It's on! I mean, it was on. It was on, but now it's off.
August 20, 2018 5:19 PM Subscribe
After days of speculation, Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull called a leadership spill today, offering the governing Liberal Party the opportunity to elect a new leader (and therefore, a new Prime Minister). It was all over in a matter of minutes, but Turnbull fended off a leadership challenge from Minister for Immigration and Border Protection Peter Dutton, winning the party room poll 48 to 35. Dutton has now resigned from Cabinet. He may not even be eligible to sit in Parliament.
At least in Australia, if the wingnuts take control of a major party there's preferential voting and hopefully my countrypeople can turn away from them.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 5:22 PM on August 20, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 5:22 PM on August 20, 2018 [1 favorite]
Round one .. now there are at least two backbenchers with sharpened knives... when will the election be called?
I think this will prove fatal for LNP victory chances whether it's this year or next.
posted by joffaboy at 5:24 PM on August 20, 2018 [2 favorites]
I think this will prove fatal for LNP victory chances whether it's this year or next.
posted by joffaboy at 5:24 PM on August 20, 2018 [2 favorites]
I think this will prove fatal for LNP victory chances whether it's this year or next.
Turnbull right now sitting in his office thinking "do I want those fucking lunatics running the country or do I want Shorten?"
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 5:26 PM on August 20, 2018 [7 favorites]
Turnbull right now sitting in his office thinking "do I want those fucking lunatics running the country or do I want Shorten?"
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 5:26 PM on August 20, 2018 [7 favorites]
Previously in Dutton news:
Peter Dutton boycotted the apology to the stolen generations.
Peter Dutton said the 'lefty journos' of the ABC were 'dead to him' because he's a side character from Mean Girls.
Peter Dutton calls the political editor of the Sunday Telegraph a 'mad fucking witch' in a text message he accidentally sent to her.
Peter Dutton claims white South African farmers need help from a 'civilized country' like Australia , causing an international incident. Bonus: Code White from ABC's the Feed.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:29 PM on August 20, 2018 [14 favorites]
Peter Dutton boycotted the apology to the stolen generations.
Peter Dutton said the 'lefty journos' of the ABC were 'dead to him' because he's a side character from Mean Girls.
Peter Dutton calls the political editor of the Sunday Telegraph a 'mad fucking witch' in a text message he accidentally sent to her.
Peter Dutton claims white South African farmers need help from a 'civilized country' like Australia , causing an international incident. Bonus: Code White from ABC's the Feed.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:29 PM on August 20, 2018 [14 favorites]
48 - 35.
Only Turnbull could win and still lose. 43% of the party don't back him.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:32 PM on August 20, 2018 [2 favorites]
Only Turnbull could win and still lose. 43% of the party don't back him.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:32 PM on August 20, 2018 [2 favorites]
Good piece from Katharine Murphy in The Guardian.
posted by turbid dahlia at 5:33 PM on August 20, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by turbid dahlia at 5:33 PM on August 20, 2018 [1 favorite]
Turnbull and his government deserve continued international condemnation for Australia's racist and barbaric policies against refugees.
posted by JamesBay at 5:35 PM on August 20, 2018 [8 favorites]
posted by JamesBay at 5:35 PM on August 20, 2018 [8 favorites]
They are fundamentally broken - the only way they can develop policy is via the opinion pages of The Australian and by trying to change leaders.
They can't plan for the future. They only have three ideas - shovel money to the rich, penalise the poor, burn coal.
And a sizeable portion of the right think the reason they are unpopular is because they aren't pursuing those "ideas" hard enough.
posted by awfurby at 5:36 PM on August 20, 2018 [8 favorites]
They can't plan for the future. They only have three ideas - shovel money to the rich, penalise the poor, burn coal.
And a sizeable portion of the right think the reason they are unpopular is because they aren't pursuing those "ideas" hard enough.
posted by awfurby at 5:36 PM on August 20, 2018 [8 favorites]
An oldie but a goodie from Dan Ilic: The Liberals are Back!
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:36 PM on August 20, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:36 PM on August 20, 2018 [1 favorite]
Only Turnbull could win and still lose. 43% of the party don't back him.
Oh come on. When does a leader who took the party into a double dissolution, slashed their majority to single digits, and let Pauline back into the fucking Senate get to keep being PM? If anything it displays that even in the face of sheer fucking incompetence of Turnbull that Dutton is still seen as the less favoured choice. The only reason Turnbull survives is that both Dutton and Shorten combined have less charisma than a potato. Although Shorten does actually spark something when he's not trying to put it on like when he called Cory Bernardi a homophobe on national telly.
Turnbull and his government deserve continued international condemnation for Australia's racist and barbaric policies against refugees.
Every Australian government since Keating deserves continued international condemnation for Australia's racist and barbaric policies against refugees.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 5:41 PM on August 20, 2018 [10 favorites]
Oh come on. When does a leader who took the party into a double dissolution, slashed their majority to single digits, and let Pauline back into the fucking Senate get to keep being PM? If anything it displays that even in the face of sheer fucking incompetence of Turnbull that Dutton is still seen as the less favoured choice. The only reason Turnbull survives is that both Dutton and Shorten combined have less charisma than a potato. Although Shorten does actually spark something when he's not trying to put it on like when he called Cory Bernardi a homophobe on national telly.
Turnbull and his government deserve continued international condemnation for Australia's racist and barbaric policies against refugees.
Every Australian government since Keating deserves continued international condemnation for Australia's racist and barbaric policies against refugees.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 5:41 PM on August 20, 2018 [10 favorites]
So a leadership spill isn’t when the Ship of State runs aground and dumps millions of liters of leadership into a bay, contaminating wildlife with Parliamentary Procedure?
posted by GenjiandProust at 5:43 PM on August 20, 2018 [21 favorites]
posted by GenjiandProust at 5:43 PM on August 20, 2018 [21 favorites]
Of course it is. How do you think they filled Lake Burley Griffin?
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 5:45 PM on August 20, 2018 [8 favorites]
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 5:45 PM on August 20, 2018 [8 favorites]
So a leadership spill isn’t when the Ship of State runs aground and dumps millions of liters of leadership into a bay, contaminating wildlife with a Parliamentary Procedure?
The government does not have millions of litres of leadership. It barely has enough for a cup of weak tea. The Ship of State is cavernously empty. However, it is true that the sludge that remains in the bottom of the hull is ruinously toxic.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:45 PM on August 20, 2018 [13 favorites]
The government does not have millions of litres of leadership. It barely has enough for a cup of weak tea. The Ship of State is cavernously empty. However, it is true that the sludge that remains in the bottom of the hull is ruinously toxic.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:45 PM on August 20, 2018 [13 favorites]
Every Australian government since Keating deserves continued international condemnation for Australia's racist and barbaric policies against refugees.
Hey, save some scorn for the people who voted them all in.
posted by Sys Rq at 5:49 PM on August 20, 2018 [12 favorites]
Hey, save some scorn for the people who voted them all in.
posted by Sys Rq at 5:49 PM on August 20, 2018 [12 favorites]
Best thing to come out of this is Darth Potato being shuffled to the backbench. He's a singularly vile lump of xenophobia and scorn in a roughly human shaped meat suit and should be fired into space for the damage he's single handedly done to the Australian political landscape. I may even have chips for dinner tonight in gratitude.
posted by Jilder at 5:53 PM on August 20, 2018 [13 favorites]
posted by Jilder at 5:53 PM on August 20, 2018 [13 favorites]
Hey you guys remember that time that a photog took an unflattering picture of Dutton, and Dutton demanded it be taken down, and it went on a viral mashup run?
Good times.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 6:10 PM on August 20, 2018 [10 favorites]
Good times.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 6:10 PM on August 20, 2018 [10 favorites]
lol every photo that has ever been taken of Dutton in his entire life is an unflattering photo, he is like Karl Pilkington's ugly, and somehow even less attuned, twin.
posted by turbid dahlia at 6:28 PM on August 20, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by turbid dahlia at 6:28 PM on August 20, 2018 [1 favorite]
Well, we've also had garbage governments since at least 2007.
posted by Merus at 6:44 PM on August 20, 2018
posted by Merus at 6:44 PM on August 20, 2018
It was a garbage government before 2007, it was just a stable one.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 7:11 PM on August 20, 2018
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 7:11 PM on August 20, 2018
It was a garbage government before 2007, it was just a stable one.
Built on the solid foundation of scapegoating gays and boat people.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 7:14 PM on August 20, 2018 [4 favorites]
Built on the solid foundation of scapegoating gays and boat people.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 7:14 PM on August 20, 2018 [4 favorites]
The only half-decent PM we've had in ten years was Julia Gillard, and she left the show in disgust when that self-serving narcissist KRudd stabbed her in the back, with Bill Shorten's hand on the dagger.
Neither party is leadable. The Labor factions are implacably irreconcilable, so we end up with drivelling nonentities like Shorten, who has less personality than a particularly dull turnip.
The LNP split between the Left and Right is unbridgeable. It's a matter of foundational beliefs. The left thinks that Big Business Knows Best, and if it doesn't will at least hand them some cushy directorships. Their self-centred venality is bottomless. The Right thinks we should have a medieval theocracy with plenty of witch-burning and xenophobia.
The Nationals are a bunch of Neanderthal tosspots stuck in a mythical 1950s utopia that never happened, but seems to have been driven by equal amounts of misogyny and racism.
Then you have the Greens, who have a bizarre structure based on giving complete power to unaccountable local party hacks, who control individual votes of MPs and Senators, meaning that even when they have serious policy ideas, their credibility is destroyed by their regional hatred for each other.
Finally, you have assorted fuckwits, drooling morons, cabbage-brained cretins and Pauline Hanson (but I repeat myself), all belching disgusting bigotry from the cross benches.
Turnbull's position is now untenable. He can't pull a cabinet together from the people who voted for him. Abbot, the smirking weasel, is sharpening his blade for a little bit of Tuesday Morning Stabbing as soon as he's within a sniff of the numbers.
The Coalition majority is wafer-thin. If Turnbull gets booted and decides to spend more time with his trust funds, there's a real chance of an October election. Shorten will lead Labor to a dispiriting performance and small Labor majority, then the Labor Right will assassinate him and install another self-serving nonentity to drag the country further into immiseration.
But it's Spring here in Queensland. Time to go outside and play.
posted by Combat Wombat at 7:44 PM on August 20, 2018 [30 favorites]
Neither party is leadable. The Labor factions are implacably irreconcilable, so we end up with drivelling nonentities like Shorten, who has less personality than a particularly dull turnip.
The LNP split between the Left and Right is unbridgeable. It's a matter of foundational beliefs. The left thinks that Big Business Knows Best, and if it doesn't will at least hand them some cushy directorships. Their self-centred venality is bottomless. The Right thinks we should have a medieval theocracy with plenty of witch-burning and xenophobia.
The Nationals are a bunch of Neanderthal tosspots stuck in a mythical 1950s utopia that never happened, but seems to have been driven by equal amounts of misogyny and racism.
Then you have the Greens, who have a bizarre structure based on giving complete power to unaccountable local party hacks, who control individual votes of MPs and Senators, meaning that even when they have serious policy ideas, their credibility is destroyed by their regional hatred for each other.
Finally, you have assorted fuckwits, drooling morons, cabbage-brained cretins and Pauline Hanson (but I repeat myself), all belching disgusting bigotry from the cross benches.
Turnbull's position is now untenable. He can't pull a cabinet together from the people who voted for him. Abbot, the smirking weasel, is sharpening his blade for a little bit of Tuesday Morning Stabbing as soon as he's within a sniff of the numbers.
The Coalition majority is wafer-thin. If Turnbull gets booted and decides to spend more time with his trust funds, there's a real chance of an October election. Shorten will lead Labor to a dispiriting performance and small Labor majority, then the Labor Right will assassinate him and install another self-serving nonentity to drag the country further into immiseration.
But it's Spring here in Queensland. Time to go outside and play.
posted by Combat Wombat at 7:44 PM on August 20, 2018 [30 favorites]
In all the previous recent cases where a PM was replaced there was a plausible story that the challenger would be more popular (at least in the short term). Not so this time. They want to knife Turnbull just for the sake of it, damn the consequences.
posted by nnethercote at 7:45 PM on August 20, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by nnethercote at 7:45 PM on August 20, 2018 [4 favorites]
I was dryly amused to find I had slept through an entire leadership spill.
posted by solarion at 8:34 PM on August 20, 2018 [8 favorites]
posted by solarion at 8:34 PM on August 20, 2018 [8 favorites]
Of course, every pointless article and every self-absorbed word spent on the tawdry drama of #libspill is column space and analysis that *could* be applied to energy policy and why we need emissions reduction, but why do that that's boring.
posted by chiquitita at 8:51 PM on August 20, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by chiquitita at 8:51 PM on August 20, 2018 [3 favorites]
He’ll be back.
posted by pompomtom at 9:10 PM on August 20, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by pompomtom at 9:10 PM on August 20, 2018 [1 favorite]
Vote of no confidence being moved, which is really the most appropriate course of action if the Government of the day is unable to pass essential legislation through the House of Representatives. Election now.
posted by chiquitita at 9:13 PM on August 20, 2018
posted by chiquitita at 9:13 PM on August 20, 2018
The best bet for the next election is probably May, I'm hearing, with February as secondary possibility. Apparently between Victorian state elections in November, NSW in March, Turnbull having said it won't be this year, and the results of the Longman by-election, those are the safest bets.
That's good, in some ways, because it means we'll get a Labor party conference in December. That could be critical for refugee policy - there's tension in the party and the unions over this. The conference in Victoria earlier this year was important - the plan to have a discussion of refugee policy was quashed by ending it early, with key unions voting to bring things to a close early. It's worth noting that, for example, Setka of the CFMEU may have supported that move, but they were also wearing our Unions For Refugees stickers as they did so. We're making slow progress on explaining to people that supporting refugees is not just humanitarian, but also politically expedient for challenging the right and the messages they send.
It's almost a certainty that we will see an increase in the level of bigotry and vile spewing from the coalition as the election draws closer. They will seek to divide us, with the same messages they're already sending - that refugees and migrants are the problem, not the government's abject failure to provide adequate levels of services. We've seen the scare-mongering with regard to the Sudanese population in Melbourne, and the constant Islamophobia is nothing new either, but we can fairly safely expect an increase in that sort of rhetoric.
So far, far too many in Labor and the leadership have been trying to compete with the coalition on xenophobia. That's not just disgusting, it's also stupid. You can't out-patriot the right, they should know that. What's needed is clear political interventions which discuss the ways in which racism is utilised in order to divide and distract, demonise and deport.
What we regular people can do is simple enough, but it's got to be more than voting. There's a lot that needs doing, but to simplify things, environment, industrial relations and racism are the three main things we should be pushing Labor on.
Whether the election is next month or as late as they can push it, people need to do more. There are constant rallies and events which you can get involved in, ways in which we can both apply pressure and develop working-class power which backs that pressure up. Even if someone clicked their fingers and we had a Labor supermajority tomorrow, they won't change things without that pressure. In 2007 they left most of the worst of Workchoices intact, and have so far continued bipartisan support for the torture camps. They're not going to save us, we have to save ourselves. The Your Rights at Work campaign collapsed after the election, and despite our best efforts at Soli and the will existing in the rank & file, it looks like Change The Rules is only going to be another electoral campaign. Still, if there's any Right-To-Strike events, that's the ongoing attempt to intervene in that campaign so it maintains organisation and efforts through into a Labor government.
posted by AnhydrousLove at 9:25 PM on August 20, 2018 [10 favorites]
That's good, in some ways, because it means we'll get a Labor party conference in December. That could be critical for refugee policy - there's tension in the party and the unions over this. The conference in Victoria earlier this year was important - the plan to have a discussion of refugee policy was quashed by ending it early, with key unions voting to bring things to a close early. It's worth noting that, for example, Setka of the CFMEU may have supported that move, but they were also wearing our Unions For Refugees stickers as they did so. We're making slow progress on explaining to people that supporting refugees is not just humanitarian, but also politically expedient for challenging the right and the messages they send.
It's almost a certainty that we will see an increase in the level of bigotry and vile spewing from the coalition as the election draws closer. They will seek to divide us, with the same messages they're already sending - that refugees and migrants are the problem, not the government's abject failure to provide adequate levels of services. We've seen the scare-mongering with regard to the Sudanese population in Melbourne, and the constant Islamophobia is nothing new either, but we can fairly safely expect an increase in that sort of rhetoric.
So far, far too many in Labor and the leadership have been trying to compete with the coalition on xenophobia. That's not just disgusting, it's also stupid. You can't out-patriot the right, they should know that. What's needed is clear political interventions which discuss the ways in which racism is utilised in order to divide and distract, demonise and deport.
What we regular people can do is simple enough, but it's got to be more than voting. There's a lot that needs doing, but to simplify things, environment, industrial relations and racism are the three main things we should be pushing Labor on.
