I've seen a LOT of people opining that Trump is faking his covid diagnosis. Here are a few points to consider:

1) This is extremely damaging for him. His brand is built on strength and manliness. Getting sick plays against that brand. It's especially damaging considering his high-profile refusal to take safety precautions. He's basically Darwin Awarded himself.

A little over twenty years ago I had the opportunity to meet this great man in person after talking to him online for some time via the usenet group aus.politics.

We talked politics, we talked about unionism, we went back to Jika and we sampled a rather interesting Croatian sour plum liquor.

We stayed in some contact over the years. His family should know that he was held in high esteem for his commitment to the cause of working people.

ETU Queensland & NTFollow
24 September ·
Vale Peter John Simpson "Simmo" 3/5/1963 – 24/9/2020