A very, very effective first Federal Election 2010 campaign ad from opposition leader Tony Abbott :



But there's something about one part of that ad that reminds me of something else....

How Australia's 5th Richest Man Is Trying To Fuck With Your Mind

By Darryl Mason

It's like watching Jabba The Hut channeling Glenn Beck, with a script written by Rupert Murdoch's chief propagandist Andrew Bolt :




Clive Palmer has had some exceptional training in psychological manipulation.

You can break down most of the key Palmer responses into three categories - Emotional Triggers, Fear Triggers and The Brighter Future theme, to inspire hope of better things to come. All of it done purposefully.

The Emotional trigger phrase is "Mums and Dads".

The Fear trigger word is "Destroy".

'The Brighter Future' theme can be seen in variants on what will happen "when" (not if) opposition leader Tony Abbott wins the 2010 Federal Election.


Emotion :

"....when mums and dads and ordinary Australians have seen the treasurer destroy their future and the future retirement."

"Everyone knows this is true. And this is bad for our workforce. It's bad for the mums and dads that work in the mines."

"But don't destroy the economy and don't destroy the industries that are employing thousands of Australians - ordinary mums and dads around Australia."

Fear :

"....ordinary Australians have seen the treasurer destroy their future and the future retirement."

"...that's what the Labor party and Mr Rudd's about - destroying the wealth of Australians."

"But don't destroy the economy and don't destroy the industries that are employing thousands of Australians..."

"(Treasurer Wayne Swan is) suggesting 'Let's take our best industry and destroy it and bring it down to the level of the rest of our economy'."

"...give them the ability to invest in projects that will provide real jobs and create real wealth, not destroy wealth. "

"And that's why we don't like to see it being destroyed by these guys."

"...he's the first person that I'd sack for bringing a tax like this, trying to destroy our resources industry."

"If it ain't broken, leave it alone. Don't try to tinker with it. Don't try to destroy it."

The Brighter Future :

"....let's make a firm stand against the ALP and send them into the Opposition where they belong. And that's what Tony Abbott's going to do in the next election..."

"...this tax is thrown out once and for all as it should be and the Treasurer is thrown out of office as he will be in the next election."

"...the Treasurer should get the boot as well and as the Prime Minister will get the boot at the next election..."

"...that's why Tony Abbott's the last sentry at the gate and he'll throw the Government out at the next election."

Here Palmer manages to cram all three into less than 15 seconds :

"....when mums and dads and ordinary Australians have seen the treasurer destroy their future and the future retirement.

And this is what's really wrong - it goes at the whole viability of our nation and that's why it's got to be stopped and that's why Tony Abbott's the last sentry at the gate and he'll throw the Government out at the next election."

And, for the smirking amusement of his mega-rich pals and his allies in the conservative media elite, he remembers to label his enemies as Communists and Socialists :

"Just because you happen to be a socialist or a communist like we know Mr Swan is, as he wants equal distribution....But comrade Rudd and his team are going to bring them back to Australia."

Communist China is, of course, one of Clive Palmer's biggest investors.


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On April 30, Deputy Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, published the transcript of a short debate she had with Opposition Leader Tony Abbott on Channel 9's Today Show. The transcript included every stutter from Abbott, every repeated word, every uh and um.

Was this done for purposes of accuracy, or mockery?

Excerpts :

TONY ABBOTT: There’s no, there’s no, there’s no confusion.

...But let me say this, but let me say this, let me say this....

...I, I, I don’t see why, ah, if they want to make a donation, ah, we, we shouldn’t accept it.

The Full Transcript Is Here

"That Water Was Cold, Ladies. Real Cold"

Tony Abbott, another victim of Unnecessary Censorship :



More victims of UC.



It's not them, it's your dirty mind.

Opposition leader Tony Abbott is not afraid to tackle the big issues of the day....well, most of the time :

QUESTION : ....The Catholic Church has had a few problems over the past few days with lights being shone on the Pope and now there’s been a link drawn between anti-Semitism and collective blame. Have you anything to say?

TONY ABBOTT: No, look, that’s right outside my field. Thank you so much.

