It is on (Turnbull calling a presser at 4pm 14th)

[metalman]

Yep, it's far more stupid to vote for the "scum bosses" of the unions than vote for a party that's bought and paid for by big business. If you read my post properly MM I was calling for balance by saying both major parties are owned by business of one sort or another. The only way you get away from this is to ban lobbying and remove all political donations. The Koch brothers (owners of Coca-Cola) are pumping $1 BILLION into campaigning for the Republican party in the US. Do you really think businesses make an investment like that without expecting something in return?

 

In 2013/14 Labor received $78m in donations. Libs received $125m and Nats $12m, so LNP total $137m. Do you reckon that extra $59m came from chook raffles at the local RSL, or businesses backing the horse they think will lower their tax obligations (or continue to ignore the current loopholes)?

Again, its rationalising crime , so the LNP gets more money, and yes they will have to owe favours for that money ,,,,but if the only way the labor party can raise funds is by extortion ,theft and ripping off union members does that not say something for what they stand for,,,,Shorten screws the workers while extorting the same company out of hundreds of thousands of dollars ,,,,,and the best defence is the LNP gets money to !

 

Union bosses steal from the members for house renos ,hookers ,holidays ,parties and the it's all because the LNP has got more donations ,,,,I mean there's union scum getting caught constantly for stealing from the very people they claim to represent ,,,,and it's all because the LNP has better donations!

 

Even the royal commission is a terrible witch hunt ( the fact that it was instigated by a couple of union reps seems irrelevant ) because when you put a dollar value on the crimes it's less than the RC costs to run,,,,since when has that been a decider in stopping crimes!

 

Like I said ALP/green voters are a special kind of stupid!

 

 

[dutchroll]

I must admit to being slightly amused at seeing Andrew Bolt fling his cornflakes bowl across the other side of the room this morning. I'm glad he can type, because the production of excessive spittle while talking does hamper the ability to be understood.

 

 

[Kyle Communications]

Yes I think poor old Andrew will be beside himself...I am sure he used to dream of sleeping at the foot of Tony's bed

 

 

[fly_tornado]

its been very enlightening watching the true believers have their smugness stripped away by Malcolm's unbridled ambition. Mal knew that there would be no second term for the Abbott government so get in whilst you can and try and minimize the damage going into the election.

 

 

[Doug Evans]

Bring back Joe .........

 

 

[Guest Andys@coffs]

I believe Political resurrection is a possibility, but the other type is a bit more challenging for mere humans......... (He fell off the perch in 2005)

 

 

[cscotthendry]

So the question is, are politicians merely becoming more myopic, or are we the general population only interested in the absolute now! I think its the former, perhaps because there is a chance it can be changed, if the latter then what hope have we?

The answer is the "middle ground". When Hawke and Keating took Labor rightward to the middle politically, they captured a lot of swinging voter that might have voted conservative. The same thing happened with Tony Blair in the UK and Bill Clinton in the US. The problem with that is that to distinguish themselves from the "Labour" parties, the Conservatives had to move further to the Right. This pleased the corporates and the already wealthy so they encouraged, financed and promoted the Conservative. Like drug addicts, the Conservative pollies became addicted to the donations and dependant on them and their media owners to get into power. As they have continued to move further rightward, they have been castigated by extremists for not being far enough out to the Right. For business and the rich, there is no definition of "Enough" and so businesses and the wealthy constantly pushed their Conservative politicians for "more" which the pollies promised in order to secure the support.

 

If the modern conservative parties had to push their current agenda without the massive support of the Murdoch media machine and the overwhelming volume of business donations, they would be unelectable.

 

 

[cscotthendry]

So it's OK for Labor to be financed by the unions, no matter how illegally those funds may be raised (theft, blackmail, standover tactics - read CFMEU,) but the Conservatives cannot? And of course, the unions don't want anything in return for their civic minded generosity, do they?

It's openly stated by the unions that they support and fund the Labor party. Why is that different from businesses funding the conservatives? You talk of funds illegally raised, but as a shareholder of any business, when was the last time that business asked you if it could donate part of the profits to a political party? When workers pay their union fees, they know what they will (mostly) be used for. If you invest in a business, you have zero say about which politicians that business donates to, and the benefits derived from those donations never end up in YOUR ockets.

