He's gone too Ruddy far this time

[aussierogue]

Guys the ex chairman of the Australian Minral council came out and stated that the miners are just crying wolf. He sees merit in the tax!

 

[WinstonWolfe]

We are weak - thats the human condition.

Then why outsource your wellbeing to people just as weak as you? Or do you believe some people are more equal?

AR, at the end of the day, one's political philosophy will be based on their life philosophy. Like Gandhi, my life meaning is to rely first and foremost on developing my own potential, with direction from my God.

If one doesn't believe in a God, doesn't feel compelled to develop their own potential, doesn't understand how to produce stuff; but rather, sees what others have produced, and determines they have a claim on that, then socialism will make a lot of sense to them.....

However, the pitfall of socialism is that it only works when there's enough non socialists applying their nose to the grindstone.

Sooner rather than later, socialists run out of other people's money to spend.

And I'll choose to put my faith in an invisible God, rather than a guy who eats ear wax and who's true humanitarianism is being unveiled bit by ugly bit.

 

[WinstonWolfe]

Guys the ex chairman of the Australian Minral council came out and stated that the miners are just crying wolf. He sees merit in the tax!

Does he know what's going to be done with the tax? NO....

More insulation? ETS campaigns? Laptops for schools? plasma handouts? property vendor bonuses? Something for the Minister for Bilbies to do? a Minister for global warming? Minister for population? another minister or three?

As I've said, let the profits flow through to the shareholders. They are bound to allocate them more efficiently than a socialist govt on training wheels.

 

[aussierogue]

Winston

Are you happy with the recent Wall st shenanigans including the corporate bonus schemes?

Are yoou happy with the way public company directors apportion shares as part of salary packages?

If you cant name a country (this is the 5th time ive asked) then give me some people - some names....

Why is it that you cant name a country that is doing it right?

 

[mrsdawnrazor]

Depending on yourself and not looking for 'handouts' is all very well if you are able to do this. If we go for this complete free market economy what happens to those who cant fend for themselves, who looks after them, the young, the old, the infirm, those injured in accidents that were no fault of their own.

What happens is exactly what happened in Russia in 1918 and France in 1789 - the power and money gets concentrated in the hands of the elite and eventually you get civil war as the masses revolt. The real point of these so called 'socialist' policies is actually civil order first and foremost. The bourgeoisie must be really careful that society does not break down.

Still I guess we could just 'let them eat cake'

 

[WinstonWolfe]

Winston

Are you happy with the recent Wall st shenanigans including the corporate bonus schemes?

You see AR, these types of shenanigans are what happens when people outsource due diligence and regulatory action to a government.....I blame the US govt for the sub prime mess. If they didn't promise to regulate (what they didn't), the public would have exercised more caution.

Let's have a look at where the US govt fell over.

- Greenspan wanted an unregulated derivatives market.

- Clinton pressured Fannie and Freddie to underwrite sub prime loans, and increase their risk exposure to such.

- Clinton repealed part of the Glass Steagall Act which then allowed aggressive investment banks to fuse with conservative commercial banks.

- Greenspan kept rates too low for too long, encouraging expenditure and asset bubble, a higher CAD, a higher need for foreign investment to fund the CAD. then he raised rates quickly.

- The democrat influenced SEC relaxed the net capital rule to allow the 5 investment banks unprecedented leverage, which led to a blow out in mortgage back securities.

- govt banking regulators allowed off balance sheet shenanigans.


Those who argue GFC was purely a result of sub prime mortgages, need to explain why there was a simultaneous bubble in commercial property, which wasn't subject to sub prime loans.

Are yoou happy with the way public company directors apportion shares as part of salary packages?

I have no doubt the allocation of profits of corporations owned by Chinese communists is 100x worse.

If many shareholders weren't so lulled into apathy, they'd take a stronger interest in what goes on in the companies they invest.....eventually such imbalances would stop via market forces.

If you cant name a country (this is the 5th time ive asked) then give me some people - some names....

Why is it that you cant name a country that is doing it right?

I told you it isn't a perfect world, so there's no perfect free market.....where's your perfect socialist state??? there's tendencies towards what sustains long term survival of a nation versus not.....and all are contingent on the values of citizens....and human nature....

I uphold that a free market system, that outsources as little as possible to govt, is better suited to the human nature of most.

Now for this is the third time I asked, define capitalism.

 

[WinstonWolfe]

Depending on yourself and not looking for 'handouts' is all very well if you are able to do this. If we go for this complete free market economy what happens to those who cant fend for themselves, who looks after them, the young, the old, the infirm, those injured in accidents that were no fault of their own.

Anyone following Gandhi's line, would never have allowed an elite to form in the first place. They would have refused to be their servants, and moved on elsewhere. The elites would have been left to survive by the sweat of their own brow....

