Auspol February: The NRL Really Screwed The Pooch

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Auspol February: The NRL Really Screwed The Pooch

Birb Katter: Sep 18, 2010; BOATS STOPPED
CARBON TAX AXED
TURNBULL AS PM
LIBERALS WILL BE RE-ELECTED IN A LANDSLIDE

open24hours posted:

It seems like the main thing missing is family sized apartments. There's no shortage of one and two bedroom ones, but four and five bedroom apartments almost don't exist in this country.

3br are everywhere so that gives you parents + 2 kids without even sharing a room. Sharing a room isn't exactly a foreign concept even in this day and age.

# ? Feb 19, 2016 01:30

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ? May 29, 2024 19:24

norp: Jan 20, 2004; TRUMP TRUMP TRUMP

let's invade New Zealand, they have oil

Birb Katter posted:

Here is a nice read on apartment living. Because I want to be just like Recoome you can click the ABC link. It's kind of long and just an opinion piece.

Wasn't expecting the eat the boomers punchline :golfclap:

# ? Feb 19, 2016 01:35

Birb Katter: Sep 18, 2010; BOATS STOPPED
CARBON TAX AXED
TURNBULL AS PM
LIBERALS WILL BE RE-ELECTED IN A LANDSLIDE

norp posted:

Wasn't expecting the eat the boomers punchline

Yeah, wanted to leave that bit as a surprise for you, the reader.

--

Yes it is important, teaching people to be tolerant of others is a good and noble goal. The other is not possible. A good comment #agc

# ? Feb 19, 2016 01:50

Birb Katter: Sep 18, 2010; BOATS STOPPED
CARBON TAX AXED
TURNBULL AS PM
LIBERALS WILL BE RE-ELECTED IN A LANDSLIDE

Birb Katter posted:

https://twitter.com/Republic_Nauru/status/696528101950394368

So it looks like the PR company that runs their twitter is deleting a few tweets about this so here are screencaps

# ? Feb 19, 2016 01:56

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

How long until we live in caves?

# ? Feb 19, 2016 01:56

Birb Katter: Sep 18, 2010; BOATS STOPPED
CARBON TAX AXED
TURNBULL AS PM
LIBERALS WILL BE RE-ELECTED IN A LANDSLIDE

Anidav posted:

How long until we live in caves?

Do you even have caves in Queensland? Are you that far advanced yet?

# ? Feb 19, 2016 01:57

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

We dig trenches and shelter ourselves with banana leaves.

# ? Feb 19, 2016 01:59

Recoome: Nov 9, 2013; Matter of fact, I'm salty now.

Birb Katter posted:

So it looks like the PR company that runs their twitter is deleting a few tweets about this so here are screencaps

This is a great, well thought out course of action that will only look good for both the Australian Govt and the Nauruan Govt.

# ? Feb 19, 2016 02:06

open24hours: Jan 7, 2001

How much worse can they look? No one wants to go on holiday to a tropical gravel pit anyway, so I doubt this affects anyone other than clandestine journalists.

# ? Feb 19, 2016 02:10

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

The Greens could preference Lord Mayor Graham Quirk ahead of Labor's Rod Harding at next month's Brisbane City Council election but only if the Liberal National Party was more forthcoming about its political donors.
Greens lord mayoral candidate Ben Pennings said while the question of preferencing was yet to be decided, he would be willing to preference the LNP, despite the parties' ideological divide.

# ? Feb 19, 2016 02:22

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

Anidav posted:

The Greens could preference Lord Mayor Graham Quirk ahead of Labor's Rod Harding at next month's Brisbane City Council election but only if the Liberal National Party was more forthcoming about its political donors.
Greens lord mayoral candidate Ben Pennings said while the question of preferencing was yet to be decided, he would be willing to preference the LNP, despite the parties' ideological divide.

And it feels great
E: http://imgur.com/kXLVir8

asio fucked around with this message at 02:39 on Feb 19, 2016

# ? Feb 19, 2016 02:37

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

Won't this just lead to a just vote 1 campaign and quirk getting in again

# ? Feb 19, 2016 03:22

Birb Katter: Sep 18, 2010; BOATS STOPPED
CARBON TAX AXED
TURNBULL AS PM
LIBERALS WILL BE RE-ELECTED IN A LANDSLIDE

ALP in Canberra are going to start major light rail construction work right when the election will be. This means that if the Libs get power and do what they promised and rip up the contracts they need to pay it out still, costing the state ~$700M.

