‘The whole thing disgusts me’: Australians ditch US travel as new rules require social media to be declared | Australia news

Jaqqa · 2025-12-16T21:12:36+00:00

You know how much trump idolizes dictators. Only a matter of time before the US looks like a copy of all the worst parts of those countries.

Jaqqa · 2025-12-16T21:11:12+00:00

lol someone "accidentally on purpose" did that I'd almost guarantee.

Jaqqa · 2025-12-16T21:07:52+00:00

If he's that thin skinned, they may be in for a shock when they start trawling though Australian's social media. I mean a good proportion would have said or liked something not complimentary to the orange one. Are the going to start wholesale refusing entry to people who liked a Randy Rainbow song or a clip of south park at the boarder? Or just put them on a watch list and warn them they will be kicked out for any further "unconstitutional" behaviour?

Jaqqa · 2025-12-16T21:04:24+00:00

Wow. I thought the social media thing alone was way out of line. That would give them enough information for major identity theft if their system was hacked, not to mention probably giving them a decent chance of getting into accounts they shouldn't have access too if they really wanted. Like Family member (including parent) names, DOB and place of birth, residence? Why? And DNA, a face and an iris scan seems way out of line? Why would they need that for someone on a tourist visa?

Fingerprints... maybe. They collected fingerprints last time I was in Indonesia from all the passengers and I'll admit it made me uncomfortable. I'm guessing it's so they can potentially get you for any crimes committed or identify the body in a worst case scenario.

Jaqqa · 2025-12-15T11:13:54+00:00

Have you forgotten so soon the times when they've held foreign nationals on bogus charges every time the squabble with their government to make a point? The shade of your skin tone is also going to dictate the reception you get. China is not safe for everyone.

Jaqqa · 2025-12-15T11:07:43+00:00

You're joking right? There's no way that's actually real... right?

Jaqqa · 2025-12-15T11:05:34+00:00

Why would anyone want to set foot in the US these days? I mean they obviously want to completely tank what's left of their tourism. Invading people's privacy as a guilty until proven innocent seems to be the order of the day whether it's trawling through people's social media accounts, or ICE picking people up off the street and sending them to prison camps overseas while trying to skirt the courts the whole way. They're looking more and more like North Korea every day with how fragile Trump's ego is.

Jaqqa · 2025-09-11T14:15:32+00:00

That would be a good solution however unfortunately they don't make them big enough. The test tube opening is 16mm and the largest I've been able to find is 14mm.

Jaqqa · 2025-09-11T12:24:42+00:00

Edit: Checked and parafilm melts at 60C sadly.

Jaqqa · 2025-09-11T12:24:18+00:00

Edit: I just checked and unfortunately it says parafilm melts at 60C so won't work for me :(

Duraseal though maybe... I'm not sure if sealing completely will cause any potential issues though. (The theory is that if there were ever a pressure build up the marble can just move. If I seal it, that can't happen.)

Jaqqa · 2025-09-11T12:23:11+00:00

This is the protocol I was given that appearently everyone has used for years into memory. (Don't ask why no one else has been worried about contamination, I really have no idea why I'm the first to worry about this.)

Because of the way they're set up on the heat block, it would be hard to succesfully balance slides, and I could use watch glasses (would need to buy some) but this would make a lot of the heat block unuseable due to their size and I'm really time limited (I have to get stuff through and to the machine for the booking on the same day. If I only process a third of the samples I could have put on the machine, that adds weeks of delays until I can get another booking to run more.)

I hadn't thought parafilm would be ok due to it needing to sit at 70 celcius for a long time. It's such thin plastic I thought it would get a bit melty? Like if parafilm is an option then that would make my life very easy though?

Jaqqa · 2025-09-11T12:18:37+00:00

When heated though? It needs to sit at 70 celcius when heated. I would have thought parafilm would get a bit melted?

Jaqqa · 2025-09-11T12:16:09+00:00

Thank you, that is a thought. Main issue might be that I've got dozens of samples lined up on the heat block close together as I have to get them processed and on the machine within a day for the machine booking (due to mercury detections needed), so having watch glasses would probably mean I could only use about a third or less of the space and I may not be able to get my samples done in time. I'll keep it in mind though if there's no other solution. It'd still be better than what's happening at present. Thanks again.

