Kezzer

News Group media and their NewsFORCE reader submitted pics and video.

2012-01-17T14:15:00.007+10:30

Dear readers,

For many weeks now, I have questioned the "innovation" called NewsFORCE by News Group newspapers such as Advertiser and its AdelaideNow website. It asks readers to send in 'news' video and pictures for publication, possibly encouraging criminal activity.

Last year a train carriage was set on fire in Port Pirie and a reader took a photo and sent it to The Advertiser, which promptly published the fiery scene under the NewsFORCE banner.
I wrote to The Advertiser and AdelaideNow editors, suggesting this notoriety could encourage copy cat activity. Of course I did not receive a reply.

Now we see on the AdelaideNow website http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/ , video submitted by a reader, of a hoon driver spinning his tyres, almost losing control on a number of occasions.
It was dangerous and there were people standing close by, filming the event.
AdelaideNow have published this footage with their NewsFORCE logo watermarked on the vision. They would know who submitted the video. Hence surely they would also be aware of the means to identity the driver? Did The Advertiser contact the Police? NewsFORCE is in my opinion, encouraging the less stable in our society, to "create news" and then submit vision of it.

PS: AdelaideNow removed the hoon video from its website within minutes of me emailing them and the media in general of my opinion on this subject.

Jenny Bell on asylum seekers

2011-12-18T17:39:00.004+10:30

A brave Australian woman, understanding the difference between Immigration and religious fervor in modern Australia....
The Veteran community has endorsed the sentiments.

The Silent majority...

This was written by Mrs. Jenny Bell of South Australia to Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott.
It has received wide circulation in Australia and overseas.

To Julia Gillard (Prime Minister) & Tony Abbott (Leader of the Opposition) ...

You BOTH Worry me! ( In fact both of your Political parties worry the hell out of me !!!)

Over the last three years, I find myself becoming more and more fearful of the pair of you, and between you, you are turning this country into a place that I no longer feel at home in, or feel a part of! I watch you in parliament, and no, not just the two of you, but every politician that I see, stand up in parliament sneering at each other, and acting like children !!! (..and if you were my children, I would be ashamed of you all ... What an example to set!)

Although, you would like us all to believe that you are putting the needs of this country at the forefront, NEITHER of you are doing that, you seem more interested in "one-up-manship ", in scoring off each other, & denigrating each other, to the detriment of this country & its people !!! It seems to be all about YOU as individuals, and not about what you can DO for this country ! It is fast becoming a place that I do not recognize, as the place I always thought, was the best place in the world to be !!!

But no longer !!!

You are not listening to the people of this country !!! And here in South Australia , your counterparts are afflicted with the same disease - is it endemic in all politicians ?

I am watching the deterioration of living standards in this country, (and according to you, on a world stage we are doing better than most countries ... REALLY ???) ... And yet the gap is widening between the "haves" and the "have-nots" . I see our homeless on the streets, our hospitals under-funded, and understaffed, our health system is an absolute mess and a disgrace ... And yet I see multi-millions of dollars being sent off shore, in aid to other countries, before attending to this country's needs !

I see the "selling off of the farm", in large amounts, to foreign interests, (In Every State ) including water rights to foreign interests too .... And WHY...? Especially when you go to great lengths to tell us that water is a finite resource, & supposedly, we must ALL be careful with how we use it, so that we ensure we have it for the future ?

Foreign interests "Fracking" for coal seam gas, and riding rough shod over farmers' rights to their own land, AND USING QUESTIONABLE CHEMICALS. (You don't even KNOW what chemicals they use), and possibly causing damage to the water table in the process !!! And those foreign interests I believe, do NOT have to pay anything in royalties back to this country, for the first five years of their tenure ... IS THIS CORRECT ???

A Carbon Tax,( which you KNOW is just another tax with a "Starting Point dollar value") which will make NO appreciable difference, to carbon emissions, AT ALL!

A tax, which in spite of all your arguments FOR it, you are doing alone, when other major countries will NOT & DO NOT embrace it, or believe in it ! All that it will do for this country is put working families and small businesses behind the eight ball, .....what planet are you on, if you think that your few hundred dollars a year, will make even a scrap of difference to the effect of the carbon tax on people ?Blind Freddy can see the holes in that argument !!! Do you really think we are that dumb ???

The CONVOY OF NO CONFIDENCE was real !!! ..and I haven't spoken to even ONE person, who would not have liked to be there if they could, but the tyranny of distance and /or work was the only thing that kept them away, ( myself included ), .. and you KNOW that only a part of the convoy was actually allowed to be in front of Parliament house and ON VIEW ... the rest were streets away, unreported by the media !

For Mr Albanese to stand up in parliament, and call it "THE CONVOY OF NO CONSEQUENCE ", in his sneering tone, shows just how out of touch with the people of Australia , you really are!!!! WE WOULD HAVE ALL LIKED TO BE THERE !!!

DEFENCE ........ Because Americans are our Allies, and we support them in Wars, ......... Korea , Vietnam , Iraq , Afghanistan , ..... and you have sent our soldiers to those places, and our soldiers fought for you, and for Australia ........ some coming home with terrible physical injuries, and some with devastating Mental Injuries as well ... BUT WHERE ARE YOU, WHEN THEY NEED YOU ?????

Veteran's Indexation to CPI only is a disgrace ... and is something YOUR Labor party Julia, used as an election sweetener, to get the Veteran's Vote ... BUT YOU LIED (Again)! You never had any intention of honouring your election promise to them ... and it WILL come back to bite you at the next election !!!! (And Tony, Liberals were NO BETTER, Howard had more than

10 years to "fix it " and didn't !)

Veterans are not alone, they have families, friends and supporters, who are heartily sick of the deception your party perpetrated on them ....AND THEY ALL VOTE !!! THEY are your obligation, first and foremost ..... and it is not your first obligation to give aid to every man and his dog overseas first !!! Look after your own FIRST !!!! Is this what you call SALUTING THEIR SERVICE ???

Have you any idea , how sickening it is for our Vets to see you both, ( Labor or Liberal ) turn up to the funerals of our current young vets for a photo opportunity, to be seen to be "caring " in the public eye, but only to turn your backs on them all, when they need you ??? (Just ask Breanna Till an Afghanistan Soldier's wife, how CARING this government is !!!)

And in light of what you DON'T do for our Vets .......Let's talk about Multiculturalism ......People have come here from other countries, for a better life, for more years than I have been alive ( I am 65 years old !) ... my own family migrated here in 1883, from Germany , and did find a better life ... Pre & Post war immigrants have came for a better life, and settled in and became wonderful contributors to this country, as did those who came here after the Vietnam War, ... all have contributed to the rich diversity of this country, and some descendants have even fought FOR this country, and they have become Australians and were glad to be ..and they had NO handouts from our Government either, ...they worked hard for everything!

I have never before had a problem with all, or any, race of immigrants coming here ... .......However , I DO NOW !!!

Please tell me why we have areas like Lakemba, where police do NOT, & will NOT go, for fear of their life ?

Please tell me why we can no longer have religion in schools, for fear of "OFFENDING" someone ? (The latest little gem is that they are not having, or being funded, for "chaplains " any more , but "Counsellors "?)

Please tell me why religious Christmas observances are no longer allowed in some schools for fear of OFFENDING someone ?

Please tell me HOW Christmas decorations in some stores might OFFEND someone ?

Please tell me why we have to have segregated days in some swimming centres, for fear of "OFFENDING" someone ?

Please tell me why we have some RADICAL clerics demanding Sharia Law in this country ... when if we were in THEIR country, this would NEVER be allowed ?

Please tell me why our laws need to be changed, so as not to OFFEND someone ?

Please tell me why we are fast becoming a MINORITY voice, in our own country, because of POLITICAL CORRECTNESS ? Please tell me WHY Australians cannot legally wear a face covering bike helmet into a bank ..and yet it is ok to wear a Burqa which covers the whole face ?

And please tell me WHY, when those people who want asylum here, can wreck our detention centres, as in Villawood , and STILL be accepted here ?

SO , in light of the above, WILL BOTH OF YOU ......Please tell me WHY, when some of our Vietnam Veterans FINALLY received (in the last 6 months) the recognition that they should have had after the Vietnam War, (and which they received from the USA & South Vietnam, during and immediately after the Vietnam War), that the families of those Veterans, were refused assistance by this Government, to attend that award ceremony, and yet this Government ....flew , accommodated , and even took on bus tours , to the the families of asylum seekers, after the funerals of those who were killed in the boat which sunk off Christmas Island ?

What does that say, about just who are this government's priorities ?

The Australian people that I speak to have genuine concerns about becoming a second class minority in our own country, and the reasons for it, are some of the above, ..... Are you so blind that you cannot see this ?

And no , I am NOT racist !!!..(if I did not like Catholics or Protestants would I be considered racist ?) Of course not !

Why is it, that if we object to what is happening in our country ... we are immediately labelled RACIST, in an attempt to shut us up ?

We are fighting Radical Muslims, in Afghanistan & Iraq , are we not ?I hear you say, yes but the Muslims we have here are "Not like that " .. well how would we know ? ...do we hear ANY of them coming out & speaking AGAINST radicals ??

I haven't ...have you ???

Islam is not compatible with ANY of the values that we hold here in Australia ! .....Are not the experiences of Britain , France , and the Netherlands an example of that? Why do you think it would be any different here ? We even have an Australian born "radical ", whose message is that Australia WILL become a Muslim country, under Sharia Law, & that we had "better get used to it ".

Will both of you grow some "Balls ", and start sticking up for this country and its people ???

We are the people who put you where you are, and PAY you to look after our interests ! ... And you are NOT doing that, by any stretch of the imagination !!!

I would appreciate an answer, from both of you, if only to convince me that once again, I am not talking to a brick wall !!!!!

In case it has escaped both of you ...I would like to remind you that, in Australia the Government ... is FOR THE PEOPLE, OF THE PEOPLE, & BY THE PEOPLE ... never forget that......because you sure have up till now !!!

Mrs Jenny Bell
20 Helene St,

Nuriootpa S.A.

Person of the Year 2011

2011-12-17T14:09:00.004+10:30

Tony Abbott wins person of the year?

Dear Qantas (click)

2011-11-02T12:23:00.002+10:30

This is a seriously funny letter to Qantas:

By Corinne Grant

November 2, 2011

Dear Qantas,

Things have not been good for some time. I’m sorry to do this in a letter but I don’t have 16 hours to sit on hold, waiting for one of your over-worked staff to answer my call.

I’m breaking up with you.

I’ve had it with you being rude to me, turning up late with no excuse, cancelling on me and losing my stuff. You don’t respect me any more. And your coffee is terrible.

You have used me, Qantas, and I can never forgive you for that.

I saved all my Frequent Flyer points for you, I hired cars and got out credit cards with your name on them, I chose the hotels and restaurants you wanted me to choose, all because you promised me a flight at the end of it.

And what did I get for that loyalty? ......................................

Read on by clicking header or copying this link into your browser:
http://thehoopla.com.au/dear-qantas-me/

Alan Joyce grounded Qantas airline (click)

2011-11-01T08:57:00.002+10:30

Now that Qantas Airways is slowly getting back to normal, there can be no doubt who grounded the airline. It was none other than Alan Joyce, the CEO of Qantas.

Many observers agree that Joyce had many other avenues left to consider instead of grounding his airline, possibly damaging "the brand" forever.

Australia's reputation as a reliable tourist destination down under, also is greatly damaged by the actions of this man.

No matter how much CEO Joyce and the Qantas board attempt to shift the blame, Joyce can not escape the fact that he was the man who grounded the fleet worldwide.
http://bit.ly/w2GnQa

Susan Mitchell on Tony Abbott (click)

2011-09-30T13:41:00.004+09:30

Susan Mitchell hits the nail on the head with her thoughts on the man who would be Liberal Prime Minister of Australia, Opposition leader Tony Abbott.

Julian Burnside QC has even more unflattering comments, .... but that's another story.

Click header to read Susan Mitchell's article.
or copy and past this link in your browser : http://bit.ly/ojBeXb

Cappo takes eye off his day job (click)

2011-09-13T09:13:00.004+09:30

It seems that Monsignor David Cappo (right) is suffering the consequences of taking his priestly eye off his role as a Catholic Priest. He seems more fixed on his serving Rann politics at taxpayers expense, ($115,00 plus perks).
The only loser in this is obviously the Catholic Church itself.

Cappo should really decide now, does he want to be a public servant, or a Catholic Priest.
He can't effectively do both, as clicking the header or pasting this link in your browser will plainly explain, as night follows day. http://bit.ly/pNyTxZ

Dear Monsignor Cappo (click)

2011-09-07T14:35:00.004+09:30

Dear Monsignor Cappo,

Its been announced by Premier Rann, that you are to retire in December as Commissioner for Social Inclusion in SA.

By my reckoning, Fr. Cappo, you have been paid well in excess of $1 million, plus perks, during the almost 10 years you have been paid to do God's work.
If I am wrong, I will certainly accept your correspondence correcting me.
I will also put your response on my Twitter site, @ResidentThinker. However, so far I have never had any correspondence back from you over the years. Disappointing really.

Is there a salary increase in your move to the Federal sphere?
If so, as a taxpayer, I would appreciate knowing how much we are paying you, to do God's work for government (rumored to be a $60,000 pay rise).

As Matt and Dave said on 891 this morning, perhaps its time for you to consider standing down as a priest and stick to your well paid, day job. No conflict then for you, as God's humble messenger.

I suppose, when a senior member of The Church gets paid handsomely by the taxpayer to assist government, then it is natural for us to question the separation of powers?

Finally Mons. Cappo, what are your qualifications in mental health? And what are the positive results of your handling of the "gang of 49"?

Best wishes,

Kerry Seebohm

Shoppies Union SDA influence over SA Labor (click)

2011-08-18T17:32:00.004+09:30

This Channel 7 Adelaide story of 17th August 2011, on the power and influence of the SDA Union over the SA Labor government is disturbing indeed.

Are we in South Australia living in a true democracy? Or do we just attend the polling booth as a feel good exercise?

This Channel seven footage poses many questions.

Video source Ch 7 Today Tonight Adelaide
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCVGF-jA4JU

The Dithering state :- Susan Mitchell opinion on Rann

2011-08-05T13:04:00.002+09:30

Friday, 5 August 2011

OPINION: The dithering state

SUSAN MITCHELL

THE media is a strange beast. For months, years even, it has been telling everyone Mike Rann has to go. The polls have been detailing it, the public has been screaming it, and even the birds have been chirping “Bye, Bye Rannbird”.

Then when it is finally determined, the numbers have been crunched, the factions have agreed and they give him the tap on the shoulder – he refuses to go. And the media says: “Oh, poor Mike, the faceless men have been to stab him in the back. How terrible.”

The question is: what is the best way to replace the old with the new, outside of an election result?

It’s not like top footballers, whose bodies tell them when they have to retire. They have a built-in UBD. But politicians are strange creatures. Even when all the neon lights are blinking GET OUT NOW, they refuse to accept their own demise.

Power is an addictive, habit-forming drug for which there is no cure, other than your own destruction or the threat of it.

In my lifetime of state premiers, Tom Playford was the only one who had it all sewn up. He had a gerrymander which he believed no one from his own party would ever destroy. But Steele Hall came along and chopped down Tom’s perpetually blooming cherry tree.

Don Dunstan gave it his best shot for a decade and then had to give it away or it would have killed him.

Dean Brown had hardly had time to warm the seat before one of his colleagues in the party tapped him on the shoulder and told him he didn’t have the numbers, then he left.

John Olsen was never called “the smiling assassin” because he looked as if he was off to the dentist instead of the premier’s office.

While the Liberals played musical chairs with their leaders, Mike Rann managed to scrape in with the support of a couple of independents and stayed there. Too long, some believed. But the reason someone stays that long in the leadership is because the Opposition is hopeless.

While a leader is continuing to win, they won’t go and no one wants to tell them they should because they will be punished for it.

The best-laid plans or arrangements between mates for an “orderly transition of power” rarely work out that way because the incumbent refuses to honour the agreement. They usually justify breaking their promise because they believe it is best for the party and the nation if they continue to lead.

Hawke and Keating became bitter enemies because there was no “handover” of power. Keating said: “If you want the top job, you have to snatch it.” He tried once, failed, sat on the backbench plotting, tried again and succeeded.

Costello should have learnt from him, because despite that piece of paper signed by them both in Ian McLachlan’s wallet, Howard refused to leave. Costello didn’t have the numbers or the guts to challenge him, so he sat and sulked for years. If he had gone for the “snatch” he probably would have won in the end. He claimed he never put himself on the line over it because of the stability of the party and the nation. Only his wife believed him.

Then, when Howard was booted out because he stayed too long and Costello was offered the job of Opposition Leader, he told them in a fit of pique to stuff it. Cut off his nose to spite his face.

Rudd …. well, Rudd destroyed himself by alienating almost every member of the caucus. Julia Gillard, as the deputy, was offered the job. She knew that as a woman, if she knocked back the chance to be prime minister, it would never be offered again. The caravan would have moved on. So she seized it and has been labelled a back-stabbing Judas ever since, a woman shoehorned into the job by “the faceless men of the Labor Party”.

And now Jay Weatherill has tried to do the right thing by not conducting a humiliating challenge against his leader but letting others knock on his door and give him the bad news. They should have known to send leading members of the cabinet instead of someone from the unions. But did they have the right to replace their leader? Of course they did.

The voters seem to think that they elect the premier. They elect only the party. And if the party decides it has no chance of winning the next election with the incumbent leader, it has the right to change him or her. It is stupid to expect a party to lose the election and then change the leader. All parties have to give it their best shot.

But having been in politics for 17 years, Rann is a master tactician and he has played on the perception that it would be ungracious and despicable to ask him to go immediately. He has asked to stay until he finishes the Olympic Dam project and mentors the new leader.

Who is in charge here? The outgoing Premier or the party that has appointed a new Premier?

Now we are back to dithering. Will he go? How long should he stay? What if he still refuses to go? Dither, dither on the wall, who is the most hopeless of us all?

It’s as bad as the Adelaide Oval fiasco or the Victoria Square reconstruction or the one-way super highway or the mining boom or the revival of the CBD or the greening of the city … and we could all add to this list of dithering. The fish rots from the head. So chop off the head or it will spread through the entire body of the fish.

This dithering has to stop or we should just change our car number plates to “The Dithering State”.

Tourism brochures could read: “Can’t make up your mind where to travel? Come to Adelaide and dither.”

www.susanmitchell.com.au

Weatherill authority underminded by Rann intransigence

2011-08-01T13:51:00.005+09:30

Arkaroola tipped the Right

KEVIN NAUGHTON : From InDaily.com.au 1/08/2011

MIKE Rann’s leadership is stone dead.

Having lost the confidence of the parliamentary party, the Cabinet room and ALP factions, each day that he delays a transition to Jay Weatherill weakens the new leader and jeopardises the party’s broader prospects.

While he hopes the massive mine at Olympic Dam will save him, it was a fledgling uranium prospect at Arkaroola that did him in.

As Indaily reported last Friday, Jay Weatherill, a member of Labor’s left, had received the support of enough members of the Right faction to be anointed as the next leader.

Once such a move is made, those who ache for change are always moved to make it swiftly. Weatherill’s team is unlikely to allow the deal to be put at risk by allowing a cooling off period.

Mike Rann, leader for 16 years, has been holding back the tide of change for almost three years.

The “night of the long knives” in October 2008, led by then ambitious Right faction convenor and Upper House member Bernie Finnigan, failed to hurt Rann’s leadership.

Yes, MPs were fed up with his leadership style, but it was too risky to start changing leaders when the polls were evenly balanced.

But in October 2009 it turned again when disaffected ex-husband of a parliament house waitress whacked the Premier with a rolled up copy of WineState magazine.

Rann’s masterful technique of answering a question that hadn’t been asked was exposed in a crisis that centred on detail and believability.

He said he had never met his attacker, Rick Phillips, and that he had never had a sexual encounter on a golf course.

Both statements were true; but they were not the questions that had been posed.

The damage was done and Rann limped to the March 2010 election where he won, courtesy of party strategist Bruce Hawker shoring up several key marginal seats.

Labor won, but 52 per cent of voters preferred the Liberals.

From that point, Mike Rann’s tenancy in the top job was temporary, as his party went about the process of working out who would lead them to the 2014 election.

The right pushed deputy Premier Kevin Foley aside and road-tested Jack Snelling and John Rau in senior positions.

With Rann still in the top job, the polls continued to slide, but Rann’s supporters still believed he could pull it back.

As he has always done in his nine years as Premier, Mike Rann was looking for symbols that would build his imagery, and if worse came to worse, would define his legacy.