# ? Feb 19, 2016 03:30

Skellybones: May 31, 2011; Fun Shoe

I was talking to a friend and they mentioned giving a speech on ANZAC Day last year as a uni guest lecturer. These are the notes they had on it, and were happy for it to be shared around.

quote:

April 25th is a perpetual day of conflict if you happen to be an Australian Historian, it is the day in which simultaneously you are both the wisest man in the room and the most ignorant of peasants. This lecture is designed to explore a thesis as to why this dichotomy has arisen, how it is that men and women who dedicate their lives to the past can so widely be considered utterly ignorant of it. It is my thesis that on the battlefields of the Great War great poet-soldiers fought a narrative war with each other, and that this narrative war expressed in words so moving they have never quite left popular culture has moved into a progression in Australia in which one side of the narrative is no longer even considered , indeed to advocate for that narrative in some cases can incite threats of violence and accusations of treason. It is an interesting aside that I look to a base of literature that is not Australian in its origin, but it is easy for Australians to forget that this was not an Australian war, this was a war of empires. I will use poems by Robert Broke and John Mccrae to illustrate the side of the twisted narrative that has become the fundamental building stone of the Anzac Myth. Against this I will use the poems of Sassoon, Wilfred Own, to illustrate a counter narrative, one in which the supposed narrative of war as noble sacrifice loses all possible justification. I will not be seeking to convince you of my own position, because that would be as equally as reprehensible as those to whom this lecture is aimed at countering. Instead I seek to reenage you in debate, to get you to once more comprehend more than a jingoistic nationalism that screams down all opposition, and maybe if you can engage in this debate, we historians can feel a little bit a more a part of Australia.

The central crux to the Anzac myth is a theme best exemplified in the poem for the fallen, indeed this poem's fourth stanza should be recognizable to all who have attended an Anzac day ceremony as the Ode to the Fallen.

With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children�
England mourns for her dead across the sea,�
Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit,�
Fallen in the cause of the free.

Solemn the drums thrill: Death august and royal�
Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres,�
There is music in the midst of desolation�
And glory that shines upon our tears.

They went with songs to the battle, they were young,�
Straight of limb, true of eyes, steady and aglow,�
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted,�
They fell with their faces to the foe.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:�
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn�
At the going down of the sun and in the morning�
We will remember them.

They mingle not with their laughing comrades again,�
They sit no more at familiar tables of home,�
They have no lot in our labour of the daytime,�
They sleep beyond England's foam.

But where our desires and hopes profound,�
Felt as a well-spring that is hidden from sight,�
To the innermost heart of their own land they are known�
As the stars are known to the night.

As the stars shall be bright when we are dust,�
Moving in marches upon the heavenly plain,�
As the stars that are starry in the time of our darkness,�
To the end, to the end, they remain.

The fourth stanza, the one that is used in Australian remembrance services can be read as an implicit establishment of the entire beginning of the cult of the dead. The entire poem however does perpetually seek to isolate the dead as being somehow uniquely sanctified. The last stanza, even seeks to establish them as being entirely beyond the forces of the universe. This perverse elevation of the dead to being beyond the universe is a beginning of an attempt to rationalize a hideous realisation. This poem however, written at the war's end, is perhaps an expected attempt to put the substance of war beyond the people. In 1914 however, Robert Brooke wrote a poem that seems to contain most of the same kind of elements.

If I should die, think only this of me:
That there�s some corner of a foreign field
That is forever England. There shall be
In that rich earth a richer dust concealed;
A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware,
Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam,
A body of England�s, breathing English air,
Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home.

And think, this heart, all evil shed away,
A pulse in the Eternal mind, no less
Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given,
Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day;
And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness,
In hearts at peace, under an English heaven.

Brooke would die in 1915, becoming as it were a finer dust, but his words would mark the beginning of a narrative war for the memory of the Great War. For Brooke death is quite literally a purifying experience, it is a sacrament required of loving English sons for their beloved motherland. This tradition towards death as a sacramental act can be even more disturbingly seen in the poem so often associated with the battle of Flanders amongst the residual British populations, John Mccrae's In Flanders Fields.

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

It is the last stanza of Mccrae's work that is disturbing, for it evokes the language of religious orders when it talks about compelling the living to take up a struggle with the enemy, charging them that shall they cease to fight the war they will be breaking faith with the dead, and as a consequence forever disturb their eternal rest. This language is both powerful and disconcerting. It suggests that we as the living have a duty not to remember but to fight, we are called perpetuate an eternal war in the name of those who are dead, and we in our turn shall call those who come after us to fight this unending war. A seriously damaging prospect.

