Australia to withdraw tens of thousands of Covid-19 fines
RT | November 29, 2022
The authorities in Australia’s largest state, New South Wales (NSW), have said that they will withdraw or refund tens of thousands of fines issued for violations of restrictions during the pandemic.
The move follows a defeat that the NSW government suffered in a court battle against free advocacy group Redfern Legal Centre on Tuesday.
The group launched a test case in July on behalf of three plaintiffs, arguing their fines of between AUS$1,000 ($673) to AUS$3,000 ($2,020) were invalid because the penalty notices didn’t describe the offense sufficiently.
“It’s not a big ask, if you’re going to fine someone for an offense, to set out what the offense is in the notice,” Katherine Richardson, the lawyer for the plaintiffs argued at the New South Wales Supreme Court, as cited by the Sydney Morning Herald.
The government’s lawyers have now conceded that the tickets really didn’t meet the legal requirements.
Shortly after the hearing, the Commissioner of Fines Administration said that 33,121 fines are going to be withdrawn, as they had been issued with similar wording to those of the plaintiffs’ notices.
Redfern Legal Centre has said on Twitter that the development was a “momentous win” for it.
However, the tax administration agency Revenue NSW insisted that the challenge had been on a “technical basis” and that the court ruling didn’t mean that offenses that led to the fines hadn’t been committed.
A full judgment in the case from presiding judge Dina Yehia is expected to be delivered next year.
Twitter quietly changes Covid-19 policy
RT | November 29, 2022
Twitter has said it will no longer enforce its coronavirus misinformation policy, according to an update on the platform’s Covid-19 transparency page that went largely unnoticed since it was posted last week. The move came as its new owner Elon Musk announced a “general amnesty” for previously suspended accounts.
The misinformation policy was initially developed in 2020 amid the outbreak of Covid-19 and was meant to combat “harmful” misleading posts about the coronavirus, government policies aimed at curbing its spread, and related vaccines.
Users who violated the rule received strikes. After two or three strikes, their accounts were suspended for 12 hours. After four, they would be locked out for a week, while offenders with more than five strikes were permanently banned from the platform.
According to statistics published by Twitter itself, between January 2020 and September 2022, the platform’s moderators challenged over 11.72 million accounts and suspended more than 11,000 for violating the rule. They also scrubbed nearly 100,000 pieces of content worldwide under the policy.
The extensive moderation policy became a topic of heated debate. Some called for more censorship of posts deemed to be harmful, while others argued this constituted suppression of free speech.
Since Musk acquired Twitter for $44 billion last month, he has made a number of dramatic changes at the company, including laying off nearly two-thirds of its staff and significantly cutting the site’s moderation and management teams.
Ahead of Thanksgiving, the billionaire also vowed to extend a “general amnesty” to an unspecified number of suspended accounts after holding a Twitter poll, in which more than 72.4% out of 3.1 million respondents supported the move.
Critics have argued that the social networking service could soon become a hotbed for misinformation, right-wing extremism and hate speech. Musk, however, has insisted that he wants Twitter to become a level playing field and a bastion of free speech where people can peacefully exchange their views on a wide range of topics.
Separate Tech and State
By Ron Paul | November 28, 2022
Senator Ed Markey (D-MA) recently got in touch with his inner mobster and threatened Elon Musk — the new owner of Twitter and the CEO of electric car company Tesla and space ventures company SpaceX. He told Musk, “Fix your companies” or “Congress will.” As part of this threat, Markey referred to an ongoing National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) investigation into Tesla’s autopilot driving system and Twitter’s 2011 consent decree with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC).
Markey has done more than make threats: He is one of a group of Democratic senators who wrote to the FTC urging an investigation into whether Musk’s actions as the new owner of Twitter violated the consent decree or consumer protection laws. Since FTC Chair Lina Khan wants to investigate as many businesses as possible, it is likely she will respond favorably to the senators’ letter.
President Biden has also endorsed an investigation into the role foreign investors played in financing Musk’s Twitter purchase. Biden may be concerned that Musk is not likely to ban tweets regarding Hunter Biden’s business deals.
Concerns that Musk would allow tweets containing information embarrassing (or worse) to the Biden administration point to the real reason many Democratic politicians and progressive writers and activists are attacking Musk. They support efforts to suppress conservative, libertarian, and other “non-woke” speech on social media. They view the prospect of a major platform refusing to silence those who dissent from the woke mob or the Democratic Party establishment as a threat to their power. Musk further angered the left by committing what, to many Democrats (and Liz Cheney), is the ultimate hate crime — allowing Donald Trump back on Twitter.
