TRUMP: I WASN’T TOUGH ENOUGH

Donald Trump has continued his inflammatory war of words with North Korea, saying the state should be “very, very nervous” and lamenting his remark about the Asian state facing “fire and fury” perhaps “wasn’t tough enough”. North Korean state media has announced the regime in Pyongyang will fire four ballistic missiles over Japan in mid-August, which will land just dozens of kilometres from Guam.

Never one to have his name omitted from a news story, Tony Abbott has told Fairfax that he would like to see Australia consider a missile defence system. In doing so, he echoed the advice of another former PM, Kevin Rudd.

‘SUPER UNIONS’ TO BE BLOCKED

Realising perhaps that you have to move against these things before they happen, the Coalition is now expected to move to introduce legislation that will block the upcoming amalgamation of the construction and maritime unions. 

The Australian reports that a bill to amend the Fair Work (Registered Organisations Act), requiring  the Fair Work Commission to consider the public interest and whether the unions involved in a merger have a record of law-breaking, is to be introduced next Wednesday. The bill will also seek to make the deregistration of those unions that break workplace law easier.

Employment Minister Michaelia Cash said the merger, which would create a union covering employees in construction, mining, the waterfront and more, was a “major threat to Australia’s productivity and economic prosperity”, echoing, strangely, the exact concerns of the delegation of 30 mining, oil and gas chief executives who met senior cabinet ministers in Canberra on Wednesday night.

But the Coalition’s plan for industrial relations  goes further (Cash referred to it as the “one of the most ambitious” the country ever seen, a chilling thought for anyone who remembers WorkChoices) in the pursuit of implementing the recommendations of the royal commission into unions by making it easier to ban union officials who repeatedly break the law.

All this follows the passage of the corrupting benefits bill — which outlaws secret payments between unions and businesses — on Wednesday. Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull told a journalist yesterday that Opposition Leader Bill Shorten would be jailed under these laws had they been in place during his tenure at the AWU.  

ABF’S SMOKING GUNS

Speaking of corruption, following the charges leveled at ABF officer Craig Richard Eakin for his alleged role in tobacco smuggling on Tuesday, the Australian Financial Review reports that more than 50 ABF officials  have been referred to the anti-corruption watchdog in the past two years.

Eakin, based at Sydney Airport, was one of eight people arrested on Tuesday morning in police raids conducted in Sydney and Dubai. Also ensnared in the raids, part of Operation Astatine, is former Border Force employee Johayna Merhi.

The Australian Federal Police will allege the pair used their knowledge to assist an organised crime syndicate in bringing drugs and illegal tobacco into the country. In the Oz former NSW police chief Ken Moroney has called for a restoration of the anti-corruption watchdog he led. The Customs Reform Board was established in 2012 and ditched by the Abbott government.

According to Fairfax, the history of “alleged corrupt insiders in Border Force and Customs who have allegedly compromised Sydney Airport or Port Botany” goes as far back as 2003.

PLEBSICITE RESPONSE CONTINUES

The fallout of the Coalition’s $122 million plebiscite continues, with both sides of the debate showing their hands. Labor, while vehemently opposing the plebiscite on principle, is going to fight for a “yes” vote. Bill Shorten told supporters of marriage equality who wished to boycott the poll that such disunity was just what opponents of same-sex marriage wanted. This followed damning comments about the plebiscite from such high-profile figures as Qantas CEO Alan Joyce (who has softened his rhetoric since) and Justice Michael Kirby.

Senator Penny Wong also backs a “yes” vote, writing an op-ed in Fairfax urging proponents of marriage equality to vote:

“There’s no denying the Turnbull government’s opinion poll is a stacked deck, designed to mark every card against those seeking marriage equality.

“That’s why supporters of marriage equality need to work twice as hard to get out the vote, and ensure that Malcolm Turnbull’s $122 million ‘survey’ accurately reflects the overwhelming will of the Australian people.”

