It’s often said – and probably true – that Australia has become more secular over the last couple of generations. Yet while the influence of Church Christianity may have waned – that doesn’t say much about Australians’ changing beliefs on social issues.

Scott Steel’s well-researched blog Pollytics.com carries a very informative article entitled: Our Changing Views on the Death Penalty.

Scott summaries the results of a recently-published opinion poll by Roy Morgan Research: Australians say penalty for murder should be Imprisonment (64%) rather than the Death Penalty (23%)

Changing views on the death penalty in Australia since 1947

Roy Morgan has been conducting the same poll within Australia since 1947. Scott has turned the results of polling over the last sixty years – presented in tabular form by Roy Morgan Research – into graphs that show the long term trends very clearly.

The results of more questions related to this topic – and other graphs displaying comparable trends – are available in the Pollytics.com article.

It’s a fascinating piece of research.

I have an antipathy to institutionalized murder and find these results a welcome indication that support for more humane polices continues to grow.

While our political elites have been seduced and cajoled into supporting the war mongering, liberty-restricting policies of Australia’s misguided ‘allies’, Australians as a whole are much less keen on violent solutions to complex problems.

I live in a very pleasant location on the north east coast of Queensland, an hour’s drive from Cairns. I’m fortunate. It’s a beautiful part of the world.

There’s only one place close to city-size around here (that’s Cairns), but there’s plenty of reef and rainforest, great beaches and lots of nice things to do.

Not surprisingly, plenty of visitors come every year to Cairns and the surrounding region. Tourism is big business – and while it’s going through a relatively depressed period at present Cairns is always busy.

Pacific Islands Forum

This week – starting from today (Tuesday 4th August 2009) – Cairns will be busier than usual. It’s the venue for this year’s Pacific Islands Forum. As well as politicians, their entourages, NGOs and media, there will doubtless be lots of security, police and ’secret police’. The Pacific Islands Forum is not quite the G-20, but it’s the closest Cairns is likely to get for a while.

I shall NOT be visiting Cairns during the week, unless under duress or in dire emergency. Meeting up with some of the social justice and environmental NGOs – which include Friends of the Earth, Oxfam and Greenpeace – would be interesting. I strongly support what these fine people are trying to achieve at this Forum. Good luck to them! But I’d rather not push my own luck. I think I’ll leave a respectable distance between myself and the melee in Cairns.

I’m thinking of renaming this blog ‘A Street’ before anyone else grabs the name.

Why? Because I slavishly follow trends. Right now, there’s an evident trend underway to call blogs by the name of a Street. One-letter street names are at a premium.

J-Street: having some success in shifting US policy aware from hard-core Zionism

It started with J-Street – a fine new initiative in which some liberal-minded Jewish Americans combined to provide the USA – and especially its Jewish community – with a more fair-minded and peaceful policy alternative to the one-eyed Israel-right-or-wrong approach of the USA’s mainstream Jewish/Zionist Lobby.

J-Street is well worth a visit if you haven’t seen it before.

Rather predictably, this has put the ultras of the Zionist movement out of sorts. Recently some of them launched ‘Z-Street‘. It’s at the far end of the Zionist spectrum. These are folk who probably think Ben Yahoo is a softie. They’re among the most extreme, ultra-nationalist Jewish-supremacists on the face of planet earth.

Z-Street: Zionist extremism unplugged

As a passionate proponent of free speech, I naturally support their right to expound their ludicrous bigoted views on their own blog. Why not? Any normal person will find Z-Street so absurd that it will surely help erode the Zionist project from within.

Regrettably, almost the entire mass media debate about Israel in ‘western’ countries such as Australia is located somewhere between J and Z on the alphabetic spectrum.

CairnsBlog is a courageous one-person blog that provides occasionally brilliant independent coverage of local issues in this region of Australia.

This morning it ran a strongly-worded anti-war article by Werner Schmidlin, a local peace activist, with the self-explanatory title: The futile and costly Afghan war.

The Michael Moore of Cairns isn't a Hollywood-promoted left-gatekeeper

It’s a fine article, not exactly what I’d have written myself, but thank heavens for diversity in the peace movement. Thank heavens that there is a peace movement in this country! You’d never guess it from the mainstream media.

