Nothing grinds my gears more than the labor leadership speculation

Do we really want to fulfill kevin rudd's sense of megalomania?

Hes not even close to a successful challenge for the labor leadership

Well the Age should've come out and said to get rid of Arthur instead!

24 June 2013, 6.18am EST
As a gay man, I will not be lectured on discrimination by Julia Gillard

AUTHOR


Marcus O'Donnell
Lecturer, Program Convenor, Journalism at University of Wollongong


Julia Gillard has taken Tony Abbott and the Liberals to task for gender bias, but what about her own stance on gay marriage? AAP/Lukas Coch
Julia Gillard has had a rough few days. More accurately weeks, well, months. Let’s face it, years. And at the centre of so many of her travails has been debate about her gender.

She’s been called a witch, deliberately barren, asked if her partner is gay and been the subject of a “joke” menu where a dish was described, with misogynistic cruelty, in terms of parts of her anatomy.

But for all Gillard’s outrage about the language and attitudes she faces, there’s a rather large elephant siting in her office in The Lodge which she seems to determined to ignore: she’s just as guilty of discrimination herself, the only difference being that instead of differentiating between people on because of their gender, she does so on their sexuality.

Until she changes her position on marriage equality anything she has to say on gender, discrimination or equality can only be taken as political posturing. In many ways marriage equality is a relatively minor issue in the larger drama of Australian political life. But on another level it is central to any evaluation of Julia Gillard’s leadership.

Equality of any kind is always important but that’s not why it matters at the moment. It matters because it speaks directly to the question of trust. It speaks to who will be valued and who will be cast aside by our political leaders. It shows us who the PM thinks is expendable.

In announcing the gender discrimination inquiry Gillard held up a conviction she needs to be held to:

Given that I want us to be a nation where [there is] equal opportunity for everyone at every time in their life, I want to get to the bottom of the problem and what the solutions could be.
A deeply admirable sentiment, but if she genuinely believed in promoting “equal opportunity for everyone at every time in their life” gay men and lesbians would have the same choice that is open to her and every other straight parliamentarian. She has chosen not to marry her partner, Tim Mathieson, but the reality is she could marry him tomorrow if she chose to.

She maintains her position on marriage is a personal view. She maintains that marriage is a deeply held tradition. She maintains that other options are available for gay and lesbian relationships.

But each time she comes up with one of these justifications for her position she portrays gay and lesbian people as “others” and actively discriminates against us, constricting our choices. Neither personal beliefs nor tradition can be used to justify discrimination. There’s a word for it: prejudice.

Gillard’s only attempt to justify her position are appeals to tradition. She told Q&A viewers that she didn’t support change because exclusively heterosexual marriage was a “cultural institution of long standing in Australian society.” To Sky News she added that there are “some important things from our past that need to continue to be part of our present and part of our future.”

Should discrimination be one of them? The White Australia policy is an important element of our past, but nobody in their right mind would suggest bringing that back.

Every advance in public policy from civil rights through to the advances of women have been battles against deeply entrenched “cultural institutions”. This is another one that simply needs to be renewed.

On the issue of marriage equality and gay rights in general, Gillard is, to quote Churchill, a riddle wrapped inside a mystery in an enigma.

She’s an atheist, socially progressive woman in a defacto relationship who most recently became famous for a speech on misogyny – it is simply inconceivable that she has deeply held personal views against same sex marriage.

If she does, it’s pure prejudice because it would go against everything else she supposedly stands for. So my only conclusion here is that she’s simply pretending, in order to play safe with marginal electorates where she hopes to shore up her votes among social conservatives. As Tom Dick has pointed out some of the marginal electorates in Northern Queensland and Western Sydney that most concern Labor are 75% Christian. Gillard’s stance on same sex marriage is designed for them.

I’m a gay man, historically I’m a Labor voter, I’ve always considered myself a feminist, but every time Julia Gillard talks about same sex marriage with one of her “I’m not a homophobe but…” statements, the Prime Minister of Australia tells me I don’t matter. The only thing that matters is her grasp on power.

I’ve made up my mind. I don’t trust her.

Can you blame me?

lol voting for Abbott because you don't trust Gillard. That's hilarious.

A gay man voting for Abbott because of Gillard's stance on gay marriage.... :-k

Im missing something here. So because he said he wont vote Labor and maybe insinuated he might consider a vote for the Liberals, you guys are blasting him?

:lol:

The author could vote greens or independant??

And hows Abbott any different to Gillard on the issue? Both exceptionally reluctant on the issue so its not like Gillard is a 'better' vote than Abbott on the issue of gay marriage.

