Politics

[Ducatiboy stu]

You're right, they should have foreseen that dodgey operators (like the ones Stu mentioned) would be sending inexperienced people into roofs with no training.

To a point.

The installers had state laws to follow which they clearly didnt.They are the ones should be held to account, just like any other tradies etc. Fuckers where worse than dodgy back yard mechanics and used car salesmen.You cant go blaming the government for every thing. The gov sets the rules ang regs which must be adhered to. They seem to want to make the gov responsible directly for the deaths... What about the state governments who didnt enforce the rules and failed to prosecute the operators...

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

You're right, they should have foreseen that dodgey operators (like the ones Stu mentioned) would be sending inexperienced people into roofs with no training.

To a point.

The installers had state laws to follow which they clearly didnt.They are the ones should be held to account, just like any other tradies etc. Fuckers where worse than dodgy back yard mechanics and used car salesmen.You cant go blaming the government for every thing. The gov sets the rules ang regs which must be adhered to. They seem to want to make the gov responsible directly for the deaths... What about the state governments who didnt enforce the rules and failed to prosecute the operators...

 

[philmud]

Rowy, (autocorrect wants me to write "toey") you haven't said what you've seen or heard, you've just said "trust me, I have intimate knowledge".

Were you there for the fundraiser? Did you see the "actual" menu that was distributed sans box joke? What intimate knowledge do you have, and have you approached the press? I don't consider a post on AHB to be 'on record' in any journalistic sense.

If your "intimate knowledge" is a restauranteur telling you the same thing he told the press, then it's fine for you to believe him, but I don't.

Again, how did Brough know about a menu that he never saw BEFORE Joe wrote to him to explain the situation?

 

[philmud]

The whole menu thing was just an extension of the mysoginist crap. The hypocrisy was incredible considering the 'joke' about Peta Credlin, the selection for Batman etc.

You can't have it both ways your honour, either the misogynist thing was "crap", or it was real, and the jokes about Credlin were hypocritical.

 

[Rowy]

Joe claimed he printed the menu as an in-house joke but it wasn't circulated - fair enough, I'm not calling him a liar. If what you're saying is that all the rest of it was a beat-up, well it probably was.However to say that Mal knew nothing about is unlikely.Rowy how does this sound as a likely run of events: it went around prior to the function or in an email for a laugh and someone has said "Joe mate very funny, be we can't have that on the menu, imagine the shitstorm!" and that was the end of it. Somebody else then found it lying around, posted the photo to stir things up.Politics is fun.

I don't know if this was the case Liam but I reckon if this was not what happened it would have been something pretty damn close to those sequence of events. It makes more sense than all the conspiracy theories. Last time I went there he was still only serving crap euro lagers which caused me much more concern than the whole menu business! He probably is just catering to his crowd, no one ever said politicians and their hangers on had taste.

 

[Rowy]

Rowy, (autocorrect wants me to write "toey") you haven't said what you've seen or heard, you've just said "trust me, I have intimate knowledge".
Were you there for the fundraiser? Did you see the "actual" menu that was distributed sans box joke? What intimate knowledge do you have, and have you approached the press? I don't consider a post on AHB to be 'on record' in any journalistic sense.
If your "intimate knowledge" is a restauranteur telling you the same thing he told the press, then it's fine for you to believe him, but I don't.
Again, how did Brough know about a menu that he never saw BEFORE Joe wrote to him to explain the situation?

I was not at the fundraiser. The wait staff that were stated openly that the menu wasn't distributed. My direct evidence relates to the fact that I have observed senior members of all parties, except the greens, having fun in Joes company. I have been there enjoying his and their company at the same time. Read Liam's version of events and you will probably get the answer to your last question. It makes sense.

 

[Rowy]

You can't have it both ways your honour, either the misogynist thing was "crap", or it was real, and the jokes about Credlin were hypocritical.

It was a beat up by John McTernan and the other spinmeisters to attack a perceived weakness with Abbott who was killing them in the polling. The hypocrisy was there for all to see but now thank god it would appear the divisive politics of the UK has left us. For hypocrisy see attack on 457visas launched by the man who was here on one........go figure.

 

[Rowy]

Phil,
I will also just add this point. The evidence for your theory of coverup is a disgruntled Labor supporting former employee who says 'I wasn't there but I just know he would have shown that menu around' versus the owner / writer, all persons at the fundraiser and the staff who state it did not appear. If you think that Mal Brough or any politician in this day and age would put their career on the line in hoping an 18yr old waitress keeps mum you have got to be joking! Conspiracy is fine but no one leaves their arse out in the sun today on a hope someone won't tell. Journalists pay bit payers good money to get those types of stories, hence my confidence in this being a non event.