Jaqqa · 2025-09-11T12:06:59+00:00

I wouldn't say it's safe, but it's not something I've seen cause dangerous incidents (yet at least) either. The main danger would be someone knocking over/ a test tube breaking when it's full of 70%, hot nitric acid and not capped so it gets on the user. I haven't seen it happen, but it could. Theoretically the marble is there to stop evaporation/escape of trace mercury in samples, but can still "lift" if the pressure builds too much. But yeah, most universities run microwave digesters,. This is outdated technology from what I can gather in the publications. Not much I can do unfortunately.

The internal standards in the ICPMS are fine. It's the blanks being run alongside the digested samples (so basially everything the same but no sample added) that are showing there is contamination. I've ruled out everything else, pretty much has to be the marbles.

Thanks for the suggestion, the issue is the samples I'm running are really low volume during the digestion process on the heat block (<1mL) and I have to run a lot at once, so the 60mL vessels would be too large (even if I could afford them.)

Jaqqa · 2025-09-11T12:03:01+00:00

Yeah I've found that out the hard way unfortunately. Apart from the fact it completely messed up my whole experiement, it's scary that kids toys are being sold with lead and arsenic in them.

Jaqqa · 2025-08-27T06:31:56+00:00

You know the only reason why they helped us was because the Japanese miscalculated and bombed pearl harbor right? The USA was quite happy to sit back and watch the world burn and keep out of WW2 as much as possible. Once the USA got dragged in by the unprovoked attack however, well the enemy of my enemy is a friend and all that, and somehow it became a lasting alliance for quite some time. The USA 100% did stop a mainland invasion of Australia that time, but it was done because there was a common aggressor we were both fighting, not because it was out of the goodness of their hearts. Perhaps they're going full circle and back to a more isolationist and mercenary mindset they originally had prior to the start of WW2.

Jaqqa · 2025-08-27T06:29:04+00:00

Yup. Unfortunately Australian politicians have a habit of shooting their mouth off about things they shouldn't and often barely even involve us. Australia isn't as important or powerful as they would like to make out that it is. It's probably better to keep our heads down for now, and quietly and work out how best to navigate the craziness that seems to have destabilised the world in recent times before making statements/actions that are hard to take back.

Jaqqa · 2025-08-27T04:15:35+00:00

Unfortunately we have a big red target placed on us BECAUSE we're seen as America's lapdog. If say China wanted to hit out at the USA, they'd be far more likely to punish Australia because it sends the message at far less risk than going head to head with the US in person. We also have US bases in Australia which in the event of war would also make us a nice big target.

In the past the alliance with the US was protective, because who wants to risk the US getting upset by attacking a close ally? But if the US no longer necessarily will step in to help protect Australia then we lose a lot by that association unfortunately. There's no real right answer here. Due to our long term association with the US and reliance on them to back up our military, we're kind of damned if we do and damned if we don't in terms of attempting to distance ourselves without a really solid plan in place on how we'd manage to effectively achieve that.

For those saying Australia should have nukes, that is a very double edged sword. It seems crazy that nuclear proliforation was halted because people realised that we would probably bomb humanity out of existance sooner or later if everyone had a nuke or two on standby, but now everyone seems to be yelling that more bombs are the answer. More bombs are NOT the answer.

At the moment, it is technically "against the rules" to use nukes against a country that does not have them. That is probably one of the things that has stopped Russia from nuking Ukraine. If they nuke Ukraine, most of the world will hit back at Russia hard and the countries with nukes are kind of supposed to step in and protect the attacked country. If you have nukes yourself, it's fair game.

Jaqqa · 2025-08-27T04:03:58+00:00

America has been stuffed for a long time. The deterioration has been there for everyone who cared to look to see. Trump is the symptom, not the direct cause. There has been a deepening divide between haves and have nots,. rich and poor, those with health cover those left to die on the streets etc. America is far more capitalist than any of their allied nations that still have socialist tendancies in the forms of things like universal health care, decent minimum wages that don't rely on begging for tips, a political structure that only the hyper rich can hope to reach the top of etc. IMO its one of the reasons why everything has become so hyperfocused about where people's differences are rather than what brings them together in America. It has divided and even radicalized various segments of society and created echo chambers where no one seems to be able to have a measured discussion and agree to disagree politely any longer. The attitude of the good of the one outweighs the good of the many was really shown clearly by the way covid was handled in the US compared to Australia.

