mightychurch.com

Yep, I’m voting Green.

I’ll be voting for Labor and the Greens in the senate

I can’t vote for the Coalition. Too much irrational nit-picking. So I don’t know who to vote for.

I vote anti-green. Anything to keep them from gaining influence and power. Ick.

Kevin Goddard - 23 July 2010 07:34 PM

Hi Arthur,

Just letting you know that Ken is not alone in his thinking about young voters and their voting trends. Most research figures that I have seen over the years tend to agree that the majority of younger voters - and there are millions - favour the left side - especially on ‘emotive’ issues ... I guess by now you’ve figured out how I’ll be voting. Also, I have yet to find anyone who will be voting Labor - and I talk to lots of people.

Cheers for now.

Thanks Kev.  I condition what I said before by saying that most of my friends (young or old) live in one of the safest Labor electorates in the country - Barton - and the adjoining seats to the north more are even more so.

I don’t remember the 80s and early 90s too well, given that I was only a toddler around that time.  But in my mind I’d like to distinguish between past and present Federal Labor governments by articulating that the current Labor government is much more right-wing then it used to be without being a bit too extreme, something which I know you and Ken won’t do.

I’ll be voting for Labor in the House of Reps and Donkey / Reverse Donkey (so long as it’s not socialist, racist, Australian Sex Party or Secular Party) in the Senate.  So I could be potentially voting Liberal or Green in the Senate for control purposes.

(Corrected for grammar)

http://www.sydneyanglicans.net/life/culture/how_should_a_christian_vote/#16715 has more discussion.  Dave has been contributing heaps in the comments ... feel free to make a few here too!

I can’t vote for the Coalition. Too much irrational nit-picking.

Like today’s admission from the Treasurer/Deputy PM for example ?

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/07/26/2964184.htm?section=justin

Swan confirms $100m-a-day debt figure

Noon   Monday 26 July 2010

Federal Treasurer Wayne Swan has conceded the Opposition is correct when it claims Labor is borrowing $100 million a day to pay back Government debt.

Mr Swan says the Government borrowed the money to support the economy during the global financial crisis.

He says that was the responsible course of action and budget deficits would have been far higher had Opposition Leader Tony Abbott been in charge.

“The correct figure is that our net debt, our net position - which is the way this has always been measured - is 6 per cent of GDP,” Mr Swan said.

“That’s the figure to use because that’s the one that international markets use to judge the strength of an economy.

“He’s [Mr Abbott] broken it down into a headline which doesn’t give you an indication of how strong our economy is.”

Say that again Mr Swan ...

the Opposition is correct when it claims Labor is borrowing $100 million a day to pay back Government debt.

BORROWING $100 million a day ...... to PAY BACK Government DEBT ????

Labor really are incompetent economic managers. Now while some of us may see this as simply more evidence of why we don’t trust Labor with money - still others just think that we’re “nit picking”. Go figure.

Just saw a post on another blog about the above Swan admission (#32) and thought I would pass it on for it’s political analysis :

Swan forgot to read the ALP script, and will now be in big trouble for telling the truth.

Here is an idea for a bumper car sticker:
”Want a small business ?  Buy a big business and let the ALP manage it”

It is said that the people get the Government they deserve.

Looking at the NSW election last time in, I would say people didnt deserve the Labor Govt they got, but they were silly enough to vote them in despite that. Now the majority are sorry they voted for them, it seems.

I hope the same effort is not repeated with the upcoming Federal election. But I would reckon that many in the electorate are actually politically ignorant. People vote on slogans, which leader appeals to them, or one-issue reasons. Pity help us.

The old joke, which is so much a fact - half the population are below average intelligence.

I can never see the reason one might vote for a minor party? They will never run the country, and they ultimately give their preferences to a major party. In the case of the Greens, how many of their preferences go to Liberals? So it is in fact a Labor vote in the end.
Why allow a minor party to dictate to the country and hold the parliament to ransom, on the basis of a few sideline issues?

