Open Forum: March 9, 2019

Posted on 12:01 am, March 9, 2019 by Sinclair Davidson
This entry was posted in Open Forum. Bookmark the permalink.

1,381 Responses to Open Forum: March 9, 2019

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  1. min
    #2955461, posted on March 11, 2019 at 9:29 am

    Joan of Arc would probably be diagnosed with schizophrenia these days . However a poor French half starved peasant girl and at that age probably not reached puberty probably going through teenage angst.

  2. John Constantine
    #2955462, posted on March 11, 2019 at 9:29 am

    To auction off wool as unmulesed, you have to tick a box to declare mulesing has ceased on your property.

    This declaration is audited, I can think of a bloke that ticked the box to see what happened, but his audit was quite unpleasant.

    Certain cronies, usually with a sheepstud and in a position to put pressure on their wool agents can get deals with speciality wool end users, where the end-user pays a premium to claim they use unmulesed wool and the sheepstud advertises their rams as worth more. The ram clients don’t get to share the crony wool deal though.

    Comrades.

  3. dover_beach
    #2955463, posted on March 11, 2019 at 9:29 am

    Calling Cardinal Pell’s Prosecution What It Is: Religious Persecution

    Without a doubt, this remains the best summary of travesty of justice that is the Pell case. Share it far and wide.

  4. Dr Faustus
    #2955464, posted on March 11, 2019 at 9:30 am

    The author is spinning furiously to hint that 50% of migrants are from English speaking western countries.
    Frankly that’s bullshit.
    No wonder he writes for Quadrant.

    Your problem here is that the article contains several linked ideas across a number of paragraphs – and this can sometimes be jolly confusing for readers with limited English comprehension.

    The author is examining the argument that while, for some, Australia is “an Asian country“, Australia actually has a dominant Western culture that many immigrants assimilate towards. Slight reading in context tells us that, rather than enumerating sources of spoken English, the 50% reference relates to the proportion of new immigrants coming from a ‘Western’ culture.

    Hope this helps.

  5. C.L.
    #2955465, posted on March 11, 2019 at 9:31 am

    Julie Bishop continues her never-ending Gillardian vagina monologues:

    Julie Bishop says politics is ‘lonely’ and ‘isolating’ as a woman.

    “It can be pretty lonely. You keep very much to yourself as a woman,” she said.

    “You don’t go out drinking with the boys — it’s just not the same camaraderie.

    “Parliament House is not a family-friendly place,” she claimed.

    She doesn’t even have a family.

    Add to that the adversarial and “rough and tumble” nature of politics and of Canberra.

    Diddums.
    But wait. She has a solution: women shouldn’t have to show up for work:

    As she prepares to leave politics, Ms Bishop suggested one way to change the political culture was to spend less time in Parliament.

    “It’s extraordinary that in this day and age, we have to have physical voting, you have to be physically present to vote,” she said.

    “I was in Ukraine years ago, they have electronic voting in Ukraine and we can’t seem to manage it in Australia.”

  6. dover_beach
    #2955466, posted on March 11, 2019 at 9:31 am

    A Conservative Catholic. Good pick to replace the loyal deputy.

    Seems she got 51 votes – La Bishop’s choice received ONE vote…

    The Libs ought to make sure this kind of information is leaked as much as possible. It might lead people to think that the long dark nightmarish Turnbullian age is drawing to a close, and that if the Libs win the next election they will be a different beast than the twisted ill-favoured creature that limped into existence under the fat-head.

    Indeed.

  7. dover_beach
    #2955467, posted on March 11, 2019 at 9:34 am

    “Parliament House is not a family-friendly place,” she claimed.

    She doesn’t even have a family.

    Oh nononono

  8. Eyrie
    #2955468, posted on March 11, 2019 at 9:34 am

    Looks like the Ethiopian crash was a MAX 8 and under similar circumstances to the October Indonesian one.
    Hmmm.
    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6791675/Ethiopian-Airlines-plane-way-Nairobi-crashes-157-people-board.html

    157 dead including these.

    “As many as 50 delegates are believed to have been on the plane heading to the UN Environment Assembly in Nairobi, which begins tomorrow.”
    Time you guys all started using Skype or other video conferencing.

  9. Leigh Lowe
    #2955469, posted on March 11, 2019 at 9:39 am

    The last time I was in Europe and tried to speak English in France, I got lots of dirty looks.

    D-Day?

  11. dover_beach
    #2955472, posted on March 11, 2019 at 9:44 am

    Hey, did anyone here watch 60 minutes last Sunday? I saw an ad on Youtube referring to ‘damning evidence against Cardinal Pell’. What was this ‘evidence’? Please don’t tell me it was the accusations of ‘Joe’ as related by Last.

  12. Leigh Lowe
    #2955473, posted on March 11, 2019 at 9:46 am

    “Parliament House is not a family-friendly place,” she claimed.

    She doesn’t even have a family.

    If she had a son, it would be just like Trayvon.
    .
    .

    As she prepares to leave politics, Ms Bishop suggested one way to change the political culture was to spend less time in Parliament.

    “It’s extraordinary that in this day and age, we have to have physical voting, you have to be physically present to vote,” she said.

    “I was in Ukraine years ago, they have electronic voting in Ukraine and we can’t seem to manage it in Australia.”
    “One could vote if one was at the polo, picking up free joo-welry, on a Greek Island … one could vote from anywhere.” Ms Bishop thought, but did not say aloud.

  13. Snoopy
    #2955475, posted on March 11, 2019 at 9:54 am

    “As many as 50 delegates are believed to have been on the plane heading to the UN Environment Assembly in Nairobi, which begins tomorrow.”

    It is a tragedy, but on the other hand these worry worts won’t be making any further contribution to global warming.

  14. John Constantine
    #2955476, posted on March 11, 2019 at 9:54 am

    AAC australian ag company announces queensl;and flood initial assessment.

    the two million acres of company land affected will take 6 to 8 million dollars to fix infrastructure.

    worst case cattle deaths fifty thousand head from the eighty odd thousand flooded, with the chance of recovering significant numbers that have wandered.