@TwitterHype

Politicians are calling Federal Election 2010 'The Twitter Election', apparently :

Federal Liberal MP Andrew Laming told a parliamentary seminar discussing the "Twitter election" that politicians could use the social networking site Facebook as a powerful tool to phish phone numbers.

Yes, a federal member of parliament does appear to be lavishing praise on a form of digital identity fraud, at least according to this headline :



From the Courier Mail :

"There is extraordinary capacity there to create non-political pages and harvest and phish huge numbers of not only emails but mobile phone numbers," he said.

"And once you have a mobile phone number . . . they don't have to follow me, I phish them and can sort of harvest huge numbers of mobile phone numbers and then I just drop them onto a single piece of software and I can SMS hundreds if not thousands of people directly when I choose."

Yeah, that'd work great. If people didn't furiously mind getting spam messages from politicians on their phones and want to punch the sender in the face, or the nuts.

What's the thinking here?

And if it really is going to be 'The Twitter Election', what should we make of the massive gulf in Twitter followers when it comes to the main event?






There's no denying the incredible power of a politician being able to reach thousands, or tens of thousands of voters through Twitter updates, free of media filtering or re-interpretation.

So far on Twitter, Rudd (and/or his team) is making Abbott look like an amateur.

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Two Believers In Old Superstitions Battle For Leadership Of Australia

What in all fuck?

Kevin Rudd has taken on his arch-rival Tony Abbott on a heavenly question - whose saintly namesake is the best?

At a dinner in Brisbane to mark St Patrick's Day, attended by both leaders, the Prime Minister jokingly contrasted his namesake - St Kevin of Glendalough - with Italy's St Anthony.

Mr Abbott (said) "...the PM is trying to be more Queensland and more catholic then he really is."

Sticking to the Irish-Catholic theme, Mr Abbott joked that Archbishop John Bathersby said that Mary Mackillop's second miracle was to bring him as leader of the opposition.

Can you both step into the 21st century, please?

The Full Story Is Here

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Tony Abbott is continuing to use the term "All hat and no cowboy" to describe prime minister Kevin Rudd. So I'll repeat what I wrote here on March 8 :

Last night, Abbott also attempted to unleash on prime minister Kevin Rudd.

"It is pretty clear he is a guy who is all announcement and no follow through. He is, to coin a phrase, 'All Hat And No Cowboy'."

Abbott didn't coin the phrase. It's been in common usage in Texas for decades :

"It is not a compliment in West Texas to be referred to as 'All hat and no cowboy'. It is a term of derision used to indicate the person has little real character beneath the very thin veneer of appearance."

It's a good line, but it doesn't sound very Australian.

There is argument that the correct West Texas historical phrase is actually "All Hat, No Cattle", which certainly sounds more local.

Or perhaps Abbott knows this phrase, too, and decided not to use it to attack Rudd, because it has been popularly attached to George W. Bush since the late 1990s.

Abbott will stick to "all hat and no cowboy". He won't allow himself to be seen comparing Rudd to Bush. Ever.

John Howard, his unofficial adviser, wouldn't let him.

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Andrew Bolt, the soon-to-be easy listening morning radio host, thinks this is representative of the "predatory gay" :



Even though they're also wearing speedos in a non-beach setting, this is not gay or even remotely homosexual, nor predatory. At all.



The "predatory gays" at least bothered to put on some footwear.

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Tony Abbott : It's Time For Big Business To Share The Wealth Around

By Darryl Mason

Tony Abbott on paid maternity leave, July 2002 :

"I'm dead against paid maternity leave as a compulsory thing. I think that making businesses pay what seems to them two wages to get one worker are, almost nothing could be more calculated to make businesses feel that the odds are stacked against them."

Tony Abbott, last night on Lateline, stacks the odds :

"If we are gonna have a comprehensive paid parental leave scheme any time soon, the fairest way to do it is for it to be a cost on business, and the fairest way to make it a cost on business is to ask larger businesses, the businesses that have the greatest capacity to pay, the businesses that have suffered least through the global financial crisis, they're the people who can best bear it."

Tony Abbott wants big business to share the wealth around, in particular to single-income families?

