John Roskam from the Institute of Public Affairs highlights the failures of the fourth estate to hold our politicians (and other institutions) to account.
Hidden away in their ivory towers, these paper shufflers claim to be able to fix the woes of the world if only....
If only they had more money, if only they had more people, if only everyone would do as they are told and stop impeding their progress.
It's total BS and one of the world's richest men has called them out on their recent preposterous claim.
The bluff caller is Elon Musk and his targets are the UN officials and their media enablers. It began with this headline in the fake news media.
It's an emotive headline. A fraction of an uber wealthy person's fortune could solve world hunger.
Given the number of philanthropists seeking to big note themselves through their tax effective foundations, it is rather astounding that none had thought to step up to the plate so no child goes hungry.
This prompted Dr. Eli David to do a little fact checking and display his results on Twitter.
Well that's a bit curious. The bureaucrats already get more money than they claim to need and yet there are hordes of hungry people in the world. The claim didn't go unnoticed by Elon Musk himself.
That's an offer too good to refuse. A centa-billionaire offering to give $6 billion to solve world hunger. All he is asking for in return is some evidence that it might do what the bureaucrat claims it will.
Then the story changed somewhat.
Prior to the Twitter spat, the director of the UN World Food Program(WFP) said that billionaires need to “step up now, on a one-time basis” to save millions of people that are being impacted by global hunger and the pandemic.
“$6 billion to help 42 million people that are literally going to die if we don’t reach them. It’s not complicated.”
When the fact check went public, the WFP director changed his tune.
“Headline not accurate. $6B will not solve world hunger, but it WILL prevent geopolitical instability, mass migration and save 42 million people on the brink of starvation. An unprecedented crisis and a perfect storm due to Covid/conflict/climate crises.”
Musk responded again asking for some details.
The bureaucrat wasn't giving up. He wrote:
“I can assure you that we have the systems in place for transparency and open source accounting. Your team can review and work with us to be totally confident of such.”
Musk then had the final word, linking to an article linking UN officials to the alleged sexual abuse of children, asking "what happened here" .
Cory Bernardi is the author of seven books and has been a member of the Australian rowing team, a publican, an investment portfolio manager and spent nearly 14 years as an Australian Senator.
Australia is being let down by a government that doesn't know what to do or how to do it. The pressure of underperformance is starting to show and we are all paying the price.
The Prime Minister has a delicate balancing act ahead of him. He needs to muscle up to China while re-establishing important trade markets for our products.
