Australia as 'democratic' as Botswana, yes really!

Australia's 'democracy' is an artifact of the past as it technically lives in the museum, the "Museum of Australian Democracy" in the old parliament house to be more precise.

When you take your children or grandchildren to a museum you show them 'things' that were in the past, e.g. dinosaurs, 'classic' cars etc

So, when you enter the old parliament house you can reminisce what 'democracy' looked like in Australia, 'cause that ain't today's reality!

See article from 9 Dec 2019 by sbs of the headline:

Australia is now in line with the United States, Ghana and Botswana in terms of civil freedoms.


Updated 09/12/2019 By Velvet Winter

An annual report on the civil rights of countries worldwide has downgraded Australia’s democracy from “open” to “narrowed”.

The CIVICUS Monitor is a collaboration between human rights organisations around the world, to assess the democratic freedoms of 196 countries.

In the 2019 report, Australia’s democratic ‘status’  dropped. This was due to recent police raids on media outlets, the growing trend of prosecuting whistleblowers like Witness K - and the increasing crackdown on peaceful protest.

The CIVICUS Monitor combines several different sources of data looking at things like the freedoms of association, peaceful assembly and ‘expression’. 

Countries are then given a ranking ranging from closed, repressed, obstructed, narrowed or open.

See the monitor at: https://www.sbs.com.au/news/the-feed/australia-s-democracy-has-been-downgraded-from-open-to-narrowed?fbclid=IwAR2zIS0i5pP334LlcpMDviJu7wPnbh9FHFqNTQ17JhJEWctLDzwRUXJZ2Kw

“All of these restrictive policies add up. We need to draw a line in the sand and say ‘enough’,” said the Centre’s Campaigns Director Tom Clarke.

 “Powerful politicians and their corporate backers don’t always respect the rights of individual people or communities,” he warned.

We need to create an Australian Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms to help level the playing field.

The 2019 report took particular aim at legislation passed by Australian parliament this year that allows law enforcement authorities to force tech companies to hand over user information - even if it is protected by end-to-end encryption.

The report’s assessment of the Australian civic space is echoed in public opinion, with just 59 percent of Australian’s saying they are satisfied with how democracy is working.

Australia is one of three countries that were downgraded in the Asia Pacific region in 2019, with India and Brunei going from obstructed to repressed.

In wider regions, Malta joined Australia in declining from an ‘open’ civic space to a ‘narrowed’ civic space.

The report also found that the percentage of the world’s population living in a ‘repressed’ democracy doubled in the last 12 months, to 40 per cent.

Countries categorised as ‘open’ decreased in the past year from 4 per cent in 2018 to 3 per cent in 2019.

As part of the research CIVICUS published a ‘watch list’ - countries where citizen’s rights are being actively infringed upon. Making the selection for 2019 were Colombia, Egypt, Guinea and Kazakhstan. 

China was highlighted for the ongoing conflict in Hong Kong over the proposed extradition bill, and the continued mistreatment of protestors and journalists.

There were several brighter spots in this year’s report. Dominican Republic and Moldova were both updated in terms of civic freedom from ‘obstructed’ to ‘narrowed’.

Government logic; Electricity down, call us re your cashless card

Things are done differently in the land called ‘down under’, a colony of the Monarch who is currently having issues with Her insubordinate grandchild (PMSL).

The colonialists (in government) have this mentality from their ancestors that stems back to 1788, where the population at large is considered to be criminals, either past present or future.

With the advent of electricity, it became easier to ‘administer’ the convicts where today a cashless society (Indue welfare card) is being imposed on the serfs, for the cheaper and quicker ‘administration’ of those pesky tax slaves who pay the taxes large corporations dodge.

The colonialists who have limited mental capacity (see picture below) ‘forget’ that with the lack of electricity, ‘cashless’ terminals do not work, where it is generally accepted that you cannot call your local welfare ‘business’ to spot (lend) you some cash’, noting that mobile tower and landline exchanges have limited offline electricity run time.

See text version of article from 9 Jan 2020 of the by sbs of the headline:

Calls for people on welfare in bushfire-affected areas to be exempt from cashless card 

Welfare agencies say people in bushfire affected areas need to be able to withdraw cash, but the government says no one relying on a cashless debit card has been impacted by the disaster.
Updated 4 hours ago, By Rosemary Bolger

Anglicare Australia has called for welfare recipients in bushfire-affected areas to receive their payments directly, rather than have to use the cashless debit card.

In places where the cashless debit card has been rolled out, 80 per cent of a person's income can be stored on the device, known as an Indue card, preventing purchases of alcohol and gambling.

