Late General Man, Welcome to the Late Debate.
Thanks for joining us on the Late Debate.
I'm James Macpherson with Liz Storra and Caleb Bond coming up tonight. One of the fastest retractions you will ever see an American TV host smears Elon Musk and then just a couple of minutes later issues a groveling apology that in.
A short time plus.
We'll look at what's making news tomorrow, including Victorian police to lower recruitment academic standards in order to try to get new offices on board, and the famous racing track Mount Panorama could be off limits to the public after an Indigenous group claims it's a sacred site and not for Ford or Holden.
We'll look at that a bit later as well.
But first, Australian childcare centers and schools will later this month celebrate Harmony Day. Personally, looking at the education standards of our kids, I wish they'd just focus on reading, writing and arithmetic, but they're going to do Harmony Day and as part of that on March twenty first, kids will try different foods, they'll wear costumes from different cultures, sing different songs and the whole idea is to sort of experience and understand the cultural backgrounds of other kids
in the class. Harmony Day fairly innocious, you would have thought, But not so according to the Australian Human Rights Commission, who've labeled Harmony Day a cover for racism.
That's right.
They say kids shouldn't be celebrating each other. No, no, they should be learning about how our nation was built on racism. Because in seventeen eighty eight white people arrived from Britain, Indigenous groups were disenfranchised, and that's what our children need to be learning about, because structural racism continues until this day.
Goodness me.
You want to talk about structural racism its structures like the Australian Human Rights Commission that are part of that if it exists. Listen to what they said in a report about Harmony Day to schools. This is their device I quote. The problem with Harmony Day is that the focus on harmony can gloss over racism.
That's right.
You can have too much harmony. It can stop people from discussing it. This is for childcare centers. Or it can cause people to think that speaking up upsets the idea of a harmonious Australian society. It distracts from recognizing and addressing the harm that racism causes to communities. The Australian Human Rights Commission putting the harm back into harmony.
Harmony is a distraction, they claim, a distraction from what from what they would love to be doing, which is training our children in the fine arts of grievance and guilt. That's right, all the colored kids can feel aggrieved and all the white kids should feel guilty. To that end, the Australian Human Rights Commission wish to rename Harmony Day the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination and push that through our Kindi's caleb, these guys are nuts.
I mean you can just imagine the kids go, oh my god, I can't wait to celebrate the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discriminations.
Say it once and say it tries with the kid.
I mean, seriously, the idea of Harmony Day is that we love our neighbors and we recognize that we all live together in one country and let's all get along because that's a nice way to live. That's not good enough, because the point here what they've actually led out of the cat they have led out of the bag is that none of it is really about harmonizing all of us.
And I've made this point before when we talk about reconciliation when it comes to Indigenous people, we're told we must achieve reconciliation, which, if you follow the definition of reconcile the prefix to reconciliation, it means that we come together and we come to some sort of agreement on what has happened before, and now we move together as one will know that's not what they want. They don't want us to live in harmony. They don't want us
to reconcile. They want to con genuinely point out the differences. The point is not to achieve harmony. The point isn't even to end racial discrimination, because of course there is no literal end to racial discrimination if you follow this to its logical conclusion, because there are never enough reparations that can be paid for the alleged racial discrimination that has occurred before you were even a glint in your
father's eye. What they want is to divide us, and they've got to start with the kids, because imagine if the kids start thinking that it's all hunky dory that we can all live together in harmony in the one country. Well, then you don't have a racism industry anymore, do you.
This is the Human Rights Commission basically peddling critical race theory, even on toddlers, being like, you're doing a terrible job, but we're not talking about harmony. We want to teach them from infancy, the politics of grievance, identity politics. How are all so divided? And like you say, the black kids can then feel aggrieved because they've just learned about
the injustices of the past. None of their generation is responsible for or ours, let us not forget, And then all the white kids can be like, oh, for heaven's sake, I had no idea. We're here thanks to all the dreadful things that we've done. Why would you want to feel little kids' heads with this. I'm actually not in favor of Harmony Day either, because this is teaching race theory of a different kind, telling these kids, oh, he's perfectly normal and good and wholesome and right, and everyone
should be doing it. This idea of multi culturalism, which I've said before and will continue to say it is a farce. A multi ethnic society absolutely but a society that doesn't work, which we discuss every other night for different reasons on this show and all the others. A society that doesn't have a cohesive culture, a society that
doesn't rally around at least one particular religion anymore. No, No, we want these kids to understand that despite having cultures that clash, religions that are completely at odds with each other, inherently held values hailing from those incredibly different cultures, we're all just a melting pot and we should all get together in harmony. Don't We talk about every single night how this isn't working so well, especially in light of what's playing out currently in the Middle East. It's simply
not true. So whether you're teaching kids' critical race theory or harmony, harmony, it's all about harmony. Multiculturalism is amazing, and all culturals, all cultures are equal. No they're not. All people are equal, yes, but all cultures absolutely not. Kids should be told our culture is the best. That's how you raise little patriots who are ready to defend and fight for what they know to be right. For
as long as they have a melting pot. They're like, well, okay, so everyone's right, even though people essentially believe incredibly different things to each other. It doesn't work.
