Shownotes
Insights and Debates on Current Affairs and Viral Moments
In this episode of the podcast, Trevor returns from a holiday in North Queensland and, alongside Shae and Joe, dives into various topics ranging from their accidental viral moment and concerns over religious instruction in Queensland state schools, to discussing voluntary assisted dying legislation, and the complexities of holding military personnel accountable for alleged war crimes. They also provide an analysis of the COVID-19 situation, focusing on vaccination rates, lockdowns, and the potential impacts of different policies on virus transmission and death rates. The episode concludes with reflections on the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan, examining the implications for the country's future, the role of international law in military accountability, and a request from Shae for audience engagement to enhance the podcasting experience.
00:00 Welcome to the Podcast: Episode 310
00:55 Holiday Tales and Viral Moments
01:47 The Bizarre Case of Accidental Virality
04:31 Debating Religious Instruction in Schools
08:00 Voluntary Assisted Dying in Queensland: A Political and Religious Debate
13:45 The Australian Christian Lobby's Stance on COVID and Religious Freedom
15:20 The Religious Freedom Bill and Workplace Discrimination
17:25 Upcoming Rally Against Religious Discrimination
20:09 Hillsong Church Controversy: Charges Against Brian Houston
23:51 COVID-19 and Public Opinion on Lockdowns
34:09 The Pandemic of the Unvaccinated: A Look at the Data
36:10 Exploring the Dougherty Report and Vaccine Coverage
37:32 The Impact of Vaccination Rates on COVID-19 Outcomes
39:17 Modeling the Delta Variant: Predictions and Realities
41:35 The Grattan Institute's Findings and the Power of Mask-Wearing
44:57 Reimagining Public Spaces for Better Air Quality
45:52 Quarantine Facilities and the Importance of Outdoor Spaces
48:36 Acknowledging the Podcast's Supporters
51:29 A Deep Dive into Afghanistan's Current Situation
01:04:11 The Complexities of War Crimes and Accountability
01:13:42 Closing Remarks and Future Plans
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Transcripts
Hello, dear listener.
Speaker:This is the iron fist in the velvet glove podcast, episode 310.
Speaker:It's the 31st of August, 2021.
Speaker:I'm Trevor AKA, the iron fist back from a holiday in north Queensland.
Speaker:I'll tell you a little bit about that in a moment, but with me as always
Speaker:Shay the subversive, how are you?
Speaker:Good evening.
Speaker:I'm very well.
Speaker:Thanks.
Speaker:And Paul, the tech not pause cause I and Joe, the tech guy.
Speaker:How are you, Joe?
Speaker:I am already, I am.
Speaker:Yeah, I am.
Speaker:I miss the contrariness and the arguments.
Speaker:So all you're welcome to, to phone in and or in on and make a cameo appearance.
Speaker:Or like if you're in the chat, say hello and and join us and make some
Speaker:comments and we'll try and get to you.
Speaker:And we'll just run through, what's been happening over the last couple of weeks
Speaker:news and politics, sex and religion.
Speaker:Just briefly on a personal note, I'm back from my holiday.
Speaker:I was up in Cairns and I went to Fitzroy island and it is a
Speaker:completely different world up there.
Speaker:Dear listener.
Speaker:So if you were able to escape lockdown and just head to north Queensland and
Speaker:go like, it's great, there's no masks.
Speaker:And you're turning the clock back three years to pre COVID times.
Speaker:It was good.
Speaker:And Fitzroy island, you can just go there, stay in this resort type
Speaker:area and walk out onto the beach.
Speaker:And snorkel is coral is turtles.
Speaker:There's all that stuff.
Speaker:It's really, really good.
Speaker:So highly recommend that if you can get away.
Speaker:It can't get to Paris on New York next year, go to Fitzroy island.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:So other things just sort of Noosa template site and stuff, we'll just
Speaker:we've got a lot of messages from people saying, Hey, did you guys see
Speaker:how you went viral on this thing?
Speaker:And there's a really strange thing happened on ABC, where on a news
Speaker:report, they did a story about some sort of stabbing of dogs.
Speaker:And, and it showed footage of us by mistake, as we exited the court.
Speaker:And then as the, as the sort of report audio, the audio
Speaker:and the video were mixed up.
Speaker:So the audio was about this dog stabbing and the, and the video was of us exiting
Speaker:the court on our court date, and then the audio sort of finished for the story.
Speaker:And then it came to to showing a shot of Rob.
Speaker:When he was doing his black mass saying hail Satan, and then
Speaker:straight from that, it goes back to the studio, to the newsreader.
Speaker:And she's just got this dead pan face speech, just completely
Speaker:nonplussed by what's happened.
Speaker:And then she starts reading her next story without any commentary.
Speaker:And I don't know, I didn't think it was that funny, but people found it
Speaker:hilarious and it went completely viral.
Speaker:There's a guy called Mickey indigo he's he's on tick-tock and normally his Tik TOK
Speaker:stuff gets maybe 6,008,000 sort of views.
Speaker:And his, his little video of us in this instance got 2.7 million views.
Speaker:And certainly the ABC version, just hundreds of thousands, it
Speaker:was an amazing viral moment.
Speaker:So.
Speaker:So to all those people who said, do you see this?
Speaker:Yes, we saw it.
Speaker:So, Joe, have you got a theory as to why it went viral, hail Satan and anything
Speaker:involving Satan is popular and I thing.
Speaker:So on the atheist side, and I think that's two fingers up to mainstream.
Speaker:Religion is popular and for the religious, it's a proof that at the
Speaker:end times are here, that Jesus is coming and the evil has taken over.
Speaker:It, it feeds into their motivation complex.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:It, apparently the algorithm worked and all these people in this sort of queue and
Speaker:on type thing, he worried about Satanists.
Speaker:This was proved to them that somehow satanic forces were at work.
Speaker:And that's the reason it went viral was because.
Speaker:It, it tapped into the algorithms for these crazy Cuellar non people.
Speaker:So that's one of the theories that anyway, it's to why it went so big.
Speaker:So, so yeah, that was so that was interesting.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:In the chat room, what lead Don?
Speaker:John, Chris.
Speaker:Good on you.
Speaker:And I think I mentioned Ross, I think saw Ross in there.
Speaker:So yes.
Speaker:Or I'd keep making comments.
Speaker:We'll try and get to them if we can.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:Now still on sort of news, a template of site and stuff.
Speaker:This, I saw a post from the Queensland parents for secular state schools, where
Speaker:they had stumbled across a, a school, which was the Bundaberg east state school.
Speaker:So on their website, they said that they offer religious instruction and
Speaker:they listed the number of faiths that are offering religious instruction
Speaker:at this government school in bundle.
Speaker:25 of them, 25 different faiths.
Speaker:Or did you see this one?
Speaker:Charlie or Joe, or only when I sent it to you?
Speaker:I did.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Was it 25 providers or was it 25 religions have signed up to a group provider though?
Speaker:It was probably done as a group thing.
Speaker:I'm not sure about that, but Ann street, gospel, chapel apostolic church of
Speaker:Queensland Bundaberg Baptist church under the Bible chapel Bundaberg
Speaker:Catholic communities, Bundaberg church of Christ, Bundaberg west
Speaker:Baptist Christ, church Anglican, city coast, church, coral coast, Christian
Speaker:Church, Crofton street, gospel hall.
Speaker:Good shepherd Anglican.
Speaker:It just goes on and on.
Speaker:I wonder, did, did any of them have to go to the Supreme court to prove
Speaker:the common faith for their followers?
Speaker:Because Christian Christianity has given a shoe in isn't it?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah, exactly.
Speaker:Mind you Crofton street, gospel hall.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:The only one that didn't have Christian in the name I could community church.
Speaker:If we had just called ourselves a Noosa church of Christ, we
Speaker:would have been straight in.
Speaker:So it's it's anyway, they make the, the point Queensland pants
Speaker:for secular state schools.
Speaker:Like some of these groups are outrageous, for example, the
Speaker:Crofton street gospel hall.
