ants Posted January 21, 2019 Share Posted January 21, 2019 51 minutes ago, karaddin said: Poor phrasing on my part, I meant "it doesn't cover enough" rather than "it doesn't cover anything that is legitimate". I have significant health costs from multiple issues and even when I looked at the top tier plans it covered almost nothing of my expenses. I think it would have improved a little in value as codeine isn't PBS but is prescription since the scheduling change so I suspect would be a covered medication now from private insurance. It obviously depends on exactly what you're on/doing, but often that is a limitation of what they're allowed to cover. They can't cover anything to do with GPs, out of hospital procedures (even when its the same as an in-hospital procedure), and a heap of other things. Personally, assuming Labour get in I'd quite welcome a productivity commission review. There are a lot of ways I think the system at all levels could be improved. And I work in the PHI industry (well, for some of my clients anyway)! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joey Crows Posted February 8, 2019 Share Posted February 8, 2019 I know very little about Australian politics having never been to the country or followed its actions closely. But I did just learn an interesting fact about the topic in a historical context. In 1967, then Prime Minister Harold Holt wandered into the surf on a beach in Victoria and was never seen again. Certainly most people from the rest of the world aren't aware of this and from what I've gathered, not that many Australians seem to know about it either. I can't imagine the President of the United States disappearing like that without it being a major historical event. Although, in today's America, if the Prez just disappeared I for one would frame the article and look at it from time to time just to bring myself a little bit of joy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paxter Posted February 15, 2019 Share Posted February 15, 2019 On 2/9/2019 at 5:45 AM, Joey Crows said: In 1967, then Prime Minister Harold Holt wandered into the surf on a beach in Victoria and was never seen again. Certainly most people from the rest of the world aren't aware of this and from what I've gathered, not that many Australians seem to know about it either. I can't imagine the President of the United States disappearing like that without it being a major historical event. Although, in today's America, if the Prez just disappeared I for one would frame the article and look at it from time to time just to bring myself a little bit of joy. I think most Aussies alive at the time would remember it (it was obviously a very major political event), but these days it is probably more remembered for being the source of famous Cold War conspiracy theories. On 2/9/2019 at 5:45 AM, Joey Crows said: I know very little about Australian politics Probably a very good thing...keep it up! On a related note: these next couple of months are going to be exhausting - two major elections, with a likely very long Federal campaign. What a slog. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
karaddin Posted February 15, 2019 Share Posted February 15, 2019 The federal government has completely lost control of the house at this point, I'm kinda amazed that the powerless backbenchers are still falling in line to hold onto "power" for as long as possible even though at this point its better in their long term interests to get the election over with and start rebuilding in opposition. And that's not even touching on the One Nation brawling. As I saw Sally Rugg point out on twitter, if a gay man had smeared blood on a door it would have been treated quite differently and more seriously - there absolutely should be criminal charges over this and the fight. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paxter Posted February 26, 2019 Share Posted February 26, 2019 Finally the suppression order has been lifted (the Vic DPP has dropped its second set of charges against Pell) and we are free to discuss the conviction of a very high-ranking member of the Roman Catholic Church for child sexual abuse. A jury in December convicted Cardinal Pell of one count of sexual penetration of a child and four counts of committing an indecent act with, or in the presence of, a child. The sentencing will happen next week. No date has been set for the appeal, but Pell's legal team has formally commenced the process. Regardless of the result of the appeal, I am proud that we live in one of the very few countries that, through usual legal processes, is ready and able to hold senior members of religious organisations accountable for historic child sex offences. This would have been unheard of in the past and is still far from the norm across the globe. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeor Posted March 18, 2019 Share Posted March 18, 2019 NSW Opposition Leader Michael Daley stays classy, the usual dog whistle about Asians taking jobs away from young Australians. The first thing that annoys me about this is that a large number of Asians are, like myself, second generation. I was born here, I speak only English, and if anyone spoke to me on the phone you'd assume I was some sports-loving Anglo bloke. I may appear Asian, but I'm as "Australian" as anyone else. Comments like Daley's just legitimise every drunk yobbo's refrain when they yell out for me to "go back to your own country!". The second thing is that it's a lazy explanation. I don't know exactly which sector is awash with Asians taking jobs away from other people. If anything, it's in the menial fields (cleaners, call centres, etc) where other people don't exactly want those jobs. If we're talking professional fields (e.g. medicine, accounting, etc) then you're welcome to study hard and try to "beat" the Asians who get into those courses. It's not exactly a secret how to get into those jobs. The third thing is that government tends to cynically exploit their own political consequences. Re: the "PhDs" comment, Sydney University now has 25% international students, most of which are mainland Chinese. This is because the government has cut so much funding from universities, that they now have to look for international full fee paying students to balance their books. To be fair, Michael Daley doesn't have anything to do with federal funding. To be sure, I'm aware there are examples of things happening out there that are not kosher, but let's not tar the vast majority with the same brush. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
