John Linton
in his predictions of the state of the planet in 1984?
I am getting an eerie feeling that Australia's and the rest of the countries in the world's populations are very much being manipulated by various Ministries Of Truth. In Australia's case this is perhaps more obvious to me as I live here but I was reminded of this possible state of 'mind' over the last few week or so having spent a few days in Sri Lanka where it is blatantly obvious to an outsider that the English language press in that country (I can't read or speak Sinhali) is very much a 'government instrument'.
It seems to me that Krudd and co have suborned the Australian media in the same way, and that since those of you who were stupid enough to vote the current muppets into governing this country, Australia has become more and more to look like Airstrip One where Newspeak and Doublespeak and, increasingly, Goodspeak have become the, pardon the mixed metaphor, the new Lingua Franca of the media and parliament.
The Ministry of Truth now holds sway over every 'public' utterance in this country with, as far as I can see, Krudd's statement du jour replacing all of his previous statements on the same topic as being the "truth" while all of his previous, and contradictory statements on the same topic being erased from the public record, or altered to reflect the 'new reality' and anyone who dares raise them being declared insane and a candidate for "re-education" - or members of the coalition members of parliament.
Why do I say this?
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124347195274260829.html
jolts you back from the mindless mantra that (All Australians Must Have 100mbps Broad Band) delivered by a new monopoly that is making wild promises (that can never in the 'old speak' be delivered, haven't been costed beyond bus ticket scribbling and aren't vaguely relevant to a country in financial difficulties). The uncanny resemblance to Airstrip One isn't the stupidity of the statements being made about an uncosted broadband provided by a replacement monopoly but haven't you noticed that everything said by Krudd and Whine follows the same incredible process of being based on no facts and with two unfailing claims:
1) Australia's economy is much better off than the rest of the countries of the world (with the clear implication that this is all due to Krudd/Whine's actions over the past 18 months of "power") when the blindingly obvious fact is that any 'status' of "better than other countries" that exists today was courtesy of the previous 12 years of coalition policy and circumstances that had nothing to do with Krudd's/Whine's crazy decisions since.
2) If Krudd's/Whine's crazy uncosted spending hadn't been done - every Australian would be worse off and 150,000 jobs would have been lost.
These two statement types are mindlessly repeated by every crazy person in this country and in every media outlet to the point that the two dumbest, most dishonest and simply outrageously lying muppets ever to hold the two most senior positions in Australian government are allowed to state anything that comes in to their head with no fear of being held to account even five minutes in to the future when they subsequently make remarks that are diametrically different.
As the article cited seems to, clearly, indicate the need for "blindingly fast" broadband is a myth and, speaking totally personally, I am one of the majority of adults who use the internet extensively that has zero need for something other than a service fast enough to provide VoIP and browsing and data base iterrogation. Now I understand that other people may well like to have the ability to stream video or other more bandwidth/speed dependent applications but are they the vast majority that needs an Australia wide capability? I don't know but I doubt it.
The other point of the cited article is simple - cost is a major concern to end users of data and entertainment services and given an ability to reduce costs or increase speeds a decision won't be made by an increasing percentage of users to increase speeds. Given the choice I would reduce costs rather than increase speeds (I have Exetel ADSL2) and if that meant not watching some movie on my PC I would go to a cinema or, heaven forbid, leave my darkened room and talk to my family or friends and acquaintances or maybe participate in some other activity.
Does a residential internet service need to be faster than 1500 kbps down? Telstra used to advance this position and, while I seldom agree with anything that Telstra says or does, I agree that residential internet speeds have no reason to be very fast at all. It seems to me that 'faster' data communications can be justified for education, health, law and order and a lot of business but has zero relevance for residential users at all. Like car enthusiasts some data users only relate to meaningless speeds. While a minute percentage of car buyers base their vehicle purchase on 'performance' almost everyone else bases their decisions on getting the lowest possible price consistent with their budget and essential needs....they, you, me don't ever have the luxury of speed for the sake of it - almost everyone spends as little as possible.
NO NATIONAL GOVERNMENT is serving the interests of the majority of the population of the country they govern by determining that, WITH NO FUTURE OPTION they WILL get a data service based solely on speed WHICH FEW INDIVIDUALS rate as their decision criteria.
And so like every other 'public issue' since November 2007 only doublespeak or newspeak is used in this country today - the facts have become not only omitted from any statement made by Krudd/Whine etc but Australians have, apparently, been brainwashed into not noticing that has happened.
Krudd is defined by this description of him over the past eighteen months"
"He is completely unrestrained in what he thinks he can say and do"
..if you don't understand that then ask yourself what you and your family/friends are doing about Swine Flu and why practically every restaurant around Australia had almost no customers two Sundays ago....or....why you need to pay much higher taxes to deliver "100 mbps" internet to "90% of Australia's population".
...but don't take my jaundiced view try this from the very pro-Labor financial editor of the SMH:
http://business.smh.com.au/business/rudd-fights-his-way-down-the-boulevard-of-broken-dreams-20090531-bro6.html