The (latest) war against Afghan resistance fighters has now been going on for nearly twice as long as World War One. It’s a war going nowhere fast – unwinnable, futile and utterly destructive for Afghans and invaders alike.

The way forward is clearly to negotiate peace. The ‘west’ has a duty to offer reparations for an illegal invasion based on lies, followed by nearly a decade of bloody occupation. If we really want to help ‘womens rights’ in Afghanistan – or other equally noble objectives – our Governments could negotiate the terms of payments to the next Afghan Government and apply pressure that way, with carrots and not sticks.

Western troops in Afghanistan: opium production has soared since their arrival

I’ve been following the career of Mark Regev with interest for some time now.

Actually, I have little choice – unless I completely stop watching English-language TV News.

A week rarely passes when Regev’s rugged good-looks aren’t featured on my box, as he earnestly provides ever more implausible rationales for Israeli war crimes. When Israeli violence hots up, on religious holidays or prior to elections, Regev appears on my screen daily.

Mark Freiberg: did this Aboriginal activist from Victoria think a name change could mask his real identity?

It doesn’t seem that a change of government makes any difference. A year ago, Regev was spinning for Mr Olmert. Now he spins for the government led by Mr Netanyahu (known to his mates as Ben Yahoo).

Does anyone else find this a tad suspicious?

My personal theory is that Mark Regev (born Mark Freiberg) is a deep-cover Australian agent.

He may seem like an Israeli these days, but it’s just a front. This rude boy from Melbourne is deep down a fair-dinkum Aussie. He’s even joked about it on occasion – a tactic often used by spooks to deflect criticism while they continue to operate in plain sight.

Mr Freiberg has probably been tasked by his controllers with eroding the Zionist Entity from within, by coming up with such absurd excuses for the Shitty Apartheid State’s recurrent crimes against humanity that even the world’s most foolish people see through them with ease.

Today Senator Bob Brown, leader of the Australian Greens, issued a statement calling for a full Parliamentary debate over Afghanistan.

Greens call for parliamentary debate on Afghanistan

Bob Brown: wants a debate about Afghanistan

Media Release | Spokesperson Bob Brown | Tuesday 21st July 2009

Australian Greens Leader, Senator Bob Brown, has called for a parliamentary debate on Australia’s continuing involvement in the war in Afghanistan.

The Greens have consistently maintained opposition to Australia’s defence forces being deployed to Afghanistan, saying they should be retained for use within our region.

“We will always support Australia’s defence force personnel in Afghanistan or wherever else they may be deployed by the government of the day,” Senator Brown said.

“However, we oppose the government’s decision, originally at the request of the Bush administration, to send Australians to Afghanistan. We advocate increased civil aid instead.

“The Bush administration made the calamitous mistake of withdrawing troops from Afghanistan for the invasion of Iraq and it is a not a mistake we believe Australian soldiers should be helping redress.

“It’s time for a full parliamentary debate about Australia’s involvement in the Afghan war.”

To someone like myself, so irate about the lack of clear anti-war voice in Parliament I feel like voting for a tree at Australia’s next election, it’s a modest step forward. Yes, indeed, there should be a Parliamentary debate about Afghanistan. A real debate, with real diversity of views represented.

My politics are on the green side.

I’ve long been persuaded that without intelligent environmental management – including management at a global level – humanity is on a fast track to wreck the only habitat we have.

I believe climate change is a highly significant issue. To those who think it’s just a media beat-up, I very much hope you’re right – but I wouldn’t gamble the planet on a hunch. I’ve held that view for over 20 years and explained why previously.

Bob Brown: has helped to save some magnificent forests

Other environmental problems must also be tackled with seriousness barely seen so far on a large scale. Most modern agricultural practices are unsustainable. We’re progressively toxifying the global environment. The appalling loss of biodiversity is a tragedy and a disgrace to this generation.

We need politicians in power who understand these issues – and have a strong commitment to do a lot better.

In Australia, a national Greens Party came into being in the 1990s, led by the popular Tasmanian environmentalist Bob Brown.