These poems above are the enforcing chains of the cult of death that surrounds Australian war, and this cult and its energies are so hideously one-eyed during the month of April. This closing of ranks enables them to ignore an entirely converse narrative, one that is no better exemplified than in the most famous poem to come out of the first world war, Wilfred Owen's Dulce et Decorum est

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of disappointed shells that dropped behind.

GAS! Gas! Quick, boys!-- An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And floundering like a man in fire or lime.--
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,--
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.

In Owen we see the stark reality of war, the horrid realities of a gas attack and what it is to watch a man die as the very action of breathing poisons his body. And yet it is the last stanza that we see the onus as to why Owen's vision has been so willfully ignored by the political masters. If in some dream you could see the horrors that I see, you would not with zest repeat the old lie of nationalism to children pliable and dreaming of being heroes, Dulce et decorum est, Pro Patria mori; which from the latin is, "it is sweet as it is fitting to die for the motherland/fatherland". This is the crux of Owen's agenda, a rejection of the justification of war, and the championing of the soldier as recipient of some noble graceful death. This raw hatred that can easily be seen in this poem is even more visible in Owen's A parable of the old man and young.

So Abram rose, and clave the wood, and went,
And took the fire with him, and a knife.
And as they sojourned both of them together,
Isaac the first-born spake and said, My Father,
Behold the preparations, fire and iron,
But where the lamb for this burnt-offering?
Then Abram bound the youth with belts and straps,
and builded parapets and trenches there,
And stretch�d forth the knife to slay his son.
When lo! an angel called him out of heaven,
Saying, Lay not thy hand upon the lad,
Neither do anything to him. Behold,
A ram, caught in a thicket by its horns;
Offer the Ram of Pride instead of him.
But the old man would not so, but slew his son,
And half the seed of Europe, one by one.
�
To truly understand this poem it does require an element of biblical literacy, but I will stream line it for you, this is a retelling of the parable of Abram and Isaac. In the story Abraham is compelled to offer his son as sacrifice to God, only for God to reveal that he brought Abram to this point to test his commitment, only to show him another way. For Owen, the situation amongst the political masters of Europe was much that of Abraham, except for them, when the time came, it was their children they sacrificed rather than their pride. Professor Jay Winter, once remarked that it was no great powers interest to go to war in 1914, and yet they all did. He further postulated that perhaps it was simply to preserve their collective honour that they committed themselves to what was to become at the time the greatest slaughter in human history. Professor Winter exclaimed these ideas in the 1990s, Owen however, he clearly saw this while the war was happening, and he was not alone. The poet Siegfried Sassoon also saw this, and this brave hero of war would not just complain in his poetry, he would complain so publically that he was forcibly committed to an asylum, for he who called the war mad, surely must be mad himself. There are three poems of Sassoon that I will share, to illustrate the nuanced nature of this complaint on his behalf. First is the poem, Does it Matter?

Does it matter? -losing your legs?�
For people will always be kind,
And you need not show that you mind
When others come in after hunting
To gobble their muffins and eggs.
Does it matter? -losing you sight?�
There�s such splendid work for the blind;�
And people will always be kind,
As you sit on the terrace remembering
And turning your face to the light.
Do they matter-those dreams in the pit?�
You can drink and forget and be glad,
And people won't say that you�re mad;�
For they know that you've fought for your country,
And no one will worry a bit.�

Sassoon's typical poem was highly sardonic in its content, and none are more biting than Does it Matter? In this poem Sassoon asks the perennial question as to what does the suffering of those who survive truly matter. In it he touches the idea of physical deformation, and yet more chillingly he accurately predicts the most insidious of the horrors of the trenches, the lasting psychological harm that could never heal. It is in Does it Matter? That we first see a soldier asking what will happen after this war must end. Before Sassoon was interred as mad, he stopped with his poetry for an action that has never again been equalled for sheer temerity, an action so unthinkable that it has likely never been considered since. He declared that he was done with war, in a published letter in the paper the Bradford Pioneer, in 1917

I am making this statement as an act of wilful defiance of military authority, because I believe that the war is being deliberately prolonged by those who have the power to end it. I am a soldier, convinced that I am acting on behalf of soldiers. I believe that this war, upon which I entered as a war of defence and liberation, has now become a war of aggression and conquest. I believe that the purposes for which I and my fellow soldiers entered upon this war should have been so clearly stated as to have made it impossible to change them, and that, had this been done, the objects which actuated us would now be attainable by negotiation.
I have seen and endured the sufferings of the troops, and I can no longer be a party to prolong these sufferings for ends which I believe to be evil and unjust. I am not protesting against the conduct of the war, but against the political errors and insecurities for which the fighting men are being sacrificed. On behalf of those who are suffering now I make this protest against the deception which is being practiced on them; also I believe that I may help to destroy the callous complacence with which the majority of those at home regard the continuance of agonies which they do not share, and which they have not sufficient imagination to realize.