Speaker:If you look at their website they say things like they've got a question,
Speaker:answer area in their website.
Speaker:Do women speak or contribute to your services?
Speaker:Answer?
Speaker:No limit do not take audible part in our services.
Speaker:We believe the Bible is very clear on this point, quite
Speaker:Corinthians chapter 14, verse 34.
Speaker:Another question.
Speaker:Do the women in your church have their heads covered?
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Once again, we believe that this is what the Bible teachers and
Speaker:they quote the scripture for that.
Speaker:So they're really hardcore.
Speaker:Do they wear mixed fabrics?
Speaker:Is the question.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So that's the sort who can waltz into our government school system
Speaker:putting women in their place.
Speaker:And they're worried about sadness and stoning.
Speaker:They're unruly children.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:So, so good on you Queensland pants for secular state school for for
Speaker:finding that group and As I said here, how messed up the RI system is
Speaker:in this state and how selective the concern of the education department
Speaker:is about who gets into our schools.
Speaker:It's more worried about the letter of the law and the optics can't let in those evil
Speaker:Satanists, but the door is wide open to groups with sexist and backward thinking.
Speaker:If they just call themselves Christians, very true members of the national party.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Thanks.
Speaker:To keep up with what happens with voluntary assisted dying
Speaker:in Queensland, the health and environment committee report came out.
Speaker:And basically there were no surprises.
Speaker:The three ALP members supported the proposed bill for voluntary
Speaker:assisted dying in its entirety.
Speaker:There was a dissenting report from the one nation MP.
Speaker:Steve Andrews.
Speaker:He played the I'm a Christian card saying it was reckless.
Speaker:And he also played the south sea Islander card saying there's a lack of consultation
Speaker:with indigenous Queenslanders.
Speaker:And there was a Dr.
Speaker:Monique Robinson had a dissenting report that just parroted
Speaker:the position of cherish life.
Speaker:But the deputy LMP, Rob mole awake he made a statement of reservation and took
Speaker:a swipe at labor and quoted Wendy Francis.
Speaker:But there weren't any real objections from him.
Speaker:So maybe the LNP might be getting nervous about the overwhelming public
Speaker:support for voluntary assisted dying.
Speaker:So, so that'll be interesting to see how that pans out.
Speaker:So so I did see the Catholic response.
Speaker:What did it say?
Speaker:They said that they didn't care what the law was.
Speaker:They weren't going to allow it on their property.
Speaker:It's okay.
Speaker:So that was with the hospitals?
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:So the master hospital and all of the respite care and all of the end
Speaker:of life facilities, the Catholic church, which apparently is 30%, 40%
Speaker:of the state's beds for aged care.
Speaker:Catholic facilities provide one in five.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:One in five, only 20%.
Speaker:They went freedom.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:I'm the hospital.
Speaker:As I see fit, I want the freedom to interfere in your life.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:And to ignore the laws of the land that everyone else has to
Speaker:abide by, because they're special.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Because yeah.
Speaker:So the Catholic hospitals, I say they will defy Queensland's euthanasia law.
Speaker:So the martyr they're not euthanasia laws.
Speaker:There's no euthanasia involved.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:But that's how they describe it.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So they say they won't be exceeding to the laws.
Speaker:We will not tolerate non-credentialed doctors coming on site, normally assist
Speaker:in the provision of voluntary assisted dying in any of our facilities, said
Speaker:Francis Sullivan chair of the Marta group.
Speaker:So it sounds to me like grounds for compulsory purchasing back.
Speaker:I think we could probably take the children's hospital back
Speaker:for the amount that the Catholic church were going to buy.
Speaker:It wasn't a dollar, it couldn't point, but it takes so much of our money to
Speaker:run these things and then they don't want to be part of it basically.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:It's just, it's this whole.
Speaker:It's just like the people with the lockdowns, it's buggy, the rest of you.
Speaker:I just want to do what I want and I just don't care.
Speaker:And I deserve government funding to do that.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Victoria, navigate this when they legislated it they didn't
Speaker:have this section in, so down there they were exempt.
Speaker:So Queensland is the first to really put the hard word on and try and force
Speaker:the Catholic institutions to comply.
Speaker:So let me just see what it says here.
Speaker:Deputy premier, Stephen Miles said cases where VAD doctors
Speaker:would offer services at faith run facilities would be very, very rare.
Speaker:It's only those circumstances where it would be unfair would cause
Speaker:unnecessary suffering to transfer the patient to a provider where
Speaker:those services can be provided.
Speaker:So I think from memory, it was if people are in a Catholic hospital
Speaker:and I want to access voluntary, assisted dying, the hospital has
Speaker:to assist them in transferring to a hospital that will allow it.
Speaker:I think that's the way the law is written.
Speaker:But if for some circumstance it can't be done.
Speaker:Then under the law, the Catholic system has to offer the service or
Speaker:allow other doctors in to offer the service to allow other doctors in.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So really Steven Miles is saying it's going to be pretty rig
Speaker:case where somebody is in such a state that they can't transfer.
Speaker:So this all comes back to a case in Canada, where there was this person who.
Speaker:Was in enormous pain and had to be taken out of pain relief in order to be
Speaker:competent enough to sign these documents and then had this horrendously painful
Speaker:ambulance journey to another hospital that was like, excrutiatingly painful.
Speaker:So it does happen where people can't be moved.
Speaker:So so yeah, Catholics just saying, well, we'll take all of your
Speaker:money, all of your society's stuff.
Speaker:But when there's laws passed, we don't like, we'll just bug you.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Well, it was like the mandatory reporting that they raised to do.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:So just in the chat room John salmon sets the word euthanasia is
Speaker:derived from the Greek word youth.
Speaker:They're not toss, meaning easy death.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:But the point was euthanasia is where the doctor ministers, the medicine
Speaker:it's voluntary, assisted dying is the doctor prescribes the medicine, but
Speaker:it's the patient who, by their own hand.
Speaker:Yup.
Speaker:Yup.
Speaker:Although I think the legislation allows for assistance if they're not
Speaker:capable of it, possibly Marie yeah.
Speaker:From memory.
Speaker:So okay.
Speaker:Just looking at the chat okay.
Speaker:Now still on some Christian bashing, they've given a bit
Speaker:in the last couple of weeks.
Speaker:So Matt Niles he's come out and said that.
Speaker:So the Australian Christian lobby believes it says that believers
Speaker:should push for COVID freedom.
Speaker:So he's big on anti locked down and pro freedom.
Speaker:And.
Speaker:Basically says that Christians shouldn't be afraid of dying.
Speaker:Because ultimately if you're a good Christian where you're going to go,
Speaker:which is interesting because I've heard hospital orderlies and nurses
Speaker:who talk about end-of-life care.
Speaker:And they said, it's the Christians who are deathly afraid.
Speaker:Whereas those with after religion, RSDs, those who are true, believers
Speaker:are almost certain that they're going to hell because, because
Speaker:it's a vengeful and petty God.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:So Richard Dennis in a tweet said something like, well, I'm confused.
Speaker:The so-called pro-life Christians who were antique voluntary, assisted
Speaker:dying, because you don't want to die early, earlier than necessary.
Speaker:I prefer people to be able to die because they want to go shopping.
Speaker:I think maybe.
Speaker:Prove their faith by doing some snake handling like, like the the ones in
Speaker:the Southern us having rattlesnakes to prove that God will protect them in.
Speaker:We, one of them gets bitten and dies, that sort of thing.
Speaker:So okay.
Speaker:What else in the chat room?
Speaker:So at that, okay.
Speaker:It's still on the Australian Christian lobby.
Speaker:And let me share this screen, if it comes up which they put out a full
Speaker:page ad, which was, are you safe at work to talk about your faith?
Speaker:Australians of faith have the right to protection.
Speaker:And then they repeat this quote of Scott Morrison.
Speaker:When he said religious freedom is a core pillar of our society
Speaker:and it's not unreasonable.
Speaker:And I think there are many millions of Australians who would like to see.
