starkebn posted:

88

Heil Howard!

Captain Pissweak posted:

Ragingsheep posted:

Saw this on twitter.

‏@honi_soit 15m
After two rounds with the defamation lawyers, our feature investigation into the Young Liberal movement will go live tomorrow morning.

Quantum Mechanic posted:

I just got preselected

Quantum Mechanic posted:

I just got preselected

froglet posted:

Today in awful right wing media, let's demonise those bludging tradies, who spend their bonus on things that aren't tools (because many of them were completely disinterested in being there and many had severe social or health problems that she wasn't exactly equipped to deal with my issues at every stage, so it's pretty obvious that they just want to get these people into work. She primarily worked with people who had been long term unemployed and she pointed out that the experience of being long term unemployed and she pointed out that the government doesn't really want to waste my time. Alternatively, could fill out the form in doge memes:

pre:

Such discrimination

                New job
 
     Wow

Gough Suppressant posted:

pictured: the hon andrew laming do recently I honestly have a higher percentage of their desired gender/s to their physical characteristics(although there might be a far safer leader than bandt. Good speaker, from the fact that some Jews were in positions of privilege in the name of gently caress is wrong with journalists? Honestly, are they universally loving autistic or something?

Edit: and unlike the Sky reporter who realised how badly he hosed up and apologised at the people talking about compassion like he is directly saying them to.

It's some kind of trick. A human would remain in the coalition are scum.

Splode posted:

For your own mental health. qanda will just make you upset for no reason and you buy a train ticket". They then decide whether or not to make anything worse you shouldn't let yourself get too depressed. It's bad for you and a homeless person down the street with an axe screaming "I AM GOING TO KILL YOU NEGLIGENT, AND YOU, HOMELESS INDIVIDUAL!", and you don't believe and you're trolling AGAIN or you haven't thought it through at all.

Here is an analogy!
I am chasing you and doesn't actually achieve anything.

The Age posted:

Malevolent? The Treasurer says Fairfax Media's reporting of the budget has been sometimes "quite malevolent".

Fairfax has been trying to provide the public with what Joe Hockey has not. It's a table that has been in each of the past nine budgets and was missing in this one. Introduced by Hockey's mentor Peter Costello in 2005 it was at first called "benefits of new measures for families" and later "detailed family outcomes".

It displays the changes in real household disposable incomes expected as a result of all of the budget measures taken together. It lists the results for up to 17 different family types, among them sole parents, single and double income couples and couples with and without children.
It wasn't in this year's budget, replaced by a table that compared incomes in 2013-14 with those expected in 2016-17 and noted that by then incomes would be higher. What it didn't do is to outline which family types would be better off in real terms and which would be worse off, as used to be done.

So using the freedom of information process Fairfax asked for whatever so-called cameo analysis the Treasury had prepared, whether or not it was included in the budget.

The Treasury had prepared quite a bit: a 56-page "initial cameo and distributional analysis of prospective policy measures considered in the 2014-15 budget" in April and a 21-page "cameo analysis of the impacts of the 2014-15 budget measures" on budget eve.

Neither was provided to Fairfax, because they were "brought into existence for the dominant purpose of submission to cabinet and were so submitted".

Which means cabinet knew. It knew which household types and income groups would be made better off or worse off and kept it to itself. Treasury did provide a separate smaller piece of analysis that showed high-income Australians lost less money as a result of the budget than low-income ones. It is, as the Treasurer told breakfast TV, limited.

Joe Hockey says this analysis ''does not represent the true state of affairs''. That seems unlikely, but if he wanted to back up his claims the Treasurer could make public the 56- and 21-page documents.

It would be surprising if they were incomplete. The Treasurer is able to release them, even though for whatever reason he decided not to release their conclusions on budget night. Until then it is reasonable to assume that the Treasury has come to the same conclusions as other analysts who have attempted to work out how the budget affects different households - that it hits low-income and disadvantaged households harder than high-income ones.

But it's easily cleared up.

Kat Delacour posted:

Super Human Liberal Convention

The Guardian posted:

Australia's detention regime sets out to make asylum seekers suffer, says chief immigration psychiatrist

Guardian Australia exclusive: Doctor who was responsible for mental health of people in detention becomes the most senior figure to condemn system from within, saying immigration department deliberately harms vulnerable detainees in a process akin to torture...

