Day to Day Politics: John Alexander – a Liberal with balls.
Sunday 18 September 2016
Former tennis champion and Member for John Howard’s old seat of Bennelong has decided to serve up a few aces to One Nation Leader Pauline Hanson.
Off topic, but people are apt to forget just what a fine tennis player he was. To this day I think he holds the best win loss ratio of any Australian Davis Cup tennis player.
I’m pleased that he has adopted my suggestion of saying it as it is. Calling her out for her racist inane comments. Saying what needs to be said unafraid that telling the truth might cost her votes in the Senate.
In a speech in Canberra, without double faulting, Alexander crossed the line and said Hanson’s speech was “abhorrent”.
Of course Alexander’s seat is very multicultural and he might have self-interest at heart but I don’t think that’s the case. No strings attached, you could say.
Yes he had the balls to say it.
“I subscribe to the Voltairean principle of respecting people’s right to say things that I disagree with. But when that speech uses broad-brush strokes to demonise an entire religion and all the observers of that religion it must be called out for what it is – its racism, its discrimination”
I had missed the fact that Ms Hanson had said that she knew more about Islam than the people who practice it.
“This must be called out for what it is – ignorance” said Alexander.
I wonder if she could make the same claim against Christians.
Speaking about Australia’s inglorious treatment and massacre of Aborigines together with attacks on Chinese migrants during the gold rush, he said:
“Unfortunately our nation has dark chapters in our history where racism and ignorance have combined to create tragic results”.
“As policymakers and leaders of this nation it is our responsibility to ensure that racism and ignorance do not combine again. That starts by identifying it and rejecting it”.
As I wrote on Thursday, the site of Michaelia Cash and other Senators (putting aside the protocol) sucking up to her after her speech was disingenuous to say the least.
Then Queensland back-bencher George Christensen served one into the backhand court by coming to Senator Hanson’s defence. Talk about a pair of mixed doubles.
And wouldn’t you know it, George apparently asked Pauline not to run a One Nation candidate in his seat in the election. Talk about deuce. I wonder if there is any truth in the rumour that George is about to join One Nation. It would cause a bit of on court friction in the House I should think.
Of course she consented. George is like her de facto representative in the House of Representatives. As the Australian Newspaper said on Saturday. Now get ready for an ace.
“The views of One Nation to a degree are the views of many in the rank and file of the (Liberal National Party)”.
The ace was actually a fault. Get ready for the second serve.
As if to prove he is an allcourt player ball boy and Hanson’s chief of staff James Ashby of ‘Ashbygate’ fame disclosed that One Nation had secured the services of a former economic adviser to Presidential Candidate Donald Trump. No names mentioned but apparently he’s a baseline player who can switch teams easily.
“We have just taken him from the Trump camp, so he’s come on board with us, so that’s pretty exciting and we need to build credibility on the economic front”.
Pauline seems to draw to the net those players on the fringe. The qualifiers who never make it into the big time. Trouble is they are all hard liners who don’t know how to make a correct call.
My thought for the day.
“Ask yourself: Does the culture we have make you feel good about yourself?”
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Jaquix
Return to home pageNot often I’d congratulate an LNP pollie!!! But credit where it’s due and good on Alexander for coming out with this.
Never was a fan of Mr Alexander but his comments on Hanson are spot on,so maybe i should’nt judge people too quickly just because they belong to a particular party or follow a certain ideological bent,so well done by Mr Alexander on this toxic topic.””
IMO there are many politicians in the Coalition that should take Alexander as an example.
wowowo. John!!!!! Absolutely spot on and congratulations.
Cash disingenuous???never she is nasty, deliberate liar.
George desert the libs when he has the balance of power in the party room? Nah, he has too much power.(wonder if barnaby is comfortable in the coalition under the present agreement or is there a possible shuffle??)
Don’t george and cash sound like most of the twitty rabbottians read on facebook?
ps
The look on brian cox’s face at senator malcolm is etched in my brain’s smilr zone.
pps the wheelchair rugby 0130 monday
Michaelia and Pauline, sisters in arms, one loud, the other gravelly, my ears are hurting…
Remember all the fuss they made of Julia’s voice.
What concerns me about Hanson, Roberts, Christensen et al is that they are telling blatant lies!!!
How far does parliamentary privilege go?
Are they guilty of misleading the Parliament?
Why are they never called out for their blatant lies, regardless of whether the target of the day is race, religion or marital status! Pauline claimed in her maiden speech 20 years ago that asians “form ghettos and do not assimilate”. Where was her evidence? She has claimed again we are in danger of being swamped by an ethnic/religious minority but no-one is calling her out on how 20 years ago, we didn’t follow her advice and the “swamping” never occurred!
Why do their lies go unchecked?
Hit them with facts!
Facts that prove their ridiculous claims for what they are! Lies!
The gullible nongs who vote for them need to see they are being hoodwinked before they will turn away.
