Ninglun’s Oz Politics and Big Archive

Since in the last weeks of the election the big thrust of the Howard TEAM will be that they alone can be TRUSTED with the ECONOMY, I am all in favour of those who question this gospel.

Take this site, for example:

Per Capita.org

Especially see this entry: Prosperity and Fairness - An evening with Andrew Charlton.

On 30 August, Per Capita was joined by Andrew Charlton at the Hero of Waterloo in Sydney to discuss his latest book, Ozonomics. Andrew is a former Rhodes Scholar, currently at the London School of Economics, who co-wrote his first book, Fair Trade for All, with Nobel Prize winner Joseph Stiglitz at the age of 26.

Andrew embarked on the Ozonomics project out of frustration with the quality of financial reporting in Australia. He felt that gold prices and dollar exchange rates shed little light on the country’s real economic dynamics and set out to explore the inner workings of the Australian economy and unpack our prevailing economic myths.

The recipe for a strong, sustainable economy can be boiled down to three ingredients, Andrew argued: the holy trinity of jobs, productivity and equality. More people in work, each producing more output, make the pie bigger. An equitable distribution of the pie, which doesn’t undermine individual incentives, delivers social justice and sustains stable economic structures.

Andrew challenged the central economic claims of the current Federal government: that reforms undertaken by Howard and Costello were directly responsible for the existing boom, and that their economic management skills are critical to the economy’s future health. This argument may be a successful exercise in political salesmanship, but it lacks any real foundation in economics.

From interest rates to the surplus to workplace reform, Andrew argued the influence of Coalition policy on economic performance has been greatly overstated. In a direct comparison of reforms undertaken by Hawke/Keating versus those of Howard/Costello, Andrew argued the former were more significant in both volume and substance.

With globalisation wreaking ever more rapid change, Andrew argued that the next major economic challenge will be the threat to Australian middle-class jobs presented by the rise of educated workforces in China and India. These jobs are no longer immune from competition, Andrew claimed, and the challenge extends far beyond call centres - right now, an accountant somewhere in India is building his expertise in Australian tax law.

When pressed on the outlook for economic policy reform in Australia, Andrew explained that he could see three separate camps emerging. First, the sandbaggers who still believed that industrial protection is the only way to save jobs. Second, the sink-or-swim crowd who believe we should deregulate labour markets to compete in a race to the bottom. And finally, the progressive globalists who recognise the opportunities as well as the challenges, and believe Australia should specialise in high value-add areas of competitive advantage…

I don’t usually lift so much of a post, but I hope the people of Per Capita will forgive me. I just think it is a message worth spreading. I have mentioned Ozonomics before.

– “Search for a Scapegoat” special October 26, 2007

And the following sums up for me all those years since Mardi Gras 1996!

Then back in September there was this report on Lateline:

Now see The Poll Bludger for 4 November: Bennelong shock: McKew leads Howard.

The worst-kept secret of recent polling history, the Sunday Telegraph’s Galaxy poll from Bennelong, has now been officially unveiled. As foreshadowed on Lateline, it has Maxine McKew leading John Howard 48 per cent to 47 per cent on the primary vote. McKew’s lead on two-party preferred is 52-48.

The Empress is betting on a narrow Liberal Party win with John Howard no longer in Parliament…

We shall see.

Someone said in the past day or so that Peter Andren, the Independent member for Calare in the central west of NSW, was a parliamentarian rather than a politician. We could do with more of that.

As Wikipedia notes, he was a teacher, television reporter, presenter and producer and radio and television news editor with CBN and 2GZ before entering politics. “He was also a vocal critic of Australia’s policy on asylum seekers, and the Iraq War. His two party-preferred vote of over 75 per cent made Calare the second-safest seat in Australia. This is the greatest achievement by an independent in Australia’s political history.”

So this seems appropriate:

“For those who simply cannot get enough of elections, The Poll Bludger is, I think, the best site in Australia. I stand in awe of the volume of comments William gets,” writes Jim Belshaw referring to The Poll Bludger.

