Great diatribe by Mitchell and Webb (of peepshow fame) on why the whole election platform claim of “eliminating government waste” is complete bollocks (I can use the word “bollocks” here because he’s English. Ahem…).
I hope Tony is listening. The Australian Liberals need a slightly better leg to stand on economically.
This Australian election has been awash in rhetoric about “turning back the boats.” Sadly, neither party is willing to honour its obligations under international asylum law and continue to use the refugee issue here as a political football (hockey puck to my Canuck brethren).
The Age’s Katz appeals to Oz’s future prime minister that we should just keep out the worst of the worst – the Canadians .
… something must be done to curb the influx of Canadastanis flowing across our borders like thick insidious maple syrup smothering a helpless little butterball atop a compassionate pancake short-stack.
Crikey’s Rundle had to say (annoyingly behind the Crikey paywall but well worth the read) about the low down on how crap this election here in Australia is. With nine days to go, I’m despondent about the state of kanga democracy. Australians deserve better. The state of this election is shameful.
Have I got that right? I mean have I got that right? Cos I don’t know how the election looks from over there, but from over here… it looks like sh-t. Beyond sh-t. Meta-sh-t.
I didn’t bother watching it, largely because I didn’t need to as I figured the outcome was a foregone conclusion, but have to say this is an amazingly disappointing election. It’s about popularity, not policies and any idea that either of these parties is being progressive is laughable. Now Labor has slid in the polls after a disastrous climate policy announcement, perhaps we’ll see some changes, but I don’t think anyone summed up the debate better than this morning’s Crikey:
Fantastic visualization of how the US subsidizes fossil fuel production versus renewables. Really would love to see this for Canada and especially Australia (where the question of renewables is much on my organization’s and the electorate’s mind heading into a federal election.).
One point that should be made: Not all fossil fuel subsidies are evil. For instance, low income home heating assistance is actually something good even if it falls under those auspices. But it’s clear from the graph that for a more independent and sustainable future, America has a ways to go. ANd most of the renewables subsidies are from ethanol-based subsidies (which is really just propping up the farming sector).
With the assassination of Rudd, the election is nigh upon us (smart money is guessing Aug 28th) and our awesome video guru, SimonDW, couldn’t help himself but put together a spoof ad. Quite seriously, there are 1.4M estimated people who need to get enrolled pretty damn quick in order to be able to exercise their democratic rights in this election so there is a method to our madness (and the AEC doesn’t allow online enrollment so it’s a painful process they need to start now).
GetUp! has been campaigning for months with the nocleanfeed and EFA coalition to kill off Conroy’s Internet filter (read: censorship) initiative. Rudd has blinked and taken it off the cards for the election and is on the defensive. We just sent this rather epic video to our awesome superhero-like membership to thank the ones who took action and to urge everyone to keep up the pressure to pull the plug completely.
Also, if you haven’t seen it, check out our original CensorDyne spoof ad which started the campaign.
Watching the UK freak out over the prospect of a hung Parliament and a (gasp) minority government, while amusing I have to admit I’m never going to be sad to see the end of simple two party political systems. While proportional representation failed in Canada, I think it’s a good idea to take a queue from John Cleese’s beautifully sarcastic short on PR.
While I’m not sure anything can save the UK after living there, this would be a good start.
Fantastic infographic from Information is Beautiful cutting through all the crap to give a clear picture of what each political party is forwarding in order to cut Britain’s whopping £167B deficit if they get into power. Love it for its clarity and conciseness.
I need this sort of graphic for the Australian election as well.
I know this is data geekiness on an incredible level , but I actually find the issues with the US Census (which is horrendously important from a representation by population and funding perspective) to be really fascinating.
It should be noted that the census is baked into the US constitution to occur every 10 years.