 

[philmud]

I was not at the fundraiser. The wait staff that were stated openly that the menu wasn't distributed. My direct evidence relates to the fact that I have observed senior members of all parties, except the greens, having fun in Joes company. I have been there enjoying his and their company at the same time. Read Liam's version of events and you will probably get the answer to your last question. It makes sense.

That's not direct evidence. In fact it's not any kind of evidence. I don't even think it has a modicum of relevance.

You might think Mal's political acumen might make it unlikely that he'd jeopardise his career in this way. Firstly, the Ashby affair shows that his judgement sucks balls. Secondly, it looks like he'll get away with the menu because the power of denial is strong.

I think Occam's Razor applies to this one. The simplest answer by far is not Liam's (sorry Liam), it is that the menu was distributed, and your buddy has agreed to take the fall.

I accept that you'll probably disagree, which is fine. I think you're biased, I assume you think I'm biased. We both believe ourselves to be the epitome of objectiveness. I don't think I have much more to add to the menugate debate, but you never know. It's hard to walk away from an Internet debate!!

 

[Liam_snorkel]

The cover-up IMO was everyone pretending they knew nothing about it when they did.
Whether or not it was presented at the dinner I doubt we'll ever know, but I'd guess that had it been we would have heard about it sooner than three months after the event..

 

[labels]

Getting back to the stimulus schemes. There is a case in point where the effectiveness of these schemes has to be doubted. For example, interest rates have fallen by a considerable amount over the last couple of years. This in itself is a stimulus to those with mortgages. However, there is plenty of evidence that mortgagees are not reducing their payments at all but are continuing to pay what they have been used to paying and have opted to reduce the life of the loan instead.

Lowing interest rates was/is supposed to stimulate the economy but has had a minimal effect, no doubt for a number of reasons including what has been happening in Canberra over the last three years.

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

You would have rocks in your head if you did reduce your repayments with low interest rates..Makes a lot of sense to pay more to give yourself a buffer for when they go up. And they will

 

[stm]

Re the $900 stimulus cheques, a study has found that most families spent an additional $1 from their cheques, and put the rest on their mortgage. Those that did spend the lot just spent it on big TVs (made in China) etc (this bit is just me having a guess). Therefore, a waste of taxpayers' money and net destructive of wealth. We were kept out of the recession by the drop in the A$, China's continued growth and the resultant boom in mining exports.

Re pink batts, the insulation industry in Australia now employs thousands fewer people than before that scheme was introduced. More destruction of wealth. Of course there were also the deaths, and Kevin continues to refuse to release important documents which may shed some light on who knew what when about the dangers.

School halls/canteens - most of the work came a long time after the economic dip and therefore also had little effect, other than more waste. Clearly, educational outcomes continued to worsen despite all the billions spent, otherwise they wouldn't still be talking about it (Gonski). But it did have the benefit of proving that just spending more money on schools does not mean that students are better educated which means that the Gonski billions will also be wasted.

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

I worked on BER projects. I tend to dissagree...It wasnt just about improving education. It employed a hell of a lot of people in the process...and that was the point.

 

[GuyQLD]

The only thing I've learnt about Australian politics in this thread is how little Australians know about politics.

Which honestly scares the shit out of me.

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

Is that a political statement

 

[stm]

Ducati - BER did employ a lot of people, but what cost? It may be that by diverting resources from other parts of the economy where the dollars would have been used for more value-added production, there has been a net reduction in wealth and employment. Google "broken window fallacy". In this case, you are the window repairer and if we go around breaking lots of windows as a job creation scheme, you will have lots of work, but at net cost to wealth and employment.

Guy - the fact that most of us on this thread are having a reasonable conversation and not resolving our differences by violence seems to me that Australians know a lot about politics. Perhaps, in the short term, a lot of people are being sucked in by Kevin's smooth talking, but they will soon wake up to it and judge him on his phenomenally disastrous record.

 

[philmud]

The only thing I've learnt about Australian politics in this thread is how little Australians know about politics.

Which honestly scares the shit out of me.

So we keep hearing. I'll pay attention when someone who says this provides some detail.

 

[Dave70]

The only thing I've learnt about Australian politics in this thread is how little Australians know about politics.

Which honestly scares the shit out of me.

Not saying you're wrong, just that your sample size is questionable.

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

Especially here..........I mean.......we are political observers who's POV changes by schooner...which cant be a bad thing......

Would rather drunks observe polititions than polititions observing drunks.....even if they are themselves drunk

And yes I am a drunk....I refuse to attend the meetings