Opinion Politics (warning, may contain political views you disagree with)

[Taylor]

Was that the same person that suggested ingesting bleach ?
Craig Kelly for health minister , he could be the saviour we have been waiting for.

Do you want to read the transcript of what that person actually said or would you prefer to continue being told what happened and believing it?

 

[salim malik]

Do you want to read the transcript of what that person actually said or would you prefer to continue being told what happened and believing it?

She who is an expert on everything I just read your posts, saves me a lot of scrolling time.

 

[Halfbaked]

Do you want to read the transcript of what that person actually said or would you prefer to continue being told what happened and believing it?

This is what the person actually said.
I for one are happy with choice America made.


I suppose it's all about interpretation. Some people seem to think this comments are fine. I'm just thankful this old fool no longer has access to buttons that can kill the planet.

 

[Taylor]

This is what the person actually said.
I for one are happy with choice America made.
View attachment 1051013View attachment 1051014

I suppose it's all about interpretation. Some people seem to think this comments are fine. I'm just thankful this old fool no longer has access to buttons that can kill the planet.

You're spot on. Current president said previous president said people should drink bleach which evidently he didn't. If we can put aside the terrible standard of a public official pontificating on potential medial avenues for a minute, because I entirely agree with you on that.

It's a symptom of a serious issue of the flow of information from event to consumer, the spin of a network is applied and changes the meaning through over simplification which becomes the fact.

Unfortunately the news networks, on all sides, eventually try and reach a bit too far in the era where people are able to go and source the video themselves and forever more that person doesn't trust what their media is telling them is true.

This has real world consequences too. This is the era where 7/10 people only read the headline. They take the soundbite as the story and fall into line on what they are told to know is true.... then when it turns out to not be true they don't read the buried retraction at all. The Michael Brown shooting that kicked off riots in which people were killed was reported as him being on his knees with his hands up saying don't shoot. This wasn't the fact, but they stirred up the emotion already - the evidence of people saying that happened turned out to be unusable as they were blocks away when the event happened.

They lost a lot of money selectively reporting on a child standing still and smiling.

One of the only good things to come from the last four years has been that more people are aware of just how manipulated they are. If you want a current example, look at how the US media is reporting the Gamestop story and how the hedge funds are actually heroes, the people on the internet are likened to economic terrorists as the money flowed the wrong direction.

 

[Bicco]

And this is why the Liberal party aren't even making ground. They (pollies, lib media, staunch supporters) are so busy trying to find and highlight anything that McGowan says or does that they can try and spin negatively and are so consumed by it that they are not presenting an alternative (possibly better) government. Salim is clearly biased but he's not wrong - who is Zak? It is appalling that someone with little to no experience is leading their party and has spent a fair bit of time putting out spot fires in his own party. How did it become this bad?

They aren't getting cut through at all. The AMA President who desperately wants to be a hero for the Liberal party, gets egg on his face almost every time he opens his mouth. I can only assume he is in an echo chamber because the public really don't seem to like him but he continues with the same media strategy on a month by month basis. Meanwhile he changes his story every five seconds thinking nobody will notice and has pretty much been wrong about every single thing he has said relating to Covid. Guys like him are not helping the cause, nor are others fixated with McGowan. Provide a viable alternative ffs!

If you are a member of the WA Liberal party (I used to be) I implore you to stand up and say enough is enough and demand some change. Having to nominate Covid and climate change conspiracy theorists recently is an appalling indicator of the position the party finds itself. And seemingly with less than a handful of women in the Young Liberals it is pretty clear things aren't going to change soon without a massive overhaul.

McGowan is far from perfect but he doesn't need to be. The opposition is an embarrassment.

What I'm finding interesting about political parties is how they're changing and drifting from their traditional base support. I've mentioned earlier in this thread about the Labor and Democrat parties doing this, but now we see the Liberal (our conservative) party being infiltrated by conspiracy theorists. A conservative party, by its own definition, should be conservative i.e. minimal change. Definitely not containing conspiracy theorists such as Jewish space lasers lighting fires (Republican party) or members of parliament questioning government health policy (Federal Liberal party). It does seem that slowly the 2 party systems are not working to reflect even the general beliefs of the electorate. I wonder if Australia will develop both a Nationalist party and a Social Democratic party to reflect this.