Speaker:Protected and I intend to follow through on that commitment.
Speaker:So this is the Australian Christian lobby putting the hard word on
Speaker:Scott Morrison about passing the religious discrimination bill.
Speaker:And, but the whole point is the whole point is their question.
Speaker:Is, are you safe at work to talk about your faith?
Speaker:Well, everybody is except if you're a non-Christian working
Speaker:in a Christian workplace.
Speaker:Oh no, no.
Speaker:It's actually the very people.
Speaker:So I have an equal opportunity employer.
Speaker:I'm sure if I was to rig it, ridiculed the younger creationists
Speaker:in my office, I would find myself on the wrong end of an HR complaint.
Speaker:So I'm not free to talk about like, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Or let's face it in Australia.
Speaker:If somebody is going to be persecuted because of their faith in the workplace.
Speaker:The most likely scenario is that you're a, non-Christian working in a
Speaker:Christian school and they found out and they put somebody else in there.
Speaker:Like that's the person most likely to be persecuted or as the lesbian, the
Speaker:other week that they had a difference of opinion as to whether or not you could
Speaker:be a good Christian and have sex outside of a marriage between a man and a woman.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:So just you know, the, just so Shane was these people, facts don't matter.
Speaker:I've nearly finished my, I have finished my rant on Christians actually.
Speaker:Now I've got one more to go.
Speaker:When you just, before you move on.
Speaker:I just I, I love a good rally.
Speaker:Makes me feel peaceful.
Speaker:And on the 4th of September, there will be a gathering with among rainbow light.
Speaker:To stop religious discrimination.
Speaker:So anyway, because any Brisbane listeners I'll be there, I should be there.
Speaker:One pitch has been square.
Speaker:The worst suggestions that possibly something else could be done, like a
Speaker:rally with cars, where everyone stays in their cars and just proceeds in that way.
Speaker:So that there isn't like a car rally.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Rather than a mass gathering of people,
Speaker:it might've been canceled since then.
Speaker:I think I only received that last week or raise fairly recently.
Speaker:I'll follow it up anyway.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Doors.
Speaker:We could do that.
Speaker:There's no problem.
Speaker:If doors be fine.
Speaker:Well, I'm moving in the wrong circle shape.
Speaker:Clearly, I subscribed to everything about religion that's going on in Australia.
Speaker:And I'm a member of the labor party.
Speaker:I had no idea that this is going on.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And, and I'm a good mates with Robin Bristow.
Speaker:One of Australia's most notorious gaming, like famous infamous.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Infamous.
Speaker:So okay.
Speaker:Well I missed that one, so, okay.
Speaker:So 4th of September.
Speaker:And where is it?
Speaker:It's just a March Brisbane square.
Speaker:Yeah, I appreciate it.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:4th of September stop religious discrimination.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:I'll try and get to that.
Speaker:Fortunately, one of the I'd rather you didn't.
Speaker:For the church of the flying spaghetti monster is not about
Speaker:or is about not proselytizing.
Speaker:So I'll be, I'll be unable to proselytize to the Christians at work.
Speaker:Once this religious freedom bill comes through is like I said, they non
Speaker:proselytizers the church of the flying spaghetti monster part of like the
Speaker:do's and don'ts combined convert people to proselytize is to try and convert.
Speaker:So a school chaplains, for example, who must be religious to have the
Speaker:job are not allowed to proselytize, meaning they're not allowed to
Speaker:try and sell their religion.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:And finally, yes, finally, I'm a bit of religious bashing.
Speaker:Ryan Houston has been charged, so head of the Hillsong church and new south
Speaker:Wales police I've charged him now.
Speaker:Be careful everybody with defamation laws here maybe remain silent if
Speaker:you don't know for sure, but I'm just reading from what I've got.
Speaker:Crikey here.
Speaker:So he's been charged in relation to how he handled the case of Brett sang stock.
Speaker:As a little boy was sexually abused by Frank Houston, the pioneering figure of
Speaker:what would become Hillsong in Australia.
Speaker:So Brian Houston's dad, Frank Houston is dead seeing savvy
Speaker:like about Frank Houston.
Speaker:You'll be okay.
Speaker:And he was a pedophile and it was all about the delay in Brian
Speaker:Houston, notifying the authorities of what his father was up to.
Speaker:So which he had lied to in the Royal commission.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:So he admitted to a delay to knowing it.
Speaker:So the criminal charge relates to events from two decades ago when
Speaker:Houston failed to notify police.
Speaker:When he allegedly became aware that he's fine, At sexually abused a young boy.
Speaker:So this all comes under section 3, 1 6 of the new south Wales crime act.
Speaker:And the elements of it are the accused person knows, believes, or reasonably
Speaker:ought to know that a child abuse offense has been committed and they know
Speaker:believable, reasonably ought to know they have information that might be of material
Speaker:assistance in securing the apprehension of the offender or prosecution.
Speaker:And they fail without reasonable excuse to bring that information to the attention
Speaker:of the police as soon as practicable.
Speaker:So the question will be what would be reasonable excuse to not bring
Speaker:the information forward to the police about your father abusing a boy.
Speaker:And there's a list of available reasonable excuses.
Speaker:It includes things where it khesed reasonably believed
Speaker:that the police already know.
Speaker:Or where the alleged victim is an adult at that time that the accused finds
Speaker:out about the offense and the accused reasonably believes that the alleged
Speaker:victim doesn't want the police to be told.
Speaker:So and the accused can also try for a reason, Annabelle,
Speaker:excuse, not in the list.
Speaker:So there are other things.
Speaker:So anyway, it's going to come down to what was his reasons for not
Speaker:giving notice to the police and it have symmetry going on here.
Speaker:We've got Brian Houston, big Powell of Scott Morrison on, on a charge
Speaker:related to Charlie pal of the former police commissioner of new south Wales.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:And not so long ago we had Cardinal pill, big power of the then of prime minister
Speaker:of what was he then prime minister No.
Speaker:I think Tony Tony Abbott was he prime minister at the time.
Speaker:And the charges in any event, high profile sort of Peter file related cases.
Speaker:Not that Brian Houston's charged with failure, but concealment.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:So of course, Brian Houston's main claim to fame is that Scott Morrison invited
Speaker:him to the white house as part of a group that we're going to the white house.
Speaker:Do you remember that show?
Speaker:Yes, I do.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:And, and you know, it's a real badge of honor for Brian Houston that he, he
Speaker:was, his character is such that even the Trump white house said we better not have
Speaker:this guy here, knocked him back our bad.
Speaker:If you've got a boom right.
Speaker:Well, it just wouldn't be 2021.
Speaker:If we didn't talk about cars, Step yourselves in it.
Speaker:Listen, I know you might be a little bit tired of it, but some
Speaker:interesting stuff has come out.
Speaker:The essential report came out today.
Speaker:So so I've got some stuff here, which is how would you rate your state government's
Speaker:response to the COVID 19 outbreak and probably no surprise that when it comes
Speaker:to writing your state as a good response in new south Wales, 40% Victoria,
Speaker:44%, meanwhile, Queensland 67, south Australia, 76 in Western Australia, 78.
Speaker:So there's going to be a common theme in these opinion, polls where new south
Speaker:Wales and Victoria pretty bad in terms of what people are thinking of them.
Speaker:So so yeah.
Speaker:How would you rate your state government's response?
Speaker:New south Wales in Victoria, people in Victoria, really angry.
Speaker:The ones I talked to anecdotally.
Speaker:What else have I got here?
Speaker:The next one is but lockdowns don't work.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And basically, you know, it wasn't that long ago, 7th of
Speaker:June, that new south Wales, was it 69% and now it's down to 40%.
Speaker:So it was second top at one stage down to the bottom in terms of approval
Speaker:by the public of their response is an interesting one is thinking about
Speaker:the lightest COVID lockdown area.
Speaker:Do you think the restrictions are too strong about right too weak?
Speaker:And this was only in places where it actually had been a lockdown.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And essentially for thinking it was too strong.
