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Episode 404 - Examining the Entrails

In this episode, we discuss the result of the referendum and the latest in Gaza

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Transcript
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From Sky News on the right to the ABC on the left, an Iron Curtain

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has descended across the continent.

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On the right of that line lies an evil empire of conservative

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Christians who deny climate change but believe in trickle down economics.

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On the left Lies a misguided and confused rabble who are supposed to

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help the working man but instead fight amongst themselves over identities.

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Only the Iron Fist Velvet Glove podcast takes the uncomfortable

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position of sitting astride the Iron Curtain to take aim at both sides.

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Only this podcast and perhaps the bullshit filter.

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can explain the dire threats facing our civilization.

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I only wish that they could have traveled back in time to when I

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was conducting the war effort with the benefit of their wise counsel.

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The war would have ended three years earlier, I would not have lost the

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election, and I would have invested heavily in technology stocks.

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In any event, I implore you to listen to this very fine podcast.

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It is your duty.

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Well, hello and welcome, dear listener.

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Episode 404.

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I'm Trevor, a.

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k.

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a.

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the Iron Fist.

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No Velvet Glove with us tonight.

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He's in a different location with no internet so couldn't make it.

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Thank you.

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But we do have our UK correspondent and tech guy, Joe, coming in all the

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way from Devon at 10 30 in the morning.

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Joe, good morning to you.

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Good morning all.

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Yeah, so Joe's there relaxing with a, with a wool and cardigan on and

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a cup of tea or coffee or something?

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No, he's got a Coke anyway, but yeah yeah, so it's just telling

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myself if you're in the chat room, say hello, like Tanya just did.

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And Yeah, so, isn't it great?

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It comes through loud and clear, thanks to the wonders of technology.

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We can continue to do this as a panel discussion.

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It just means our little group of meerkats are scattered all over the planet.

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So, well, anything happened in the last seven days that

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we need to talk about, Joe?

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I can't think of anything, no.

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Oh, well, we'll just call it a bits and Yeah, that's it.

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Yeah, a voice result.

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It's come through, eh?

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Not an unexpected result of Rejecting the proposal, 60 to 40

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not a single state in favour of it.

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And that was a surprise.

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It was shaping up that way early on, wasn't it, that some would get through.

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So, the ACT, not a state, but a territory passed it.

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And the closest was Victoria, but it was still 55 45 against.

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And the state that was most against was Queensland.

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68.

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9 against only 31.

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1 in favour.

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So, overall for the country, pretty much 60 40.

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And that was a fairly conclusive result.

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And boy oh boy, there's been some...

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Hand wringing?

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Ah, hand wringing is the word I wanted to use as well, Joe.

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Boy, advocates for the, for the voice, people on the left, really

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going to town about what this means.

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And, you know, there are arguments about...

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Means we're all a bunch of racists.

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Yes, essentially.

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Dumb racists.

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Yeah.

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Only dumb racists could possibly have voted for, against this

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proposal, this modest proposal.

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And and what a terrible state of affairs this is.

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That's, that's pretty much the line coming from advocates for the yes vote.

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And...

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You need to be careful with a modest proposal.

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Yeah, well that's, that's their argument, is it was a modest proposal.

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A generous invitation a reaching out that was rejected and that the

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only possible conclusion is that Australians are racist and don't care.

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And that's just bullshit.

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Well, I did see some yes advocates saying that.

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It wasn't that Australia was racist.

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I saw some saying that the yes vote hadn't properly explained their position.

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And then some others saying, look Australians on the whole...

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People want everything that the Yes Camp want, they just think that the proposal

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put forward was the wrong proposal.

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It was the wrong way to go about it.

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It wasn't that the average Australian doesn't want to close the gap.

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It was just people didn't see the value in what was being proposed.

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Correct.

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And I've got some polling by Essential Poll that says exactly that, which

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we'll get to a little bit later on, but we'll sort of set the scene before that.

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So.

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You know, there's a lot of people saying, what does it mean?

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At its most basic level, it just simply means people didn't like the voice.

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It doesn't mean that they rejected recognition of Indigenous people.

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There wasn't the option to recognise Indigenous people and reject the voice.

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So, if you just didn't like the voice, you had to reject the entire proposal.

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And, in the same way that the Yes Advocates...

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They never dealt with the issue of, you know, show us how

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this will make a difference.

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And they never dealt with the issue of, show us why this isn't a racist proposal.

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And they skirted around the issue and relied on emotion.

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And I've got some clips from Michael Mansell to deal with that, where they

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asked people to be emotional about the plight of Indigenous people and somehow

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make a connection that wasn't there yet.

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And, and yeah.

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The, the strongest argument about the this is a racist proposal is, well,

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the constitutions are already racist, so making it more racist is, is fine.

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Mm-hmm.

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Which to me is counterintuitive.

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Yeah.

