topic Poor Tony just can't help himself. in Community Spirit

Poor Tony just can't help himself.

alexander*beetle — Sun, 27 Oct 2013 22:15:26 GMT

http://m.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/tony-abbotts-alp-criticism-could-affect-us-links-20131027-2w9lv.html

Tony Abbott's use of a Washington Post interview to brand his Labor predecessors as ''wacko'' and ''embarrassing'' could set back his working relationship with the Obama adminstration, a leading US commentator says.

Norman Ornstein, an author and political scientist with the right-leaning American Enterprise Institute, said he ''winced'' when he read the interview in which Mr Abbott put the boot into the Rudd-Gillard government in unusually strong language for a foreign interview.

''It really does violate a basic principle of diplomacy to drag in your domestic politics when you go abroad,'' Dr Ornstein said. ''It certainly can't help in building a bond of any sort with President Obama to rip into a party, government and - at least implicitly - leader, with whom Obama has worked so closely.

''Perhaps you can chalk it up to a rookie mistake. But it is a pretty big one.''

Politicians around the world typically refrain from engaging in fierce domestic political argument when they are speaking to an overseas audience.

Dr Ornstein, a resident scholar at the AEI - one of Washington's oldest think tanks - was one of Foreign Policy magazine's 100 ''top global thinkers'' in 2012.

In the interview, Mr Abbott told The Washington Post that the former Labor government's conduct was ''a circus'' and was ''scandalously wasteful''.

''It was an embarrassing spectacle and I think Australians are relieved they are gone,'' he said.

Asked about Labor's plan to extend fibre to every household under the national broadband network, Mr Abbott said: ''Welcome to the wonderful, wacko world of the former government.''

Julia Gillard in particular forged what observers say was a warm and constructive relationship with Mr Obama, which included the deal to station US marines in Darwin. She was one of just 12 world leaders whose calls Mr Obama returned personally after they had called to congratulate him on his 2012 re-election.

Former diplomat and senior public servant John Menadue said it remained to be seen whether Mr Abbott could ''make the transition from a critic in opposition and an attack dog to a responsible and constructive prime minister''.

In 2007, then prime minister John Howard caused an international stir when he said al-Qaeda in Iraq would be praying for an Obama victory in the presidential race - a criticism of Mr Obama's plan to bring US troops home from Iraq.

Meanwhile, the White House has refused to comment on - or rule out - whether the US National Security Agency has ever tapped the phones of any Australian prime minister.

In the wake of revelations that the NSA may have bugged German Chancellor Angela Merkel's mobile phone, Fairfax Media asked the US government whether it could rule out ever bugging Australian leaders.

National Security Council spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden said: ''We are not going to comment publicly on every specific alleged intelligence activity, and as a matter of policy we have made clear that the United States gathers foreign intelligence of the type gathered by all nations.''

Re: Poor Tony just can't help himself.

lakeland27 — Sun, 27 Oct 2013 22:21:43 GMT

tapping abbotts phone would reveal a lot of ummm and arrrr, but nothing of interest or value apart from his domestic agenda.

Re: Poor Tony just can't help himself.

freddie*rooster — Sun, 27 Oct 2013 22:29:27 GMT

Tapping his ear piece would be more lucrative.

Re: Poor Tony just can't help himself.

kennedia_nigricans — Sun, 27 Oct 2013 22:33:18 GMT

the USA, canada, NZ, austrlia and the UK are in some special club (forgot the name). they don't spy on each other. that's what that they say anyway, everyone else is fair game.

Re: Poor Tony just can't help himself.

lakeland27 — Sun, 27 Oct 2013 22:33:52 GMT

@freddie*rooster wrote:
Tapping his ear piece would be more lucrative.

i guess you'd find out who his answer coach is . hunt needs an earpiece too.

Re: Poor Tony just can't help himself.

azureline** — Sun, 27 Oct 2013 22:53:17 GMT

Re: Poor Tony just can't help himself.

cherry*135 — Mon, 28 Oct 2013 03:43:39 GMT

@kennedia_nigricans wrote:
the USA, canada, NZ, austrlia and the UK are in some special club (forgot the name). they don't spy on each other. that's what that they say anyway, everyone else is fair game.

Still spy on close allies though?

Barack Obama knew US spies were targeting Germany's Angela Merkel: reports

The spying row between Germany and America is deepening, with fresh reports that United States president Barack Obama knew his country was monitoring the German chancellor's phone calls.

Germany received information last week that American spies had bugged Angela Merkel's mobile phone, prompting Berlin to summon the US ambassador, a move unprecedented in post-war relations between the close allies.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-10-28/claims-obama-was-aware-of-merkel-phone-tapping/5048718

Re: Poor Tony just can't help himself.

newstart2380 — Mon, 28 Oct 2013 04:08:04 GMT

Go Tony, some people just can't handle honest thruths, it's about time someone just told it like it is and stop trying not to offend by not saying anything.

Re: Poor Tony just can't help himself.

lakeland27 — Mon, 28 Oct 2013 04:20:06 GMT

he 's never 'told it like it is' he has rorted more money in office out of the taxpayer than anyone else in the parliament. he's a sponge, a leech on the public purse.

