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Secret Ballots and ALP Democracy Secret ballots may certainly be necessary to ensure democracy in certain situations. But everything depends on the context. In some contexts, a secret ballot is clearly regarded as anti-democratic. We insist on open voting in Parliament and on Local Councils. In these contexts, a secret ballot would be regarded as anti-democratic. We hold that members of Parliament and ...
On Factions (Part 2) (See part 1 of this article here) Some people seem to imagine that if factions did not exist debates in the Labor Party would be more open and democratic. If not for factions, the issues could be worked through debates on the Conference floor and then voted upon democratically. Maybe the policy supported by the best ...
THE USA- Wall Street v Main Street The COVID-19 pandemic induced an economic panic in March 2020. Share prices declined by 30%. The Federal Reserve Bank responded to the panic by again expanding its balance sheet assets by a whopping 66%. It went from US$4.2 trillion on March 4, 2020, to in excess of US$7 trillion on May 20, 2020: Not surprisingly, the ...
On Factions (Part 1) Kevin Rudd has called for factions within the ALP to be “abolished”. What are we to make of this? At the outset, I should declare for transparency that I am a long-standing member of the Socialist Left faction of the ALP and a former long-standing member of its executive. To start I think Kevin Rudd’s call is ...
Danger, Danger- Pearson support for Job Guarantee spells potential disaster for Labor Two remarkable opinion pieces appeared in ‘The Australian’ over the weekend. One was by Noel Pearson, the other was by economist William Mitchell. Pearson is well known for his connections to the Liberal Party. In 2009 he lobbied Rob Oakshot to support the formation of an Abbott Government. In 2011 he gave the Sir Robert Menzies Lecture ...
Branch Stacking- what can be done? It is one thing to suspect, or even know, someone is a branch stacker. The type of evidence obtained covertly in the Somyurek case, which demonstrated an intention to stack, as well as the fact of payment of other’s membership fees, is rare as hen’s teeth. The ALP Victorian Branch rules against branch stacking look fairly comprehensive ...
Thoughts on the demonstrations A lot of my friends have posted in favour of the demonstrations held across Australia yesterday on the issue of aboriginal deaths in custody. But I think the demonstrations were irresponsible. Hopefully, we are not “in the middle of a pandemic” as some commentators have stated. With no new cases over the last few days, it appears ...
Monetisation of Public Debt The public debt of a government that can issue its own currency is the amount the government has spent into the economy which has not yet been taxed back. If you were the government of the only village in the world, and you had the only money printing machine in the village, why would you borrow ...
El Salto de Fe En su libro ‘God’ Reza Aslan, él mismo un creyente, afirma que la creencia religiosa necesariamente requiere un ‘salto de fe’. Él dice que cualquier creyente que te diga lo contrario probablemente está en el proceso de tratar de convertirte. Aunque es un creyente, Aslan no es un Evangelista. Aslan comienza su libro discutiendo teorías sobre ...
A new narrative around Federal Government Debt Labor’s current national platform provides: “Labor will deliver sound public finances by adhering to a fiscal strategy that achieves a balanced budget on average over the economic cycle… Achieving a balanced budget is not an end in itself, but it is an appropriate medium-term objective, as part of sound fiscal policy and economic management which takes ...
‘The Deficit Myth’- the next best seller on economics? In 2013 French economist Thomas Piketty’s book ‘Capital in the Twenty-First Century’ was released and became a best seller. On May 18, 2014, the English edition reached number one on The New York Times Best Seller list for best selling hardcover nonfiction and became the greatest sales success ever of academic publisher Harvard University Press. As of January ...
Fábrica Americana (American Factory) Si pensaste que la ventaja que tiene China en la fabricación es por causa de la manipulación de su tasa de cambio o por el robo de tecnología extranjera, hay que ver la película ‘American Factory’. Sea cual sea la importancia de un yuan bajo, o el robo de tecnología, en la dominación china de la ...
Responding to Corona Virus and Pre-Existing Economic Issues Prior to the CVP Australia’s economy was already afflicted by significant economic problems including the following: Stagnant real wage growth and high incidence of insecure employment; Falling investment and stagnant economic growth; Increasing economic inequality; Increasing gender inequality– Over the last 12 years, Australia has fallen from a rank of 15th to 44th on the World Economic Forum’s Global ...
Federal Labor will need a new narrative around funding further fiscal stimulus (Tony Dalton assisted me with the contents of this article) Australia, like the rest of the world, faces a very serious situation. The coronavirus pandemic (CVP) and the ensuing economic crisis are unlikely to be short-lived. Despite Australia’s remarkable success in limiting the spread of the virus so far, Covid-19 is extremely contagious with high lethality and ...
A resurrection reflection On this day a few thousand years ago Jesus was resurrected into everlasting life. Except that he already presumably had everlasting life because he was already a part of the Holy Trinity. Anyway, where did he go and what is it like there? The Quran gives a very clear vision of what heaven is like. There are lots ...