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Category Archives: Liberal

WATCH: Mark Wahlberg ditched liberal California to ‘give my kids a better life’ – Washington Examiner

Posted: October 15, 2022 at 5:29 pm

Actor Mark Wahlberg said he moved his family out of California to give his children a better life.

"I moved to California many years ago to pursue acting and Ive only made a couple of movies in the entire time that I was there," he told CBS's The Talk on Tuesday. "So, to be able to give my kids a better life and follow and pursue their dreams whether it be my daughter as an equestrian, my son as a basketball player, my younger son as a golfer, this made a lot more sense for us."

ANOTHER FLOUNDERING TURNOUT FOR CNN WITH JAKE TAPPER'S PRIMETIME SHOW DEBUT

The actor described wanting to build a studio in his new state and make a "Hollywood 2.0" in Nevada so that he can work from home.

"So, we came here to just kind of give ourselves a new look, a fresh start for the kids, and theres a lot of opportunity here. Im really excited about the future, he continued.

"There's lots of opportunity here," Wahlberg added.

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In a 2016 interview, he told Task & Purpose that many celebrities talk about politics a lot more than they ought to. A lot of Hollywood is living in a bubble," he said. "Theyre pretty out of touch with the common person, the everyday guy out there providing for their family.

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WATCH: Mark Wahlberg ditched liberal California to 'give my kids a better life' - Washington Examiner

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A Liberal View of the Hijab Controversy – The Citizen

Posted: at 5:29 pm

We can only sympathise with the honourable Judges of the Supreme Court, who have accomplished a thankless task this week, while giving their verdict on the hijab issue. There are already serious clashes on the matter across the world and within the country, sometimes even among those who claim to share the same principles, ideology and religion.

Liberals are being mocked for supporting the women protesting against the hijab in Iran, while defending those claiming the right to wear it in India. The clamour of the debate is also silencing many voices, within and outside the Muslim community.

Countries which have good credentials as functional democracies cannot give us any pointers on proper secular behaviour. This is something that every nation must decide for itself within its own historical and socio-political context.

The French approach to the hijab issue is widely misunderstood. Secularism is enshrined in the French principle of Lacit. This is a freedom that the country has won after more than a century of battle against religious forces.

The French Revolution of 1789 and subsequent outbursts were a fight not only against autocratic monarchs, but also against the powers and privileges of churches, particularly of the Catholic church. Which is why the different republics and constitutions of France have ruthlessly enforced the separation of the Church from the State.

A major plank of this division is the refusal to permit citizens to wear clothing identified with religion in any public space. The French ban on the hijab and the identifying marks of religions arises not from a dislike of Islam, but from a determination to never again return the control of secular spaces to religious organisations.

But, even the French are conflicted, when nuns, devout Catholics sporting crosses, turbaned Sikhs and members of certain Jewish communities who insist on wearing religious insignia move around in their roads, parks and schools. The UK, which still cannot have a Catholic head of State because the King is also the head of the Anglican Church, is certainly in no position to teach us lessons in secularism.

We must, therefore, forge our own unique Indian approach to this thorny issue in accordance with the country's religious and social diversity and our desire to create a modern, cosmopolitan environment. Most Indians do not realise that we are the country with the largest number of religions in the world: Hinduism, Christianity (one of Jesus's apostles, Thomas, came to India and we have almost every variant of Christianity in our country), Islam in many forms, Buddhism (which spread across the world out of India), Jainism and Sikhism.

Secularism is not a modern concept imported from the Western world. Every part of India has forged its own way of peaceful coexistence, using methods by which shrines of different faiths huddle together in harmony and pilgrimages are made to common temples. This symbiosis is reflected in sages like Shirdi Sai Baba, the Muslim seer, who is revered by most Hindus.

Exclusion of costumes associated with religious identity in public spaces in the French style is, therefore, impossible in India. Hindus must sport bindis and caste marks, Sikhs must wear turbans and kirpans, Christians must put on scapulas and crosses and Jews their skull caps. Muslims, too, must put on fezes, if they wish to.

When I was growing up in Kerala as a child, I saw different kinds of mundu worn differently by Hindus, Muslims and Christians. These distinctions have now disappeared, since use of the mundu has become rarer. Apparently, therefore, there should be no controversy about the use of the hijab.

But, this is not a straightforward matter. Both supporters and opponents of the hijab have communal agendas for which the costume is only a symbol. They are determined to drive the discussion to the brink to provoke violence and conflict.

We are not even told exactly what the issue is. I would like to drop the use of terms like hijab and purdah (the elephant in the room that is not talked about) and simply ask if the demand is for covering the head. This is a common practice among many religious communities. Catholic women in Kerala and in countries like Spain and Portugal do so while going to church. Hindu women of north India cover their heads too as a mark of respect, while greeting older members of the family.

Orthodox Rajasthani women of some communities even draw their dupattas across their faces. Head coverings are also mandatory for men in many religions. There is nothing controversial in this request.

If the demand is for women alone to put on a black robe and a mask to conceal the body and the face, whatever be the name of the costume (hijab or purdah), we must look at the reasons for this injunction. This is when the misogyny underlying the garb becomes apparent.

Women's bodies and faces evoke impure thoughts and lust in men; hence, they must be concealed to keep women safe. The dress is not linked to religion, for men do not have to follow the practice. No civilised country which gives women equal rights should accept this sort of thinking.

