Our Guest Author is, once again, Gorgeous Dunny, with another of his fascinating “Memoirs of a Country Employment Counsellor”. Thank you, GD!
(Credit: Joseph A. Rosen, Guitar International)
Lessons in life can spring from the most improbable sources. The legendary guitarist Les Paul never forgot one he’d had as a small boy.
A road workman on a lunch break fascinated him by playing lively tunes on his harmonica. Suddenly the workman stopped and handed young Les the harmonica, saying, “Here, you have a go.”
Les shyly declined, mentioning he couldn’t play. The workman jumped up angrily and shouted, “Never say you can’t until you prove you can’t!” He handed him the harmonica again and said, “Now, Play!”
Young Les modestly complied, fumbling away making awkward sounds from the instrument. The workman, now more kindly, took the harmonica back from him and said, “All right, son. You’ve proved you can’t play at the moment. It don’t mean you can’t ever play. Always remember that, kid. Never say you can’t until you prove you can’t.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZFKeyGpgK0
Les did always remember, and applied it to everything he tackled in life. The harmonica was the first musical instrument that he mastered, but he was destined for much greater things as an innovator with the guitar.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HH8vjxFIUC4
As a teenager, I’d read this story in one of those Readers Digest features called something like, “My most unforgettable moments”. It stayed with me because Les Paul’s amazing guitar performances had made him an idol of mine. I started to include it in my own life because it sounded pretty good. How do we know we can’t, if we don’t prove we can’t?
In my tourism career, I found it a useful way of addressing problems. In Sydney during the late 60s, South Australian Tourist Bureau did very well out of interest in the semi-desert and desert areas of the Flinders Ranges and Central Australia. But one problem was that tourist services were virtually confined to the winter months from April to September. The climate could be quite severe in the summer months, and air-conditioning was not then commonplace.
(Aroona Dam, Flinders Ranges, South Australia. Photograph: Mike Langford )
Yet many people, because of their employment or business, could only travel in the summer months. I negotiated for some time with tour operators before one took the plunge with an Ayers Rock- Alice Springs tour ex Adelaide starting from Boxing Day. It required a little adaption such as air-conditioned vehicles and avoiding much travel through the middle of the day. But it could be done. The tour was oversubscribed, leading to another departure. That operator expanded the following season and other tour operators offered services after that success.
It was more daunting for the Birdsville and Strzelecki Tracks and Simpson Desert areas. Even during the winter months, only four-wheel drive vehicles could be used and great care had to be exercised. One ‘regular’ couple that had grown to love desert areas had a long ambition to tour there, but could only travel during December-January. Again I lobbied various operators before one agreed to try it. My couple were among the first to book in what became a successful, in-demand tour.
(Credit: Malcur)
(Credit: Australian Geographic – Photograph: Jiri Lochman)
They could not contain their joy when they returned to tell me about it. He developed a shocking sun skin cancer on the forehead but felt that it was a small price for what was the trip of a lifetime. I tried to bring that attitude to my later career in employment counselling, never say you can’t, until you prove you can’t.
I received just such a challenge at Portland when Bev came to see me. She was seeking Labour Market Program (LMP) assistance to do a two-year travel course. I should mention that the Commonwealth Employment Service (CES) could only approve LMP assistance for course durations of up to one year. Anything longer had to be recommended and approved by me. As it turned out, it was singularly appropriate that it went to me.
Bev had no problem meeting the eligibility requirements for assistance. She was in her late twenties and had a most unusual background. As a qualified chef, her employment future had seemed assured until an unusual accident at home in Melbourne. She fell off a stool while doing some repairs at home. From the subsequent head injuries she had a stroke. After rehabilitation, and parental support in her native town of Portland, she had made a partial recovery, but had a permanent paralysis of her right side – arm and leg. She got around with a walking stick and had learned other things such as writing with her left hand.
Being used to her own independence, Bev was determined to return to work. She could never return to cooking because of the heavy work shifting pots, plus the general agility now denied her with the right side paralysis. So she looked at retraining for work as a travel consultant where her disability would not be a major problem.