    The dry times impact on the rest of the comany’s stations is estimated at near thirty million for the second half of the year.

    Others preferred, unless it gets taken over to be split up.

    AAC though has access to capital markets to raise fix up cash. the individual independent stations that were hit like this do not have this fall back safety net.

  15. 1735099
    #2955477, posted on March 11, 2019 at 9:55 am

    Hope this helps.

    My reading comprehension skills are sufficient to detect spin when I read it.
    Australia is a multicultural country. That’s simply fact.
    The immigration statistics, which he skirts around in a crudely deceptive manner, show him up.

  16. Eyrie
    #2955478, posted on March 11, 2019 at 9:56 am

    Yes, spend less time in Parliament. Two one month sessions every three years ought to do it , barring a war emergency. Members to be physically present the whole time when in session.

  17. Leigh Lowe
    #2955479, posted on March 11, 2019 at 9:58 am

    “As many as 50 delegates are believed to have been on the plane heading to the UN Environment Assembly in Nairobi, which begins tomorrow.”

    Hope they bought their carbon offsets before take-off.
    It would be terrible to die in a state of mortal carbon sin, and be condemned forever to Gaia hell.

  18. Dr Faustus
    #2955480, posted on March 11, 2019 at 9:58 am

    Their ABC struggling to understand how Celia Hammond managed to pick up Curtin despite “damaging media reports” of her vile personal opinions:

    Details emerged of a speech given by Ms Hammond in 2013, in which she raised concerns about “premarital casual sex” and “militant feminism”.

    Hard to see why Mz Bishop’s candidate only picked up one vote:

    Ms Watson-Lynn described herself on Twitter as a “non-Liberal voter” in 2013, heavily criticised Tony Abbott and referred to Malcolm Turnbull as “sexy”.

    A sexy Miserable Ghost.
    There’s some sort of message in there.

  19. Boambee John
    #2955481, posted on March 11, 2019 at 9:59 am

    calli at 0903

    On English speaking in France, once they know you’re an Aussie and not a nob from across the channel, they are quite pleasant. Makes you wonder how appallingly you have to treat the locals to get that visceral reaction.

    Oui. First question on hearing broken French: “Anglais?” in a suspicious tone.

    On hearing the response “Non, non, Australie” all becomes friendly. (Well, perhaps not in Paris, they are different; maybe Numbers spends all his time there?)

  20. Snoopy
    #2955482, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:00 am

    As she prepares to leave politics, Ms Bishop suggested one way to change the political culture was to spend less time in Parliament.

    That gender pay gap thingy is a complete mystery.

  21. Leigh Lowe
    #2955483, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:03 am

    As she prepares to leave politics, Ms Bishop suggested one way to change the political culture was to spend less time in Parliament.

    McStabby is remarkably honest in her self-assessment that the culture of Parliament will be improved considerably by her spending less time there.

  22. Boambee John
    #2955484, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:06 am

    Numbers at 0955

    Australia is a multicultural country. That’s simply fact.

    Indeed it is.

    Now we have the joys of African “yoof” running amok in tge streets and invading homes when they are not engaging in intra-cultural brawls, fgm, calls fir J oo s to be murdered and many other multicultural enrichments.

    But our cuisine is soooo varied!

  23. Leigh Lowe
    #2955485, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:09 am

    Hard to see why Mz Bishop’s candidate only picked up one vote:

    Massive “fuck you” to McStabby from the little people.
    There is a lesson here for the SFLs (if they choose to heed it) is that the idea that McStabby and the Poodle had tyeir finger on the pulse of their respective states and were vote-harvesting machines might just be bullshit.

  24. Miltonf
    #2955486, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:15 am

    Great that those Two are going

  25. Boambee John
    #2955487, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:15 am

    Eyrie
    #2955478, posted on March 11, 2019 at 9:56 am
    Yes, spend less time in Parliament. Two one month sessions every three years ought to do it , barring a war emergency. Members to be physically present the whole time when in session.

    Bit hard line.

    One month each year, one week for presentation and debate of the Budget, one week for repeal of obsolete laws and regulations, one week to discuse constituen ts’ grievances, the final week for general business.

  26. struth
    #2955489, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:18 am

    Good Moaning.

    Australia is a capitalist western Christian country.
    This is anathema to numbers and his fellow communists who, elected and unelected, have been trying to destroy it with multiculturalism.
    Yet, except for Mussies, most immigrants that come here come precisely FOR a western lifestyle and all it’s benefits , and aren’t doing enough destroying.
    They quickly learned that with eastern Asians, and switched pretty quickly.
    Bloody hell, some of them were quite business minded and even right wing!
    Hence the left’s desire to see immigration from the most wretched and disgusting cultures on the planet, and joyously encourage radical islam.

  27. Arky
    #2955490, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:21 am

    Australia is a capitalist western Christian country.

    ..
    Not really.
    Australia is a formally Christian, crony capitalist, soon to have to decide between Chinese or Arab domination country.

  28. struth
    #2955491, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:21 am

    As many as 50 delegates are believed to have been on the plane heading to the UN Environment Assembly in Nairobi, which begins tomorrow.”

    With so many of these pricks flying around the world, this was bound to happen.
    It was statistically surprising it hadn’t happened yet, but not that many private jets go down and when they do, it’s only small numbers involved.
    The UN will decree no more commercial air travel with the proles for their VIP’s.

  29. Arky
    #2955493, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:24 am

    I come down on the side of submission to our Chinese friends, if you really have to pick one.

  30. John Constantine
    #2955494, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:25 am

    Billionaire donorclass favorite, stabby mclickspittle bishop lived a sellout career of signing any document that progressed the agenda of her billionaire speed dial owners.

    If there was a functioning media class in australia, we would have a big list of exactly what our well coiffed quisling has unswervingly and eternally signed us up to.

    And a list of donations.