Whether the election is next month or as late as they can push it, people need to do more. There are constant rallies and events which you can get involved in, ways in which we can both apply pressure and develop working-class power which backs that pressure up. Even if someone clicked their fingers and we had a Labor supermajority tomorrow, they won't change things without that pressure. In 2007 they left most of the worst of Workchoices intact, and have so far continued bipartisan support for the torture camps. They're not going to save us, we have to save ourselves. The Your Rights at Work campaign collapsed after the election, and despite our best efforts at Soli and the will existing in the rank & file, it looks like Change The Rules is only going to be another electoral campaign. Still, if there's any Right-To-Strike events, that's the ongoing attempt to intervene in that campaign so it maintains organisation and efforts through into a Labor government.
posted by AnhydrousLove at 9:25 PM on August 20, 2018 [10 favorites]
September 5 is the United Voice Equal Pay Rally, Martin Place
September 6 is the All Out For the Right to Strike / Rally Against the Turnbull Government by the CFMMEU. That's going to include stop-work actions, and if it's large enough, the plan is to take the next one national.
The plans for if Trump visits in November are not specifically relevant to the election, but we're expecting people to come out in wild numbers if that happens. It'll be important for organisers to be there making principled arguments about how we can actually effectively challenge Trump and his global influence here in Australia. The united front is still developing, but for now there's an organising meeting in a couple of days.
Sorry for the NSW focus, but, especially if you're in Victoria, if you're interested in getting more involved but are not sure how, feel free to contact me and I'll talk to some coms and see what's happening where you are. I'm not talking about campaigning for Labor, I'm talking about campaigning on issues, taking advantage of people paying more attention to politics and getting them engaged and involved in ways that will last beyond the election.
posted by AnhydrousLove at 9:56 PM on August 20, 2018 [5 favorites]
September 6 is the All Out For the Right to Strike / Rally Against the Turnbull Government by the CFMMEU. That's going to include stop-work actions, and if it's large enough, the plan is to take the next one national.
The plans for if Trump visits in November are not specifically relevant to the election, but we're expecting people to come out in wild numbers if that happens. It'll be important for organisers to be there making principled arguments about how we can actually effectively challenge Trump and his global influence here in Australia. The united front is still developing, but for now there's an organising meeting in a couple of days.
Sorry for the NSW focus, but, especially if you're in Victoria, if you're interested in getting more involved but are not sure how, feel free to contact me and I'll talk to some coms and see what's happening where you are. I'm not talking about campaigning for Labor, I'm talking about campaigning on issues, taking advantage of people paying more attention to politics and getting them engaged and involved in ways that will last beyond the election.
posted by AnhydrousLove at 9:56 PM on August 20, 2018 [5 favorites]
Is there a translation of what all this means for the non-australians out there? Even with the American politics threads I appreciate a who's who and a nice timeline of events.
posted by runcibleshaw at 10:03 PM on August 20, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by runcibleshaw at 10:03 PM on August 20, 2018 [2 favorites]
Hey, I know Sam Langford, writer of that Junkee article. Absolutely lovely person.
I popped back in to say a little more about Dutton's history if people aren't aware.
He's right up there as possibly the worst person in parliament. He held the over-concentrated Minister for Home Affairs position, which is a super-portfolio, from wikipedia
with responsibilities for national security including cybersecurity and counterterrorism, law enforcement, emergency management, transport security, immigration, citizenship, border control, and multicultural affairs. The Minister for Home Affairs is assisted by the Minister for Law Enforcement and Cybersecurity, the Minister for Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs, and the Assistant Minister for Home Affairs.
He was a QSLD cop for 9 years, and they're not exactly known for being friendly.
There's a lot of speculation that he resigned from that position a couple of weeks shy of earning some sort of retirement package to avoid events coming to light with regard to him abusing Indigenous Australian kids in the practice of his policing.
posted by AnhydrousLove at 12:04 AM on August 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
I popped back in to say a little more about Dutton's history if people aren't aware.
He's right up there as possibly the worst person in parliament. He held the over-concentrated Minister for Home Affairs position, which is a super-portfolio, from wikipedia
with responsibilities for national security including cybersecurity and counterterrorism, law enforcement, emergency management, transport security, immigration, citizenship, border control, and multicultural affairs. The Minister for Home Affairs is assisted by the Minister for Law Enforcement and Cybersecurity, the Minister for Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs, and the Assistant Minister for Home Affairs.
He was a QSLD cop for 9 years, and they're not exactly known for being friendly.
There's a lot of speculation that he resigned from that position a couple of weeks shy of earning some sort of retirement package to avoid events coming to light with regard to him abusing Indigenous Australian kids in the practice of his policing.
posted by AnhydrousLove at 12:04 AM on August 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
He was also the Minister in charge of the Paramilitary Operation in Melbourne's CBD a few years back.
And Dutton went to court to prevent a dying 12 y/o imprisoned on Nauru from being flown to Australia for treatment. The courts eventually required the child to be transported. But it's still not happening thanks to Border Force not allowing the father to attend. Border Force, our version of ICE, is part of Dutton's portfolio.
Dutton is a shithouse of a human being.
posted by michswiss at 12:15 AM on August 21, 2018 [17 favorites]
And Dutton went to court to prevent a dying 12 y/o imprisoned on Nauru from being flown to Australia for treatment. The courts eventually required the child to be transported. But it's still not happening thanks to Border Force not allowing the father to attend. Border Force, our version of ICE, is part of Dutton's portfolio.
Dutton is a shithouse of a human being.
posted by michswiss at 12:15 AM on August 21, 2018 [17 favorites]
That particular issue has actually just been resolved (I think literally a couple of hours ago). It's happened before though and will happen again.
Key section
The federal court has consistently found medical facilities to treat psychological illnesses or complex physical conditions do not exist on Nauru.
The court has also found that detention on the island is causing harm to children.
Americans, if you're not already aware, michswiss is very much correct. Everything that's bubbling up with ICE now, Australian Border Force has been pioneering for decades. People got used to kids being imprisoned.
Now the EU is considering adopting our model.
posted by AnhydrousLove at 12:37 AM on August 21, 2018 [6 favorites]
Key section
The federal court has consistently found medical facilities to treat psychological illnesses or complex physical conditions do not exist on Nauru.
The court has also found that detention on the island is causing harm to children.
Americans, if you're not already aware, michswiss is very much correct. Everything that's bubbling up with ICE now, Australian Border Force has been pioneering for decades. People got used to kids being imprisoned.
Now the EU is considering adopting our model.
posted by AnhydrousLove at 12:37 AM on August 21, 2018 [6 favorites]
A few days ago I tweeted about the RNZAF mounting a humanitarian raid by landing a C130 on Nauru, rescuing the people held there and bringing them to NZ. I was only partially joking. AU, do better FFS, you're an embarrassing neighbour.
posted by phigmov at 1:50 AM on August 21, 2018 [5 favorites]
posted by phigmov at 1:50 AM on August 21, 2018 [5 favorites]
Yeah, when it comes to US pol wrt kids in cages I'm generally like "at least one of your major parties gives a shit at all!" It's always interesting to talk to other Australians about the toddlers in cages thing -- I'm just like, "yeah, they're copying us!" and the invariable reaction is the fuck you say. But it's so true! They are! The exact justification that is so abhorrent in the US -- separating children from parents for the sake of deterrence, ie. torture for the sake of having a bit less paperwork down the line -- is the exact justification that is so widely accepted in Aus that few people even question it as perhaps not even being a justification to start with. I can't be the only person to remember the detention camps where the inmates sewed their mouths shut in protest? Repeatedly?
In related news, the Australian Refugee Action Network has a Kids Off Nauru campaign going at the moment, with planned events, a petition to sign, and the link has current petitions and media stories to give an idea of the current situation.
To quote from there --
"Q. What does the #KIDSOFFNAURU campaign want? What is the solution?
A. The Australian Parliament must act to bring every child and their family to Australia by Universal Children’s Day, on November 20.
They should be either resettled in Australia or in another suitable country which welcomes them.
Children in detention should not be discriminated against and must be given a fair chance for survival and development.
All decisions taken about offshore, indefinite detention must first and foremost consider the best interest of the child.
This is to ensure that these children will be able to face their futures with certainty and finally start to pursue their hopes and dreams.
Whatever the solution, locking up children is not it."
This watered-down list should not be radical (note that it doesn't even call to abolish indefinite detention directly), and yet, the fucking Murdoch rags rag on like doing our duty by a few hundred traumatised refugees will bring in the fucking apocalypse. We'd fucking deserve the fucking apocalyse anyhow, that's no reason not to!
wrt Dutton -- among a pack of rancid potatoes Dutton is the dripping pestilence. Glad he's fucked off to the backbench but that still leaves the superportfolio, and who the fuck knows what wankery will eventuate with that? It's fucking poisonous to lump all that together to boot -- no way someone should have that much concentrated power to start with. Disband the superportfolio, I say.
And this NEG nonsense! I was going to make an auspol post around the shenanigans lately but where the fuck to even start? Turnbull's flip flopping like a fucking carp. He hasn't got a position, he's got a little axis to spin around whenever the right-er wing clears its throat. First it was, Victorian Labor who? then it was, we totally care about the emissions! then it was, we're not even going to bother with any climate targets, and by the way, the models we're supposedly basing all this on? Secret! Nobody gets to see them! And then it's, oh, NEG who? I don't even know her. The fuck? No states are going to go for any of that nonsense.
And this Reef shit. $444m to an org staffed by coal and adjacent energy companies, without tender, meaning without contract -- a fucking tax-free gift to a pack of six slimeballs that the likes of CSIRO have to apply to for money, given their known fucking interests, several of which slimeballs Lucy Turnbull very likely hosted for dinner -- and Turnbull's not being dragged screaming to explain himself in parliament? WesFarmers is disengaging but I don't want disengagement, I want some fucking answers. Such as, how is that not naked fucking corruption? How involved is your company and where's the money? Where's the fucking interest on all that money?
I'm furious with the pollies lately. I'm almost always furious, but there is so much to be furious about at the moment! I will say that giving some poor bastard a piece of my mind -- politely, mind you -- when I call a swanky office or three is somewhat helpful. The #KIDSOFFNAURU campaign recommends calling both Turnbull and Shorten -- I'd add in your state Premier's office as well. It is a federal issue, but states can collectively push federal offices given enough pieces of mind to get them going.
I know, I know, 'calling your rep' sounds so. fucking. American. Do it anyway. If you can do it for a portrait of the Queen, you can do it for our Omelas.
posted by E. Whitehall at 2:04 AM on August 21, 2018 [21 favorites]
In related news, the Australian Refugee Action Network has a Kids Off Nauru campaign going at the moment, with planned events, a petition to sign, and the link has current petitions and media stories to give an idea of the current situation.
To quote from there --
"Q. What does the #KIDSOFFNAURU campaign want? What is the solution?
A. The Australian Parliament must act to bring every child and their family to Australia by Universal Children’s Day, on November 20.
They should be either resettled in Australia or in another suitable country which welcomes them.
Children in detention should not be discriminated against and must be given a fair chance for survival and development.
All decisions taken about offshore, indefinite detention must first and foremost consider the best interest of the child.
This is to ensure that these children will be able to face their futures with certainty and finally start to pursue their hopes and dreams.
Whatever the solution, locking up children is not it."
This watered-down list should not be radical (note that it doesn't even call to abolish indefinite detention directly), and yet, the fucking Murdoch rags rag on like doing our duty by a few hundred traumatised refugees will bring in the fucking apocalypse. We'd fucking deserve the fucking apocalyse anyhow, that's no reason not to!
wrt Dutton -- among a pack of rancid potatoes Dutton is the dripping pestilence. Glad he's fucked off to the backbench but that still leaves the superportfolio, and who the fuck knows what wankery will eventuate with that? It's fucking poisonous to lump all that together to boot -- no way someone should have that much concentrated power to start with. Disband the superportfolio, I say.
And this NEG nonsense! I was going to make an auspol post around the shenanigans lately but where the fuck to even start? Turnbull's flip flopping like a fucking carp. He hasn't got a position, he's got a little axis to spin around whenever the right-er wing clears its throat. First it was, Victorian Labor who? then it was, we totally care about the emissions! then it was, we're not even going to bother with any climate targets, and by the way, the models we're supposedly basing all this on? Secret! Nobody gets to see them! And then it's, oh, NEG who? I don't even know her. The fuck? No states are going to go for any of that nonsense.
And this Reef shit. $444m to an org staffed by coal and adjacent energy companies, without tender, meaning without contract -- a fucking tax-free gift to a pack of six slimeballs that the likes of CSIRO have to apply to for money, given their known fucking interests, several of which slimeballs Lucy Turnbull very likely hosted for dinner -- and Turnbull's not being dragged screaming to explain himself in parliament? WesFarmers is disengaging but I don't want disengagement, I want some fucking answers. Such as, how is that not naked fucking corruption? How involved is your company and where's the money? Where's the fucking interest on all that money?
I'm furious with the pollies lately. I'm almost always furious, but there is so much to be furious about at the moment! I will say that giving some poor bastard a piece of my mind -- politely, mind you -- when I call a swanky office or three is somewhat helpful. The #KIDSOFFNAURU campaign recommends calling both Turnbull and Shorten -- I'd add in your state Premier's office as well. It is a federal issue, but states can collectively push federal offices given enough pieces of mind to get them going.
I know, I know, 'calling your rep' sounds so. fucking. American. Do it anyway. If you can do it for a portrait of the Queen, you can do it for our Omelas.
posted by E. Whitehall at 2:04 AM on August 21, 2018 [21 favorites]
And one more thing -- with Dutton stepping back, you know who is Acting Home Affairs Minister? Fucking ScoMo. He's Treasurer as well! That's the most powerful position that could possibly exist, and it's fucking ScoMo.
Fuck me.
posted by E. Whitehall at 2:15 AM on August 21, 2018 [4 favorites]
Fuck me.
posted by E. Whitehall at 2:15 AM on August 21, 2018 [4 favorites]
Australian paramedics have a quick test for concussion, they ask what year it is, and who is the Pime Minister of Australia.
They might have to change that last question.
posted by adept256 at 2:54 AM on August 21, 2018 [13 favorites]
They might have to change that last question.
posted by adept256 at 2:54 AM on August 21, 2018 [13 favorites]
And this Reef shit. $444m to an org staffed by coal and adjacent energy companies, without tender, meaning without contract
I think I can answer this one. UNESCO wants the government to spend money on the reef to maintain it's world heritage listing, and it has to be spent by 2020. They were running out of time, so they just wrote a check, and there, money spent!
Of course, the money hasn't even begun to actually be used, but on paper the government has technically spent it. This won't fool UNESCO for a moment, but at this point they're just ticking boxes.
posted by adept256 at 2:59 AM on August 21, 2018 [6 favorites]
I think I can answer this one. UNESCO wants the government to spend money on the reef to maintain it's world heritage listing, and it has to be spent by 2020. They were running out of time, so they just wrote a check, and there, money spent!
Of course, the money hasn't even begun to actually be used, but on paper the government has technically spent it. This won't fool UNESCO for a moment, but at this point they're just ticking boxes.
posted by adept256 at 2:59 AM on August 21, 2018 [6 favorites]
Even by recent standards it's pretty wild. There's been talk of another spill on Thursday, junior ministers attempting to resign, Chester (a Nat!) threatening to sit on the cross benches rather than serve Dutton and Liberals hinting they would resign their seats and force an election.
posted by hawthorne at 3:02 AM on August 21, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by hawthorne at 3:02 AM on August 21, 2018 [3 favorites]
Dutton has now resigned from Cabinet.
And nothing of value was lost.
posted by gesso at 3:58 AM on August 21, 2018 [5 favorites]
And nothing of value was lost.
posted by gesso at 3:58 AM on August 21, 2018 [5 favorites]
Time to change the smoke detector batteries I guess
posted by mbo at 4:25 AM on August 21, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by mbo at 4:25 AM on August 21, 2018 [4 favorites]
Deputy Labor leader Tanya Plibersek said Mr Turnbull led a "Frankenstein's monster" of a government.
"It has the face of the member for Wentworth (Mr Turnbull), the policies of the member for Warringah (Tony Abbott), and it has the cold, shrivelled soul of the member for Dickson (Mr Dutton)," Ms Plibersek said.
OUCH.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 4:30 AM on August 21, 2018 [16 favorites]
"It has the face of the member for Wentworth (Mr Turnbull), the policies of the member for Warringah (Tony Abbott), and it has the cold, shrivelled soul of the member for Dickson (Mr Dutton)," Ms Plibersek said.
OUCH.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 4:30 AM on August 21, 2018 [16 favorites]
And this NEG nonsense! I was going to make an auspol post around the shenanigans lately but where the fuck to even start?
Something that really incenses me is the number of po-faced journalists tut-tutting about how both parties are "playing politics", and the "need for a solution". They're right - both parties are playing politics, but not in the sense they think, and their venal horse-race calling is part of the problem.
The complete abrogation of responsibility, by politicians, and the media in the face of climate change still staggers me. Both sides are playing politics - by not taking this threat that will kill literally billions of people, and impoverish billions more, at all seriously.
