Gee, that's funny, Poirot. I am one of the electorate, and even though I don't like Abbott, I don't think his budget is a "scam." I realise that somebody had to take the unpopular step and try and save this country from insolvency, and that is very hard to do with the very people who ruined our economy still in power in the Senate and doing everything they can to sabotage Abbott's efforts. They are doing it because they would rather see this country broke and Abbott discredited than do anything positive to help repair the mess that they know they created.

Abbot agrees with your opinion that there are lots of good Muslims and just a few bad ones, so he asked the "moderate" Muslim organisations to meet him so that he could explain that the new laws were not targeting moderate Muslims. The term "Team Australia" is therefore being used by Abbott as a sign of Muslim INCLUSION into Australian society, something I would have thought you would have grudgingly given him a Guernsey for.

But no, your irrational hatred of Abbott prevents you from even giving him any credit for anything. Everything he does can be presented as something insidious when looked at through the distorting lens of you peculiar ideology. But I have to thank people like you, in a way. I was once a trendy lefty myself, but it was the incredible mindsets of people like yourself who saw conspiracies everywhere and who could only see their political opponents as something entirely evil, that convinced me that there was something fundamentally wrong with the whole trendy lefty mindset.

For your information, I opposed the US liberation of Iraq, but not because of the reflexive anti Americanism of people like yourself. And I could understand why the Americans had to go in, even though I thought it was a mistake to do so. i would have thought it self evident that there was only one person responsible for the mess in Iraq, and that was not George Bush, but Saddam Hussein.

"Gee, that's funny, Poirot. I am one of the electorate, and even though I don't like Abbott, I don't think his budget is a "scam." I realise that somebody had to take the unpopular step and try and save this country from insolvency, and that is very hard to do with the very people who ruined our economy still in power in the Senate and doing everything they can to sabotage Abbott's efforts. They are doing it because they would rather see this country broke and Abbott discredited than do anything positive to help repair the mess that they know they created"

Yes, thanks for that LEGO.

If you can't detect a Govt cooking up a fiscal crisis to aid their agenda, there's nothing I can say to help you.

http://www.smh.com.au/business/the-economy/australian-economy-is-not-in-trouble-joe-hockey-tells-nz-20140726-zx6ie.html

"Joe Hockey has told New Zealand that there is no crisis in the Australian economy, nor is it in trouble.

The treasurer also made no mention of the "budget emergency" he and his government referred to when justifying their unpopular budget to Australians.

Instead, Mr Hockey reassured Kiwis that their second biggest trading partner is benefiting from 23 years of consecutive economic growth.

"The Australian economy is not in trouble," he told New Zealand political current affairs show The Nation on Saturday."

(Mr Hockey appears to drop his guard here - somehow imagining that the truth he utters in New Zealand won't make its way across the Tasman before the next election.)

His "crisis" bilge is apparently strictly for domestic consumption

"For your information, I opposed the US liberation of Iraq, but not because of the reflexive anti Americanism of people like yourself. And I could understand why the Americans had to go in, even though I thought it was a mistake to do so....."

The Americans went in ostensibly because they insisted Saddam had WMD's - that was the line they ran to launch the invasion - despite assurances from inspectors that none had been detected.

We all knew what would happen - and that is exactly what has happened.

POIROT, you know the drill. Never stand between a member of the Liberal Party and a:

- a bucket of money

- an American claim that war is necessary to get rid of a dictator

- a brownpaper bag full of 100 dollar notes.

- a developer with greed in his eyes

- a newspaper written by News Corp

- a video camera

- a chair belonging to a female

- an open door to the American Embassy

- a plan to rip off pensioners and the working classes

- a cocktail party with the rich and famous

- a chance to meet the Queen

- an offer to fund an overseas trip, all expenses paid

- a chance to mock or bring down a member of the LABOR Party

- a bottle of Grange

- a free evening at an upmarket brothel

This list is not complete but you get the idea!

Poirot, a billion dollars every month, just for interest, on our debt, should be taken seriously. Someone with a sense of responsibility, could label it a crisis. Someone like you, would be better occupied listening to someone with a sense of responsibility, rather than contributing your baseless inanities here.
Our economy is no longer in the control of economic vandals, despite the peripheral damage they inflict through the Senate, so Hockey’s assertions are justified, to anyone who gives them proper consideration.

But...but...Leo,

According to Joe, there is "no crisis".

"Joe Hockey has told New Zealand that there is no crisis in the Australian economy, nor is it in trouble."

"The treasurer also made no mention of the "budget emergency" he and his government referred to when justifying their unpopular budget to Australians.

Instead, Mr Hockey reassured Kiwis that their second biggest trading partner is benefiting from 23 years of consecutive economic growth.

"The Australian economy is not in trouble," he told New Zealand political current affairs show The Nation on Saturday."

Sloppy Joe is welcome to look at structural reform...but he's not welcome to string different stories (depending on whom he's addressing)....and telling whoppers about the fiscal state of an economy, which in the wake of the GFC, is one of envies of the OECD

Poirot, thanks for demonstrating how a lefty goes about dishonest distortion. You take a statement made for one purpose, presentation of the state of our economy with regard to its current functioning, and pretend that it applies to a consideration for its internal and future functioning. Like any practised lefty, you have dishonesty and misrepresentation down to a fine art.

My comment was:” Hockey’s assertions are justified, to anyone who gives them proper consideration.”
I know, of course, that you do not have the capacity to give them proper, honest consideration