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The drips win the week

Saturday 30 June 2018

Introduction

I should have posted this piece last Saturday but because of some issues with my password and my lack of understanding of cyber security, it wasn’t possible. I take full blame, and apologise unreservedly for all the inconvenience. God only knows I have enough trouble with the pop up toaster. Anyway, I have added new material to bring it up to date.

Drip-down conservative economic theory had a big win last week and the MSM are wetting their slacks with Shorten’s slip of the tongue comment about tax.

However, the tax cuts have forged a demarcation line down the centre of Australian politics. On the left you have a leader with a lifetime of serving the worker, openly intent on making Australia a fairer place with better hospitals, better infrastructure a better standard of education with a greater concentration on those things that glue a society together.

On the right we have a leader born and bred into wealth and privilege intent on making the rich richer in the foolish belief that by doling so he will raise the standards of the poor and middle class.

Nowhere in the world can there be found any evidence of drip-down economics working. Unfortunately though it seems that aspiring to be rich is now the right’s catch phrase. That’s what everyone is hoodwinked into believing.

In America the people are told that everyone can aspire to be President but they have woken to the fact that they cannot. Aspiration is fine but it should come with honesty and equality. That all the aspiration in the world can make everyone rich and powerful. Americans have learnt this and now see it for what it is.

Money has been so promoted as the answer to everything that people actually believe it. We can no longer get by on what should be ample because we are persuaded that we must have more to simply survive.

My thought of the week

“Never in the history of this nation have the rich and privileged been so openly brazen.”

Comment of the Week

GetUp! tweet:

“Setting aside everything else wrong with Turnbull’s tax cuts for the wealthy – @PaulineHansonOz complaining about politicians giving themselves pay increases, on the same day she votes to give herself a $7000 a year tax cut, is just bloody bizarre.”

The Scandal Sheet

1 You gotta admit it’s a good line! “The trouble with Pauline Hanson is she’s looking for three senators with lower IQs than her – it’s an impossible task,” Mr. Palmer told Fairfax Media.

2 Liberal Branch Meeting brawl

And they say that manners are part of conservative ideology.

On this day in 2015

Retiring Coalition Senator Sue Boyce has made some startling revelations. Tony Abbott is sexist. The Coalition has been dog whistling over Asylum Seekers. She felt the party had moved further to the right and bemoaned the absence of women in the party. The shocker though was describing Morrison as an “extremely Christian Man”

The latest Poll Bludger

IPOS 53-47 To Labor yesterday.

Essential Research: 52-48 to Labor

My warning of a poll drought in the previous post hadn’t reckoned on Fairfax’s Ipsos series, which fills the void with a 53-47 result for Labor, down from 54-46 from the previous poll six weeks ago. As best as I can tell, all we have to go on at this stage is an editorial in The Age that suggests both major parties are on 35% of the primary vote, which is a two point drop for Labor and a one point drop for the Coalition.

Top Tweets of the week

Adam Bandt

BREAKING: Turnbull’s tax cuts for MPs and millionaires passes Parliament, with Pauline Hanson’s One Nation & Centre Alliance’s (ex-Xenophon) support. They’ve just voted to end progressive taxation in Australia and send us on the path to becoming a US-style unequal society

Paula Dale

Seriously this Gov’t can’t be voted out soon enough they have no care for us who are doing it tuff 😣no penalty rates low wages and now tax cuts for the rich what is Australia becoming?

RabidLeftieHamster

Can someone please explain to me why Hanson had a recent shitfight with Burton over his support for this tax plan and now is voting for it herself?

Bill Shorten

Voting themselves a $7000 tax cut. And what are they cutting to pay for it? Yourlocal schools and hospitals.

Katharine Murphy

Am I the only person who thinks all the hammering of “aspirational” is a bit high concept? What does it even mean? Don’t voters just want to know the nuts and bolts of the respective packages? Aspiration is like a unicorn, desired but never sighted.

Quentin Dempster

Australia is now being governed by a new coalition: LNP/PHON/Murdoch Press. Victory for the Battler’s?

George Megalogenis

Apology accepted (as an ABC contributor). But those reader comments were no better or worse than what some of your senior commentators write/tweet about the ABC on a daily basis. Time to drop the vendetta and return to the national affairs journalism that made my old paper great.

GetUp!

Setting aside everything else wrong with Turnbull’s tax cuts for the wealthy – @PaulineHansonOz complaining about politicians giving themselves pay increases, on the same day she votes to give herself a $7000 a year tax cut, is just bloody bizarre.