Liberals are conflicted because women themselves wish to conceal their bodies with such robes to protect themselves from the gaze of men in public spaces. This is the "choice" argument that is used to counter the charges of misogyny.

But, the word "choice" can be particularly misleading, when applied to women. This is a group that must pick its words and moderate its behaviour to suit the expectations of the family and of society.

How do we discover if there has been a free and open choice, without pressure or influence? The first ingredient in making a choice is full knowledge of the implications and alternatives.

Most of the women who choose to conceal their bodies and faces are neither aware of the misogyny behind the demand nor the other possibilities open to them. They do not debate the matter with women who live and dress differently. Their families and communities shape their ideas and preferences and influence them covertly and overtly.

Those outside the group have no way of knowing if there has been an independent choice, but they should at least take it with a pinch of salt. At one time, many Muslim women who moved around without black robes and masks were available in India as role models to girls from more conservative families.

Such women are the norm in Muslim countries like Malaysia, Indonesia and Turkey. When many Indians found employment in the oil driven economies of the Middle East (and especially in Saudi Arabia), these modern influences were replaced by a more conservative and retrograde mentality, that associated the misogyny of the face-and-mask covering with faith in Islam. This has led to a backlash in the demands made on Indian Muslim women.

Hindu and Muslim fundamentalists have much to gain from the controversy, but not their women. By bringing the issue to a boil, they are making it impossible to transition easily to a liberated environment in India, to an ambience more in line with the Indonesian and Turkish example, rather than the Saudi Arabian.

I also wonder if the controversy has isolated Muslim women coming from families who do not mask themselves by implicitly requiring them too to proclaim their adherence to the practice as proof of their faith in Islam. What I would like to see, therefore, is free use of head coverings and religious marks of all religions in public and private spaces. To encourage families to educate daughters,

I would prefer the State to allow the use of masks and black robes in public spaces; that is, up to the gates of educational institutions. To fight misogyny, however, I would insist on these being removed within classrooms, since security concerns in these areas should be addressed by the authorities.

This was exactly the situation I had known in Kerala, when I was growing up. This was also where we stood in Karnataka before the controversy was ignited. Polarising citizens by creating confrontations will increase the political clout of all fundamentalist groups. It will not, however, do any favour to Indian women.

Renuka Viswanathan is a former civil servant.

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A Liberal View of the Hijab Controversy - The Citizen

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Liberal chair of Taiwan parliamentary group says Taiwan should be at the table with other nations – CBC News

Posted: at 5:29 pm

The chair of Parliament's Canada-Taiwan Friendship Group said Taiwan should be granted membership in international organizations to discuss issues and threats that affect the whole planet.

Speaking in Taipei during the friendship group's visit to Taiwan this week, Liberal MP Judy Sgro said Taiwan should be give membership in the World Health Organization and the International Civil Aviation Organization

"Why wouldn't they be part of WHO and ICAO and those other international organizations? [Their membership] should not be a threat to anyone," she said Friday.

"Taiwan should be at the tableat these major discussions when we talk about health issues and security issues."

The MPs who took part in thevisit to Taiwan included Liberal MP Angelo Lacono, Bloc Qubcois MP Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay and Conservative MPs Chris Lewis and Richard Martel.

China considers Taiwan a breakaway province and views any expression of support by a foreign government as interference in its internal affairs.

Canada has a "one China policy" that does not recognize Taiwan as a sovereign political entity, although Canada has a cultural and trading relationship with the country.

China's embassy in Ottawa was quick to denounce the visit by Canada's parliamentarians.

"Despite China's stern position, JudySgro and [four] other Canadian Parliament members persist in visiting the Taiwan region of China, which blatantly violates the one-China principle, grossly interferes in China's internal affairs and sends a seriouslywrong signal to the Taiwan independence separatist forces," the statement said.

China said in the statement that the "one China policy"is an international norm and the foundation for China'srelations with countries like Canada.

"China will continue to take resolute and strong measures to defend its national sovereignty and territorial integrity, and oppose the interference by external forces in China's internal affairs," the statement said.

Sgro and the other MPs in the group said that despite China's condemnation, the trip was a success because it revealed several business opportunities for both Canadian and Taiwanese companies.

"We're here to learn. We have. We'll take those voices and those messages back to Canada and look where there's opportunities to do those connections and promote businesses," Sgro said.

"The fact that not everyone is happy that we're here, well, that's unfortunate. But we're here and we've had a wonderful week and we look forward to taking the messages back."

Lewis, who represents the Ontario riding of Essex, said the automotive industry in Ontario is struggling with a shortage of some electronic goods produced in Taiwan. While visiting the country, he said, he spoke to manufacturers directly to ask for increased supplies.

"We've got parking lots full of cars, finished product cars,that sit in the parking lot, can't be sold, because we don'thave semiconductors," he said.

Lewis said he and other MPs met with senior executives at Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co Ltd., theworld's largest contract chipmaker, and asked them to "put Canada at the top of the list."

Lewis said MPs were assured that Taiwan is working"very diligently" to build more chips.

During the visit, Sgro was presented with the Special Medal of Diplomacy by Taiwan's Foreign Affairs Minister Joseph Wu in a ceremony in Taipei.

"I appreciate being recognized for all the work that we've done together and I look forward to continuing our friendship for many years to some," she said in a social media post.

Taiwan's ministry for foreign affairs held a dinner for the group and said in a social media post that it appreciates Canada's friendship.

