MissEchelon posted:

That one gets pushed to the "most read" section every month or so. It's pretty great. I mean something something fairfax jihad

ScreamingLlama posted:

Just so you know, I did NOT vote for Barnaby Joyce and am therefore not responsible for having such an utter disgrace of an MP.

I also agree that both Joyce and Sandilands are both dickheads.

Beetphyxious posted:

We've done some lobbying in the social housing sector to try get access to super to fund social housing developments. no dice.

Pickled Tink posted:

First Dog!



Kittens!:

tithin posted:

EvilElmo posted:

Also worth noting that large chunks of ISIS ground is literally nothing but sand. Looks bad on map, but strategically they're only really in a handful of spaces in that zone.

tithin posted:

Thing is though, that super builds up over a lifetime. Even if hypothetically they allow access to super to appease the blood gods of housing, unless it's an older (mid 40s) person accessing it, then it's not going to be enough for a deposit and it's nominally the first home buyer that they're aiming to entice with this.

Kommando posted:

Arg, while its nice to have on the public record that it was found to be valid for Barnaby Joyce to be called a wanker and an idiot, I don't want Sandilands to be credited with the victory.

tithin posted:

Hey, you didn't answer me in the last thread, and I was genuinely curious, how is the AEC appeal going?

"John Oliver’s hilarious reaction to Tony Abbott eating a raw, unpeeled onion posted:

During a Q&A session with British television host John Oliver last night, one heroic Sydney local asked him what he thought of the infamous footage of Tony Abbott eating a raw onion.

The entire Sydney State Theatre was then treated to Oliver’s live, bewildered reaction to the video that continues to baffle this fine nation.

David - otherwise known as the hero our city deserves - called out: “Did you see Tony Abbott eat the onion?”

“T - Tony Abbott? Tony Abbott what?”

“The onion! Eat the onion! Tony Abbott ate the onion!”

The sheer disbelief in Oliver’s voice said it all, as he attempted to make sense of the question. Just remember that this was a man hearing - first-hand - that the current Prime Minister of Australia bit into a raw, unpeeled onion.

“Did he do it competently?”

Laughter followed, but it soon became clear that words were not enough. Oliver would need evidence of this. He just wasn’t getting it.

“He ate an onion? He ATE an ONION? He ate an onion like a two-year-old eats an onion, thinking: ‘it’s round and I’ve seen round apples! Is this an apple?’ No. he did not do that.”

And then, when an audience member enlightened him to the sheer gravity of the event --

“He ate TWO?! Get the f**k out!”

Finally, the blessed video footage was produced.

There was a deep silence, followed by running commentary which sounded both impressed and fearful.

“The SKIN was on it. What’s he DOING?”

Then, in a quiet, terrified whimper: “Why does he eat the SECOND one? ‘Oooh - that was an onion. I wonder if THIS onion is an onion!’”

The audience was in hysterics by this point. Suddenly, the entire thing seemed to click in Oliver’s mind, as he yelled: “HE NEEDS CONSTANT SUPERVISION!”

freebooter posted:

Rarely has there been a clearer example of cultural cringe than Australia's recent wankfest over John Oliver criticising our government

open24hours posted:

John Oliver sucks. I hate that fake histrionic style he and Jon Stewart have.

freebooter posted:

Over the past week I've been linked to about half a dozen articles about John Oliver's hilaaaaaaaarious takes on Australian politics, usually in Buzzfeed or Junkee or whatever, and the tone of every single one of them has been irritatingly sycophantic. HOW GREAT IS IT THAT THE FAMOUS COMEDIAN FINDS THE SAME THINGS WE DO FUNNY YOU GUYSSSSS! It's embarrassing. Nothing against you, you just broke the camel's back.

quote:

Fifty-five million helpless Australian dollars will be given a new home in Cambodia, after a diplomatic arrangement was struck between the two countries.
Immigration Minister Peter Dutton said there was no place for the money in Australia and that the agreement was a chance for the currency to start afresh.

“We’ll also be providing additional funds and support to ensure the money settles into the country seamlessly,” he said.
A spokesperson for the Cambodian Government – known to be one of the most corrupt in the world – said the money would be warmly welcomed in the country.
The notes will be transferred to a secure bank account in Phnom Penh this week.

QUACKTASTIC posted:

Can you link them? they sound really funny.

quote:

Get ready for a recession every decade, experts warn September 1, 2015 Peter Martin Economics Editor, The Age

If we were sleepwalking into a mess, would we know it? Our leaders wouldn't.