Speaker:The new south Wales, 28% Victoria, 35% Queensland, 20 south Australia,
Speaker:12 Western, Australia, 30.
Speaker:So and in the about right states it was new south Wales and
Speaker:Victoria performing the worst.
Speaker:And let me just see if we've got, I think people are getting to the point
Speaker:where they start to lose patience with the lockdowns in Victoria, especially.
Speaker:And this is the one that I really wanted to get to, and that is what do
Speaker:you think about this deal this night?
Speaker:What do you think is an acceptable number of deaths to
Speaker:deal with per year from COVID?
Speaker:So there's a lot of talk happening at the moment.
Speaker:When do we open up our economy?
Speaker:When do we stop with the lockdowns at what percentage vaccination, right.
Speaker:Do we decide that's it we're really going to avoid lockdowns unless there's
Speaker:something quite extraordinary happening.
Speaker:And we know there are going to be some infections and we know
Speaker:there's going to be some deaths and we just have to live with some.
Speaker:And so the question is what, what's the number of deaths per year?
Speaker:That for the, for the whole of Australia, that you would consider
Speaker:acceptable number for us to sort of stop this lockdown situation shy.
Speaker:Did you have an, a number in your mind that you would have thought was,
Speaker:was reasonable for Australia in terms of number of deaths that you would
Speaker:have thought, ah, a thousand a year.
Speaker:Fair enough.
Speaker:That's if, if or 2000 or a hundred, like, did you have a number in mind?
Speaker:I, I probably haven't really considered the consequences of people dying, but both
Speaker:my mom and my younger sister are nurses.
Speaker:So I just sort of consider it from how many beds we have and yeah, where
Speaker:like, yeah, I don't have a number of pop, but that's all I think about it.
Speaker:I think about the risk to my youngest sister is already puts herself at risk
Speaker:in a general medical ward all the time is frequently, you know pushed already.
Speaker:That's what I think about is the number of beds in hospitals the whole time.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:Judge, do you have a number in your head if they said, well, when vaccinations
Speaker:reach 80% of the adult population and we calculate that, that will mean.
Speaker:A thousand deaths a year and we decide we're going to open up to just
Speaker:does a thousand sound like an okay.
Speaker:Number to you.
Speaker:Is there a number that, you know, go ahead that you think so, so flu
Speaker:is I believe around 1500 a year.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:So if it was around 1500, it would be equivalent to flu.
Speaker:The question is, if we're adding that on top of flu, we've now
Speaker:doubled the death rate a year.
Speaker:And also, I don't know that flu has the ongoing complications, so it
Speaker:isn't measuring it against the flu, a valid proposition anyway, like,
Speaker:well, it's considerably tagine, but they're talking about it becoming
Speaker:endemic and having COVID seasons.
Speaker:Like we have flu seasons.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So if it was an equivalent.
Speaker:A problem that flu is we've lived with flu for a long time.
Speaker:Now, obviously with all the lockdowns we've had, we've had no
Speaker:flu, we've had absolutely yeah.
Speaker:Record low numbers of flu cases.
Speaker:So, and that they think that the bounce back is that we're going to have a
Speaker:bad flu season when we do open up.
Speaker:But if we had a similar number of people in total, I think dying or flu and COVID
Speaker:I think that's a relatively valid call.
Speaker:The question is, you know, in terms of not mortality, but morbidity, if we
Speaker:have people with long-term disabilities because of COVID there may be, the
Speaker:answer is the same as with with measles where we are aiming for zero.
Speaker:And just because the current vaccine.
Speaker:Isn't great.
Speaker:Doesn't mean that the next generation won't be, if, for example, they were
Speaker:saying, look at 80% we could stop lockdowns pretty much, except in
Speaker:quite extraordinary circumstances.
Speaker:And we know for example, 2000 people are going to die, but if we waited another
Speaker:year and got up to 90%, then we would know that basically zero would die.
Speaker:For example, just as a hypothetical.
Speaker:So I'm just trying to paint it in a hypothetical situation.
Speaker:I sort of think we've reached the point where we are prepared to spend
Speaker:or to cop a couple of thousand lives.
Speaker:I reckon in order to, to get the whole of Australia back to.
Speaker:If it, if, if, if it got Australia back to normal, I would, I
Speaker:would've thought the figure would be around a couple of thousand.
Speaker:I don't think we're ever going to get back to normal.
Speaker:There's talk about masks being a long-term thing.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:But, but in sense of lockdowns stopping and businesses, being able to open
Speaker:pretty much all the time now they might be, well, I think international
Speaker:travel is probably the peak one.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So anyway, the essential report did a survey and they said, how many deaths
Speaker:nationally from COVID-19 do you think is acceptable to live with in Australia
Speaker:as locked down, restrictions are removed and the head less than a hundred
Speaker:between a hundred and a thousand between 1,003 thousand, between 3000 and 5,000
Speaker:and more than 5,000 deaths per year.
Speaker:And.
Speaker:Biggest one by long way was less than a hundred per year,
Speaker:which was 61% of respondents.
Speaker:The next was between a hundred and a thousand deaths per year.
Speaker:That was going to be acceptable to 25% of the respondents.
Speaker:And then between 1,003 thousand deaths per year is probably where I am.
Speaker:And I'm in a mere 10% of the population on that one.
Speaker:So I was quite shocked that the current thinking was that lockdowns
Speaker:can't end if there's a risk of more than a hundred deaths per year,
Speaker:that seems a very low number to me.
Speaker:I don't know that it's surprised by that.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I don't think it is either.
Speaker:I mean, what's yeah.
Speaker:I, that to me was an unrealistic figure to think that.
Speaker:If as the acceptable figure, it was why too low, I think, in the
Speaker:chat room, what do you think?
Speaker:What was your in your chat room?
Speaker:Could you let me know what you think in your head you would have thought as the
Speaker:acceptable annual death rate from COVID to live with in Australia is locked down.
Speaker:Restrictions are removed.
Speaker:So yeah, that shocked me.
Speaker:And just on that figure, so 61% went for a hundred deaths or less per year.
Speaker:In terms of female, 70% of females thought that 52% of males, so females
Speaker:more likely to be quite conservative.
Speaker:So so what lead the wizard says it may not be a realistic figure,
Speaker:but I think it demonstrates how many people are inherently decent.
Speaker:I'm feeling like I'm not decent with that one.
Speaker:What leaks
Speaker:all the way up, like it's.
Speaker:Because there is a weighing up this of, you know, the lockdowns do have an
Speaker:emotional cost and they, I mean, yes.
Speaker:It's yeah.
Speaker:The other question is when we tap these figures of, you know,
Speaker:70 or 80%, is that of the total population or is that yes, adults?
Speaker:Like the dynamic.
Speaker:How about exile?
Speaker:I guess people don't really think of kids dying from it.
Speaker:It doesn't matter if kids are unvaccinated, then it
Speaker:will spread through the kids.
Speaker:And if you're an 80% of adults, 60% of the total population.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Correct.
Speaker:So I think this would have been talking about people 16 years, plus
Speaker:I think so time to move on to some modeling and let me just quickly
Speaker:see where we are on that one.
Speaker:So.
Speaker:I'll get rid of that stuff on the screen.
Speaker:So we all look a bit bigger, right.
Speaker:So what do we have here?
Speaker:It's going to be the pandemic of the unvaccinated essentially
Speaker:is what is becoming obvious.
Speaker:So bricks, now this article might be a week old or something, but at
Speaker:that point, current numbers from new south Wales shall have the 66
Speaker:people in ICU, 59 are not vaccinated.
Speaker:Seven have had one dose.
Speaker:No one currently in ICU or requiring ventilation has been fully vaccinated.
Speaker:So that was in Sydney probably about a week ago.
Speaker:By the age of that article.
Speaker:I'm not exactly sure.
Speaker:I, I honestly, 98% in the states critical care patients or deaths are on vaccines.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:So it's going to be a pandemic of the unvaccinated in Iceland.
Speaker:They've got 93% of the population, 16 years or older vaccinated, they're
Speaker:getting 2,783 cases over the past 30 days.