"We're thankful for the support of the like-minded lawmakers and feel truly blessed to call them our friends," the ministry said in thepost.

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Liberal chair of Taiwan parliamentary group says Taiwan should be at the table with other nations - CBC News

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The Liberal Party is in a dire state across Australia right now. That should worry us all – The Conversation

Posted: at 5:29 pm

The duty of an Opposition is to oppose attributed to Lord Randolph Churchill is one of those quotations I remember seeing on exam papers in high school politics classes. It is true, but only half-true.

Tony Abbott opposed. He opposed relentlessly. Assisted by a conservative media that also opposed relentlessly, he did much to help destroy the Labor governments of Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard, although they did a better job of destroying themselves.

When Abbott won a massive victory at the 2013 election, it was easy to proclaim him an all-time champion. In their book Battleground: Why the Liberal Party Shirtfronted Tony Abbott, Wayne Errington and Peter van Onselen thought historians might one day see Abbott as the countrys best ever opposition leader.

Yet the negativity surrounding the role rarely makes opposition leaders popular. Late in 2012, 60% of the public told pollsters they disapproved of the job Abbott was doing.

Read more: Are we learning the wrong lessons from history?

In most occupations, we do not treat people only capable of doing half their job as good at it. Abbott was, at best, capable of doing half his job. Even then, he brought such political aggression and opportunism to the task that it poisoned the well for when he won office. As prime minister, he continued to be the countrys most prominent opposition leader.

Under the system of party government that still operates in Australia, we need effective oppositions. We need them for two reasons. They are there to keep governments accountable. And they are there to prepare for being the government themselves.

Assuming for a moment that both sides of politics accept both democratic norms and that their mission is to serve the public good assumptions that recent US experience, and a little of our own, suggest might be dubious it is beneficial to have changes of government every few years. At best, it can freshen policy, challenge entrenched assumptions, and bring new personnel, energy and life to government.

As in sport, many people are wedded to their own team and want that team to win although in Australian politics, far fewer today than a generation or two ago. But as in a sporting competition in which the same team wins every year, it is not good for democratic politics when one party is permanently excluded from office. That is why those who think the present weakness of the Liberal Party is only a cause for celebration or mockery might do well to think again.

The Liberals weakness is self-evident and, especially at the state level, part of a long-term change in the countrys electoral politics. Labor had only been a majority government once before John Cain junior became Victorian premier in 1982. In the 40 years since, it has only had three terms out of office.

The pattern in South Australia is similar, although the shift there occurred earlier. Decades of Liberal dominance to the mid-1960s were followed by decades of Labor dominance. In Queensland, Labor dominated from 1915 to 1957, the Country Party or Nationals (sometimes partnered by the Liberals) from then until 1989, and Labor has dominated since. In New South Wales, a Coalition government in office since 2011 has moved on to premier number four, looks tired, is often mired in scandal. It faces an uphill battle to be re-elected in March next year.

In the various states, the Liberal Partys position seems dire. A report on the Western Australian branch following its reduction to two lower house seats at the 2021 state election left the impression of an organisation that was a smouldering wreck. The WA Nationals, with four seats, became the opposition. WA voters registered their views again at the 2022 federal election by awarding Labor a swing of more than 10% and electing a teal independent to a formerly safe Liberal seat.

The Victorian Liberal Party, once considered that partys jewel in the crown, has consistently failed to present as a serious alternative to the Andrews Labor government. Its polling is dire in the lead-up to a November election, and it is a regular target of ridicule.

The federal scene, too, is much worse for the Coalition parties than Labors poor primary vote and slight majority at the 2022 election would indicate. That election was a landslide not in favour of Labor but against the Coalition. Its loss of seats to independents in traditional heartlands looks at least as bad and probably worse than the loss of blue-collar support by Labor in many of its own heartlands in the mid-1990s (the latter has, in any case, been consistently exaggerated).

Read more: Did Australia just make a move to the left?

Oppositions do more than compete for government. They also play a crucial role in keeping governments accountable. It is a rare government that can enjoy years in office without becoming just a little arrogant and entitled. Equally seriously, popular and successful governments might perform poorly in some areas. Labor governments in Victoria and WA, for example, have had significant problems in the delivery of health services. It is appropriate and important to have an opposition that can identify and criticise problems as well as suggest alternative policies and provide viable electoral competition.

As we head towards the 50th anniversary of the election of the Whitlam government in December, it may well be that it is Gough Whitlams achievements as opposition leader that should grab our attention. For what it is worth, I consider him the best opposition leader the country has seen. Why? In stark contrast with Abbott, Whitlam was successful both in keeping governments accountable and in preparing for office. No one can accuse Prime Minister Whitlam of behaving as though he were leader of the opposition.

Whitlams government had faults. But his was a government with a genuine sense of purpose. It left a significant, positive and enduring imprint on the country. That had its origins in a fruitful period of opposition.

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The Liberal Party is in a dire state across Australia right now. That should worry us all - The Conversation

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Why ‘Liberals’ Tie Themselves Into Knots Over Hinduism And Hindutva – Swarajya

Posted: at 5:29 pm

One must empathise with Left-liberals who have to perform a high-wire balancing act just to acknowledge the obvious.

For the Left-liberal, Hinduism did not exist before the British came to rule over us; but caste rigidity, which was as much a colonial legacy as anything else, must be labelled as intrinsically Hindu and ancient.