Search age: Search in:
theage.com.au

Rudd push out of puff, Gillard going nowhere

June 25, 2013

A third push to reinstall Kevin Rudd as Labor leader was in disarray on Monday evening as it emerged its singular strategy of forcing pro-Gillard ministers to take the initiative and ''tap'' the Prime Minister on the shoulder had come to nothing.

With no plan B, it now looks increasingly likely there will be no change of leader as time for a final showdown runs out.

Instead, pressure is intensifying on the former prime minister to back up his camp's faux campaign with a formal challenge as frustrated MPs on both sides of the stand-off come to the realisation that Julia Gillard will not give in.

While the Labor caucus meets on Tuesday morning, Mr Rudd will not be present as he travels to Sydney to attend the memorial for Hazel Hawke from 1.30pm.

Ms Gillard, who will also attend the memorial, offered Mr Rudd a lift in her VIP jet, but he declined, with his office explaining he had already made travel arrangements.

As the destructive stalemate enters its presumed end-game in the last days of the 43rd Parliament, an uneasy consensus is emerging that it will be up to Mr Rudd to force a spill through demonstrating overwhelming support in the 102-member caucus.

But with the cabinet and her backbench holding firm, Ms Gillard is standing her ground.

The Rudd camp, which continues to say its man must be drafted, is uncertain of its next move, unable even to say if he would nominate in a ballot, or do as he did in March and sit on his hands.

Ms Gillard affirmed on Monday that she was ''absolutely'' confident of her caucus majority, insisting the leadership question had been dealt with in March.

But others acting on her behalf taunted Mr Rudd to end the destabilisation by either launching a formal challenge or pulling back.

Climate Change Minister Greg Combet said the leadership needed to be settled this week. ''We certainly can't have this go on,'' he told Radio National. ''It's just got to be resolved. Kevin Rudd has to decide whether he's a candidate or not and then do something about it. The ball's in Kevin Rudd's court.''

With the internal contest increasingly being fought on the airwaves, a Rudd supporter, NSW MP Stephen Jones, warned that the party faced a ''thumping'' and should hold a ballot this week.

The sense of desperation was added to by the latest national poll showing Labor's primary vote dipping below 30 per cent, and Ms Gillard's popularity losing more ground to Opposition Leader Tony Abbott.

Pro-Rudd forces continue to discuss the idea of a senior delegation of ministers calling on Ms Gillard to stand down ''for the good of the party'', but privately strategists admit they are out of ideas.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/national/rudd-push-out-of-puff-gillard-going-nowhere-20130624-2oswx.html#ixzz2X8QjbmNP

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weighted_voting

^ Its interesting how we are all equal, the vote of the affluent equates to the same of 10000 steel workers in this country

Its f'ed simple as that

People smuggler claims SOS calls can get asylum seekers to Christmas Island

guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 25 June 2013 12.18

A self-confessed people smuggler has admitted that boats carrying asylum seekers are instructed to send out SOS calls to Christmas Island to make sure they are picked up while referring to the people who pay him thousands of dollars for the voyage as "goats".

A joint investigation between Fairfax Media and the ABC has uncovered a video of a man who calls himself Freddy Ambon discussing his strategies for successfully getting asylum seeker boats to Christmas Island, claiming the Indonesian police are in cahoots with him.

"And then the police headquarters, the police HQ, will escort the boat," he says in the recording made in an Indonesian apartment.

"... I'm a former policeman, don't ask which unit, I'm a former policeman, this is just for you to know but this means there is no problem bro.

"No problem, no problem, no problem, the passengers will get through."

Ambon said all people smugglers needed was "good co-ordination" to depart Indonesia and head for Christmas Island which is reportedly code for bribery.

"The boat will first go to Labuhan, then the people, the goats, are in Mediterania (a Jakarta suburb) or elsewhere then my men will pick them up," he said, charting the course he sends asylum seekers on.

Ambon charges between $5000 and $6000 per asylum seeker for the journey and admits he helped organise the passage of a boat which sank last year with more than 200 people on board, killing 96 people a few miles from Christmas Island.

He says he is happy to send boats with just 50 people on board and thought the boat was overloaded at the time.

He also admits to instructing the boats to send out distress calls once they are in Christmas Island waters.

"Satellite phones. The captain has one and I have one, so when they're still on their way … the captain calls the police on Christmas Island and asks to be picked up … we don't wait until they arrive before calling in the emergency," he said.

"Save our Souls! SOS! Save Our Souls! … then the police come and rescue."

Indonesian authorities have denied the allegations of bribery or that police would turn a blind eye to asylum seeker boats leaving harbours.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/25/people-smuggler-christmas-island-asylum?

