The misdirection of Abbott or putting the count back into accountability

MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:

I’m just quoting the reports…

MALCOLM TURNBULL:

No, the way you phrased it doesn’t sound right to me, but I think Tony was quite upfront and said that he had been in Melbourne and he had been to a fundraiser the night before.

MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:

But he didn’t use that to justify billing the taxpayers?

MALCOLM TURNBULL:

I don’t recall him saying that, no.

MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:

Okay.

As soon as I heard this interview, I remarked to a colleague that I just like to hear some interviewer somewhere actually ask the REALLY difficult questions, like instead of just saying “Okay”, ask Turnbull if he doesn’t recall because he has a failing memory or because he doesn’t pay attention in party room meetings.

Or is he just saying he doesn’t recall for the same reasons that most people say it: Nobody can prove that you’re actually lying!

Still, using taxpayer funds to attend a Liberal fundraiser isn’t really that important. After all, Abbott did attend a hospital in the same trip where he told us how committed the government was to science and research.

This was very necessary, because getting rid of the science ministry and cutting billions of dollars out or research funding could lead people to think just that, if it wasn’t for Abbott going to Melbourne and reiterating his government’s support for these things. Rather like when people thought that the Liberals had broken promises, just because they’d said some things before the election that were very different to the things they did after the election.

But just once I’d like to hear an interview where they were actually expected to remember what they’d said just a few days earlier. If I ever got the chance, it”d go something like this:

“Good morning, I’m very pleased to interview our Prime Miniature, Tiny Abbott.” 

“Ah… Good morning.”

“First up, let me ask you about the proposed co-payment of $7. How long before you put it up to the point that you can say that bulk-billing isn’t worth the paperwork?”

“Look… ah, Rossleigh… we were elected to make the tough decisons, and I don’t shy away from that…”

“But the co-payment isn’t even going to help the Budget bottom line. It’s going to a medical research fund that we have no details about. For all we know the medical research fund could be looking at the health benefits of Cabinet members drinking a bottle of Grange once a week.”

“Look, ah… the fundamental thing here is… ah, our government is committed to cleaning up the mess that Labor left. We don’t want our children saddled with debt.”

“Ok, you’re not going to answer my question so let’s move on to the phrases that you’ve been coached to say at every opportunity.”

“I resent the implication there.”

“Just say Labor’s mess nine times, followed by debt is baaahd three times, and we can move on. What about your decision to deny job-seekers the dole for six months?”

“I make no apology for making the tough decisions. We need to fix…”

“Labor’s mess, yes, go on.”

“…Labor’s mess or suffer a big drop in Australia’s standard of living.”

“Yes, but how can you say that you’re doing this to maintain Australia’s standard of living while reducing the standard of living to the majority of the population.”

“Rossleigh, you can’t go on putting things on the credit card forever.”

“Actually you can. In fact, one of my credit cards gives me rewards points. I put all my energy bills on it and last month I had enough points to get an iPad. And the other one give you credit which you can pay off your bill after 8,000 points. Labor must have run up a bucketload of rewards points. “

“Yes, but eventually you have to pay it back.”

“Well, at the end of each month actually. Otherwise you pay an enormous interest rate.”

“That’s what we’re paying. We pay over a billion dollars in interest every month. Can you imagine what we could do with a billion dollars?”

‘Buy a couple more fighter jets or VIP aircraft? But what about the unemployed, how do they survive for those six months?”

“As I’ve said before, they should earn or learn.”

“Populate or perish. Sorry, I don’t know why I said that. So what should they learn?”

“Well that’s up to them.”

“But where do you see the jobs coming from? I mean, what should they be preparing for? Obviously the car industry’s out, so what about a job in the renewable energy sector? Do you see opportunities opening up there?”

“It’s not up to the government to predict where the jobs might open up.”

“So you expect someone with no expertise to predict what qualifications would be best to gain in order to find employment in the future?”

“What they study is up to them, It’s not up to the government to be telling them what to do.”

“Unless they’re on work for the dole. But surely you don’t want to encourage people who don’t have a job to go into debt.”

“What are you doing about?”

“Well, if they go back to study, won’t they be incurring a HECS debt?”

“Ah… not necessarily. There are things they could be doing that wouldn’t…”

“And which of those are likely to lead to an actual job? I thought that you didn’t want to saddle our children with debt. Aren’t your policies doing just that?”

“Look, we’re just not going to stand by and let innocent people be slaughtered in Iraq by people with Australian passports because of the insulation scheme which led to unsustainable debt on our credit cards.”

Mm. I guess that’d blow my chances of a knighthood…

Ah well!

It seems he’s the same even when the interview is fiction!