Graham: You would have to be a liberal or what is called a howard hugger.
'Honest?' Howard is an unmitigated grubby liar which makes him completely untrusworthy and totally deceitful added to this he is divisive and even more arrogant than Hawke. And his sending the national's leader around the country come election time with a big brown paper bag buying votes is reprehensible. I know some will squeak, as howard does, "but the others have done it when they were in power" but that does not make it honest,decent or honourable. But heh! as a Queenslander who remembers Joh and his misfits, who better to send out with a proverbial brown paper bag than the leader of the Nits err sorry Gnats - wrong again its the nats. Regards, numbat

graham - thank you for writing up the results of the survey. it constantly amazes me that the furphy that the economy is booming, or going along 'okay', or 'on the up and up' is accepted by the media and the opposition. how can the economy be fine, when there are such huge disaparities in incomes - $aus millions for corporate 'kings' and (un)living wage for the 'ordinary' worker who has no clout as now dealt with by the fair (sic) pay commission. the economy cannot be 'okay' when we now see many, many people without liveable wages; when we see many unemployed - and those labelled 'employed' as engaged in paidemployment for as little as one hour a week - because they cannot secure jobs with higher levels of working hours. how can the economy be 'booming' when the rates of bankruptcy are soaring? how can the economy be 'fine', when thousands of australians are unable to buy a home. how can it be 'on the up and up' if many australians are being evicted from their homes as wages do not cover repayments - that once were covered by incomes?

(to be continued)

continued ...
australia once was a country where everyone was seen as having a right to the opportunity of buying a home - owning a home and the real possibility for many/most to do so. this principle no longer applies. it is nonsense to say that those who cannot afford a home should go to the backblocks in order to purchase. first, the backblocks are too expensive for many and, anyway, travel costs (mmmm petrol anyone) make this 'option' less than feasible. when will someone in a position of power begin to articulate the reality for too many australians - that the economy is in regression as huge numbers of australians are not being well served, and a few are being enabled to gross-out on greed.

the economy can be 'fine' or 'okay' in the current climate only if 'economy' and 'economics' are seen as unrelated to humanity - as unrelated to the humanbeings who should be served by the economy and economics. the economy can be 'on the up and up' or 'booming' only if 'economy' and 'economics' are seen as having nothing to do with the rights and wellbeing of *all* citizens and residents of the country.

when will the opposition begin to see that its constant acquiesance to the nonsense of the 'excellent' economy does not reflect what is happening in australia - particularly the australia the alp is supposed to represent.

Careful Joss,
You start sprouting posts like that.. 'they'are likely to start on you as being one of those rare almost extinct species that would like to see some equality in a population, if not the entire world. Oh yes some might say mmmm could be a socialist in our midst, and others start to utter the word ' pinko' then before you know it, you've been branded ' a raving trotskyistic commo ratbag'
I myself would be too far left for any trots, I'd scare the daylights out of em.
I hope you have some success convincing others about equality but don't hold your breath.
Cheers Neil

From the Hansard, 6th April 1998.

In the Grievance debate on 6th April Mr ALBANESE (Member for Grayndler) said:

"Today my grievance is against the Prime Minister (Mr Howard) for his failure to provide leadership. You can trim the eyebrows; you can cap the teeth; you can cut the hair; you can put on different glasses; you can give him a ewe's milk facial, for all I care; but, to paraphrase a gritty Australian saying, 'Same stuff, different bucket.' In the pantheon of chinless blue bloods and suburban accountants that makes up the Australian Liberal Party, this bloke is truly one out of the box. You have to go back to Billy McMahon to find a Prime Minister who even approaches this one for petulance, pettiness and sheer grinding inadequacy. I read the late Paul Hasluck's description of Billy McMahon, and I cannot find a thing that does not describe this Prime Minister equally well:

I confess to a dislike of McMahon. The longer one is associated with him the deeper the contempt for him grows and I find it hard to allow him any merit. Disloyal, devious, dishonest, untrustworthy, petty, cowardly - all these adjectives have been weighed by me and I could not in truth modify or reduce any one of them in its application to him."

Howard will loose because he is disloyal, devious, dishonest, untrustworthy, petty and cowardly. It has just taken the majority of Australians 10 years to figure this out.

Anyone who thinks that Rudd is more honest than Howard is most definately indulging in thinking of the wishful kind.
Even through the TV you can see Rudd's real exexpression trying to escape through the painted on one, & the 10 ton press, holding down, what he would realy like to say.
There is none so blind as those who do not want to see, or those who don't care. Those who voted fot Keating proved that.

Then, perhaps my judgment, is becomming clouded by my growing disgust, over the last couple of years, with another lying polly called Beattie, who must have now captured the record for lying, to match the one for imcompetence, he already holds.