If we wanted someone to manage our household, what type of manager would we look for? One who has a bad record and lies to us, or someone who is honest and a good money manager? That is why I prefer the Libs. They have a much better record, and in the end give most people more financial benefit because they get the house in order.

The libs screw civil society up.
We get wealth and reduce capacity to enjoy it.
I hate how they mess up communities.
You can have them

    Kev,  Maybe you could vote for Labour because they are a shambles. Afterall to preserve democracy we must have at least 2 parties. I think Democracy is more important to preserve than $1oo million a day. Just ask Sydney Anglican treasurer.

Some level of government debt is essential - it results in a healthy economy (I don’t fully understand the economics behind it, but this is how it always has been.) The question is whether the debt is growing uncontrollably, and I don’t believe it currently is.

Hey Ken,

What do you think about this startling revelation about dear Julia ?

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/breaking-news/gillard-opposed-parental-leave-report/story-e6freuyi-1225897683259

Gillard opposed parental leave - report

From:AAP July 27, 2010 7:15PM

PRIME Minister Julia Gillard reportedly opposed a parental leave scheme and had concerns about a pension increase when she was Kevin Rudd’s deputy.

The Nine Network’s political journalist Laurie Oakes said he had leaked information from government sources supporting this assertion.

Ms Gillard reportedly opposed in cabinet the 18-week paid parental leave scheme set at the minimum wage, which is due to begin in January 2011.

“The idea that paid parental leave would be a political winner was misconstrued,’’ Ms Gillard was quoted as telling cabinet.

“People beyond child-bearing age would resent it as would stay-at-home mothers.”

Ms Gillard reportedly questioned the $30 a week increase for single pensioners, billed as the biggest rise in a century since the pension was introduced.

Government sources quoted in the report said that while Ms Gillard was not opposed to the pension increase, she questioned the $14 billion cost on the grounds “elderly voters did not support Labor”.

Mr Oakes said the leaks did not come from the Liberal Party and hinted that the source was someone closer to home.

The Labor Party campaign office has issued a response on behalf of Ms Gillard.

“Cabinet discussions are confidential. I have always respected cabinet confidentiality and I will continue to do so,” it said in a statement.

“In any case, I would not respond to anonymous allegations.

“If the Liberal Party have allegations to make, they should put their names to them.”

A further report to appear in today’s “Australian” :

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/people-in-politics/parental-leave-claim-jolts-pm-as-family-comes-to-the-fore/story-fn5oa9i5-1225897713969

Parental leave claim hits PM as family comes to the fore

Brendan Nicholson and Patricia Karvelas     From:The Australian July 28, 2010

NEW claims that Julia Gillard opposed Labor’s paid parental leave scheme in cabinet jolted her campaign last night as family issues became front and centre of the contest.

The embarrassing claims emerged on a day when the Prime Minister was forced to discuss publicly the prospects of her marrying her live-in boyfriend, Tim Mathieson, and Tony Abbott campaigned with his daughter Louise, 21, a day after his wife, Margie, joined him at a childcare launch, highlighting the differences between the leaders’ personal circumstances.

Nine Network journalist Laurie Oakes reported last night that Ms Gillard opposed the government’s plan for an 18-week paid parental leave scheme set at the minimum wage and questioned increasing the age pension by $30 a week for singles when they were discussed by cabinet.

Oakes said Ms Gillard, who was then deputy prime minister, argued that the idea that paid parental leave would be a political winner was being misconstrued. She said people beyond child-bearing age would resent it, as would stay-at-home mothers, Oakes said.

She also allegedly questioned the $14 billion cost of the pension increase on the grounds “elderly voters did not support Labor”.

Ms Gillard told Oakes that if the Liberals had allegations to make, they should put their names to them. That invited the barbed retort from Oakes that the information did not come from the Liberals. “You’ll need to look a lot closer to home,” he said.