 

[Taylor]

I wonder if Australia will develop both a Nationalist party and a Social Democratic party to reflect this.

That's an interesting point. The marriage of convenience between the greens and the ALP isn't good for long term worker positions and the unions know it. So where do they side? I don't think it serves anyone's interest if the public perception of party support for business AND workers is the same party.

 

[holybishop]

Another day, another donut. Looking forward to easing of restrictions this weekend.

 

[Clems Knee]

It's difficult when people interchange variant with spike protein, but the definitions I'm using are from a leading infectious disease specialist in the UK and make it easier to understand, especially when comparing to vaccines.

The data using deaths, show the original spike was back last winter and while you can expect a smaller second spike, which they had, a third from the same strain is almost impossible and that is why the analysis of excess deaths since late December, looked at other reasons for the increase in deaths. This evidence supports deaths from the original strain was mostly neutralised.

Also there is much research that shows herd immunity doesn't just rely on SARS CoV 1 virus, but is developed from cross immunity with four other almost identical corona cold viruses, SARS CoV 1 and MERS, with numbers 60% or more cross immunity quoted.

There is no evidence that the so called new UK strain is more infectious, whether on surfaces or not. The geographic analysis of new cases and deaths in the UK, acknowledges there are many questions to answer, but it's possible lockdowns are one of the reason for increased number of positive cases.

While there was only one Perth case in the community is an excellent observational study that shows none of the three people he lived with, or the 150 close contacts or 30,000 in areas he's been were positive. If the numbers that someone quoted here were even half correct, you could expect one of two of his housemates to be infected and 50 close contacts.

We're dealing with a nasty cold and WHO, thousands of the world top researchers, specialists and scientists are saying lockdowns are not the solution or a way forward in dealing with SARS CoV 2 virus. Lockdowns hurt many more physically and economically that they save, especially in Australia.

While I totally supported McGowan's actions up until now, he has now overreacted three times in closing boarders for nothing and this hard lockdown from his own incompetence in hotel quarantine procedures (and I note he says nothing will change until after he gets the results of an Inquiry, can't take any other states experiences in a/c) with made up rules not based on any medical evidence, when he could have just used his contact tracing apparatus set in place. He showed no thought for destroying businesses, when other options were available and it's nothing but an election ploy, but he's lost my vote.

I can't believe your arrogance and ignorance that you feel you can insult one of Australia's leading Emeritus Professors, immunologist, vaccine specialist and COVID expert, when you obviously hadn't read his comprehensive evaluation and recommendations. I have no idea about his political leanings, but to suggest that he only came to these conclusions for some sort of political point scoring is unbelievable.

I'm not sure where your getting the claim about huge amount of money trying to prove the effectiveness of HCQ, because that's so blatantly incorrect, I'm asking is it opposite day?

It makes no sense for you (or the leading UK infectious disease specialist) to limit the use of the term strain with spike protein, as strains and variants are terms used across virology and the S-protein is limited to the Co-Vid viruses. So no, it doesn't make it easier to understand.

Much of what you have wrote is gobbledegook. Your thoughts on the death data and herd immunity make no sense: How does MERS and CoVid-1 help achieve herd immunity, when neither viruses (fortunately) infected the population in great numbers? The corona cold viruses are hardly "almost identical" to the CoVid-2 virus. Where did you get that idea? You think we are dealing with a nasty cold? Reality and you are clearly not friends.

The UK variant is well documented as being 70% more infectious. Reasons for the virus being more infectious include: evading the immune response, binds to cells better so a smaller dose is needed to get infected, people who are infected produce more virus, or surviving better in the environment. It seems that people are producing more virus.

You claim that lockdowns hurt more than they help. It may be true that in Europe or the USA where the virus is widespread it won't help, but in WA or elsewhere in Australia, it stops the virus becoming widespread and enables contact tracers a chance to be effective. Elsewhere in the world contact tracing has been completely overwhelmed.

