Auspol April - Long Live the Glorious State of North Queensland

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Auspol April - Long Live the Glorious State of North Queensland

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Senor Tron: May 26, 2006

Anidav posted:

Best...state?

Nope.

As a South Australian it pains me to say it, but lately Victoria is the one smashing it.

# ? Apr 22, 2016 10:16

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ? May 24, 2024 15:45

gay picnic defence: Oct 5, 2009; I'M CONCERNED ABOUT A NUMBER OF THINGS

Senor Tron posted:

Nope.

As a South Australian it pains me to say it, but lately Victoria is the one smashing it.

I don''t normally like the ALP much but Dan the Man has been doing a pretty good job. Maybe the threat of losing half your inner city seats to the Greens puts things into perspective a little.

# ? Apr 22, 2016 10:26

I would blow Dane Cook: Dec 26, 2008

What is Sophie Mirabella's cunning plan? I can't figure it out.

# ? Apr 22, 2016 10:33

hooman: Oct 11, 2007; This guy seems legit.; Fun Shoe

Jumpingmanjim posted:

What is Sophie Mirabella's cunning plan? I can't figure it out.

Be a horrible awful person.

# ? Apr 22, 2016 10:49

Negligent: Aug 20, 2013; Its just lovely here this time of year.

Actually a solid plan since most country people are terrible

# ? Apr 22, 2016 10:54

LibertyCat: Mar 5, 2016; by WE B Bourgeois

Cartoon posted:

Helmets save lives. Sad that some of those are libertarians but that's socialism for you.

Do you know what would save even more cyclist lives? Banning them from roads without a cycling license. The license would be a written and practical proof of road rules, emergency procedures etc. If bad behavior (eg running red lights) was observed it would be taken away. The license would be renewed every five or so years, and a "User Pays" system would ensure it remains cost neutral.

This may seem harsh but what price do you put on a Human Life?

LibertyCat fucked around with this message at 11:10 on Apr 22, 2016

# ? Apr 22, 2016 11:05

Negative Entropy: Nov 30, 2009

http://www.crikey.com.au/2016/04/22/annastacia-palaszczuk-qld-electoral-system-change/

Poll Bludger has a good write up on what happened in QLD.

quote:

Poll Bludger: has Palaszczuk already secured a second term?

Annastacia Palaszczuk might've won the next Queensland election already thanks to a nifty piece of electoral reform.
There are still nearly two years to go until the state next goes to the polls, but yesterday might well go down as the day Annastacia Palaszczuk�s Labor government won itself the next Queensland election.

This was not achieved Paul Keating-style, with a searingly effective demolition of a showpiece opposition policy, or as John Howard might have done, by using unanticipated external events to wrest back an initiative that had long seemed lost, but through a dramatic and entirely unheralded change to the electoral system.

The minority Labor government appeared to be on the back foot yesterday as crossbenchers lined up with the opposition to support a bill to add four extra seats to the 89-member Parliament, thereby addressing their concerns about the level of rural and regional representation.

The passage of the bill loomed as an embarrassing demonstration of the government�s weakness, as the decisive vote in favour was to come from Cairns MP Rob Pyne, who last month quit the ALP to sit as an independent.

However, the smile was shortly wiped from the Liberal National Party�s collective dial when the government tacked on an amendment to abolish optional preferential voting, and again require that voters number every box on their ballot papers.

That sounded awfully good to the crossbenchers, who now stand to receive the overwhelming majority of the preferences of any major party candidate they succeed in outpolling.

Opposition members were less pleased, with one going so far as to say: �Today we have seen democracy die.�

It�s hard to know whether to be impressed by the government�s audacity, or appalled by its cynicism.

The very same Labor Party whose federal members vented outrage just a few weeks ago over the rushed process on Senate reform was now turning the state�s electoral system on its head without so much as the fig leaf of a consultation process.

It stands in very stark contrast to the way optional preferential voting was introduced after Wayne Goss led Labor to power in 1989, and set to work addressing the scandalous state of the electoral system bequeathed to it after the Joh Bjelke-Petersen years.

