Politics Super Thread - keep it all in here

[stryker]

The problem is Bret that such a high percentage of people dont bother to take the time and properly distribute their preferences.

 

[BRET]

Funny…...I seem to recall u being pretty sure that we would not make the eight.

And great news that the greens are going to help that red haired lady.

Very nice.

We are in the 8 DESPITE Sheens. But that is a whole other issue not relevant here.

 

[simonthetiger]

I think it is relevant.

It shows that you were way off with your judgement with regards to leadership and therefore your input on this subect is clouded with the same misguided ethos.

 

[stryker]

I think it is relevant.

It shows that you were way off with your judgement with regards to leadership and therefore your input on this subect is clouded with the same misguided ethos.

:unamused:

 

[redemption]

dumb question for dummmmm people!

party not individual! (has the Rudd dumping not been a lesson to the previously deluded???)

(& your vote is virtually meaningless unless in a marginal electorate like Bennelong which will be determined by the support of local Asian lobbies anyway)

 

[alien]

I say I say I say….....

simon says

 

[Yossarian]

Yossarian, how did you think Gillard handled herself?

In the debate? You'll need to be more specific.

 

[Yossarian]

That was by far the most ill-conceived and tragic of all their work…I agree with your comments CB.
A few others:
Fuel watch,
Grocery watch,
20/20 summit,
CPRS backflip,
ETS backdown,
Stimulous packages,
Copenhagen climate conference,
BER
Mining super profits tax,
Illegal boat people,
Sri Lankans who held the gov to ransom,
Ruthless way they snuffed their leader.....

Plenty of others as well.

It's a bit rich listing CPRS and ETS when the Libs voted against them. Grocery watch? Fuel watch? For real? Well it's hardly Children Overboard territory now is it. Maybe they were non core promises!!!

Copenhagen climate conference? What else would you have had them done? What would People Skills have done differently?

And if you want to keep bringing up the stimulus package go ahead. That was excellent policy and is the reason why Australia was the only major western economy to avoid recession.

 

[Cultured_Bogan]

That was by far the most ill-conceived and tragic of all their work…I agree with your comments CB.
A few others:
Fuel watch,
Grocery watch,
20/20 summit,
CPRS backflip,
ETS backdown,
Stimulous packages,
Copenhagen climate conference,
BER
Mining super profits tax,
Illegal boat people,
Sri Lankans who held the gov to ransom,
Ruthless way they snuffed their leader.....

Plenty of others as well.

It's a bit rich listing CPRS and ETS when the Libs voted against them. Grocery watch? Fuel watch? For real? Well it's hardly Children Overboard territory now is it. Maybe they were non core promises!!!

Copenhagen climate conference? What else would you have had them done? What would People Skills have done differently?

And if you want to keep bringing up the stimulus package go ahead. That was excellent policy and is the reason why Australia was the only major western economy to avoid recession.

If anyone did a backflip on the ETS it was the Libs when they knocked Turnbull on the head for supporting it.

 

[hammertime]

It's a bit rich listing CPRS and ETS when the Libs voted against them. Grocery watch? Fuel watch? For real? Well it's hardly Children Overboard territory now is it. Maybe they were non core promises!!!

Copenhagen climate conference? What else would you have had them done? What would People Skills have done differently?

And if you want to keep bringing up the stimulus package go ahead. That was excellent policy and is the reason why Australia was the only major western economy to avoid recession.

Yoss, you are one of the very few Labor supporters who actually do make some good points.

I think you are right about the Stimulus. It was needed. But, I don't think you ever hear anyone say that it wasn't. It was just the terrible policy structure, size and the review of it that was poorly done.

If Labor had done 3 things my thinking about the stimulus would be much different.

1) Did 2 things with the insulation. Negated Foil Insulation & opened it to existing installers only. It was clear to Garratt the risks when constructing the policy and, at the very least, he should have FIXED things when the first person was killed or the first home burnt down.
2) Made sure the Public school builds were done much like the successful Private school funding where they could source their own contractor. A P&C council is much like a strata body. They would have got it done properly for their kids benefit. One of the most powerful motivators out there. I have a feeling with the requirement for the 'Thanks to Labor' plaques outside these halls where we vote, that there was some self-indulgence going on in this policy.
Personally though, with the looming baby boomer issues, the money should have been spent on building Hospital infrastructure and purchasing medical machines rather than something that, for the most part, won't produce any sort of higher educational outcome. At least better health resources should produce cost savings in the future.
3) Made sure the cash handouts stayed in Australia. Paying overseas pensioners who had worked here for a month in 1940 (because they are on a international social security agreement), or prison inmates was again a policy mess. I personally didn't like the cash handouts, I thought they were pretty retarded and excessive, but I could have lived with paying back this 'loan' for others, when I myself never got one..