So I have a suggestion.
So the Australian Human Rights Commission want to rename Harmony Day, right, Their suggestion is what is an International Day for the Elimination of racism.
I've got another suggestion.
We rename Harmony Day Australia Day every day on January twenty six. But here's the serious point. You've got to harmonize around something exactly. So to have harmony, there's got to be something that you harmonize around. So surely what we harmonize around is the fact we are all Australian. January twenty sixth Harmony Day.
I agree.
Change the name of it Harmony Days, a bit call Australia Day.
It could really work.
And then what it kind of proves really is that you give them an inch, they'll take a mile. Like okay, So we started to acknowledge that we shouldn't be racist, but then that's not good enough because apparently it hides racism.
Like how do you win? You don't win this battle. That's the point.
Well, I forget which one of you said, the racism industry but of course, if Harmony Day works, the Australian Human Rights Commission doesn't need it's fifty million dollar a year funding allowance because there'll be nothing for it to do.
And I think that's the thing that really gets their go.
We can scrap it. Tell you who is scrapping critical race theory in the classroom is Trump's administration. They gave schools until the twenty eighth of February to get rid of all their DEI nonsense or their critical race indoctrination out of the classroom or lose their federal funding. Now what school is going to put up their hands and say, oh, yes, we'll just shut up shop because well, we want to keep teaching this nonsense. None of them. But the Trump
administration didn't stop there after February twenty eighth. They've launched just last week an online portal called Getting Rid of DEEI, which is for the use of parents, of students, everyone on the ground. That will of course be the ones aware if schools are not obeying this edict from the federal government. They say, jump online. We want to know what schools are breaking the rules. They literally tell people, if you're using this porthole, describe it as much detail
as possible, the discriminatory practice taking place. They call these illegal discriminatory practices. They want to identify potential areas for investigation. This is incredible. This portal says the US Department of Education is committed to ensuring all students have access to meaningful learning free of divisive ideologies and indoctrination. So while we've got our Human Rights Commission literally saying you're not shoving this down kids and throats hard enough, you've got
the Trump administration saying you will. We're gutting this out of the entire schooling system, and if you break the rules, mom and dads around the country are going to dob you in and you will lose your federal funding.
I love this so much, especially as a parent who's had kids come home from school with books where they've got a picture of an indigenous person under a tree looking incredibly happy. And then besides that, there's a picture of a modern city and there's smoke coming out of factory stacks, and the implication clearly is that Australia was this idyllic paradise until white people arrived with their industrial revolution, and your kids are getting bombarded with that right from
an early age to now my kids in university. And we had that story just the other night about Macquarie University, where young people are being taught that if they're not Indigenous, they're a settler and a guest in this country. And you've got lecturers starting the semester by telling students if you address me by female pronouns, though I am a female, I will ignore you. So it's rammed down kids' throats continually.
Parents in this country you complain it falls on deaf ears, but in the United States now you can make a legitimate complaint and the Education Department will listen and do something about it.
And I'm sure those books your sons were sent home with were made by modern printers and then modern binders and all this sort of modern technology that then allows us to read books about how it was such an idyllic lifestyle before the white man rocked up by the bye.
But I think it's fantastic.
They should call it the did Dorbin Division and expand it from you know, beyond schools to everywhere. Right every time you see DEI report it to the government and then they can go in and do something about it. I do wish that perhaps it would lob in my emails first so that we've got the stories here to do first before everyone else gets onto them. But that's
sort of been your only outlet thus far. Right, If there's something going on in a school, or there's something going on that you think is dodgy in terms of DEI that the only way you could do anything about it was to go to the media and get a journalist to report on the story and then hope they created enough of a ground swell for something to be done. Now you've got a government that is proactively wanting to do things. They're saying, look, if you see it, tell us.