Among the measures taken was the establishment of the Electoral and Administrative Review Commission, in response to one of the principal recommendations of the Fitzgerald inquiry that lifted the lid on the state�s culture of political and police corruption.

The main concern of this body was to address the gerrymandering and malapportionment that are remembered as Bjelke-Petersen�s legacy, though he was by no means their sole author.

It was no doubt pleasing to the Labor government that this august and non-partisan body recommended following the example of New South Wales in abandoning the requirement that voters number every box.

With the Greens yet to establish themselves as the third force in Australian politics, and the Australian Democrats not much of a factor on the state scene, the main impact of compulsory preferential voting was in allowing Nationals and Liberal candidates to contest the same seats without splitting the vote and delivering victory to Labor � precisely the reason preferential voting was first introduced at federal level by a conservative government in 1918.

The optional preferential voting reform was not much commented on at that time, as it was seen as a low-order concern when compared with the concurrent introduction of �one vote, one value� electoral boundaries.

For the most part, voters continued to number every box, following a habit ingrained by long-established practice at both federal and state level.

But as the years went by, two factors caused optional preferential voting to take on ever greater significance.

One was the weakening of the major parties� hold on voter loyalties, and the resulting increase in the number of seats being determined by preferences, or the absence thereof.

The other was a strategy increasingly employed by major parties of simplifying their messages by recommending supporters �just vote one�, as former Labor premier Peter Beattie did to devastating effect when the right-of-centre vote fractured amid the One Nation insurgency at the turn of the millennium.

This was dramatically illustrated when Labor returned to power last year, just three years after the rout administered to Anna Bligh�s government in 2012 reduced it to seven seats.

Otherwise accurate opinion polls failed to forecast this outcome, as it had not been anticipated how dramatically the hard-edged approach of Campbell Newman�s government was going to change the behaviour of minor party and independent voters.

At the previous two elections, Greens voters in particular were inclined to place a pox on both houses after more than a decade of Labor rule, with around two in five of their votes exhausting when preferences were allocated.

But in 2015, two in five suddenly became one in five, as left-of-centre voters found a determination to go the extra mile to see the back of Newman.

Now Labor is back in government, it has had good cause to fear that the swelling ranks of Greens voters might revert to type.

The point is well illustrated by published opinion polls, which have recorded little change on the election result so far as the primary vote is concerned.

Observers have been reluctant to conclude that these numbers would be sufficient for Labor to maintain its tenuous grip on power, given the likelihood that many Greens voters will have a more apathetic frame of mind next time around.

Galaxy Research has dealt with the issue by averaging preference flows from the last three elections in determining its two-party preferred results, rather than following the usual practice of simply going on the most recent election.

A poll it conducted just last week credited the LNP with a 51-49 lead, despite the two major parties� primary votes being almost exactly as they were at the election, when the 51-49 result was in favour of Labor.

For both the pollsters and the Labor Party, the situation now becomes a lot more straightforward, with at least three-quarters of Greens voters set to follow their well-established habit of favouring Labor over the conservatives, however reluctantly.

Life may well have become less complicated for the LNP too, though in a less enviable way. Barring a substantial change in political fortunes, the unanticipated trek through the wilderness that began with last year�s shock defeat could now be even longer than it feared.

# ? Apr 22, 2016 11:08

I would blow Dane Cook: Dec 26, 2008

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cuF_oglX-JY

# ? Apr 22, 2016 11:16

Tokamak: Dec 22, 2004

Jumpingmanjim posted:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cuF_oglX-JY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OV_kxWstbAg

# ? Apr 22, 2016 11:38

Negative Entropy: Nov 30, 2009

Jumpingmanjim posted:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cuF_oglX-JY

# ? Apr 22, 2016 12:20

fliptophead: Oct 2, 2006

LibertyCat posted:

Do you know what would save even more cyclist lives? Banning them from roads without a cycling license. The license would be a written and practical proof of road rules, emergency procedures etc. If bad behavior (eg running red lights) was observed it would be taken away. The license would be renewed every five or so years, and a "User Pays" system would ensure it remains cost neutral.

