Australian Politics: The Albanese Times

[arthwollipot]

Just reviewing the old thread, I noticed that I made a prediction that came true.

[psionl0]

Originally Posted by arthwollipot

Just reviewing the old thread, I noticed that I made a prediction that came true.

"Landslide" is a bit of a stretch. In fact, if WA hadn't defied the national trend and switched votes to Labor, we would have a hung parliament now.

[lionking]

Originally Posted by psionl0

"Landslide" is a bit of a stretch. In fact, if WA hadn't defied the national trend and switched votes to Labor, we would have a hung parliament now.

Yes an expected response.

“Decimation of the Coalition” would probably have been better. But the same overall result. ALP gets a clear majority.

[arthwollipot]

Originally Posted by psionl0

"Landslide" is a bit of a stretch. In fact, if WA hadn't defied the national trend and switched votes to Labor, we would have a hung parliament now.

Would "utter bloodbath" be a better descriptor, do you think?

[lionking]

Originally Posted by arthwollipot

Would "utter bloodbath" be a better descriptor, do you think?

Probably.

[Wildy]

Barilaro withdrew from NY position because Scott Morrison was already in the role, just to tie the bs going on in Federal Politics with bs going on in NSW politics.

[lionking]

Originally Posted by Wildy

Barilaro withdrew from NY position because Scott Morrison was already in the role, just to tie the bs going on in Federal Politics with bs going on in NSW politics.

Beautiful.

[arthwollipot]

Wow.

[Norman Alexander]

I wondered who our new bus driver was... Some guy I have seen on TV somewhere recently...

[lionking]

Re post #309. Morrison has now appointed himself President, CEO, Board Member and Coach of Essendon.

(I might have mentioned this before but one of my sons is in a senior management position at Essendon. He must feel like a guest at the Red Wedding right now)

[arthwollipot]

"Sometimes when you embark on a witch hunt, you find a witch."

- Tim Ayres

[Wildy]

Hmmm branch stacking in the Victorian Liberal party. I wonder why a Pentecostal church would do that?

[arthwollipot]

Originally Posted by Wildy

Hmmm branch stacking in the Victorian Liberal party. I wonder why a Pentecostal church would do that?

Of course it's got nothing to do with religion, and dominionism doesn't exist anyway.

[Wildy]

In other news, I was listening to Question Time on the radio today. It was quite fun seeing Labor tear into the opposition when they were asked transparency questions.

[arthwollipot]

Originally Posted by Wildy

In other news, I was listening to Question Time on the radio today. It was quite fun seeing Labor tear into the opposition when they were asked transparency questions.

I was following it on the liveblog. This is how it went down:

Quote:

Peter Dutton to Anthony Albanese:

My question is to Prime Minister and I refer to his previous answer. Prime Minister, was the matter considered by the governments’ cabinet committee or was given by the [clerk]

Albanese:

We don’t talk about cabinet operations. The Leader of the Opposition knows that is the case. That it is impossible for me to answer a question about a cabinet...

Dutton:

A very tight and specific question, didn’t go to deliberations, didn’t go to anything other than...

(there is no point of order)

Albansese:

It did go to the operations of cabinet and a cabinet committee. Which we do not answer those questions in this chamber. You actually wait and get that. Apparently the Westminster system...

…Apparently the Westminster system is alien to those opposite.

(Dutton yells out: “TRANSPARENCY” and half the chamber breaks into outright laughter)

Albanese:

That is not surprising. I will tell you the way the Westminster system operates and has operated since Federation. You have a cabinet then you have cabinet committees. But those opposite had a cabinet committee of one. With one member so they could avoid transparency. So they can avoid concessions and say it was a meeting of the Cabinet committee when people coopted onto it.

Then we know opposite when it comes to transparency and the functioning of government we had the former minister for Home Affairs did not know he was the cominister. The coMinister. We had the Minister for Health that didn’t know there was another one. (Actually, Greg Hunt did know and was one of the only people who did)

The Minister for energy, science and industry who didn’t know there was another one. The final decision maker wasn’t actually the Minister, it was the Prime Minister.

I tell you what is occurring now and what those opposite might not recognise come up we have a proper cabinet government. A proper cabinet government. That has cohort comments from ministers that doesn’t have PowerPoint presentations from Crosby Texter. Doesn’t have PowerPoint presentations that have proper deliberations that result in outcomes that are then released through legislation.

They are the processes we have.

(source)

I think there are a few glitches in the speech-to-text system they use.

[arthwollipot]

The Prime Minister also said today (again) that he is happy to be back in public housing.

He's referring to The Lodge.

[arthwollipot]

And Labor's climate bill, the one we largely elected them for, has passed the Senate. There are a few amendments added by Pocock which means it has to go briefly back to the House, but it'll pass there too, and then it's off to the GG.

It's real. They did it.

[arthwollipot]

And that's it. Royal assent is the only thing left to do. We have a climate target.

[Wildy]

Nice.