It's a bit like the cops, or as if you see something, if you hear something, say something, And they're applying exactly the same logic here, and so it should be because the parents are the eyes and.
The ears of the schools, and.
You know, you can imagine why a department wouldn't know what's going on in every single school everywhere. So unless someone does blow the whistle, these things will just continue to happen.
So thank god someone's come up with a way.
Who would have thought, you know, the idea of a website where you can go on and say something's.
Happening at my school and it goes off to the government. So novel. Why did no one think of this before? Strange, isn't it.
While we're in the United States and talking about Trump, etc. He would have seen, I'm sure over the weekend his meeting with the Ukrainian president, LORDI mu Zelensky. Now I'm not going to go chapter and verse into it, because well, if you haven't seen the coverage, you have definitely been living under a rock. But as a small reminder of how things went, he was a little bit of the meeting between Zelenski and Donald Trump the other day.
Cabinet, we gave you, through the stupid president, three hundred and fifty billion dollars. We gave your military equipment, and you've met are brave, but they had to use our military one of if you didn't have our military equipment. If you didn't have our military equipment, this war would have been over.
In two weeks now, Zelensky has gone to the US to publicly sign a minerals sharing deal between Ukraine and the US that would then become a major plank of negotiating an end to the war between Ukraine and Russia. They set up a great trap for Zelenski. There he walked in, he became argumentative, and they were just as argumentative back, they being Trump and his Vice president J. D. Vance, who also took up the torch against Zelenski.
Take a look, have you said thank you once? A lot of times.
You went to Pennsylvania and campaigned for the opposition in October, offer some words of appreciation for the United States of America and the president who's trying to save your country.
Now, there's been a lot of talk since then that Vance overstepped the line. And how dare he speak directly to Zelenski and say you should be more grateful for what we have done to you, as though he were the petulant child in the room. I must remind people this is not the first time this has happened, and it's not the first time it's happened under a Democrat administration either. It's just that in that case, it didn't
happen publicly. It happened over the phone talking about Joe Biden. Now, yes, it didn't happen publicly, but that's not the fault of Joe Biden. Nor is it the fault of JD Vans that the situation in which they got argumentative was in front of reporters, as Zelensky could have avoided that just as well as anyone else could have. But this has happened before, Biden said when he was president to Zelenski, you should be more grateful, Tager listen.
In this conversation, President Biden called President Zelensky to tell him about a roughly one billion dollar package of additional equipment and weapons for the Ukrainian military coming from the United States. During the course of the call, President Zelensky continued. According to a number of officials who we spoke with who are familiar with the call, president Zelensky continued to talk about the additional equipment and weapons and support that he
and his military needed. According to these officials, they said that President Biden finally just got frustrated and lost his temper and told President Zelensky, look, you could be a little bit more great for he knew that the narrative out there needed to be that the Ukrainian people and President Zelensky were grateful for it. If this was the support was going to continue at that same level kit like.
It's basically a carbon copy of the conversation that Vance and Trump had with Zelensky, except that that one was done behind closed doors. The other one with Trump and Advanced, you actually got to see in public. The position of the Bard administration and the Trump administration on.
That specific point is exactly the same. But the problem here.
Of course, is that if you actually want to end the war, which is Trump's stated goal, He's got no other state of goal here except to end this war, and I think Zelensky to some degree wants to achieve that. But the problem is you have to seed ground in order to do it. Both Russia and Ukraine have to make some kind of concessions in order to end this war. Now, Zelensky, for moral reasons, doesn't want to make those concent sessions.
And I understand why. For moral reasons he wouldn't want to make those concessions because Russia started this war, etc. That's fine, but there ain't going to be an end to the war unless you're willing to make those concessions. And if you don't do that, more people die, and this just goes on and on and on forever, and that's not good.
For anyone. I mean, Russia's not losing this war.
Sure, Ukraine's been able to keep them at bay to some degree for a very long time. Now, this war's gone a lot longer than we thought it would, But Russia's not losing this war. The only way to end it as if they both say we'll give up some ground.
But it doesn't seem like that's going to happen.
And what's interesting is that Macron Zelensky was offered an opportunity to apologize on Fox News and decline to apologize for his behavior. He's run off to Europe. He's meeting with Starma and Macron and others, and now they're trying to come up with a peace plan. But it depends again on the goodwill of America, because America have to
back it. One thing that no one's really reflected on, I don't think, and that is Trump had been saying for some time that European countries need to look after their own defense, they need to raise their defense budgets. He's been quite adamant that that needs to happen. America can't just keep on carrying the whole world. And the meeting that Starmer had with mccron and other European leaders. They all said that European nations need to lift their
defense spending to three point five percent of GDP. The average is one point seven percent across the European Union at the moment. So whatever happens out of this, Trump has achieved one of his stated goals, and that is to cajole the Europeans into, hey, stop free loading of America and start to look after your own defense.