That's the Liberals arguments with the stimulus. Not that it wasn't needed, but it was VERY badly administered. Plus, It was not forward thinking, it was focus group thinking.

 

[Cultured_Bogan]

Well said Hammer.

Another issue with the cash handouts was how many people actually used that money for what was intended? I'm sure alot of people went out and bought LCD televisions and PlayStation 3's with their handouts, but I know a lot of people (myself included,) who used that money to knock off an extra mortgage repayment or two, pay the rego on the car or pay bills. I guarantee the effect of that initiative was not nearly as positive as it could have been.

 

[Yossarian]

It's a bit rich listing CPRS and ETS when the Libs voted against them. Grocery watch? Fuel watch? For real? Well it's hardly Children Overboard territory now is it. Maybe they were non core promises!!!

Copenhagen climate conference? What else would you have had them done? What would People Skills have done differently?

And if you want to keep bringing up the stimulus package go ahead. That was excellent policy and is the reason why Australia was the only major western economy to avoid recession.

Yoss, you are one of the very few Labor supporters who actually do make some good points.

I think you are right about the Stimulus. It was needed. But, I don't think you ever hear anyone say that it wasn't. It was just the terrible policy structure, size and the review of it that was poorly done.

If Labor had done 3 things my thinking about the stimulus would be much different.

1) Did 2 things with the insulation. Negated Foil Insulation & opened it to existing installers only. It was clear to Garratt the risks when constructing the policy and, at the very least, he should have FIXED things when the first person was killed or the first home burnt down.
2) Made sure the Public school builds were done much like the successful Private school funding where they could source their own contractor. A P&C council is much like a strata body. They would have got it done properly for their kids benefit. One of the most powerful motivators out there. I have a feeling with the requirement for the 'Thanks to Labor' plaques outside these halls where we vote, that there was some self-indulgence going on in this policy.
Personally though, with the looming baby boomer issues, the money should have been spent on building Hospital infrastructure and purchasing medical machines rather than something that, for the most part, won't produce any sort of higher educational outcome. At least better health resources should produce cost savings in the future.
3) Made sure the cash handouts stayed in Australia. Paying overseas pensioners who had worked here for a month in 1940 (because they are on a international social security agreement), or prison inmates was again a policy mess. I personally didn't like the cash handouts, I thought they were pretty retarded and excessive, but I could have lived with paying back this 'loan' for others, when I myself never got one..

That's the Liberals arguments with the stimulus. Not that it wasn't needed, but it was VERY badly administered. Plus, It was not forward thinking, it was focus group thinking.

I'm not sure that is really true. Abbott has made several comments about the size of the stimulus package with reference to the debt and borrowing levels. Anyway just to quickly comment on the issues you raised:

1 - Agree for the most part. The idea was okay but as a policy wonk myself, the implementation was poor and could have been solved largely by the provisos you raised.

2 - The health angle is not a bad point however the greater problem with hospitals is the staffing. Also in the current political set-up it would have been difficult to directly spend that sort of money bypassing the states. And of course the number of hospitals is much less than schools so as a stimulus measure it would have not been as strong.

I reiterate that the average P&C couldn't organise a bake sale let alone finding a builder and the whole thing would have been a corruption nightmare waiting to happen. Someone in the P&C would bound to be or know a builder who could knock something up cheap. As I said a lot of the problems could have been overcome by having a value for money check on what was being proposed but the scope and speed of the policy led to things getting a bit out of control. That said it is not bad policy and a lot of schools will get much needed facilities as a result and the building will put money into the economy. All parties like plaques and signs touting these things…

3 - I know that sounds like common sense but the cost of weeding out people living overseas would have probably cost more than the savings made. It would also be in violation of reciprocal pension schemes and we do very well out of these (there are a lot more British OAP in Aus then vice versa). Time was also a factor so it was probably a reasonable move to pump it out wholesale rather than hiring people at Centrelink or ATO to fine tune it. I understand the amount of money that went offshore was a very minuscule percentage of the total funds.