One of the trial sites is Ceduna in South Australia where bushfires triggered a power outage to 25,000 customers on New Year's Eve.

Anglicare Australia executive director Kasy Chambers said it was unrealistic to expect people to rely on the card in areas where the power has been cut.

"People must be able to get essential supplies to live and adapt in the wake of the bushfires. With the power out and many outlets closed, people must be able to withdraw cash," Ms Chambers said.

But a spokesperson for Social Services Minister Anne Ruston said there had been no impact on terminal availability in trial sites as a result of the fires.

"The department continues to actively monitor the situation and will ensure that cashless debit card trial participants have access to their funds should there be an emergency situation in any of the trial sites."

Other trial sites in East Kimberley and the Goldfields in Western Australia, and Hervey Bay in Queensland are far from the bushfires.

Anyone travelling to bushfire-hit areas is encouraged to call the cashless debit card hotline for assistance.

Earlier this week, Centrelink advised people on the cashless welfare card to call them if they have been affected by fires. 

Ms Chambers said that’s not good enough.

"With the power out and phones unavailable, contacting Centrelink is just not an option for people in the thick of the crisis. The card must be suspended indefinitely."

Ms Chambers said Anglicare had been contacted by several people, some who had been visiting friends and families in bushfire-hit regions, who had had problems using their cashless debit card.

"It's really an inconvenience at best, huge difficulty at worst on top of an already chaotic situation when you haven't got access to pure cash to buy food.

"This is an extreme example, but it does bring home that real inconvenience and lack of dignity."

On Monday, one social media user asked how someone on the cashless welfare card was expected to feed their family.

"Are they just expected to die?" they tweeted.

In response, Centrelink said: "If anyone is in that situation, they should let us know."

The government has deployed mobile service centres to the NSW's South Coast and East Gippsland in Victoria to assist Centrelink customers in those bushfire affected regions.

On Monday, Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced that job seekers in fire-affected regions would be exempted from mutual obligation requirements for at least two months.

A spokesperson for the Employment Department said they were working to implement appropriate arrangements and to identify areas in which they will apply.

Will a Royal Commission into the bushfires mention this?

That’s right if it was to be held, will a Royal Commission into the bush fires mention a post from the ‘Corporate Australia’ site?

More importantly will the Royal Commission address the law contained within the meme within a post within the site?

That’s right, the people in government in Victoria have been able to make it rain ‘legally’ since 1967.

So why have there been so many so called ‘droughts’ throughout the years, when the people in government can literally make it rain?

This law is current as of this post,

and is available for your perusal at:

http://www8.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/viewdb/au/legis/vic/consol_act/rca1967198/ 

See the 'Rain-Making Control Act 1967' within the post below, which is different to the current one within the Austlii reference above:

Chemtrails in Victoria since 1967

Chinese manufacturer adds spyware to smart phones

So, this is how they do it:

Companies like Foxtel, Google and now Realme get you hooked on their product, where no advertisements or low cost is the emphasis or the reason to purchase it.

They then add 'spyware' for the purpose of providing a 'better end-user experience' or whatever other BS term the marketing department can come up with.

We should all know how competitive the Chinese are, or rather how good they are copying, and not wanting to be outdone by the five eyes surveillance network, they want a slice of the "surveil the shit outta everyone" pie too, by installing 'adware' on Realme branded smartphones.

See article from 31 Dec 2019 by 9TO5Google of the headline:

Realme is bringing ads to its ColorOS Android skin after a year of huge growth

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Ads in software are a great source of revenue for companies, but it’s usually something that users don’t appreciate. This week, Realme announced that it would be bringing ads to ColorOS following a year of massive growth in the Android market.


Realme, for those unaware, is a popular Android smartphone maker, especially in India. We haven’t covered Realme much, but in 2019, the company managed 400% year over year growth which saw it take the #4 spot in India behind Xiaomi, Samsung, and Vivo. Part of that growth is thanks to Realme’s value on its smartphones which are usually priced lower than the comparable competition.

Going into 2020, Realme wants to “continue offering more surprises” by bringing “content recommendations” to its ColorOS skin over Android. Essentially, Realme is bringing ads to its software in order to help maintain a “healthy and sustainable business model” going forward.

This change will affect devices running ColorOS 6 and the ads on Realme devices will appear in two different places. The first is in the Phone Manager app while the second is on the Security Check page. The ads are enabled by default, but Realme users can disable them by going to Settings > Additional Settings > Content Recommendation and toggling the “feature” off.

Ironically, Realme made fun of Xiaomi earlier this year (via Android Authority) over ads that Xiaomi placed within MIUI, even showing it as a selling point of the Realme 3.