Like, fuck me. If there was a meteorite the size Switzerland headed for Earth, impact is scheduled for around 2090, but it will be pretty much un-divertable by 2050, of course smaller chunks will start arriving and killing the odd village here, the odd playground there from around 2025 - and no one was doing anything. Can you imagine the reaction?? People would be in the streets. Politicians of all stripes would be falling over themselves to spend the most on the best, biggest, fastest solution. If you said it didn't really matter, and no one really cares your political career would go up in smoke.
Instead we have these fucking idiots running the asylum, and Labor are too scared to tell anyone the truth cause no one wants to believe and the media are happy to publish absolute nonsense and dismiss the Greens as some kind of loonies.
Turnbull, the ultimate Quisling, the man who said he wouldn't lead a government that didn't take climate change seriously. What a motherfucker. It's a shame they'll all be dead by time people will wake up to their crimes. He and the whole party should be in the fucking Hague just for this - let alone what they are doing in concentration camps on Manus and now Nauru.
Meanwhile, that meteor just keeps getting closer...
My only comfort is a dutton govt would deliver a potentially historic loss, and hopefully spend years in the wilderness if Labor learned their goddamn lesson from last time. We deserve a menzies era on our side, too.
posted by smoke at 4:30 AM on August 21, 2018 [15 favorites]
Something that really incenses me is the number of po-faced journalists tut-tutting about how both parties are "playing politics", and the "need for a solution". They're right - both parties are playing politics, but not in the sense they think, and their venal horse-race calling is part of the problem.
The complete abrogation of responsibility, by politicians, and the media in the face of climate change still staggers me. Both sides are playing politics - by not taking this threat that will kill literally billions of people, and impoverish billions more, at all seriously.
Like, fuck me. If there was a meteorite the size Switzerland headed for Earth, impact is scheduled for around 2090, but it will be pretty much un-divertable by 2050, of course smaller chunks will start arriving and killing the odd village here, the odd playground there from around 2025 - and no one was doing anything. Can you imagine the reaction?? People would be in the streets. Politicians of all stripes would be falling over themselves to spend the most on the best, biggest, fastest solution. If you said it didn't really matter, and no one really cares your political career would go up in smoke.
Instead we have these fucking idiots running the asylum, and Labor are too scared to tell anyone the truth cause no one wants to believe and the media are happy to publish absolute nonsense and dismiss the Greens as some kind of loonies.
Turnbull, the ultimate Quisling, the man who said he wouldn't lead a government that didn't take climate change seriously. What a motherfucker. It's a shame they'll all be dead by time people will wake up to their crimes. He and the whole party should be in the fucking Hague just for this - let alone what they are doing in concentration camps on Manus and now Nauru.
Meanwhile, that meteor just keeps getting closer...
My only comfort is a dutton govt would deliver a potentially historic loss, and hopefully spend years in the wilderness if Labor learned their goddamn lesson from last time. We deserve a menzies era on our side, too.
posted by smoke at 4:30 AM on August 21, 2018 [15 favorites]
I blame Meg Lees.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 4:48 AM on August 21, 2018
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 4:48 AM on August 21, 2018
Australian paramedics have a quick test for concussion, they ask what year it is, and who is the Pime Minister of Australia.
They might have to change that last question.
Oh no, I work in healthcare and the ship has well sailed on that being useful. You just get the same annoying jokes now.
posted by chiquitita at 5:07 AM on August 21, 2018 [5 favorites]
They might have to change that last question.
Oh no, I work in healthcare and the ship has well sailed on that being useful. You just get the same annoying jokes now.
posted by chiquitita at 5:07 AM on August 21, 2018 [5 favorites]
Labor has to realise that their support for offshore detention just provides cover for the Abbott branch of the LNP. They can claim they'll be more humane about it than Dutton is, but that's just quibbling over details. As long as refugees are held offshore, there will be no oversight worth a damn, and any fig leaves they put in place will be stripped away by Scott Morrison or whichever fascist ends up in the figurehead role after Turnbull. The Greens can't end this policy by themselves and the rest of the minors don't give a shit. So it's on Labor to figure out an alternative ASAfuckingP.
posted by harriet vane at 5:17 AM on August 21, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by harriet vane at 5:17 AM on August 21, 2018 [3 favorites]
Update your electoral details, cats and kittens, because it looks like the government that holds a majority so slim that the opposition has been able to pass motions while the whips weren't paying attention is getting into a shitfight. There could be a snap poll in the forecast, and that will almost certainly mean a Labor government.
posted by Merus at 5:19 AM on August 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by Merus at 5:19 AM on August 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
People have compared Dutton to Mussolini, but the leader he most resembles is Putin; other than the physical resemblance, there's the security-forces background (Queensland's notoriously unaccountable police force, rather than the KGB), and the tendency to personally concentrate unaccountable power in his hands.
And Dutton got a far better result in this leadership challenge than either Keating or Abbott got in their first one. Which suggests that he may yet become PM.
Which makes one wonder whether, should he become PM, he has a Putin/Erdogan-style strategy of cementing that power beyond the ability of ordinary democratic procedure to interfere in his reshaping of Australia, and if so, how will that happen. Presumably a merging of ASIO/ASIS with the Australian Federal Police along with a politicised purge of those insufficiently loyal to Dutton, the bringing to bear of national-security laws (most of which are in place now, with draconian cryptography back-door laws looking set to be waved through by Labor because national security) against journalists and politicians who pose a threat, followed by a compromising of the electoral process, the ultimate result being the Liberal Party becoming an Australian equivalent of United Russia or AKP. Though how would that happen? Would the ALP be allowed to go on as a comic relief (like opposition parties in Russia), with all involved knowing that there are boundaries and if they cross them and start to seriously oppose, there will be severe personal consequences? Or would they end up in jail like the HDP in Turkey?
posted by acb at 5:59 AM on August 21, 2018
And Dutton got a far better result in this leadership challenge than either Keating or Abbott got in their first one. Which suggests that he may yet become PM.
Which makes one wonder whether, should he become PM, he has a Putin/Erdogan-style strategy of cementing that power beyond the ability of ordinary democratic procedure to interfere in his reshaping of Australia, and if so, how will that happen. Presumably a merging of ASIO/ASIS with the Australian Federal Police along with a politicised purge of those insufficiently loyal to Dutton, the bringing to bear of national-security laws (most of which are in place now, with draconian cryptography back-door laws looking set to be waved through by Labor because national security) against journalists and politicians who pose a threat, followed by a compromising of the electoral process, the ultimate result being the Liberal Party becoming an Australian equivalent of United Russia or AKP. Though how would that happen? Would the ALP be allowed to go on as a comic relief (like opposition parties in Russia), with all involved knowing that there are boundaries and if they cross them and start to seriously oppose, there will be severe personal consequences? Or would they end up in jail like the HDP in Turkey?
posted by acb at 5:59 AM on August 21, 2018
To be fair, Dutton started as a cop in the immediate post-Fitzgerald era - probably the least corrupt time & place to be a cop in Australia in living memory.
That said, he was in the Drug & Sex Offenders squads where the heavy-handed authoritarianism, if not the corruption, definitely lingered in parts - so it's not a complete pass…
posted by Pinback at 6:24 AM on August 21, 2018
That said, he was in the Drug & Sex Offenders squads where the heavy-handed authoritarianism, if not the corruption, definitely lingered in parts - so it's not a complete pass…
posted by Pinback at 6:24 AM on August 21, 2018
If Peter Dutton becomes PM, there is no evidence that he will be able to maintain the confidence of Parliament a week. Forget the crossbenchers, there are Nationals saying they will vote with Labor in a vote of no confidence against the government.
Do you know how business interests feel about the Coalition since they torched the NEG, the holy grail of investor stability in the energy market?
How does the Coalition fund an election campaign if they've pissed off the Business Council of Australia with their policy shenanigans and sacked the prime minister who was an investment banker? Do you know who funded their last election campaign? Malcolm Turnbull! Do you think MT will be donating another cool $1.75 million at the next election? Not bloody likely!
The Liberal party have well and truly fucked themselves this time.
posted by chiquitita at 6:25 AM on August 21, 2018 [7 favorites]
Do you know how business interests feel about the Coalition since they torched the NEG, the holy grail of investor stability in the energy market?
How does the Coalition fund an election campaign if they've pissed off the Business Council of Australia with their policy shenanigans and sacked the prime minister who was an investment banker? Do you know who funded their last election campaign? Malcolm Turnbull! Do you think MT will be donating another cool $1.75 million at the next election? Not bloody likely!
The Liberal party have well and truly fucked themselves this time.
posted by chiquitita at 6:25 AM on August 21, 2018 [7 favorites]
The Liberal party have well and truly fucked themselves this time.
But at least Dutton and Abbott will have Turnbull's scalp hanging from their belt.
My old MP, Ian Goodenough, was a Dutton supporter. Gotta call my folks and tell them they cannot possibly vote for him again if they had before.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 6:38 AM on August 21, 2018
But at least Dutton and Abbott will have Turnbull's scalp hanging from their belt.
My old MP, Ian Goodenough, was a Dutton supporter. Gotta call my folks and tell them they cannot possibly vote for him again if they had before.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 6:38 AM on August 21, 2018
Dutton has had sweeping national-security powers for years. If he has the will to power of a Putin or an Erdogan, he will have used that to gather material to induce compliance in and/or put away enemies when the time comes to take the gloves off. It'll be a chaotic transition, though if he makes it through, he could end up transforming Australia as profoundly as Russia or Turkey.
posted by acb at 7:07 AM on August 21, 2018
posted by acb at 7:07 AM on August 21, 2018
Do you know who funded their last election campaign? Malcolm Turnbull! Do you think MT will be donating another cool $1.75 million at the next election? Not bloody likely!
Well, some people get off on being humiliated, so perhaps he did get his money's worth.
Malcolm Turnbull: the Subservient Chicken of #auspol.
posted by acb at 8:56 AM on August 21, 2018
Well, some people get off on being humiliated, so perhaps he did get his money's worth.
Malcolm Turnbull: the Subservient Chicken of #auspol.
posted by acb at 8:56 AM on August 21, 2018
What if we end up with Abbott again? Is this why the onion-crunching lizard in human skin keeps flapping his mouth instead of shutting up like a good backbencher? He's planning to somehow come out of the next spill, or the next, or the election, as the next PM?
I'd love to put it past him, but he's the right sort of intermingled with the Nationals' wild-eyed moneyed wing and more than venal enough.
posted by E. Whitehall at 9:04 AM on August 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
I'd love to put it past him, but he's the right sort of intermingled with the Nationals' wild-eyed moneyed wing and more than venal enough.
posted by E. Whitehall at 9:04 AM on August 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
Those little "who should be PM?" votes on the news.com.au had Julie Bishop up at 28% second only to Turnbull.
I think 28% of the population might be onto something. Toss both of them out on their asses and give her PM.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 1:18 PM on August 21, 2018
I think 28% of the population might be onto something. Toss both of them out on their asses and give her PM.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 1:18 PM on August 21, 2018
Yesterday at Parliament House was nuts. I'm not expecting it to let up today. Or tomorrow.
posted by the duck by the oboe at 1:45 PM on August 21, 2018
posted by the duck by the oboe at 1:45 PM on August 21, 2018
Well, it’s for sure not over. At least four front benchers have offered to resign because they support the racist potato.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 3:28 PM on August 21, 2018
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 3:28 PM on August 21, 2018
They need to lose their seats.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 3:51 PM on August 21, 2018
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 3:51 PM on August 21, 2018
A lot of this reminds me of Secret City. I thought that was well-done and scary but now I'm wondering what Australian Mefites think of it.
posted by billsaysthis at 4:23 PM on August 21, 2018
posted by billsaysthis at 4:23 PM on August 21, 2018
I only watched the first episode, but what I thought was "Why is Damon Herriman playing a woman?"
posted by misfish at 4:46 PM on August 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by misfish at 4:46 PM on August 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
I found it odd and not in a good way. It leaned heavily on broad and inaccurate cliches about Australian party politics and very badly misstated the way journalists work in Parliament. Perhaps because it was based on books written by journalists from the press gallery.
posted by the duck by the oboe at 4:54 PM on August 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by the duck by the oboe at 4:54 PM on August 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
I also slept through it... enjoying all the memes though. #PutOutYourPotatoes everyone!
In other news, rumours of a potential greens spill....? ;)
posted by womb of things to be and tomb of things that were at 5:52 PM on August 21, 2018
In other news, rumours of a potential greens spill....? ;)
posted by womb of things to be and tomb of things that were at 5:52 PM on August 21, 2018
I put on ABC News 24 in my lunch break to watch this press conference and through the strangled protestations of Scott Morrison that they have been doing such a good job the ticker kept offering up the names of ministers who have resigned, one by one. 10 ministers off the front bench, brutal.
posted by chiquitita at 8:15 PM on August 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by chiquitita at 8:15 PM on August 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
The fascist potato has gone the full racist (again), claiming that immigrants cause traffic jams.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 8:42 PM on August 21, 2018
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 8:42 PM on August 21, 2018
I liked the question from one of the journos (possibly ... Laura Tingle? would she be in a press scrum?) about how much of the money earmarked for the now-scrapped corporate tax cuts policy would be going back into services vs how much going to tax cuts for SMEs.
The answer was essentially "TBD" which I interpreted to be "bugger all, obviously, are you new here?"
posted by joz at 8:45 PM on August 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
The answer was essentially "TBD" which I interpreted to be "bugger all, obviously, are you new here?"
posted by joz at 8:45 PM on August 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
Dutton's a little too compromised to have the time to seize the reins of power. He won't have the political legitimacy, because he hasn't won an election. He doesn't have the numbers - the government currently relies on support from the crossbench, none of which is there if the leadership changes and probably won't be there if Dutton is installed as leader. He's already legally compromised, the argument is all teed up, and if it's relevant Labor are happy to refer him to the High Court who will essentially drop everything to turn it around in a couple of months. And after all that, there's an election due, and Australia doesn't have the same turnout problems America and Russia do. The Coalition are probably fucked.
The way you steal elections in Australia is guarantee supply to a minority government or do Senate preference deals.
posted by Merus at 9:26 PM on August 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
The way you steal elections in Australia is guarantee supply to a minority government or do Senate preference deals.
posted by Merus at 9:26 PM on August 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
He's already legally compromised, the argument is all teed up, and if it's relevant Labor are happy to refer him to the High Court who will essentially drop everything to turn it around in a couple of months.
Turnbull's playing games in QT re: Dutton's constitutional eligibility -- hasn't seen Dutton's 'I can too' legal advice, the advice isn't public, he isn't interested in taking the case to the high court, as of QT ten minutes ago wasn't planning to refer to the solicitor-general. Now it's being reported that it's going to go to the solicitor-general.
The case seems pretty solid. You can dick around and say the subsidies were paid to the provider on behalf of the parents rather than to the provider direct, but the money exchanging hands still passed through specific coffers that Dutton benefited from. It would be lovely if Dutton were hoist by his own petard.
On the other hand, First Dog on the Moon has it right that the issues here are fairly fucking systemic and Dutton being a fascist potato who pretends helplessness in the face of his own portfolio and position of power is not that different from the fascist onion, turnip, etc. He could make it worse, sure, but the status quo is already really fucking bad. Labor needs to focus on reverting the status quo/pushing forward (reverting cuts to penalty rates, taking up the NZ offer to resettle the Manus Island/Nauru refugees, improving climate targets, etc.), not just 'at least we're not Coalition eh'. They'll likely win the election still but I suspect expecting gratitude for not being as bad as the Nationals' pack of shitstains won't cut it in the current atmosphere.
This shitshow. It's only fucking Wednesday!
posted by E. Whitehall at 10:36 PM on August 21, 2018 [4 favorites]
Turnbull's playing games in QT re: Dutton's constitutional eligibility -- hasn't seen Dutton's 'I can too' legal advice, the advice isn't public, he isn't interested in taking the case to the high court, as of QT ten minutes ago wasn't planning to refer to the solicitor-general. Now it's being reported that it's going to go to the solicitor-general.
The case seems pretty solid. You can dick around and say the subsidies were paid to the provider on behalf of the parents rather than to the provider direct, but the money exchanging hands still passed through specific coffers that Dutton benefited from. It would be lovely if Dutton were hoist by his own petard.
On the other hand, First Dog on the Moon has it right that the issues here are fairly fucking systemic and Dutton being a fascist potato who pretends helplessness in the face of his own portfolio and position of power is not that different from the fascist onion, turnip, etc. He could make it worse, sure, but the status quo is already really fucking bad. Labor needs to focus on reverting the status quo/pushing forward (reverting cuts to penalty rates, taking up the NZ offer to resettle the Manus Island/Nauru refugees, improving climate targets, etc.), not just 'at least we're not Coalition eh'. They'll likely win the election still but I suspect expecting gratitude for not being as bad as the Nationals' pack of shitstains won't cut it in the current atmosphere.