Who does he think he is? Obama?

"(Compulsory paid maternity leave) is pro-family, it's pro-child, it's pro-mother, and in the end, it's gonna produce a much stronger economy, because if we look after mothers in the workforce, we'll have more kids, and there is no greater contribution to the future economic strength of Australia than the kids we have now."

Well, kids, and coal.

Tony Abbott wasn't too keen to be reminded of the statements he made back in 2002 by Lateline host Leigh Sales :

TONY ABBOTT: ....I'm fully aware of that quote, Leigh. I have changed my mind.

LEIGH SALES: I'm sure you are. Our viewers ...

TONY ABBOTT: And isn't it a good thing to change your mind as your understanding grows?

LEIGH SALES: That is quite a change of heart.

TONY ABBOTT: Yeah, no, look, I accept that.

LEIGH SALES: So what's brought it about?

TONY ABBOTT: Well, what's brought it about is deeper understanding of the practical difficulties of women who are trying to juggle families and careers. We should not ...

LEIGH SALES: And how have you come to that deeper understanding?

TONY ABBOTT: By, I suppose, being more conscious of the burdens that friends and family members are carrying and of thinking more deeply about the sorts of choices that I would like to be available for my own daughters.

He wants big business to pick up the tab for his daughters' maternity leave.

So what's good for Abbott's children is good for Australia. I wonder if he had elderly relatives who smoked cannabis to relieve arthritis pain and reduce inflammation he would suddenly be backing medicinal marijuana?

Last night, Abbott also attempted to unleash on prime minister Kevin Rudd :

"It is pretty clear he is a guy who is all announcement and no follow through. He is, t coin a phrase, 'All Hat And No Cowboy'."

Abbott didn't coin the phrase. It's been in common usage in Texas for decades :

"It is not a compliment in West Texas to be referred to as 'All hat and no cowboy'. It is a term of derision used to indicate the person has little real character beneath the very thin veneer of appearance."

It's a good line, but it doesn't sound very Australian.

There is argument that the correct West Texas historical phrase is actually "All Hat, No Cattle", which certainly sounds more local.

Or perhaps Abbott knows this phrase, too, and decided not to use it to attack Rudd, because it has been popularly attached to George W. Bush since the late 1990s.


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Thanks to reader Kerry for sending this in :



Tony Abbott explained it is impossible for him to have sex while on the road campaigning.

The 'Related Coverage' side-bar headline :




Dead Horse? I call mine The Lone Ranger.

"Sorry Puppy, We're Putting You Down For Gaia"

By Darryl Mason

Opposition leader Tony "Treeple Skills" Abbott is continuing to push his eco-credentials in the confident hope that if he's interviewed in front of enough wilderness money shots, dappled in the sunlight breaking through canopies of palm fronds, then those who think The Greens are simply too gay to earn a real Christian's environmental vote will go for him.

And they probably will.

But how Green will Tony Abbott turn? Will he come up with that will out-eco even The Greens?

Some inspiration may be found in a report examining revolutionary society-transforming ways to allegedly halt rapid climate change :

Its State of the World 2010 report published this week outlines a blueprint for changing our entire way of life. "Preventing the collapse of human civilisation requires nothing less than a wholesale transformation of dominant cultural patterns. This transformation would reject consumerism... and establish in its place a new cultural framework centred on sustainability."

Surely a report like this would include a long list of things we should no longer do, or products and lifestyles we should no longer embrace? Oh, it surely does :

Get rid of the dog.

No bottled water.

No takeaway menus.

No fun cars.

Don't buy books or toys, borrow them from libraries.

Grow your own (food) in community gardens.

All products should be designed to last a lifetime.

Public transport only.

No plane-related holidays, or air-based trips at all.

Probably not much in there for Tony Abbott. Though it would be good to see him come out for community gardens and more public book & toy libaries. And the idea of any politician trying to rally local industry to go back to creating quality products that last (most of) a lifetime would be exciting indeed.

But Abbott won't go GreenXtreme, no matter how many new votes there might be in it.

