The Australian politics thread

[Burgey]

Don't worry. Tone's on with Ray Hadley this morning. No doubt the tough questions will be asked of him..

Meanwhile Tone, you stay classy mate:

Unseaworthy death boat used in Coalition ad

[Burgey]

Judging by their broadband policy, the Coalition really does want to take us back to 1996.

[pasag]

Didn't think Gillard was impressive at all itbt.

[howardj]

Originally Posted by Burgey

Costello is not qualified to say who should or shouldn't be PM, when he never had the stones to run himself. At least Rudd had the stones to stand up and have a crack at it.

Costello is the ultimate s******ing school kids, big with the sneer and the one-liners, but when asked to come to the front of the class, lacks the balls to go through with his rhetoric.

I did say

'There is no irony in what Fraser and Costello said. They are both perfectly qualified to comment on whether somebody is ready to be PM, and whether they are economically savvy respectively.

That is, Fraser is qualified to comment on who should be PM, and Costello on matters economic.

As for Rudd...I can understand Labor hacks backing their leader. But how any swinging voter could have been conned by that guy is beyond me. Anybody with any judgement of people could see that guy was an absolute fake from a mile away. It's an indictment on the system that such an abusive, incompetent bully, so lacking in people skills, could make it to the top. As it was, at least the system flushed him out in record time.

[howardj]

Originally Posted by Burgey

Don't worry. Tone's on with Ray Hadley this morning. No doubt the tough questions will be asked of him..

Meanwhile Tone, you stay classy mate:

Unseaworthy death boat used in Coalition ad

About as classy as you're turning this thread into tbh.

If we want the latest ALP press release, surely we can just visit their website.

[Burgey]

Look mate, people know which side each of us support. I don't make a secret of it, neither do you.

So if it's all right for one of us to have Stop the Boats or whatever HQ sends through that day, why is it not all right for the other to round on the opposite side?

Costello Abbott, Gillard or anyone can't make public pronouncements, have them thrown back at them and then say it's all a "smear".

Besides, you don't mind throwing a few barbs about the thread. Or does tough love only flow the one way?


Edit: and this IT debate being had at the moment is kind of like "nerds gone mad".

[Redbacks]

Originally Posted by Jono

Reckon he has the best name of any politician. Really rolls of the tongue well.

Probably doesn't know much about the economy though if he really believes this:

Joe Hockey blames government intervention for global financial crisis | The Australian

From first principles microeconomics it is a valid claim IMO. Not 100% responsible obviously, but to say as Dudd did in his 7000 word manafesto that the GFC was cause simply by failed neo-liberal economics was also questionable. Fortunately he wrote his ridiculous article when he was as popular, only J Howard accusing him of intellectual dishonesty got any traction in the media.

Impossible to have a free market with 0 influence by government, however by fixing prices. I.e. making home ownership out of sink with the domestic economies ability to produce you end up with a surpluss of production and no money to back it up. Therefore a huge amount of worthless houses and people easily defaulting on loans, tax payer now footing the bill for a trillion dollars etc.

An arguement that had the value of houses been left to rationalise at the market rate occured the crisis would have been less deep is plausible. The ridiculous lack of transparency in the financial sector also a huuggee!!! contributor too.

[benchmark00]

Originally Posted by Burgey

Judging by their broadband policy, the Coalition really does want to take us back to 1996.

To a time where censorship was rife...

Oh wait, that's the Labor party!


Moving forward.

[Burgey]

Originally Posted by benchmark00

To a time where censorship was rife...

Oh wait, that's the Labor party!


Moving forward.

No one needs a filter under the coalition policy because the speed will be so slow the p0rn sites won't load anyway

Real Action

[Spark]

Originally Posted by pasag

Didn't think Gillard was impressive at all itbt.

Didn't say she was impressive, was more talking about the fact that one person = no dickheads yelling across each other (Emerson/Joyce, looking at you) wasting everyone's time with partisan nonsense, less irritating repetitive softball pointless questions, instead more questions about policy. It was nice to see.

Originally Posted by howardj

I agree that Gillard was quite impressive last night - I'm willing to give credit to the other side, and am not a paid up party hack . However, her job was made considerably easier by Tony Jones - who is either biased or has not been following politics as closely as he should be - not pulling her up on various claims very important claims which she just repeated over and over again last night. Two off the top of my head were:

- that the Liberals are increasing company tax and that this will make groceries dearer (at worst, the rate will stay at 30%, and for all but 3000 companies it will be half of a percent lower than Labor i.e. 28.5% compared to 29%.) It was like he pretended he did not know that the Liberals are cutting company tax by more than what Labor are.

- that the Liberals opposed economic stimulus. She must have said this, unchallenged, at least 10 times. The facts are that they supported the first stimulus, and only voted down the second round because they thought it should be $20 billion, not $42 billion. Turns out, given all the waste and given that it is still rolling out now, it looks like they were right.

For Jones to sit there, and surely the guy knew about these things otherwise he is derelict in his job, and let her go unchallenged and repeat these things, was high farce. It was an unpaid, unchallenged advertisement.

I agree that Tony Jones let her off easily - I thought she did very well in subtly making him let his guard down and did that very quickly and very easily - but he's not KO'B.

[pasag]

Originally Posted by Spark

Didn't say she was impressive.

Two other posters did though

[Son Of Coco]

Originally Posted by James90

You're kidding right? Did you see the report? Did you see the press conference?

The Liberals scare campaigns around action on climate change and the level of debt have been disgraceful and I have a really horrible feeling in my stomach about what's going on. Surely they can't possibly get elected.

I'm terrified. Tony Abbott has rattled me. In just over two weeks we may be in opposition and I might be out of a job.

We have a man who gained leadership on the basis of blocking legislation and spreading dishonest information at every opportunity. He has attacked everything the Government has done over the past three years and has used his friends in the media to validate his claims even though the vast majority of them are complete and utter bull****.

He is the most reactionary backwards-thinking leader of a parliamentary party I have ever seen and in just over two weeks he could be Prime Minister.

I feel genuinely ill.

Yeah, it's ridiculous how much bull**** gets trotted out. If Australians believe it though then they get everything they deserve.

I saw an expert in something or other talking up the economic stimulus on TV the other morning. It's funny how when asked a direct question regarding it the Libs have nothing to say that should hold water. Unfortunately it might though.

[Son Of Coco]

Originally Posted by Craig

I think we can put down my local seat (Federal) of Fadden down as a Liberal victory. Given that I speak to a lot of people and they all speak of nothing but disdain for Labor, and that I barely see any posters or any campaigning from the Labor (or any other party) candidate, other then Stuart Robert, the Liberal Party candidate.

You live on the Gold Coast though Craig, given the vacuous nature of most of its inhabitants and the number of Maseratis and Beamers around it's a given most would be Liberal voters

[pasag]

Seems like I'm the only one though.

[Son Of Coco]

Originally Posted by howardj

That is, Fraser is qualified to comment on who should be PM, and Costello on matters economic.

I'm not sure he is. I mean, if it's Labor's fault we went into somewhat of an economic downturn but not their doing that we got out of it then it stands to reason that Costello had nothing to do with the good times during the Liberal's reign.

And what of the social downturn we took during the Liberal years? That must be the Lib's fault.