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12 hours ago, jw1739 said:

I have never before felt so completely disconnected from the process or the outcome as I have this time around.

There's an article by Stan Grant somewhere about the decline, or indeed death, of liberal democracy. Perhaps he's right.

Personally I feel that the Clive Palmer advertising became intolerable and there was no way to shut it off. The text messages were intolerable.

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11 hours ago, NewConvert said:

Personally I feel that the Clive Palmer advertising became intolerable and there was no way to shut it off. The text messages were intolerable.

I paid no attention whatsoever to those minor parties, and I'm astonished at the % of the primary vote that they received. It is bad enough trying to find something of substance from the major parties in the rhetorical vomit that they produce without venturing any further.

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6 hours ago, MHFC-FAN said:

I don't recall seeing a party called anti-vaxxers? Who are you referring to?

The Federation Party for starters - you needed to go to their website to see that all their policies were about stopping all public health initiatives. Then there were a few independents and the UAP.

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16 hours ago, NewConvert said:

The Federation Party for starters - you needed to go to their website to see that all their policies were about stopping all public health initiatives. Then there were a few independents and the UAP.

Most of them were anti-mandate rather than anti-vaxx, fwiw.

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18 hours ago, NewConvert said:

The Federation Party for starters - you needed to go to their website to see that all their policies were about stopping all public health initiatives. Then there were a few independents and the UAP.

Policies on stopping all public health? Like closing hospitals and discontinuing emergency services? Or do you mean they were against mandatory vaccination? 

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5 hours ago, MHFC-FAN said:

Policies on stopping all public health? Like closing hospitals and discontinuing emergency services? Or do you mean they were against mandatory vaccination? 

 

17 minutes ago, jw1739 said:

Thanks for the link JW. The wording is quite broad and of course the question with people like that is where do you stop? Where are the limits?

The problem with ideologues is that they are always after purity. And for those that don't have to live with the consequences purity overrides everything and there is always someone more pure.

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3 hours ago, NewConvert said:

 

Thanks for the link JW. The wording is quite broad and of course the question with people like that is where do you stop? Where are the limits?

The problem with ideologues is that they are always after purity. And for those that don't have to live with the consequences purity overrides everything and there is always someone more pure.

I'm right with you, don't get me wrong on this. In some electorates, as much as 15% of the first preferences went, in total, to the various fringe party candidates. My question is whether they had any idea of what they were voting for? Who reads this stuff - honestly? Much of it is just a tirade against the measures that were used against a  pathogen with unknown longer-term effects. As you say, where are the limits? Do they have the same policies for all the other diseases as well - measles, chicken pox, tuberculosis, HIV, poliomyelitis, monkeypox, malaria, etc. etc.? 

It's this sort of stuff that makes me object to having to give any sort of "vote" to any candidate that I don't want to see in parliament under any circumstances.

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23 hours ago, jw1739 said:

Anyway, Albanese seems to have had a sound first week, and I sincerely hope that he can grow into the statesman role and become a real leader for the country. I feel it's something we desperately need.

Most people I have spoken to express relief rather than warmth for Albanese or the ALP. And the relief is that the Morrison government were incompetent and that is something that Australian's are not used to. Can Albanese grow? I remain optimistic but as long as he shows that he is not incompetent then I will be satisfied.

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1 hour ago, NewConvert said:

Most people I have spoken to express relief rather than warmth for Albanese or the ALP. And the relief is that the Morrison government were incompetent and that is something that Australian's are not used to. Can Albanese grow? I remain optimistic but as long as he shows that he is not incompetent then I will be satisfied.

I want more than that I'm afraid. I think that we need to define some new directions for the country and a challenging vision for what we are going to be, and visible action rather than just rhetoric and then excuses. He has to walk the talk.

Every government gets a honeymoon period. Can he control the factions in his party, and can he control parliament? Albanese has to avoid getting tripped up on minor "issues" and throwaway lines and then having to extricate himself. He needs to keep a cool head and focus on the big picture.

We'll know fairly soon I think.

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On 28/05/2022 at 9:51 AM, NewConvert said:

 that is something that Australian's are not used to.

Not sure i can agree with that. The last 15 years has been chock full of the worst, most self interested politicians this country has ever seen.