I couldn’t agree more.

I would also recommend: Australia Votes 2007 and Unleashed on the ABC site.

Peter Garrett, that is. Coalition jumps on Garrett’s ‘policy change’ comments. Dumb and stupid, even if it was a joke which it pretty surely was, but while Steve Price really ought to be sympathetic about dumb and stupid you really need to button your lip when talking off the cuff to people like Steve Price, Peter.

I imagine Kevin Rudd may find a colourful stream of language in his next conversation with the ex rock star… May even have a touch of Tony Abbott’s earthiness about it, I suspect.

Later

Garrett is not good at the ten second bite. He seems to me to have made a hash of explaining himself by falling into mantras — three repeated twice in almost as many seconds…

On the other hand, it is possible that “When we get in we will change everything” did have more than one meaning — Price’s and Garrett’s…

Next day

ABC News reports:

‘Joking over’ for Garrett and Labor

Opposition environment spokesman Peter Garrett says comments he made to radio broadcaster Steve Price yesterday have been totally blown out of proportion. Mr Garrett was asked about Labor’s “me-too” policies during a conversation with Mr Price at Melbourne airport yesterday, and responded that Labor would “change it all” if elected.

Yesterday he said that the comments were meant as a joke.

This morning Mr Garrett said he had spoken to the Opposition Leader Kevin Rudd, who he said shared his sense of humour and appreciated the comments were meant as a joke. Mr Garrett has apologised for any confusion and says that the joking is over for the Labor party in this campaign.

Channel Nine television personality Richard Wilkins witnessed the conversation and has backed Mr Garrett’s version of events.

But the Nationals’ Leader Mark Vaile has told Sky Television that Mr Garrett has revealed Labor’s true agenda.

“He said it was a casual comment. Well, casual comments come from the heart, they’re the things that you believe,” he said. “Once on Monday on climate change, and then yesterday on their overall agenda about the me-tooism, Mr Garrett has explained quite clearly to the people of Australia what will happen if a Rudd Labor government is elected.”

Given that we got a GST when Howard said “never ever” and that Work”Choices” came in all unheralded after the election of 2004, I guess the pot is rather calling the kettle black here, even if the construction TEH TEAM is putting on this is the one you’d expect…

I was amused by a similar thought on Blogger on the Cast Iron Balcony the other day:

… What is it about the no-talent bums the Liberals are putting up in the Labor held seats, my brother moaned. He would like to know whether
(a) that’s all the talent the Liberal party grass roots has to offer
(b) it’s a deliberate insult to the citizens in safe seats who they know are going to vote Labor anyway?

As you can imagine, I could only nod and commiserate with him, but I have no real explanation of the phenomenon, except that Mr Curtis’s candidacy fits the current Liberal love affair with US-style Christian wingnuts…

Indeed.

See Study finds left-wing brain, right-wing brain.

Exploring the neurobiology of politics, scientists have found that liberals tolerate ambiguity and conflict better than conservatives because of how their brains work.

In a simple experiment reported today in the journal Nature Neuroscience, scientists at New York University and UCLA show that political orientation is related to differences in how the brain processes information.

Previous psychological studies have found that conservatives tend to be more structured and persistent in their judgments whereas liberals are more open to new experiences. The latest study found those traits are not confined to political situations but also influence everyday decisions.

The results show “there are two cognitive styles — a liberal style and a conservative style,” said UCLA neurologist Dr. Marco Iacoboni, who was not connected to the latest research…

Frank J. Sulloway, a researcher at UC Berkeley’s Institute of Personality and Social Research who was not connected to the study, said the results “provided an elegant demonstration that individual differences on a conservative-liberal dimension are strongly related to brain activity.”

Analyzing the data, Sulloway said liberals were 4.9 times as likely as conservatives to show activity in the brain circuits that deal with conflicts, and 2.2 times as likely to score in the top half of the distribution for accuracy.

