Interesting stuff
So the question remains, how do you counter that strategy?
"self interest tinged with fear as far as I can see" On average, yes agree, nail just got hit on head.
"So the question remains, how do you counter that strategy?" I think one strategy could be from the ground up, education. Teach the new generations critical thinking, how to critically evaluate the media they are constantly exposed to and equip them with the tools to distinguish information from misinformation and form rational perceptions based on evidence rather than opinion.
Would be nice if the government could implement that as a compulsory high school subject :)
“gutless windbag”
probably trying to avoid behaving like Kevin Rudd
Thankfully it is already out there in the education system, it's not a dichotomy but you've got a big two: constructivist learning theory and behaviorist learning theory. Constructivist is less direct instruction and more scaffolding (guiding the student to an answer or solution largely achieved by their own critical thinking), behaviorist more direct instruction and ROTE learning. When you hear conservative politicians and media lobbyists bang on about "back to basics" education, they're lobbying for behaviorist teaching strategies, it raises generations that are on average less likely to question and are more easily fed bullshit.
Its a good thing the Libs were in after the fires as at least we had some cash in the bank to spend on a very expensive recovery. If Shorten would have got in we would be broke and he would have borrowed Billions off his Chinese friends who by the way emit 27% of the worlds emissions. If we can convince the Libs to "Green up" a bit more. and I think they will, we will have a sensible stable govt. for many years. People who blame Morrison for everything when he's only been the chief and major decision maker for a few months really annoy me. A study of your own will show that we can wipe out all the carbon pollution of the entire modern age simply by planting millions and millions of trees. Most councils give them to you for free or you can buy tubestock for $2 so get started and make a difference. Re greening the deserts should also be a priority as it will bring more inland rain. They should be voting dirtgirl for the Nobel prize rather than Greta. Its easy to point fingers and say "you do something" when you yourself are actually doing nothing. The greens are expert at this and would be the worst Fascist govt in history if elected as there is no democracy with them.They and their views are the only views or else and most of them would never have planted a single tree. There would be no free speech and we already see this with people like Folau who is being hounded to the ends of the earth because he posted a passage from the bible everyone swears on. If we forget our past and our roots of freedom and just chuck it all away we really are doomed to a fascist and regulated future where we look back and say"We had it all, and we just threw it all away".
The LNP of today barely resembles the Liberal party of 1949. Bit disingenuous to suggest that the LNP has continued in the same vein for 70 years and that Australians are eternally self interested.
If that were true , we would never have become the beacon for social democracy that we were until relatively recently.
"Also, an annual report on the civil rights of countries worldwide has downgraded Australia’s democracy from “open” to “narrowed”.
That puts us on par with Ghana and Botswana in terms of civil freedoms."
And also puts us in the same rating as USA, UK, Japan, France, Spain, Italy and better than much of Europe,
Don't expect you too agree but IMHO the reason for our downgrade all made complete sense.
https://www.sbs.com.au/news/the-feed/australia-s-democracy-has-been-down...
100% Optimist
Complete misnomer, Optimist.
Anyone got thoughts on this article about Prof Stephanie Kelton and the deficit myth? VJ..?
Have we been sold a lie (a great many lies), or is it an evolution of monetary theory?
Interesting way of looking at things. Way outside my areas of expertise, but it would seem that even if the government can't go broke, it needs to be mindful of inflation (as alluded to in the article). Spend too many dollars into existence, the value of the dollar drops (or from another point of view, goods & services become more expensive) - an extreme of that would be Zimbabwe-style hyperinflation. So an appropriate balance of gov't spending/taxation is needed to keep that in check, but spending need not necessarily be greater-or-equal to incomings (taxation), depending on where that balance point is?
Actually Optimistic, costings prepared by the independent Parliamentary Budget Office and released eight days before the election adjudged that, over the next four years, deducting expenditure from revenue, Labor would be $17 billion more in surplus than the Coalition.
Of course a nation can go broke.
It’s the equivalent of saying that we can’t go broke amongst the people living in my house because we just write each other IOUs if we don’t have any money.
And what happens when you need something from outside the house and you have nothing of worth to offer except IOUs ? Particularly after you’ve already sold off half the bedrooms and the kitchen.
And that’s what Australia has done . Unless we get royalties from commodities exports we have nothing because in most instances Australians don’t own the businesses which do the exporting. We just take a small slice as our stuff gets sold overseas around us.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperinflation_in_Zimbabwe
If we lived in a completely independent economy we might not go broke if we never experienced a drought or any other shock but in a global context .....no chance.
Considering some of the commentary on here, again I must point out the obvious:
The federal Liberal government is the national and natural party of government in Australia. Since 1949.
Australians vote for them, and their partners and proxies.