Who determines whether someone can fend for themselves or not? is it an either/or thing?

What is sure is if you make no effort, it's a self fulfilling prophecy.
And what is sure, is the less that make effort, the less wealthy a country will become. Cultivating dependency on the state, makes fiscal and intellectual sloths of that many more of us. And that leads to less wealth to be shared around with those genuinely incapacitated.

 

[mrsdawnrazor]

But how do you define a wealthy country - ave net worth per individual, GDP, GNP, availability of social services, free universal education and healthcare etc etc, freedom of speech or self expression.

All these methods are floored and it depends on who you are talking too. I would have thought the true wealth of the country would be determined by how it treated its less advantaged

 

[redwing]

Emails are hitting overdrive now, have received this one in slightly different formats twice today

What has the Rudd government actually achieved?"

Here's the list so far:

1 Said Sorry several times.

2 Ratified Kyoto as it is about to expire without successor.

3 Organised "best and brightest summit" - if anything useful came out of that, I missed it..

4 Set up "fuel watch", a costly fiasco since abandoned.

5 Set up "grocery watch" another costly fiasco since abandoned.

6 Established the Australian Social Inclusion Board. This rarely heard of bureaucracy was set up because "Every Australian should have an opportunity to be a full participant in the life of the nation. Unfortunately, too many Australians remain locked out of the benefits of work, education, community engagement and access to basic services. This social exclusion is a significant barrier to sustained prosperity and restricts Australia 's future growth". If there is any evidence to support this argument it wasn't included in the announcement. The Board has been described as "the biggest waste of tax dollars imaginable, towards some more Rudd-style feel-goodism". That was in May 2008. It probably did seem a big waste of tax dollars then, but it's been turned into a drop in the ocean by what's happened since.

7 Set up the home insulation program - what a disaster! It was a disaster because Rudd so wanted the Feds to be able to claim the credit he gave it to his Dept of Environment. This feel-good department, whose Minister's previous experience was lead singer with a rock band, is full of environmental scientists and climate change disciples with zero experience in dealing with the real world or delivering real programs.. Four deaths, a minister demoted, (not sacked or had his salary reduced) and $50 million to former union heavy Greg Combet to fix it, and Combet says that may not be enough. And the claimed environmental benefits were grossly exaggerated. Rudd said he took full responsibility but I don't know what that means - he's still PM, he's still drawing his salary and privileged superannuation benefits.

8 Set up SIHIP (Strategic Indigenous Housing and Infrastructure Program). This program was initiated by a Memorandum of Understanding in September 2007. In July 2009 the ABC (hardly a hot-bed of opposition to the ALP) reported on its Lateline program that it was yet to build a single house. That was despite $45.54 million of its $672 million budget having been spent. A government report dated August 2009 said the program was being criticised as: too slow to deliver; its governance was overly bureaucratic; the program is too costly in terms of unit cost of housing and administration. The revised program budget is still $672m with each new house expected to cost $450,000 or $529,000 after factoring in a proportion of administration costs and "contingencies". As at 1 February 2010, only 2 of a target of 750 houses and 70 of 2,500 refurbishments had been completed.

9 Sent money direct to taxpayers and non-taxpayers to spend on large screen imported TV's to stimulate the economy and avoid the effects of what Rudd and Swan called the worst depression since the 1930s. In fact unemployment was 11% in 1991 and in 2009 didn't get to 6%, which not too many years ago would have been regarded as virtually full employment. Remember Beattie's target 5%? But if you can't maintain your popularity rating by sending money to voters what can you do?

10 Promised that every child in every school in Australia would get a computer. This program is moving so slowly that most of the people who were high school students at the time of the promise will have left school before they see a new computer.

11 Set up the $70m green loans mess - people gave up their jobs, paid $3,000 for qualifications and insurance to be trained as assessors, only to find the demand for green loans had been grossly exaggerated, many more assessors were trained than the program envisaged, and there was no work for most of them. The Courier-Mail reported on 2 Feb 2010 that: "The Federal Government predicted up to 200,000 home-owners would take up the loans and only 1,000 have done so ....instead of training 1,500 to 2,000 well-qualified assessors the Government permitted a blow-out and it is now estimated there will be up to 11,500 well-qualified assessors". The program has now been transferred to Penny Wong's department - that should fix it.

12 Turned a good budget surplus into such a huge debt that our grandchildren will have so much trouble servicing it that our population will have to increase rapidly. Blamed the global financial collapse while steadfastly refusing to give any credit to Howard or Costello for leaving them an excellent budget position to work with.

13 Didn't include any major infrastructure in the stimulus package because the effects would be felt too slowly (except for duplicating school halls and gyms).

14 Set up the home solar hot water initiative which was abruptly ended three weeks early with eight hours notice. This caused chaos in the industry, and many people intending to lodge applications missed out. Peter Garrett blamed a cost blow-out from the original estimate of $150 million to $750 million a year for the cut-back.

