Aussie Politics: Please post your response (No stamp needed)

[Horza]

7 hours ago, Skyrazer said:

Yeah and it looks like Milne has just resigned (as he should). I wonder where this leaves Guthrie now as it makes it look like her "sacking" was completely unwarranted.

She's still terminated. She'll get quite a good settlement cos the board will want to avoid legal action, after which she'll go on to the dozens of other corporate gigs lined up for her. Don't let the fact that Milne was a doofus being played like a 1960 classic sunburst Les Paul by Malcolm obscure that she was an unpopular manager who didn't have the confidence of most of the staff, lacked an appreciation of the politics and culture of the organisation and divided her time between other postings (which is crazy to me but that's how corporate Australia rolls, CEOs and directorships, gotta catch 'em all). 

[Paxter]

13 hours ago, Horza said:

She's still terminated. She'll get quite a good settlement cos the board will want to avoid legal action, after which she'll go on to the dozens of other corporate gigs lined up for her. Don't let the fact that Milne was a doofus being played like a 1960 classic sunburst Les Paul by Malcolm obscure that she was an unpopular manager who didn't have the confidence of most of the staff, lacked an appreciation of the politics and culture of the organisation and divided her time between other postings (which is crazy to me but that's how corporate Australia rolls, CEOs and directorships, gotta catch 'em all). 

Totally agree with that.

*waves to Horza*

[karaddin]

On 9/21/2018 at 10:11 PM, Jeor said:

My dislike of Shorten isn't anything in particular; it's just one of those things (I'm sure for everything that I'm about to say next there are corresponding fluffs on the Coalition side). He's made a few gaffes, e.g. the absurd "rolled gold guarantee" that no Labor politicinas had citizenship problems, and his pretty offensive "Employ Australians First" ad that featured basically all white people (I'm ethnically Chinese).

In trying to think about why I've historically been a Liberal voter, I think it comes down to Labor's way of using class warfare (and yes, I know the Coalition do it too). My parents emigrated here from Singapore when me and my siblings were born. We were reasonably well-off, but not incredibly wealthy, and both parents worked long hours to send my brother and I to a private school because (like many migrant families) they put their children's education at the top of their priority list.

In those formative years, I was turned off by Labor because I constantly heard cheap attacks against rich private school kids and parents characterising us as wealthy Kerry Packer-type families siphoning off government funds while we sip champagne (the debate about government money going to private schools is, I think, a bit more nuanced than it seems*). In my experience, the majority of private school kids came from families like ours; two working parents and lots of sacrifice. And rightly or wrongly, I grew up with the belief that the Coalition generally liked and helped people who tried to get ahead (or at least more than Labor did). There's not a lot between them, but the Coalition are a tad more socially conservative and economically liberal, which goes with my personal leanings.

In terms of being disgusted with the Coalition, I would have been more disgusted if Dutton had become the leader (in which case I probably would have flipped). Morrison on the other hand I find more palatable. And for all the (deserved) opprobrium over the Coalition's ridiculous "stop the boats" policy, which is probably my biggest bugbear with them, Labor aren't exactly offering much of an alternative; Shorten's quoted as much that he'll continue the Coalition policies.

*EDIT: To explain my private school remark, fully one third of the population goes to a non-government school. That's clearly not all Richie Rich families. Also, the government spends less money per student in a private school than in a public school. If no support were offered, fewer students would go to private schools and therefore they would go to public schools where they cost the government more per head. So theoretically there's a good reason why some government money should go to private schools. Of course, the actual level can still be debated but I don't think it should be zero.

I didn't reply to this until now because honestly I have a pretty hard time wrapping my head around how you can grant higher weight to Labor class warfare rhetoric against middle+ class in the past over the actual class warfare being waged against the most vulnerable in society in the present.

The general bent of your criticism of Shorten is also taking the most uncharitable view (although granted its also one that was heavily pushed by the media). I think he overstated things but the fact of the matter was that Labor did have a process for at least vetting the citizenship issue and the High Court had not yet given clear guidance on some of the matters - the only one that was outright just a fail on Labors side was Feeney and he was a disgrace that is thankfully gone from parliament. Meanwhile there were more Coalition MPs that should have been referred at the same time as the Labor referrals and they just refused to refer any more of their own and got away with it. I don't like the "Employ Australians first" stuff either but how on earth can you weigh the racism brought into parliament and decide the coalition look better on that front than Labor?