karaddin Posted March 18, 2019 Share Posted March 18, 2019 9 minutes ago, Jeor said: The third thing is that government tends to cynically exploit their own political consequences. Re: the "PhDs" comment, Sydney University now has 25% international students, most of which are mainland Chinese. This is because the government has cut so much funding from universities, that they now have to look for international full fee paying students to balance their books. To be fair, Michael Daley doesn't have anything to do with federal funding. I know we've disagreed about the racism of the coalition before, but we're not going to disagree on this subject. The best thing I can say about Daley is that he's not Foley. Those comments are disgraceful and cynical and if Labor actually manage to win the election with shit like that it will be a short lived victory. I think just as relevant as the bit I've quoted here is that while international students are 25% of students, they are now over 50% of the unis entire revenue stream. Education is one of Australia's biggest exploits and the governments keep pushing universities to it more and more by cutting funding, to blame the students that come here and get price gouged for keeping our education system afloat is as illogical as it is awful. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paxter Posted March 20, 2019 Share Posted March 20, 2019 Yes that was disgraceful from Daley. From what I've seen during this campaign he's a pretty poor performer overall and clearly inferior to his Labor leader counterparts in other states. I'm tipping a Coalition minority government for NSW. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brook Posted March 21, 2019 Share Posted March 21, 2019 The rule I’ve seen quoted is “The NSW branch of any political party is always the worst” and it’s pretty hard to argue right now. I don’t know how many other people have been getting these or if I was just super unlucky to end up on their list but I have been inundated with spam sms messages for Mark Latham over the last week. Including one a couple of days ago promising to cut immigration which made me swear at my phone. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wall Flower Posted March 21, 2019 Share Posted March 21, 2019 41 minutes ago, brook said: The rule I’ve seen quoted is “The NSW branch of any political party is always the worst” and it’s pretty hard to argue right now. I don’t know how many other people have been getting these or if I was just super unlucky to end up on their list but I have been inundated with spam sms messages for Mark Latham over the last week. Including one a couple of days ago promising to cut immigration which made me swear at my phone. As a 3rd pikewoman (love your description btw) could you not just stick Latham with the pointy end? He raises my blood pressure every time he appears on my TV or in my paper. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
karaddin Posted March 21, 2019 Share Posted March 21, 2019 59 minutes ago, Wall Flower said: As a 3rd pikewoman (love your description btw) could you not just stick Latham with the pointy end? He raises my blood pressure every time he appears on my TV or in my paper. Channel 7 is abandoning even the slightest pretext of balance in their panel for this weekends election coverage and Latham is the token "ex-Labor" representative apparently, because the panel is Latham (NSW One Nation), Alan Jones, Pru Goward (NSW Liberal), Andrew Constance (NSW Liberal with a hard on for "Uber but for public transport"), Barnaby Joyce (Federal National), Kerry Chikarovski (Former NSW Liberal leader). Literally 4 current or former LNP politicians, a One Nation candidate and Alan fucking Jones. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
karaddin Posted March 22, 2019 Share Posted March 22, 2019 I actually watched the Waleed interview of ScoMo last night as I thought it had the potential to blow up. ScoMo didn't go quite as off the rails as he might have, and he didn't run away from the interview after a question he didn't like (unlike in the presser the other day) but I still don't think that would have been a convincing performance to anyone that wasn't a bolted on supporter already. It really felt like he was relying on people having a heavy bias towards seeing him as respectful and Waleed as disrespectful on the basis of race as his tone was far less controlled. I particularly think his "perhaps you'd like to rephrase the question" and "I'm the Prime Minister!!" lines came across very poorly. How did it come across to someone with a more conservative mindset @Jeor? Assuming you've seen it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wall Flower Posted March 22, 2019 Share Posted March 22, 2019 On 3/21/2019 at 1:18 PM, karaddin said: Channel 7 is abandoning even the slightest pretext of balance in their panel for this weekends election coverage and Latham is the token "ex-Labor" representative apparently, because the panel is Latham (NSW One Nation), Alan Jones, Pru Goward (NSW Liberal), Andrew Constance (NSW Liberal with a hard on for "Uber but for public transport"), Barnaby Joyce (Federal National), Kerry Chikarovski (Former NSW Liberal leader). Literally 4 current or former LNP politicians, a One Nation candidate and Alan fucking Jones. Channel 7's supposed introspection after Christchurch didn't last longer than a nanosecond did it? Luckily, I live in Canberra so I don't feel obliged to watch the coverage. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeor Posted March 22, 2019 Share Posted March 22, 2019 8 hours ago, karaddin said: How did it come across to someone with a more conservative mindset @Jeor? Assuming you've seen it. I actually haven't seen it - I was about to look it up and didn't realise it was actually so long! I might get around to it this weekend. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