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And you know, prior to Noel Pearson's essay where he raised the voice,

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the option that was being considered was put in a recognition clause

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and get rid of the race provisions that were in there already.

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That would have got up.

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But not this.

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So, so there's a lot of talk about what it means and what it doesn't mean, and

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we'll get into the commentary of that but, you know, really, the Yes Advocates

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are just pretty poor in their commentary because they're, they're arguing

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something that's not right, that 60 percent of Australians are dumb racists.

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And it's really upsetting people because they're saying to Indigenous

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people, you know, if this doesn't get up, Australians are rejecting

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you and don't want to help you.

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And naturally, many Indigenous people are believing that,

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and are now genuinely upset.

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But that's not the case.

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So...

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So these Yes Advocates who are shitty that they lost, have painted

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a picture that is upsetting people it's painting a picture of a racist,

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uncaring community that doesn't give a shit about Indigenous people.

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That's just not true.

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So they're it's a disservice to the people that they're supposedly trying to help.

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Yeah.

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So.

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Thank you.

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Well, personally, I don't care about Indigenous people.

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I care about all Australians.

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And so I don't care what colour your skin is.

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If you need help, I want to be part of the community that gives help.

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And sure, absolutely, there are probably a greater proportion of

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First Nation people that need help rather than white people, but I don't

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think that they should be treated any differently, any, any special thing

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because I want everybody to get help.

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Hmm.

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So, this was actually a victory for equality and against racism,

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but in these Orwellian times...

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of doublespeak.

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Yes, advocates are arguing the opposite, and our media and our public

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intellectuals demonstrated how poor they are at doing their jobs, and even

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well meaning members of the public can't follow points of debate and

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argue rationally, and we've lost our ability to genuinely debate ideas.

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And let me just put the chat on the screen so I can see it.

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So there was a Father Frank Brennan, who we've mentioned

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over the years, a Jesuit priest, definitely in favour of a yes vote.

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He wrote after the referendum a piece that was, you know, sad about what had

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happened, but said accept the result.

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But I'm just going to read a couple of paragraphs of what he

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said, which is very pertinent.

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So this is Frank Brennan.

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This referendum was nothing like the 1967 referendum.

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It was nothing like the same sex marriage plebiscite.

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In 1967, over 90 percent of voters supported a proposal put forward,

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urging that Aboriginal people be treated the same as the rest of us.

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Okay?

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In 1967, 90 percent of voters agreed to that proposal.

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Treat Aboriginal people the same as the rest of us.

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In the same sex marriage plebiscite over 50%.

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Over 60%.

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Who chose to vote supported a proposal that the civil institution of marriage

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be made available to all couples regardless of their sexual orientation.

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In both these votes, we were voting to treat everyone the same.

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This referendum was nothing of the sort.

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In fact, it was probably the exact opposite on one reading, the 60% no vote.

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was a decision, once again, to treat everyone the same, declining to

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set up a new constitutional entity available only to one group of

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citizens, namely the First Australians.

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So, accurate portrayal, I think, by Frank Brennan of what actually happened.

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Just in terms of the voting and the different seats, It was pretty apparent

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that seats that were won by Greens in the federal sphere, or by Teal candidates,

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those were the sort of electorates that voted yes in favour of the voice.

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Just those handful of seats.

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So, I'm in the seat of Ryan, for example, and that was won by a

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Greens candidate in the last federal election, and the seat I'm in was one

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of the few that voted in favour of.

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A voice, so it's these inner city, well educated, upper middle class areas that

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were in favour of the Yes Vote compared to the rest of the country pretty sort of,

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and it didn't really matter, that was in more or less all the states where that was

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sort of indicative of how the voting went.

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What happened in Dixon, Joe?

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Yeah strangely enough.

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It being Peter Dutton's electorate it was a no, and it was quite interesting

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the early votes trended no the people who voted at City Hall in Brisbane

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attended or trended left, trended yes.

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So these were people in the Dixon electorate who were working in the city?

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Yes.

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Who had voted at the City Hall, yeah.

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Yes.

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And then it was mostly no, there were a couple of, basically as he

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got closer to the city, it trended yes, the further out for the city, it

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trended no, but I think Mount Nebo was one of the polling stations and that

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was the strongest yes vote at 72%.

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Also interesting was the spoiled ballots, whatever they call them, invalid, I think.

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Which varied between one and three percent, and I was, well,

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I don't know what it normally is.

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I thought that was quite high though.

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Seems high, doesn't it?

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Yeah.

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And I wonder how many people went, I have to vote, but I don't want to vote.

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So I'm gonna spoil my paper.

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I've got some quotes from some people just to give some sense of what the left or the

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yes advocates are saying about the result.

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Alan Patience, who writes in the John Menendee blog, What the whole debate

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about an Indigenous voice to parliament demonstrated, with brutal clarity, is that

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Australia is a morally backward society.

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Goes on, During the debate the no side resorted to numerous lies, distortions

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of the truth and misinformation.

