Greenwash Political Action Party and Urban Grassroots Movement for the Green Party

Monday, July 31, 2006

Why Howard Vs Beazley is bad for the country but good for the minor parties

This was first published by crikey.com.au

The prospect for another Howard vs Beazley election will bore the pants of many progressive and young voters. Having lived through the same in 1998 and 2001 there are plenty of people who have spent most of their adult life in a perpetual sense of deja vu about politics.

The perception that Kim Beazley is John Howard-lite was nailed forever by the Tampa experience and his recent abandonment of an anti-uranium/nuclear position has just driven this home.

For voters looking for something different, minor parties will be their only choice. If a voter wants something different out of politics, or some excitement, or some change they are not going to vote for John Howard or Kim Beazley. They represent everything that is old in politics. And while this might suit the times for some of the electorate (with Howard and Beazley acting as kind of safe ‘father’ figures in a age of terrorism etc), there is a decent swag of the Australian population that wants some choice in their politics.

There is also the possibility that some voters will baulk at power residing so much in one person for so long. Not only will Howard have wielded executive power for over 11 and half years come election time, but he will have had the Senate for over 2 years as well.

As the leading vote pullers amongst the minor parties at the moment the Greens are the obvious front runners to capitalize but they will have to make sure their fresh round of candidates are up to the job and that they can successfully position themselves as providing actual solutions to the emerging big global issue – climate change.

Most people are writing the Democrats off but the party aint over till the last Senator is gone and anything is possible if there is a big non-major party vote. More likely though the Senate will be a battle between the Greens and the Christian right’s Family First. Meanwhile Labor’s Senate leader Chris Evans is also reportedly crafting a strategy to get the Labor vote up in the Senate.

The challenge remains: can the progressive forces in Australia ignite a second election in 2007 to defeat the Coalition and Family First in the Senate? Can people be convinced that there are really two polls going on and that their second vote for the Senate is just as important. If so, it is possible that the Coalition could be reduced below the critical 43% in at least two states thereby removing their control of the Senate.

Even voters happy with Howard on one level can easily be persuaded that having the Senate in the hands of one man for so long is not a good thing.

posted by Ben Oquist # 2:25 PM 0 comments

Friday, July 28, 2006

No balance in treatment of forest complaints at the ABC

After mega bucks were spent by woodchipping industry lawyers, the Australian Communications and Media Authority has criticised the 2004 ABC Four Corners program for using ‘emotive’ language.

But when right wing columnist Michael Duffy’s ABC radio program allowed more than a dozen factual errors in favour of the logging industry to go to air a year later in April 2005, no action was taken. This wasn’t a question of emotive language – basic facts were wrong. What’s more, there wasn’t even an attempt at balance on Duffy’s show. In over 2000 words on the topic, no view other than that of the loggers was put to air. Compare that to the acres of air time given to the logging industry in the Four Corners special.

After complaints made to the ABC, Duffy was forced to put one correction on his website - which simply repeated the error - but all other mistakes and biases in the program remain uncorrected.

posted by Ben Oquist # 11:32 AM 0 comments

Monday, July 24, 2006

Where is the real criticism of the Greens?

The Greens bashing from Christian Kerr continued on Crikey recently. Here is my response, an edited version of which appeared in Crikey today. Scroll down to see Mr Kerr's original attack that appeared in Crikey on Friday 21 July 2006.

Where is the real criticism of the Greens?

It is a pity Christian Kerr didn't do his homework before his latest contribution to his ongoing tirade against the Greens.

He implies that the Greens strong denouncement of the Israeli Government's slaughter of innocent civilians hasn't also contained criticism of Hezbollah or Hamas. It is true that like Kofi Annan and the European Union (and unlike Howard and Beazley who have slavishly followed the George Bush line on Israel), the Greens have condemned Israel's actions as disproportionate. However, just one click to Greens leader Bob Brown's website shows the Greens first formal statement on the issue from July 17.

"Australia should take a lead in halting Israel's bombing of civilians and Hezbollah's bloody rocket strikes, Greens Leader Bob Brown said today. 'John Howard should call George W Bush and push for rapid UN intervention to obviate war, instead of leaving the civilian casualty toll to rise. The bombing by both Israel and Hezbollah is inhumane and not excusable,' Senator Brown said."

Another couple of clicks leads to the Greens policy on the Israel-Palestine issue. A robustly developed policy with input from all sides of the debate, it explicitly condemns terrorism - whether suicide bombing or the state sanctioned variety.

Kerr's latest Greens-bashing is symptomatic of a tone found too often in the mainstream media in Australia. There is very little substantive analysis of the party – with mostly right-wing commentators offering shrill dismal or ridicule with little – if any - considered discussion. It is a shame that Crikey, led by Kerr, so often does the same.

Whatever one thinks of the Australian Greens, it is a well established party with almost 10,000 members, upwards of 30,000 estimated supporters and nearly a million voters at the last federal election. With 15 state and federal members of parliament and 80 local councillors (some with executive power) - the party needs critical analysis, for all political parties need to be kept on their toes.

But the shallow derision so often dished up on the Greens doesn't do this. In fact, all it does is drive a rift between the media (Crikey included) and the elements of its audience who support the Greens or are interested in the party's ideas and actions.