    Crony socialism is simple, billionaire crony developer donors pay for political policies based on massive debt funded trillion dollar credit creation and massive importation of millions of the worlds poorest people as consumption machines to squander the credit on crushloading australias cities.

    The oligarchs sellout australias urban amenity for cents in the dollar for personal profit and their crony political creatures get brown paper bags of fivers and free chinese banquets.

    Comrade Maaaaaaaaates.

  31. John Constantine
    #2955495, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:32 am

    The physical bodies of australias political corruptocracy have the right to be anywhere on earth when it comes time for the vote on a fair dinkum exit from all transnational conventions corruptly signed for kickbacks.

    Their votes still count as long as their heads are on pikes on display in the parliment.

    Blink if you oppose an end to corruptly signed conventions.

    Comrades.

  32. Socrates at the Pub
    #2955496, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:33 am

    The last time I was in Europe and tried to speak English in France, I got lots of dirty looks.

    What methodology was used to determine that the “lots of dirty looks” were due to the “speaking English”?

  33. OldOzzie
    #2955497, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:35 am

    Eyrie
    #2955468, posted on March 11, 2019 at 9:34 am

    Looks like the Ethiopian crash was a MAX 8 and under similar circumstances to the October Indonesian one.
    Hmmm.
    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6791675/Ethiopian-Airlines-plane-way-Nairobi-crashes-157-people-board.html

    157 dead including these.

    “As many as 50 delegates are believed to have been on the plane heading to the UN Environment Assembly in Nairobi, which begins tomorrow.”
    Time you guys all started using Skype or other video conferencing.

    Eyrie

    yes if you look at the Flightradar24 data regarding the crash of Ethiopian Airlines flight 302 you will see flight 302 going up and down like a yo-yu, just like Lion Air 737 Max 8

    As the Bllomberg Article Second Boeing 737 Max Crash Within Months Kills 157 in Ethiopia

    The FAA and Boeing have been finalizing a software fix for an obscure anti-stall measure created for the 737 Max that came to light with the Indonesia tragedy. The Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System, or MCAS, triggered by an erroneous sensor reading, had baffled pilots by pushing the Lion Air plane downward dozens of times before it crashed.

    The Lion Air tragedy in Indonesia, like the Ethiopian Airlines crash, occurred shortly after takeoff. Data from the Indonesian jet’s flight recorder showed that an errant sensor had signaled that the plane was in danger of stalling, causing the MCAS software to push the aircraft’s nose downward.

    Two short, erratic Boeing flights end in tragedy: Could they be linked?

    The pilots on the Lion Air jet counteracted the movement repeatedly, but the cycle repeated itself more than two dozen times before the plane entered its final dive. The accident inflamed controversy over pilot training for the 737 Max, since Boeing hadn’t flagged the anti-stall feature in training materials or most flight crew manuals.

    As of last week, Southwest and American hadn’t yet received any information from Boeing about the promised MCAS software patch, although neither carrier says its planes have experienced any problems with the system.

  34. struth
    #2955498, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:35 am

    Not really.
    Australia is a formally Christian, crony capitalist, soon to have to decide between Chinese or Arab domination country.

    Yes, maybe I should have put it in the past tense.
    Bloody teachers.
    Always correcting people!

    Australia was a once vibrant western, capitalist country, with a constitution and parliamentary law and culture purely Christian.
    It enjoyed great benefits from this and on the world stage, exceeded in performance and achievement, in everything from sport, inventiveness, and record breaking achievements such as in flight.
    Then a generation came along that spawned the likes of Numbers……………………………..

  35. Socrates at the Pub
    #2955499, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:35 am

    AAC though has access to capital markets to raise fix up cash. the individual independent stations that were hit like this do not have this fall back safety net.

    AA also has enough females hitting the ground this year on other stations to fully restock their country on the Flinders floodplain.
    Individual stations do not have access to a calf factory elsewhere churning out more than their entire Cloncurry holdings can carry.

  36. twostix
    #2955500, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:36 am

    Australia is a multicultural country. That’s simply fact.

    Australia is 90% white european.

    That there’s a couple of other tiny nations living inside our borders because the current political establishment is lunatic drunk on hatred of the white working classes and empathy gone wild is neither here nor there.

  37. struth
    #2955501, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:42 am

    The last time I was in Europe and tried to speak English in France, I got lots of dirty looks.

    You have a hard enough time here.

    That’s why they put you in charge of the dribbling retards.
    You and your shaving mirror.

    As shown this morning, with your inability to comprehend the Quadrant article, when brains were being handed out, you were on stress leave.

  38. Bruce of Newcastle
    #2955502, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:44 am

    “As many as 50 delegates are believed to have been on the plane heading to the UN Environment Assembly in Nairobi, which begins tomorrow.”

    Climate administrators should now make all their contesserations virtual to save lives and CO2.

  39. Arky
    #2955503, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:45 am

    The English speaking people are everywhere. and in everything on the retreat.
    We abort an horrific proportion of pregnancies. We have exported our industrial base, hollowed out education and academia. Most are now atheists. Most children do not know the stories behind Christmas or Easter, or even who fought who in WW II.
    In England, the political class is fighting tooth and nail against the results of a popular vote in order to keep it subject to the EU.
    In the USA, the Democrats are at the point of advocating eliminating the country’s borders with the Spanish speaking south.
    Virtually all products in every store and shop across all our nations are made in the PRC.
    The next generations of consumer products. software and industrial plant will be designed in China.
    Eventually the empty trademarks that gave us reassurance during the transition will be gone.
    So will the cheap prices and functioning just in time delivery networks.
    Get ready to eat shit.
    That is all the good news I have today. Sunshine mode off.

  40. John Constantine
    #2955505, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:48 am

    As soon as the fences are fixed on the AAC floodplain stations, aac cattle from droughted stations can be trucked in.

    Cut their million dollar a week feed bill.

    Family stations may be able to take stock on agistment or profit share or sell management services to other cattle owners to fund infrastructure repairs, but the numbers aren’t as good as running your own cattle.

    They don’t need any more bad luck for a while.