And even when this backdoor nod to Hinduisms existence is accepted, it must be contrasted with vile Hindutva, so that only negative linkages remain to the term Hindu.

The latest liberal to do this kind of balancing act is Pratap Bhanu Mehta, who called out the tendency among some intellectuals to deny Hinduisms existence before colonial interventions made the term more widely usable to describe an Indic plurality.

But before he acknowledged the obvious, from the very first line of his article, he sought to differentiate Hindutva from Hinduism.

He wrote: In part as a reaction to the spiritual desecration, homogenisation and centralisation of Hinduism that Hindutva represents, there is a temptation to take recourse to the idea that Hinduism is a colonial invention and no such identity existed before the 19th century.

Really? Is it the votaries of Hindutva who are desecrating Hinduism or its mindless critics?

The context of Mehtas observation was a recent statement by actor Kamal Haasan, a covert Hinduphobe, who critiqued the film Ponniyin Selvan-I, based on a popular novel written by the late Kalki Krishnamurthy and serialised in the Tamil magazine Kalki in the sixties.

The novel has had, and continues to have, a cult following among some sections of Tamilians. It is a piece of historical fiction set in the Chola era, where some of the finest Hindu temples were built. Most major Tamil dynasties, whether Cholas or Pandyas or Pallavas, were great temple builders.

But Kamal Haasan would have none of it. There was no Hinduism in the Chola era, he said. There were Shaivites and Vaishnavites, no Hindus.

To debunk this nonsense, Mehta, in an article in The Indian Express, had to resort to the subterfuge of bringing in Hindutva to contrast with Hinduism.

He wrote: Recently, the actorKamal Haasanwas reported as referring to this idea in his historical critique ofPonniyin Selvan-I, to flag the dangers of homogenisation in modern representations of Hinduism.

"Kamal Haasans critique has a local context in Tamil Nadu politics. But increasingly, this idea of Hinduism as a British invention is seen as some kind of intellectual response to the claims of Hindutva.

"Many academics and self-proclaimed secularists spout this idea, as if this was common sense. But this idea is itself philosophically nave, culturally ignorant and even politically self-defeating.

Mehta is right to indirectly point out that the mainstream Dravidian political discourse in Tamil Nadu is anti-Hindu, but why does he need to bring in Hindutva, and give it a negative connotation, just to be able to say that denying the existence of Hinduism was philosophically nave, culturally ignorant and even politically self-defeating.

Clearly, liberals fear being cancelled by their own for merely accepting the reality of Hinduisms pre-colonial existence.

Mehta is bang on when he notes that a category can exist even though it may not have a name attached to it, especially when almost every foreign source assumed that Indias plurality existed within a field that made it distinctive.

As one TV debate participant noted, we dont say the human species did not exist before the term homo sapiens was invented. We dont say the American continent did not exist before Amerigo Vespucci and Columbus brought it to the notice of Europeans.

The real problem is why Mehta thinks Hindutva is about spiritual desecration, homogenisation and centralisation of Hinduism? Is the search for common elements (our collective Hinduness) a form of homogenisation and centralisation?

While religion can be vulgarised by (for example) the use of loud Bollywood music during festivals, but is this spiritual desecration when Hinduism does not hold spirituality to be something different from basic human desires?

Hinduism embeds both sublime spirituality and earthy physicality. The four purusharthas: Dharma, Artha, Kama and Moksha, embody this multiplicity of human aspirations. Sensory pleasures were never deemed to be antithetical to more spiritual pursuits.

Where is the attempt at homogeneity, when all that is being attempted under the banner of Hindutva is to find common elements of identity in order to protect the interests of the collective?

Take a different example. When there is no caste called Dalit, why are so many different and unrelated jatis seeking to band themselves together under the term Dalit?

Why do we have a term called feminism, when we know that every woman is different from other women, and groups different from other groups? Is this an attempt at homogeneity?

If Hindutva is homogenisation, then Dalitism the search for an overarching identity in order to protect common interests and rights - is invalid too.

The real issue is not that Hindus are trying to find common linkages to one another, but why they need to do so.

Unlike religions which had clear founders and a set of defined fundamentals, where commonality is defined by these two factors, Hinduism is a ground-up religion that grew from this soil.

Soft unity was forged through interactions, contestations, debates and by borrowing ideas from one another.

Put simply, the three religions that originated from desert cults and three Indian ones Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism started with a unified set of ideas and then developed diversity.

Hinduism started at the other end, with plurality as the norm, and then seeking spiritual and temporal unity. Given its origins and development over five millennia, it is easier to divide Hindus than unite them.

Which is why the predatory and expansionist religions find it easier to recruit new members by exploiting internal fault-lines. To guard against this, Hindus need to find common elements for unifying them and survive these assaults.

This is not the same as homogenisation and centralisation.

Pratap Bhanu Mehta should focus on the truth that he finds relevant, not try to create imaginary threats to plurality through homogenisation and spiritual desecration.

He could have merely said that Hinduism-deniers have no clothes, but he chose to clothe his statement by pointing in a different direction to balance the truth with some untruth. He probably fears being "cancelled".

Also Read: Hinduism v/s Hindutva: A False Dichotomy

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Why 'Liberals' Tie Themselves Into Knots Over Hinduism And Hindutva - Swarajya

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Liberals want investigation into attempts by premier to force out Speaker of the House – CBC.ca

Posted: at 5:29 pm

Opposition MLAs are calling for an independent investigation intoefforts by Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston to exert pressure on the Speaker of the House to resign.