I show this to demonstrate a fundamental point, that a man who was a decorated hero and who would indeed return to the war, was so disgusted with what he saw as the wholesale slaughter of his men for no justifiable reason that he would be willing to put himself before a firing squad, after all, this statement was essentially a statement of desertion and treason. And yet, for all his hatred of the war and his commanders, Sassoon would return to war, for perhaps the reason which is so wrongly forgotten, the love of brothers that binds soldiers together.
Sassoon's poem Banishment represents the forgotten soldier's those who survived.

I am banished from the patient men who fight�
They smote my heart to pity, built my pride.�
Shoulder to aching shoulder, side by side,�
They trudged away from life�s broad wealds of light.�
Their wrongs were mine; and ever in my sight
They went arrayed in honour. But they died,��
Not one by one: and mutinous I cried�
To those who sent them out into the night.�

The darkness tells how vainly I have striven�
To free them from the pit where they must dwell
In outcast gloom convulsed and jagged and riven�
By grappling guns. Love drove me to rebel.�
Love drives me back to grope with them through hell;�
And in their tortured eyes I stand forgiven.�

For Sassoon, his actions were a protest that had achieved nothing, he could not save them through a political course of action, and his tortured sense of self compelled him towards returning. Love drove me to rebel. Love drives me back to grope with them through hell, this is the essence that is ignored in the critical narrative of the war that the Australian tradition has ignored. There is however one final poem of Sassoon that reinforces the true crime that is the ignorance of the internal battle for the soul of the memory of the war, and that is the poem Aftermath.

Have you forgotten yet?...
For the world's events have rumbled on since those gagged days,
Like traffic checked while at the crossing of city-ways:
And the haunted gap in your mind has filled with thoughts that flow
Like clouds in the lit heaven of life; and you're a man reprieved to go,
Taking your peaceful share of Time, with joy to spare.
But the past is just the same--and War's a bloody game...
Have you forgotten yet?...
Look down, and swear by the slain of the War that you'll never forget.

Do you remember the dark months you held the sector at Mametz--
The nights you watched and wired and dug and piled sandbags on parapets?
Do you remember the rats; and the stench
Of corpses rotting in front of the front-line trench--
And dawn coming, dirty-white, and chill with a hopeless rain?
Do you ever stop and ask, 'Is it all going to happen again?'

Do you remember that hour of din before the attack--
And the anger, the blind compassion that seized and shook you then
As you peered at the doomed and haggard faces of your men?
Do you remember the stretcher-cases lurching back
With dying eyes and lolling heads--those ashen-grey
Masks of the lads who once were keen and kind and gay?

Have you forgotten yet?...
Look up, and swear by the green of the spring that you'll never forget.�

It is tremendously easy to say that the ceremony of Anzac is exactly what Sassoon would want, however, how can such a statement be true when in our discussions of Anzac the language of mateship, of noble sacrifice for country, of service and of duty is spread, and yet this language of the horror is ignored. For Sassoon and his brother-poet's the agenda was to remind the world of the sheer horror that was war, in a desperate effort first to stop it, then to ensure it would never occur again. And yet this is not the message of Anzac, indeed the message of Sassoon and Owen, the two greatest War Poets is utterly side stepped in any Australian act of remembrance. Instead we use allegorical stories of men and donkeys, (little aside, in most instances, no soldier identified with the Simpson story survived more than two weeks) or the myth of nation. None of these feature in the written memories of two of the most prominent warrior-poets, and yet, we scholars who acknowledge these voices are shouted down by the ignorant and the boastful, to elevate the sacred dead to the shore of Valhalla. When I started this lecture I said I was not here to convince you, my point still stands, but I challenge you, why must this second narrative sourced from the same time as the first be any less important or vocally heard and celebrated than the mindless nationalism of Brooke, or the empty platitudes of the Ode.

TLDR: ANZAC Day = Death Cult

He was called Unaustralian afterwards.

Skellybones fucked around with this message at 04:08 on Feb 19, 2016

# ? Feb 19, 2016 04:05

Solemn Sloth: Jul 11, 2015; Baby you can shout at me,
But you can't need my eyes.

Same

# ? Feb 19, 2016 04:13

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

Those Looney greens.

# ? Feb 19, 2016 04:15

Recoome: Nov 9, 2013; Matter of fact, I'm salty now.