Sulloway said the results could explain why President Bush demonstrated a single-minded commitment to the Iraq war and why some people perceived Sen. John F. Kerry, the liberal Massachusetts Democrat who opposed Bush in the 2004 presidential race, as a “flip-flopper” for changing his mind about the conflict.

Based on the results, he said, liberals could be expected to more readily accept new social, scientific or religious ideas.

“There is ample data from the history of science showing that social and political liberals indeed do tend to support major revolutions in science,” said Sulloway, who has written about the history of science and has studied behavioral differences between conservatives and liberals…

Perhaps we should start support groups for these folk? Or is that what the Liberal Party actually is?

Mr Abbott yesterday described as a stunt a move by Mr Banton to present him with a petition supporting the listing of the mesothelioma drug Alimta on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS).

“Let’s be up front about this, I know Bernie is very sick, but just because a person is sick doesn’t necessarily mean that he is pure of heart in all things,” Mr Abbott told the Nine Network. Mr Abbott this morning rang Mr Banton to apologise for his comments.

“I’ve had a chat to Bernie this morning,” Mr Abbott told AAP. “He is a thoroughly decent bloke, he is very committed to helping people who are suffering from asbestos-related diseases. It’s a thoroughly admirable commitment. Obviously I shouldn’t have been as dismissive as I was and I’ve apologised to him.”

Mr Banton, the face of asbestos-disease sufferers, said yesterday he was “infuriated” when the Health Minister was not in his Sydney office to accept the petition. Mr Banton said Mr Abbott, who was in Melbourne, knew of the plans to present him with the petition at his Manly office. Mr Abbott said he was not aware that Mr Banton had planned to present the petition at his Sydney office until it was too late.

– Abbott’s day from hell

Yes, but the mental set that led Abbott to kick out in the first place was only too typical, don’t you think? God help us if someone so patently lacking tact or judgement ever rises any higher.

Thomas has done today’s debate between Abbott and Roxon, so just go there.

John Della Bosca, the NSW Education Minister, has a point.

DESPITE promising 100 new technical colleges across the country the Federal Government has failed to provide even half of the eight it promised for NSW before the last election, the state’s Education Minister, John Della Bosca, said yesterday. Just three had been established and they had secured just 20 per cent of the overall enrolment target, he said.

“One was an existing private school and another contracts the local TAFE to provide its entire vocational program,” Mr Della Bosca said. “A fourth college at western Sydney is not recognised by the independent Board of Studies because it does not have registration as a separate non-government school. The other colleges have failed to get enough teaching staff onto AWAs to open their doors.”

Mr Della Bosca said the Hunter college had attracted 134 students, and the Illawarra facility 37 students, with all its training delivered by TAFE…

Margaret Gardner, vice-chancellor of RMIT and president of the Australian Technology Network of universities, said the technical colleges were not the solution to the skills shortage and were an unnecessary duplication of private colleges and TAFE.

Hatred of the Australian Education Union and the state education unions which serve the existing TAFE institutions seems to me more than part of the government’s agenda. It can’t be objective rationality that has taken them down this wasteful path.

Future of TAFE (PDF)

AEU Fact Sheet (PDF)

It is good to see what strikes me as humour, of a kind, on Catholic News. The reference is to The Australian Christian Lobby who have been talking up their Australia Votes site — Provided as a service to the community of voters across Australia by the Australian Christian Lobby. While I reached it from the ACL site you will notice how modestly Australia Votes advertises its connection at the foot of the page. Some might see that as excessively modest.

Jim Wallace is not so modest when he claims to be speaking for the 64% of the population who identify as Christian. Rather, it might be said, he is indulging in fantasy 1) because his position is by no means that of Christians as such, but only of certain schools of Christianity and 2) that 64% strikes me as very hopeful indeed.

