EYE-BALL’s Harry’s Growl on – Election 2013 – Growl No: 14 – The ALP tinkering and staring at the abyss …

Latest ‘Harry’s Growl’ Posts: – 10th Feb – Election 2013 – Growl No: 13 – The Obeid Dynasty Profile – – 9th Feb – Election 2013  – Growl No: 12 – Dunce Hat’s sit firmly on Gillard and Swan’s noggin’s – – 8th Feb – Election 2013 – Growl No: 11 – Parliamentary remuneration – Peter Slipper in Profile – – 8th Feb – Growl No: 10 – Parliamentary remuneration – Peter Slipper in Profile – – 7th Feb – Election 2013  – Growl No: 9 – Gillard in Focus – – 6th Feb – Election 2013 – Growl No: 8 – Obeid has decided to take a few with him – – 4th Feb – Election 2013 – Growl No: 7 – ABC’s “Q&A” proves none of them have a goddamn clue – 4th Feb – Election 2013 – Growl No: 6 – Gillard in Cartoon Form – – 4th Feb – Election 2013  – Growl No: 5 – Poll Results,  Senate Leadership, & Pyne’s Hitler Gibe – – 2nd Feb –  Election 2013 – Growl No: 4 – Craig Thompson’s Bankruptcy revisited – – 1st Feb – Election 2013  – Growl No: 3 – Roxon’s Rocky Status as the AG  – – 31st Jan – Election 2013 – Growl No: 2 – Gillard lifts her skirts to thrill the Media  – – 28th Jan – Election 2013 – Growl No: 1 – Senator Penny Wong … policy exposed – – 18th Jan – Hedley Thomas and Larry Pickering – – Resume their AWU crusade against Gillard  – – 1st Jan 2013 – Jenny Macklin – Joins Swan as another ALP Fu_kwit – Claims she can live on the Newstart allowance – – 20th Dec – Wayne Swan – His backflip on the 2012-13 Surplus – Makes him the Fu_kwit of all Fu_kwits – – 16th Dec – Lenore Taylor – Chief Political Correspondent for the SMH  – Part II – – A correspondent pushing her own political agenda  – – 15th Dec – Lenore Taylor – Chief Political Correspondent for the SMH  – A correspondent with her own political agenda  – – 14th Dec – Gillard’s Gutter Mouth – The dishonour she does to the office of the Prime Minister – – 3rd Dec – The GREENS – Leader Milne has her head in the sand – – 28th Nov – The Dogs have their BONE Part II – The Wilson Interview and how it reflects on Gillard – – 27th Nov – The Dogs have their BONE Part I – Gillard’s kicked them out the house – – 23rd Nov – The ALP and Obeid Train Wreck  – is it meant to distract from Gillard & the AWU Scandal – – 22nd Nov – Gunfights at the OK Corral: Misandry v Misogyny – GILLARD v Ralph BLEWITT – GILLARD v Hedley THOMAS – GILLARD v Mike SMITH – GILLARD v Larry PICKERING – GILLARD v ALP Caucus – GILLARD v All Australians … – 13th Nov – The Day the heavens began to cave in – – Obeid and his entourage to bring it all down … – – 10th Nov – The 2012 US Presidential Election Part II – The Fallout – the GOP beating up on itself – – 8th Nov – The 2012 US Presidential Election Part I – what does it really mean — – 7th Nov – Bob Carr … Foreign Minister – as profiled by “The Australian’s” Ross Fitzgerald – – 29th Oct – The Most Irrelevant of all Irrelevancy – Independents – Slipper, Thompson, Windsor, Oakeshott, Katter & Wilkie – hanging on to office rather than face the electorate – – 27th Oct – Julia Gillard does not understand Hypocrisy – ALP Powerbrokers dump Penny Wong – makes Gillard look foolish over her ‘sexism’ claims – To see more EYE-BALL Harry’s Growl posts: click here …	Title: – Election 2013  – Growl No: 14 – – The ALP tinkering and staring at the abyss –  | Author: EYE-BALL’s Harry’s Growl | 15th Feb 2013|
	New Pickering images added – 15th Feb 2013 – see end of text linked here The ‘House’ finished its first session for the year yesterday –  the Opposition did not raise the AWU scandal during the two-week sitting. As strategy I think the Opposition erred – they only had to ask a single question of Gillard and she would have been on the back-foot and distracted – This is what they should have asked – “The Question is to the Prime Minister: “Prime Minister the police investigating the AWU scandal have interview a number of people, are you one of them, if not, have they advised or have you been advised that the police are wanting to question you?” … The Supplementary … “…Prime Minister, do you expect to be interviewed by the police, and if so, what do why do you think the police consider you a ‘person of interest’?” … or something along these lines …. This AWU overhang is just one of the issues Gillard has closing in around her – her most pressing agenda is how to