He couldn’t lay claim to the Adelaide Oval – that was first a Liberal policy and then a Kevin Foley initiative.

He had built up a strong portfolio of achievements in renewable energy, but the masses were losing interest in green issues.

And while the Adelaide desalination plant was a big winner when the State was parched from years of drought, it held no value when the State was soggy underfoot.

That left Olympic Dam – the BHP Billiton project that he had been spruiking since 2005 and had expected to be up and about by 2007.

If he can get his name on that plaque, he would at least have a major project to his name – something more than a tram extension in the city.

In what appears to be a contradiction to his Olympic Dam position, Rann also has a passion for European politics and environmental issues – and the proposed uranium mine at Arkaroola presented a fascinating opportunity.

In contrast to Olympic Dam, Arkaroola was a prospect – not an existing mine.

The debate over mining in a wilderness area such as Arkaroola in the far north had raged for almost three years since the exploration company, Marathon Resources, clumsily dumped exploration waste in a shallow pit.

And so it came to be that while his Mineral Resources Minister and Right faction power broker Tom Koutsantonis was rubbing shoulders at the Australian Uranium Conference in Perth on July 21, the Premier was booking a plane to Arkaroola for July 22.

Sources close to Mr Koutsantonis said the Minister was upbeat about the prospects of a go-ahead at Arkaroola, with the appropriate environmental safeguards.

“He was telling people at the conference that everything was fine,” the source said.

“His department officials were of the same mind.”

Also of the same mind, was factional heavyweight Senator Don Farrell, a reported supporter of the Arkaroola bid.

Few appear to have known about the Arkaroola total-ban decision and Indaily understands Mr Koutsantonis was enraged at being told he had to travel to the region with the Premier to announce the mine had been killed off.

Rann had scored his environmental credibility, but in doing so had cut Koutsantonis’s grass.

From that day onward, the talk got louder among Labor’s powerbrokers, incensed at Rann insistence on writing his own script.

With no credible alternative of their own, the Right settled on a deal with Weatherill and Rann was told last Friday.

He denied it Friday night, but then confirmed the arrangement in a statement from India late on the weekend.

But he still wanted some more.

Always keen to write the story he wants the media to run, Rann is insisting that he will mentor Weatherill on how to do the job and then take the biggest prize on offer – ownership of the Olympic Dam expansion deal.

It weakens Weatherill’s authority and the party won’t stand for it.

Rann’s desperation for a legacy has brought him undone on two fronts and the end will come sooner than he hopes.

Anthony Barnett opinions on Murdoch (Click)

2011-07-19T16:30:00.003+09:30

About the author

Anthony Barnett is the founder of openDemocracy and the Co-Editor of its UK section, Our Kingdom.

A potentially awesome shift in the UK’s power structure is taking place if the role and influence of Murdoch’s newspapers is really undermined. This is because the mess that Jeremy Hunt wishes to see sorted out is the very fusion of politicians, journalists and media owners that govern us - the political class.

A pharaoh who cast his shadow over us for 30 years has fallen. His empire still functions. A grovelling PR apology of crocodile proportions may restore some of his influence. But the kind of power Rupert Murdoch exercised has been broken. We breathe a freer air in Britain. It is so surprising, it is hard to believe.

Here are some reflections on the culture Murdoch personified and the system of power he helped shape and has left behind in the UK.

Personally, Murdoch deserves his humiliation given the way he has treated others. Politically, to see the most powerful figure in British politics (a man able to enter Downing Street by the back door for secret meetings at will for over thirty years) lose his power is great for democracy and liberty. Economically, a ruthless advocate of the market system, an opponent of regulation and the welfare state, Rupert’s son James, sees his pivotal position being whisked from under him.

My delight in all this is tempered by a question. Is the speed of the Murdoch’s disgrace evidence of the strength, vitality and health of democracy in Britain or is it a confirmation of its crumbling weakness and accompanying hysteria? If the answer is a combination of both how do we ensure that the former predominates over the latter?

Fear

Murdoch traded on fear. He and his papers always sensed a weak point and were unscrupulous in exploiting it for the worse. He favoured war, polarisation, division, greed and sexism because they sold papers and gave him leverage.

We all knew about his hacking of celebrities, paying the police and intimidating MPs, threatening to work over their private lives [9] if they tried to hold News International to account. We knew this especially thanks to the Guardian, its editor Alan Rusbridger who supported the investigations and Nick Davies, its key reporter, whose book Flat Earth News [10] maps the wider degeneration of contemporary journalism. Yet many continued to buy News International papers while those who spoke out against them were ghettoised. From the police to the BBC, critical stories were scorned, dismissed as merely the Guardian/Observer trying to ‘get at’ a man whose power represented the accepted status quo. The prime minister has just told us that he was not in fact explicitly warned against taking his Director of Communications into Downing Street - a man who oversaw “a flourishing criminal conspiracy” when he was Editor of the News of the World - because, as he told the House of Commons, the information had already “been published in the Guardian”. So that doesn’t count then. Why, it might equally have appeared in that organ of truthfulness Private Eye!

I am compressing things here, which I’ll unpack when we come to the Prime Minister who should clearly resign. One of the reasons for David Cameron finally throwing the book at Murdoch is an attempt to save his own skin.

Cameron knew. We all knew. And yet much of the public and the political class continued to buy his papers and take them seriously. Murdoch and his employees took this for public as well as official support - or at least active permission for the way they behaved. It turns out to have been cowed acceptance.

Was it as simple as that? This is the interpretation offered by Tim Garton Ash in his Guardian column [11]. He describes the appalling influence of News International on politicians of all parties and the shocking spinelessness of the police and concludes “the most plausible explanation boils down to fear”. Now, he continues, we are putting the “putrid quagmire” behind us and “the future looks brighter”. Out of this, “one of the most important crises in the British political system”, we can put in place a new settlement between politics and the media.

The problem with this analysis is that it turns all those who were running the state, the political parties, the police, the civil service, almost all MPs and the governments of the day, into the intimidated victims of News International. Murdoch’s dark empire frightened and suborned them into submission.

While I agree we are witnessing a crisis and a welcome democratic opportunity, this isn’t a plausible explanation of what has happened.

Murdoch’s dynamic hypocrisy

Murdoch is a warmonger. He is a man who sells wars. He learnt the profits of war in the Falkland conflict in 1982 and this bonded him to Margaret Thatcher. He applied this at a world level after 9/11. Not one of his 130 odd editors around the globe opposed the invasion of Iraq. He formed a triumvirate with Bush and Blair to back the invasion. Had his media been genuinely investigative (as is now claimed for News of the World) they’d have exposed the lies and disinformation in the lead up to Iraq. Instead, at Fox News especially, he helped create and disseminate them.

One of the profits of wartime alliance with leaders is their gratitude and access to official license. Although a leading advocate of market fundamentalism and hostility to state regulation, Murdoch was a welfare monopolist. His greatest skill was fixing deals with government, permitting him a market advantage.

This was the malevolent dishonesty at the heart of Murdochism. He was a close ally of state power who advocated hostility towards it. Worse, he was an ally of the most baleful and threatening aspects of state power, its police and security and the database state, while he attacked its best aspects, regulation, welfare, investment in and defence of the public interest.

His close relationship to power allowed his media to help ‘create reality’. This reinforced a belief that he was above the law. Being above the law is worse – more frightening and lethal – than being merely criminal. It means your crimes do not need to be secret and you can get away with them (see also Tony Blair). Armed criminals do not threaten the state’s monopoly of coercion. A mafia does.

Buying police was an aspect of this and police corruption is a huge part of the story in London. It is unlikely that the details will come out as much as they should. The British way of dealing with police corruption, if it can, is to retire the officers concerned and move on. The relationship of News International to the employment of criminals and ex-criminals was actively connived in by the police (and apparently also elements in the secret service). This is another example of News International double-standards. When it supported ‘our boys in blue’ its readers did not think this meant they were corrupting them.

Page three in the Sun is a daily example of Murdoch’s double standards. The supposed advocate of family values he was undermining them in the name of “good, clean fun” – ironically, what he hid behind the frankness of topless nudity was a use of women that was anything but honest.

In none of this, however, can it be said that he acted alone. His empire was not that of a tyrant built by conquest. In Britain he was more the agent of an Anglo-American elite than its master. In the UK in the 1970s they wanted to secure the newly oil-rich archipelago for finance-dominated globalisation and this meant breaking Britain’s post-war welfare state and its consensus politics. Murdoch was a crucial part of this. But he was a hired-hand, an energetic foreigner with few if any scruples, used to blast apart the ranks of a lazy, cosy elite and over-trade-unionised working classes.

Too much power

This influenced British opinion and its politics, including how people voted. I don’t agree with David Elstein [12] that the influence of Murdoch’s papers didn’t have electoral outcomes. Murdoch’s press was a constant, shaping cultural pressure, direct and indirect. Even if mechanically assessing voting intentions is unable to measure this, priorities were set and political agendas shaped (just as I think the BBC influences voters).

Where I agree with Elstein is that the creation of satellite television was a creative move that increased plurality and quality competition. Opposition to the total takeover of BSkyB stemmed from fear that his monopolising this success would give his newspaper holdings an advantage, by combining a pay wall and cross-media integration into the BSkyB charging system. Probably, Murdoch was more interested in taking a wholly owned BSkyB out of the UK’s tax jurisdiction. And, of course, there was its potential Foxisation.

The battle over this became a symbol of a larger fightback over Murdoch’s influence within the oppressive, dehumanisation project of commercial media. He came to personify this. Ironically, the celebrity culture that he encouraged made him the bogyman for those who scorned it. Yet given his power and his son’s beliefs [13], the precautionary principle seemed more than reasonable to me. I opposed the BSkyB takeover as a citizen, which is why I argued [14], as soon as the Dowler revelation broke, that it was the Murdochs themselves, not their editors, who should be removed. Henry Porter put it simply and rightly on the Today programme. Murdoch had too much power and ought to have less, not more.

There is a kind of Masonic expertise amongst those who understand the intricacies of broadcasting law and its oversight and regulation, what this permits and doesn’t, which suggested a more nuanced view. But for all his brilliance and daring as a media mogul, Murdoch was a man who stood for bad things. That was the basis for my opposition to him. The feeling is strongly reinforced by James Murdoch. Thirty years of Rupert expanding his influence was bad enough. The prospect of a successful dynastic transition, with James in the saddle riding $2billion plus profits a year and shaping his media to his agenda was intolerable.

It feels strange, as if it is a hostage to fortune, to write about their power in the past tense.

The source of Murdoch’s power over Britain

Though hardly original or limited to him, Murdoch’s populism and celebration of the market were popular. They provided a genuine political attraction in a snobbish country without an honest constitution, where access to political power was an establishment game that relied on norms of paternalism and gentlemen’s rules.

Those who trade in fear live off the weakness of others. In the UK this informal, elitist constitution of ours while lauded as strong because flexible is in fact a weakness. Murdoch joined with Thatcher in exploiting its informality to expand their power and in the process further hollowed out its self-belief. They began to dismantle the old regime without any desire to replace it by anything other than themselves, the less regulated the better. The process continued under Tony Blair.

In 1945 the ‘absolute sovereignty of parliament’ meant the sovereignty of a genuine system: a politically interested monarch, a wealthy landed aristocracy in the House of Lords, a Commons that believed in itself that was voted in by mass-based parties, an independent civil service (without special advisors), the Church of England, and the last of empire. It was financially bust and had to be propped up by Marshall aid. But it had been re-forged by wartime Churchillism into a powerful system of consent.

Today it is easy for us to see the closed and undemocratic nature of its elitism and forget how deeply it support penetrated the population, thanks to trade unions, a shared wartime experience and commitment to the creation of a welfare state and improving living standards. When this political edifice tottered in the crisis years of the seventies it needed an honest constitutional democracy to replace its closed shops with open associations that could have preserved its social democratic dynamism.

Instead, we had Thatcher. She shattered the closed shops, it should not be forgotten, of both the City of London and the union, with a free market ideology for which Murdoch was the foremost media propagandist (he had bought the News of the World in 1969 and the Sun in 1970, she enabled him to acquire the Times and Sunday Times in 1981). Their successful assault was permitted by the lack of constitutional safeguards, a lack they then preserved. This is why his papers are ferocious opponents of constitutional reform. The high point of the process came in 2003 when the absolute sovereignty of parliament became the absolute sovereignty of Tony Blair. Except that Blair needed Murdoch to achieve it.

The importance of this for the UK’s political culture may be hard to grasp, so here is an example to illustrate the wider point. In his sycophantic biography of Murdoch, William Shawcross asks the media mogul, known to be privately a republican, about the monarchy. Murdoch’s answer is revealing. He says, I am summarising from memory: “if you want to preserve such an obvious weakness that is fine by me”. It was like a bully praising an opponent for his cowardice. “Please keep your elitist, indefensible system as this means you will find it all the harder to regulate and govern me!” (Only he didn’t say “please”.)

From the eighties onwards the clash between Murdoch-Thatcher-and-Blair and the traditional British Establishment was a conflict between two non-democratic forces. The mandarin elite of the old regime was undermined by the grasping opportunism of the global capitalism Murdoch represented. A decisive section of the ambitious middle and upper classes preferred the modernisation Murdoch offered to the restrictions of the old regime. Together the rising, media-savvy politicians, policy advisors, PR consultants along with editors and proprietors formed a ‘political class’ that pushed aside the old establishment. But there was a refreshing aspect to this. It did raise people’s game. It did bring wealth and growth with it, however unbalanced and unequal. Britain was in a crisis in the 1970s. It badly did (and still does) need to change (but not in the way Murdoch advocated). It remains appallingly elitist.

It is not the case that a good, honourable system was tyrannised over by an incoming authoritarian. A decayed, elite system that refused to democratise itself embraced modernisation from outside to preserve its privilege.

The fire in the firestorm

The kind of change the UK needs is a genuinely popular, democratic politics that has a new sense of the public interest, one that is not BBC-Reithian and top down.

But is this what is happening? The New York Times (locked in deadly competition with Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal) declared that a ‘British Spring’ was under way – its democratic breezes and fresh social media campaigns lifting fear over Westminster as it was cleansed of Wapping’s sinister influence.

If this is a Tahrir Square moment, where are the people in the square? The British public, I would argue, did play a decisive yet ghostlike role in all this. The moment the Guardian published the revelation that Milly Dowler’s phone had been hacked was indeed a tipping point. As the story began to roll, everyone knew that the game had changed. The family of a murdered girl had been given false hope that she was alive thanks to the heartless indifference of a News of the World hired hand.

Had the political leaders stood together and defended Murdoch in the way he had come to expect, Parliament Square would have been seized by a crowd exponentially larger than the 30,000 young people who stormed it in December last year.

It is an irony of our post-modern times. Industrial-scale callousness of the kind that led to the Dowler hack has been going on since the popular press was invented. Historically, the wealthy and important were treated with deference while the poor were punished because as victims they deserved what they got. Today - and when did this happen? - if you are a leading member of society, powerful, rich or a celebrity, then you are ‘fair game’ for maltreatment. It is acceptable to hack the phones of top people or steal and publish their medical records – good luck to you mate! But if you hurt the feelings of the poor and innocent you have to go to jail.

Call me egalitarian but I find this peculiar. What was been found utterly intolerable and created mass revulsion is the prospect of regular people being worked over like celebrities by the tabloids. Even though most of us are taught that we would rather like to be a celebrity. The peculiarity is a delight: Murdoch was brought down thanks to his own populism.

But what was the nature of the explosion, given the absence of the masses in any physical sense as the Wapping Bastille crumbled?

Here is how the Prime Minister experienced the pressure after a week of attempting to minimise the whole affair, do what he could to protect Murdoch and limit the damage to himself. On Wednesday 13 July he told the House of Commons:

We have to be clear about what is happening here. There is a firestorm, if you like, that is engulfing parts of the media, parts of the police and, indeed, our political system’s ability to respond. What we must do in the coming days and weeks is think above all of the victims, such as the Dowler family, who are watching this today, and make doubly sure that we get to the bottom of what happened and prosecute those who are guilty.

Later in the debate he repeated the phrase

What has happened here is a massive firestorm of allegations that have got worse and worse.

And again:

Of course it takes time to get these things right when you have this enormous firestorm going on, but I think that we have taken some major steps forward that will make a big difference.

Was it a firestorm of revelations and allegations that was toasting him, or a firestorm of popular revulsion and public opposition?

The adroitness of the British elite

This is where the British elite has not lost its adroitness. It has always governed with consent, working hard to try and make sure government was popular. The Victorians rightly saw this as being distinct from democracy, at a time when most of the population were not yet trusted with the vote. Now, however, opinion polls confirm that politicians as a class are staring into the abyss of almost complete lack of public trust.

In the expenses crisis of 2009, the politicians worked out how to put themselves at the head of the opposition to what they had been doing. It seemed to work. (There is an amusing John Cleese short where he plays a boss who concludes that he has to fire himself then gives himself another chance.) Now they did the same again. To a man and woman our MPs were aware of the baleful influence of News International better than any, yet took its calls. All of a sudden, with an ultra-quick exhalation of remorse, they unanimously supported a motion in Parliament against any expansion of Murdoch’s power, leading the revolution against themselves!

Two things were going on when the politicians turned themselves into the voice of the public’s revulsion at the lawlessness of News International, an amorality they had connived in for years.

On the one hand a genuine and welcome shift in the balance of power is taking place, as unaccountable might is brought to book and the intimate collusion of the executive and the media is to some degree prised apart. When the parliamentary expenses crisis was at its height, Graham Allen MP wrote a powerful complaint [15]. He protested that the government and the media were ganging up in a collusive tango against Parliament itself, damaging any real hope of democracy in the process. The peccadilloes and permissiveness of backbenchers who were on the make had in fact originally been inspired by an executive hoping to make them more submissive. The Telegraph-led assault against, far from leading to a strengthening of the independence of MPs, had happened upon new forms of taming them and a further weakening of parliament. In this way a justified exposure led to a ‘clean up’ that in fact increased centralisation and further weakened parliamentary democracy in the UK.

This analysis places the collaboration between the executive (ministers and civil servants) and privately owned media at the centre of the state: the very collaboration that has been set back, at least momentarily, by the assault unleashed upon the Murdoch empire. As a result, we are becoming freer, and the polity more law-abiding and less corrupt, especially thanks to a clearer shared understanding of how bad things were. It may be relative but it is a wonderful improvement. How was it achieved?

Ed Miliband played a pivotal role. Casting aside the advice of caution, he spoke for himself and broke the collusion of party power with Murdoch’s influence. In doing so he spoke to and for the country for the first time since becoming his party’s leader. He thus became prime-ministerial at a stroke (a great stroke). It is difficult to think of a moment when the leader of the opposition so clearly led the way in an issue of such importance.

To everyone’s astonishment he did the right thing! With the public clearly taking his side he had momentum and the initiative. Also, he clearly enjoyed it and was saying what he meant. And he was clean. At the end of June he was seen to be a loser, unable to make his mark. The media was especially hostile to him because he had not been their candidate. The Blairite machine had stitched up the papers and TV into supporting David Miliband. The arrogance of the media, led by boys and girls from News International, ilies in its conviction that it is the voice of the people. This means it can decide who is electable, as it did with Blair and Cameron. Suddenly, Miliband’s disadvantage in this respect came to his aid: it meant that he could lead the demand to have the Augean stables of British power swept clean.

Yet the sweeper remains a united House of Commons and a judicial inquiry. As if the cattle themselves can clear away thirty years of their own deposits. Anything to head off the mighty Hercules of an angry people!

Ed Miliband, celebrity and the net

Three things have contributed to Miliband’s crushing defeat of Murdoch. First, his leadership was on the edge of extinction. Tony Blair had launched a devastating, serpentine assault upon him – naturally enough in the Sun [16]. The former leader and his followers seem to have decided they had to oust Ed Miliband now, if his replacement was to have any chance of unifying the party after a bruising fight and winning an election in 2015. Miliband’s only hope of defeating his opponents, who included most Labour MPs, was to show that he could win voter endorsement, outsmart Cameron, and open up the Labour Party to a new generation of support that would bring an expanded, growing party behind him. All this seemed quite beyond him when he made a totally disastrous response to the one-day strike by public sector workers the previous week (see this account by Dan Hancox [17]). Young newcomers who had joined Labour to stop the Coalition were tearing up their party cards and posting images of this online.

With nothing to lose, Miliband wanted to say what he really thought about the behaviour of the Murdoch machine and risk becoming its enemy. He consulted with his team on Tuesday 5 July, the day after the Dowler revelations. Promptly dubbed the “sod it” meeting, with nothing to lose he spoke out and became his own man.