  41. struth
    #2955506, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:48 am

    With all this bullshit on planes these days, they should note be allowed to produce this fly by wire electronics ans sensors etc bound to fail, without having a big red button in the cockpit marked “manual flight” where the basic control of the plane can be put 100 percent back in the pilot’s hands.
    The bigger A/Craft would require power assistance that should be from a completely separate form.

    We are now seeing the generations of all brains no common sense building cars and planes, over engineering and relying too much on fallible computer and sensor technology.

  42. Bruce of Newcastle
    #2955507, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:49 am

    I cite the precautionary principle as why climate professionals should no longer fly all around the world to exotic tropical resorts. You can never be too careful.

  43. areff
    #2955508, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:51 am

    Try this, Numbers:

    Je suis un Australian et ma Francais est terrible, mais j’attempte la lingua belle Francais

    They’ll speak English quite cheerfully once they know you’re neither a Pom, not in the least intelligent and inflict on their tongue great indignities than even Bill Shorten could manage at a Young Labor camp.
    Conclude by announcing Plastic Bertrand would make a better president than Macron. They’ll kiss you on both cheeks and send you on your way.

    If you can resist the temptation, DON’T tell them how your life was reduced to a pathetic shambles as a linear consequence of the French failure of arms at Dien Bien Phu.

  44. MatrixTransform
    #2955509, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:54 am

    You and your shaving mirror.

    reminds me of budgerigar we had when I was a kid.

    Who’s a pretty boy then?

  45. Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
    #2955510, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:55 am

    The last time I was in Europe and tried to speak English in France, I got lots of dirty looks.

    Never had any problem.

  46. Arky
    #2955511, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:58 am

    Our FM radio stations across the English speaking world play music from twenty or more years ago, because we have stopped producing new music worth listening to.
    Our story tellers just keep pummeling the corpse of long- dead authorities who have had no real influence over anything for three generations.
    Our standards are so low that small girls are accepted into roles that were previously reserved for the best and strongest men.
    We no longer hang even the worst murdering criminals or seek to keep the mentally ill contained.

  47. Mother Lode
    #2955512, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:00 am

    Joan of Arc heard voices of St Catherine – presumably Catherine of Alexandria. Who in all likelihood never existed .

    The past is a foreign country, they do things differently there.

    The mediaeval mind did see the world differently, forces of good and evil were far more immanent and present in the world. It is funny, mediaevals are held up as backward and superstitious yet their beliefs are comparable to the superstitions of the Romans and Greeks who maintained vast priesthoods and practiced all manner of augury, prophecy and necromancy, believed in witches, spirits and whatnot.

    When we read of Joan hearing voices, perhaps we should consider what experience she was putting into words. An intuition that strikes with such force that it seems to come from without is hardly new. We would even say that it was like a voice without being considered gaga. Our understanding of nature and the human psyche means the idea of another voice being in head is absurd. If we grew up believing that the supernatural might intervene then this would not be weird at all.

    I expect most people would have experienced something like this at the time – telling them the right way to behave, unflinchingly exhorting them to duty and honour and such, enhancing life.

    When we speak of people hearing voices we generally think think of something very particular – where the voices confuse, taunt, or encourage acts deleterious to the welfare of the host.

    The mediaevals would have seen that as the intervention of the evil forces.

  48. struth
    #2955513, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:00 am

    The English speaking people are everywhere. and in everything on the retreat.
    We abort an horrific proportion of pregnancies. We have exported our industrial base, hollowed out education and academia. Most are now atheists. Most children do not know the stories behind Christmas or Easter, or even who fought who in WW II.
    In England, the political class is fighting tooth and nail against the results of a popular vote in order to keep it subject to the EU.
    In the USA, the Democrats are at the point of advocating eliminating the country’s borders with the Spanish speaking south.
    Virtually all products in every store and shop across all our nations are made in the PRC.
    The next generations of consumer products. software and industrial plant will be designed in China.
    Eventually the empty trademarks that gave us reassurance during the transition will be gone.
    So will the cheap prices and functioning just in time delivery networks.
    Get ready to eat shit.
    That is all the good news I have today. Sunshine mode off.

    Let me help you feel better.

    Donald Trump.
    He still has five odd more years to go.

    He understands his capitalist country can pound China and win.
    Because he believes in capitalism and competition.
    Man of the pseudorighties here think it’s a matter of population which, history shows, is a croc of shit.

    But he gets it.
    That’s why TDS is so bad with the left.

    There is still hope, and although the white English speakers maybe dying out, more people than ever are speaking English, it is the universal language for good reason, it is the best language, born of freedom to acquire other words and adapt.

    And the other stuff has been caused by the shit like numbers, in our schools.

  49. Bruce of Newcastle
    #2955514, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:02 am

    Our FM radio stations across the English speaking world play music from twenty or more years ago, because we have stopped producing new music worth listening to.

    Are you saying that atonal chanting about hos and bling isn’t worth listening to?

  50. Arky
    #2955515, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:04 am

    There is still hope,

    ..
    There isn’t, but we should act as if there is.
    But first, we must face up to how bad it is, and sweep away those who brought us here.

  51. Mother Lode
    #2955516, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:09 am

    Julie Bishop continues her never-ending Gillardian vagina monologues:

    Nothing persuades me more of someone’s suitability for high office that their wallowing in self-pity for their own choices.

    The rattling jumble of bones in a human-shaped skin sack simply cannot see why no one else sees her as the colossus she sees in the mirror in the mornings.

    The only time she was impressive was after MH17 was shot down over Ukraine and Abbott put his hand up her back and operated her mouth as she strutted (accompanied by persistent clattering of bones) the world stage.

  52. Myrddin Seren
    #2955517, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:09 am

    The next biggest groups, Chinese …….immigrants, ……

    Willing to stand corrected, but I think in most recent stats, the Chinese are the biggest cohort coming here.

    Since life and travel patterns changed for me in 2013, the demographics of northern Sydney have notably changed. The Han are moving in, in large numbers, quickly. People at the supermarket I am trying to give helpful advice to who simply smile back and shrug their shoulders – can’t speak a single word of English.