The threat against Musk shows the threat to liberty is not just from big tech; it is from the alliance between big tech and big government.
Some conservatives think that increasing government’s power over social media is the correct way to make big tech respect free speech. However, increasing the US government’s power over social media can just end up putting more power behind government threats like those from Rep. Markey. Expanded government control over how social media companies conduct their business can also further incentivize the companies to work with the federal government to shut down free speech.
Once the government steps in with increased regulation, the risk is that greater government control over what is communicated on social media will follow. The question will just be who is calling the shots on the exercise of that control. Will the result be an increase of the liberal or “woke” pressure on social media companies to silence conservatives, libertarians, opponents of teaching critical race theory and transgenderism in schools, and those who question the safety and effectiveness of covid vaccines? Alternatively, will a new sort of pressure become dominant, maybe pressure to comply with conservative or Republican preferred limits on speech? Either way, liberty loses.
Big tech companies silence their users to curry favor with politicians and bureaucrats, often after “encouragement” from politicians and bureaucrats. Therefore, to end big tech’s censorship, Americans should demand that all government officials — including the president — not violate the First Amendment. We must work to put an end to government officials pressuring or even “encouraging” social media platforms either to silence any American citizen because of his opinions or to downplay or suppress any news story. The way to protect free speech online is to separate tech and state.
Copyright © 2022 by RonPaul Institute.
British Media Minister Shows Double Standards on Free Speech in China and UK
Samizdat – 29.11.2022
The British government’s draft Online Safety Bill has previously come under fire from free speech campaigners and MPs — including current culture and media minister Michelle Donelan — for demanding social media sites censor posts which do not break any law.
The UK’s media minister has demanded Beijing grant British journalists freedom of speech — while suppressing it at home.
But her department is also spearheading new legislation to censor social media posts even if they do not break any laws against threats or incitement.
Speaking on a radio programme on Tuesday morning, Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Secretary Michelle Donelan said it was “absolutely shocking” that a reporter for British state media was arrested while covering protests against COVID-related restrictions in Shanghai.
“We believe in press freedom and the media to be able to report all over the globe,” Donelan said.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian accused the British media of “playing the victim” after it claimed cameraman Edward Lawrence was “beaten and kicked” by police.
Zhao urged foreign journalists not to engage in activities “unrelated to their role” — implying they were taking part in the protests rather than reporting them impartially.
The new draft of the Online Safety Bill, which Donelan’s department is pushing through Parliament, would force social media moderators to delete users’ posts if they have “reasonable grounds to infer” their content could cause “serious distress” to some individuals.
The previous version drafted under Donelan’s predecessor Nadine Dorries was criticised by MPs and free speech advocates for attempting to ban comments it dubbed “legal but harmful”.
Donelan herself said at the time that wording would create “a quasi-legal category between illegal and legal.”
A government factsheet published in May said the bill would only mandate censoring social media posts if some harm was “intended”, without a reasonable excuse or the defence of public interest — theoretically protecting satirical cartoons and statements of political opinion.
Ironically, Dorries was herself reportedly banned from a private WhatsApp group for Conservative Party MPs in December 2021 for defending then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson from her colleagues’ criticism.
The Australian Government Lied: Doctors are NOT covered by Government’s indemnity for Covid Injections
By Rhoda Wilson • The Exposé • November 27, 2022
Last week Elizabeth Hart wrote to Mark Butler, Australian Minister for Health and Aged Care, about the government misleading health practitioners who are administering Covid injections into believing they are covered by a government medical indemnity scheme. “It has now been confirmed by your department that health practitioners are not covered by a specific Covid-19 government medical indemnity scheme,” she wrote.
Elizabeth Hart is an independent researcher investigating the overuse of vaccine products and conflicts of interest in vaccination policy.
According to a response Hart received on 17 November from Nigel Murray – Assistant Secretary, MBS Policy and Specialist Services Branch – the government did not put in place a medical indemnity scheme for health professionals. Instead, Murray told Hart, “the former [Morrison] Government established the no-fault Scheme, which commenced operations on 13 December 2021.” Later in the same letter, he again confirmed the scheme did not exist:
“While a medical indemnity scheme for health professionals administering the Covid-19 vaccine was not established per se, the creation of the no-fault Scheme was intended to support increased participation by health professionals in the Covid-19 Vaccination roll-out.”