 

[stryker]

It's a bit rich listing CPRS and ETS when the Libs voted against them. Grocery watch? Fuel watch? For real? Well it's hardly Children Overboard territory now is it. Maybe they were non core promises!!!

Copenhagen climate conference? What else would you have had them done? What would People Skills have done differently?

And if you want to keep bringing up the stimulus package go ahead. That was excellent policy and is the reason why Australia was the only major western economy to avoid recession.

Its not rich at all. Rudd claimed "..to not take up the CPRS while waiting for the rest of the world to act would be political cowardice….an absolute failure in leadership and an absolute failure in logic." He also called Global Warming "the greatest moral dilema of our time" My problem with this is that there is just as much proven data claiming that GW isnt solely man made and is in fact nature doing what it does. Labor think that taxing the bejesus out of everyone will help the problem. It's not a great leap to be sceptical in the extreme of this.

Fuel and grocery watch are just examples of the flipant nature in which this mob form policies. What could either of these commissioners do to change anything? you need to get real.

The way that Rudd and his cronies carried on at the CCC was an embarrassment to this nation. The way he tried to coincide his arrival with that of Obama was laughable. He wanted to be one of the "cool kids" that arrived with the pres, so they could storm into the conference and change things up. Did you manage to catch any of his speech? It was for the large part cringeworthy.

Although the stimulus packages were well intentioned it was just another policy that was carried out incompetently. A lot of people didnt pump the grant back into the economy, a lot of it went either into savings or onto debt repayments. If it was regulated properly it could have made the difference they said it was intended to, what it really came across as as was a cash prize bride from a desperate government. Dont try an tell me that it saved us from recession...It was our trade with the chinese and the mining industry - two things that Labor are now attacking.

 

[hammertime]

1 - Agree for the most part. The idea was okay but as a policy wonk myself, the implementation was poor and could have been solved largely by the provisos you raised.

2 - The health angle is not a bad point however the greater problem with hospitals is the staffing. Also in the current political set-up it would have been difficult to directly spend that sort of money bypassing the states. And of course the number of hospitals is much less than schools so as a stimulus measure it would have not been as strong.

I reiterate that the average P&C couldn't organise a bake sale let alone finding a builder and the whole thing would have been a corruption nightmare waiting to happen. Someone in the P&C would bound to be or know a builder who could knock something up cheap. As I said a lot of the problems could have been overcome by having a value for money check on what was being proposed but the scope and speed of the policy led to things getting a bit out of control. That said it is not bad policy and a lot of schools will get much needed facilities as a result and the building will put money into the economy. All parties like plaques and signs touting these things…

3 - I know that sounds like common sense but the cost of weeding out people living overseas would have probably cost more than the savings made. It would also be in violation of reciprocal pension schemes and we do very well out of these (there are a lot more British OAP in Aus then vice versa). Time was also a factor so it was probably a reasonable move to pump it out wholesale rather than hiring people at Centrelink or ATO to fine tune it. I understand the amount of money that went offshore was a very minuscule percentage of the total funds.

1\. The Liberals have always just said it could have been done for less. Turnbull actually released an alternate policy around the same time, a lot of the elements were the same but it was restructured to give more bang for the buck. The party in opposition don't have the resources that the government in power do to look at any cabinet-in confidence research (which is everything) or alternate options either.

2\. I was more aiming towards getting more equipment to make things more efficient to reduce staff numbers. I probably just didn't word it properly. One story that sticks in my mind recently is a little girl riddled with cancer who had to write to all state Labor members asking for a MRI (or some sort of machine) because her local didn't have one. It was state govt, but, I think in total she got 3 replies. I remember one was Jodi McKay.. but anyway, why don't we have that kind of equipment where needed? Surely if we did, it would take less staff resources to press the button then to arrange the whole transportation and logistics to get her into another hospital. I take your point, but hospitals are nation wide and there was already enough work for tradies with the home buyers grant & the insulation scheme.

I think there is less risk getting a P&C group to make a decision than a staffer 200 miles away. I think the way that the private school projects worked out, it is probably proof of that.

3\. I work on databases as a job. Given the data, it's honestly a 5 minute job to weed those out. All you need is the Social security/inmate list, then tie it into the ATO tax payer list. Both would have tax file numbers. But you are right about the proportion, it was a small amount. Just because I'm going to be someone paying these back ,it does irk me if the money was even slightly wasted.