karaddin Posted March 23, 2019 Share Posted March 23, 2019 Well this isn't turning out as close as expected. If it comes down to Daley's comments I really really fucking hope people take note of the fact the Vic Liberals went hard on race baiting and got destroyed, NSW Labor tried more underhanded race baiting and also got hurt by it. Its wrong and its bad for your electoral prospects so fucking get your heads out of your asses. I have major reservations about what the coalition is doing to the state, I think a lot of the contracts that have been handed out are looking awfully shady and the stadiums are a waste of money, but I also accept this is still following a very long Labor government that had also decayed into major corruption and in opposition they have not really made the case for themselves as a viable government. They did have some good policies this time but ugh. Long wait to find out how big a shambles the upper house is. If this was the result in the federal election I'd be feeling very differently, but for NSW I can't blame the voters. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeor Posted March 23, 2019 Share Posted March 23, 2019 The NSW Coalition will be quietly very happy at these results. They've been returned, it now looks like a matter of whether they'll get a majority or minority government. I think they would have viewed minority government as a mild positive, but the fact that the majority is still in play would be a big positive. That being said the postal votes are still to be counted and I expect they will gravitate more towards Labor, as they wouldn't have been influenced by Michael Daley's last-week gaffes. So it may still end up a minority government which is nothing for the Coalition to crow about. The election coverage is a bit patchy. Most of these politicians who are up there aren't doing any favours. Some of the Libs (particularly the other Lib guy on Channel Nine, not Rob Stokes) are a bit too aggressively bullish while Jodi McKay on ABC for Labor is giving off lots of sour grapes sounds. It's good to see Morris Iemma back and he's been pretty balanced considering he's been a former Labor premier, but gosh he looks a lot older now. My thought is that in Sydney, people are perhaps willing to give the Coalition at least some credit for building stuff. There are a lot of visible infrastructure projects going on. There will be delays and stuff-ups, but I think the general population is willing to give them a long leash as long as they see that they are trying something. The Libs will be happy they've managed to hang on because over the next four years, there will be a lot of ribbon cutting and grand openings of things, which they'll be able to take credit for. For all that, it was still a very close run thing and the Liberals benefited from Daley's week from hell (Asian comments + the debate where he couldn't name figures on hospitals and schools despite saying that was the centerpiece of their policies). I think Labor also started from a weakened position with the Luke Foley scandal as well and a new leader having to be shoehorned in with only 130 days. Some easy vote pickups for Labor were spurned - for example, with Daley saying that he would keep the lockout laws. It must have been hard so I appreciate he had the guts to make a tough decision, but that also likely cost Labor some votes. So while the NSW Coalition government will be very happy, I think a lot of them should realise they got lucky with lots of Labor self inflicted wounds. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
karaddin Posted March 23, 2019 Share Posted March 23, 2019 8 minutes ago, Jeor said: The election coverage is a bit patchy. Most of these politicians who are up there aren't doing any favours. Some of the Libs (particularly the other Lib guy on Channel Nine, not Rob Stokes) are a bit too aggressively bullish while Jodi McKay on ABC for Labor is giving off lots of sour grapes sounds. It's good to see Morris Iemma back and he's been pretty balanced considering he's been a former Labor premier, but gosh he looks a lot older now. ... For all that, it was still a very close run thing and the Liberals benefited from Daley's week from hell (Asian comments + the debate where he couldn't name figures on hospitals and schools despite saying that was the centerpiece of their policies). I think Labor also started from a weakened position with the Luke Foley scandal as well and a new leader having to be shoehorned in with only 130 days. Some easy vote pickups for Labor were spurned - for example, with Daley saying that he would keep the lockout laws. It must have been hard so I appreciate he had the guts to make a tough decision, but that also likely cost Labor some votes. Bolded - I get super pissed off when Liberals do this when there are bad results for them and let me tell you, its no less infuriating when its coming from my own side. This is absolutely a bad result for Labor and its one thing to insist on pointing out the coalition lost seats but its another to pretend its not a bad result. Show some integrity and cop to the terrible outcome. I think your other comments are pretty on point. It was clear years ago that Foley was a terrible leader and should have been replaced but they ignored it until the damage was too great to ignore and then the replacement still did them no favours. I highly doubt they'll change again now but they really need to. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paxter Posted March 23, 2019 Share Posted March 23, 2019 Fuck. Four more years. A surprisingly decisive win from Berejiklian and her party. Labor thoroughly deserve to be in opposition in this state. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeor Posted March 24, 2019 Share Posted March 24, 2019 Now eyes will turn to the federal election. Scott Morrison shouldn't take too much encouragement from this, even if he did sound a bit bullish last night. First, the Nationals got pummelled and that's likely to continue at the federal level. Second, the result was clearly assisted by a very weak Labor party and that's unlikely to continue with Bill Shorten in charge of Federal Labor. I am concerned at One Nation's apparent success at the polls. Their rise does not bode well for politics in general. I hope they get crushed in the federal election, but I'm afraid they'll snag a few more Senate seats and with them the balance of power. If that horror story happened, I'd actually be more comfortable with a Labor government (gasp) which would be more likely to push back on One Nation than a Coalition government (where some extreme right wing elements would likely collaborate with them). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brook Posted March 24, 2019 Share Posted March 24, 2019 Preferences and the different voting methods can change a lot between state and federal but I am taking heart that the one nation vote (at this stage of counting) doesn’t look high enough to get them a nsw senate spot if it was replicated in the federal election. I know some individual electorates have had a strong showing but tbh the ON upper house vote is lower than I feared, it’s just the threshold is ridiculously low Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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