Enemies? Who needs 'em ....

[TomB]

.... when your team mates kick own goals.

That's really putting the Slipper in ay Tony?

Poor old Libs, out-piliticked, out gunned and just ... not in.

[Neferti]

.... when your team mates kick own goals.

That's really putting the Slipper in ay Tony?

Poor old Libs, out-piliticked, out gunned and just ... not in.

You have to be a rusted on ALP voter ..... I can tell by the spelling. Nothing to see here folks ....

[mantra]

.... when your team mates kick own goals.

That's really putting the Slipper in ay Tony?

Poor old Libs, out-piliticked, out gunned and just ... not in.

Yes it would have been a shock for Abbott - but then politics is a very dirty game. Gillard and Abbott are both as bad as each other - so in the scheme of things it doesn't matter that much.

AS far as game changers go, they don't come much bigger. The resignation of Harry Jenkins as Speaker of the Parliament this morning has fundamentally shifted the rocky ground that Julia Gillard has had to traverse for the past year.

Liberal MP Peter Slipper will take the chair, giving the government an extra number in the lower house and the government vital breathing space. Slipper will resign as a member of the Liberal Party giving Labor a one seat lead in terms of raw numbers over the Coalition.

It gives Labor a two seat buffer when it comes to voting in the house.

What does this mean?

Most importantly, it has neutered Andrew Wilkie, the Tasmanian Independent who has held a gun to the government's head for the past 12 months over his pokie reforms.

Wilkie has threatened to withdraw his support if the Government doesn't pass his legislation for mandatory precommitment by May next year.

That threat has now become a hollow one, as his power to bring down the government with a single vote has been removed.

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/s ... 6204769488

[boxy]

I understand the Libs (and their media dogs) being pissed with Slipper, but what exactly has Gillard/Labor done wrong?

[mantra]

I understand the Libs (and their media dogs) being pissed with Slipper, but what exactly has Gillard/Labor done wrong?

She's weakened the Libs. According to much of the RW media she's playing a dirty game - first stabbing Rudd in the back and now allowing some allegedly corrupt Coalition backbencher to strengthen her position. This move has just made it that much harder to get rid of her.

[boxy]

So, I repeat. What exactly has she done wrong?

I can see it being wrong to give him the job, if the coalition had booted him for being corrupt... but no, they were happy to use his much needed vote in the house. They have nothing to whine about, other than his back stabbing them.

[IQS.RLOW]

Grubby move from a grubby govt giving a grubby minister a plum job so the grubby govt can keep their grubby snouts in the trough.

Grubs. Filthy, stinking grubs

[mellie]

Tony's a dark horse, and will prevail.... (he's pacing himself) ... Australians are tired of Labors wacky wayward rainbow uncertainty and internal mischief/dysfunction, this and know only a stable government can deliver a stable economy.

I'm not worried about it, Tony Abbott will be our next PM, let Gillard run her course, it wont be a long one.

[mellie]

Slippery Pete was a given, not really a surprise.

He was afterall a Turncoat in waiting.


And why?

- Smirk




Right now, I like Barnaby Joyce, the mans articulate and intelligent, this and is capable of getting his message across.

Speaks with clarity.

It's important that members mean what they say, and say only what they mean.

[Shivaruna]

Grubby move from a grubby govt giving a grubby minister a plum job so the grubby govt can keep their grubby snouts in the trough.

Grubs. Filthy, stinking grubs

I understand all the comments about grubby, but then confusion trying to understand the inclusion of the word minister. Is that an oblique reference to what is widely reported that Slipper had become a Parson, or similar? And, if the positions were reversed, do you think Mr Abbott would have acted differently? After all, what is so incomprehensible about a Government taking whatever legitimate steps it can to shore up it's ability to do the job it was elected to do?

I think it also has to accepted that the ALP read the Slipper position with much greater clarity than did the LNP. Did the LNP really believe that anyone they were threatening with dis-endorsment, and no pre-selection for the next election would just sit idle, dumb struck and politically suicidal when a golden opportunty to secure a future of at least two kinds (even short term it may well be) walked past the front door?