quote:

Sigh.

It is at this point I scream internally that the SA blackouts were caused by a giant fricking storm which knocked out the transmitters and you can have all the power in the world but it’s useless without the things that transmit it, but I am as dead inside as the government backbench.

Knobb Manwich posted:

What are Portugal's drug laws and what is so good about them? Are they mandatory or something?

Knobb Manwich posted:

What are Portugal's drug laws and what is so good about them? Are they mandatory or something?

Knobb Manwich posted:

What are Portugal's drug laws and what is so good about them? Are they mandatory or something?

Knobb Manwich posted:

What are Portugal's drug laws and what is so good about them? Are they mandatory or something?

The Guardian posted:

In 2001, nearly two decades into Pereira’s accidental specialisation in addiction, Portugal became the first country to decriminalise the possession and consumption of all illicit substances. Rather than being arrested, those caught with a personal supply might be given a warning, a small fine, or told to appear before a local commission – a doctor, a lawyer and a social worker – about treatment, harm reduction, and the support services that were available to them.

The opioid crisis soon stabilised, and the ensuing years saw dramatic drops in problematic drug use, HIV and hepatitis infection rates, overdose deaths, drug-related crime and incarceration rates. HIV infection plummeted from an all-time high in 2000 of 104.2 new cases per million to 4.2 cases per million in 2015. The data behind these changes has been studied and cited as evidence by harm-reduction movements around the globe. It’s misleading, however, to credit these positive results entirely to a change in law.

Portugal’s remarkable recovery, and the fact that it has held steady through several changes in government – including conservative leaders who would have preferred to return to the US-style war on drugs – could not have happened without an enormous cultural shift, and a change in how the country viewed drugs, addiction – and itself. In many ways, the law was merely a reflection of transformations that were already happening in clinics, in pharmacies and around kitchen tables across the country. The official policy of decriminalisation made it far easier for a broad range of services (health, psychiatry, employment, housing etc) that had been struggling to pool their resources and expertise, to work together more effectively to serve their communities.

Ora Tzo posted:

Senor Tron posted:

We need the most Australian thing then, a TISM tribute act.

quote:

New South Wales MPs agree Canberra politicians have made the Liberal brand so toxic that an early federal election is the Berejiklian Government's best hope of holding onto power at the ballot box in March.

One MP told the ABC: "If we had our way, we'd like ScoMo to call an election this afternoon."
However, most are not holding out hope that Prime Minister Scott Morrison will heed his predecessor Malcolm Turnbull's advice to call an election as soon as possible after the summer break.
"Look, there's Buckley's chance of that happening, but it could save our bacon if it did," one minister told the ABC.
"Malcolm Turnbull is just saying what everyone wants — an early federal election," said a backbencher.
"The damage from the feds is just unbelievable — without an early federal poll we're going to be taken out as collateral damage and for no reason whatsoever."

...

But others caution it is too early to raise the white flag.
One MP said: "There are still four months to go, voters aren't even switched on yet".

BrigadierSensible posted:

Can I ask a serious question?

Why is calling someone a "clown", or a "disgrace" considered unparlimentary language and gets you kicked out?

Are we that prudish? That thin skinned? That petty?

What if you go the full ScoMo and call someone a blinking drongo, or a flaming duffer?

quote:

Labor's Senate leader Penny Wong has accused the government of "perverting the course of the Senate" after it killed off a move to scrap laws that allow religious schools to kick out LGBT students.

Finance minister Mathias Cormann - the leader of the government in the Senate - successfully suspended standing orders minutes before the chamber was due to vote on Labor's legislation on Monday afternoon.
The proposed changes to the Sex Discrimination Act, which has included exemptions for religious schools since its introduction in 1983, would strip non-government schools of the power to exclude or expel students on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity.
Cormann was aided in his 11th hour move to prevent the chamber passing Labor's legislation by the two Centre Alliance senators, Stirling Griff and Rex Patrick, who had previously indicated their support for the bill.
With their help, the government won a vote to overturn an order made by the Senate last week that Labor's legislation had to be debated and voted on by 1:50pm today.
David Leyonhjelm, Cory Bernardi, Brian Burston, Fraser Anning and the two One Nation senators voted with the government.
Labor, the Greens, Tim Storer and Derryn Hinch voted against the government's move.
By using procedure to block the legislation passing the Senate, the government has saved itself the embarrassment of having its numbers tested on the floor of the House of Representatives.
All while claiming it still supports the legislation.

bandaid.friend posted:

https://www.buzzfeed.com/aliceworkman/religious-schools-discrimination-school-children

The Coalition blocked procedure in the Senate out of the fear Labor would vote against its own bill in the House of Reps just to embarrass the government ???