Hart informed Butler, the promise of “a medical indemnity scheme for health professionals administering the Covid-19 vaccine” probably did intend “to support increased participation by health professionals in the Covid-19 Vaccination roll-out”. But it turns out they are not personally protected by a government scheme. She explained to Butler:
In July 2021, the Morrison Government stated it was establishing a “fit-for-purpose Covid-19 vaccine medical indemnity scheme” to “support increased vaccination uptake by assuring Australians that health professionals, including GPs, nurses and pharmacists administering Covid vaccines as part of the Commonwealth vaccination program have appropriate indemnity coverage”, with a further announcement in August 2021 stating “The Morrison Government has finalised the details of the no-fault Covid-19 Vaccine Claim Scheme following extensive consultation with the peak medical, healthcare, business and insurance sectors to ensure a comprehensive National Scheme”, noting “It also ensure [sic] that health professionals administering vaccines will be able to continue with their crucial role in the vaccine roll out with assurance that the claims scheme will offer them protection”
But it now turns out health professionals are not personally protected by a specific Covid-19 medical indemnity scheme.
The letter from Nigel Murray also confirms: “Informed consent should be obtained for every Covid-19 vaccination, as per usual consent procedures for other vaccinations.”
Mark Butler, it appears health practitioners don’t have specific government medical indemnity re the Covid jab rollout, although they might think they do. They will have to look to their own medical indemnity insurance to protect them. And they should be obtaining informed consent for every Covid-19 jab…but is this actually happening?
What is the quality of information being provided to people, including parents of children, to enable them to properly evaluate the threat of SARS-CoV-2/Covid-19, and the risks and benefits of the multiple Covid jabs, in their own specific circumstances? Why are people of most ages and health status being called upon to have the Covid-19 jabs? Who is actually at serious risk with SARS-CoV-2/Covid-19? Does having repeated Covid jabs compromise the immune system and make people more vulnerable? Nigel Murray includes reference to the ‘Covid-19 vaccination – Patient resources’ webpage in his letter, but this webpage only includes information re Covid jabs for children, not for adults. Nigel Murray’s letter also includes a link to a ‘Consent form for Covid-19 vaccination’.
How does this information re Covid jabs referred to by Nigel Murray stack up in the ‘valid informed consent’ stakes? I would say not very well at all…
This is an extremely serious situation, Mark Butler – it’s highly likely ‘valid informed consent’ has not been properly obtained by many health practitioners before administering Covid-19 jabs.
The health practitioners inserting the needle must be warned they’re not protected by a specific government Covid medical indemnity scheme after all…and they need to consider the quality of the information they’re providing to people to gain their ‘valid informed consent’ to the jabs. They must also consider the impact of jab mandates – which pressure, coerce and manipulate people to submit to Covid jabs, in contravention of The Australian Immunisation Handbook, i.e., jab mandates inhibit a ‘voluntary’ decision.
Mark Butler, please advise what steps you are taking to address this matter.
This email is being circulated to other parties, including the response from your department.
Health practitioners, Covid jabs and ‘valid informed consent’ – a medical ethics disaster, Elizabeth Hart emails
As Dr. Mike Yeadon noted on his Telegram channel: “This has all the appearance of government throwing medical staff under the bus on liability & requirements for informed consent.”
Two days later, Hart forwarded her email trail with Butler to Kamran Abbasi, editor-in-chief of the British Medical Journal (“BMJ”), copying in numerous “people influential on international public health/vaccination policy via the scientific and medical establishment, and other parties.” People copied into her email included infamous modeller Neil Ferguson, UK’s Chief (Covid) Medical Adviser Chris Whitty, President of the Royal Society, and Oxford/AstraZeneca injection’s developers Adrian Hill and Sarah Gilbert.
The BMJ claims to be evidence-based and patient-centred and customer-focused – surely ensuring ‘valid informed consent’ before medical interventions, such as Covid jabs, should be foremost in your values?
Sadly, ‘valid informed consent’ appears to have been sacrificed during the grossly disproportionate and ill-targeted Covid debacle. This scandal is now unfolding in Australia.
FYI, please see [above] my response to Australian federal health minister Mark Butler, on the subject of health practitioners’ medical indemnity insurance for Covid-19 jab administration, and health practitioners’ obligation to obtain ‘informed consent’.
This information has major implications for health practitioners administering Covid-19 jabs in Australia – they need to know they’re not covered by a specific government Covid-19 medical indemnity scheme, and that they’re obligated to obtain informed consent before every Covid-19 jab.
