Humphrey McQueen: WikiLeaks can help us interpret and change the world
More than 400 people crowded into a lecture theatre at the University of Technology Sydney on February 17 a public forum, “Don’t shoot the messenger: WikiLeaks, Assange and Democracy”. The forum was organised by the Support Assange and WikiLeaks Coalition.
... I’m sure you have heard the difference between interpreting the world and changing it. Sometimes people put this pair up as if we could have one or the other. We can’t. In every aspect of life, whether in science or in politics, the two activities have to go together. The way we interpret the world is by changing it. We work on it, we do something to it, and through that experience we get a better sense of where we are going. And the obverse is true: to change the world, we need to be able to interpret it. Our task is to perform both, not one or the other.
A second and related point in conclusion is in regard to the Pentagon Papers and the comparisons with WikiLeaks. There can be no doubt that the release of the Pentagon Papers helped the peoples of Indochina to defeat the US invaders. Nothing can take away from the work that Daniel Ellsberg did.
But we need to remember that Ellsberg did what he did because the US was losing the war on the battlefield. That is what he had learned by going there as a true believer. He knew that the reality of defeat was documented in these official reports and felt he had to get this information out. The reality had changed, and so had his understanding of the war. The crucial factor in ending the war was not the publication of the Pentagon Papers, as useful as many of us found them, but the refusal of the Vietnamese to surrender.
That’s what ended the war, at the cost of two million Indochinese, and 60,000 Americans and other allied troops. It was that armed struggle that changed the world in Indochina, and indeed, in many ways, changed the entire world, because the Indo-Chinese showed that even the US, the greatest power on earth, could be broken and driven into the sea.
The combination of interpretation and change that the Vietnamese and their allies demonstrated is the vision that we can take from WikiLeaks and away from this meeting ...
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Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Monday, February 27, 2012
ACTU: Unite against Abbott threat
27 February, 2012 | ACTU Media Release
The leadership of the Federal Labor Party has now been settled, and the Government must urgently focus on an agenda to improve the lives of all Australians, united against the real threat to workers’ rights and the economy of a Tony Abbott government.
ACTU President Ged Kearney said the leadership debate had been a harmful distraction from the real task of securing and creating jobs and managing the economy in the interests of all Australians.
She said today’s ballot was decisive and all Labor MPs must unite behind the Prime Minister to concentrate on the real issues that working Australians and their families care about.
“Australians care about real issues facing our nation right now, such as having access to reliable jobs, with good and secure wages and conditions, and managing the economy through the challenges it faces,” Ms Kearney said.
“These issues are what unions are focused on and what the Government must focus on too, through ensuring better conditions for the 40% of Australian workers who do not have secure work, making sure the benefits of the mining booms are spread equitably and not just taken out of Australia through super profits, increasing superannuation for working people to 12%, a national disability insurance scheme, and improving the delivery of health, education, and other important services.
“Labor needs to keep the rights of workers to a decent wage and fair conditions front and centre when it makes policy.
“The Government and its MPs must now knuckle down to do the job they were elected to do.”
ACTU Secretary Jeff Lawrence said the Labor Government had achieved much, including returning the rights at work which had been taken away by WorkChoices, navigating Australia’s economy safely through the Global Financial Crisis, funding Australia’s first paid maternity leave scheme, supporting manufacturing, delivering pay equity for workers in the social and community sector, tackling climate change and building the National Broadband Network.
“Australians chose to elect a Labor Government because they want a government that will stand up to business interests that are not in the national interest or who take an anti-worker line.
“Australian unions will work with the Government to deliver an agenda for working people and their families, and it is now time for Labor MPs to put aside any divisions and focus on the task at hand,” Mr Lawrence said.
“All Labor MPs should focus on the main game by getting out to their electorates to explain the government's agenda and work hard to deliver it. The alternative is a Tony Abbott-led Coalition government that would wreck this progress and is hankering to return Australia to the dark days of WorkChoices-style laws that take away workers’ rights.”
The leadership of the Federal Labor Party has now been settled, and the Government must urgently focus on an agenda to improve the lives of all Australians, united against the real threat to workers’ rights and the economy of a Tony Abbott government.
