Escape from America: Russell Island, Australia

[Canberra, 1/31/22]

You’re an academic who came to Brisbane rather late in life. How did this happen and why Oz?

-I was a Lecturer at the University of Vermont from 2002-2013. My contract was year to year and I had to raise 40% of my own salary through grants. They would never give me a permanent contract because I didn’t have a PhD. I finally got fed up and applied for PhD programs in 2012 and got a scholarship to the University of Queensland starting in 2014.

I graduated in 2020 with a PhD in Mineral Economics and Governance. I then worked as a Research Fellow and Lecturer at UQ for two years and received permanent residency, so I stayed.  During Covid they locked me out of campus for 4 months although I wasn't fired. 196 out of 200 people in my institute were injected with the Covid shot.  Only 4 were uninjected including me.  UQ mandated it to be on campus, going against the Queensland government's advice as tertiary education was not defined as a critical location for transmission. Surprise, surprise UQ has a $230 million contract with Sanofi to make mRNA shots. The Director of my Institute confessed to me that he got a blood clot in his eye and went blind for two weeks, needing to go on leave to cover it up. He also got tachycardia and skin cancer immediately after receiving the jab. Despite this he refused to speak up publicly against the jab or the mandate. This hypocrisy was too much for me and I quit my job at UQ. I’ve been working full-time since to create an affordable housing charity.

You’re living on Russell Island, a haven for “down and outers.” What does it mean to be a poor Aussie?

-The primary difference between the US and Australia that I would point to is the minimum wage. In US the federal minimum is $7.25/hr and hasn't increased since 2009. The national minimum wage in Australia is $23.23 per hour. Even in US dollars that is $15.40/hr, which is double the US minimum. This is the reason there is so much less poverty in Australia than in US.  It used to be called the “lucky country.” However, inflation in housing costs, food and other expenses is driving more Australians into poverty. The main problem is the unavailability of affordable housing. The median house price in Australia is over $1 million in major cities. This doesn't make any sense as Australia has only 26 million people in a land area nearly equal to the US. Bad government policy accounts for this.

If you are really poor in Australia you do what is called “sleeping rough,” which means sleeping outside.

Russell Island had the cheapest land and rents in the entire Brisbane area, so a lot of the so-called “lower socio-economic” people went to live there. My two neighbors on Russell Island are both former building contractors and one with their wife. They are down to earth people and very helpful. One is missing most of his teeth and doesn’t bother getting them fixed. There are two local pubs on the island, the RSL (Returning Servicemembers League) and the Bowls Club. I described the Bowls Club as a “Star Wars” bar comparing it to the famous bar scene of aliens in the Star Wars movie. The people are very colorful and friendly, with bikers, gangsters, druggies, with a variety of wild garb and hairstyles. Australians would describe them as “bogans” which means unrefined or unsophisticated.

One of the reasons land was so cheap there is due to supposedly the longest fraud case in British legal history. I heard it took 17 years to settle.  Someone was selling land below the high tide line to people from elsewhere sight unseen. They took photos at low tide and then sold the property based on the photos. Due to this scandal the council ended up with hundreds of blocks of land, and the island was stigmatized. The island became known as a refuge for drug addicts, criminals and other ne'er-do-wells, which further drove down property values. The island requires a 20-30 minute ferry ride, and according to locals, people would move there, buy property, then get island fever and leave. This would put more properties on the market and keep prices low. The idea of building a bridge to the island would result in a rush of opportunists driving up land values, but the bridge never got built, so the land values went back down.

Up until recently a lot could be had for $20,000 on Russell and rents were cheap.  People lived in buses, tents, and other impromptu housing for years. But during Covid many people from NSW and Victoria moved up due to much more favorable policies in Qld regarding the Covid scamdemic.  They bought property and drove property prices up to double their previous prices unfortunately. The island is now getting gentrified.

As far away from other whites as possible, Australia tried to stay white but has given up. Asians are very visible now, and they're still coming. Do you see racial tensions flaring up? Australia’s relationship with China is also troubled. Though it depends on China to buy much of its goods, it has also antagonized China due to pressure from the US. With the US near collapse, I don't see how Oz can resist becoming more Chinese and China dependent. Your thoughts on this?

-For a long time Australia had what was called the “White Australia” policy preventing non-white  immigration. For the first 4 years I was here immigration was extremely restrictive and boats with illegal immigrants were sent to Nauru, where conditions were so terrible it was a scandal.