But at this point, once America has pulled the plug, and it well and truly has, it doesn't matter what France and the UK do, because what also nobody talks about is obviously this is an incredibly expensive war, but Russia is out beforeilming both the united efforts of the US and NATO when it comes to making artillery, and
that's something everyone seems to have missed. This has been such an exercise in highlighting the fact that NATO hasn't been able to turn spending power into firepower quick enough. All the artillery that the US has sent to the Ukraine is not coming out of stocked full shelves bountiful with artillery. It's been coming off conveyor belts. Russia and you can google this for yourself. Has absolutely outstripped the combined efforts of the US and NATO when it comes
to just pumping out its own artillery. They have industrial capacity. NATO has proved that it clearly does not, even with the US on its side. But what I can't believe is how many commentators today we're condemning Vance, we're condemning Trump like this had come as some sort of surprise.
These guys had said for months in the lead up to the election, appealing to their base, who is furious at the amount of money that has been spent on this war, they have said, and you will remember, Trump was like, within twenty four hours, within twenty four hours, I get into the White House, it's gonna be over now. Of course he hasn't been able to deliver on that. But people saying, oh, Trump advanced just totally embarrassed themselves.
And this was humiliating. Do you think this wasn't calculated? Do you genuinely think this wasn't choreographed? They are playing to the base. Trump doesn't find this embarrassing at all. Remember, the guy comes from TV. He loves the theater, he loves the drama. He revels in this kind of thing. And you can bet your bottom dollar that these two said, wait, we promised our base we would not be doing business with this guy going forward. Now are being featured him
sitting in the White House. It looks rather cozy. We need to send a message to the base that we are standing by the things that we promised them. And what I can't believe is the Lensky's attitude, knowing that that is what this administration had been saying four months in the lead up. In fact, on February nineteenth, this is what Trump wrote on his own social account. He said,
think of it a modestly successful comedian VLADIMIRS. Skeolensky. Zolensky rather talk to the United States of America into spending three hundred and fifty billion dollars to go into a war that couldn't be won, that never had to start, but a war that he without the US and Trump will never be able to settle. The United States has spent two hundred billion dollars more than Europe, and Europe's
money is guaranteed while we'll get nothing back. Why didn't sleepy Joe Biden demand equalization in that this war is far more important to Europe than it is to us. We have a big, beautiful ocean as separation. On top of this, Zelenski admits that half of the money we sent him is missing. That's a true story. He refuses to have elections, is very low in Ukrainian polls, and the only thing he was good at was playing Biden
like a fiddle. A dictator without elections, Zolensky better move fast or he is not going to have a country left. In the meantime, we are successfully negotiating an end to the war with Russia, something all admit only Trump and the Trump admin can do. Biden never tried. Europe has failed to bring peace, and Zelensky probably wants to keep the gravy train going. I love Ukraine, but Zelensky has
done a terrible job. His country is shattered and millions have unnecessarily died, and so it continues very provocative to say the least. This is what Zelensky knew he was walking into in this meeting, and yet his attitude talking over the leader of the free world. You'd think you'd just be like, Okay, no matter what they do, grin and bear it. But this narrative coming out of the mainstream media that this guy was here and he was just to cement a minerals deal. That was the point
of this. Put the wall to one side for two seconds. This was a minerals deal, and we're supposed to believe that it was thrown out the window because Zelenski was a little bit rude, a little bit short, do me a favor. This administration knew exactly what they were doing, making an example out of him, voicing the frustration of millions of Americans, and it worked. They're on side well.
Anlys Nielsen made the point on Paul Murray's program before Us that they essentially gave him enough rope to hang himself, and he jumped into the trap and gave them the trigger to do what they wanted to do.
He played that really dumb. The way he went into that meeting.
It could have been a lot more civil than it was, but he took debait and handed them the easy wins.
It's going to say, you know, you could say that Trump and Vance made an example of him. Zelenski made a pretty good example of himself. I thought, hey, moving on. You know, the other day I told a story on this program about a TV special run back in nineteen eighty six.
It was called The Mystery of El.