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Their leaders insisted that we must be respectful of no voters.

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But how can anyone respect people who have chosen indifference over concern?

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Hostility over love?

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Exclusion over inclusion.

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Cruelty over compassion.

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Further on he says, What the whole debate about an Indigenous voice to parliament

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demonstrated with brutal clarity is that Australia is a morally backward society.

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The one glimmer of hope is a new generation of voters and

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potential leaders is coming.

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They will help the country to steer clear of the political morass of resentfulness,

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racism and inhumanity into which Dutton and his ilk would take the country.

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Look, it's entirely possible to have voted no.

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And to not even have read a single thing that Dutton and his mob said about it,

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and to the whole point about not enough information, you know, personally,

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complete bullshit, there was enough information, it was just a bad idea.

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Well, I think there were probably three reasons for voting no.

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One is you're a racist, and I'm sure that some people were.

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The other one was misinformation from the no vote.

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Where they were saying it would mean this need more information

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would mean that No, no, no, but also constitutionally risky and all that.

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And also that there was gonna be taxes and it was going to be land

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grabs and all sorts of things.

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And then finally it was, you've read it, you thought that it was a bad idea because

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you couldn't see any particular way that it was actually gonna benefit anyone.

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We'll get into those reasons.

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It's in the essential poll.

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Albanese in his speech afterwards he said, basically he said,

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Albanese said many people have worked all their lives for this.

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And that's just bullshit.

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Yeah, it's only a recent thing.

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That's right.

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It's just a Noel Pearson thought bubble from 2014 in his quarterly essay titled,

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A Rightful Place, Race Recognition and a More Complete Commonwealth.

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Okay, so some, some nine year olds have, have worked all their life for this.

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Yes, so, that was complete bullshit to say that people have

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worked their lives for the voice.

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It's an invention of Noel Pearson's that was a bad idea.

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I was watching the ABC coverage.

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I saw a lot of upper middle class professionals.

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on national television complaining about their disadvantage.

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I mean they talked about we are disadvantaged and I'm looking

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at these people thinking you don't look at disadvantage to me.

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One of them was a professor at a university.

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Like for sake, you are, describe your disadvantage to me.

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One commentator did talk about focusing on disadvantage

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rather than race in the future.

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I'll get to him.

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That was that was a guy, Wesley Aird.

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Right.

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Just a bit more hand wringing Bernard Kean in Crikey wrote, There

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are no ifs, buts or niceties around this transformational moment.

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The argument that it was a constitutionally enshrined voice,

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not recognition that was rejected, doesn't stand up to scrutiny.

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There is no recognition without a voice because the recognition requested by

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First Peoples begins with a voice.

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That's just logic, illogical crap by Bernard Keane.

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Perfectly possible to reject.

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He says the argument that it was a constitutionally enshrined shine

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voice, not recognition that was rejected, doesn't stand up to scrutiny.

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There is no recognition without a voice because the recognition requested by

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First Peoples begins with a voice.

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Anything else is a fake.

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I think the recognition is that they're equal citizens and that happened in 1967.

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Yes.

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And if there was to be a recognition of historical facts of Indigenous people

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being here first and colonization by white people, put it in.

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That, I was not, you know, I didn't want to reject that.

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I wanted to reject the voice.

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Bernard Kean is wrong.

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And just because Indigenous people wanted the voice doesn't change that.

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It's a nonsense.

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This is the sort of pathetic, illogical, irrational argument that we've had from

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our media and public intellectuals.

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Hang on.

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Saying black is white and...

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The sun will, you know, rise in the west and set in the

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east, because they say it does.

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Just because you say it, doesn't mean it's the case.

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I'm, I'm a middle aged man, white man, I want a middle aged

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white man voice to parliament.

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Doesn't mean I should get one, but...

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Well, anything else is a fake, he says.

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One peddled, primarily, by old white conservatives.

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You think recognition can be imposed on them, like invasion, dispossession and

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genocide was imposed on First Peoples.

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The no was inarguably a no to recognition.

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Bullshit.

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Lots of people would have accepted a recognition, they just didn't accept.

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That is complete bullshit, Bernard Kean.

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He goes on, There can be no pretense that this was some sort of

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accidental result or a failure of politicians or of the Yes campaign.

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There will be inevitable post mortems of the failure of Yes.

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But this was a referendum around a single, simple question.

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There was no complexity, no litany of important policy issues, no personalities,

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no preferential voting, all of which feature in general elections.

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This was as simple as democracy gets.

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And the outcome was as simple as the lopsided result.

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Australians voted by a large margin to keep pretending First Peoples

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weren't here before invasion, or to not care that they were.

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That is not what the vote was.

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The vote was whether there would be a voice.

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It was not a vote about whether people were here first, and it

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wasn't a vote about whether we care.

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But, but also, whether we care that they were, in what way should we care?

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Yes.