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4 hours ago, bt50 said:

Not sure i can agree with that. The last 15 years has been chock full of the worst, most self interested politicians this country has ever seen.

They may have been self-interested but not necessarily incompetent. Example, not sending the health minister or the PM to negotiate with Pfizer, not organising the roll out and then blaming companies (Woolies retorted that they call it planning). In my lifetime I have often disagreed with policies (and semi-corrupt behaviour) but incompetence was a new low.

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In terms of the pandemic, I'm not sure what is the correct word to describe Australia's response. I'm no expert, but my impression at the time was that none of our leaders were quite sure where the responsibilities lay or how much power they actually had and where they could exercise it. I recall at one stage thinking that the PM didn't understand what powers he actually had, and didn't have, under the constitution. One result of this was that the usual point-scoring continued unabated  - "my response is better than your response" and "who's got the toughest lockdown?" - kindergarten sandpit stuff. Another was the arguing over quarantine facilities (did they ever get built by the way?) - "I want it here. Shan't, I want it over here."

One of the outcomes I hoped for was that the pandemic would cause us to revisit these seemingly continual arguments over the division of authorities between the States and the Feds, and sort it out once and for all. As it is now, with the current infections, serious illnesses, hospitalizations, deaths and long COVID seemingly being swept under the carpet, and everything "back to normal" (although it isn't) it doesn't look as though we will look at anything, and therefore that we won't be better organised and prepared when the next public health crises comes - or  perhaps any crisis

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14 minutes ago, jw1739 said:

In terms of the pandemic, I'm not sure what is the correct word to describe Australia's response. I'm no expert, but my impression at the time was that none of our leaders were quite sure where the responsibilities lay or how much power they actually had and where they could exercise it. I recall at one stage thinking that the PM didn't understand what powers he actually had, and didn't have, under the constitution. One result of this was that the usual point-scoring continued unabated  - "my response is better than your response" and "who's got the toughest lockdown?" - kindergarten sandpit stuff. Another was the arguing over quarantine facilities (did they ever get built by the way?) - "I want it here. Shan't, I want it over here."

One of the outcomes I hoped for was that the pandemic would cause us to revisit these seemingly continual arguments over the division of authorities between the States and the Feds, and sort it out once and for all. As it is now, with the current infections, serious illnesses, hospitalizations, deaths and long COVID seemingly being swept under the carpet, and everything "back to normal" (although it isn't) it doesn't look as though we will look at anything, and therefore that we won't be better organised and prepared when the next public health crises comes - or  perhaps any crisis

Interestingly enough, it wasn't until Morrison became PM that legally the states had to ask for Federal assistance during emergencies. However, under previous PMs, the issue never arose, the federal and state governments just did. In any case, NSW during the latest floods had to ask in writing, three times, before anything happened. Hence Morrison and his government were incompetent.

Way back in the early 70s Whitlam offered to take over the entire hospital network from the states but the then Liberal party and the states opposed the move.

I don't think that the issue is a constitutional one - unless a state government challenges it in the High Court. It was a case of the federal government not even imagining what to do. Hence Gladys' comments on Morrison.

I suspect that the reason Morrison is remaining in Parliament is because he won't be able to get a decent corporate job as no one would have him. Contrast that with Gladys who left politics under a cloud and joined Optus at board level.

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  • 2 months later...
55 minutes ago, kingofhearts said:

Fuck we voted scott morrison out, why are we still hearing about this cunt

That's not true. He may no longer be Prime Minister but he's still an MP. As Prime Minister he may well have acted improperly, and he certainly wasn't open and transparent with his cabinet about his actions.

3 hours ago, NewConvert said:

@jw1739 After this week's events I am ready to change the constitution to prevent anything like this happening again.

I think that the problem is what would the changes be? The whole system is rotten to the core, from local government right up to Canberra - just a litany of corruption, rorts, jobs for the boys, self interest, etc. etc. Barely a week goes by without a scandal at one of the three levels of government. We've spent the past 30 years wasting time on social engineering rather than focussing on building the country for the majority and for the future.