counter Mr Rudd and his re-emergence as a ‘Lazarus’ like ghost wanting to walk and dance over her grave. In addition her Cabinet is breaking ranks, her caucus is in silent revolt and feeding the media with ‘bombs’ that have Gillard tip-towing with her head swiveled watching for the assassins – she knows how they work and she knows they are coming. The brave face she offered when senior Ministers Roxon and Evans quit, the makeup holding up the brave face is cracking – it’s not a case of her standing too close to the fire and the clay caked face drying out – she’s in the fire and relying on her devil cousins to once again protect her. The Opposition’s attacks over the two-week ‘House’ session focused on economic management targeting both Gillard and Swan. They harassed Swan over his ‘surplus’ backflip, the farcical MRRT ‘tax collect’, getting the unemployment big number wrong i.e. 5.1% when the correct figure is 5.4%, and a lot more. Below are some snippets of media stories over the MRRT debacle over the past week when Swan was forced by the Courts to release the MRRT collect when he tried to have the numbers hidden. Swan must stop his games and rein in spending: … I GUESS it’s a boy thing. Mine’s bigger than yours. This was Wayne Swan’s claim about the government’s fiscal consolidation record. Sadly, it does not stand up to scrutiny – Keating’s and Costello’s were bigger. And by the way, whatever is in the forward estimates – forwards, in Wayne speak – does not count, as we have seen with the ditching of the surplus commitment less than two months after it was “confirmed” in the Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook. If size is not everything, Swan boasted for a while about the speed of his government’s fiscal consolidation. He has had to drop this bit of bragging too, as it is not true. He now tells us that “we have very substantial fiscal consolidation in place to pay for Gonski and the NDIS”. But hang on, if Gonski and the NDIS are to be paid for – let’s underestimate the real cost and put it at $12 billion per year, for argument’s sake – there will be no fiscal consolidation. Digital Pass $1 for first 28 Days If we look at the forward estimates, the government is only anticipating an underlying cash balance (surplus) of $6.4bn in 2015-16. The projected surpluses are even lower in 2013-14 and 2014-15. Absent some very large savings – and note that the Treasurer likes to include tax hikes in his list of “saves” – there is no way that the government can fund the NDIS and Gonski and achieve any meaningful fiscal consolidation. The budgetary pickle in which the government is stuck is entirely of its own making. It failed to realise that the underlying tax base is unlikely to recover for years. It continued to spend when the economic imperatives had subsided. It irresponsibly shuffled spending and receipts between years, bringing some forward and deferring others, in order to keep the pretence of a surplus in 2012-13 alive. … continues… Two weeks ago the Government Treasury exposes mining tax flaws: … In explosive testimony to the Senate economics committee yesterday, Dr Parkinson said Treasury had compiled its budget forecasts in ignorance of the real cost of concessions agreed to by Wayne Swan and Resources Minister Martin Ferguson when they renegotiated the tax in private with the chief executives of BHP Billiton, Rio Tinto and Xstrata in mid-2010. “We’ve adjusted those estimates for the things that we can see that have changed in the interim. What we haven’t done is adjust the estimates for things that we can’t see,” he said. Reporting a $3 billion loss as it wrote down the value of assets, Rio yesterday confirmed that it had paid no minerals resource rent tax on its massive West Australian iron ore operations or its east-coast coalmines. Dr Parkinson said that when Treasury lowered its forecast for first-year revenue from the MRRT from the $3bn predicted in last May’s budget to $2bn in the October update, it had taken into account falling commodity prices, the high value of the Australian dollar and increases in state government royalties. “We can see the commodity prices . . . and we can get very quick estimates of movements in volume,” he said. “The second thing we can see in real time is the exchange rate; and the third thing we can see in real time is