Yeah poor battler. And she's only succumbing to the lack of choice she has in having a child.....

So lets recap,

1. $4 billion gap environment plan
2. Sacking between 12,000 - 20,000 public servants
3. Scrapping NBN rollout
4. Scrapping school kids bonus
5. Scrapping carbon tax
6. Refugee policy breaches international law
7. 26 week paid maternity leaved or those up to $150,000 per year
8. Tax 3,000 biggest employers 1.5%
9. Keep Rudd's tax increases
10. Alleged $50-$70 billion spending shortfall.

Labor to preference greens. I feel sick

- You forgot about the Company and Fringe Benifit Tax cuts.
- Anti-gay marriage.
- Healthcare cuts.

I have no alligence to either party. The funny thing about Australia is we have choice.

You can choose to study and have the qualifications to get a high paying job, you may also choose that that isn't for you. I work in a factory and I don't make that much.

All in saying is you can't have punish a high Earner for fearing you offend the low income earner.

"I buy more expensive stuff, therefore I deserve more free money from the Taxpayers when I choose to have a baby"

It's baffling.

It also fails to factor combined income. A highly paid professional woman deciding to have a baby is likely to have a partner that is also a highly paid professional (of course, there will be exceptions, but its likely).

This is diverting money away from the taxpayers purse (and likely cuts to services, infrastructure and projects that you can bet are coming) and giving large chunks of it to people that really do not require it.

Pork barrel policy that makes no fiscal sense. Again.

Put simply, Sly Goat, a woman earning $150k/year has 8 months before she goes on maternity leave in which time she earns some $100,000 compared to a woman earning $30k/year making around 20k. Fair to say that the woman earning $150k a year has a much better opportunity to put some money aside while she's on maternity leave and giving maternity leave to a person on that kind of salary is just rubbing salt into the wounds of lower income earners.

Come on now guys, those more fortunate in our society worked hard for their standard of living. It's only fair that we all chip in and help out with those Porsche Cayenne repayments, au pair salaries and multi million dollar mortgages. Yachts don't grow on trees, you know.

The important thing is that we all band together. We don't let people in our society go without.

Except the fags, of course, fuck those jokers.

Just watched a live interview with Rudd at the gym where he pretty much told the country that he doesn't give a fuck about mining.

Good work Ruddy, you just lost my vote.

Well, Libs are short term thinkers

What was said exactly?

Technially they aren't 'scrapping' the NBN, they are turning it into a half-rate network that costs just as much money. Scrapping implies they'll save money.

[-x
That's fence-sitter talk!

As a football fan you should know better than most that the world is no place for fence-sitters. In this country you're either a misogynistic, racist conservative or a socialist, do-gooding global-warmist.

Even if it was half-rate it would be an abortion of a policy. It's not even close to half rate.

Why do labor supporters keep bagging T.A for being anti gay marriage when we've had 6 years of federal labor an no Gay marriage?

:? You'd rather bag a party who changed their position for the better than the one who aren't going to budge?

Frankly if labor win the election and then change the laws then fantastic, but after 6 years of government to turn around and accuse the opposition of being anti-gay is hypocrisy at its worst.

Why wait to the election for the change of heart?

Edited by sydneyfc1987: 18/8/2013 03:49:13 PM

Rudd says Liberal spending cuts would cause recession

From: AAP August 18, 2013 3:12PM

PRIME Minister Kevin Rudd says if the coalition goes ahead with spending cuts it could send the economy into recession.

He says Labor has a plan to diversify the economy as the mining investment boom ends, but Opposition Leader Tony Abbott hasn't developed or told the Australian people of his intentions.

"He's just told us that he's got a secret plan for $70 billion worth of cuts to jobs, health and education,'' Mr Rudd said in Sydney today.

"If Mr Abbott proceeds with the $70 billion worth of cuts, and we can only assume he will, he runs a very grave risk in 2014, if he is elected, of throwing this economy into recession.''

The coalition denies it has plans for $70 billion worth of cuts affecting health and education.

Mr Rudd cited analysis by Finance Minister Penny Wong concluding the coalition needed to cut $69 billion to $71 billion to fund its policy promises.

"When you look at an economy our size, if you were to rip out that, or a large part of it ... you don't have to be a mathematical whiz to work out that that would throw the economy into recession," Mr Rudd said.

He said Labor had worked hard during the 2008-2009 global financial crisis to avoid a recession.

The prime minister pointed to the British conservative party's austerity drive, saying it sent the UK economy into recession.

Labor's economic update released earlier this month showed revenues had declined by about $33 billion since the May budget.

Treasurer Chris Bowen said the option was to make up the gap by cutting spending or increasing taxes.

"We took the decision to offset some of those dollars over time," he said.

"It was open to us to cut more and to increase taxes more, but of course that would risk a hammer blow to the economy just when it can't afford it.

"That would risk ... a significant contraction in economic activity."

The coalition's policies have been sent to the Parliamentary Budget Office for costing and the results are still to be released.

Mr Abbott has said the coalition will announce its budgetary plans in the final week before the September 7 election.

"Mr Abbott is being deliberately evasive," Mr Rudd said.

"His campaign is being deliberately evasive."

The prime minister was at Westmead in western Sydney to announce a $357 million package - some of it flagged previously - to upgrade hospitals and boost health services across the country.

The funding includes $100 million for Westmead Hospital and $10 million for the Children's Medical Research Institute at Westmead.

The announcement marked the opening of a new attack platform for Labor as it heads into the election campaign's third week.

"Health and hospital services is in the DNA of the Australian Labor Party," Mr Rudd said.