This may seem harsh but what price do you put on a Human Life?

Hmm I already pay for rego and license to operate a thing that kills a lot of people, that I don't use that often, but what I should really do is stop paying for that and pay a small fee to ride a bike instead? Done!

# ? Apr 22, 2016 12:57

I would blow Dane Cook: Dec 26, 2008

https://twitter.com/NatalieKotsios/status/723466936609181696

what is this I don't even?

# ? Apr 22, 2016 13:00

I would blow Dane Cook: Dec 26, 2008

# ? Apr 22, 2016 13:13

Anidav: Feb 25, 2010; ahhh fuck its the rats again

Lmao. News LTD.

Might aswell have the headline as a coupon
*note:not redeemable after election*
*note:tax cuts may not happen*

# ? Apr 22, 2016 13:50

Negligent: Aug 20, 2013; Its just lovely here this time of year.

honestly, news ltd could put a different photo of bill shorten on the front page with no caption each day until the election and still gently caress his chances

bill shorten, outside a chinese restaurant, loving kevin rudd

bill shorten, giving testimony to the trade union royal commission

bill shorten, arguing in favour of boat turnbacks at the alp national conference

etc

# ? Apr 22, 2016 14:01

Anidav: Feb 25, 2010; ahhh fuck its the rats again

Bill Shorten poses for trading card photo.

# ? Apr 22, 2016 14:02

I would blow Dane Cook: Dec 26, 2008

Negligent posted:

honestly, news ltd could put a different photo of bill shorten on the front page with no caption each day until the election and still gently caress his chances

bill shorten, outside a chinese restaurant, loving kevin rudd

bill shorten, giving testimony to the trade union royal commission

bill shorten, arguing in favour of boat turnbacks at the alp national conference

etc

How do you feel about Bill Shorten?

# ? Apr 22, 2016 14:03

Skellybones: May 31, 2011; Fun Shoe

Anidav posted:

Bill Shorten poses for trading card photo.

# ? Apr 22, 2016 14:13

hooman: Oct 11, 2007; This guy seems legit.; Fun Shoe

Jumpingmanjim posted:

https://twitter.com/NatalieKotsios/status/723466936609181696

what is this I don't even?

The sound of backpedaling hard.

# ? Apr 22, 2016 15:20

Pickled Tink: Apr 28, 2012; Have you heard about First Dog? It's a very good comic I just love.

Also, wear your bike helmets kids. I copped several blows to the head but my helmet left me totally unscathed.

Finally you should check out First Dog as it's a good comic I like it very much.; Fun Shoe

Jumpingmanjim posted:

https://twitter.com/NatalieKotsios/status/723466936609181696

what is this I don't even?

Born to rule black hearted monster shoots mouth off in manner befitting their black heartedness. Later alerted that this kind of thing has consequences and attempts to backpedal.

Consequences like this:

Labor refers Sophie Mirabella's claims to auditor general over $10m �political retribution� posted:

Labor has asked the auditor general to investigate Sophie Mirabella�s claims her former electorate did not receive $10m in hospital funding because it voted her out, arguing it smacks of �political retribution�.

On Thursday in a Sky debate the former member for Indi said: �I had a commitment for a $10m allocation to the Wangaratta hospital that if elected I was going to announce a week after the election.�

�That is $10m that Wangaratta hasn�t had because Cathy [McGowan] got elected.�

Mirabella attempted to clarify the comments on Friday by saying: �it�s about who is a strong advocate when there are dozens of really good cases of hospitals all over regional Australia fighting to get on top of the list.

�It�s about who has the ability and the knowledge and the contacts in government to go to the top of the list, Cathy wasn�t able to do it, I will be.�

However, Mirabella does not appear to have retracted her claim she had a commitment for the funding before the election.

Labor�s health spokeswoman Catherine King has referred the issue to the auditor general, asking him to investigate what she said appeared to be an act of �political retribution�.