 

[Yossarian]

It's a bit rich listing CPRS and ETS when the Libs voted against them. Grocery watch? Fuel watch? For real? Well it's hardly Children Overboard territory now is it. Maybe they were non core promises!!!

Copenhagen climate conference? What else would you have had them done? What would People Skills have done differently?

And if you want to keep bringing up the stimulus package go ahead. That was excellent policy and is the reason why Australia was the only major western economy to avoid recession.

Its not rich at all. Rudd claimed "..to not take up the CPRS while waiting for the rest of the world to act would be political cowardice….an absolute failure in leadership and an absolute failure in logic." He also called Global Warming "the greatest moral dilema of our time" My problem with this is that there is just as much proven data claiming that GW isnt solely man made and is in fact nature doing what it does. Labor think that taxing the bejesus out of everyone will help the problem. It's not a great leap to be sceptical in the extreme of this.

Fuel and grocery watch are just examples of the flipant nature in which this mob form policies. What could either of these commissioners do to change anything? you need to get real.

The way that Rudd and his cronies carried on at the CCC was an embarrassment to this nation. The way he tried to coincide his arrival with that of Obama was laughable. He wanted to be one of the "cool kids" that arrived with the pres, so they could storm into the conference and change things up. Did you manage to catch any of his speech? It was for the large part cringeworthy.

Although the stimulus packages were well intentioned it was just another policy that was carried out incompetently. A lot of people didnt pump the grant back into the economy, a lot of it went either into savings or onto debt repayments. If it was regulated properly it could have made the difference they said it was intended to, what it really came across as as was a cash prize bride from a desperate government. Dont try an tell me that it saved us from recession...It was our trade with the chinese and the mining industry - two things that Labor are now attacking.

Stryker it's simple - Rudd put up legislation on climate change and your mob voted it down.

Mining is roughly 5% of the Australian economy - yes having a strong mining output helped but to give no credit to the stimulus package shows a lack of basic economic understanding. Everyone from the World Bank to the Wall Street Journal agrees the stimulus package was a key factor in Australia avoiding recession.

 

[Yossarian]

1 - Agree for the most part. The idea was okay but as a policy wonk myself, the implementation was poor and could have been solved largely by the provisos you raised.

2 - The health angle is not a bad point however the greater problem with hospitals is the staffing. Also in the current political set-up it would have been difficult to directly spend that sort of money bypassing the states. And of course the number of hospitals is much less than schools so as a stimulus measure it would have not been as strong.

I reiterate that the average P&C couldn't organise a bake sale let alone finding a builder and the whole thing would have been a corruption nightmare waiting to happen. Someone in the P&C would bound to be or know a builder who could knock something up cheap. As I said a lot of the problems could have been overcome by having a value for money check on what was being proposed but the scope and speed of the policy led to things getting a bit out of control. That said it is not bad policy and a lot of schools will get much needed facilities as a result and the building will put money into the economy. All parties like plaques and signs touting these things…

3 - I know that sounds like common sense but the cost of weeding out people living overseas would have probably cost more than the savings made. It would also be in violation of reciprocal pension schemes and we do very well out of these (there are a lot more British OAP in Aus then vice versa). Time was also a factor so it was probably a reasonable move to pump it out wholesale rather than hiring people at Centrelink or ATO to fine tune it. I understand the amount of money that went offshore was a very minuscule percentage of the total funds.

1\. The Liberals have always just said it could have been done for less. Turnbull actually released an alternate policy around the same time, a lot of the elements were the same but it was restructured to give more bang for the buck. The party in opposition don't have the resources that the government in power do to look at any cabinet-in confidence research (which is everything) or alternate options either.

2\. I was more aiming towards getting more equipment to make things more efficient to reduce staff numbers. I probably just didn't word it properly. One story that sticks in my mind recently is a little girl riddled with cancer who had to write to all state Labor members asking for a MRI (or some sort of machine) because her local didn't have one. It was state govt, but, I think in total she got 3 replies. I remember one was Jodi McKay.. but anyway, why don't we have that kind of equipment where needed? Surely if we did, it would take less staff resources to press the button then to arrange the whole transportation and logistics to get her into another hospital. I take your point, but hospitals are nation wide and there was already enough work for tradies with the home buyers grant & the insulation scheme.

