Because it doesn't really impact too many people here so directly I might put the Aussie stuff here.
For some time now there's been a lot of talk about the leadership of the incumbent ALP govenment (Australian Labor Party). Previous Prime Minister Kevin Rudd was ousted in a leadership challenge. The Labor Party have essentially two inside competing factions- the labor left and the labor right. Current PM Julia Gillard is supported by (though I don't think is actually of) the right. Rudd is similarly associate with the left.
There's a lot of media speculation of another challenge, this time with Rudd ousting Gillard. It sounded like crap to me but a friend whose political awareness is pretty top notch suggests the original backers of Gillard (Bill Shorten and other names I don't recall) are themselves losing faith in the ability of Gillard to beat Tony Abbot (climate skeptic, opposition leader). Last election was a hung parliament. So what does that mean? Not sure. But it's going to be an interesting
Holy fuck.
Rudd just quit and made no bones about his feelings that he did not hold the confidence of the party or PM.
He gave his federal party a kick in the balls but he's also given a rousing endorsement to the State Labor party in QLD possibly making the upcoming unwinnable election winnable.
Labor is in a mess.
As I understand it, the Australian Liberal Party are utterly insufferable, with Tony Abbott being like Michael Gove, only without the latter's "charm".
Maybe Rudd is hoping that enough people are scared by Abbott's extreme social conservatism that they will not get in, and that disaffected left wingers will vote Green, and so strengthen the hand of the left wing of the Labor Party? Agitating from the left would defiitely move the party more in the direction he would like, though it may take some time in Opposition to fully build up the left of the party.
Rudd is many things but he's never struck me as an idiot. There's one idea floating right now that Mondays vote was meant to set the scene for a leadership challenge after the next election. Again, this would be a figure from the left. Your theory is interesting too Cain. Labor often seems to take Greens support for granted because, hey, what ate they gonna do, preference the Libs? The election I was involved in though there was a lot of animosity between the parties and the Greens didn't preference anyone at all. Green=Labor is actually a major PR issue for the greens.
Abbot is truly horrible but the tangible loathing of Gillard really could lose the ALP the election. The last one got us into the current hung parliament. It will be a good election for the Greens perhaps but ultimately a Liberal victory isn't something I'd like to see.
Gillard has previously proposed American style primaries, but I think this time around the Australian people are too fatigued of politics to go there any time soon.
Sorry, all I know about politics in the land of kangaroos is that you have Xenophon, and he is at least selectively awesome.
What's awesome about Xenephon? He's struck me as a bit of a twat. Isn't he family first?
Quote from: Placid Dingo on February 29, 2012, 10:50:50 PM
What's awesome about Xenephon? He's struck me as a bit of a twat. Isn't he family first?
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=xenophon+scientology
I did say "selectively" awesome.
Ha! I'd forgotten about that.
I thought maybe you meant how he always has two sharpened pencils on him in case of terrorist sattack.
Im pretty sure he lost his position though.
Placid, you're thinking of this guy -
(http://www.smh.com.au/ffximage/2008/09/25/stevefielding_narrowweb__300x466,0.jpg)
Steve Fielding, one of the wackiest people thrust into our senate by our wierd preferential Senate voting system. 1.8 per cent of Victorian vote got him a senate seat, due to occultic preference swaps between the major parties to keep the Greens out.
I'd post some of his wacky quotes, but they seem to be fairly standard quotes coming out of American parliamentarians anyway. Dawking told him his IQ was lower than an earth-worm's on a panel show once. Things like "A bloke cannot marry his brother; it is not right. A woman cannot marry their sister; it is not right. A bloke cannot marry a bloke because it is not right, and a female cannot marry a female because it is not right. I don't support this." Creationism, etc.
Xenophon is still in the Senate, and will continue to be so, I think, because his anti-pokie campaigning resonates with enough South Australians to get him a Senate quota. Not to mention being the only Oz pollie to campaign against the Scientologists, as well as other things that he can take a principled stand on, becasue he's an independent. Don't agree with everything, but I consider one of the few "good guys" in parliament.
Thank you DC.
Yea, Xenophons alright.
I haven't really been too conceerned about the Gillard/Rudd thing. Largely irrelevant, except for the bit where it's helping Tony Abbott's cause. Even though he's refrained from making too many outlandish right-wing statements, he and Rick Santorum are from the same altar-cloth.
Honestly, I see the current state of affairs as the best government we could have within the realistic parameters of our form of democracy. Media and commentators whinge about the "hung" parliament, but it's been the best period of legislation since *looks around sheepishly* Gough Whitlam.
Last election, Gillard stood up and proudly announce that she wouldn't really be doing anything at all, but she wasn't Abbott, and ha, as if you people are stupid enough to nearly elect him!
But now, she has to deal with Greens and the Indies, who I'm glad to say have been surprising voices of reason at most times. We'd have no carbon action, no Disability Insurance Scheme, no pokie action (well, actually, that hasn't happened yet), no medicare dental coverage, no increases in wages for NGO service workers...the list could go on, without this wonderful hung parliament.