�Punishing the people of Indi for electing an independent MP is not legitimate grounds on which to base decisions about the expenditure of a significant sum of taxpayer money.�

The current health minister, Sussan Ley, said �neither I, nor my department, is aware of any public commitment to give Wangaratta Hospital $10m�.

But Ley did not rule out that a private commitment had existed. �I am not going to speculate on private discussions that may have occurred during an election campaign, let alone those I was not even privy to,� she said.

A spokesman for Peter Dutton, who was shadow health minister before the 2013 election and health minister after, referred Guardian Australia to Mirabella�s attempts to clarify the claim of a commitment, but did not answer questions about whether Dutton was aware of such a commitment.

Mirabella has been contacted for comment.

# ? Apr 22, 2016 15:34

I would blow Dane Cook: Dec 26, 2008

When calculating senate quotas:

quote:

Quota = [Formal votes / (vacancies + 1)] + 1

Why do they add 1 to vacancies?

# ? Apr 22, 2016 15:42

Senor Tron: May 26, 2006

Jumpingmanjim posted:

When calculating senate quotas:

Why do they add 1 to vacancies?

Thanks to the need to get one vote above 1/7th of the vote, whatever is left at the end will always be less than a full quota.

# ? Apr 22, 2016 16:52

Sparticle: Oct 7, 2012

Jumpingmanjim posted:

When calculating senate quotas:

Why do they add 1 to vacancies?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Droop_quota

# ? Apr 22, 2016 16:55

I would blow Dane Cook: Dec 26, 2008

Ah so it is just like the Duckworth-Lewis Method, I see.

# ? Apr 22, 2016 17:02

Haught: Jan 18, 2009

Jumpingmanjim posted:

Ah so it is just like the Duckworth-Lewis Method, I see.

Hope it doesn't rain on election day.

# ? Apr 22, 2016 22:11

I would blow Dane Cook: Dec 26, 2008

quote:

Tony Abbott: I�m not blind to the flaws that ended my leadership

No change of leadership happens overnight, as political parties don�t lightly cull their leaders, especially in government. Inevitably, it �involves much disruption and lasting bad blood. It�s hard to vote no confidence in the prime minister without casting aspersions on the government too. It only happens when a majority of MPs have concluded that they�d be more likely to gain promotion, win their seats or hold government under someone else. The question for me is not just what others might have done wrong but what I could have done better or differently to have made the coup less likely.

Inevitably, some criticism is justified. No one makes the right call on everything. There are some �no win� decisions, no matter who or how gifted the decision-maker might be. I am convinced that the Abbott government got the big things right. Equally, there�s no doubt that there were mistakes in smaller things that loomed large enough for my colleagues to think that they would fare better under a new leader.

No one could credibly claim that I ran a �do nothing� government. My 2013 election campaign pledge was that we�d stop the boats, scrap the carbon tax, build the roads of the 21st century and get the budget back under control. Just two years on, with the partial exception of budget savings, the Abbott government had substantially delivered. In addition, we�d finalised three historic free-trade agreements with our largest trading partners; ended the practice of bailing out failing businesses; ramped up national security against unprecedented terror threats at home and abroad; and there was an orderly process in place to handle complex and contentious issues such as tax reform and federation reform via two white papers. Despite headwinds abroad, about 300,000 extra jobs had been created in an economy that was �under new management and open for business�.

If the Abbott government �really had been chaotic and dysfunctional, as alleged, how did all this happen? Stopping the boats was supposed to be impossible. Labor said it was an undeliverable three-word slogan. The boats were stopped because the government had a crystal-clear objective, a well-thought-through plan and the capacity to adapt to changing circumstances; and, most importantly, the ability of ministers to work together with senior officials and with thousands of personnel to get things done.

If the Abbott government �really had zero ability to work with the Senate, how did we manage the repeal of the carbon tax and the mining tax, plus significant pension reform and a raft of savings totalling $50 billion over the forward estimates? If I had failed to grow into the job of being prime minister, who or what persuaded the leaders of South Korea, Japan and China that FTAs that had eluded my predecessors for a �decade were a good idea; and how had the G20 that I chaired been such a diplomatic success? If the Abbott government had been �uninterested in economics or incapable of serious reform, how could we have �resisted the pressure from big busi��nesses to bail them out of trouble? If I really had been �incapable of putting �nation before party, how did the government maintain bipartisanship on four tranches of national security legislation?