Asked to comment last night, Ms Gillard issued a statement that did not answer the claim about her views on paid parental leave.

“I was very proud to be a member of the Labor team that delivered these two historic achievements—delivering a better deal for pensioners and supporting parents to spend more time with their babies,” she said. “Pensioners and families deserve more support, and this government has acted to give them that support.”

The revelations blunted Labor’s attacks on the Coalition’s parental leave scheme, which the government claims will lead to higher prices for consumers and drive up inflation.

Oakes’s report came two weeks after he put to Ms Gillard during a nationally televised National Press Club appearance an allegation that she had reneged on the deal that would have allowed Kevin Rudd to remain prime minister. Former Labor leader Mark Latham has, in his book, previously accused Mr Rudd of leaking information to Oakes.

Hi Arthur,

At #24 you said :

It’s the older voters that prop Labor up most; in my opinion the retirees are a much bigger factor - as those on the pension want it preserved and fear that it would be slashed under a Liberal government.

Obviously Julia Gillard has a different view -

She also allegedly questioned the $14 billion cost of the pension increase on the grounds “elderly voters did not support Labor”.

Maybe Ken and I are onto something about how Labor thinks and acts after all ;)

A warning for those who are thinking of voting for the Greens :

http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/radical-roots-seep-through-at-the-heart-of-greens-20100726-10sj0.html#poll

Radical roots seep through at the heart of Greens  by Gerard Henderson

July 27, 2010

Senator Bob Brown gave some good advice to voters last week. Asked about the preference deal negotiated between the Greens and Labor, the Greens leader declared he agreed “with those people who last time ignored the preference directions from all the parties and put their preferences where they wanted to”. Brown said this is what he did.

The Greens leader is much admired among journalists. With the obvious exception of Leigh Sales on Lateline, few reporters drew attention to the disingenuousness involved here. The Greens negotiated a deal to direct preferences to Labor in the Senate, and in most of the marginal House of Representatives seats, in return for ALP preferences in both the Senate and the House. This will almost certainly ensure that the Greens will exercise the balance of power in the Senate after July 1 next year.

Yet Brown is dismissive of the agreement likely to ensure a forthcoming key role for him in Australian politics. That aside, Brown has established a useful precedent. It is widely accepted the Greens have a chance in this election of winning seats in the House. The most likely prospects are the inner-city seats of Melbourne (where Cath Bowtell has Labor preselection after Lindsay Tanner’s resignation), Sydney and Grayndler. The latter two seats are being defended by Labor ministers Tanya Plibersek and Anthony Albanese respectively.

The Liberal Party has no hope of winning seats in inner-city Melbourne or Sydney. Nor do the Greens have the support to win an absolute majority. The Greens can only win if they receive Liberal preferences - which is likely to be the case.

It is here that Brown’s advice has value. It would make sense for Liberal voters to place the likes of Bowtell, Plibersek and Albanese ahead of the Greens, irrespective of what the Liberal Party machine directs. The Liberal Party is closer to the left of the ALP than to the middle-class radicals who control the inner-city Greens.

Labor remains favourite to win the election despite the narrowing of its lead in some opinion polls. In any event, a surprise Coalition victory would not be dependent on the Greens winning inner-city electorates from Labor. Moreover, in the event of a hung parliament, the Greens are more likely to support Labor and Julia Gillard than the Coalition and Tony Abbott.

The only way for the Liberals and Nationals to stop Greens’ victories in the Senate is to maximise the Coalition vote. As the Australian Workers Union national secretary and Labor Party faction leader, Paul Howes, has pointed out, the contemporary Greens are conflicted. There are Greens such as Brown and senator Christine Milne, who are primarily environmental activists. There are Greens such as NSW Senate candidate Lee Rhiannon who are inner-city left-wing political activists.