    ….are also in Australia to make the most of living in the West

    ,…

    I think there is a difference between people who WANT to go to a new and better place; and those who simply desire to GET AWAY from someplace awful, although they really didn’t want to go in the first place.

    Fraser’s hillbillies from the Bekaa Valley have been stridently resistant to assimilation, and bring a lot of the ‘old ways’ with them. A lot of the Han are here as an insurance policy against the rise of the Second Great Helmsman – Xi. They are quite happy in a Chinese bubble. Take a walk between Town Hall and Central – there are vast numbers of people living, working and studying in that stretch who need never speak a word in other than Mandarin or Korean.

    ….not to turn Australia into a little Asia….

    See above. Not so sure about that – the Han like China and Chinese ways, just a bit worried about Xi-ism. See also – Forest City as a template for a bubble world.

    That means speaking English,

    Again, depends on willingness, age ( how many elderly grandparents are we importing ? ) and necessity. If everything in your life is in Chinese, Korean, Arabic or whatever – who cares about ‘Strine.

    …succeeding in school,

    No brainer. Oh – there may be some exceptions from African conflict zones.

    …and embracing Western values.

    Mmmmm. By the time we see if that hypothesis wins out, it will be too late if the view is incorrect.

  53. OldOzzie
    #2955518, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:10 am

    How Boeing’s 737 Max Went From Bestseller to Safety Concern

    Nov. 7, 2018

    Boeing responds to the crash by advising pilots that the Max’s so-called angle-of-attack sensor can provide false readings, causing the plane’s computers to erroneously detect a mid-flight stall in airflow. That in turn can cause the aircraft to abruptly dive to regain the speed the computer has calculated it needs to keep flying. Pilots could counteract the sudden downward tilt by following a checklist in their training manual, the planemaker said.

    I am missing something here

    – your plane is close to the ground and the software has caused the aircraft to abruptly dive to regain the speed the computer has calculated it needs to keep flying. and Boeing’s solution is to follow a checklist in their training manual – “hang on why I look for and then go through the Checklist – “Oops sorry I have crashed – I ran out of time!!!?

  54. thefrollickingmole
    #2955519, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:16 am

    Heres a little bit of trumpian splendor for Monday.

    His barring local tax deductions over a set amount it bearing fruit in the big apple.
    https://nypost.com/2019/03/09/new-york-city-is-edging-toward-financial-disaster-experts-warn/

    Property taxes, almost half of the city’s revenue, is rising faster than any other revenue source — squeezing businesses and forcing homeowners, already hit by federal property tax deduction changes, to relocate to lower-tax states.

    Dear me, are some of those calling for higher taxes for everyone else fleeing higher taxes?

  55. struth
    #2955520, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:18 am

    In the music industry I’ll have you know there are great talents.

    They only gives the crap that bow down to triple JJJ and leftism.

    The best art and music comes out of non government funded situations.

    The golden age of music recently, from the western world from Before Elvis to about the year 2000 show us that.
    What music did the communist block produce in that time?
    The more socialist, the less quality is the art.

  56. Des Deskperson
    #2955521, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:19 am

    ‘Julie Bishop continues her never-ending Gillardian vagina monologues:’

    It says a lot about the insularity and/or bias and/or lack of curiosity of the Canberra Press gallery that it has never even hinted – perhaps it’s never even dawned on them – what everyone else in Canberra knows. That Bishop is a lazy, feckless, incompetent shallow show-pony.

  57. twostix
    #2955522, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:19 am

    Our FM radio stations across the English speaking world play music from twenty or more years ago, because we have stopped producing new music worth listening to.

    FM what the hell?

    There’s tonnes of good music being made, it’s just not on horrible centrally controlled distibution platforms anymore.

  58. Mother Lode
    #2955523, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:20 am

    Hey, did anyone here watch 60 minutes last Sunday? I saw an ad on Youtube referring to ‘damning evidence against Cardinal Pell’.

    When was the last time 60 Minutes reported anything that resounded outside the TV bubble.

    Even Four Corners can achieve that (although they have to fabricate stuff to do it).

    60 Minutes is just interactive theatre for people who want to pretend they are in the thick of things, but when the end credits begin to role the whole fantasy disappears in a puff, promptly replaced by news that you will save 10c on a packet of Tim Tams this week at Coles.

  59. Arky
    #2955524, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:22 am

    There’s tonnes of good music being made,

    ..
    No.
    It is all dirge-like crap.

  60. twostix
    #2955525, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:24 am

    Last time Australia had an enourmous mining boom that ended up with a hangover off all of the chancer, mercenary riff-raff of the world hanging around our towns and cities causing trouble we eventually sorted things out with some simple legislation and a new government that was out of the hands of the colonial gentry and in the hands of the people.

    That lasted ok for nearly a century, we just have to do that again.

    Easy.

  61. Tom
    #2955526, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:27 am

    Clever Mark Knight cartoon on Page 25 of today’s Herald Sun: a house brick with ScoMo’s features attempts to fly in the Moomba Birdman Rally, which celebrates the dodos of this world.

    (I don’t have a sub, so I can’t locate the URL; Knight is no longer on Twitter, which used to allow me to post his work.)

  62. C.L.
    #2955527, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:30 am

    Nothing persuades me more of someone’s suitability for high office that their wallowing in self-pity for their own choices.

    The root cause of her misery is not having any children.
    She wants somebody to blame.
    Men.

  65. C.L.
    #2955532, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:41 am

    Laughed aloud at the lights this morning as I listened to Ray Hadley talking about the latest African tribal brawl in Melbourne. Something about how the festival was meant to showcase ethnic culture.

    Well, yes.

    Moomba Festival has been marred by violent youths for third year in a row.

    According to the report, tensions between ethnic gangs saw a brawl break out outside St Paul’s Cathedral, marring the festival’s otherwise amicable celebrations.

