Conservative media baron Rupert Murdoch has called on Tony Abbott to show leadership and make the "cruel choice" to sack his controversial chief of staff - and if the Prime Minister won't act, Peta Credlin should resign.

Mr Murdoch's intervention is the second since Mr Abbott's decision to honour Prince Philip with an Australian knighthood on Australia Day - a choice that has also prompted serious chatter amongst Liberal MPs about the Mr Abbott's leadership. 

Just days after Mr Abbott dismissed social media as "electronic graffiti", Mr Murdoch weighed into the debate via Twitter and urged the Prime Minister to "forget fairness" and focus on "team work".

read more: http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/rupert-murdoch-calls-on-tony-abbott-to-make-cruel-choice-and-sack-peta-credlin-20150128-12zvy8.html

From Victoria Rollison...

 

I’m really sick of people saying that they didn’t expect Tony Abbott to be the type of Prime Minister he is. I’m really sick of people saying his policies caught them by surprise, that they didn’t expect him to slash and burn to the extent that he has tried, but thankfully, so far mostly failed to. I hear all types of people, even political journalists, saying that Abbott promised he wouldn’t be making cuts and they took him on his word and they didn’t expect him to lie. He had a pamphlet and apparently this was gospel truth about exactly what an Abbott government would look like. To this, I’ve always said, just look at him! Listen to him! Use your brain! Are you blind? Wilfully blind perhaps?

Independent bloggers like me, who predicted exactly how bad the Abbott government would be were told we were just partisan Labor hacks and that he really wouldn’t be nearly as bad as we said. But we, if anything, mostly under-predicted how bad he is going to be. However we were spot on with the ideology that oozes out of this government – the class and culture war that’s been inflicted is exactly as we thought it would be. How did we guess the type of policies Abbott would sneakily introduce once in power, but those who are paid to inform the community totally missed it? Seriously, how was this mistake to universally made? How could Australians be so let down that they have had the Abbott surprise inflicted on them? How could they be left so ill-prepared and uninformed?

http://victoriarollison.com/2015/01/25/we-knew-who-abbott-was-back-then/

------------------------------------

Victoria, how could they be uninformed? one word: Rupert...

Here at YD, we've been onto Abbott since our conception... I have made more than 3750 crummy cartoons (possibly a world record for crummy cartoons) since and many of them have been dedicated to expose Tony's extensive lying ability...

The first one, in 2005, would have been:

 

Artful dodger and his mate!

 

 

Get rich quick; mug the sick!

 

 

Tony did not have to learn much from the master:

 

the porkologist.

 

 

 

 

One of Tony Abbott's backbenchers is urging the city-based Prime Minister to stop reacting to the "texting, latte-sipping, keyboard warriors who frequent the tapas bars of Sydney and Melbourne" and visit a country pub to get an "honest appraisal" of how the government can improve.

NSW Nationals MP Michael McCormack told Fairfax Media he did not support Mr Abbott's decision to knight Prince Philip on Australia Day, saying it had left most voters "scratching their heads".

The parliamentary secretary to the Finance Minister said the decision went against the grain of "most ordinary everyday Australians" and had exposed the government to "ridicule".

read more:

http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/coalition-mps-jump...

 

If the Prince Philip knighthood affair was an isolated incident, we could be scratching our head as to where this came from... But far from it. This is blunder number 152 just for the past twelve months from a lunatic mind (about 53 MAJOR BLUNDERS, 36 average blunders and 63 small annoying idiotic actions with no other repercussion than Tony Abbott getting eggs on his face — or swindling choco-favours.

Mightily embarrassing for the country as a whole, disastrous for people living close to the bread line — and showing to all of us that entitlements are not dead for those who can give cash to the Liberals (CONservatives) or lick the next mentioned part of the Liberals (CONservatives) anatomy... So, instead of scratching our head, we cannot do other but scratch our butt in the deepest part of the crack...

 

 

 

Federal Government ministers are backing Tony Abbott in the face of fierce criticism from long-time friend and conservative commentator Andrew Bolt.

Bolt has turned on the Prime Minister, saying Mr Abbott's decision to award Prince Philip a knighthood could be fatal to his leadership.

Mr Abbott has promised to consult more as the storm over his decision to award the country's highest honour to the Queen's husband continues to grow.

Bolt told Macquarie Radio he thought the knighthood decision could end Mr Abbott's leadership.

"This is just such a pathetically stupid - gosh, I didn't mean to be that strong because I actually like Tony Abbott very much - but this is just such a very, very, very stupid decision, so damaging that it could be fatal," he said.

