On the money

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Too funny

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Bill Leak – The Australian

Rumblings about Gillard being deposed

This just in from Andrew Bolt and The Australian.

Following discussion this morning on The Insiders, there are fresh rumours that Julia Gillard may be about to be deposed in favour of Kevin Rudd.

PM replaced before election?

Key backers, rumoured to include Bill “I support whatever the Prime Minister says even though I dont know what she said” Shorten, are said to be “wobbling” in their support, especially given the rock star reception afforded Kevni when he visited Geelong on Friday.

Could Labor possibly be prepared to swap back to the man they described as a raging, psychopathic egomaniac?

Would the voting public be so stupid to vote back in a man said to be so dysfunctional that no one wanted to work with him?

Personally, I would like nothing better than to see the back of Julia Gillard, but I desperately would like the voting public afforded the chance to send her on her way themselves, not another coup by Labor’s Faceless Men.

Watching Gillard deliver her speech conceding the election to Abbott would be priceless and worth every second of the 98 days that we would have to endure until that delicious moment could eventuate.

What does Feeney the Faceless Man know?

With Martin Ferguson’s recent retirement a bunfight has erupted for his old seat of Batman.

Batman is recognised as Labor’s safest seat in Australia, with Labor holding the seat at the last election with a margin of 25%.

In today’s political environment, this is tantamount to rolled gold for the preferred Labor candidate.

Whoever gets the nod is almost guaranteed a seat in the new parliament after the September election.  They might even get to be the driver of the Labor Tarago post September.

So who is shaping up to get the golden nod?

The front runner at the moment is Senator David Feeney. Feeney is already a Senator but he is likely to lose his Senate seat as he is currently listed as the third candidate on Labor’s Senate ticket.

As a result, Feeney has put  up his hand for the Lower House seat and has been backed in by non-other than the Prime Minister, Julia Gillard.

This is where things start to get a bit weird.

You see, Gillard Cabinet ministers Jenny Macklin, Penny Wong and junior minister Catherine King have publicly backed the need for Labor to select a woman for Batman, which really puts them at odds with Gillard.

Macklin was quoted recently saying that the ALP was failing to meet its rules that required 40 per cent of candidates in winnable seats to be women.

…I am very concerned that if a woman is not preselected for Batman, the ALP in Victoria will have only 27 per cent of candidates in held seats who are women.

This is well short of the 40 per cent required by the national rules.

It does not reflect the depth of talented women in Australian society today – women who should be encouraged and supported to take up the opportunity to represent their community.

Where does this 40% quota come from?  It comes from Labor’s contentious 40/40/20 rule, which is a direct policy platform of EMILY’s List, the progressive feminist group that has provided Australia with the cream of female politicians over the past 20 years.

Politicians of calibre such as Kate Lundy, Tanya Plibersek, Penny Wong, Jenny Macklin, Lara Giddings and Julia Gillard are all products of EMILY’s List, as were failed Labor Premiers Carmen Lawrence, Anna Bligh, and Kristina Kennelley.

EMILY is an acronym for Early Money Is Like Yeast, as it makes the dough rise and apparently this is directly translatable to women in politics. Get in early and watch them rise to the top.

EMILY’s List Australia was started in 1996 by the infamous and lamentable Victorian Premier, Joan Kirner, who reportedly was apoplectic when Julia Gillard had failed to win pre-selection twice in the early 1990’s.

In order to secure Gillard her treasured spot in our illustrious Parliament, Kirner created EMILY’s List Australia and for the first nine years of EMILY’s List Australia’s operation, Joan Kirner was CEO.

Soon after the establishment of EMILY’s List, Gillard finally gained preselection in the Labor safe seat of Lalor and as they say in the movies, the rest is history.  Except it is history a great deal of people know very little about.

While Julia Gillard is EMILY’s List’s most famous product, it is extremely strange that she is not backing a woman, especially one of the Sisterhood™ for the safe seat of Batman and even more so considering Labor’s Left faction openly canvassing that they may possibly pursue a complaint with the party about the failure to meet the target.

If that complaint were to be upheld the party rules say there must be a spill of every seat’s preselection in the state, including the Prime Minister’s.

So why exactly is Gillard backing Feeney if it goes against Labor policy, flies in the face of her beloved EMILY’s List core beliefs and puts her hold on her own seat at risk?

Apparently Gillard considers Senator Feeney a strong and loyal ally who has performed well.

Particularly since he was one of the faceless factional leaders involved in overthrowing former prime minister Kevin Rudd in 2010, helping Julia Gillard rise to the prime ministership.  So it would seem that because of this Feeney has Gillard’s backing and remains firm favourite for the seat.

However, Michael Smith, the 2UE broadcaster who lost his job because of his pursuit of truth in the AWU scandal, thinks it is not just Feeney’s support of Gillard in the Night of the Long Knives that holds the key to this Machiavellian style pre-selection mystery.

Let’s see what Michael has to say in his recent post – David Feeney, Julia Gillard, Emily and her list. It’s not who you know, it’s what you know about them – because it makes for very interesting reading indeed.

