TrippaSnippa

This was a defamation case, i.e. a civil case. Ten's defence was that their imputation that Lehrmann raped Higgins was substantially true, so the judge had to rule on whether or not the rape happened. It is not a criminal conviction and there won't be one in this case because the criminal trial was abandoned due to juror misconduct.

ABC News in Australia has been using the passive voice everywhere in regards to Israel until they simply couldn't avoid it any longer now that Israel has killed an Australian aid worker.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/3/26/australias-abc-staffs-concerns-over-gaza-bias-revealed#:~:text=Staff%20at%20Australia's%20national%20broadcaster,claims%20that%20convulsed%20the%20outlet. ABC staff have been complaining internally about pro-Israel bias in their use of language too

snake_case gang represent

The chamber of commerce and other employer groups never want minimum or award wages to rise by more than inflation.

I recall more than one year (every year?) where they asked for minimum wage increases that were less than inflation. They don't just want wages to stagnate, they want wages to decrease.

OH SO YOU THINK PEOPLE SHOULDN'T HAVE PRIVATE TRANSPORTATION? You want to keep people imprisoned in their 15 minute cities? ^heavy ^/s

GP fees have increased steadily over the last decade but the previous conservative Liberal/National coalition government froze the Medicare rebate in 2014 to try to force more of a user-pays system into place, which led more and more practices to stop bulk billing (only charging the rebate amount, meaning no cost to the patient). The current Labor government (ostensibly centre-left but arguably more centre-right now) has increased the rebate, but it hasn't been enough to significantly reverse the trend yet. Specialist fees have always had an out of pocket cost in my adult lifetime (15-20 years).

Specialist fees (and nowadays a lot of GP fees for that matter) are not fully covered by the Medicare rebate. Typically you'll pay about $300 for an standard consultation appointment and get not quite half of that back.

I'd say Eric is more like Buster because if they had a Michael they might not be in so much trouble.

Just announce that you're running for office, then the charges become election interference.

Almost like it's an ideological thing and not based on any kind of evidence or fiscal policy.

The bar for proving defamation is already high enough that there's no risk of accidentally chilling honest political speech.

Not in Australia, the bar for defo is stupidly low. The defendant basically has to prove their innocence. The law is fucked and the new "public interest" defence failed its first test in court. Defamation law is abused by the rich and powerful to suppress free speech and silence critics. Even if you can successfully prove substantial truth or genuinely held opinion you'll still be ruined by all the legal costs.