BrigadierSensible posted:

Are we that prudish? That thin skinned? That petty?

bandaid.friend posted:

https://www.buzzfeed.com/aliceworkman/religious-schools-discrimination-school-children

The Coalition blocked procedure in the Senate out of the fear Labor would vote against its own bill in the House of Reps just to embarrass the government ???

bandaid.friend posted:

Stirling Griff and Rex Patrick

I would blow Dane Cook posted:

I would blow Dane Cook posted:

BrigadierSensible posted:

Can I ask a serious question?

Why is calling someone a "clown", or a "disgrace" considered unparlimentary language and gets you kicked out?

Are we that prudish? That thin skinned? That petty?

What if you go the full ScoMo and call someone a blinking drongo, or a flaming duffer?

quote:

I’ve been having a chat to Stirling Griff and Rex Patrick from Centre Alliance to discuss why the party voted with the government to delay the Senate vote on Labor’s bill to repeal religious exemptions to discrimination law to protect LGBT students.

Both said that they wanted time to consider government amendments that attempt to balance protection of LGBT students with religious freedom, which they only received on Friday.

The amendments allow schools to set rules and codes of conduct that indirectly discriminate against LGBT students where they are imposed “in good faith in order to avoid injury to the religious susceptibilities of adherents of that religion or creed”.

Griff said there was “no major breakdown of problems” with schools expelling gay students and Labor wanted an early vote as “a bit of politics in the last week of the [parliamentary] year to beat the Liberals with”.

Patrick reiterated the party supports removing discrimination but wanted to put “policy over politics” because the “simple bill had turned complex”. “If that doesn’t suit the politics of others, then so be it.”

If Mathias Cormann moves to send the bill to committee, Centre Alliance will agree to that course, even if the committee may not report back until next year and it takes the bill off the agenda in the final sitting week.

I would blow Dane Cook posted:

The Guardian Live Blog posted:

The attorney general Christian Porter has publicly rejected Labor demands to pass an interim encryption bill extending new powers only for the investigation of the most serious crimes, warning the opposition the whole bill will be put to parliament this week.


As negotiations between the parties resumed on the encryption bill, Porter told Sky News the main issues between the parties were whether state police should gain powers to order tech companies to help break encryption, “the types of offences that the notice powers would apply to” and the “authorisation processes” before notices are issued.

Porter :

“We’re not having any interim agreements/ There’ll be a bill put before parliament and the bill with either be agreed or it won’t be agreed, but we will be dealing with this this week.”

Porter queried why Labor would support a bill “that says it’s necessary and appropriate to protect Australians” when the AFP and Asio order companies to assist decryption “but it’s not at the time reasonable for state police to also have that assistance”. He noted state police forces also had counter terrorism units and argued they needed the same powers.

“There’s no point in allowing half of our law enforcement agencies to be able to have this assistance in investigating terrorism, but not the other half ...

“You’d effectively be passing half a regime, which would be totally ineffective. I mean, this bill operates as a conjunctive whole. So what we are trying to do is have a whole bill.”

ABC posted:

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews has announced a royal commission into the use by police of a criminal defence lawyer as an informant during Melbourne's bloody gangland war.

bandaid.friend posted:

I just don't get it - if Labor did vote against their own bill, they'd look like huge arseholes, lose some support and the Coalition'd be able to go on about Labor chaos for weeks

Was there some kind of threat to the Government if the bill didn't pass the Lower House?

bell jar posted:

They don't want it to pass, as it was literally just intended to mitigate some of the electoral hemorrhaging in notoriously socially progressive Wentworth/Victoria.

snoremac posted:

People are legitimately disgusted that the climate kids chanted “ScoMo sucks”.

monkeu posted:

These are also invariably the same people who accuse the left of being snowflakes

bell jar posted:

They don't want it to pass as-is and don't have the numbers to ensure that the amendments they want get in