“If you don’t want the opposition to do their job, then let’s just have Vladimir Putin as the Premier and let him do his thing.“
<-Michael Daley and the potential of creating Gladys Putinovas
Why are so few of us interested in democracy?
We fear that the horse has already bolted even down under. The group of people who have faith in our social institutions – parliarmentary democracy, courts, police, science, education, even the privatised age care, is shrinking
UK Professor Murphy shared the following statement of concern issued in the US by more than 100 academics who are worried about the state of US democracy. We should take note here in the UK. The Tories are following the path that the Republicans are taking:
Statement of Concern
The Threats to American Democracy and the Need for National Voting and Election Administration Standards
STATEMENT
June 1, 2021
Is a CEO Worth 1,000 Times the Median Worker? Bloomberg
CEO pay rises to $12.7M even as pandemic ravages economy
AP: “As COVID-19 ravaged the world last year, CEOs’ big pay packages seemed to be under as much threat as everything else. Fortunately for those CEOs, many had boards of directors willing to see the pandemic as an extraordinary event beyond their control. Across the country, boards made changes to the intricate formulas that determine their CEOs’ pay — and other moves — that helped make up for losses created by the crisis. As a result, pay packages rose yet again last year for the CEOs of the biggest companies, even though the pandemic sent the economy to its worst quarter on record and slashed corporate profits around the world. The median pay package for a CEO at an S&P 500 company hit $12.7 million in 2020, according to data analyzed by Equilar for The Associated Press. That means half the CEOs in the survey made more, and half made less. It’s 5% more than the median pay for that same group of CEOs in 2019 and an acceleration from the 4.1% climb in last year’s survey…”
Russians sent packing from Prague embassy stronghold at centre of spy dispute
Mr Daley, who has been raising concerns about the issue in Parliament for years, said he was doing the job of opposition by holding the government to account.
“If you don’t want the opposition to do their job, then let’s just have Vladimir Putin as the Premier and let him do his thing.“
Mr Daley on Wednesday called for an upper house inquiry into revelations the government attempted to cover up artificial inflation of the state’s budgets by tens of billions of dollars.
It followed a Herald investigation revealing the government had shifted the rail network’s costs onto a corporation that still hasn’t been able to properly operate six years after it was launched.
More MPs pick sides in Labor leadership tussle, as candidates prepare for possible ballot
The cover-up of a ‘financial mirage’ that has inflated the NSW budget and may put rail safety at risk
- Via Adele Ferguson and Matt O'Sullivan
Open Culture: “Design Thinking for the Greater Good: Innovation in the Social Sectorshows how and why human-centered design is a powerful tool. Offered by the Darden School of Business at the University of Virginia, the course lets students “view design thinking success stories from around the world, in areas as diverse as government, health care, and education.” Throughout the course, students will “learn the tools, techniques and mindset needed to use design thinking to uncover new and creative solutions in the social sector. You can take Design Thinking for the Greater Good for free by selecting the audit option upon enrolling. If you want to take the course for a certificate, you will need to pay a fee. Design Thinking for the Greater Good has been added to our list of Free Business Courses, a subset of our collection, 1,700 Free Online Courses from Top Universities…”
Open Culture: “Design Thinking for the Greater Good: Innovation in the Social Sectorshows how and why human-centered design is a powerful tool. Offered by the Darden School of Business at the University of Virginia, the course lets students “view design thinking success stories from around the world, in areas as diverse as government, health care, and education.” Throughout the course, students will “learn the tools, techniques and mindset needed to use design thinking to uncover new and creative solutions in the social sector. You can take Design Thinking for the Greater Good for free by selecting the audit option upon enrolling. If you want to take the course for a certificate, you will need to pay a fee. Design Thinking for the Greater Good has been added to our list of Free Business Courses, a subset of our collection, 1,700 Free Online Courses from Top Universities…”
Where Some See Calls for Accountability, Others See Censorship, Punishment
“People have challenged each other’s views for much of human history. But the internet – particularly social media – has changed how, when and where these kinds of interactions occur. The number of people who can go online and call out others for their behavior or words is immense, and it’s never been easier to summon groups to join the public fray. The phrase “cancel culture” is said to have originated from a relatively obscure slang term – “cancel,” referring to breaking up with someone – used in a 1980s song. This term was then referenced in film and television and later evolved and gained traction on social media. Over the past several years, cancel culture has become a deeply contested idea in the nation’s political discourse. There are plenty of debates over what it is and what it means, including whether it’s a way to hold people accountable, or a tactic to punish others unjustly, or a mix of both. And some argue that cancel culture doesn’t even exist. To better understand how the U.S. public views the concept of cancel culture, Pew Research Center asked Americans in September 2020 to share – in their own words – what they think the term means and, more broadly, how they feel about the act of calling out others on social media. The survey finds a public deeply divided, including over the very meaning of the phrase…”
Should Labor oppose the Government’s Stage 3 Income Tax Cuts?