Rapidly rising incomes are a lubricant - they stop people rubbing up against each other. Tony Abbott opened last week's national reform summit with a self-congratulatory video in which he talked about cutting red tape, the China-Australia free trade agreement, and the need to protect mining from "vigilantism in the courts". Things were heading in the right direction. Joe Hockey gave a speech that said even less, talking about the rise of the consumer and observing that his dad once told him, "ideas are free, but good ideas are gold nuggets". Bill Shorten was better. The deficit had doubled. Wages growth was at record lows. Economic growth was nearly a full percentage point below trend. Australia's transition from the mining boom had been patchy.

Then the politicians left the room.

The summit was told that the economy was set to grow at a mere fraction of the officially projected pace, so slowly that the living standard expected in 2055 wouldn't be reached until 2075, when most of us would no longer be alive. The intergenerational report had assumed average growth in real incomes of 1.4 per cent per year for each of the next 40 years. It would mean that by 2055 real income per person would be an impressive 75 per cent higher than it is today. We would easily be able to afford any extra tax we needed to fund higher pensions and health costs, and our incomes would be climbing so fast, we wouldn't much mind if the tax system was changed. Even in March, when the report was released, Treasury officials regarded the assumption as a stretch. Since then views about the future have changed. The Reserve Bank believes Australia's sustainable rate of economic growth may be lower than in the past, so low as to make the projections in the intergenerational report unachievable.

On Wednesday at the reform summit, economic modeller Janine Dixon from Victoria University put numbers on a rate of income growth she said was more realistic. Instead of growing by an average of 1.4 per cent per year, real income per person would grow by a bit less than 1 per cent, enough to leave us only 44 per cent better off by 2055. We would need to wait another 20 years to be as well off in 2075 as the intergenerational report said we would be in 2055. Her thinking is that productivity (output per hour worked) will grow far more slowly than it has. To prepare the intergenerational report, the Treasury simply projected the growth rate of the past 40 years to the next 40. She said the past 40 years included "an exceptional period in Australia's economic history – a period which included the major economic reforms of the 1980s combined with unprecedented growth in computing and communications technology and the benefits of the stability brought about by a 23-year run of positive economic growth". Assuming that we are unlikely to computerise once again, and knowing we can't cut high tariffs to near zero again, and that we are most unlikely to survive yet another generation without a recession, she has come up with a much lower estimate of normal productivity growth by excluding the exceptional years between 1994 and 2004.

Professor Ross Garnaut seized on the implications. On present settings, Australia had no chance of achieving the promised 2020 surplus, and instead faced "ever increasing budget deficits". Dixon outlined other implications. If incomes don't rise as rapidly, we will need to save more in order to fund the things we could have once relied on income growth and future generations to fund.Baby boomers and generations X and Y and Z will fight among themselves over who should pay the most. Rapidly rising incomes are a lubricant - they stop people rubbing up against each other. The fighting has already started. Instead of embracing tax reform as our leaders used to, the present lot are frightened, knowing that unless incomes are rising rapidly, tax reform is close to a zero sum game. It isn't possible to make everyone better off.

The former treasury secretary Martin Parkinson said the enormity of what was in store amounted to a recession every decade, as each decade lost 5 percentage points of expected GDP. "It means willingly accepting the impact of a recession," he said. "We are actually going to find ourselves sleepwalking into a real mess." We might get a foretaste on Wednesday when the Bureau of Statistics releases the June quarter national accounts. One bank is tipping economic growth of just 0.2 per cent in the quarter; another, 0.4 per cent. Either result is pitifully low by the standards we have come to expect and if sustained would drive annual growth below 2 per cent. It might be something we will have to get used to. Highly aged societies such as Japan and Italy have long been used to low income growth. Highly aged individuals get used to it as well. The transition has probably been under way for some time. Until now it has been masked by the mining booms.

It won't be catastrophic, but it won't be pleasant. Things that have been easy will become more difficult. It would be nice if our leaders even acknowledged the possibility.

quote:

The verdict

The ACTU claims the China free trade agreement allows Chinese companies to bring in their own workforce for projects over $150 million and removes the requirement for jobs be offered to local workers first.

The written agreement does state that Chinese companies can set up a large infrastructure project without testing the market to see if there are Australian workers to do the jobs. It also says that when issuing visas for these jobs, labour market testing is done "where required" and both the Foreign Affairs and Immigration Departments say companies will have to advertise jobs on these projects to local workers first. But the agreement does not specify that labour market testing must occur before visas are granted and the Department told Fact Check that requirement could be waived in "unique and exceptional circumstances". Experts contacted by Fact Check say the China free trade agreement allows the Immigration Department to decide that jobs should be offered to local workers before it issues visas to overseas workers, but it does not require this to happen.