If the Abbott office really had been oppressive, why was staff turnover so low? How could a badly managed operation have managed to dispatch a Labor �government in almost record time? No large office working under great pressure is free from tension or personality clashes but my team was highly professional and included some who�d worked in senior roles in the Howard office and ministry with which, they thought, mine stood comparison. The last thing former members of my staff �deserve is to have their reputations blackened by people trying to justify a change of leadership.

The most compelling vindication of the Abbott government has been the Turnbull government�s maintenance of its key policies: including turning around illegal immigrant boats, direct �action on climate change, a plebiscite on same-sex marriage and stripping terrorists with dual �nationality of their Australian �citizenship.

All prime ministers have to make hard calls, as so many decisions are contentious, even within parties, and have to be resolved by someone taking a side. The challenge is to ensure that people feel sufficiently �in the loop� to accept the decisions that go against them. There were some issues that the Abbott government could have managed better or not pursued at all. Still, some of our thorniest problems were handled with a collegiality quite at odds with the �repeated allegations of �command and control�.

After winning the leadership by just one vote in 2009, at Kevin Andrews�s urging I held an unprecedented secret ballot where the partyroom overwhelmingly confirmed that we would oppose the then Labor government�s emissions trading scheme. Once the policy question had been resolved, there was no ideological �get square� because our party, in John Howard�s words, flourishes as a �broad church�. Successful political parties need to make the most of all their talent; so once he�d �decided to stay in the parliament, I restored Malcolm Turnbull to the shadow cabinet in the post-2010 election reshuffle.

Our direct-action policy on climate change � tree planting on poor soils, improved pasture and new technology � was designed not only to reduce emissions but to improve our economic performance as well. By adopting such measures in preference to an emissions trading scheme, the party stayed united because these measures made sense regardless of the precise extent of man-made global warming.

Same-sex marriage became a fraught issue as soon as Labor changed its position to allow a conscience vote. Prior to the 2013 election, my response to colleagues who were keen for change was that there couldn�t be a free vote on a matter of party policy. More importantly, we couldn�t credibly drat Labor on the carbon tax (for having one policy �before an election but a different one afterwards) if we did exactly the same with same-sex marriage.

Going into the 2013 election, our position was that same-sex marriage would be a matter for the Coalition partyroom if a private member�s bill were to come up in the next parliament. By the time one did, in mid-2015, the National Party remained overwhelmingly opposed while a significant minority in the Liberal Party had �become strongly in favour.

As prime minister, Howard had shrewdly pointed out that the Liberal Party was the representative, in this country, of both the small-l liberal and the conservative political traditions. In my judgment, the principal political party of the centre-Right could not lightly abandon an understanding of marriage that had stood since time immemorial. We needed an outcome that �accommodated changing views inside the party and within the community but that respected the traditional concept of marriage.

In our partyroom debate, �almost every MP spoke and about two-thirds supported marriage between a man and a woman. In my judgment, the minority view was too strong for the pre-existing policy to stand unaltered for �another term but that meant finding a mechanism to deal with it that both sides could respect with an outcome that nearly everyone could accept. Hence, a plebiscite in the next term of parliament.

Not all the contentious issues that the Abbott government faced were as successfully managed. A very serious mistake, in retrospect, was abolishing the debt ceiling. This was done to avoid a confidence-sapping �fiscal cliff� early in the life of a new government. We never imagined that the crossbench elected in 2013 would be so resistant to spending cuts. After its mistakes in government, we never imagined that the Labor Party would be so committed to unsustainable spending. What�s now �apparent is that the debt ceiling would have forced both the opposition and the crossbench to face fiscal reality in a way that no amount of cajoling could.

