Gough Suppressant posted:

While I really would enjoy seeing Abbott kicked down by his own party, I'd prefer he remain the leader because that is the surest way of getting the lot of them out of power next election.

Amethyst posted:

Changing leaders would be a hilariously stupid thing for them to do. Bring it on.

Lid posted:

3. Cabinet reshuffle, which is being rumoured with most heavily Joe Hockey being bounced for Malcolm Turnbull and Scott Morrison over to take over the Defence portfolio. This too is a poor idea as it requires a complete restart of the government and is sure to piss off some people in his cabinet depending on what he does. Hell given it's Tony he might send Julie Bishop to the backbench.

Sanguine posted:

I really don't think a change of leaders would cause the damage that the Rudd/Gillard switch did.

There's already a bit of clearing the ground for a leadership change, with comments like 'changing leaders is fine if it's done right' (I've heard some softening of the issue on insiders and 7:30). The primary reason it was such a mess last time was it being blown up on every media front, and every time the wind changed 'LEADERSHIP BACKSTABBING' was on the front pages. You could have both Gillard and Rudd saying flatly 'there's nothing happening', with Rudd saying 'I'm not looking to challenge' and it'd still be the headline for a good week.

Without the media frenzy I think Bishop could quite easily slide into the leadership spot and the thing would be painted over as a 'responsible move to suit the mess labour left us in' as well as 'a progressive move in having a female leader, showing how modern and progressive the libs really are'.

I would love for it to tank the LNP even more, but I honestly think it would be a mild bump followed by steady recovery towards the next election. It would be A Bad Thing.

Lid posted:

Then a few days later Tony added on Andrew Robb without explanation, which has actually pissed off Robb as not only does he go to a conference on a subject he doesn't believe in (alongside things like reality) but that while he was in South America at the time touring for trade meetings now he has to make a large schedule adjustment to several trade meetings just so he can go to Peru, where he is unwanted, to prevent Bishop from doing anything, who doesn't want him to be there.

quote:

@MSMWatchdog2013 @ewe2 @jackinbocks2025 @GregHuntMP's office categorically told me they could not tell me if he was going "due to security reasons". Pfffft.

quote:

@MSMWatchdog2013 @ewe2 @jackinbocks2025 @GregHuntMP Yep.They were quite tetchy when I asked a simple question i.e. "Is Hunt going to Lima?" Weird & paranoid.

Sanguine posted:

Without the media frenzy I think Bishop could quite easily slide into the leadership spot and the thing would be painted over as a 'responsible move to suit the mess labour left us in' as well as 'a progressive move in having a female leader, showing how modern and progressive the libs really are'.

ewe2 posted:

Don't you think it odd that no one mentions Hunt at all and no one's even surprised by that? MSM silent on the issue, but a twitterer went and asked the Department and got this answer:



"security reasons" being "we're not allowed to embarrass the Minister who was told to shut up when he asked why he couldn't go" and I'm guessing that's the line they sold the MSM which went "oh fine".

Lid posted:

Abbott will not go quietly. He is a student politician through and through.

Sanguine posted:

I hope you're right, I do, but I worry. Things can get much worse from here.

ewe2 posted:

Scott Morrison PM and Immigration Minister. Get ready.

Anidav posted:

ewe2 posted:

No. Bishop isn't that stupid. She didn't get to be deputy to several different leaders without brains.

Cartoon posted:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-12-08/ill-fated-asylum-seeker-forced-to-wait-for-medical-transfer/5952756


Please note that this is a failure in precisely the system that Morrison has now legislated to include the fate of EVEN MORE people. Note also what happens when there is a problem. This is a dark cloud over a festering boil on our national character (One only hopes that it leads to a "life-threatening systemic infection").

Anidav posted:

ewe2 posted:

FFS Mirabella isn't even a sitting member.

Julie Bishop will use climate talks in Peru to argue Great Barrier Reef is not in danger posted:

FOREIGN Minister Julie Bishop will use climate talks in Peru to argue the Great Barrier Reef isn’t in danger.
She’ll also warn UNESCO it’s at risk of being duped by activists.
Ms Bishop will lobby members of UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee not to list the reef as a World Heritage site in danger next year, saying this could set a dangerous precedent that could affect the home countries of committee members.
“Every country that has an environmental icon that activists seize upon would be at risk,” she will say, according to The Courier-Mail.
“There is no justification for an in-danger listing by the World Heritage Committee.” The World Heritage Committee will meet next June to decide whether to formally declare the reef as an asset in danger.
The conservation group WWF Australia says Ms Bishop’s position is disappointing, given Australia’s own scientists are saying the government’s efforts on reef protection are severely lacking.
“It’s very disappointing that our foreign minister is trying to frighten foreign governments, instead of Australia taking strong action,” WWF’s Great Barrier Reef coastal campaign manager Louise Matthiesson told AAP.
Australian reef expert Terry Hughes has said the Abbott government’s claim the reef is not in danger defies all available science.
The director of the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies last month said there was a disconnect between the government’s position and what scientists across the globe are saying.
The government’s own reef outlook report, released earlier this year, found the reef is in poor condition and deteriorating, with climate change the primary threat, Prof Hughes said.