Liberal House leader Derek Mombourquette moved a resolution on Friday that, if passed, would see the conflict of interest commissioner conduct an independent review of the situation and reaffirm the independence of the Speaker's office.

"If this was a sporting game, people would understand: the coach can't have influence over the ref. It's not fair," Liberal Leader Zach Churchill told reporters.

"This isn't a game. This is our democracy and [the Speaker] has a right to act impartially. He has a duty to do that."

The Liberals were responding to comments Speaker Keith Bain made Thursday that Houston asked him to resign to give other people a chance in the role and because past rulings he's made put the government "in a hard spot."

Bain said he signed a document in the premier's office on Wednesday pledging to resign by next April, but that he'd hoped there was room for further negotiation on that matter because he didn't want to give up his job.

The premier's office has refused to release a copy of the document.

Churchill said it doesn't matter if Houston is happy with rulings by the Speaker.

"What matters is if those rulings are fair to the chamber and to the representatives in that chamber."

Houston would not directly answer any questions about the matter on Thursday, despite the fact his caucus office issued a news release saying Bain promised to resign by next April 1. On Friday, he walked away without talking to reporters.

NDP Leader Claudia Chender said the premier's actions are the latest in apattern of behaviour by Houston and his office that manifests as "silencing anyone, by any means that they have at their disposal, who will dare speak in a contrary manner to their policies.

"And I think that's very, very troubling in a democracy," she told reporters.

"This is the 175th anniversary of responsible government in Nova Scotia and it may be on the decline here."

In announcing Bain's pending departure on Thursday, the Tories also announced that theywould be adding three new deputy speakers all from their caucus to join the current two deputies who represent the Liberals and NDP.

Churchill said the premier's actions extend beyond the legislature and send a chilling effect across government.

Since coming to power, Houston has fired the CEO of the health authority and its board. He also dismissed the three heads of the province's economic development Crown corporations in a step to reorganize the entities. In doing so, Houston appointed people he called personal friends as the interim heads of those new bodies.

The message the premier is sending is that if people cross him, they'll be gone, said Chender.

"It demonstrates a vindictiveness and a desire to consolidate power and do his will."

Chender said MLAs need to push back and remind the premier that, "as of today, we're still in a democracy."

The Liberals intend to call their motion for debate on Wednesday, when they have control over the agenda of the House. The motion is unlikely to pass, given the Tory majority in the chamber.

Churchill also stood Friday on a point of privilege, saying Houston's attempts to influence the Speaker affects his rights as a member, and all other MLAs, to do their job in the legislature. They've been prevented from asking the premier about it during Question Period because Bain has ruled the subject does not fit within the mandate of the premieror any cabinet minister.

Deputy Speaker Angela Simmonds said she would issue a ruling at a later date.

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Once I get the hospital, Ill happily retire: Liberals defend rural heartland against independent – The Age

Posted: at 5:29 pm

He believes you have to belong to a major party to make a difference, and argues his 16 years as the local member gives him the experience to secure the facility. If Jacqui Hawkins wins, that will set the campaign back years, Tilley told The Age in Wodonga on Tuesday.

Hawkins, 31, sees a different picture: Tilley has had 16 years in power to deliver, and has so far failed: The report cards there for everyone to see.

Albury-Wodonga Health, which is jointly funded by Victoria and NSW, is advocating for a new single site and a dramatic increase in surgical, recovery and theatre beds because the population is ageing and expected to grow 30 per cent by 2036.

The Victorian branch of the Australian Medical Association agrees a new hospital is needed, as do hundreds of people who have joined local protests organised by community group called Better Border Health. Animal Justice Party candidate and paramedic Mike Fuery said community health was his key concern.

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Selina Moon, who lives on the outskirts of Albury, told The Age the hospital system seemed crowded and underfunded when she gave birth in Wodonga two years ago.

Andrea, a retail store manager in Corryong, about a 90-minute drive away, who did not want her surname published, agreed health and the lack of general practitioners was the biggest issue facing the town. Housing them, though, would be a problem.

I dont even go to the doctor here, I go to another town ... We dont have homes, we dont have rentals. To bring the right doctors up here, they need somewhere to live.

Wodonga resident Terry Irvine told The Age he was concerned the regions were paying for policies that only benefit Melbourne, and politicians were rorting the system while doing f--- all for the community.

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Polling of the seat by RedBridge and paid for by Climate 200, the fundraising vehicle bankrolling some independents, suggests Tilleys primary vote has dropped from 40 per cent since the last election.

Single seat polling is not necessarily indicative of the outcome because the sample sizes tend to be small. However, RedBridge director and former Labor strategist Kos Samaras said a lower primary vote could make it difficult for Tilley to win.

Climate 200 funded the polling on its own and Hawkins said she declined their support, despite shared interests in the environment and integrity.

The poll also showed Hawkins suffers from a lack of recognition, with about 60 per cent of people saying they had not heard of her. If she won, she would be the first woman to hold the seat.

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The poll suggested cost of living was the biggest priority for local voters, followed by health, climate change or the environment, and integrity. Vaccine mandates and lockdowns also came up in a community split in two by COVID-19 border closures. In a wet season with plenty of potholes, road maintenance was also an issue.

