We Have Liberal Leaders In Charge – Thank God!
Confirmation bias is a truly wonderful thing. Ok, there are times when it may sound ridiculous. I’d mention Donald Trump and the stolen election here but while some of you would be laughing that anyone could believe the guy after all the lies he’s told, others will be saying, “Yeah, of course, it’s a conspiracy and deep state are working with Biden and by the way did you check out Pete Evans latest recipe – it’s delicious…”
So I can’t help but think that the past couple of weeks will have been great for those who’ve used the hashtag, “I Stand With Dan”, his detractors will still be suggesting that it’s only his Belt and Road agreement that brought COVID-19 to Australia. Yes, Andrews made mistakes but he stood up and owned them and brought the state down from hundreds of cases to zero. Hang on, say some, he’s responsible for all the deaths because he refused to use the army or the police. The fact that it’s recently emerged that the army won’t do certain security tasks and the fact that it was a police officer in NSW who waved through the Germans won’t alter their view that somehow the virus wouldn’t have escaped hotel quarantine if we hadn’t had private security
Just for the sake of those who aren’t aware of the facts, what happened with the German tourists/Australian citizens goes something like this: They arrived on a plane from overseas and because they spoke no English they were waved on by a NSW police officer who decided that because there were two of them they were a pair which he mistook for another “au pair” situation which would have had them waved through once someone had phoned Peter Dutton so he saved time by not bothering the minister. Of course, some of you are wondering why it would be presumed only those with a grasp of the language need to quarantine but clearly that’s not the case at all. It’s been established that they were not, in fact, tourists but Australian citizens which tends to suggest that Gladys is employing police who have a limited grasp of English and no understanding that “quarantine” does not mean let them jump on a plane with loads of other people and quarantine once they’re back home in Melbourne which currently doesn’t have anyone quarantining. At the point they arrived in Melbourne they looked confused and a security guard established that they were looking for someone to explain what they were meant to do. But none of this is anyone’s fault and certainly not the NSW premier’s because she’s just tired and only human.
No, while Gladys is lauded as the gold standard by the part-time PM, Scott “the handyman” Morrison, we have constant calls for Andrews to resign. Gladys, it seems, was just unlucky in love and who hasn’t spent taxpayers’ money to visit their dodgy boyfriend and as for that Ruby Princess – it was the fault of someone else because why should a premier be responsible for the incompetence of someone else… unless they’re a Labor one, like Dan Andrews.
Obviously, in writing this I’m well aware that I’m only putting facts out there and facts are highly unlikely to change anyone’s mind. However…
The great myth about the Liberals being more competent economic managers is rarely ever challenged even though facts don’t back it up. I could go back through our history and point out that Fraser came to power because both inflation and unemployment were too high. Not only that but the Whitlam government was spending too much and we needed to get the deficit under control. In his seven years, inflation was still high, unemployment was higher and the deficit never went anywhere near a surplus.
In his early days as Treasurer when Paul Keating was preparing the budget, the various Liberal politicians were suggesting that he needed to get the deficit down much lower and that if they were in charge then they’d have a much smaller one. To everyone’s surprise, Keating announced a surplus which left the same Coalition politicians telling us that if they were in charge they’d have had a larger one.
After years of that economic oxymoron, negative growth, the early nineties saw Labor deliver the sort of growth that the Liberals assured us was impossible. They achieved this by adopting a Keynesian style stimulus package which enabled Howard and Costello to inherit an economy which was growing so well – thanks also to a resources boom – that not even they could stuff it up completely.
Rudd was elected and shortly after the world was hit by the GFC which, like the oil shocks of the seventies, was not the fault of the Australian government. When Labor went hard on the stimulus packages and spending, the Liberals argued that they’d spent too much too quickly and they’re be nothing left for when the recession hit. The Liberals had to change their line of attack once there was no recession in Australia. No, it wasn’t the economic management of the government; they’d wasted money by giving it back to us and by building things and we didn’t need to do that because Australia didn’t have a recession. Yes, when the Liberals return money to taxpayers that’s good because they’ll know how spend it better than the government, but the Rudd stimulus was only going to be wasted on gambling, drinking and silly purchases.
Now we have the absurdity of people arguing that the Morrison government is managing the economy really well and I’m not about to argue that everything they’ve done is wrong. But if we apply their own standards, imagine if a Labor government did this:
- Promise that we were “back in black” pre-election, only to fail to deliver a budget at the specified time because it’s all too uncertain.
- Have unemployment jump
- Preside over the first Australian recession this century
- Deliver the biggest deficit in our history
- Borrow more than all the previous Australian governments combined
- Have no plan to pay it back until some unspecified date when unemployment is less than 6%
- Destroy our trade with our biggest trading partner by calling for an investigation into Covid-19 which pointed the finger at China
I’m not saying that all these things are entirely the government’s fault. I’m merely suggesting that if these are the signs of good economic managers, what do bad ones look like?
Or to put it another way, when Robert Doyle challenged Dennis Nap-time for the role of Victorian Opposition leader, he argued that they’d be facing devastation at the next election if there wasn’t a change of leader. Doyle went on to record the biggest loss by a Victorian Liberal leader in the state’s history. On election night, I turned to my wife and said, “Gee, I wonder if Doyle’s supporters are saying how lucky they were that they changed leaders course it would have been even worse under Napthine.”
Yeah, confirmation bias is a tricky thing.