And we are a beacon of democracy, according to some if not most Australians.
It's a plain fact, isn't it?
So what's the problem? Is there even a problem?
Depends if you believe that the fact you’re pushing is whether the LNP have been voted in more or that it’s the Australian people have perennially pushed individual self interest over that of the community.
Your determination comes across as a sideways attempt to slur Australians in this manner.
Prediction.....Coronavirus will cripple the Aussie economy within 6 months.
Shit is going to get very weird.
Reckon the Tokyo Olympic Committee are worried?
No more than the average indebted Aussie should be.
Hope I’m wrong. Happy to say that I’m obviously no expert , but I personally think things aren’t going to be very happy for many this year.
Scomo and Frydenberg can be counted on to make things worse . They are just more shrapnel in the handgrenade.
What do you reckon this means for Australia ?
“As of this week, two thirds of the Chinese economy remains shut down. More than 80 per cent of its manufacturing industry is closed, rising to 90 per cent for exporters. The Chinese economy is 17 per cent of the world economy and deeply integrated into international supply chains. You cannot shut it down for long without shutting down the world.”
17 percent of the world’s economy and a much larger percent of Australia’s economy .....we will get caned . And that’s without considering our debt loading . I’ve deeply regretted our country’s excessive integration with China but I never wanted to see it the solution come in the form of human misery.
Then again.....Here’s where our leaders do something phenomenally stupid like allowing China wholesale use of part of our North under the guise of an emergency “ gift “.
Sorry, again, the objective and relatively simple fact remains that the Liberal party has been voted into government federally more often than not for the last 71 years.
We obviously like what they stand for.
How is that a slur on the Australian voter?
I guess it depends on what people think they stand for. What is their ideology; How does that affect their policies; Does any of that even really enter into it.
How do Australian voters get any information about all that stuff anyway? Mainly?
not generally a conspiracy theorist but the reaction in china and here to a virus which from all reports isnt much worse than the annual flu (knocking off old/ immunocompromised , and a few unlucky healthy people ) seems out of proportion. what arent they telling us?
(and pupkin, if you dont know the australian public are completely stupid and do what the evil murdoch empire tell them to you havent been on this thread for long)
I cannot believe this deficit myth thingy is getting taken seriously. my mate showed it to me on a facebook vid about 2 years ago, I can't be sure, but I bet it was her oz research partner that was doing the talking
not having a shot at you stunet, it does make some kind of sense, and is very attractive, but....
as blowin points out, it probably works in theory, in theory! ...if you are isolated from the world and it's markets, but we are not, and are never likely to be. and even if we were, we'd become like indonesia, where middle class people have a good life domestically, but are limited to travelling to countries like thailand that have similar levels of development and currency value.
I'm relatively cool with the idea of isolationism, but most aussies are not, and never likely to be...
currency values, while being somewhat mysterious, and possibly purposely confusing, are basically a reflection of the confidence the world has in your country. confidence in your government, financial systems, people, technology level, rule of law, education levels, and prospects for the future, etc.
going down this road would no doubt give a huge blast of meth up the main vien domestically, but then just like a crackhead, fall in a heap long term.
PPP is what matters, purchasing power parity. how much wealth your citizens have relatively on the global scale (I might be talking shit, as I have a very basic understanding). while there is much talk of china becoming the worlds largest economy, and indonesia climbing to 4 or 5 or whatever, the majority of their people still live on a pittance on the global scale and are severely restricted in their opportunities for travel, work, education, etc.
I'm sorry to be so blunt and brutal, but this idea just reeks of the left having no idea; no ideas; and some serious desperation to facillitate their socialist utopia
but looking forward to vj's take on it all...
also, still waiting for vj to get back to me on the global monetry system going down the printing money road (quantitive easing, helicopter money, etc. etc.) and this being not much more than a labrynth of iou notes, and whether someone, some country, the global monopoly board guardans perhaps? are skimmimg profits off of all this activity by way of interest on the initial printing of the money?
also re. PPP, I think this measure is only becoming more important as technology and the world develops. once upon a time, foot soldiers and slave workers were important for defending, building, and aquiring (invading) wealth. now wars are fought with technology. just look at the US and it's casualty rate, versus the local casualty rate in the middle east. the US has totally dominated the area with a minimum of troops and casualties
the same goes for farming, manufacturing, and pretty much everything, as the robots take over. large populations are becoming a burden not an assett, just as large families are becoming less of an assett in developing countries
something for the 'big australia' folk to think about...
also, also, I think it's no coincidence that my mate that showed me that vid loves his credit. always setting up businesses with other people's money, and often failing. also loves his cars, tv's, holidays, pretty much everything on credit
offer him a credit card upgrade and he'll take it, every time
luckily his latest venture is going quite well. for now...