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9 hours ago, jw1739 said:

That's not true. He may no longer be Prime Minister but he's still an MP. As Prime Minister he may well have acted improperly, and he certainly wasn't open and transparent with his cabinet about his actions.

I think that the problem is what would the changes be? The whole system is rotten to the core, from local government right up to Canberra - just a litany of corruption, rorts, jobs for the boys, self interest, etc. etc. Barely a week goes by without a scandal at one of the three levels of government. We've spent the past 30 years wasting time on social engineering rather than focussing on building the country for the majority and for the future.

corruption and process are two different things. Right now, the former PM cannot be charged with anything and has established a legal precedent thanks to Michael Porter. So the solution is to override the legal mechanism, preferably via a constitutional amendment thus preventing anyone from creating and using such a mechanism.

Corruption and rorts should be part of a federal ICAC - at state level there are already laws in place (Victorian a very weak though). Jobs for the boys and self-interest are grey areas. As an example, the Liberal MP Dan Tehan has two Masters degrees in Foreign Affairs and Trade as well as having worked in the department of foreign affairs. If he was named ambassador to somewhere I would not be opposed because he has the background for it. Job for the boys? Yes. OTOH, Sophie Mirabella qualified for nothing and yet so many plum posts.

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10 hours ago, jw1739 said:

Thanks for that, although I strongly disagree that the GG is meant to be Australian democracy's failsafe. The GG is explicitly there to protect the interests of the sovereign, that is, Queen Lizzy II.

The undermining of democracy, at least in Australia, is because not enough  people join political parties and BTW volunteer organisations such as local sports clubs are also facing the same existential dilemma. Though experiment: imagine that 10% of the electorate joined the ALP, 10% joined the Liberal party and 10% join other political parties - do you honestly think that the same list of candidates would have been pre-selected if that was the case?

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I don't think I need any comments from an American basketballer to assist me in making an informed decision on the "Voice to Parliament" proposal.

IMO it's poor form by the newly-elected government to treat such a serious proposal as some sort of showbiz event.

The proposal will stand or fall on its merits as determined by all Australian citizens, whatever their origins, as it should be.

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26 minutes ago, jw1739 said:

I don't think I need any comments from an American basketballer to assist me in making an informed decision on the "Voice to Parliament" proposal.

IMO it's poor form by the newly-elected government to treat such a serious proposal as some sort of showbiz event.

The proposal will stand or fall on its merits as determined by all Australian citizens, whatever their origins, as it should be.

Promotions by governments are nothing unusual. The angle here of course is that it reaches a demographic that can be difficult to reach and it says that the world is watching. Before you get all nationalistic on me, those who travel internationally experience either increased good will or a cool wind. At least we are not Russians that seem to have had a bad reputation for ages - long before the current spate of wars.

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  • 2 months later...

@jw1739 as requested :)

I am getting uncomfortable with the state government, specially with the size of the debt and the reduced number of health care and teachers in the state system - primarily due to covid. Even more concerning is that the opposition have not made much progress in presenting a coherent critique of the government much less alternative policies. If the opposition loses seats then it will be much harder to create both with fewer members in parliament. And if there are more independents then it is harder for a coherent critique to develop.

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56 minutes ago, NewConvert said:

@jw1739 as requested :)

I am getting uncomfortable with the state government, specially with the size of the debt and the reduced number of health care and teachers in the state system - primarily due to covid. Even more concerning is that the opposition have not made much progress in presenting a coherent critique of the government much less alternative policies. If the opposition loses seats then it will be much harder to create both with fewer members in parliament. And if there are more independents then it is harder for a coherent critique to develop.

I'm disillusioned by what's happening - or not happening - at both a state and Commonwealth level, basically because I don't see any actual fundamental change taking place, or even proposed. It's simply more, or less, of the same every time. You can pour money into "health," "education," "transport," "defence" etc. etc. , all of which are undefined bottomless pits. What we should be doing is deciding on outputs, and then determining what the inputs should be to achieve those outputs, and then where the taxes should be raised to realise those inputs. I know I'll be shot down for saying so, but at a Commonwealth level there's far too much emphasis on social engineering and at a state level on electorate-based promises. The other thing that really gets to me, which I believe is evidence of poor policy, is "relief payments." We're seeing this right now with electricity and gas - the systems of supply are broken. Sure you need to give relief in the short-term, but that won't fix the broken system, so get on and do the fix or else all that will happen is relief will be needed again in the future.