Australia faces a choice between demands for lower taxes, and raising the revenue needed to fund essential services. This article suggests how a plan to increase taxation revenue could be presented at the next election, starting with ditching the Government’s Stage 3 income tax cuts....
From Facts to Fake News: How Information Gets Distorted
Knowledge@Wharton: “Remember the old childhood game of telephone? One kid whispers a phrase in another kid’s ear, and it gets passed along until the final child in the chain repeats it out loud. Inevitably, the words change along the way, subject to the cognitive interpretation of the listener. Retelling stories may be harmless amusement on the playground, but new research from Wharton sounds the alarm on the grown-up version by revealing how news can become more biased as it is repeated from person to person. As information travels farther away from its original source, retellers tend to select facts, offer their own interpretations, and lean toward the negative, according to the study titled The Dynamics of Distortion: How Successive Summarization Alters the Retelling of News.“This paper started because I was interested initially in understanding how we end up with fake news. But quickly I realized that this project was going to be about something much broader, and I think more interesting, which is how do original news stories become distorted as they’re retold sequentially across people,” Wharton marketing professor Shiri Melumad said in an interview with Wharton Business Daily on SiriusXM. (Listen to the podcast at the top of this page.)…”
Cheating markets in everything
Here is the Amazon listing
Eleven men have been arrested in a dramatic police operation after a former bikie was allegedly the victim of a targeted kidnapping and ransom attempt.
Police were called to a home in Bringelly in south-west Sydney at 3am on Tuesday after receiving reports Dillan Mancuso, 37, had been abducted by an armed group of men who also assaulted his 61-year-old father at the property.
Eleven arrested following alleged bikie kidnapping in Sydney’s south-west
1000 Musicians Play Rock Songs From Nirvana, Queen, etc.
Before I clicked play on the video embedded above of 1000 musicians playing Learn to Fly by the Foo Fighters, I assumed it was going to be kind of a mess, a muddled wall of sound. Instead, I was surprised to hear something almost magical, a rock anthem played with the fullness of a orchestra or chorus, the band and the crowd merged into a single, gorgeously layered entity. I was moved by it, almost immediately. All those drummers pounding away on their drum kits in unison! You can check out this playlist for more 1000 musician versions of rock songs, including Seven Nation Army (White Stripes), We Will Rock You (Queen), and Smells Like Teen Spirit (Nirvana)
We are on the cusp of a global pandemic driven by greed, an avoidably vulnerable digital ecosystem, and an ever-widening criminal enterprise
Testimony of Christopher C. Krebs [Director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency] Before the Committee on Homeland Security Subcommittee on Cybersecurity, Infrastructure Protection, & Innovation U.S. House of Representatives On Responding to Ransomware: Exploring Policy Solutions to a Cybersecurity Crisis – May 5, 2021. Washington: “…Simply put, ransomware is a business, and business is good. The criminals do the crimes and their victims pay the ransom. Often it seems easier (and seemingly the right thing to do from a fiduciary duty to shareholders perspective) to pay and get the decryption key rather than rebuild the network. There are three problems with this logic: (1) you are doing business with a criminal and expecting them to live up to their side of the bargain. It is not unusual for the decryption key to not work. (2) There is no honor amongst thieves and no guarantee that the actor will not remain embedded in the victim’s network for a return visit later, after all the victim has already painted themselves an easy mark. (3) By paying the ransom, the victim is validating the business model and essentially making a capital contribution to the criminal, allowing them to hire more developers, more customer service, and upgrade delivery infrastructure. And, most worrisome, go on to the next victim. We must address the ransomware business model head on and disrupt the ability of victims to pay ransom. We need to prioritize countering ransomware as a nation. That includes appropriately investing in our government agencies and their ability to investigate, disrupt, and apprehend criminals. We need to do more to understand the ransomware economy and the various players in the market. And at the points where cryptocurrency intersects with the traditional economy, we need to take action to provide more information, more transparency, and comply with the laws that are already on the books. This includes Kiosks, Over the Countertrading desks, and cryptocurrency. Lastly, we don’t know enough about the ransomware economy, as it operates in the shadows. We lack a clear understanding of the scale of the problem, including the number of victims of ransomware – the denominator we are trying to improve against….
