Abbott Leadership challenge - "Et tu, Turnbull?" - 14/9/15

[Footy Smarts]

http://m.theage.com.au/federal-poli...ster-on-appointing-women-20150916-gjoh3o.html

and the leaks begin

Yep. Who could've guessed that the whole united, no wrecking stuff would last all of a day.

Not a great start for Malcolm. Disappointingly small poll increase, leaks already happening, looking weak promoting policies he disagrees with and the right wing media going at him (see the DT).

He should've had the guts to change tack immediately once he was sworn in. Keep his popularity by being honest about policies. Trying to satisfy the right wing is making him look weak and they're still going to try and destroy him so what's the point.

 

[Bomberboyokay]

http://m.theage.com.au/federal-poli...ster-on-appointing-women-20150916-gjoh3o.html

and the leaks begin

Good, good...

 

[Bomberboyokay]

You forget the findings of the Heydon RC into unions that Labor so desperately wanted to close down will be available. Bill smells now but he will probably be stinking by the end.

In case you hadn't noticed, Heydon's idiocy has turned the royal commission into an empty gun.

 

[Todman]

In case you hadn't noticed, Heydon's idiocy has turned the royal commission into an empty gun.

Still plenty of bullets to be fired.

 

[Bomberboyokay]

Still plenty of bullets to be fired.

Heydon grabbed the gun and threw it in the ocean. It won't fire a shot let alone hit anybody.

 

[Todman]

Heydon grabbed the gun and threw it in the ocean. It won't fire a shot let alone hit anybody.

First, Heydon is investigating deals Shorten struck as head of the Australian Workers Union, which cut workers’ entitlements but had employers donate to the AWU. In one deal, an employer even paid $40,000 for Shorten’s personal benefit.

Second, Heydon is on the tail of crooked union officials, especially in the CFMEU. Already 26 union officials past and present have been recommended for charges.

You don't have to be a genius to know that Shorten is protecting union crooks. Former ACTU president, Martin Ferguson, says he “will not damn” a royal commission that “is potentially going to be very important in reforming the trade union movement and the Labor Party”. And Ferguson, a former Labor minister, warned that too many Labor MPs now “wait for the phone call from the trade union heavy to tell them what to do”.

 

[cartwright]

didnt want to make a new thread, but McDonald needs to pull his head in
A LIBERAL MP TOLD PENNY WONG TO 'SPEAK AUSTRALIAN' IN THE SENATE TODAY

http://www.pedestrian.tv/news/arts-...an-i/2be5cad0-292b-4110-9a25-9b240de3c965.htm

 

[Maggie5]

26 people are already facing charges.

NSW ICAC say hi.

 

[romeohwho]

26 people are already facing charges.

So what-if unions are crook -great-let's clean them up but don't pretend that the big business supporting the libs isn't every bit as crooked-generally more corrupt. Luckily the libs have people like Heydon to help out.

 

[Maggie5]

didnt want to make a new thread, but McDonald needs to pull his head in
A LIBERAL MP TOLD PENNY WONG TO 'SPEAK AUSTRALIAN' IN THE SENATE TODAY

http://www.pedestrian.tv/news/arts-...an-i/2be5cad0-292b-4110-9a25-9b240de3c965.htm

It has now come to light that Macdonald directed his utterly offensive comments at Scotland-born Labor Senator Doug Cameron, who has a thick Glaswegian accent. Penny Wong asked for the comment to be withdrawn, because REGARDLESS of accent, telling someone to speak Australian is a) fundamentally incorrect, and b) derogatory.

This is wrong, I really think he was talking to Cormann or maybe Erica?

Whether it was directed to Penny or Cameron, this is type of comment that belongs in the fifties.

What a dong, he is a perfect example of the typical born to rule mentality of a Liberal politician.

 

[Bomberboyokay]

didnt want to make a new thread, but McDonald needs to pull his head in
A LIBERAL MP TOLD PENNY WONG TO 'SPEAK AUSTRALIAN' IN THE SENATE TODAY

http://www.pedestrian.tv/news/arts-...an-i/2be5cad0-292b-4110-9a25-9b240de3c965.htm

 

[Todman]

So what-if unions are crook -great-let's clean them up but don't pretend that the big business supporting the libs isn't every bit as crooked-generally more corrupt. Luckily the libs have people like Heydon to help out.