Another Voice is Cardinal George Pell. He speaks for Cardinal George Pell and for those Catholics (and others) who really listen to him. I have no idea how many Catholics do listen to him, but I know the days are long gone since Australian Catholics automatically followed whatever their Bishops and Rome told them to think. This is not to deny that there will be those who agree with Pell on this issue or that, not all of them Catholics. There are even some issues where I agree with Pell, though this is not one of them.

TONY EASTLEY: The Catholic Archbishop of Sydney, Cardinal George Pell, has made an argument for maintaining discrimination against gay couples, saying it’s wrong to equate the position with any sort of racial discrimination.
Cardinal Pell’s argument has the backing of a large Christian lobby group, which is flexing its muscle as the election draws nearer.
Simon Lauder reports.
SIMON LAUDER: After being accused of contempt of the New South Wales Parliament this year, Cardinal George Pell knows all too well the perils of preaching to politicians.
But last night in Sydney, launching his own book about religion and politics, Cardinal Pell attacked those who say the Church shouldn’t get political.
GEORGE PELL: The Greens, some Democrats and largely silent minority elements in both major parties would like to exclude religious considerations from public discussion.
SIMON LAUDER: Cardinal Pell sees a looming battle between religion, and its right to discriminate against gay people, and the push to remove discrimination from laws.
GEORGE PELL: At the heart of this attack on the concept of exemptions for faith-based agencies, lies a false analogy between alleged discrimination against homosexuals and racial discrimination. And this is already beginning to appear in Australia.

I am not so sure it is a false analogy.

Then I could get onto Family First, but I don’t propose to in this entry.

I know where I stand on a variety of issues, and on others am not so certain. I take account of Christian opinion among other opinions. I identify as Christian, but not as Pell Christian or Wallace Christian. I am sure I am not alone.

So long as they are not underhanded about how they do it I don’t mind if Christian groups with whom I may not agree express their views and try to persuade the rest of us. The Australia Votes site strikes me as a tad underhanded, at least in its presentation. It is not “objective” obviously. The activities of the Exclusive Brethren — running advertisements that do not have their name on them for example — are well documented. Four Corners has been there and done that. Less sinister, in my view, than the EB is Hillsong — less sinister because it is more obvious on whose behalf they speak. I also would suggest that in Australia at large the influence of Hillsong (or Catch the Fire) is easily exaggerated. Most Aussies, I suspect, while they may tell the Census they are “Christian” really dislike “Bible bashers”, much as they always have. That is not to deny local pockets of influence in Bible Belt suburbs. Parts of Bennelong are such an instance that may well make life harder for Maxine McKew.

On the other hand I have uploaded some Uniting Church material to this site — because I think generally that material is good. Not by any means an invitation to theocracy though. I think some of my blogging confreres get a bit too excited by all that, even if I can see why.

Next day

Read On Christian and Muslim thick-Sheiks by Irfan Yusuf.

…the Christian vote is highly fractured. The presence of Family First denied Nile a Senate seat at the last Federal Election. This time around, CDP and FF may well share preferences. Presuming, of course, neither party’s candidates are caught flashing in front of the cameras.

The self-styled Australian Christian Lobby has asked party candidates to complete a national survey. The Greens have refused. ACL’s Mufti Jim Wallace has issued a fatwa that “the Greens had shown they were not concerned about the Christian vote and he expected this would influence where these voters put their preferences.”

In one survey question ACL asks: “What are your main priorities if elected for the next term of government? What can you offer to the Christian constituency in particular?”

What on earth is “the Christian constituency”? How does ACL define “Christian”? Does he include people who go to church but resent the encroachment of far-Right Christians into politics?

Wallace is sounding more and more like certain Muslim thick-Sheiks and self-appointed leaders who think they can deliver Muslim votes and support. That Muslims necessarily listen to them. That Muslims are necessarily one community…

From the ABC’s Unleashed.

See also The Gospels of John and Kevin.