"I thought it was verging on fatal already but this is too much. This is a friendless decision, where his friends would feel stupid defending it."

Bolt said he decided to break his holidays and make the comments because he was "just so flabbergasted" by Mr Abbott's move.

"You cannot think what the point is - damaging, laughing stock, helps his enemies, doesn't win over anyone - all those things are bad," he said.

But Cabinet ministers have jumped to the Prime Minister's defence this morning.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-01-29/ministers-back-pm-in-wake-of-andre...

---------------------------------------

"Yep", they said, in unison... "he may have made a blunder or several blunders — possibly 173 blunders — since coming to power, but we support him every inch of the blundering way in those blunders... because he is our unflinching blundering leader. We love him for showing the way to blunder-country... and we jump knee deep into blunder, while saluting his glorious blunders"...

How sad to see formerly intelligent people being blinded by blundering love of blunders...

 

 

Abbott never did win any electoral popularity contests but stability was his major selling point. He united the party in opposition and pushed Labor over the edge. Now the government that promised to put the adults back in charge is looking rather juvenile.

Rupert Murdoch and Andrew Bolt, among other media supporters, have weighed in amid the fallout over the prime minister’s decision to honour Prince Philip with a knighthood. “This is such a very, very, very stupid decision, so damaging that it could be fatal,” Bolt said. “I thought it was verging on fatal already, but this is too much.”

And the day after those Murdoch tweets, Phil Coorey of the Financial Review reports that Abbott dumped his senior communications adviser and overhauled his media team after the media tycoon lobbied him over the Christmas break. Though now that Murdoch has called for Peta Credlin’s resignation, Abbott has no choice but to keep her on.

Having previously swung in behind the PM, his media supporters have now judged he cannot do one thing right.

We know Abbott has been calling backbenchers for quiet chats. The Liberal MP Dan Tehan told us so, and Abbott himself referred to his “candid conversations” with colleagues on Australia Day.

We know from many different polls that voters prefer Malcolm Turnbull or Julie Bishop to Abbott when asked who should lead the Liberal party.

We know thoughts of leadership change have crossed the minds of backbenchers. Amid the tumult and the shouting, nothing else is on the public record.

read more:

http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2015/jan/29/dangerous-days-for...

 

------------------------------

 

Candide, ou l'Optimisme (/ˌkænˈdiːd/; French: [kɑ̃did]) is a French satire first published in 1759 by Voltaire, a philosopher of the Age of Enlightenment. The novella has been widely translated, with English versions titledCandide: or, All for the Best (1759); Candide: or, The Optimist (1762); and Candide: or, Optimism (1947).[5]It begins with a young man, Candide, who is living a sheltered life in an Edenic paradise and being indoctrinated with Leibnizian optimism (or simply "optimism") by his mentor, Professor Pangloss.[6] The work describes the abrupt cessation of this lifestyle, followed by Candide's slow, painful disillusionment as he witnesses and experiences great hardships in the world. Voltaire concludes with Candide, if not rejecting optimism outright, advocating a deeply practical precept, "we must cultivate our garden", in lieu of the Leibnizian mantra of Pangloss, "all is for the best" in the "best of all possible worlds".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candide

 

------------------------

 

For candid Tony, "all is getting worse" in the "silliest of the possible world" if he can remember...

Doctor Leonisky diagnostic: It seems that Tony Abbott's memory is very wonky. He should have been in a retirement village for dementia patients long ago. He cannot remember what he says from one day to the next — his memory lapse being short range, long range and mid-range... But he is extremely generous. His political promises are fantastic if you're not poor, sick, destitute, ordinary, studying, working weekends or just working in general. If you are working for car manufacturers, the ABC, SBS and mining or are defence personnel veterans, he might have said things once that he cannot remember. The symptoms of Tony's disease (Lacunar amnesia candida or selective memory loss with angelman syndrome optimism) is that you're out of a job, have no cash to pay bills and can become depressed. 

 

see also; 

raising the flour to puff puff...

 

 

Waleed Aly analysis of the Abbott situation is quite simplistic. This is what he says:

Of all the conclusions to draw from the Abbott government's current predicament, perhaps the most erroneous would be that it is simply a  product of Tony Abbott's idiosyncrasies. Sure, it's hard to resist amid the cosmic weirdness of this Prince Philip saga. But there's a difference between a trigger and a cause. Knights and Dames - even ones as bizarre as Sir Phil - don't topple Prime Ministers. That sort of thing only matters when your government has torched every last bit of its political capital. That happened around budget time last year, but in truth, the story goes back even further. This process was set in motion before Abbott was even Prime Minister, and was visible from his very first day in office.  