This may only have happened because his back was up against the wall, but from the wall’s side there were two forces pushing him forward. The full-spectrum dominance of the tabloid media is no longer the only voice in town when it came to summoning up what is called popular opinion. Two new forms of influence have emerged over the last twenty years. Both existed in a more confined analogue form before then, but are now turbo-driven by digital communication and the internet. They are ‘celebrity’ and viral campaigns.

Celebrity is now a form of power. An issue can languish on the margins – or be something the Guardian ‘bangs on’ about - and then be catapulted to prominence by celebrity advocacy. A well-chosen celebrity bestows ‘sex-appeal’ on the most unlikely cause, creates attention, ends specialist status and ensures that ‘everyone’ is talking about whatever it is. Politicians then compete to show they are ‘with it’ for fear of being shown-up as being ‘without it’ by their opponents. Like all forms of volatile power, celebrity endorsement can blow up in your face or humiliate everyone by turning into a damp squib. So-called “reality” television has created celebrity-for-itself, those famous for being famous (and selling newspapers and magazines) of whom many of us have never heard. Their support can be fatal for a cause. Meanwhile other celebrities have to some degree earned their fame, if not their notoriety. They can have a genuine voice provided they also have authority to speak for the cause in question.

An example of this kind of celebrity power in the UK was Joanna Lumley’s campaign to allow Ghurkhas who had risked their lives for Britain to come and live here. She was brilliantly successful, as well as being funny and attractive, because her father had been an officer in the 6th Gurkha Rifles. It was a cause that mattered to her personally. Thus her use of her stardust was genuine not contrived. It meant hers was not just a celebrity endorsement, as in an advert: in this campaign she was also a ‘real person’, not a contrived figure of public relations. The mixture of authenticity, public recognition and an attractive appearance and personality is compelling, drawing in millions to consider a call or an argument they’d otherwise have ignored.

This was the mixture that celebrities like Jemima Kahn and Hugh Grant brought to the lobby against hacking [18]. In a striking Newsnight encounter Grant told an executive from the Times that far from his sister paper’s bad behaviour being “in the past” as he claimed, the Sun had recently acquired and published Grant’s own private medical records. Everyone was astonished and appalled. Grant could no longer be scorned as merely publicity-seeking in his support for the campaign.

So Miliband had effective celebrity on his side. It’s a new form of top-down populism that has escaped the control of the tabloids who created it and in this case celebrity served democracy. For sure it is ambiguous and self-interested, but it has brought a new force into the equations of power.

In addition to gathering celebrity support, Miliband’s stand echoed the call of online campaigns by Avaaz [19] globally, which called for an end to “Murdoch’s criminal empire”, and 38Degrees [20] in the UK. Both had memberships who wanted to blow the whistle of the web against News International. Thousands upon thousands of messages poured in, not least to MPs from people in their constituencies, and companies were called upon to boycott News of the World. Paul Mason of Newsnight asked if the network had defeated the hierarchy [21]. The answer is “yes, in part”. As with celebrity power, the monopoly of traditional politics is being prised open and Miliband finally found himself on the upside of the energy.

Once he went for broke the firestorm became unstoppable. He became the leader of the ‘political class’ which then put itself at the forefront of the mass outrage against the way the political class had behaved.

The ‘Political Class’

I say ‘political class’. As the nature of political power in London reshaped itself in the hacking crisis, this term went live in a novel way. It was introduced as a concept by Peter Oborne in his book, ‘The Triumph of the Political Class’. [22]In it he argues that the British aristocracy, industrial and middle classes, inspired by a Burkean ideal of public service, created in the 19th century an uncorrupt disinterested administrative class who could not be bribed or suborned, while being an MP was unpaid. Public service became a self-regulated, honourable calling at the heart of the Establishment. This ethic carried through the Second World War and into the 1970s, when a new process started. This got into its stride under Thatcher and came into its own under New Labour, which saw the rise of manipulative, corporate populism (Oborne is kind enough to credit me with this term I coined in 1999 to describe New Labour). The agent of this change was the rise of ‘the political class’, who are mostly Oxbridge-educated men recruited young into the circuits of political influence. Two things define this force. First, it seeks personal gain from public office. Second, it makes its career and its fortune from “a fusion between the media and political domains”. This analysis set Oborne at odds with the dominant narrative which misleadingly offers the public the picture of still honourable politicians harassed by a “feral” media (Tony Blair’s term) as the influential nether world of advisors and consultants is lost from sight. A critical figure in the formation of the new corruption was Rupert Murdoch, to whom Oborne dedicates a trenchant section.

After the book was published the term ‘political class’ moved into circulation, although usually by journalists contemptuously deploying it to describe politicians, as if they themselves were not part of it. On Friday July 8, in an interview with Kirsty Wark for Newsnight, Ed Miliband told her that the “whole political class” had got it wrong in its relationship with Murdoch. In effect he identified himself positively and professionally as a member of it. This was the first time I had heard the term used in this fashion, as an objective uncritical description of reality, a plain man’s substitute for the political elite. Implicitly, Miliband’s use included the media and certainly unelected advisors and the civil service within its ambit.

Miliband was making the language as well as the political weather. It didn’t take longer than a weekend for this to gain parliamentary recognition. Answering questions for the government in the debate on phone hacking and News International [23] on Monday July 11, Jeremy Hunt, the Secretary of State for Culture, the Media and Sport, said at one point, “We have all failed—politicians, journalists and media owners - and we must all work together to put the problem right”. And later, “In the last Parliament there were two Select Committee inquiries on the matter and two reports by the Information Commissioner stating that things were wrong and needed to be sorted out, but nothing happened. Let us hope that as a political class we are up to the challenge of sorting things out this time”.

Hunt’s use of the term is impeccable, combining politicians, journalists and media owners. But what he wishes for is impossible. The mess is the fact that we are governed by a fusion of politicians, journalists and media owners. They have come together in pursuit of the creation of public consent to policies which benefit them but are against the public interest.

What is needed is a Chris Wood style “grand correction [24]” which, naturally, the political class is determined to prevent. One form of it has been advocated by Suzanne Moore [25] to “bust open journalistic practice”, another by Dan Hind in his Return of the Public [26]. It is the principle on which OurKingdom was initiated within openDemocracy. We need citizen government that opens up the political class to constitutional democracy. And maybe the only force that is able to do this is a networked politics [27].

Gordon Brown, David Cameron

It is a long way from here to there. Standing in our way is the political class itself, a vested interest dislocated from genuine political movements and public life. Gordon Brown entered the debate in the House of Commons on Wednesday to demonstrate what I mean. It was a graceless, rambling, self-pitying performance. Without a touch of remorse, Brown put himself forward, in a television interview as well, as a pure victim, a man and his family wronged by what he denounced as a “criminal-media nexus [28]”. He didn’t mention that he had tried very hard to become a member of it himself (and permitted his own people to intrude on the private lives of others). Allison Pearson spelt it out in the Telegraph [29], “For Brown to complain about the invasion of “private grief” was like Faust moaning that someone had forged his signature on the pact with the Devil”. Tim Garton Ash accepts Brown’s presentation. I think it is evidence for Oborne’s thesis that the underlying nexus is the active, collusive twinning of politicians and proprietors who are in it together, while falsely presenting it as a fight to the death.

In order to justify himself and prove that his relationship with News International was not cosy, Brown read out from the advice he had received from the head of the civil service when he inquired as to whether he could call for a public inquiry into the News of the World – after News International had switched its support from Labour to the Tories. The answer came back that it was so close to the election it would look partisan and might fail if it was challenged in a judicial review. This, Brown implied, showed how the forces had ganged up against him.

But a simple response was available to him in the light of this wholly predictable advice. Brown could have made a call for a full-scale inquiry into the tabloid press part of Labour’s election manifesto. He could have taken the issue to the voters and challenged the tabloids to do their worst. We can now see that this could have won him political support and personal sympathy. Instead, he played the game. By intervening in the way he did this past week he is still playing the same game. We, the public, are again encouraged to be observers not players.

More ominously, his successor is still playing the game. As he entered Downing Street for the first time as Prime Minister, David Cameron said, “I want a political system that people can trust and look up to once again”. Hah! I referred above to one of the warnings he was given not to take Andy Coulson into Downing Street as he had overseen a “flourishing criminal conspiracy”. It was in fact written by Peter Oborne who has been an acquaintance of Cameron for twenty years. True it was in the Observer [30] and it is well worth re-reading it today. I posted about it at the time, in an article on the heart of the matter [31]. If it had been arguably untrue, Coulson would have sued. It is inconceivable that the Tory leader was not aware of the seriousness of these charges in the run up to the election.

But pressed on the issue in his press conference [32] on Friday July 9, Cameron said repeatedly that he had checked and, for example, “no one gave me any specific information. Obviously, I sought assurances, I received assurances, I commissioned a company to do a basic background check, but I’m not hiding from the decision I made.” But he was hiding. Because his next answer - “I sought some specific assurances but also some general assurances as you would expect. It was a series of conversations, a series of meetings we had after he resigned from the News of the World, before he came to work with me at Conservative Central Office and in the House of Commons.” – referred to the time he first employed Coulson four years ago, not the warnings against his taking Coulson with him into Number 10.

It is interesting to see how skilfully Cameron dissembles and wriggles, worth remembering when listening to future presentations of policy. Now it turns out that he had invited him to Chequers as a weekend friend even after he was forced to step out of Downing Street. This is a perfect example of the integration of media and politics that is coming apart. The Prime Minister now denounces in shocked terms the possibility that he has been lied to by Coulson, if with a touch more remorse than his predecessor Brown. In both cases they are seeking to scapegoat Murdoch and company for their own collusion.

Conclusion

A potentially awesome shift in the UK’s power structure is taking place if the role and influence of Murdoch’s newspapers is really undermined. When Thatcher introduced market fundamentalism into Britain, Murdoch was a key player in winning popular support for privatisation and undermining the unions. Now the Coalition, alongside their austerity programme are launching an unprecedented reconfiguration of the state, opening it up to corporate provision in the name of the Big Society, as Olly Huitson has summarised. The same day that Jeremy Hunt told parliament that “we the political class” should “sort things out”, the Prime Minister launched the Open Public Services White Paper, a classic of political class jargon dissected by Anna Coote [33]. Without the influence of the Murdoch press, Cameron may find it hard to break the inevitable resistance to his double-sided campaign of austerity and marketisation.

At the same time, many in the media are also rubbing their hands with pleasure at the humiliation of a rival. In terms of the news, we are now left with a monopoly provider in the BBC. (see these graphs here [34], displayed on Conservative Home). Why is the BBC a danger? Well, for a start it permitted the creation of the database state. It never gave the Guardian’s coverage of the hacking case its due. If it had been left to the BBC, all the most egregious aspects of Murdoch’s power would have remained intact. It also is part of the circuit of the political class. We won’t be safe until there is competition and plurality within public service broadcasting – a case set out in open debate in the Public Service Broadcasting Forum [35]. But for this to happen there needs to be a democratic ethic of public interest guiding the media that is not defined in terms of the market and efficiency. Des Freedman’s report of the utter incomprehension [36] of broadcasters, from the BBC to Google, in the face of such a suggestion is a salutary warning that Murdochism will live on after Murdoch.

Forget the minders just ask our elected MP's advice.

2011-07-11T09:36:00.004+09:30

Dear SA and Federal Members of Parliament.

Here is a novel idea!

If supported, it will get you all back in touch with the community you are elected to represent. It will also save Australia millions of dollars.

Sack all of your (highly paid) advisers, minders and speech writers.
Hey we didn't elect Premier Rann for example, to have his speeches written by some highly paid unelected minder did we! Its not working anyway.
Office staff members, please read on before you delete this email so your boss does not get to read it. I have taken the time, surely he/she should get to read it?
Its not for you and doesn't refer to your good selves anyway. . This email is for the member of parliament you are working for. Ok?

How can MP's and Senators etc. be in touch with the community? Think about it. How can they be in touch if they continually listen to their minders/advisers/speech writers?
You pay them to advise you on all manner of things including the polls and what the community supposedly want and are thinking. That is an impossible job for them to do. Its impossible.

Minders are not at grass roots level. You pay them to spin to you what they think is happening in the community.
Want to save some money and get in touch for that effort?

Don't we, under the Westminster System elect our local representatives to do that job for us? Yes we do.
If that is not the case, then why have elections at all?
Just get your advisers that you pay, to do our job for you!
However, I have never, not once, had a minder or adviser, or a speech writer contact me for my opinions. So what does he/she know?
That's why I and many thousands of us, write to our local representatives.
Are we truly wasting our time?
You surely must begin to listen to our voices via our representatives of the Party we choose to vote for. They really are in touch with community values, thinking and expectations.
When is the last time a minder or adviser attended a suburban street corner meeting of the locals? My local member does. That's why I vote for him.
You don't need to spend millions on unrepresentative, unelected "advisers" do you? We are here. Hello!

I know, and on your individual reflection, you will have to admit that you also know, that your Party and leaders are out of touch with the people of the real world out there.
You collectively spend millions of our tax dollars to be "advised" on what the community is thinking. Why on earth are you doing this? Why? It is not even democratic.

Simply get back to basics. The first party that does it, listens to its own MP's and ditches the "advisers" will certainly be the winner. Please give it some thought, and don't be afraid of your Leader, who I can't even send this email to, because they don't allow ordinary people like me to have their email address. Mike Rann won't get this, neither will Julia Gillard. In touch with the community? They don't even respond to our Tweets! They just want us to log on to their website and fill in "a form"! Do you mind? We all know what happens to that effort by we mere voters.

So get back to basics. That's why I vote for my local representative, to advise you on what we are thinking and what our expectations are.
Its simple really when you stand back and think about it.

Labor in particular is hearing from the voters via the newspaper and talk-back radio, loud and clear, that you are detached from us and don't listen to us. Are we frustrated? You bet we are. But your "advisers" know better!!
You pay millions of our taxes to "advisers" to tell you what we are thinking? Oh please!

Something is very wrong here. Australia and all Australians (except the minders) suffer the consequences of this disconnect.

Please consider. The winner will be the party that listens to us via our representatives in Parliament. That's what it's supposed to be all about anyway isn't it?
Forgive me for my naivety.

Best wishes,

Kerry Seebohm

Labor "values" further decline under Rann leadership (click header)

2011-07-07T10:49:00.007+09:30

07-07-2011
Dear Editor The Advertiser,

I am appalled that Rann Labor is now going to take more rent money from the less advantaged of our community living in housing trust homes.
How can they still call themselves Labor when they now want any working child, who lives in a Trust House at home with his/her parents to now have to contribute directly to the government, 15% of their take home income.

Don't the people who live in government homes deserve a break to improve their life too?
Don't their children deserve all the help they can get to improve their well being and perhaps eventually save enough of their income, to buy their own modest home?
Not under Rann Labor apparently.

What has happened to Labor values under the leadership of Premier Mike Rann?
To say I am disgusted with this decision is an understatement.

Labor used to be the champion of redistribution of wealth.
For Jennifer Rankine to say it is unfair for ordinary taxpayers to be subsidising the rent of the less well off, is total rubbish.
Why do we elect a Labor government?

And where is Monsignor Cappo's public view on this. We are paying him handsomely from taxpayers money apparently for social inclusion, not social exclusion.
Mike Rann, and Jennifer Rankine, I am appalled. Shame on you. Shame!

Kerry Seebohm
Footnote: I wonder if The Advertiser will publish this one,...... and intact?

UNPUBLISHED

Qantas slips further down the scale (click)

2011-06-24T08:37:00.003+09:30

Qantas, our national flag carrier has long been held in high esteem with Australian and world travellers.
But over recent years something is amiss.
They now rank 8th and falling, in the latest international Skytrax survey.

Adelaide for example, the capital city of South Australia, a city with a population of over 1.2 million, is so poorly served by Qantas internationally, that any would-be travellers, need to exit Australia via Melbourne or even worse, via Sydney terminals.

I can recall when Qantas served Adelaide well with Jumbo Jets. Not for years now have they done this. Cost cutting has virtually cut Adelaide out of the international equation. Cheaper to send us to Sydney to depart, and arrive back in Australia. Tough luck that we are so inconvenienced, but that is the Qantas way it seems.

Recently my partner and I had to travel via Sydney to go overseas. We had no other choice but to travel QF for this particular extensive trip.

However, to catch the 11am QF Sydney flight ouot of Sydney, we had to rise at 4am in Adelaide, to catch the 6am, two hour flight to SYD, to board the Qantas international flight.
If QF had served ADL better with their international flights (perhaps SYD-ADL-Shanghai) we would be able to rise at a reasonable hour, to catch a flight around noon, which was heading west anyway.
I can recall when British Airways flew Jumbo's into ADL from Melbourne and vv.
But then with an agreement with code share partner Qantas, not only did BA cease flying to Adelaide, but Qantas shut down most of their international flights here too, soon after.

Of course, we were further inconvenienced when flying home via Los Angeles.
We arrived on the QF flight at 6:30am in SYD. All passengers then went through passport control and customs. The SYD passengers could then go home and be relaxed by 8:30am.

We Adelaide passengers, were treated to collecting our baggage, taking it to a domestic flight drop-off bay, then catching a bus to the QF domestic departure terminal.
We again had to go through security search, and wait another two hours in the terminal before the QF flight finally took us on the 2 hour flight to Adelaide.
We arrived in Adelaide at 11:30am, 5 hours after arriving in SYD from the 14 hour flight from LA.
Qantas domestic terminal in SYD did not even offer free WiFi connection (unless you are a Qantas Club member where you do get connected free.)
Even McDonalds worldwide, offer their customers free WiFi.

Qantas really need to lift their game, to stop their market share decline and service their capital cities including their near forgotten city of Adelaide, much better.

Supporting the international airlines that do arrive and depart from Adelaide should be encouraged. Airlines such as Singapore Airlines (which are soon to code share with Virgin) Malaysian Airlines, Cathay Pacific and Air New Zealand. They all support us more than our own Qantas.

Vietnam Veteran Normie Rowe dedication to us Vietnam Veterans (click)

2011-04-20T15:01:00.003+09:30

As we approach our sacred Anzac Day, I am reminded of this dedication song, sung by Normie Rowe, who himself is a Vietnam Veteran.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4nT6SpNaekQ

Business SA, 20th Century thinking? (click)

2011-04-19T18:53:00.004+09:30

Dear Business SA,

Are you the same "progressive" group that says South Australia's future is connected with the East Coast time zone? Then I begin to question your credentials!

Are you really so conservative and backward that you can't see the big picture, that South Australia's future is not in Sydney, but in the power house economies west of us, in Asia?

If you were truly 'progressive' you would be pushing for SA to move our time zone 30 minutes to the West, closer to the Asian economies and the same time as Japan! Sydney is not our future.
May I even ask how can Perth prosper and yet its not on Sydney time? I really have difficulty understanding your logic?

However, you have today really proved your conservative backward thinking, by saying that the Adelaide Oval redevelopment will be the saviour of SA?
Wouldn't it make more sense to pressure government for a purpose built, stand alone Stadium with a roof?
Why should Adelaide go from a two "stadium" city, down to one? Is that progress Business SA style?
Ahh but then of course, AAMI Stadium would be a developers picnic! This short term thinking is what has made Adelaide, formerly Australia's third city to now being only bigger than Hobart. We have been going backwards for years.

Politics will never serve SA well, if that is your modus operandi, then get back to your charter and think the big picture.

I really am not impressed by the Bovver Boy style pressure being exerted by your organisation, government and business generally, for the Adelaide Oval redevelopment.
If you reflect, the development really looks more a like Bullens Circus tent. Most of you are old enough to know what I am saying, and would remember Bullens.

Promote SA please.

And may I also ask, what is your opinion of the old North Adelaide Le Cornu paddock, vacant after 22 years of inaction?
Business?........... SA style?
We better believe it.

http://tinyurl.com/3s5en72

Even the Feds are worried about Rann

2011-04-14T16:46:00.003+09:30

Even the Feds are getting nervous about Rann SA Labor.
http://bit.ly/eorpQe

Rann just does not seemingly have the ability to understand that his disconnect from his people is doing great harm for "the Labor brand" in South Australia.

Rann has been leader of SA Labor for 17 years. That's long enough for any human to lose touch with reality.
He seemingly is prepared to bring down the government just so long as he can hang in there for another few months to achieve the "honor" of being SA Labor's longest serving Premier.
What the?

Renewal begins at the top Mike.

Surely Adelaide can do better than this? (click)

2011-04-13T16:52:00.002+09:30

Adelaide without doubt enjoys a lifestyle second to none. But are we compromising our potential by allowing such apalling architecture to be built in our city?
Click the header for the short film.

