Being An Aussie Blues

"I Fixed It!" - No You Didn't

Christopher Pyne declared he'd fixed the deregulation bill to get it through the senate. He was most chuffed about it and put in this performance, which earned him much derision and ridicule (as it should).

"I fixed it", he declared, visibly quite proud of himself.

...only to have his bill defeated in the Senate.

The Senate has rejected the Abbott government's proposed higher education changes - including the deregulation of university fees - for the second time within three months.
The government's bill, which would have allowed universities to set their own undergraduate fees, was defeated by 34 votes to 30 on Tuesday night. 

The government fell three votes short of the six crossbench votes it needed to pass the changes. 

Senators Bob Day, David Leyonhjelm and John Madigan voted in favour of the bill while senators Ricky Muir, Glenn Lazarus, Nick Xenophon, Zhenya Wang and Jacqui Lambie voted against it.

So much for that one. What can you say?

Off The Cuff Gratuitous Offence To Ireland

Maybe the Irish are sensitive about being Irish. But what can a people do being born in a certain place with a certain heritage? There are much worse things in the world, like being born intemperate like our Prime Minister.

Taoiseach Enda Kenny has told an Irish newspaper he had watched Mr Abbott's video and rejected the perception that Ireland was synonymous with alcohol. 

 (I confess, I don't know how to pronounce Taoiseach)

Mr Abbott prompted criticism last week for the video message, in which he awkwardly describes St Patrick's Day as the one day when "it's good to be green".

He proclaims Ireland's most famous day "a great day for the Irish, and the English, the Vietnamese, the Cambodians and everyone who cares to come to a party".
Mr Abbott signs off his message with an apology that "I can't be there to share a Guinness or two or maybe even three". 

Mr Kenny said he had heard Mr Abbott's comments and he didn't agree with them.
"I've heard the Prime Minister's comments. He made them. I don't agree with that," he was reported as saying in the Irish Independent. 

"I think that it is perfectly in order for so many Irish people in Australia to have an enjoyable celebration of St Patrick's Day and St Patrick's week, and to do so in a thoroughly responsible fashion. 

"There has been a long-term view of a stage Irish perception. I reject that. I think it's really important that we understand that we have a national day that can be celebrated worldwide, St Patrick's Day."

I think the word got out that Tony Abbott is now a free-to-all punching bag. Much as I hold Tony Abbott in low esteem, I don't think he was that offensive. Needless to point out that the Irish diaspora is huge. St Patrick's Day is all over the anglophone world. Nobody thinks it's exclusively a day for alcohol consumption, or that it is a day of alcohol consumption because it's an Irish holiday. I don't really get the objection. Is Mr. Kenny really that interested in responsible drinking in Australia? I can't imagine it.

I think Mr. Kenny is one of those people looking to take deep offence in the most innocuous of comments. Well sir, here's a bit of advice to you Mr. Kenny: leave the kicking of Tony Abbott to us Australians and stay the fuck out of things you don't understand.

WTE Joe Hockey Lives Up To His WTE Status

Worst Treasurer Ever Joe Hockey ran into serious flack on television. He was asked why he hadn't abolished Negative Gearing and reclaimed it would force up rents. That was a red rag to the bull - and a bull arms with facts at that:

It was absolutely true that rents went up fast in Sydney, "which might have been there wasn't a lot of housing being built in Sydney in the couple of years previously". 

"But look beyond Sydney and rents were dead - barely moved in Brisbane, didn't go up very far in Melbourne, didn't go up very far in Adelaide. They did go up very fast in Perth which makes you suspect very strongly that the race memory we have of abolish negative gearing, that rents will go up, is a race memory built on Sydney." 

Daley said rents shouldn't go up because "by definition what happens at the auction is that the investor doesn't win the auction but someone who wants to live in the house does. Net impact, there is one less renter and there is one less rental property. Net impact on the rental market, zero."

Yep. but even more damning than the Negative Gearing bit was this section:

Then Daley took on Hockey's claim that he was delivering the biggest infrastructure program in Australian history. 

"It certainly hasn't gone up," he said. "It's probably tailed off, at least in as a percentage of GDP." 

Hockey said Daley was wrong. "For a start we put $1.5 billion into WestConnex in Sydney," he said. 

Daley reminded him that the project predated the Abbott government. He said not a single new project approved in Hockey's first budget had received a green light from Infrastructure Australia. 

Hockey deflected the accusation by saying Melbourne's East West Link had at least been subject to a cost benefit analysis by the Victorian government. He was reminded that the former Victorian government refused to release it in part because the numbers didn't stack up. 

When Hockey said the tax discussion paper wouldn't consider tax increases, Daley said that was exactly what was needed. 

"We as a society have essentially decided to spend quite a lot more money on health. It's good news, it's keeping people alive for a lot longer. The bad news is someone's got to pay for it. We've agreed as a society to have an national disability insurance scheme scheme, that's terrific but somebody's got to pay for it." 

"So far we've had relatively little discussion about the fact that taxes will probably have to go up, and of course no politician wants to talk about that."

And Joe Hockey promptly stopped talking about it. Didn't mention having to raise taxes at all.
It must be great fun to be made to look like a complete dill in front of all those people in TeeVee-land. Of course, this being Q&A, it probably rated at best 8%. I sure as heck didn't watch it.