Cultural Cringe

Australians have been immersed in a culture war for as long as this continent has been colonised by the invading British and their convicts. However, the modern day attack on intellectuals, thinkers, scientists, artists and the concept of multiculturalism by the Howard government, created a new kind of divisiveness within Australia. That divisiveness, however doubtful it may have seemed by many during the 1990's through to the early years of the 21st Century, is now as clear as ever thanks to the carriage of social media forums and the Internet allowing mass audiences access to independent media.

Leading up to the 2013 election, Tony Abbott's Liberal Party made a clear stand. Not on policies, costings or national direction, but where they would continue to manifest the cultural cringe in our society. Abbott, if nothing else (and he isn't much) is a staunch monarchist. The cultural cringe became evident the moment he chose to pledge allegiance to Queen Elisabeth II and God, rather than the Australian people - a people of whom half the voting population wanted to see him become their Prime Minister.

Abbott has laid the groundwork for the latest attack by conservatives in the country against a progressive idea: Moving on from Britain.

I could get into an entire piece here about how Abbott was a London born emigrant, however that would be a ridiculous argument, as former PM Julia Gillard was born in Wales and is a republican. No, what would be much more appropriate would be to attack the very ideals of Abbott himself and how they are hindering Australian sovereignty and progression in the world, particularly in our region.

I've said many times before in past blogs (which can't be linked here as they've been taken down for various reasons) that Australia is indeed an Asian nation. We are in the Asian region and, as such, we need to embrace our geographic neighbours and build much stronger relationships than we currently have. Abbott's move to begin what he has dubbed "Operation Sovereign Borders" (while ironically ignoring Indonesia's sovereignty) is a mighty step backwards in building those relationships. In fact, it could potentially damage any future attempt to build on trade and diplomatic relations. By not including the Indonesian government in border protection plans (which both major parties have been ashamedly cruel in developing) he has severed hopes of closer ties with our nearest neighbours.

The idea of Australia the colony still maintains a presence with conservative politics in Australia. Despite many from the right championing the cause for republicanism such as Malcolm Turnbull and former Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser. The coalition's very heavy shift further right once Abbott became party leader meant that favouring the constitutional monarchy became an unspoken policy, one that seems won't be spoken about in a long time as it seems unlikely that Australians will have a referendum on the subject for a few years.

Tony Abbott is an Australian Prime Minister, who quite simply, does not have respect for the Australian people. He has ideals of a British Australia. One that relives the days of the great Empire. Simply put; Tony Abbott has colonial values.

Many jokes have been made over the past few years about how Abbott has backwards views and will take Australia back to the 1950's. However, this writer would wager that it would be even further back than that. Our new PM lives his life derived from values that pre-date federation. One shudders to think what the rest of the world's leaders, particularly those within our own region, think about the direction of our nation now based on who is calling the shots. As stated in a previous post it doesn't look likely that the coalition will hold much power in the senate, however when looking at who has won some of the final seats, it looks like the balance of power could tip to the conservatives in the end with most legislation. With Abbott and his antagonistic agenda against the country moving forward, the only hope is that he will pay for his lack of respect for the electorate three years from now.

However, as it was said in my previous post, as Howard was able to change the attitudes of many, particularly amongst the younger generations, so too could Abbott. It would be disastrous to think that, if years from now, we had an entire generation of Australians who truly believed that the old, outdated and vintage values of Abbott's coalition were ones to live and die for. I would hate to think that one day we would lose all respect for the great thinkers, for the artists, for those who help our most marginalised and voiceless when they need help the most. 

I would think it a national disaster; a long-term national disaster, to live in an Australia where more respect was given to an athlete or celebrity than to a nurse, doctor, teacher or child-care worker.

Hold on.

We're already there, but I do digress. Back to my earlier point about Australian sovereignty.

For someone such as Tony Abbott to suggest that he will be a Prime Minister for Australia's Indigenous is both an insult to the Indigenous population and to the intelligence of every single living Australian. He has made it well-known in the past that he is a monarchist. He is proud of Australia's heritage. Rather than point out that Australia was invaded, settled and colonised by another nation that simply did not recognise that the land was even inhabited at the time, he is a firm believer that it was settled for the greater good and that it was the destiny of the British Empire to colonise the entire continent.