I think there is less risk getting a P&C group to make a decision than a staffer 200 miles away. I think the way that the private school projects worked out, it is probably proof of that.

3\. I work on databases as a job. Given the data, it's honestly a 5 minute job to weed those out. All you need is the Social security/inmate list, then tie it into the ATO tax payer list. Both would have tax file numbers. But you are right about the proportion, it was a small amount. Just because I'm going to be someone paying these back ,it does irk me if the money was even slightly wasted.

All fair enough points. I guess the problem with the last point is more getting the data. Having worked with a lot of these agencies they aren't particularly good at sharing information. It would have taken a while (I'd think anyway) to get lists of prisoners and their TFNs. As I said I gather the problem with people OS was more the reciprocal arrangements and no doubt Centrelink not having up to date data on everyone. Someone may live in NZ now but all Centrelink knows is they lived in Australia 12 years ago. I understand your frustration though!!

 

[hammertime]

All fair enough points. I guess the problem with the last point is more getting the data. Having worked with a lot of these agencies they aren't particularly good at sharing information. It would have taken a while (I'd think anyway) to get lists of prisoners and their TFNs. As I said I gather the problem with people OS was more the reciprocal arrangements and no doubt Centrelink not having up to date data on everyone. Someone may live in NZ now but all Centrelink knows is they lived in Australia 12 years ago. I understand your frustration though!!

I know what you mean mate. I actually thought of an idea a while ago to create a central government IT agency that would handle all the data and systems development. It would have so many cost savings compared to the way departments handle their own software development. When I was in DOFA, there were so many inefficiencies. Like you say, getting data is extremely painful. You can't be assured of it's accuracy either.

I was there 5 years ago, so not sure if it's any better. But I hope to god it is.

 

[Yossarian]

All fair enough points. I guess the problem with the last point is more getting the data. Having worked with a lot of these agencies they aren't particularly good at sharing information. It would have taken a while (I'd think anyway) to get lists of prisoners and their TFNs. As I said I gather the problem with people OS was more the reciprocal arrangements and no doubt Centrelink not having up to date data on everyone. Someone may live in NZ now but all Centrelink knows is they lived in Australia 12 years ago. I understand your frustration though!!

I know what you mean mate. I actually thought of an idea a while ago to create a central government IT agency that would handle all the data and systems development. It would have so many cost savings compared to the way departments handle their own software development. When I was in DOFA, there were so many inefficiencies. Like you say, getting data is extremely painful. You can't be assured of it's accuracy either.

I was there 5 years ago, so not sure if it's any better. But I hope to god it is.

Very true. There are far too many agencies collecting information which other organistations have in a similar if not exactly the same form. There are a lot of empire builders out there and even more egos! Centralising a lot of the IT functions actually makes a hell of a lot of sense - if they all used the same framework it would make importing data a lot easier and quicker. Shame it never took off.

 

[stryker]

Firstly…they're not "my mob", sure they are going to get my vote this time around but that has more to do with me not wanting an extremely incompetent party running my country. I have actually voted Labor in the past believe it or not.

Secondly the legislation put up on climate control was knee jerk and fundamentally flawed...you may also notice that the Greens voted it down as well.

As I said, the stimulous packages were well intentioned...just horribly implemented. Your wording of our economic positioning is biased. Sure they helped, but so did the strong economy inherited from the Liberals as well as our relationship with China and the mining industry.

 

[Yossarian]

Firstly…they're not "my mob", sure they are going to get my vote this time around but that has more to do with me not wanting an extremely incompetent party running my country. I have actually voted Labor in the past believe it or not.

Secondly the legislation put up on climate control was knee jerk and fundamentally flawed...you may also notice that the Greens voted it down as well.

As I said, the stimulous packages were well intentioned...just horribly implemented. Your wording of our economic positioning is biased. Sure they helped, but so did the strong economy inherited from the Liberals as well as our relationship with China and the mining industry.

Yes I find it hard to believe you ever voted Labor. And as long as you parrot Alan Jones as a credible source I will link with you the Libs. You've maintained a fairly solid line on this debate which is firmly on the Liberal side. Pretending to be an impartial observer isn't really going to fly.

Yes the Greens voted it down - they didn't think it went far enough. The Greens are idiots.

Australia is well maintained economy because of the reforms and handling of both sides of politics since 1983\. To suggest it is solely because of Howard/Costello is false. Mining receipts would not have been enough to keep Australia out of recession but they did help.