state royalty rates.” … continues … More MRRT woes as Twiggy Forrest’s Fortescue takes the Government to court: …In documents lodged in the High Court in response to a challenge by Andrew Forrest’s Fortescue Metals Group, the government rejects the miner’s key claim that the minerals resource rent tax is unconstitutional because it is levied on miners unequally between states. The legal moves come as Julia Gillard faces growing pressure from the Greens and independents to abandon her agreement with miners under which royalties can be deducted from a company’s MRRT liability. And in a reprise of the Treasurer’s war against Mr Forrest, the government submission suggests the High Court should see the challenge as an example of Fortescue attempting to evade paying the MRRT. “In the end, this case should be seen for what it is,” the submission says. “The plaintiffs do not like the MRRT Act because they may have to pay more for the ability to harness above-normal profits from carrying on mining in Australia.” Fortescue has said it does not expect to pay a significant amount of MRRT for several years due to generous depreciation provisions available only to established miners. The legal challenge to the MRRT — which raised $126 million in its first six months — is due to be heard in the High Court on March 6. … continues … And to add to the MRRT woes – Mr Rudd stoked the fire when he pointed the witch’s stick at Swan and Gillard as the recalcitrant architect’s of the revamped MRRT that gave miners a big windfall.   Their reason for booting RUDD was the miners taking on the Government over the MRRT and winning the PR battle only months out from an election.   It seems the wheel has turned full circle and the MRRT disaster is again at the doorstep of both Gillard and Swan.  Rudd is on the prowl, testing the waters again … and just the very thought of him again out there working the back channels and undermining Gillard makes us all glow at the impending ALP disaster. A spill is only weeks away … perhaps as soon as before the next House sitting in mid-March. … see Rudd’s fire stoking story below – … KEVIN Rudd says Wayne Swan and Julia Gillard must bear the responsibility for Labor’s mining tax and deal with the consequences its near non-existent revenue. The former prime minister said the government must now be mindful of the undertakings it gave the mining industry when recasting the tax after he was deposed as Labor leader. But said Australians deserved a fair share of the nation’s natural resources, and urged the government to be bold in its attempts to plug the tax’s revenue holes. “No government should ever take a backwards step in pursuit of the national interest,” Mr Rudd told Sky News. Mr Rudd said it was Mr Swan who’d come up with the initial design of the tax, based on the findings of the Henry Review which the Treasurer commissioned. He said the decision to dump the resources super profits tax was made by Mr Swan and Ms Gillard following his replacement as Labor leader, and it up to them to consider any fresh amendments. “I think in terms of any future changes to the tax, given the fact that it has not collected any real revenue of any significance so far, that really is for the Prime Minister and for the Treasurer to consider, and I’ll leave it with them,” Mr Rudd told Sky News. He said history would judge whether Ms Gillard and Mr Swan gave away too much in their negotiations with mining companies. … continues … The Sports Doping fiasco: It was reported at the time that this was a story to distract from Gillard’s woes at the time.  Nothing that has happened proves this a wrong assumption.  In fact – everything that has unfolded since points to the ACC getting ahead of itself and Ministers Lundy and Clair should be quizzed about the timing of the ACC report release. This was no more than a ‘beat-up’ all designed as a distraction to get Gillard’s ‘gizzards’ off the front page – the upshot, Australian sport has been the laughing-stock of the world for two weeks and demonstrates to what lengths Gillard and her ‘devil’ cousins will go to survive … read a story on this below … ACC reaction hysterical: Speed … As anti-doping authorities begin a lengthy process of establishing whether there is any evidence to support claims that doping is rife, former International Cricket Council chief