Courier Mail tho

# ? Feb 19, 2016 04:20

Halo14: Sep 11, 2001

There's more than one way to kill negative gearing

http://www.theage.com.au/comment/capital-gains-tax-theres-more-than-one-way-to-kill-negative-gearing-20160216-gmvict.html

# ? Feb 19, 2016 04:53

Amethyst: Mar 28, 2004; I CANNOT HELP BUT MAKE THE DCSS THREAD A FETID SWAMP OF UNFUN POSTING
plz notice me trunk-senpai

Skellybones posted:

I was talking to a friend and they mentioned giving a speech on ANZAC Day last year as a uni guest lecturer. These are the notes they had on it, and were happy for it to be shared around.

TLDR: ANZAC Day = Death Cult

He was called Unaustralian afterwards.

This is excellent, thanks.

e: lol @ whoever bought me this avatar

# ? Feb 19, 2016 04:58

iajanus: Aug 17, 2004; NUMBER 1 QUEENSLAND SUPPORTER
MAROONS 2023 STATE OF ORIGIN CHAMPIONS FOR LIFE

Halo14 posted:

There's more than one way to kill negative gearing

http://www.theage.com.au/comment/capital-gains-tax-theres-more-than-one-way-to-kill-negative-gearing-20160216-gmvict.html

Kill all the boomers?

# ? Feb 19, 2016 04:59

Birb Katter: Sep 18, 2010; BOATS STOPPED
CARBON TAX AXED
TURNBULL AS PM
LIBERALS WILL BE RE-ELECTED IN A LANDSLIDE

If you go to the computer without any clothes on you catch a virus

The cold analogy before that is also totally bunk too, ABC health has this from 2008 and you could find way more detailed sources of this if you gave a flying gently caress.

# ? Feb 19, 2016 05:01

Megillah Gorilla: Sep 22, 2003; If only all of life's problems could be solved by smoking a professor of ancient evil texts.; Bread Liar

Who wants to put a smile of their face with the misfortune of bigots?

quote:

Antigay Group Blunders Protest, Raises Thousands For Queer Teen Gala Instead

In an astoundingly satisfying turn of events, the efforts of an antigay group hoping to sabotage an annual LGBTQ teen dance have backfired, instead contributing thousands of dollars to the event they meant to derail.

The Victorian Same Sex Gender Diverse Formal in Australia is meant to give a safe space for teens who don�t identify as straight to celebrate and create happy memories. Attendees wear what they want, bring who they want, dance with whomever they want � you get the picture.

Minus 18, the group that throws the event, decided this year to crowdfund tickets for teens who couldn�t afford the $40 admission price. Great idea!

Enter the hilariously named antigay group, the Stop Safe Schools Coalition.

(Yes, there is actually a group called the �Stop Safe Schools Coalition,� which fights against the federal Government-funded Safe Schools Coalition Australia program � a �coalition of schools and organizations that aim to foster safe and inclusive environments for same-sex attracted, intersex, and gender diverse students, staff and families.�)

Stop Safe Schools caught wind of Minus 18�s event, and devised a nefarious plan that rivals their pitiful group�s name in sheer stupidity.

They called upon their members to buy up as many tickets as they could after thinking they�d discovered a loophole that said the tickets were nontransferable and nonrefundable.

The more tickets they bought, they told their minions, the more teens would be unable to attend. Thus, �the more youth we protect.�

The group overlooked one tiny detail � the ticketing program is set up as a crowdfunding system.

Every ticket �purchased� is guaranteed to go to a LGBTQ teen to attend the event.

�You realise that if the conservatives do buy all the tickets, you can just allow registered people on a waiting list in for free? They�re effectively subsidising tickets for those who can�t buy one,� one commenter pointed out on the event�s Facebook page.

Minus 18 set an initial goal of raising $15k for 500 tickets. The group has reportedly raised nearly $30k as of Tuesday.

With all that extra money, they�re planning on moving the event to a larger venue and upping capacity so more teens can attend.

# ? Feb 19, 2016 05:34

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

Malcolm Turnbull's ascendant Coalition government is moving closer to calling an early election, even as strategists warn of a backlash from voters that could cost it 10 or more seats.
The negative voter reaction is considered "containable" and is being factored in to considerations, with private polling suggesting voters will stick with Mr Turnbull, even if they mark the Coalition down for backing away from now-unaffordable promises of significant tax cuts and fast budget repair.
Several senior Coalition figures acknowledged that an atmospheric change had occurred in politics making a snap poll more likely

Fairfax Media has spoken to senior ministers and party strategists who all confirmed an early poll and a double dissolution election, which must be called no later than May 11 and held no later than July 16, was increasingly likely.

