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Australian Blog ★ Adventure Australia
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Government Believes Welfare Recipients Take Ice

The right wing Australian government continues its usury of welfare recipients. It treats them like trash, sorting them and throwing out who they deem to be ripping off society. Like treasurer Joe Hockey says, the welfare state has ended, while he continues to take a $1,000 handout each month for a house his wife owns in Canberra.

Is there a link between the illegal use of the drug ice and those on Centrelink payments? There obviously isn't! However, the government plans to test all those receiving money. All Australians do not have equal rights. If you have a job you can continue to work being powered along by crystal methamphetamine.

Drug taking will never be stopped despite the war by police instigated by government. In ancient times only medicine men and in some cases women had the knowledge of how to "potion-out" mind alternating chemicals. Their distorted "dreaming" was mistaken for contact with the afterlife. Today, everyone can easily access the chemicals commonly termed drugs to go on a trip. If anything illegal drugs can currently be more easily obtained.

It looks like mandatory 10 year imprisonment for 2g or more of ice. What is magical about 2g? Nothing really. It is arbitrary. It could be a tonne. C

ontinually testing known addicts is a waste of time and money. You are hooked for life. Money should be spent on preventing potential new users from experimenting. Treatment doesn't do any good.

✴ Society by Ty Buchanan ✴

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Inquiry Into Tax Dodge by Tech Giants is a Lie Fest

It amazes me how people can blatantly lie, and continue to lie, when everyone else knows the truth. There is a Senate inquiry in Australia into big companies, mainly tech giants, avoiding tax that is owed to this country. Mr King, the head of Apple Australia strongly denies that the company is reducing its tax payments through questionable methods. Fair "crack in the door mate" we all know what is really going on. Is Ireland involved in these methods?

Apple and Google are the major companies targeted by the inquiry. Britain is planning to regulate to make them pay what is due there. Other countries are watching to see what Britain does. Of course, the easiest way to get money out of the tech megaliths is to introduce a revenue tax irrespective of profit, because it is profit that is being skimmed off subsidiaries by head office for non-existent services.

The Australian Tax Office wants its pound of flesh from internationals as it does from locals. Last year Apple paid $80m in tax from profit of $250m. Revenue was $6 billion. While this is a tax rate of 32 per cent, the profit margin of only 4.17 percent is highly suspect. Apple charges a fixed rate of 30 per cent on all app revenue in its App Store. Furthermore, it has huge income from sales of its own merchandise for which the profit margin is not widely known.

Mr King said that Apple would willingly enter into an agreement with the ATO. By saying this he clearly believes that he can choose not to follow Australian law. Apple's tax rate of 32 per cent seems reasonable at first glance when compared to Google Australia's rate of 15 percent. However, Google's profit margin of 13 per cent is more realistic.

Lastly, Mr King of Apple said that Australian app developers had made a fortune out of new apps. He fails to mention the gargantuan amount made by Apple from these. The guaranteed 30 per cent on all downloads is a money grab by any definition considering Apple has set this rate itself and it can easily raise it at any time, even for apps already available.

✴ Technology by Ty Buchanan ✴

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Swift Parrot is Endangered

✴ Conservation by Ty Buchanan ✴

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Malcolm Fraser Has Died

Today is a sad day for Australia. A past prime minister Malcolm Fraser has died aged 84. He was the last of the true Liberal prime ministers. He resigned from the Liberal Party five years ago because, he said, there were no true liberals in positions of authority in the party today. It is now a conservative party and there is no place for himself in it.

Malcolm in 1982

He has condemned the current government's policy of "turn the boats back" as racist. All his life he was a strong supporter of multiculturalism in Australia. He said look around you and people from all cultures live here. This cannot be changed. The policy of closing the door to true refugees is an anachronism.

Even John Howard was center right. He was never a liberal. When the Coalition gets into government it does the same thing every time - take from the poor and give to the rich, a conservative right wing policy. That is the reason for current problems in Government. The budgets are just too far to the right for senators to pass.

Malcolm Fraser did mend his falling out with Gough Whitlam over the "Dismissal". This is something that Prime Minister Tony Abbott will never do with his critics in the Labor Party and independents in the Senate. A video of Tony Abbott in the House of Representatives shows him shouldering aside Bill Shorten leader of the Australian Labor Party.

Tony Abbott is hanging onto power by being selfish, not stepping down when he knows the great majority of Australians hate him. Malcolm Turnbull seems to be a true liberal waiting in the wings. Tony Abbott's reign will be just a hiccup, a glitch, in history, a time of failures. No doubt the policy on boats will change with future governments.

Politics by Ty Buchanan ✴

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Foot in Your Mouth Prime Minister

Our beloved Australian prime minister has put his foot in his mouth yet again. I don't believe that I have experienced such a pig headed, mislead person who has gained the highest position in the land before.

He has weighed into the debate of Western Australia's intention to close down remote Aboriginal communities, despite the first Australians being born and bred there. It is a case of whites controlling the lives of black people because Caucasians dominate power and authority in Australia.

Western Australian governments of both persuasions have a history of being bigoted toward Aboriginals. There have been cases in the past of whites buying votes at state and federal elections by giving Aboriginals alcohol. This is despicable behavior.

Tony Abbott, the Australian prime minister, has said that aboriginals should be forcibly moved to cities because they are a drain on the welfare system. He believes that they will fill job vacancies that do not exist in built-up regions.

Apparently, living where you are born is a life-choice. What nonsense! Where are Aboriginals going to get the large amount of money required to make such a major move to cities? And without immediate employment, welfare will still have to be paid. It is impossible to pay high city rents on unemployment benefits.