[arthwollipot]

Australian parliament passes first climate change legislation in a decade

Quote:

Labor’s climate bill has passed both houses of parliament with support from the Greens and key crossbench senators


Australia’s first climate change legislation in a decade has passed federal parliament with support from the Greens and key crossbench senators.

Labor’s climate bill – which includes the national targets of cutting emissions by at least 43% by 2030 (compared with 2005) and reaching net zero by 2050 – cleared the Senate 37 votes to 30 after the government accepted some minor amendments proposed by the ACT independent David Pocock.

It was backed by Pocock and the Jacqui Lambie Network and opposed by the Coalition, One Nation and United Australia’s Ralph Babet.

The amended bill returned to the House of Representatives for the formality of a final vote at 4pm on Thursday. The climate change minister, Chris Bowen, told the parliament “today is a good day for our parliament and our country, and we’re going to need many more of them”.

He said the passage of the legislation would send a message to the world that Australia was driving down emissions and was “serious about reaping the economic opportunities from affordable renewable energy”.

“Legislating these targets gives certainty to investors and participants in the energy market and will help stabilise our energy system,” he said.

[arthwollipot]

Mehreen Faruqi says Pauline Hanson is racist.

Mehreen Faruqi considering human rights commission complaint over Pauline Hanson tweet

Quote:

Greens senator says One Nation leader created hostile and unsafe workplace and she has since been subjected to racist hate speech by others


Greens senator Mehreen Faruqi has accused Senator Pauline Hanson of creating a hostile and unsafe workplace, and is considering a complaint to the Australian Human Rights Commission, after the One Nation leader told her to “piss off back to Pakistan” on social media.

Faruqi said she had been subjected to racist hate speech from others on social media after a tweet from Hanson, who last week took offence over her comments about the death of Queen Elizabeth II.

The standoff between the two senators began on 9 September, the day of the Queen’s death, Faruqi, deputy leader of the Greens, tweeted: “I cannot mourn the leader of a racist empire built on stolen lives, land and wealth of colonised peoples.”

Hanson quote-tweeted that post to her own followers, replying: “Your attitude appalls and disgusts me. When you immigrated to Australia you took every advantage of this country. You took citizenship, bought multiple homes, and a job in a parliament. It’s clear you’re not happy, so pack your bags and piss off back to Pakistan.”

In other news, she also said that water is wet and the Pope is Catholic.

[Norman Alexander]

Hanson doesn't like Australians who are not like her. Which means we know there are 24,999,999 Australians who are not like her.

[arthwollipot]

More and more of Morrison's corruption is revealed.

Scott Morrison’s secretive cabinet committee of one had hundreds of meetings, FOI documents suggest

Quote:

Exclusive: Transparency advocate Rex Patrick says body established by former PM with only one permanent member – Morrison – was ‘an abuse of process’


Scott Morrison’s secretive cabinet committee of one permanent member appears to have met hundreds of times in the last term of parliament, documents released under freedom of information have revealed.

The cabinet office policy committee (COPC) – of which Morrison was listed as the only permanent member – created 739 sets of minutes from meetings, the information released by the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet (PMC) showed.

It has sparked fresh warnings from the former senator Rex Patrick that the body was an “abuse of process”, and prompted calls to release its documents, or to expand the inquiry into Morrison’s multiple ministries, as proposed by the Greens.

But Anthony Albanese’s criticism of the “cabinet committee with one member on it” has spurred a response from Morrison – who has claimed through a spokesperson the deputy prime minister, treasurer and finance minister “were co-opted on to all meetings of any COPC [that is] an automatic participation”.

[Thor 2]

Now our new skin head leader of the opposition, is distancing himself further from Scomo than ever. He is coming out in favour of corruption enquiry. Something Scomo resisted resolutely.

[arthwollipot]

Originally Posted by Thor 2

Something Scomo resisted resolutely.

Gee, I wonder why?

[Orphia Nay]

"Teena McQueen told to quit as Liberal vice-president after she celebrated defeat of ‘leftie’ candidates
Moderate Liberals say McQueen is out of touch and any suggestion that going further to the right is the solution to the party’s woes ‘defies logic and reason’"

"McQueen told the CPAC Australia conference on the weekend that “the good thing about the last federal election is a lot of those lefties [in the Liberal party] are gone – we should rejoice in that”.

“People I’ve been trying to get rid of for a decade have gone, we need to renew with good conservative candidates,” she said in Sydney.

The Liberal party, Senator Simon Birmingham and others have now attacked McQueen over the “offensive” comments, with some insisting she resigns.

“Members of the federal executive are rightly expected to support our MPs and candidates – if they can’t do that then they have no justifiable place being on the federal executive,” Birmingham told Guardian Australia.

Asked on Thursday if McQueen should resign, Birmingham replied: “Yes.”"

https://www.theguardian.com/australi...tie-candidates

[arthwollipot]

She's a real piece of work, hey?

[arthwollipot]

Originally Posted by arthwollipot

Mehreen Faruqi says Pauline Hanson is racist.

