And so this is Christmas and what have our politicians done? More importantly, have they been naughty or nice?
It’s probably more of a northern hemisphere cultural contrivance that those who have been naughty are destined to receive only a lump of coal for their dastardly deeds in the preceding 364 days.
Down in the southern hemisphere a lump of coal is the only thing Scott Morrison wants for Christmas. In fact, he wants more than one and what Santa can’t provide, he’s hoping Adani can. The downside is it might cost the rest of us a billion dollars and counting. Scott needs some coal for props in the parliament and others to use as paperweights in his office. He will continue to do so until the black lung kicks in.
Santas take many forms. Even in Australia, Santas vary from outrageously jolly with luxurious thick beards to those wearing crappy polyester bristles with the elastic showing, a cushion wedged up their guts and smelling vaguely of alcohol.
In Japan, where just 1 per cent of the population is Christian, they love santa-san and they think he flies down from the moon every year to hand out gifts, which probably makes more sense than the North Pole.
A solid argument could be made that our federal MPs already have their own type of Santa who flies down on his sled from Beijing. This Santa comes in the form of generous businessmen bearing party donations. The really good thing is he comes more than once a year. In fact, pretty much whenever he likes.
My favourite of all Santas is the Amish type, Belsnickel. Belsnickel is a bad-tempered version of Santa. Dressed in rags, he turns up at your home uninvited, bangs on the front door and demands to know if children have been “impish or admirable”. Like George Christensen he carries a whip but unlike George Christensen, he is not afraid to use it.
I’ve always thought our Santa was too soft. Sure he can terrify very small kids by his sheer size and through the shocking ghastliness of his lurid outfit, but the rest of us can sidle up, leap into his lap and make demands without fear of rejection. Our Santa has to listen. Belsnickel, who looks like and really is a kind of an angry, old homeless guy, does all the talking.
So Belsnickel it is for our federal parliamentarians and have they been impish or admirable?
I’ve been checking the list and I’ve been checking it more than once.
For reasons of space, not every MP getting a gift is listed here because let’s face it, most of them aren’t that interesting.
Sam Dastyari: A job.
Tony Abbott: A job and some dignity.
Malcolm Turnbull: What do you give the amorphous blob that has everything? An endoskeleton, of course.
Bill Shorten: He’s not sure but he’s put in a call to the CFMEU to see what they’d want him to have.
Julie Bishop: She does not want Malcolm’s job. He’s performing well under great difficulty. No, she is quite satisfied with being deputy and foreign minister. Really. Wait. How many Newspolls was that again?
Bob Katter: How can we celebrate Christmas when every three months a person is torn to pieces by a crocodile in north Queensland?
Pauline Hanson: Just a card, thanks. In fact, lots of cards. Maybe give James Ashby’s printing business a bell?
Kevin Andrews: I hate to be critical of a person’s appearance but let’s be honest about Kevin. The man looks like Fine Cotton on race day. For Christmas he needs a professional colouring job on that bonce of his. Maybe some blonde tips. Maybe the full Milo.
Adam Bandt: A vegan turkey with all the organic trimmings washed down with lashings of decocoanated cocoa.
George Christensen: Malcolm Turnbull’s head on a stake or he’ll resign. He means it this time. He’s not kidding around anymore.
David Feeney: A real estate portfolio, a map and a passport.
Barnaby Joyce: The Deputy PM’s list didn’t pass the High Court. The good news is he makes a perfect Christmas decoration. Just stand him right next to the tree. No batteries required.
Eric Abetz: A 1962 desk calendar for the Tasmanian senator’s desk. It won’t actually be 1962 but he can close his eyes and pretend. Ah, the good old days.
Cory Bernardi: Nothing. The Liberal Party is his gift and it keeps on giving.
Belsnickel is coming, folks, and unlike Santa, he does not mess around.