ACTU President Ged Kearney said the leadership debate had been a harmful distraction from the real task of securing and creating jobs and managing the economy in the interests of all Australians.
She said today’s ballot was decisive and all Labor MPs must unite behind the Prime Minister to concentrate on the real issues that working Australians and their families care about.
“Australians care about real issues facing our nation right now, such as having access to reliable jobs, with good and secure wages and conditions, and managing the economy through the challenges it faces,” Ms Kearney said.
“These issues are what unions are focused on and what the Government must focus on too, through ensuring better conditions for the 40% of Australian workers who do not have secure work, making sure the benefits of the mining booms are spread equitably and not just taken out of Australia through super profits, increasing superannuation for working people to 12%, a national disability insurance scheme, and improving the delivery of health, education, and other important services.
“Labor needs to keep the rights of workers to a decent wage and fair conditions front and centre when it makes policy.
“The Government and its MPs must now knuckle down to do the job they were elected to do.”
ACTU Secretary Jeff Lawrence said the Labor Government had achieved much, including returning the rights at work which had been taken away by WorkChoices, navigating Australia’s economy safely through the Global Financial Crisis, funding Australia’s first paid maternity leave scheme, supporting manufacturing, delivering pay equity for workers in the social and community sector, tackling climate change and building the National Broadband Network.
“Australians chose to elect a Labor Government because they want a government that will stand up to business interests that are not in the national interest or who take an anti-worker line.
“Australian unions will work with the Government to deliver an agenda for working people and their families, and it is now time for Labor MPs to put aside any divisions and focus on the task at hand,” Mr Lawrence said.
“All Labor MPs should focus on the main game by getting out to their electorates to explain the government's agenda and work hard to deliver it. The alternative is a Tony Abbott-led Coalition government that would wreck this progress and is hankering to return Australia to the dark days of WorkChoices-style laws that take away workers’ rights.”
Saturday, February 25, 2012
Eveleigh Railway Film Festival: 25/02/2012
The Eveleigh Railway Film Festival
Saturday 25 February 2012
is presenting a festival of fascinating railway-related films, including our short silent drama ...
THE BALLAD OF BETTY & JOE
... and old silent films by J.P. McGowan (1880 - 1952) and much, much more. Plus a talk by David Donaldson of Sydney Film Festival fame on McGowan, a fascinating early Australian filmmaker who went to Hollywood as an actor and stuntman in the silent period and remains the only Australian to be made a life member of the Directors Guild of America.
McGowan - the "Railroad Man" - became famous for making thrilling, silent-era serials involving trains, and ultimately worked on over 600 films, including sound films, and with the likes of John Wayne, Hopalong Cassidy, Gene Autry, Rita Hayworth, Spencer Tracey, Randolph Scott -- the list goes on....
Thursday, February 23, 2012
NSW: O'Farrell attack on unions
The O'Farrell Government is seeking to undermine working people and their trade unions, with a series of new laws introduced to parliament designed to nobble trade unions and their capacity to advocate and campaign for members.
The laws are designed to impose unreasonably harsh penalties when workers take industrial action and divide unions, through the false pretext of ‘competition’.
Unions NSW Secretary, Mark Lennon, said the Government had introduced the laws with no consultation, only one day after a Commission of Audit recommended consideration of new industrial relations laws.
"This Government clearly believes unions have no right to exist and is doing everything in its power to stamp them out," Unions NSW Secretary, Mark Lennon said.
"The community has already resolved this issue - it was called the Your Rights at Work campaign. The Premier and his ministers ought to learn from that experience.
"The NSW community tell us regularly that they believe trade unions have a legitimate right to exist. Who else will stick up for their interests in the workplace?"
Today's introduction of new laws comes after the Government flagged its intention to cut staff ratios for nurses, police, firefighters and other public sector workers in yesterday's Commission of Audit.
Mr Lennon said the impact of the laws would be to undermine services to the community.
"This Government had made an art form of springing contentious and major legislation on the parliament late in the day with no consultation," Mr Lennon said.
"The Premier and his team insist on attacking public services and the people who deliver them. It has to stop."
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