If big business is crooked then lets press charges.

 

[Maggie5]

Thanks for the vid.

Dear Erica, wagging his finger to Penny, F*ck, how childish is he!

Surely we don't deserve these dickheads in government.

 

[Todman]

It was direct at Doug Cameron.

 

[romeohwho]

If big business is crooked then lets press charges.

Indeed or lets spend a lot of money on a Royal commission-we can put Heydon in charge of this one too.

 

[romeohwho]

Thanks for the vid.

Dear Erica, wagging his finger to Penny, F*ck, how childish is he!

Surely we don't deserve these dickheads in government.

Bunch of tossers-Wong was correct-not acceptable.
Hoping that Turnbull starts the tone being raised everywhere in these circles.

 

[Ratts of Tobruk]

If big business is crooked then lets press charges.

Are you being ironic? That's exactly what the Unions say should happen with "union crooks". And your comments are odd on the whole issue. The $40K is well known but you bring it up like that's going to come out of the final findings. Heydon's reputation and actions are questionable. The 26 or 27 that are recommended for charges, which the Liberals love to bring up, has actually only resulted in 2 or 3 charges right? An RC has a lot of power, but if they can't make things stick then the point is to find out institutional problems so solutions can be worked out. The witch-hunt it has been, is not a useful approach.

And what happened when Gillard & Rudd did come back so early? All it does is give the opposition a fantastic opportunity for some highly visible grave dancing. Tactically quite daft. If/when he does come back, the news cycle would have moved on and the impact will be lessened, many people have a short attention span. It really will just be the ALP upset by this due to the lost opportunity, the attention has already moved onto Shorten.

You think the news cycle will move on from 'Liberals removed a first term PM after complaining for 5 years about Labor removing a first term PM'???

Whenever Abbott turns up it will be a story. It would've been smarter to do it early to allow it to be a part of the general hubbub, rather than it's own separate thing that distracts from whatever narrative Turnbull is trying to get going in the future.

In all honesty there is no difference between the two, no actual ideology, precious little policy, its all personalities who respond to the ludicrous cycle of the overly frequent opinion poll. It used to be the poll was only published every few months or so, it could be used as an accurate gauge of how the electorate felt about the government's performance. Now happening every 2 weeks, it measures the government response to the current media spin cycle - and a good portion of that is driven by the opinion polls themselves. Plus there's no way of knowing that the persons polled actually give real opinions. I bet if the pollsters falsified the results, no one would detect it - and you could burn a few politicians careers by doing so.

There are massive differences between the two major parties, so I don't know why you are saying this (is it related to you thinking the public are stupid and easily led?). Minor parties suggest the majors are the same to try and promote their own groups (so good on them for trying) and lazy observers suggest they're the same to justify not paying much attention to politics. It's a weird thing to say on the back of the obviously large arguments had in public. They are similar in that they both want power and therefore react to general public opinion, but they still have different ideas about the world and so you see things like the attempt to make the unemployed wait 6 months before getting any welfare.

If that isn't different enough, then I think people should be careful what they wish for. The reason changing PMs so many times this milennium hasn't caused much actual change is because the general ideas of all serious people in politics are similar. A lightly regulated market works well. Even the extreme ideas of Abbott were limited by the Senate. But not before the Car Industry was wound up, NBN severely comprimised, Royal Commissions poorly directed, etc. If only people had realised the two major parties were very different before voting him in...

And gaming a poll isn't very smart seeing as they're done by multiple different companies so you get found out quick. Newspoll are unsurprisingly nicer to the Liberals, but that difference is due to how they phrase their questions and so if they ask some National Security stuff about scary ISIS coming for each and every one of us, then the 'Who would you vote for if their was an election tomorrow?' question gets a bit more LNP votes.

Are you suggesting that Gillard is a person of 'good character' and that Abbott isn't? Tony Abbott was loyal to a fault. Gillard was disloyal, actually disloyal is even a compliment for Gillard. Abbott is just a very proud person. 3-4 days in the life of Australian politics is absolutely nothing, if most of these politicians taken 3-4 day off - we would probably be better off.

If you aren't aware, you are failing to measure things equally. Reading Bolt can be entertaining, but he has a skewed and highly selective view of the world.

