Dear Shadow Minister,

Congratulations you've ticked a few more talking points.

Now concentrate mate,

Bob Katter.

Csteele,

Nice try. I understand that you need to change the subject after having your Labor fairy tale debunked.

Dear Shadow Minister,

You can't ignore Bob, there he sits, all 10 Gallons of him.

During the recession the total number of construction jobs in Australia went up by around 5% a year. Over the same period the US lost 30% or more jobs in the sector.

What do you think it would have done to our economy to have even half that fall inflicted on us?

Did you know how much money was required to achieve that? You might call it excessive in hindsight but Rudd and Swann did a hell of a job by Bob Katter's reckoning and unless you can give me a good reason to disregard his take and accept yours I will stick with his assessment precisely because it is not Labour Party hype nor Liberal Party dismissiveness.

I don't believe that Howard/Costello would have been capable of handling the GFC response as effectively as Rudd/Swan.

The way the conservatives operate and think would have stopped them from making the necessary decisions.

Their principles consist only of -

1. Smaller Government and lower taxes
2. Less corporate regulation and
3. Deregulation of the labour market

-and that's about all.

To do anything else is "not in their DNA".

They baulk at spending money on infrastructure and their response would likely have been to give tax cuts to corporations and the higher tax rates and further cut working conditions to provide a stimulus at the higher levels.

Rudd succeeded because they provided the stimulus at the bottom level where it would provide an immediate effect instead of hoping for a "trickle-down". This strategy has since been widely acknowledged as being the correct one.

By the way, the insulation scheme was actually something left behind "on the shelf" by the previous minister Malcolm Turnbull. It was poorly managed because the implementation was too rushed but not quite as disasterous as (mis)represented in the media.

Csteele and wobbles.

As pointed out previously the Coalition successfully guided Aus through the Asian crisis with hardly a hiccup, and while not getting a surplus, didn't incur anywhere near the same debt.

Both of you seem to forget that controlled spending in a recession is not rocket science, and Rudd / Swan didn't do anything special.

Construction industry threatened - build something
Car industry threatened - subsidize car purchases
etc.

The problem is that they managed it badly, and we ended up with far more debt than needed, and almost nothing to show for it, nothing at least that would help the economy.

C steel, I can't believe you said this....By the way, the insulation scheme was actually something left behind "on the shelf" by the previous minister Malcolm Turnbull. It was poorly managed because the implementation was too rushed but not quite as disasterous as (mis)represented in the media.

I suggest you try telling that to the parents of those young ones who lost their lives, despite the warnings, or, perhaps one of the many who either can't sell their house, as it hasn't been rectified, or, it's burned down.

As i have said before, there is no shame in not knowing how to implement a good plan, but it's a crying shame when industry experts advice is totally ignored.

Rock star one day, waking disaster the next.