    Perfect symbolism. The hordes fight for dominance outside a defunct Christian church.

    Hundreds of police were deployed to the scene … Police had to intervene arresting three people …

    Wow. Hundreds of police arrested three whole people.

  66. Lysander
    #2955533, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:42 am

    I have heard Celia Hammond is a conservative. And a very clever one at that. Comments?

  67. notafan
    #2955534, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:42 am

    Walked out the door this morning to see my son’s car tailgate open and his work boot on the ground.

    All his near new tools stolen. He is still an apprentice so it’s an especially big financial hit.

    Miserable curs, to steal a person’s livelihood.

  69. Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
    #2955536, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:45 am

    We are now seeing the generations of all brains no common sense building cars and planes, over engineering and relying too much on fallible computer and sensor technology.

    Please let me add to this those nerds currently designing ‘features’ on smart phones, and especially those tinkering with the phone cameras. My camera on my S9x is now so complicated I can hardly use it, and I’m sure the S10 has great improvements made to complicate it even further. The number of obscure menus you have to chase down a rabbit hole to get to something fairly everyday (like a hotspot switch for instance) is simply dreadful. It would be OK if they didn’t keep changing the menu route, but every new phone iteration puts things you want in a different place.

  70. JC
    #2955537, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:46 am

    Doesn’t sound like terrible work and it’s not strenuous either as you could do it 7 days a week. Almost A$150,000 a year tax free. That would be close to A$250,000 in taxable income? You could also gain weight!

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6791637/Homeless-beggars-making-200-DAY-reveals-ex-soldier-says-11lb-streets.html

  71. C.L.
    #2955538, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:46 am

    Senior Democrats now calling for extermination of the Romanovs …
    Mayor Bill de Blasio:

    Bill de Blasio✔@BilldeBlasio
    Brothers and sisters, there is plenty of money in this country. There is plenty of money in this world. It’s just in the wrong hands.

    Meanwhile …

    Bill de Blasio’s wife Chirlane McCray cannot explain where $850million given to the mental health program she champions has gone, according to reports.

    In the three years it has been running, organizers at ThriveNYC have largely failed to keep records of the initiative’s achievements – and data that has been collected shows it lagging well behind targets.

    Despite that, the program has been granted an even bigger budget going forward and is now on track to spend $1billion over five years.

  72. C.L.
    #2955539, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:47 am

    Walked out the door this morning to see my son’s car tailgate open and his work boot on the ground.

    All his near new tools stolen. He is still an apprentice so it’s an especially big financial hit.

    Low dogs.

  73. stackja
    #2955540, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:49 am

    Myrddin Seren
    #2955517, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:09 am

    Ballarat Chinese miners upset many.

  74. Miltonf
    #2955541, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:49 am

    May be the WA Libs have more sense than in NSW. Seems like full on civil war in that state. Time for a split?

  75. thefrollickingmole
    #2955542, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:54 am

    Things going swimmingly in numbers paradise.

    ‘A city of shadows’: fear as Venezuela’s crippling blackout enters day four

    But fear not, 15 years of Shorten will get us there (or 25 years of the stupid fucking libs).

  76. notafan
    #2955543, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:57 am

    The last time I was in Europe and tried to speak English in France, I got lots of dirty looks.

    Very bad manners, to expect people to speak your language in a foreign country.

    Start in French and you get a very different response, and people very happy to speak English. Mind you I’ve had people in Paris approach me and offer assistance in English when I have been wrestling with maps, or to tell me to zip up my backpack, the rude Parisian stereotype is exaggerated, not surprised that you promulgate it.

    it might surprise you too that some of us don’t only speak to people in the tourist trade, and as I mentioned the aspirational who are keen to migrant to or work in, or do business with English speaking countries do speak English.

  77. 1735099
    #2955544, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:58 am

    It would be OK if they didn’t keep changing the menu route, but every new phone iteration puts things you want in a different place.

    It’s called “marketing”, Lizzie.
    These phones have extra new features, whether needed or not.
    It’s one of the characteristics of the capitalist system -you need to take the bad with the good.
    You’ll just have to go with the flow and quit whingeing, or buy a cheaper phone.
    Nokia 7.1 is worth a look.
    Comparing phones is a bit like comparing Audis with Kias. It’s an “image” thing.
    One is more reliable and cheaper.
    The other has a name that appeals to status conscious “aspirationals”, but is really a Volkswagen in a nice suit, and you pay through the nose for the name.
    Das Auto……

  78. Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
    #2955545, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:00 pm

    Hard to see why Mz Bishop’s candidate only picked up one vote:
    Massive “fuck you” to McStabby from the little people.
    There is a lesson here for the SFLs (if they choose to heed it) is that the idea that McStabby and the Poodle had tyeir finger on the pulse of their respective states and were vote-harvesting machines might just be bullshit.

    Yes, SFL’s. I still can’t understand why they haven’t twigged that Abbott won a massive number of seats in an outstanding victory in 2013 on immigration and not being ripped off by a carbon tax and that it’s all been downhill since then. What could possibly be missing?

    I guess another five years of met bureau ‘hottest evahs’ has pushed along the climate agenda, but it can still be fought and defeated with a clear-eyed policy blueprint on not letting things as yet harmless or unproven collapse our economy under Shorten. But even Abbott is running scared on it now.

  79. JC
    #2955546, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:00 pm

    ‘A city of shadows’: fear as Venezuela’s crippling blackout enters day four

    It’s like the third or 4th day now… But hey, what’s happening in Venezuela isn’t really like… real socialism.

  81. Sinclair Davidson
    #2955548, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:02 pm

    I’ll be appearing on Sky tonight at 8 – talking about privatising the ABC.

  82. Bruce of Newcastle
    #2955549, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:03 pm

    Bill de Blasio✔@BilldeBlasio
    Brothers and sisters, there is plenty of money in this country. There is plenty of money in this world. It’s just in the wrong hands.

    Bill de Blasio Net Worth

    Bill de Blasio has a net worth of over $2.5 million. The wealth has been created in his career as a politician.

