Why NSW has always been ahead of Victoria

[9 min read]

Dear Reader,

The Australian political system has failed the people.

I guess it’s really just catching up with the rest of the world. In the same way as the RBA caught up with the Federal Reserve, the Bank of Japan, the European Central Bank, and the Bank of England.

They’ve all gone ‘QE’, and are happily destroying the purchasing power of their respective national currencies.

It probably shouldn’t be surprising, then, to see this insanity permeate into all levels of society, especially politics.

Before I talk specifics though, let’s put things into context. Then you can ask yourself; how far have we come? How much have we ‘progressed’?

You see, the Constitution of the country that is now under constant abuse from elected and unelected bureaucrats took a long time to draft and agree on. Henry Parkes first envisaged a unified Australia as early as the 1850s.

Federation, as it become known, would have perhaps occurred years earlier but for the animosities between the NSW free traders and the protectionist Victorians. See, the Vics have always had a leftist bent!

The first Constitutional Convention occurred in Sydney in 1891. As David Kemp writes in A Free Country, Australians’ Search for Utopia, Duncan Gillies, Premier of Victoria, spoke at the first session:

‘There have been no peoples in these colonies who have no enjoyed the most perfect freedom to express their opinions in public, and through their representatives in parliament, on any public question of importance. There has never been any occasion when such an opportunity has not been given to every man in this country, and so free and liberal are our laws and public institutions that it has never been suggested by any mortal upon this continent that that right should in any way be restricted. On the contrary, we all feel proud of the freedom which everyone in this country enjoys. It is a freedom not surpassed in any state of the world, not even in the boasted republic of America.’

Kemp added:

‘Those who had women or the Aboriginal people in mind would have questioned Gilles’ generalization, but no one questioned its truth as it applied to British and “native-born” Australian men.’

I bring this up, because 130 years later, I reckon our founding fathers would be horrified at the lack of freedom we now have. Moreover, they would be appalled at the liberties being taken from us by health bureaucrats.

In their time, a health bureaucrat wasn’t even a thing. There was this crazy antiquated notion that you were generally responsible for your own health. Weird, huh?

But now, we are all subject to the whims of these bureaucratic tyrants.

What about the story of the couple who were denied access to their newborn baby in QLD for eight days so they could complete their quarantine…despite being vaccinated and testing negative multiple times?

Stay safe!

Or this:

‘The Queensland government has refused travel permits for Mark Kilian and Anneli Gericke, despite the couple being fully vaccinated.

‘They flew to Australia from the US to visit Mr Kilian’s 80-year-old father, who is dying with pancreatic cancer.

‘After the couple arrived in Sydney on Tuesday morning, they were prevented from boarding a private charter flight to Coolangatta.

‘Mr Kilian said his father was “really holding on” for the couple to see him, but the “disappointment” of being unable to see them is a “shock for him”.’

But hey everyone, get jabbed with an experimental vaccine and you’ll be able to travel again, we promise! Not after the first jab though. Maybe after the second. Or perhaps when you get the booster. (Despite the vaccine not protecting you from getting the virus OR from passing it on!)

Of course, state governments can only legally get away with this under the cover of a ‘state of emergency’. Operating under this state of emergency allows governments to impinge on personal freedoms and trash the Constitution.

And in Victoria, they want to make it permanent. 130 years ago, NSW and Victoria offered stark contrasts in the way they wanted to develop economically. NSW, under the guidance of one of its great premiers, George Reid, believed passionately in free trade between the states.

Victoria, on the other hand, supported tariffs to protect their industries. Reid knew that the result of protection was higher-priced goods, paid for by the people.

NSW won that argument.

Today, the two states offer another stark contrast in the way this virus is managed. Victoria’s health system is completely incompetent. They try to mask this by maximum fearmongering. NSW, on the other hand, calmly manages a few sick people without going into meltdown (or lockdown).

One state (mostly) respects the liberal tradition of freedom of movement, association, and speech, while the other has turned full soviet.