One of the first policies we heard about was the coalition's plans to scrap millions of dollars from Aboriginal legal aid. A much needed program for indigenous men and women seeing as how such a large percentage within their population end up behind bars or are prosecuted.

No acknowledgement has been forthcoming from Abbott about the Stolen Generation, nor has there been any apology. Much like his predecessor, Howard, Abbott remains stubborn in his refusal to accept blame on behalf of the Australian government for what happened all those years ago.

He was also cabinet minister when ATSIC was scrapped (although not part of his portfolio, however he has made no mention of any new successor to the organisation).

Yet, the man makes the empty gesture of stating that he will work for Indigenous Australians.

He also made the empty gesture of naming himself Minister for Women only hours after naming one woman on his front bench.

Laughable.

We should not take much stock of what Tony Abbott says, as we know that in the end it will all come out as lies and broken promises anyway. However, what we should worry about is the allegiance pledged to the Queen. 

This is the very real threat to Australia's sovereignty. Not those scary brown people from the north that he keeps warning us about.

Abbott's Agenda

Apologies for the long time between posts, it's been a fairly joyous occasion in our household this past week upon the arrival of our second baby boy, Oscar.

Now to business.

Yesterday's news regarding PM elect Abbott's cabinet held absolutely no surprises. He did state upon taking government that he would lead a government of no surprises. What's shocking, however, are the omissions from his ministry as well as the disturbing legacy that this could leave with our country.

Before continuing, here is a short list of the ministry positions now defunct under the coalition regime:

Minister for Science
Minister for Climate Change
Minister for Disabilities
Minister for Aged Care
Minister for Higher Education
Minister for Youth
Minister for Early Childhood
Minister for Workplace Relations
Minister for Mental Health
Minister for Water

And in, we have:

Minister for ANZAC Day
Minister for Border Protection (tacked on to the Immigration portfolio)

and

Minister for Sport...

Sport?

Sport?

So, essentially, the Australian public have effectively helped to vote in a majority government that deems sport to be more important than every single one of the ministries that were scrapped.

Excuse me while I staple my dick to an electric barbed wire fence.

ANZAC Day? We have a whole fucking government ministry dedicated to one public holiday of the year. A public holiday where we are virtually forced to cry our patriotic little faces off as we remember wars in Europe, and more recently, wars against those nasty brown people. At least that's the impression I get from those who take the day seriously.

Small Government

So, we are treated to small government, where the most marginalised in society now have absolutely no one in Canberra dedicated to them, and being advised on possible legislation that would actually benefit them. Nor do we have an advocate for the climate and the human impact causing the shift in temperatures that are now more than evidently clear, particularly if you look at the science.

Science, but that's OK, because we still have someone on the front bench who... oh, wait.

Science has gone as well.

I guess when you don't actually believe in science and every single one of your beliefs comes from a book written over 2000 years ago that claims the world was created in 6 days and is only 6000 years old, you don't need nasty, evil science to dictate legislation or policy. Why should we trust in medicine when we've got magic, potions, spells and good old gut instinct to get us by? Why believe what those eggheads in white coats who play with funny instruments and tools all the time say? Plus their papers are too long... no time to read all the big, hard words.

Wrong Focus by the Media

Yet, what baffles me the most is the focus that the mainstream media has now taken with the announcement.

The focus, while fairly placed on the lack of women promoted to cabinet (1 out of 20 positions), the obvious stupidity of these omitted portfolios and the ones that have been created should really be reported on or at least given more emphasis on how damaging they are to the country. We now have a very clear insight into coalition policy and the direction that Abbott now wants to take our country.

Meanwhile, things are beginning to unravel within the noalition itself. Dissent wasn't something that we saw (or at least what the media would allow us to see) within the Liberal Party while they were in opposition, however just today we have had MP's within the party criticise Abbott for both the lack of women as well as the most important portfolios.

Abbott's Agenda

Once again, Australia has been thrust into the clutches of a coalition government. The last time the Nationals and Liberals took power from Labor was in 1996. Paul Keating, who lost in a landslide that year as PM, famously said that when you change the government, you change the country. Truer words cannot be said, and the prophetic phrase rang very true shortly as new PM John Howard surely changed attitudes and the common social discourse in Australia to one of xenophobia, 'us and them', greed and selfishness. 