 

 

[Russ]

No party, no pollie runs this country....... the media does, they have the power to make......and break, pollies fear them.

 

News........is now 24hr TV......or even 1/2 hr "news breaks".........."news" is saturating our lives.

 

 

[willedoo]

No party, no pollie runs this country....... the media does, they have the power to make......and break, pollies fear them.News........is now 24hr TV......or even 1/2 hr "news breaks".........."news" is saturating our lives.

It's sad, really. The wheels fell off everything when news became entertainment with stations competing for viewers.

 

I noticed when our TV stations went from 1/2 hr. news at 6.00pm. to a full hour, the ambulance chasing and BS increased significantly.

 

Also with the 24 hour news cycle, the news people know that we have collective ADD, so they aren't too concerned with accuracy - we'll forget about it tomorrow and there'll be a new story. As a result, the standard of journalism is at it's lowest ebb ever.

 

As for international news, I don't even want to go there. Nowdays, the state security agency of a country can post a fake video on Youtube, and before you can blink, it's dished up on our TV screens as fact, as long as it fits the dominant narrative.

 

 

[Robbo]

The tv is rarely on in my place....... Used to love listening to the "wireless" but now thats gone to the dogs.......

 

 

[fly_tornado]

No party, no pollie runs this country....... the media does, they have the power to make......and break, pollies fear them.News........is now 24hr TV......or even 1/2 hr "news breaks".........."news" is saturating our lives.

bombing Syria was the last real indulgence of the party, everyone in the back bench is worried about losing their seats. Its the bad leadership, primarily selling out to corporate interests, that made Abbott and keeps Shorten unpopular.

 

 

[dutchroll]

It's openly stated by the unions that they support and fund the Labor party. Why is that different from businesses funding the conservatives? You talk of funds illegally raised, but as a shareholder of any business, when was the last time that business asked you if it could donate part of the profits to a political party? When workers pay their union fees, they know what they will (mostly) be used for. If you invest in a business, you have zero say about which politicians that business donates to, and the benefits derived from those donations never end up in YOUR ockets.

That fact has always bemused me.

 

Many on the conservative side harp on about Labor being funded by unions in return for policy favours. Apparently where their own funding comes from, and who benefits from their own policy decisions, is a complete mystery to them.

 

 

[willedoo]

The tv is rarely on in my place....... Used to love listening to the "wireless" but now thats gone to the dogs.......

Robbo, you're not missing much by leaving that TV off.

 

The ABC radio is still not too bad. Good football coverage and the current affairs aren't as biased as the ABC TV.

 

 

[Robbo]

Yep... I must admit I enjoy listening to Tony Delroy & Trevor Chappell...

 

Although don't cheat on Delroys quiz or he will terminate the call... LOL

 

 

[Yenn]

I think I will give up on the ABC. I always watch the 7pm news, but yesterday the Abbot fiasco was going full bore when I turned on at a bit before 7. They did find a cople of minutes to give other news, before 7-30 came on and it was full bore Abbot again. It is just cheap journalism. The journos don't have to think, just spout away and get an expert or two to waffle on a bit and there you are 2 hours taken care of.

 

Next thing will be the USA presidential elections full bore. ABC quoted that Obama was in his last year as president the other day. They can't even count how long it is till the next pres will be inaugurated in Jan 2017.

 

 

[kaz3g]

I tend to agree. What we need is a LEADER. Someone with vision, intelligence and the skill to take us along with him. If only the media would allow that to happen.

So we need governments and oppositions that will plan policies for the long term rather than focussing on the next election. We need governments and oppositions that do all possible to denounce and deal with corruption, no matter whether it is capitalising on insider knowledge about planning decisions or undeclared election funding or electoral funding which is blatant vote-buying rather than meeting prioritised needs.

 

The only way we will have any chance of getting them is if the populace chooses to vote the transgressors, whoever they are, out of office rather than being welded on conservative or labor unthinking voters.

 

I still believe in fairies....

 

Kaz

 

 

[Guest Andys@coffs]

Couldn't agree more Kaz......reality unfortunately is that many would think poorly of those that don't vote...and yet imho those that just always vote X no matter what are as equally useless to Australia.....I mean in reality who among us is entirely and unequivocally happy with the way things are and yet we somehow expect a different outcome but change nothing........There's power in the swinging vote. Make them work damn hard for your vote, its almost priceless so don't just give it away! Reality is the mainstream party's love those that can be relied to vote for them no matter what and so they do exactly nothing for them rather shift all the discretionary adjustments to those seats that swing...... and all the powerbrokers...well swinging seats aren't their seat!!!!!

