George W Bush's Legacy... is there one?

This article has filtered through in a slow news week as being a great summation of George W Bush's legacy... there isn't one!

I am truly disturbed...

The Redneck American at his ugly worst...

There is a great deal of videos on YouTube that are depicting Barrack Obama as Hitler.

A sample of this is below. It is pure unadulterated Hate Speech and those who believe in this rubbish should take a good hard look at yourselves and check yourself in to your friendly local mental health facility.

In fact I welcome anyone to come on here and try and "justify" this rubbish.

Polticians Are Idiots...

OK, regular readers of this blog know that I was anti-John Howard and that I wanted a change to take place to help us improve our social infrastructure. You know, hospitals, education and a generally more tolerant society to the minorities.

So thats all good, but then Rudd - as I have previously lamented - blew half the surplus on cash handouts.

Now the new NSW Premier has issued a mini-budget in which he has scrapped capital infrastructure in the form of rail and light rail and has instead decided to slug people an extra dollar on the Harbour Bridge and Sydney Harbour Tunnel during peak hour.

So instead of giving people a viable alternative to driving and hence increasing the congestion, he punishes people financially for utilising the ONLY mode of transport available to those who would have benefitted from the new rail / light rail projects.

I don't live in Sydney's North West, and I do have viable rail transport, but this really is a DUMB decision.

This story is best highlighted in this case study from the Herald.

The story on the budget announcement is here; and take note of the fact that the Premier doesnt have a drivers license... do we all remember the last Premier who didnt drive??

For the record and for comparison, my rail ticket is $178 a month.

Rudd's Billions

Well, Kevin Rudd did well to initially state that the Federal Government would underwrite any losses suffered in the event of an Australian bank collapsing as a result of the world's financial crisis. Good point for him, thats what a Government is to do when times of hardship happen.

But I totally disagree with the soon announcement that the Federal Government will give one off payments of $2100 to pensioners, $1000 to babies born after 14 October and lump sum payments (the amount escapes me) for low income earners and an increase from the first home buyers grant to $14,000 (up from the existing $7,000) and an astonishing grant of $21,000 to first home "builders" as long as the house is constructed before 30 June 2009.

This totals a massive $10.4 BILLION dollars in hand outs.

And why? Because the "average" Australian is struggling during the current financial crisis....

What a load of rubbish! The reason why the crisis happened in the first place was that people were living on credit and buying homes on 100%+ mortgages and then defaulting on those mortgages causing a glut of 'bad debt' in the market place. It is because of the chronic ability for people to buy things within their means...

And now Rudd is giving people a lump sum which will primarily be used on luxury items and paying off debt so people can use more credit. In addition, do you not think that every house just went up in value by an additional $7,000 and hence mortgages will be that fractionally more expensive?

Why not simply reduce fuel excise so that the average Australian will save $1000 a year on petrol? The surplus remains, the government takes a cut on their income but Australians will have a bit more disposable income to ensure that the economy remains proportionally prosperous.

Instead, Rudd has blown the surplus - which should be used for capital expenditure on infrastructure - on your average Australian gaining a plasma TV.

Disgraceful!

Special Comment on Sarah Palin

I havent been too bloggy of late and therefore have not really gotten into the US election campaign and in particular, a complete idiot of a person Sarah Palin who is the Vice Presidential Candidate for the Republicans. This woman would be #2 in the White House should McCain win.

But she makes no off the cuff speeches, she refuses interviews, she says very little in public and when she does she is seen as light weight and focuses on dirty politics.

If you agree with that statement, then you will enjoy this.



* kudos for Glenn for passing this to me.

US Presidential Elections - YAWN

The running mate of John McCain's teenage daughter is pregnant and there is a story breaking now that the potential VP of the United States also had an extramarital affair...

We've had Obama vs Hilary... we've had Clinton sex scandals prior to that...

Its all too much and goes on for far too long!

When is this election happening? Enough already!

If you want to read the latest, click here

Holidaying? South Ossettia looks nice...

Channel 9 news is awash with Golden Glory (sounds suss right?) and we're all basking in the glow of the nations obsession with swimming (there are other sports right?) and then we have some ads and then some minor local news with Morris Iemma in the doldrums once again about some failed High Speed Rail Link consortium... poor old Morris can't take a trick. If the project is underfunded by the bidder by $2.5Bn (yes BILLION) you cancel it... but thats a bad thing for Morris isnt it... the poor plebites from Penrith will have to catch trains that take an hour to the city.