Adelaide needs to embrace the 21st Century, and not allow the priveleged few in North Adelaide and the South East corner of our city to prohibit growth. Adelaide is now Australia's "backwater" and does not need to be that way. The new Lord MayorStephen Yarwood might well eventually achieve change. But he has a hard task ahead of him.

Country hospitals suffer funding whilst a tram is extended for new RAH

2011-04-11T16:43:00.002+09:30

Monday, 11 April 2011

Health gave $6m for tram stop

KEVIN NAUGHTON

MORE than $6 million was paid from Health Department grants funding to pay for part of the tram extension along North Terrace in anticipation of the new Royal Adelaide Hospital.

No other money was sought from businesses or institutions on the route.

Shadow Health minister Duncan McFetridge said the payment reflected the wrong priorities.

“If the government believes Health should pay because a tram line is built outside its new hospital location, then why hasn’t it asked the Casino, Rundle Mall and Uni SA for similar contributions?” he said.

“It’s $6 million that would have been better spent on health care.”

The grant of $6,248,444 appears in a list of more than 400 Health Department grants for community-based health care programs in the 2010 financial year.

It is the only grant that is not related to community-based health care or health promotion. The other grants, totalling $122.7 million, range from $14,755 for childhood immunisation to $1.3 million for AIDS Council programs.

The 20-page list was provided last week by the Health Department in response to a question asked last October by Dr McFetridge about the tram extension payment.

No reasons are given for the tram payment.

When the question was first raised in Budget hearings last October 11, Health Minister John Hill said he would respond after taking advice.

“We are not precisely sure, but we will get some advice,” Mr Hill said.

“I am assuming it was work that was being done by them for us, but I will get some advice for you.

“The tram project is not a Health Department project.”

Mr McFetridge asked again why the money was paid from the Health budget?

Mr Hill: “I am not trying to be difficult, but I am not aware of the detail. I will happily get some advice.”

Indaily also asked the Minister’s office last Friday for a reason why the Health money had been diverted to pay for a tram extension. No response was received.

A spokesman for Transport and Infrastructure minister Pat Conlon told Indaily: “Both extensions were entirely funded by the State Govt through DTEI with no contributions made or sought from private enterprise.”

- Author Kevin Naughton InDaily www.indaily.com.au

NSW Labor: Has SA Rann Labor caught disease?

2011-04-01T14:03:00.002+10:30

SA Premier Mike Rann in full flight.

Author: Rodney Cavalier ALP historian, former NSW Labor minister and author of Power Crisis: The Self-Destruction of a State Labor Party.

SO much of the commentary by those who regard themselves as friends of Labor is predicated on an arrogance accumulated over 70 years that we, who are Labor, will win elections and govern except when we do not have our act together. The Liberals and Nationals are occasional players who come on the stage only when our performance drops and promptly vacate when we are ready.

So many want to believe the electorate is waiting for Labor to get its act together. I suggest March 26 is different.

The model of governance for NSW Labor devised by Bill McKell (premier, 1941-47) was broken during these four years past. The model will not be rebuilt, the pieces are lost. There are many authors of this destruction; no one is innocent. A Labor government proceeded with a measure not supported by any significant force in the Labor movement. McKell's model expressly avoided open conflict while he employed persuasion to turn the ranks around. If he could not persuade, he did not proceed.

The McKell model was followed by each of his successors unto the modern era: Neville Wran and Bob Carr did not proceed with measures lacking support from the party that had made their careers and their governments possible.

Labor has been in power for 52 of the 70 years since McKell remade NSW Labor. Not just in power but effective. In the 23 general elections held in that time Labor won 16 and was competitive in all but three. Loss of office in 1965 and 1988 did not change the colour of the ocean. This year has. For 70 years Labor was a party somewhere in the 40 per cents vying for government. Now its ceiling is in the 30s, slipping into the 20s. Three out of four NSW voters rejected Labor. The election was a cataclysm, unprecedented anywhere in Australia since the establishment of the two-party system in 1910.

This is a party all but wiped out in the Hunter and hanging on in the Illawarra, a few suburbs in the inner ring of Sydney and its western fringe. Labor holds not one country seat. In 18 seats it came third or worse, with a primary vote in the teens or single digits. It could not have been worse.

There is no silver lining except in the totality of defeat. There can be no hiding, no pretence, no hope that a pendulum swing will bring Labor back. If Barry O'Farrell follows his instincts, governs from the centre, spends and borrows to spend, Labor has a long wait before it is back in the game, like the decade after 1965 when Bob Askin fulfilled his election promises and broadly governed well. Askin is the model for this new government, not Nick Greiner, not Jeff Kennett. Behave like you have 10 years, reform steadily, deliver on what you have promised, avoid corruption and scandal and you will get 10 years. For starters.

NSW Labor began its degeneration with candidate selection in 2003. Imposition became the norm. The obviously inadequate were protected from the ALP membership. The Labor caucus failed to renew. A question for the darkest hours is how a government that began with Carr, Andrew Refshauge, Michael Egan, Craig Knowles, Jeff Shaw, Bob Debus and other good people, a government that picked up John Watkins and Morris Iemma along the way, could finish as it did: the worst NSW has seen. Labor came back from 1965 and 1988 but it had no cause to dissociate itself from the record of what had gone before. The next Labor premier will need to have credibly dissociated himself or herself from the final years of this show.

The only precedent for a defeat of this dimension is 1932 when NSW Labor offered two parties in the wake of the governor's dismissal of the Lang government. Labor polled, wait for it, 44.6 per cent, some 20 percentage points in front of where Labor is now. If you take comfort from Labor's recovery only nine years later, look at what happened in those nine years: Labor lost twice more emphatically; John Curtin, federal Labor leader, devoted some part of every day to the destruction of Jack Lang and Langism; federal intervention broke the rulers of the NSW branch. Backed by federal authority, McKell toppled Lang. McKell represented a complete break from all that had gone before; he campaigned against what Labor had been as much as the government of the day.

In the past 16 years about 130 ALP branches have folded. Most of the rest are phantoms, paper frauds that could not pass a breath-on-the-mirror test. The consequence was obvious on polling day: the land mass of NSW

lacked Labor people to staff booths. It was not possible to paper the cracks with the salaried political class, not even with an injection from interstate. The absentees had the honesty to tell us: "I am just not working for this outfit."

What are the prospects for meaningful ALP reform? None, actually. Within weeks it will be business as usual. Giving meaning to ALP membership involves a serious involvement in forming policy and candidate selection. Empowering the membership means disempowering union officials. Not some light-hearted frolic that adjusts on the margins the absolute control of this party that affiliated unions exercise. Reform requires a destruction so complete that the votes controlled by union officials on the floor of an annual conference reduces to the 8 per cent unions represent in the NSW workforce.

That is not going to happen; if it did, most of the administrative committee would be out of business and most of the MLCs and senators. So, too, the members of the ALP National Executive, who must not escape blame as co-conspirators in this cataclysm. The executive endorsed candidates without any base in the party and protected the horrors perpetrated by the NSW machine. Real reform means exposing every MP to review and replacement by party members. None of this will happen. Labor's culture of entitlement is rotten through and through. Those with the power to reform are the beneficiaries of what is.

Source --- The Australian

Renewal begins at the top Mike (click)

2011-03-28T14:53:00.002+10:30

We read that the knives are possibly out to tap Kevin Foley on the shoulder. That he alone is "hurting the Labor brand". I do wonder why the former Treasurer has been singled out. I have always believed that renewal begins at the top.
The shuffling of deck chairs has done little, if anything, to revitalise the Rann government.

Premier Rann promised to reconnect with the electorate following the government's near loss last year. The evidence following, has shown the premier is either not interested or at best, unable to connect with the community. He has become disconnected and seems to think that his use of Twitter is the way of embracing the public.

How any leader of any party can consider that after 16 years of leadership, one can still be fresh, open to new ideas and has the ear of the public is questionable.
Mike Rann has been leading SA Labor for 16 years. He has been rewarded with the Premiership for nine of those years. He should reflect that possibly he is the problem with SA Labor seeming freefall from popularity.

The recent NewsPoll found that Rann now only has a 29% public support. He won government last year on only 48% of the vote, the warning signs are so obvious.
To single out Foley is not really getting to the core problem. Renewal begins at the top, and 16 years of Rann leadership, brings about disconnect, arrogance and inability to understand the public mood.
The establishment of an ICAC would be the start of a new premier's renewal of Labor.

We are judged by the company we keep (click)

2011-03-24T10:01:00.003+10:30

This is the man who wants to become Prime Minister of Australia.
He is a person who obviously has serious problems with the company he keeps.
He would be more suited to leading an Australian chapter of the US Tea Party.

Bad news catches up with Good-News-Mike

2011-03-15T11:20:00.003+10:30

Tuesday, 15 March 2011

Rann scuppered below decks

KEVIN NAUGHTON : OPINION (Source InDaily.com.au)

MAN the lifeboats – the ship is sinking and we are three years away from the nearest port.

It’s all over for the Rann Labor Government and recent activity shows the transition is already under way.

Firstly, the polls are unshakeable.

The election poll of a year ago showed a 7.8 per cent swing away from Labor and dissatisfaction with its leader Mike Rann.

The trend was repeated in the Sunday Mail poll last month and confirmed in the historically accurate Newspoll last week.

Secondly, the power brokers know it’s over.

They removed some of the rubble (Treasurer Kevin Foley) and installed contenders for the top job in high-profile positions to see how the electorate might warm to them.

John Rau as deputy, Jack Snelling as Treasurer, were the choices of the powerful Right faction and Jay Weatherill remains the choice of the less powerful Left.

Thirdly, the staffers started to look for better pastures.

Paul Flanagan, a Rann loyalist and media unit manager, has headed to a PR role at BHP Billiton while Rann’s number one media strategist Jill Bottrall has settled into a less stressful role in the department after taking a two month holiday.

These are the signs of a group that’s being dismantled.

The final step in the process is the removal of the Premier Mike Rann.

Very senior Labor people have told Indaily it will happen, but the timing is changeable.

Rann himself appears to be the only person yet to recognise the inevitability of the process of change, launching into high rotation media appearances ever since the Sunday Mail poll.

It had all the usual hallmarks of his one-dimensional style; attaching himself to good news, good times and good people.

But as Newspoll showed, not even a month of festivals, a week of Lance Armstrong nor Holden’s new car launch and a record grain harvest could change the key numbers.

Seventy per cent of voters don’t want him.

He believes he can reverse the trend, but if he couldn’t do it in the benign political atmosphere of March, then he can’t do it at all.

The political reporters will also be his enemy. They can see a political necking coming and they won’t let up until it happens.

Meanwhile the State Liberal leader Isobel Redmond says she wants to remain a small target while “Labor implodes”.

That’s fine, but what’s the Lib plan when a new Labor emerges?

The Good Ship Rann has been deserted by its crew, but there’s a new liner on the horizon by the March 2014 election.

It will be fresh, have new hospitals rising up on the old railyards, expressways to open and the AFL about to step into a new Adelaide Oval home.

Jay Weatherill is sleeping contentedly below deck.

Susan Mitchell not impressed with Federal Lib direction.

2011-03-11T12:48:00.003+10:30

Friday, 11 March 2011

"Fish Rots from the head"

REGARDLESS of your political colours, you must have been proud for your country when you saw Julia Gillard standing there before the American Congress delivering a speech which received a rapturous reception.

Certainly they would have stood politely and clapped her even if they hadn’t liked the speech. Americans are very gracious people and very respectful of high office.

For the first time in our history, we had a woman speaking on behalf of our country, a position which no woman in the US has ever held. Julia Gillard does not come from a privileged background but has taken advantage of all the opportunities this country has provided since the resurgence of feminism in the 1970s.

This week was the centenary of International Women’s Day and our Prime Minister is well aware of all the freedoms she has enjoyed because of the work of previous Australian women and enlightened men and the equal opportunity legislation they have enacted.

There was no sense of entitlement in anything she said or conveyed in her manner. She spoke with grace, charm and humour. She even recognised former Prime Minister John Howard as a former speaker to the Congress.

It was a proud occasion for Australia. When interviewed after her presentation she refused to talk about herself or take personal praise for her performance. She said that she was there as the holder of the office of Prime Minister and she was merely trying to do her best for the country.

For the young women of Australia her performance signalled that everything was possible for them, they could achieve their dreams if they worked hard and never gave up. This was the message that was being beamed about our country to newsrooms all over the world.

How distressing it was, therefore, when SKY News interviewed a newly elected younger woman from the Liberal Party and when asked about the PM’s wonderful reception in Washington, to witness her mean-spirited and partisan response.

This 34-year-old Liberal MP from the Melbourne seat of Higgins, Kelly O’Dwyer, replaced the former Treasurer Peter Costello, for whom she has been an adviser. She was the first woman in the Liberal Party to win pre-selection for an inner city, safe seat.

Totally unmoved by the occasion, as both a woman and an Australian, she conceded that the PM’s reception had been “good” and then immediately segued into reminding us that foreign affairs was not the PM’s passion, attacked her for previous gaffes and said that she hoped she would not make any while on this tour.

There was no respect for The Office of the Prime Minister, no congratulations on the outstanding response she had achieved from the assembled Congress on what was a first, not just for an Australian woman but for any Australian Prime Minister.

O’Dwyer’s manner was disrespectful, ungracious, mean and self-regarding. As far as she was concerned she was on television to promote herself, her party and stick the knife into the Prime Minister.

International Women’s Day, the struggles of other women which have paved the way for her to gain her position mean nothing to her. Her sense of her own importance and entitlement was visceral.

Unfortunately she is not alone. Her fellow MP, Sophie Mirabella could not wait to get on television and compare Julia Gillard with Colonel Gaddafi. Why are these young women in the Liberal Party so vicious? They are not interested in discussing policy. All they want to do is score hits by denigrating the Prime Minister.

Never before in the history of women in the Liberal Party have we seen this demeaning and crass behaviour. Something is rotten in the current Liberal Party. The fish rots from the head and the stench can be traced directly back to the current leader. Not under the previous Opposition leadership of Brendan Nelson, or Malcolm Turnbull did we ever get a whiff of this stench.

Ever since Tony Abbott gained the leadership by one vote, he has created a milieu of disrespect and aggression, an attack dog mentality, more at home in male sporting arenas than parliament house.

There is an aura of “anything goes as long as you score a goal or a hit”, an inability to know when a line has been crossed, a determination never to apologise unless backed into a corner.

Is this to be the Liberal Party of the future? A group of junkyard dogs eager for a scrap, consisting mostly of ex-staffers or corporate lawyers trained for the kill?

Only those who copy the Abbott belief that every issue is either black or white, positive or negative, depending on which side is proposing it, will be promoted.

The Kelly O’Dwyers are media trained, schooled in never answering a tough question but very skilled in turning it around in order to attack the enemy. Like their current leader, they believe in nothing but power and their own path to achieving it.

Perhaps that is why despite the Coalition’s recent rise in the polls, the voters of Australia still do not see him as the preferred Prime Minister.

While Julia Gillard was in Washington receiving multiple standing ovations on behalf of her country, Tony Abbott was, just by chance, on the attack in her electorate, telling them that her carbon tax was plunging a dagger into their hearts. Good leadership requires more than overblown rhetoric and an overdose of testosterone.

Have your say. Feedback to indaily@solsticemedia.com.au

www.susanmitchell.com.au

ABC's Insiders looks at the antics of our federal Pollies.

2011-03-08T13:57:00.003+10:30

Federal Parliament is often likened to school yard antics.
But it truly is theatre and no wonder many of us don't take them too seriously at all.
ABC's Insiders program, captures the antics of our elected representatives with graphic accuracy.

Allan Jones no respect for PM of Australia

2011-03-08T13:45:00.005+10:30

Surely even Alan Jones of Sydney's 2GB, should respect the office of the Prime Minister!

Tuesday, 8 March 2011 (From InDaily www.indaily.com.au)

OPINION: SUSAN MITCHELL

Adelaide manners matter

GENERALLY speaking, the good citizens of Adelaide are a pretty civilised bunch when it comes to public discourse. Apart from the occasional ratbag rave on commercial radio, we conduct our arguments in a polite, respectful manner.

The freedom to speak your mind is a touchstone of a democratic nation. The manner in which you undertake this verbal expression, however, is quite another issue. Our colony was based on people who believed in the value of good manners as a means of conducting human relationships, regardless of wealth or class background.

The larger eastern states, particularly New South Wales, like to sneer at Adelaide’s emphasis on civilised behaviour and way of speaking, which they believe comes from a sense of superiority because we never allowed convicts into our colony. But the time has come to remind them that their origins are also showing. The public behaviour and uncivilised manner of speaking of their leading commercial radio presenters and the Federal Leader of the Opposition is out of control.

NSW established a convict culture from its very beginnings. There was no room or time for manners or civilised discussion when many of the first “settlers” arrived with chains around their ankles.

What began as a convict culture is still essentially a convict culture, a “them and us” culture, a “means will always justify the end” culture, a “survival of the loudest” culture, a “strike the first blow” culture.

If you think I am being too harsh, just listen to commercial talk radio in Sydney. The highest-rating talk station is 2GB and its most successful announcer is Alan Jones. This is the man who thinks it is acceptable to berate the elected Prime Minister of Australia for being a little late for his program. Now, however much he hates Julia Gillard for her gender or politics, she does hold the office of Prime Minister and that alone should engender some basic respect.

Jones began his recent interview with Gillard by ranting about her late arrival. When she apologised and explained she was a bit busy, he snapped “we’re all busy” and continued to talk over the top of her and even call her Ju-liar. His program sets the tone for the rest of the day on 2GB and all the wannabe Alan Jones copy his manners, or lack of them, and overbearing style.

Mark Day, The Australian’s media writer, calls it “redneck radio”; others have named it “shock-jock shit-stirring” or “bogan broadcasting”. I call it “convict radio.”

The opposing commercial talk station, 2UE, attempted a more civilised approach with presenters such as Mike Carleton and Peter Fitzsimons, but in a desperate grab for ratings, it has reverted to stealing some of 2GB’s Alan Jones clones. So for 24 hours every day, from both stations, listeners are assaulted by a barrage of incessant and ridiculing attacks on Julia Gillard and the Government in the most uncouth language, tone and style. Their listeners are the elderly (who are easily scared and made anxious), the so-called battlers (those for whom earning enough money is always a struggle), the disaffected (those who feel fate has dealt them a bad hand) and the mentally fragile (who don’t need much to tip them over the edge).

The daily tabloids simply feed off what is said on convict radio by appealing to the same section of the population.

These are the same people Tony Abbott is calling on to attend a “people’s revolt” in Canberra on March 23. Once you lose basic manners and respect for the Office of Prime Minister, whoever the incumbent, you get the kind of dangerous vitriol that is being written on the Facebook page that has been organised for “The Revolt Against the Carbon Tax”. Comments such as: “We have got to get rid of the Godless mistress of deceit.”

Even extremists from the Tea Party in the United States are being attracted to the site and are contributing sentiments such as: “Sorry to see we are not the only nation plagued with vermin like Obama.” In the case of Julia Gillard, most of the toxic remarks are just poorly disguised sexism, just as with Obama they are based on racism.

And this is my point. Once you allow the airwaves to be polluted by a lack of manners and a total disrespect from highly paid, high-rating presenters, you unleash the worst of convict culture. Once rampant sexism and racism is out of the bag, it is very hard to put them back in. Extremists on both the Right and the Left will proceed to light the fires of violence. No wonder Tony Windsor is receiving death threats.

Sophie Mirabella, a Federal MP from Victoria, added her own fuel to the fires of disrespect and uncouth behaviour when she compared Julia Gillard to the dictator and tyrant Gaddafi, by claiming they were both delusional. Instead of insisting she apologise, Tony Abbott dismissed her comments as “colourful”, thus allowing the convict culture to grow. His other way of dismissing publicly disrespectful remarks from members of his party is to say they are merely part of a “robust” debate.

Perhaps Christopher Pearson, a long-time resident and supporter of Adelaide and one of Abbott’s chief cheerleaders, should instruct him in the wisdom and necessity of acquiring and practising Adelaide manners.

As William of Wykeham, the Bishop of Winchester and founder of New College in Oxford, a university which Mr Abbott once attended, wrote: “Manners maketh man.”

www.susanmitchell.com.au

The Rann government turns toxic as it disconnects (Click)

2011-02-12T16:14:00.004+10:30

So, Mike Rann thinks his toxic government can be saved by reshuffling the deck chairs and moving even further to the religious right. Monsignor Cappo would be really chuffed.