On the schools issue - I'm also from a comfortable middle class background with a hardworking father that went to a private (Catholic) school. The 1/3 of all kids in Australia go to private schools isn't proof that private school funding should be above criticism, its proof of the magnitude of the problem. When the privileged in society get to completely withdraw from an institution it leads to that institution being neglected. Even when public schools still get adequate funding (and some of them do) there is still inequity in the schooling system from the existence of private schools due to all the non monetary resources that get funnelled to private schools (and public schools in wealthy areas). Its a complicated issue that can't be solved overnight, but our rate of private schools is massively higher than comparable countries - only 9% attend private schools in the US and 7% in the UK. Its not a criticism of people that send their kids to a private school, but it is a problem with our system.

And this isn't a response just to the quoted post but Morrison is a very long way from a moderate. He might be "moderate" within the party now because Dutton etc are so far right, but he's still very far right himself with radical religious views that are not in step with the Australian public. The idea that people will swallow the idea that he is a moderate just because he's not Dutton and the media is complicit in his daggy dad shtick is chilling. We're still waiting for him to reveal how he's going to try legalise religious based discrimination against LGBTQ people from the Ruddock review they refuse to make public. So please stop basing a significant part of your voting decision on Labor rhetoric that isn't even current while ignoring that the coalition doesn't just use equivalent rhetoric but actually puts it into practice.

[Jeor]

1 hour ago, karaddin said:

I didn't reply to this until now because honestly I have a pretty hard time wrapping my head around how you can grant higher weight to Labor class warfare rhetoric against middle+ class in the past over the actual class warfare being waged against the most vulnerable in society in the present.

@karaddin, rather than respond point by point (we'll go on forever otherwise!) I'm not absolving the Coalition of wrongdoing at all. As I said in my original post, there will always be cases of bad behaviour or bad policies everywhere in politics, no matter the party. Similarly, I'm not basing a significant part of my voting pattern on Labor rhetoric that isn't even current - it's more that on the balance of things, the Coalition is a little more socially conservative and a little more economically liberal, which are directions I tend to favour.

1 hour ago, karaddin said:

 I don't like the "Employ Australians first" stuff either but how on earth can you weigh the racism brought into parliament and decide the coalition look better on that front than Labor?

I love it when people tell me how I should feel about racism. Are the Coalition racist too? Probably - in my experience Australia is a pretty racist country (albeit just not self-aware, I'm not ascribing maliciousness to it all) and I've long assumed that's just the way it is and you get on with life. But I can still get annoyed at little one-off things here and there, and it's just Labor's luck that their highly visible ad was one of them.

[karaddin]

24 minutes ago, Jeor said:

I love it when people tell me how I should feel about racism. Are the Coalition racist too? Probably - in my experience Australia is a pretty racist country (albeit just not self-aware, I'm not ascribing maliciousness to it all) and I've long assumed that's just the way it is and you get on with life. But I can still get annoyed at little one-off things here and there, and it's just Labor's luck that their highly visible ad was one of them.

Bolded absolutely, and Labor definitely have racist policies, I'm not trying to tell you that ad wasn't racist. You just seem to be giving a hell of a pass to the coalition and when they've structured as large a part of their platform around explicit racism for the last 20 years as they have that's weird.

[Jeor]

2 minutes ago, karaddin said:

Bolded absolutely, and Labor definitely have racist policies, I'm not trying to tell you that ad wasn't racist. You just seem to be giving a hell of a pass to the coalition and when they've structured as large a part of their platform around explicit racism for the last 20 years as they have that's fucked.

Thanks, I probably shouldn't have come on quite so strong and I know you weren't excusing it. A genuine question though...what parts of the Coalition platform do you see as explicitly racist? We have previously mentioned immigration and boat people, although I think that's one where Labor are only marginally better.

[Paxter]

4 hours ago, Jeor said:

Thanks, I probably shouldn't have come on quite so strong and I know you weren't excusing it. A genuine question though...what parts of the Coalition platform do you see as explicitly racist? We have previously mentioned immigration and boat people, although I think that's one where Labor are only marginally better.

