CoronaVirus ==> Empty Shelves

[NeilS]

Why not just report the news?

I don't favour any particular publication or broadcast. I read and listen to many from both sides.

...

The bad plus the good = the whole story I hope.

Not if the good (or the bad) is false and propagandist, to serve the best interests of the media owner. The function of the Fourth Estate is to report facts. Further analysis and opinion pieces should be based on the facts too.

I find fact checking invaluable .... FactCheck.org - A Project of The Annenberg Public Policy Center ... and, there are many other fact checking outfits listed here. Some very obvious county omissions from that list.

Just calling something fake news of course doesn't make it so and that can also be fact checked.

The last thing we need is for the media to just retweet whatever comes out of an administration or executive. That would definitely make them muppets (puppets) that fail to fulfill one of the main roles of the media in a democracy; holding those in government to account.

Last night I watched a movie on the Stasi in East Germany at its zenith. The job of the media was to report the news and the Stasi told them what was and wasn't news. Control of the media is the first item in the playbook of authoritarian governments on both the far right and the left, and every other form of dictatorship in between.

Press freedom and diversity within the press is essential for a healthy democracy.

[GraemeCook]

Prof Paul Kelly (Dep CMO) is not ruling out making downloading their tracking app compulsory. ....

I don't have a mobile. Will he buy me one?

My partner has lived through the various Police State/Military Juntas of Argentina in the 70s and 80s, and understandably she is not at all happy about it.

Have a Chilean friend who says the Allende government used ID cards to track families.

Some questions that I can think of:

• What guarantee do we have that the data will not be used for anything else? Certainly mobile phone movements can currently be traced, but that requires a warrant or court order AFAIK.
• What guarantee do we have that this is not the thin end of the surveillance wedge, and that the surveilling will not continue after the pandemic crisis is finished because Mr Potato Head can now track us all?
• What guarantee do we have that this golden opportunity to turn it into an Australia Card on steroids will not be taken?
• Do they really need that data, given that Australia is more or less leading the western world in controlling the virus? .....

Aren't Google, Amazon, Chairman Xi and an entire industry already doing that?

[GraemeCook]

......
AND they were allowed to keep the documents they seized illegally - how the bloody hell does THAT work? It's akin to "You have been found guilty of stealing the jewels, but you can keep them".

That is a surprisingly common occurence with white collar crime. How often has someone convicted of market offences (eg insider trading) been forced to hand over the loot.

[GraemeCook]

Ah yes. ASD, or DSD as it was known when I spent a few years working there and in some of the other nearby buildings.
.....

So you worked in a call centre?

[justonething]

If the app was able to be deleted after the pandemic was finished that would be different and I'd be ok with helping, but I wonder if it will be like the ATO being made as a payee in bank accounts - can't be deleted.

That's what the govt said through Stuart Roberts (If he knows what he's saying). Data is stored locally until you say you're infected, in which case the history of the last 21 days is uploaded to a server, and is used to warn others. It's also open source. It looks OK at the moment.

[FenceFurniture]

Stuart Roberts (If he knows what he's saying).

I think there might be a contradiction there. He is amongst the dopiest ever.

[doug3030]

Ah yes. ASD, or DSD as it was known when I spent a few years working there and in some of the other nearby buildings.

So you worked in a call centre?

No, I spent my 20 year and two day Army Career working as an Intelligence Analyst, among other things.

[Bushmiller]

I don't have a mobile. Will he buy me one?

Graeme

I'm in the same boat. Ohhhh...errr. I could probably have phrased that better.

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

Last night I watched a movie on the Stasi in East Germany at its zenith. The job of the media was to report the news and the Stasi told them what was and wasn't news. Control of the media is the first item in the playbook of authoritarian governments on both the far right and the left, and every other form of dictatorship in between.

Neil

You may recall the control of the media in Orwell's 1984. It absolutely dictated what the news was to the point it also re-wrote history on a daily basis to suit the thinking of the day. Extreme? Yes.

Clearly there are places around the world where this already happens or has happened. I worked with a young Chinese man who had been at university during the Tiananmen Square "incident." He was told nobody was injured or killed there.

The question remains as to what level of police state we are comfortable with and I completely accept we are already there in many respects. Satellites, credit cards, banking, Internet, Social messaging, drivers licence, traffic cameras, CCTV. Maybe even the Woodwork Forums?



Regards
Paul

[NeilS]

Neil

You may recall the control of the media in Orwell's 1984. It absolutely dictated what the news was to the point it also re-wrote history on a daily basis to suit the thinking of the day. Extreme? Yes.

Yes, Paul, and also Animal Farm. The dictum "All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others." is one of the most chilling quotes that comes to mind from that one.

Not that I think that we are under any immediate threat of totalitarianism here, or in any other country with a long history of democracy, but we need to be constantly vigilant for any early signs of its resurgence. If we need a reminder, it is only just under 90 years since the Reichstag fire.

[FenceFurniture]

Not that I think that we are under any immediate threat of totalitarianism here, or in any other country with a long history of democracy, but we need to be constantly vigilant for any early signs of its resurgence.

We do indeed have to be vigilant. One only has to listen to Trump's rumblings about a 25 year Trump Dynasty (or whatever the period he mentioned) a few months ago, followed by yesterday encouraging protesters to disobey State directions after saying 24 hours earlier that the States could do what they need in terms of reopening...after saying 24 hours before that that the States would be bent to his rule. A day or two before that he was saying that his power is absolute.

If that isn't rattling towards the far right.....

Man I'm glad I live in Australia!

[woodPixel]

Ah yes. ASD, or DSD as it was known when I spent a few years working there and in some of the other nearby buildings.

Interesting times.

Hehe. DSD. I didn't think anyone would know what I was talking about, so I modernised it.

Yeah. Wow. JHC did I get into some strife!

[woodPixel]

So you worked in a call centre?

Gardener. Just a lowly gardener. Or the canteen, just a know-nothing grunt.

Everyone works in the canteen. Except for some cleaners.

[FenceFurniture]

From the Guardian blog:
Coronavirus live news: US accused of 'dereliction of duty' as deaths in Spain top 20,000 | World news | The Guardian

"Trump, who has clashed with Democratic governors over how soon to reopen the US economy, tweeted his support on Friday, in an unprecedented endorsement of civil disobedience by a sitting president."


What a place.

[woodhutt]

why are they counteracting the Trump mouthpiece? Why not just report the news?

They are reporting the news. The news is that DT is constantly making untrue statements (no one lies anymore apparently. They just "mis-speak") and there is a need to correct his statements/claims. The alternative is to allow his statements - which in many cases are provably untrue - to go unchallenged. If someone is constantly "mis-speaking" and therefore constantly needs correcting, then it takes on the appearance of a personal attack.
Pete