Headlines Thursday 16th October

Not much behind Kevin Rudd’s shock and awe
Piers Akerman
PRIME Minister Kevin Rudd used his first state-of-the-nation address to warn Australians of the “worst global financial crisis since the Great Depression”, striking fear into the hearts and minds of those who have not been following the meltdown.

Treasurer Wayne Swan echoed his leader’s message, warning that the “global crisis has entered a dangerous new phase’’ - no ambiguity there, either - and a claque of Labor MPs parroted the same message yesterday whenever a microphone appeared.

No one here, or abroad, could possibly now doubt the severity of the fiscal collapse and, as an economic stimulus, the Rudd Labor Government’s $10.4 billion package offers a quick solution which even Opposition Leader Malcolm Turnbull rapidly blessed, though with some understandable concerns.

The principle problem for Rudd, Swan and the third member of their economic team, Treasury Secretary Ken Henry, is that the big plan has come up with little, if anything, in the way of supporting argument or forecast documents.

While the beneficiaries of the Rudd Government’s unexpected pinata are not ungrateful for the largesse they will be showered with, Australians are justified in asking what economic data the troika used last weekend when considering what action was needed.

When the last Labor prime minister Paul Keating released his first economic program, Working Nation, at the end of February 1992, the ambitious program was accompanied by enough tables and charts and graphs to gladden any bureaucratic heart.

That plan, like Rudd’s Economic Security Strategy, was designed to resolve a crisis - in Keating’s case, soaring unemployment.

The aim was to create 800,000 jobs by 1996 but by the end of 1992 unemployment had reached 11.4 per cent, the highest level since the Depression in the 1930s. -ALP governments have always been good at spending our money. In recent times, it hasn’t merely been spending, but much more focused. Money is given to industrialists who favor the ALP. Sometimes they porkbarrel funds in swinging electorates, other times they favor projects which only benefit them .. as with desalinating water.
here is how one punter describes things .. in reply to the accurate statement that the Howard government was Australia’s most effective.

effective Austr Govt ever?
policy ?
They rode off keatings work added a gst that was not their idea it was ripped off .
Fiddled with superannuation that keating put in but never raised it.
China was the reason for our mining growing like it did not the liberal party.
Keatings work during the 80 got us through the asian crisis and stoped us going into recession .
Recession would have hit australia in howards first two years in office.
Howard is on the record of saying keating set us up.

The lies told so as to make others forget how bad they have been.- ed.
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How we must fight in Afghanistan
Andrew Bolt
Major General (Rtd) Jim Molan was chief of staff of the joint forces in Iraq, and has just written a terrific book on the lessons learned there. But while Iraq now seems won, Molan has sent me an article he written to warn that the war in Afghanistan is going much worse than it should, both there and in the battle of the headlines here:

The last government did not sell its commitment to Iraq to the Australian population because (I suspect) of a lack of real commitment and a fear of the consequence if it all went really bad. This bunker mentality left the field open to a generally uninformed media reinforced by self fulfilling polls, then exploited by the opposition for short term political gain.

I can see no real effort to sell (explain) the Afghanistan commitment. If the Rudd Government is not careful, the current opposition will start to attack the current government over Afghanistan in exactly the same opportunistic way that the last opposition attacked the last government over Iraq. - of course it is also important we fight effectively, and not just send troops to die so that our government can keep elected - ed.
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North Pole too icy now to mention
Andrew Bolt

Remember all those dire warnings in the media of an ice-free North Pole this (northern) summer? Remember the British eco-explorer, Lewis Gordon Pugh, announcing he’d paddle to the Pole to draw attention to the frightening lack of ice?

But....

Has anyone in the main-stream media since told you that Pugh had to call off his plan, still 600 miles from the North Pole, when his kayak ran into too much ice?
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Had to happen
Andrew Bolt
Sooner than predicted:

WAYNE Swan is today refusing to speculate that the era of budget surpluses is over as economists predict a deficit next year.
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Sack the parents
Andrew Bolt

What you get from an Attorney-General who still has a problem with authority:

TEENS will be judges, prosecutors and jurors in cases of other kids accused of minor crimes under a radical Victorian Government plan.