    A millionaire trougher wants to give OPM to other lefty troughers.

  83. struth
    #2955550, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:03 pm

    But fear not, 15 years of Shorten will get us there (or 25 years of the stupid fucking libs).

    It won’t take that long.

  84. Boambee John
    #2955553, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:04 pm

    Bishop is a lazy, feckless, incompetent shallow show-pony.

    Flattery will get you nowhere Des.

  85. JC
    #2955554, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:06 pm

    But seriously, why not? As distorting and evil subsidies are why not subsidize a coal station when we’re doing it with ruinables?

    PM slaps down Joyce coal demand

    The PM has slapped down Barnaby Joyce’s call for a government-subsidised coal-fired power station in central Queensland.

  86. BrettW
    #2955555, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:06 pm

    CL, todays DM mentions NY about to go bust.

  87. struth
    #2955556, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:07 pm

    It’s one of the characteristics of the capitalist system -you need to take the bad with the good.

    Dickhead, she doesn’t have to take the bad at all.

    It’s called choice, and she is discussing with adults weather the choice is worth it o not.
    Think of it as feedback.
    Whereas feedback in our utopia gets you sent to Gulugs.
    17 year wait for an east german snotbox, anyone?
    No choice there.

  88. Myrddin Seren
    #2955559, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:08 pm

    But fear not, 15 years of Shorten will get us there (or 25 years of the stupid fucking libs).

    struth

    It won’t take that long.

    Exactly, struth.

    Just because Labor and the Greens bat on about ‘by 2030’ doesn’t mean the power grid ticks along until New Years Day 2030 and then, kabong, Caracas here we come.

    The more unreliables the Feds and States mandate, the less incentive to invest in the current power baseload.

    ‘By 2030’ will come a lot sooner.

  89. Lysander
    #2955561, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:08 pm

    Sinc on Sky “after dark” lol! Look forward to it!

    Keep Classic FM and regional ABC radio but sell the rest.

  90. struth
    #2955562, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:08 pm

    PM slaps down Joyce coal demand

    So hopefully we’ll slap him down at the election, the fuckwit UN puppet that it is.

  91. Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
    #2955564, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:10 pm

    I wouldn’t swap my Audi Q5 for a Kia, Numbers, unless I was really broke. Thankfully, I am (we are) not. It’s better than a Volkswagen too, any day. You do get what you pay for with Das Auto, although we could do without the wretched luxury tax. I’ll burn you up Heartbreak Hill into Vaucluse (rats! they just reduced speed to 50k’s so we’ll go after midnight) and you’ll see. Power and engineered harmony in an auto is power indeed. Very nice it is too.

    As for marketing, someone soon will see the real gap in the market and put out a smart phone and camera that meets the real needs of the technologically less-inclined. My kids all love their ‘new’ phones with all features. I and others resistant to nerdish bothers constitute a niche market, and capitalism is good at seizing those. It’s also very good at creative destruction. Pause to think how good a phone you would have now, Numbers, if socialism had been producing them. It would be like flying on Aeroflot. Yetch.

  92. Carbon Emitter
    #2955566, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:11 pm

    ‘The last time I was in Europe and tried to speak English in France, I got lots of dirty looks.’

    In a trip to Paris I entered a retail shop and asked a question in English. The sales person asked if I could speak French. I replied I could not but I would try if he had plenty of time. He replied with a smile, no English would be fine!

  93. notafan
    #2955568, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:12 pm

    Whatever St Joan heard or didn’t hear, she inspired the French to beat the English enemy and she was a good and faithful Catholic who died for her beliefs at the hands of the enemy.

  94. 1735099
    #2955570, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:12 pm

    Are you sure you’re not a little confused, Lizzie?
    The S9X is a popular brand of variable speed wind turbine.
    I don’t know if it actually makes calls, and it must be a bugger to haul around in the Audi.

  95. Bruce of Newcastle
    #2955571, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:12 pm

    It’s called “marketing”

    Speaking of rude uncouth capitalist behaviour I’m entertained by AOC’s latest baggage:

    Ocasio-Cortez owes back taxes from 2012, ignored notices, but wants Americans to pay more taxes (10 Mar)

    A book company AOC founded in 2012 to publish children’s books in the Bronx still owes New York State over $1,870 in corporate taxes, according to public records uncovered by the New York Post.

    The state dissolved her company, Brook Avenue Press, in October 2016, presumably due to its failure to pay corporate taxes or file a tax return.

    In typical socialist fashion, Ocasio-Cortez’s little “book-publishing company” got cheap office space as part of a city-subsidized program.

    However, there are no records of Brook Avenue Press ever having published a single book.

    Ocasio-Cortez ignored a July 2017 tax warrant from the state demanding payment of her delinquent taxes.

    A socialist who doesn’t pay her taxes? How embarrassing! No wonder she’s so critical of capitalism: she tried doing it and faceplanted totally.

  96. Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
    #2955574, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:14 pm

    17 year wait for an east german snotbox, anyone?
    No choice there.

    Exackerly, Struth.

    Complain as I did above, and a visit from the Stasi is booked for you immediately.

  98. Enoch Root
    #2955577, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:18 pm

    I’ve been following Cat for some days now (I used to follow a pretty similar blog back home). I am a newcomer to Australia , escaping from a country crippled by 16 years of Labour Party rule. Everybody around me seems to be voting for Shorten in the coming election. I obviously don’t vote, but I am doing my best to try to explain what happened back home and how this could easily happen in Australia if it keeps its current march. So far I’ve sadly not been too successful…

    I feel really sorry for libertarian and conservative Australians, but it seems everyone will have to see first-hand were this damned ideology leads to. Brace yourselves… I’ve seen this before… It’s really ugly. Hopefully everyone will come back to senses before it’s too late.

  99. areff
    #2955578, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:18 pm

    I’ll be appearing on Sky tonight at 8 – talking about privatising the ABC.