This was the dilemma for me. She could have remained on disability pension for the rest of her life, but she wanted to work and deserved to be encouraged. Yet coming from the travel industry myself, I knew immediately that it was unsuited to her. She was an introvert personality. She had no clerical/administrative background.
Without exceptional motivation, it was hard to see how she could adapt. Part of my recommendation was based around the prospects of her getting employment after completing the course. I just couldn’t see it happening in Bev’s case.
On the other hand, I felt that whatever I did, I should not say to her that she can’t do it. She ought to be encouraged, but the challenge was to get her going in a vocational direction that would be beneficial. Instead, I asked her why she had decided to do a travel training course. Her answer was startling and enlightening. She had been determined to work again as she recovered. Whatever she tried to do, she’d always been told it was not possible. Finally, she’d received a lot of encouragement from a social worker. She suggested the Travel course to Bev.
The choice was inappropriate in my view. But it was understandable that, having been given no encouragement to that point, she should snatch at that option. I had formed quite different ideas based on my experience in rehabilitation. I believed that it was easier to make the transition to a new career if you could draw on the knowledge and experience of your existing trade or occupation.
For example, I’d had considerable success with former building industry tradespeople (plumbing, bricklaying, carpentry, painting) by placing them in hardware store retail sales. Their particular knowledge was a major sales asset for the hardware stores’ primary client group of home handymen/renovators. Often the essential need of these customers was the knowledge/advice of how to address a problem or an emergency. The sales of recommended products followed from that advice.
I’d encouraged other injured tradespeople into getting TAFE training qualifications so that they could teach or assess/test apprentices. These methods lessened the amount of learning needed to enter a new occupation, while drawing on areas of knowledge in which they were competent. My idea with Bev was that such a pathway would make it a little easier to achieve her goal of useful employment.
The trick was how to bring her around to this idea without discouraging her. What I had in mind was something like an Advanced Certificate in Hospitality, which was essentially about kitchen management in a hotel or restaurant. It took in such things as planning menus and supplies, arranging services, training apprentices and kitchen-hands plus specialty things such as nutrition, diet and hygiene. It would still require her to develop additional skills, but in the context of advancing on her existing knowledge and skills.
South West TAFE at Warrnambool had a School of Hospitality and Tourism, which was ideal for what I had in mind. It had options of courses in travel/tourism and hospitality/cookery. I said that, for a start, I’d prefer that she do a course locally (the one she’d originally nominated was in Melbourne) so that she still had parental/family support. She agreed with the sense of that, and I said I’d set up an interview with the Head of that school.
(Credit: Lyons)
I rang him to discuss setting up an interview with Bev. I explained the background and where I was hoping to take it, bearing in mind that I did not want to discourage her. He proved remarkably sympathetic, having a brother with a major disability. He said that he’d show her right through the department and what each course did and led to. He was confident it would be enough information for her to decide for herself and he looked forward to her becoming a student there. I contacted Bev and arranged her transport to Warrnambool for the interview.
A few weeks later, she saw me again about getting training assistance to do the Advanced Certificate in Hospitality. It was a two-year course, just as the travel one was. I happily arranged the recommendation/approval for this course, including the daily commuting bus transport from Portland. I left it to my new friend at TAFE to arrange whatever modifications might have been needed to allow Bev to cope physically.
I still feigned innocence on the whole thing, and I asked her what had changed her mind about her choice of course.
She replied, “Oh, I realized after I went over there that a travel certificate was a stupid choice and that this one made a lot more sense.”
Although I had manipulated the situation a little, I had left the ultimate decision up to her. I was glad she’d reached that conclusion.
I saw her at the end of the year at Warrnambool, when there had to be a renewal of her training assistance program for the second year. She had passed the first year requirements comfortably, and was satisfied with the course she’d selected. The only change was that she’d decided to relocate to Warrnambool for the second year. The daily travel (one hour each way) had been a bit tiring with her disability.
She gained her qualification. I next saw her was a year or two later at Hamilton. I was visiting the Wool Bales, which was a tourism project at Hamilton organized by Yooralla to employ people with severe disabilities. Bev had been recruited (in the ‘open market’) to supervise and train people with disabilities to prepare meals and food for visiting tourists. She seemed very comfortably in her element, training and supervising disability trainees in this work. Visitors to the Wool Bales greatly valued the quality of the food output. The trainees adored Bev as she hobbled about the kitchen barking out instructions.