Until we invent Public Transport that bends the space / time continuim then we're a bit stuck aren't we... Until Dr Who becomes Minister for Transport, I guess we'll have to make do with people in Penrith taking an hour to get to the city.

Anyways, I digress...

Just before the sport, there was this little story about a place called Ossettia and the southern bit being attacked from the north by Russians.

Apparently that means North Ossettia is Russian? I am only assuming...

And George W Bush supports the American Dream Team AND Georgia... its nice that he is so complimentary to Georgia, but I wonder if he realises that the bit he supports doesn't have Atlanta in it?

So, anyway, some Ossettians were keen to head North but the South wouldnt let them go, and the Georgians (remember, no Olympics have been held in Georgia, except for Atlanta 96) were really keen for them to stay and big bad Vlad Putin told them to piss off and sent in the troops across the border (from Tennessee or North Carolina?).

No wonder George W Bush is confused, I guess he'll have to spank... um... ask the girls in the US Womens Beach Volleyball team what part of Georgia they're from!

Downer Retires - Thank Christ

This article is a nice summation of my opinion of Alexander Downer who announced his retirement yesterday.

A pompous, arrogant, toffee nosed twat who was seemingly incompetent and yet held one of the most important portfolios in the Howard ministry during perhaps the most tumultuous period of Foreign Policy for our country.

I cannot say anything positive about the guy and I hope he fades from the country's collective memory soon...

Where Are Our Civil Liberties?

Interesting new laws were passed by the NSW State Government in past couple of days... apparently it is now an offence to "annoy a pilgrim" here in Sydney for World Youth Day (week).

Offenders will be charged and financially penalised.

Anyone protesting the Papal visit must have their material "pre-approved" so as not to cause offence. And the distribution of non-christian material, condoms, gay rights or any other material likely to cause "offence or annoyance" can bring charges against the individual.

Can I ask why this was necessary and how is this constitutionally allowable? Are we not a free democratic society and have the right to our views? Why do the fucking happy clapping god botherers (annoyance intended) get to have their sensitivities protected by unconstitutional legislation?

Will enacting these laws cause more protests and have the intentions of the government to keep the World Youth Day events free of protest been well and truly kyboshed? (is that a Jewish phrase? Is that offensive??)

It's about time Governments stop catering to the vocal minority and started realising that 90% of the populace on any given issue just don't care and that as long as there is no violence (and we already have a capable police force to stop that) there is really not any point in trying to dictate the populations thought processes.

People will think what they think and will act on those thoughts as they see fit. As long as they don't hurt anybody else in enacting those acts, then by our societies standards they are entitled to those thoughts / beliefs / actions.

How about Morris Iemma worry about what he was elected for which is ensuring we have a decent health and education system.

Its Obama!

Well, finally the US Democrats have plumped for Barrack Obama to run for them in the US Presidential race… I have to say this seems like a good move as I believed Hillary Clinton was running for her personal ambitions rather than for any greater ideal about American politics.  One US political reporter stated that she wouldn’t throw in the towel for the benefit of uniting the Democratic Party because she is only interested in maximising the result for Team Clinton.

Putting aside the impeachment of her husband, I always thought Bill Clinton was a good US President and that he and the Democrats did a lot to further peaceful relations in the Middle East etc… but I just cant see Hilary doing that.  So from a US Foreign Policy perspective, I am glad Obama has the nod.

This in turns brings me to his Republican opponent John McCain.  If there was a person who was worse and more feared than George W Bush, then it’s this nutter.  You will never see a more militant right wing gun nut than John McCain.  He is already on record that he wants to “take out Iran” and “finish the job” in the Middle East.  This is a scary man!  And I fear that pre-election the current Republican regime will do something drastic in Iran.  To sum it up, I believe if McCain is the next US President, we’re all fucked.  Food, petrol up… economic recessions and depressions in and a world that will be unsafe anywhere as the already horrendous wars and terrorist events will only escalate up to new levels.