Malcolm Speed also said the Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority needed greater resources to investigate doping in AFL and NRL ranks in the wake of the ACC report. Speaking as director of the Coalition of Major Professional and Participation Sports, which met in Melbourne yesterday to discuss the ACC’s findings that organised crime had infiltrated sport through illicit drugs, performance-enhancing drugs and match-fixing, Mr Speed said “when the four of those issues are put together in the one press conference, obviously there is a sensational, high-level, perhaps hysterical response”. ASADA has conceded it has no evidence yet that AFL or NRL footballers have taken performance-enhancing drugs; merely information it must investigate to determine whether anyone has a case to answer. … continues … The Federal Government budget cuts – Victorian Hospital funding: Another of the self lit fires burning within the ALP – Victoria’s bushfire season has been devastating and this story has only had limited media time – it will become bigger in coming weeks – read more below … Health row over Swan’s ‘old data’ … Victorian Health Minister David Davis has accused Wayne Swan of “wittingly or unwittingly” using outdated population figures to strip his state of $107 million in 2012-13 and has demanded the Treasurer correct the error and restore the funding. “The consequence of this incorrect use of population data has been a commonwealth cut in health funding being made half-way through the financial year, a clawback in commonwealth health funding from every health service across the country after patients have been treated and a rebasing of commonwealth funding of health into the future,” Mr Davis told federal Health Minister Tanya Plibersek yesterday. Mr Davis said Mr Swan had used outdated population figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, which showed a fall in the Victorian population of 11,111 people, even though he had the up-to-date figures. “The commonwealth Treasurer’s manipulation of the data could not be more serious and calls into question the integrity of federal financial relations,” Mr Davis said … continues … Other matters of interest for the period were the confusing speculation about what Shorten did or did not say about Superannuation and tax hikes to cover the budget shortfall, and what he implied when he said what he claims not to have said. The upshot is that the ‘boat is leaking’ and the time until it sinks is decreasing with each passing day and week.     If Gillard had any sense of moral recognition she would fall on her sword to the cheers of the masses … but she is of a different ilk –  she does all women in a modern society a disservice.  These days the woman’s ‘slap’ is no more, they are more inclined to throw a ‘punch’ … and Gillard has taken that a few steps further. Politics is a patience game most of the time … let the fear of the ‘what’s next’ chip away at the foundations … but when it happens it still shocks. Australia is about to rebirth itself and rid s all of a toxic sludge that imposed itself nearly three years ago … ALP faithful want their Party back without the Union factions or the Gillard puppet singing to Ludwig and his fellow Union heavies. Until the Unions are bought to heel and flushed clean true ALP supporters will treat the ALP like lepers. You’d think they would be able to see themselves in this light if they for once in their live undressed in front of a mirror, and saw themselves for what they really represent. Larry Pickering’s Political Take: To bring some much-needed levity – there is always the Larry Pickering Cartoons … below is a sample of his summer offerings – his images page can be access here … [click on image below to enlarge] … enjoy and don’t hurt yourself with the belly laughs … Larry Pickering also writes some very intelligent blogs including many on the AWU scandal.  Whilst not as regarded as Hedley Thomas in journalistic circles – his penmanship and his heady wit give him a take on things not easily publishable in mainstream media.  None the less … his take on events cuts to the chase and he does not mince words … his Facebook page can be accessed here … Added 15th Feb 2013: To see all of Pickering’s Political cartoons – use this link …
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