And don't even start me on my local council...

Just a rant I suppose...

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4 hours ago, jw1739 said:

I'm disillusioned by what's happening - or not happening - at both a state and Commonwealth level, basically because I don't see any actual fundamental change taking place, or even proposed. It's simply more, or less, of the same every time. You can pour money into "health," "education," "transport," "defence" etc. etc. , all of which are undefined bottomless pits. What we should be doing is deciding on outputs, and then determining what the inputs should be to achieve those outputs, and then where the taxes should be raised to realise those inputs. I know I'll be shot down for saying so, but at a Commonwealth level there's far too much emphasis on social engineering and at a state level on electorate-based promises. The other thing that really gets to me, which I believe is evidence of poor policy, is "relief payments." We're seeing this right now with electricity and gas - the systems of supply are broken. Sure you need to give relief in the short-term, but that won't fix the broken system, so get on and do the fix or else all that will happen is relief will be needed again in the future.

And don't even start me on my local council...

Just a rant I suppose...

If you waltz on over to my post in the International Politics, you will note that Liz Truss did have a go at making fundaMENTAL changes and look where that got the UK. So either the broad strokes are ok just need finessing or governments/oppositions start making the case for bigger changes. Sadly, the electorate recoils at large scale changes hence the now perpetual small target election strategy. On this I can't hold politicians guilty as that comes down to the electorate coming to terms that fundamental changes are required and accepting to live with it.

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Fair enough. The only people who welcome change are those who benefit from it. But, for example, I'd guess that the electorate would welcome a decent taxation system in which the mish-mash of current taxes and levies is replaced by a financial transaction tax. And a proper national health service. And the building of national transport infrastructure so that we could actually decentralise rather than have a handful of sprawling cities that are rapidly become unliveable.

All we do now is stick band-aid on top of the previous band-aid while the sore underneath continues to fester.

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8 hours ago, jw1739 said:

Fair enough. The only people who welcome change are those who benefit from it. But, for example, I'd guess that the electorate would welcome a decent taxation system in which the mish-mash of current taxes and levies is replaced by a financial transaction tax. And a proper national health service. And the building of national transport infrastructure so that we could actually decentralise rather than have a handful of sprawling cities that are rapidly become unliveable.

All we do now is stick band-aid on top of the previous band-aid while the sore underneath continues to fester.

I think that some changes benefit everybody; the issue is when the benefit becomes clear and who suffers the immediate consequences. The converse is true as well - the closing of psychiatric hospitals in the early 90s benefited no one in the cities but farmers got a tax cut. I firmly believe that the financial sector is out of control as historically this sector has been about 5% of GDP but it is way above that now. Hence a financial transaction tax makes perfect sense.

As for decentralisation - that was bipartisan policy from 1901 until 1987. It did not work. Bizarrely enough, Victoria was decentralising organically prior to Covid. George Megalogenis had an article in The Age in 2020/2021 showing the stats. What effect Covid has on this I don't know. What I do know is that providing full on NBN and public transport (fields that I am familiar with) will cost a lot. On top of the covid expenditure makes this tricky.

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I take note of everything you say. But I also make the point that we have to look at the cost of NOT doing something, and that's my issue with not building a fast efficient railway network - probably rebuilding when you look at what we once had - and other public transport infrastructure, or indeed infrastructure in general. Our cities are becoming unliveable, road traffic unmanageable, many people virtually isolated in sprawling outer suburbs. And I think these continuing developments should be taken out of the hands of politicians, who simply politicise them and we get the repetitive cycle of tit-for-tat "promises" - "my hospital is bigger than yours" type stuff.

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8 hours ago, jw1739 said:

I take note of everything you say. But I also make the point that we have to look at the cost of NOT doing something, and that's my issue with not building a fast efficient railway network - probably rebuilding when you look at what we once had - and other public transport infrastructure, or indeed infrastructure in general. Our cities are becoming unliveable, road traffic unmanageable, many people virtually isolated in sprawling outer suburbs. And I think these continuing developments should be taken out of the hands of politicians, who simply politicise them and we get the repetitive cycle of tit-for-tat "promises" - "my hospital is bigger than yours" type stuff.

