Peter Boyle

For the last five days, Feli McHughes, Joel McHughes and Gregory Coffey from the Ngemba Billabong Restoration Project in Brewarrina, NSW, have been trying to hand over a $260,000 cheque to the head of the Department of Aboriginal Affairs.

The “free market” fanatics at the Productivity Commission have done their dirty job once again with their newly released Caring For Older Australians report. It would be more honestly titled Throw The Oldies To The Wolves because it follows vicious cuts to disabilities pensions.

Supporters of justice for former Guantanamo Bay prisoner David Hicks rallied outside the NSW Supreme Court on August 3 to condemn moves by the Department of Public Prosecutions to seize the proceeds of Hicks’ 2010 book Guantanamo: My Journey under “proceeds of crime” laws. Speakers at the rally included Stop the War Coalition Sydney’s Pip Hinman, NSW Greens MP David Shoebridge, and peace activist Donna Mulhearn.

John Bellamy Foster, the keynote speaker at the upcoming World At A Crossroads: Climate Change Social Change conference — to be held in Melbourne from September 30 to October 3 — is the co-author (with Fred Magdoff) of a newly published book: What Every Environmentalist Needs to Know About Capitalism.

The double meaning in the popular slogan “White Australia has a black history”, sadly, still applies to federal, state and territory government policies. Governments may have apologised for past mistreatment but they are still destroying Aboriginal communities and stealing Aboriginal land. Official racism is as alive as ever. The Gillard Labor government’s Ministry of Truth must be working overtime to churn out titles for programs that say the opposite of what they actually deliver.

John Bellamy Foster, the keynote speaker at the upcoming "World At A Crossroads" Climate Change Social Change conference - to be held in Melbourne University and Victoria Trades Hall on September 30-October 3, 2011 - is the co-author (with Fred Magdoff) of a newly published book entitled What every environmentalist needs to know about capitalism.

Sydney Stop The War Coalition held a street-theatre protest in Darling Harbour on July 29 outside a $1000-a-head speaking engagement for former British PM and war criminal Tony Blair. The protesters held a mock trial of Blair, who was charged, tried and convicted of making fraudulent excuses for the invasion of Iraq, the murder of a million Iraqi people, profiting from the proceeds of crime and other crimes against humanity.

In the very early morning of August 3, about 180 workers and volunteers from the City of Sydney’s Homelessness Unit will do a count of the “rough sleepers” in the city. The previous count in February, when the weather was much warmer, found 363 people sleeping on Sydney’s streets. Last winter’s count was 289.

Media mogul Rupert Murdoch described his appearance before the British parliamentary hearing into the News Of The World’s phone hacking scandal as the “most humble day” of his life. His son, James, added: “It’s a matter of great regret … these actions do not live up to the standards that our company aspires to around the round.”

The headline on the final issue of Rupert Murdoch’s News Of The World, “Thank You & Goodbye”, provoked speculation of suitable rejoinders like “Piss Off & Good Riddance!” and more colourful expressions of the same sentiment.

A week after Malaysian authorities failed to stop people taking to the streets of the capital Kuala Lumpur on July 9 to demand free and fair elections, six activists from the Socialist Party of Malaysia (PSM) remained detained without trial. The detainees include federal member of parliament Dr Jeyakumar Deveraj, who has been hailed by a prominent local writer as “the Malaysian saint of the poor”.

There’s been so much political spin around the Julia Gillard government’s carbon tax announcement. Of course, there’s the predictable hysterical hollering from Tony Abbott, Barnaby Joyce and the climate change denier’s camp, but there is also tons of bullshit from the Labor government. However, a couple of developments have provided a much-needed reality check.