Legal visitors and immigrants from Asia were treated differently. Asian students and property investors were welcomed.  Universities based their financial models on massive Asian enrollment and paying non-resident tuition fees.  Half the students in my PhD program were Chinese, and there was a large contingent from Ghana and South America.  There were only 2-3 Australians. Chinese students were their bread and butter and relations with China were very friendly as it was Australia's largest trading partner.  This all changed in 2018 as I pointed out in my second article on Australia.  When Trump started the tariff war on China, Australia was instructed by the US to make China enemy #1, which they did overnight to the detriment of their trade with China.  Australians started becoming hostile to Asians and more incidents of harassment and violence toward Asians started to occur.  This demonstrates the complete subservience of Australia to the US.

Australians feel unbridled loyalty to the US for defeating the Japanese in the battles of Coral Sea and Midway. For preventing an invasion of Oz, Aussies offer unconditional loyalty to the US. Just tell them which of your illegal, immoral wars to join, and they’ll be there pronto! They’ll suffer anything for their loyal friends, the Yanks.

Now the borders have been thrown open to immigrants, which is happening everywhere, so it must be a coordinated effort globally like the Covid scam was.

Australia is caught between its dependence on China for trade and its military alliance with the US. As the US empire declines, Australia will renew trade with China, to its benefit.

Some cultural observations: Australia already exhibits several Asian characteristics. They have what is called the “Tall Poppy” syndrome which seeks to cut down anyone who gets ahead. This is very similar to the well-known Japanese phrase “the nail that stick up gets hammered down.” Like Asians, Australians are also very indirect and will never confront you to your face. They will always be agreeable to everything, but often don’t follow through when they don’t really mean it. They engage in group think, and will “cancel” anyone who doesn’t agree with them. I was cancelled at the university for refusing the clot shot.

A friend in rural Victoria told me, “Australia’s great strength is that the rule of law is strongly internalized and obeyed but it’s also the great weakness, as that obedience has led us down some dark passages, of which the Covid disaster is the latest.” She also said voting in Oz is mandatory. No matter how nauseating their choices or corrupt the system, Aussies must tolerate the winner, since he won “fair and square.” In the US, voting is used to legitimize war criminals, genocides and pedophiles!

You wrote in Asia Times that Aussies “feel it is their birthright to go for a surf, eat some prawns or Moreton Bay bugs, hike in the hills, enjoy life, obsess about cricket, Australian Football League, National Rugby League, Rugby Union, soccer, or any kind of sport, when they aren’t working at their easy high-paying jobs, or drinking in a pub.” With Covid, though, everything changed. With an incredible 245 day lockdown, Melbourne was transformed from one of the best cities on earth to one of its worst. Other burgs didn't suffer as much. During my recent visit to Brisbane, life seemed fine. I saw only a few homeless. Compared to Philly, Baltimore, New Orleans or St Louis, etc., Brisbane was much more civilized and even idyllic. Its streets were clean and safe. Perhaps Covid was merely an aberration? Can Aussies just return to their Moreton Bay bugs, rugby and fruity beer?

-Covid was handled differently in each state, similar to the US. The Premier of each state was a crucial factor as well as the political leaning of the state.

Victoria is/was the most socially progressive state in Australia, similar to Canada, New Zealand, or blue states in the US, and behaved in similar ways. Let’s split people into collectivists favoring the state and individualists favoring individual rights. The collectivists generally fell for the Covid psy-op and the individualists didn't.  All of my PhD friends got the jab, and none of my working class friends got it.  Educated people trust the system and working class people don’t. I went to every anti-mandate freedom rally in Brisbane and the convoy to Canberra. The chant in front of Parliament was “Sack them all!” There were 1/2 million people the week I was there and 2 million
the next week. All the people were working class teachers, health care workers, service workers, or business owners.

Dictator Dan (Andrews) in Victoria imposed the most draconian lockdowns on Melbourne and Victoria, and it turned into a police state with police goons beating, choking, and shooting protestors with rubber bullets.

New South Wales they brought in the federal police to Sydney and were arresting people on the beach and even surfers!