Re: Poor Tony just can't help himself.

freshwater-2 — Mon, 28 Oct 2013 04:29:27 GMT

OMG the guy's a loose cannon. Didn't he listen to advisers re acceptable behaviour on the international stage, especially in Washington DC where strict protocols are in place.

What a total embarrassment.

And where is his Foreign Minister.....MIA?

Re: Poor Tony just can't help himself.

poddster — Mon, 28 Oct 2013 04:36:05 GMT

I am soooo looking forward to the 12th. when see see Little Willie Shorten in question time. Should be fun 🙂

Re: Poor Tony just can't help himself.

lakeland27 — Mon, 28 Oct 2013 04:39:31 GMT

so am i , when albanese gets stuck into them. its obvious from the constant references shorten scares you btw.

Re: Poor Tony just can't help himself.

poddster — Mon, 28 Oct 2013 06:30:51 GMT

Everyone is use to seeing pollies in the media constantly making a lot of noise without substance and now when it is not all talk and no action they are having withdrawal symptoms.

Re: Poor Tony just can't help himself.

poddster — Mon, 28 Oct 2013 04:41:15 GMT

Thank you LL, I do enjoy a good giggle and you are the best source there is 🙂

Re: Poor Tony just can't help himself.

poddster — Mon, 28 Oct 2013 04:42:53 GMT

Yep.

Albanese gets stuck all the time 🙂

Re: Poor Tony just can't help himself.

lakeland27 — Mon, 28 Oct 2013 04:43:39 GMT

Albo can open up with this

Did the Prime Minister turn a profit from Pollie Pedal?

inSh

Julie Owens MP: “I don’t believe that you can call it charity work if the taxpayer is paying your salary to do it – let alone if you make a profit out of it on the back of $350 in travelling allowance a day.”

No one begrudges the blood and sweat that Prime Minister Tony Abbott and his fellow politicians have shed while riding thousands of kilometres in the annual Pollie Pedal cycling fundraising tours — or the more than $2.5 million they have raised for charities since it started in 1998.

But what distinguishes Abbott from the dozens of politicians who have ridden the Pollie Pedal rides over the past 15 years is that he appears to be the only politician to have claimed travelling allowances and other expenses for his participation.

He may even have made a profit from the event http://blogs.crikey.com.au/northern/2013/10/25/did-the-prime-minister-turn-a-profit-from-pollie-pedal/

Re: Poor Tony just can't help himself.

lakeland27 — Mon, 28 Oct 2013 04:46:35 GMT

note the paid sponsorship on his shirt. did that money go to him or the charity ? on form it went to him, but surely not even he is that compromised ?

Re: Poor Tony just can't help himself.

poddster — Mon, 28 Oct 2013 04:47:09 GMT

I very much doubl that even he would make such fool of himself. But you never know 🙂

Re: Poor Tony just can't help himself.

lakeland27 — Mon, 28 Oct 2013 04:50:42 GMT

‘Cheap at twice the price’. The Prime Minister and Big Pharma

Max Markson told The Northern Myth that if AMGEN was paying $80,000 a year to have Tony Abbott promote their brand that it was sponsorship that was ‘cheap at twice the price’.

Roll back to first light on 8 September 2013. Tony Abbott, Australia’s Prime Minister elect, emerges barefoot into the early morning light. He is in his cycling gear and squats to put on his cleated cycling shoes then walks to his waiting road-bike in that curious clickety-clack heel-bound duck walk that cyclists have when off their bike.

No-one looks cool walking in those shoes but not being cool has never bothered Abbott.

Like half the country I was nursing a slight hangover and was watching the early news from the east coast. Abbott was in neck-to-knee lyrca emblazoned with sponsors for his annual charity fund-raiser Pollie Pedal, which his office runs in conjunction with Carers Australia.

Pollie Pedal’s sponsors include Gerry Ryan’s Jayco caravans, a law firm, a book chain and three pharmaceutical companies – alphapharm, Roche and Pfizer. Running across Abbott’s chest in bright blue and down the outside of each thigh is the logo “AMGEN”.

So who or what is AMGEN?

The Australian branch of AMGEN – the world’s largest biotechnology company – has been the major sponsor of Pollie Pedal since 2007. In 2013 that sponsorship was valued at $80,000 while alphapharm, Roche and Pfizer would each have coughed between $20,000 and $50,000 as ‘supporting’ and ‘major’ sponsors respectively.

So far so good – there is nothing controversial about large companies tipping their hard-earned in to assist worthy causes. But what happens when one of those companies admits to criminal conduct and pays a large fine to settle Federal and State lawsuits in the United States? http://blogs.crikey.com.au/northern/2013/09/13/cheap-at-twice-the-price-the-prime-minister-and-big-pharma/

Re: Poor Tony just can't help himself.

lakeland27 — Mon, 28 Oct 2013 04:52:57 GMT

@poddster wrote:
I very much doubl that even he would make such fool of himself. But you never know 🙂

i'm glad you are happy with that, i doubt anyone else but terminal rusties would agree however.