Sarah Palin would be damned happy with you Mike should you ever retire, I'm sure she would have you on her staff.

The Liberal (conservative) leader Isobel Redmond is looking more like a waterside worker every day compared to you.

If you are foolish enough and you apparently are, ..... ( just like Mubarak) to think that a few changes below you, will settle down the restive crowd, you are more disconnected from your people than I thought you were.
Remember the trickery of the shock 48% 'win'? "Put your family first", yeah! Win at all cost. Forget values or integrity.

Renewal begins at the top!

That's why Mubarak's reshuffle, keeping himself in top position, just did not work. Fortunately for you, South Australians do not take to the streets to prove a point. At least not yet.

You Tweet daily your nonsense on Twitter, errantly thinking, no doubt, that you are connecting with the masses with your 140 character governing of South Australia, along with the Shoppies Union. Is Parliament now so irrelevant, that you could govern from the SDA office?

As with Mubarak, you pontificate, you take no questions and give no answers. When something goes wrong, you shy away from your obligations and send out a minister to cover the problem.

If you are so full of yourself, and you are prepared to pull the SA Labor government down with you, so be it. But you are showing total disregard for those who still have empathy with (former) Labor values.

Finally, please stop using the name of the great Don Dunstan as your mentor. He would vomit to witness what is now happening to SA Labor.

"Renewal begins at the top, not half way down"!

RannSpin doesn't include women?

2011-02-10T16:59:00.003+10:30

Source: InDaily indaily@solsticemedia.com.au

Thursday, 10 February 2011

Disgrace: Where are the women?

Susan Mitchell

IT’S a disgrace. And all members of the SA Labor Party should hang their heads in shame.

How, in 2011, can Premier Mike Rann, have the gall to announce a so-called”renewal”, a “regeneration” even, in his Ministry and not promote any of the three women who currently hold Ministries?

Moreover, how can he have the hypocrisy not to promote any new women into the “new” lineup.

Rann is forever claiming former Premier Don Dunstan as his hero and mentor.

In 1976 Dunstan was the first Premier in the nation to appoint a Commissioner for Equal Opportunity whose role was to administer the first Sex Discrimination Act in the nation. We were the leaders in the fight for women to gain those positions of power which had been closed to them because of their gender.

In 1994 we had a huge state celebration. It was one hundred years since we had passed legislation allowing women to vote, another first in the nation. We had also passed legislation allowing women to stand for parliament. This was a first in the entire world. What a proud legacy.

And here we are in 2011, with a Premier who huffs and puffs, and still we only have three female ministers out of 15, and no new women elevated to the ministry. The newly elevated Deputy Premier, John Rau, also a newly elevated Attorney General, said that it was “unfortunate” that three women lost their seats in the state election.

Unfortunate? How pathetic. How lame an excuse for not elevating three new women into the ministry or at least promoting the ones they had.

Men also lost their seats but it didn’t stop the Premier from elevating two new men, Bernie Finnigan and Tom Kenyon into his ministry. Why not Chloe Fox? If she is good enough to be Deputy Speaker then why not make her a member of the ministry?

Is there perhaps another Don who is now the real mentor of Premier Rann? The so called “right “ faction of the state Labor Party has two arms, the Catholic, and the non-Catholic.

As Kevin Naughton outlined yesterday in Indaily, those Catholics who would normally have split off to join the DLP in the 1950s, stayed in the SA Labor Party and built their base. Their current leader Don Farrell is now calling the shots.

The euphemism for the policies that these powerful men support is that they are “socially conservative.” Just what does this mean? It is time to spell this out so that everyone who has been loyal to the ALP knows exactly who and what they are voting for.

The Catholic Church has not exactly been known for its equal treatment of women. It is controlled by a rigid hierarchy of men, all of whom have renounced intimacy with women.

From the highest position of Pope to the lowliest parish priest, women are banned from applying. These ordained men dictate all the rules regarding women. No sex before marriage, no oral contraception, no use of condoms, no right to legal abortion, no use of the “morning after” pill, no divorce, no same- sex relationships.

Is it any wonder then that the powerful Catholic Right faction of the ALP has not promoted any of its women members to positions in the ministry? All three of the only female members of the current Ministry are from the Left faction. The Catholic right have promoted two of their young men. Surprise, surprise.

Is it any wonder that we are the only State or territory in Australia not to have had a female Premier? We have never even had a female leader representing the ALP.

There is no place for women to hold positions of power in the hierarchy of the Catholic Church, nor any chance that this will change in our life time. Is the same to be true for our State ALP government, dominated as it currently is by a faction of powerful Catholic conservatives? Which Don should the Premier be following?

Why should a woman give them her vote?

Why should a man who believes in equality give them his vote?

These are the real questions we should all be asking ourselves.

www.susanmitchell.com.au

Mannum Waters above 1956 flood level.

2011-01-19T18:23:00.003+10:30

Thanks to Des Ryan editor of InDaily, http://www.indaily.com.au/ he has investigated the Mannum Waters development, and it in fact is above the 1956 flood level. The waterfront area is for boats only. And "they can float".

That has to be good news for all concerned.

Mammum Waters (click here)

2011-01-18T11:06:00.004+10:30

What an idealic setting. Mannum Waters, on the banks of the slow moving Murray River.

Declared a "Major Project" by the Rann government in 2005, when SA was experiencing one of the worst droughts ever to hit Australia. The River is no longer moving slowly.

No thoughts perhaps in 2005, that one day the River might flood again, as it did in 1956, when it even inundated the main street of Mannum, which is situated well above the River.
As far as I know, Mannum Waters is at, or close to river level, not metres above the river as is the main street of Mannum.

If the devastating flood of Queensland, NSW, and now Victoria feed into The Murray (as they do) I wonder who is going to pay if beautiful Mannum Waters lives by its name and is drowned?
I hope my concern is proved to be way wrong!

The sycophantic delusionist (click)

2011-01-10T14:26:00.004+10:30

Our Premier Rann postulated in The Advertiser on 7th. Jan. 2011 how "he feels good about making hard decisions if its for the benefit of the state".

The man is delusional. He believes his own spin now, when we stopped years ago.

I can't think of one "hard decision" he has made in his 9 years of government.
He's let us down time and again with water, he spun almost out of control with his grandiose statements of 'historic agreements' as the Lower Lakes died and became acidic.
Now the River Murray is in flood, he can't make the "hard decision" to help the Riverland farmers lift their water allocation from 67% to 100%, because doing so might upset the up-river states, and it would be breaking an agreement.

Rann rants on saying that if we broke the water entitlement agreement, the up-river states would "dud us" when times got tough and dry again. Well deluded Premier Rann, they DID dud us when times were tough during the big dry of over 12 years. And that was including the entitlement agreement that you signed.

Come on Mike, you are believing your own deluded statements of grandeur. You have made easy and soft decisions all your premiership. Only you believe there were the occasional tough decisions thrown in.

If you do believe your own rhetoric, about feeling good making tough decisions for the benefit of SA, then here is one that will have a huge benefit to this entire state.
Make the hard decision to resign your commission. Do it Mike. I know its hard, but it is for the betterment of all South Australia. No soft options.

South Australia will "thank you" in years to come, for that hard decision.

Clicking the header above reveals what a sycophant is. Or copy and past this into your browser: http://tinyurl.com/8zgc3

Has Emperor Mike had a facelift?

2011-01-07T16:15:00.005+10:30

2011
2010

Has Premier Mike had a facelift as rumored last year?

You be the judge.

Is there anything real about Good-News-Mike?

Rann's Adelaide, a footprint the size of LA?

2011-01-07T14:21:00.003+10:30

Well well, Town Planner Kevin O'Leary is less than flattering of Mike Rann's big Adelaide.
Lack of infastructure is the least of Emperor Rann's worries.

As long as his monument is an Adelaide that has houses over prime farming lands in the Hills and north past Gawler and south to Mclaren Vale.
It would look beautiful from a satellite. 150km of gleaming lights at night and not a freeway or expressway in sight.

Click the header for Kevin O'Leary's views on Rann's non plan.
http://tinyurl.com/2dzbfy3

Oh and Happy New Year!

Seasons Greetings and Happy Christmas

2010-12-18T15:19:00.003+10:30

May everyone enjoy this season of goodwill and remember the real meaning of Christmas.

Click header, or here for Celine Dione. http://tinyurl.com/2wwnm7h

2010-12-17T12:31:00.000+10:30

(Courtesy of InDaily Adelaide)

Friday, December 17, 2010

Off with their heads

POLITICS

TOM RICHARDSON

“KILL the head and the body will die.”

That phrase appeared, without explanation, in the notebook of gonzo genius Hunter S. Thompson amid a whirlwind of chaos, carnage and substance abuse on assignment in Las Vegas.

There has been a similar dose of chaos and carnage (albeit, one presumes, without the substance abuse) in the life of the Rann Government of late.

But as the calendar winds down on South Australian Labor’s annus horribilis, party insiders are expressing quite the opposite sentiment to the one Thompson scribbled unconsciously in a haze of fear and loathing.

At various times this year, there has been frenetic speculation about the political future of either Mike Rann or Kevin Foley, sometimes both at once, but rarely neither at once.

Every now and again doubts about the political future of Pat Conlon have been thrown in for good measure.

It is hard to see 2010 as anything but an abject failure for this Government, which is remarkable given it won a historic third term back in March.

Since that high watermark Labor has been dogged by trouble, with its leadership flailing in a sort of collective paralysis, unable to realign the political radar that seemed so unerring for much of the past decade.

But even the celebrations surrounding the election itself were muted; if the victory was the culmination of eight years’ hard work, it was treated more like a bullet dodged, and its legacy has been enduring bitterness within the party.

The leadership is increasingly isolated from the broader party, which seems to be regarded with distrust, and from the media, against which it appears to bear some kind of grudge.

Ironic, given that this has been among the most media-driven and message-focused governments in modern Australia.

For much of the year, the Government has meandered without direction; every now and again, it has been shaken from its funk, forced into action as an issue seizes the public imagination, almost inevitably to the detriment of the Labor brand.

Dodgy electioneering, a slash-and-burn budget, investment in Puglia, the Treasurer’s lonely late-night wanderings and the Premier’s mo: it all adds up to a year from hell.

And the problem is that few in the ALP camp can see anything improving overmuch in 2011 without a dramatic change in the party’s leadership and direction.

They want to kill the head to save the body. Or, perhaps more to the point, they believe the head has long since ceased to function effectively, and must be amputated to prevent the malaise infecting the carcass.

As union lefty Wayne Hanson put it to the party’s recent convention: “The fish stinks from the head down.”

In the scheme of things, yesterday’s mid-year budget review will neither save Foley’s bacon nor hasten his execution.

Coming so swiftly on the heels of a delayed September Budget that has never been far from the forefront of public debate in the interim, it was never going to be anything more than a reminder that GST revenues continue to decline, and that the present administration prizes retaining its AAA credit rating above any other function of state government.

It was also a reminder of the realpolitik nature of September’s financial statement.

The Treasurer says he doesn’t foresee any major savings initiatives in next year’s budget. No great bombshell, of course; the first post-election budget was always going to contain the bulk of the electoral poison.

Foley admitted himself on Budget Day that he structured his economic programs to dovetail nicely with the electoral cycle. After all, the financially prudent approach, if one accepts that this harsh budget cull was necessary, would have been to include the bulk of the savings in last year’s pre-poll budget statement. But that would have been electoral suicide.

Foley desperately doesn’t want the 2010 budget to be his last because he knows it will be far and away his meanest and leanest. At the least, he wants the chance to bring the budget back into surplus next year.

So far, many in his faction feel inclined to give him that chance, not least so they don’t lump some cleanskin with mopping up the dregs of the economic downturn and tar Foley’s successor with the same brush that has helped make the Treasurer public enemy number one among the public sector unions.

Rann and Foley have become inseparable in the eyes of many in the party. Foley says that since his “near-death” experience, he is less inclined to contemplate some symbolic feel-good ending in which the two of them ride off into the sunset together, but that is still the finale favoured by many in the ALP.

Perhaps the pair still hopes a positive budget in May 2011 will buy them another 12 months in the saddle.

“It’s been a rough, tough year (but) I fully expect to deliver next year’s budget … and the one after,” Foley said at yesterday’s press conference.

As ever with Kevin Foley, he got the first bit right, and then took it one step too far.

Even those who want to see him hang around until May would baulk at the thought of another two years with the current leadership at the helm.

After the Kevin Rudd debacle, Labor is keenly aware that assassinating even an unpopular leader does a party no favours out in Voterland. They want to avoid a similar scenario, but not at all costs.

Rann and Foley need a new strategy, a new approach and a new mindset for 2011, because if the new year begins much as the current one has ebbed away, it will only crystallize the view so prevalent among their colleagues that the party must lop off its own head to salvage what’s left of the body.

Tom Richardson is the Channel 9 chief political reporter

Dean Jaenshch on Australia's federalism

2010-12-02T16:20:00.002+10:30

Thursday, December 02, 2010 Source: InDaily.com.au

AUSTRALIAS POLITICAL SYSTEM NEEDS OVERHAUL

Australia’s political system needs a major overhaul if it is to re-engage the public and produce effective government in the 21st century, according to Professor Dean Jaensch.

The scrapping of State Governments, changes to the voting system, the recruitment of more talented politicians, and a more liberal attitude to the disclosure of information are amongst a suite of reforms that the doyen of political commentators says should be considered.

Presenting the inaugural Dean Jaensch Lecture this week, Professor Jaensch said he had, since his first study of Australian politics in 1963, considered that while Australia’s system was envied by many around the world “it is by no means the best democracy that it could be.”

Before a discussion panel of former Federal Minister and Flinders academic, Dr Neal Blewett, Senator Nick Xenophon and political lobbyist, Ms Mia Handshin – moderated by the ABC’s Tony Jones – and an invited audience, Professor Jaensch said “there needs to be a continuing debate about how we, the people, can achieve improvements to our political system”.

“There is a sense of urgency about this, as my opinion is that Australia seems to be sliding away from, rather than towards, more democratic structures, institutions and processes,” Professor Jaensch said.

He said an early target for reform should be the Australian Constitution because “its content in 2010 is an anachronism, it needs to be brought into the 21st century”.

“A federal structure was essential in the formation of a nation. In 2010, it has also become an anachronism, a hindrance to efficient and effective government. Duplication, even triplication is rife and inefficiencies abound,” Professor Jaensch said.

“We need a new federalism. But this will be difficult. Whenever I raise a proposal for abolishing the States and establishing a national-regional system, the opposition is best described by one reaction I received: ‘but what about the Sheffield Shield?’” he said.

Professor Jaensch said the so-called “reform” of Federal Parliament initiated by the Independent MPs since the 2010 election has only touched the surface, and the Parliament and the political processes that support it remains flawed.

“The process of real reform should start with the appointment of an independent Speaker, drawn from outside the Parliament.

“In representation, in elections, Australians should have the widest possible choice. But why should I have to provide preferences for candidates I would not feed? Optional preferences, then the abolition of above-the-line voting, a proportional representation system (preferably the Tasmanian Hare Clark system), more transparent laws on funding of political parties in the election process, and truth in political advertising would be major improvements.

“Responsible government, a keystone of a Westminster system, has been significantly eroded. The concept, simply defined as a chain of accountability: public service accountable to a Minister, who is accountable to Cabinet, which is accountable to Parliament, which is accountable to the people, has too many broken links in the chain. It can be argued that the only time responsible government works to any real degree is when there is a hung Parliament.

“If an outside Speaker is accepted, then why not go one step further? One problem of Cabinet government, especially in the smaller State Parliaments, is the difficulty in finding enough people of quality to become ministers of State. Low numbers in State Parliaments provide a limited gene pool.

“For this reason alone, Australia needs to consider the appointment of ministers from outside the Parliament. This, like the Speaker proposal, would be a radical transformation of the so-called Westminster system, and would lead to further debate about Australia becoming a republic, with full separation of powers.”

Professor Jaensch, an Adjunct Professor of Politics at Flinders University, will be honoured with an annual $1000 scholarship in his name to be offered from 2011 to the highest performing student in the first-year subject, Australian Politics: A Comparative Study.

Susan Mitchell on Labor Values

2010-12-01T14:53:00.001+10:30

Wednesday, December 01, 2010

What are Labor values?

OPINION
SUSAN MITCHELL

WITH the debacle of the SA Labor Party’s State Convention and the results of the Victorian State Election ringing in our ears, it is time to focus on exactly what we expect Labor governments to deliver to their voters.

We are constantly hearing the cry that the ALP has forgotten its basic Labor Values. But no one has actually spelt out what we understand these values to be.

So let me ask you the question … what are Labor Values?

I am not nor have I ever been a member of any political party. I am, just like you, an ordinary voter, entitled to an opinion.

So, in my opinion, these are what I believe to be the values of the ALP. I write these with no spin, no jargon, no tired platitudes.

All values need a basic foundation on which to rest. Let’s keep it simple. I think the four foundation principles of the ALP are: FAIRNESS, EQUALITY, REFORM, COMPASSION.

All policies which emanate from a Labor government should be framed within these four principles.

Labor = work = workers. When times are good, the salaries and conditions of all workers should keep pace with the rest of the society. When times are bad, conditions must be protected. Workers, particularly at the lower end of the scale, should not be punished by having their rights and conditions reduced.

Health. We have a system of socialised medicine in Medicare that is the best in advanced economies. That system must be maintained and meet the needs of both public and private health providers. No Australian, rich or poor, old or young, should ever be turned away from a public hospital when in mental or physical need. If necessary, levies must be raised to maintain this system to a high standard.

Education. Public schools must be funded to meet the highest academic needs of a changing society. Teachers must be of the highest quality and paid accordingly. Re-education must be made available for those marginalised by the technological revolution.

Public Transport. Must keep pace with the changing needs of our society. It should be affordable, clean, safe and accessible. Infrastructure must be regularly updated for an increasingly mobile population.

Fees. Government regulation should apply to fees extracted by banks, water providers and power suppliers. Concessions for those in need must be maintained. Government must not abuse fees such as Stamp Duty, parking and traffic fines, council rates etc as a means of raising revenue due to poor economic management.

Welfare. Strict guidelines must be enforced so that those in the greatest need are looked after. Every effort must be made to provide employment opportunities for all. Those who rort or abuse the system must be punished by law.

Taxes. Those who can afford it should pay more taxes than those who cannot. All tax cuts and governments handouts should be means-tested. The rich do not need tax cuts. Tax rorting must be punished by law.

Responsibility. The government must seek at all times to explain to voters that we all share a responsibility for the health, welfare and education of other Australians.

Reforms. The government must never cease to institute reforms to make the nation a more fair and equal place for all its citizens. All reforms should enable everyone to be given the opportunity to develop their talents regardless of race, class, gender or sexuality. All reforms must seek to grant every citizen equal rights and freedoms.

Capitalism. This system of government works for us. It is far from perfect but it can always be changed to make it a fairer, more equal and compassionate system. Those against whom it discriminates must be helped. The privileged must help the underprivileged or we are all lesser human beings.

I know none of this is rocket science but the time is now ripe for us all to spell out what we expect from a Labor Government.

They keep saying, “we hear your message”.

This is your opportunity to tell them what your message is.

www.susanmitchell.com.au

What do you think? Let us know at indaily@solsticemedia.com.au Name and suburb required for publication.

2010-11-30T14:15:00.003+10:30

Tuesday, November 30, 2010

The future is already here

NEW MEDIA

DES RYAN

THERE will not be a single breakthrough in the new media future. It will likely be a variety of transitions that arise through trial and error. Evolution, nor revolution.

Indaily is part of the transition. It arose out of the Independent Weekly newspaper, which closed last week, and we will continue to fight the good fight as an independent media voice in Adelaide.

Under the old media model, the mass market had a hunger for news, which a select few got to supply and made massive profits from it.

The technology for producing and distributing the news was expensive. Printing presses could only be afforded by the rich. Newspaper companies built glass office towers, symbolic temples that reflected their own self-regard. The smug message to everyone was: You don’t know anything about the world, so we are going to explain it to you and you are going to pay for it.

Then along came the internet.

For the traditional media, the internet was a permanent game changer, and the old players are still scrambling to come to grips with the consequences.

All around, meantime, non-traditional media sites are finding a massive market. Senior journalists are leaving the New York Times and The Washington Post to work at the Huffington Post, a content aggregating blog launched in 2005, which covers politics, media, business, entertainment, living, style and comedy. In addition to its core staff, HuffPo has 3000 bloggers who contribute material.

AOL, a tech company that started as an internet service provider, is currently the largest hirer of journalists in the US. AOL has 100 million users every month.