Howes declared in The Sunday Telegraph that the Greens ‘‘party is being infiltrated by many whose commitment to the environment is questionable, and who are more focused on turning the Greens into a left-wing, socialist-style party’‘. Earlier, on the The Contrarians program on Sky News, Howes referred to Rhiannon as coming from a family who were ‘‘lifelong members of the pro-Stalinist Socialist Party’‘. He went on to warn about the ex-communists and socialists ‘‘trying to take over the inner-city branches of the Greens’‘.

Nationals senator Fiona Nash has the third spot on the Coalition’s Senate ticket in NSW. Assuming Labor wins three Senate quotas and the Coalition two, the sixth vacancy will likely be contested between Nash and Rhiannon. Here the occasionally soft Coalition types can learn from the tough-minded Howes.

So far, Nash has said little, if anything, about Rhiannon. Sure Rhiannon’s resume contains scant material about her radical past. However, the details are set out in Mark Aarons’s The Family File, the author’s account of his family’s long-time membership of the Communist Party of Australia.

Rhiannon is not responsible for the fact she is the daughter of long-time CPA operatives Bill and Freda Brown (no relation to Bob Brown). But she is responsible for continuing the family’s tradition as a young adult. In his book, Mark Aarons, the son of Laurie and Carol Aarons, says the Aarons and Brown families tolerated the excesses of communist totalitarianism up until the brutal invasion of Czechoslovakia by the Soviet Union in 1968. Then the communist movement split. The Aarons family stood up to Moscow but the Brown family adopted the position of continuing Stalinists and formed the Socialist Party of Australia.

Mark Aarons fell out with Rhiannon in the 1970s when, he claims, she refused to condemn the invasion of Czechoslovakia or the shooting of workers by the Polish communist dictatorship. He writes: ‘‘I could not conceive of someone of my age and experience supporting Moscow’s policies.’‘

Already there is evident tension between the Greens leadership in Canberra and Rhiannon. This is likely to increase if she wins a Senate vacancy. Howes understands the anti-business, anti-jobs agenda of the radical Greens is contrary to Labor’s stance. You have to wonder how long it will take the Coalition to wake up to the fact that the best way to defend Nash is to expose Rhiannon’s middle-class radicalism.

Gerard Henderson is executive director of The Sydney Institute.

Just 2 of hundreds of comments :

“A vote for the Greens is an admission that you do not have the intellectual rigor to truly assess the policies of the major parties and make a choice.
No responsible voter could review all the Greens policies, many of which are utterly insane, and genuinely consider them to be the best party to vote for.”

“I feel like I have woken up to some alternative universe.  Since when did these communists get into mainstream politics?  Surely there are enough from the Eastern Block, Afghanistan or Vietnam who fled to Australia in the 50s’ 60’s 70’s and beyond to call these shameless people out for what they are? These regimes are evil beyond measure and their principal tool is subversion of the young.  Has the world really forgotten so easily?  I was warned that this is how it would start by parents and grandparents, but thought at the time they were being alarmist.”

Hi Doug,

When you suggested at #36 that :

Kev,  Maybe you could vote for Labour because they are a shambles

I guess that you weren’t really expecting the media to agree with you so soon about Labor being in such a hopeless mess.

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/breaking-news/gillard-government-chaotic/story-e6freuyi-1225897786306

Gillard Government ‘chaotic’

From:AAP   July 28, 2010 4:27AM

JULIA Gillard has been accused of running a chaotic government plagued by vendettas following a report she opposed paid parental leave in cabinet.

Channel 9 political journalist Laurie Oakes has quoted unnamed Government sources saying the prime minister spoke out against Labor’s 18-week scheme, due to start in January, when she was Kevin Rudd’s deputy.

The report also suggested Ms Gillard questioned but did not oppose a $30 rise in the single pension on the basis elderly people did not vote Labor.