I don't know about Prof Clancy, I was asking the question. He is apparently the main source being quoted by MP Craig Kelly, who is a noted purveyor of wild conspiracy theories. Anybody still spruiking hydrochloroquine is ignoring the overwhelming evidence that it is a waste of resources and can actually be harmful. About the time Clive Palmer bought a huge supply of HCQ and Trump started pushing the drug, a large number of scientists started doing randomised trials on its effectiveness. More so than any other drug, and there was no shortage of funding available for this. The results have been in for months. Look it up yourself. Just don't look up Craig Kelly on facebook, which seems to be your main source, since Twitter banned Trump.
Here's a good start for you, a review of some 142 trials: https://www.cebm.net/covid-19/hydroxychloroquine-for-covid-19-what-do-the-clinical-trials-tell-us/

 

[Nothing]

It makes no sense for you (or the leading UK infectious disease specialist) to limit the use of the term strain with spike protein, as strains and variants are terms used across virology and the S-protein is limited to the Co-Vid viruses. So no, it doesn't make it easier to understand.

Much of what you have wrote is gobbledegook. Your thoughts on the death data and herd immunity make no sense: How does MERS and CoVid-1 help achieve herd immunity, when neither viruses (fortunately) infected the population in great numbers? The corona cold viruses are hardly "almost identical" to the CoVid-2 virus. Where did you get that idea? You think we are dealing with a nasty cold? Reality and you are clearly not friends.

The UK variant is well documented as being 70% more infectious. Reasons for the virus being more infectious include: evading the immune response, binds to cells better so a smaller dose is needed to get infected, people who are infected produce more virus, or surviving better in the environment. It seems that people are producing more virus.

You claim that lockdowns hurt more than they help. It may be true that in Europe or the USA where the virus is widespread it won't help, but in WA or elsewhere in Australia, it stops the virus becoming widespread and enables contact tracers a chance to be effective. Elsewhere in the world contact tracing has been completely overwhelmed.

I don't know about Prof Clancy, I was asking the question. He is apparently the main source being quoted by MP Craig Kelly, who is a noted purveyor of wild conspiracy theories. Anybody still spruiking hydrochloroquine is ignoring the overwhelming evidence that it is a waste of resources and can actually be harmful. About the time Clive Palmer bought a huge supply of HCQ and Trump started pushing the drug, a large number of scientists started doing randomised trials on its effectiveness. More so than any other drug, and there was no shortage of funding available for this. The results have been in for months. Look it up yourself. Just don't look up Craig Kelly on facebook, which seems to be your main source, since Twitter banned Trump.
Here's a good start for you, a review of some 142 trials: https://www.cebm.net/covid-19/hydroxychloroquine-for-covid-19-what-do-the-clinical-trials-tell-us/

BlueE is so far down the CT rabbit hole his only sources are those that confirm his pre-existing biases. I'm surprised he hasn't quoted Pete Evans.

 

[salim malik]

You're spot on. Current president said previous president said people should drink bleach which evidently he didn't. If we can put aside the terrible standard of a public official pontificating on potential medial avenues for a minute, because I entirely agree with you on that.

It's a symptom of a serious issue of the flow of information from event to consumer, the spin of a network is applied and changes the meaning through over simplification which becomes the fact.

Unfortunately the news networks, on all sides, eventually try and reach a bit too far in the era where people are able to go and source the video themselves and forever more that person doesn't trust what their media is telling them is true.

This has real world consequences too. This is the era where 7/10 people only read the headline. They take the soundbite as the story and fall into line on what they are told to know is true.... then when it turns out to not be true they don't read the buried retraction at all. The Michael Brown shooting that kicked off riots in which people were killed was reported as him being on his knees with his hands up saying don't shoot. This wasn't the fact, but they stirred up the emotion already - the evidence of people saying that happened turned out to be unusable as they were blocks away when the event happened.

They lost a lot of money selectively reporting on a child standing still and smiling.