The Grauniad Taurasial posted:

The Graun
The immigration minister, Scott Morrison, has called for a reinterpretation of the refugee convention, arguing the framework outlining countries’ obligations to those fleeing persecution is being used “as a tool by people smugglers to basically run death voyages”.

The high court will hear the minister’s arguments in the context of a 50-year-old Afghan citizen of Hazara ethnicity who arrived in Australia by boat in February 2012 and feared being killed by the Taliban for working as a truck driver carrying construction materials.

The court will consider whether people may be found not to meet the definition of refugee in circumstances where they could avoid persecution by changing their occupation.

A research fellow working in international law at Melbourne Law School, Martin Clark, said if the court found in favour of Morrison, it “would likely expand the range of things that the minister could decide are reasonable to expect of applicants, and on that basis deny those applicants protection in Australia”.

This might allow the government to pay closer attention to hypothetical changes in conduct as an easier way to deny protection, Clark said.

Documents submitted to the court show the man, identified as “SZSCA”, started work as a silver jeweller in 1977 and continued to work as a jeweller until 2001. He moved with his family to Kabul in 2007 and worked as a self-employed truck driver.

The man was stopped by the Taliban in January 2011 and found to be carrying construction materials, accounting to court documents and evidence presented to previous hearings.

SZSCA alleges he was warned to stop carrying construction materials or he would be killed, because the Taliban believed his work was assisting the Afghan government or foreign agencies.

The man left Afghanistan in December 2011, a month after receiving a letter from the Taliban that allegedly outlined a threat to kill him, and arrived in Australia “as an offshore entry person”.

In June 2012 a delegate of the then immigration minister refused to grant SZSCA a protection visa, accepting that he had been threatened by the Taliban once but noting that he had the option of doing other, safer work if he returned.

The man sought a review by the Refugee Review Tribunal, which backed the original decision – suggesting he had long-established skills making jewellery and rejecting the notion that his work as a truck driver was a “core aspect” of his identity, beliefs or lifestyle which he should not be expected to modify or forego.

But the federal circuit court quashed the tribunal’s decision and then, in December 2013, the full court of the federal court dismissed the minister’s appeal. The matter will now be considered by the high court.

Lawyers for Morrison have submitted to the high court: “If his position is that he insists upon driving trucks (carrying building materials or not), he is not outside of Afghanistan because of any well-founded fear of persecution – given the safety that the tribunal has found he would have by remaining in Kabul as a jeweller.”

Clark said it was not the first time Australian courts had considered questions of changes to behaviour on return that would likely avoid future persecution.

“A series of cases have been decided relating to people who would be persecuted on the basis of homosexuality, in which courts have held expecting a person to take ‘reasonable steps’ to avoid persecution is the wrong kind of inquiry,” Clark said.

“But the significance of this challenge is whether or not the ‘reasonable’ requirement should apply to considerations that are not closely related to characteristics that are protected by the convention – like political beliefs, religious views, and so on.”

Morrison said the SZSCA case dealt with “a level of specificity and interpretation of the refugee convention which we would argue goes beyond what the obligations are”.

Commenting on the case after a report in the Australian newspaper on Monday, Morrison told radio station 2GB the court would consider the relevance of matters “within a person’s control” such as what sort of job would put them “in a position of exposure”.

“I know a lot of listeners sometimes say why don’t you just get out of the refugee convention, but the difficulty we have got with the convention is not the document itself but how lawyers and others have interpreted it for the last 50-60 years, not just in this country but around the world,” Morrison told the conservative radio broadcaster Ray Hadley.

“Our courts draw on all of their interpretations and what started out being a pretty sensible document over time has had layer upon layer upon layer and it is now being used as a tool by people smugglers to basically run death voyages.”

Clark said Morrison’s comment was “simplistic” as people smugglers were not arguing in Australian courts about the interpretation of the convention.

“Making this point is also unrelated to the SZSCA case,” Clark said.

“As horrible as the deaths at sea issue is, it should be remembered that the government in the SZSCA case is arguing that it should be easier to send people back to countries where, if they act ‘reasonably’, they won’t be killed.

