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Private equity investments are bad for health. These American style investments are incredibly unhealthy for the vehicles they, often, drive into the ground. Healthscope: The private equity fail for hospitals in Australia. What private equity does is saddle the thing that they buy with all the debt raised to purchase it in the first place. Then, it liquidates whatever juicy assets in the possession of the targeted investment vehicle. In this case, it was selling all the real estate upon which these dozens of private hospitals reside. This raised billions for the private equity firm. Following this all the hospitals had to pay commercial rents to the new owners of the land. Making operating the businesses more expensive.Continue Reading

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a white mushroom in the middle of a green forest

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My prediction is that the alleged mushroom poison lady will be convicted and sentenced as a mass murderer. No great shakes, I hear you say. But, and this is the point of this post, I further predict that she will follow in the footsteps of prior Aussie femme fatales like Lindy Chamberlain and Kathleen Folbigg. These publicly excoriated Aussie women were later released and their crimes pardoned on the basis of wrongful convictions. Erin Patterson has all the hallmarks of the Australian predilection for going to town over femme fatales downunder. Nothing excites the media and the locals more than a deadly woman.Continue Reading

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witch riding motorcycle toy

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“Once there was a wicked witch in the lovely land of Oz
And a wickeder, wickeder, wickeder witch there never, never was.”

Voldemort has fallen in the seat of Dickson and the divisive Peter Dutton is politically dead. Now, Jim Chalmers decently said he was not one to dance on the grave of a political opponent. However, if you live by the sword you die by the sword and Mr Dutton was an aggressive and polarising figure on the Australian political stage. The Liberal Party has lost the 2025 federal election in a landslide to Labor. Ding dong the Dutton witch is dead. Long live Australia.Continue Reading

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Robodebt disgrace: The legacy of the Coalition

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The Trump campaign chief was in Australia advising Peter Dutton’s Liberal Party in the run up to the federal election. This answers that question about the ties between Peter Dutton and Donald Trump’s Republican Party in the US. If, as the Trump campaign chief claims, he was downunder advising the Liberal Party campaign we can observe the close links between the two organisations. Shared aspirations and ways of going about things should send alarm bells off in the minds of Australian voters. Trump campaign advised Peter Dutton in Australia regarding his bid to become Prime Minister in the 2025 election.Continue Reading

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Or has he made a mess of his first few months of the season, as head coach of the Swans in 2025? Tom McCartin? A failed experiment still costing the team stability and continuity. The Sydney Swans AFL  side is sliding down to the lower reaches of a long ladder. 14th place. Has Dean Cox inherited a damaged team? Did John Longmire exit a traumatised football team? Injuries to important senior players have made things worse to be sure. However if a solid system was in place, then, the thinking goes that new soldiers come in and play the roles required. This is not happening in terms of four quarter performances producing winning results.Continue Reading

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cars on road on rush hour

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Australia currently has the worst vehicle emission’s standards in the Western world. Why is this so? Politics, of course. This basic health and environmental issue has been made a political football by the right wing LNP. The Coalition continually appeals to the lowest of the low comfort zone of their voters. You never see this mob ask anything of their voters to raise their standards for the betterment of the community. No, it is always framed in such way as to reduce everything to what it might cost in the short term in dollars. Peter Dutton the alarmist politician crying ‘wolf’ about possible price increases and exaggerating the amount for all its worth. Dutton always framing stuff in the negative for voters.Continue Reading

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A lot of Australian politicians have a problem because Trump’s America has gone batshit crazy. Why is this a particular problem for them? Basically because they and their parties have been following the American lead for decades. Pissweak Aussie pollies have been following in the shadow of big brother for the longest time. Not having to really think for themselves or come up with anything original has attracted a certain kind of Australian to their ranks. This applies to both sides but the Libs and Nats in particular have been drinking deeply from that stars and stripes cup for many years. Australian politicians bereft of inspiration now.Continue Reading

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white and black typewriter on green grass

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The true story behind the Trump tariffs will blow your mind. You may or may not know that the key economic advisor behind the tariffs is one Peter Navarro. Donald Trump originally came across Navarro thanks to son in law Jared Kushner. Apparently, he did an Amazon search for books on economics and found one with the catchy title – The Coming China Wars by Peter Navarro. In that book Navarro references repeatedly an economist named Ron Varo to bolster his economic theories about the effectiveness of tariffs. It turns out that Ron Varo does not actually exist and is an anagram of Navarro’s own name. The dishonesty of these right wing extremists around Donald Trump is gobsmacking.Continue Reading

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In the wake of Trump 2.0 and the growing realisation that America is completely on the wrong track or, indeed, coming off the rails, do we need to de-Americanise Australia? Take a moment to consider how far down this Americanised route Australia has already travelled. In this Neoliberal Era, in which we live, it is big business running the show and Corporate Australia has imported most of their ideas and ways of doing things from the Yanks. Over decades, we have brought in American CEOs and many of our home grown business leaders have done their MBs at US higher learning institutions. Things like outsourcing jobs overseas to reduce labour costs and the rise of private equity investment are all American initiatives. Australian big business is very US orientated in the ways it goes about things.Continue Reading