I was not all that impressed by Brendan Nelson when he had the Education portfolio, as you know, and tonight’s Four Corners (see the banner link) raised very interesting issues about his watch in Defence, and about his predecessor and indeed the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet. These are critical issues when a government prides itself both on its commitment to security, is involved in war on a number of fronts, and also prides itself on its economic responsibility.

“If you think about all the planes that are available as being puppies in a litter, the Super Hornet is the runt.” US aviation analyst James Stevenson

For more than 30 years Australia has rested its security on the seemingly ageless wings of its F-111 fighter fleet.

But in aviation circles these days there are doubts and rumblings. Some experts fear Australia is set to give away its crucial air superiority in the region.

The reason, they claim, is that decision-makers have made the wrong choices about the planes that will replace the F-111s.

Critics fix their sights on the US-made F/18-A Super Hornet. Australia is the only country outside the US to have bought the Super Hornet – 24 of them.

“I cannot believe that we would waste $6.6 billion of the taxpayers’ money on an aeroplane that has no practical use against any modern new generation fighter coming into our arc of interest to our north,” declares a former RAAF commander.

A growing squadron of critics - including a recent senior Defence insider who now breaks his silence to Four Corners - claim the still-to-be-delivered Super Hornets will be no match for the cheaper, faster, Russian-made Sukhoi fighters bought by Indonesia, Malaysia and China.

Four Corners traces the chain of multi-billion dollar aircraft deals that are beginning to spark concerns about the nation’s future defence capability…

Heavy stuff. The critical bit was the way they broke their own rules on competitive tendering and careful research before committing to megabucks. I am not arguing that megabucks did not have to be spent, but the sum and the product do not seem to many the wisest either in terms of procedures or outcomes. It will be fascinating to see the government spin this between now and the election.

I wish Lord Malcolm was still around; his views would have been worth listening to 1) because he was not anti-government by default and 2) he had forgotten more about aviation, both civil and military, than I ever knew. I know he had followed these matters with some interest in the past.

Media Watch’s follow-up story (here) on Nelson being sucked in on his own website by a fake story that had been exposed by Snopes.com just added to the egg on the good doctor’s face. (Some will say, “Oh naughty ABC” over that, but I think he deserves it.)

If, as I hope, Kevin Rudd wins next month one outcome will be the comparatively swift and overdue demise of the NSW Labor government. In the interim period many of the issues currently, and sometimes correctly, ascribed to lack of cooperation between Canberra and Macquarie Street will have been addressed. That can only be good, and the next step will see Morrie Iemma and his sorry crew out on their ears, as they so richly deserve. In the meantime let’s hope the NSW Libs and Nats get their act together so they are fit to govern. Crushing the troglodytes on their own Right would be a good project while they prepare for their inevitable return to power. With a Howard defeat at the federal level that should be easier, I hope.

Let’s face it: we did quite well with Fahey in Macquarie Street and Hawke/Keating in Canberra.

Meanwhile, back to Morrie and his mates: Iemma’s push for web betting is just typical.

THE giant global gambling company Betfair looks set to be awarded a licence to operate online betting in NSW after the Premier intervened to make his Gaming and Racing Minister hold discussions with the agency.

Morris Iemma’s office refused to comment yesterday on whether the half-owner of Betfair, James Packer’s PBL, or associates on PBL’s behalf had lobbied the Premier or his chief of staff to have the organisation licensed in NSW. But the minister, Graham West, has told a budget estimates hearing that Mr Iemma instructed him to tackle the issue.

A licence to operate in NSW could be hugely lucrative for Betfair, whose only major Australian toehold is in Tasmania. And the Iemma Government - already accused of an addiction to funding services with gambling revenue, particularly from poker machines - is already flagging the millions it could reap to fund schools and hospitals.

In an intriguing twist yesterday, Mr Iemma’s close friend and confidant on media matters, Peter Barron, would not be drawn on Betfair. Asked by the Herald if he was involved in lobbying or providing advice for Betfair on behalf of PBL, Mr Barron - who has advised the Packer family in the past, and who was thanked by the Premier during his election victory speech for his media advice - said: “No comment.”