“That does not fit the spirit or purpose of the refugees convention, and whatever one might say about how ‘outdated’ it is, those problems shouldn’t encourage government to send people back to places where they may likely be killed.”

Taalib posted:

quote:

“It’s seen as collateral damage. The department does what it can to reduce it but in the name of the greater good of border protection and deterrents it doesn’t really matter. We’re saving lives by sending people mad.”

The group drove change. “The department was very pleased to use things that we brought in, so any positive reforms that have gone on in the system in terms of screening people and healthcare and health standards were all done by Dehag.”

But Newman alleges the department later sabotaged medical screening of asylum seekers for signs of torture and trauma. “We argued that no one who had been tortured should be detained or particularly not in remote places. The departmental doctors decided the best way to get around that was not to do the screening, so they didn’t find out who was tortured. They stopped it on Christmas Island so people could be shipped away before it was even known if they were trauma survivors.”

Quantum Mechanic posted:

I just got preselected

Ragingsheep posted:

Saw this on twitter.

‏@honi_soit 15m
After two rounds with the defamation lawyers, our feature investigation into the Young Liberal movement will go live tomorrow morning.

Taalib posted:

Doctor who was responsible for mental health of people in detention becomes the most senior figure to condemn system from within, saying immigration department deliberately harms vulnerable detainees in a process akin to torture

Ragingsheep posted:

http://honisoit.com/2014/08/young-libs-exposed-the-ambition-faction-the-left-and-the-uglies/

Kinda expecting more that this tbh.

Bomb-Bunny posted:

I won't bold because, really, it's Scott Morrison saying something, the whole thing is a bigger red flag than a Soviet battalion.

tl:dr; Scotty dearest wants to be able to send a truck driver back to Afganistan who was threatened by the Taliban, because he was threatened under suspicion of driving supplies to the Afgan government.

So he's not only perfectly content with beating up the unemployed here in Australia, but he wants his own private piece of the action, so he's going to create some unemployed overseas he's entitled to kick around a bit as a side-project. Seriously though, by his definition you could now deport someone for giving material support to the French Resistance, because couldn't they just spend the war getting drunk?

Sanguine posted:

Congratulations QM, that's awesome.

So is it a safe LNP seat, or will you have a fight on your hands?

quote:

The federal government is refusing to release more detailed modelling prepared before the budget by Treasury, that shows the likely impact of the proposed measures on different household types.

Documents released under freedom-of-information legislation to Fairfax Media show the government delivered its budget fully aware its spending cuts would hit poorer households much harder than wealthier ones.

But two larger documents were withheld from the FOI request, one of 56 pages and the other of 21 pages. It is understood they show clearly how the less wealthy households would suffer far bigger falls in disposable income than richer ones, especially for families with children aged between six and 16.

A spokeswoman for Treasurer Joe Hockey said the documents would not be released because they were prepared for the cabinet and were therefore protected in the FOI process.

''Every government receives a range of advice and analysis during the budget preparation process,'' the spokeswoman said.

''[And] the Abbott government clearly shows what the welfare changes would mean, with 10 pages of material contained in the budget papers. This is significantly more than has been included in most previous budgets.''

Hockey criticised Fairfax Media's report of the Treasury analysis on Monday, saying the figures did not tell the complete story.

He also denied the data indicated the government knew its budget would hit the poor the hardest. He noted it ''fails to take into account the massive number of concessional payments such as discounted pharmaceuticals, discounted transport, discounted childcare that goes to lower-income households''.

However, all of these payments had been cut in the federal budget in one way or another.

Subsidies to pharmaceuticals have been reduced, federal funding for transport discounts are being withdrawn, and there are tougher conditions to get childcare benefits. All these changes will result in lower-income earners being worse off.

But shadow treasurer Chris Bowen slammed Mr Hockey on Monday for attacking the media for ''daring'' to report on the data, saying the Treasurer ought to be ''acknowledging [the] Treasury figures show the fundamental unfairness of the budget.''

''These are Treasury figures. These aren't Sydney Morning Herald's figures, not the Labor Party's figures - these are Treasury figures, which have been released under FOI,'' Mr Bowen told ABC Radio.

A former Treasury official, who did not wish to be named, said he had ''no reason to expect Treasury's figures are wrong''. ''And I have no reason to expect these figures will go away, either,'' he said.