(Credit: Wikimedia Commons)
I felt a sense of satisfaction not just at the end result but also that I’d had contact with her at all CES offices in this region that I served, starting at Portland, then Warrnambool and finally Hamilton.
It seemed to reinforce to me that where at all possible, you should not close off options to a person seeking to enter or re-enter the workforce. In many cases what they want to do may be a pointless dream, but it should not be up to us to deny them that hope. Rather, by questioning, logical inferences and examples we should encourage people to reach their most achievable goal.
With Bev, I could have justified rejecting her application for training assistance on the grounds that firstly she may not be capable of completing the travel course, and secondly that completion alone would not lead to employment. But of what benefit to her in her efforts to find work? Yet if I had merely approved it on the basis of ‘doing something’ it could have led to similar disappointment. I needed to find a way of not refusing her, but opening up other possibilities. Then she could more easily commit to her own best interests.
My political hero was Don Dunstan, who for a while was also my boss when SA Tourism became part of the Premiers Department. Although he did not consciously adopt an attitude identical to Les Paul’s workman, it was similar but just expressed differently.
(Credit: Radio Adelaide)
When faced with urgently needed reforms, whether from decriminalizing homosexuality to imposing a deposit on beverage containers, Dunstan would always ask the question, “Well, why not?”
If he couldn’t give a rational answer to that, then he’d do something about it. The political difficulty was not an issue. Should it be, he would work on bringing opponents around to it. What mattered was whether it was right or needed to be done. It does require political courage. Other states have buckled at drink container reform just as soon as the selfish beverage lobby turned up the heat on them. But what is right is often more important than what is politically safe to do.
Who would have thought that the outlook of a road works laborer from 90 years ago could still resonate? It does seem a good approach to life.
Never Say You Can’t, Until You Prove You Can’t.
THE PUB 
Jaeger
Has it splashed in?
Live coverage:
It looks like it broke apart before it reached perihelion (closest approach to the Sun) and evaporated.
Good morning Dawn Patrollers.
The Unravelling! Fraudband is now living up to its name.
http://www.smh.com.au/it-pro/government-it/confidential-briefing-nbn-unlikely-to-meet-coalitions-deadline-20131128-hv3tp.html
From the Senate Committee hearing yesterday.
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/nov/28/telstra-network-held-together-plastic-bags
You’re playing with fire, Prissy!
http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/former-panellists-unite-in-support-of-gonski-reforms-20131128-2yecj.html
Mark Kenny thinks so, too.
http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-opinion/pynes-broken-promise-set-to-haunt-abbott-20131127-2ya8p.html
Ned Manning on the same subject.
http://www.smh.com.au/comment/how-gonski-kept-teachers-going-20131127-2ya8n.html
Section 2 . . .
A delightful play on words from Alan Moir.
http://www.smh.com.au/photogallery/federal-politics/cartoons/alan-moir-20090907-fdxk.html
David Pope keeps up the pressure on Abbott.
http://www.smh.com.au/photogallery/federal-politics/cartoons/david-pope-20120214-1t3j0.html
Ron Tandberg with democracy Victorian style.
http://www.smh.com.au/photogallery/federal-politics/cartoons/ron-tandberg-20090910-fixc.html
A rather strange contribution today from David Rowe on business models.
http://www.afr.com/p/national/cartoon_gallery_david_rowe_1g8WHy9urgOIQrWQ0IrkdO
For comparison here’s Comet Lovejoy, a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kreutz_Sungrazers"Kreutz Sungrazer comet that did make it around the sun, but disintegrated a few days later:
And from the Land of the Free – Slow news day, it’s Thanksgiving.
School governance Colorado style.
http://thepoliticalcarnival.net/2013/11/28/circumcision-no-chop-it-all-off/
Some more Thanksgiving Day cartoons.
http://thepoliticalcarnival.net/2013/11/28/cartoons-day-happy-thanksgiving/
Well done that man. 🙂
No, I don’t think so. At perihelion, the comet would have be travelling at 684,000 kph; it would take a lot of energy to slow it (or what’s left of it) down enough to fall into the Sun. Large fragments should continue on the original orbit (more or less); gas and dust would probably get blow away by the solar wind.