Victoria Police is investigating who got what from the AWU WRA slush fund.

Very serious charges await people who knowingly enjoyed the financial and taxation benefits from that well structured slush fund, which was created using the best legal advice money can’t buy.

A reasonable person would think it quite likely too that an incoming Coalition Government will commission an enquiry knto the AWU Scandal with powers to compel people to give evidence.  That enquiry will have powers the police don’t.   It is always good to know that there are people on the same page as you if the Sheriff comes a-summonsing.

David Feeney has no affirmative action equal opportunity disadvantaged feminine LGBTI or skin shading issues to give him the nod for pre-selection for the safest of safe seats, to rebalance Martin Ferguson’s nonPC white maleness.   David’s  just a normal pudgy former union official white man who knows where the bodies files are.

The Emily’s Listers will be a bit list-off to see that their gel, the first gel PM, has annointed a mere male to take over from the previous holder who was also merely male.

After Wayne HEM put $5,000 forgettable into Ms Gillard’s bank account, and after Bruce Wilson had “just decided while I was away that I should have my home renovated so he just id it” and after Kon Spyridis had made such a racket at the office looking for money – well, along came the Knight in Shining Armour David Feeney to help to record the correct version of history.

David Feeney is named 6 times by Ms Gillard in the Record of Interview with MD Peter Gordon on 11 September, 1995.   David Feeney was a central figure in Ms Gillard’s claims that she paid for all her own renovations.

Here are the 6 Feeney “grabs” from the record of interview, then I’ll publish the whole of the section for context.   The speaker is Ms Gillard, 11 September, 1995.

• David Feeney, who is an official of the Transport Workers’ Union, had raised it with Andrew with the specific intent of Andrew raising it with me and David was happy for me to talk to him about it.

• I have spoken to David Feeney. I spoke to him on Friday afternoon.

• Obviously, it accords with what David Feeney has told me that he was sent away by the AWU and without explanation an account from Con was put in my letter box last week, so that’s the first account that I’ve had from him.

• I’m making arrangements to get the $1780 together to pay the rest of it. I have suggested to David Feeney that I think the way forward in relation to this is for me to simply meet with Bob Smith at FIME and say someone came here looking for payment of an account.

• The information from David Feeney is that Bob Smith doesn’t believe that I am at fault in relation to this. He has got no agenda about damaging me in relation to this or using it against me, that he will be quite happy to see the issue go away, and that he thinks that Bob will respond well to a direct discussion like that.

• I’ve left that matter on the basis that David Feeney will sound Bob out and, provided there isn’t any unforeseen problem, I will meet with Bob as soon as possible for the purpose of clarifying that matter. Now I believe that that must be the source of the rumour about, that must be the factual construct behind what has become the rumour about, about the association or Bruce or the union or whoever paying for work on my house and I don’t obviously given I’ve been fairly surprised by events to date in relation to this matter, I can’t categorically rule out that something at my house didn’t get paid for by the association or something at my house didn’t get paid for by the union or whatever, I just, I don’t feel confident saying I can categorically rule it out

Sorry Emily, when it comes to historic appointments, you can’t compete with David’s grip on a little piece of Australian historic gold.  

It’s not who you know, it’s what you know about them.

Well, as Michael outlines in the rest of his post and indeed nearly his whole blog, Gillard’s motives are not what they seem and are somewhat murkier than most would imagine possible for someone holding the highest office in the land.

A union slush fund, a corrupt union conman and a shonky Labor lawyer, nearly $1 million dollars fraudulently obtained with the help from a dodgy Power of Attorney, supposedly witnessed by one J.E.Gillard, past and current Slater & Gordon MD’s and a couple of dodgy Union officials in Feeney and Shorten running interference to stop things coming to light, then and now.

All of this fleshes out a story that continues to this day, despite the best efforts of Labor power brokers with too much to lose and many in the Left leaning mainstream media all trying to just make it all go away.

They said of Nixon and the Watergate scandal that brought his Presidency to it’s knees that it wasn’t the crime, but the coverup that eventually brought him unstuck.

Gillard’s cries of “I have done nothing wrong” sound eerily similar to the disgraced Nixon’s cries of “I am not a criminal“.

With the factional vultures with an axe to grind circling and the Victorian Police investigating, this story might just well be coming to an end.

From little things big things grow. Much like yeast in bread dough.

None too soon either.

Why Labor doesn’t bite the hand that feeds it…

In my recent post “The Unholy Triumvirate of Australian Politics” I developed a nice little diagram highlighting the money-go-round that is the relationship between Unions, the Labor Party, and finally Labor Governments.

Well that view has been completely affirmed by John Ferguson in The Australian just a few days ago in his article Militant union underpins ALP, which again is behind Evil Rupert’s Evil Paywall™ so I will summarise for those of you that don’t pay for the news you consume.

The Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU) is one of Australia’s largest and most militant unions, and it turns out that this militant union is seriously underwriting the Labor party.