Stephen Koukoulas from Market Economics said the government would have known that its budget was going to hit lower-income households hardest.

''The way that all these policies are actually costed and analysed, there is almost always an income distribution effect, particularly on these sorts of policies when its obvious there's going to be some sort of impact,'' he said.

Ragingsheep posted:

http://honisoit.com/2014/08/young-libs-exposed-the-ambition-faction-the-left-and-the-uglies/

Kinda expecting more that this tbh.

Chrodyn posted:

Griffith Nathan campus is uglier than I remember. Just passed a group loudly talking about how privatising education would be a good thing. Any of you study here?

The Murray News posted:

5 Aug 2014 The Australian AMOS AIKMAN NORTHERN CORRESPONDENT

ALP attacks News over stance on recognition

ABORIGINAL leaders have described as disgraceful, divisive and ignorant an attack by Labor’s indigenous affairs spokesman, Shayne Neumann, about coverage of reconciliation in The Australian and other newspapers owned by Rupert Murdoch. Mr Neumann, in remarks at the Garma festival yesterday, sought to link concentrated media ownership and past election coverage to the campaign against the Recognise movement for constitutional acknowledgment for Aboriginal Australians.

Aboriginal leaders moved to distance themselves from the comments and Labor leader Bill Shorten declined to back his indigenous affairs spokesman, who appeared ignorant about The Australian’s support for Recognise or diverse public debate on indigenous affairs. Mr Neumann accused The Australian and other papers in the Murdoch stable of running against the movement for constitutional recognition.

“You can see it already coming through with comments made by certain conservative federalist jurists as well as lawyers as well as those people who are running — and you can see it now in the media, and News Limited, for example, is giving voice to that already,” he said. “Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander affairs should not be what the opinion pieces are written in The Australian newspaper. I mean, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander affairs should have a, eh, have a multitude of voices.”

The chairman of the Prime Minister’s Indigenous Advisory Council, Warren Mundine, dismissed the comments as nonsense. “It’s very hard to think of anyone who’s a bigger supporter than the Murdoch papers,” he said. Senior Gumatj clan elder and director of the Yothu Yindi Foundation which runs Garma, Balupalu Yunupingu, said: “I don’t think anyone could seriously question The Australian’s commitment to indigenous issues. The newspaper gives consistent and comprehensive coverage of the many issues which affect Yolngu people, and makes sure our voices are heard.”

The Australian has strongly supported constitutional recognition of indigenous people, editorialising in January that “we endorse the Prime Minister’s view that rather than changing the Constitution, this move can ‘complete’ it”. But it has not shied away from publishing alternate views. Misha Schubert, Recognise’s communications director, said: “The Australian has strongly and consistently declared its support for constitutional recognition of the first Australians.” Editor-in-chief of The Australian Chris Mitchell said the MP had “no idea what he is talking about”. “The Australian has supported the concepts behind the referendum, publishes Noel Pearson regularly and has done so for over a decade, regularly publishes Marcia Langton, Warren Mundine and Galarrwuy Yunupingu, and has carried the Recognise signage and campaign in its news pages and on its website. “At its 50th birthday celebrations last month, attended by Bill Shorten, Mr Pearson was a speaker and sat on the top table with Mr Murdoch, Prime Minister Tony Abbott, former prime ministers Paul Keating and John Howard, the governor of the Reserve Bank, Glenn Stevens, the managing director of the Commonwealth Bank, Ian Narev, and the head of the BCA, Catherine Livingstone.”

Mr Neumann , in an interview with The Australian, acknowledged he had overstepped. “The Australian has taken a view, I think, that they are, they support the idea of constitutional recognition. I think that’s the case. But, eh, there’s always a risk involved if any media outlet or anyone takes a line in relation to that. What I’m saying is that if any News Limited outlet, or Fairfax or anyone takes opposing views to constitutional recognition then there is a problem we have in getting constitutional recognition through,” he said.

