The Briggs Brag

Interesting article in today's Australian about the defeat of the brash Mr Jamie Briggs in the seat of Mayo.   More than one journalist has commented on the fact that Mr Briggs seems to blame everyone (in this case Julie Bishop) other than himself.  Which I think rather goes to the point that he just doesn't get it...like a lot of career Liberal politicians, his predecessor included; and his colleague in the electorate of Sturt.
The best comment I heard on morning radio was from  the redoubtable Senator X...he was asked why do you think your (the X Team's) candidate Rebekah Sharkie won?...the dialogue went something like this:

X: "Well she is a local, she lives in the electorate  and she worked the local community  for 6 weeks"
Interviewer: "Well so is Jamie Briggs, he lives locally and has been very visible"
X: "Yes" (and this is the killer...so pay attention to his nuanced comment said sotto voce ( which is my only explanation for why this perceptive comment has not been picked up in the press)
X: " The difference is that the more she went round the electorate people warmed to her, and liked her more..."
He left us to wonder what happened as Briggs went around his electorate! I will leave you make your own connection

One of my observations about the culture of the Liberal Party is that it is such a "boys club"  typified by snide remarks,  inhouse jokes, deprecatory slurs, and arrogant proclamations of their own 'rightness' as opposed to 'righteousness'

AD (Briggs' predecessor in Mayo ) used to caricature my predecessor in another position, Ron Williams: innovative missionary, bishop, & ethicist as Ron the Red!
I actually think Ron was not worried...and would have been bemused, knowing what schoolboy antics this boy's club gets up to.
But I think the use of the tactic which dismisses people so glibly is shallow and patronising.

Equally both the bumptious Mr Briggs, and the prissy Mr Pyne used to opine about Senator X.
They hated the fact that he was able to catch the public imagination...often by stunts    and DID!

It was the cry of a political establishment being furious that THEIR message did not impact like the good Senator's.

Well there are lots of messages to be learnt

The different rule of law

I find it difficult to believe that our leaders might suggest that if they "pay back" their fraudulent claims then that is OK.
This began with the Helicopter Saga.......it doesn't matter that it was wrong as long as I paid back the money....equally well Opposition  MPs make the same claim....if  I am caught out  but I then pay it pay it back then that fixes it  up . To use Rhyming Slang...this is WOOL KNIT...
If a burglar ...before a court, said 'I will give the stolen goods back'...or 'I will repay those who had their goods stolen'   I am not convinced that  "paying back"actually deals with fraud

Who do our MP's represent?

Today Queensland Member for Cook, just expelled from the ALP, has notified everyone that he is staying on as an independent.
It is his right!  Although elected as a member of a political party (the ALP)...he is actually elected as himself, Billy Gordon!   He is not without controversy.
The Labor Premier called on him first to leave the party, he did ( or was expelled)! And then to do the "right thing" and resign and allow a by-election....even though it might cost her the leadership of the State. 
This is brave of Premier Anastasia Palaszczuk. I am impressed by her integrity and courage. Two virtues which appeal to the Christian heart...integrity and courage.
And, which I would admit, we have not always been good at.
I have met recently with a person who knows her well, his representations to me assure me she is (as 1066 and All That might say....a good thing). I will leave that to you
One of the issues this sets before the electorate, both in Queensland and, throughout the nation at both State and Federal level is whether a person is elected as an individual or as a member of a party ticket.
Inevitably when trouble occurs people frame their answer to meet their own circumstances.
So, Mr Gordon has quite rightly exercised his legal prerogative that he is elected as an individual!
Now he is an "Independent" ie. he has been cut free from the party which no-doubt funded much of his electoral campaign....he can do as his will and conscience require.
Ms Lambie, and Mr Lazarus did this, various others have left their parties after they have been elected.
And it is their right.......Apparently

But is it RIGHT!

Although Queensland does not have an Upper House, the Federal Parliament does and other States do.
We have been, at Federal level, given the option to vote, say, 1 to 16 "Above the line"  or 1 to 133 "Below the line".  
One gets the impression that most people vote Above the line.  Which is decidedly less complex and laborious. That is, they vote for the party and the Party's particular preferential choices.
So when an elected person who may have been elected No. 1 on the Labor or Liberal ticket .....or Palmer United Party....a case referred to above.....decides to jump ship what should happen?
The candidate inevitably says ....I was elected because I was me, and how fabulous am I because of my profile.....and the Party inevitably says .....They should resign because they were elected  on the Party Ticket.
Ms Palaszczuk was rather suggesting this about Mr Gordon...and Mr Palmer certainly wants Senators Lazarus and Lambie to capitulate to his strident influence, I draw short of calling it bullying!

In the end I think ABOVE THE LINE VOTING is iniquitous. It is a ploy of the Party System to manipulate numbers. So it serves them right when it backfires...as, increasingly, it seems to do

The Farce. Act II

Could not believe Katter's performance on Q& A last night! I have been spending the week telling folks that he is not as bad as he was. But I am afraid that I have to revise that estimation.

He says many wise things. But he is a bully of a man, who can only deal with criticism by force, shouting down his opponents. Refusing to engage in any constructive dialogue that dares to critique his narrow views.

That was scene 1 of this Act II

Scene 2. Was his appearance at a bizarre Press Conferenece at 1 p.m. today. At which he pontificated and procrastinated. One can only wonder why. He went on and on.

There seemed only one dynamic that was at play here. He was holding a separate Press Conference because his conclusion was different from the other two.

He supported the coalition.