Here’s Comet Lovejoy again; it skimmed the Sun a mere 140,000km or so above the surface, travelling at a maximum of 536 km/s (0.18% of the speed of light!) Not bad for a dirty snowball:
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/sunearth/news/comet-lovejoy.html
The government cannot help itself.
It’s still in election campaign mode. I saw Pyne interviewed last night and half his blathering consisted mainly of “Short Change Shorten” and similar schoolyard name-calling.
This may play well in the Tradies Bar at Rooty Hill RSL, and on 2GB, but where else would any serious adult think it’s a worthwhile contribution to debate?
Abbott, himself, is on a road to Perdition. He’s finding that simple, short-term solutions like sending a letter to SBY don’t instantly fix complex international problems. Commentators like Sheridan, an Abbott crony for decades, declaring Peace In Our Time don’t make it so. SBY doesn’t so much want an apology for Kevin Rudd’s spying, or an agreement on future spying (regulated spying? Does anyone think this is a serious topic?), but a resetting of the entire relationship between Australia and Indonesia, with Indonesia occupying a status more befitting its position in Asia. No more “You likey-likey Ozzie aid?” for SBY.
Abbott’s journey seems to consist of a ruthless determination to carry out promises made, at the time, simply to differentiate his opposition from the Labor government. The reasoning and even the tactical motivations have been lost in the mists of time, yet he persists in attempting to maintain the glory days of Opposition where every week brought a new poll that “spelt doom for the Gillard government”, based on something or other Abbott had spurted out (or if Kevin Rudd appeared at a local fete taking selfies for the adoring crowds).
If Abbott blurted out something about tearing down the NBN, in the heat of the moment, in parliament, by God he was going to stick with it through thick and thin, even though his alternative Fraudband brainfart is such a joke. It was never meant to be actually built. It was just a “because-it’s-not-Labor’s-idea” idea.
Joe Hockey spent so much time railing against (what now were clearly) miniscule rises in the debt limit that you’d think he’d have too much pride to try to raise it himself, and by an amount greater than anything Labor ever dreamed of.
The old tricks just aren’t working anymore. They used to say, “But we’re not the government” whenever they were asked a too curly question. They don’t have that excuse anymore. Sure, they’re trying to milk as much out of the old paradigm as possible by saying, “But we’re only a new government, just elected”, but the public has been conditioned to expect instant fixes, and idea put into their empty heads, ironically, by none other than the Coalition themselves.
To the public, the only saving grace of Fraudband was that we’d have it up and running by 2016, in toto. 25 mBits was bearable, just, if it could be built quickly. And if you really wanted fibre into the premises, you could pay for it. But the revelations in today’s SMH from what appears to be a leaked Communications Blue Book show they’ll be lucky to have even turned the first sod by then, much less built the creaking, bloody monster on rotting copper foundations.
We were told by supposedly professional journalists that three years of slagging-off of Indonesia, by Abbott, was forgiven in a single afternoon’s chat between Abbott and SBY. Once again: the Instant Fix. When the Spy Crisis broke, the same hacks, Foreign Affairs wonks all by now, soberly informed us that it was a long time ago and that Abbott could have solved it easily by being more up-front about it, instead of “refusing to apologize”.
It was never about the actual spying. That cat was belled when no mention whatsoever was made of Kevin Rudd (or Julia Gillard) by the Indonesians. At least they twigged that Rudd was not in power today, and indeed, not even in the parliament. Abbott had thought he was clever in apologizing for Julia Gillard’s transgressions. He’d gotten the word “apology” into the debate, but it wasn’t for anything he’d done. But it seems like it didn’t impress SBY.
Nevertheless, the whispers from Abbott hacks (who play the role of “the other side of Abbott’s mouth”) were that it was all down to Kevin Rudd. That may have played well domestically (or may not have), but still no ice was cut.
We had an Instant Fix to the original Indonesia-Australia problem (really a Coalition-Indonesia problem) touted that wasn’t an instant fix at all. Then we were told that an Instant Fix might have worked to fix the Spying Crisis. And now we have been told that a simple exchange of letters – another Instant Fix – has finally done the trick.