Hopefully a more moderate UK leadership, a UN still smarting from the lessons learnt from last time, and our own KRudd not towing the US policy mantra like Johnny Howard did will see us avert a worse crisis than what is going on today in Iraq.

I can’t vote, but I sure hope you Americans do the right thing at the polling booths!

Melbourne For The Day

Small post today, I am in the Qantas Club at Sydney Airport heading to Melbourne for a 2hr meeting... so in short, whilst I wanted to write a long break down of last nights budget announcement, I am a bit strapped for time to do so.

 

In short however, I think its a good budget.  I am going to lose the Part B of childcare - approx $2K per annum for us - but I am happy to do so on the basis that spending is reduced, what spending is incurred is for public infratstructure and that any government hand outs given out are for the truly needy.  Means testing is the way to go.

 

I note however that the Libs are claiming credit for the tax cuts... why?  They're the things that got this inflation ball rolling in the first place.

 

Anyway, happy to take feedback on what everyone else thought, but I thought it was a good prudent start to realigning what a govt should be providing - necessity and not luxuries.

Rudd's First Budget

Well, the first budget under the new Labor government will be announced on Tuesday and we’re hearing things being released as “gossip” or “tidbits” that in my mind are quite interesting.

Before dealing with specifics, the fact is that with a huge surplus we have the opportunity to spend money on infrastructure but at the same time perhaps tweak certain taxes to correct some of the imbalances in our society.

I am looking see increased allocations to spending in Hospitals, Education and Transportation… even if it is simply an increase to state allocations.

But the taxes will be interesting.  The increase on tax on “alcopops” is another example of a social tax.  I think you will find the increase in the taxes in cigarettes to be on the cards.  Luxury cars being subject to higher taxes would be another beneficial tax.  The means testing of the baby bonus I would also welcome as well as perhaps the first home buyers grant.

To me, the tax system should be principled on the fact that those who can afford to pay, pay and those who are truly needy gain a benefit.  At present taxes are applied with little thought on social responsibility.

Rudd was given a mandate to change, lets hope that the media keeps it into perspective when they analyse his output this week.

Speaking of tragedies...

This looks like a good read...

I am normally a reader of fiction over non-fiction, but I might pick this book up... Even the review is interesting, let alone the actual book!

Zimbabwe

Enough of the frivolities...

Zimbabwe. Where is the UN on this? Mugabe is elected out clearly, refuses to show himself publically, calls a recount on no basis, and in the intervening three weeks, 10 elected representatives of the opposition party (who should be in power) have been murdered and now the Mugabe Health Minister threatens to shoot opposition supporters.

If there was ever the case for third party intervention, its Zimbabwe. As a Commonwealth (or are they ex-Commonwealth) nation, the British should invade, oust the dictator and his cronies and instill the properly elected party as leaders of the country.

But why don't they? Americans seem to jump willingly into the Mid-East, and Australia gets involved in East Timor and the Solomons, and the Brits fought a whole war against Argentina over a rocky outcrop of sheep paddocks in the Falklands.

Why is Zimbabwe simply untouchable?? The guy is a despot and should be removed. Permanently.

Wollongong - The Hotbed of well... beds!

Wow, who would have thought that the Wollongong area was such a hot bed of scandal! This whole thing about a 32yr old single-mum who was a Town Planner for the Council there having affairs with developers and subsequently approving their development applications has finally reached Premier Morris Iemma's office.

When the wheel starts turning, it certainly gains momentum doesnt it! 32yr old woman probably being taken advantage of by devious developers involved in low grade criminal activity explodes into a connection with a member of the council on sexual harrassment charges who has just landed a plumb job for one of the Premiers cabinet who himself has been known to be subject to sexual harrassment and now the Premier is in the cross hairs.

Who knew that local politics was so seedy! *feigns shock*

Funny how all this stuff comes out with the Government in disarray and waiting for a credible opposition to knock them off... but thats still the issue, the NSW State Liberals are still proverbial limp lettuce at the moment.

Interest Rates

Well, the Interest Rates are going up… never mind the fact some banks raised them anyway last month, the Reserve Bank raised the official interest rates by 25 basis points which lead the Commonwealth Bank to raise its lending rates by 30 today.

Whilst the interest rates are one thing, I want to make 2 comments.

