Re: Aus Federal Politics thread (XII)

[horace]

but then agian as the old Beatles song goes ..."you say it's your birthday"

[embee]

Whereas from TA we get this:

“Under members opposite, defence jobs in this country declined by 10 per cent,” Mr Abbott told parliament.

“There was a holocaust of jobs in defence industries under members opposite.”.

Happily he quickly apologised for using the term.

another word hi-jacked by political correctness

poor effort

Does holocaust have several meanings?

Was Abbott using it in the Nazi context?

If Abbott ate a Golden Gaytime would he be asked why he doesn't support same sex marriages?

[Blackadder]

It does have several meanings, but to use a word so strongly linked to the atrocities of WWII, poor judgement from the PM.

[JGK]

It does have several meanings, but to use a word so strongly linked to the atrocities of WWII, poor judgement from the PM.

Funnily enough he replaced it with decimate which also has a modern usage much different to historical meaning.

[embee]

Here's four examples of Oz pollies or ex pollies using the word holocaust ....a comrade, two watermelons and a good guy

The Rudd government deserved to be re-elected for saving Australia from an "economic holocaust" that had massively crunched the US and UK

“It is an environmental holocaust, no different to the Sumatran clearfelling and burning which so appalled (climate change economist) Sir Nicholas Stern a fortnight ago,”

"These clean technology companies have the ability to offset the kind of holocaust that we are driving our economy, our society and our environment towards."

"Because the strength of the Australian economy has shown in the face of the Asian economic holocaust has been absolutely remarkable."

[horace]

I think it unacceptable in each of the uses cited.

Lazy use of hyperbole encourages use of terms such as holocaust which for 70+ years has had a very particular meaning.

[JGK]

I think it unacceptable in each of the uses cited.

Lazy use of hyperbole encourages use of terms such as holocaust which for 70+ years has had a very particular meaning.

Meh. The phrase "nuclear holocaust" was used ad infinitum in the 80s without anyone associating it with concentration camps.

[Paul Keating]

Here's four examples of Oz pollies or ex pollies using the word holocaust ....a comrade,  two watermelons and a good guy

The Rudd government deserved to be re-elected for saving Australia from an "economic holocaust" that had massively crunched the US and UK

“It is an environmental holocaust, no different to the Sumatran clearfelling and burning which so appalled (climate change economist) Sir Nicholas Stern a fortnight ago,”

"These clean technology companies have the ability to offset the kind of holocaust that we are driving our economy, our society and our environment towards."

"Because the strength of the Australian economy has shown in the face of the Asian economic holocaust has been absolutely remarkable."

Two wrongs make a right for you. Seriously pull your head in. Or tell it to the Jewish community.

[embee]

The top use was your eponym

None of the users were denigrating , disrespecting the Jewish community

Only one of the users was Tony Abbott ...

[skully]

Must be a slow news day.

[lardbucket]

Lazy use of hyperbole

Nice; that was Julia.

[horace]

the MM today has announced bribe to subscribe...eg $80 pw for part pensioners...

[JGK]

the MM today has announced bribe to subscribe...eg $80 pw for part pensioners...

They've lowered the deeming rates which seems a fair thing in the current interest rate environment.

[horace]

nah screw them...those kulaks voted the wrong way!!!

[embee]

THE Abbott government is being forced by the Senate to give a tax cut it never offered as compensation for a policy that no longer exists to deliver a promise Labor broke. That’s what’s wrong with the budget.

It is the same Senate that is forcing the Coalition government to keep spending money on the SchoolKids Bonus that it said — before the election — it would axe. That’s what’s wrong with the ­budget.

A government in a political hole that has bungled the fiscal ­repair job by failing to convince the public of its remedy now speaks of new spending on a ­families package and small-­business tax cuts as it seeks votes, yet cannot pay for the spending it ­already makes. That’s what’s wrong with the budget.

The Greens who won’t provide the votes to achieve their own ­policy to increase petrol tax ­because it would help the Abbott government. That’s what’s wrong with the budget.

An opposition that put the ­budget into deficit and loaded it up with new spending votes against $5 billion of savings it took to the last election. That’s what’s wrong with the budget.

And voters who think it’s ­Valentine’s Day every day and want politicians to wine and dine them and send chocolates and flowers when what they really need is a no-frills meat-and-three-veg ­fiscal meal. That’s what’s wrong with the budget.

This is just a taste of the problems that plague the federal budget, which has lived beyond its means for the past six years with deficits of $27bn, $54.5bn, $47.5bn, $43.4bn, $18.8bn and the most ­recent $48.5bn. That’s $240bn in total.