On Friday, Mr Turnbull left open the option if the government's plans to restore the Australian Building and Construction Commission is blocked again by the Senate.
"As to the question about a double dissolution under section 57 of Constitution, that is obviously available in circumstances where bills have been rejected within the appropriate time period ... it is an option available to government in those circumstances, but at the moment your question is a hypothetical one," he said.
People close to the Prime Minister said Mr Turnbull's thinking was "evolving" on the issue and that he was "seeking all opinions and listening to people carefully" before making a decision.

"Prime ministers call an election when they think they can win," the source said.
Another well-placed source said an early poll was a "live option, more so than a month ago", while a third said discussions were "moving", and that " the prospect that they may make that decision has increased".
"We can't get clear air to talk about economic issues. Labor is throwing out ideas and policies that are underdone, the discussion is not productive, so why not short-circuit it and then get going again?"
Earlier on Friday, Innovation Minister Christopher Pyne told the Nine Network's breakfast television audience that an early poll was "a live option", citing blocked union corruption legislation as a likely justification.
"There is not only issues around savings measures [stuck in the Senate], there is the Australian Building and Construction Commission," he said.

Opposition Leader Bill Shorten said on Friday that the opposition was "not afraid of an election but the Liberals are afraid of the budget. They need to tell us what their economic plans are."
The Coalition's Registered Organisations Bill, which is designed to improve union governance, is already a double dissolution trigger for the government and a second bill, designed to restore the ABCC, is also likely to be rejected by the Senate again and become a trigger.
Several senior Coalition figures acknowledged that an "atmospheric" change had occurred in politics, making a snap poll more likely.
A well-placed source described the prospect of seat losses as "inevitable" but not, in of itself, a sufficient deterrent against going early.
"Soldiers die in wars, mate; generals accept that," the source quipped.

Strategists remain confident of victory, given the government holds 90 seats to Labor's 55 in the House of Representatives. But with its current lead in the polls, and the Prime Minister's high personal standing on a head-to-head comparison with Mr Shorten's, hardheads also acknowledge that a repeat of former prime minister Tony Abbott's landslide win in 2013 was out of reach.
A senior source within the Coalition has revealed to Fairfax Media that losing seats is regarded as inevitable in light of Labor's stronger than expected performance, the "high water mark" of 2013, a softer than hoped for economy, and the absence of room in a cash-strapped budget to deliver pre-election spending.
Liberal and Nationals strategists are also growing increasingly conscious of Labor's slow but steady recovery to be now within four points of the Coalition according to last weekend's Fairfax-Ipsos poll.
For their part, Labor strategists believe the opposition's improvement has been driven by a combination of factors ranging from sluggish economic growth and disappointment at Mr Turnbull's dithering over tax reform, through to the opposition's willingness to get out in front with "substantial" policies in areas of taxation, education, and health.
A sober assessment of the Coalition's prospects has it losing as many as four seats in Queensland where the "high water mark" reference was particularly applied. Coalition strategists believe seats that could fall in northern Queensland include Capricornia (0.8 per cent), Herbert (6.2 per cent) and even Dawson (7.6 per cent).

In the state's urbanised south-east corner, seats such as Petrie (0.5 per cent) and Bonner (3.7 per cent) are prime candidates to change hands.
Labor has a clear strategy to target 11 seats in the Sunshine State and believes the Prime Minister has a "Queensland problem".
In New South Wales, the ALP is eyeing Dobell (0.3 per cent), Paterson (1.3 per cent) and Barton (5.4 per cent), which are all held by Liberals but have become notionally Labor seats following a redistribution of electoral boundaries.
Despite its small scale, Tasmania could offer Labor hopes of up to three seats in Bass (4 per cent), Braddon (2.6 per cent) and Lyons (1.2 per cent).
South Australian voters are expected to deliver Hindmarsh (1.9 per cent) back to Labor and Western Australia could see two more in Cowan (4 per cent) and Hasluck (5.9 per cent), with the newly created seat of Burt regarded as notionally Labor.
In the top end, the Coalition considers Solomon (1.4 per cent) vulnerable, with one senior source describing the outcome there as "anyone's guess".
And, while the Coalition's standing in Victoria has improved markedly since Mr Abbott was dumped as prime minister, Coalition strategists are pessimistic about the prospect of picking up Labor marginals including McEwen (0.2 per cent) and Bendigo (1.3 per cent).
One Coalition strategist said that the government's election agenda - which would emphasise sound, frugal economic management and the need to reform workplace laws - was taking shape behind the scenes and was more advanced than nervous backbenchers may realise.
" People have to hold their nerve and wait for the policies to be announced," the MP said.

