Out of the many current issues, I have chosen just three which have been widely reported: the death of Kumanjayi Walker, the “renewables” business and the election of Joe Biden as President of the USA. From seemingly innocuous origins each of these subjects had profound impacts on many people.

Kumanjayi Walker

The whole tragedy of Kumanjayi’s life and death began when his pregnant mother drank alcohol. It ended when he was shot three times by police officer John Rolfe in the Northern Territory in 2019, sending reverberations throughout black and white communities.

FASD (Foetal Alcohol Syndrome Disorder) is rampant in Aboriginal communities, decades on from a paediatrician’s impassioned pleas to do something about Indigenous infant mortality and morbidity, (low early stage brain growth resulting from poor nutrition). Both FASD and poor early nutrition hamper normal brain growth that can never be regained. For unborn Kumanjayi, his mother’s drinking was both a life and death sentence. Being unwanted, except by his grandmother, did not help.

Learning and discipline are difficult for those with FASD, resulting in uncontrollable behavioural problems, often harming those around him. A long rap sheet of dysfunction accumulated over Kumanjayi’s short 19 years. Attacking police with an axe was one of the later episodes.

Controlling violent outbursts for the safety of others involved the law. Yet police have been trained in de-escalation to accommodate outbursts. For instance, police backed off after the axe incident, which was recorded on body-cam for those coming afterwards.

Constable Rolfe and his partner were surprised to find Kumanjayi at his grandmother’s place, late evening when they went to arrest him. When Rolfe was stabbed in the shoulder with scissors, he drew his weapon and shot the offender, shooting twice more as the offender threatened his partner’s life.

Kumanjayi died that evening, unable to be attended by health professionals because the community had destroyed the health centre at Yuendumu. Elderly white nursing staff at risk had left under a hail of rocks, only adding to this tragic saga.

The death of a black man at the hands of a white policeman at the height of the #BlackLivesMatter political movement generated high volatility, blame and resentment quickly became political. Chief Minister of the Northern Territory joined the chorus. Within days Constable Rolfe was charged with murder and relieved of duties awaiting trial.

At his recent trial, Rolfe was exonerated, releasing a new wave of black disgruntlement at white man’s law.

Yet at the root of this story is the sad truth that drinking alcohol while pregnant, a seemingly innocuous pursuit, can have long-term implications for health, wellbeing and prospects of innocent children born, social disruption wrought upon others and the groundswell of inter-racial hatred so practised. Blaming whitey does nothing to help individuals and communities who stand to benefit from improvements to order, education and health care by those who put their lives on the line to face the challenge. As Indigenous woman Jacinta Price advises, Indigenous communities must themselves step up and be responsible.

“Renewables” business

Original worthy concerns to care for the environment have been distorted by taxpayer subsidies to encourage positive action. A global gravy train of opportunism now despoils the environment intended to protect and penalises the poor and businesses which should benefit. Unchecked under climate catastrophe mania, a worthy ideal has become a serious threat to our national security.

The word “renewables’ is couched in parenthesis, because they are not. In fact it is merely a slick marketing label to draw investors into an industry entirely reliant on taxpayer subsidies that is neither reliable nor sustainable.

As the war in Ukraine has demonstrated to the virtue signalling Europeans, shafting energy self-sufficiency in coal, gas and nuclear to Russian oil and gas has left their national security terribly exposed. Europeans are now firing up their coal, gas and nuclear plants once more.

For decades energy policy has been captured by the environmental movement which has challenged us globally to clean up our act and conserve our ecology. Coal, gas and oil which have, for two hundred years, brought billions of people out of poverty and fed our prosperity, are deemed evil by the climate cultists.

Any business for “renewables” does not stack up well enough for a business loan at the local bank, getting by on global climate mania. For instance, all require despised mining to manufacture and transport; ecology and environmental aesthetics are destroyed by vast swathes of solar and wind farms; energy is lost in transmission from remote sites; and waste management after a short lifespan has yet to be resolved. No doubt even greater subsidies will be demanded to get rid of the failing machinery of “renewables”.

In the meantime, our power bills have multiplied; families are under energy distress unable to pay their bills in time; businesses have closed because energy is unaffordable; and worst of all, running down our base load power leaves our nation’s security exposed, like Europe, to the will of dictators who do not follow the simple green mantra to save our planet with so called “renewables”.

Good intentions leave us critically exposed. Emotion and greed have prevented us from thinking through this issue.

Election of Joe Biden

Election of Joe Biden from his Delaware basement as President of the USA, with WOC (woman of colour) Kamala Harris as his VP is far enough from our shores to be of little interest to many in Australia. After all, Presidential elections in the world’s foremost democracy occur every four years with much hullaballoo.

What has been truly surprising is the rapid speed at which, by fiat rather than parliamentary debate, former President Trump’s policies have been reversed and global order threatened. Every anti-Trump step Biden has taken has weakened America.

Biden has taken USA from energy self-sufficiency under Trump, to begging dependence on Russia, Venezuela and OPEC countries. Shutting down oil and gas production on federal land and closing the Keystone pipeline from Canada has had damaging effects on supply. Gas (petrol) prices have risen, fuelling inflation as transport costs of goods increase.

We are baulking at petrol price rises here too as a result. Under Biden’s Green New Deal policies, everyone (except privileged elites) is expected to catch the electric bus or walk.

At grave risk is the global currency, as Saudi Arabia refuses Biden’s calls, dealing directly with China in Renminbi rather than US$ and India trades with Russia in Roubles.

An ignominious, chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan left soldiers dead and wounded and $85billion military equipment behind.

Biden immediately stopped work on the southern border wall. Contravention of federal laws opening up the border has allowed almost 2 million undocumented people from over 100 countries to cross into the USA in the middle of a pandemic, many dispersed by bus and plane in the middle of the night to cities across the nation.

Drug and people smuggling and child prostitution cartels have been active. Fentanyl from China, through Mexico has resulted in over 100,000 Americans overdosing a year.

Weak leadership in the USA has emboldened autocrats whose system challenges democracy: Putin invaded Ukraine; China threatens Taiwan and the Asia Pacific; Iran, back at the nuclear negotiations, threatens everyone especially Israel; and Kim Jong Un from North Korea rattles his ballistic missiles for attention. In his better years as VP to Obama, Obama knew you “could always rely on Joe to fxxk things up”. Now, in serious senile decline, Biden poses a threat to this own country and endangers the world, including Australia.

Playing the diversity card appointing a black woman as VP has been equally disastrous. Cackling, incompetent Kamala is a totally embarrassing lightweight, which would not matter, except we are all at risk, economically and on national security.

Perhaps woke billionaire tech oligarchs who invested $hundreds of millions to manipulate the 2020 election to put Biden in the White House didn’t think things through. Or maybe they did, and the unfolding disastrous change in world order is part of their plan for a new world order.

The most we can do is be aware of consequences and think through decisions we make and actions we take to ensure maximum benefit to all and any harm is minimised.