The NT Intervention, its successor policies, the refusal to say Sorry and a slew of more recent decisions (Tony Abbott as Special Envoy, rejection of the Uluru Statement of the Heart, cashless debit cards in remote communities) come to my mind as obvious policies that have pandered to racist elements in the Coalition base.

I think you could quite easily pick out a few elements in each of economic/welfare, justice and child protection policy (to name a few areas) in which Coalition politicians (State and Federal) consistently craft messages aimed at ignorant and prejudiced voters.

ETA: On Morrison, I should clarify that in no way do I see him as a moderate (he didn’t even vote for marriage equality!) I think he’s a compromise candidate who sits on the right of the spectrum between genuine moderates and hard-line conservatives, and this makes him a feasible leader capable of unifying a fractious party. 

[Jeor]

14 hours ago, Paxter said:

The NT Intervention, its successor policies, the refusal to say Sorry and a slew of more recent decisions (Tony Abbott as Special Envoy, rejection of the Uluru Statement of the Heart, cashless debit cards in remote communities) come to my mind as obvious policies that have pandered to racist elements in the Coalition base.

ETA: On Morrison, I should clarify that in no way do I see him as a moderate (he didn’t even vote for marriage equality!) I think he’s a compromise candidate who sits on the right of the spectrum between genuine moderates and hard-line conservatives, and this makes him a feasible leader capable of unifying a fractious party. 

Ah, fair play to that - Coalition policy on indigenous affairs is indeed racist.

Re: Morrison, of course he's only a moderate in the Liberal party sense of the word. If you were to put him on the overall political spectrum he'd still be right-wing, probably Howard-esque. With the daggy dad image, religious/traditional family values and all that sort of thing (the "Aussie battler" shtick), I wouldn't be surprised if the Liberals try to build up an image of Morrison as the second coming of John Howard (who might have lost the plot at the end, but was for most of his time a successful PM).

Malcolm Turnbull could lay claim to being a legitimate centrist or centre-right candidate in a general election and was further left than Howard or Morrison, who I'd probably call plain old right wing. But over on the far or extreme right you have Dutton, Abbott and co.

[Stubby]

On 9/29/2018 at 12:12 PM, Jeor said:

Ah, fair play to that - Coalition policy on indigenous affairs is indeed racist.

Re: Morrison, of course he's only a moderate in the Liberal party sense of the word. If you were to put him on the overall political spectrum he'd still be right-wing, probably Howard-esque. With the daggy dad image, religious/traditional family values and all that sort of thing (the "Aussie battler" shtick), I wouldn't be surprised if the Liberals try to build up an image of Morrison as the second coming of John Howard (who might have lost the plot at the end, but was for most of his time a successful PM).

Malcolm Turnbull could lay claim to being a legitimate centrist or centre-right candidate in a general election and was further left than Howard or Morrison, who I'd probably call plain old right wing. But over on the far or extreme right you have Dutton, Abbott and co.

It is just shtick, IMO.  It's a persona that he puts out there to deceive.

[karaddin]

@Jeor Pax already gave a good answer, but I'd also include the aforementioned immigration and asylum seeker issue in greater detail than "both parties are bad on it". The coalition has fed public sentiment against asylum seekers, they have actively scare mongered about the people who seek asylum, they pretend they are not genuine refugees, they push dehumanising language ("illegals" for example). Ever since Tampa in 2001 the Coalition has used this issue to portray themselves as tough compared to Labor being soft and untrustworthy/incapable of getting "the job" done. What I'm getting at is that I damn both sides for the policies we hold, but I attribute more racism to the coalition for driving this policy and dragging Labor after them - they stoke the racism that feeds it, Labor followed because it cares more about racist votes than it does about standing up against racism.

And lest you think I'm solely blaming the coalition for the entire thing, I'm not - mandatory detention was started by Labor and the blame on that goes back to Hawke/Keating.

In this particular case I damn the Coalition for their cynical opportunistic racism and Labor for their cowardice and complicity. Personally I refuse to vote for either party with my primary vote while they hold a policy of torturing people as a deterrent - once you accept the idea of trading someone elses suffering for your own benefit you're on a very dark and dangerous path.

Pax's examples are also very much part of what I mean by explicitly racist policies, and Indigenous policy is probably one area where ScoMo marks himself as markedly worse than the party under Turnbull. Appointing Abbott as the "special emissary" is a deliberate insult and spitting in the face of the Indigenous community and I cannot believe it wasn't intended as such.