One of the only good things to come from the last four years has been that more people are aware of just how manipulated they are. If you want a current example, look at how the US media is reporting the Gamestop story and how the hedge funds are actually heroes, the people on the internet are likened to economic terrorists as the money flowed the wrong direction.

Scrolling through the gobbledygook are you saying Trump didn't make the drinking bleach comment?
Is q anon where you find your news.?

 

[Square Peg]

Another day, another donut. Looking forward to easing of restrictions this weekend.

Does Jacob Kagi really have Kent Brockman as his avatar or has that been Photoshopped?

 

[Square Peg]

What I'm finding interesting about political parties is how they're changing and drifting from their traditional base support. I've mentioned earlier in this thread about the Labor and Democrat parties doing this, but now we see the Liberal (our conservative) party being infiltrated by conspiracy theorists. A conservative party, by its own definition, should be conservative i.e. minimal change. Definitely not containing conspiracy theorists such as Jewish space lasers lighting fires (Republican party) or members of parliament questioning government health policy (Federal Liberal party). It does seem that slowly the 2 party systems are not working to reflect even the general beliefs of the electorate. I wonder if Australia will develop both a Nationalist party and a Social Democratic party to reflect this.

Part of the problem may be that membership of both main parties is so low, it becomes easier for nuts and extremists to branch stack and get preselected

 

[Taylor]

Scrolling through the gobbledygook are you saying Trump didn't make the drinking bleach comment?
Is q anon where you find your news.?

That's exactly what I'm saying. You can read it yourself. He never says to drink bleach. That was spun out of what he actually said to feed it to those watching to make it easier for them to, if you excuse the pun, ingest the preferred opinion. So much so that a democratic donor with previous court history of assaulting her partner claims they drank the pool cleaner because Trump said to and he died, she was held up as an example of how dangerous the president was and disappeared from screens as soon as the backstory of her came to light. They feed you lies, use you and most people thank them for it.

If someone here has been swept off in a conspiracy to serve a political end, it's you.

And it's ok, because now you know not to believe everything you see and hear so the world is a better place already.

 

[poshman]

Scrolling through the gobbledygook are you saying Trump didn't make the drinking bleach comment?
Is q anon where you find your news.?

I don't understand the need to be so personally attacking. I read through the transcript above and unless I missed it I didn't read where he said people should drink bleach. I may have missed it. Did you read it and I missed it?

If someone disagrees with you are they automatically stupid or a conspiracy theorist or something sinister?

 

[salim malik]

That's exactly what I'm saying. You can read it yourself. He never says to drink bleach. That was spun out of what he actually said to feed it to those watching to make it easier for them to, if you excuse the pun, ingest the preferred opinion.

If someone here has been swept off in a conspiracy to serve a political end, it's you.

And it's ok, because now you know not to believe everything you see and hear so the world is a better place already.

Yeh he did , I saw the clip where he asked his health advisor if there was some way to inject or introduce it into the lungs.
You didn't answer the Q anon question.

 

[salim malik]

I don't understand the need to be so personally attacking. I read through the transcript above and unless I missed it I didn't read where he said people should drink bleach. I may have missed it. Did you read it and I missed it?

If someone disagrees with you are they automatically stupid or a conspiracy theorist or something sinister?

He said inject or introduce, Trump is on record as saying that.
Hard to dispute the evidence.

 

[Bring back Drum]

I think it’s fair to say that Trump was basically saying can we inject disinfectant into the body?
Bleach wasn’t mentioned, but is of course a disinfectant.
Spin it as much as you like, but he was talking out of his arse with no support from anywhere, in particular the expert present who was dumbfounded.

 

[Taylor]

Yeh he did , I saw the clip where he asked his health advisor if there was some way to inject or introduce it into the lungs.
You didn't answer the Q anon question.

So now you're spinning it into drink bleach? Find me the part of the video where he says drink bleach. I have found a video the president saying drink bleach, but it's Biden in a fact-checked false claim about Trump saying it.

What do you think Qanon is? From what I understand it's not a news service at all.

