The Wonderful World of Oz

http://www.macrobusiness.com.au/2016/10/bloomberg-warns-rise-aussie-oligarchs/

Bloomberg warns of the rise Aussie “oligarchs”
By Houses and Holes in Australian Economy

at 11:29 am on October 25, 2016 | 13 comments

From Bloomie:

There’s a well-known order of business for foreigners trying to invest in emerging markets. Before you do anything else, hand a slice of your consortium to a local oligarch who can open doors in government and help soothe nationalist sentiments.

Australia wouldn’t normally be included in that basket. The country tends to score highly on the World Bank’s ease of doing business index, and has been one of the world’s top 10 recipients of foreign direct investment over the past five years. But recent foreign-investment decisions are giving the country an increasingly frontier feel.

A group of outback cattle barons at the weekend bid A$386 million ($294 million) for S. Kidman & Co., a vast ranching business whose land holdings cover an area larger than South Korea.

…Treasurer Scott Morrison blocked the sale of that site to foreign buyers last November, but that wasn’t enough to deter the Chinese-owned Dakang Australia consortium, which bid A$370 million-odd for the remainder in combination with a 20 percent Australian partner in April.

That offer was in turn blocked by Morrison just nine days after being lodged. Without a national security justification to fall back on, he instead cited “the size and significance of the Kidman portfolio” — as plain a demonstration as you could get that the decision had been made purely on political grounds.

Another group of Australian oligarchs collected Ausgrid at a $5 billion discount to the Chinese offer. I could go on.

The Bloomberg article is overly simple in that it defines the rejection of all foreign investment as bad. Australia has a good case to protect itself from overly aggressive Chinese influence, as well as solid arguments against it on the basis of economic benefit where no value is being added to the purchase.

But the oligarchy charge still stands when you have arbitrary foreign investment rules and folks like Barnaby Joyce courting local billionaires as he and they pick choose which foreign purchases to resits and compete with (not necessarily in concert).

We desperately need a new set of rules for the treatment of Chinese investment.
 
That is one very confused article. There is no arbitrary kneejerk rules on foreign investment. (there are kneejerk opinions but thats different) There is a Foreign Investment Review Board (FIRB) - always has been.
 
Ziggy Mosslmani told to mull over mullet defamation bid in Sydney court
By Brooke BoneyUpdated 30 minutes ago

PHOTO: The photo of Ziggy Mosslmani has been viewed more than 1.7 million times online. (Facebook: Jeremy Nool)
RELATED STORY: 3 expert tips for making a viral video
MAP: Sydney 2000
A Sydney man who claimed he was publicly ridiculed because of his mullet has suffered a setback in his defamation case against media organisations.

Ziggy Mosslmani was photographed at an 18th birthday party in Sydney in July last year by a professional photographer who then uploaded the photo to Facebook.

Within days the post went viral, spurring satirical memes and media stories about his haircut.

Mr Mosslmani claims he was ridiculed for his mullet after members of the public created photoshopped images of him and news organisations published the photos with headlines he claimed made him out to be ridiculous, ugly and a joke.

One article suggested his mullet hairdo belonged in the "Hairy Hall of Shame'.

The original photo has been shared hundreds of times on Facebook and there are nearly 2,000 comments on the picture, while stories about the photo have been viewed more than 1.7 million times.

The three media organisations, The Daily Mail, The Daily Telegraph and the Australian Radio Network, argued in court "that the plaintiff, by reason of permitting himself to be photographed with a mullet hairstyle, has justifiably exposed himself to ridicule by the public".

District Court judge Judith Gibson struck out the teenager's imputations of ridicule and asked him to file an amended statement of claim.

In handing down his decision, Judge Gibson said most of the comments were humorous in nature.

"The plaintiff's striking mullet haircut has generated a great deal of interest on the internet, most of it humorous, and some of it in the form of clever observations, such as the 'Pythagoras' direction in one of the memes," he said.

The photographer, Jeremy Nool, said he had no idea the photo would make such an impact.

"It was one of the photos where everyone's dancing. I thought this is a good angle and the lighting was good," he said.

"When I put it up I didn't expect anything to happen, but it blew up and went viral."
 
Well, it's not exactly the royal enclosure at Ascot:

Melbourne Cup.jpg
 

Australian of the fucking year right there. No less deserving than the people who seem to get these awards now for being noisy victims - at least this bloke did something. He'd swap it for a carton in about 5 seconds anyway - which is the way it should be.
 