We live in a two-party preference system. Wollongong is split by two electorates, neither of which have the Greens in position to be the 2nd party behind Labor & in front of the Liberals. He can't avoid putting either of the two major parties ahead of each other.

is Afro gay?

There is synchronised swimming and now we have synchronised sinking, courtesy of the two men whose electorates delivered the highest anti-Labor vote in the nation yet chose to support the rolling debacle known as the Gillard government and the Rudd exile.

Rather than face the wrath of their electorates in September, Robert Oakeshott, who faced certain annihilation, and Tony Windsor, who faced a highly uncertain fate, have chosen what this column has said they would both do: weasel off the sinking ship they delivered to the nation.

Typically, Oakeshott was spectacularly self-serving and incredible. As in, not credible. He told his local newspaper and greatest supporter, the Port Macquarie News: “There is absolutely no fear whatsoever of the ballot box. It's not an issue of running and losing. If anything, it's a respect for winning that makes me make a call now.”

What a load of Oakeshott!

Absolutely no fear of the ballot box? A respect for winning? He has retired at age 43, with the polls showing he was facing humiliation from his Lyne electorate.

Yet he claimed: “They were encouraging me to stay.” We can only wonder who “they” are.

The man has a credibility gap. In a column published in this space in September 2010, just after the Gillard government had returned to power thanks to Oakeshott, it began:

“There were six people in the room. Morris Iemma was there with his top advisers to meet Rob Oakeshott and his key staffer. It was 2007; Iemma was premier of NSW, Oakeshott was an independent state MP. Oakeshott had a list of requests. One was that he be considered for an appointment as a minister in the Iemma Labor government...

“[Michael] Costa remembered it vividly... When Oakeshott was asked about it the next day. He responded by telling one reporter the story was 'bullshit'. He attributed it to 'faceless men' of the Labor machine.

“But there were no faceless men. There was Iemma, who not only confirmed to this column that Oakeshott had offered himself as a minister, but also provided details of the meeting. He recalled Oakeshott saying he may resign his seat, returning it to the Nationals. Costa supports Iemma's recollections, and Costa is the opposite of faceless.”

“On Friday, at a press conference, when Oakeshott was confronted with the reality that the story of his request for a ministry was coming from senior people speaking on-the-record, his response was: 'I don't have any recollection of any conversation.'

“This is not good... In fact, the entire edifice of political innocence that Oakeshott has carefully built around himself is not credible.”

In Oakeshott's electorate in the 2010 election, the combined primary votes of the ALP and the Greens was a pathetic 17.2 per cent. Even more telling, this anti-Labor vote was replicated in the electorate's Senate vote, with the Coalition winning 45.75 per cent of the primary vote to Labor's 30.3 per cent. The anti-Labor/Greens landslide in Lyne was the second biggest in the country.

The biggest anti-Labor/Greens landslide was in Tony Windsor's electorate, New England. We all know how that turned out: a mandate for Labor.

Windsor, like Oakeshott, has maintained the Gillard government to the bitter, very bitter, end.

Today both Windsor and Oakeshott were full of praise about their ability to deliver government spending to their electorates. But when you've fluked the balance of power in a hung parliament, you are not going to be short of offers from the government whose survival depends in your vote.

Even this self-proclaimed dollar-deliverance is questionable. Back in 2007, when they negotiated with the major parties over which to support, the Opposition Leader, Tony Abbott, proposed a permanent $1 billion-a-year increase in regional infrastructure spending. It was an offer both much larger and with fewer contingencies than Labor's counter-offer.

They both conjured from all this a mandate for Labor and ever since, out of pride and fear, have steadfastly kept the Gillard in power through the Craig Thomson disgrace, the Peter Slipper disgrace, the asylum seekers disgrace, the thousand drowned boat people disgrace, the carbon tax lie, the mining tax debacle, the budget surplus joke and the collapse of public support.

Windsor did this after turning an 8 per cent primary vote for Labor, and a 28.7 per cent Senate vote for Labor in his electorate, into a mandate for the endless turbulence of Labor government, which now has his names inscribed on it.

Almost two years ago, in August 2011, this column made a prediction: “Windsor will take the weasel option at the next federal election. He will not recontest his seat. After doing everything in his power to create the Gillard government and then sustain it in office, he will not want to face the electorate he betrayed.”

Let us not forget that in defending his decisions Windsor was willing to quote private conversations to make political attacks, based on claims no one could check.

Now they have both cut and run, while claiming no fear, and praising themselves and each other for their political service and astuteness.


Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/comment/what-a-load-of-oakeshott-20130626-2owev.html#ixzz2XIS9PrTv

Abbott must be laughing so hard now.