We also have the likes of Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Twitter, Wikipedia and Apple, which have grown into enormously powerful companies. They were started by tech guys and venture capitalists with no special knowledge or appreciation for news. But they now control what we get to see.

Yes. The likes of Rupert Murdoch have been usurped to an extent.

Take Apple, a consumer electronics company that produces such devices as iPhones and iPads. Apple sells 275,000 devices a day worldwide. It just recorded its first quarter of $20 billion revenue.

But if you are a newspaper owner and decide you want your app to be available to iPad users, here is what could happen. Apple might approve your app or might not, and will take as much time as it likes to get around to making a decision. It will also impose all sorts of arbitrary conditions, such as what name you can and cannot call your app. Then Apple will want 30 per cent of your subscription revenue and 40 per cent of ad revenue.

That’s what the newspaper and publishing industry is waking up to. That’s the new paradigm. If you want access to the smartest, latest technology, you’d better be prepared to pay plenty to get inside the gate. Apple is also rumoured to be floating its own model to become a distribution stream for news, not just for other people’s apps.

Happily, though, such power can cut both ways.

Apple introduced Ping – a social network for music – on its iTunes site. Ping allows people to follow their favourite artists and friends to discover the music they’re talking about, listening to and downloading. Trouble was, to join the Ping community, you first had to buy the music from iTunes. You couldn’t write a post about a song or a band unless you bought the product. The buy-first policy caused such an anti-iTunes backlash among customers that Apple quickly relented and changed Ping to now allow open, free access.

The lesson it teaches is you can monetise a site but try to squeeze out too much profit and it will come back to bite you.

In the background, the grumbling old media owners agonise about how to make money in the free media environment.

It’s a burning issue for the global empire of Rupert Murdoch, who so dominates the Adelaide media scene through The Advertiser, the Sunday Mail, The Australian, Messenger community newspapers, various magazines and AdelaideNow online, along with Fox, movies and who knows what else.

The News Corp business model is to erect paywalls around its news websites, or at least those “exclusive content” sections, for which the customers will have to pay to gain access. Plainly, Murdoch does not embrace a free, open system of content. His model is based on the belief that the way to make money is to isolate yourself from the rest of the web.

The new paywall at The Times of London immediately rubbed out more than 90 per cent of online subscribers. Maybe this was exactly what Rupert had in mind. Or perhaps not. The vital question, though, is will the remaining 10 per cent be sufficient to sustain the business at a time when his newspapers are in circulation free-fall?

Murdoch is an old media genius. No question. But that old model looks to be broken as a sustainable business.

Is the 80 year old a modernist media genius too? He once famously ordered his senior global executives not to spend any more money on website development since none of them could show him how to turn a profit online. Eventually, too late, he bought My Space, only to see it swamped by Facebook.

Unlike News Corp, Indaily believes in the open, free dissemination of news and information. Is this concept really so radical? Hardly. Radio, TV and community newspapers have been doing it for decades, and selling advertising off the back of it.

Innovative devices such as an iPad, ingenious though it is, are simply tools. The core issue remains the content and engaging the readers. The focus of Indaily is to search out the distilled essence of what makes Adelaide tick and present it in a convenient and easy-to-use format.

Indaily has gone through a transition point beyond the printed version of the Independent Weekly. We will build on the paper’s reputation by breaking our own stories rather than following the Media GroupThink elsewhere in Adelaide. To provide a different national slant we also have access to outside sources such as Fairfax Media, Business Spectator and Crikey! And we are constantly searching for new ways to plug into the voices of our readers. One example is the Imagine Adelaide forum, our ongoing debate about the future of the city.

Our readers, we believe, are influential, connected and committed to making things better in this city. So is Indaily.

The future is already here – it has happened – and you are reading one version of it with Indaily.

Deputy Premier felled in city (click)

2010-11-29T08:12:00.005+10:30

The Deputy Premier gets 'king hit' at 3am in Waymouth St. in Adelaide, and yet Premier Rann can't bring himself to even acknowledge it, preferring to talk about a Guitar Festival he attended that night. How much more disconnect from reality can he get?
Q. What was the 50 year old Deputy Premier doing at 3am alone in the CBD?
Q. If he was walking to find a taxi, doesn't he have a mobile phone?

Full story in AdelaideNow, click the header or copy this link. http://tinyurl.com/2f4plkc

As Emperor Rann declines, Jay Weatherill climbs

2010-11-26T13:07:00.003+10:30

Friday, November 26, 2010

Poll tolls for Rann

KEVIN NAUGHTON (InDaily Online)

ALP officials have commissioned private research on who should replace Mike Rann as Premier, say senior party insiders, and the top pick is Jay Weatherill.

Key party officials have been briefed in recent days on the poll results based on the views of more than 1000 voters – a significantly credible sample.

The findings are likely to be widely discussed in the private meetings of officials at this weekend’s State Convention of the ALP.

Two officials who have seen the polling report have told Indaily the results present a dilemma for the party.

“The Right is confronted with a dilemma because none of their candidates are within range of being an acceptable choice for leader,” one official said.

“They are now considering what the options are.”

Education Minister Weatherill topped the poll with 34 per cent, while the Right’s preferred choice Kevin Foley is at just two per cent.

Respondents also named Mr Foley as the person least preferred as next Premier.

It’s understood that among the remaining 11 Lower House ministers none is close to Mr Weatherill in the poll.

The results are mirrored in a public poll published today in The Advertiser.

The poll of 544 voters shows a similar collapse in Labor’s primary vote and strong support for Mr Weatherill as replacement leader.

It’s a significant change of position for the party which now appears to have “moved on” from the leadership pairing of Mike Rann and Kevin Foley.

“The fact is that the party knows that the leadership is on the nose with South Australian voters,” one senior official said yesterday.

“”They’ve run their race and there needs to be a transition before too much damage is done.

“The notion that the Premier be allowed to stay until he breaks some longevity record is no longer being accepted within the party.

“Longevity is no justification for holding office.”

It’s understood that the leadership poll followed previous polling which showed a major fall in the party’s primary vote.

Adelaide University’s head of politics Dr Clem McIntyre says the polling is another sign the ALP is readying itself for change.

“The notion that Rann can hang on till the end of 2011 or early 2012 and then hand over is now looking remote, he said.

“I don’t think he’ll get that far. We are seeing all the signs that the party has switched off from its disciplined approach of the last eight or nine years.

“The O’Brien incident in parliament was extraordinary,” Dr McIntyre said, referring to a parliamentary tiff last Wednesday between the Agriculture Minister and Mr Foley.

“I’m struck by how ill-disciplined the party has been since the State Budget (in September).

“I’ve been scratching my head to remember a minister getting a pasting like that from a colleague on the floor of the House and I can’t.”

Dr McIntyre said it was possible for the Right faction to do a deal with Jay Weatherill – a member of the Left – as part of leadership discussions.

“Look, if he was offered a deal where he moved from the Left faction in exchange for the Premiership of the State then I don’t think he would need much thinking time.”

Just resign Rann or Legislative Council must block Supply (click)

2010-11-16T08:24:00.005+10:30

For God's sake you ALP mob. Just give SA a break and sack Rann and Foley before they pull the Labor brand further into disrepute.
Is Premier Rann now so deluded that he can't see what he is doing to South Australia? His greatest claim to fame will be Lance Armstrong, again at taxpayers undisclosed expense.

We owe Rann nothing. You owe Rann nothing. He is leader for 16 years of being in the sunshine, premier for 8 1/2 years. What more does he want as he continues his great arrogant disconnect from reality and the people of South Australia.

Just read the daily letters in the newspapers. They are real people, not not "hiding" behind blogs like @ResidentThinker aka Kerry Seebohm.

Minister O'Brien's statement that we are borrowing money to pay wages is further proof that under Rann, this government is tired, deluded and bereft of any Labor values. Values that led me to join the ALP at the age of 14.
I am no longer a member, it is easier to criticise all parties being unaligned. I was requested to re-join the ALP recently, to put my views "directly" to those in power. But I am far too experienced to fall for that one! Rann doesn't listen to anyone, not even you. So why would he listen to me? Only people power will dislodge this guy and his mate Foley if you don't do it.

Should Rann and Foley not resign, or be pushed by you mob, then I will do my humble best to garner support for the Legislative Council to block Supply. South Australia deserves much much better than what we are suffering now. "Put your Family First"?
PS Foley, didn't you know that Australia escaped the global financial crisis .......... so stop using it as an excuse for your fiscal incompetence!

2010-11-14T15:38:00.002+10:30

Congratulations Stephen Yarwood, Adelaide's new (and youngest ever) Lord Mayor.

Lets get this city moving!

Adelaide to be a city "with a mojo"?

2010-11-12T13:38:00.005+10:30

From Adelaide's Independent Weekly, online InDaily newspaper

Friday, November 12, 2010

Call to treat CBD as special zone

DES RYAN- Journalist : Nathan Paine Property Council SA

THE Property Council has called for the Adelaide CBD to be declared a Zone of State Significance to remove it from the “quagmire of parochial politics and stagnation”.

In a public policy paper outlining plans to make Adelaide a “Powerhouse CBD”, the SA Division today has called for sweeping reforms to the governance of the city to recognise its importance to the state’s economy.

SA executive director Nathan Paine said that with the close of council elections today, it was an ideal time to “lock in reforms” under a new Lord Mayor and council.

“This public policy paper seeks to crystalise the key issues that hold the City back from its potential and transform Adelaide from a sleepy town of the past into a Powerhouse City of the future,” he said.

“The State Government’s call for a team to coordinate and masterplan Adelaide’s Riverbank redevelopment is a great step in the right direction but we need this type of approach to the City as a whole.

“It must always be front of mind that Adelaide is the economic, social and cultural heart of this state – if the city doesn’t function, the state simply can’t thrive.

“As a Zone of State Significance the city could escape the quagmire of parochial politics and stagnation and finally achieve its potential.”

Mr Paine said Powerhouse CBD advances the work started in the SA Division’s

2009 blueprint, “Adelaide2036: Building on Light’s Vision”.

The new report recommends immediate actions to improve the “amenity and vibrancy” of the city, revitalising public spaces and the arterial connections between them.

In addition to providing State Significance status, the paper calls for

the “activation” of the parklands;
a “more imaginative and effective approach” towards heritage;
the removal of barriers to multi-storey developments and the “activation” of laneways.

Mr Paine said some recommendations from Adelaide 2036 had been delivered and

others were in train, but the momentum for reform must be pushed along harder.

“Colonel William Light gave us an incredible canvas to build upon in Adelaide, but because of narrow parochial interests and a lack of political will we’ve always been scared away from pursuing its full potential.

“It’s time we swept away the old way of doing things, that we stopped bowing down to the opponents to progress.

“It’s time to roll up our sleeves and actually start doing all the things that the overwhelming majority of us want – a city with mojo, a bustling Riverbank precinct, active and beautiful parklands and, at last, a functional Victoria Square.

“We need reforms at the very top to do this, and the Powerhouse City paper provides the roadmap to achieve those reforms.”

Puglia.... Nice 'work' if you can get it. (Click)

2010-11-08T11:34:00.004+10:30

What was the reason for SA priest, Monsignor David Cappo attending the Rann government's "Trade Fair" at Puglia in Southern Italy?
We taxpayer are again slugged by Rann for what seems to be another junket paid for by the taxpayers, as funding is withdrawn from country hospitals in Keith, Ardrossan etc. The 'Trade Fair' did not have a single SA business in attendence!

David Cappo's attendance in Puglia is very questionable. He is certainly on the government payroll as a Commissioner of Social Inclusion in SA. But what reason did he have to accept the trip to Puglia? Perhaps we are selling rosary beads or other trinkets to the local Italians in Southern Italy?

Rann's antics get more and more questionable by the day.

Carnegie Lemon closes ranks

2010-10-28T17:04:00.000+10:30

Thursday, October 28, 2010 Source: InDaily Adelaide

Carnegie Mellon tight-lipped

DANIELLE FORSYTH

THE Carnegie Mellon University is refusing to answer questions about the future of its Adelaide campus.

The taxpayer subsidised university has been subject to persistent rumours of financial trouble, including possible closure next year.

Reports earlier this month claimed the university campus would close within 12 months due to declining enrolment figures, but Carnegie Mellon has declined to speak to Indaily about the allegations.

Since 2006, the American university has received more than $23 million in state government funding and $8 million from the federal government to establish and maintain the Adelaide campus.

This week, Carnegie Mellon continually pushed back an Indaily interview with executive director Professor Terry Buss before it was cancelled altogether.

The university instead provided a statement which said they were “committed to our programs in Adelaide and to the South Australian community”.

“There are no plans to close the operations in Adelaide and no truth that a closing in 12 months is imminent,” the statement said.

Premier Mike Rann has repeatedly defended the university against claims it is a waste of taxpayer money and this week said the allegations were made by people “jealous” of Carnegie Mellon.

Earlier this year, Professor Buss said the college would be able to operate without state government funding, and was now overseeing a restructure to offer more short-term courses which it hoped would succeed better than the current one- to two-year options.

Approximately 100 of the university’s 247 students since 2006 have been paid public servants on a 75 per cent government scholarship.

Susan Mitchell on Don Dunstan and leadership

2010-10-26T16:52:00.003+10:30

Dunstan reminds us of what is possible

SUSAN MITCHELL in 'InDaily'

I HAVE just received an invitation to celebrate the 35th anniversary of the first Sex Discrimination Act to be passed in Australia? Where was it enacted? South Australia? By whom? Premier Don Dunstan.

How long is it since South Australia was the first to be known for doing anything?

After a long apprenticeship in the South Australian Labor Party, Don Dunstan had heard endless sorry tales from battlers in his electorate regarding the rip-offs from the housing and used car industries. As a lawyer, he knew that any legal redress was way beyond their means. So in another first he drafted the first consumer protection laws in Australia.

Hot on the heels of this legislation we were the first to abolish discrimination based on race, colour of skin or country of origin.

Which was the first state to enable Aborigines to live on their own lands and determine their own future with assistance from the government?

South Australia under Premier Don Dunstan.

Throughout the 1970s the rest of the nation was astounded that little old Adelaide, city of Churches, was leading the way in much needed reforms?

What followed in the other firsts was homosexual law reform, censorship law reform, and the most controversial of them all in what had become known as “the wowser state”, reform of the Licensing Act. Adelaide still had what was known as the six o’clock swill: no restaurant licences, no permit for alcohol in social clubs and even for those with permits, all alcohol was to be off the table by 9pm. Bowling clubs were regularly raided and lockers were inspected to see if they were hiding grog.

I know it all sounds totally unreal and ludicrous now but how often do we remind ourselves that we were the first state to make these widespread reforms. How did this happen? Was it something in the water? Hardly.

Did the good citizens of Adelaide rear up in passionate dissent? Hardly.

Did the Labor Party members smoke too much dope at one of their conferences? Hardly.

Even though the Labor Party hates to laud individuals over the collective, it must admit that all the firsts sprang from the vision and hard work of one man: Don Dunstan.

Apart from all these outstanding reforms, he set in train his plans for a State Tourism Industry based on the production of the best wine and food. He established Regency Park College to train chefs to international standard. By including tourism under the Industrial Systems Provisions he ensured that a state with a narrow manufacturing base provided employment even in tough economic times. As he said, “computers can’t make a bed or prepare a meal”.

He set up permanent arts companies so that practitioners could live and work in Adelaide. He finished building the Festival Centre, established the State Opera, gave the State Theatre Company a resident company of actors, established the South Australian Film Corporation. And so the list goes on.

I am not engaging in some kind of nostalgic yearning for the past but reminding those who lived here in the 1970s and informing those who were not even born, what can be accomplished by one outstanding leader, even in a small city like Adelaide. We seem to have settled into a malaise of mediocrity.

If firsts have been achieved before, they can be done again.

Leadership is about having a clear and well-thought out plan for the future of the city and the negotiation skills to make it happen. Leadership is not spin or rhetoric or slogans, it is action. Don’t for one minute think that Dunstan’s own ministers weren’t gobsmacked by what he encouraged them to achieve. The comfortable citizens of Adelaide could not believe what was happening before their eyes. Many of them were outraged. Some viciously vituperative in their assessments. But somehow he always managed to scrape over the line at election time.

Some naysayers still wish to wipe away his achievements by claiming that it was just the turbulent times that produced such reforms. If that were true then why was Adelaide the first state to enact them. Why not anarchic Sydney or Marxist Melbourne? Why slumbering Adelaide?

Successive governments of both persuasions have been riding on the coat- tails of Dunstan’s reforms and leadership ever since. Every time we sit outside and enjoy a glass of wine and a delicious meal, we should toast him for being the first Premier to introduce outdoor dining.

I am not claiming that he should be our next saint; as Joe E Brown said in the film Some Like It Hot, “Nobody’s perfect.”

But when we look at the leaders we have had in this State since Dunstan, it is vital to our future that those who experienced the Dunstan decade remind themselves and others of what is possible. He never gave up on Adelaide being the best at everything it did. We don’t have to be the biggest city in the nation but we can still be the best. It all depends on the qualities of the leader. Even the current Prime Minister cited Dunstan as her political role model. It is time, once again, for us to settle for nothing less.

www.susanmitchell.com.au

The high costs of our Royal System (click)

2010-10-24T08:14:00.004+10:30

I wonder what royalists are thinking on how they can justify this gravy train?.... And these are only present and past Governors General.
Throw in former state governors and what a costly regal system we have in Australia.
Onward the Republic of Australia I say.

AUSTRALIA'S former governors-general are each costing taxpayers as much as $500,000 a year in pensions, office space and executive staff.

According to documents obtained under Freedom of Information laws, the total cost of former governors-general has risen to nearly $3 million a year or $237,205 a month.

The biggest spenders are former Labor leader Bill Hayden and controversial Howard Government appointee Peter Hollingworth, who was forced to resign in 2003 after less than two years in the job.

Mr Hayden has cost an average of $539,000 a year since the 2007 election and Dr Hollingworth an average of $502,000.

Click header for full story! Source: Adelaide's Sunday Mail.

You bet we need an ICAC & we need it now

2010-10-20T08:09:00.003+10:30

TAXPAYERS paid the Premier's chief of staff Nick Alexandrides about $80,000 more than the Government reported in its yearly salary reports.

In evidence given to the Budget and Finance committee this week, Department of Premier and Cabinet chief executive Chris Eccles confirmed Mr Alexandrides' total remuneration package was between $250,000-$259,000, rather than the $175,201 reported in the Government gazette.

Government spokeswoman Jill Bottrall said the approximate $80,000 difference could be attributed to "on-costs" such as employer superannuation fund contributions, but was unable to provide a breakdown.

"It would account for all costs associated with his employment including salary, the cost of the non-monetary benefits and superannuation and other on-costs," she said.

"This is a standard public sector accounting requirement."

"Nick doesn't receive superannuation payments.

"He pays into the fund, and the department makes a contribution.

"That's how superannuation works," she said.

Opposition finance spokesman Rob Lucas said the Government's failure to include the extra benefits appeared to be a breach of the Public Sector Act.

"The bottom line is they are required to reveal the detailed remuneration in the Gazette (and) the Act clearly defines remuneration as salary, allowances and other monetary benefits," he said.

"It is quite clear that remuneration includes monetary benefits and monetary benefits includes superannuation."

Mr Lucas said the Liberal Party had been told Mr Alexandrides received superannuation payments of $45,000 a year - a figure that was unable to be confirmed by the Government yesterday.

"This (the amount) is information that we just don't keep or have access to in this office," Ms Bottrall said.

The $45,000 would equate to about 26 per cent - 17 per cent higher than public servants' superannuation rate.

Mr Lucas said he had also been informed that Ms Jill Bottrall, who is one of Mike Rann's key media advisers, had received a total remuneration package of up to $25,000 higher than the gazetted figure of $155,733.

Asked to confirm the figure yesterday, Ms Bottrall did not respond.

Mr Lucas said failing to include superannuation benefits in the gazetted amount meant other employees could be receiving generous super contributions without the public knowing.

-Source Adelaide Advertiser 20.10.2010

Susan Mitchell on Adelaide

2010-10-14T14:41:00.000+10:30

From InDaily http://www.indaily.com.au/

Thursday, October 14, 2010

Adelaide, Adelaide, ever lovin Adelaide

IT’S time to talk about the plight of our city.

I speak as a fifth generation Adelaidean. Both sides of my family arrived here soon after settlement and most of their offspring have remained here.

They all believed that Adelaide was the nation’s best kept secret and they liked it that way. Not for us the convict culture of vulgar displays of wealth, the endless bragging about how well we were all doing, the insidious comparisons with the rest of the world.