Sky News

Shadow Assistant Treasurer @ALeighMP: I don’t think there’s anything fair or Australian about the notion a surgeon should pay the same marginal rate of tax as a nurse.

Tim’s titbits

1 Turnbull has suddenly become the friend of the worker. After removing some of their penalty rates. Presiding over increased cost of living. Wage stagnation etc.

2 Richo is saying if Labor does poorly in the by-elections Albo will become leader. And the election will be in September. He said.

Braddon is probably gone for Labor. Longman not looking great either.

3 It’s gotten worse these last twenty years. Lack of diversity in parliament. Gene pool is too narrow.

4 Paul Kelly wrote a good article today. Saying this week was Turnbull’s most significant parliamentary win in 2 years. I would say in the time he has been PM. Sets us up for a traditional class-based election. Do people want to pay higher tax but have the money pay for services like hospitals? Or do they want to pay less tax. Which encourages aspiration.

5 President trump will visit Australia later in the year. Means election will be next year for sure.

6 Senate passes PM’s income tax cuts 37 Votes For 33 Against.

The Senate comprises of 76 Senators ,12 from each State and 2 from the ACT and the NT.

The bill passed the upper house 37 votes FOR to 33 AGAINST.

Labor has 26 senators, Greens have 9 senators

Liberals have 26 senators
National party has 5 senators
PHON 2 senators Pauline Hanson Land, Peter Georgiou WA
Centre Alliance 2 senators Stirling Griff and Rex Patrick both SA

Labor senators, the Greens and independent Tim Storer opposed the plan.

Under the first of three stages in the plan, low- and middle-income earners will get tax relief of up to $530 a year from July 1 with benefits for people earning up to $200,000 to come into place in 2024.

The entire package cleared the Senate with the support of Pauline Hanson’s One Nation (2 votes) and Centre Alliance 2 votes”

My clown of last week

The red-headed one, yet again, still, on going.

Can someone please explain to me why Hanson had a recent shitfight with Burston over his support for this tax plan and now is voting for it herself?

My thought for the day

“Having the ability to admit that you are wrong is an absolute prerequisite to discernment and knowledge.”

18 comments

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  1. Terence Mills

    It must be hard, as a Newscorp journalist with integrity, when the dreaded management email arrives, telling you to write a piece on how amazing the prime minister is and how his ability to cut taxes represents the greatest break through in national economic management since Turnbull took over from Abbott.

    You then have to bite your lip and pretend that this frenzy of tax cuts represents taxation reform and (and if you are of a religious persuasion) hope that you don’t get struck by a thunderbolt.

    As you finish your phantasy piece – having inserted the required number of references to an aspirational nation – and submit it for editorial and IPA oversight do you then reflect on what you have done with your career and how the once proud and independent fourth-estate you aspired to be a part of, has become a lackey of a foreign mogul.

  2. Terence Mills

    I couldn’t help noticing the irony of our defence announcements.

    In 2016 Malcolm Turnbull has announced all 12 of Australia’s next fleet of submarines will be built in Adelaide with French company DCNS winning the $50 billion contract.

    This week the prime minister announced that British company BAE Systems had won the contract for nine Hunter class high-tech, anti-submarine frigates worth $35 billion also to be built in Adelaide with construction to commence in 2020.

    Also last week the PM announced that Australia will acquire six Northrop Grumman unmanned spy planes (drones) at a cost of $7 Billion which will be used to hunt enemy submarines and carry out surveillance flights (for Mr Dutton ?).

    So that’s $92 billion and change : we should be able to detect our own submarines and destroy them if appropriate : have we got a hang-up on submarines ?

  3. Kaye Lee

    Pauline’s stoush with Burston was over company tax cuts, not the income tax cuts that were passed.

    She gave my favourite quote for the week:

    “One Nation will not be supporting company tax cuts. So I haven’t flip-flopped. I said NO originally. Then I said YES. Then I have said NO, and I’ve stuck to it.”

    Bill has also taken back his comment about changing the tax cuts for small/medium business after consultation with his colleagues. That was sensible.

  4. Andrew Smith

    The LNP’s audience is the upper median age vote (many rusted on or former Labour and/or Catholic) and those who think, like trickle down economics, that establishment or top people’s fairy dust will sprinkle down and turn them into members of the WASP upper middle class, are misguided.