Thank goodness, despite Rob Oakshot's equally tedious prevarication (15 mins), he and Windsor went with Ms Gillard. I will blog later about the one really good thing that Oakshot said and the saintly Fr Spencer Dunkerley who foreshadowed him by 40 years

Up for grabs

I would have to say that, by and large, there is nothing in it for me...so my vote is up for sale!

While those who know me will also know I am joking, it would seem that our politicians seem to think that this is what they should be doing...ie trying to bribe the voters with bigger and better what evers.

This is so transparent that it has become laughable. As far as I can tell a couple of things are happening:

• A whole lot of people like me know more about who they are not going to vote for rather than who they are going to end up voting for. At a lunch yesterday, in a lull in the conversation I (perhaps foolishly) threw in "Well have we decided who we are going to vote for?" I was not quite prepared for the tirade that followed against our local member. Though I think it's entirely justified.
• So, a lot of people I know who think the humane treatment of refugees is important find themselves looking for an alternative way through the major party hypocrisy. They will obviously vote Green or (maybe) Democrat.
• Yes, that's another interesting thing. Suddenly Democrats have begun to appear again.
• Others who are perhaps less inclined to focus on the refugee issue seem to be gravitating back to their traditional party (I was conscious that at least one person at the above mentioned lunch who is a traditional Liberal voter would have found the vitriol against our sitting member..AS...pretty hard to cope with...she will never vote Labor, finds it hard to vote Green because they are even more pinko than than Labor.) Such folk whether Labor or Liberal traditionally will gravitate back to their comfort zone
• As one who thinks that it's quite good to have no one party having an absolute right to rule, I would like to think that the Greens will actually get enough votes to win a couple of lower house seats. I think it's unlikely, but we will see.

Unhealthy democracy

Writing in The Advertiser , Alexander Downer is no doubt correct that this next election will be interesting because it will give the voters a black and white choice. He is wrong in suggesting that this is ideological.
What it would seem is happening is that, once again, we are being subjected to fear mongering . As Downer himself elucidates, refugees arriving by boat will once again be the
political weapon of the Liberals.
But equally well we might note that Labor will invite us to lash out at the rich mining magnates.
This is not ideology. This is prejudice. This is not healthy democracy it is cynicism at its worst.

Unbelievable and yet strangely believable!

Choking on one's muesli, I had to laugh to hear Malcolm Turnbull say that the task for the incoming Labor Government was to not blame the previous Government for the financial mess that it inherited.
This is rich coming from a party which continued, up until it was removed from power, to blame the governments of Hawke and Keating for over a decade after those Labor governments set up the financial structures which allowed the Liberals to capitalise on a deregulated environment which they themselves had failed to establish. This despite having been in power for most of the four decades from the 40s to the 80s.
I think the electorate at the last election found this all wore a bit thin, at what point would the Howard Government actually take responsibility for having got somethings wrong as well as taking the (often unwarranted) credit for having got things right?
Turnbull is right, in a way, the Rudd government will need to accept responsibility for what they do. But give them a break...it has only been weeks since they took over!

I keep checking!

It is amazing in a way (and I keep checking) that we have had almost a week of a Labor government and the sky hasn't fallen in. Of course they haven't been sworn in yet!

Kerboom!

I feel I am just exploding with political thoughts, and in a way I don't want to harangue the loyal readerships. So some snippets only:

• Getting fed up of hearing Kev say "I am an economic conservative!"
• Listening to Matt and Dave on the radio broadcasting from the marginal electorate of Sturt and it sounds more like a Saturday morning fete (car park caper!!) than a key election focus
• Almost burst a gut when Kev was being asked this morning "Is the Labor party still a party of the left?" and he would not answer. And he was asked again "Is the Labor party still a party of the left?" and he would not answer. And yet again: "Is the Labor party still a party of the left?" and he would not answer but obfuscated...I think we have to move away from left and right or up and down. For goodness sake St Gough of Woolahra (sitting with his fellow Labor Prime Ministers at the launch yesterday...knowing he was too old to be stabbed in the back) would shudder. Still I have already declared earlier this week that I am just a silly old lefty...obviously one of the fee lefties left
• Am enjoying watching Johnny dropping his bundle and failing to hit the correct political mark. It is interesting to see, that given that he is without question a if not the consummate performer in the Federal sphere, that he just seems to have lost sight of the target.
• I like an election where the candidates are known by their first names...little Johnny, Kevin, Malcolm, Alexander.......though the onslaught of Mr X may bring a change in this
• I hope that the Federal sphere will be enriched by the said Senator X and that he is not just swallowed up by the big pond...as it were.
• If I go back to school will they give me a new computer.
  

Ho-hum

Allowing for the fact that it is the last week of sitting for the Federal Parliament, and I have been away for six weeks, I am already tired of the drivel that is passing for serious political debate.

The beat-up about using Kiribilli House for whatever purpose is tedious in the extreme. Likewise if I hear the carefully scripted use of the term "Union bosses" again I will scream...when will we actually get down to policy and substance.

I want to discuss not "catering costs" or "election strategies" as tittilating as these might be; but rather such issues as:

• how is the education system going to be upscaled in the next two decades to set us in a key postion for the future?
• how are inequalities between various people in the workforce going to be addressed to allow the whole of our society to benefit from the relevantly buoyant state ofg our economy
• what is being discussed behind the scenes about issues to do with future power-generation, nuclear power and carbon emissions

Let's drop the crap about the fluff and get on with the important stuff.