Ms Gillard has refused to confirm or deny the report, arguing cabinet discussions should stay confidential. But senior Opposition frontbencher Andrew Robb said the leaked report showed Ms Gillard could not run a stable government.

“Within a matter of weeks, the Gillard government is falling apart,” Mr Robb said yesterday.
“It’s descending into chaos, it’s plagued by leaks, it’s plagued by paybacks and vendetta. Discipline has disappeared.”

The report comes less than two weeks after it was revealed Ms Gillard reneged on a deal she had made with Mr Rudd the night before Labor powerbrokers rolled him as leader in late June.

I agree with you Doug - Labor is a shambles ;)

Hey everyone,

@ Ken, Kev and Dannii re Federal Labor’s debt - it’s insubstantial compared to GDP, and better than all developed countries apart from Luxembourg.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_public_debt has one of many sources substantiating this; other sources from the OECD and RBA I’ve read in the past say something similar.  That’s right, Federal Labor in Australia even with debt being $100m a day has one of the LOWEST rates of government debt in the world.  But don’t let the truth get in the way of a good story eh?

@ Kev re borrowing to repay debt - Accounting and Finance 101.  It’s common practice amongst banks and governments as all their balance sheets are naturally long-dated on assets (or tax) and short-dated on liabilities (or debt).  These institutions typically roll debt, another way of saying that the institution is temporarily borrowing to repay debt.  Next.

@ Kev re Julia - People are most free to personally disagree with their leaders then vote in line, it’s called the exercise of democracy.  That’s what Lib supporters would say if it happened in their party.  Whatever the motivation, Julia was rightfully concerned about not wasting money on an overly expensive paid parental leave scheme like what Tony Abbott is proposing.  I disagree with Julia regarding her underestimate of elderly support for Labor though.

@ Ken re people voting on one issue - Lib supporters generally do the same, except they vote on the issue of the almighty dollar.

@ Ken re voting other parties in the Senate - It’s important in the interests of democracy that no party has total control of both houses.  Otherwise you will see evil policies such as Workchoices being let through without a whimper.

With all the Federal Labor bashing especially in the Daily Tele and AM talkback going on, you’d think that if Tony Abbott was elected the mistakes would all go away.  But Abbott has already made plenty of mistakes in opposition, not least the one where he admitted to being a liar (“Don’t trust me on anything unless it’s in writing”).  If the Libs get in, which is thankfully unlikely with Abbott as leader, then you really deserve it.  That said, I don’t hate the Libs, I just hate a minority in the Libs one of which is Abbott.

Hi Arthur,

Thanks for all that detailed response. However, I would like to consider “Basic Finance 101” :

If someone has a big debt - and then borrows more money just to try and cover the repayments - then wouldn’t they be just going backwards and getting into even more debt ? Just ask your local bank manager for advice if you consider this is faulty thinking.

With regard to national debt, the facts are that Labor inherited a handy $26 billion in the bank when they came to office in 2007 - and after spending that amount have proceeded to build up a debt of almost $100 billion. That’s a negative turnaround of almost $126 billion.

When the Howard government was elected back in 1996 they inherited a national debt from Hawke/Keating of $96 billion - which took almost 10 years to finally eradicate. It seems like another case of deja vu is approaching ;)

Hi Arthur, thanks for that. It’s kind of what I thought, but I don’t have the technical knowlege

My point of disagreement is on the Senate.  The Greens are not honorable like the Democrats were.  And while they like to present on environmental credentials, I think they really are implacably anti-Christian.  (And I don’t think a donkey vote is the answer, either.) 
 
Check these out, if you haven’t already:
   
 
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/dangerous-hands-to-be-holding-balance-of-power/story-fn59niix-1225895823244 
     
 
http://leerhiannon.org.au/speeches/humanist-society

Now, a lot of this from Lee Rhiannon is crazy stuff, and although it only seems to apply to the loony religious right, my hunch is Lee Rhiannon would tend to lump most Christians and certainly all evangelicals together. 
   