This shitshow. It's only fucking Wednesday!
posted by E. Whitehall at 10:36 PM on August 21, 2018 [4 favorites]
If Dutton gets cut down there will be another contender. Dutton is not popular because he is a charismatic visionary with great ideas for the country. Even by right wing nutjob standards his manifesto over the last two days is incoherent. The GST thing? Idiotic! He's being entirely inflated by the hot air arising from 2GB and Ray Hadley, and the moment he's unfeasible they'll pick someone else. They just hate Malcolm Turnbull so beyond reason they will do all manner of irrational mental gymnastics to tear him down.
posted by chiquitita at 11:32 PM on August 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by chiquitita at 11:32 PM on August 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
Dutton is not popular because he is a charismatic visionary with great ideas for the country.
I'm assuming this is sarcasm.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 11:48 PM on August 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
I'm assuming this is sarcasm.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 11:48 PM on August 21, 2018 [1 favorite]
Attorney General Christian Porter has sought advice from the Solicitor General on the potato's s44 status.
Unsure if Porter is trying to wreck Dutton or clear him.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 11:51 PM on August 21, 2018 [3 favorites]
Unsure if Porter is trying to wreck Dutton or clear him.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 11:51 PM on August 21, 2018 [3 favorites]
To clarify, I don't think the right wing are rallying behind PD because they think he has the best conceptual vision. I think they're swarming because he is the conservative meat puppet who has put his hand up to take down Turnbull, who they hate, and the next meat puppet in a suit who puts their hand up would do just as well.
posted by chiquitita at 12:02 AM on August 22, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by chiquitita at 12:02 AM on August 22, 2018 [3 favorites]
Yeah, Dutton is a cultural warrior. He's a terrible choice in terms of electability, but the only reason they're knifing Turnbull is because they want someone who will deliver the lefty tears they so desperately crave to assuage the fact that none of their ideas seem to work the way they're supposed to.
posted by Merus at 1:38 AM on August 22, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by Merus at 1:38 AM on August 22, 2018 [4 favorites]
Dutton has Murdoch's confidence, right? That'd still count for something.
The humanising puff pieces are starting: he's a “Brisbane battler” now in The Australian. Look for the daggy-dad front-page stories in the Daily Telegraph. Hopefully his handlers will make sure to coach him on answers to questions like “what's your favourite AC/DC song” this time.
posted by acb at 2:50 AM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
The humanising puff pieces are starting: he's a “Brisbane battler” now in The Australian. Look for the daggy-dad front-page stories in the Daily Telegraph. Hopefully his handlers will make sure to coach him on answers to questions like “what's your favourite AC/DC song” this time.
posted by acb at 2:50 AM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
Aaaand it may be back on again lolsob
posted by moody cow at 3:15 AM on August 22, 2018
Please do forgive us as we wade through the misinformation to find the truth of this push from the Dutton camp. Already we’ve heard false reports about cabinet figures resigning - Mathias Cormann and Dan Tehan - and declaring their hand for Dutton.
The key thing that we’re trying to work out is this: does the Dutton camp have the numbers to force a meeting? The numbers are unclear so far.
posted by moody cow at 3:15 AM on August 22, 2018
Thurs is the last day before the two-week break. It'll probably be tomorrow, if it happens.
Then again, Libs couldn't organise a root in a brothel.
posted by E. Whitehall at 3:25 AM on August 22, 2018 [2 favorites]
Then again, Libs couldn't organise a root in a brothel.
posted by E. Whitehall at 3:25 AM on August 22, 2018 [2 favorites]
Australian paramedics have a quick test for concussion, they ask what year it is, and who is the Pime Minister of Australia.
They might have to change that last question.
I have (apparently) been asked this question by paramedics while lying in the middle of an intersection, in the Gillard era. I am told I got the answer wrong but they couldn't determine if this was because I hadn't been paying attention or was concussed. In the end, also not knowing what year it was or how to use my phone resolved the question. I don't really know why they bothered asking.
posted by deadwax at 3:37 AM on August 22, 2018 [6 favorites]
They might have to change that last question.
I have (apparently) been asked this question by paramedics while lying in the middle of an intersection, in the Gillard era. I am told I got the answer wrong but they couldn't determine if this was because I hadn't been paying attention or was concussed. In the end, also not knowing what year it was or how to use my phone resolved the question. I don't really know why they bothered asking.
posted by deadwax at 3:37 AM on August 22, 2018 [6 favorites]
Can of worms. Can of worms! Ooh, don't you love that image! Especially with Dutton as head worm. Is the head worm really a potato who is ineligible to be in parliament in the first place due to a financial conflict of interest. Is the onion-eater set to return to cabinet? I'm teaching Shakespeare at the moment and the urge is great to mimic the bard's take on modern concerns.
In iambic pentameter of course.
posted by Thella at 5:11 AM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
In iambic pentameter of course.
posted by Thella at 5:11 AM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
Then again, Libs couldn't organise a root in a brothel.
The problem we've had for a while is that Murdock is a more than competent pimp.
posted by Jilder at 3:43 PM on August 22, 2018 [5 favorites]
The problem we've had for a while is that Murdock is a more than competent pimp.
posted by Jilder at 3:43 PM on August 22, 2018 [5 favorites]
Dutton thinks he has the numbers this time. I wonder if the Nationals will follow up on their threat to cross the floor on a no confidence.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 4:17 PM on August 22, 2018
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 4:17 PM on August 22, 2018
Good fucking god, Cormann, Cash and Fifield just resigned.
Cormann: "with a heavy heart we went to the PM to tell him he no longer enjoys majority support of Liberal Party room". All three of them voted for Mal on Tuesday. Cormann claims that 5 MPs have switched sides. The racist potato only needed 7 more votes, and Abetz wasn't around on Tuesday.
You guys, this is happening.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 4:47 PM on August 22, 2018 [2 favorites]
Cormann: "with a heavy heart we went to the PM to tell him he no longer enjoys majority support of Liberal Party room". All three of them voted for Mal on Tuesday. Cormann claims that 5 MPs have switched sides. The racist potato only needed 7 more votes, and Abetz wasn't around on Tuesday.
You guys, this is happening.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 4:47 PM on August 22, 2018 [2 favorites]
Yep. It's Prime Minister Brussel Sprout in days if not hours. Chaotic government from now until whenever the next election happens. Stay stable Labor.
posted by michswiss at 4:50 PM on August 22, 2018
posted by michswiss at 4:50 PM on August 22, 2018
Chaotic government from now until whenever the next election happens.
How would we tell the difference.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 4:52 PM on August 22, 2018 [2 favorites]
How would we tell the difference.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 4:52 PM on August 22, 2018 [2 favorites]
He's done. Cormann support was critical.
Never mind that cash should be in jail for AWU raids, and if this is about winning elections, Dutton is the worst choice compared to Bishop and scomo (and they are not even that far behind, ludicrous, honestly).
posted by smoke at 4:52 PM on August 22, 2018 [4 favorites]
Never mind that cash should be in jail for AWU raids, and if this is about winning elections, Dutton is the worst choice compared to Bishop and scomo (and they are not even that far behind, ludicrous, honestly).
posted by smoke at 4:52 PM on August 22, 2018 [4 favorites]
Forgot to add that Dutton is most likely in breach of s44 in the constitution. So we'll have a PM that is ineligible to sit in parliament and no way to refer him to the High Court.
posted by michswiss at 4:55 PM on August 22, 2018
posted by michswiss at 4:55 PM on August 22, 2018
AND ALSO THAT DUTTON IS A WHITE SUPREMACIST
AND HAS FOR YEARS DENIED MEDICAL CARE TO PEOPLE HE HAS PUT IN FUCKING CONCENTRATION CAMPS
AND WANTS THE ABILITY TO DEPLOY THE ARMY ON PROTESTORS
AND DOESN'T BELIEVE IN CLIMATE CHANGE
AND IS A VIRULENT HOMOPHOBE
WHAT THE FUCKING FUCK IS EVEN WHAT IDK FUCK EVERYTHING
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 4:56 PM on August 22, 2018 [19 favorites]
AND HAS FOR YEARS DENIED MEDICAL CARE TO PEOPLE HE HAS PUT IN FUCKING CONCENTRATION CAMPS
AND WANTS THE ABILITY TO DEPLOY THE ARMY ON PROTESTORS
AND DOESN'T BELIEVE IN CLIMATE CHANGE
AND IS A VIRULENT HOMOPHOBE
WHAT THE FUCKING FUCK IS EVEN WHAT IDK FUCK EVERYTHING
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 4:56 PM on August 22, 2018 [19 favorites]
A 12 year old tried to light herself on fire yesterday on Nauru. Another girl is on a hunger strike.
That's on Dutton.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 4:59 PM on August 22, 2018 [9 favorites]
That's on Dutton.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 4:59 PM on August 22, 2018 [9 favorites]
I hope Dutton calls an election soon and then we can see the end of them and perhaps even him for, hopefully, a very long time.
posted by Panthalassa at 5:00 PM on August 22, 2018
posted by Panthalassa at 5:00 PM on August 22, 2018
WHAT THE FUCKING FUCK IS EVEN WHAT IDK FUCK EVERYTHING
The conservative wing is learning from their US brethren. Just threaten to burn the whole party down if they're not kowtowed to. Moderate and business liberals crave stability. They're not going to play chicken with the party.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 5:01 PM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
The conservative wing is learning from their US brethren. Just threaten to burn the whole party down if they're not kowtowed to. Moderate and business liberals crave stability. They're not going to play chicken with the party.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 5:01 PM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
My old man was a loyal and dedicated small l liberal and active party member.
We'd be able to solve all our energy and climate change problems just by hooking his rolling in his grave up to a generator. He'd be beyond livid, this is not the party he knew and if the libs have abandoned his demographic they've sure as hell abandoned most of the rest of us.
posted by deadwax at 5:12 PM on August 22, 2018 [3 favorites]
We'd be able to solve all our energy and climate change problems just by hooking his rolling in his grave up to a generator. He'd be beyond livid, this is not the party he knew and if the libs have abandoned his demographic they've sure as hell abandoned most of the rest of us.
posted by deadwax at 5:12 PM on August 22, 2018 [3 favorites]
The Liberal Party is about to go to a ballot without legal advice from the commonwealth's top legal officer about whether the challenger is eligible to sit in parliament.
Is this going to be another situation where Australia rewrites the rules on Westminster constitutional conventions?
posted by JamesBay at 5:18 PM on August 22, 2018 [2 favorites]
Is this going to be another situation where Australia rewrites the rules on Westminster constitutional conventions?
posted by JamesBay at 5:18 PM on August 22, 2018 [2 favorites]
No wonder the GG stuck around this week!
15 minutes ago from the grauniad's liveblog:
Suffer with me!
posted by E. Whitehall at 5:30 PM on August 22, 2018 [3 favorites]
15 minutes ago from the grauniad's liveblog:
Labor tries to have Dutton referred to high court5 minutes ago, same liveblog:
Labor are being rather sneaky in the lower house, too. They’re trying to refer Peter Dutton to the high court over his eligibility woes.
The Coalition is in disarray, and the numbers are tight.
A division is being called.
Here’s the text of the motion, moved by Tony Burke, the opposition’s manager of business.
I move –
That pursuant to section 376 of the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918, the House of
Representatives refer the following questions to the Court of Disputed Returns:
1. whether, by reason of s44 of the Constitution, the place of the Member for Dickson (Mr Dutton) has become vacant;
2. if the answer to Question (1) is “yes”, by what means and in what manner that vacancy should be filled;
3. what directions and other orders, if any, the Court should make in order to hear and finally dispose of this reference; and
4. what, if any, orders should be made as to the costs of these proceedings.
Dutton survives high court push by barest marginrubs temples
Wow. That was incredibly tight.
The government hangs on by a single vote. One vote. Remarkable. It was 68-69.
Just to put that in context, the parliament almost decided to refer our likely next prime minister, Peter Dutton, to the nation’s highest court because he may not have been eligible to sit in parliament.
Suffer with me!
posted by E. Whitehall at 5:30 PM on August 22, 2018 [3 favorites]
All the crossbenchers voted with the ALP - I wonder whether this will be sustainable. But remember, _all_ those caught under S44 have been returned and there is no reason why Dutton can't be PM and not have a seat (for a while).
posted by hawthorne at 5:37 PM on August 22, 2018
posted by hawthorne at 5:37 PM on August 22, 2018
David Speers is reporting that ScoMo is going for it now.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:38 PM on August 22, 2018
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:38 PM on August 22, 2018
But remember, _all_ those caught under S44 have been returned
Dutton holds his seat with a margin of 1.6% and there's been a major swing against the Coalition in every byelection. It wouldn't be an easy win.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:40 PM on August 22, 2018
Dutton holds his seat with a margin of 1.6% and there's been a major swing against the Coalition in every byelection. It wouldn't be an easy win.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:40 PM on August 22, 2018
ScoMo has just thrown his hat into the ring. Turnbull is definitely gone. While more eloquent than Dutton, he's just as vile.
posted by michswiss at 5:44 PM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by michswiss at 5:44 PM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
I think I could survive ScoMo, horrendous as he is. But Dutton is just pants off batshit crazy.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:55 PM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:55 PM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
You won't get one without the other, unfortunately -- heard a rumour earlier this week (yesterday???) that ScoMo wants to be PM with Dutton as his deputy.
posted by E. Whitehall at 5:59 PM on August 22, 2018
posted by E. Whitehall at 5:59 PM on August 22, 2018
If that's the case Julie Bishop should put her hat in. She'd be more capable and more likable than both those two clowns put together.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 6:10 PM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 6:10 PM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
Maybe Dutton is not meant to be Prime Minister beyond the next election, whether he knows it or not. There's no way he can campaign as much as he needs to in such a marginal seat for himself and do what is needed for the party as Prime Minister.
It's feels so cliche but these people are insane!
Katherine Murphy calls it out (short vid on twitter link)
posted by chiquitita at 6:16 PM on August 22, 2018 [2 favorites]
It's feels so cliche but these people are insane!
Katherine Murphy calls it out (short vid on twitter link)
posted by chiquitita at 6:16 PM on August 22, 2018 [2 favorites]
If Darren Chester has any sort of spine Dutton won't be anything more than a caretaker PM.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 6:21 PM on August 22, 2018
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 6:21 PM on August 22, 2018
I think the ScoMo / PD ticket was a compromise option floated that maybe wouldn't completely torch the joint.
From the Guardian Liveblog
Peter Dutton would actively harm the Liberal Party’s vote if made leader, according to a ReachTel poll conducted on Wednesday night.
The poll of 2,430 voters found that 55.5% would be less likely to vote for the Liberals if Dutton becomes leader, compared with 22.9% who would be more likely and 21.5% who say it wouldn’t change their vote.
In fact, a majority in all age groups and sexes would be less likely to vote Liberal. Women in particular seem to dislike Dutton - 57% would be less likely to vote Liberal. Young people aged 18-34 are most opposed (57.6%).
Seriously has there been a gas leak in Parliament house? Can we check their health? Why! Do! This!
posted by chiquitita at 6:21 PM on August 22, 2018 [4 favorites]
From the Guardian Liveblog
Peter Dutton would actively harm the Liberal Party’s vote if made leader, according to a ReachTel poll conducted on Wednesday night.
The poll of 2,430 voters found that 55.5% would be less likely to vote for the Liberals if Dutton becomes leader, compared with 22.9% who would be more likely and 21.5% who say it wouldn’t change their vote.
In fact, a majority in all age groups and sexes would be less likely to vote Liberal. Women in particular seem to dislike Dutton - 57% would be less likely to vote Liberal. Young people aged 18-34 are most opposed (57.6%).
Seriously has there been a gas leak in Parliament house? Can we check their health? Why! Do! This!
posted by chiquitita at 6:21 PM on August 22, 2018 [4 favorites]
Why! Do! This!
The lunatics are trying to take over the asylum. The easiest way to get the doctors and orderlies out is to set the whole thing on fire.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 6:25 PM on August 22, 2018
The lunatics are trying to take over the asylum. The easiest way to get the doctors and orderlies out is to set the whole thing on fire.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 6:25 PM on August 22, 2018
I honestly think Trump is a factor here. Right-wingers all over the world have become bolder.
posted by nnethercote at 6:28 PM on August 22, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by nnethercote at 6:28 PM on August 22, 2018 [3 favorites]
Trump is a symptom of that, not a cause. What's happening here & now is actually nothing terribly out of the ordinary for Australian, or even Westminster, politics - except that, thanks to the internet & instant media, it's a bit more public.
Short version: the driver is emboldened extreme right-wing sentiment, not Trump.
posted by Pinback at 6:33 PM on August 22, 2018 [2 favorites]
Short version: the driver is emboldened extreme right-wing sentiment, not Trump.
posted by Pinback at 6:33 PM on August 22, 2018 [2 favorites]
Trump is a symptom of that, not a cause.
Can you clearly distinguish such causes and symptoms? I don't think so.
What's happening here & now is actually nothing terribly out of the ordinary for Australian
I disagree. As I said above: "In all the previous recent cases where a PM was replaced there was a plausible story that the challenger would be more popular (at least in the short term). Not so this time. They want to knife Turnbull just for the sake of it, damn the consequences."
posted by nnethercote at 6:35 PM on August 22, 2018 [2 favorites]
Can you clearly distinguish such causes and symptoms? I don't think so.