ETA: And in case I'm still managing to undersell how much of my anger on asylum seeker policy is directed at Labor, I want to see immigration ministers and probably PMs that had oversight of these policies indicted in the Hague irrespective of party.

[Paxter]

The most frustrating thing (to my mind) is that the Coalition has successfully sold to voters the idea that "well-managed borders and low maritime deaths = inhumane treatment of asylum seekers and a refugee policy that violates international law." With that bit of (sickening) political artistry complete, there really is no way in 2018 that a mainstream Australian political party can propose policy reform without losing out at the ballot box. I leave it to the individual as to whether Labor can be at all excused in these circumstances!

ETA: It doesn't help that policymakers all over the world are completely botching international refugee policy, which makes it easier for Australia to appear OK on a relative analysis. If Europe, for example, had stitched together a coherent and humane multilateral response to the influx of refugees a couple of years ago, then we could be closer to seeing reform in this country. 

[karaddin]

Of course from other countries point of view, they all get to cite what Australia has been doing as a precedent for a) getting away with this stuff and b) getting to claim it "works" so I don't really feel we're in any position to complain about others.

I agree with your first paragraph, but you're never going to change anyones mind by simply agreeing the Coalition and going along with their policy. Sometimes taking the moral stand requires sacrifice, and for political parties that can mean accepting an electoral defeat in order to stand up and be a leader to the country. I understand the logic process by which the left of Labor convinces themselves that they have to be in power to change these things, but when you throw away your moral authority you are no more able to change it when you do get into power than you could from opposition. There are some things you can just never compromise on.

[Jeor]

48 minutes ago, karaddin said:

I agree with your first paragraph, but you're never going to change anyones mind by simply agreeing the Coalition and going along with their policy. Sometimes taking the moral stand requires sacrifice, and for political parties that can mean accepting an electoral defeat in order to stand up and be a leader to the country. I understand the logic process by which the left of Labor convinces themselves that they have to be in power to change these things, but when you throw away your moral authority you are no more able to change it when you do get into power than you could from opposition. There are some things you can just never compromise on.

This is where I feel in the future there are some good opportunities that will come. The recent revolution in politics, where there is a backlash against political correctness and a distrust of the political class in general, has been used by Trump et al and all the cynical politicians for nefarious purposes (i.e. say what you like and get away with it, deliberately stoke outrage, lie all the time until people accept it as truth). I'm guessing part of the appeal of Trump (hard writing even that sentence) is that people are fed up with political fence-sitting and professional politicians who dodge every tough issue.

Instead of having the hard right politicians exploiting that, I reckon there's now some ground opened up for some common-sense, decent people to also say things that would have been considered political suicide in the past. Things like immigration (as has been mentioned), dealing with the demographic time bomb, climate change and energy policy, higher taxes to pay for better services and infrastructure - all of which had previously been considered in the political "too hard" basket really should be on the table and politicians should be able to survive and tough out the bad press.

Even more so in Australia where there's compulsory voting, as long as a politican comes across as sensible, kind and competent, and has a corresponding sensible, kind and competent plan for Australia, you'd think they'd find a decent constituency.

 

[Paxter]

15 hours ago, Jeor said:

Things like immigration (as has been mentioned), dealing with the demographic time bomb, climate change and energy policy, higher taxes to pay for better services and infrastructure - all of which had previously been considered in the political "too hard" basket really should be on the table and politicians should be able to survive and tough out the bad press.

This sounds a bit like the Rudd policy manifesto of 2007-10: a substantially more compassionate asylum seekers policy, expanded legal immigration to deal with the demographics issue, spending big on infrastructure, drawing up plans for an ETS to deal with climate change and the 'education revolution.' He also tried to lift taxes to pay for better services (though I'm guessing a mining supertax isn't what you have in mind!) Rudd was ahead of his time?!

I'm also guessing you went for Howard in '07...

On an unrelated note: I am starting to get nervous about how the religious freedoms debate is going to play out after the by-election. Catholic schools already have an exemption to discriminate on the basis of sexuality - this currently prevents my sister from disclosing her sexuality to her colleagues. I fear that this debate is going to take us even further down a road on which the state gets behind religious-based discrimination.