As The Age reported earlier this week:

‘The Andrews government is secretly negotiating with three crossbenchers to introduce specific pandemic laws that would permanently replace controversial state of emergency powers and significantly change the way the state manages COVID-19 this year.

‘State of emergency laws have been active in Victoria since last March as the legal instrument that allows authorities to enforce a range of public health commands, including lockdowns, mandatory mask wearing and 14-day quarantine.

‘The Age can reveal the government is designing the new laws to cover all future pandemics, not just the coronavirus pandemic. It is intended that they will be in place by December, when the current state of emergency provisions expire, and a first draft is expected within the next two months.

‘The pandemic legislation will be permanently shaped by the demands of three upper-house crossbenchers: Animal Justice Party MP Andy Meddick, Reason Party MP Fiona Patten and Greens leader Samantha Ratnam.

‘In an unconventional move that has infuriated the Coalition and other crossbenchers, the Health Department is negotiating the new legislation with only Mr Meddick, Ms Patten and the Greens, and has held a series of meetings with them behind closed doors in recent weeks.’

The ideals behind our famous Constitution, which we fought two World Wars for, are nowhere to be seen in Victorian politics (or politics anywhere in this country, to be honest). This is a naked power grab under the guise of ‘health’ and ‘keeping us safe’, using fear as an instrument of coercion.

It’s a good time to remind you that this virus is only dangerous to a small segment of society. The elderly and those with ‘comorbidities’. And with the elderly, the average age of death from COVID (or with COVID, I can’t keep up with their definitions) is OLDER than the average age of death in general!

A responsible government should do everything to protect this group while doing everything to maintain the rights and freedoms of everyone else.

But instead we have insane hysteria (fully fuelled by a compliant media) when there is ONE case.

All to promote enough fear to get you to take an experimental vaccine that won’t stop you getting or passing on the virus, and for many age groups is potentially more harmful than the virus itself.

If I didn’t know any better, I’d think that someone was conducting an experiment on us. But nah, that’s just a conspiracy theory.

A conspiracy theory?

Yeah. Something that everyone laughs at as crazy talk (because the media and government couldn’t possibly be lying to us), until a year or two later when all of a sudden, the official narrative emerges with holes all over the place.

Let me leave you with the words of Alfred Deakin (who went on to become Australia’s second prime minister) speaking at the conclusion to the second Constitutional Convention in 1898:

‘What a charter of liberty that is embraced within this bill — of political liberty and religious liberty — the liberty and the means to achieve all the which mean in these days can reasonably aspire. A charter of liberty is enshrined in this Constitution, which is also a charter of peace — peace order and good government for the whole of the peoples whom it will embrace and unite’

If only it were so.

Regards,

Greg Canavan,
Editor, The Rum Rebellion

The Masses Will Pay the Price
By Bill Bonner

We’re in a rush this morning. No time to write a short message. We’ll have to send you a long one.

First, here’s Business Insider with a news update:

‘Michael Burry said markets were in a bubble of unprecedented scale.

‘The “Big Short” investor tweeted his dire warning after a 10-week break from Twitter.

‘Burry has flagged reckless speculation on Tesla stock, bitcoin, and other assets.

‘“People always ask me what is going on in the markets,” the investor tweeted. “It is simple. Greatest Speculative Bubble of All Time in All Things. By two orders of magnitude. #FlyingPigs360.”’

Meanwhile, a dear reader in Canada, Luke K, sees inflation in action:

‘Hi Bill, inflation is definitely here. And it came with a massive bang. Our pool heater went on the fritz the other day. We called to have a heater technician come by for an inspection from our local pool company. $349 Canadian for one hour of his time. To clean the heater and get it going. Parts extra.

‘Instead, we called a private individual. Showed me the part that needed replacing. A small circuit board that might cost $10 to build. Local shops, and online ones, were selling the card for $600 CAD. After the tech left (which cost me $100 for his visit), I removed the card from the heater and found a spider had touched two live leads on the other side and virtually exploded all over the circuit board.

‘Cleaned the card with a toothbrush and reinserted. Heater was working again. Best $100 I ever spent.