The electorate of Capricornia local LNP champion and prominent business man and twice failed mayoral candidate Dominic Doblo (See his election campaign signage here) https://twitter.com/Trish_Corry/status/756253689887662082
His comment in the newspaper was this: Touted as the LNP’s number-one supporter throughout the Federal Election campaign only months ago, Mr Doblo denounced his backing and stated, “bugger the LNP, they don’t want to do nothing… next election her (Pauline’s) party will hold the balance of power” before passing the microphone to Ms Hanson.
George may not be the only LNP nationalist to be lured to joining Hanson. She will be in love with the regional and rural LNP electorates at the moment. I expect we will see much more from her in Rockhampton. I expect she will be putting up a state candidate for Keppel and Rockhampton as she was very particular to speak to the local issue of a casino licence for Great Keppel Island and ‘getting this off the ground.”
“Ask yourself: Does the culture we have make you feel good about yourself?”
NO. I feel distressed more often than not.
Yes, good show from Alexander. I think I might advocate to my local McMillan representative, Russell Broadbent to do the same and call out Hanson for a bigot and community divider.
While she has so much oxygen, anybody attempting to argue caution against continued rampant economic immigration runs the risk of being tarred with the same brush as Hanson.
JMS, I’d like to do the same in my local electorate. Except is Steven Ciobo, a not-so-upfront racist. Remember Q&A
True, Klaus. Ciobo is a smooth neoliberal silver-tongue like Frydenberg but with less human warmth IMO.
Still, it would be a good exercise to put him on the spot like I did when he was parroting the ‘JobsnGrowth’ mantra on ABC774.
His response was he could see I was not a Liberal voter. I considered his acknowledgement, my victory!
Looks like Brandis has been told to clear up plebiscite mess. Mumbling something about working with Labor. No idea what he is saying.
John Lord
What am I who despises all religions and who considers the
brainwashingindoctrination of minorswithto religion as child abuse?I consider myself to be an anti-theist.
Cheers.
Bennelong is my electorate and don’t start me on John Alexander – known colloquially as “the member for tennis”, whose only public appearances coincide with sporting events and little else.
I’ve contacted his office on a number of occasions about the TPP, same sex marriage, the NBN, Refugees, the privatisation of Medicare and all I get in return is the usual Liberal party form letter, spruiking government propaganda.
Ours is an electorate which has seem a steady increase in the Asian population, predominately from Korea, Hong Kong and mainland China. Predominately good, hard-working people, many of them running small businesses but all very, very aspirational – hence the reason why the Libs now see the seat becoming safer by the day. But having watched Howard thrown from office as a sitting Prime Minister, they can’t afford to be too complacent.1
Don’t’d be fooled, Alexander is a dyed-in-the-wool neoliberal, conservative and his speech is nothing more than a strategic effort to maintain his local Asian voter base.
Anomander – I wouldn’t be so sure. You’ll often find that those “aspirational” types are the first to start complaining about immigrants (even thought that is exactly what they are), as long as it is a different sub-culture to theirs. Judging by the way those in Hong Kong treat their Phillipino slaves, sorry home-helps, I think he is being more genuine that most of his party who pay lip service to multiculturalism, but would never have a brown person round for drinks (unless there was a chance of a bung, of course).
According to Insiders this morning, Cash hugged Hanson because she is a hugger and apparently hugs everyone being naturally gregarious. So I’m waiting to see how many Labor new senator she hugs over the next load of first speechers.
I heard that amazing comment about Cash too. She strikes me as a nasty piece of works, if she considers one to be beneath her contempt and unfortunately that would account for more than two-thirds of the population.
I cannot fathom how some of those so-called insightful journos can assess such a decadent character to have any human warmth that she “hugs everyone”.
But then, I suppose her hugs are targeted towards her ladder building peers and dopey voters, and the journos such as the dude today, who want to stay sweet with her to ensure their continued luxurious and slimy careers.
Shane Wright provided the Cash ‘endorsement’ as the natural ‘hugger’. Needless to say, he works for ‘The West Australian’ and therefore has ‘skin in the game’ when it comes to WA sources and how WA Senators should be portrayed.
George Christensen: “The views of One Nation to a degree are the views of many in the rank and file of the (Liberal National Party)”. So there you have it folks. I was surprised this wasnt picked up by the MSM – but of course it would be an inconvenient one to report on wouldnt it.
Judas gave the odd hug too.
None Steve Laing and you don’t have to look far to find out. Twitter has posted the image of her scarping out the chamber when Labor’s Anne Aly was about to give her maiden speech. I don’t think Cash stayed for a single speech after Hanson’s.
About that awful Michaelia Cash – I dont think she would be a hugger at all. She is just a Liberal clone, and I suspect she was just overdoing her orders of “be nice to Pauline, she’s got 4 votes we need”. Glad Mobius mentioned Twitter had image of her scarpering out the chamber when Anne Aly did her beautiful speech. (I had wondered what happened there) What a difference, yet the media have barely mentioned Anne’s speech, nor that of Ms M McCarthy, also well worth watching. Linda Burney ditto. Ive just instituted a personal policy of not reading any articles about Hanson. Malcolm Roberts though is a good spot of comedy.