What's happening here & now is actually nothing terribly out of the ordinary for Australian
I disagree. As I said above: "In all the previous recent cases where a PM was replaced there was a plausible story that the challenger would be more popular (at least in the short term). Not so this time. They want to knife Turnbull just for the sake of it, damn the consequences."
posted by nnethercote at 6:35 PM on August 22, 2018 [2 favorites]
At least with compulsory voting it makes the country more resistant to the far-right keeping power.
If there's an election One Nation risks probably losing three seats as they don't come anywhere near enough in the count in 2016 outside of QLD and Hanson has that seat locked up until 2022. Fraser Anning will be out getting rid of what's left of Bob Katter in the Senate. Bernardi will be out on his arse. Hinch is out. Culleton is gone. David Leyonhjelm is out. All of the batshit right fringe elements that were allowed in on the half sized count of the DD will be swept away.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 6:38 PM on August 22, 2018 [6 favorites]
If there's an election One Nation risks probably losing three seats as they don't come anywhere near enough in the count in 2016 outside of QLD and Hanson has that seat locked up until 2022. Fraser Anning will be out getting rid of what's left of Bob Katter in the Senate. Bernardi will be out on his arse. Hinch is out. Culleton is gone. David Leyonhjelm is out. All of the batshit right fringe elements that were allowed in on the half sized count of the DD will be swept away.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 6:38 PM on August 22, 2018 [6 favorites]
I had to refresh my memory, but ScoMo is every bit the human rights abuser, homophobe, and climate change denier that the potato is. The only difference is that he seems to be able to human slightly better than Dutton.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 6:51 PM on August 22, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 6:51 PM on August 22, 2018 [4 favorites]
The government is now moving to adjourn the house so QT won't happen. That's not common.
posted by the duck by the oboe at 6:53 PM on August 22, 2018
posted by the duck by the oboe at 6:53 PM on August 22, 2018
It's not, at all. It's obscene is what it is.
Tony Burke bringing the goods -- "There will be no question time today because they don't know who their prime minister is"
posted by E. Whitehall at 6:55 PM on August 22, 2018 [3 favorites]
Tony Burke bringing the goods -- "There will be no question time today because they don't know who their prime minister is"
posted by E. Whitehall at 6:55 PM on August 22, 2018 [3 favorites]
Nationals voting with the government to adjourn.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 6:58 PM on August 22, 2018
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 6:58 PM on August 22, 2018
Govt adjourned until the tenth.
Will the Libs/Nats sort their shit out in the next two weeks? Naaaaah. Will Turnbull have a liedown after his backstabbing? Who wouldn't? Will Dutton learn to smile with his eyes? Nahhhh, that would be effort. Will ScoMo take some sandpaper to his air of smug superiority? Dream on. Will the puff pieces continue to fail to mention their mutual record of human rights abuses and disregard for the sick and poor? What is Murdoch for but lovingly wanking the far-right? Really, who needs a bit of tissue when you've The Australian on your doorstep?
posted by E. Whitehall at 7:16 PM on August 22, 2018 [2 favorites]
Will the Libs/Nats sort their shit out in the next two weeks? Naaaaah. Will Turnbull have a liedown after his backstabbing? Who wouldn't? Will Dutton learn to smile with his eyes? Nahhhh, that would be effort. Will ScoMo take some sandpaper to his air of smug superiority? Dream on. Will the puff pieces continue to fail to mention their mutual record of human rights abuses and disregard for the sick and poor? What is Murdoch for but lovingly wanking the far-right? Really, who needs a bit of tissue when you've The Australian on your doorstep?
posted by E. Whitehall at 7:16 PM on August 22, 2018 [2 favorites]
Dutton might figure out his fave AC/DC song so it’s all so exciting!
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 7:20 PM on August 22, 2018
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 7:20 PM on August 22, 2018
Night of the Long Knives, naturally.
posted by E. Whitehall at 7:24 PM on August 22, 2018
posted by E. Whitehall at 7:24 PM on August 22, 2018
Turnbull: I’ve never given in to bullies.
As his NEG renewable energy targets sit in tatters at the bequest of the loony right literally less than 48 hours ago.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 8:22 PM on August 22, 2018 [6 favorites]
As his NEG renewable energy targets sit in tatters at the bequest of the loony right literally less than 48 hours ago.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 8:22 PM on August 22, 2018 [6 favorites]
Sorry for the question from afar, but could Turnbull go to the GG and ask for Parliament to be dissolved and an election held? In Canada this would be possible, though with these numbers they might ask the opposition to have a go at forming government. Dissolution perhaps not advisable for the Liberal party there but if he wanted to burn it all down out of spite, could he do that?
posted by Rumple at 9:11 PM on August 22, 2018
posted by Rumple at 9:11 PM on August 22, 2018
Sorry for the question from afar, but could Turnbull go to the GG and ask for Parliament to be dissolved and an election held?
I don't see how. The GG could simply say "I don't believe you have the confidence of the House, go and show me you do, then ask me".
posted by hawthorne at 9:24 PM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
I don't see how. The GG could simply say "I don't believe you have the confidence of the House, go and show me you do, then ask me".
posted by hawthorne at 9:24 PM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
On the other hand, if Dutton wins tomorrow, Turnbull seems to say he will leave, which will trigger a byelection (which the Libs may well lose). That might force a general election because their majority is 1.
posted by hawthorne at 9:32 PM on August 22, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by hawthorne at 9:32 PM on August 22, 2018 [3 favorites]
In Canada, not having the confidence of the House would actually be one express reason to dissolve Parliament. But the PM can call a snap election at their pleasure so far as I know, with no vote in Parliament, but the GG has to agree. In the case that a minority party or parties could muster the votes, they would be given the chance instead of an election being called.
Obviously Australia is different with PR and an elected Senate and whatnot, but the basic premise that the GG is the proxy head of state and can dissolve Parliament is the same.
posted by Rumple at 9:35 PM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
Obviously Australia is different with PR and an elected Senate and whatnot, but the basic premise that the GG is the proxy head of state and can dissolve Parliament is the same.
posted by Rumple at 9:35 PM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
Wong laying it on a bit thick in the Senate now. Penny, you were in this ludicrous position yourself just a few years ago.
posted by smoke at 9:47 PM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by smoke at 9:47 PM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
Sure, but at least Labor weren’t arguing over which white supremacist to elevate.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 9:54 PM on August 22, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 9:54 PM on August 22, 2018 [4 favorites]
This link from election analyst Antony Green (I can say psephologist here, right?) explains why an election is unlikely till next May, even if Turnbull wanted to be spiteful:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-08-22/the-when-and-how-of-calling-the-next-federal-election/10153686
posted by bystander at 10:16 PM on August 22, 2018 [3 favorites]
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-08-22/the-when-and-how-of-calling-the-next-federal-election/10153686
posted by bystander at 10:16 PM on August 22, 2018 [3 favorites]
In hindsight it was a bit of a tactical error on the Coalition's part to adjourn the lower house so that most of the footage from today is of Senators grandstanding over how useless the government is, especially if they can't guarantee supply.
posted by Merus at 10:17 PM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by Merus at 10:17 PM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
In Canada, not having the confidence of the House would actually be one express reason to dissolve Parliament.
In Canada it's usually when a government bill that involves money (budget) or policy is defeated in the Lower House (in Canada if the Senate somehow every had the chance to defeat a supply bill, it would not mean government should be dissolved).
In this scenario, though, in Canada the prime minister would likely call an election, and the GG (or LG) would honour that request.
I believe confidence of the House is more relevant in Canada when attempting to form a government.
posted by JamesBay at 10:26 PM on August 22, 2018
In Canada it's usually when a government bill that involves money (budget) or policy is defeated in the Lower House (in Canada if the Senate somehow every had the chance to defeat a supply bill, it would not mean government should be dissolved).
In this scenario, though, in Canada the prime minister would likely call an election, and the GG (or LG) would honour that request.
I believe confidence of the House is more relevant in Canada when attempting to form a government.
posted by JamesBay at 10:26 PM on August 22, 2018
I have worked at Parliament House for 23 years and today has absolutely baked my noodle.
posted by the duck by the oboe at 10:33 PM on August 22, 2018 [13 favorites]
posted by the duck by the oboe at 10:33 PM on August 22, 2018 [13 favorites]
Thanks bystander, that's a really informative link which highlights the major differences between Canada and Australia.
posted by Rumple at 10:35 PM on August 22, 2018
posted by Rumple at 10:35 PM on August 22, 2018
Peter Dutton (@PeterDutton5)
I wish the people of Australia would look at my profile and realize I’m a 30 yr old black man before sending me tweets and DMs.
(The back and forth with a random bunch of Australians, mostly begging this Peter to try for the leadership, is nice).
posted by Pink Frost at 10:52 PM on August 22, 2018 [6 favorites]
I wish the people of Australia would look at my profile and realize I’m a 30 yr old black man before sending me tweets and DMs.
(The back and forth with a random bunch of Australians, mostly begging this Peter to try for the leadership, is nice).
posted by Pink Frost at 10:52 PM on August 22, 2018 [6 favorites]
Well he seems nice and has popcorn.
posted by hawthorne at 11:05 PM on August 22, 2018 [6 favorites]
posted by hawthorne at 11:05 PM on August 22, 2018 [6 favorites]
#lnpslags, like the trumpists, hate all forms of government except the part that pays their wages.
posted by emf at 11:26 PM on August 22, 2018
posted by emf at 11:26 PM on August 22, 2018
Well he seems nice and has popcorn.
He's got my vote
posted by daybeforetheday at 2:36 AM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
He's got my vote
posted by daybeforetheday at 2:36 AM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
What is the correct forum to use to invite peacekeeping forces from New Zealand?
posted by pompomtom at 2:38 AM on August 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by pompomtom at 2:38 AM on August 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
Just go to the coast and weep loudly enough and Jacinda Ardern will rise from the sea to comfort you.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 3:19 AM on August 23, 2018 [6 favorites]
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 3:19 AM on August 23, 2018 [6 favorites]
Quality work from the Betoota Advocate: Can You Useless Fucks Actually Do Some Work, Asks Nation
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 3:52 AM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 3:52 AM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
Dutton has been in charge of Australia's vast national-security apparatus for a few years, which includes mass surveillance and data retention. I wonder if the difference between the first and second spill results was from him or his trusted lieutenants scouring the surveillance logs of key Coalition MPs and their families and finding the means to put the hard word on enough of them to shift numbers. (I.e., what would be known in the other thread as “kompromat”.)
posted by acb at 5:18 AM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by acb at 5:18 AM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
The weird thing is that Turnbull has been such an snivelling appeaser for the whole of his PMship but as soon as his position is actually lost (when Corman, Cash and Fifield front the media) he starts boxing a bit clever. Still going to leave a smoking ruin though.
posted by hawthorne at 5:22 AM on August 23, 2018
posted by hawthorne at 5:22 AM on August 23, 2018
Just go to the coast and weep loudly enough and Jacinda Ardern will rise from the sea to comfort you.
Or in the other direction. If Australian/New Zealand relations deteriorate further, I could imagine a conservative Australian government adopting the “our own backyard” doctrine and directing ASIS to help a pro-Canberra right-wing party in the NZ elections, using the sorts of techniques the GRU used in 2016 (surveillance-based hyper-targetting, and such), or otherwise pushing for a soft regime change across the Tasman.
posted by acb at 5:32 AM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
Or in the other direction. If Australian/New Zealand relations deteriorate further, I could imagine a conservative Australian government adopting the “our own backyard” doctrine and directing ASIS to help a pro-Canberra right-wing party in the NZ elections, using the sorts of techniques the GRU used in 2016 (surveillance-based hyper-targetting, and such), or otherwise pushing for a soft regime change across the Tasman.
posted by acb at 5:32 AM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
No, in the other direction, Harold Holt rises from the sea to follow you around Wellington while muttering about Chinese mini subs.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:46 AM on August 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:46 AM on August 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
acb, I don't know if this will help, but please don't attribute to malice what can be explained by stupidity. These are very self-interested people who care more about squabbling with each other than any legitimate strategy.
Dutton theoretically does have those powers, sure. He's way more likely to use them on people who make him frown on Twitter than on his colleagues, because he respects media exposure way more than he respects the people in his own party. It's weird to say to a certain extent they are all protected from seriously investigating/blackmailing/compromising each other by their own mutual venal, recursive self-interest, but I really do think it's the case.
posted by E. Whitehall at 6:13 AM on August 23, 2018
Dutton theoretically does have those powers, sure. He's way more likely to use them on people who make him frown on Twitter than on his colleagues, because he respects media exposure way more than he respects the people in his own party. It's weird to say to a certain extent they are all protected from seriously investigating/blackmailing/compromising each other by their own mutual venal, recursive self-interest, but I really do think it's the case.
posted by E. Whitehall at 6:13 AM on August 23, 2018
Sydney: Tomorrow (24th), Dutton out, refugees in. Town Hall 17:30, by Refugee Action Coalition.
Sunday (26th), Protest: Down with Dutton! Town Hall @ 13:00, by NUS Against Racism et al.
Melbourne: September 16th, Dutton Out! Refugees In! State Library @ 14:00, by Refugee Action Collective.
Queensland: Saturday (25th) If Dutton wins - protest outside his electoral office 199 Gympie Rd, Strathpine 4500 @ 11:00, by Refugee Action Collective.
September 8th, Rally Against Racism - Yes to Multiculturalism, No to Xenophobia, King George Square CBD @ 11:30, by RAC, Antifa, Greens et al.
These are just what's prepared now, whenever we know more or there's an actual spill there's probably going to be more snap protests called. Also, for any Sydneysiders, the CFMEU Delegates meeting is tomorrow. It's worth getting the unions and Greens on board, but that's going to take people standing up and making good arguments.
It doesn't matter if it's Dutton, ScoMo, Turnbull or Bishop, the impetus remains the same. The coalition are worried about losing their base to One Nation, etc. They're only going to get worse. They don't even have to cede the election if they can push the racism hard enough, as with Howard and the Tampa. The so-called moderates in the party are utterly failing to stand up to pressure from their right. We cannot cede any ground here, as it's all too likely that Labor will ape their politics if they think it'll gain them half a vote.
posted by AnhydrousLove at 6:33 AM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
Sunday (26th), Protest: Down with Dutton! Town Hall @ 13:00, by NUS Against Racism et al.
Melbourne: September 16th, Dutton Out! Refugees In! State Library @ 14:00, by Refugee Action Collective.
Queensland: Saturday (25th) If Dutton wins - protest outside his electoral office 199 Gympie Rd, Strathpine 4500 @ 11:00, by Refugee Action Collective.
September 8th, Rally Against Racism - Yes to Multiculturalism, No to Xenophobia, King George Square CBD @ 11:30, by RAC, Antifa, Greens et al.
These are just what's prepared now, whenever we know more or there's an actual spill there's probably going to be more snap protests called. Also, for any Sydneysiders, the CFMEU Delegates meeting is tomorrow. It's worth getting the unions and Greens on board, but that's going to take people standing up and making good arguments.
It doesn't matter if it's Dutton, ScoMo, Turnbull or Bishop, the impetus remains the same. The coalition are worried about losing their base to One Nation, etc. They're only going to get worse. They don't even have to cede the election if they can push the racism hard enough, as with Howard and the Tampa. The so-called moderates in the party are utterly failing to stand up to pressure from their right. We cannot cede any ground here, as it's all too likely that Labor will ape their politics if they think it'll gain them half a vote.
posted by AnhydrousLove at 6:33 AM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
What is the correct forum to use to invite peacekeeping forces from New Zealand?
Well our Deputy Prime Minister is over there at the moment; you're welcome to him if you like? NZ Twitter has pretty much decided that he's running a temporary government until you can get back on your feet and establish some solid democratic institutions.
I could imagine a conservative Australian government adopting the “our own backyard” doctrine and directing ASIS to help a pro-Canberra right-wing party in the NZ elections,
To some extent I'm sure that's happening, though maybe not the micro-targeting. Definitely sharing of ideas and people like Lynton Crosby getting involved. The Liberals would certainly rather deal with NZ National than Labour.
posted by Pink Frost at 12:31 PM on August 23, 2018
Well our Deputy Prime Minister is over there at the moment; you're welcome to him if you like? NZ Twitter has pretty much decided that he's running a temporary government until you can get back on your feet and establish some solid democratic institutions.
I could imagine a conservative Australian government adopting the “our own backyard” doctrine and directing ASIS to help a pro-Canberra right-wing party in the NZ elections,
To some extent I'm sure that's happening, though maybe not the micro-targeting. Definitely sharing of ideas and people like Lynton Crosby getting involved. The Liberals would certainly rather deal with NZ National than Labour.
posted by Pink Frost at 12:31 PM on August 23, 2018
Dutton apparently got #43. Spill looks to be happening.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 3:17 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 3:17 PM on August 23, 2018
Cormann is on Team Dutton so any moderates may face an uphill battle. Apparently they want to bring back the Howard battler coalition.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 3:20 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 3:20 PM on August 23, 2018
Advice from the Solicitor General is in on the potato's eligibility to sit in Parliament under s44. Haven't seen the full advice but apparently Dutton is 'not incapable' to sit.