Except it hasn’t.
Life is not as simple as the Coalition in Opposition told us it would be.
We were also told that, in and of itself, the election of a Coalition government would solve the Consumer confidence problem, literally from Day #1. Retail stores prepared Monster Sales for the Sunday. No-one turned up. They were too busy buying stuff off eBay.
This prophesized, miraculous turnaround was yet another Instant Fix. Presumably the Coalition would stop whingeing about the economy overnight, they’d take the pressure off (classic “Protection Racket” tactics), and all would be well.
Except they didn’t stop whingeing. They ramped it up, more concerned with making excuses than purveying sunshine.
The Instant Fix combined with a gloomy, complaining Opposition mindset have killed off any chance of an improvement in consumer, or business confidence. Instead of talking up the economy, Joe Hockey is crying about debt, threatening to close down GMH, preparing swingeing cuts, and generally taking us down with him in a vortex of gloom, simply to save his own political skin, and to avoid having to admit that the Instant Fix never was a goer.
“As ye sow, so shall ye reap”. All true, and what they will soon be reaping is a whirlwind of pain, and deservedly so.
Their sin, their mortal sin, was to tell us that all the nation’s problems – real and imaginary – could be solved simply by their being elected, with no need for policies or any attempt at forward thinking on their (or our) parts required. Elect us and the pain will go away.
Well, you can’t eat slogans. And you can’t keep on making up new names for Bill Shorten forever, hoping they’ll do as a substitute for policy and work ethic. Eventually you have to DO something constructive, not destructive, and you have to take the people along with you.
This mob are a disgrace, a shame upon Australia. They have few ideas on what to do, and most of the ones they do have are rusty with age. Playing dress-ups, and changing hairstyles won’t save Abbott. Parsing his own words for non-existant nuances, won’t help Pyne. Putting that “angry look” on his face won’t help Joe Hockey. Writing a letter to SBY won’t mollify the Indonesians. And going to cocktail parties, showing off her nipples, won’t save Julie Bishop from what is coming.
They promised a land of milk and honey and they’ve produced a lemon instead. There is no such thing as the Instant Fix, and there never was. Because it’s in the Australian and the Daily Telegraph, and on 2GB doesn’t make it true.
I look forward with great anticipation to watching the Coalition, and the media, learn this lesson.
The Idiot is absolutely clueless. He seems to think international diplomacy is exactly the same as being on the SRC at uni – if your fellow members don’t do what you want you just act like a thug, hurl insults, make threats, punch a few walls and break a few glass doors until everyone caves in. He also seems to think China and Indonesia need us more then we need them. He’s wrong.
Today we have this –
Jakarta extends bans on co-operation
http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/jakarta-extends-bans-on-cooperation-20131128-2yel0.html#ixzz2lyOTuPCT
And this –
Tony Abbott refuses to back down over China comments
http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/tony-abbott-refuses-to-back-down-over-china-comments-20131128-2ydw1.html#ixzz2lyN9eo3m
The abbott and his ilk will discover the folly of being diplomatic idiots and they will learn the hard way that China and Indonesia can, and will do very well for themselves without having to put up with arrogant sniping and hissy fits from an Australian Government which lied its way into office. Our regional neighbours will teach Australia an important lesson as it sits down at the arse end of the region in isolation.
http://www.avaaz.org/en/petition/Malcolm_Turnbull_MP_Minister_for_Communications_in_the_Australian_Governme_Roll_out_FTTH_so_people_can_watch_4K_TV/?copy
My Petition, not meant as a Petition as such, just to draw attention to the need for 4K and 3D TV—by 2016 4K TVs will be cheaper but without FTTH people will be peeved they can’t watch real 4KTV on their big TVs/home cinema set ups etc. Make the Libs want roll out FTTH out of sheer self preservation.
Hojo put his judges cap on as he delivers his decision regarding the takeover bid of Grain Corp by ADM. I suspect ADM took the abbott’s election win speech at face value when he declared Australia was now open for business and thought the success of their “investment” bid was a foregone conclusion. The coalition fan club are lauding HoJo as being on a par with the “great” treasurer Costello!