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Yes.

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There are all sorts of ways.

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We'll get on to it.

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We're Indigenous people themselves agreeing with this.

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So, all right.

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Well, the essential report let me see if I can get this up and and look

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at some of the results from that.

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Bear with me a second while I get this on the screen.

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Yeah, there we go.

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So there's going to be a bunch of graphs and we'll work our way through

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it as I'm sharing this screen.

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Right, let's move through the national mood, support for the Voice to Parliament

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main reason to vote no at the referendum.

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So, 42%.

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It will divide Australia in the constitution on the basis of race.

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That's what I've been saying all along.

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That's what people have been saying all along, and it was never.

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Confronted properly by the Yes campaign.

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So 42 percent of people said, who said no, their main reason was

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it will divide Australia in the Constitution on the basis of race.

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26 percent said there was not enough detail on how the voice will work.

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Personally, I never argued that.

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I don't think that's the case.

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That, to me, was not the problem.

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The problem was it was a bad idea.

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Now, 18 percent said it won't make a real difference to the lives of

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ordinary Indigenous Australians, and I think that's the case, and 14

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percent said it will give Indigenous Australians rights and privileges

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that other Australians don't have.

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That is, of course, the special lobbying rights that we've talked about before,

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so, so that's the reasons why, according to the Essential Poll, the people

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who voted no, mostly it's going to divide Australia on the basis of race.

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Not enough detail.

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It won't make a difference, and it gives rights and privileges

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to Indigenous Australians that other Australians don't have.

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Gender wise, not much difference in the genders.

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Men more, sorry, females, surprisingly, more likely to

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say there was not enough detail.

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31%, as opposed to men, 23%.

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So, age wise, age differences older people are more likely to say it's

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racist less likely to say there was not enough detail, less likely to

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say it won't make a real difference, but more likely to say that it gives

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Indigenous people rights and privileges.

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So, Older people were more about the racial issues of those who voted no.

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Younger people were talking about not enough detail and

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it won't make a difference.

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And voting intention agreeing in voters who voted no did so because

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they said there wasn't enough detail on how it would work.

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And coalition voters was because of the racism issue.

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And that's the sort of main items to glean from that.

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So, no surprises there, I don't think.

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That all makes sense to me.

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What else did we have here?

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Support for government actions after the referendum.

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So, one of the options is, in the event that the referendum does not

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succeed, to what extent do you agree or disagree with the following statements?

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And the one that got the most support was, continue to work with First Nations

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communities to find solutions to the issues they faced, and whether and

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that was pretty much let me just try and get that in the right, let's do

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it by voting intention, I think it's going to be the easiest, I'll do it by

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gender, sorry folks, leave that with me.

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So, you know, between 60 65 percent of people said yep.

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Continue to work with First Nations communities to find solutions, that's

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what they want the government to do if the referendum does not succeed.

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Around the 37 38 percent said start working on a treaty, same number

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said start working on a truth telling commission, about the same number said

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establish an Aboriginal voice that's not enshrined in the constitution, and

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similar numbers around the mid 30s were Recognise Aboriginal and Islander people

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in the Constitution through another referendum without establishing a voice.

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So, majority support for continuing to work to find solutions, and

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very minimal support in the 30s.

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For treaty, truth telling, non constitutional voice type of things.

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Yeah, for all of the doomsayers out there saying Australia's racist, then

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most Australians want the government to find solutions to close the gap.

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They just don't want it done via the mechanism of the voice.

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And, I'll come back to, if we get time Australian Israel and

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Palestine type stuff in there, so, Joe, any thoughts on any of that?

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Any of that surprise you?

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There was something I was looking at I can't remember what it was though.

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There was something about the Liberals and the Greens, which was a little surprising.

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But No, I don't think so.

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I think the vast majority of people recognize that Indigenous

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people, especially those in remote communities, are in shocking

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circumstances, and they want that fixed.

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But again, having a voice in Parliament, I don't think is the answer.

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And I think most people thought that.

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Hmm.

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Yeah.

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Ah.

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Okay.

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Actually, surprising thing was women were slightly less empathetic about

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finding out what Aboriginals need.

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They were 63 percent as opposed to 65%.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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But on the whole, not a great gender difference in this, in these issues.

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Whereas we found with the Morrison government, for example, at the last

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federal election, there were quite distinct gender differences in.

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Invoking intention that don't appear in this voice polling from Essential Poll.

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Yeah, right.

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I've got some clips from some different people, so we hear some voices.

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I think I'd mentioned before Michael Mansell, and I might

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have mentioned his daughter.

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I saw a clip where she was interviewed, so Michael Mansell and

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his daughter were both no campaigners.

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And the reason was that they wanted, they saw the voices being useless,

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and they wanted genuine power in the sense of members, indigenous

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members in the Senate, or they wanted a treaty or, or other things, and

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they saw the voices being useless.

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So here's a little bit of Michael Mansell's daughter.

