Dear Hasbeen,

Talking about pollies who can be bought... Gee whiz
I seem to recall Tony Windsor telling us about
how Mr Abbott pleaded for Windsor's vote - and
Abbott telling him that "He'd do anything to be PM,
short of sell his ar*se." And as for Mr Howard?
and the hospital he offered Tassie?

As Peter Coleman points out in "The Costello Memoirs,"
"That man was
determined to hang onto power, while possibly not
Mugabe-esque, was unyielding. John Howard is not an
unusual case. The pain and frustration of dislodging
Prime Minister Hawke or Bjelke-Petersen are fresh in
memory, Tony Blair was as unwilling to vacate 10
Downing Street as John Howard was to vacate Kirribilli House
(although Blair finally made way for his successor)."

The US set the world an example in constitutionally limiting
the number of years a President may remain in office, but
even there Bill Clinton strove very strongly to return to
the White House on the coat-tails of his wife.

Politicians firmly believe that their day will come.
They're politicians in the way others are poets. They
can't help themselves.

It identifies only two periods of Australian "fiscal profligacy" in recent years, both during Mr Howard's term in office - in 2003 at the start of the mining boom and during his final years in office between 2005 and 2007.
Mr Howard defended his record on Friday, saying that government spending as a percentage of GDP declined during his term.

Finance minister Penny Wong says the IMF has endorsed Labor's stimulus spending. Photo: Andrew Meares
''According to none other than the Governor of the Reserve Bank, Australia's fiscal position is the envy of the developed world,'' the former prime minister's spokesman said.
But the Grattan Institute economist, Saul Eslake, argues that Mr Howard's statement about spending declining as a percentage of GDP, while technically true, is irrelevant and misleading.
''The Howard government in its last two terms was rolling in cash,'' Mr Eslake said.
Mr Howard rode two booms - in mining and household spending - and as a result raked in ''extraordinary'' amounts of income during its last two terms.
During that period, Mr Eslake said, the Howard government increased spending ''in real terms'' at a faster rate than any other government since the Whitlam years.
Mr Eslake did say, however, that he was ''gobsmacked'' the IMF did not judge Gough Whitlam's government as profligate.
''That they didn't regard the 40 per cent plus increase in government spending in 1974 to 1975 under the Whitlam government as profligate . . . [that's] far worse than anything the Howard government undertook,'' Mr Eslake said.
The Minister for Finance, Penny Wong, said the IMF study endorsed the current Labor government's ''responsible spending decisions'' while diminishing Mr Howard's record.
''The study shows the Howard government clearly missed opportunities to effectively use the mining boom and strong global economic conditions to invest in Australia's future, and it debunks the myth spouted by Tony Abbott and Joe Hockey that the Howard government exercised spending restraint,'' Ms Wong said.

The Rudd Gillard governments have had greater revenues than the Howard Governments. Government income is increasing. Swan never ever claims revenue is decreasing. He only ever claims his projections of growth of revenue are decreasing.

This government and all it's hoodwinked supports take us for mugs. That's why they will be absolutely decimated at an election this year. The polls we see in the newspapers are wrong. Simply too many people are angry and disengaged and their opinions cannot be assessed by polsters. They refuse to be polled.

Abbott will be Australia's next elected PM. If the Labor party replace Gillard with Shorten, Abbott will very quickly expose Shorten for the absolute dummey he is. It won't take very much.

All this talk about Turnbull just makes more people angry and disengaged.

Mr Abbott is the least popular Opposition Leader
that Australia has ever had. Many people find him
to be not only an ambarrassment but rather scary
as well. If Mr Abbott continues to slide in the
polls a nervous Liberal Party will replace him.
And the only viable alternative that the Liberal
Party has is - Mr Turnbull.

Tony has not bothered to talk so far , so what makes you think he would start with shorten.
Can you imagine tony and the worm ?
Turnbull is the only hope you have of not making a fool of yourselves.
The only time Abbott has talked is when someone has given him a script.
The good old golden years exposed again.