Speaker:They've had no deaths in the past 30 days from COVID because that high
Speaker:vaccination rate, so what we need to do is a quick recap on our national plan.
Speaker:So this was about phase I B, C, and D I say, phases on stun.
Speaker:Does do people stay?
Speaker:Yeah, the plan was it, the plan is to get Morrison reelected.
Speaker:That's the plan.
Speaker:That seems to be the plan.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So there was phase a phase B phase C and phase D.
Speaker:So phase I was pretty much where we are at the moment.
Speaker:Phase B was supposedly 70% vaccination.
Speaker:Where lockdowns would be less likely.
Speaker:And some of the special rules would be easing restrictions
Speaker:on vaccinated residents.
Speaker:So maybe vaccinated people would have a bit more freedom to oh,
Speaker:Constance or something like that.
Speaker:Oh, no, you do that.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So that was guys be 70% vaccination lockdowns, less
Speaker:likely maybe some special deals.
Speaker:If you're vaccinated in phase C, that was 80% vaccination.
Speaker:Now this is sort of 16 years and older.
Speaker:And what that was looking at was highly targeted lockdowns only, and looking
Speaker:at potentially exempting vaccinated residents from all domestic restrictions.
Speaker:So so pretty much that was phase C.
Speaker:Phase D was basically going to be highly quarantined for
Speaker:high risk inbound travelers.
Speaker:So this sort of 70% lockdowns, less likely 80% highly targeted lockdowns only.
Speaker:And so there was a report called the Dougherty report, which has come out and
Speaker:it was asked to define a target level of vaccine coverage for transmission,
Speaker:but for transmission, for to phase B of the national plane, where lockdowns
Speaker:would be less likely but possible.
Speaker:So so the Dougherty report is what's been talked about a fair bit lately, and
Speaker:I'm just going to put up on the screen now, a bit of luck, but the dirty report
Speaker:summary is for those in the chat room.
Speaker:So.
Speaker:If the vaccination rate for 16 years and older was 70% that would
Speaker:mean of the total population.
Speaker:It's 56%.
Speaker:And they thought that if there was effective what they called testing
Speaker:tracing isolation and quarantine that would still have to go on
Speaker:the deaths might be 1,520 at 70%.
Speaker:And at 80%, the deaths might be 980 per year.
Speaker:So that's what the Dougherty report kind of came up with.
Speaker:In a nutshell, the problem was the dirty reports seem to
Speaker:be premised on us, starting.
Speaker:Not many cases, which meant that the testing and tracing and the isolation
Speaker:and the quarantine would be quite effective because there wouldn't be
Speaker:that many people sick so that the testing and tracing authorities could
Speaker:actually do the job effectively.
Speaker:And now that new south Wales is getting continually out of control,
Speaker:that scenario doesn't really apply.
Speaker:So they've basically gone back to the Doherty Institute and said, redo the
Speaker:figures instead of a starting point of 30 people infected, you can have
Speaker:to start with thousands and trying to tell us what the figure is then.
Speaker:So so that's the Dougherty report and it's the problem with models
Speaker:like we've talked about in the past.
Speaker:Anyone who has faith in a models never been involved in the making of a model?
Speaker:Well, I was going to say I was listening to an epidemiologist talking
Speaker:and he said, all models are wrong.
Speaker:Some models are useful.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And so I've been looking at this Dowdy model and the Grattan
Speaker:Institute did a model as well.
Speaker:And and I think the so the Delta variant it's, it's sort of our number.
Speaker:This is the number of people that are infected person will infect.
Speaker:So it's somewhere around the 5, 6, 7 sort of mark in terms of the number of people
Speaker:that, that that the, the, our number is.
Speaker:And you can reduce that our number with effective tracing
Speaker:and isolation and quarantine.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:So so they pulled out some numbers, I'll put this on the screen as well,
Speaker:build up, and they put a number of scenarios where there was 50%, 70%,
Speaker:75% and 80% vaccination coverage.
Speaker:And then they assumed an R number of four, five or six in terms of how, how
Speaker:easily it spread and running the numbers.
Speaker:You get a huge variation depending on this.
Speaker:So for example, I'll just take one, which is the 75% vaccination coverage.
Speaker:And the peak daily cases would be 73,000.
Speaker:The peak ICU use would be 8,000.
Speaker:And the Tova deaths a year would be seven and a half thousand.
Speaker:But if the number instead of being six was five, then instead of seven
Speaker:and a half thousand deaths, it's 320.
Speaker:So these, this sort of exponential growth of the Delta variation, when
Speaker:you, when you're talking exponential growth, the slightest change in this,
Speaker:our number makes a huge difference.
Speaker:Again at the 80% vaccination coverage, actually.
Speaker:Sorry, I haven't got that on the screen.
Speaker:I'll have that up.
Speaker:Ju just as a aside, I've just looked measles has an
Speaker:arm zero of 16 to 18, right?
Speaker:Highly infectious.
Speaker:It is incredibly infectious.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So back to this Grattan Institute modeling this scenario at 80% vaccination
Speaker:coverage, if the effective, our number is six, there's going to be 2,250 deaths.
Speaker:But if the number is five, that's going to be 10.
Speaker:So models, models, like honestly, you cannot look at these models if
Speaker:you see them with any confidence at all, because you have no idea
Speaker:how effective any of these sort of restrictions will be on this, our number.
Speaker:Have you seen the there's a scientific body in the UK?
Speaker:I think called Sabre who advised the government and their job is to
Speaker:do effectively worst case scenarios for the government to be able to.
Speaker:And they have said that if COVID mutates like MERS was that
Speaker:had a 33% or 30% death rate.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So that doesn't happen.
Speaker:Yes, effectively.
Speaker:They're saying one of the possibilities is that COVID could
Speaker:mutate and become more deadly.
Speaker:And, and in that case, if you're having, you know, a thousand
Speaker:cases a day, a thousand infections a day, 300 of those will die.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:Let's hope we don't get anywhere near that.
Speaker:But this, I just found this one from the Grattan Institute, really interesting.
Speaker:Just the same group they're running the models.
Speaker:And just the one change.
Speaker:If instead of infecting six people on average, you infect
Speaker:five on average, then the day.
Speaker:Go from seven and a half thousand down to 320, I just found it quite
Speaker:extraordinary how that worked.
Speaker:And so if you see models and when the Dodi report comes out with theirs, it's really
Speaker:a going to be a it's a guessing game.
Speaker:And I think we're just going to reach the point where they'll try things for a bit.
Speaker:They'll try it unrestricted when we get to 80%.
Speaker:And if it gets out of control and death seemed to start gathering up
Speaker:quicker than they modeled that I would.
Speaker:And we'll be back to restrictions.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:A real life experiment is really what will be done.
Speaker:You can, you can have a model to give you some idea of what might happen, but gee,
Speaker:you wouldn't put a lot of faith in it.
Speaker:Would you?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:You can say, like from the public figures, the chief health officers, we haven't
Speaker:come across so we can do our best to predict and hypothesize, but yeah, w we
Speaker:can see, so there are very simple steps to reduce the Azara and wearing a mask.
Speaker:Honestly, if the two of you are w so if the infected person on the
Speaker:non-infected person wears a mask, suddenly the R zero drops by.
Speaker:Even if it's only two, if your job's from six to four, it makes a huge difference.
Speaker:And people go, oh, you know, a mask doesn't stop the virus.
Speaker:If it stops 90% of the load coming out of your body.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:That's enough.
Speaker:And, and the same with, you know people are talking about w the,
Speaker:the air that we accept to breathe.
Speaker:We wouldn't accept drinking water at that clutter.
Speaker:And so I think there is going to become a lot more focus on
Speaker:fresh air in public spaces.
Speaker:This idea of recycling air through the air conditioning
Speaker:system over and over and over.
Speaker:There is probably going to be a complete rethink of public spaces, public
Speaker:buildings, and somewhere in Europe, I think Belgium has now enforced air
Speaker:quality monitoring, basically monitoring carbon dioxide levels as a proxy of
Speaker:how much fresh air there is because obviously we breathe out carbon dioxide.
