Trashcanman,

I see that while attempting to nit pick, you chose not to challenge that:
-Your previous claim that the costs will double are rubbish,
-that the government are incompetent at large projects.

PS. A huge scheme to build a government corporation with sole ownership of the countries network resources, and a shift back to state based employment, easily fits within the definition of social engineering.

Oh TCM “...There is no name-calling on this planet that could offend me as much as you telling me my children should not have been born (GrahamY take note)”

… it seems I have “rattled” you somewhat, how apt!

Ah well so be it,

Re “what has happened to society or the attitudes etc of younger generations while on their watch.”

Yes, we have a problem

Maybe bring back military conscription … that might help

Or make prison a place where even big men fear to tread, instead of “Disneyland with bars”.

Anyway.. like I said previously, we are all individuals, one way of stopping the indolent failing in their responsibility for bringing up their children is to cut their dole payments to the point they cannot afford kids, instead of all the namby-pamby handouts for irresponsible procreation which we have today.

Like I said previously, none of the children I fathered have asked for subsidy since before the age of 21..

I suppose some leftie-minded social worker would say that the advantage they will gain from that self-reliance is an unfair benefit they have over the “waifs and stray” offspring of the indiscriminate fornicators and should thus be taxed more

But we don’t live in that sort of "bizarro" world, where the best “advantage” is to be able to claim a “disadvantage”.

“we need to go beyond profit when talking about issues of nation-building.”

Yes, Russia tried that… had the best "nation building" nuclear missiles in the world… and shops full of empty shelves!

Your theory of “nation building” is just another socialist fraud..


It has been tried and failed more times than you have had a sandwich (or a hot dinner)

Fixing the illegal boat arrivals is easy…. Issue the RAN with smart bombs instead of life belts… but humanely, we should probably just

Lock ‘em up on Nauru
Add them to a list of “never to be allowed entry to Australia”
And send them back to wherever the boat sailed from and let that country work out their country of origin.

"if we want to remain a competitive economy"

Yes, I think we ought to break that idea apart and work out what it is about "a competitive economy" which is more important than anything else:

More important than any moral stand.
More important than balancing work and family.
More important than the mental health of our kids.
More important than preserving our ability as a nation to manufacture our own everyday-necessities.
More important than our chances to survive once the world-population bubble explodes.

Are we selling ourselves for cheap holidays overseas? or for bigger plasma screens?

Perhaps you can tell us, TrashcanMan, what does competitiveness mean for you, then we can see whether we can find an alternative way to achieve what you actually want.

Shadow Minister,

So it's better not to build any railways, roads or hospitals now either because they will be cheaper and better later on?

Maybe governments should stay out of those areas too and "let the market decide".

My final argument against is this;We are in dire economic times,we don't need more debt.Why is the ordinary tax payer forking our again for multi-nationals to use this infrastucture for free.

In the near future there may be cheaper and better mediums of sending information.So what's the hurry? I find the speed right now just fine.

Rache,

To avoid looking like an idiot, I would suggest actually reading the thread.

The government could spend trillions of dollars on anticipated infrastructure, or even on infrastructure that is needed now. The issue is to get the best bang for the buck now.

Having just racked up nearly $90bn in debt since coming into office, this is hardly the time to whip out the credit card.