Are we guilty of Schadenfreude?

Reading the mainstream newspapers this week and listening to talkback radio has been like going back in time to 2013 when the Labor government was in disarray, the economy was supposedly haemorrhaging and the national debt was skyrocketing.

We remember how the Murdoch press were in hyper drive spilling out story after story about a dysfunctional government, incompetent ministers, backbench members speaking out of turn, leadership rumblings which turned out to be true and so on, and so on. Talk back Radio was doing much the same.

Read more at: The Australian Independent Media Network

First Cracks Appearing

Last night, we witnessed the first cracks in the wall of solidarity in the Liberal Party opening up.

Western Australian liberal MP Dr Dennis Jensen broke ranks with his fellow MPs and called for a leadership spill. He made the call in an interview with Leigh Sales on ABC’s 7.30. Dr Jensen stated that he had received many calls from other MPs, all of whom wanted a leadership change.

Read more at: The Australian Independent Media Network

The Smell of Blood

It’s in the air right now. You can actually taste it. The knives are out. The phones are running hot. How many more clichés can you fit in one paragraph? Politics can be a savage sport, a blood sport. And it generally is when opposing parties face off in parliament. But when the fighting starts within a party, when friend becomes foe, that’s when the blood starts to flow.

Read more at: The Australian Independent Media Network

The MSM asleep at the Wheel.

Last week Mainstream Media (MSM) political commentators were united in their condemnation and their mockery of PM Tony Abbott following his bizarre announcement that HRH Prince Phillip would become an Australian Knight.

They also seemed equally united in their condemnation of Abbott’s overall performance and the prospect of an imminent leadership challenge  following the Queensland election. Better late than never, I suppose.

Read more at: The Australian Independent Media Network

Could anything be more contradictory?

Assistant Treasurer, Josh Frydenberg has just returned from the World Economic Forum meeting in Davos with some pearls of wisdom that have come from a suppository of wisdom that would put Tony Abbott’s suppository of wisdom to shame, i.e., the Troika, otherwise known as the EU Commission, the International Monetary Fund and the European Central Bank.

Read more at: The Australian Independent Media Network

The Equality of Citizenship.

During the period between WW2 and the 1970s most western governments established employment as a right of citizenship. They declared that a properly regulated redistribution of wealth was necessary in a free market system and that an enlightened society required some form of income protection that would be based on a just wage system.

Read more at: The Australian Independent Media Network

The New Cop on the Beat

Andrew Street and Matthew Knott’s highly entertaining and informative articles in the Sydney Morning Herald on Thursday 22nd January, give us some insight as to what we can reasonably expect from the new Minister for Social Services, Scott Morrison.

Read more at: The Australian Independent Media Network

Where are the Visionaries?

If ever Tony Abbott had an opportunity to become the infrastructure Prime Minister he boasted he wanted to be, right now it is staring him in the face. Right now he could authorise a massive capital spending program that would literally electrify the nation and elevate it back to near full employment.

Read more at: The Australian Independent Media Network