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We've had advisory bodies advising government about

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closing the gap for 14 years now.

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It's not an issue of the government not having enough

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advice from Aboriginal people.

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The issue here is that the government aren't willing to listen to the

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advice or act on that advice.

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While many of Tasmania's most powerful current and...

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Just pausing there.

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I've been banging on about that for months.

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Years.

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And people just call me a white feathery nose.

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Nothin but there's somebody who knows something about it, who

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says exactly the same thing.

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can support the voice, influential Aboriginal groups do not.

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This is not going to see any land returned, this is not going to help

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incarceration rates, it's not going to support Aboriginal sovereignty

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or self determination, so we say no.

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We want what was stolen from us, and that was certainly not an advisory body.

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So, that was, that was her.

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Now let me find another video.

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This time I was watching this is the sort of post referendum wrap up on the

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ABC and here's Michael Mansell talking about the failure of the Yes campaign.

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I want to bring in Parliamentary Leader Michael Mansell in Tasmania in Hobart

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tonight, Michael good to see you.

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Why do you think Australians voted no tonight?

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This was a, an awful campaign that was run by both the Prime

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Minister and the Yes campaign.

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At no stage did they put forward a compelling case as to why.

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An advisory body should be entrenched in the Constitution.

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Instead, the whole campaign was based on emotion.

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They were saying, you know, all the ads.

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You might recall all the ads showing disadvantage, disadvantage, and then

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somehow stitching that to the advisory body as a solution, and at no stage

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did the Yes campaign explain how an advisory body could do that which the

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Prime Minister, state governments, and the peak organisations couldn't.

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Exactly what I've been saying and asking people to give me an

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example and nobody ever could.

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But what, what would I know?

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Instead of taking on that core issue and explaining to people here is why

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this is so good, they just expected people to jump on board emotionally.

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If you are not a racist Aboriginal, you'll vote for this.

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And of course it worked with some people, but obviously not enough.

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I think he has his finger on the pulse as to what happened, and

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a bit more from Michael Mansell

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here we go with him.

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The Liberal and National Party, very cleverly, allowed two black

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faces to lead the no campaign, and Peter Dutton and David Littleproud

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were then able to sit behind them.

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and let the two Aboriginal candidates run the no case, and it was very effective.

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And instead of the yes campaign explaining why the arguments from Jacinta Price and

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Warren Mundine were not valid people like Marcia Langton and Pat Dodson and other

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people you know, use the old racist tag.

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This proposal was not about sharing power with Aboriginal people.

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This was about leaving Aboriginal people on the outside, trying

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to influence the power brokers and of course it didn't work.

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And even if it had worked, it wouldn't have made the least bit of difference.

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And all of those campaigns by the yes, yes people saying, you know, when they

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raise the expectations of Aboriginal people, that your lives will be better.

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Will this young child have a future?

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I mean, that was pretty underhanded.

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So they shouldn't particularly point the finger at the no camp.

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They should look a bit in the mirror and just see how they run their campaign.

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There we go.

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It says it all.

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I was interested the we want what was stolen from us.

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Mm-hmm.

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. Oh, what was stolen was the whole of Australia.

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Yes.

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And, and it was, and it was from So is that white?

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His ancestors is from his ancestors.

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It wasn't stolen from him because it was, it was an event that had preceded

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him, but does that mean white people out?

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I, it was a very nebulous statement, wasn't it?

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Yeah.

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Obviously, I don't agree with everything he says, but Well, it's

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his daughter, actually, but...

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Treaty and reparations.

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So, on the same, sort of, program on the panel at ABC they had a guy, Wesley Aird.

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Now, he's an Indigenous advocate.

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He's from the Gold Coast Aboriginal community.

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He's worked in Indigenous affairs for over 25 years.

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He was in the Army.

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He was first Indigenous graduate from the Royal Military College at Duntroon.

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And yeah, he's obviously a right winger Indigenous advocate.

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I hadn't come across him before until I saw him on this panel, but he had been

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on Q& A, I subsequently discovered.

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So, here's what he was saying in this panel discussion.

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And let me find a little clip for you.

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Wesley Eyred

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is this guy.

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And the Director of the Centre for Indigenous Training and former

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Coalition Advisor during the Howard and Abbott years, Wesley Eyred.

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When I look back on the statistics around the Aboriginal and Torres Strait

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Islander Commission all those years ago, there were a lot of Indigenous

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people that weren't active in that.

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And the reason they weren't is because they were involved in the economy.

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Mum and dad were going to work, kids were going to school.

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You know, we do have a fairly urban and suburban indigenous population.

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A lot of indigenous people are active in the economy.

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So I think that instead of collectivising Indigenous people and saying, you

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know, it's us 3 percent versus you 97%.

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Maybe we should fund need and focus on need and address it where we can according

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to households and their lived experiences and assist people where we, where we can.