But I strongly suspect many health practitioners have failed to obtain ‘valid informed consent’ before the Covid jabs. How have things gone so terribly wrong?
This is a very serious situation, Kamran Abbasi, at the heart of medical ethics. This should be a priority topic on the BMJ.
Biden’s ex-disinfo czar registers as foreign agent
RT | November 28, 2022
The former disinformation czar for President Joe Biden’s administration has apparently landed on her feet after resigning amid controversy earlier this year. She has registered as a foreign agent representing a UK activist group that advocates for censorship of speech it finds objectionable.
Nina Jankowicz filed her registration paperwork with the US Department of Justice earlier this month, identifying herself as a representative for the London-based Centre for Information Resilience (CIR). Her work with CIR will include serving as an ambassador for the group with US policymakers, media outlets and technology companies.
Jankowicz resigned as the director of the newly created US Disinformation Governance Board last May, after the administration “paused” the initiative amid public outcry that it might operate as an Orwellian “Ministry of Truth.” She had contributed to such fears by calling for blue-check Twitter users like her to police commentary on the social media platform by editing tweets that they considered false or misleading.
Jankowicz had also been criticized for being a purveyor of false information herself. For instance, she called the New York Post’s October 2020 scoop on Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop a “Trump campaign product” and warned that militant supporters of then-president Donald Trump would show up at the polls to intimidate voters. She called for Big Tech platforms to censor allegations that Covid-19 leaked from a Chinese lab and claimed that online mockery of Vice President Kamala Harris was a threat to national security and democracy.
CIR, which is funded partly by the UK government, bills itself as an independent “social enterprise” that counters disinformation, exposes human rights abuses and combats online behavior it deems harmful to women and non-white people. Its advisers include former CIA analyst Cindy Otis and former Estonian president Toomas Hendrik Ilves, who led his country’s accession to NATO.
Much of the group’s commentary is anti-Russia, especially as it relates to the Ukraine conflict. For instance, it accused Russian forces of committing various war crimes and claimed that Moscow illegally deported Ukrainian civilians to Russia. Last year, CIR claimed to have discovered a coordinated network of social media accounts that posted Chinese Communist Party propaganda.
CIR co-founder Ross Burley, a former British Foreign Office operative, has publicly called for social media platforms to ban certain independent journalists and outlets, such as the Grayzone, which he called a “Russian propaganda outfit.”
Trump Says Justice Department is ‘Corrupt’
Samizdat – 27.11.2022
WASHINGTON – Former US President Donald Trump has accused the US Department of Justice (DOJ) of corruption and of making false allegations against him.
“The ‘Justice’ Department is CORRUPT. Offered Christopher Steele $1,000,000 to lie about me, paid Russian a fortune to ‘get Trump,’ told Facebook not to mention the Hunter Biden Laptop before the Election, ‘it was Russian disinformation,’ when they KNEW it was not,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform on Sunday.
Last month, Trump said that the decision by a US jury to acquit Russian national Igor Danchenko on charges of lying to the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) regarding the Trump-Russia collusion probe shows the disgraceful nature of the US justice system.
The case against Danchenko started last November, when he pleaded not guilty to charges of lying to the FBI about his role in the discredited “Steele Dossier” used to allege collusion between Trump and the Kremlin during the 2018 US presidential election.
The prosecution contended that Danchenko lied to the authorities about the sources of information given to former British spy Christopher Steele for the dossier on purported contacts between Trump and Russian officials. The indictment against Danchenko accused him of fabricating the information.
A Special Counsel investigation did not find any proof of collusion between Trump and Russia.
Senior FBI intelligence analyst Brian Auten testified in court in October that the FBI had offered $1 million to Steele to provide evidence to back his allegations.
Senator Markey calls for Twitter regulation after Elon Musk ignored his letter
Senator Markey wants social media regulated for “safety”
By Christina Maas | Reclaim The Net | November 27, 2022
Senator Ed Markey (D-Mass.) has called on Congress to pass new legislation to regulate social media after Elon Musk ignored his demand letter.
On November 11, Markey sent a letter to Musk asking about the new paid account verification feature. The first rollout of Twitter Blue made it easier for users to impersonate politicians, celebrities, and brands. The Washington Post was able to create a verified account of Senator Markey.

After Markey shared a copy of the letter on Twitter and highlighted that The Post was able to impersonate him, Musk joked with him, writing: “Perhaps it is because your real account sounds like a parody.” A few hours later, Musk wrote, “And why does your pp have a mask!?”