Capone's Vault, and television networks all over the world ran this special where they blew up el Capone's vault and everyone was fascinated by what they would find in there. Of course, when it was blown open, the worldwide television audience was greatly disappointed because there was just some dirt and some empty whiskey bottles.
That was it. Well, history repeats.
The whole world was waiting with baited breath at the weekend for the release of the Epstein files, which the Trump administration had promised and which Attorney General Pam Bondi had blown up to be bigger than ben her. Here she is speaking prior to the release of those files. This was on February twenty first.
The DOJ may be releasing the list of Jeffrey Epstein's clients.
Well, that really happen.
It's sitting on my desk right now to review. That's been a directive by President Trump.
I'm reviewing that.
I'm reviewing JFK files, MLK files. That's all in the process of being reviewed, because that was done at the directive of the president from all of these agencies.
So she's getting us ready and then five days later she was building it up even more.
There are well over this will make you sick. Two hundred victims, two hundred. We have to make sure that their identity is protected and their personal information. But other than that, I think tomorrow the personal information of victims. Other than that, I think tomorrow, Jesse breaking news. Right now, you're going to see some Epstein information being released.
We're going to see some Epstein information released. So binders were given out to particular people. The Epstein files phase one the most transparent administration in history. All that information was later posted online with this disclaimer from the Trump administration quote, the first phase of declassified files largely contains documents that have previously been leaked but never released in a formal capacity. Caleb, it was a bit of a
nothing burger. It was like blowing open El Capone's safe and there was a bit of dirt and some empty bottles.
Nothing. We didn't already know.
What more could you ask for it.
It's like when you know things turn up in newspapers and then five days later the government say we've got a brand new announcement for you we already knew about did Bevans say? This is really odd because Cash Patil, who's now in charge of the FBI, has previously talked about how he wants this to believe be released.
He's read the files, et cetera.
Pam Bondie is now saying that the reason we didn't get any more information in this tranch of documents is because the FBI refused to release them. Cash Patel has not publicly commented about this since Pam said that some three days ago. Now, there is something weird going on here right now now, whether that is that there are staff in the FBI that didn't release it and now Patel's trying to work behind the scenes, who knows, but he hasn't acknowledged publicly why any of this has happened
or how any of this has happened. So it would lead you to us, why have we not actually seen anything that's of any interest yet. And the fact that they trumpeted it so hard the release right like they got influencers in and podcasters and whatever and gave them advanced copies of the documents, which was a bit weird to begin with. I mean you know, it's reasonably standard that media get embargoed versions of documents so that they can publish a story at the same time as something
is released publicly. That's normal and standard practice, so you can get the praises of these things as quickly as possible. But it wasn't just a he is document in secret treat it secretly put your report out at this time on this date. They got them in in a publicity stunt and got them to walk around waiving the documents around to show that they had them, and then when they opened them up found there was nothing inside.
The whole thing is bizarre.
And they had to know it would massively backfire because these influences, these podcasters. Basically, if you're an American podcaster or similar with over a million followers, you get invited to these things now, which is a great plus. But some of these guys are the ones that have been following the Epstein story for years and years and years.
It was six years ago now that this guy suddenly turned up dead, and just when people thought they were getting justice, no information has come to light, and they were told that they would get new stuff in this lever arch file that each of them got and as you said, Caleb, it was talked up as like, oh,
please don't discuss this yet. You know, they didn't use the word embargo, but it was very much implied that you are being let into the inner sanctum with this information it's not yet to go public, to which these guys went home, read through that lever Arch file and said, this stuff is years old. There is not one scaic of new information that has come to light. What was this entire fiasco about. So they've really shot themselves in the foot, particularly Pam Bondi because of course she's very
new as Attorney general. This is Trump's pick. People have very high expectations. This is something that the Trump team trumpeted for ages that they were going to do. Same with the JFK files. Haven't seen any of those either, have you know me? Neither keep me posted. These guys are owed answers and they're still seeing absolutely nothing. So this is a massive embarrassment. Then Pam turns around, like you say, he blames the FBI and says, but I've
given them a deadline eight am Friday. They've got to give me the stuff that they haven't given me yet. But when The leaders of the FBI now are Cash Pattel, who's talked about this at length and how much he wants to bust it wide open. His deputy Don Borngino has also talked about this at length for years. This
guy's in the no, he knows what he's talking about. Again, we're supposed to believe that the FBI are the ones who are like pussy footing around this, not being upfront and hon us not blowing it open like they promised. Everyone's smelling a rat right now and saying this guy, why won't you reveal anything to us? And what Bondi was saying there about, Oh, you know, it's about keeping the victims their information. Nobody is expecting that what they
want is the client list. You promised a client list. You promised that this thing was going to peel paint off the walls and justice was going to be served at last on these rich and powerful people that participated in a child sex trafficking ring, and still we got nothing. Meanwhile, Gealing Maxwell is serving twenty years basically in a really nice place with the ankle bracelet on for crimes that involve no one, apparently involve absolutely nobody seems incredible.