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Because I think Indigenous disadvantage is going to be overcome.

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Probably one household at a time.

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Young kids need role models.

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They need to go to school.

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You know, we shouldn't lose sight that there is a struggle ahead of us,

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but I think it's going to be a very personal struggle from here on in.

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Does that argument sound familiar, Joe?

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Yes, might have heard it once or twice.

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Yeah, but, you know, I'm just insensitive white fella who knows fuck all if I

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say it, but he'll be dismissed because he's a right winger who used to work in

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the Howard government in some respect.

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So he'll be, you know, because of who you are, your argument is shit, rather

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than what is the actual argument.

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Yeah, I mean, the racism towards Lydia Thorpe and Jacinta Price.

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Was quite impressive, because they had the wrong views of a black person, and

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therefore they could be discounted.

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Yes.

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Coconuts.

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Yes.

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Ah, there we go.

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So,

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I've run through the first notes of this section, Joe, of The Voice, but

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it really, it just really strikes me of a failure of our public

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intellectuals, a failure of our, our media to deal with the topics that...

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We've dealt with on this podcast.

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Nobody else has talked about them.

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And Orwellian doublespeak where the racist, the people promoting racist

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policy are accusing the people who want to be colourblind of being racist.

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Well, but also Albanese, if you really wanted to do something, there's

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a royal commission from, I don't know what it was, 10, 15 years ago?

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That none of the, or very few of the, recommendations have been implemented.

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And I think that was Aboriginal deaths in custody, I don't know.

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There was definitely a Royal Commission where nothing happened.

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None of the recommendations.

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It's like, why not start with that?

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Mm, yeah.

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So, so that's where we're at I hope.

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I hold that the debate will improve.

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I hope that people like Wesley Eyred...

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Get some sort of better airplay, but I hold out no hope.

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He'll be accused of being some Warren Mundine or Jacinta

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Price type of character.

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And that will dismiss his arguments without them being properly examined.

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But for me what I heard there was spot on.

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We should be talking about disadvantage.

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There's a significant middle class, upper middle class, well

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to do Indigenous population.

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They're doing fine.

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Let's look at disadvantage, but there we go.

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So, that's the wrap of the Indigenous issue and good on you in the chat

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room for the people who have been making their comments and I don't

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know that there's anything there.

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John says, I thought you were a Bernard fanboy.

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I, I like Bernard Keane on certain things.

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It just goes to show John that when I think somebody's speaking shit,

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I'll say they're speaking shit.

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They're saying something, an argument that's good, I'll say it's good.

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It just doesn't matter who they are, it's the argument itself that is important.

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I was with somebody else recently, who was that?

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Can't remember.

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But, yeah, it's the merits of the argument itself that's important,

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not the person saying it.

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And too often...

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Well, so it should be.

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Yeah, too often the Yes Campaign just will dismiss an argument by

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dismissing the person proposing it, rather than dealing with the issue.

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And that's where we've got to, where we've got to.

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Surely, we'll take a break without people talking about Treaty or truth

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telling Joe, but surely they can tell there's no appetite for Treaty.

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I don't know, it depends on how, Lydia thought was very much Treaty first.

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Yes.

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And I don't know how much coverage she will get.

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I know the right wing press hates her because there were lots of articles about

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her behavior outside of nightclubs, so I don't know what was going on there,

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but I think that if the yes vote or the yes campaign falls apart, then

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it may be, it may well be people like Lydia Thorpe pushing for the treaty.

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And I can see them very much being fought tooth and nail by Landon and the like.

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Yeah, so if you come in late to the podcast Scott's not here because

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he's out of town, out of where he normally is and without internet,

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so he wasn't able to join us.

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But Joe is now acting not only as our tech guy, but as our UK correspondent.

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Coming in loud and clear from Devon, so, there we go.

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Right, well, Joe, let's have a quick talk about Palestine and

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Israel and the latest there.

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Just a couple of things I wanted to mention.

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Ursula von der Leyen.

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Ursula von der Leyen she's some sort of like, something to do with the

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European Commission of some sort.

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She's always giving speeches and she's on Twitter quoted as saying, Russia's

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attacks against civilian infrastructure, especially electricity, are war crimes.

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Cutting off men, women, children of water, electricity and heating with

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winter coming, these are acts of pure terror and we have to call it as such.

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So that was her opinion about Russia and its actions against the Ukraine.

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Meanwhile, turning to Palestine and...

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Israel, she wrote, at the dawn of Shabbat last Saturday, the

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whole world woke up in horror.

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The terrorist attack by Hamas is an act of war, and we fully support

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Israel's right to defend itself.

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Defend itself, yes.

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Impose.

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Punitive action on an entire population?

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Definitely not.

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Hmm, yeah.

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I mean, it seems that they've cut off water, electricity.

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They have.

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And they've been bombing buildings.

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Yes.

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Clearly, civilians are going to die and have died.