     
   

Humanist Society
— filed under: Religion, Speech
Monday 18 May 2009
The rise of the religious right is very real. While their vote is relatively small, money is not in short supply and they have powerful friends. They are a growing political force in this country and one we need to factor into our own work for a secular society committed to equity for all.

Sydney
The rise of the religious right is very real. While their vote is relatively small, money is not in short supply and they have powerful friends. They are a growing political force in this country and one we need to factor into our own work for a secular society committed to equity for all.

In our country the Christian faith dominates and those with a narrow view of that faith interpret their beliefs as providing legitimation for the divine right of those who have power.

Australia is dominated by a profit making system in which people who are wealthy have a disproportionate influence over the whole nation.

The stairway to paradise has become almost indistinguishable from the stairway of opportunity. Prosperity theology is a dangerous fundamentalist religion. They may not have suicide bombers but their damage to our way of life and values that serve all is immense.

Family First has grown out of this approach to politics. To what extent they are a deliberate import from the USA we don’t yet know. But they are definitely part of the political landscape after the Labor Party in Victoria breathed life into them with a miscalculated preference deal.

It is worth noting that Family First’s chairperson Peter Harris has said that it was the Greens with their “tough tax and liberal drug policies” that spurred his party on. They were able to raise $1.2 million for the 2004 election campaign. This is a phenomenal amount for a small party. They won a Senate seat in Victoria with less than 2% of the vote.

Our concern is that while Family First and the Christian right is still small it could exert undue influence on conservative governments similar to what One Nation did in the late 1990s.

The Howard government’s policies on refugees and indigenous people were heavily influenced by One Nation. And now we could see Family First exert the same influence on Howard’s policies on health, welfare and education.

We have already seen a major funding boost to Christian schools from the federal government and we will see more of that.

Family First are the political voice of some ugly policies that we have not heard of in this country since the dark days of sectarian divisions in the first half of last century.

A Family First candidate in Victoria, Pastor Danny Nalliah, called on his followers to pull down Satan’s strongholds, which he named as brothels, gambling places, mosques and temples.

In the seat of La Trobe the Family First posters read “A vote for Christian Disarray is a vote for Satan”. Disarray was the Labor candidate who was voted out.

And then there was the Family First party worker in Queensland who said they supported lesbians being burnt to death.

I acknowledge that the Family First leadership has moved to distance themselves from these extreme statements but I would argue that the Family First agenda benefits from these outbursts. Obviously the publicity puts them in the spot light but also the outlandish positions pulls the political agenda to the right and opens up space for those who are trying to reverse hard one gains.

Women’s right to access abortion services looks like it is at the top of their hit list.

Last Thursday night I attended a small protest outside the very swank Sheraton on the Park. Inside an innocently named Women’s Forum was to be held. It was in fact a meeting to discuss the next stage in the campaign to ban abortions.

In attendance were Family First President Andrea Mason, Julia Irwin former Labor Senator and other leading women in this area. This was a meeting to whip up ordinary women - four busloads from the Hills district were brought in.

Please don’t think that just because PM John Howard reined in some of his own MPs on the abortion issue that it has gone away. The push to ban abortion is very real - it is well funded, and well connected.

This week in parliament all MPs received a disturbing booklet “Abortion and Religion”, produced by the Foundation for Human Development.

This 20-page colour glossy has a summary of misleading figures on abortions. Many of the figures being quoted include procedures carried out when women have naturally lost their baby. This is clearly a dishonest way to inflate the figures.

The booklet brings together the views of 16 religious leaders including Buddhist, different Christian faiths and the Jewish faith. While all these faiths are not against a women’s right to choose abortion the way the material is presented leaves one with that impression that the official position of all these religions is anti-abortion. The reality is that the Foundation have found 16 male religious leaders to write about their own thoughts on this matter.