This article was published in The Australian 15 December 2017
Downer, the major contractor for the proposed polluting coal mine has just parted ways with Adani due public pressure and the veto of the NAIF loan. One more nail in their coffin……
thank-you #GalileeBlockade thank-you #StopAdani & thank-you to the dedication & passion of the Get-Up movement for people power.
Australia should ban Adani from our shores & commit to building a massive solar farm on that same site that would provide employment for thousands & we could actually achieve zero emissions and cheaper power bills. http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-12-18/adani-parts-way-mining-services-company-down-carmichael-mine-qld/9267778
Another step closer…..🌏
Solar doesn’t employ people Bella. Once constructed that its. Coal employs people past construction. That’s the difference. Those people are taxed and spend money and add to our economy not for 12months but 40 or so years. That’s been my point through all of this.
“Solar doesn’t employ people Bella. Once constructed that its. Coal employs people past construction”.
GROAN….coal employs people because the fire stations are high maintenance, always breaking down. Renewables are low maintenance. Build and forget.
And the people who do the maintenance, mine the coal, run the rail the Coal gets delivered on, run the power station, employed in the towns where these people live. What do they do for jobs Bassy in your set and forget world?
But produce very cheap electricity that used to give us a competitive advantage.
It is NOT cheap electricity when you look at the pollution, carnage and illnesses, cost to the health system that coal contributes. FFS they had to stop a Test match the other week between India and Silly Lanka because of coal pollution.
Brilliant Razor. So we should get rid of trucks and trains and employ coolies with wheelbarrows. We’ll be rolling in it!
Why would we do that JB?
We wouldn’t do that. I was taking your proposition to it’s natural and absurd conclusion.
Forty years of environmental chaos plus the farmers with no drinkable water for livestock from the Basin.
Most Ozzies aren’t willing to risk that with a dodgy Indian company already facing multiple environmental charges and fraud. For the last time, those thousands of jobs are make believe & the indigenous rights will have to be heard in March.
Bella,
Most of the indigenous people from the area want the jobs. I’ve shot you down on this before.
don’t believe that either…you’re not reliable
You “shot” me Razor? 😢😢 When your only reference is from one Australian publication it’s a very long way from the facts.
You could try googling it.
https://newmatilda.com/2017/11/23/traditional-owners-expose-adanis-relentless-pursuit-of-wj-country/
Will the below do puff?
https://www.dailymercury.com.au/news/adani-carmichael-mine-welcomed-by-aboriginal-elder/3189720/
Read the reticle no you’ll get the picture.
Just as a question. Do you know any aboriginal people from regional areas puff? Have you ever spent time or lived with any?
wont do at all strop..already you’re down to one elder
you’re unreliable
http://wanganjagalingou.com.au/wj-traditional-owners-win-interim-injunction-in-federal-court/
back at cha
Do you know any aboriginal people from regional areas ?
Do you speak for them all?
I know that’s your point mate but at what cost?
Adani have been glaringly dishonest from the get go so put as simply as this, why should Australians trust them with forty years to destroy our Galilee Basin, poison the water & wreck our Reef in exchange for 1400 possible short term jobs?
This selfish & greedy company are reknown for putting humanity aside for profit & avoiding taxes at every chance.
If Adani want to ‘sell’ their ‘concern’ about the poor people in India without electricity they could do it right now by pouring their Cayman wealth into renewable energy plants across their own country. But that grand furphy marketing ploy has been exposed long ago.
Turnbull should direct Canavan to stop thrashing a dying horse & just pull the plug. Coal is not the answer & Adani is definitely not some kind of Utopian solution to NQ jobs.
Have a lovely Christmas Razor.
Not utopia but jobs to many 0f my friends all the same.
Merry Christmas to you and yours Bella. People of differing opinions make this country great. If either the far left / Greens had control or the far right we’d all be in trouble. Hope 2018 is a great year for you.
Thanks Razor & Happy Christmas to you & yours as well. 🎄⛄🌲
I like nearly everyone on this blog Bella and you particularly are one of my favourites! Without people like you there’d be nobody helping people. There’d be no hope. I don’t have to always agree with you but I recognise your spirit of generosity and sense of right.
