massacre

Not so long ago the middle classes were marching enthusiastically all over the western world to defend freedom of the press, after the massacre of journalists at Charlie Hebdo. "We are all Charlie!" they cried. Now there is hardly a peep about Julian Assange's cruel and unusual punishment for telling the world of war-crimes. Certainly no mass marches in the street. What's the difference? The mainstream press is singing a different song. It suited them to have people marching in the streets about Charlie Hebdo. Now, for some reason, it doesn't.

It looks like youtube has removed this excellent analysis of the New Zealand terror attacks, probably because it criticises the unipolar political perspective of the corporate press and big tech platforms. There is an embed code for the video at Press TV Iran's site, but for some reason it does not work. We will therefore simply link to the press tv site. You can click on the video picture to see the debate.

On the 2nd October 2018, a young woman’s life was brought to a brutal end by a bullet from an ISIS executioner’s hand-gun. Mrs Thoraya Um Ammar was executed on video by the terrorist group more than two months after she and twenty five other women and children were kidnapped from the Sweida countryside, south of Damascus on July 25th 2018. 

News is still filtering out today about a US Army Staff Sergeant who allegedly yesterday (Sunday) left his barracks in southern Afghanistan before dawn and walked to the rural villages of Balandi and Alokzai in Afghan's southern Panjwai district and went on a shooting rampage, murdering sixteen unarmed civilians in their homes. Reportedly mostly women and children are among the dead. The number of wounded is still not known.

Of course after having recently contributed an article associated with the Hoddle Street Massacre of 1987, such a tragic incident is on my mind.
As the incident is too fresh to know the truth, the causes, the details, no fair assessment can yet be made. That will be the task of the investigation as promised by US President Barack Obama.
Some questions though....

It's time for some answers from the RSPCA regarding the 4,000 kangaroos that were killed by Defence at Majura Firing Range in the last few weeks. How humane was the 'cull' and were they really 'starving'? Too many questions are left answered - did Defence have an accurate count of the total number of kangaroos living at Majura to begin with? More red flags were raised when ACT Chief Minister Jon Stanhope tried to reverse the Injunction that forced them to stop killing - it's beginning to look suspiciously like another Belconnen cover-up .....