You tend not to see such things when you're guzzling victory champagne, but the 2013 election was an underwhelming one for the Coalition. The nation had just evicted an unelectable mess; a government whose supporters were disillusioned and whose opponents hated it viscerally. Yet, in an election where Labor and the Greens together lost nearly 8 per cent of the vote, the Coalition - the only major alternative - gained a mere 2 per cent.  A win, sure. But more of the Steven Bradbury variety. The country never truly voted for an Abbott government, so much as against the debacle they'd been enduring.

 

That matters because it makes the governing bit much harder. It means Abbott never had much capital to begin with. His clearest mandate was to be someone other than Rudd or Gillard. Once that was fulfilled, Abbott had nowhere to go: nothing to do with his power. 

Consider the rules he laid out as non-negotiable tests of government legitimacy: no broken promises, no leadership changes, no new or increased taxes, no budgetary blowouts, and no policies (like, say, a carbon price) that would increase the punters' cost of living. Oh, and no cuts to anything somebody likes - health, education, public broadcasting, defence. We'll cut government spending (which is wasteful), but when asked we'll quarantine just about everything from those cuts. This is a mass of populist contradictions. 

That made Abbott a devastating opposition leader. But as he destroyed Rudd and Gillard, he was also destroying himself.

 

http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-opinion/the-pms-woes-st...

--------------------------------------------------

Gus respond:

Waleed Aly analysis of the situation is very simplistic. It basically eliminates the media out of the political equation. The media has a huge responsibility in making sure that political fairness applies. But the media in this county is hugely unbalanced towards supporting the ning-nong, aka Tony Abbott for profit. Tony had a dream run in the media. In the merde-och press which controls 70 per cent of printed news and influences about 70 per cent of other news outlets, Tony Abbott was the darling goldilocky boy, even when he pissed on people. Especially when he pissed on good social ideals...

The rest of the media did not do its job.

Murdoch allied with Abbott one hundred per cent, but also "allied" with Rudd in order to topple Gillard. Rudd believe he was supported by Murdoch, but as soon as Gillard was out of the way, Murdoch dropped Rudd like a smelly sock. It was on the card... We predicted it..

 

I agree with Waleed that Tony's problems started long ago. But way further back than Aleed is prepared to dig out. It goes even further back than Tony's tumultuous university days — when he was "toying" with the idea of going with Labor or the Libs... I think the Labor mugs of the time saw through Tony's irrationality, misogyny, Santamarianism (religious Catholic former faction of Labor which Labor hated), short fuse and bullying. The other side accepted him reluctantly at first, but they love anyone who wants to join as long as the newcomers idolise cash. This was never a problem with Tony who married the quite disparate beliefs in A B Santamaria's strict social ideals and gold. By 2005 we all knew Tony was suspect and loony at best and rotten at worse. 

 

But we did not count on Rupert. 

I believe, Rupert Murdoch made a fun "impossible" challenge for himself: make Tony Abbott palatable to the electorate — or at least "electable".  Many of Tony's idiosyncrasies were swept under the carpet and I trust Murdoch had a few sleepless nights working on this entertaining pet project of his.

 

Tony Abbott on his own would not win against Julia Gillard. NEVER.

The merde-och press had to create or use a situation that it would make fester to divide the Labor party. Cleverly, Rudd was propped up all the time. Julia Gillard was poo-pooed all the time. Especially when she was doing well. Murdoch made sure Rudd was leaking like an old incontinent sieve and would be rewarded for it... Thus the "public" never forgave Julia for ousting Kevin... This idea was manufactured and dumped on the public by the media, repeatedly. "Hey don't forget, SHE's the one who knife Rudd" was the message every second week. No need to mention that Rudd did not want to go to a spill, as it was his right to fight. No, Rudd just caved in and cried... because he knew he would have lost 100 per cent. His colleagues could not stand his irrationality and explosive anger.

 

Presently, on the other side in 2015, in the CONservatives, "someone" has to find the courage and sense to politically knife Tony Abbott... Or Tony has to go to a spill... But he knows he's got his mates by the balls... So the conservative are all pissing in their pants at this prospect... They are led in the wilderness by a crazy mad monk and they still hope he will turn to be Jesus Christ... The role of Catholicism in the Australian political process should not be ignored as well, as it defines a lot of factions in the political parties on both sides.