Sometimes “no comment” speaks volumes.

1. Meanwhile, Andrew West, writing in the SMH reported that as West Pennant Hills resident Bernie Banton was being wheeled into Concord Hospital last week to have his lungs drained, the mesothelioma sufferer who led the fight for compensation for victims of the James Hardie asbestos scandal had scathing words for the federal Workplace Relations Minister, Joe Hockey.

“What a grub,” he said, after Mr Hockey said trade unions were irrelevant. “Where was Hockey during the James Hardie campaign? We didn’t see him for dust.”

Mr Banton said that without the support of unions - and especially the former ACTU secretary Greg Combet - up to 56,000 victims would not be entitled to the $1.4 billion in compensation from the corporation.

“It was their campaigning and negotiating skills that clinched that deal,” he said.

Later, Mr Hockey conceded that Mr Banton had a point. “When unions go into bat for people like Bernie Banton they are relevant,” he said. – SOURCE

2. “A class act takes a step into the light

“IT’S [UNION BOSS] Bill Shorten’s 39th birthday tomorrow. But the head of the Australian Workers Union has already had his present: the rescue of Tasmanian miners Todd Russell and Brant Webb, which also happened to catapult him onto the national stage just in time to fulfil the political ambitions which many say will take him all the way to the Lodge…

“Whether the man suits the times or the times suit the man, it is clear that the diminutive, Jesuit-educated lawyer with an MBA covered himself in glory during the 14-day marathon rescue…

“He gave excellent, generous sound bites. Authenticity cannot be learnt, and it is hard to think of Kim Beazley in the same position saying anything that didn’t appear to be shouted at an imaginary crowd…” — Miranda Devine: May 11, 2006

The class act is now the Labor candidate for Maribyrnong.

3. “Labor says Workplace Relations Minister Joe Hockey’s admission the government is running a fear campaign over ALP union links exposes its fearmongering ahead of the election. Launching a new round of Liberal advertising attacking Labor’s union links, Mr Hockey told reporters: “Our fear campaign is based on fact.” — SOURCE

4. “JOHN HOWARD has urged voters to forget about a Liberal Party ad from the 2004 election campaign that promised to “keep interest rates at record lows” because it only ran for two nights and he never made the claim personally.

“His pitch came as a new Herald/Nielsen online poll found Labor maintaining an election-winning lead in the middle of the second week of the campaign and Kevin Rudd outstripping Mr Howard as preferred prime minister by 53 per cent to 39 per cent.” — SOURCE

Thanks to Arthur for alerting me to this.

Satire and “unfair” of course, but very clever. I have the previous three episodes on Journalspace.

And speaking of unfair, here is a musical offering for you.

– Cyrius1.

I believe Yunupingu’s recent speech is a very significant speech, a watershed even, so much so that I have added it in full to the Indigenous Australia pages here. The Australian’s headline Yunupingu backs Howard is one construction that may be put on it, but then it could equally have been Yunupingu backs Rudd. What it does signal is that we are indeed in a transitional state on these matters.

Read Yunupingu with an open mind though. We all need to do that.

Meanwhile some of the reservations many have sincerely had, myself included, about the Northern Territory intervention are captured well in the following Uniting Church pamphlet:

Northern Territory Intervention (PDF).

But what a fascinating person and what an interesting site!

Nothing, apart from the Howard Government winning this years election, (which is not going to happen), would disappoint me more than if John Howard had chosen not to contest it as his party’s leader. For a while it seemed, he was contemplating retirement; passing the baton to his economic partner throughout his eleven year reign, treasurer Peter Costello. Fortunately Howard’s hubris, along with his life-long dedication to conservatism, and his love of power, has seen him remain to fight his last fight. I didn’t want him to retire, because I want to see him defeated.

And a voice from the bush too…

Now I am going over to Lines from a Floating Life to add Bob Innes and Desert Dreams to my blog roll! Pure gold.