But the coalition wasn't saying what it would do for health, he said.

"It's 'dive, dive dive' for cover."

Mr Abbott is expected to respond later in the day.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/election-2013/rudd-says-liberal-spending-cuts-would-cause-recession/story-fn9qr68y-1226699413194

Princess Diana Death: Latest Conspiracy Claims She was Killed by SAS

By DRISHYA NAIR: Subscribe to Drishya's RSS feed | August 18, 2013 6:30 AM GMT

Nearly 16 years after the death of Princess Diana, a new conspiracy theory has emerged claiming that the British military was involved in the fatal car crash at Paris that killed Diana, her boyfriend Dodi Al Fayed, and her driver.

However, the claims are being knocked down by British police which denies the military had to do anything with the August 1997 crash.

"This is not a re-investigation," London police stressed in a brief statement release.

According to an article on the website of the Sunday People newspaper, the origin of the conspiracy theory reportedly sparked after the parents-in-law of a British Special Forces sniper sent the claim to military authorities and then London police. The soldier has only been identified as Soldier N

The article, which does not quote a source for the report says that a seven-page handwritten letter was sent by Soldier N's in-laws. According to the paper, the soldier and his wife are no longer together, but when they were, the soldier had once boasted to his wife that the elite British Special Air Service (SAS) commando unit was responsible for the deaths.

"He (Soldier N) also told her (his wife) that it was the XXX who arranged Princess Diana's death and that has been covered up," a Mirror report said.

The U.K.'s Ministry of Defence told CNN that "this is for Metropolitan Police to investigate."

According to the report, the Ministry of Defence, the Royal Military Police and the Service Prosecuting Authority have been aware of the claim since September 2011, when it was sent during the court martial of Soldier N's roommate, Sergeant Danny Nightingale.

The letter, also reportedly makes allegations on Soldier N, regarding his behavior with his wife and in-laws, ever since the couple's split.

The report further says that even after receiving the letter during Sgt Nightangle's trial, the SPA forwarded the document to the court after removing all references to the paramilitary force.

"The Metropolitan Police Service is scoping information that has recently been received in relation to the deaths of Diana, Princess of Wales and Dodi Fayed and assessing its relevance and credibility. The assessment will be carried out by officers from the Specialist Crime and Operations command", Scotland Yard said according to the Mirror report.

Diana's boyfriend Dodi's father Mohamed Fayed has long maintained that the car crash which killed Diana, his son and their driver was a conspiracy which involved the British state.

In 2008, an inquest jury had ruled that Diana's driver Henry Paul and the paparazzi following their car, shared the blame for deaths of Diana and Dodi Fayed.

The possibly that the couple was murdered, was ruled out on the basis of a lack of evidence.

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/articles/499712/20130818/princess-diana-death-latest-conspiracy-sas-soldier.htm?

On the gay marriage issue, it's worth pointing out that Rudd has NOT promised to legalise gay marriage, all he has commited to do is to introduce the legislation, but then allow his MP's a conscious vote on the issue. Now this is an important point, because with policies such as the carbon tax, the Labor party vote based on a party room decision, ie if the measure is passed in the party room, then 100% of MP's vote for the policy on the floor of parliament, so even those MP's who opposed the policy in the party room still vote in bloc with the party on the floor of parliament.

If Rudd and Labor where really serious about this issue, they would actually DENY their MP's a conscious vote and instead force the party as a group to vote for the gay marriage legislation, which is the only way to actually guarantee that a vote for Labor is a vote for gay marriage. Without it, Kevin Rudd knows that at least a percentage of his MP's will NOT vote in favour of gay marriage, many are on record to this extent, meaning that knowing that it Rudd wins it will be by a small margin, then the chances of getting a majority of MP's to support the policy is practically nill.

It's easy for Kevin Rudd to say that he supports gay marriage when he knows that he can't actually deliver it, meaning that all he is really doing is dangling false hope in front of the gay community on this issue.

As much as I want to see gay marriage legalised, the reality is that it will NEVER happen without bipartisan support across the two parties, which I fear is still the better part of 2 - 3 elections away...

Pretty much

Care to share what he actually said? :lol:

-PB

Not sure if he is referring to the same thing I saw, but what I saw was him basically continuing to talk about how the boom is over and that we need to transition to the "new economy" rather then chase the miners around to try and keep them going...

... Then he chases Holden and Toyota around with a blank cheque.

Not hypocritical at all

So basically he said we need to diversify the economy? What an evil man. :lol:

Yeah, I guess benelsmore thinks we shouldn't do anything, and just keep letting the billionare miners dig up the ground, take the profit for themselves, and sit around watching every other sector but tourism abandon the country....

If anyone thinks labor will allow gay marriage then you're extremely gullible.

They've had 6 years to legalise it and they haven't, Rudd has just said that to win cheap votes.

Oh he is! I want my Dutch disease please and make it snappy!

No absolutely, we do need to diversify the economy, but your missing my point, you can't say lets diversify the economy on one hand and transition to thr new industries, but then run around with blank cheque trying to prop up a dieing industry on the other!

Rudd needs to choose a position and stick with it. You can't bash up on the Libs for not being prepared to spend billions on saving the motor industry, but then on the hand criticise the Libs for policies designed to help the mining industry, that employs far more people then the motor industry by the way

My problem isn't with Rudd's basic policy positions, it's the contradictions he keeps presenting. He gives off the perception that his opinion is dictated solely by marginal seat polling...

Edited by RJL25: 18/8/2013 08:29:54 PM