That fuckwit is lucky the roo didn't rip his guts open with its hind legs.
 
A four-metre python swallowed a wallaby at Paradise Palms golf course in north Queensland. The 30-minute struggle took place in the middle of the fairway on the 17th hole. Declan McCollam, general manager of Paradise Palms, told AAP the python was harmless to humans. “The wildlife on Paradise Palms has always been an attraction for golfers, and it is clear that is well and thriving.”
snake eating walllaby.jpg
 
The "democracy sausage" is a colloquial name given to the Australian tradition of holding a fundraising sausage sizzle at polling places on election day.

The democracy sausage has become so well recognised and expected in Australian culture, that in the 24 hours leading up to the 2 July, 2016, federal election Twitter changed its emoji for #ausvotes from a ballot box to a sausage lying on a slice of white bread topped with sauce.[1] In December 2016, the Australian National Dictionary Centre selected "democracy sausage" as its Australian Word of the Year for 2016.[2]

Australians always vote on a Saturday, and voting is compulsory, so there is always a big voter turnout.[1] Many of the polling places are located at schools, community halls and churches,[3] so the groups whose facilities are used for polling booths often take advantage of the large amount of people coming to their location, and set up stalls to raise funds for their groups.[4] For many community groups this is the biggest fundraising event of the year.[1]

Sausages on bread are not the only items sold at the election day stalls, voters can also purchase cakes, drinks and other food items such as vegetarian and gluten free options.[3][5][6][7] Various websites and social media accounts have been set up to help the public locate which polling booths have stalls and what will be available at them, so that they can choose a polling location according to their food choices.[4][8] In the 2 July 2016 federal election, one such site recorded 2301 polling booths as having sausages and/or cakes available,[9] and another recorded 2094,[10] each of which is over one-third of the total number.[3][4]

Some cake stalls sell themed sweets which are named as a play on politicians' names such as; Alba-Cheesy Cakes, Malcolm Turnovers, Plebislice, Jacqui Lambingtons, Tanya Plibiscuits, Malcolm Turnballs, and Richard Di Nutella Fudge.[11]

In 1989, Peter Dowding, then Premier of Western Australia, was forced to deny accusations the Labor Party was bribing voters with free sausages and drinks before the state election that year. Police investigated whether a 'free family sausage sizzle' held a week before the election breached the Electoral Act. The saga continued when Mr Dowding accused state Liberal Party leader, Barry MacKinnon, of being photographed during the campaign wearing a barbeque hat and apron 'being involved in the dissemination of sausages'.[12][13]
 
Democracy sausage snags Word of the Year as smashed avo, shoey lose out By Alkira Reinfrank




  • Deplorables: The term is used to refer to people considered to be extremely conservative or reactionary, especially those who reject mainstream politics.
  • Ausexit: Following the Brexit referendum in the UK, a republican push for Australia to leave the monarchy was reignited.
Research into the Australian language is undertaken by the National Dictionary Centre and the University of Oxford.
 
Dumb and dumber arsonists burn pizza shop and themselves

Pizza shop owner Derek McPadden and regular customer Habil Biyak are unlikely to qualify as criminal masterminds after they were convicted last week over a deliberately lit fire and fraudulent insurance claim in 2013.

Biyak, who was sentenced in the County Court to 22 months in prison, suffered horrific burns from the botched arson attack that caused more than $100,000 in damage to the St Albans shop and threatened a family living above the premise
1482632888359.jpg

Former pizza shop owner Derek McPadden, was convicted of arson. Photo: Angela Wylie
McPadden, who hatched the hare-brained plan to torch his own business and lodged a $717,000 insurance claim, will be sentenced next year after he was found guilty of several charges including arson, perjury and reckless conduct endangering life.

If the plan was poorly conceived, its execution was even worse. In the early hours of August 11, 2013, Biyak entered the pizza shop armed with a jerry-can, while McPadden parked his car in a nearby street.
As the premises were doused with petrol, the 48-year-old tripped and soaked his jeans in the accelerant.

When a flame was lit, Biyak went up like a Roman candle.

Engulfed in flames, Biyak rushed for the exit, but found the door had been accidentally locked. He escaped by smashing a window, but received significant burns to more than 30 per cent of his body.
1482632888359.jpg

Former pizza shop customer and convicted arsonist Habil Biyak shows his scars at Melbourne Magistrates Court in 2014. Photo: Angela Wylie
McPadden was waiting in his car, and according to Biyak, who testified against his accomplice, asked him: "Is it done?"

