Thursday 10 July 2014

Unleash the hounds - » The Australian Independent Media Network

Unleash the hounds - » The Australian Independent Media Network





Unleash the hounds











I have often impressed on my children that it is easy to lie,
cheat and steal (if I was an Abbott fan I could stop there), but it
diminishes you.  You must set your own standards.  You must value your
integrity and be honest so others may be confident in trusting you (plus
your stress levels will be much lower).  You must respect the rights of
others, from their possessions to their feelings.  You must try to make
a positive contribution to the world.  And when you fall down, as you
must at times, pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and learn from the
experience.
I have also stressed to them that every person has something
interesting about them and if you listen then you will find it.  We
don’t all have the same skills or the same interests or opinions but we
all have something to contribute.  I often hear people say that respect
is earned – I disagree.  One should always start from a position of
respect – contempt is earned.


I don’t admire people who can throw a punch – I admire people who can
avoid punching, or people who can take a punch and not retaliate. 
There is nothing “best and fairest” about hitting someone Tony.  I
admire people who do what they can to improve the lives of others and to
make other people happy.


I realise this is very idealistic and no-one is perfect but, as a working brief, they are reasonable aspirations.

And then we have this government who, by their language and actions,
have gone against these very principles.  They have unleashed the hounds
and Australia is the poorer for it.


Let’s start with climate change.

Malcolm Turnbull and Kevin Rudd reached consensus on the need for an
ETS and the majority of Australian people supported taking action on
climate change.  And then along comes Tone who, in return for a complete
turnaround on his previously stated support for carbon pricing, was
gifted the leadership by the deniers in the Liberal Party.


In Malcolm Turnbull’s own words

“the fact is that Tony and the people who put him in his
job do not want to do anything about climate change. They do not believe
in human caused global warming. As Tony observed on one occasion
“climate change is crap” or if you consider his mentor, Senator Minchin,
the world is not warming, it’s cooling and the climate change issue is
part of a vast left wing conspiracy to deindustrialise the world.”


Tony himself has in just four or five months publicly advocated the
blocking of the ETS, the passing of the ETS, the amending of the ETS and
if the amendments were satisfactory passing it, and now the blocking of
it.


His only redeeming virtue in this remarkable lack of conviction is
that every time he announced a new position to me he would preface it
with “Mate, mate, I know I am a bit of a weather vane on this, but…..”
Tony then went on an attack dog campaign directed at “working
families”, branding Julia Gillard a liar and making wild assertions
about $100 lamb roasts and whole towns disappearing, none of which came
to fruition.  The effect of carbon pricing on the cost of living was
estimated to be 0.7%, far short of the 2.5% increase brought about by
the introduction of the GST.


Somehow he was able to make people forget that electricity prices had
been increasing rapidly for the past two decades with an increase of
170% from 1995 to 2012 – the carbon price was to blame!


He also studiously avoided mentioning the compensation package which
saw the proceeds of the carbon tax redistributed to pensioners,
families, and trade exposed industries.  Seniors groups determined that 93 per cent of pensioner households would be at least 20 per cent better off.


“The discussion about carbon tax is very lopsided at the moment, in
that all of the emphasis is on the extra costs that will be born through
the tax, but not on the money that will flow back to households through
other payments,” said Frank Jotzo, director of the Centre for Climate
Economics and Policy at the Australian National University.


Tony’s campaign of fear worked even though it was based on lies. 
Denialists, sceptics, and conspiracy theorists were given a validity
they did not merit and a platform to spout their rubbish.  Tony even
appeared at a speaking engagement with that fruitcake Monckton who all
of a sudden found the ABC, under Maurice Newman, a willing participant
in his bullshit


Since coming to power, denialists have been appointed to every
advisory role and, regardless of their lack of expertise, their voice
has drowned out that of the scientists.  From Tony’s page:


Tony Burns:  Come on Scott, true believer. In your own
words, what is the EVIDENCE that man’s CO2 has caused any of the warming
since the Little Ice Age ? … the warming that STOPPED 2 decades ago.


Connie Handbury:  I’m sick and tired of the scientific community
being bandied around as if they were gods and must be believed and
obeyed. Only a small number of wizards ever got anything right and there
is good documentary evidence in the star treck trilogy that they were
time travellers.
And then we have the disgraceful unleashing of the racist bigots in our society in a very purposeful campaign.