So, fuck.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 4:43 PM on August 23, 2018
So, fuck.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 4:43 PM on August 23, 2018
Ray Hadley saying it needs to be Dutton because immigrants cause traffic in Sydney.
Poor dear says it takes him ages to get to the footy.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 4:51 PM on August 23, 2018
Poor dear says it takes him ages to get to the footy.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 4:51 PM on August 23, 2018
For those who’ve come across the seas-- The lesser known second verse of Advance Australia Fair.
We’ve boundless plains to share
With courage let us all combine
To Advance Australia Fair
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 4:55 PM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
Haven't seen the full advice but apparently Dutton is 'not incapable' to sit.
Correction: "In my opinion, the better view is that Mr Dutton is not incapable of sitting as a member of the House of Representatives".
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 4:56 PM on August 23, 2018
Correction: "In my opinion, the better view is that Mr Dutton is not incapable of sitting as a member of the House of Representatives".
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 4:56 PM on August 23, 2018
The lesser known second verse of Advance Australia Fair.
Fun fact: it's actually the third verse, though it's typically sung second. Verses 2, 4 and 5 don't get used these days because they're full of "O Brittania" crap. (Full lyrics)
posted by nnethercote at 5:09 PM on August 23, 2018
Fun fact: it's actually the third verse, though it's typically sung second. Verses 2, 4 and 5 don't get used these days because they're full of "O Brittania" crap. (Full lyrics)
posted by nnethercote at 5:09 PM on August 23, 2018
Referendum to replace it with 'I Am Australian' tbh
The SG's advice looks like hedging to me. The Liberals are going to run with it but as far as I can see he's saying only the High Court can actually determine this for sure.
posted by Merus at 5:29 PM on August 23, 2018
The SG's advice looks like hedging to me. The Liberals are going to run with it but as far as I can see he's saying only the High Court can actually determine this for sure.
posted by Merus at 5:29 PM on August 23, 2018
Snap Morgan Poll shows electors prefer Turnbull to Shorten but Shorten preferred to Dutton
Bishop leads Shorten 64-36. Dutton is at the opposite end of the spectrum and trails Shorten 38-62. Scomo is 50-50 against Shorten.
So yeah. That's where we are.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 5:30 PM on August 23, 2018
Bishop leads Shorten 64-36. Dutton is at the opposite end of the spectrum and trails Shorten 38-62. Scomo is 50-50 against Shorten.
So yeah. That's where we are.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 5:30 PM on August 23, 2018
Labor have to get new image consultants - I think it's notable that both Shorten and Gillard were like rabbits in the headlights in front of the camera but apparently quite likeable away from it.
Anyway, here's an argument that Rupert Murdoch deserves a lot of the blame for the instability of politics in this country [The New Daily]:
Anyway, here's an argument that Rupert Murdoch deserves a lot of the blame for the instability of politics in this country [The New Daily]:
Journalists traditionally tread a fine line in leadership contests, forced to sift through leaks, whispers and background conversations when reporting a fast-moving story. On this occasion though, too many appeared to cross it. And most of those work for News Corp or its entities.posted by Merus at 5:37 PM on August 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
Their willingness to insert themselves into the story was a long, long way from traditional journalism’s demands of objectivity, fairness, balance and a genuine search for truth. I fear it won’t be a one-off either.
The front pages of the company’s tabloids were also firmly against Turnbull, the Herald Sun branding him “Dead Mal Walking” and the Courier-Mail welcoming candidate Dutton with “The Pete Is On”.
The choir was pretty clearly singing from the same song sheet. This is not entirely unexpected. As many have observed on this and other continents, Rupert has form in this regard.
The SG's advice looks like hedging to me. The Liberals are going to run with it but as far as I can see he's saying only the High Court can actually determine this for sure.
Of course he's hedging, he's a QC. They never give a definitive answer. But in my experience the advice translates as: "You idiots gave me a verbal-only briefing and 18 hours, I don't know if you've left anything out, there's no jurisprudence, and the High Court has previously been divided on these issues. Who the fuck knows, but based on what I fucking know at this particular moment, why the fuck not? Ask the High Court, it's their fucking job."
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:53 PM on August 23, 2018 [9 favorites]
Of course he's hedging, he's a QC. They never give a definitive answer. But in my experience the advice translates as: "You idiots gave me a verbal-only briefing and 18 hours, I don't know if you've left anything out, there's no jurisprudence, and the High Court has previously been divided on these issues. Who the fuck knows, but based on what I fucking know at this particular moment, why the fuck not? Ask the High Court, it's their fucking job."
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:53 PM on August 23, 2018 [9 favorites]
The division of Dickson does not like Dutton's knifing of the PM. It would be hilarious if, in his first election, Dutton has to be parachuted into a safe liberal seat to stop him from being voted straight out on his arse.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 5:55 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 5:55 PM on August 23, 2018
Peter Dutton, a sales manager at Austin’s Soul Popped Popcorn (yes, they sell popcorn), has been receiving Twitter replies and direct messages confusing him with Australian candidate Peter Dutton, who goes by the Twitter handle @PeterDutton_MP.
Sorry about the mix-up mate, but honestly, we haven't met and you're the best Peter Dutton I know.
posted by adept256 at 6:09 PM on August 23, 2018 [6 favorites]
Sorry about the mix-up mate, but honestly, we haven't met and you're the best Peter Dutton I know.
posted by adept256 at 6:09 PM on August 23, 2018 [6 favorites]
Well it looks like the conservatives are going to start preselection shitfights all over if Dutton isn't elevated and crowned king.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 6:18 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 6:18 PM on August 23, 2018
Kick Them Out - Senator Richard Di Natale
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 6:26 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 6:26 PM on August 23, 2018
Truffles has the petition for the spill, he's verifying the required 43 signatures. Put on the popcorn, the spill is happening (unless the potato can't count).
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 6:38 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 6:38 PM on August 23, 2018
They're verifying because they want to find out about threats and coercion with the collection of the signatures. If someone says they were cajoled the whole thing will probably fall into a heap and Turnbull will no doubt be firing back telling Dutton to get fucked.
Then who knows. All out civil war I guess.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 6:47 PM on August 23, 2018
Then who knows. All out civil war I guess.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 6:47 PM on August 23, 2018
Holy goddamn crap, Trumble just resigned. Before the spill. From Parliament. Good luck on the Wentworth byelection, fuckos.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 6:49 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 6:49 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
The Wentworth byelection is easy. It's a safe Liberal seat and has been for years.
The tricky part is surviving the confidence motion between now and the byelection.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 6:53 PM on August 23, 2018
The tricky part is surviving the confidence motion between now and the byelection.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 6:53 PM on August 23, 2018
The Wentworth byelection is easy. It's a safe Liberal seat and has been for years.
Yeah, I just looked up the margin - Turnbull got 67% of the vote last time (2 party preferred). Even this mess wouldn't put a dent in that large enough to swing the seat.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 6:57 PM on August 23, 2018
Yeah, I just looked up the margin - Turnbull got 67% of the vote last time (2 party preferred). Even this mess wouldn't put a dent in that large enough to swing the seat.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 6:57 PM on August 23, 2018
What a bloody disgrace this mob is. Can't the GG just chuck 'em all out and call a general election?
posted by adept256 at 6:58 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by adept256 at 6:58 PM on August 23, 2018
This pack of chucklefucks.
posted by E. Whitehall at 7:02 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by E. Whitehall at 7:02 PM on August 23, 2018
If it's PM Dutton I'm fucking off to NZ. Did you know Dunedin has better internet than Brisbane? It's like they took Rudd's idea and didn't fucking cripple it out of spite.
posted by adept256 at 7:05 PM on August 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by adept256 at 7:05 PM on August 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
If it's either ScoMo or Dutton, which looks inevitable, the fuck is this timeline, I'm organising a snap YELLING OUTSIDE PARLIAMENT HOUSE event.
They're both human rights abusers. They both hold minorities, the sick, the poor and the desperate in contempt. Never forget ScoMo used to be responsible for the camps too. I'm pissed off.
Bishop isn't any better either; who the fuck knows what she really thinks other than going along with it all. Might as well just make the event.
posted by E. Whitehall at 7:11 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
They're both human rights abusers. They both hold minorities, the sick, the poor and the desperate in contempt. Never forget ScoMo used to be responsible for the camps too. I'm pissed off.
Bishop isn't any better either; who the fuck knows what she really thinks other than going along with it all. Might as well just make the event.
posted by E. Whitehall at 7:11 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
I honestly think that's true, back when Malcolm was communications minister, they couldn't let the NBN be a success. They know their base, at least at that time, didn't give a shit about that internet thing the kids are talking about. These people listen to AM radio and read newspapers. $50 billion for kids toys? Nah, we can do it cheaper.
They fucked it up deliberately so the glorious labour NBN would be a disaster. We're going to have to redo the whole thing, costing yet more, but hey, at least they made Rudd look bad to people who are completely tech illiterate.
posted by adept256 at 7:13 PM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
They fucked it up deliberately so the glorious labour NBN would be a disaster. We're going to have to redo the whole thing, costing yet more, but hey, at least they made Rudd look bad to people who are completely tech illiterate.
posted by adept256 at 7:13 PM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
My parents-in-law in Tokoroa, rural NZ, population < 14,000 have had super high speed NBN for the last four years. They don't actually know what the internet is for or anything, and would have preferred to stay on dial-up.
posted by lollusc at 7:25 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by lollusc at 7:25 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
I'm an ex-employee of an Australian ISP and we fought like hell for something like the NBN. It was one of the happiest days of my life when Rudd won in '07 and it was coming. It broke my heart to wake up in 2013 to know the NBN was effectively dead as we know it.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 7:26 PM on August 23, 2018 [5 favorites]
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 7:26 PM on August 23, 2018 [5 favorites]
The fuckup brigade are voting now. It shouldn't be long.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 7:32 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 7:32 PM on August 23, 2018
I’m watching the TV and apparently our new PM is an anonymous door in a white-painted corridor.
posted by um at 7:36 PM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by um at 7:36 PM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
I'd vote Prime Minister Door over any of them.
posted by adept256 at 7:38 PM on August 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by adept256 at 7:38 PM on August 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
So, spill motion carried 45 to 40. That means Malcolm's resignation is official.
Don't let Prime Minister Door hit you you in the arse on the way out Truffles, you utter fucking waste of skin and organs.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 7:41 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
Don't let Prime Minister Door hit you you in the arse on the way out Truffles, you utter fucking waste of skin and organs.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 7:41 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
So now it's a 3 way death match between ScoMo, JBish and PDutts. Worst action movie ever.
ALIEN vs PREDATOR vs POTATO
WHOEVER WINS, WE LOSE.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 7:43 PM on August 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
WHOEVER WINS, WE LOSE.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 7:43 PM on August 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
So it's going to be ScoMo or Potato - Bishop lost the ballot.
posted by valetta at 7:45 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by valetta at 7:45 PM on August 23, 2018
Bishop is out.
So the next election is going to be race baiting.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 7:45 PM on August 23, 2018
So the next election is going to be race baiting.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 7:45 PM on August 23, 2018
The only qualified person for the job is out in favour of two white male blowhards.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 7:46 PM on August 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 7:46 PM on August 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
I hate this. I hate them.
posted by E. Whitehall at 7:49 PM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by E. Whitehall at 7:49 PM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
It's ScoMo.
He's a fucking monster. But so is Dutton.
God, I wish i could get drunk.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 7:51 PM on August 23, 2018 [4 favorites]
He's a fucking monster. But so is Dutton.
God, I wish i could get drunk.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 7:51 PM on August 23, 2018 [4 favorites]
It's ScoMo.
posted by E. Whitehall at 7:52 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by E. Whitehall at 7:52 PM on August 23, 2018
Thank Christ no Dutton.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 7:52 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 7:52 PM on August 23, 2018
There's a small joy to be had by Potato being unsuccessful. But ugh, these people.
posted by honey-barbara at 7:53 PM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by honey-barbara at 7:53 PM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
45-40. Now how do the conservatives react? Do they slink back into the shadows or do they try to knife Scomo or do they just start setting preselection fires all over the electorate?
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 7:54 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 7:54 PM on August 23, 2018
Considering that Dutton's camp is rumoured to have been threatening byelections to get votes, this is probably not over. I vote both knifing and preselection fires.
posted by E. Whitehall at 7:55 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by E. Whitehall at 7:55 PM on August 23, 2018
Congratulations, here is your poisoned chalice.
posted by adept256 at 7:55 PM on August 23, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by adept256 at 7:55 PM on August 23, 2018 [4 favorites]
As others have said, Scott Morrison is just as complicit in the human rights crimes as Dutton. But I'm pleased that Dutton lost and I hope that he doesn't get a portfolio after all this.
posted by michswiss at 7:55 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by michswiss at 7:55 PM on August 23, 2018
Do they slink back into the shadows or do they try to knife Scomo or do they just start setting preselection fires all over the electorate?
Yes.
posted by nnethercote at 7:56 PM on August 23, 2018 [5 favorites]
Yes.
posted by nnethercote at 7:56 PM on August 23, 2018 [5 favorites]
This came down to a vote over which foot to shoot themselves in.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 7:56 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 7:56 PM on August 23, 2018
Josh Frydenberg is deputy. Not surprised Bishop didn't put her hand up -- this is not going to last long. 40 to 45 votes? There's no way Abbott (and NewsCorp) will let it rest.
posted by E. Whitehall at 8:03 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by E. Whitehall at 8:03 PM on August 23, 2018
Josh Frydenberg is deputy.
Dutton and Abbott have been NEGged.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 8:14 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
Dutton and Abbott have been NEGged.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 8:14 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
Every time ScoMo opens his mouth all I hear is the inchoate screams of the damned. And the Australian Christian Lobby just offered their congratulations and support to this evangelical, far-right, same-sex-marriage-opposing ass [vomits].
Meanwhile Nats MP Kevin Hogan is off to the cross-bench, and though he's pledged to support supply, that leaves the Liberals with 75 MPs with one serving as speaker, which makes them a minority government even without JBish and Trufflepants vacating their seats. It's looking very unlikely that they'll survive the period between now and the byelection(s) without staring down a vote of no-confidence.
posted by MarchHare at 8:16 PM on August 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
Meanwhile Nats MP Kevin Hogan is off to the cross-bench, and though he's pledged to support supply, that leaves the Liberals with 75 MPs with one serving as speaker, which makes them a minority government even without JBish and Trufflepants vacating their seats. It's looking very unlikely that they'll survive the period between now and the byelection(s) without staring down a vote of no-confidence.
posted by MarchHare at 8:16 PM on August 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
Can Abbott just go away? Just clear off. You're never going to be PM again mate. Climate change is real and your sister is marrying her girlfriend. You lost, now piss off.
posted by adept256 at 8:17 PM on August 23, 2018 [11 favorites]
posted by adept256 at 8:17 PM on August 23, 2018 [11 favorites]
It speaks!
𝅘𝅥𝅯 Loyalty to Scott Morrison 𝅘𝅥𝅯
oh boy I needed a laugh
posted by adept256 at 8:22 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
𝅘𝅥𝅯 Loyalty to Scott Morrison 𝅘𝅥𝅯
oh boy I needed a laugh
posted by adept256 at 8:22 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
Did Abbott look like he had been crying?
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 8:24 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 8:24 PM on August 23, 2018
Abbott definitely looked more lizardy than usual. Shedding his skin?
posted by E. Whitehall at 8:24 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by E. Whitehall at 8:24 PM on August 23, 2018
> Abbott definitely looked more lizardy than usual. Shedding his skin?
And now you know the real reason they fenced off the top of Parliament House…
posted by Pinback at 8:31 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
And now you know the real reason they fenced off the top of Parliament House…
posted by Pinback at 8:31 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
Also, fuck me but ScoMo's current position is too fucking powerful. It was too fucking powerful on Wednesday but it's now it's even worse. Acting Home Affairs Minister. Treasurer. PM.
He better untangle all that shit immediately.
posted by E. Whitehall at 8:34 PM on August 23, 2018
He better untangle all that shit immediately.
posted by E. Whitehall at 8:34 PM on August 23, 2018
@michaelkoziol
Tony Abbott’s sister Christine Forster has confirmed to me she is considering running for Wentworth after receiving much encouragement #auspol #libspill
posted by moody cow at 8:41 PM on August 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
Tony Abbott’s sister Christine Forster has confirmed to me she is considering running for Wentworth after receiving much encouragement #auspol #libspill
posted by moody cow at 8:41 PM on August 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
Sobs
posted by kitten magic at 8:46 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by kitten magic at 8:46 PM on August 23, 2018
Dutton does all the dirty work and Morrison ends up PM. He must be gleeful. Gah.
posted by nnethercote at 8:46 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by nnethercote at 8:46 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
I can't console myself with 'at least it's not Dutton'. Fucking ScoMo. Sobs.
posted by kitten magic at 8:47 PM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by kitten magic at 8:47 PM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
Seriously. There is no relief to be found in it being ScoMo, and the people who are all at least it's not Dutton have forgotten that ScoMo is just as much a piece of loathsome scum. Don't fall for the greasy veneer.