1.      This is not a result of a Labor Govt.  Do NOT listen to the likes of Malcolm Turnbull that may (will) come out and say that Labor is “mismanaging” the economy.  This is a load of rubbish and is pure out and out politicking point scoring.  The real reasons stem from a Liberal govt coveting the US foreign policy whilst at the same time providing tax cuts whilst maintaining a massive budgetary surplus.  Perhaps if they had invested in infrastructure rather than our back pockets we wouldn’t be this flush with cash.

2.      Second, there is another way to relieve the inflation in the market.  What about income and GST tax increases?  Would that be political suicide?  At the moment our increased interest rates means we are relieved of dollars via our mortgage payments and other investments and that money goes into the banks for the benefit of shareholders.  We spend less as a result and inflation subsides.  But what if we lost our dollars via increased taxes and then those dollars were then shipped into the Governments coffers for the benefit of all via hospitals, education et al?  Again, we wouldn’t be able to spend as much but at least the dollars would be put to the general good.

I presume this makes me a Communist as well, but maybe they were on to something!

Rudd Funds "Extremist Cult"...

Whilst everyone who regularly reads this will know, I was very against the Howard Government and strongly supported the Labor campaign for change. The basis of this wasnt really on the fundamentals of what a Labor govt would do as opposed to a Liberal one, but the driver was that I felt that the Liberal govt who had been in power for so many years had long ago ceased to be a government for the people and became a self driven machine that resulted in many instances of a lack of transparency. In short, they became self serving and not public serving.

Rudd campaigned about integrity and open and transparent government.

Now this:

In September 2006, a young Labor opposition front bencher named Kevin Rudd challenged the Howard Government on their support and funding of the religious cult / sect "The Brethran". At the time, it was highlighted by the Four Corners program that the Brethren received not only special funding but also critical excemptions from the Liberal Work Choices legislation. Many commentators / bloggers questioned whether the Prime Minister Howard was actually a member of the Brethren given his apparent generous and imbalanced support...

Fast forward to today and now the PM title sits with that very same frontbencher Mr Kevin Rudd. He now is reviewing the funding of Education at a Federal level and in the past week or so the media has picked up on the imbalances within the Liberal's scheme favouring Private education over Public. This shouldnt be a surprise as the Liberal cornerstone is privatisation and free market economic theory as opposed to state based schemes.

But why then has Rudd promised a whopping $10M of government funding for the Exclusive Brethren schools? Kevin Rudd has not hidden his Christianity at all during the election campaign and it wasnt an issue during the campaign as both candidates seemed equal in regards to their personal beliefs and outlooks in life. Whilst I am not of those same beliefs I feel that as long as a person does not use their political power to promote personal beliefs (i.e. Tony Abbott and Abortion / Birth Control legislation!) then a member of parliament can be of any faith whatsoever... seperation of Church and State if you like.

But now that he's in... he has done the opposite to a) his comments on the Exclusive Brethren b) his notion of fair funding for all school systems and c) has perhaps been influenced by his personal beliefs against the principals of the Labor Party and his very recent election campaign.

Views people?

Liberals Implode!

Well.... Costello goes, Vaile steps down, Downer is depressed, Abbot describes himself on the sound bite I saw last night of "having reasonable people skills" (LOL!) and the walking Cone Head Brendan Nelson (ex Labor Party Member) is also keen to step up...

 

Seriously, it is too comical to watch!  Particularly as Howard made such a huge pitch for Costello on his exit speech to see Costello go "thanks, but I'd rather do something else" it just shows how much Howard had lost touch.

 

Turnbull seems to be light on in experience and is already engaging on the dreaded "me-tooism" that Liberals laughed about pre-election by saying that he supports Rudd signing Kyoto...

 

Having said that if Turnbull had successfully swayed Howard to sign Kyoto and he had apologised to the Aboriginals AND he had some sort of human compassion, then maybe Howard wouldnt be down at Centrelink today getting his pension.

 

In the meantime, Rudd has turned up at a school, requested Treasury costings for his proposals of PC's in the schools and has requested ALL of his ministers to visit a private and public school in their respective electorates before this Thursday!  Nothing like Day 1 enthusiasm! Lets hope it carries on for the entire term...