The barmy army have sabotaged the WACA.
He he Milton, I saw one scribe referring to the incontinent covers at the WACA.
I know a guy who imbibed way too much during the first day of the first Test ever held in Hobart. Of course it gets darker quicker down at 42 degrees Latitude, and security being what it is he managed to get out on the ground and pee on the pitch. It must have frozen solid because there was no talk of wet patches nor delayed start on day 2.
Oops the bit about getting dark is of course nonsense in Summer, I should know having lived there for three years. The point should have been it was very late at night.
Oh, gotcha after I had posted!! 🙂
Playing cricket in Winter Lou?
At the moment it’s light until about 9.15pm.
8.30 as I write and the sun is shining!
I loathe daylight saving, it’s unnatural.
Give me more dark anyday. 🌒
I AGREE
It’s s bit disconcerting when you glance at the clock and realise it’s 9pm and have done nothing about preparing dinner yet Bella!
Spoken like true Queenslanders Bella, Razor.
When we lived in South Hobart, we got the bonus of two sunsets in mid Summer. The sun would settle behind Mount Wellington around 8ish, then pop out the other side of the mountain half an hour later for a second helping before saying goodnight. It was kind of fun.
Nice to see the latest addition to all those diesel generators in SA.
The final solution is … wait for it …. pay high energy users to shut their businesses down if the power usage goes too high..
Elon’s battery pack will only give 1 hour charge I understand JackSprat so maybe if we lived in SA wise to buy up lots of Everyready Torches! Cheers have a super 2018
It would be laughable if it wasn’t so sad JS.
Tell you what, I’ll let you know what my next power bill comes it at, for this 8 bed jobbie, and the pool, and the sheds. Compare it to yours. Then you can see if you are still laughing. Why do I need batteries Henry, Havent had a power out in over a year now? No major storms. Remember the massive storm? You guys are losing the ability to retain new information it seems, just spewing the same old same old nonsense out of the Libs handbook.
You know, when you cant digest new stuff….. its the long goodbye out. Damn sad.
JS about 2 weeks ago this was discussed they are turbines that will run on Gas from next year. Did you miss the report out today showing electricity prices in SA are going to drop 7.3% next year and 7% the year after? SA has had a 70% increase in electricity prices in the last decade QLD, NSW, Vic. have all had rises above 120% in the same period. SA has lower price rises and dropping prices due to its Renewables. Your delusions are becoming more frequent. Seek help.
I think the point JS was making was not the cost of power, Dismayed.
It was the fact that high energy user businesses were going to be paid to shut down if overall usage got too high.
In other words there seems some doubt that the power supply would meet demand – even with the backup generators?
Yvonne, Large power users get asked to shut down all over the country it happens in NSW and QLD routinely. Seriously start to read something other than the Australian for information. Read the link regarding the tesla battery already working to maintain the NEM due to coal being unreliable and too slow to react.
Surprising. I thought that the Elon Musk batteries in conjunction with the generators were going to ensure there were no power problems and put an end to business uncertainty?
Just reading tomorrow’s front page – it looks like Xenophon could be the new premier come next election. Things could change there.
Well stop thinking and start reading and listening. There is no perfect way of delivering power. That solution is logical in extremis. Do you think coal fired plants have always kept up with demand in the past?
Have you heard of brown-outs or black-outs?
Actually they pretty much did old bean and would still be if subsidised renewables hadn’t made them more costly.
So what happens when we’re in this new renewable fantasy land and the CO2 levels don’t change no the weather is just the same as it always has been. Gets warmer for a few decades, then colder for a few more. Listening to you people you’d swear the Ice Age never happened.
Oh dear! Razor, you don’t understand at all. We are seeing changes in the climate occurring in just a couple of decades that took thousands of years to happen before.
You are probably right insofar as lowering emissions may very well make things worse. We are beyond the tipping point now and there is no way out.