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Return to home pageWhat or which liberals! Religious money grabbing conservatves we have. Menzies would be spinning in his grave!
I have no desire to distract from Rossleigh’s words but that pic – i had to go outside so my howling laughter didn’t scare the cat.
Indeed, GG, so illustrative 😉
Rossleigh, you omitted the nice little earner for the “mates” – the Indue card which, in a world where the RWNJs maintain that we must always take individual responsibility for ourselves, takes that option from those who find themselves in straitened cicumstances.
The attitude prevails: “… was only going to be wasted on gambling, drinking and silly purchases.”
Cue: ‘High Roller’ Casino rooms and ubiquetous ‘pokies’; extended pub opening hours and cheap booze in Parliaments’ canteens; and Post Office watches – but definitely not the $20 ones from in-store.
Hypocrisy writ large.
Now Rossleigh, you remember what Napoleon said; ”Never disturb your enemy while they are making mistakes”.
Some other points:
1) Mick Muck may yet turn out to be the best electoral asset for urban regional electorates as country people wake up and realise that the Nazional$ Party and those politicians are doing deals with water by stealing from agriculture to give to foreign owned multinational mining corporations that pay little or no taxation in Australia but make significant political donations ns to the Nazional$ Party..
2) Canberra has been drinking Trumpery Water while shouting ”the COALition is the best manager for the Australian economy”. So, I guess politically naive Australian voters would not recognise that doubling the national deficit in one year is a real achievement, just like having the highest daily incidence of COVID-19 infections in the USA (United States of Apartheid)..
3) Presently 3/8 NSW electorates have been cleansed of representatives of the Nazional$ and replaced with SFF and INDEPENDENTs who are providing a high quality representation for the Australian voters that Nazional$ have failed to provide for decades. There is likely to be more cleansing at the next NSW election.
4) In Northern Tablelands and New England the Nazional$ duopoly has struck a deal with the about 50% foreign owned Costa Guyra Tomato Farm to supply Armidale drinking water from Malpas Dam and thrown in an about $13 MILLION pipeline to carry the water directly into the Tomato Farm.
Now what quantum of political donations does an about $13 MILLION free, gratis and for nothing water supply pipeline earn for the metropolitan unelected political hacks who control pre-selection to keep them in the manner to which they wish to remain accustomed? Why did the then Nazional$ controlled Armidale Regional Council terrorise the Progressive Ladies faction by questioning this policy dictated by the political aspirant former Mayor and the former CEO? Why has the Tomato farm been allowed to demand Armidale drinking water during the worst drought in living memory?
Oops!!! Silly me!! The contract including the Force Majeur clause suspending the contract responsibilities for the duration of a natural calamity was ”misplaced” or ”lost” in the ARC Deeds Box, just below the former Hinton Art Collection Bequest documents.
5) Now Rossleigh, I venture onto sacred ground with this next point; Barnyard Joke and his private practising in public venues of adultery, alcoholism, bigotry, and misogyny that are ”the family values” espoused by the Nazional$. Naturally these are all private matters, so it is reasonable to conclude that Tamworth women who support adultery support Nazional$.
Too true Rossleigh!
They are sooo transparent in their left right bias. And Gladys is a disaster and is quickly becoming self endowed Teflon.
This was my morning post!
Greg Hunt yesterday made the statement below which is a) a lie (the tourists were picked up by a friendly security person. Not as any part of a security checkpoint) and b) another example of a Federal Minister ignoring the errors made in an LNP state.
Can you imagine the flak if the tourists had arrived at Melbourne and transferred to Sydney?
“There are multiple rings of containment within the quarantine and border system and, ultimately, these passengers have been picked up within those rings of containment,” Hunt told Sky News on Sunday.
I want to buy the person who chose that photo a beer. Or whatever they prefer.
The picture of the souffle is apt when describing the ‘better economic management’ skills of the fools. They have to thank the media for their illusion of financial and budgetery greatness. Time and again they have been shown to be total jackasses who couldn’t manage a school canteen expense account. But Rupert covers for them, as they cover his arse. A text book case of you scratch my backside and I’ll scratch yours.
@leefe: Costello is holding his head in that peculiar position to stop his nose running after removing his proboscis from the anal sphincter of a Liarbral Party financial donor.
But wait … look again …. is Scummo practising fellatio on Costello, hence the ecstatic glower of ejaculation?????
Could you take your list to a grade 3 class and ask them to rewrite it. Then send the rewrite to albo and wong. They may understand the economic lies that appear in the last week of the election NEED action from albo to give us an answer to the bullshit of the libs being better managers. No better time than now to redress the GFC effort and it use by scummo. They could add there was &^&@@ all trickle down and no jobs from gifts to the rich but give a quid to the poor and byebye recession???
ps
yes NEC,
the picture does pose the question:
How ‘ard was it???
NEC:
Having an IQ higher than the average (or even considerably above average) LNP politician (or voter), and a mind that generally dwells not so much in the gutter as in the sewers, I do not need the image explained to me. Just let me sit here and enjoy it.
I don’t know everyone is getting worked up about the photo. It’s just Little Johnnie cleaning Pete’s shoes and using his eyebrows to tickle Pete’s peter for that extra bit of customer satisfaction while he’s working.
“Oh, Oh, Oh, Oh, Ahhhhhhh, John Johnnie, John, No, No, Yes, Yes, Ahhhhh”