Personally, I try and watch as many sources as I can - then I'll look for the video of something myself and see how each report spun it into line with their predetermined narratives.

I've seen it in WA too where I've been in public where a newsworthy event has taken place, violence and police action - the reporters managed to turn the story from one of stupid thugs into a mob attack on an innocent, which it wasn't, but it makes for a better story.

They all do it because it's not important for them to tell you the truth, it's important for them to get you to watch.

You got sucked in, that's ok. You're awake to the rubbish now and you can move on.

 

[Taylor]

Go listen to the 2004 album by Green Day for three minutes. It has not gotten better. People are still being led around by the media.

 

[poshman]

He said inject or introduce, Trump is on record as saying that.
Hard to dispute the evidence.

Right - so did he say 'Drink bleach' - which is what you are being called out on. Taylor has said that he was poor in his ramble but challenged you on that one point.

While he said inject or introduce did he say 'Drink Bleach?'

Now as you are demanding taylor answer a ridiculous question I will ask again 'If someone disagrees with you are they automatically stupid, or a conspiracy theorist or something sinister?

I have asked other questions on this thread that need to be answered long and short term in relation to locking down and the other effects on the community locking down causes.

Are you in favour of a lockdown each and every time there is one case in the community? Over what period of time would you be happy for that to occur - for example, if in 2023 there is one case would you still want us to lockdown?

I don't have strong opinions on this - in my opinion, the WHO has ruined its authority and reputation. We know that politicians will not always automatically do what is best for the people (on all sides) but weigh political factors into decisions. We also know the media is sadly now barely trustworthy as the model they use to make money in the internet age has and does plague the industry. I do have lots of questions - questions that not many are asking and that will not be answered well if when there is a disagreement the conversation doesn't move forward in good faith but instead resorts to name-calling or accusations.

WHO have now said that ongoing lockdowns are not a sustainable answer to the ongoing problem. Now as the have also proven to be politically motivated are trustworthy? Do we throw away all they have done or question everything? I tend to sway towards questioning and investigation. I do think they need an overhaul and leadership needs to change. Having said that, I also think if functioning well they are a valuable international resource.

To pick up from my last longer post - The client we are trying to get a machine in for from overseas in a last-ditch attempt to save her voice has deteriorated further this past week. In her instance as a 59 year old widow, she will more than likely lose the use of her voice and become more socially isolated than she was previously. While I am working on the machine side, there are now plans being put in place around ongoing support, interventions etc to help her in what will more than likely be an outcome of loss of voice. This would have more than likely been avoidable (nothing is certain in health care) if the lockdowns from early last year weren't in place. I am not saying we shouldn't have locked down, I am saying that locking down does have other severe consequences.

As mentioned previously management at scale is incredibly difficult. This is one case being measured against the health and well being of the broader society... Is there a way to tranche treatment and restrictions to protect the vulnerable?

There are other costs (not even starting on broader economic issues) to society for each lockdown. While it is popular and easy to take an extreme position, they are very rarely useful unless applied to the WCE Scum up the road... ( I kid... mostly!)

I think that the current media situation and Trump made this thing far more politicised than it should have been. It would be nice if we took the partisan stuff out of the conversation.

 

[Taylor]

I wouldn't be too worried about the click bait pushing potential wedge issues you're shown on online media affecting parties and elections here. Most Australians are well and truly close to the middle left or right. Labor was reminded last election that for most of us it's our hip pocket that influences our vote and everything else is secondary, regardless of how much we talk about it.

I think this is the strength of our system, since everyone has to vote and most people are sitting with one cheek over each side of the left/right fence (if not leaning on it from the left side) the extreme positions don't get a whole lot of traction and most of the political messaging is appealing to the middle.

Which is why so much attention is thrown to families, education, healthcare etc.

 

[wayToGo_]

So now you're spinning it into drink bleach? Find me the part of the video where he says drink bleach. I have found a video the president saying drink bleach, but it's Biden in a fact-checked false claim about Trump saying it.

What do you think Qanon is? From what I understand it's not a news service at all.

