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Day to Day Politics: What others say about . . .

Day to Day Politics: What others say about?

Friday  July 22 2016

A selection of thoughts from my many friends who express opinions.

1 Tim Leeder:

”Less than half of Australians want a plebiscite on same-sex marriage, with support plummeting once voters are aware that the Turnbull Government’s proposal will cost $160 million but not compel members of Parliament to respect the result.”

Me: It looks like they will put it in mothballs. So much for a plebiscite before Christmas.

2 My American friend Frank Innes:

” FACT … The Melania speech is actually a blessing for Trump. THE MOST CRITICAL THING BEING TALKED ABOUT IS THE PLAGIARISM! ! ! ! Nothing specific regarding what Trump’s platform is being discussed. i.e.: How will 11 million be deported? What does it mean: Make America Great Again? (Will he bring the jobs home that he exported to China? Make America Safe Again….. will he take the guns away? Will he lock more people up? Will he go to War with Iran to eliminate the Bomb possibility? We he take us to war in Syria? — Russia comes to the aide of their ally will Trump kick Russia’s butt also (and China has a vested interest in Syria! Will trump put China in its proper place.”

”MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN? Ronald Reagan was doing that crap… 4 or 5 military actions to project power … That really made America Great. The world does not have much respect for the RUMP… The Rump believe that their FEAR is Respect (same mentality of the street gangs in the city here.) yeshe Melania speech is a blessing for the Rump….the really important issues are not being addressed”

Me: Only in America. The astonishing events at the Republican convention, with Ted Cruz refusing to endorse Donald Trump, serve only to confirm the fact that the USA may be the most technologically advanced country in the world but in terms of electing its leader the GOP has shown that it is intellectually barren.

Frank replied:

”John, the RNC convention cannot even be called a Circus — Circus’ are organized. They were not able to follow a time schedule and time and time again was grasping for a direction. AND there was more than 200 big name Republican Leaders that did not attend the convention and none of them endorsed the Rump.”

”Even big name Republicans were speakers and they did not endorse the Rump. Several times in the conversations included the encouragement to “””GET OUT AND VOTE. … and Vote Down The Ballot ! ! ! ! (Not for Trump but the party members on down the ballot. The RNC is split … Very possibly the RNC is severely wounded and if it survives it will take a very long time to rebuild.”

3 Kay Rollison:

”The most significant change was getting Greg Hunt out of environment, and replacing him with Josh Frydenberg. The prime minister should be applauded for this. Hunt, by now, has managed both to hold too many positions on how to tackle climate change, and to dig in far too deep on Direct Action. Moving him frees Turnbull to execute a shift in the Coalition’s approach, which will be necessary as he seeks to re-establish credibility with the electorate in the years ahead. This was a canny move. BUT. Read on.”

4 Tim Leeder:

”Interesting stats. The government has spent over $33 billion on counter terrorism measures in Australia since 9/11. In that time 2 people have died in Australia from terrorism.”

Me: A bit of perspective please.

Tim Leeder:

In 2013 we voted to end the carbon tax. In its two years of life emissions from electricity generation fell an exceptional 10.6%. In the 21 months since they’ve climbed 5.6%.

“I feel as if my work is done,” he said on his stepping aside in the Environment ministry after almost a decade in the job.

He named the $2.55 billion emissions reduction fund – which pays farmers and business to reduce CO2 – as Australia’s climate policy centerpiece.

Me: Fact is he has been a disaster from start to finish. And to top it off Turnbull appoints a ‘coal man’ as his replacement.

An observation.

If we’re not raising new generations to be better stewards of the environment, what’s the point?”

 5  Chris Bowen delivered a speech on Thursday in which he said:

“People disillusioned by anaemic growth and growing income inequality are being sold simple messages that the answer to their problems and their nation’s problems is isolation; isolation from trade, isolation from immigration,” Bowen’s speech notes say. “A political debate is raging across the planet – open versus closed.”

Me: The phrase “open versus closed” is one used by former British Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg. He used it as opposed to a ‘’them and us’’society. Interesting for Bowen to use it.

6 Russell Green in response to my post. ‘The wisdom of a child defeats Hanson’:

”Here is a thought for you all to ponder, There are roughly 1.6 Billion Muslims in the world, if they all wanted you dead, guess what, you would be. That is the absurdity of the argument. It’s true that a few might want you dead even quite a few but the chances of it actually happening are slim – too remote. Deliberately putting yourself in harm’s way different matter altogether, but harm’s way is not Bourke Street at 4 O’clock in the afternoon. It is time we had a little perspective about this situation. Since 9/11 there have been 2 people killed in terror attacks carried out in the name of Islam. Since January this year 36 women have died, due to domestic violence. I ask what the greater terror threat is.”

Michael Brooke from the same post:

”I like your defence of multicultural Australia. Your best essays are those that come from your life experience. I share some of your perceptions of Australia as it was in the 50s and 60s. I too saw the start of Asian immigration and with it the bitter hatred of racialism, which vanished, as you say, in the same way as did animosity toward Greek and Italian immigrants. I know about racialism. My childhood was in Kenya, and there I saw how horrendously the white colonials treated black Africans. My parents loathed people of colour (those wogs), and Jews, and Gypsies, and were disgustingly nasty about homosexuality. I went to school in Germany, and there I was on the receiving end of post war detestation of everything British. I came to Australia in 1959, and witnessed the emergence of multiculturalism, which is one of the many things I admire about Australia. And yet I have always been aware of Australians like Pauline Hanson, with a proclivity for racial hatred — nothing special about Australia’s xenophobia — I grew up with it, encountered it everywhere I went, and I’ve found it here, and find it overtly emergent again, and I find it sad and dangerous. And so I’m led to respond to your essay, glad always when someone speaks out against racialism … well said John.”