Speaker:And so the more people you get into a space, the more carbon dioxide you
Speaker:breathe out and they have set thresholds that effectively, once you reach one
Speaker:threshold, you, I think you need to get fresh air in above a certain threshold.
Speaker:The building shut down, and this is all about reducing transmissibility.
Speaker:Can you tell me Joe, as anybody else built quarantine facilities, any
Speaker:other countries with that in mind?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And so that podcast was talking about how hotel quarantine was the worst thing
Speaker:we could have done shutting everyone in these rooms with shared air conditioning.
Speaker:And how, if we just use motels instead, or like the Northern territory camp?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:There everyone was in separate donors.
Speaker:It basically, it almost certainly wouldn't have broken out a quarantine.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So what was I going to say on that?
Speaker:So anyway, when you see a model come out, when the Dodi report comes out
Speaker:take it all with a grain of salt.
Speaker:And yeah, definitely the mask wearing is going to be with us for a long time.
Speaker:For that very reason.
Speaker:It's a big effect on that, our number.
Speaker:And when we get to the vaccination levels of 75, 80, 80 5% shifting
Speaker:that our number down just one or two notches is just going to have been
Speaker:the difference between thousands of people dying and potentially a handful.
Speaker:Amazing.
Speaker:If you get nothing else from this episode, deal not go for that one.
Speaker:Now, does anyone else talking of masks, get frustrated with people
Speaker:who wear them around their chin.
Speaker:He goes to the shopping center and it's it's under their nose.
Speaker:Cause apparently they don't breathe out of their nose.
Speaker:Yeah, it's saying why.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Oh, I know what it's going to say.
Speaker:My friends from Victoria who come up to well, they went up to Cairns he months
Speaker:ago when they are able to, for the most recent lockdown and they just made the
Speaker:point that there's so much more outdoor dining in Queensland and to pay to
Speaker:Victoria and even just shops, like we often have the door is open to a shop.
Speaker:Like it's a big, wide entrance.
Speaker:That's never sort of closed, whereas, but there is an air Victoria.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:But in Victoria, it's a much more confined areas.
Speaker:Not nearly as outdoorsy as we are with our lifestyle in Queensland
Speaker:that's to the well, we've been lucky.
Speaker:I, it would be interesting to see what effect because obviously with
Speaker:air conditioning, you don't want to lose your cold air inside the door.
Speaker:And so they blast air down vertically across the doorway to stop all their
Speaker:escaping and whether that would stop the fresh air mixing or whether that
Speaker:would be the same as a closed door.
Speaker:I don't know.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:But my little island retreat that I was just on, we ate out every night and every
Speaker:breakfast, but it was always outdoors on a patio area and everybody else was as well.
Speaker:It was, yeah.
Speaker:Saying couldn't do any Victoria.
Speaker:Okay.
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Speaker:I thank you very much for your time, right?
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Now next topic is.
Speaker:Where are we up to in terms of time I 26?
Speaker:Let's let's do a little bit on Afghanistan.
Speaker:So thoughts as you look at it shy, and you see the images of the air lift and
Speaker:all the rest of it, what impressions do you have of the whole thing?
Speaker:Do you think this is a fiasco and Joe Biden's insane and
Speaker:they should be staying there?
Speaker:Or do you have an opinion about it at all?
Speaker:Does it strike you one layer?
Speaker:Well, I did a semi-related piece of assessment at uni.
Speaker:So I'm studying a degree in justice and the assignment task was to come up
Speaker:with a policy solution for holding our soldiers to account for their war crimes.
Speaker:And when I got that assignment, I was like,
Speaker:but luckily they fell.
Speaker:I downstairs is ex-army.
Speaker:So I asked him if I could come over for a beer and pick his brain about
Speaker:what they already have in place, what types of things they have.
Speaker:And he was like, yeah, sure.
Speaker:As long as I don't end up being with but shout out to Tim, if you're listening,
Speaker:he basically said to me that He finds it highly suspicious that the Burton report
Speaker:came out and basically cleared all the top headquarter staff of any knowledge.
Speaker:And that it's much the same, whether it was Joe Biden, Donald
Speaker:Trump, the Taliban, they have been negotiating this exit for months.
Speaker:They have known it's happening for months that they didn't put any
Speaker:structures in to start evacuating people sooner, frankly is just garbage.
Speaker:They knew they've known for months and they, they opted out.
Speaker:So the, the applicants took it down.
Speaker:Trump's proudly announcing his agreement with the Taliban.
Speaker:The Republicans took off their website the day after the evacuation so that they
Speaker:could point the fingers at Biden, but it was Trump who negotiated the ceasefire.
Speaker:It was Trump who negotiated that withdrawal.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:And just so structures in place and that's, regardless of whether
Speaker:it's Australian or American, we're both kind of, I dunno, shrug
Speaker:their shoulders and it's yeah.
Speaker:I, when I saw that footage, I like cried cause it's so heartbreaking.
Speaker:The Republicans would say, well it's a shoddy exit.
Speaker:It could have been done much better than this.
Speaker:And I guess Biden would say, well, the military, tell me it wasn't
Speaker:going to happen over the weekend.
Speaker:Like a deed.
Speaker:We thought we had a few months at the end of the day, I don't think there's
Speaker:ever a pretty exit from that situation.
Speaker:It's not like you're retreating over the border.
Speaker:You're just retreating to the capital city.
Speaker:And it was always going to be an airlift of sorts.
Speaker:So it's interesting that, you know, the Taliban basically have
Speaker:allowed a hundred thousand people.
Speaker:My airplane, like they actually facilitated it and they worked together
Speaker:with the USA in terms of allowing people into the airport to escape quite
Speaker:extraordinary, really think about it.
Speaker:So it didn't shoot down any of the planes.
Speaker:And I think about a hundred thousand people have been evacuated.
Speaker:So and then, you know, the only incident besides just general chaos was the suicide
Speaker:bomber and that was Al Qaeda and ISIS.
Speaker:Sorry.
Speaker:So hadn't blown up devices, air strikes.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Sworn enemies of the television in the USA.
Speaker:So you're doing well when you're the enemy of the television in the USA,
Speaker:even the Taliban can't stomach you.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:But I dunno.
Speaker:I just think it's quite an extraordinary thing.
Speaker:That they basically stood back and even assisted the exit
Speaker:of a hundred thousand people.
Speaker:I heard a quote from a woman who was saying an Afghan woman who was saying
Speaker:yeah, the U S were propping up all Lords who were just as bad as the Taliban.
Speaker:So effectively, there were three people subjugating Afghan women.
Speaker:It was the U S army.
Speaker:It was the Taliban and it was the local warlords.
Speaker:And now that the Americans are gone, there's only two of them subjugating.
Speaker:So there's slightly more hope.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:It's just one, one of the troublemakers out of the scene.
Speaker:So it all comes back to this thing that these people have to
Speaker:have to go through the process of changing the society themselves.
Speaker:You just can't impose these things from outside and expect to get.
Speaker:Acceptance.
Speaker:These people have to be allowed to do it their own way.
Speaker:And so I was listening to some stuff today, basically talk, I think it was
Speaker:a late night live, basically making the point that the Taliban say what
Speaker:you like about the Taliban, but they at least are very anti-corruption and they
Speaker:will enforce a legal system of sorts.
Speaker:Now it's going to be Sharia law, but at least people could
Speaker:actually get some things enforced.
Speaker:And they're very hard on corruption.
Speaker:So they actually have some things going for them that would appeal to people.
Speaker:You can understand, some people would go, this place has been chaotic.
Speaker:At least I can get some things done with the Taliban in place.
Speaker:The Muslim brotherhood in Egypt was very much the same that
Speaker:there was lots of corruption.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And the Muslim brotherhood came in and said, we will stamp out corruption.
Speaker:We will provide food.
Speaker:So the sick the poor, you know but you have to accept a law.
