In his first two months since being elected federal ALP leader on December 4, Kevin Rudd has made subtle, but significant changes to federal Labor policy in its battle of ideas for Australias future. As if following a dictum not to be wedged politically outflanked from the right by PM John Howards Coalition government Rudd is moving significant sections of Labor policy in a more rightward direction and attempting to position Labor as the defender of the fabric of Australian family life.
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Seven-hundred people crammed into the Melbourne City Conference Centre on February 8 to hear radical journalist and film-maker John Pilgers call for mass action against the invasion of Iraq the paramount war crime against humanity from which all other war crimes follow.
According to former French intelligence security chief Alain Chouet, the terrorism-related charges against Willie Brigitte, who is being tried in France, are “weak”. Quoted in the February 5 Australian, he said Brigitte is a “person without importance whom the Australian authorities continue to play on to create fear”.
Due to mistakes introduced during the sub-editing of Lynda Hansens obituary for Phil Perrier (GLW #697), he was wrongly described as a Queensland Aboriginal activist, rather than a Queensland Aboriginal rights activist, and the concluding section of the eulogy made by Sam Watson at the February 2 Sorry ceremony were mistakenly attributed to Bernie Neville.
Ecosocialism blog
Readers of Green Left Weekly may be interested in Climate and Capitalism, a new blog, edited in Canada, that aims to present Marxist perspectives on climate change, and to provide socialists with the information and analysis they
On February 2, ABC News Online reported the laying off of 110 workers by Melbourne carpet manufacturer Feltex. A spokesperson for Godfrey Hirst, which took over Feltex late last year, said the workers jobs would go with the closure of the Feltex factories in Tottenham and Braybrook in Melbournes west. This vindicated workers and unionists who had resisted attempts by Godfrey Hirst to take away their redundancy entitlements, Textile, Clothing and Footwear Union media officer Tommy Clarke told Green Left Weekly.
It was with much disgust and sadness that I watched the demolition, on February 6, of perfectly good public housing on the Macquarie Fields public housing estate.
The queer rights activists of Community Action Against Homophobia (CAAH) believe that Peter Jensen, the Anglican archbishop of Sydney, should condemn a highly oppressive anti-gay law being introduced in Nigeria that is being backed by the Anglican Church in that country.
Critics of Venezuelas socialist president, Hugo Chavez, finally feel vindicated (again), Venezuelanalysis.com editor Gregory Wilpert wrote in a February 6 comment piece. The Venezuelan dictatorship that they have been predicting for the past eight years has, according to them, finally come to pass for the sixth or so time.
Second Sydney Latin America Film Festival
Chauvel Cinema, Paddington
Seymour Centre, Darlington and Club Marconi, Bossley Park
February 22-March 4 http://www.sydneylatinofilmfestival.org
Chauvel Cinema, Paddington
Seymour Centre, Darlington and Club Marconi, Bossley Park
February 22-March 4 http://www.sydneylatinofilmfestival.org
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