Today in Labor History January 26, 1808: Soldiers took over New South Wales, Australia, during the Rum Rebellion. It was Australia’s only military coup. At the time, NSW was a British penal colony. William Bligh was governor of the territory. This was the same William Bligh who was an officer under Captain Cook when he attempted to kidnap the King of Hawai’i. He was also the same William Bligh who was overthrown in the Mutiny on the Bounty, in 1789. It is questionable why the British thought he’d do better in charge of a bunch of prisoners and unruly soldiers, than he did with a bunch of sailors. Perhaps they were just desperate. One of Bligh’s commissions was to reign in the Rum Corps, which held a monopoly on the illegal rum trade in Australia. They also controlled the sale of other commodities. Bligh started to enforce penalties for the illegal sale and importation of liquor. He also tried to provide relief to farmers, suffering from recent flooding and price-gouging by the Rum Corps, by providing provisions from the colony’s stores. The monopolists didn’t like his looting of the stores, from which they were profiting handsomely, nor his enforcement of the liquor laws. So, they arrested him and deported him to Hobart, Van Diemen’s Land. The military remained in control of NSW until 1810.
Consider #Procter&Gamble (P&G), the parent company of #Charmin, #Puffs, #Bounty and more: About 40% of the wood pulp that #P&G uses for its North American paper products comes from #Canada, where the #timber industry's chainsaws are busy chipping away at the #boreal.
On the third anniversary of #China ’s national security law #HongKong offers #bounty for info to capture exiled political #activists - Nathan Law talks to the bbc about what it means:
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@kev At this point I would love to see someone posting a #bounty to be paid in #monero for recording that meeting in full, uncut and uncensored and putting it on #bitTorrent & #IPFS...
China accuses UK of protecting ‘fugitives’ after bounty put on Hong Kong democracy activists | The Guardian (archive.fo)
Chinese embassy in London tells UK to ‘stop interfering’ in China’s affairs, as Hong Kong leader says overseas activists will be ‘pursued for life.’