Labor in power between 2007 and 2013 was able to do very little to turn the tide. The ALP had already  begun it's shift to the right (virtually started in the 80's but slowed to a halt under Keating), and Howard's thug caste (yes, every right-wing government spawns them) the nu-bogan, ensured that attitudes towards foreigners or anything remotely foreign remained negative. It was a time when a rise in 'Fit in or Fuck Off' bumper stickers could be seen on one in ten utes and 4x4's, and television network programming was fairly homogenous as far as ethnic groups went.

The uphill battle of cultural and social change was fought hard by Julia Gillard - a PM who will eventually be remembered as someone who had vision and actually brought about change during her time, something that Kevin Rudd was unfortunately not inclined to do.

Abbott's agenda now seems fairly clear - cut the funding to anything intellectual, progressive or beneficial for the environment. Halt the growth of government and reverse it to a shrink that will cover only the shame of Australia's elected government.

The anti-intellectualism of the Howard years was very evident in the cuts to funding for higher education, but now Abbott has decided to erase that ministry itself. Youth and Seniors were also portfolios that were promised, so we can safely say that this is Abbott's first broken promise.

The backlash against this will be swift and loud but, rest assured, it will be hushed by the media and almost seem as if there is no issue.

After all, people voted them in on the pre tense that they would solve all our 'issues'. 

Irony will be history's buddy, in the end. 

From Lower House Disappointment to Senate Hope to Senate Horror

That was the story of the past two days while votes for Federal Parliament's Upper House were still being counted. The senate seats, to be taken by their elected candidates in July of next year, were the last bastion of hope for those who were still in shock and despair over the reality of an Abbott-led coalition government.

From late Saturday night when all doubt had been removed over the question of who would retain or form government, the focus shifted to the senate results, something a lot more important considering that The Greens have had the balance of power there for quite some time. Questions were being asked and some unknown variables were coming into play: Would this balance of power be retained, strengthened or lost, and who were these 'other' candidates and their respective parties of which the general public knows absolutely nothing about, including this writer?

From articles that were read early on Monday morning and discussions had with numerous colleagues which really only amounted to speculation and hearsay, I gathered quite quickly that these unknowns, mainly this Liberal Democratic Party, Motoring Enthusiasts Party and Sports Party are, in fact, quite right-leaning, the most dangerous of which is the LDC candidate, David Leyonhjelm, a hardcore libertarian who opposes taxes and supports gun rights, and the most shocking and potentially comedy-laden is the Motoring Enthusiasts Party's, Ricky Muir - the typical Aussie rev head (see, bogan).

Let's start with Australia's very own Tea Party Republican David Leyonhjelm. A former member of both the ALP and the Liberal party, he left the latter during the mid 1990's after John Howard's gun reforms and buy-back scheme following the devastation of the Port Arthur Massacre. A gun enthusiast, libertarian and all-round ass hat, Leyonhjelm opposes big government, income taxes, arms regulation and just about any other sane measure that civil societies actually need in order to be civil. He loves him some corporate freedom, so he is definitely also opposed to the Carbon Tax as well as the Mining Tax. In fact, he's taken his book of policies right out of Ayn Rand's cold, dead hands.

The fact that this man has been able to make his way into public office, not to mention the Senate, is a result of two possible things; People in NSW are starting to find the American Tea Party appealing or, the distribution of preferences to micro parties with so many micro parties on the ticket for one election has meant that these types of candidates have won seats without even picking up 1% of the primary vote.

I've said it before and I will always repeat myself: "You need to vote BELOW the line". Yes, I agree, voting above does save time and if you have researched and studied where each party's preferences will fall in each state and your happy with them, then do it. However, you don't know where every single of the 50 to 60 preferences will go if you haven't. Sometimes you may not even be happy where the preferences are even if you've researched it. For example, I myself found out that The Greens (who I always vote for first in both houses) were giving their second preferences to the Palmer United Party. (a party that has also won 2 seats in the senate and will probably make the difference on much legislation from next year). While I agreed with the PUP's policies on asylum seekers (treating them like human beings and letting them in our country) I disliked the fact that they support coal mining and opposed the carbon and mining taxes. So, being the responsible voter that I am, I decided to give my second preference to a party that was more in line with the core ideas that The Greens SHOULD be sticking to.

Next up, set to join our esteemed Upper House in Canberra next year is the discerning gentleman by the name of Ricky Muir.

