“The first time I heard the phrase [opioid epidemic] would have been around 2017,” says AG Morrison, a poppy farmer in Tasmania’s north central town of Cressy. “Honestly, I just ignored it. It’s something I’ve got no control over. The situation in the US doesn’t interest me one bit.”

Like many Tasmanian farmers, Morrison argues that poppies were and still are just a small part of his operation, thereby reducing his accountability. He and his brother also grow wheat, barley, and peas and he estimates that poppies make up just 15 percent of his total business. But more importantly, he says the issue in the US was never one of supply, but over-prescription.

“It’s their government, it’s their laws that are to be blamed, it’s nothing to do with us. It’s like blaming tobacco farmers for people getting lung cancer or something. They’re two different matters.”

Morrison’s argument is not without merit. Like so many others, he was contracted to grow a legal crop heavily regulated by the Australian Government, which in turn was heavily monitored by the United Nations. So at a glance, Tasmania’s farmers can claim plausible deniability.
https://www.vice.com/en/article/qjpdj3/welcome-to-tasmania-australia-that-spawned-americas-opioid-crisis-epidemic

Tension, Then Some Tears, as TV News Narrates a Moment for History

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/07/business/media/presidential-election-tv-networks-call.html

The news networks pledged restraint going into election night. Four days later, anchors waited until a fresh batch of Pennsylvania votes allowed them to project a winner.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/nov/07/rupert-murdoch-owned-us-outlets-turn-on-trump-urging-him-to-concede-with-grace

Multiple Rupert Murdoch-owned conservative media outlets in the United States have shifted their messaging in a seeming effort to warn readers and viewers that Donald Trump may well have lost the presidential election.

The new messaging appears to be closely coordinated, and it includes an appeal to Trump to preserve his “legacy” by showing grace in defeat. The message is being carried on Fox News and in the Wall Street Journal and the New York Post – all outlets avidly consumed by Trump himself, especially Fox.

One Fox News host, Laura Ingraham, an intimate of the president ever since she spoke at the 2016 Republican national convention, made an astounding statement that seemed directed at Trump personally, advising him to accept defeat “if and when that does happen” with “grace and composure” and appealing to his sense of his own legacy.

Ingraham said in part: “If and when it’s time to accept an unfavourable outcome in this election, and we hope it never comes, but if and when that does happen, president Trump needs to do it with the same grace and composure he demonstrated at that town hall with Savannah Guthrie. So many people remarked about his tone and presence. Exactly what he needs.

“Now losing, especially when you believe the process wasn’t fair, it’s a gut punch. And I’m not conceding anything tonight, by the way. But losing, if that’s what happens – it’s awful. But president Trump’s legacy will only become more significant if he focuses on moving the country forward.”

The Wall Street Journal has published an opinion piece with almost the exact same message. It is titled “The Presidential Endgame” and subtitled “Trump has the right to fight in court, but he needs evidence to prove voter fraud”.

cont. in the article.