 

PS - listening to my favourite radio shows on pod casts (SheBang, Get This, Spoonman) this morning, its amazing how many wowsers rang up on Monday morning and complained about the result and how its going to be the death of Australia.  Get over it people!  About 55-60% of us voted for a Labor or Green candidate.  Your Coalition of Liberal and National barely had an impact and it is clear that people want more than dollars in the bank!

Victory For Rudd

Well, I have been banging on about Howard and his cronies for many years now and its all a bit surreal that he isn't there to whinge about!  I think though that the election result is a great victory for the people who think that there is more to the world and our country than a budgetary surplus.  Yes, Howard did do a good job of managing the economy in the sense that we had heaps of coins in the coffers, but ultimately he and his party lacked some missing quality of humanity that you cant quite put your finger on, but you knew it was there.

 

Howard used human emotions and frailties to hold power for most of his eleven years, particularly since Sept 11 2001.  He had the fear of global terrorism behind him when he concocted up the "Children Overboard Affair" and he took Australia from a well respected peaceful country to one of association with a maniacal idiot in George Bush that led us into a virtually en-extractable position in the Middle East.  Our nation is cursed from Muslim nations such as Indonesia and is seen as a blundering Western nation sticking its nose into Asian and Middle East affairs...

 

I think Howard's term in office was best summed up in this article and in particular I quote: 

"Mr Howard, who almost certainly has lost his seat of Bennelong, said nothing publicly yesterday. His only duty was a private function for staff at Kirribilli House. As the Liberals drowned their sorrows on Saturday night, one former senior Liberal adviser blamed the result on "the f---ing Chinese", an apparent reference to Asian voters in Bennelong turning against Mr Howard"

 

The Australian Liberal party lost touch with the people of Australia.  We are multi-cultural and in many cases bi-lingual with Asian and Middle Eastern descendants now much more prominent than the post war immigrants from Europe.  The Liberal party failed to grasp that and I believe that it was a huge issue for them in what caused them to lose the plot.

 

The other issue that Howard refused to budge on was the whole concept of Climate Change.  The World, be it a natural cycle or be it one that we are exacerbating (my view is its a bit of both) is warming up and the world's patterns of climate are going through a major upheaval.  That is a fact.  They believe in less than one life time there will be no more ice at the North Pole.  The worlds oceans are changing and this effects the worlds wind patterns and that effects the rain fall patterns.  You cannot escape this.  Yet Howard refused to budge one iota and insisted that doing anything would disrupt the blessed economy.

 

Again, the economy.  It always came back to the dollars in the coffers.  Seriously, what is wrong with having a zero surplus?  What is wrong with the Federal government spending EVERY dollar they get in taxes.  I agree that you shouldnt overspend and have a debt, but whats wrong with using our taxes for the people?

 

I look forward to the new Labor government.  I think it will provide a refreshing change.  We will probably see Rudd apologise to the Stolen Generation.  I expect to see him and his government interacting at a more polite level with our Asian neighbours and build some good will between us and countries like the Phillipines and Thailand.  I expect our relationships with China to become even more important to us than the US as they are really the new economic powerhouse.

 

I expect us to sign Kyoto and become leaders in the subsequent phases of that process.

 

All in all, I think this is a change for the good.  People will have to realise that from a budgetary perspective things will be tougher, but lets not forget that money isnt everything.

The Time Is Nigh...

Well, tomorrow is polling day and I will be keen to get down to the local school, grab my sausage sandwich, barge past the pamphlet flingers without taking anything, walk in and have my say...

 

I think you all know who I am voting for...

 

But then the Senate... I may this year number all of the candidates... I must say I am not keen on the preferencial deals that are done and I want to have my say in who goes ahead of who... so I may take the time to work through the full list... can we have a punt on how long that piece of paper is?  I bet its close to 2 metres!!

 

Then after that, Saturday morning will be generally relaxing, I will go to cricket, but given my Queensland trip, I am not on the team sheet, so its a bit of a moral support and perhaps a field as a sub and then its a BBQ at home with the election coverage in the background.

 

I dont know why, I am normally not so keen, but I am really keen to catch a bit of the election coverage and watch Johnnies final speech live as opposed to the news feeds.

 

But what time will that be?  I think the election will be close, so I dont expect an early concession from either party... but I am putting it down that the concession will come at 11:30pm... some 3hrs after Perth closes its polls...