A number of pre-selections are still be resolved across the country, including in key Liberal-held seats such as Mackellar in Sydney and Goldstein in Melbourne, but will be sorted in the next month or so.
At the same time, a deal on Senate voting reform between the government and the Greens, designed to reduce the "gaming" of preferences by micro parties and so to reduce the number of crossbenchers, is reportedly close.
Earlier this month, Mr Turnbull told the Coalition party room that an election in the second half of the year, between August and October was the most likely option but that a double dissolution remained a "live option".
Similarly, former deputy prime minister Warren Truss recently told a function that a double dissolution was needed to "sort out" the Senate.
The latest the government can call a double dissolution election is May 11, the day after the budget is handed down and it is not possible for polling day to be any later than July 16. The earliest a normal half-Senate election can be held is August 6.

# ? Feb 19, 2016 05:37

Halo14: Sep 11, 2001

Gorilla Salad posted:

Who wants to put a smile of their face with the misfortune of bigots?

That made my day

# ? Feb 19, 2016 05:41

Mr Chips: Jun 27, 2007; Whose arse do I have to blow smoke up to get rid of this baby?

Birb Katter posted:

3br are everywhere so that gives you parents + 2 kids without even sharing a room. Sharing a room isn't exactly a foreign concept even in this day and age.

There's a shitload of stuff going up around innet metro Perth these days that's blocks of 2BR, 2 bath units. I've been keeping an eye on it and there are lots of them that are remaining unsold/unrented 6+ months after completion. It's looking a very much like the supposed glut of things no-one really wants.

# ? Feb 19, 2016 05:43

ewe2: Jul 1, 2009

Skellybones posted:

TLDR: ANZAC Day = Death Cult

He was called Unaustralian afterwards.

That was like a time capsule for me. Believe it or not, back in the late 70's before the death cult got into full swing, this was the general interpretation of war poetry in high school English and History, right down to the contrast between poets like Brooke and Owen, although Futility by Owen was usually quoted because even then Dulce et decorum est was considered a bit near to the bone what with high school latin mottos etc. Sassoon was mentioned but in dark whispers.

Now you're unaustralian for pointing out what's obvious to anyone with a lifespan longer than a millenial. No wonder old men lust after war.

edit: actually Sassoon isn't even mentioned in my high school poetry reference but neither is Brooke, only Owen won that particular battle. Without being explicit, I think my generation was led to believe that the attitude of the WWI poets was rendered redundant by the necessities of WW2, but still that left WW1 in an uncomfortable and ironic no-man's land that no one was prepared to cross.

ewe2 fucked around with this message at 06:19 on Feb 19, 2016

# ? Feb 19, 2016 05:47

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

It was pretty funny going through primary school and the general consensus was British commanders hosed up and Australia got destroyed by the Turkish. By the time I hit high school it changed to WE WAS HEROES AND MATESHIP!

# ? Feb 19, 2016 05:50

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

"stop safe schools coalition"

# ? Feb 19, 2016 05:54

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

Mr Chips posted:

There's a shitload of stuff going up around innet metro Perth these days that's blocks of 2BR, 2 bath units. I've been keeping an eye on it and there are lots of them that are remaining unsold/unrented 6+ months after completion. It's looking a very much like the supposed glut of things no-one really wants.

Let me tell you how these are a great investment in prime city locations that can only go up uP UP!

Also thanks a lot skellybones for posting that anzac speech, that was a great read.

# ? Feb 19, 2016 05:54

Halo14: Sep 11, 2001

What the gently caress? Apparently George Pell had a 'secret' visit to Australia last year. Even paying a visit to Ballarat?

via reddit: http://www.brokenrites.org.au/drupal/node/391

quote:

Despite his long-standing "health problems" as a 74-year-old, Cardinal George Pell makes frequent trips away from his Rome headquarters. For example, in March-April 2015, he made a secret trip by air to Australia, and then he returned to Rome in time to "appear" by video-link (instead of really appearing in person) for a public hearing of Australia's national child-abuse Royal Commission a few weeks later (in May 2015). The Commissioners had approved Pell's May 2015 video-link because of the alleged "difficulty" of Pell flying to Australia from Rome. The Commissioners did not know of Pell's recent secret trip. News of his recent secret trip leaked out during the May 2015 hearing. And Pell's video-link in May 2015 turned out to be a technological disaster. The Commissioners then asked Pell to appear in person at his next scheduled public hearing in Australia (in December 2015) but his lawyers sent a "sick note" (signed by one of his own doctors, not an independent one), citing his long-standing health issues as grounds for getting yet another video-link. His next video-link is to begin on 29 February 2016. Please stay tuned for the next episode.