Another serious problem was how to balance pre-election commitments with the worse-than-expected budget position we inherited and the faster-than-Treasury-forecast collapse in the terms of trade. The budget repair challenge in 2014 was even bigger than in 2013 when, in opposition, I�d declared a �budget emer�gency�. The Abbott government tried to balance the need to keep commitments with the need for budget repair by starting some key savings measures (such as pension changes) after the next election. I thought that this was akin to Howard promising �never, ever� to introduce a GST but then taking one to an election. Still, the public felt let down � and, in �politics, it�s the perception that matters most.

At the very beginning of the Abbott government�s life, I made a series of decisions that were reasonable, even self-evident in principle, but which created much resentment in the partyroom. I stopped the employment of �immediate family members in MPs� own offices because of the inevitable perceptions of favouritism; I ended first-class overseas travel out of respect for taxpayers; and I restricted family travel �within Australia and spouse travel overseas because family very �rarely accompanied business trips in the private sector. These were perks many MPs had understandably enjoyed and that previous prime ministers had tolerated. In some cases, having a spouse in the office, paid or �unpaid, may have helped MPs� work. With the �benefit of hindsight, at the very least, I should have handled this more sensitively.

Section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act makes it illegal to �offend, insult, humiliate or �intimidate� people on race grounds. This is clearly a bad law. Our debates should be polite but they should never be guaranteed not to offend. The Coalition had opposed section 18C on free speech grounds when it was introduced by the Keating government. Still, the Howard government had left it on the statute books presumably because it was rarely used. It was only after the columnist Andrew Bolt was successfully prosecuted in 2011 that the Coalition promised to ��repeal it in its present form�.

A rather convoluted draft �repeal bill prompted backbench threats to cross the floor and fierce criticism from state Liberal leaders. As well, by mid-2014, with the terror threat rising, I was starting to consider new laws to crack down on Islamist hate preachers. Nevertheless, as soon as I said that changes to section 18C were �off the table�, there were cries of �betrayal from conservatives who had hitherto been largely silent. With hindsight, I should have persisted with a simpler amendment along the lines of senator Bob Day�s later private member�s bill.

Another big problem was the six-months-at-full-pay government-funded paid parental leave scheme that I�d first advocated in my book Battlelines and had taken to two elections as Coalition policy. If couples where both partners work for middle incomes are to have more children, it really must be easier to combine work and family. Modern conservatism should make it more practical for more people to have more children. Still, some colleagues felt deeply that it was valuing women in the workforce ahead of stay-at-home mums. Well before a group of conservative dissidents had emerged, I should have concluded that budget realities made this �policy undeliverable.

The restoration of knighthoods in the Order of Australia was a personal decision. Sir Peter Cosgrove, Dame Quentin Bryce, Dame Marie Bashir and Sir Angus Houston were popular choices, but knighting Prince Philip generated a storm of criticism. No one raised it with me when I spent an hour in a public bar in Colac a few days after Australia Day 2015 but it was certainly cited by colleagues at the time of the attempted spill a fortnight later. I should have �anticipated this hostility (even though Canada and New Zealand had not long before each conferred on Prince Philip their highest honour) and I should have left these awards in the hands of the council of the order. Likewise, the initial presence of only one woman in the cabinet was an avoidable error.

Looking back over my prime ministership, I should have done more media interviews, especially long-form interviews where �voters see more personality and less adversarial sparring. Yes, there�s always the risk of mistakes but there�s also the chance to �develop an argument and to engender confidence.

In retrospect, the small things that annoyed people tended to outweigh the big things that pleased them. There were always people willing the Abbott government to fail but I made some �unnecessary enemies and left too many friends feeling under-�appreciated. The Australian newspaper, for instance, welcomed the China free-trade deal but on its front page criticised the government for its inability to market its own success.

In this climate, everything �became questionable, even volunteering in remote indigenous communities or the annual Pollie Pedal charity bike ride that would normally have been marks of �authenticity, or at least originality. It became beneath the dignity of a prime minister to serve in the local rural fire brigade or to do surf patrol, at least if it meant wearing Speedos!

I can�t let pride in what was achieved under my leadership blind me to the flaws that made its termination easier, even if claims were exaggerated or exploited in self-serving ways. Enough went wrong to cause the Liberal Party to copy Labor�s decapitation of a first-term government, rather than to learn from it; and, for that, I must take responsibility.