The latest predictions, issued last December, are that the next four years will see more red ink worth $40.4bn, $31.2bn, $20.8bn and $11.5bn.

These forecasts are certain to change — probably for the worst — but based on the current trajectory that’s another $104bn of deficits unless we have deliberate decisions to make more cuts or raise extra revenue and without spending a single dollar more in the next four years.

As Reserve Bank governor Glenn Stevens warned on Friday, while public debt is “not going to kill us today … I think it is important for public policy to get the debt trajectory on to a different ­trajectory from the one it is going to be on”.

The forward estimates showing the budget deficit gradually getting smaller “assumes, of course, that nothing goes wrong in that time”.

We might be lucky and get higher-than-expected growth, but economies also have downturns and Stevens said that to ­believe nothing would go wrong “might be being a little hopeful”. Stevens, who has led the central bank since 2006, when Peter Costello had big surpluses, and has seen the Asian financial crisis, the global financial crisis and both mining booms is not prone to exaggeration.

The government, the Greens, Labor, the Senate and voters should listen to his words.

He painted a picture of what would happen if there was a serious downturn in the economy, as a warning and not a forecast.

“The budget deficit would go from 2 per cent of GDP to 5 or 6 in a heartbeat,” he said.

“And whichever government finds itself in office when that has occurred — some of you will be there — will find much less ­discretion afforded to you by ­financial markets that day than you will be comfortable with if your budget deficit has already gone on to be a fairly big number,” he told the MPs on the House of Representatives economics committee. “The amount of discretion we have right now is a lot. Conditions are very benign, and the debt is not large and is not accumulating ­rapidly.

“It is not quite clear what trajectory the deficit is on now, ­because it is difficult to pass things in the parliament. But in the scenario I am sketching out — which I am not predicting, and which I hope we could avoid but which you cannot just assume blithely can never happen — things would be a lot less comfortable. It would be better not to ever be in that ­position.”

Stevens says returning to a surplus and low debt are needed for “a rainy day”. He cited Britain, saying it had “pretty tough budgetary measures, but is actually now growing quite well”.

“I am not sure that the evidence is unambiguous that taking the fiscal medicine in a sensible way, even if it was a bit tough, did not get them on the right path.”

Think about that on July 1 when, instead of doing something sensible to cut spending to control debt and deficit, we take the popular option of a tax cut, costing $2bn over the next three years, that was actually dumped by Julia Gillard and Wayne Swan on the eve of Labor’s last budget.

The tax cut had been intended as the second round of minor compensation for the carbon tax, but Labor realised it was not ­needed and booked the saving in the budget, but never got around to taking it off the books.

Now, in a populist frenzy, it won’t vote to clean up its own ­sloppy paperwork.

The $2bn will hurt the budget, but individually the tax cuts are tiny. People earning between $25,000 and $65,000 get $83 a year. Not a week, but a year. That’s $1.59 a week.

“Not a sandwich, not a milkshake,” quips Deloitte Access Economics director Chris Richardson.

For those earning about $70,000 the tax cut is $63 a year — $1.21 a week. Everyone earning above $80,000 get $13 a year — 25c a week.

The majority of the Senate wants to keep a weekly tax cut of between 25c and $1.59 as compensation for a carbon tax that has been abolished. Sure, everyone wants a tax cut, but this one isn’t worth it.

It will take hard yards to fix the budget, but the Senate cannot even take the easy steps.

[Paul Keating]

How about not caving into petrol price indexation ala LJH.

Would have saved the budget $5B a year.

[embee]

How about not caving into petrol price indexation ala LJH.

Would have saved the budget $5B a year.

Two wrongs make a right for you. Seriously pull your head in.

[horace]

the libs are simply hopeless at negotiation...they specialise in telling people how to live their lives but no5t in working with them...this is why morons like Creepy Mirabella lost their seat to an Independent

[JGK]

It's getting bad for TA when the News Ltd papers are running anti-Abbott stories:

Philip Ruddock told Tony Abbott about backbench disquiet

EXCLUSIVE

TONY Abbott was informed by former chief whip Philip Ruddock on multiple occasions that there was disquiet among his backbench about the direction of his government.
In a direct rebuke to the Prime Minister’s comments yesterday, News Corp Australia understands Mr Abbott was told on multiple occasions about the level of concern by his chief whip.
But even before things came to that, Mr Ruddock’s role was substantially muted in comparison to the chief whip’s position in opposition and under the former Howard government.
Mr Ruddock was cut out of key tactics meetings and full meetings of the ministry.
“In the Howard era the whip was included in everything like that,” one MP said.
“To cut Philip out of those meetings and then say it’s all his fault, that he didn’t tell us what’s going on is just stupid.
PHILIP RUDDOCK SACKED: Did Tony Abbott just break another promise?
“Philip has been treated like the rest of us — we don’t want to hear any problems, just do what we say.”
News Corp Australia also understands the Prime Minister began calling a large number of MPs directly in January to gauge how they felt about the direction his government was taking.
It is understood Mr Ruddock encouraged MPs to express any concerns they had directly with Mr Abbott.
On Friday, the Prime Minister sacked Mr Ruddock, who was elected in 1973, as chief whip and replaced him with Queensland Liberal National Party MP Scott Buchholz. Abbott loyalist Andrew Nikolic was promoted to one of the deputy whip positions.
Contacted today, Mr Ruddock would not comment further to what he said over the weekend about his sacking.
Firm friends ... Then Opposition Leader Tony Abbott with Philip Ruddock during the 2013 e
Firm friends ... Then Opposition Leader Tony Abbott with Philip Ruddock during the 2013 election campaign. Photo By Gary Ramage Source: News Limited
“I have nothing further to say on that, the decision was one made by the leader,” Mr Ruddock said.
“My expectation is that if the Prime Minister had concerns about the way I undertook the task, he would put them to me.”
During a radio appearance this afternoon, Mr Ruddock could not confirm that Tony Abbott still had his support to continue as Prime Minister.
“He had my support,” Mr Ruddock told Sydney’s 2UE radio referring to last week’s spill motion.
But pressed further on if that meant Mr Abbott still enjoyed his support, Mr Ruddock would not elaborate.
“He had my support,” he repeated.
Yesterday, the Prime Minister said he was blindsided by the level of discontent within his party, following 39 MPs in his party room voting in favour of a leadership spill last Monday.
“Plainly, I wasn’t as aware as I should have been of all of this. I never want to find myself in this position ever again,” Mr Abbott told Andrew Bolt when quizzed about Mr Ruddock’s sacking yesterday.
Today Mr Abbott compared the whip decision to his ministry reshuffle last year.
News Corp Australia has been told by more than a dozen MPs that they personally spoke with the Prime Minister in the lead up to last week’s vote on a leadership spill.
Loyal ... Philip Ruddock in crowd as Tony Abbott addressed post budget response lunch at
Loyal ... Philip Ruddock in crowd as Tony Abbott addressed post budget response lunch at the Sheraton Wentworth Hotel in Sydney in 2012. Source: News Limited
Many said they directly expressed concerns over the party’s direction and certain key policies such as Paid Parental Leave and the GP co-payment.
“I told him how I felt and that I wasn’t the only one,” one MP said.
Another MP said: “Prime ministers have telephones provided free of charge by the Commonwealth so they have plenty of time to ring plenty of people”.
Another MP said: “That statement (from Mr Abbott) doesn’t seem at all accurate. I know MPs were telling him about their concerns, and it wasn’t just backbenchers I must say.”
“The level of backbench angst and anger was continuing to rise for six months. Those calls we got in January were the first real chat many of us had had with the Prime Minister in the whole time we’ve been in government,” another MP said.
“You didn’t have to be Nostradamus to see what was coming.”
Several MPs have told News Corp Australia they have been fielding calls from the Liberal party membership and community leaders who were “particularly antsy” about Mr Ruddock’s sacking.
“Philip is Mr Multicultural. He is deeply respected and a lot of community leaders are really angry about how he’s been treated,” one MP said.
Another MP said: “The multicultural community is really upset about this decision. My office has been getting calls about it.”

[skully]

And from the twit who would have us believe he can be Treasurer

"OPPOSITION treasury spokesman Chris Bowen says he knows what Australia’s tax rates are despite being unable to identify the tax-free threshold during a live television interview.

Under repeated questioning during the interview on Sky News’ Richo and Jones program last night, Mr Bowen was unable to correctly nominate the figure of $18,200.

Pressed by talkback host Alan Jones to explain what Australia’s tax levels were, Mr Bowen fumbled and appeared increasingly uncomfortable.

Speaking after the interview, Mr Bowen said he thought Mr Jones was quizzing him about superannuation tax rather than personal income tax rates but he conceded it had not been his best performance."

---------------------------------------

What a dill. Even in Opposition he's a useless qunt.

[embee]

not knowing a tax rate worked for Pallashay

[skully]

But she's not the potential next Treasurer.

[embee]

dont apply logic to people who vote for the pinkos

[skully]

Too true. The collective goldfish memory of the electorate scares the bejezus out of me.

[horace]

this is why I am emigrating from this place..

[Sponsored content]