From the outset, the Australian Greens embraced a commitment to ecological sustainability, social justice and to the peaceful resolution to conflict. Opposition to war is a key issue for many Greens supporters.

In June 2008, the Australian Greens issued a Policy Statement on International Relations. It’s the most recent policy statement I’ve found that mentions Afghanistan. The reference is brief, but leaves no room for ambiguity:

Message from the Supreme Leader*

I call on the Great Australian Workers and Masses to publicly criticize Comrade Turnbull’s reckless and irresponsible quasi-Libertarian and neo-Liberalist tendencies!

Comrades must also criticize the dangerous opportunism of Left-Deviationalist Brown!

Oh Great Australian masses!

Follow only your Beloved Helmsman!

Unite in praise of Chairman Kevin, who basks in the adoration of all Working and Peasant Families (unlike the discredited Post-Blairite revisionist London clique!)

The Gang of Three: Enemies of the Free Peoples Democratic Republic of Murdochistan

Long Live Chairman Kevin!

Long Live Deputy Gillard!

Long live the Free Peoples Democratic Republic of Murdochistan!

________________________

CHAIRMAN’S BIG PICTURE THOUGHT OF THE DAY…

Reports have reached me that there are many Bad Thoughts on the Interwebs.

Bad thoughts are the People’s Enemy!

Bad Thoughts are not tolerated in the Free Peoples Democratic Republic of Murdochistan!

Comrade-workers must report all transgressions immediately to:

Comrade ‘Wally’ Conroy,
Peoples Commissariat for the Eradication of Bad Thoughts
Parliament House, Canberra

_________________________________________________

* Winner 2007, 2008 & 2009
Australian Friends of Plutocracy Top Service Award
Murdoch-Lowy Institute for Plausible Sycophants

… fortunately ex-Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney prerecorded a pithy message to the world, previously featured on this blog with  the title A Green Leader with Guts in late December 2008:

McKinney, who ran as the Greens Presidential candidate in 2008,  is currently banged up in an Israeli place of detention. It’s been several days now.

Predictably, the sycophantic pro-Zionist western media has given this incident a pathetic amount of coverage. Much of it has been sneering and  disparaging.

The Spirit of Humanity - hijacked by Zionists

Her crime?

Along with a score of human rights activists, Cynthia McKinney was attempting to symbolically breach the cruel Israeli blockade of Gaza, which long preceded Israel’s brutal military attack in January this year – and which continues to this day, making reconstruction impossible.

Cynthia sees this as an first-order outrage.

Unlike most western politicians, she has the courage to say so. And for the second time in six months, McKinney boarded a small boat in late June, loaded with urgently-needed relief  supplies, and sailed towards Gaza. The video above shows McKinney after the first relief boat was rammed by Israel, endangering those aboard and terminating the voyage. This time, the Israelis are holding McKinney in detention. Let’s hope they aren’t torturing her in Facility 1391.

Earlier today I wrote to the Australian Greens imploring them AT THE VERY LEAST to protest the arrest of Cynthia McKinney.

Of the handful of political parties with representatives in the Australian national Parliament, I much prefer the policies of the Australian Greens.

I usually find complimentary things to say about the Greens’ Senators work in the Federal Senate. Senator Ludlum, for instance, has played a smart and constructive role in the Internet censorship debate. Christine Milne is superb on the Climate Change issue. Those are just two examples. Overall, the Greens’ team is grossly overstretched, with only five Senators to cover all issues; it’s also hardworking.

Australian Greens' Leader Bob Brown: vocal about Tibet, silent on Gaza

Yet overstretched or not, the Greens are timid to the point of embarrassed silence on other subjects that cry out for investigation and follow-up.

The leadership of the Australian Greens have been either too ignorant, too stupid, too cowardly or too ‘bought-off’ to raise hard questions about 9-11 in the Australian Senate, questions begging to be asked. I hope it’s just the former, but ignorance, as the saying goes, is really no excuse.

Among people from many lands, Australians died on that tragic day in New York City in quite horrible circumstances. Who in our Parliament pursues justice for them? The answer, as far as I can see, is no-one.