The Upper Murray is still recovering from the devastating 2019-2020 bushfire season, and locals say young men have suicided. Rivers were breaching their cap this week under heavy rain.

Hawkins takes her yellow branding seriously: she wears yellow earrings when she sits down with The Age in Wodonga on Monday and her campaign office, which her volunteers now call the hive, is brimming with yellow, including the kitchen sink.

Shes worked for independents such as Cathy McGowan, in bushfire recovery, regional tourism, and manufacturing, after growing up on a farm south of Wodonga at Staghorn Flat.

Tilley a volunteer in the Country Fire Authority and former member of Victoria Police and the Australian Army said he has always acted with integrity for his electorate, and sees himself as independent.

I wear the company colours [of the Liberal Party], but Im a franchisee, and the franchisee fights frequently with the franchisor, Tilley said. If I walk down the street [when he retires], hopefully people can say thanks Bill, you did your best, and not punch me in the face.

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Once I get the hospital, Ill happily retire: Liberals defend rural heartland against independent - The Age

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Opinion | Liberals Currently Control Twitter. That Needs to Change. – POLITICO

Posted: October 8, 2022 at 3:45 pm

Most of the complaints about Musk are meritless and tell us more about the cluelessness or hypocrisy of his critics than his alleged perfidy. At the end of the day, the case against him boils down to the criticism that he will allow too much unfettered speech on his social media platform, a plaint that would have made little sense to anyone a decade or so ago when the balance of center-left opinion was still robustly free speech.

As it is, a libertarian-ish business leader is saying he wants an important platform for political and social advocacy and argument to provide the widest possible latitude for varied, clashing views, and the reaction of a large segment of commentators is, This man must be stopped.

Musk cant catch a break. Bill Clintons former Labor Secretary Robert Reich tweeted, When multi-billionaires take control of our most vital platforms for communication, its not a win for free speech. Its a win for oligarchy.

As they say on Twitter, Whos going to tell him?

Successful social media companies arent typically owned and run by low-income individuals (at least not by the time they are out of their garages). The co-founder and former CEO of Twitter who was in place when Reich was much less alarmed by the direction of the platform, Jack Dorsey, is worth $7 billion by some estimates.

Although hes taken a beating lately, Mark Zuckerberg still has a net worth of something like $50 billion.

Suffice it to say that Musk is not single-handedly bringing income inequality to Americas social-media companies.

At the end of the day, the biggest problem that Musks critics have with him is that he is a threat to their de facto control of Twitter. Ben Collins of NBC tweeted that Twitter will change dramatically if Musk owns it, and if the takeover gets done early enough, based on the people hes aligned with, yes, it would actually affect [the] midterms.

The worry that Twitters policies under Musk might affect the upcoming election is an implicit acknowledgment that its current policies have political consequences, and they clearly do otherwise, it wouldnt be that so many Democrats and progressives happen to be absolutely desperate to protect the Twitter status quo.

Collins warned that if Musk takes Twitter private the rule-making could become capricious. Indeed, Musk can elevate any idea or person he wants through recommendations and UX [user experience] choices and there will be no oversight on this as a private company.

One wonders what has supposedly happened prior to this point? Was there accountability when Twitter tried to squelch a totally legitimate news story about Hunter Bidens laptop prior to the 2020 election? Has anyone blown the whistle as the platform forbids one side of the debate on trans issues from using its preferred terms and expressing its deeply held, sincere beliefs? Is anyone keeping it from suspending the account of a conservative satirical publication, or cracking down on an account devoted simply to reposting already public videos?

The worst case is that these decisions are made explicitly to disadvantage conservatives. The best case is that decisions about what constitutes harassment and misinformation and the like inevitably involve subjective value judgments and politics naturally enters into them.

It would be easier to believe that neutral criteria were used, say, to kick Marjorie Taylor Greene off the platform, if a member of the Squad were getting dinged, too. Itd be easier to take the flagging of conservatives for spreading misinformation or alleged misinformation, if, for instance, Stacey Abrams and her supporters were whistled for running down the Georgia election system with various provable distortions.

Twitter is run as if a workforce of hyper-online progressive employees overwhelmingly living and working in a deeply blue jurisdiction is calling the shots, and, of course, so it is.

Another count against Musk is that these employees hate him. But so what? If we all agree that Twitter is an important public forum, its rules shouldnt be set by a group of people who have a vested interest in vindicating their own ideological beliefs and fashionable obsessions.

The underlying belief of those who think Musk is about to ruin Twitter and blight the American political conversation is that Donald Trump wouldnt have won the 2016 presidential election if it werent for Russian bots and right-wing purveyors of misinformation running riot on social media. If these were all repressed, the electoral system would be restored to its senses meaning back to Democratic control.

The effect of the 2016 Russian information operation was always exaggerated, though, and the attempt to squash misinformation on social media has veered into misbegotten campaigns against entirely reasonable points of view that baffle or outrage progressive America (the idea that Covid might have leaked from a lab got this treatment for a while).

Musks classical-liberal view that false or unwelcome speech is best combated by more speech once was a matter of consensus. That it feels radical now and is so bitterly contested is a symptom of how the Overton window has shifted toward speech suppression in the name of content moderation.

