The thread for discussing “the spill motion”. Will we get a new PM next week?
The attempted spill of the Australian PM is on.
Some skeptical MPs and commentators have been aggressively and publicly attacking Australian PM Tony Abbott, yet he’s has been one of the most skeptical PMs in the Western World. The climate debate is heating up again with Paris on this year. Seriously — is any alternative better?
Potential candidates include Julie Bishop, Malcolm Turnbull and Scott Morrison. According to Dennis Shanahan both Turnbull and Morrison have said they will not challenge. The WA MP rebels (both skeptics) are apparently angling for Julie Bishop, a fellow West Australian.
Malcolm Turnbull is Australia’s version of David Cameron. Will Turnbull, ex Goldman Sachs, former opposition leader who died on the sword of an emissions trading scheme, be our PM next week? If Turnbull did run and win, the only bright point is it will be the best thing for those hoping to set up the equivalent of the UKIP in Australia. It could be the trigger for the conservatives to split from the Labor-lite Liberals. The passion against Turnbull runs deep.
The Nationals have vowed that Turnbull would have to give a written guarantee that he will not pursue a trading scheme, change asylum seeker polices or back gay marriage.
LIVE COVERAGE: Abbott leadership crisis
Abbott’s biggest mistake was to feed his opponents and starve his friends
Just this week the government gave $25m to a pointless “carbon capture and storage” project, ensuring yet another group with a vested interest and a PR department to saturate the media with climate fear. They feed the crocodile. They could have given just $10m to set up a new Centre of Natural Climate Research — a group to study the natural forces which drive our climate and which could have provided a small counterweight to the billion dollar industry with an interest in blaming CO2 for everything. They could have provided a mere $1m to a group to replicate the Bureau of Meteorology’s datasets and provide an independent commentary on the scientific value of the biased, major adjustments that the BOM deems necessary.
If the Greens don’t welcome extra funding to understand the climate, what does that say about them? If they worry about climate change, the Australian weather records are too important not to check.
No matter what Abbott did, he was going to score huge flak for any cuts. He has made almost none, yet copped the headlines anyway — so in for a penny, in for a pound. The left loving media were never going to praise him.
The ABC is beyond redemption
In the internet age who needs a public broadcaster? It should be privatized entirely, or, at a minimum, split into two, call one left and one right, and give them equal funding. That’s the only way the conservative half of the population would get a voice on a public broadcaster. It would mean total funding to the ABC could remain the same — “no cuts”. As it is, only 10% of the population watch it, but they are often the journalists working for other media outlets. The ABC sets the tone, determines what is omitted or downplayed in the news, and coordinates the progressive talking points.
Freedom does not come for free
In the end Abbott has done more for climate skepticism than almost any other leader. He axed the carbon tax, axed Flannery’s Climate Commission, and folded the Dept of Climate Change back into the Dept of the Environment. Which political leader has done more? All the leaders have fed the crocodile; none yet dare to starve it, or even feed its competitors. All quake at the namecalling and run for fear of being called a denier. Who will rise above the school-yard bullies?