He will stay the coure of the lo-fi greener, all the "What's Good For The Environment Is Good For Australia" pap, and leave alone any moves towards killing off the airline, publishing, pet, fast food and disposable product industries with a radical Fight Club-style anti-consumerist platform.

In Abbott's favour, when it comes to greening up, is the fact that he doesn't seem out of place tromping through a forest, where Kevin Rudd looks about as comfortable and competent amongst the trees as John Howard did on a cricket pitch.

Vote Liberal, Labor Or Greens, It Doesn't Matter, Australia Will Still Get A Carbon Tax

By Darryl Mason

Chris Ulhmann writes on ABC's The Drum that Opposition Leader Tony Abbott knows he has only one shot at becoming prime minister, so this is it, he's going in hard...or so it would
appear :

The Coalition is not going to win a war for the votes of climate change purists or the devotees of detail. What it wants is to set up a position that it can defend while it seeks to win a war of attrition against the Government's emissions trading scheme.

It is reminiscent of what has happened to United States in Iraq and Afghanistan. Given its domination of the sky, no conventional army can stop an America invasion. But as Machiavelli knew, taking a country and holding it are two very different things. The way to beat America is to get its soldiers out of their planes and tanks and into a prolonged street-by-street battle.

The Coalition doesn't want to engage in lofty debates that it knows almost no one understands. It wants hand-to-hand combat on the cost of living increases that come with putting a price on carbon.

Climate Change Minister Penny Wong was almost, almost, worn down by Tony Jones on Lateline last night, when he refused to stop asking her how much pricing carbon will eventually cost the average family. She avoided answering at least twelve questions on the subject. It was gruesome, like watching John Howard in late 2002 trying to deny we were about to go to War On Iraq, when Australian soldiers had already been deployed, knowing they were going there to fight.

The Rudd government for now has not much to counter the opposition's claims that the GBNT (Great Big New Tax) will cost everybody. It will.

But Abbott already appears suspicious is his mind-numbing repetitive use of "Great Big New Tax" by not calling the GBNT what it really is, will eventually become, was always going to be. A Carbon Tax.

Abbott is reluctant to call it a carbon tax because he knows that if he becomes prime minister, it will be all but impossible for Australia to function in the New Global Economy without one.

Labor and The Greens want a carbon tax, the Liberals will accept one, and Barnaby Joyce will be told to hold back from shouting about '"Carbon Tax!!" in public, too often. Entertaining his own dreams of one day becoming prime minister himself, Joyce will also, reluctantly, play along.

The Carbon Tax was always going to be the end result of either the introduction of an ETS, or the abandonment of an ETS. It doesn't matter which reality unfolds between now and election day. The introduction of a carbon tax was the mission from at least 2006 onwards for Labor, the Liberals and The Greens, irrespective of how oppposed they appeared to be of each other's plans.

To really whip up the growing tide of climate change skeptics in Australia, to get on side a new Liberal conservative base, Abbott needs to go to the election pledging 'No Carbon Tax!' if he really wants to win.

But he won't do it.

No matter how much he wants to win.

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Cock Of The Walk

The Daily Telegraph isn't joking, this really is their top story :



The reason why you will never see Kevin Rudd parading down a public road in speedos is because he's hung like Matt Shirvington, and secret polls taken by his PR people have revealed that the majority of Australian males will never vote for a man endowed beyond the national average. One who has to kick, instead of tap.

True story.

Would I lie to you?



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Conga Line Of Hilarity

By Darryl Mason

Mike Carlton takes his well-sharpened scythe to the new Opposition front bench :

That egregious drongo Kevin Andrews is the Coalition's new shadow minister for families, housing and human services, ha ha.

The rebarbative Senator Eric Abetz gets workplace relations, haw haw. Bronwyn Bishop, aka Attila the Hen, will be "working with seniors", tee hee.

Philip Ruddock, the whited sepulchre, returns from the dead; a backwoods Queensland bean counter, Barnaby Joyce, is given the finance portfolio and, most hilarious of all, Senator Nick Minchin will handle energy and resources. Chortle, guffaw.

Never let it be said that Tony Abbott is without a sense of humour.

Oh, he's a comedic genius. The grimly determined straight man to Barnaby 'Fuck China' Joyce.