We were not international in our dreams, nor did we wish to be. We were contented with our way of life. That is still, by and large, our default position.

However, every living thing in order not to die out must change and adapt to changes outside itself. Adelaide seems to have an inbuilt resistance to change. “We like things the way they are. They suit us. Don’t rock the boat” are phrases still heard in the majority of Adelaide homes.

Nevertheless, we have experienced, but only rarely, leaders who have attempted to make radical changes to this city’s view of itself.

In my lifetime, Don Dunstan was one of these leaders. I left Adelaide in my early 20s, like most enterprising young people in the late ‘60s to live and work in London and Europe.

In the early 1970s due to the ill health of my parents I returned home. What I confronted was amazing. The quiet, self-satisfied, parochial city that I had left was now a cauldron of radical changes and the focus of national and international attention.

People were flying in from other states and other parts of the world , eager to work for the new government. A Premier called Don Dunstan was enacting changes and passing legislation that the rest of the country, if not the world, considered radical. The pace of the city had gone from bucolic to buzzing.

The good citizens of Adelaide were at first stunned but consoled by a sense that this new phase would quickly pass, like a swarm of locusts. But it didn’t pass. It lasted a decade.

Dunstan was bold. He made changes that were far from popular, changes that split the city and divided families but nothing deterred him from his vision of making us the most advanced and civilised small city in the southern hemisphere.

He continued to be re-elected but only ever by a few seats and in the end it took a terrible toll on his health. He withstood vitriolic attacks on his background , his birth, his family, his sexuality and certainly his politics. But he never gave up.

Those 10 years in the 1970s provided a template for change that no political leader since has been bold enough to imitate. It takes guts and passion to be an agent of change and even those who loathed him and everything he stood for, were forced to admire his guts and his determination.

Unfortunately, once he left office, so did all those talented and creative thinkers who had followed him to this city.

The time is ripe for another leader of his courage and vision to recharge this city and make the changes that are necessary to take it into the current global world. We need another leader like Tom Playford or Don Dunstan, both of whom had the guts to act. In politics as in life, as in literature, character is action.

The only motto Adelaide’s leaders need to follow now is “Just Do It.”

Don’t dither and dick around.

Make a decision and act on it.

Don’t listen to the naysayers and the whiners, just plough on.

If you doubt that our city is not moribund, then please answer these questions.

How did we ever get a freeway that went only one way?

Why, when we were the first to have an Arts Festival, are we the last to make it annual?

Why have we taken so long to have a first class sporting facility at The Adelaide Oval?

Why have we taken 20 years to discuss changes to Victoria Square?

Why is Victoria Park being allowed to remain a wasteland?

Why is Port Adelaide still so undeveloped?

Why do we have new trams that go nowhere?

Why has the River Torrens and its banks remained so undeveloped?

These are just a few of the unanswered questions that I keep asking everyone since I recently returned to live in this city?

The State is booming, thanks to mining. Everywhere I visit, outside of the city, is full of individuals who have had the guts to start wonderful businesses in local produce like cheese and olive oil and wine and present fantastic food in all sorts of cafes and restaurants.

Nothing of this energy, initiative and enterprise is happening in the city where I have chosen to live. Why? Consider this an ongoing conversation.

Can somebody give me the answers? www.susanmitchell.com.au

Yes Susan, in two words Mike Rann!

Susan Mitchell on Festivals

2010-10-12T14:46:00.001+10:30

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

And the last shall be first

THIS is not about knocking Adelaide. It is about praising Brisbane. It is also about asking some hard questions.

I have recently returned from The Brisbane Festival (September 4-25) and must admit to being gobsmacked by what they turned on. I say this having witnessed and loved most of the Adelaide Festivals since they began in 1960. I was still at school when I saw my first major theatrical production in the Bonython Theatre. Zoe Caldwell in Saint Joan. I was hooked on arts festivals from then on.

Adelaide was among the first cities in Australia to present a major Festival of Arts, modelled on the established Edinburgh Festival. So not only did we set the national template and the highest of standards, we soon realised that we were the perfect size and planned city for a festival.

We had enough theatres that we could walk between and the perfect climate in March for outdoor events. We started with a biennial Festival because true to our natural inclination we were cautious and not prone to biting off more than we could chew. So successful were we that visitors came from all over the nation and even from overseas to experience the artistic riches we presented.

We even officially branded ourselves The Festival State and displayed it proudly on our car numberplates.

Of course the other capital cities looked on with envy and one by one they created their own festivals. Melbourne and Sydney, however, keen to outdo Adelaide, decided to make their Arts festival an annual event. They figured that something which was so successful and gave such pleasure to so many people should happen every year.

Adelaide, however, refused to follow them. In fact, The Board of Governors who ran the festival, argued that having it every other year was what made it “so special”. I cannot understand the logic of this and never could. If you applied this to other pleasures such as great food or wine or sex, would you opt to enjoy them every year or every two years?

In desperation, as Chair of Adelaide Writers Week, fondly known as the jewel in the crown, I and my board explored and promulgated the possibility of Writers Week being an annual event. So outraged was the Board of Governors that we were all sacked and a new board appointed who would never raise the question again.

Now, 16 years later, another Board of Management of the Adelaide Festival has decided that both the Festival and Writers Week should become annual events every March. Why did it take Adelaide so long to catch up to the other festivals? That is an interesting question for another column – but now I want to review the recent Brisbane Festival.

In 1996, Brisbane was the very last capital city in Australia to produce an arts festival. In fact Brisbane, like Perth, was even smaller than Adelaide not so many decades ago.

Brisbane was viewed by the rest of the nation as a bit backward in the arts and a rather unsophisticated country town. Its culture was known for its corruption not its creativity. And then it found itself the host of Expo and never looked back.

The city is strangely shaped and rather cramped between the river and the suburbs. And the Brisbane River was brown and rather sluggish, much like The River Torrens.

When Sally-anne Atkinson was Lord Mayor she realised that all great cities make the most of their river and she set about building boardwalks and bridges which in turn spawned restaurants and cafes.

When Jim Soorley took over as Lord Mayor he made the river and its banks the focal point of the city and added river ferries to transport people to its various hubs, including the University. Boardwalks now line both sides of the River and various bridges lead us to the major cultural institutions on the river’s South Bank.

In short Brisbane developed way beyond anyone’s expectations and has continued to flourish. If you haven’t been there for a while you should go, just to view it for yourself.

As the youngest Arts Festival it took a while to get the citizens attuned to what it offered.

This year, under the artistic directorship of Noel Staunton, it has taken off. I witnessed the kind of genuine excitement in the crowds that flocked to the events I attended that I remembered from the grand days of our festivals where we trekked to unused quarries and stayed awake until dawn just to witness and experience Peter Brook’s epic play, The Mahabharitah.

No, I am not going to wallow in sentimental nostalgia, although I did note that when Stephen Fry was performing his monologue at the Sydney Opera House recently, he did actually say when comparing his experience at various festivals, “it was nothing like the old Adelaide Festival was” – the use of the past tense being a clear implication that our festival has declined.

Noel Staunton, is widely known in the Arts as Mr Fix-it and it was to him that we turned when our production of The Ring Cycle was going pear-shaped. He made sure that it was a triumph and recognised as one of the best productions in the world.

Did we capitalise on this triumph, which was another first for Australia? Alas, no. It was so sensational and gave so much pleasure to so many people, the powers that be clearly reasoned that what would make it really “special” was doing it every 10 years.

So Brisbane snapped up Mr Staunton and he created a buzz in the city that they have never before experienced. Not only did he use all the established performing venues but for the first time they experienced a free night at the Opera at the Eagle Farm Racecourse. I was told that so enthralled were they at this new experience that blokes who were looking for their cars after the Opera were singing out directions in the style of Figaro.

Staunton also turned one of the spaces in the old Brisbane Powerhouse (saved form demolition by Jim Soorley) into an amphitheatre. On the nights I was there, The Powerhouse was charged by the enthusiasm of people attending its various theatres and eating and drinking in the restaurants on the edge of the Brisbane River. I can still see the hundreds of tiny lights either side of the pathways in the darkness of the amphitheatre pinpointing their ladders into the sky.

The four performances that I saw were all different, all excellent in standard and all packed to the rafters. There was a one man performance of Beckett by an Irish actor on an almost bare stage which held the audience spellbound for nearly two hours. It was funny, sad and utterly riveting.

Meryl Tankard, much beloved of Adelaide audiences until an act of sheer stupidity caused us to lose her and her talents, presented a new, mesmerising show The Oracle, which is going on to New York after Brisbane.

Every festival should include a new Australian premiere and Brisbane’s was Shanghai Lady Killer which had all the fun of film noir, Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon and Kill Bill backed by an original music score. The audience screamed and shouted their approval.

And in an exclusive performance for Brisbane, the national Ballet of Cuba performed a dazzling production of Don Quixote. The audience didn’t just clap and scream, some stood up and whistled, some were so excited they stood on their seats to applaud.

Staunton, with all his knowledge and experience of past festivals in other states and other countries has delivered Brisbane a knockout festival. Lucky them.

Declaration: Susan Mitchen is an Honorary Ambassador, City of Brisbane.

www.susanmitchell.com.au

Democracy - Rann government style

2010-09-29T08:22:00.003+09:30

PARKS COMMUNITY CENTRE

Mrs REDMOND (Heysen—Leader of the Opposition) (14:54): My question is again to the Premier. Why didn't the Premier and the government tell the people who use the Parks Community Centre before the 2010 election of their plans to close the centre?

The Hon. J.M. RANKINE (Wright—Minister for Families and Communities, Minister for Housing, Minister for Ageing, Minister for Disability) (14:54): We were faced with the task of making sure we get best value for money for the South Australian taxpayers. Is it best use of taxpayers' money to spend $16 million over the next 10 years maintaining what are currently barely adequate facilities for people of the western suburbs? This is an opportunity for us to provide improved services—

Mr Williams interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! I warn the deputy leader.

The Hon. J.M. RANKINE: —and facilities for the people of the western suburbs. We have already seen a $600 million commitment to that area, lifting the lives of those people—

Mrs REDMOND: Point of order, Madam Speaker: you just read out the relevant standing order about the need to answer the substance of the question. The question was about why the government did not tell the people who used The Parks Community Centre, before the election, that it intended to close it. That is the substance of the question.

The SPEAKER: No, I still think the minister is getting to the answer; I will give her the benefit of the doubt at this stage.

The Hon. J.M. RANKINE: Let me also make the point that when The Parks was established in the 1970s the western suburbs were very different to what they are now. We had something like an 80 per cent Housing Trust concentration in some of those suburbs; it is now below 25 per cent.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. J.M. RANKINE: The decision in relation to The Parks was a proposal that was put to government by the Sustainable Budget Commission after the election.

Video of today's protest Rally at SA Parliament (click)

2010-09-28T16:50:00.005+09:30

Perhaps the chickens are coming home to roost?
Perhaps the people are sick and tired of being ignored by an arrogant and detached Rann Government who finds money for everything except those who matter?

But when the unions come out to protest against Labor and the disadvantaged citizens (whom Labor is supposed to represent) rally on the steps of Parliament .............. something is very very wrong.

Rann and Foley have no idea where this people power is going to lead to. And it is their own fault.

We have a fake imposter of a Labor Premier Mike Rann and a fake imposter Kevin Foley as his deputy. Time for the Parliamentary Labor Party to see the light and move on these two fakes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0jW3diI1HCU

Rann Labor abandons its heartland (click)

2010-09-27T21:47:00.004+09:30

If Rann's Labor could possibly disconnect itself even more from the community it purports to represent, then this is it.

Rann/Foley are going to bulldoze the Parks Community Centre in the western suburbs of Adelaide.

The emotions of the locals is overwhelming and yet Rann who won't even live in his Salisbury electorate is oblivious to it .

This is a disgrace and further shows that Rann is a fake impostor of a Labor leader and his deputy Kevin Foley has shown his arrogant incompetence as treasurer.
In boasting that we have a AAA rating, (paid by the government) and yet he has to abandon his Labor principles along with Premier Rann to bulldoze the community center in Adelaide's less than affluent west is a disgrace for anyone who dares to call himself a Labor person.

A disgrace that Don Dunstan in this video clip, (click header) must be turning in his grave as Rann abandons Labor values and principles!

How can Rann sleep at night in his chosen upmarket and leafy Norwood is beyond the understanding of most of us. He has forgotten his roots, except for one or two infamous ones of course!!
The Governor should withdraw his commision.

Des Ryan editor InDaily hits the spot.

2010-09-21T14:29:00.002+09:30

Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Where would we be without journos

GOVERNMENTS love secrecy, that goes without saying.

They are secretive because the alternative, being open and transparent, means being held to account. Therefore they are secretive even when there is no need to be secretive.

Because we, the public, are apparently not to be trusted.

Premier Mike Rann and his people expect us to take their word at face value and to pay no great attention to whatever might be brewing behind the scenes.

Such is the modern political craft of spin doctoring, which is an extension of government obsession with secrecy to the exclusion of the public’s entitlement to know.

State Cabinet meets in secret and publishes no records of its considerations for 20, 30 or even 75 years in some circumstances. Embarrassing documents are “walked through’’ Cabinet to ensure they are exempt from Freedom of Information searches, though the documents are never actually discussed around the table.

Occasionally, though, we get a brief keyhole glimpse of how things really work behind the closed doors.

Details tend to come out little by little, and only when forced by some revelation. Questions are asked about the RAH and Adelaide Oval, for example, and the confidential material leaks out through the media.

The Sustainable Budget Commission drew up a so-called “slash and burn” secret list of savage State Budget cuts for Treasurer Kevin Foley.

The SBC report floated a long, controversial list of suggested cutbacks, among them to close country hospitals, police and fire stations, the closure of The Repatriation Hospital, reducing expenditure on the homelessness and charging disabled adults for government-supplied equipment.

We all had a stake in knowing what was being contemplated here. Yet it remained a state secret until someone leaked the details to the media.

Foley, who adopted very few of the SBC recommendations, called in investigators from the Attorney-General’s Department to hunt down the whistleblower, as if the person had acted dishonourably and against the public interest.

Another example: The Transport Department refused to publicly release information about the condition of SA’s 700 bridges, claiming al-Qaida terrorists might use the details to launch an attack.

First the World Trade Centre, next the Mitcham Station underpass.

Only when the claim was debunked by the State Ombudsman did the Transport Department relent and release the information. There was no immediate response by Osama bin Laden.

Here’s another: SA Water intends to run a new water pipeline through the suburbs – connected by five industrial-sized pumping stations in residential areas – yet refused to share the secret details with stressed householders unless they first signed a confidentiality agreement.

The clear inference was that anyone who disclosed the details would be sued by SA Water.

Why? No one could explain, not even Water Minister Paul Caica, who eventually told residents they could safely ignore the implied threat.

Generally speaking, public scrutiny has a life cycle of four stages:

Exposure – Hidden material is revealed by an official investigation, a whistleblower or through the media asking questions.

Spinning – A PR attempt is made to put a gloss on the damage and to limit the public outrage.

Transparency – An apology is offered and the hidden material is openly shared with the public.

Management – Steps are taken to ensure that other hidden material never becomes available, by declaring it publicly off-limits on the basis of privacy, national security or cabinet confidentiality.

“Commercial in-confidence” is also cited by governments for keeping information secret, as if this gives a cloak of legitimacy for any underhand deals.

In fact, whenever government money confers an advantage on an individual or a private company, we the taxpayers are entitled to know about it. Who is being looked after and why? We have a right to be kept informed.

The problem is, as soon as political parties get hold of power, it does not take long before they reward their supporters and exclude their detractors, a system of Mafia-like patronage.

Patronage is the heartbeat of politics. Everything has a price. Influence and loyalty can be bought and sold.

Cynicism inevitably spreads. Remain loyal and you will be looked after; the compliant will be rewarded to undermine those who are out of favour.

It’s a system under which businesses feel obliged to pay money to a lobbyist to arrange access and a cosy chat with the minister, who is in a position to enhance their commercial interests.

These are not social calls. The clients are there to ensure their own prosperity, not for the coffee and sweet biscuits.

If they don’t want to play the game, then try going elsewhere and negotiate a better deal.

True, there are public registers of political lobbyists and of campaign donations, as there are also FOI procedures and an Ombudsman. But these are of limited usefulness, to a greater or lesser extent, and do not readily deliver up what is really happening deep down.

Such processes might offer a reassuring, superficial sense of the openness of government, but just don’t expect too much openness.

The patronage system is deeply flawed, I believe, yet legal. The question arises: by what standards are we to judge those who operate by its flawed rules when their behaviour breaches no law but stinks nonetheless?

Also, we can hear what politicians say, but how are we to judge if they are being honest or lying if we do not know the back story? How do we know if a political donor is expecting to be rewarded later on for a contribution, nudge-wink?

And who is going to expose any of this?

Well, journalists. They like to see themselves as the vigilant truth seekers. It is no coincidence that the public exposure of wrongdoing mostly occurs through the media, not within the chambers of Parliament House.

Good journalists require a certain temperament, I think. They need to be driven to discover what the powerful are hiding and why, from the starting point that no government decision should be allowed to go uncontested.

Why, why, always why? It’s the only question that matters.

Journalists need to be dogged. Patient with a capital P in checking and cross-referencing the facts. Above all, journalism is the art of verification.

Nothing to hide? Of course there is, and it’s a journalist’s job to go fetch it out.

Every now and then, sufficient facts are dragged into the open by the media to suggest that government corruption has occurred, or greed, or plain incompetence. Blessed be the whistleblower.

As for what happens next, refer back to the Four Points above, the closed, spinning loop.

Most of us have an image in our minds of how a government ought to behave. First of all, no government should be allowed to place its own political self interest higher than the communal interest, especially when transparency and accountability go missing.

South Australia needs an independent crime commission to investigate government dishonesty in its various forms.

The Premier thinks otherwise.

Then let’s have a Truth Commission, an independent body to expose the lies of politicians. Except, of course, the whole edifice of government would come tumbling down.

-Des Ryan is the Editor of Indaily

http://www.indaily.com.au/

To subscribe to the free online newspaper email: indaily@solsticemedia.com.au

Foley 'Pays' for AAA Rating (click)

2010-09-21T08:45:00.003+09:30

Ratings agency gives SA double-A-plus

21.09.2010

A parliamentary inquiry has heard a third credit ratings agency, Fitch's, does not give South Australia a triple-A rating.

The inquiry heard Standard & Poor's, which has just re-affirmed a triple-A rating for SA, is paid more than $300,000 by the Government for its services.

Another agency, Moody's, is also paid and has given the same rating.

But Under-Treasurer Jim Wright says Fitch's has a different rating and is offering a free service.

That agency rates South Australia as double-A-plus.

Mr Wright told a SA parliamentary inquiry a recommendation by the Sustainable Budget Commission (SBC) to cease paying the other two ratings agencies was rejected.

"The SBC identified the possibility that you might not go ahead and pay them and rely on them on them rating you anyway, but some ratings agencies do - Fitch's, for instance, they rate the state at the moment and we don't pay them a fee," he told the inquiry.

SA Treasurer Kevin Foley said Standard & Poor's and Moody's were the best in the business.

We were cynically Conned by disconnected government

2010-09-17T09:57:00.003+09:30

If anyone was ever wondering what the Rann - Foley government think of their constituency, this pic says it all.

After weeks of kite flying, the budget is handed down and we were cynically conned that The Repat Hospital at Daw Park was to be closed. Police stations would be closed, and Carrick Hill residence and Carclew would be sold. Etc. Etc.

Well, just have a look on the faces of our premier and treasurer on the front page of The Advertiser 17.09.2010

This Rann government is so disconnected from the electorate, one is entitled to ask how much lower can it go?

Hendrik Gout on the election fallout (click)

2010-08-26T10:44:00.003+09:30

Henrik Gout of the Independent Weekly's InDaily offers an interesting take on the recent federal election.

Frankly, I personally think we should all go back to the polls and in the light of recent events, make a new, decisive choice on who is to form government.
To rely on independents is fraught with danger. OK it worked in South Australia, but we are talking about a national government not an irrelevant state government.

CRIKEY

2010-08-23T16:49:00.000+09:30

Letter from the miners: boys, what have we done?

Bernard Keane

Memo to Minerals Council of Australia ? attention Mitch Hooke and Brendan Pearson

Mitch, Brendan ? great outcome on Saturday and you and the member organisations can be proud of the sterling work you did. People mocked the industry and its claims about the mining tax but you've had the last laugh. You set out to remove a democratically-elected government and, with the help of News Limited, you've damn near pulled it off. Mitch, we know you said after Rudd was dispatched that there should be no appearance of dancing on his grave but surely you're entitled to a little jig now that the end of Labor is in sight.