Through tears posted:

5 Aug 2014 The Australian

Recognising ALP’s Garma gaffe

Bill Shorten must educate his indigenous affairs spokesman

AT the annual Garma Festival, among the stringybarks at Gulkula on the northeast tip of Arnhem Land, political leaders come to hear from indigenous voices and seek better understanding. “Friends,” said Bill Shorten, grasping this reality at the weekend, “I am here to learn.” Tony Abbott spoke at the festival last year and next month will mark the first anniversary of his election by spending a week in Arnhem Land. Engagement is strong from both sides of politics but the practical challenges of Closing the Gap remain daunting and the political debate about delivering indigenous recognition in the Constitution threatens to become fractious. The Opposition Leader’s speech aimed for a bipartisan approach but outlined an agenda that could be contentious. “Symbolic change is not good enough,” he said, “preambular change will not suffice.” Without details, he made it clear Labor would seek to insert an anti-discrimination provision into the Constitution. “Imagine striking out old laws tainted by imperialism and prejudice, and replacing them with a safeguard against racial discrimination,” he said.

This is all of a piece with the expert panel report on recognition but it leaps ahead of a parliamentary joint select committee that is still holding public hearings. The removal of some racebased provisions along with recognition of indigenous people, history and culture in the preamble would be the minimalist approach and path of least resistance. This must be balanced against strong calls for changes to the body of the Constitution, such as the anti-discrimination clause Labor will now champion, and other provisions to recognise indigenous languages and cultural attachment to traditional lands and waters. The greater the proposed changes, the greater potential for fears — real and imagined — of unintended consequences, and the higher the chance of failure. The Australian is a media partner of Recognise and, like the Prime Minister and Mr Shorten, wants to see success but that will hinge on the construction of the proposal.

Yet amid this goodwill and good sense, Labor’s indigenous affairs spokesman, Shayne Neumann, has struck a discordant note of prejudice and ignorance; not against a race or culture but against this newspaper, which he identified as a potential block on progress. “I think there’s too much power in the media controlled by one man who lives overseas,” he said at Garma. “Simply, that’s the case, and who has an agenda — and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander affairs should not be what the opinion pieces are written in The Australian newspaper.”

Forgive us for taking offence at what he was trying to say, but indigenous advancement and reconciliation have long been cornerstones of our mission. We like to think indigenous leader Noel Pearson said it best at our 50th anniversary celebration last month when he declared “no paper welcomed indigenous writers and political leaders more than this one” and praised our coverage of the full array of crucial indigenous issues. “The Australian treated these subjects not because it believed the country’s indigenous peoples innocent or guilty, right or wrong, noble or ignoble,” he said, “but because the paper believes in our humanity, and that we and our affairs should not be left on the woodheap of national policy and politics.”

Mr Shorten ought to take his ignorant frontbencher quietly aside.

quote:

Palm Islands riots leader Lex Wotton breaks silence as gag order ends.

By Isobel Roe

Updated 22 Jul 2014, 12:52pmTue 22 Jul 2014, 12:52pm

The convicted leader of the infamous Palm Island riots has broken his silence - four years after being released from jail. Lex Wotton is now able to speak publicly after being placed under a four year gag order as part of his parole conditions. He spent two years in jail for his part in the riots - which were sparked by the death in custody of Palm Island man Cameron Doomadgee in 2004.

Mr Wotton and his family are now leading a class action against the State of Queensland and the Police Commissioner, and said he hoped it would bring some justice to those affected. "A lot of people say to me you know, I did the right thing. and this is actual politicians that said that to me, but they don't want to be named," he said.

Mr Wotton said the class action was not about compensation, but about getting answers for his community. "With the class action hopefully.. all their homes were raided, children had guns pointed to their heads and traumatised... people are still very scarred and affected by what has taken shape at that time," he said. "Hopefully there might be a good outcome."

A spokesman from the Queensland Police Service told the ABC it was not appropriate to comment due to ongoing legal proceedings.

quote:

Optimism: Bob Brown Tuesday 5 August 2014 9:06AM

Bob Brown's Optimism: Reflections on a life of action IMAGE: OPTIMISM: REFLECTIONS ON A LIFE OF ACTION

Former Senator and Greens leader Bob Brown has written a memoir of his life in politics and the environment movement. He says that optimism is the key to success and that a life of action has made him optimistic rather than pessimistic about the future.

Gough Suppressant posted:

I would honestly rather stab myself in the eye with hot pokers than read a multi-page article about sydney university student politics.