I take note of what you are saying. Historically, town planning was decentralised but somewhere around 1990 and embraced by all sides of politics was to make the CBD the centrepiece for business, entertainment and tourism. Sydney on the other hand being topographically  more difficult developed organically multiple centres of business/entertainment and Qld historically has also being more decentralised.

There is one other aspect to consider and that is that you can't force people. So now we have a hodgepodge where locals oppose medium/high density (supported by the greens in a hypocritical move) but state governments override the local concerns. A statewide fast rail and optical fibre network will do a lot to ease congestion and liveability issues. Not sure about nationwide fast rail though.

The other thing is that developers are getting away without building proper lieveability sectors around the new suburbs. Hence there is one shopping centre without entertainment facilities, schools, etc. And that will cause a demographic time bomb when the kids reach 18.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I'm bitterly disappointed by these revelations on child detention in Australia. How we can justify treating people this way beggars belief. Also disgusted by the recent letters sent to 495 asylum seekers suggesting that they make arrangements to "move elsewhere." As someone suffering from the inaction and policies of the Government via the Department of Home Affairs Immigration Section I call for changes to be made to how this Department operates. As well as strutting his stuff on the international stage Albanese needs to show some leadership here at home. Well, home for some people but not quite home for others so it seems...

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20 hours ago, jw1739 said:

I'm bitterly disappointed by these revelations on child detention in Australia. How we can justify treating people this way beggars belief. Also disgusted by the recent letters sent to 495 asylum seekers suggesting that they make arrangements to "move elsewhere." As someone suffering from the inaction and policies of the Government via the Department of Home Affairs Immigration Section I call for changes to be made to how this Department operates. As well as strutting his stuff on the international stage Albanese needs to show some leadership here at home. Well, home for some people but not quite home for others so it seems...

Listening to the Robodebt RC, hearing the senior public servants shitting themselves telling the politicians what they were doing was illegal and therefore not telling them, tells me a lot how the Coalition was running the public service. I suspect that this method was used throughout the public service and so the whole department will need to be re-staffed.

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Absolutely. Seemingly no-one having or accepting accountability for anything. It's the same in the various State "public services," the most recent being the forensic services debacle in Queensland.

In passing, any views out there on what is likely to happen in the forthcoming Victorian election? I've got my (postal vote) ballot papers sitting in front of me and don't really want to vote for anyone...

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You do realise that you can send in blank postal papers. I have done that before as I felt that there was no one really providing an inspiring future and nothing outstanding had happened.

As for next week - I don't have any particular insight other than we need to wait and see. First up, I know that there are a lot of small business and sole traders (including tradies) who are pissed off. So I am expecting the ALP to lose a few seats. The unfortunate thing is that the coalition is unlikely to pick up many. There is the real danger that the coalition will lose seats to liberal independents. Right now looking at state divisions in WA & Vic we are witnessing the demise of the Liberal or at least an implosion. SA also has problems but of a different kind. NSW will be instructive next year. Tasmanians seem to be doing OK and Qld will most likely be tantalisingly close but not enough. So at the end of the day the lower house will have an ALP majority and a minority in the upper house. The Greens are not going to make much of an inroad although they should pick up Richmond.

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1 minute ago, NewConvert said:

You do realise that you can send in blank postal papers. I have done that before as I felt that there was no one really providing an inspiring future and nothing outstanding had happened.

Yes, I do. But that simply passes the choice on to someone else. However, I may still do it. Better, perhaps, to vote one way in the lower house and the other in the upper house?

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Appalling revelations concerning state care and guardianship in Western Australia coming out of the latest Royal Commission. What kind of society are we living in?

Looks like the Victorian election could go down to the wire. It really is difficult to know who to vote for.

For the upper house I'm in the Southern Metropolitan electorate, and it grates on me to see so many candidates who don't live in suburbs that I would describe as "southern."

Where possible I've voted for people who might at least have some knowledge of the suburb where I reside.

I shall watch TV on Saturday evening with interest.

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