The ACTU's claim checks out.

Firetrick posted:

I saw John Oliver live in Melbourne, can confirm he was funny. Obviously he made fun of Abbott a bit here too, but he was well known for that already from the show and people expect it of him I guess.

Hockeys Budget posted:

Real GDP is forecast to grow by 2¾ per cent in 2015-16, before increasing to around trend growth of 3¼ per cent in 2016-17.

Quantum Mechanic posted:

It's less cultural cringe and more that we now have a Prime Minister so drastically incompetent that he's internationally famous for it.

Anidav posted:

Someone make a version of that graph with the "Recovery!" from the climate change graph.gif

tithin posted:

I saw him too, right up until I heckled him and he called me an idiot.

He seemed to be on point.

Jumpingmanjim posted:

http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/is-labor-running-dead-in-canning-to-protect-tony-abbott-20150901-gjd1m5.html



hahahahahahah

quote:

Labor strategists concede the government's unpopularity, and that of the Prime Minister in particular, provide the opposition's best hopes for victory in 2016. Thus, they fear a shock byelection loss for the government would shatter the party room resolve and could see Mr Abbott replaced by the more centrist and popular Malcolm Turnbull.

On Wednesday morning Mr Abbott made what may be only his second campaign appearance in the Perth seat during the campaign.

At a media conference in the electorate with Liberal Party candidate Andrew Hastie, the Prime Minister brushed aside questions on what bearing a poor result in Canning would have on his future.

"Look, it's not about me. It's about the people of Canning, it really is," Mr Abbott said.

Mr Hastie himself intervened when Mr Abbott was asked again about leadership speculation.

Answering the question on Mr Abbott's behalf, Mr Hastie said: "I don't have time to take counsel from the east coast Twitterati."

"There's a significant disconnect between what people are saying over in the east and what is happening here in Canning," he said.

But Mr Abbott rejected suggestions Labor was "running dead" in Canning, predicting a fierce campaign from the opposition during the final two weeks before the byelection.

"Our absolute expectation is that there will be a Labor blitz in the last few weeks of this campaign because Labor want this seat," Mr Abbott said.

"It was once a very, very marginal seat."

It comes as cabinet assesses progress of the campaign to hold the seat retained by the Liberals by almost 12 per cent in the 2013 election.

Ms Bishop briefed cabinet on Tuesday about the campaign in which she is playing the key leadership role in close concert with Mr Hastie, a 32-year-old former SAS captain.

It is reported she said Labor was pouring fewer resources into the effort than expected of a party trying to win it, and that Labor's candidate, Matt Keogh, had tended to concentrated his efforts in the northern part of the seat in an area set to become part of the new federal division of Burt.

An electoral redistribution will take effect at the general election creating an extra WA seat, the demographic make-up of which should see it categorised as a Labor seat.

Opposition Leader Bill Shorten said on Wednesday it was a "priority" for Labor to do well in Canning.

"It's a priority to do well because i believe Australia needs a new direction," he said.

Mr Keogh rejected suggestions Labor was not campaigning seriously, declaring they could win the seat and was trying to do so.

"We're not running dead at all in Canning," he told the ABC's Radio National on Wednesday.

"We're not the Liberal Party, we don't have the cash resources for wraparound ads in every newspaper.

"But that doesn't matter because what we're doing is going out and talking to the voters on the ground

"That's exactly how our late former member Don Randall campaigned and what he did while he was a local member."

Mr Keogh said it would be a "tight race" despite the government's margin of almost 12 per cent.

"We definitely have a chance to win this seat. The vibe out on the street definitely makes that clear," he said.

That view was endorsed by the government too, with Assistant Treasurer Josh Frydenberg, telling Sky's Kieran GIlbert that the claim Labor was running dead was illusory.

"Absolutely not," he said. "Make no mistake, Labor wants to win the seat of Canning and will throw everything possible that they can at the byelection."

He said he was "sure" Labor wanted to win, but the government was doing everything necessary to retain it, which is why Mr Abbott has made a second lightning appearance in the electorate.

BCR posted:

The Peccadillo posted:

The phrase "Screw you, Takriti!", does not do a bunch to heighten the "sobreity".

Also that is cool. I lived in East Melbourne for a while, and my girlfriend used to spit at those protesters whenever she walked to the post office.