Queensland only had a few deaths from Covid and it was treated very differently. Queensland is warm most of the year and people are outside a lot in parks and doing exercise and recreation. Perhaps the vitamin D immunized them from covid? The police were very polite and cooperative with the anti-mandate protestors and did not engage in any of the atrocities committed by the Victoria police. Many people moved up to Queensland from Victoria and NSW after the borders opened because of this. It will take a long time for Melbourne to recover. It is now being swamped by immigrants to make things worse.

I can only speculate about the reason for this different police response. Qld was known as a police state with a virtual dictator, Johannes Bjelke-Petersen (1968-1987). After a Royal Commission into the abuses, there were reforms. Perhaps the better police behavior was because of those reforms?

Covid just wasn’t that big a problem in Qld because the people are healthier, outdoors, and getting vitamin D. That is what you observed. Local, municipal government is very good in Qld, and government gets worse as you go to state and federal level. I think that is true everywhere,

People in Qld were allowed outside and didn’t really give up their lifestyles. In Victoria and other states, not so much.

I left the US in 2018 and haven’t returned. You spend months each year in Cape Cod and Florida. Do you have hope for America? If so, will you ever return? If you had to spend the rest of your life in just one country, which would it be?

-I spent almost every summer since 1976 on Cape Cod. First I was a lifeguard for 18 years, then I had a sailing charter business for 15 years until 2019. I visit my 94 year old mother in Florida every year. After she passes away, I don’t know if I will return except to visit my sister and niece in Boston occasionally.

My mom lives in a majority Jewish retirement community so they are mostly Democrats who all hate Governor De Santis and think Trump is the anti-Christ. This despite the fact he did more for Israel than any other President. They have Trump Derangement Syndrome. They don’t seem to notice that Biden is actually deranged. Democrats their whole life, they’re just loyal to their team no matter what. Much of the rest of Florida is Republican and support Trump. Southeast Florida is bubble of retired people from NY and Boston who carry their “liberal” values with them.

Cape Cod has changed over the years from a mostly rural fishing and tourist place to being much more populated with escapees from NYC and Boston. I am mostly familiar with Wellfleet where the famous oysters come from. When I first left Cape cod in 1982 a 3/4 acre lot in Wellfleet was $15,000.  The same lot now would be $300,000 or more.

Wellfleet is populated by rich leftists from Boston, Cambridge, and NYC. They fell completely for the Covid scamdemic. When I visited Wellfleet in summer 2022 I was unable to attend the live theatre due to being unvaccinated and refusing to wear a mask. A local friend said that during Covid it was completely insane with all the most extreme Covid measures being enforced by the local gestapo and liberals who turned instantly into government supporting fascists.

There is no stopping the collapse of the US empire. The next financial crisis (probably in 2026) should help finish it off, in addition to de-dollarization in the rest of the world.

As recently deceased Johan Galtung said, he loves the US republic, but hates the empire. Once the empire collapses it’s possible the US can become a republic, and be a normal country not trying to dominate the earth. But it will take a while.

If I had to live anywhere it would probably be Thailand.

In recent years I tried to have a normal relationship with a woman in Australia three times. The first one turned out to be a covert narcissist who screamed and yelled at me for no reason. When I complained she said I was “weak” and couldn’t take it. I said I really loved her but couldn’t tolerate her behavior, and would help her with her anger problem. She said, “This is how I am and I’m not going to change,” so that was that. The second one would insult me, then say she was just kidding, which was passive aggressive. I left. The third wouldn’t sleep with me unless I shaved off all the hair on my body. I said no thanks.

A friend took me to Patong, Thailand and I found it to be paradise. The women are feminine, beautiful, sweet and kind, the land of smiles. The older ones remain slender and look 20 years younger. They don’t have any of the Christian guilt or hangups about sex. They don’t seem to mind if we are older as long as we support them and their families financially. Some Thai friends took me to the Buddhist temple for holiday worship and Buddhism seem to influence their culture in a positive way.

As a man of experience and means, you can choose where to live. Most Americans can barely pay their bills and haven’t traveled. They can’t fathom emigrating to an unknown land. If you were similarly stuck, what would you do? Whatever it is, I wouldn’t advise moving to Philly!

-Apparently only 30% of Americans have a passport. The easiest place for them to escape to would probably be Mexico.

—Gary Flomenhoft, 68-years-old

[room on Russell Island, Queensland]

[rally in Brisbane, 2022]

[rally in Brisbane, 2022]

[Patong, Thailand in 2023]