    Be prepared to have the AFP investigate you

  100. thefrollickingmole
    #2955580, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:19 pm

    Doomlord, 5,000 bonus molecoins if you can introduce the “R A B Z doctrine” to the conversation.

    It’s called “marketing”, Lizzie.
    These phones have extra new features, whether needed or not.
    It’s one of the characteristics of the capitalist system -you need to take the bad with the good.

    He mused as he typed on his Amiga 500 and wondered which of his Daguerreotypes to post using his 56k modem.

  101. struth
    #2955587, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:26 pm

    Welcome Enoch Root
    Believe it or not Australia has a majority conservative voters.

    They only have minorities to vote for because our Liberals (right wing) solod out to the left.
    We have a noisy left and a way too silent right wing who still believe it’s rude to speak about politics publicly, giving the appearance “everybody is going to vote Labour”
    By the sounds of it, you may be in a city as well, which makes it worse.
    But It’s great to have you here, but I think you have jumped ship straight onto the Titanic.

  103. Bruce of Newcastle
    #2955590, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:30 pm

    Enoch – Welcome to the Cat OT! We had a Labor government here for 7 years until 2013. It was a mess. And the Left has gotten leftier since then. Unfortunately the Liberal Party has roughly moved into the messy hole the Labor Party of the Rudd-Gillard years has vacated, so we have a choice of lefty vs more lefty vs the loopy Greens.

    I will be spoiling my House of Reps ballot paper rather than allow my vote to flow to the major parties via preferences, and in the Senate I’ll vote only for twelve real right wing candidates below the line so no preference can flow to the purple parties there either.

  104. Fat Tony
    #2955591, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:30 pm

    Sinclair Davidson
    #2955548, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:02 pm
    I’ll be appearing on Sky tonight at 8 – talking about privatising the ABC.

    Now I’d be impressed if you were on the ABC tonight – talking about privatising the ABC. 🙂

  105. struth
    #2955592, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:30 pm

    Hi Sinclair I’ll be watching.
    Good Luck.

    At the very least, ABC watchers could have a locked station until they unlock it with a fee payment.

    One billion dollars for Hospitals etc, I’m sue you’ve got all the arguments down Pat.
    Give them Hell, really get stuck in.
    No Mr Nice Guy, it’s way past that.

  106. Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
    #2955594, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:37 pm

    Whatever my phone’s alphabetical provenance, Numbers, it is the second-latest Samsung.
    A nine plus of some sort. Cost around nine hundred bucks too, maybe a year or more ago.
    Hairy encouraged me to get it, in order to counter my techno-phobias.
    He says I work by folklore on my computer and with all electronic items.

    We’re putting in a new kitchen now, and I refused to have a top model electronic oven as we’d had before. I’d never cook again. (Perhaps no bad thing, some might think.) I’ve chosen the legacy Smeg pyrolytic oven and their induction cooktop, both with proper turnable switches and a microwave the same. I noticed that even their severely high end electronic oven now offers drop down menus on a readable panel. I had this same high end model in a previous place about six years ago, and it was awful. A running strip of icons that you just couldn’t keep track of. So obviously they have been listening to feedback (you there Numbers?).

    Point of illustration about opaque settings: we stayed in a very smart Airbnb in Stavanger in Norway and the ‘designer’ Norwegian cooktop there absolutely defeated us both. It was all ‘lightly tap the glass top’ driven and you couldn’t even work out what hotplate it referred to. The little bit of Norwegian on the side didn’t help either. We got take-out each of the two nights we were there. Just about managed the washing machine, which was the point of getting an apartment in the first place.

  107. Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
    #2955595, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:42 pm

    I imagine too it would be possible to ‘lightly tap’ that glass cooktop accidentally as you waved a hand around during a conversation, and bingo! the beans are soup (more than usual) and the spuds are raw.

  108. Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
    #2955598, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:46 pm

    I’ll be appearing on Sky tonight at 8 – talking about privatising the ABC.

    We’ll record it. We’re out, doing good political duties.

  109. Enoch Root
    #2955610, posted on March 11, 2019 at 1:08 pm

    @ struth, posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:26 pm

    Welcome Enoch Root
    Believe it or not Australia has a majority conservative voters.

    So, there is hope! Back home they just begun fixing those 16 years of Labour rule now… It’s the same, the people is conservative, but were tricked to vote for Labour. Hopefully the majority start realizing they’re being tricked here as well.

    By the sounds of it, you may be in a city as well, which makes it worse.
    But It’s great to have you here, but I think you have jumped ship straight onto the Titanic.

    I sure hope there’s still time to steer this Titanic away from the iceberg 😉

    Bruce of Newcastle posted on March 11, 2019 at 12:30 pm

    Enoch – Welcome to the Cat OT!

    Thanks Bruce. Feel at home already,

  110. max
    #2955656, posted on March 11, 2019 at 2:03 pm

    One thing’s for sure, you’ll never, ever be invited on to the ABC to discuss that topic.

    The ABC is adamant in its refusal to countenance any scrutiny of itself.

  111. Sinclair Davidson
    #2955660, posted on March 11, 2019 at 2:08 pm

    Actually no. Chris did a lot of ABC radio talking about our book.

  112. MatrixTransform
    #2955793, posted on March 11, 2019 at 5:23 pm

    JC – #2955537, posted on March 11, 2019 at 11:46 am
    That would be close to A$250,000 in taxable income?

    about 15 years ago in Northcote Plaza Im going into Kmart with cousin and my kids around xmas.
    Thers a guy begging at the entrance suitably disheveled with a deserving story.
    As we get close he brightens up and says “oh hi Mark, what are you doing in Melb”
    Cuz: Byron is giving me the shits
    Begz: yeah me too but Im going back next week. Only came down to earn some money.
    Cuz: what are you doing begging
    Begz: This isnt begging, its work. A couple of hours here pulls a few hundred.

    hand on heart …I saw and heard this in real life.

    ps, your’e still a skimmer

  131. MatrixTransform
    #2956102, posted on March 11, 2019 at 10:52 pm

    c3RyYW5nZSBwYWxjZQ==

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