It’s gone exponential, every year hotter than the last, and the differential between each succeeding year is greater than the previous.
You just don’t see it do you?
The air will be cleaner and health cost will drop.
Calm down Boa
I’m perfectly calm Triv. I seriously thought the supply issue had been solved with the batteries and generators. DId you direct the same comment to JS. ? Just asking
Was he talking about Xenophon?
Yes, you too. Old age really doing it for you, poor thing. What outages? We havent needed the generators or the batteries. And its been rather hot and uncomfortable btw. Why cant you dullards get it through your heads we dont have power failures like you all try to say. Do you like lying for Liberals so much? I am tired of trying.
I give up.
How much are you taking from the coal fired Eastern State generators when its dark Wraith?
Do you know what a wind turbine looks like. I do. Its like a big aeroplane, only no passengers. Hundreds and hundreds of them, all over the Bungara Ranges, as far as you can see. Spinning, spinning, spinning. Jack dont come back about no wind, this is one of the most godforsaken blown out bastard places on earth.
merry xmas
No don’t give up wraith, in fact, post more info on SA’s breakaway renewables investments.
You never know, your forward thinking state might just inspire others to follow the same path! I’ve always been into energy saving at home but Qld has more increases on the way I’m considering going off the grid as my son has done.
Have a great Christmas wraith.🌲
Merry Christmas Bella, you are a true gift to us all.
Why so defensive wraith? . I never suggested there had been outages – I merely made the comment that I thought that the battery system and backup generators were there to absolutely avoid the risk of outages. I was just surprised that, with an impressive backup arrangement, the best in the country maybe, there is the suggestion that high users may have to shut down.
Pleased to hear you’ve had no blackouts.
Glad you’ve given up on me – thanks!
Dont worry Boa, Ive given up on some of the best people! You are in good company.
But why on earth did you think that? Was there some information getting around that no-one else got?
Yvonne, do you recall anything from yesterday? You have constantly made references to system black not blackout as you have called it SA experienced last year due to Privately owned transmission towers being knocked over by 190km/h winds. Oh you don’t recall. No surprises.
SA lost power due to their over reliance on interstate power through the interconnector. Once their renewables shut down and the interconnector said bye that was it for them……they could not generate their own base load power.
Actually,
Sorry I’ll start again.
Actually Dismayed, I did read the article and commented favourably higher up.
Next time Boa could you read tomorrow’s back page instead of the front and give us the race results. That would help.
It’s a lost cause TV. The bit about Xenophon got me, he hasn’t even named his candidates yet.
I think Triv was being humorous Penny.
Anyway I took it as quite funny. There is a good side to everyone. Why not?
Geez. Good point Triv. Just think how rich we could all be. I’d charge minimal brokerage.
Spoilsports – they only give front-page.
info freely available
http://reneweconomy.com.au/nem-watch/
Reneweconomy should be retitled rentseekereconomy.
cant …… LNP copyright
tomago will tell you all about that …the summer just gone.. not happy about it either
http://www.tomago.com.au/
Wonderful cooperation between POTUS Trump and POTRF Putin, Mr Insider as we read in your august newspaper that Vladimir Putin has thanked Donald Trump for a CIA tip-off which averted a major terrorist attack in St Petersburg. Heart warming and I expect Putin will be strolling with Trump on the lawns of the White House in 2018, perhaps Kim Jong-un shortly after that.
https://tinyurl.com/ya332g4y
Scott Morrison take a bow…you are the worst
#MYEFO
hehehe naughty….https://twitter.com/TheKouk
Evolution of 2017-18 budget deficit forecast
2014 Budget -$2.8b
2014 MYEFO -$11.5b
2015 Budget -$14.4b
2015 MYEFO -$23.0b
2016 Budget -$26.1b
2016 MYEFO -$28.7b
2017 Budget -$29.4b
2017 MYEFO -$23.6b Today – “We are fixing the budget”
It happens when Labor pushed all their spending past the forward estimates. Read up on it smoke, it will enlighten you. A non funded NDIS didn’t help either.
structural deficit sonny from well beyond RGR
get off the hydro its killing you
No read this when Costello fudged his forward estimates:-
The Liberals constantly accused Labor of ‘spending money it did not have’ but Costello made an art form of this. Costello in 2007 made projections about the future and planned to spend money that was just not there. It is very strange Labor is accused of this whilst the Liberals, as usual, get off Scott free.