By the way, allowing Trump back on Twitter, as Musk is expected to do, wouldnt be a partisan power play. First of all, its significance would probably be exaggerated. Trump getting kicked off Twitter diminished his influence over the hour-by-hour political and media conversation, but its not as though hes been bereft without it hes retained his hold on the GOP, the real measure of his power, just fine.

Also, his Twitter return would hardly be an unalloyed benefit to him or the GOP. There are a lot of people in the Republican Party who would prefer to look past his poisonous musings and its a little harder to do that if hes back Twitter. (His own platform, Truth Social, doesnt have nearly the sway.) And Democrats, who want Trump to be as prominent as possible as a foil for Biden and others, should welcome a steady diet of Trump tweets again.

There is no doubt that Musk will encounter significant challenges to implementing his vision. Lines have to be drawn somewhere and hell have to guard against being as arbitrary as the prior regime just in a different way. But no one should doubt that he is deeply anti-bot (hes complained bitterly about their prevalence and tried to use them as a way out of the deal), and hopefully he will find more ways to allow people to choose for themselves what they want to see or not, without Sanhedrin-like rulings on deeply contentious political and moral questions.

Obviously, not all of this will be to everyones liking, especially to progressives who have gotten used to working their will with Twitter. But the social media platform is, ultimately, a private business that can set any rules it wants. If a more free-speech-oriented Twitter is hateful to them, they can take the advice they threw at conservatives disenchanted with the platform in recent years and go out and, build their own Twitter.

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Opinion | Liberals Currently Control Twitter. That Needs to Change. - POLITICO

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Liberal MP Calls for ‘Comprehensive Review’ of His Government’s Response to COVID-19 Pandemic – The Epoch Times

Posted: at 3:45 pm

A Liberal MP wants a comprehensive review of his governments response to the COVID-19 pandemic, as more accountability and transparency are needed to answer to Canadians when it comes to implementing measures that affect the whole country.

We need a greater level of accountability and transparency. And so in this case, we need the health minister ideally to identify the key drivers of pandemic risks, describe how Canadian activities contribute to that risk, and then put in place measures to mitigate that risk, said Nathaniel Erskine-Smith in an interview with the National Post, reported on Oct. 7.

Erskine-Smith said he doesnt have any specific failure in mind that he wants the review to focus on, but would rather leave it to experts with the right experience and knowledge to judge the governments response.

In a perfect world, wed be striking a committee of people who are much smarter than me and with relevant expertise to answer that very question, he said.

Former Health Minister Patty Hajdu suggested last April that a full investigation into Canadas response will be required at the appropriate time. To date, the Liberal cabinet has yet to launch a task force with specific timelines and plans on how the issue will be discussed.

The Epoch Times reached out to incumbent Health Minister Jean-Yves Ducloss office for comment, but staff were unable to respond by publication time.

Erskine-Smith said in the interview that the federal government should take the opportunity to learn from COVID so that the country is better prepared for future pandemics.

Learning the lessons to inform those best efforts going forward is, I think, where the greatest value is, he said.

In June, the Liberal MP put forward a private members bill calling for a comprehensive review of the federal response to the pandemic.

Specifically, the bill requires Duclos to set up an advisory committee to review the pandemic response in order to reduce the risks associated with future pandemics and inform a pandemic prevention and preparedness plan. It also requires the health minister to consult other ministers in creating the new plan.

Finally, it amends the Department of Health Act to provide that the Minister of Health must appoint a national pandemic prevention and preparedness coordinator from among the officials of the Public Health Agency of Canada to coordinate the activities under the Pandemic Prevention and Preparedness Act, the bill said.

The bill completed its first reading on June 17, with a second reading pending. According to theParliament of Canadas website, the bill has been placed in the Order of Precedence since June 20.

There is a worry that we dont learn the appropriate lessons, and one of those lessons has to be that we have stronger public accountability for all future governments, whatever political stripe, Erskine-Smith said.

This isnt the first time the Liberal backbencher voiced his opinion about his partys approach in handling the pandemic.

In a speech on Feb. 21, Erskine-Smith said he had concerns about the invocation of the Emergencies Act by his government and the extension of its measures for 30 days.

Im skeptical that the strict legal test was met for the Acts invocation, and Im not convinced that the emergency measures should continue to exist beyond today, he said.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau invoked the Emergencies Act on Feb. 14, using it as a means to quash the protests against COVID-19 mandates and restrictions by truckers and their supporters in Ottawa and across the country.

In May, Erskine-Smith criticized his partys travel restrictions, saying the vaccine mandates were no longer justified.

On Sept. 26, the government announced it was ending federal COVID-19 entry rules, and the use of ArriveCan became optional on Oct. 1. The decision was made based on the latest evidence, available data, operational considerations, and the epidemiological situation, both in Canada and internationally, a government news release said.

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Isaac Teo is an Epoch Times reporter based in Toronto.

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Liberal MP Calls for 'Comprehensive Review' of His Government's Response to COVID-19 Pandemic - The Epoch Times

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Liberal Justices Take The Reins In First Week Of Arguments – Above the Law

Posted: at 3:45 pm

The first argument of 2022 in Sackett v. EPA also marked Justice Ketanji Brown Jacksons first argument as a newly appointed justice. After several of her peers on the Court completed introductory questions, Justice Jackson chimed in by piggybacking on top of the previous question asked by Justice Kagan. Justice Jackson began by asking about Congress intention with the Clean Water Act:

isnt the issue what Congress would have intended with respect to adjacency and there was a regulation that defined adjacency to include neighboring? And as far as I know, Congress used the term adjacency and didnt adjust it to try to make clear the touching requirement that you say was intended by the term.