Severely burnt and near-naked, Biyak probably did not need to respond.

Biyak was later dropped at the Broadmeadows home of a female acquaintance and given a wad of cash by McPadden.

Biyak told the woman that his shocking burns had been sustained from siphoning fuel from a motorcycle.

The woman testified against both men and said she witnessed Biyak re-enacting the arson scene in front of her sons. He also told the boys that the blaze was an "insurance job".

After spending a day-and-a-half on the woman's couch in excruciating pain, Biyak was taken to The Alfred hospital by ambulance, where he remained for almost three months before undergoing further rehabilitation at a hospital in Caulfield.

As Biyak convalesced, McPadden scrambled to cover his tracks. He replaced the front seat of his car at a wrecker's yard in Deer Park.

Unfortunately for McPadden, he confided in an undercover police officer and confirmed the seat had been swapped to remove all traces of Biyak's burnt skin.

The police officer had been introduced to McPadden by his former mate Biyak, who received a discounted sentence for assisting the police investigation.

While awaiting trial, McPadden relocated to Colac, where he opened another pizza shop.

He will spend Christmas behind bars and will be sentenced on February 6 next year.
 
Dumb and dumber arsonists burn pizza shop and themselves

Pizza shop owner Derek McPadden and regular customer Habil Biyak are unlikely to qualify as criminal masterminds after they were convicted last week over a deliberately lit fire and fraudulent insurance claim in 2013.

Biyak, who was sentenced in the County Court to 22 months in prison, suffered horrific burns from the botched arson attack that caused more than $100,000 in damage to the St Albans shop and threatened a family living above the premise
1482632888359.jpg

Former pizza shop owner Derek McPadden, was convicted of arson. Photo: Angela Wylie
McPadden, who hatched the hare-brained plan to torch his own business and lodged a $717,000 insurance claim, will be sentenced next year after he was found guilty of several charges including arson, perjury and reckless conduct endangering life.

If the plan was poorly conceived, its execution was even worse. In the early hours of August 11, 2013, Biyak entered the pizza shop armed with a jerry-can, while McPadden parked his car in a nearby street.
As the premises were doused with petrol, the 48-year-old tripped and soaked his jeans in the accelerant.

When a flame was lit, Biyak went up like a Roman candle.

Engulfed in flames, Biyak rushed for the exit, but found the door had been accidentally locked. He escaped by smashing a window, but received significant burns to more than 30 per cent of his body.
1482632888359.jpg

Former pizza shop customer and convicted arsonist Habil Biyak shows his scars at Melbourne Magistrates Court in 2014. Photo: Angela Wylie
McPadden was waiting in his car, and according to Biyak, who testified against his accomplice, asked him: "Is it done?"

Severely burnt and near-naked, Biyak probably did not need to respond.

Biyak was later dropped at the Broadmeadows home of a female acquaintance and given a wad of cash by McPadden.

Biyak told the woman that his shocking burns had been sustained from siphoning fuel from a motorcycle.

The woman testified against both men and said she witnessed Biyak re-enacting the arson scene in front of her sons. He also told the boys that the blaze was an "insurance job".

After spending a day-and-a-half on the woman's couch in excruciating pain, Biyak was taken to The Alfred hospital by ambulance, where he remained for almost three months before undergoing further rehabilitation at a hospital in Caulfield.

As Biyak convalesced, McPadden scrambled to cover his tracks. He replaced the front seat of his car at a wrecker's yard in Deer Park.

Unfortunately for McPadden, he confided in an undercover police officer and confirmed the seat had been swapped to remove all traces of Biyak's burnt skin.

The police officer had been introduced to McPadden by his former mate Biyak, who received a discounted sentence for assisting the police investigation.

While awaiting trial, McPadden relocated to Colac, where he opened another pizza shop.

He will spend Christmas behind bars and will be sentenced on February 6 next year.

 
Obviously not historically accurate but at least it represents a better present than the realities of past genocides and all that.
 
Welcome to Australia, a land of creatures out to kill you… maybe
January 26, 2017 6.55am AEDT

Welcome to Australia, a place that is the focus of regular reports that nearly every creature is ready and waiting to pounce. If it rains, it brings warnings of venomous snakes. If the weather is dry, then giant spiders can set up house in your power box.