Bondie said, you know, promises made, promises kept seepack when it came to the release of these documents. I don't think at this point you'd say the promise has been kept, would you.
No, not at all to Romania now, where here we have another European country who is trying to get a right leading government. We've seen this in the Netherlands. We've seen this in France, We've seen this in Italy. We've seen this across the board as countries in the European Union go the European Union is not serving our interests. We want a radical We want someone who is going to put our country first. Well, this guy called Kaylin
George Estu, Sorry mate if I've mispronounced your name. He's heading up what Once again the mainstream media is calling a far right party. They love to do this. They're even using the whole oh he loves Russia, his mates with Putin, even though the guy has literally said, quote, I'm not a fan, end quote. Just to make it really clear, do not try to be smirched me with that. I know it's worked in the past for you, but I am not a Putin fan. Well, he run. He
won the first round of elections in Romania. They have a complicated system there, but all went well during the first round. The second row was stymied, and now this guy ends up in prison. He was just in a car on his way to a rally when he was taken into custody in Romania on what I can only tell is trumped up chargers. Now it's very hard to
know what are the facts and figures about this. Who knows much about Romanian politics, but this looks like a stitch up, as most stitch ups are when it's pertaining to a right leaning leader trying to get up in the EU who has made great promises to their country. They have the popular vote, and so the media goes to town on them, as do the powers that be, to make sure that they never actually get the gong. But check out the crowd protest trying to get Kaylin
George Escue out of jail. Look at the masses that are gathered to say, get our guy out of prison. We elected him in the first round, we'll elect him in every other round. You guys are trying to stick our guy, and you've arrested him, you've indicted him, and on what charge. It's very hard to believe any of this. But once again, this is what they tried to do with Lee Penn, with smirching her as some crazy right wing nut job. This is what they did with Garrett
Wilda's crazy nut wing right job. You can go through each of the countries. Germany, they tried this on really hard with the AfD. Didn't work. They have the popular vote, and here we are in Romania. It just seems like copy paste.
It's always interesting when they use smears like far right, which as far as I can tell, means you believe in God, country and family.
They probably have very hard immigration policies.
They've called him a.
Populist, which I guess is true since he did win the first round of the election, an ultranationalist, which means he rejects the EU globalist fantasy and he believes in national sovereignty, and he's admirer of Trump, which is one of the worst things you can be these days.
Calling in sixth.
Position going into the first round of the presidential election, so literally came out of nowhere to win that first round. And one of the charges against him is and I quote, setting up an organization with fascist, racist, and xenophobic characteristics, which sounds like a very subjective sort of criminal charge.
Well, yeah, and they're claiming that he's set up some sort of anti Semitic group. And the reporting out of the Romanian media has been all this stuff leaked from the charges that they're they're laying against him, saying he tried to lead some coup against the government and that's anti constitutional. Look, if governments just listened to their people, you wouldn't have to deal with people like him in the first place, would you.
You wonder how you end up with these supposedly far.
Right candidates because people have got no other choice. Seriously, just listen to people when they say they want their countries to be looked after. Quickly, before we go to a break, If you've been watching this program for the better part of two years, if you've been reading my columns, you'll know I've been banging on about the illicit tobacco trade and the fact that it was all created by the federal government because they charge it a high heaven
with tobacco excise. If you try to buy a packet of daries down at the supermarket, and.
Would you believe it? Everyone else has now jumped on board.
There's been some great reporting over the weekend from the nine newspapers and sixty Minutes last night Nick Nick mackenzie sorry, great investigation. Four Corners has run an investigation this evening on the ABC about this booming illicit tobacco trade. If you're not a smoker and you don't know exactly how easy it is to buy a packet of illegal cigarettes with no tax on it, and exactly how cheap they are, this is how easy it is.
Hi, thanks Manchester Satires plase just one packs.
For thirteen bucks a pack o good.
That's going on in thousands of tobacconists and convenience stores across the country, basically with zero impunity. The money that you spend on that elicit packet of cigarettes goes on to fund all sorts of other crime human trafficking, murder, etc. That's the sort of stuff that goes on. Because the crime gags are forgetting about drugs. Now they're getting involved in elicit tobacco why because the federal government created this market.