15 Disbanded "Work Choices". He had to do this because it was the unions' self-funded campaign against it that got him elected. Replaced it by giving back powers to the unions and re-instating the Industrial Relations Club. Set up Fair WorkAustralia with what seems to many as an over-representation of people with union backgrounds.

16 Changed the previous government's immigration laws so successfully that the exponential blow-out in illegal boat arrivals created a need for a lot more accommodation on Christmas Island.
17 Has recently suspended the processing of applications for permanent visas until after the election. presumably hoping there won't be a dramatic build up on Christmas Inland and that the electors will forget about the whole situation by the next election.

18 Said "the science is in on climate change" and claimed the Emissions Trading Scheme would fix it. Labelled sceptics as deniers.

19 Attempted to railroad the ETS through the Senate before Copenhagen for no other reason than it would have allowed Rudd to strut the world stage.

20 Went to Copenhagen taking 114 government free-loaders with him (one of the largest of the 190 delegations), at huge cost to the Australian taxpayer and the world's environment. I haven't seen any announcement of the cost of the junket (and I doubt I ever will), but I'm sure that whatever was going to be achieved, at least 100 of the free-loaders were superfluous to requirements. And it was fairly predictable that nothing would be achieved.

21 Refuses to debate the use of nuclear power generation to reduce pollution because it's against ALP and union policy.

22 Has opened one of 2,650 promised "trades training centres", one of 260 promised child care centres in schools and TAFEs, and 2 of 31 promised GP Super Clinics.

23 Attracted 752 retired nurses back into the profession using a return-to-work bonus. When they announced this scheme Labor hoped 7,750 would take up the offer.

24 Removed Labor's original election 2007 promises from the ALP website.

25 Promised to take Japan to court on whaling, but now says that will not be until November, probably after the election. As time goes on, I find I'm becoming less convinced about who is really at fault here, Japan for fishing in international waters, or the protesters for disrupting a legitimate commercial operation.

26 Has so far kept the Henry tax review secret for political reasons.. Last week Rudd was saying it wouldn't be released until after the election. Wiser heads have since made him realise people won't vote for a new tax system when they don't know what's in it. And there must be something nasty in it, either unpalatable to the voters or inconsistent with ALP policy, or it would be heralded as another triumph for the Rudd government.

27 Announced he will keep 30% of the state's GST to fund 60% of their hospital costs. The 60% funding will have strings attached. The states have not been given any of the details, just the executive summary, and he expects them to agree to the proposals without knowing what the strings are, or what he might take back with the other hand under the Henry tax review. The announcement doesn't explain how it will improve delivery of hospital services, but it will probably add another layer of bureaucrats to the health system. Australia already has 450,000 bureaucrats looking after 290,000 health professionals. The announcement was hurriedly made in March 2010 after it had been pointed out that he had imposed a June 2009 deadline on himself for reform of the hospitals system. Perhaps this explains the lack of details. Refer back to the criticisms of SIHIP above. I think it'll be deja vu all over again. Rudd said if the states block his plan he will take it to a referendum, which of course is just grandstanding.

28. Turned Gillard loose with $16.7 billion to give building contractors, states and bureaucrats a feast in return for COLA.s and unwanted libraries and gyms – the insulation racket all over again in spades.

29 Last week he trotted out five senior ministers to criticise the Senate for being "obstructionist".. The 5 were Jenny (SIHIP) Macklin, Penny (ETS) Wong, Lindsay (clean nose) Tanner, Nicola (new hospital system) Roxon, and Greg (Mr Fixit) Combet. I think Rudd is lucky the Senate has been obstructionist because if it wasn't he'd have more failures to add to his already impressive list. I noticed Julia was too smart to join the line-up of losers, and has managed not to be associated with too many of the above "achievements" – actually lying low while the schools building fiasco and criminal activities are unfolding. But watch your back, Kev.

As you might have guessed, I think Rudd's a dud. But everyone's entitled to their own opinion, and if I've missed some real achievements I sincerely apologise.

I can't wait to hear how he will try to turn these "achievements" into something which will encourage the Australian electors to give Labor and, equally important, the unions another chance

 

[WinstonWolfe]

But how do you define a wealthy country - ave net worth per individual, GDP, GNP, availability of social services, free universal education and healthcare etc etc, freedom of speech or self expression.

All these methods are floored and it depends on who you are talking too. I would have thought the true wealth of the country would be determined by how it treated its less advantaged

It is well established the less resources in a country, the more competition for them, and the less care for others...hence the flow of migrants away from countries with less resources towards those with more.

The point I have been making all along is producing adequate goods and services is a powerful expression of caring for others. It provides jobs for them, and the means to live. Ergo, I think socialists who believe they are superior humanitarians, should become entrepreneurs. That would also allow them to feel even more warm, fuzzy, and morally superior, when they give more of their profits to help others.