I received a lot of public advice to drop key personnel, including treasurer Joe Hockey and chief of staff Peta Credlin. As is now more apparent, it�s far from easy to deliver savings against a hostile Senate, with big spending ��Abbott-proofed� in legislation. It�s far from easy to deliver tax �reform in an era of chronic deficits. In prime ministers� offices, there has to be a balance between �going with the flow� and �getting the message right�; even standing up to ministers when the situation demands it. My considered judgment was that dumping people who were working in lock-step with the prime minister was much more likely to trigger a crisis than to resolve one.

Looking back, the Abbott government�s biggest problem was people�s reluctance to accept that short-term pain might be needed for long-term gain. People readily believe that what�s said to be in the national interest is really just someone else�s self-interest. �Resentment that someone, somewhere, somehow is getting a better deal is easy to exploit, especially in the era of social media and a Senate that no longer sees itself as a house of review. Governments have a big megaphone but it�s harder and harder to have a mea�sured debate about anything that involves reducing benefits or services, however unsustainable they might be. Even if the fundamental point is conceded, there is always someone or something else that should be targeted.

The Abbott government was committed to budget surpluses � and to securing the savings to �obtain them � so that we could responsibly deliver lower taxes and greater prosperity. We supported a Medicare co-payment because people should make a contribution to the services they receive, rather than expect something for nothing. We wanted school-leavers to go to work or to stay in education or training �because no one should begin adult life on social security if there is an alternative. We wanted to reform pensions because you can�t have fewer workers supporting more pensioners without feeding intergenerational resentment. We sought a lower rate of increase in commonwealth funding for public schools and public hospitals �because the states should take more responsibility for the ser�vices they deliver. There was a moral purpose to all the reforms of the 2014 budget but it was lost in a welter of complaints about cruel cuts and broken promises that made the government look more interested in economic theory than in people�s lives.

People needed a greater �appreciation of the government�s aims. We needed to explain better that sensible economic policy is not an end in itself but the means to a better society and to people being more able to achieve their potential. In the busy-ness of �public life and in the crossfire of politics, the Abbott government was too often unable to convey that its fundamental purpose was a stronger society and more fulfilled people.

The conservative side of politics is not just about better economic management. We�re about the greater fairness, more thoroughgoing justice and deeper empowerment that a stronger economy makes possible. This was the challenge that the Abbott government couldn�t always rise to and that I hope to address in my future public life.

This is an edited extract from the third and final article Tony Abbott agreed in January to provide to Quadrant magazine in defence of the Abbott government�s record. The full article will appear in the May edition of Quadrant. �The Economic Case for the Abbott Government� was published in the March issue and �The National Security Case for the Abbott Government� in April.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/opi...4e74fff79104eb7

# ? Apr 22, 2016 22:18

Zenithe: Feb 25, 2013; _{Ask not to whom the Anidavatar belongs; it belongs to thee.}

I'm great and all my critics are dumb and wrong, Tones out.

# ? Apr 22, 2016 22:49

fiery_valkyrie: Mar 26, 2003; I'm proud of you, Bender. Sure, you lost. You lost bad. But the important thing is I beat up someone who hurt my feelings in high school.

That's an extract??? That man really loves to talk about himself.

# ? Apr 22, 2016 22:58

Zenithe: Feb 25, 2013; _{Ask not to whom the Anidavatar belongs; it belongs to thee.}

fiery_valkyrie posted:

That's an extract??? That man really loves to talk about himself.

quote:

This is an edited extract from the third and final article Tony Abbott agreed in January to provide to Quadrant magazine in defence of the Abbott government�s record.

An extract from part of of a 3 part series.

# ? Apr 22, 2016 23:01

I would blow Dane Cook: Dec 26, 2008

Have you read Quadrant or the Australian? This is like porn for them.

# ? Apr 22, 2016 23:18

Negative Entropy: Nov 30, 2009

still trying to claim the bad things he did were good.