 

 

[Geoff13]

[ATTACH]47708._xfImport[/ATTACH]

[dutchroll]

Well, technically the results do matter. Unlike in the USA where you directly vote for a leader, here you vote for your local member (which they do in the mid-terms). You may choose to interpret this as a vote for the leader, or you may (as quite a number of people do) be simply voting for the party and you'd likely vote that way regardless of who is the leader and whether or not you'd prefer a different one.

 

For the swinging voters the difference between who is or isn't is the leader is the greatest.

 

The weirdest thing is hearing the real hardcore conservative voters who liked Abbott saying they won't vote Liberal now. They want to cut off their nose to spite their face! It's beyond bizarre that you could be a true-blue LNP supporter and actually vote to either make your party lose to the opposition, or to fail to have a legislative majority and have thus hamstring their ability to govern. But......they are the people for whom I most often have difficulty determining their logic at the best of times.

 

 

[Kiwi303]

Actually the American political system isn't set up so you Directly vote for a leader.

 

It is a remnant from the days of horse and pony and long distances before trains. they vote for a delegate, who was supposed to travel as the representative of that local community to where the potential presidential candidates were, appraise them, and vote for the nominee to stand as president they felt best suited the localities needs. These are the Primarys, which are what Trump and Hillary are campaigning for now, to be their parties respective presidential candidate.

 

After the slate of possible presidents is filled, people vote for Electors, again supposed to be intelligent, educated, cultured men with the ability to travel long distances and ascertain which of the various candidates on the ballot should become the next president. The collection of Electors is the US Electoral College.

 

John Q Public has no say in who becomes president, only indirectly by electing an elector he thinks will vote the same way he will.

 

 

[willedoo]

You're quite right there, Kiwi303. Remember the Al Gore vs George Bush election. Gore won the majority of votes in the majority of states and still lost to Bush.

 

 

[Marty_d]

Again, its rationalising crime , so the LNP gets more money, and yes they will have to owe favours for that money ,,,,but if the only way the labor party can raise funds is by extortion ,theft and ripping off union members does that not say something for what they stand for,,,,Shorten screws the workers while extorting the same company out of hundreds of thousands of dollars ,,,,,and the best defence is the LNP gets money to !Union bosses steal from the members for house renos ,hookers ,holidays ,parties and the it's all because the LNP has got more donations ,,,,I mean there's union scum getting caught constantly for stealing from the very people they claim to represent ,,,,and it's all because the LNP has better donations!

 

Even the royal commission is a terrible witch hunt ( the fact that it was instigated by a couple of union reps seems irrelevant ) because when you put a dollar value on the crimes it's less than the RC costs to run,,,,since when has that been a decider in stopping crimes!

 

Like I said ALP/green voters are a special kind of stupid!

The RC is a furphy, everyone knows that. If the cops, the crime commission and all the other existing law enforcement out there can't investigate actual crime, what the hell is the use of them? Abbott started the TURC solely to dish dirt on the Labor party by association and his plan is obviously working in your particular case.

 

By this logic, given that the RC into institutional responses to child abuse have found far worse criminal activity in some religious organisations, and Tony Abbott, Cory Bernardi and Kevin Andrews are religious nutters, they're criminal too. Fair comparison? Yeah, I agree, it's equally as stupid a proposition.

 

And even if you think the ALP is tainted by union involvement, why are you having a crack at the Greens? They are a separate party, you do know that, right?

 

Special kind of stupid. Hmmm.

 

 

[dutchroll]

Yeah I'm aware of that Kiwi. However in many States it's against the law for an electoral college member to go against the popular vote (ie, become what they call a "faithless elector"). Even where it's not, it's considered pretty bad form. Sure it has been done though, however it has never, ever changed an election result in the USA.

 

The peculiarities of the raw percentage of the popular vote versus who actually wins occur in any country with a "representative" style system, ie, where an individual government member holds a "seat", or casts an election vote on behalf of a group of voters.

 

 

[PA.]

Public Service Message.

 

 

 

 

 

Remember to change your Smoke Alarm Batteries each time Australia changes it's Prime Minister.