Personally, I try and watch as many sources as I can - then I'll look for the video of something myself and see how each report spun it into line with their predetermined narratives.

I've seen it in WA too where I've been in public where a newsworthy event has taken place, violence and police action - the reporters managed to turn the story from one of stupid thugs into a mob attack on an innocent, which it wasn't, but it makes for a better story.

They all do it because it's not important for them to tell you the truth, it's important for them to get you to watch.

You got sucked in, that's ok. You're awake to the rubbish now and you can move on.

This is a hard one. On the one hand I agree what he said was simplified by the media and ran like wild fire as 'drinking bleach/Clorox' but on the other hand what he did say was still incredibly dangerous and it needed to be countered in a way that (spread and) immediately discouraged anyone and everyone from thinking that something like drinking/injecting a 'disinfectant' might help protect them from a pandemic.

If T***p wasn't a pathological liar himself then I think you could justifiably defend how some things he said were portrayed in the media. But when he uses those same over simplification/twisting words to spread his lies (you blame the media for doing) is it really that wrong for the non-RW media to fight fire with fire?

I want the media to be better but even more so I never want to see an abhorrent human like T***p to be put in such a position of power and be able to abuse that power continuously. The RW media (eg Fox News/Newsmax/OAN) enabled T***p and what happened in the US. It's one thing to twist words, I think it is a whole other world where 'news' services willingly spread lies that they know are lies.

 

[Bring back Drum]

Am I being too optimistic in hoping that McGowan can give us best & worst case scenario shortly on what we can expect on the tomorrow’s results?
Surely we can be told ASAP what restrictions there are going to be from 6am tomorrow if there a no further cases from testing announced tomorrow. Even if lockdown is lifted as expected.
Along with what to expect if there are more cases detected?
Realistically these are the 2 outcomes & even if it is a cautious approach, just tell us.

 

[Taylor]

This is a hard one. On the one hand I agree what he said was simplified by the media and ran like wild fire as 'drinking bleach/Clorox' but on the other hand what he did say was still incredibly dangerous and it needed to be countered in a way that (spread and) immediately discouraged anyone and everyone from thinking that something like drinking/injecting a 'disinfectant' might help protect them from a pandemic.

If T***p wasn't a pathological liar himself then I think you could justifiably defend how some things he said were portrayed in the media. But when he uses those same over simplification/twisting words to spread his lies (you blame the media for doing) is it really that wrong for the non-RW media to fight fire with fire?

I want the media to be better but even more so I never want to see an abhorrent human like T***p to be put in such a position of power and be able to abuse that power continuously. The RW media (eg Fox News/Newsmax/OAN) enabled T***p and what happened in the US. It's one thing to twist words, I think it is a whole other world where 'news' services willingly spread lies that they know are lies.

I think we can all agree that Trump was a very poor example of a politician and a very poor example of a person to be in a position of such influence.

I think Trump was a reaction to the media as a whole, I don't think he is the cause at all. He is a symptom of a divide in their nation where most people don't think their news is telling them the truth. Wrapped up with millionaires in hollywood preaching to them, millionaire life long politicians claiming to represent them and then bailing out their friends - so much so that Clinton said you need a private policy and a public policy on issues - good for her for saying the quiet part out loud.

I think it's absolutely wrong for people to spin things at all and claim they are a trusted source for news. I'm ok with them presenting themselves as tabloid editorials though. Currently both sides present themselves as giving you the unwashed potatoes, but they have manufactured the story they want.

Remember when the assassination of a terrorist leader was given the headline of a scholar killed? It's so unhealthy for their system where they can't give a single win to their political opponent.

 

[Scham]

Am I being too optimistic in hoping that McGowan can give us best & worst case scenario shortly on what we can expect on the tomorrow’s results?
Surely we can be told ASAP what restrictions there are going to be from 6am tomorrow if there a no further cases from testing announced tomorrow. Even if lockdown is lifted as expected.
Along with what to expect if there are more cases detected?
Realistically these are the 2 outcomes & even if it is a cautious approach, just tell us.

That would reduce his amount of TV appearances - not going to happen.