Welcome to The Emperor's Clothes, a blog about politics, social issues and campaigns. Below here you can find the entire collection of posts on this blog, with the latest ones at the top. I'd love you to comment or feedback (even negative feedback, if polite. Trolls and comments that are unpleasant will be removed) If... Continue Reading →
@Albo’s Victory Speech
I was thinking the other day about what Australia really needs from its Government, to replace the current broken down corrupt and incompetent LNP Government, so I wrote Albo’s victory speech for him: “Ladies and Gentlemen, friends, fellow Australians. Thank you all for that welcome. Tonight, after nine long years of conservative Government, is a... Continue Reading →
The False Dichotomy Of Growth Limits vs Population Limits
It’s hard to remember how many times I have read that those committed to population control or limits are racists. Alternatively they are simplistic dunderheads who don’t understand that it’s growth, not population, that is the real problem in the destruction of the planet’s environment. The clear implication is that since developed world populations have... Continue Reading →
Politician’s Partners – Fair Game
Politicians Spouses are Fair Game Politicians and political figures love to play the game “Attack me by all means but leave my family alone.” For children, certainly those under the age of about twenty to twenty-five, at ages when one cannot necessarily be expected to have developed one's own opinions, that's a reasonable position to... Continue Reading →
The Death of the Fourth Estate
The Death of the Fourth Estate How the entire mainstream media is an apologist for corruption and greed To paraphrase Shakespeare, I come to bury the Fourth Estate, not to praise it. As an instrument of accountability in our society the mainstream media is now largely irrelevant. The notion that the media is the fourth... Continue Reading →
Saying what others are thinking – Wishing ill on others
Like many others I was brought up with the adage that it was wrong to wish ill on others. It’s part of basic Christian precepts of turning the other cheek and could be seen as among a range of other adages such as loving thine enemy and, politically, “keeping your friends close and your enemies... Continue Reading →
Your freedoms and rights are a myth
(You have no rights, only privileges conferred by society) The problem with the demands for “rights” and “freedoms” by the anti-vax, anti-lockdown, mask-free movement is that those demands are based on a mythology perpetrated by groups such as the Institute of Public Affairs (IPA). That mythology is itself based on US ideological concepts of individual... Continue Reading →
Demonising Virtue, Value and Ethics
Or how the right “invented” and weaponised the terms "political correctness”, “virtue signalling”, “woke” and “cancel culture” As our politics has drifted relentlessly to the right, in recent years, and as the features of neo-liberal economies have increasingly driven inequality and environmental degradation, a part of this drift has been the labelling of virtue as... Continue Reading →
Our deathly suffocation by the mainstream media
(OR HOW WE SHOULD WISH FOR THE DEATH OF NINE/FAIRFAX AND THE GUARDIAN AS WELL AS THE MURDOCH PRESS) It’s accepted as an article of truth that the mainstream media (MSM) is supposed to hold those in power accountable. But there are two problems with that in modern Australia. The first is that the MSM... Continue Reading →
Why we should feel free to “desecrate” the Australian flag and other shibboleths
Why we should “desecrate” the Australian flag and to refuse to sing or stand for the anthem or other so-called patriotic symbols and other shibboleths We often read media stories or posts on Twitter, or elsewhere, defending the flag, the national anthem, Australia Day or other icons of nationhood or celebrating the nation state and... Continue Reading →
The transition from ICE to EVs and hybrids – summary
The transition to EVs will be much faster than generally anticipated if the announcements of leading car manufacturers and manufacturing countries is taken for granted. The table below lists these announcements and, based on them, once could assume that by 2030 it will become increasingly difficult to buy new ICE vehicles globally. Additionally it's likely... Continue Reading →
Democratic Follies
The Failure of Representative Democracy Australia’s political parties and its mainstream media exist in a little bubble of self-satisfaction and complacency about our representative democracy - as exemplified recently by Scott Morrison’s reflection that ‘at least in Australia people demonstrating don’t get shot at’. If this is the best measure he can summon of the... Continue Reading →
The Most Corrupt Government in Australian History – a summary
The current government is the most dishonest, dangerous, incompetent, corrupt, hypocritical and unaccountable government in Australian political history. By this, I mean the Liberal National party in it’s three terms of office stretching back over eight years. It has undermined every notion of good government and ministerial accountability.
Judgement Day will Come
I see the fires’s dull dangerous glowIt flickers like the anger in my soulA burning rage at the failed leadersThe tentacles of grief grasp our heartsFor the destruction of our olive landLike the wreathes of smoke curling upEach fire the death of a thousand animalsMurdered on the killing fields of climateA bloody plain of lies,... Continue Reading →
Like Lemmings to a Cliff – The Media; Climate
As the political temperature over climate and fires has risen this week, the media has rushed to apportion blame for both fires and the rising crescendo of outrage at the inaction of conservative (and some Labor) governments across Australia - and at the responses of the Federal Government when questioned, at media conferences, about these... Continue Reading →
Murder by any other name – When will we start calling climate science denying politicians what they are: murderers!!
The Bahamas. This is not an accident (Photo Our News Travis Carroll) Are Scott Morrison, Donald Trump, Bolsonaro, Boris Johnson and a myriad other leaders, former leaders (Abbott), and ministers (Proudfoot, Taylor etc) murderers? In my book, yes. When you take actions that you know are going to kill people then that makes you, arguably,... Continue Reading →