In general... The Herd's 77% expresses my thoughts at the mo.
posted by E. Whitehall at 8:52 PM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
In general... The Herd's 77% expresses my thoughts at the mo.
posted by E. Whitehall at 8:52 PM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
The only silver lining of Prime Minister Dutton would have been that the government would have been more likely to topple early. ScoMo kept his hands clean, and there'll be enough people who'll want to try and avoid an election and make this work.
Someone please call a fucking election.
posted by Merus at 9:05 PM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
Someone please call a fucking election.
posted by Merus at 9:05 PM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
Young Jack's closing remarks at his grandad's farewell speech pretty much summed up the reaction of the country to this bullshit waste of a week.
posted by valetta at 9:52 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by valetta at 9:52 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
His speech was like something out of a parallel universe - trying to claim credit for same sex marriage, pathetic.
I loved how desperately he was scratching around for something else to lay claim to.
posted by smoke at 10:07 PM on August 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
I loved how desperately he was scratching around for something else to lay claim to.
posted by smoke at 10:07 PM on August 23, 2018 [3 favorites]
My parents-in-law in Tokoroa, rural NZ, population < 14,000 have had super high speed NBN for the last four years.
A couple of years back, while on hols, I met a Kiwi bloke who'd taken a career shift to install fibre for the Kiwi NBN thing. He assumed we must have it all installed and humming along, because "you lot started first, didn't you? What's the problem?".
I'd've preferred they'd just drubbed us at rugby again.
posted by pompomtom at 10:10 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
A couple of years back, while on hols, I met a Kiwi bloke who'd taken a career shift to install fibre for the Kiwi NBN thing. He assumed we must have it all installed and humming along, because "you lot started first, didn't you? What's the problem?".
I'd've preferred they'd just drubbed us at rugby again.
posted by pompomtom at 10:10 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
Here's the list. I know five year olds with better handwriting than Eric Abetz. Notice whose name is missing?
posted by MarchHare at 10:35 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by MarchHare at 10:35 PM on August 23, 2018
I'll never forgive Malcolm for that. I mean, this is my career, I work in IT. I remember that presser he did with Tony to announce their FTTN, was it 2010? I just kept saying to myself 'no no no no no'. And I knew they didn't understand. They're not tech people. They made a political decision on a technical matter, one which they plainly don't, and still don't understand.
I remember Malcolm saying something truly stupid about the 4g network; 'Mobile broadband is great! We should skip the NBN and just use this!' WTF do you think the cell tower plugs into dipshit?
And that sort of politics over rationality is writ large in the energy 'debate'. Tony Abbott doesn't believe in science. You can see the reef dying FROM SPACE. That's not enough for him. He's drawn his little ideological circle and he's not budging from it. Ever, for anything. The other day I heard him say in a grossly sarcastic tone 'we'll let the Labour party worry about saving the planet'. When did saving the planet become a fluffy soft touchy feely thing only pinko lefties care about? Not for Tony that nonsense.
Fucking, ugh. Friendly asteroids, this way to Canberra, rain your fiery doom.
posted by adept256 at 10:35 PM on August 23, 2018 [6 favorites]
I remember Malcolm saying something truly stupid about the 4g network; 'Mobile broadband is great! We should skip the NBN and just use this!' WTF do you think the cell tower plugs into dipshit?
And that sort of politics over rationality is writ large in the energy 'debate'. Tony Abbott doesn't believe in science. You can see the reef dying FROM SPACE. That's not enough for him. He's drawn his little ideological circle and he's not budging from it. Ever, for anything. The other day I heard him say in a grossly sarcastic tone 'we'll let the Labour party worry about saving the planet'. When did saving the planet become a fluffy soft touchy feely thing only pinko lefties care about? Not for Tony that nonsense.
Fucking, ugh. Friendly asteroids, this way to Canberra, rain your fiery doom.
posted by adept256 at 10:35 PM on August 23, 2018 [6 favorites]
I know "they fucked up the NBN on purpose" thing is tempting, but it's clearly nonsense. Believing it requires you to think that Turnbull had and over the course of several years successfully implemented a plan involving numerous other people. Come on.
posted by hawthorne at 10:36 PM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by hawthorne at 10:36 PM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
Yeah, the NBN's downfall is much, much more stupid. It was Foxtel and Telstra.
posted by E. Whitehall at 10:41 PM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by E. Whitehall at 10:41 PM on August 23, 2018 [2 favorites]
Today I learned there is an MP named Ian Goodenough.
posted by nnethercote at 10:45 PM on August 23, 2018
posted by nnethercote at 10:45 PM on August 23, 2018
It was intensely satisfying when the NBN failed for the exact reason the IT industry said it would fail (the legacy infrastructure wasn't suitable and you'd spend billions of dollars acquiring stuff you'd have to replace anyway). We couldn't have cable internet but at least we could be accurate.
posted by Merus at 10:47 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by Merus at 10:47 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
nnethercote, rarely has a last name been more ill-fitting.
posted by MarchHare at 10:52 PM on August 23, 2018 [5 favorites]
posted by MarchHare at 10:52 PM on August 23, 2018 [5 favorites]
he has an executive assistant named Tanya Moreorless and presumably his chief of staff is David Fairtomiddling
posted by Merus at 10:56 PM on August 23, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by Merus at 10:56 PM on August 23, 2018 [4 favorites]
If there was no informal vote in this time, does that mean it must have been Bishop the other times?
With a bit of luck the right is going to go (more) bananas now that Dutton has failed.
posted by hawthorne at 11:29 PM on August 23, 2018
With a bit of luck the right is going to go (more) bananas now that Dutton has failed.
posted by hawthorne at 11:29 PM on August 23, 2018
Main takeaways from the ScoMo address:
1) LNP racist talking points full-bore, feat. fair go, sharks, and "keeping Australia great"
2) no fucking idea what he's doing in the future but he looks forward to it possibly
3) no early election (on his account, anyway)
4) Frydenberg is the Treasurer so now we're all thoroughly fucked.
Also, he can't fucking talk. ScoMo. Mate. You delayed this shit by an hour. Get your shit together.
posted by E. Whitehall at 11:34 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
1) LNP racist talking points full-bore, feat. fair go, sharks, and "keeping Australia great"
2) no fucking idea what he's doing in the future but he looks forward to it possibly
3) no early election (on his account, anyway)
4) Frydenberg is the Treasurer so now we're all thoroughly fucked.
Also, he can't fucking talk. ScoMo. Mate. You delayed this shit by an hour. Get your shit together.
posted by E. Whitehall at 11:34 PM on August 23, 2018 [1 favorite]
Well my useless backbencher didn't sign this, unless there's a page missing - I only count 36 names across 4 pages?
(Edited to clarify: he was useless before today, not because he didn't sign)
posted by harriet vane at 11:38 PM on August 23, 2018
(Edited to clarify: he was useless before today, not because he didn't sign)
posted by harriet vane at 11:38 PM on August 23, 2018
.
Morrison and Trump. This really is the darkest timeline.
posted by daybeforetheday at 2:35 AM on August 24, 2018
Morrison and Trump. This really is the darkest timeline.
posted by daybeforetheday at 2:35 AM on August 24, 2018
Scott Morrison is such a [another LNP] giant hypocrite, it's just painful to think what this country has endured since Howard politicised boat arrivals. It makes me weep. Such thorough assholes.
posted by honey-barbara at 2:43 AM on August 24, 2018
posted by honey-barbara at 2:43 AM on August 24, 2018
Giving Dutton a fucking ministry after all this shit. Knife the sitting fucking PM, fail to install yourself in the top job, get on the front bench as a consolation prize.
Why don't we just give Abbott Home Affairs while we're at it?
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 3:40 AM on August 24, 2018
Why don't we just give Abbott Home Affairs while we're at it?
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 3:40 AM on August 24, 2018
He's a fucking monster. But so is Dutton.
All hail the marginally lesser evil.
The good news: Morrison is less likely to rapidly remake Australia into a police state.
The bad news: with Abbott and Dutton (and the Australian Conservatives) pushing the Overton Window, with assistance from News Corp., Morrison is more likely to pass for a “moderate” or “centrist” and may have a better chance at the next election.
And, to be fair, performative cruelty to refugees is solidly bipartisan policy in Australia. The ALP is 99% behind it (the other 1% being the Kearney-esque bleeding-hearts they run in inner-city electorates if the Greens are breathing down their necks, but keep on a tight leash otherwise).
posted by acb at 3:58 AM on August 24, 2018 [4 favorites]
All hail the marginally lesser evil.
The good news: Morrison is less likely to rapidly remake Australia into a police state.
The bad news: with Abbott and Dutton (and the Australian Conservatives) pushing the Overton Window, with assistance from News Corp., Morrison is more likely to pass for a “moderate” or “centrist” and may have a better chance at the next election.
And, to be fair, performative cruelty to refugees is solidly bipartisan policy in Australia. The ALP is 99% behind it (the other 1% being the Kearney-esque bleeding-hearts they run in inner-city electorates if the Greens are breathing down their necks, but keep on a tight leash otherwise).
posted by acb at 3:58 AM on August 24, 2018 [4 favorites]
Can Abbott just go away? Just clear off. You're never going to be PM again mate.
The pendulum may well swing towards unhinged hard-right culture-warriors. Is it likely that Abbott would get looked over for, say, Bernardi or Shelton or someone in that case?
posted by acb at 4:00 AM on August 24, 2018 [1 favorite]
The pendulum may well swing towards unhinged hard-right culture-warriors. Is it likely that Abbott would get looked over for, say, Bernardi or Shelton or someone in that case?
posted by acb at 4:00 AM on August 24, 2018 [1 favorite]
> Morrison is more likely to pass for a “moderate” or “centrist” and may have a better chance at the next election.
I think this is true. A van mowing down some pedestrians driven by a guy on a bridging visa would be all it would take to make the next election a close call.
Dutton is unelectable almost across the spectrum. In my (aspirational liberal leaning) corporate office today people were relieved it was ScoMo over Dutton. The vibe was, he is a bit of a dill, but not nasty like creepy Pete.
That said, there was a lot of disgust at the leadership malarky. But I have to think that will fade pretty quickly.
Chances are the LNP are tossed out next poll, but it won't be the drubbing Dutton would have overseen.
I guess the redeeming idea for the left is if ScoMo loses, it feeds the 'protect the base' line so we might see a hard right take over. And that would make them a much weaker opposition.
posted by bystander at 5:00 AM on August 24, 2018 [1 favorite]
I think this is true. A van mowing down some pedestrians driven by a guy on a bridging visa would be all it would take to make the next election a close call.
Dutton is unelectable almost across the spectrum. In my (aspirational liberal leaning) corporate office today people were relieved it was ScoMo over Dutton. The vibe was, he is a bit of a dill, but not nasty like creepy Pete.
That said, there was a lot of disgust at the leadership malarky. But I have to think that will fade pretty quickly.
Chances are the LNP are tossed out next poll, but it won't be the drubbing Dutton would have overseen.
I guess the redeeming idea for the left is if ScoMo loses, it feeds the 'protect the base' line so we might see a hard right take over. And that would make them a much weaker opposition.
posted by bystander at 5:00 AM on August 24, 2018 [1 favorite]
Great picture by Ellinghausen: Josh Frydenberg is congratulated by long-time Parliament House cleaner Anna Jancevski as he returns to his office after the leadership ballot
Annabel Crabb:
It's taken 14 years for the Liberal Party to work Malcolm Turnbull, like a splinter, out of its flesh.
And today, in a final bout of demented junkie-scratching, they've finally done it.
posted by hawthorne at 5:38 AM on August 24, 2018 [2 favorites]
Annabel Crabb:
It's taken 14 years for the Liberal Party to work Malcolm Turnbull, like a splinter, out of its flesh.
And today, in a final bout of demented junkie-scratching, they've finally done it.
posted by hawthorne at 5:38 AM on August 24, 2018 [2 favorites]
ScoMo has much harder right tendencies than Mal. And he still has to deal with the same 40 assholes that toppled Mal but didn’t get their pick. Just like Mal he will have to capitulate to them to prevent another knifing. And just like with Mal, Toned Abs will be whispering in the background, destabilising everything. And the potato now, too, will feel he was robbed. ScoMo has inherited a chalice that is not only poisoned, but covered in spikes. It’s going to be a trainwreck.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:40 AM on August 24, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:40 AM on August 24, 2018 [3 favorites]
I'm certainly not taking it as a given that Labor will take the next election, although it's true that it looks more like it now.
My concern, and one my coms share, is that Labor will now feel like they don't have to promise anything, don't have to review their policies, don't have to be desirable, just more desirable than the coalition. That's always a problem with 2-party politics, but recent events will only exacerbate the effect.
Meanwhile the Murdoch media will be telling the public the whole time that a shred of kindness is the greatest failing a government could possibly have. Apparently they ran around 3000 Islamophobic articles in a single year across their top 5 newspapers. Almost two a day, in every copy. That's not even considering the rest of their bullshit neoliberal-at-best politics.
posted by AnhydrousLove at 6:07 AM on August 24, 2018 [5 favorites]
My concern, and one my coms share, is that Labor will now feel like they don't have to promise anything, don't have to review their policies, don't have to be desirable, just more desirable than the coalition. That's always a problem with 2-party politics, but recent events will only exacerbate the effect.
Meanwhile the Murdoch media will be telling the public the whole time that a shred of kindness is the greatest failing a government could possibly have. Apparently they ran around 3000 Islamophobic articles in a single year across their top 5 newspapers. Almost two a day, in every copy. That's not even considering the rest of their bullshit neoliberal-at-best politics.
posted by AnhydrousLove at 6:07 AM on August 24, 2018 [5 favorites]
The ALP is 99% behind it (the other 1% being the Kearney-esque bleeding-hearts they run in inner-city electorates if the Greens are breathing down their necks, but keep on a tight leash otherwise
This is where I get messed up. I grew up in one of those seats. I've been voting Greens for 20 years to show my displeasure to the ALP for not being as lefty as I expect them to be. It's all a freaking waste of time because 99% of people are voting for selfish self interest or weirdass right wing ideals. I can't even get excited about an election because what, Shorten? Could he be less inspiring? I miss the Australian Democracts of my youth. The worlds going to hell in a handbasket and I won't even get a sausage sizzle when we go to the polls because they aren't gluten free. FFS!
Clearly it's past my bedtime too.
posted by kitten magic at 6:18 AM on August 24, 2018 [2 favorites]
This is where I get messed up. I grew up in one of those seats. I've been voting Greens for 20 years to show my displeasure to the ALP for not being as lefty as I expect them to be. It's all a freaking waste of time because 99% of people are voting for selfish self interest or weirdass right wing ideals. I can't even get excited about an election because what, Shorten? Could he be less inspiring? I miss the Australian Democracts of my youth. The worlds going to hell in a handbasket and I won't even get a sausage sizzle when we go to the polls because they aren't gluten free. FFS!
Clearly it's past my bedtime too.
posted by kitten magic at 6:18 AM on August 24, 2018 [2 favorites]
Shorten?
Please don't forget it's about the whole front bench, not just the leader. Shorten might not be an inspirational speaker, but he's run a tight ship in opposition. I personally think Albo or Wong are the best communicators of the Labor FB. But look at the evolving Coalition FB. Pure hypocrisy and RWNJ's all of them.
Then look at the Labor team and the policies they've been working on (not ignoring the refugee and boat arrivals crimes). I will work to see a sane and competent FB in government, even if it includes a PM that regularly trips over his own tongue when speaking to the media.
posted by michswiss at 6:31 AM on August 24, 2018 [4 favorites]
Please don't forget it's about the whole front bench, not just the leader. Shorten might not be an inspirational speaker, but he's run a tight ship in opposition. I personally think Albo or Wong are the best communicators of the Labor FB. But look at the evolving Coalition FB. Pure hypocrisy and RWNJ's all of them.
Then look at the Labor team and the policies they've been working on (not ignoring the refugee and boat arrivals crimes). I will work to see a sane and competent FB in government, even if it includes a PM that regularly trips over his own tongue when speaking to the media.
posted by michswiss at 6:31 AM on August 24, 2018 [4 favorites]
When we're being compared to the US, it's easy to say that we're a socialist paradise full of quality education, vaguely affordable tertiary study, healthcare, safety nets, preferential voting and proportional representation.
The reality is though, we're not just capitalist, but experiencing the same decades-long nosedive into concrete by way of neoliberalism everywhere else is. Our government is concerned with maintaining their own power and profits above most else. They certainly don't want to cede any ground to the left that they don't have to.
Our unions are in shambles, youth are checked out and cynical, older people are checked-out and cynical and every election gets a "Winners and Losers" rundown by the ABC. Which may yet be privatised.
The environment is crumbling, no, being crumbled before our eyes while police powers are expanded, Centrelink is run into the ground, the NT Intervention continues in practice if not name, treaty is scorned and immigrants assaulted.
None of this will be changed by voting alone.
posted by AnhydrousLove at 6:45 AM on August 24, 2018 [2 favorites]
The reality is though, we're not just capitalist, but experiencing the same decades-long nosedive into concrete by way of neoliberalism everywhere else is. Our government is concerned with maintaining their own power and profits above most else. They certainly don't want to cede any ground to the left that they don't have to.