    It is unlikely as evidenced by Liberal strategies to encourage conservatives who follow orders and respect authority ie. Mormon and evangelical Christians to join branches (in Victoria), vote for the right policies (from IPA) and act as a praetorian guard against anything actually liberal; just vote for us then shut up and be quiet.

  5. Ian Parfrey

    @Shanewombat.

    Awesome blog with a list of ‘to dos’ that almost mirrors my own. Great minds think alike and all that.

    I recommend all to have a read.

  6. helvityni

    …and that sprinkling of fairy dust will turn even Pauline into a Liberal swan…

    Doesn’t Bill know that ONLY Liberals can change their mind about something….?

  7. Kaye Lee

    If we are talking about drip of the week, David Leyonhjelm must come in for serious consideration after he yelled that Sarah Hanson-Young “should stop shagging men”, and then told her to “f— off” when she confronted him about it, during a parliamentary debate about women and violence.

    You just have to love these free speech advocates. Like Prue MacSween who claimed she was “tempted to run over” Yassmin Abdel-Magied in response to her Anzac post.

    MacSween defended her threat of violence with, “I think it is sad that people cannot express their opinion in this country… for fear of upsetting the feral trolls.” She had rather less to say about how sad it is that people in this country can’t express an opinion that Prue disagrees with without Prue expressing her desire to kill them.

    https://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/life-and-relationships/is-this-what-motivated-david-leyonhjelm-to-insult-sarah-hanson-young-20180629-p4zoo2.html

  8. Ross in Gippsland

    John Lord, you say Malcolm Turnbull wants to raise the standards of the poor and middle classes.
    I’ve seen no evidence to support that assumption, in fact by his and his governments actions it’s the reverse.

  9. Russell

    Tomorrow is a new start to the revolution – wages for hard working Aussies down down down; wages for scum politicians up, up, up. #ToxicLNP worst economic managers in Australian history.

  10. Kronomex

    Ross in Gippsland, I wonder if by “standards” John means Malfeasance giving free flags to the poor and middle class that proclaim them to be “Poor and Middle Class” and are to be avoided by the LNP until election time?

    Kaye Lee, I hereby nominate Leyonhjelm to be the first (and no doubt more will follow) recipient of the “F*cking Prick of the Month Award.” The award itself is a bronze hand holding a large rubber dildo with a photo of the recipients face glued to the knob end.

  11. David Bruce

    Australia used to be such a nice place to raise a family…

  12. johno

    Thanks John Lord. The IPA might be under pressure to give Pauline free membership if she hasn’t joined already.

  13. paul walter

    I think Pauline says “yes” a little bit too often.

    But the story that has my ire is Parliament again shepherding through a national security bill thats obscured main goal is again, the suppression of information and civil liberties here.

  14. Jamesss

    Thank You Kronomex, ha ha ha love your deserving comment.

  15. Kaye Lee

    Leyonhjelm was on that appalling show Outsiders this morning and he continued the abuse.

    As SHY said,….

    “In any other workplace, anywhere in the country, telling a woman to ‘stop shagging men’ would land you in hot water. Here in parliament, it lands you an exclusive with Sky News, where you’re given the opportunity to double down.

    “We reward bad behaviour with attention. Men who use sexism to belittle or intimidate women, as I experienced by Senator Leyonhjelm, face no backlash.”

    https://www.theguardian.com/media/2018/jul/01/sky-news-apologises-for-featuring-appalling-comments-about-sarah-hanson-young

    Leyonhjelm then tweeted calling Angela Bishop a “bigoted bitch” for saying his behaviour was unacceptable.

    This guy really has to go.

  16. paul walter

    He’s making a play for his senate place on the basis that enough voters will be reactionary enough to like his type of comment.

    Angela Bishop is on that evening show on Ten, isn’t she?

    Can’t say I like her but she has drawn out a comment from the offending senator that is actually nastier than the one directed at SHY in some ways. SHY sounded like a rough attempt at humour, but the one against Bishop reveals the underlying nasty nature more clearly.

  17. paul walter

    Feeling embarrassed. Of course, I never watch or Sky or whatever it is — Murdoch garbage I won’t have in my house or pay good money for, to chase after.rubbish.

    But until this evening’s Media Watch, I had not the foggiest just how bad this thing has been, the Sky thing is not a mistake but a crock of filth.

    Now, from this point, you start to wonder if the whole thing was concocted earlier to give Leyjonhelm publicity and also orchestrated to do a concerted slag on SHY.

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