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Australian Politics General...

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IFocus said:
Still has moved a significant common sense policy agenda through parliament benefiting lower / middle paid Australians not just doing press photo opportunities and handing out pamphlets.
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I won't say he hasn't done some good but the big mistake was putting far too much emphasis into the Voice.

It was a third tier policy during the election campaign and, politically, should've been handled that way. Something for a junior minister to look after that the PM might've commented on once or twice but that's all.

He really needs to be working 7 days a week catching up at this point. 2024 needs to be a year when Labor knocks the ball out of the park in terms of delivery if they want to impress the public.

Delivering results that is, not speeches and promises.
 
Point of order:

The government cannot deliver any results. They can only facilitate the private sector to do so, or at least get out of the way.

This, they are not doing.
 
wayneL said:
The government cannot deliver any results. They can only facilitate the private sector to do so, or at least get out of the way.
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This depends on the issue at hand.

Immigration for example is absolutely an issue in government hands.

Energy infrastructure and economics is partly government, partly private.

Obstacles and disincentives to land development are in the hands of government. The private sector does the actual building but government has a lot of influence over what happens there, indeed it's arguably government getting it wrong that's created most of the problems.
 
Well that was part of my point, vis a vis "facilitation".

Humans respond to incentives. Everything springs from that, this is what the Austrians have always understood and what the socialists never have.
 
wayneL said:
Well that was part of my point, vis a vis "facilitation".

Humans respond to incentives. Everything springs from that, this is what the Austrians have always understood and what the socialists never have.
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There was a time when governments built and owned social housing.

Given the inability/reluctance of the private sector to supply that market, a return by government into that sector is a viable outcome.
 
SirRumpole said:
There was a time when governments built and owned social housing.

Given the inability/reluctance of the private sector to supply that market, a return by government into that sector is a viable outcome.
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This is first order thinking, whereas the problem of housing social housing (and think deeply about what that term actually means) is several orders deeper than that. The government deciding to wade in to that arena again will in no way solve the problem. Additionally it would probably create problems of greater magnitude, distorting supply and demand in other areas of the economy.

It is simply not a problem of not enough housing for clients of the socialist state, there being many facets to this.
 
There may well be a distortion. Rents would fall, that's want the vast majority of people want. The market is already distorted by incentives given to investors which have created the problem, but I guess that a small percentage that benefit from these don't want them removed and they have a loud voice.
 
SirRumpole said:
There was a time when governments built and owned social housing.

Given the inability/reluctance of the private sector to supply that market, a return by government into that sector is a viable outcome.
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We have gone down the US road (think Regan ) and now accept people sleeping on the streets as normal, it fu(king isn't and never should be time to get back to Australian values and reject US influences typically US flag waving patriotic BS IMHO.
 
I won't say it was perfect but comparing housing 40 years ago versus today, I'd say it worked far better then than it does now.

I don't know what all the answers are but it does seem the present building industry and the overall development chain has a lot of inefficiencies at every step of the process. Some of those are due to government, some don't seem to be.
 
IFocus said:
We have gone down the US road (think Regan ) and now accept people sleeping on the streets as normal, it fu(king isn't and never should be time to get back to Australian values and reject US influences typically US flag waving patriotic BS IMHO.
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I'm all for moving back to the restrictive immigration policies of old. Crush the housing and education ponzi and stop the flood of cheap migrant workers and 'fake' professionals.

But what are Australian values? Aren't they pretty well flag waving patriotic things? And how exactly is that going to stop homelessness?
 
Its the vibe mate, its all about the vibe.
Mick
 
The Triangle said:
But what are Australian values? Aren't they pretty well flag waving patriotic things? And how exactly is that going to stop homelessness?
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The Australian flag waving BS is relatively new, Australians used to be totally cincal about the grandstanding false patriot BS as in politicians now standing in front of walls of flags, total vomit IMHO.

Australian values were about what you did nothing to do with images that are now served up as some sort of representation of your beliefs that don't exist.
 

We have never been as pretentious as the Yanks who seemingly have a need to plant Old Glory in every corner of their world.
 
I'll go along with that to a large degree.

What does patriotism actually mean?

Loyalty to a government?

Political boundaries?

The people within it?

An overarching cultural idiom?

Cheering for the swimming team because they're winning?

Etc.

What is it?
 
A staple diet of American t.v programmed conditioning, over the last 40 years, has a lot to answer for.
It is just a shame we have embraced it so much, that we are gagging to emulate it, as you said there is no excuse for homelessness, yet we are forging ahead with it.
As our underlying economic issues aren't being addressed, maybe a Big Australia is the way forward, I would just like them to explain why.
 
sptrawler said:
A staple diet of American t.v programmed conditioning, over the last 40 years, has a lot to answer for.
It is just a shame we have embraced it so much, that we are gagging to emulate it.
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On the other hand, going back to the 70s when we first came to Australia, we did the national anthem and had flag raising ceremonies at school assemblies.

It was far more in the United States of course when I was there. Pledge of allegiance, national anthem and other patriotic songs, plus the "honour" of being able to be one to raise, take down and fold the flag (it was quite the ritual).

It was so ingrained that I can still remember by heart all of the patriotic songs.

I have no idea whether that all still happens.
 
In a word No, when I go down to the grandkids assembly, there is acknowledgement of the indigenous and then move on.
Which in itself is interesting as 90% of the kids are either Asian or Indian and look about as interested in the acknowledgement, as we are in the Adhan calling up the hordes at sunrise.
Can't wait to see how this patriotism goes, when it is called upon in about 20 years time, it will be " You want me to do what, you have got to be $hitting me".

Let's be honest, Mascot Towers is nothing compared to the building problems we are going to have, when Xi is sitting in Canberra.

Australia is looking more and more like General Custer, at the Little Big Horn, meanwhile we are busy telling everyone we don't need backup FFS.
 
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SirRumpole said:
Different type of Indians.
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Yep but same result, he thought he was bigger than what he was and spurned assistance due to extreme arrogance.
You know like how we are saying flck the yanks and the U.K as well, that I find interesting, who do the muppets think they are going to call if a foreign country decides to take us on.
(Let's be honest it probably wouldn't be China, but it could well be a country heavily sponsored by China)

Have they actually thought past their own arrogance, I don't think so, they can't think past their tribal political conditioning let alone the international landscape.
 
I think this point is far more important than just flags and so on.

There's an awful lot going on at present that amounts to symbolism rather than substance. Everything from education to climate change to housing to economic reform it's the same story. What we're seeing is something that creates the impression of action, as distinct from actual action.

I call it the Hollywood movie approach. Because it actually is the case that movies can and do use certain stereotypes and imagery to create the impression of something in a way that's immediately recognisable to pretty much everyone, even those who have no first hand experience of the situation being portrayed. Anything from working in a big business head office to life in the 1980's, movies can and do convey the situation in a way practically everyone recognises even if they've never seen the real thing.

Trouble is we seem to be seeing that in reality now. A focus on creating the illusion of something rather than the substance.

Flag waving etc and other overt displays of patriotism are very much like that. They create an impression of something but they aren't that thing. They're the movie stereotype version of it, they create an illusion extremely well but they're not the real deal. Putting up foreign made flags has nothing to do with Australian values or real patriotism.

We've living in an extremely fake world right now. A world where saying the right words but delivering absolutely nothing sees someone placed on a pedestal versus someone who promises a third as much but actually delivers it in full is heavily criticised for not doing enough.

All sides are guilty and it's ultimately going to bite society extremely hard in my view.
 
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