Bill Shorten - not a good look

[Neferti]

I saw the bit with Bull Shitten (love the nickname) waving his arms about at the TURC when pontificating about mushrooms ... or something. Unbelievable.

[Rorschach]

It's all about Bill... didn't you know.

Labor has such a shallow talent pool and no credibility.

[mantra]

Labor has such a shallow talent pool and no credibility.

This is why people should make protest votes. Abbott has no competition and when a government gets absolute power, which is a possibility after the next election - he will attempt to erode what's left of our democracy. Regardless of how bad the opposition is, they should still be able to stand up and question the government's policies. Abbott wants to obliterate them altogether. If Labor ever manages to get into power again - they need a Royal Commission into the government's recent signing up to the latest FTA and uncover all the dirty deals made in China's favour.

Labor senator Kim Carr has warned a future Labor government could set up its own royal commission into Liberal Party donations.

"This is a government that's setting a shocking precedent. The Labor Party when it returns to [government] will be under incredible pressure to respond to this precedent," he said.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-07-10/b ... be/6609494

[IQS.RLOW]

Sounds like you're panicking mantra.
You must be able to see that the Libs will get back in with no worries.

It's a beautiful thing. Australia will be prosperous once more and the debt will be repaid.

The alternative is massive debt and deficits for decades and shitty feel good policy that does more harm than good. About time you realised what your side of politics offers.

[Rorschach]

How soon we forget... these FTAs started with Howard there have been 2 labor governments working on them in between.

Carrs threats are both stupid and childish. Go labor.

[mantra]

How soon we forget... these FTAs started with Howard there have been 2 labor governments working on them in between.

Carrs threats are both stupid and childish. Go labor.

The China one is the most dodgy so far especially as their economy is on the verge of collapse. Will their investments here be on the back of our banks? What about the gigantic Chinese-owned Shenhua Watermark mine being plonked right in the middle of our best agricultural land?

Since when did we start sanctioning state owned investment from China? That has never been allowed before.

[mantra]

Sounds like you're panicking mantra.
You must be able to see that the Libs will get back in with no worries.

It's a beautiful thing. Australia will be prosperous once more and the debt will be repaid.

The alternative is massive debt and deficits for decades and shitty feel good policy that does more harm than good. About time you realised what your side of politics offers.

Yet our budget is on the decline, our borrowings have doubled and the government continues to increase its spending. What about our trade deficit? That has been a serious worry for more than a decade. Under Labor there was some improvement in the figures, but in the last 12 months they have worsened considerably. We already have large trade deficits with those nations we have FTA's with. Generally they haven't been good news for our economy and we carry a debt with every one of them.

[Rorschach]

How soon we forget... these FTAs started with Howard there have been 2 labor governments working on them in between.

Carrs threats are both stupid and childish. Go labor.

The China one is the most dodgy so far especially as their economy is on the verge of collapse. Will their investments here be on the back of our banks? What about the gigantic Chinese-owned Shenhua Watermark mine being plonked right in the middle of our best agricultural land?

Since when did we start sanctioning state owned investment from China? That has never been allowed before.

1/ The China one was under labor longer than the Libs....
2/ China's economy is not on the verge of collapse.
3/ It's in a large agricultural area but apparently not impacting on our best agricultural land in that area.
4/ We've been pandering to China since Gough started it.

[Rorschach]

Sounds like you're panicking mantra.
You must be able to see that the Libs will get back in with no worries.

It's a beautiful thing. Australia will be prosperous once more and the debt will be repaid.

The alternative is massive debt and deficits for decades and shitty feel good policy that does more harm than good. About time you realised what your side of politics offers.

Yet our budget is on the decline, our borrowings have doubled and the government continues to increase its spending. What about our trade deficit? That has been a serious worry for more than a decade. Under Labor there was some improvement in the figures, but in the last 12 months they have worsened considerably. We already have large trade deficits with those nations we have FTA's with. Generally they haven't been good news for our economy and we carry a debt with every one of them.

Waiting for you to do some research and post some facts, not just your opinions.

[mantra]

Waiting for you to do some research and post some facts, not just your opinions.

You read the papers. Government debt and deficit has reached record highs in the last couple of years. While we concentrate on terrorism, we're not supposed to notice how bad the economy is. You might not like the Guardian as a source, but you can't dispute the Financial Review or Trading Economics.

As at the end of March 2015, Australia’s net foreign debt stood at $955bn, a record high. As a share of GDP, this was equal to 59.5%, also a record high.

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfre ... lia-undone

The hard facts are dumbfounding. Since the budget's underlying cash balance slipped into deficit in the 2009 financial year, the cumulative shortfall between what the Commonwealth spends and what it earns will total a record 19.5 per cent of GDP by June 2015.

And based on Treasury's forecasts, the cumulative underlying cash deficit since 2009 will add up to 24.3 per cent of GDP by June 2019. That heroically assumes Australia benefits from above-trend real GDP growth between 2017 and 2019, noting Treasury's very wide 90 per cent "confidence interval" over this horizon implies we could be on the brink of either a boom or bust. That is, Treasury has no idea.

http://www.afr.com/news/policy/budget/f ... 512-gguuug

Government Spending in Australia increased to 70330 AUD Million in the first quarter of 2015 from 70032 AUD Million in the fourth quarter of 2014. Government Spending in Australia averaged 34113.84 AUD Million from 1959 until 2015, reaching an all time high of 70330 AUD Million in the first quarter of 2015 and a record low of 8769 AUD Million in the second quarter of 1960. Government Spending in Australia is reported by the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

http://www.tradingeconomics.com/austral ... t-spending