quote:

She’ll also warn UNESCO it’s at risk of being duped by activists.

hiddenmovement posted:

She's priced the same as Melbourne's chances of winning the 2015 AFL Premiership so that should give you some idea of how seriously Sportsbet regard Mirabella

http://www.sportsbet.com.au/betting/australian-rules/afl/AFL-Premiership-Winner-2015-1553803.html

EDIT: Geez Brisbane might be worth a bet for the 8 now I look at it

quote:

Outside the inner circle, which is certain to be shaken up before long, only the parliamentary secretary to the prime minister, Josh Frydenberg, offers a gleam of talent for the future.

quote:

CROSSBENCH senator Ricky Muir last week described his decision to back the Abbott Government’s draconian legislation on refugees and asylum seekers as “a choice between a bad option and a worse option”.

He was right and, with his vote, Australia is now effectively a rogue state when it comes to international law and respect for basic human rights.

With the passage of the Bill we have erased any references to our obligations under the United Nations Convention on Refugees. This was a document that emerged in the aftermath of the horrors of World War II, and one that Australia helped formulate.

In June this year the UNHCR released a report showing the number of refugees, asylum seekers and internally displaced people worldwide had, for the first time since WWII, topped
50 million people. Of these, 16.7 million people are classified as refugees.

In the face of this global crisis the response from Australia — one of the wealthiest nations on Earth — has been to cut our refugee resettlement intake from overseas and pass cruel, callous legislation that is arguably in breach of international law

We cage asylum seekers in what can only be described as tropical gulags — hellholes where disease, violence, depression and sexual assault festers — and refer to them as “illegal” even though they have committed no crime.

When Immigration Minister Scott Morrison and his supporters talk of “illegals” they are lying, in an effort to dehumanise and demonise. As Article 14 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights makes perfectly clear: “Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution.”

We deny refugees and asylum seekers fair and timely assessment and then when and if their claims have eventually been processed, we effectively deny them entry to Australia.

And bear in mind here that as of the latest figures available, about 70 per cent of the more than 2000 detainees languishing behind wire in the Manus Island and Nauru compounds who have had their claims processed have had positive determination of their refugee status.

For them there will be no resettlement here. They can languish on Nauru for a few years, possibly be resettled in Papua New Guinea — perhaps shipped off to that bastion of democracy and human rights known as Cambodia — or, for some, be offered a Temporary Protection Visa that may eventually see them shipped off to anywhere in the world of the minister’s choosing anyway.

It is a policy of deliberate cruelty perpetrated by both sides of politics, but taken to new — to use Senator Sarah Hanson-Young’s description — sociopathic depths by Morrison last week.

Morrison effectively used children in detention as pawns to blackmail his legislation through the Senate, saying to the likes of Muir: “Pass my Bill and I’ll release the kids.”

This ignores the fact that he (and Labor before him) has the power at any time to release those children. It is hard to imagine a more cynically exploitative abuse of process and human life, and this from a man who professes to be a Christian. And here it is a shame Muir and others didn’t stand firm and say “Release the children first, and then we’ll negotiate”.

With the passage of his Bill Morrison is now virtually omnipotent when it comes to unfettered — and unchecked — control over other people’s lives.

Asylum seekers arriving by boat will no longer have access to the Refugee Review Tribunal. Their cases will be considered on a “fast track” basis without even formal interviews and they are denied natural justice in the form of access to our courts, with any appeals instead being heard internally by Morrison’s department.

Morrison has the power to individually refuse refugee status on the nebulous grounds of “national interest” or “character”. He does not have to publish his reasons.

Worse, he has the power to deport people anywhere in the world, even if that places them at risk of torture. The relevant clause dictates that an unlawful non-citizen must be removed regardless: “It is irrelevant whether Australia has non-refoulement obligations in respect of an unlawful non-citizen.”

As the Law Council of Australia pointed out in a Senate Committee submission last month, “the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties requires States to implement their obligations in good faith and stipulates that a State may not invoke the provisions of internal law as a justification of its failure to perform its obligations under a treaty …”

The LCA also argues that the rule of law requires “Executive powers to be carefully defined by law, so that it is not up to the Executive to determine what powers it has, and how they should be used”, and “Executive decision-making to comply with the principles of natural justice and be subject to meaningful judicial review.”

Scratch that. What would a few lawyers know about justice?

It is tempting to argue for a royal commission to uncover the true horrors and abuse of law inherent in Australia’s maltreatment of the world’s most vulnerable, but given this government’s unilateral ruthlessness the findings would likely be ignored.

Future generations will look back on this dark period in Australian history with profound shame and regret. Many of us feel that way already.

quote:

brandy 6 HOURS AGO
Funny how it is always baby boomers protesting this type of action.

Always passing on the debt to the next generation.

Ahhh the most selfish generation that ever existed does not mention we are taking more refugees through the correct channels now.

Now I must get back to work so I can fund your retirement and pay for my own.

ewe2 posted:

This guy knows what's up. But I'm still going for Morrison eventually. And here's the real problem:


That is, if the front bench chumps fail, there's nothing. Only the neoliberal Obama might save them.