Fantastic work.

There's only one tiny fly in the ointment and we hate to raise it at a time when we should be celebrating, but it appears that, in setting out to remove the Labor government, we've ushered in political forces that, well, not to put too fine a point on it, appear rather hostile to the industry.

Now, we don't refer to the uncertainty that will be occasioned by minority government. That of course is a concern to mining investors. As one international investor said the other day, "you call it democracy ? we call it sovereign risk". But nevertheless we all agree that major constitutional reform is not a priority for the industry just at this juncture. And in any event the point is there's no longer a majority Labor government, and that's what we were after.

What I'm referring to is that from July 1 we've got a hostile Senate, with nine Greens. Nine! Some of us nearly fell off our piles of gold ingots when we saw these fair trade-loving, soyaccino-sipping, joint-puffing, social justice-slurping lunatics were almost going to get into double figures. Why didn't we see this coming when we set out to undermine a Labor government? At least we got the MRRT out of Gillard. The Greens actually want to go back to the RSPT, and impose a functional, effective emissions trading scheme.

Okay, we know neither will actually have a substantial impact on our revenue or profits, but we've been insistent for years that both will bring the entire mining industry to an end. And how much new greentape are we going to see imposed on the industry as a consequence of this? We dread to think what'll happen next time there's an itty-bitty oil spill from one of the offshore drillers.

That's not all. Not only is there a Green in the House of Representatives, but the independents are now in charge in the Reps. Have you listened to what Tony Windsor has been saying about coal companies in the Liverpool Plains area? We've got billions of dollars in investments ready to go in the area and people like Windsor are demanding impact studies and whatnot. Some crap about food production and groundwater. It's less than two years since Windsor was with Bob Brown -- Bob bloody Brown -- giving support to farmers trying to block BHP's exploration at Caroona.

We just hope you blokes haven't created a Frankenstein monster with all this. We need to fire up the campaign again, get the ads rolling, put a stop to this stuff before it gets off the ground. Can you start the teleconferences again and we'll get some planning underway? There's no time to lose.

Also, you might want to have a word with Simon and the boys at AMEC. Despite the ads, despite the robocalls, despite tipping millions into the WA Libs, they don't look like they've pulled off Hasluck yet. Our grandmother could have won Hasluck in this election (or could have if we hadn't sold her years ago) but they're still counting and it's not clear we've won it yet. Bit of a post-mortem might be required over there.

Other than that, keep up the good work.

Regards,

Australia's mining executives

Hiler discusses the Federal Election

2010-08-23T08:24:00.003+09:30

As usual this parody hits the spot!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pNDLzx9vyU&feature=player_embedded

The Light on the Hill

2010-08-22T15:25:00.004+09:30

Modern Labor would do itself a real favour if it would get back to its roots.

It would also be doing the people of Australia who believe in a centre-left social democratic party an even bigger favour.
Modern Labor is poll driven, has lost its values, politically assassinates its own Prime Minister, for no other reason than it thinks it 'might lose' under him.
Well, I disagree. Kevin Rudd had the power of incumbency and with his stature, would have led Labor to victory on August 21st.
Julia Gillard had no legitimacy of incumbency and Australia knew it.
Perhaps you all should go back to the "Light on the Hill" and reflect on your own disgraceful actions of the past two months.

We are the people who matter, not your backroom back stabbing self indulgent power brokers from the right. Shame on you all. And get back to your values or the rank and file will do it for you!

Ben Chifley Speech - The light on the hill

Ben Chifley - The light on the hill

I have had the privilege of leading the Labor Party for nearly four years. They have not been easy times and it has not been an easy job. It is a man-killing job and would be impossible if it were not for the help of my colleagues and members of the movement.

No Labor Minister or leader ever has an easy job. The urgency that rests behind the Labor movement, pushing it on to do things, to create new conditions, to reorganise the economy of the country, always means that the people who work within the Labor movement, people who lead, can never have an easy job. The job of the evangelist is never easy.

Because of the turn of fortune's wheel your Premier (Mr McGirr) and I have gained some prominence in the Labor movement. But the strength of the movement cannot come from us. We may make plans and pass legislation to help and direct the economy of the country. But the job of getting the things the people of the country want comes from the roots of the Labour movement - the people who support it.

When I sat at a Labor meeting in the country with only ten or fifteen men there, I found a man sitting beside me who had been working in the Labor movement for fifty-four years. I have no doubt that many of you have been doing the same, not hoping for any advantage from the movement, not hoping for any personal gain, but because you believe in a movement that has been built up to bring better conditions to the people. Therefore, the success of the Labour Party at the next elections depends entirely, as it always has done, on the people who work.

I try to think of the Labor movement, not as putting an extra sixpence into somebody's pocket, or making somebody Prime Minister or Premier, but as a movement bringing something better to the people, better standards of living, greater happiness to the mass of the people. We have a great objective - the light on the hill - which we aim to reach by working the betterment of mankind not only here but anywhere we may give a helping hand. If it were not for that, the Labor movement would not be worth fighting for.

If the movement can make someone more comfortable, give to some father or mother a greater feeling of security for their children, a feeling that if a depression comes there will be work, that the government is striving its hardest to do its best, then the Labour movement will be completely justified.

It does not matter about persons like me who have our limitations. I only hope that the generosity, kindliness and friendliness shown to me by thousands of my colleagues in the Labour movement will continue to be given to the movement and add zest to its work.

Ben Chifley Speech - The light on the hill

Channel 7 & Carnegie Lemon (click)

2010-08-09T10:09:00.007+09:30

It seems that Premier Rann is slowly being exposed to the folly of his dream child, Carnegie Mellon University Adelaide.
His 2005 dream is costing taxpayers an arm and a leg, and enrollments are falling to unsustainable levels.
One campus has been closed (but rent was still being paid by us) for two years out of the four year existence of this university in Adelaide.

Channel 7 Mike Smithson, is working on this story and exposing the folly that CMU Adelaide has become. Click header to see the footage.

The list of confetti-like taxpayer money being thrown around by Mike Rann is sickening, and costing this state dearly.
The issues of possible fraud at Head Office in Pittsburgh is yet to be discussed.

Let's hope that Jay Wetherill can soon gather the numbers to finally rid SA of the likes of good-news-ribbon cutting Mike.

The Nervous Labor Nellies

2010-08-02T10:15:00.003+09:30

The nervous Nellies in Labor continue to destablise the party.

First they thought they couldn't win under Kevin Rudd. So they sacked him.
Now they think they can't win under the 'new' Julia Gillard.

So, back to the drawing board and we witness the 'real' Julia Gillard makeover.
New Julia. Real Julia?

Don't we deserve better?

Justice seen to be done? (click)

2010-07-31T08:49:00.002+09:30

The latest poll in Melbourne's The Age newspaper indicated a large swing away from Julia Gillard's Labor.

Could the power hungry back room boys who stabbed PM Rudd in the back overnight, now be going to get the justice they deserve?

Rudd, win or lose should have taken Labor to the polls as PM. What a lot of nervous nellies Labor seems to be these days. Selling their soul, just because things looked a bit tough and some thought they would lose government. Well it seems, justice will seen to be done on August 22nd.

1975 Sacking and 2010 De-Ja-Vu

2010-07-30T16:50:00.005+09:30

Interesting times we live in.

I recall as a young man in 1975 the outrage felt throughout Australia when the Governor General, Sir John Kerr, sacked the Prime Minister of the day, Gough Whitlam.

Here we are in 2010 when we see another Prime Minister sacked.
But this time, it was the PM's own party that sacked him, the Australian Labor Party knifed sitting Prime Minister Kevin Rudd overnight, denying him the chance to lead to the next federal election.
The ALP installed former deputy PM Julia Gillard into office.

So much for Labor mateship and loyalty to its own.

The reason for ousting PM Kevin Rudd ............... they might lose the election.
No wonder the electorate is so pissed off with all politicians and all political parties.

More trees to be axed .... This time for O-Bahn extension

2010-07-23T13:41:00.004+09:30

So we are now to see even more government sponsored destruction of our environment, this time for the O-Bahn track extension through the parklands. The Advertiser reports that the plans will mean the axing of 560 trees and shrubs.

Weren't they happy with the 800 plus trees felled for the tram extension to the Entertainment Centre?

When will this government put a value on mature trees? They will announce no doubt, that for every mature tree axed, twice as many new ones will be planted. Trouble is, they will take decades before they mature, capture carbon and shade our city in the manner the felled trees have done.

I am not against development, I actually believe environmentally sensitive growth is necessary. But in a drying climate as ours (again our rainfall is well below average) every tree must be valued and preserved.

We do not live in a lush tropical climate, we live in the driest city on the driest inhabited continent on the planet. Sustainability should be the keyword. Not so called progress at any cost to the environment.

ICAC SA (click)

2010-07-23T08:56:00.003+09:30

Citizens tired of waiting for the Rann government to establish an Independent Commission against Corruption (ICAC) have quietly launched a new website. http://www.icacsa.com.au/index.html

Rann has proven that he is not a man of his word, when following the March State election he promised to re-connect with the electorate. If anything he has gone backwards, only 32 days of parliament for the entire year and government by Twitter is his preferred means of connection.

Tasmania had its election on the same day as South Australia, yet it managed to bring down its budget weeks ago.
The UK had its national election weeks ago, and there was even a change of government. Yet they have managed to bring down their budget.
However, in this State of SA, often described as a 'backwater' Rann says Foley can't bring his budget to Parliament until September, "due to the March election".
These people really are taking us for mushrooms. But unless one is careful, mushrooms can poison.

I urge you to take a look at ICAC SA http://www.icacsa.com.au/index.html
It's here to stay!

Tony ah ah ah ah ah

2010-07-21T13:19:00.004+09:30

From time to time its good to step back and have a good laugh. By clicking the title you will see Tony at his best.

Ya gotta appreciate Hendrik Gout's journalism (click)

2010-07-10T14:19:00.002+09:30

Anyone who doesn't buy The Independent Weekly or read the slightly clumsy online version InDaily really are missing out on a balanced overview of all things South Australian.
No I am not paid to say this, but I love our democracy and hate political spin and bullshit!

http://www.independentweekly.com.au/news/local/news/general/the-curious-case-of-laura-lee/1880488.aspx?storypage=0

Our forgotten Lower Lakes (click)

2010-07-10T09:58:00.005+09:30

Not sure how many times we say it, but the state of the Lower Lakes is not only a national disgrace but an international disgrace. If the Lakes were in Queensland it would be declared a national disaster and yet we just accept that it has to be that way in South Australia.

Mike Rann as is his bent, announced an "historic agreement" a couple years ago now, and all we have witnessed is the Lakes dry up and turn to battery acid.

When will we ever see good-news-Mike actually do something for this State? And for that matter, when will we ever see him actually showing some empathy for our environment?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W9sj-lvyy54

Carnegie Lemon?

2010-07-09T09:09:00.003+09:30

Is Carnegie Mellon University in Adelaide, the next embarrassing lemon to sour the returned Labor Government?

We haven't heard much lately, and the old truism "still waters run deep" is eerily looking muddy.

Perhaps the Opposition have something up their sleeve? Interesting times ahead.

Is Rann losing control of the Oval agenda?

2010-06-29T16:13:00.004+09:30

The ongoing farce of the Adelaide Oval re-development is beginning to resemble a 3rd rate TV soap opera.

Premier Rann said he would re-connect with us? ... Better hurry up mate! We are waiting to be connected.

The government is twisting and turning on things such as costs, the bridge over the Torrens, whether there will be a car park or not, and now no cover over the tennis courts. Are we soon to be asked to bring our own bean bags or fold up chairs to "save costs"?
Does anyone now know exactly what we are going to get anymore with this plan? I for one have no idea anymore. Is there a footbridge or not?
Premier Rann remains silent (of course) he will only surface when there is a ribbon to cut or something to open.
Deputy and treasurer Foley is feeling the heat as Rann's nominated 'bovver boy'! But the heat is also transferring to Good-News-Mike.
Is there a distinct possibility that in the rush for a pre-election "stadium" announcement, that it could soon bring the downfall of not only Foley but the Premier himself?
We have already witnessed what has happened to the Prime Minister of Australia. When things go wrong, they go very wrong, and very quickly.
Its so embarrassing to be a South Australian at the moment.
The never ending Oval mini-series, has more twists and turns than the Gorge Road. The tangled web that has been spun by Rann and Foley is now close to being out of control and could well bring about their demise.
I suppose as Kevin Rudd might say, 'that's what happens when you fail to connect with those who matter .... the electorate'!
Click the header for what the electorate is saying .... its not nice.

Re-Connecting with the electorate?

2010-06-08T14:43:00.005+09:30

It sure is more than a worry, when a State Premier who says he wants to 're-connect' with his electorate, disappears from his constituents whilst overseas.
Even our National Broadcaster ABC, via local radio in Adelaide can't contact or find the Premier of South Australia.
No-one knows where Premier Mike Rann is.

He was last seen in London, and even his beloved Tweets have stopped.
......... Government by Twitter? You be the judge!

Is Mike ok? Do we need to consider a new Premier (memories of PM Harold Holt disappearing off Portsea) comes to mind.

Premier Good-News as he is dubbed for his penchant for only fronting up to announce, ...... you guessed it, .......... good news, is seriously missing in action somewhere.
His deputy Kevin Foley who declared publicly that he is "not the sharpest tool in the shed" has also gone to ground.

Who is running this state?

We are entitled to ask is Parliament relevant anymore in SA, since they rarely sit, and the Premier governs via Twitter and then disappears as does the Deputy Premier. HELP!

Now it is The Treasurer who has misled us

2010-06-03T16:28:00.005+09:30

Even the reluctant state of Victoria has admitted it needs an Independent Commission Against Corruption. So the only state left "squeaky clean" is Mike Rann's South Australia.

Rann is a premier who has presided over a very dodgy election campaign where his supporters wore fake "put your Family First" T-Shirts. Many registered voters were not able to vote and suggestions that one family voted numerous times.
And that is just the start.
We have a treasurer who did not tell the electorate all that he knew about the blowout in costs for the Adelaide Oval re-development. Yes its our money he is spending, not his. So "keep 'em in the dark until we win".
He allegedly lied (misled) to state parliament that he knew nothing.
The outrage of the electorate is growing at this illegitimate government.

Yes if we were lied to, misled, and information withheld from voters just so they could sneak back into government, then we have good reason to be outraged and call this Rann government illegitimate.
We demand the government resign and new elections called forthwith.

Is Rann's win legitimate?

2010-05-29T09:02:00.004+09:30

I continue to ask the question. Did Mike Rann win government on false pretenses on March 20th 2010? If so, if we were deliberately misled into voting for him, then we are entitled to ask, is his government illegitimate?

Were we misled or just lied to?

2010-05-28T10:34:00.008+09:30

PREMIER Mike Rann has been accused of misleading voters during the election campaign by indicating he would secure 400 billion litres of extra water for South Australia from the Queensland floods.

The Opposition yesterday seized on evidence given to a federal budget estimates committee in Canberra by a Murray Darling Basin Authority spokesman that only about 220 billion litres would be delivered to SA from the floods.

SA Senator and Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for the Murray Darling Basin Simon Birmingham said Mr Rann had raised expectations during the election campaign that state would receive significantly more water than is now forecast.

"It is clear that Mike Rann deliberately misled South Australians in the middle of the election campaign about one of the most important issues facing our state. It was a truly shameful act," he said.

"The MDBA was quite clear that, at best, Mike Rann negotiated an extra 100 gigalitres of flows back in January, which is a mere pittance of the hundreds of gigalitres Mr Rann claimed during the election." ..............

To read full article, click header.

ADL Oval redevelopment becoming farcical

2010-05-26T13:45:00.002+09:30

It seems that Rann's Labor considers us to be ill educated mugs.
He won the March election on half truths and very dodgy tactics.
Now the Adelaide Oval redevelopment is turning into a farce that could mirror our famous one-way expressway.

The costs are blowing out (breaking a Rann promise to spend no more than $450m) and now he thinks we will swallow the latest $85m overrun as being necessary. Conveniently omitting that SACA has a debt of ...... you guessed it, .......... $85m.
If an imaginary election were to be held now, all those South Australians who now feel so cheated by Rann & Co, would certainly show him the door this time! BIG time.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/video/2010/05/25/2909279.htm Click header to view ABC report on the farce.

SA Labor's "not true blue" election (click)

2010-05-20T09:42:00.002+09:30

Seems that there is an ever increasing groundswell to get on board a legal fight to overturn the recent SA election.

The link on the header (Click) gives the story of a growing angst against the many dodgy events leading up to polling day, and polling day itself.

You can also contact Mark Aldridge on:- aldridgemark@bigpond.com

http://www.todaytonightadelaide.com.au/?page=Story&StoryID=675

The "Mad Monk" is more than a worry (click)

2010-05-18T10:58:00.004+09:30

Tony Abbott continues his flaky diatribe on his desperate bid to win his place in The Lodge.
Apparently, he will do anything and say anything in his quest to get there.
Is this man a danger to our democracy and our nation?

No Internet Censorship (click)

2010-05-11T07:38:00.002+09:30

NO INTERNET CENSORSHIP!
http://www.getup.org.au/campaign/SaveTheNet&id=1061

Kezzer

News Group media and their NewsFORCE reader submitted pics and video.

Jenny Bell on asylum seekers

Person of the Year 2011

Dear Qantas (click)

Alan Joyce grounded Qantas airline (click)

Susan Mitchell on Tony Abbott (click)

Cappo takes eye off his day job (click)

Dear Monsignor Cappo (click)

Shoppies Union SDA influence over SA Labor (click)

The Dithering state :- Susan Mitchell opinion on Rann

Friday, 5 August 2011

OPINION: The dithering state

Weatherill authority underminded by Rann intransigence

Arkaroola tipped the Right

Anthony Barnett opinions on Murdoch (Click)

Forget the minders just ask our elected MP's advice.

Labor "values" further decline under Rann *leadership* (click header)

Qantas slips further down the scale (click)

Vietnam Veteran Normie Rowe dedication to us Vietnam Veterans (click)

Business SA, 20th Century thinking? (click)

Even the Feds are worried about Rann

Surely Adelaide can do better than this? (click)

Country hospitals suffer funding whilst a tram is extended for new RAH

Monday, 11 April 2011

Health gave $6m for tram stop

NSW Labor: Has SA Rann Labor caught disease?

Renewal begins at the top Mike (click)

We are judged by the company we keep (click)

Bad news catches up with Good-News-Mike

Tuesday, 15 March 2011

Rann scuppered below decks

KEVIN NAUGHTON : OPINION (Source InDaily.com.au)

Susan Mitchell not impressed with Federal Lib direction.

Friday, 11 March 2011

ABC's Insiders looks at the antics of our federal Pollies.

Allan Jones no respect for PM of Australia

Tuesday, 8 March 2011 (From InDaily www.indaily.com.au)

OPINION: SUSAN MITCHELL

The Rann government turns toxic as it disconnects (Click)

RannSpin doesn't include women?

Source: InDaily indaily@solsticemedia.com.au

Thursday, 10 February 2011

Disgrace: Where are the women?

Susan Mitchell

Mannum Waters above 1956 flood level.

Mammum Waters (click here)

The sycophantic delusionist (click)

Has Emperor Mike had a facelift?

Rann's Adelaide, a footprint the size of LA?

Seasons Greetings and Happy Christmas

Friday, December 17, 2010

Off with their heads

Dean Jaenshch on Australia's federalism

Thursday, December 02, 2010 Source: InDaily.com.au

AUSTRALIAS POLITICAL SYSTEM NEEDS OVERHAUL

Susan Mitchell on Labor Values

Wednesday, December 01, 2010

What are Labor values?

Tuesday, November 30, 2010

The future is already here

DES RYAN

Deputy Premier felled in city (click)

As Emperor Rann declines, Jay Weatherill climbs

Friday, November 26, 2010

Poll tolls for Rann

KEVIN NAUGHTON (InDaily Online)

Just resign Rann or Legislative Council must block Supply (click)

Adelaide to be a city "with a mojo"?

Friday, November 12, 2010

Call to treat CBD as special zone

DES RYAN- Journalist : Nathan Paine Property Council SA

Puglia.... Nice 'work' if you can get it. (Click)

Carnegie Lemon closes ranks

Thursday, October 28, 2010 Source: InDaily Adelaide

Carnegie Mellon tight-lipped

DANIELLE FORSYTH

Susan Mitchell on Don Dunstan and leadership

The high costs of our Royal System (click)

You bet we need an ICAC & we need it now

Labor "values" further decline under Rann leadership (click header)