This really shouldnt come as that much of a surprise because the CFMEU has been publically backed by the ALP here in Victoria, but what is surprising is the level of financial support that the CFMEU and indeed the union movement in general contributes to the Labor party.

As the graphic shows, the CFMEU has contributed $9.1 Million since 2001 towards the Labor party, second only to the extremely powerful Shoppies Union.  That is some serious amount of money going in the front door of the Labor party.

Interestingly, these unusually large donations started to climb after John Howard initiated the royal commission into the building industry started in 2001.  I wonder why that was…

Now, I was a union member once upon a time due to a no ticket no work policy, which despite being against the law was quite openly applied.  Suffice to say that I didn’t last long there 🙂

What irked me was not only that I basically had no choice but to join the union, but also because I had no say whatsoever in what donations were made by my union in my name.

I know of many other people who find themselves in similar positions and almost to the man these people just sign up because they cant be bothered with the bully tactics that union members use to intimidate non-union members.

This is why legislation introduced in NSW to prohibit political contributions to only individuals is a step in the right direction.

Of course this was quite necessary in NSW due to the completely corrupt influence of unions and Labor party members on critical decisions such as the granting of million dollar coal exploration licences and looking at this research it would appear that something similar is needed here in Victoria.

However, I wonder what the response would be if Victoria followed NSW’s lead and banned political donations from organisations and instead insisted that only individual people could make donations?  I would imagine their response would not be a quiet nor meek stroll through the CBD.

Interestingly, this legislation is currently being appealed in NSW by… you guessed it, the Unions.

The only Union that is missing from the list of contributors is the AWU, but I suppose that they probably feel that they have donated enough in the past either in actual funds or in kind.

Like not pressing charges when a supposedly “young and naive” lawyer helped rip off several hundreds of thousand dollars out of their pockets.

Not far off the truth..

H/T Michael Smith News

Tough as old boots… and just as palatable

As I mentioned during the week, Stephen Conroy’s ill fated media regulation bill may have woken up certain sections of Australia’s media that have been asleep at the wheel for the past 3 years, or maybe even longer.

Now even territory that was once friendly, if not fawning in it’s praise of Gillard’s famed negotiation skills and her steely resolve to hang on to power at all costs, has started to actually analyse the PM’s performance and personality a little more critically than before following one of the strangest days in Australian political history.

This makes a pleasant change to the normally sycophantic scribbling that the Canberra Press Gallery has continually dished up to Australians in both the News Ltd and Fairfax press over the past few years.

The latest scribe to actually put his thinking cap on is Mark Butler, Editor-at-Large of the Sydney Morning Herald (oh, how I love that term… “Editor–at-Large“).

In Butler’s latest piece this morning, he has had a look at Gillard’s “legendary” toughness and comes to the conclusion that it is now actually a massive flaw of her somewhat questionable character.

Let’s see what Mark has to say after the ALP’s leadership debacle on Thursday

This is the worst of bullfighting: the contest in which the wounded beast thrashes on, scarred and bloodied but stubbornly defiant in the face of what the matador and everyone in the stands knows to be the inevitability of its demise.

Julia Gillard is mortally wounded. She might have lived to fight another day after Thursday’s farcical leadership showdown – and she might well have put paid to Kevin Rudd’s ambitions in the process – but her political demise is assured.

If the Labor caucus is incapable of delivering the coup de grace, then the Australian people surely will on September 14.

Ouch.

Gillard herself considers herself to be “feisty” but, as I explained last week, feisty is not something that I would like to use to describe myself, especially given it’s alternative meanings in the PM’s favourite dictionary.

So, what does Mark have to say about Gillard’s “legendary” toughness now that the Raging Bull of Altona is mortally wounded, as he so eloquently put it?

We have heard much in recent times about Gillard’s toughness.

Friend and foe acknowledge the remarkable emotional strength that has enabled her to withstand the enervating pressures of minority government and the intense and unrelenting attacks that she has endured from opponents inside and outside her party.

But it is time to recognise that toughness not as a virtue but as a terrible flaw, an obstinacy that has encouraged Gillard to defy the harsh reality that her leadership has lost authority and that she is driving the Labor Party inexorably towards disaster.

Well now, that sounds like a pretty fair assessment to me.

Gillard’s authority has long been shattered in all circles in Australia except in those of her main political constituents – Australia’s increasingly unrepresentative unions and the faceless men that run them.

Much like Gillard, Australia’s unions are staring unflinchingly down the barrel as they look to rush headlong to their own demise along with her.

More power to them, I say…

Hopefully by the end of this increasingly painful period of Australia’s history, they too may just be that…

History.

We’re Labor, the fresh start people

Once, twice, three times the lady known as Ms Gillard has steered the Labor party towards a fresh start… At what we’re not sure but it sure isn’t Stabilidy and Cerdundy like we were all promised.

Especially with five senior Ministers and a host of up and comers… who have now gone actually.

Labor, the fresh start people

Labor lives to fight another day

Great cartoon from Mark Knight in The Herald Sun… devastatingly on the money.