Adam Bandt's radical policies:
sounds like more socialist utopia bullshit...
but I like it. ...this time
just drop all the 'diversity' bullshit and I might take them seriously
...hell, do that and I might even return to voting for them...
Lounge Lzard, surely you're being facetious about the Australian voting public, the media, and the Liberal party's electoral success. There must be something more than that.
Speaking of which, that above policy platform will never fly in Australia. That much is certain. For example, we had a carbon pricing mechanism that Tony Abbott and Peta Credlin successfully rebranded in the media as a 'carbon tax', and which they subsequently repealed when they won the election 7 years ago.
Sounds more like complete unrealistic BS from a party that would never have to fulfil their promises so can say anything they like.
Realistically maybe 2050 is a realistic goal to be 100% renewables, but only if batteries get really good and cheap or we diversify our energy mix, add heaps more hyrdo, thermal etc (ideally nuclear but never going to happen here),
Many countries will reach 100% carbon free energy by 2030 but all those countries on track have decent amounts of nuclear, hydro, thermal...and are just adding wind and solar to compliment their reliable base load energy, phasing out coal first and then will phase out gas last. (many countries in Europe, even places like California etc)
Coal exports will be phased out once demand is gone no sooner, gas well the world demand is increasing and our demand will increase so expect more gas mining not less.
Better more realistic goal for 2030 would be to have all our coal power plants with a decent life span left switched over to gas as the first realistic phase to cutting emissions.
"carbon pricing mechanism" sounds a bit like programmatic specificity...
It's a bloody tax!
...designed as a disincentive...
designed to work just like a proposed sugar tax would. make other shit cheaper, and provide a disincentive to the old ways.
gillard and co. fooled no one with their play on words. what's more they lost all credibility when they introduced the tax, and then supposedly gave it all back through rebates. just fucken be straight with people. the left has got to get over it's obsession with language
you really do make it too easy for the right to make a mockery of you
poll after poll have shown the vast majority of aussies support action on climate change and an increase in renewables.
the vast majority also supported gay marraige. they also support equality, being nice to migrants, and even not judging muslims, but you fools just couldn't/can't stop throwing around your '-isms' and '-phobias'
fucken get over it!
returning to free uni. education and increasing single parent payments might be too much to ask for. maybe even the coalition tax cuts, but the rest of it would more than likely be perfectly fine to MOST australians
that's all you need to do. appeal to most australians. a very basic principle of democracy that seems long lost on many people that are on the left of politics
lounge lizard
influenza mortality rate is roughly 0.13 - 0.14% (https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/index.html - do the maths)
novel coronavirus seems to be coming in at about 2-3%
if you are standing in a group of 10,000 and you all have the flu, 13 or 14 of you will die
if you are standing in a group of 10,000 and you all have the novel corona virus, 200 or 300 of you will die
I don't expect coal gone and full renewables by 2030 indo, ...but its not a bad goal to have...
agree re. hydro. not nuclear!
oz has got to get over it's aversion to dams. we love bob brown and what he did (most of us), but his legacy is an unhealthy, non compromising, refusal to any dams at all in australia
uk are almost full renewables, portugal just went full renewables. this was only achievable through the use of dams
grow up anstralia!
..however, if you make 'overthrowing the patriachy' a part of that new deal, you have a snowball in hell's chance of getting anywhere...
On the the other hand, blowing the patriarchy sounds like a good deal.
Look what else Adani's doing.
https://www.adaniaustralia.com/projects-businesses/renewables
I think the coal export thing is just to replace brown with black coal so people can see where they are going in India.Probably temporary as their power stations are aging too. I'm pretty sure the link above shows where we are all really heading in the not too distant future. Going off grid right now is easy for any of you as well if your really keen. Just treat your house like a motor home only a bit bigger.
"On the the other hand, blowing the patriarchy sounds like a good deal."
I like the sound of that boxright
you never know, it might work, it's all about the language ...apparently...
“It wasn’t a carbon tax, as you know. It was many other things in nomenclature terms but we made it a carbon tax. We made it a fight about the hip pocket and not about the environment.
That was brutal retail politics and it took Abbott about six months to cut through and, when he cut through, Gillard was gone.”
Peta Credlin.
Facts just getting in the way of an obsession with language?
But then again that obsession with language works politically. Abbott used the word 'tax', and his three word slogans, to great effect. He won. His successor Turnbull said he wanted to move away from three word slogans, and he nearly lost. Our current PM realises the power of marketing language and he won handsomely.
Anyway, I do agree Sypkhan that all a political party needs to do is appeal to most Australians, and that that's a very basic principle of democracy.
That would account for our Liberal party's 71 years of federal electoral success, more times than not, of course.