So who is the Foundation. On the website of the NSW Right to Life Association website it is listed under “Other Australian Pro-Life Groups” in one spot while elsewhere it describes the Foundation as “the educational and counselling arm of NSW Right to Life”.

Now the truth about the relationship of the Foundation and the Association may seem peripheral but it could be very significant as the Australian Tax Office in 2000 made the Foundation for Human Development a Deductible Gift Recipient. Now it would appear from our reading of the regulations that organisations with this tax-deductible status are clearly prohibited from lobbying.

If the Foundation is an arm of the Right to Life Association it is clearly linked with lobbying. But in their name they are lobbying MPs around the country as shown by their publication “Abortion and Religion”.

So does that mean the Foundation is not acting within the requirements of the ATO. Is it breaking the law? Hopefully the ATO is doing its job and checking this out.

For ourselves we need to closely monitor the activities of the likes of Family First, the Foundation for Human Development and their ilk.

A secular society where women’s health needs are fully met are being eroded. Turning around that tide of destruction and ensuring that the religious right is not in the political ascendancy are clearly linked.

APOLOGY TO ARTHUR:

Sorry Arthur, but I made a mistake in #44. Apparently the Rudd/Gillard Labor government has NOT got us into debt for about $100 billion. It seems that our National net debt has actually blown out to a staggering $150 billion !!!!! 

And that will probably not be fully repaid for a generation - unbelievable incompetency - but typical Labor approach.  And the states also have a combined debt of about $160 billion - so that about rounds it up. It’s not a pretty picture - and I am truly sorry. Sorry, that is, that Labor’s amateurism and incompetence have created such a mess.

You seem to want a situation in which there is no government debt at all. But that would mean there would be no government bonds - highly stable and very low risk investments.

You seem to want a situation in which there is no government debt at all.

That’s not what I meant to imply - although having no debt is certainly a good target for anyone to ultimately aim for. Debt in itself can be okay - PROVIDED that you can afford to repay it. That is how most of us buy houses and cars etc. But if we only attempt to pay off the interest each month, then we will never reduce the total amount of debt which will still be there long down the track.

Regarding our national net federal debt, I am pointing out that whereas the “Government Kitty” had a positive balance of $26 billion dollars less than three years ago, the Rudd/Gillard government has spent that amount - and has left us with a negative balance of about minus $150 billion. I cannot see any wisdom in arguing that that is a good situation to be in.

At the moment, the Federal government is still borrowing even more money ( as Wayne Swan admitted the other day ) in order to repay the interest bills which keep on coming with strict regularity. That seems unwise to me - especially when so many community needs and projects are refused any more financial support because the cupboard is bare.

Two items for attention :

(1) Did anyone else catch the beginning of tonight’s Channel Ten 5pm News ?

If so, you would have observed our “de facto” Prime Minister LYING OUTRIGHT to the Australian public. When talking about Kevin Rudd being in hospital for an emergency gall bladder operation, Julia looked at the camera and said “we wish Kevin Rudd well and WE ARE ALL PRAYING for his speedy recovery”.

Now that sentiment sounds okay - however,  does anyone else see the sheer spin, hypocrisy and insincerity in what she just said ? After all, this is the same Julia Gillard who boasted only last week that she is an ATHEIST. Julia often talks of the ALP being a ‘broad church’ - BUT when did ATHEISTS start praying ? She obviously has no idea of what she believes - or even what she doesn’t believe ?

(2)  My ‘troubled’ conscience vote :

How ironic that my second preference vote will actually go to the Greens ( who I consider whackos ). You see I live in Werriwa - and, incredibly, we have only 3 candidates ! So my first vote will be for the Liberals - and then, in order to give my last preference to the Labor candidate,  I will therefore HAVE to give Greens my number 2.

Who would ever have thought that I would be placed in such an invidious position ? Now this really is ironic !!!

Who are the candidates ? Check it out at :

http://www.aec.gov.au/election/who-are-the-candidates.htm