Even the police agree.
Sixty Minutes last night and the nine newspapers today were.
Quoting Rowan Park.
He's the former head of the Border Forces Tobacco Task Force, and he says the Federal Health Department's ideological zealotry in relation to elicit tobacco has caused the problem and continues to fuel it.
These are the people who.
Are trying to combat the illicit tobacco trade that is being run by organized crime. The government is at fault. If they weren't so greedy with their tax, the government wouldn't be funding indirectly murder, rape, all sorts of stuff in this country right now. This is what happens when you go overboard on tax. They've been worn so many times on this and they've done nothing. If you're the leader of the Hells Angels or any of the other Middle Eastern crime gangs, I'll tell you what, they won't
be voting for Peter Dutton. They'll all be voting for Anthony al but Easy, and they should be sending him a letter of thanks for giving them a brand new market that has been so damn lucrative.
We're going to go to a break when we come back.
Well, it's making news tomorrow, including the racetrack. Mount Panorama could be off limits to the public after an Indigenous group claims it's a sacred sight.
All of that and law in a moment.
Welcome back. Well, let's give you the first look at tomorrow's front pages. We'll start with the Herald's Sun, which has got a great story on the front page.
The headline reads Easier to be a Cop.
Police in Victoria are loosening their academic standards to lift an abysmal recruitment rate. The force has relaxed several education and health requirements for some recruits. The article goes on to say applicants who receive an Australian Tertiary Admission ranking of sixty five or above will no longer be required
to sit the entrance exam. Just for context, the average ATAR in Victoria last year was sixty nine point five, So you can now score sixty five fairly well below average, and that will be considered good enough for the Victorian Police. Of course, you can score lower than that and score your spot in the federal government's cabinet. I love this quote in the article from Chief Commissioner Rick Nugent.
He says there is no.
Minimum ATAR study score or education level required to join Victoria Police.
That's hardly a ringing endorsement.
No, I mean, I've got to say, I'm looking at your doodles on the front of the Herald Sun tomorrow, James.
I am shocked. I tell you the things he draws. I was on his newspapers.
But if you were thinking of joining the coppers, right, would you really go?
Hmm?
I can't be there, goes my pen off.
That is, I can't be bothered being a copper anymore because I'd have to take a test in order to be entered into the police force. Is that really the thing that's preventing anyone from signing up to the police force in Victoria. I don't think it is. As if they can say this is going to get one single extra person into the police force. I can't see how
it's going to do anything. If you're that lazy that you don't want to take a test to become a police officer, do we even want you as a police officer in the first place.
Get some more people in, but they'd be all the wrong kind of people.
Yeah. The message is if you don't do well at school, there's always the Victorian Police.
We'll give you a gun.
Don't worry, We'll give you a gun and a chaser for good measure to the front page of the Northern Territory News. Now show us the Mondays Northern Territory government wants federal cash on the table for port buy out. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, we're talking about the Port of Darwin.
Could it be at last stump it up? The Northern Territory Government is sending representatives on a key mission to Canberra that could see the Federal Labor government put up the cash to buy the Port of Darwin from Chinese operator's land bridge. Ultimately it will be a case of stump up or shut up on the table for the
Albanesi government. Now, I'm sure you, like any rational thinking person, thinks is absolutely nuts that this port that was once bonded to eternity by the Japs during World War Two, because port's are very important strategic logistical I mean they make or break, especially during wartime, that we just handed it over to our chief enemy, thank you, Malcolm Turnbull for a pole tree just over half a million dollars
and they have it for ninety nine years. This is the stupidest thing I have ever seen in my entire life, and yet ALBANSI stood by it. Remember in twenty twenty three there was a blistering report that came out. Morrison also did one because he was like, well, you know, got to be seen to be doing something. Every defense expert has screened their lungs out over this, saying we've got to buy it back, We've got to break this agreement. And then Albanesi came out and said, look, we've had
a review and it's all a okay. Three days before he announced that he was going to China to visit Jijingping and be called a handsome boy. So this farce has continued for a very long time. Tensions are very high with regards to our relations with China, especially now that Trump's in the White House. The tiny has never been better. But do you I think this government's actually going to do something about it.
This is the sort of thing you do in the lead up to an election where national defense is becoming an issue. People are doubting your commitment to it, so you hint that we're going to do this, and then you.
Win the election and you forget all about it. I think that might be what.