It should be noted that many white Australians choose to live in remote places so they can more easily get long-term welfare benefits. Indeed, they choose to get in the "tiny" and go fishing every day.

✴ Politics by Ty Buchanan ✴

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Government Beliefs Have No Foundation

The present federal government has a policy of the market will solve all problems: we will get rid of regulatory bodies and legislation. This would be good if it was right but it isn't. Private industry will not build roads, for example.

Getting rid of regulation on investment advisers was a mistake. Thankfully it was resurrected and defeated in the Senate. If it had stayed, advisers would have pulled the wool over the eyes of the poor in society - those who do not know how the system operates.

The government is trying to abolish the body that reviews charity organizations. Senate opposition will put an end to this. Why is the government wasting its time and taxpayers money throwing legislation at the Senate that clearly will not get through?

There is no debt problem in Australia contrary to the wild obsession put forward by the Coalition. Australia has only 17 per cent debt. This compares to over 90 per cent for most other Western countries.

The economy has had a dramatic fall in growth. This could be seen as due to spending cuts. However, there have been only small spending cuts. The national debt is higher now than it was under Labor. Blaming Labor would seem to be right, but Independents, Greens and the Palmer United Party are blocking radical changes.

Abolishing the carbon tax is seem as a win for the Coalition. This is only for the short term. There is no doubt it will be back when we have a labor government after the next election. Just the threat of cuts is offending voters right across the board. Putting it bluntly, Tony Abbott looks like a fool stumbling in the dark. Reason and common sense are not part of his arsenal. National debt is a furphy: people don't care about debt as long as they can earn an income.

Politics by Ty Buchanan

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Australian Blog★
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Tony Abbot's Government Has a Clear Policy

The Abbott government has a clear policy driving its actions : it strongly believes in the free market mechanism and is "trying" to balance the books like a successful business. However, a government is not a business. It operates to benefit its people.

You need a heart to understand what your citizens want. Unfortunately, Abbot does not have a heart. He is selfish in forcing his beliefs on the Australian people, because that is what they are - beliefs. The market will not provide a fair health care system. In the US market health care runs riot over the welfare of the people. This is what Abbott wants to foister on Australians.

Tony Abbot is not interested in democracy. Belly aching about not being able to get his $7 GP co-payment through the senate was laughed at by delegates at the G20 conference. How obsessed can one be? He is definitely too selfish for words. He wants to force his views on the country like John Howard did. Note, Howard not only lost government in his last election, he lost his safe liberal seat as well.

Tony Abbott will have problems at the next federal election. However, he can always count of GPs who have far right conservative tendencies. This is despite the fact that they get wealthy being paid under a socialist medical system. The current health care structure is too ingrained in Australia for the conservative Coalition to demolish, despite their wish to do so.

Health by Ty Buchanan

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Australian Blog★
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Chasm Between Universitis and Industry is Still Wide

Scientists at universities (but not in industry) are jumping up and down welcoming the Commonwealth Science Council (CSC) saying it will breed market culture in science. The odd thing is this isn't the market in operation. It is managed interference in free scientific operations. Why should scientific research be managed at all?

Another thing is, it will be chaired by the Prime Minister Tony Abbott. What does the PM know about science? The truth is he knows no more than the average person. He is not trained in science. The body will give advice. And you know what they say about advice - it is best ignored.

The CSC will not improve the chasm between universities and industry. Academia has a good bond with industry in the US. Just why we cannot do the same in Australia is a mystery. A new referee in the ring like the CSC will not improve the boxing match. Industry and academia remain at odds. The blame really lies on the university side. They still live in their ivory towers being paid huge sums in separation from reality.

CSIRO does the industry-university joint operation well. It points the way to how things should be done. Universities should just copy what CSIRO does. It is as simple as that. There is nothing difficult to it. First though, universities need to get down from their high horses and be in partnership with business - they always want to run the show.

Funny Animal Pictures by Ty Buchanan

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Australian Blog★
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Australian Teachers Do Not Need to Copy Asia

There is nothing wrong with the quality of Australian teachers. Saying that we can learn a lot from Asian teachers is absolutely wrong. It is the culture of the student that determines whether he/she will be successful in becoming educationally proficient.

Children of Chinese immigrants to Australia do much better than offspring of many other subcultures. Native third generation Australians do worst of all. This is because their parents get on with living their own lives and leave their kids to learn by themselves. There is nothing wrong with this policy. Chinese parents do similarly, but they do help much more financially with education.

Mao Tse-tung was once asked by a Western reporter what was the most difficult thing about governing China. He replied it was teaching children to believe in Communism when Chinese are born Capitalists. Trading has been an important part of Chinese culture for thousands of years so calculating and finance are important.

To be successful in life high academic achievement is paramount. Children of immigrants know this as well as their parents, particularly those from Asia. There is one issue that is problematic for even these children. That is the paranoia about rote learning in the West, even though rote is still held to the fore in Asia. Independent thinking is necessary. However, if you wait for a child to understand everything naturally without explaining the answers you will wait forever.

East Asians will pay for their children to "cram" learn with private coaches. This is not part of Australian culture. Nonetheless, this service is available in Australia. The Asian mother drives her offspring forward no matter where they live in the world. This drive is "absorbed" by the child.

Chinese also know that core subjects like maths are more important than choice subjects like surfing for example. The number of Australians who make a living at surfing can be counted on one hand. It is clear that Australian education is not managed well. Some decisions are not rational at all.

Education by Ty Buchanan

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