'ring the bells that still can ring, forget your perfect offering; there is a crack in everything; that's how the light gets in.' leonard cohen

Kim Jong Un visit confirmed for Moscow in May It appears North Korean leader Kim Jong Un will make Moscow the venue for his first foreign visit in May.

Vale to Tom Uren, a great Australian Socialist. So much, so well done, so true.

Dear Editor As a secular, atheist, free speaking and free thinking Australian I am appalled by the continual destruction of human life and human meaning by the Great Religions, whether they be Baptists, Bath'ists, Bejesusus or BeJews Bemohammedans or Buddhists. To me, they are all an equal blight of cancer upon human societies and human intelligence and are only propelled through thousands of years by the powers of property ownership and buggery, which is all they are all basically interested in. Good riddance to bad rubbish. As for laws about free speech, well, I think if you have the courage to think it, then you have the courage to state it, and woe be to anyone who stands against that in the 21st century.

Seoul seeks proactive means to curb 'anti-state' groups The Justice Ministry will seek to devise proactive means for curbing "anti-state" and "pro-enemy" activities, such as those that support North Korea, it said Wednesday.

Teachers get suspended jail terms for security law breach (Yonhap News) Four teachers received suspended jail terms Friday after a Seoul court found them guilty of engaging in pro-North Korea activities.

The Enforced Narrative and why I am not Charlie

3 weeks ago the US launched a massive rocket attack on what they believed was an Al Q'ada administrative headquarters in Yemen.

The attack killed and dismembered some Al Q'ada people who we would define as bad guys, but also killed, burnt, dismembered hundreds of innocent Yemeni men women and children who we don't care about anyway.

The Paris attack, and the Martin Place strike before it, when see from the perspective of a 'tit-for-tat' response remain very mild, and almost compassionate, in comparison.

This is about 'business': property, ownership of resources and wealth; none of this is about religion, neither our bizarre morality or the morality of the other players.

Meanwhile, France, Australia, Canada and the US continue the massive indiscriminate bombing and white phosphorous attacks on Iraqis, and we think this is somehow a good and moral thing...and the media is careful not to mention this in relation to the response in Paris.

And then, to see Benjamin Netanyahu in the front line of a march to support human rights...instead of in the dock of the International Criminal Court... Goodness me. No, I am not Charlie.