Demonising asylum seekers for political gain was a new low which
began with John Howard and was gleefully taken up by Abbott.  Who could
forget the weeks of Parliament devoted to the “convicted Egyptian
jihadist terrorist kept behind a pool fence”.  This disgraceful episode
is Australia’s version of Peter Greste.


In fact Mr Abdellatif
was never charged or convicted on serious terrorism crimes in his
native Egypt and turned out not to be a national security threat.  He
identified himself immediately on reaching Australia and made them aware
of the charges against him and provided evidence refuting them.


But because of the campaign of lies waged by the Opposition, Mr
Abdellatif was removed from his family and locked up in high-security at
Villawood where he remains to this day despite Interpol agreeing he
poses no threat.


“I have been separated from my family in detention for over a year
for no reason,” he told Fairfax Media. “The separation has been
extremely stressful for all my family including my children. We should
be reunited and allowed to live in the community.  The Immigration
department has ignored the new information from Egypt that reveals
clearly that all the charges against me are politically motivated and
are baseless,” he said. “I am as innocent as the Al-Jazeera journalists
who are also the victims of a political trial by the Egyptian military.”


We then had the “feisty, sexy” Fiona Scott suggesting that asylum seekers were responsible for clogging up our highways and hospital waiting rooms.

Reporter: So you mention asylum seekers and overcrowding. I don’t quite get the connection.

Fiona Scott: Well, my recommendation is go and sit in the Emergency
Department of Nepean Hospital or go and sit on the M4 and people see
50,000 people come in by boat; that’s more than twice the population of
Glenmore Park where we just were.
She later qualified these remarks saying she is not blaming the 161
asylum seekers living in the area for a lack of services in western
Sydney, but simply reflecting the concerns of a community she seeks to
represent.  Rather than allaying the unfounded fears of her
constituents, she chose to exploit them.


And of course, we had the concerted campaign by George Brandis and
boy wonder, Tim Wilson, to water down racial discrimination laws and
champion the rights of bigots to be racist and didn’t the bigots flood
out from underneath their rocks.  They have been given official sanction
for their hatred and Liberal Party pages are full of their vile
poison.  The following is an exchange I had on Tony Abbott’s facebook
page:


Mary McIntosh: I don’t consider having gold credit cards,
I phones, digital cameras and the like the possessions of desperate
“poor” asylum seekers. They then have the hide to complain they were
given food that was out of date.


Kaye Lee:  Mary, they are fleeing persecution. It is often the
professional people who are targeted…academics, journalists. Seeking
asylum isn’t means tested. I am horrified by the selfishness of today’s
Australia.


Mary McIntosh: Well if you are so unselfish, how about you take in
about half a dozen and fully support them, you know food, clothe them,
provide housing, all medical and dental needs etc and show us up as the
selfish people of Australia today. But if they are Muslims, don’t forget
there will be no more bacon for breakfast, nor roast pork at Christmas.
Silly me there won’t be Christmas for you because it offends them. Good
luck


Jon. F.Edwards:  Well said Mary McIntosh, but you forgot too mention
that because she is unclean they will want too circumcise her, make her
wear a Burka.
Not content with stirring up the racists, Tony has also made a
deliberate strategy of classifying people as “lifters or leaners.” 
People who are disabled or unemployed or on a pension will now be
vilified as a burden on our society.


I remember a period after university when my husband could not get a
job in his profession so he applied for other jobs, only to be told he
was overqualified – apparently they felt he would not stay so they would
not employ him.  And we are the lucky ones.  I know of many people who
have found themselves unemployed through no fault of their own.  Those
who are made redundant may find another job, only to be made redundant
again – last in, first out.  Young people with no experience can find it
very difficult to get that first break.  Unemployment is no picnic and
living below the poverty line is a daily struggle.


So well done Tony.  You have done more to change this country in your
time as leader of your party than anyone before you.  You have turned
us into a global pariah and a domestic disgrace.  Read the comments on
your own facebook page and understand that YOU are responsible for
bringing out the very worst in what used to be a great country which,
before you came along, was renowned for its contribution to the world
and for lending a helping hand to those in need.



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