@Sypkan
I think you will find Portugal still has gas and coal, but their consumption varies month to month, maybe they hit close to 100% use of renewables in January? (as it has up to December in this link)
https://www.apren.pt/en/renewable-energies/production
UK is at about 40% renewables but also has about 20% nuclear and swapped coal to gas for a major chunk.
Switzerland, France & Sweden, Norway i believe are those with most carbon free energy all at about 90%
Australia should definitely increase hyrdo, but i was looking at figures the other day and it varies quite a bit year to year how much energy is produced from hydro, i guess we are at a disadvantage too not having lots of rain or snow fields.
"Look what else Adani's doing.
https://www.adaniaustralia.com/projects-businesses/renewables
I think the coal export thing is just to replace brown with black coal so people can see where they are going in India.Probably temporary as their power stations are aging too. I'm pretty sure the link above shows where we are all really heading in the not too distant future. Going off grid right now is easy for any of you as well if your really keen. Just treat your house like a motor home only a bit bigger."
Adani have been into renewables for quite some time, they own the worlds second largest solar farm which was the worlds largest for quite some time.
They have proposals for the worlds largest hybrid solar with wind farm too.
Going off grid is not that easy, its very costly especially if you don't have the main grid as back up, which for most people they will always need especially in places like Victoria where we can get rain for days in winter.
"oz has got to get over it's aversion to dams. we love bob brown and what he did (most of us), but his legacy is an unhealthy, non compromising, refusal to any dams at all in australia"
The fuck you on about mate. There's dams galore in Australia, especially the eastern states.
I live in high rainfall Northern rivers. I could drive to a dozen huge dams within 2hrs of my place.
Is Snowy 2.0 a dam thing?
the adani thing...
it's called lip service, ...and capitalism.
nothing wrong with that, ...the second one, just shows there's money to be made in the future, and they can sed where stuff is heading
yeh probably a one off indo, I saw it in an article months ago. germany made the same claim last year, probably a good month too ie. ideal conditions.
but it does show we are not that far off providing reliable base load power, something you would think is decades away if you listen to those clowns on outsiders too much (I like those clowns on outsiders, well some of them, I cannot stand that cunt that recites all sorts of shakespearean like classical conservative adoring history shit...)
yep rainfall definitely an issue in oz, but so is water security, two birds? plus, I'm pushing the dam barrow because of the pumped hydro big battery thing ie. don't need rain, geez you could even do it with sea water possibly? within a perfect bay or valley type set up... seems a good idea to store all that excess power generation on super sunny/windy days...
I'm allowed to disagree with peta credlin's assessment of what won them the election aren't I?
polls show.... again and again....
yeh, it was a part of it, but it was more about rudd, gillarud rudd, and a general lack of confidence in labor's ability to achieve something, ...anything...
not to mention their general lack of conviction, as well as pink batts, 'education revolution' non revolution, dodgy buildings, ndis dreaming, wayne swan's evaporating surplus, cheques for tv's, sqaundered gfc opportunities, failed oppotunities generally, failed (good idea) mining tax, divisive..., not looking after workers, selling out the country, and on and on and on...
"Anyway, I do agree Sypkhan that all a political party needs to do is appeal to most Australians, and that that's a very basic principle of democracy."
so get on with it facto...
you're a part of the apperatus, come up with something, ...anything...
an idea, a concept, a plan, something that will actually appeal to enough australians to get you into power, and possibly keep you there, so everything you do isn't undone at the next popularity contest
this is the game, play it!
better ...or at a minimum, mildly competently...
no point lamenting that your constituents are bogan port supporters just because you like the crows
appeal to the people who will actually vote for you
...or just keep losing...
up to you...
"The fuck you on about mate. There's dams galore in Australia, especially the eastern states.
I live in high rainfall Northern rivers. I could drive to a dozen huge dams within 2hrs of my place."
....and when was the last significant dam built in australia?
"Is Snowy 2.0 a dam thing?"
it could be...
I'm thinking something is gonna hold all that water...
or could...
Not sure, there's been shiteloads of dams built on private property in the last decade.
https://theconversation.com/dams-are-being-built-but-they-are-private-au...
Last major dam proposal I know of was the Traveston Crossing Dam proposal on the Mary River in 2006, which was rightly rejected on the grounds that it was an environmental nightmare and local residents were against it.
I rest my case...
private ones don't count. though it would be super smart to integrate them into energy storage
Sypkhan, the Liberal party won. As they have done for the best part of 71 years. The will of the people has been done again. What needs to be fixed?
You're surely not against the wishes of the majority of Australians? Especially after listing the many, many failures of the Labor government of those 'pricing carbon' days and as reported at the time?
you sound confused facto
no point pitching to sweden when you're living in seaton
??
Have it cunts