Well we can wipe off the chance to become an important part of the Asian century. It appears it will be, as I predicted before th election, that our role would be, the white trash of Asia.
It has not sunk into the skulls of what we have as governmental today, that others do not need us, do not rely on us.
Even yesterday, Abbott said that trade will continue with China, no matter what we say. That they need us, more than we need them.
Mt. Abbott, once again, you have it wrong.
Indonesia said today, they will pick up helping Australia out, when Abbott gets his act together. Yes, Indonesia has told Abbott he needs them, more than they need us.
Abbott, time to cut the stunts. Time to cut the slogans, and get down to governing. That is what you were elected for.
There is no time for settling what you see as old scores.
Governments are elected, to govern fr all. Mr. Abbott, that includes listening to all, and even making compromises.
It is time. to drop your stance, of fighting for what Mr. Santamaria seen as important, and bring your mind into this century.
Cassidy:
The “clapped out sedan” was only “clapped out” because Abbott and his gang took to it with a tyre iron, denting every panel, smashing every piece of glass. They let the tyres down, poured sugar in the petrol tank and shoved a potato up the exhaust pipe. They drained the sump and keyringed the Duco.
Then they had the hide to say the original owner hadn’t looked after it.
Worse, journalists like Cassidy swallowed the line whole, and repeat it ad nauseam.
Surprise, surprise…
Take-out statement from Mumble in today’s article:
by significantly underestimating preference flows from minors and Independents.
Conroy just played Ziggy saying fibre would, and should, kill copper… from four years ago.
OUCH!!!
Ziggy says a girl’s got a right to change his mind… hasn’t he?
Cassidy,
A has-been who never was much to crow about. Like the rest of the country’s twits who pass themselves off as journalists, they supped on the bullshit of coalition propaganda, rubbed their sated bellies and sat on TV panels of their own ilk and set about trashing and destroying good government as well as sullying the character of our first female prime minister. And, to what end?
Cassidy does what all the others are doing, that thing that’s making me so angry, lumping everyone together, referring to ‘the electorate’ or ‘voters’ or ‘we’, saying ‘we’ all voted for this government. Well, no, ‘we’ didn’t. Half of us voted against the lousy scumbags – or 46 point something percent accordng to the AEC figures. A few million didn’t even bother to turn up or if they did, voted informal.
So stop it. Stop telling me I voted for this government. Stop telling me I’m happy with what they are doing. Stop saying the whole country is absolutely delighted with Abbott’s tough stance on whatever. Because it’s not true. But then, when did Cassidy and his ilk ever tell the truth anyway?
F(ig)MD
The Abbott gov’t taking on China!
Abbott continues to trash this country in our major trading partners’ eyes. Well done you mob of braindead dinosaurs.
Senate Hearings on NBNCo now on.
If Rudd hadn’t happened before the election, Conroy would have been there to put the skids under Truffles so that the voters would not have been conned so badly with fraudband. Neither Rudd nor Albo knew enough about the NBN/communications portfolio and were left wanting in trying to show fraudband for what it is.
Tony Abbott, the train wreck…meet ; Casey Jones, the union scab and another train wreck!
Fed up,
Where?
I’m starting to think that Turnbull really believes in Fraudband and will defend it to the bitter end.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-11-29/leaked-nbn-co-document-downgrades-revenue-projections/5124258
So now the Murdoch media’s resident Rudd fanboy tells us this. Obviously to spill the beans earlier in the year wouldn’t have helped his hero take back the prize.
Oh, I doubt Turncoat believes in it, he knows it is a crock, that is why he snaps at informed questioners when they ask pointed questions about FTTN. He is doing what he is told while keeping an eye open to replacing Abbott.
Leone,
They lump us all together as having voted for these scumbags because it makes them feel better to think ‘everyone else’ is as stupid as they were.
Apparently about a million voters didn’t vote at all and some 800,000 voted informal (A chunk of these I suspect did so deliberately because they refused to vote for Rudd and couldn’t vote for the abbott).
There seems to be a sad lack of satire comedy about Australian politics lately. Before the election shows like Mad as Hell and Wednesday Night Fever pulled no punches in kicking Labor while it was down, but now there seems to be nothing. The only ‘comedy’ out there is imported American sitcoms, British panel shows and any “Australian” comedy is just celebrity gossip and shallow trash.