Meanwhile, Malcolm Turnbull sits back, enjoying the show as much as the rest of us, probably more, and bides his time. Let the reanimated Howard-era remnants take the floor for a while, let them spout their 20th century ideas and ideals to a nation that has mostly well and truly moved on. Let them frighten away the few still willing to dump some cash into the Liberal Party coffers. Let them lose the next federal election and lose their seats in the process. Then the rebuilding of the Liberal Party can begin.

If Turnbull can still be bothered by then, that is.

But the question for now is, how will Tony Abbott deal with what are expected to be the very regular mopping up sessions before the media after Barnaby Joyce relieves himself with a grin? How many times will Abbott jam his hand into a plastic bag to quickly disappear yet another moist, warm Joyce deposit on Econogeddon before he just fucking snaps?

And what does Abbott think about the stories drifting down from North Queensland on how Barnaby has been boasting to some locals that the Liberals need him far more than he needs them? That soon enough the polls will reveal he is a more popular choice for opposition leader than Abbott? And that he could one day, if he really wanted to, even have a fair crack at becoming prime minister?

After getting rid of Tony Abbott, that is.

A fresh slogan for the opposition they can have for free :

The Coalition 2010 : Please Stop Laughing.

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You Slurp Your White Wine And Sip Your Lattes

It's often interesting to see how the international media is reporting news from Australia.

Nick Cohen, of the UK Guardian, takes his readers through recent tumultuous events in Australian politics :

Last week, Malcolm Turnbull became the first right-wing leader to be deposed for the ideological crime of taking global warming seriously. Turnbull was a confident politician, from a party that had dominated Australian politics until Labor's victory in 2007.

He thought he was at the centre of the English-speaking world's conservative consensus. He dutifully committed his Liberal party to go along with Labor's plans to use a cap-and-trade scheme to cut emissions. His party's members went wild.

Tony Abbott, a reactionary Catholic, saw his chance, added opposition to green taxes to the old agenda of opposing gay marriage and abortion, and replaced Turnbull as leader.

How concise.

Cohen also claims a "right-leaning" Australian journalist told him that :

"climate change is now morphing from a science issue into yet another front line in the culture wars, in which any obsession of the inner-city, mung-bean-flavoured-tofu-eating, latte-slurping political/academic/media class is automatically the target of resentment and scorn".

So many cliches. There isn't a Google entry for Piers Akerman using "mung bean flavoured tofu eating" elites. Yet.

And this :

Globally, environmentalism is a middle-class cause, and in Britain, disastrously for its supporters, the children of the aristocracy and super-rich dominate the green movement. As before, many onlookers fear that they will pay the price for the soothing of the consciences of the wealthy.

Poor people like trees and clean air, too.

Abbott Redefines The Lies That Led To The Deaths Of 5000 American Soldiers And 100,000 Iraqis

The GodBott on the 2002 lies about Iraq WMDs and the alleged threat to Australia posed by Saddam Hussein, from ABC News :

".....whether something is a lie depends not on what turns out subsequently to be so, but on your state of mind."

Presumably Abbott thinks that rule applies even if your prime minister had personally committed Australians troops to an illegal War On Iraq within days of 9/11, and literally signed onto the war in February 2002, regardless of the WMD threat, or lack of one.




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Tony Abbott "lacks humanity"


I'm sure it's just a coincidence.

The Orstrahyun, December 1, 10am :

Abbott thinks reality is a confessional booth, and all sins are immediately absolved.

Tony Abbott, December 1, The 7.30 Report :

"Well, this is not a confessional and you can't give me absolution."

update : Tony Abbott joins Twitter and states the obvious :




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Hello Ladies


"ten ferrets worth of torso hair"


Miranda Devine on Tony Abbott :

As for Abbott's lack of female appeal, he's decisive, fit and virile, for starters, hardly a turn-off to women...He's a rugby playing, boxing Rhodes Scholar....a surf lifesaver and a volunteer firefighter.

It's going to be one of those elections.


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Tony Abbott's office denies hot Canberra rumours that this will be the Liberal Party's 2010 federal election campaign theme :






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