Rudd was going nuts. He had to go. Abbott is going nuts (has been nuts since day one but no-one paid attention since Murdoch wanted us to believe that Abbott was sane). HE HAS TO GO. But because the media played the duplicitous, hypocritical game to get rid of Julia, now everyone is at a loss on how to get rid of the idiot, apart from placing polonium in his tea cup... or blame his controller, Madam Credlin...

We believe what we are told by the media... Well not really. There is only a small proportion of voters in the middle of the political spectrum. no more than 15 per cent who change their political minds. All the efforts by the media is thus to influence that 15 per cent into believing one thing or the other. With well targeted media campaigns, a large proportion of people in this unthinking swinging "middle" can be made to believe the earth is flat. Murdoch believes the earth is flat and rectangular like a greenback.

 

We got lucky that the complicated senate numbers is poised. But we could have a simple silly switch by a senator or two and the full folly of Abbott's policies could become laws that would stuff up this country for years.

 

We have to stop him and not so strangely, he is the one helping us stop him by being hugely ARROGANT with knighthood (he'll learn from this "episode" he tells us — yeah, my granny is still alive and turning 165 tomorrow), sneakily STUPID and scientifically illiterate in general. 

Abbott is not to be trusted. We can't afford his style of doing things.

 

He is a vengeful destroyer. With Pyne, he is taking his revenge on the equitable university system for his loss to a woman then, when he sought leadership of the student union to turn it into his little fiefdom of conservatism or whatever — as long as it was HIS.

 

Tony destroyed the only chance Australia had to deal with global warming.

 

Tony further destroyed Australia's very thin credibility on human rights by making defence break international laws.

 

Tony does not care about you. He cares about digging holes and about his mates who make cash out of digging holes.

 

Tony does not care about the environment. But he will spruik his inexistent credentials on this subject to humour you.

 

And the media so far has help him sustain this idiocy as a way to govern this country. It's crap. The media is crap.

 

Waleed, it's time for you to tell us fair and square that Tony Abbott is crap without going around the bush. Because whenever you are beating around the bush, Tony has already moved on to another pile of crap. 

 

Now, most of the media, as usual, is providing Tony with excuses for his crap... or give him yet again more time for him to make amends... Unbelievable. Hit him on the cabooche! Boom! He's got to go... Simple, not simplistic.

 

 

 

TRACKING ABBOTT’S WRECKAGE

 

Tony Abbott has been in power since 7 September 2013. From that moment, he and his government have broken promises and hurt Australians. This post will be regularly updated to keep track of the Abbott Government’s broken promises and everything his Government does to hurt Australians. Each separate item will have a link to a source. Broken promises appear in bold and in a separate fully referenced list at the end.

 

THE LIST

414. Awards a Knighthood to Prince Philip on Australia Day – 26 January 2015

413. Undermines court system by commenting on the bail decision of a Victorian magistrate – January 16, 2015

412. Announces a freezes to the annual increases to the Medicare schedule – 12 January 2015

411. Attempts to undermine Medicare by slashing the amount doctors get for consultations – 12 January 2015

410. Votes against a UN resolution calling for the end of the Israeli occupation of Palestine – 31 December 2014

409. Spends millions on market research and TV advertisements promoting their proposal to uncap university fees – 28 December 2014

 

read more:

http://sallymcmanus.net/abbotts-wreckage/

 

 

An embattled Abbott government has risked damage to long-running political bipartisanship on national security by accusing the former Labor government of having allowed terrorists to enter the country.

In a fiery question time at the end of what was unquestionably its worst week since being elected, the government used a pre-arranged "Dorothy Dix" question from its own side to draw attention to the fact that two alleged terrorists arrested this week in Sydney had entered Australia during the term of the most recent Labor government.

read more:

http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/abbott-government-...

 

 

One could start a tit for tat here... Everyone knows that the "Lebanese" "mafia" led by the likes of Eddie Obeid were let into this country by "Liberal" (CONservative) Governments... The little grub Turdy has no shame and plays the sabre rattling despite the clear demarkation between politics and the law, once a case is on with lawyers and so forth. He is prejudicing the trial.... TONY-THE-NASTY IDIOT HAS TO GO... His "good" government that started yesterday is already swimming down the gutter, the sewer and has reached the cesspit of the cloaca.

His close shave with political death has taught him NOTHING... TONY IS STILL TONY... A bloody turd. And his mates are in the shit as well.