Our unions are in shambles, youth are checked out and cynical, older people are checked-out and cynical and every election gets a "Winners and Losers" rundown by the ABC. Which may yet be privatised.
The environment is crumbling, no, being crumbled before our eyes while police powers are expanded, Centrelink is run into the ground, the NT Intervention continues in practice if not name, treaty is scorned and immigrants assaulted.
None of this will be changed by voting alone.
posted by AnhydrousLove at 6:45 AM on August 24, 2018 [2 favorites]
I miss the Australian Democracts of my youth.
My first election of 2001 was the last hurrah of the Democrats. I was still there in 2007. Everyone else had moved on.
That was my last election.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 7:25 AM on August 24, 2018
My first election of 2001 was the last hurrah of the Democrats. I was still there in 2007. Everyone else had moved on.
That was my last election.
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 7:25 AM on August 24, 2018
None of this will be changed by voting alone.
OK, but I am not buying you a packet of marbles.
posted by hawthorne at 7:40 AM on August 24, 2018 [3 favorites]
OK, but I am not buying you a packet of marbles.
posted by hawthorne at 7:40 AM on August 24, 2018 [3 favorites]
Meanwhile the Murdoch media will be telling the public the whole time that a shred of kindness is the greatest failing a government could possibly have. Apparently they ran around 3000 Islamophobic articles in a single year across their top 5 newspapers
Which is why I suspect that the conservatives may win the Victorian state election in November, despite the common wisdom that the Andrews government is coasting to a second term. The Murdoch drumbeat of OMG AFRICAN GANGS will only get louder and more insistent as the election approaches. Which will have zero effect on educated inner-city professionals, but they weren't the ones who decided the last election: the ALP won it with swings in outer suburban electorates, and it's those former Coalition voters who swung to the ALP that Guy needs to win back.
These voters live in the outer suburbs and get most of their news from the press (i.e., the Herald-Sun and Australian, now that Fairfax is on the way out) and TV news. If they hear that restaurants in Melbourne are going out of business because people are too scared to venture outdoors after dark because of OMG AFRICAN GANGS, well, the only restaurants they see regularly are shopping-centre food courts and drive-throughs, and they have no more way of debunking this than a voter in a US red state has of knowing that, say, London or Paris is not an ISIS-controlled no-go zone, as the man on FOXNews has been telling them.
posted by acb at 8:53 AM on August 24, 2018 [3 favorites]
Which is why I suspect that the conservatives may win the Victorian state election in November, despite the common wisdom that the Andrews government is coasting to a second term. The Murdoch drumbeat of OMG AFRICAN GANGS will only get louder and more insistent as the election approaches. Which will have zero effect on educated inner-city professionals, but they weren't the ones who decided the last election: the ALP won it with swings in outer suburban electorates, and it's those former Coalition voters who swung to the ALP that Guy needs to win back.
These voters live in the outer suburbs and get most of their news from the press (i.e., the Herald-Sun and Australian, now that Fairfax is on the way out) and TV news. If they hear that restaurants in Melbourne are going out of business because people are too scared to venture outdoors after dark because of OMG AFRICAN GANGS, well, the only restaurants they see regularly are shopping-centre food courts and drive-throughs, and they have no more way of debunking this than a voter in a US red state has of knowing that, say, London or Paris is not an ISIS-controlled no-go zone, as the man on FOXNews has been telling them.
posted by acb at 8:53 AM on August 24, 2018 [3 favorites]
Man, I sure picked a hell of a week to pop home to visit the folks in Tas as a breather from constant depressing news about Brexit. (He says, typing this in Heathrow Terminal 3 just before the flight.)
Time to chant my calming Murdoch mantra.
posted by rory at 11:22 AM on August 24, 2018
Time to chant my calming Murdoch mantra.
posted by rory at 11:22 AM on August 24, 2018
(the other 1% being the Kearney-esque bleeding-hearts they run in inner-city electorates if the Greens are breathing down their necks, but keep on a tight leash otherwise).
Cooper (formerly Batman) isn't inner-city. /cranky outer suburbanite who lives in the electorate
posted by daybeforetheday at 3:04 PM on August 24, 2018
Cooper (formerly Batman) isn't inner-city. /cranky outer suburbanite who lives in the electorate
posted by daybeforetheday at 3:04 PM on August 24, 2018
Cooper (formerly Batman) isn't inner-city. /cranky outer suburbanite who lives in the electorate
Preston/Coburg isn't the outer suburbs by a long shot. The outer suburbs are places like Cranbourne, Lilydale, Ferntree Gully, Ringwood, and so on. Places of vast swirly labyrinths of residential streets, quarter-acre blocks with 3-car garages, huge shopping centres that are mostly car parks, half-hourly bus services that stop at 6pm and don't run on weekends, Assembly Of God megachurches which by now constitute most of the local Liberal Party branch, and nothing to do but watch TV.
posted by acb at 3:11 PM on August 24, 2018 [3 favorites]
Preston/Coburg isn't the outer suburbs by a long shot. The outer suburbs are places like Cranbourne, Lilydale, Ferntree Gully, Ringwood, and so on. Places of vast swirly labyrinths of residential streets, quarter-acre blocks with 3-car garages, huge shopping centres that are mostly car parks, half-hourly bus services that stop at 6pm and don't run on weekends, Assembly Of God megachurches which by now constitute most of the local Liberal Party branch, and nothing to do but watch TV.
posted by acb at 3:11 PM on August 24, 2018 [3 favorites]
Yes, they mentioned Bell St as the "goat's cheese curtain" (Salt's term) and how the Greeen's would prosper inside it and the ALP might hang outside. Exactly the opposite of what happened - the ALP did well inside and less well outside.
posted by hawthorne at 7:44 PM on August 24, 2018
posted by hawthorne at 7:44 PM on August 24, 2018
The Greens ran a horseshit election though. If you were looking to the Greens as a corrective for Labor putting jockeying over the good of the country, the Greens in that election proved they could be just as myopically self-interested as Labor.
The Chris Uhlmann blow-up is interesting, where he straight-up said that the Murdoch papers don't play fair and they're out to get specific leaders. I don't know if the mostly NewsCorp-led backlash is going to get the rest of the press corp to pull their head in, or whether Uhlmann saying it and having Turnbull basically confirm it will give cover for the rest of the political press to run with it. Uhlmann's recently been building a brand around saying the Emperor has no clothes (which is better than his previous brand of dipshit climate sceptic). He made international media from his report for the ABC on how out-of-depth and unpopular Trump was at the G20 summit, and now this. So, moment in flux. It's definitely going to be tricky to try and shove the Overton window back so that, say, running a concentration camp is seen as beyond the pale, but 'the right wing TV people are trying to subvert democracy' sounds like a good narrative to me.
posted by Merus at 9:02 PM on August 24, 2018 [3 favorites]
The Chris Uhlmann blow-up is interesting, where he straight-up said that the Murdoch papers don't play fair and they're out to get specific leaders. I don't know if the mostly NewsCorp-led backlash is going to get the rest of the press corp to pull their head in, or whether Uhlmann saying it and having Turnbull basically confirm it will give cover for the rest of the political press to run with it. Uhlmann's recently been building a brand around saying the Emperor has no clothes (which is better than his previous brand of dipshit climate sceptic). He made international media from his report for the ABC on how out-of-depth and unpopular Trump was at the G20 summit, and now this. So, moment in flux. It's definitely going to be tricky to try and shove the Overton window back so that, say, running a concentration camp is seen as beyond the pale, but 'the right wing TV people are trying to subvert democracy' sounds like a good narrative to me.
posted by Merus at 9:02 PM on August 24, 2018 [3 favorites]
This has been an absolutely rubbish week for the nation, as if the Libs (except for Turnbull and Bishop) collectively decided to slam a fifth of vodka then dared to jump in the ute.
I've watched with a great deal of chagrin as we've gone through PMs like Tinder hookups - nothing long term to build a life on (nor a nation). Factoring out the appropriate amount of partisan glee, I think
KRudd is correct in calling for changes to leadership rules, even if it's just a change, and not copying Labour. But it's clear that the current state of affairs is damaging to the country - if we can't keep a leader for longer than 18 months, how are we meant to undertake anything serious and long-term? Is there any chance of doing an NBN correctly when so many ministers are treacherous and can't put national interest above self-interest?
Julie Bishop deserves praise for being loyal. Almost nobody else within the Liberal Party has displayed that particular virtue recently, and I'm disgusted. It's as if they've all looked to the United States, and that country's colossal failure to put country above party, and then gone "nah, totally fine if we're selfish, it's not gonna hurt Australia." Idiots.
(I continue to think Julie Bishop would make a great PM. She's humane, capable of not breaking ranks, and has been a *fantastic* foreign minister.)
As for Scott Morrison, I'm willing to see what happens. I think Australia needs to do better with immigration policy, in every respect. I think the current approach displays insufficient concern for other human beings. I think we should have some sort of model where immigrants are adopted by volunteer families to help them with everything. I'm not holding my breath that ScoMo will move in any of these directions.
Overall, I'm extremely concerned for Australia the nation. Both Britain and the US have politically shot themselves in the genitals in recent history, and we don't seem to be learning the lessons of those failures.
posted by iffthen at 1:43 AM on August 25, 2018
I've watched with a great deal of chagrin as we've gone through PMs like Tinder hookups - nothing long term to build a life on (nor a nation). Factoring out the appropriate amount of partisan glee, I think
KRudd is correct in calling for changes to leadership rules, even if it's just a change, and not copying Labour. But it's clear that the current state of affairs is damaging to the country - if we can't keep a leader for longer than 18 months, how are we meant to undertake anything serious and long-term? Is there any chance of doing an NBN correctly when so many ministers are treacherous and can't put national interest above self-interest?
Julie Bishop deserves praise for being loyal. Almost nobody else within the Liberal Party has displayed that particular virtue recently, and I'm disgusted. It's as if they've all looked to the United States, and that country's colossal failure to put country above party, and then gone "nah, totally fine if we're selfish, it's not gonna hurt Australia." Idiots.
(I continue to think Julie Bishop would make a great PM. She's humane, capable of not breaking ranks, and has been a *fantastic* foreign minister.)
As for Scott Morrison, I'm willing to see what happens. I think Australia needs to do better with immigration policy, in every respect. I think the current approach displays insufficient concern for other human beings. I think we should have some sort of model where immigrants are adopted by volunteer families to help them with everything. I'm not holding my breath that ScoMo will move in any of these directions.
Overall, I'm extremely concerned for Australia the nation. Both Britain and the US have politically shot themselves in the genitals in recent history, and we don't seem to be learning the lessons of those failures.
posted by iffthen at 1:43 AM on August 25, 2018
She's humane
Are you shitting me? This is a woman who defended CSR from the people they poisoned with asbestos, drawing out the case until the plaintiff died.
posted by smoke at 2:55 AM on August 25, 2018 [8 favorites]
Are you shitting me? This is a woman who defended CSR from the people they poisoned with asbestos, drawing out the case until the plaintiff died.
posted by smoke at 2:55 AM on August 25, 2018 [8 favorites]
I mean granted, she's not batshit fucking insane, and seems fairly competent (at least that's what I've heard from people I know in DFAT). But she's still evil. In some ways, competent evil is scarier.
posted by smoke at 2:57 AM on August 25, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by smoke at 2:57 AM on August 25, 2018 [4 favorites]
> "But it's clear that the current state of affairs is damaging to the country - if we can't keep a leader for longer than 18 months, how are we meant to undertake anything serious and long-term?
That's the narrative, at least. Makes you wonder who wrote the script…
Yeah, it's unstable in the short-term, and untenable in the long-term. But, overall, its less damaging to state of the country than the 25+ years Murdoch's been setting the agenda, or having those related necromancers Jones & Bolt whispering instructions to the dead…
posted by Pinback at 6:00 AM on August 25, 2018 [1 favorite]
That's the narrative, at least. Makes you wonder who wrote the script…
Yeah, it's unstable in the short-term, and untenable in the long-term. But, overall, its less damaging to state of the country than the 25+ years Murdoch's been setting the agenda, or having those related necromancers Jones & Bolt whispering instructions to the dead…
posted by Pinback at 6:00 AM on August 25, 2018 [1 favorite]
Yes, they mentioned Bell St as the "goat's cheese curtain" (Salt's term)
Also, the Hipster-Proof Fence.
posted by acb at 4:49 PM on August 25, 2018 [1 favorite]
Also, the Hipster-Proof Fence.
posted by acb at 4:49 PM on August 25, 2018 [1 favorite]
ScoMo has handed the immigration portfolio back to the potato. And energy policy to the one of the biggest idiots on climate issues in the party, sworn enemy of wind turbines Angus Taylor.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:17 AM on August 26, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:17 AM on August 26, 2018 [2 favorites]
I don't necessarily know if Julie Bishop's legal career is indicative of her personal ethics. That's what lawyers do, they present their clients' position, no matter how abhorrent.
posted by Merus at 5:31 AM on August 26, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by Merus at 5:31 AM on August 26, 2018 [1 favorite]
Is Abbot being appointed to Indigenous Affairs the big finger to the population that I think it is? Guardian article from 2016 here.
posted by jadepearl at 2:40 PM on August 26, 2018
posted by jadepearl at 2:40 PM on August 26, 2018
I don't necessarily know if Julie Bishop's legal career is indicative of her personal ethics. That's what lawyers do, they present their clients' position, no matter how abhorrent.
Yes, lawyers are obliged to do this by professional obligations. However, they aren’t obliged to stymie and delay proceedings until the plaintiff dies. That’s extremely unethical. Not particularly uncommon in the asbestos field, but unethical all the same and she should be judged for it.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 2:57 PM on August 26, 2018 [4 favorites]
Yes, lawyers are obliged to do this by professional obligations. However, they aren’t obliged to stymie and delay proceedings until the plaintiff dies. That’s extremely unethical. Not particularly uncommon in the asbestos field, but unethical all the same and she should be judged for it.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 2:57 PM on August 26, 2018 [4 favorites]
That aside, her voting record is as abhorrent as ScoMo or Dutton, and she should be judged for that too.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 2:58 PM on August 26, 2018 [5 favorites]
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 2:58 PM on August 26, 2018 [5 favorites]
Madame Tussauds will no longer be sculpting figures of sitting Australian PMs.
posted by Chrysostom at 9:57 PM on August 26, 2018
posted by Chrysostom at 9:57 PM on August 26, 2018
I find it increasingly difficult to distinguish the major parties on the basis of policy, and they seem to united in defending the shocking treatment of Australian asylum seekers confined in Nauru. I really don't know why they've decided it's the hill they're going to die on.
posted by Joe in Australia at 10:41 PM on August 26, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by Joe in Australia at 10:41 PM on August 26, 2018 [3 favorites]
It because Labor believes the electorate is racist enough that if they don’t beat up on refugees, they’ll lose the next election.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 1:43 AM on August 27, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 1:43 AM on August 27, 2018 [1 favorite]
Which is funny, in some ways, because Fraser's actions wrt to Viet 'boat people' shows that, with leadership, the public can and does embrace refugees. He didn't always enjoy bipartisan support for it (or even partisan, thanks John Howard, you douchebag), but I certainly don't think he faced the kind of opposition we see from the coalition today.
This being said, it's still a frigging disgrace and Labor will never get my primary vote until they show some humanity (and even then, probably won't until they take an evidence based approach to climate change. People dismiss the Greens as a fringe party, but for reals, they are far and away the most evidence based with all their policies).
posted by smoke at 3:50 AM on August 27, 2018 [2 favorites]
This being said, it's still a frigging disgrace and Labor will never get my primary vote until they show some humanity (and even then, probably won't until they take an evidence based approach to climate change. People dismiss the Greens as a fringe party, but for reals, they are far and away the most evidence based with all their policies).
posted by smoke at 3:50 AM on August 27, 2018 [2 favorites]
On a tangent: Australia has not escaped the attention of Russian government-linked trolling operations. (Apparently they're mostly at the building-trust/cultivating-assets stage of their operation, posting memes like “make a movie Australian”, though are also engaging with the far right and trying to promote a sense of insecurity.)
posted by acb at 6:09 AM on August 27, 2018
posted by acb at 6:09 AM on August 27, 2018
An assessment of J Bish from an aid perspective (tl;dr very shit)
posted by smoke at 8:04 PM on August 27, 2018
posted by smoke at 8:04 PM on August 27, 2018
Things are getting weird now.
Firstly, I'm shocked that Fatman Scoop is still a thing.
Secondly, I'm shocked that this isn't the weirdest thing in Australian politics right now, because Pauline Hanson wants to beat a 9 year old for not singing the national anthem in school.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 4:15 PM on September 16, 2018 [2 favorites]
Firstly, I'm shocked that Fatman Scoop is still a thing.
Secondly, I'm shocked that this isn't the weirdest thing in Australian politics right now, because Pauline Hanson wants to beat a 9 year old for not singing the national anthem in school.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 4:15 PM on September 16, 2018 [2 favorites]
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posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:21 PM on August 20, 2018 [4 favorites]