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And, well, that's collateral damage.

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That's allowable.

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Yes.

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But the cutting off water and electricity is definitely a no no.

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Yes.

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From the Israeli point of view...

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And I've spoken to a Jewish person about this, you know, when the Palestinians

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broke out of Gaza and gunned down women and children and babies, that

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was seen as being significantly worse than Israel blowing up an entire

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apartment block where there would be women and babies and children.

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They see that as two different, morally different things.

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I don't know that it is.

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Yeah, I mean, it's one of those trolley problems, isn't it?

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You could argue that one is an intentional act and the other one is indiscriminate.

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So, you're aiming for the soldiers and you're accidentally killing

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civilians rather than deliberately going out and targeting civilians.

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Yes.

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But you know you're going to be killing civilians.

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You know it's going to mitigate that, yes.

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Yes.

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But you've got people who are elderly, can't get up and down stairs, elevators

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don't work, you know, or whatever.

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Hamas are hiding out in tunnels under the Gaza Strip anyway, so bombing

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above ground is doing nothing anyway.

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And this is the group, Israel, who had no idea that the attack

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was coming, and now suddenly...

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Have all the intelligence to say, well, if we bomb this particular building,

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we know that's a Hamas building.

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But they didn't have the intelligence before to tell them

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about the strike that was coming.

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But suddenly they've got the intelligence to tell them where they're, you

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know, hiding and which building.

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So, halt on both sides.

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And, yeah is one more morally reprehensible than the other?

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I'm not so sure.

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But you will never convince people.

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Once they're in one of those camps, it's very, it's impossible for people

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who are so distraught to sort of overcome the bias that has been forced

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on them, so, yeah, one person I was speaking to, their, their niece.

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Was there, and she got to a service station when they were attacked.

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Everybody in the service station died, except for her, because

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she was hiding in a cupboard.

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Like, what an experience.

Speaker:

So, sounds like school shootings in the US.

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Yes, it does, doesn't it?

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Yeah.

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We had headlines saying 40 babies murdered by Hamas, and cutting the

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throats of babies in a massacre.

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And we had Joe Biden more or less confirming that he'd seen pictures, but

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then they'd be walking back to say, well, actually, there is no proof of that.

Speaker:

So, but that is in the minds of some people now that Amass had murdered

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babies by cutting off their throats.

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Although apparently the IDF have now released photos of mutilated children.

Speaker:

So it may not have been that particular incident, but apparently

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there is now photographic evidence.

Speaker:

Also worth noting, Bellingcat, who are open source investigative journalists.

Speaker:

Do you have a section on social media misinformation?

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And they were debunking a number of videos going, this is claimed

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to be from the latest outbreak.

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Actually, it's from 10 years ago and is in a different part of the world.

Speaker:

So there's, there's a very interesting if I think it's Bellingcat.

Speaker:

org, just Google Belling cat as in putting a bell on a cat.

Speaker:

And they have a Palestine, Israel, Israel.

Speaker:

page that is updated with the various things that they've debunked.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

What did the White House say?

Speaker:

So the thing that gets me about the way the White House operates, Joe, is

Speaker:

these spokespersons come out and answer questions on behalf of the administration.

Speaker:

And how are they supposed to be able to read the mind of the

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president on a whole range of issues?

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I just don't know how that's supposed to work, where.

Speaker:

People are asking them, what's the administration's position on this and

Speaker:

this and this, and in any event, one of the spokespeople is Corinne Jean Pierre,

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and at a press briefing on Wednesday, she responded to a question about certain

Speaker:

progressive lawmakers calling for a ceasefire and a de escalation of violence.

Speaker:

So she was asked about this.

Speaker:

proposed ceasefire in the Gaza.

Speaker:

And she said, quote, I've seen some of those statements this weekend.

Speaker:

We're going to continue to be very clear.

Speaker:

We believe they're wrong.

Speaker:

We believe they're repugnant.

Speaker:

And we believe they're disgraceful.

Speaker:

This is to the idea of a ceasefire.

Speaker:

Is repugnant and disgraceful.

Speaker:

As he goes on, our condemnation belongs squarely with terrorists who have

Speaker:

brutally murdered, raped, kidnapped hundreds, hundreds of Israelis.

Speaker:

There can be no equivocation about that.

Speaker:

There are not two sides here.

Speaker:

There are not two sides.

Speaker:

So there you go that's apparently the Biden administration's

Speaker:

view on the conflict.

Speaker:

Just finally, Joe.

Speaker:

Was listening to something and I can't remember what they were

Speaker:

talking about, the west sorry.

Speaker:

Gaza Strip.

Speaker:

And apparently Hamas had seized power, so I dunno that they were elected.

Speaker:

Yeah, I don't know either.

Speaker:

I've also been hearing stories that Israel more or less encouraged Hamas

Speaker:

because they didn't want the more reasonable groups there offering.