After the attorney Mr. Schiff conceded this point, Justice Jackson followed up with:

Well, let me let me let me try to bring some enlightenment to it by asking it this way. You say the question is which wetlands are covered, which I agree with, but I guess my question is, why would Congress draw the coverage line between abutting wetlands and neighboring wetlands when the objective of the statute is to ensure the chemical, physical, and biological integrity of the nations waters?

Justice Thomas actually began the questioning at oral argument as has typically been the case since last term. Justice Thomas began by helping Damien Schiff set the groundwork for the initial argument by engaging in the following back and forth:

JUSTICE THOMAS: Mr. Schiff, can can intrastate, purely intrastate, navigable bodies of water be waters of the United States?

SCHIFF: Yes, Justice Thomas.

JUSTICE THOMAS: And how is that, if its purely intrastate?

SCHIFF: If as a statutory matter, if that intrastate navigable water connects with some form of interstate transportation such that there could be a continuous channel of interstate commerce, then that water could be regulated.

While Justice Thomas began laying the foundation for questioning Mr. Schiff, the three justices on the left of the Court were all more involved in the arguments for the petitioners side than Justice Thomas was in terms of words spoken.

Perhaps more importantly, all three liberal justices were much more engaged during the petitioners turn than they were during the respondents argument. More engagement during one sides argument is often (but not always) a sign that the justices will vote against that side.

Since some of the more conservative justices spoke more during Brian Fletchers argument for the respondent, we may get a split decision for the first argument of the term.

The first figure tracks the words spoken during the entire span of oral arguments in Sackett.

While Justice Thomas only spoke sparsely, the rest of the justices engaged in the arguments more vigorously. The top four most active speaking justices in Sackett were the four female justices on the Court. This is also the first time four female justices have sat together on the Court. Quite a watershed moment.

The most active speakers on the Court during arguments in Sackett were as follows:

While the three more liberal justices spoke more during the petitioners argument, Justice Barrett spoke about evenly to both the petitioner and the respondents attorney.

Moving on to the rest of the week, Justice Jackson had the most words in an argument in the Merrill case with 2,269 words. It is very rare for a justice to speak over 2,000 words in an argument, even if there is extra time given for that argument. The next most active speaking justice in Merrill was Justice Kagan at 1,436 words.

Justice Jackson spoke more than any other justice in three of the four arguments this past week: Arellano, Sackett, and Merrill. She ended the week with almost a third more words spoken than any other justice at 4,568 words. The graph below shows the breakdowns for all the justices across the week.

Last Term

Last terms first argument was in Mississippi v. Tennessee. There was less engagement from the justices on the whole in that argument than in Sackett. In Sackett two justices, Justices Sotomayor and Barrett, each spoke over 1,000 words. No justice spoke over 1,000 words in last terms first argument. The justice that spoke the most during that argument was Chief Justice Roberts with 920 words and the second most came from Justice Gorsuch with 736 words.

The justices were even less talkative during the second oral argument last term which was Wooden v. United States. There, Justice Alito spoke the most with 751 words followed by Justice Kagan with 717 words.

Other Justices Firsts

Going back over the speaking statistics for the two justices appointed prior to Justice Jackson Justices Barrett and Gorsuch Justice Jackson appears to be much more talkative out of the gates.

Justice Barrett was confirmed in late October of 2020 and so she didnt sit for oral arguments until the November sitting. Her first oral argument was in United States Fish and Wildlife v. Sierra Club. Barrett was more reticent than Justice Jackson in her first oral argument as she spoke 490 words. The following graph has the speaking statistics for all the justices at that argument.

Per the statistics the justices appeared generally less engaged in these arguments than they did in Sackett. That said, Justice Breyer was far ahead of the pack in the US Fish arguments followed by Justice Kagan. Justice Gorsuch who spoke the third most during those arguments spoke over 150 fewer words than Justice Breyer.

Justice Kavanaugh was confirmed to the Court on October 6, 2018. He also did not start at the beginning of the term but took part in the last several arguments of the October sitting. Justice Kavanaughs first oral argument was in Stokeling v. United States. In 2018 as this was pre-pandemic Thomas was not generally participatory at oral arguments and he did not ask any questions in Stokeling. Justice Breyer did not actively participate either. This left seven justices to engage in oral arguments.

The justices still did not speak as much in Stokeling as they did in Sackett. Even so, Kavanaugh was the fifth most talkative justice during those arguments. In Stokeling, the justices word counts were as follows:

Kavanaugh only said 345 words during those arguments. This was fewer than Justices Barrett and Jackson in their first oral arguments. All other justices speaking statistics in Stokeling were dwarfed by Justice Kagans 1,067 words. Justice Alito was the second most active justice in the Stokeling arguments with 680 words.

Will Justice Jackson continue with her active participation during oral arguments? Will the female justices continue to ask questions as frequently especially the liberal justices? Will the speaking statistics correlate with the justices votes on the merits? We are only four oral arguments into the 2022 Term and there are lots of questions like these that will take weeks or months to answer.

Read more at Empirical SCOTUS.

Adam Feldman runs the litigation consulting company Optimized Legal Solutions LLC. For more information write Adam atadam@feldmannet.com.Find him on Twitter:@AdamSFeldman.

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