But as Australia prepares once again to welcome many new citizens this Australia Day, it seems appropriate to take a closer look at how deadly our creatures really are.

There is no doubt Australia harbours venomous animals and encounters that can be traumatic and need a rapid emergency response.

We must we careful not to understate the impact of any encounters with venomous animals on families and the sufferers themselves. Nor must we play down the highly specialised management, effective treatment and medical care required.

But is this reputation of a land of deadly and aggressive creatures well founded?

Detail in the data
My colleagues and I recently published a review of hospital admissions and deaths caused by venomous animals in the Internal Medical Journal.

We sourced data from 2001-2013 from national hospital admissions and national coronial information, which showed more than 42,000 hospitalisations from venomous sting or bites. Most – not all – are shown in the graph, below.

Over the 12 years that’s an average 3,500 people admitted to hospital every year for a venom-related injury. This can be loosely averaged 0.01% of the Australian population per year, or roughly one in 10,000 Australians.

Allergy or anaphylaxis from insect stings such as bees or wasps were responsible for about one-third (33%) of hospital admissions, followed by spider bites (30%) and snake bites (15%).

Over the 12 years, 64 people were killed by a venomous sting or bite, with more than half of these (34) caused by an allergic reaction to an insect bite that brought on anaphylactic shock.

Of these, 27 deaths were the result of a bee or wasp sting, with only one case of a beekeeper being killed. Anaphylaxis to tick and ant bites combined caused five deaths, the box jellyfish caused three deaths and two deaths were from an unidentified insect.

Given there are 140 species of land snakes in Australia, snake bite fatalities are very rare, at 27 for the study period. To put that in perspective, the World Health Organization estimates that at least 100,000 people die from snake bite globally each year.



The red belly black snake is not as nasty as it looks. Flickr/Derek A Young, CC BY-NC
While it’s natural to be frightened of snakes, the reality is the number of deaths from snake bites in Australia is very small. In the same time frame, for example, figures from the National Coronial Information System (NCIS) show nearly 5,000 people died from drowning and 1,000 from burns in Australia.

Nevertheless, snake bites do hold the crown as the most common cause of death, with nearly twice as many deaths per hospital admission than any other venomous injury, making snakebite one of the most important issues to address.

Deadly creatures elsewhere
Understandably, living in a country with creatures that can potentially kill us is a daunting prospect. As you can see from the figures, though, they don’t kill as many people as you might think and other countries have their own potentially deadly creatures.

In the United Kingdom there are reports of deaths or injuries from bees, widow spiders, jellyfish and adder snakes.

The continent of America has a menagerie of reptilian assassins such as vipers, and its mammals also pack a punch, with reports of attacks from bears, wolves and mountain lions.

A sturdy Australian would surely quake at the thought of being faced with an offensive grizzly, with no amount of Crocodile Dundee-esk buffalo hypnotism techniques going to get us through that encounter.
Sure Australia also has sharks and crocodiles, but it’s important to note that the majority of our critters do not come after you.

Minimising the minimal risk
Our report, while giving a broad overview of envenoming trends in Australia, does raise more questions than it answers. Questions such as: who is most at risk and how can we support them? Do we need more localised guidelines? And how do we maintain knowledge for such a rare injury?





No one died from a spider bite during the 12 years of our study. Flickr/Corrie Barklimore, CC BY


This work seeks to initiate new conversations in regard to potential gaps in knowledge in both the public and health domains, and find solutions. We’re currently seeking funding to continue this research.

From an individual or national public health perspective, we can’t make informed decisions until we have a much clearer picture of what’s going on. The big question is how can we manage this coexistence with the creatures around us, without being detrimental to people and the creatures themselves.

It comes down to understanding, appreciating and respecting the amazing diversity nature has provided us. We need to learn about prevention methods and understand correct first aid.

This, together with the ongoing research and improvements in clinical care and the accessibility, affordability, effective management and treatment of bites and stings in Australia, actually make it one of the safest places in the world, and certainly not one of the deadliest.
 
Trump is going to build a Great Barrier Reef and make Australia pay for it!
 
I think this is something we need fwiffo down here for. Expert negotiator and strategist. Imagine fwiffo with a 3 wine lunch + 2 afternoon beers and a good shot of whisky in him talking to Frump. He'd do him like a dinner and we'd end up getting ownership of Manhattan Island for a few beads.
 

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