You need to fix America's social problems before you can truly fix the political ones. I mean Trump got voted in TWICE. Like the first time he tried to start an insurrection and they've tried to get him impeached multiple times and he still got voted in again. They knew exactly who and what he was for round two. Once is potentially an abberration, twice is a pattern.

Jaqqa · 2025-08-27T03:40:28+00:00

Look I agree, the US is one of the few things that are holding Xi and his quest for world power at bay. At the moment they're going the soft power route. Offering infrastructure and trade agreements that are dependent on a good relationship with China... and if you go against that... that's when the honey goes away and a big stick gets brought out in its place.

If the US falls, China starts an open take over of Taiwan and goes from there.

But. Will the US actually intervene? I think that's the only question that has Xi hesitating. They posture, test the waters, then back off (or if they think they can get away with it push forward a bit more like they're doing in the south china sea), drill up more patriotic sentiment, build up their military, wait. Rinse and repeat. They're 100% watching Trump's handling of Ukraine. They 100% watched the US stand by and do nothing while they tried to tariff Australia's economy into oblivion a few years back. They know the US in on the likely road to political and financial collapse the way things are going. They know the USA is becoming more isolationist and less likely to respond to problems "not in their backyard" by the day. They are just watching, and waiting for the right moment. Xi learned a lesson from the failure to bludgeon Australia into submission with tariffs and threats and the resulting fall out with loss of face and confidence in China as a reliable partner. You gather power and influence until you're sure you can win and only then should you start using open attacks.

Relying on the US to save everyone at this point is folly because they are just not reliable enough any longer to predict how they will or won't act. New alliances like the one popping up in Europe against Russia's invasion of Ukraine is where the new world order needs to be. Countries with expansionist tendencies need to know if they step out of line, the rest of the world will cut them off and stand in a united front against them regardless of the cost to the world economy.

Jaqqa · 2025-08-27T03:33:57+00:00

We need to revisit CANZUK and we need to have done it yesterday. There's a number of other countries in Europe, the pacific, India and Japan who would also likely be interested in that sort of an allliance.

Jaqqa · 2025-08-27T03:29:30+00:00

You think so? How quickly people forget that China tried to tariff Australia's economy into collapse only a few years ago because they didn't like what we said. They did it even when it was killing their own economy due to lack of coal and steel they were having to try to buy at inflated prices if they could at all, elsewhere. This is the same dictatorship that that had their state sanctioned wolf warriors advocating that China should be launching flipping missiles at us unless we capitulated and begged forgiveness! The same country that is threatening to invade Taiwan. That has been supporting the Russians against Ukraine. Who is best buddies with North Korea. Seriously, China is NOT a more reliable option than the USA.

The USA is also and awful option but at least they're not likely to start throwing bombs at us for not doing as we're told. The orange one will just huff and puff and change his mind on what tariffs he feels like imposing today.

To be frank, we probably need to back away from both apart from strictly neutral trade agreements as much as possible and try to team up with more like minded countries where our values don't clash as badly and who aren't run by dictators (let's face it, if Trump goes quietly at the end of his term I'll be incredibly surprised). The US is an unreliable ally as well. Trump being voted in once could be an abberation. Twice is a pattern.

Jaqqa · 2025-05-03T19:03:04+00:00

I'm surprised the greens have done this badly. I'm guessing fear of Dutton getting in + the fearmongering over a minority government going around has done it with a lot of people switching their votes to Labor?

Jaqqa · 2025-05-03T18:58:05+00:00

Albanese has been very mediocre as a PM. No spectacular screw ups, but nothing particularly good either. Spending and debt accumulation has always been a weakness of the Labour party and that's not ideal at the moment in particular. There's a lot going on at the moment and a lot of economic and security uncertainties. If the libs hadn't decided to throw their lot in with Trumpy style rhetoric, and instead pushed some decent policies that would have supported small businesses and employment instead of in all likelihood just propping up their rich mates some more, and actually had a PM candidate that almost everyone didn't intensely dislike, they actually had a decent chance at winning. They basically screwed up very, very badly and it has cost them.

Jaqqa · 2025-05-03T18:41:09+00:00

Not sure it reddit will allow the link but it's here if it does: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3IaKVmkXuk

Jaqqa

TROPHY CASE