‘As for new heaters? $2500 (used to be $1000-$1500) and not a SINGLE ONE in the entire city. Backordered until July. Welcome to the beginnings of hyperinflation!’

That’s a shocker! We didn’t even know they had swimming pools in Canada.

No choice

Another dear reader, Patricia M, wonders what to do:

‘I’m a very new investor in the stock market. I’m astounded at what I’ve learned in just nine months on the scene, which is that there’s no rhyme or reason to investing in stocks.

‘I know I’m failing to protect myself and my family, but there doesn’t seem to be much I can do to turn the tables without having an awful lot of money! I can see something really huge coming down the pike. I think I understand most of it; I’ve been reading like there’s no tomorrow, just trying to learn how to play. But every time I turn around, up pops another story to complicate, obfuscate, misdirect, and so on.

‘So, my big question is: How does an average Joe get a leg up on this situation?

‘Between Wall Street, governments, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the 1%ers, and whoever else is “IN” the game, I don’t believe life will ever again make sense. I used to be an optimist, but how can one remain optimistic in a world that one just can’t relate?

‘I just can’t see a positive outcome for the masses.’

You’re right. There’s not going to be any positive outcome for the masses. The game is rigged against them.

The Fed (representing the entire elite of the US) cannot expect to get much more from them in taxes. And their savings are not enough to cover the deficits.

It’s inflate and die…meaning, the Fed has no choice. They have to print money.

And this means the masses will pay — via consumer price inflation.

Dangerous time

But let’s try to be helpful. What should a normal person do to protect himself and increase his wealth?

The quick answer: The normal person, in a normal time, should do the normal thing.

But this is no normal time. It’s a freaky…weird…and head-scratching time. And a very dangerous time.

But we still have to start with the basics.

The trouble with the average Joe is that he has only his time to sell. And the trouble with his time is that even in normal times, it may not be worth very much. It depends on what he does with it.

The average wage is about US$25 an hour. So if he works 40 hours, he makes US$1,000 per week. If he does that for a full year, after taxes, he ends up with about US$40,000. That’s not going to take him very far…

If he is a skilled professional, on the other hand — an accountant, dentist, surgeon, lawyer, engineer, or architect — he should do better. He might net out (after fixed office costs, insurance, and fees) US$100 an hour. This would give him US$200,000 a year…which might then be reduced to, say, US$150,000 after taxes.

The trouble with time is that it is not scalable. Each hour clicks by exactly like the hour before it. And the hourly worker — no matter how skilled — cannot make more of it.

So, selling his time, the average Joe cannot increase his earnings easily.

He has to take some of his earnings and put them into something that is scalable…

Too little, too late

Investing, for example.

He might, for example, buy a rundown house…fix it up on weekends…and rent it out. The house might go up in price, while he is collecting a decent rent. Then, he might be able to borrow against the equity in order to buy another house.

That is classic scaling. It works as long as he doesn’t get stuck with too much debt…and empty houses.

This approach also has the advantage of offering some protection against inflation. Typically, people try to escape inflation by buying real estate — something solid that won’t lose value. This pushes up property prices.

Plus, the landlord can raise rents to try to keep up with his rising costs.

But the poor renter is squeezed. He struggles to keep his wages in line with price increases. But he falls behind…the salary adjustments don’t come fast enough. They’re too little and too late.

Inflation makes time less valuable! Not only because the average wage earner can’t keep up…but also because it destroys capital — which is what gives value to time.

Unhealthy economy

In a healthy economy, people save…and invest their money to try to earn more money. They start businesses and hire workers. Wages go up.

But in an inflationary economy, nobody wants to save. Capital gets frittered away on meme stocks…NFTs…Dogecoin…overpriced zombie companies…gambling…super yachts…and government boondoggles.

An air of ‘Sha…na…na…live for today…’ takes hold.

And then it turns grim…and the masses are robbed.

We’ll be back tomorrow with more helpful comments!

Regards,

Bill Bonner,
For The Rum Rebellion