Costello estimated that total federal government revenue (including GST) would be $288.7bn in 2007–8. It came in at $294.9bn, so once again Costello erred on the downside, by $6.2billion.
But wait…there’s more! Costello also erred over the next three years. Costello predicted $304.7billion revenue in 2008–9, $320.7bn in 2009–10 and $336.1bn in 2010–11. Revenue came in at $292.6bn, $284.7bn and $302.0bn, which meant shortfalls of $12.1bn, $36.1bn and $34.1bn respectively.
Had the Howard government been re-elected in November 2007, the year before the global financial crisis hit, they would have had some explaining to do, as Costello too would have had to contend with the GFC as well as falling tax revenue. Costello was budgeting for money in advance that would never eventuate and setting a huge $80billion structural deficit booby trap for the incoming Rudd and Abbott governments.
Gee It’s taken that long to work through Howard’s, Rudd’s and Julia’s largesse
A great little article.
http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/politically-incorrect-resort-would-make-a-great-retro-holiday/news-story/890bbb826fb369a16bd9a57c2db2812d
A strange thing it will be, Jack, looking at the happy snaps of the rearranged Cabinet and realising that George Brandis had some attractive moments in the job.
Re Rory O’Donoghue, I saw a play/musical at the Kirk Theatre in Surry Hills in the late 70’s written by Graeme Bond and Jim Burnett and it was a cracker of a show. Boy’s Own McBeth. O’Donoghue was a cast member and I still have the vinyl of the soundtrack.
It was the longest running Australian written musical ever, only beaten in the 90’s by The Boy From Oz. A review in The Sunday Telegraph at the time said, “A combination of Welcome Back Kotter, Monty Python’s Flying Circus, Shakespeare in Rock n Roll”
A very talented man. Vale.
And here’s a great clip from the cast reunion back in 2010.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5YpQqz8E-I
Footage from Raqqa – as people start to rebuild a city in ruins and their shattered lives. Total devastation.
Comment from a man with despair clearly evident – that innocent children, after being forced to watch public executions and decapitations, and who were once scared of a chicken being slaughtered are now scared of nothing.
Chilling comment, so much in just one sentence – and so dreadfully sad. Is it ever possible to restore their childhood?
Shocking indeed Boadicea and it makes our problems pale into insignificance here in Australia doesn’t it particularly the way our Pollies of all sides behave. Cheers may your 2018 be a beauty
Indeed, HB.
Likewise, all the best to you and yours – good health and happiness in 2018
And the meek shall inherit the earth.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gs_-Maajkos
From Liberty Valance.
“The meek shall inherit the Earth.”
“Well, about six foot of it anyways.”
It seems to me Frank Zappa.was a visionary of his time.
I fell into that link of yours about an hour ago, not knowing anything much about this musician I’d vaguely heard of, then got lost in his story & his interview ‘style’.
Absorbing. A genius.
Just wanted to thank you for the link Jean. ☮
Happy Christmas to you. 🌲
Bella, Frank went beyond genius. He was a guy who grew up in the desert amidst mediocrity and taught himself music from books and seized life by the nuts and ran with it like a very weird artistic Olympian.
He and Captain Beefheart (Don van Vliet) formed a singularity of creativity out in the desert that no duo in any city anywhere ever has matched. Just a strange and mind-blowing creative coherence that will never happen again.
Thanks for the clip, JB.
Peyote?
Cheers Ms B.
Long ago when I were a boy, before the world went beige……………
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bnb7D5diJac