Happens here, maybe, though I don't know that.
Finocchiaro in the Northern Territory would actually he would just hand that a little freebach to Albanizi. But it's even worse than you described is in terms of that report, because it was three days before he said he was going to go to China, but he dropped it on a Friday afternoon, which is the oldest trick in the book when you're trying to bury a story. Six months
after he had received that report. He sat on the report for six months before he decided to tell us that it was okay to keep the Port of Darwin in Chinese hands. It is absolutely staggering that that still exists. If he's got at least two brain cells, ALBERANIZI will do something about it. But I'm not going to breath because of course we saw how he treated those warships, Chinese warships floating around the Australian coast. I think China's just able to do what they want really basically. Oh
also slide of hand in television. I've got another pen, and now I didn't get up out of my seat to retrieve.
The one that I threw off the desk. F I can do.
Anything made that's going to be so you had one in your pocket.
Well, well I had one next to the desk. Look you know, you know I've always got pins because you never know when I'm going to have a hissy fit and throw one at my producer. Let's go to the Australian tomorrow where it is sacred status bid for iconic
motor race site. The fringe indigenous group that brought down the billion dollar Blaney Mind Project has laid the groundwork for an unprecedented legal bid to declare the peak of Mount Panorama, overlooking Australia's iconic motor racing circuit, a sacred site after one of its former members ashes were scattered there. Can you imagine this, James, I know how much you enjoy your your supercars sport.
Can you imation making it a sacred site?
Actually it should be a sacred site because it is so bloody important to Australian culture, But not for the reasons they suggest.
I've been to a couple of smoking ceremonies at Mount Panorama in nineteen eighty six and in nineteen eighty eight.
It's smoking, so it's coming out of the back of the car.
Yes, But this indigenous group applied for permission and received it from the council to go to this summit on Mount Panorama, to conduct a smoking ceremony, to sprinkle the ashes of an indigenous man who had no connection to Mount Panorama at the top of the mountain mark a tree, and now they've claimed it's a sacred site because this man's ashes have been sprinkled. Think about those surfers who go out after a mate gets taken by a shark or whatever, and they sprinkle their mate's ashes out in
the ocean. What are they going to start to claim that that now belongs to them and their mates because ashes are there. This is unbelievable that they're doing this. We're going to go to a break when we come back. One of the most incredible retraction that you'll see on TV. An American show blasts elon Musk and then just moments later issues the glovalent groveling apology that's coming up with us.
The moment welcome back.
Well, LISZT TV hosts get it wrong occasionally, but this one was a doozy.
Oh, this was deliberate. We all know that Musk derangement syndrome has taken off since Trump made it to the White House and decided to make this guy his sidekick. Lefty's love to hate him. So, of course that includes the panel of the View, but none more so than Joey Biha, who decided to just go full misinformation disinformation, spouting her hatred. For one, Elon Musk.
Was upborn in this country, who was born under apartheid in South Africa, so has that mentality going on? He was pro apartid as I understand it. Now, I'm getting some flat because I said that Musk was pro apartheid. I don't really know for sure if he was. He grew up at that time when a part time was in phil Blom before the great Nelson Mandela fixed out he was around at that time, but maybe he was.
Maybe he wasn't He might have.
Been a young guy too, So don't be so emmy, O.
Can you a very formose way of saying, I just made that up? I imagine if each of us were responsible and clearly supported whatever was going on in our nation of birth.
Well, well, you know, Joy Biha was born in nineteen forty two, and I think Hippler was running around the world in nineteen forty two, wasn't he? She must be a Nazi. For goodness sake, how dumb can you get?
Now?
Look, it's no secret that I have a thing about people dressing well, particularly for the circumstance they are in. You might remember I had a spray in the early days of this program about Senator David Poe, cup Poke, cup po Cox sorry, rocking up to Parliament with so much as a suit and tie and he's walking around the corridors in a T shirt. Adam Sandler did much the same today at the Oscars. You know, I really couldn't give two rats about the Oscars, the degenerate nonsense
that goes on there. But seriously, mate, if you're rocking up to an awards night, you can do better than this.
And finally, for such a prestigious night, it's important that everyone is properly dressed.
Okay, you're dressed well.
Adam Gold here, what's.
Up, my brother?
What's going on?
Adam?
What are you wearing?
What? What are you doing right now?
And asking you what you're wearing?
Nobody even thought about what I was wearing.
You brought it up.
There you go. He's the Zelenski of the Oscars. That's it from us. Stick around coming up is the readependent, his show, good Night