[dornishpen]

I’m just curious, I tried to google to see if I could find any polls, but didn’t find anything; what percentage of the Australian public supports the government’s policies about asylum seekers/migrants on boats and the island detention camps?

[Paxter]

59 minutes ago, dornishpen said:

I’m just curious, I tried to google to see if I could find any polls, but didn’t find anything; what percentage of the Australian public supports the government’s policies about asylum seekers/migrants on boats and the island detention camps?

I've seen a few recent-ish polls showing that Australians are split down the middle on whether refugees being detained offshore should be allowed to resettle in Australia. But most of the recent polling seems to be about legal immigration - I assume because Australians are largely happy with existing asylum seekers policy (i.e. the delightful cocktail of boat turnbacks, offshore processing and temporary protection visas).

[dornishpen]

15 minutes ago, Paxter said:

I've seen a few recent-ish polls showing that Australians are split down the middle on whether refugees being detained offshore should be allowed to resettle in Australia. But most of the recent polling seems to be about legal immigration - I assume because Australians are largely happy with existing asylum seekers policy (i.e. the delightful cocktail of boat turnbacks, offshore processing and temporary protection visas).

Thank you. I’ve only read about it in he international press, but It seems like such a needlessly cruel policy, I was disturbed when your government turned down NZ’s offer to give them asylum.

[Paxter]

15 minutes ago, dornishpen said:

Thank you. I’ve only read about it in he international press, but It seems like such a needlessly cruel policy, I was disturbed when your government turned down NZ’s offer to give them asylum.

You're not the only one! The Coalition defended its position with the familiar "cruel to be kind" argument.

For what it's worth, the Federal Opposition has been pressuring the Government to reconsider New Zealand's offer and would likely enter into negotiations with Ardern on the matter if they win the 2019 election. 

[Jeor]

2 hours ago, Paxter said:

This sounds a bit like the Rudd policy manifesto of 2007-10: a substantially more compassionate asylum seekers policy, expanded legal immigration to deal with the demographics issue, spending big on infrastructure, drawing up plans for an ETS to deal with climate change and the 'education revolution.' He also tried to lift taxes to pay for better services (though I'm guessing a mining supertax isn't what you have in mind!) Rudd was ahead of his time?!

I'm also guessing you went for Howard in '07...

Erm, yes, I think I might have voted Coalition...

As you've said, the immigration debate is linked to the demographic issue and it makes sense to expand legal immigration. I wouldn't have done the mining supertax, no... in terms of higher taxes I think a combination of lifting the top income tax bracket and lifting (or broadening the base) of the GST would be the fairest way to do it as it shares the pain across both ends of the social spectrum. I would probably leave company tax untouched, but not lower it. Strengthening the GST is a must, given the demographic issue (as everyone pays GST, not just income earners i.e. workforce-age people).

 

[karaddin]

On the tax front I really hate the way Labor have failed to challenge the prevailing attitude on taxes since Howards cuts - Rudd even continued those. It lets the debate about the deficit stay focused on cutting spending when expenditure is only one half of the picture. I'm not a fan of increasing the GST as I feel its regressive and the poor bear too much of that burden, but I think income tax needs to go back up. I'd also like to see the policies that function as wealth transfer to the old wealthy changed, close the superannuation loopholes, close some of the corporate ones as well.

Superannuation is a scheme that has been warped, its meant to be a pool that you draw down on to pay for your retirement, instead a significant portion of the country has re-conceptualised it as such a large pool of money that you live off the interest/profit on it and never actually touch the total pool. That needs to change.

3 hours ago, Paxter said:

On an unrelated note: I am starting to get nervous about how the religious freedoms debate is going to play out after the by-election. Catholic schools already have an exemption to discriminate on the basis of sexuality - this currently prevents my sister from disclosing her sexuality to her colleagues. I fear that this debate is going to take us even further down a road on which the state gets behind religious-based discrimination.

I am very very scared about this, and its one of the things looming large in my mind when I felt the need to say ScoMo is no moderate. He's not even mainstream Australian conservative Christian, he's an evangelical more in the style of the US than traditional Catholic or Protestant and he's got a review that was clearly very biased to try and use as justification for winding back anti discrimination protections before they are voted out of government. With how large a percentage of our aged care facilities have been pushed onto religious providers in the last couple of decades, thats one area where a LOT of harm could be done.