Two observations.

“Life is about perception. Not what is but what we perceive it to be.”

The more we relate to others the more we get to know ourselves.”

7 Anthony Albanese has called for more transparency regarding political donations. He said that Malcolm Turnbulls gift of $1m from his own pocket to the Liberal party during the federal election was extraordinary. Albanese reckoned the Liberal party’s campaign was in disarray and “if you can’t run an election campaign in an orderly way it doesn’t augur well for whether you’ll be an orderly government”.

Me: Why do we have to wait until February of next year to find out how much money, and by who, has been donated? Why can’t the public simply go to a web site and find out. It has now been suggested that Turnbulls donation was much more than $1 million. Just another wiff of corruption I suggest.

My thought for the day.

“If you read the Bible searching for an understanding of life. And you read it with logical reasoning and an exploratory mind you can only conclude that it was written by people seeking understanding, but constrained by the knowledge of the time.”

 

13 comments

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  1. Bighead1883

    With the Oldfield / Hanson revelation of a first meeting sexual tryst whilst Oldfield was a staffer to Tony Abbott and the subsequent jailing of Hanson for bunged up electoral fraud charges,whom she clearly blames Abbott/Howard and Beattie for,we are in for an exciting and agile time John Lord

    Malcolm Turnbull will have to show much innovation in his upcoming horse trading with the Senate which is rumoured to have 4 or more One Nation Senators and his DD ABCC bill is first cab off the rank

    Malcolm does have a human sacrifice that he can use to maximum advantage if he has to–see for your self > https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Cn4z2vxUAAAiP3C.jpg

  2. Graham Parton

    Who are the two who are alleged to have been killed by terrorists? Surely not the two who died in the Lindt Café, he wasn’t a “terrorist”, just a nut with a gun.

  3. Terry2

    Ted Cruz has gone up considerably in my estimation.

    The Republican Convention has turned into a tawdry and vulgar version of the Hunger Games and in the process is destroying the GOP.

  4. Grim

    Waterboarding would be the only thing I could suggest for Greg Hunt. He is the Dorian Grey for the environment. Greg now wears beautiful suits. He looks great on the outside. But we all know how vile, twisted and really evil he is on the inside. Greg’s picture in his attic would reveal his true ugliness.

  5. wam

    50%????? less than 8% will get you a seat in the senate?
    The crude interpretation of carbon price as a tax was briefly challenged by gillard and most commentators strayed from the rabbott’s slogan ‘tax’ till he took the initiative back and labor dropped the ball by not revealing that the ‘direct action’ really was a tax that waved billions in front of private industry with a history of ‘being loose’ in claiming government cash.
    All politicians should have a website describing their work history. This would expel our impression that they only work about 35 days a year.
    dear lord your thought suggests religion could rewrite the bible with science? A casual look shows men have embraced modernity but still maintain the restrictions on women. This confirms my belief that religion is by men for men.
    Michael Brooke could be tempered by the abyssmal treatment of the white children exported from england after the war and realisation of what chance Aboriginal parents or children had of being heard.(rabbott proof fence)
    ps did frank know how shorten became leader (or turnball)?

  6. win

    Totally agree with your thought for the day. All ‘holy’ books only as good as the understanding of the era. I can’t say this in all church circles though. Still too many who revere the book , when it is life (including non human) that is sacred.

  7. Terry2

    Mobius

    thanks for that : how ironic if Abbott’s RC into union criminality only ends up catching one serial offender – which reminds me, why is it taking so long to charge Kathy Jackson ?

  8. Möbius Ecko

    Watch for this one to come up in a budget under this government.

    Turnbull flagged changes to tertiary education funding and HECS in the May budget. A growing push is being made to recover HECS debts from deceased estates and from the estates of partners of those with a HECS debt where the debtor no longer works.

    This is a government that’s looking to screw every bit of blood out of every small stone whilst the mountains bulging money are growing bigger hoarding more and more of it.

  9. Freethinker

    Malcolm has been told for a second time by Bob Katter
    Bob Katter warns PM not to ‘antagonise’ him by proceeding with ABCC bill
    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2016/jul/22/bob-katter-warns-pm-not-to-antagonise-him-by-proceeding-with-abcc-bill

    “Clearly this is going to antagonise me,” Katter told Guardian Australia on Friday. “This was introduced by an extreme faction within the Liberal party and I do not know why the government will proceed in a highly controversial area such as this when you still have no hope getting through Senate.”

    “The ABCC legislation contains the removal of the right to remain silent. It also contains powers for the government to apprehend without reasonable cause to suspect.”

    Some how I thing that this government will not going to be able to survive 2 years in power.

  10. Terry2

    Freethinker

    That’s the nub : we don’t have a Bill of Rights so the so called right to remain silent only exists if it is written into legislation and with the ABCC it isn’t.

    We really badly need a national Bill of Rights.

  11. Freethinker

    Yes Terry, you are correct, I just quoted Bob.
    In any case, IMO, the government is heading to chaos

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