Speaker:So for a lot of people, it was a trade off.
Speaker:They were willing to pay.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:So I optimistic, oh, it's going to be a disaster for the year and there'll
Speaker:be a, I wouldn't want to be there.
Speaker:I wouldn't want any, it's going to be very hard, but it's, it's always been hard.
Speaker:Well, that's what happens when multinationals, well, when, when
Speaker:empires keep inviting you all the time you know, the USA is just
Speaker:the most recent in a long line.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Russia, before that.
Speaker:On goals before that, like they just keep coming through British before.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:So if, you know, they really need a chance to do it from within and do
Speaker:it themselves in order to change, just imposing it from the outside and
Speaker:expecting these people to swallow it.
Speaker:Whatever's imposed on them, just isn't going to work.
Speaker:So I listened to a British army interpreter who worked, served out
Speaker:loud and he said, we, we assume that it's us versus the Taliban.
Speaker:And he said that it isn't, it's, inter-tribal eight seats, family
Speaker:level conflicts that have been going on for thousands of years.
Speaker:And the foreigners coming in are just seen as easy sources of cash and weapons
Speaker:to carry on these tribal conflicts.
Speaker:And until they sought out their tribal conflicts, it's
Speaker:going to make no difference.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:And if, if the Taliban sought out the corruption issue, that's one
Speaker:of the biggest issue that they need to get a grip of in that country.
Speaker:So once you've sorted the corruption out to some extent, then you can
Speaker:start working on other things.
Speaker:But if you, if you're just a corrupt society, then you
Speaker:can't really work on anything.
Speaker:So so look getting the Americans out.
Speaker:Let, if, if people just let them alone long enough, then who knows what could
Speaker:happen, but it's never going to happen with outsiders imposing their view.
Speaker:So let me quote some stuff here.
Speaker:This is from the John McAdoo blog.
Speaker:The first general lesson for Australia as an ally of the us is to recognize
Speaker:that many Americans are congenitally, unable to comprehend their anniversaries
Speaker:or to accord them for life.
Speaker:They cannot accept that other nations won't simply be prepared to abandon
Speaker:their own history and culture and the norms and institutions that have given
Speaker:rise to they've given rise to, for an American style democratic capitalist
Speaker:model Americans as a group, don't seem to understand that when forced to
Speaker:jettison their traditional institutions, administration, and governance practices
Speaker:and models, there will be resistance and backlash and enormous opportunities
Speaker:for corruption and incompetence.
Speaker:It's exactly right.
Speaker:They just think, oh, if we show these people wonderful Western liberal democracy
Speaker:they'll just jump at it and it'll all be over and that's just not how it works.
Speaker:They just don't get it.
Speaker:So it's called serfdom, right?
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:American democracy.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:So I'm actually next week, I think I might do a book review on.
Speaker:The shock doctrine, I think because people look at the third world, if
Speaker:you like, or developing countries and, and, and they see them as corrupt, see
Speaker:them as just not adopting the wonderful Western liberal democratic system.
Speaker:If only they would do it, then they would be just like us and I.
Speaker:These people are just never allowed to there's these impositions put on them,
Speaker:whether militarily by the us inviting them or financially by the international
Speaker:monetary fund in the world bank just constraining what they do, where they're
Speaker:not allowed to develop technologies because the us and others have these sort
Speaker:of copyrights in place and patents that never allow them to develop technology.
Speaker:So they're just left to grow bananas and dig up rocks out of the soil and
Speaker:they can't do the valuated things that Western countries can do.
Speaker:So this sort of behind the eight ball anyway, I think there might be next week.
Speaker:So there's a lot of criticism of Joe Biden, but I think full credit to
Speaker:him, he decided no we're out of here.
Speaker:And there would have been a lot of generals saying, oh, another
Speaker:six months, another 12 months.
Speaker:And he said, no, we're, we're out of here.
Speaker:There was actually an agreement with the Taliban that they would be out by
Speaker:August, whatever it was, because I think it was an August date because they were
Speaker:saying you've, you've made this deal.
Speaker:And if you're not out by this date, there will be repercussions.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:So, so the date was imposed on him by an agreement that he
Speaker:hadn't been party to, right?
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So.
Speaker:So that's that.
Speaker:And just in terms of our involvement in Vietnam, again, the essential report
Speaker:came out with with a poll of Australians.
Speaker:So how strongly do you agree or disagree with the following statements about
Speaker:Australia's involvement in the 20 year conflict in Afghanistan is the
Speaker:one that got me was the deployment of Australian troops in Afghanistan
Speaker:has benefited Afghanistan and its inhabitants 42% of Australians.
Speaker:Agree with that.
Speaker:And only 22% disagree.
Speaker:What do you 2% say the deployment of Australian troops has benefited
Speaker:Afghanistan and it's, you know, I'm saving because for my assignment, I
Speaker:had to I had to look for, or sort of give some sort of substantiate that
Speaker:what appetite the electorate had for holding Afghan soldiers to account.
Speaker:And I couldn't find anything, but I could have, might've made a, been
Speaker:at been able to make that work.
Speaker:So, Dan, yeah.
Speaker:Well only came out today, showing central report only came out today.
Speaker:So yeah, 42% of Australians think the deployment of trained troops
Speaker:in Afghanistan has benefited Afghanistan and its inhabitants.
Speaker:Like, it's not like that was going great under like the back to square one, the
Speaker:starters worse than square one, arguably.
Speaker:And.
Speaker:Yeah, tell veins back in charge and it wasn't the great 20 years.
Speaker:Anyway, there's a big disparity between the urban and the regional areas.
Speaker:Ah, I'm quite shocked that so many Australians think so positively
Speaker:about our involvement there.
Speaker:I am surprised by that.
Speaker:So let me see.
Speaker:So that's Afghanistan.
Speaker:I think anybody got anything else they want to add about
Speaker:Afghanistan before I move on?
Speaker:No, no, I don't think so.
Speaker:Unless you want to hear my policy solution, this is your policy as
Speaker:to justice in terms of dealing with war crimes by Australian troops.
Speaker:And what was your pilot?
Speaker:Well, what is your policy solution?
Speaker:So my policy solution was clutching at straws, but there's
Speaker:an international criminal court.
Speaker:So the case that the government repeals laws that they brought
Speaker:in, where they basically Australia is in principle aligned with an
Speaker:international criminal court.
Speaker:But we have laws to say that we'll basically deal with anything.
Speaker:John Howard brought in laws that says we're going to
Speaker:deal with anything in house.
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So I made an argument that we could repeal that law, that we
Speaker:could have our soldiers go off to the international criminal court.
Speaker:Where, where on the grounds that they would get an impartial
Speaker:hearing because the Barisone report doesn't strike me as impartial.
Speaker:Rolling.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:No electoral appetite for that at all.
Speaker:So you had the crazy idea that Australian troops could just comply
Speaker:with international law, at least be put, because I just don't think
Speaker:there'll be found guilty even the way the Barrett's port was collected.
Speaker:They asked soldiers without actually saying to the soldiers,
Speaker:like what might be at stake that these matters could be put forward.
Speaker:So I think most of the evidence is what do you call it?
Speaker:Inadmissible.
Speaker:So it would be basically a way to look good and get a fair trial, possibly get
Speaker:a really good outcome for everybody.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And, and for those soldiers, for the soldiers who spoke up and
Speaker:said, this is actually isn't okay.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Things happened cause that they lost their livelihoods.
Speaker:They lost their careers.
Speaker:They've had battles with their mental health as a result of being a snitch.
Speaker:One of the SAS troops who spoke up, had explosives outside of our house.
Speaker:So, you know, there is a case to make, even though, even though
Speaker:Australians probably don't have an appetite for, for doing it still
Speaker:could be the right thing to do.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:That was my policy solution.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:I sounds fair enough.
Speaker:I have just this one concern where I think of soldiers 18, 19, 20, throwing
Speaker:into these conflicts, which are not like the second world war where, you know,
Speaker:you're there, it's gorilla warfare.