While the Coalition’s Yes supporters are showing no sign that they will campaign on the issue, the No camp are making themselves heard, with MP Andrew Hastie (backed by Kevin Andrews) concerned about the apparent lack of religious protections in the bill put forward by Senator Dean Smith.

“What protections will be given both to individuals and institutions?” Hastie asked. “The Smith bill only offered protections to individuals involved in the conduct of weddings. It failed to grasp the far-reaching significance of redefining marriage.”

Acting Special Minister of State Mathias Cormann has meanwhile asked for a bipartisan push to to pass a special law to set the ground rules for a “fair and respectful debate on same-sex marriage”, after concerns where raised that, as it is not subject to electoral law, advertising material around the plebiscite could contain malicious and misleading information.

READ ALL ABOUT IT

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Tourism industry funds research trip to most damaged part of Great Barrier Reef

Australian Army bans male recruits to get female numbers up

WHAT’S ON TODAY

Adelaide: Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull is expected to headline a dinner for FutureSA with SA Opposition Leader Steve Marshall.

Melbourne: RBA governor Philip Lowe before House Economics Committee 

THE COMMENTARIAT

Shorten’s impassioned ‘yes’ plea for marriage equality channels both empathy and outrage — Katharine Murphy (Guardian Australia): “The second basic political objective was binding Labor’s cause to progress, to weave the threads of his own political movement through an epochal cultural and social shift, where support for marriage equality had gone from a minority preoccupation to a mainstream cause.”

Sam-sex marriage: Turnbull in trouble without postal vote win — David Crowe (The Australian $): “Just as it was this week, the outcome will be seen through the prism of Turnbull’s leadership. Everything is always the leader’s fault, but this treats the partyroom too lightly. It hides the deeper malaise — the structural weakness of the Liberals, ready to brawl among themselves while their enemies look on and laugh.”

MPs’ same-sex marriage betrayal is all about saving their own skins — Sharri Markson (The Daily Telegraph $): “Asked who they plan to install in [Tim Wilson’s] seat, the answer is instantaneous. Peta Credlin is their first choice.”

THE WORLD

The number of migrants and refugees who have drowned off the coast of Yemen after being forced into the sea by people smugglers has now passed 100. In the latest incident, about 55 people died after being forced off a boat when smugglers believed they spotted a patrol ship. Despite Yemen’s civil war, people are fleeing Africa in order to pass through Yemen and reach wealthier Middle Eastern states. — The Guardian

External observers have encouraged all parties to accept the result of Kenya’s presidential election. While Kenya’s electoral commission confirmed an attempted hack, it said it was not successful, and foreign observers including former US secretary of state John Kerry endorsed the result. — BBC

WHAT WE’RE READING

How America lost its mind (The Atlantic): “The American experiment, the original embodiment of the great Enlightenment idea of intellectual freedom, whereby every individual is welcome to believe anything she wishes, has metastasised out of control. And most of us haven’t realised how far-reaching our strange new normal has become.”

Biohackers encoded malware on a strand of DNA (Wired): “If hackers did pull off the trick, the researchers say they could potentially gain access to valuable intellectual property, or possibly taint genetic analysis like criminal DNA testing. Companies could even potentially place malicious code in the DNA of genetically modified products, as a way to protect trade secrets, the researchers suggest.”

Guam: a tiny territory caught in a global war of words (New York Times): “Like other Guam residents, Ms. Sokala has been inundated with text messages from friends on the mainland — islanders’ term for the continental United States — asking how she was doing. ‘Everyone is nervous, but I think it is our families out there stateside that are more nervous for us,’ Ms. Sokala said. Still, early Thursday morning, she found herself unable to sleep.”

Marriage equality’s secret weapon (Inside Story): “If Abbott continues pushing himself to the front and centre of the campaign it may well impress the roughly 10 per cent of the electorate who remain his fans (and who will be voting ‘no’ anyway) but the large bulk of the country will simply be reminded daily of why they couldn’t stand him in the first place. If this plebiscite becomes in any way about Abbott’s return to the top job, that can only help the  ‘yes’ case.”

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