 

[mrsdawnrazor]

Emails are hitting overdrive now, have received this one in slightly different formats twice today

I love this email - the hopes and dreams of those who don't want to believe, it but know, Tony Abbott is unelectable

 

[markpatric]

The recent twists and turns by Kev from Qld and the growing political lawlessness are starting to show the person Australians voted for a revolving door "PM",I'm sickened by what is happening in this country after all within 2-3 years several high flow cheap labour new mines in S-America-Africa-S-E-Asia,will come on line and the facts are China will own those mines upfront,it will be an interesting time when Australian Miners try to play on those levels,unless we become politically subservient to Rudds buddies in China..willair..

I respect your opinion and can see why you could look at it that way but I actually think Rudd is the best pm we`ve had in years, it just happens that he came into power when the world financial mess finally reared its ugly head.
I think Obama has had a hard run as well but I don`t see any redeeming features at all there, I think it is clear he doesn`t have any experience for the job to the point of being ridiculous.
I think Rudd sees that he is damned whatever he does and wants out.
Rudd should have been given the nobel peace prize for apologising to the aboriginals alone, at least Rudd followed through on some of his promises but yes he is gone so is Obama imo, only Rudd by choice though.

 

[Sunfish]

I love this email - the hopes and dreams of those who don't want to believe, it but know, Tony Abbott is unelectable

But aren't you making the assumption that oppositions win elections? Last I heard gubbmints lose 'em.

If you ever believed that the carbon trading scheme wasn't all about tax, notice how quickly it was dumped and replaced by another tax grab with a shorter time line, not even disguised as something with lofty principles. Instead he appealed to the basest of instincts: envy and sloth!

He must believe there are more lazy b's after a free ride than outraged workers/self funded retirees.

 

[markpatric]

Emails are hitting overdrive now, have received this one in slightly different formats twice today

Yes they have been busy and because of it we have learned a heck of a lot in a short time, some of these issues had to be looked into, I honestly believe Rudd has been great for this country, he has a go!, admits he was wrong and has tried damn hard to follow his word which we all know is an impossible feat in politics anyhow.

I would rather have a leader who has a go and shows some good human qualities than a front running twit like Howard, who was Bush trying to kid when he said Howard was the man of iron or whatever he said he must have been making a joke, maybe he meant he was a man made for ironing?.

 

[mrsdawnrazor]

But aren't you making the assumption that oppositions win elections? Last I heard gubbmints lose 'em.

Seen the UK election results? - Gubbermints can only lose elections if there is someone to take over.
My prediction - another election on less than 12 months, a tory win (just) then massive spending cuts, a 1 term government then the tories out of office for a generation (again). If labour win, same scenario. Whoever makes the cuts necessary will become so unpopular so fast that they wont get a look in again.
Oh, they could provoke some small country to invade a far flung part of the empire - worked in 82

 

[Sunfish]

Seen the UK election results?

Is that where a hopeless Labour party lost in spite of having a pathetic opposition?

Oh, they could provoke some small country to invade a far flung part of the empire - worked in 82

We now have the internet. Political parties seem to think we don't know how to get facts from a broader source.

 

[The Fence]

Thorpey hows that 400 percent looking?

???? .....what 400% ?

 

[willair]

I respect your opinion and can see why you could look at it that way but I actually think Rudd is the best pm we`ve had in years, it just happens that he came into power when the world financial mess finally reared its ugly head.
I think Obama has had a hard run as well but I don`t see any redeeming features at all there, I think it is clear he doesn`t have any experience for the job to the point of being ridiculous.
I think Rudd sees that he is damned whatever he does and wants out.
Rudd should have been given the nobel peace prize for apologising to the aboriginals alone, at least Rudd followed through on some of his promises but yes he is gone so is Obama imo, only Rudd by choice though.

No problem,that's all everything is just other peoples opinions,to me Rudd is just a Talk Show Host says everything the front bar drinkers want to hear,puts on the smile,talks about working families,and keeps all his hidden agendas inside his inner circle as the confettie falls all around him,,,and as this is still a free country vote for who you want..
willair

 

[Aaron Sice]

he waqs a good talk show host on Sunrise - i think that was his ploy.

he has great networking skills - absolutely unqualified for the PM office, but great networking skills...

 

[markpatric]

No problem,that's all everything is just other peoples opinions,to me Rudd is just a Talk Show Host says everything the front bar drinkers want to hear,puts on the smile,talks about working families,and keeps all his hidden agendas inside his inner circle as the confettie falls all around him,,,and as this is still a free country vote for who you want..
willair

Rudd a talk show host?, you tell a joke!, the prime minister is intelligent and likable but he is about as animated as a fence post.