Speaker:

Reasonable peace terms, but I haven't got to the bottom of that yet, but

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a sort of a Machiavellian type of argument that, that Israel encouraged.

Speaker:

There's also

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arguments that the Israeli government knew of the attacks, unless it

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happened, to galvanize public support.

Speaker:

Yes.

Speaker:

All these sorts of Machiavellian things that may or may not be true, who knows,

Speaker:

so, There's also concern that Hezbollah and the Lebanon will join up because

Speaker:

they are also, it's a Iranian front, so they're supported and funded by Iran.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

And just finally, Joe, just back to the US, so Robert Kennedy Jr.,

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our favourite anti vaxxer Yeah.

Speaker:

He's announced that he's going to be running as an independent, so,

Speaker:

the interesting thing in America, dear listener, is they don't have

Speaker:

preferential voting, so if you, if you split, say, the, let's assume

Speaker:

for example that Robert Kennedy Jr.

Speaker:

is going to split the Democratic vote, that may not be the case, but just assume

Speaker:

that that's the case, so whereas before it might have been, you know, 50 50.

Speaker:

And then suddenly, maybe 15 percent or 10 percent of Democrat voters go

Speaker:

to Robert Kennedy, then Trump wins.

Speaker:

And they've also got this Cornell of a name, who's also looking at running.

Speaker:

And this might be an election where there is some significant independents

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running, who might split these votes.

Speaker:

And open the door to a Trump victory, even though, even

Speaker:

without that, he's in the lead.

Speaker:

Anything is possible in this upcoming US election.

Speaker:

Well, assuming he's picked as the Republican candidate, because if he

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doesn't, then he'll run as an Independent, which will split the Republican vote.

Speaker:

Yes.

Speaker:

So, there's no opportunity for preferential voting

Speaker:

where you as we do have here.

Speaker:

So, that is going to make that election really interesting as

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these independent candidates appear.

Speaker:

And someone like Robert Kennedy Jr., is he going to take Democratic votes or

Speaker:

is he going to take Republican votes?

Speaker:

Because...

Speaker:

He's such a weird character on some of these policies.

Speaker:

Anything's possible.

Speaker:

I'm not sure, but, yes, I mean, the anti vax actually is a

Speaker:

left wing thing, historically.

Speaker:

It was very much a rich parent worried about their poor little babies and autism.

Speaker:

Hippie flower child, sort of.

Speaker:

Absolutely.

Speaker:

And that tended to be much more left leaning.

Speaker:

It was only COVID that it really started to become a right wing thing.

Speaker:

Yes.

Speaker:

John in the chat room says, The Pep podcast did a really

Speaker:

good deep dive on RKJr.

Speaker:

His popularity will probably fall off a cliff.

Speaker:

Says John.

Speaker:

Okay.

Speaker:

Watley the Wizard says almost certainly the Israeli government

Speaker:

knew about it beforehand.

Speaker:

John also says Hamas were elected.

Speaker:

No, no, he says Humas was elected.

Speaker:

Yeah, Humas, yes.

Speaker:

Hey so yeah, that's that.

Speaker:

Well, look, it's a quick episode.

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We don't have Scott here.

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And ah, in the aftermath of the voice referendum, I think

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that's enough for an episode.

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People over there, Joe, as our UK correspondent, what's

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happening on the ground in the UK?

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What do we need to know?

Speaker:

Or what are they, anybody over there think that Australia is now a bunch

Speaker:

of racist assholes as a result, or they don't even know about it?

Speaker:

I did see a news thing of what was the international coverage,

Speaker:

and it really was a damp squib.

Speaker:

There wasn't much international coverage, and most of it just said...

Speaker:

The referendum failed and I think the people who were trying to collate all

Speaker:

of that were making an argument that Australia was being seen as racist again.

Speaker:

But I didn't, I didn't see from the headlines I saw, I didn't read it as

Speaker:

painting a particularly bad picture.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

But really, the rest of the world doesn't care about Australia.

Speaker:

I know it's, it's hard to hear, but that's the, the brutal truth.

Speaker:

It's so far away that people just don't pay attention.

Speaker:

They've got their own little worries.

Speaker:

In the chat room, Watley the Wizard said Watley said, this is, because you,

Speaker:

because John Hummus, rather, Watley says, so Israel went to war with...

Speaker:

Surely Tavulli would get in on the action.

Speaker:

I thought Watley was just, just joking.

Speaker:

I hope it wasn't a picking on your spelling.

Speaker:

Yeah, well, there we go.

Speaker:

That's a big event in Australian political history, social, you know,

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little study society course that we've got here on the Velvet Glove.

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Thanks for tuning in.

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Thanks for listening.

Speaker:

And we'll be back next week with something.

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We'll see what happens.

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Talk to you then.

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Bye for now.

Speaker:

And it's a good note from him.

Speaker:

Yeah.

About the Podcast

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The Iron Fist and the Velvet Glove
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