Speaker:It's this you're in amongst where you, you don't know friend
Speaker:or foe, they all look the same.
Speaker:It'd be very stressful situation for soldiers in a Vietnam,
Speaker:Ghana, Stan type role where.
Speaker:You know, you, you take a hill and in Vietnam, for example, and then you're
Speaker:back there the next week taking the same hill and, and you're, you're going
Speaker:through a village and you don't know whether the Vietcong in here or not.
Speaker:You don't know whether these are the people you're trying to protect,
Speaker:or the people are going to try and kill you the same in Afghanistan.
Speaker:You just don't know.
Speaker:I just have a lot of sympathy for the stress that would be on a young
Speaker:man in that situation who might then do something really bad and high,
Speaker:a big price for, but they'll put in a terribly difficult situation.
Speaker:There is a huge difference between an enlisted soldier and an SAS trooper.
Speaker:The SAS troopers are trained to within an inch of their lives.
Speaker:None of them are 17, 18, 19.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:They've all got years of service behind them.
Speaker:It's, it's not that this is a one off that this is a snap thing.
Speaker:This speaks to a culture of entitlement that comes from the top all the way down.
Speaker:Even if it's not condoned, it's certainly not stamped out, but still
Speaker:you've got guys put into that culture.
Speaker:It's a very, you know, loyal T to the brotherhood type culture.
Speaker:I agree one's doing it.
Speaker:And the change has to come from the top and I, yeah, I just have some sympathy
Speaker:for it wouldn't be easy at times to say, no, I'm not doing that now.
Speaker:It's all very easy back here to say that.
Speaker:So, so Mila, I was stopped by a helicopter pilot who pulled her.
Speaker:Pissed aloud and threatened to shoot American soldiers in
Speaker:the middle of the massacre.
Speaker:Indeed.
Speaker:And that was extraordinary.
Speaker:That was extraordinary.
Speaker:Would you have done that?
Speaker:I don't know until you're in this situation, how can you honestly say
Speaker:find it so extraordinary makes it think that we probably wouldn't have, and
Speaker:if he had turned his back and walked away, is he as guilty of a war crime
Speaker:for having allowed, allowed attack?
Speaker:It's just, he was an officer.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:As, as an AMA and he would have been an officer, so yeah.
Speaker:In fact, he would have been more than complicit as the senior or
Speaker:one of the senior officers onsite.
Speaker:So to allow that, to carry on.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Anyway, I'm just, I agree.
Speaker:It's good idea that they should be subject to international law and
Speaker:adjudication by independent body.
Speaker:That's good.
Speaker:Part of the case was is that perhaps with that level of impartiality, they
Speaker:might be able to give us some more dirt on more people up the chain.
Speaker:Like yeah, because I, I, my ideal solution was to hold the big, the
Speaker:big boys, you know, like John Howard to account, but I had to be able to
Speaker:bind a policy solution that had been used somewhere else in the world.
Speaker:So as far as I could tell, we hadn't ever successfully tried a
Speaker:prime minister for Rowan that they didn't commit, but had directed to.
Speaker:So anyway, that Paul would say that's left work, gone crazy yet.
Speaker:But I remember the opposite with the SAS shooting, IRA members in general.
Speaker:And the outcry in the British press that these, these poor, our IRA members
Speaker:had been shot dead and hadn't been arrested and allowed to face God.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:And the point was, they were planning to set off a bomb in the middle of a tourist.
Speaker:It was a military parade in front of tourists.
Speaker:So they were going to, they were going to kill hundreds of tourists and they
Speaker:were shot dead by the SAS, whether it was justified or not certainly this
Speaker:wasn't innocent villages that the soldiers didn't know right or wrong.
Speaker:These were criminals who were in the process of a crime
Speaker:of a terrorist atrocity.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:So I don't know that the military is always given a free pass to comparing,
Speaker:you know, what has gone on here.
Speaker:With the accountability that has been held in other places, again with SAS,
Speaker:I think maybe it needs a, a whistle blowing service, somebody
Speaker:who you can anonymously contact.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Well man, the, my next one I have, I did discuss that, that the army doesn't have
Speaker:a, you know, HR department for national security reasons and that type of thing.
Speaker:And certainly like at Quantis and in my experience in a, in a range of things
Speaker:where I've basically had to deviate from procedure or had to make a complaint,
Speaker:having that separate structure.
Speaker:Like I, a security, like I hate department, like my chain of command.
Speaker:I have a whole range of accessible places that I can go to report something.
Speaker:And then I've got a whole range of going somewhere else, if I'm
Speaker:not satisfied with the outcome.
Speaker:And it seems like the army doesn't have that.
Speaker:So if you're being bullied by your commanding officer, you go to his
Speaker:commanding officer and that's it.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And that actually doesn't work all of the time.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So it was one of your recommendations, our HR department for the no stuck
Speaker:with international criminal court.
Speaker:I just stuck to one thing I wanted to do HR, but I, again, I couldn't find
Speaker:any other military service that also offers the HR department in the world.
Speaker:You know obviously there was the TV show JAG.
Speaker:Is there a effectively military police service that is responsible
Speaker:for the behavior of soldiers?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:But that's about prosecuting them after they've reached some military rules.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Or it's just like a private police force for dealing with military personnel.
Speaker:Isn't it?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:That definitely, that definitely would be someone somewhere.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Find it in time.
Speaker:All right, well I'm going to leave my social contract talk quite another time.
Speaker:I think that'll be Nick.
Speaker:Next week, I think, oh, well next week it'll just be me and somebody or
Speaker:book review or something like that.
Speaker:So we will come back as a panel in two weeks time in the chat room.
Speaker:Thank you.
Speaker:Lots of comments.
Speaker:They are you guys chat away amongst yourselves about all sorts of things.
Speaker:It's hard to keep track of what you're actually, because you're referring to
Speaker:what other people have said good on you.
Speaker:What Lee's been busy in there in very busy bottling.
Speaker:So may I make a request?
Speaker:I of the audience, I finally got the courage to listen back to my previous
Speaker:episodes and got used to my voice and I actually don't see that I'm improving.
Speaker:So what I thought about might be worthwhile is I would love it if
Speaker:an audience member might be able to give some of their time to
Speaker:just riff with me prior to a show.
Speaker:So if any of you are interested in that, could you please pass your
Speaker:contact details on to Trevor and say, yes, I'd be willing to talk to Shay to
Speaker:just like, not out some of the issues.
Speaker:And it would be good if you were someone that's really cutthroat and down the line.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Feelings.
Speaker:Just like to say, what's your point, what's your view?
Speaker:You haven't done this, so you haven't done that.
Speaker:And I'll be able to just like develop myself much more quickly in that way.
Speaker:So anyway, Yes.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I think that was, that's a different thing.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:I heard it.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I just thought I'd throw it out there.
Speaker:If, if anybody's I don't know, got some spare time that
Speaker:would be really useful to me.
Speaker:And I'd really appreciate that.
Speaker:So I just Pasco details onto travel and I'll take it from there.
Speaker:Go to the website, hit the contact link and send us a note and I'll pass
Speaker:you onto Shai and you can riff away and practice all that sort of stuff.
Speaker:So so that's all good.
Speaker:Yeah, I don't think I can go too much further.
Speaker:I'll spend too much time back in those messages, but good on you for everyone
Speaker:who was in there and chatting away amongst yourselves, much appreciated.
Speaker:Yeah, if you've seen any articles.
Speaker:Ah, thanks, John.
Speaker:Perfect.
Speaker:Yeah, actually I do have John's details.
Speaker:I can give that to you.
Speaker:So, all right.
Speaker:Well, a bit of wind up.
Speaker:Thank you for your attention and your listening.
Speaker:Thank you to the patrons as well.
Speaker:That's much appreciated and we'll talk to the panel in two weeks time,
Speaker:but I'll be back maybe an interview, maybe a book review, not sure next
Speaker:week about something, but until then.
Speaker:Bye for now.
Speaker:Goodbye.
Speaker:Thanks for tonight.
Speaker:Good night from him.