Are they forbidden to make ridicule of Abbott and the Liberal Party? I imagine that’s the case on the ABC, since bullying thugs hate being made fun of, so I doubt there’ll ever be an “At Home With Tony” series. That’s a shame, it’s not like there’s any lack of material.
Unless of course, Australian politics itself is meant to be the comedy. That’d be understandable, since modern comedy seems to be not so much about wits, just lashing out viciously at certain targets.
Austalian politics is way beyond being any sort of comedy. It’s already a three-act tragedy and getting worse.
puffytmd
November 29, 2013 at 8:49 AM
F(ig)MD
The Abbott gov’t taking on China!
Abbott continues to trash this country in our major trading partners’ eyes. Well done you mob of braindead dinosaurs.
I don’t disagree. I just liked that description of ‘dinosaurs’ coming from a dragon. Who better to know, I suppose?
From the looks of it, Ziggy Bulldust is about as fit to run the NBN as Basil Fawlty is fit to run a hotel.
Dragons and dinosaurs are not related in any way. The proof is that they are all dead and we are still here. 🙂
I thought The Roast had its moments, when I caught it. That wasn’t often though as it was 10 minutes on AB2 at 7.30. And I’ve just noticed its last episode was a month ago (http://www.abc.net.au/tv/theroast/)
I think you’re being a bit unfair on Mad As Hell too. They gave it to the Libs just as hard if not harder I thought. Couldn’t believe it when they wrapped up the latest series earlier in the year and didn’t have another planned for election time.
Puffy,
Attadragon!
I didn’t think they were just as hard on the Liberals. Sure there were some moments where they made fun of them, but the overarching narrative of the entire program was that “Labor are going to lose no matter what” and that sucked the humour out of it for me. Touches like pro-Labor characters looking desperate and scared and being made to look hypocritical and out of touch and pro-Coalition characters being cocksure and confident despite being a little loopy.
Conroy on NBN buying back the Telstra copper network:
“You could be shaping up to be the country’s second Alan Bond”
Ludlum: “Fraudband will cost more, charge more, earn less, and break down more often than Labor’s NBN… so WHY are we building it?”
Ziggy: “I dunno.”
Conroy cuts to the chase:
“Your TASK is to get 25 mBit Fraudband built to everywhere in the country by 2016.”
Ziggy: “That’s not a task. That’s a footprint.”
Sorry Ziggy… Turnbull promised it would be fullly up and running by 2016..
Another promise broken.
Ziggy is a clown.
Ziggy Whataclownski.
Free articles, decision was announced this morning.
http://www.afr.com/p/business/companies/hockey_rejects_adm_graincorp_takeover_NCmrWeaJLbeHeyOUlfPyXP
http://www.afr.com/p/business/companies/hockey_decision_leaves_graincorp_6IXpmpYrnQ6MOKsmsce1lM
That lady on the Senate Committee is making excellent points as a non-techie, i.e. the common voice.
You don’t have to be too technical to understand that a copper network that Telstra itself indicated was at “5 minutes to midnight” 10 years ago (with subsequent neglect of maintenance ever since) is rooted, especially compared to something that can deliver gigabits per second and last for another hundred years, at least.
And this extra speed being provided all for a lousy couple of billion dollars more.
I hope if Labor wins in 2016 it won’t be too expensive to just resume FTTH again. Or if it is, Labor can sell the message “Well, sorry, but the LNP stuffed up the plan so badly that we’ll have to pay even more for a decent network”.
I’d hate for the situation to be something like “Sorry, but it’s too late, you voted for this second rate plan so that’s all you’re getting this decade”.
*Correction:
“Sorry, but it’s too late, the majority of you voted for this second rate plan”
To listen,go to parliament site, where one can listen live,
Slower, less profit to the taxpayer.
Yes, and made up of many different technologies , most that are or becoming superseded, that differ across the country.
One that needs to be connected to the power grid,
What we are now getting is a uniform system, across this country, One technology, that does not breed to be connected to the power system. One that is cheaper to maintain.
Conroy is challenging Ziggy honesty,
Ziggy is unimpressive, I must say.