 

[kfc1]

There are massive differences between the two major parties, so I don't know why you are saying this (is it related to you thinking the public are stupid and easily led?). Minor parties suggest the majors are the same to try and promote their own groups (so good on them for trying) and lazy observers suggest they're the same to justify not paying much attention to politics. It's a weird thing to say on the back of the obviously large arguments had in public. They are similar in that they both want power and therefore react to general public opinion, but they still have different ideas about the world and so you see things like the attempt to make the unemployed wait 6 months before getting any welfare.

If that isn't different enough, then I think people should be careful what they wish for. The reason changing PMs so many times this milennium hasn't caused much change is because the general ideas of all serious people in politics are similar. A lightly regulated market works well.

There are minor differences between the parties. For a large number of people, neither party aligns with their political values so the choice between the two is 'six of one, half a dozen of the other'. If the 2 Party system was Liberal v Greens then you could say there is a huge difference between the two, but it's not, it's just a couple of centre-right parties battling it out to stay in power as opposed to making a difference.

 

[Showbags]

If big business is crooked then lets press charges.

The same logic applies with Unions. Why did we need an expensive Royal Commission costing nearly $100 mill? Why did they not just immediately press charges as you say?

If a Royal Commission into Trade Unions is fair then so is a RC into Corporate Donations to Political Campaigns (though Labor I'd guess aren't totally clean on this matter either).

For example, Kevin Andrews was given multiple donations by the gambling lobby, while he was in charge of writing legislation repealing Labor's mandatory pre-commitment technology to stop problem gamblers blowing all their money on the pokies. This is the sort of shit that is rife between both major parties and needs to be stamped out (but I'll hazard a guess is ALOT worse on the Liberal side).

 

[skilts]

Much has been made, possibly rightly, of the lack of stability in our office of Prime Minister. So many changes over such a short period speaks ill of the way our politics are functioning. On the other hand, that there have been so many changes in leadership without there being blood on the streets speaks well of how our polity withstands these hiccoughs.

 

[King Elvis]

I wonder who 'the public' is that he refers to? No-one I know wants an increase in the GST. Will kill small business who import.

There is always something that will kill business off.

The GST should go up, but it should be as part of a taxation reform program.

 

[King Elvis]

The same logic applies with Unions. Why did we need an expensive Royal Commission costing nearly $100 mill? Why did they not just immediately press charges as you say?

If a Royal Commission into Trade Unions is fair then so is a RC into Corporate Donations to Political Campaigns (though Labor I'd guess aren't totally clean on this matter either).

For example, Kevin Andrews was given multiple donations by the gambling lobby, while he was in charge of writing legislation repealing Labor's mandatory pre-commitment technology to stop problem gamblers blowing all their money on the pokies. This is the sort of shit that is rife between both major parties and needs to be stamped out (but I'll hazard a guess is ALOT worse on the Liberal side).

Contra or someone will correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't believe Unions are governed by corporate legislature, and the legislation which does cover them is a lot more lax and ill defined.

 

[Maggie5]

There is always something that will kill business off.

The GST should go up, but it should be as part of a taxation reform program.

Why should it go up? This IMO is a lazy way of balancing the budget.

There is absolutely no way any tax reform will sufficiently compensate those at the lower end of income.
Even worse if they broaden the GST to include health, education and other currently exempt goods.

The gap between rich and poor has increased dramatically in the last 5 years. Do we want a bigger welfare bill, what does that do to society and individuals?

 

[Ratts of Tobruk]

The gap between rich and poor has increased dramatically in the last 5 years. Do we want a bigger welfare bill, what does that do to society and individuals?

That's a fair point. The less people think they 'need' welfare to live the better it is for their psychology and that of the nation. God knows Abbott backers have already done damage with their 'leaners and lifters' type Tea Party politics. I wonder if having the tax-free threshold shifted to $25K would be enough? Doesn't really help part-time parents.

 

[ralphmalph]

Turnbull's ideology and view on things matches up a hell of a lot better with my views than Abbott's.

I expect there to be policy changes, and I think those people who expected him to change every policy stance Abbott had, within 24 hours of being in the job, are complete morons.

Sure. But who are those people expecting that?

Aside from the fact that Turnbull actually appears to be intelligent and competent, I've got no doubt policies and positions will change.

Well, call me old fashioned but unlike you, I think I'll wait until I see what policies change and how before deciding to vote for the Libs.