Outside Tasmania, there seems to be a general lack of public constructive criticism of the Greens . Where is the analysis of where the party should go from here for example? A considered critique of its initiatives on climate change or West Papua? Or who the party's supporter base is or what the ideological battles of the future will be? The party should be subjected to the same kind of critique that other political parties cop.

Kerrs' attack is reminiscent not only of the worst kind of ill-informed over-simplification of the Middle East politics, but also the shrill ridicule of the Greens proffered by sections of the mainstream media. It simply sets Crikey up as a kind of Bolt/Akerman-lite.
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Any excuse to get the Greens logo on TV, by Christian Kerr
The Greens seem to be prepared to use any excuse to get their logo on TV, going by an email from NSW Greens political education worker James Diack:

"Dear Members and Supporters, In response to the growing crisis in Lebanon and Palestine an emergency rally has been called by The Australian Arabic Committee for Solidarity with Palestinian and Lebanese People, a group representing over 50 community organisations.

The Rally is this Saturday, details are below: 12noon Saturday 22 July, Hyde Park North, Sydney Greens triangles and placards will be provided – please meet on the east side of the fountain. Israel is continuing to inflict collective punishment on the Lebanese and Palestinian people, bombing apartment complexes, ports, bridges, roads leading out of Lebanon, water sanitation plants and power plants. Over 210 people have been killed in Lebanon alone, all but fourteen of them civilians. Much media commentary has focused on Australian nationals stuck in Lebanon, but little attention is being paid to the millions of Lebanese and Palestinians who are being forced to endure the indiscriminate Israeli military aggression. There have been protests throughout the world, including in Israel, against the attacks. Join with this international movement to demand an immediate end to the outrageous and flagrant breaches of human rights and the needless death and destruction.

Greens Senator Kerry Nettle issued a press release on this issue yesterday, which can be seen here. "

No-one can doubt that there's a humanitarian crisis in the Middle East. However, it might be nice for the Greens to admit that the Israelis have never said that their primary goal is wipe the Palestinians or the Lebanese from the face of the earth – unlike comments made by Hezbollah, Hamas or the countries that sponsor their terrorism about the Jewish state.

posted by Ben Oquist # 2:10 PM 0 comments

Monday, July 17, 2006

Howard’s greenhouse hypocrisies

Today John Howard will presumably repeat his pitch about the importance of doing something about climate change while at the same time defending his government’s decisions not to do anything much about climate change.

He will deride Kyoto as having done little to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and in the same breath defend his Government’s record of doing even less.

He will rubbish the EU greenhouse gas trading schemes because it has proved to be flawed and not achieving as much as was hoped. He won’t say that this is because governments caved into fossil fuel industry pressure when setting up the scheme by not providing effective reduction targets now and into the future.

He could then try to defend the his Government’s Mandatory Renewable Energy Target (MRET) program - which is effectively a type of greenhouse gas trading – but not acknowledge is proving to be completely flawed because his Government has caved into fossil fuel industry pressure by not providing effective renewable targets now and into the future.

He might repeat Environment Minister Ian Campbell’s rhetoric that the world needs a 60% reduction in greenhouse emissions by mid century but then refuse to commit Australia to achieving such a goal.

He will spruik the case for nuclear power – an expensive, dangerous and untried technology in Australia while refusing to do any more for renewable energy or energy efficiency – the proven , cost effective technologies that are already deployed in this country.

The solution
Australia needs a renewable energy target of at least 20% by 2020 and a carbon tax now. But don’t expect to hear that from Howard today. Just more hypocrisies and more pandering to the fossil fuel and nuclear industries.

posted by Ben Oquist # 11:28 AM 1 comments

Thursday, July 13, 2006

Piers Akerman's ridiculous statment

One of the journalist quotes of the year must surely go to Piers Akerman when he said this morning “I don’t think my writing could be seen to be partisan”.

Akerman was speaking on ABC Radio National’s Media Report in a program devoted to the media coverage of the Howard-Costello stoush.

It was a pretty interesting discussion between the program’s host Gerarld Tooth, SBS TV and Press Gallery president Karen Middleton, News Ltd’s Glen Milne and the aforementioned Daily Telegraph hack Mr Akerman.

They talked about crossing the line between commentary and journalism and whether Akerman and Milne had been taking sides in the PM vs Treasurer battle. And it was in that context that Akerman made his ridiculous statement “I don’t think my writing could be seen to be partisan”.

For Piers to claim that he is not partisan is about the most ridiculous thing he has ever said. And if you have read any of Ackerman’s Howard worshipping, right wing fanaticism over the years you’ll know that is one hell of a claim!

I mean, has Piers ever written anything that isn’t partisan?

But really, everyone knows Glen Milne is in the Costello camp and Piers is a Howard loyalist. Why don’t they just admit it and get on with it. After all, ‘disclosure’ is meant to be one of the high principles of journalism.

While we are at it, let’s have some reporting on what the actual policy differences would be between a Howard and Costello led Australia. My feeling is that Costello actually stands for very little. Remember his stupid Australia values speech where he claimed having paved roads was a key Australian value? Sum it up this way: he couldn’t be described as a conviction politician.

posted by Ben Oquist # 10:34 AM