# ? Apr 22, 2016 23:20

I would blow Dane Cook: Dec 26, 2008

https://twitter.com/samanthamaiden/status/723132699590811651

# ? Apr 22, 2016 23:39

gay picnic defence: Oct 5, 2009; I'M CONCERNED ABOUT A NUMBER OF THINGS

Apparently Turnbull is promising to pay for kids dental care or something. Hopefully the ALP responds by making dental covered by medicare in reply.

# ? Apr 23, 2016 00:12

asio: Nov 29, 2008; "Also Sprach Arnold Jacobs: A Developmental Guide for Brass Wind Musicians" refers to the mullet as an important tool for professional cornet playing and box smashing black and blood

gay picnic defence posted:

Apparently Turnbull is promising to pay for kids dental care or something. Hopefully the ALP responds by making dental covered by medicare in reply.

Malcolm adopting greens policy? This is exactly what tony warned us about!

# ? Apr 23, 2016 00:59

teacup: Dec 20, 2006; = M I L K E R S =

gay picnic defence posted:

I don''t normally like the ALP much but Dan the Man has been doing a pretty good job. Maybe the threat of losing half your inner city seats to the Greens puts things into perspective a little.

It'd be really interesting to be a fly on the wall with some of these guys. It's so difficult with the 'vote with labor or die' process the party requires to know how real or not people are. I'm a fairly strong Green supporter but really any seat that goes Labor over Liberal I see as at least a partial win (or not a full loss) when a decent independent gets voted into a seat I always see it as a good thing- maybe certain things they look at don't align with what I believe personally, but hey no party or person ever will and someone sticking up for an electorate rather than just the big two parties is always good.

I know the answer is "because labor durr" but how many / do any Labor party members/MPs/etc not mind the greens as much? Like "Oh poo poo we lost the seat of melbourne... but at least it's not to the Libs?" or is it just a more passive "born to rule" mentality than the libs?

# ? Apr 23, 2016 01:08

Squidtits: Mar 30, 2004; Spank me, you know you wanna

I don't know but I think they see the Greens as someone who they can at least work with rather than the LNP who will be opposed to everything.

# ? Apr 23, 2016 01:39

Redcordial: Nov 7, 2009; TRUMP TRUMP TRUMP

lol the country is fed up with your safe spaces and trigger warnings you useless special snowflakes, send the sjws to mexico

No one specifically asked, but let me tell you why Adam Bandt is a legend. He has personally visited a program I help manage which works with disadvantaged men, and the impact of such visits is more than just financial support and funding.
The few times he has graced our service he has attended with leading health and social leaders and program coordinators which enable a greater level of networking and relationship building.
The positive presence and contributions from such well-known MP's really has a flow on effect on the clients well being. It helps instil trust and faith in the system that has so often worn them down and abandoned them, and this is something to admire and be thankful of.
Bandt has also waved back to me the few times I have seen him at rallies and marches after throwing him a wave and smile, and that's loving cool.

Dan Andrews likes my posts when I comment on his facebook, and that's pretty loving cool too.

So pretty much, we seem to experience some of the most social and out-going MP's down here in Melbourne and for that I am thankful.

# ? Apr 23, 2016 01:47

Anidav: Feb 25, 2010; ahhh fuck its the rats again

Campbell Newman PMed me on Facebook once to tell me I was wrong in his comments section about privatisation.

# ? Apr 23, 2016 02:05

Anidav: Feb 25, 2010; ahhh fuck its the rats again

But you guys know politicians pages are run by teenage hacks who have the maturity of a fairy tale.

# ? Apr 23, 2016 02:06

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# ? May 24, 2024 15:45

I would blow Dane Cook: Dec 26, 2008

Anidav posted:

Campbell Newman PMed me on Facebook once to tell me I was wrong in his comments section about privatisation.

Anidav posted:

But you guys know politicians pages are run by teenage hacks who have the maturity of a fairy tale.

Nah that was probably Campbell Newman.

# ? Apr 23, 2016 02:08

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Auspol April - Long Live the Glorious State of North Queensland

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