The billionaire was referring to Markey’s profile picture, which shows him in a face covering.
Markey later threatened the Tesla owner: “One of your companies is under an FTC consent decree. Auto safety watchdog NHTSA is investigating another for killing people. And you’re spending your time picking fights online. Fix your companies. Or Congress will.”
Musk had until November 25 to respond to Markey’s letter, which he did not.
“Elon Musk could respond to my tweets but failed to respond to my letter by yesterday’s deadline and answer basic questions about Twitter verification,” Markey tweeted on November 26. “Congress must end the era of failed Big Tech self-regulation and pass laws that put user safety over the whims of billionaires.”
Musk is yet to respond to Markey’s latest tweet. However, on Friday, he did appear to answer one of the senator’s questions by announcing a new verification system. It will require manual authentication and the check marks will have different colors depending on the type of user.
“Gold check for companies, grey check for government, blue for individuals (celebrity or not), and all verified accounts will be manually authenticated before check activates,” Musk said.
Former CIA analyst on Twitter: “this freedom of speech is just nonsense”
Bob Baer isn’t a fan of Elon Musk’s Twitter
By Dan Frieth | Reclaim The Net | November 27, 2022
Former CIA analyst Bob Baer, in an interview with CNN’s Boris Sanchez, said that the idea of “free speech” on Elon Musk’s Twitter is “nonsense.”
Sanchez started the discussion by noting that Musk recently said that banned accounts will be reinstated, after a poll the Tesla owner launched went in favor of granting amnesty to accounts that had been censored by Twitter.
Baer said, “Well Boris, I can tell you one thing, Putin is going to be all over Twitter.
“If there’s no regulations on this, fake accounts, spoofed accounts, the rest of it – this is a great opportunity for him. And so when he’s talking about the popular voice, Musk he’s really talking about Russian intelligence.”
He added: “The Russians are waiting for something like this. They need a propaganda campaign against the United States and against our support for Ukraine, and they’re gonna be all over Twitter – I guarantee this – supporting the far right, plans, demands to stop arming Ukraine. You just wait.”
Baer explained how Russia could use the platform for a disinformation campaign: “What Putin’s gonna do, and the Russians, is they’re gonna use this as a vehicle to save himself in Ukraine. And you know, whether it’s gonna work or not, I don’t know. But we’re gonna see, as soon as these restrictions come off, we’re gonna see the Russians all over it.”
Asked how Twitter can combat the spread of disinformation, Baer said that the platform was already doing it before Musk took over.
“Well that’s why the pre-Musk Twitter had 7000 people going through these accounts. You can pick ‘em out with algorithms, you can pick ‘em out by looking at ‘em. You can check IPs and the rest of it, and you simply block ‘em,” the CIA analyst explained.
7000 was the approximate total number of employees at Twitter, not the size of the moderation team.
Baer blasted Musk’s idea of free speech, saying, “And it’s not right. And you know, this freedom of speech is just nonsense, ’cause you can’t go into a movie theater and yell, ‘fire!’ It’s against the law,” – 🛡 repeating a statement that in itself is misinformation.
Musk Promises to Make ‘Alternative Phone’ If Twitter Gets Removed From App Stores
Samizdat – 26.11.2022
WASHINGTON – Twitter’s new owner, billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk, says he will create a new smartphone if the social network is removed from the Apple and Google app stores.
“I certainly hope it does not come to that, but, yes, if there is no other choice, I will make an alternative phone,” Musk tweeted on Friday, in response to a user’s suggestion that Musk should produce his own phone instead of the “biased, snooping iPhone and Android,” if the Twitter app becomes unavailable on them.
On October 28, Musk finalized the acquisition of Twitter, which cost him $44 billion. Following the takeover, Musk changed the company’s day-to-day operations, including the termination of Twitter’s executives, who were responsible for the platform’s privacy and cybersecurity, as well as regular Twitter employees. The significant policy changes have caused a wave of concern.
The Washington Post reported on Wednesday, citing market research data, that more than one-third of Twitter’s top 100 advertisers had stopped putting ads on the social media platform in the two weeks following Musk’s takeover of the company.
Earlier this month, Twitter unblocked former US President Donald Trump’s account, banned after the January 6, 2021 events at the US Capitol, as the majority of participants in a survey conducted by Musk voted in favor of the measure.
Musk has promised that Twitter will reinstate blocked accounts after the majority of users voted for “general amnesty.”