Mehreen Faruqi’s racism complaint over Pauline Hanson tweet accepted by Human Rights Commission

Quote:

Exclusive: Greens senator says racism takes an ‘immense toll’ on wellbeing and those responsible ‘must be held to account’


The Australian Human Rights Commission has accepted Mehreen Faruqi’s complaint against Pauline Hanson over alleged racial discrimination and racial hatred for her incendiary “piss off back to Pakistan” tweet, with the commission to consider the issue in light of section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act.

Greens senator Faruqi said she hoped to extract an apology “at the very least” from the One Nation founder, speaking of the “immense toll” of racism on health and wellbeing.

“For too long, Senator Hanson has been allowed to perpetrate racism without any consequences. The Senate couldn’t even agree to censure her last week. Enough is enough,” Faruqi told Guardian Australia.

[psionl0]

Originally Posted by arthwollipot

Mehreen Faruqi’s racism complaint over Pauline Hanson tweet accepted by Human Rights Commission

Some people never learn.

She got kicked out of the LP because she defied the "thou shalt not speak thy mind" crowd and gave racists everywhere a voice. This action is only going to increase her influence.

[arthwollipot]

Things That People Are Paying Attention To Now:

Reality cheque: we taught AI to spot the most used props this election. Here’s what it found

Quote:

Hi-vis workwear and cute dogs have come to dominate politicians’ 2022 Australian federal election campaign photos, but giant cheques are out of fashion


The novelty cheque has long been a mainstay of the political “photo op” but a Guardian Australia analysis of photos posted during the 2022 and 2019 election campaigns suggests giant cheques are on the way out, while hi-vis workwear and photos of dogs are on the rise.

During our work building the automated systems behind the pork-o-meter, which tracks election campaign pork barrelling as it occurs, the Guardian’s data team found ourselves asking an important question. Could we teach a robot to spot photos of novelty cheques?

We were already using machine learning to flag text from politicians’ Facebook posts as likely grant announcements and election promises, but having another model in place to find big cheques and certificates in photos might pick up things we’d missed in the text.

[arthwollipot]

Another of Morrison's Mistakes has just been fixed.

Australia quietly drops recognition of West Jerusalem as capital of Israel

Quote:

Exclusive: Former PM Scott Morrison’s decision to formally recognise West Jerusalem has now been reversed by Labor government


Australia has quietly dropped its recognition of West Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, unwinding language adopted by Scott Morrison’s government after the US moved its own embassy from Tel Aviv.

The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade has retained the bipartisan position that Australia “is committed to a two-state solution in which Israel and a future Palestinian state co‑exist, in peace and security, within internationally recognised borders”.

But in the past few days it has deleted two sentences from its website that were first added after then prime minister Morrison unveiled a new Australian policy four years ago.

The freshly deleted sentences said: “Consistent with this longstanding policy, in December 2018, Australia recognised West Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, being the seat of the Knesset and many of the institutions of the Israeli government.

“Australia looks forward to moving its embassy to West Jerusalem when practical, in support of, and after the final status determination of, a two-state solution.”

The foreign affairs minister, Penny Wong, had said in 2018 that Labor “does not support unilateral recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and in government would reverse this decision” – but the language remained on the Dfat website as recently as last week.

[Thor 2]

Morrison's action on this issue was an example of his faith taking over. He wanted to hasten the onset of the End Times.

[The Atheist]

Bloody good show!

Of course, they'll get labelled anti-semite now.

[psionl0]

Originally Posted by Thor 2

Morrison's action on this issue was an example of his faith taking over. He wanted to hasten the onset of the End Times.

[lionking]

Originally Posted by Thor 2

Morrison's action on this issue was an example of his faith taking over. He wanted to hasten the onset of the End Times.

No. It was to suck up to the US and particularly Trump.

[arthwollipot]

Originally Posted by lionking

No. It was to suck up to the US and particularly Trump.

Agreed. He wasn't even particularly subtle about it, either.

[Orphia Nay]

I hear Fred Nile has announced his retirement. Good ******* riddance!

[Thor 2]

Originally Posted by lionking

No. It was to suck up to the US and particularly Trump.

Well that too. You can't deny he was faith driven though - arm in the air, demonstrating his commitment at those Pentecostal services. I wonder if he ever got into talking in tongues and rolling around on the floor?

[Thor 2]

Just too elaborate on the above I think Morrison's religious faith won him over when considering environmental issues also. He recently gave a sermon at Margaret Court's Church:

https://www.smh.com.au/politics/fede...18-p5b2i2.html

"Don't trust in governments, trust in God." was the message.

[arthwollipot]

Originally Posted by Thor 2

Well that too. You can't deny he was faith driven though - arm in the air, demonstrating his commitment at those Pentecostal services. I wonder if he ever got into talking in tongues and rolling around on the floor?

I'm certain he spoke in tongues, but I doubt he'd roll about on the floor. I never saw anyone doing that at any of the revivals I went to. Didn't see anyone handling snakes either, and that's definitely something that some branches of American Pentecostals do.