Clearly, Pell is avoiding Australia while civil investigations are under way about church sexual abuse that occurred on Pell's watch.

Pell's secret trip to Australia in March-April 2015 included a visit to his home town, Ballarat, which is the town at the centre of church-abuse allegations (and the cover-up) in western Victoria. Pell's trip was revealed in the April 2015 edition of the magazine of St Patrick's College, Ballarat � the school where Pell had been a pupil. The magazine article, which has been seen by Broken Rites, indicates that Pell's visit to the school occurred about 27 March 2015, "during a short vacation in Australia". There is a photo of Pell, together with headmaster John Crowley, while touring the school to see its latest extensions.

The editors of this school magazine didn't realise that, by revealing Pell's visit, they were "letting the cat out of the bag". News of the school magazine article (and the secret trip) reached journalists in Australia during the Commission's May 2015 public hearing.

Even the Australian Catholic bishops' spokesman on Royal Commission matters (Mr Francis Sullivan, from the church's "Truth, Justice and Healing Commission") didn't know about the trip until journalists told him in May 2015.

It is not known what else Pell did during his May 2015 trip to Australia but it would have been an ideal opportunity to have discussions with his Australian lawyers and his communications strategists, to figure out how to handle the Royal Commission and the church's victims. These advisers would understand the tactic of having a video-link from Rome instead of Pell appearing in Australia in person.

# ? Feb 19, 2016 06:11

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

Supposedly there were a bunch of people out there that would share an apartment if they had their own bathroom, solving the rental availability problem :shrug:

# ? Feb 19, 2016 06:14

Birb Katter: Sep 18, 2010; BOATS STOPPED
CARBON TAX AXED
TURNBULL AS PM
LIBERALS WILL BE RE-ELECTED IN A LANDSLIDE

Turnbull is going full Abbott and now saying that Shorten just wants to remove 30% of housing demand so people's homes become worth less.

# ? Feb 19, 2016 06:17

tithin: Nov 14, 2003; [Grandmaster Tactician]

Halo14 posted:

What the gently caress? Apparently George Pell had a 'secret' visit to Australia last year. Even paying a visit to Ballarat?

via reddit: http://www.brokenrites.org.au/drupal/node/391

Anyone surprised? at all?

# ? Feb 19, 2016 06:18

Megillah Gorilla: Sep 22, 2003; If only all of life's problems could be solved by smoking a professor of ancient evil texts.; Bread Liar

Birb Katter posted:

Turnbull is going full Abbott and now saying that Shorten just wants to remove 30% of housing demand so people's homes become worth less.

gently caress it - all land owned by the government. People and corporations lease at nominal rates.

# ? Feb 19, 2016 06:19

ewe2: Jul 1, 2009

Birb Katter posted:

Turnbull is going full Abbott and now saying that Shorten just wants to remove 30% of housing demand so people's homes become worth less.

Smells like a big nudge to see if the early election DD idea will swing.

# ? Feb 19, 2016 06:20

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

tithin posted:

Anyone surprised? at all?

I'm not usually the type to form a lynch mob, but you know what, for this tremendous piece of poo poo I'm willing to make an exception.

# ? Feb 19, 2016 06:23

Birb Katter: Sep 18, 2010; BOATS STOPPED
CARBON TAX AXED
TURNBULL AS PM
LIBERALS WILL BE RE-ELECTED IN A LANDSLIDE

The Kouk nails it

https://twitter.com/TheKouk/status/700550146598182912

# ? Feb 19, 2016 06:25

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

ewe2 posted:

Smells like a big nudge to see if the early election DD idea will swing.

Well they have to say something, given they don't actually have any new policies to counter it with.

# ? Feb 19, 2016 06:28

Birb Katter: Sep 18, 2010; BOATS STOPPED
CARBON TAX AXED
TURNBULL AS PM
LIBERALS WILL BE RE-ELECTED IN A LANDSLIDE

Doctor Spaceman posted:

Well they have to say something, given they don't actually have any new policies to counter it with.

What about all the stuff the treasurer announced yesterday :pseudo:

# ? Feb 19, 2016 06:33

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ? May 29, 2024 19:24

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

Lmao a DD on Negative Gearing would be the most LNP thing to do.

# ? Feb 19, 2016 06:39

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Auspol February: The NRL Really Screwed The Pooch

«‹›83 »