Now Ricky enjoys the finer things in life - he is an advocate of the fine arts, a keen cello player, a cigar enthusiast who doesn't mind attending the opera each weekend.

Jokes.

He's a dead set bogan.

Ricky enjoys, among other things, throwing kangaroo faeces, doing up his '78 Monaro, wearing black all the time, and doing mainies in his Pulsar... probably.

Yes, motoring enthusiasts. So, I guess if it came down to it, this guy would surely block any extra funding for public transport or emissions regulations on vehicles, not with a simple 'no', but it would most likely be by driving his '76 Falcon GT crashing through the walls of the chamber before finishing a series of donuts by the Senate President's seat and throwing Kangaroo droppings at the clerk before exiting.

That's how you leave your mark on Australian politics.

Sigh.

Women of Calibre

I've been closely following the battle in the seat of Indi, currently held by Sophie 'Witch Ditching' Mirabella, one of Tony Abbott's 'sex appeal' laden women of calibre.

Indi, held by Mirabella for 5 terms now, is extremely close to call at this time and the Independent, Cathy McGowan who has garnered strong support from Greens and Get Up volunteers leading up to the election, looks strong so far in the count.

I've been looking closely at this seat because if you understood the kind of nasty, volatile spew that came forth from Mirabella's disgusting mouth, then you'd see why it's imperative that someone like this NOT take up a cabinet position, let alone office.

Mirabella, who rarely ever drops into her electorate, even during campaign time, has made recent headlines, mostly controversial and most recently for violating AEC regulations, has accused the independent McGowan of being anything but independent. That's Noalition speak for, 'Unfair, you ran a better campaign, now time for me to bitch and moan about it.'

Then over in NSW we have Fiona Scott, one of Abbott's women with 'sex appeal'. As oblivious as Tony was about his very stupid blunder, it was even funnier (or scarier) to hear Scott screech like a shrill about how asylum seekers were clogging up queues, taking up hospital beds etc etc the usual xenophobic rubbish that we've come to expect from the Lib/Nats for a long time now.

Finally, we have the equally xenophobic but no less sexy Teresa Gambaro - the one who boomed loudly a couple of years ago about all the soap that was needed to cleanse immigrants, because they smell... bad. Yes, this was stated loud and clear by none other than the sitting member for Brisbane. Gambaro's quote was definitely not taken out of context. I remember numerous people since who were arguing that she was talking about olfactory sensors. Hang on a minute here, let's call a spade a spade, shall we? When you're discussing odours, and immigrants, and your party has a definite policy against increases to immigration and treats refugees like rubbish, how can that be taken any other way but the words spewed forth from the mouth of a definite racist.

And finally, we have my favourite - Western Australia's favourite daughter...mother... err... grandmother? I don't know, but anyway, we have Julie Bishop....

Actually, I might dedicate one entire article just to her... far too much to say right now about the potential Foreign Minister.

So there you have it, a simple summary of some of Tony Abbott's 'Women of Calibre'.

New Management?

Well, it's 12:17am and I sit here, far from sleepiness but close to fatigue. It's been a long day, and with all the tension, stress, excitement, joy... well, really there was no joy... anyway, all the emotions and strange, disturbing feelings that came along have all been overshadowed now by the great sadness and grief that stirs within my bowels loins heart (it takes me a while to get the right word when I'm this upset).

Today, Australia voted the coalition back into power. Back in government for the first time since Kevin Rudd's ALP in 2007 gave Johnny Howard's Lib/Nats a tombstone piledriver worthy of a WWE championship belt. It's been a short (or long, it's all about perspective) 6 years. Only 6 years, you say? In that time, Rudd has been ousted by the under-appreciated and underestimated Julia Gillard. "Knifed", as the papers all said, because when you want to get a point across, you use loaded language - see also "faceless men". He took the leadership back via the same caucus in which he was first "knifed" three years later with an election looming.

The ALP government since 2007 has done many things. The introduction of the Carbon Tax as well as  the NDIS were visionary and a step forward.

All that is now about to change.

On Monday, Australia will wake up to it's new government. "New management" the incoming fundamentalist and misogynistic, budgie smuggler donning new PM has called it.

This is a new blog of mine that will track the movement, every single policy, every quote - see also "gaffe" and every single time Joe Hockey adjusts his pants during question time.

Stay tuned, there's a lot more to come, particularly in the first week.

Watch this space.