I use the word wonderful relatively. remember Gillard's promise on climate change? "I'll put together a random group of citizens to talk about it for the next three years!". Amazing, that you can try and dress up iinaction as an actual policy.
MORE HUNG PARLIAMENTS! I say.
Gillard is holding a buisiness conference which seems to be about hoping industry will provide a few soundbites on how stable our economy is.
In QLD Can-Do is making important changes, like taking away State Support for Gay Union Ceromonies because 'some groups might think it looks like its trying to imitate marriage'. So in real terms, no pragmatgic change, just a mild 'fuck you' to keep the conservatives happy.
HArrassment of an Independent (Craig Thompson - suspected of misuse of union funds) kind of peaked, and then everyone got really upset and it kind of dropped off the media.
Also, Pokies Legislation designed to fail has been placed in the wilderness to be picked apart by scavengers.
Quote from: Placid Dingo on February 19, 2012, 02:38:28 AM
Because it doesn't really impact too many people here so directly I might put the Aussie stuff here.
It impacts me.
Ask me why.
Why?
Quote from: The Freeky of SCIENCE! on June 13, 2012, 05:13:51 PM
Why?
Because I like to think, sometimes, that people ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WORLD might not be as STUPID as they are here. But they are. This fills my heart with hate. It makes me want to send the 6th fleet around to Australia and teach those pouch-bellied, beer-swilling dingos WHO THE FUCKING BOSS IS, when it comes to dumbfuckery.
Yeah, you'd think people who couldn't possibly be farther away wouldn't be as stupid.
Indian Call Centre workers are trained to treat us all as if we are stupid. I've always assumed that selling something to someone else begins with the belief that the potential buyer is stupid. I've never kept a call centre person on the phone long enough to find out their assessment of our collective intelligence, so I don't know. A Mother Jones reporter went "undercover" to find this out -
http://www.news.com.au/national/what-indian-calls-centres-are-really-told-about-australians/story-e6frfkvr-1226100495649
In "dissecting" the Australian psyche in 20 minutes, the teacher told the class, "Just stating the facts, guys. Australia is known as the dumbest continent. Literally, college was unknown there until recently, so speak slowly".
That's fantastic.
New report points to culture of sexual abuse in ADF.
People who abused or turned a blind eye are probably in senior positions.
http://m.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/defence/australian-defence-force-lifts-lid-on-history-of-abuse-after-legal-review/story-e6frg8yo-1226292734187
It's like the ADF are training the forces to prepare for some kind of battle against women. Are we preparing to invade that island that Wonder Woman comes from or something? I think it's in the Pacific, even though there's not a hint of Polynesian features amongst all the white women that live there.
So, a bit on Australian stupidity.
I was talking to an American when I was in Argentina in 2000. I was comparing the amount of flags (Argentinian) on display in Buenos Aires with America, and explained that in Australia, people who fly the flag outside their house were looked at as being nutters. The American was surprised, saying you were considered nutty if you didn't display the flag, kind of thing.
In the years since, it seems you can't go anywhere here without some wanker toting a flag. Little plastic ones waving on both sides of cars, people with those stupid "Love it or Leave it" t-shirts, and those Southern Cross tattoos that in some places, it seems every second person has. I've seen this as a big step backwards in our intellectual development. The Southern Cross is on every flag in the Southern Hemisphere, but these folk think it's uniquely Australian. The Union Jack is on every second flag in the Pacific. So if we lined up our flag with Fiji's, New Zealand's, the Cayman islands and probably a dozen or so more, I doubt the folks tattooing it onto their necks would even tell the difference.
Through the 70's, 80's and half the 90's, in spite of their many faults, our politicians started looking outward to Asia, proclaimed an internationalism, and started talking it up. Many racists shut up. Travelling in 1994, if anyone said Australia was racist, I would argue that yes, Australia has racists, but overall, it's a tolerant place that accepts racial difference. Travelling in 2000, if someone said the same thing, I wouldn't argue, but nod in agreement.
From the mid 90's, we had politicians that belonged in the 50's, openly saying racist things about a variety of ethnic groups, and the racists felt empowered to sprout their crap again, on radio, TV, in public, in op/eds.
The point is, we got collectively stupider, via the mechanisms of mindless nationalism and ignorant patriotism. I will have more to say.
Watched the first episode of a show called "Dumb, Drunk and Racist" last night. Four people are brought over from India to test the hypothesis that Australians are dumb, drunk and racist. There's a lot of things the show could have done better, but I like the idea of it, especially since these things aren't really investigated much by our media. I'm not sure what the point of staging a life-guard saving one of the Indian lads from a rip on Bondi beach is, but at least this show is starting a conversation about some of the less impressive parts of Australian life and culture.
http://www.abc.net.au/tv/dumbdrunkracist/episodes/ep01.htm
It's refreshing to watch somehitng that's critical of this country. While there was a time when media and film did explore the ugly sides of Australian life, the past century has seen it all glossed over and anything critical about the place is excluded. Might be interesting.
Incidentally, the Australian move to try and be an "Asian nation" was seen as highly offensive by most Asian nations at the time.