Tim Blair

I wish Howard would stop spending my money.

Well its an interesting day when the conservatives are frothing at the latte over Labor losing the gay and lesbian vote. How times change. Dont froth too much I caution as more likely than not Christian Conservatism a la Tony Abbott will still be dead last on the list of gay and lesbian preferences. I think Labor will still likely score a good share of their preferences still and these will count.
Then the next one on the list - um, why when some fringe socialist web site attacks Peter Garrett you'd bother mentioning it. What do these Socialist endangered species poll, dude? Anyone knows the lefties on the spectrum are mainly in The Greens these days, not some fringe Socialist 1000 vote party.
In any case what is this article talking about saying Labor are promoting him as a star. Garrett hasnt been heard of since he announced he would run and has been campaigning locally to my knowledge. If he is keeping his mouth shut then I am sure the Liberal Party would love him as a candidate compared to "A vote for me is not a vote for Howard" Malcolm Turnbull.
"Mmmm ... speaking of socialism":
Medicare- well, it is a sad concession from PM Howard that despite his cherished dream to have a private US style system, in some areas of Australian society social unity is still strong and his dream is unattainable. Medicare is here to stay and even he is throwing money at it. Whatever the attempts at rejigging and two tiering Medicare the polling must be showing the scheme still has strong support. So I agree with the heading for this one - Medicare is socialism - and people support it - sorry PM Howard.

How can Peter Garret dance around like that while the earth is turning? How can he sleep while the beds are burning?

Just askin'.

Well its an interesting day when the conservatives are frothing at the latte over Labor losing the gay and lesbian vote. How times change. Dont froth too much I caution as more likely than not Christian Conservatism a la Tony Abbott will still be dead last on the list of gay and lesbian preferences. I think Labor will still likely score a good share of their preferences still and these will count.
Then the next one on the list - um, why when some fringe socialist web site attacks Peter Garrett you'd bother mentioning it. What do these Socialist endangered species poll, dude? Anyone knows the lefties on the spectrum are mainly in The Greens these days, not some fringe Socialist 1000 vote party.
In any case what is this article talking about saying Labor are promoting him as a star. Garrett hasnt been heard of at least on a national level since he announced he would run and has been campaigning locally to my knowledge. If he is keeping his mouth shut then I am sure the Liberal Party would love him as a candidate compared to "A vote for me is not a vote for Howard" Malcolm Turnbull.
"Mmmm ... speaking of socialism":
Medicare- well, it is a sad concession from PM Howard that despite his cherished dream to have a private US style system, in some areas of Australian society social unity is still strong and his dream is unattainable. Medicare is here to stay and even he is throwing money at it. Whatever the attempts at rejigging and two tiering Medicare the polling must be showing the scheme still has strong support. So I agree with the heading for this one - Medicare is socialism - and people support it - sorry PM Howard.

sorry folks, posted twice

Oh my God, Tim, did you see Media Watch? THEY FINALLY CRITICISED A LABOR PARTY STOOGE!!!! IT'S THE RAPTURE!!!!!!

Yeh Clem that ABC crowd are really pro Labor. They ask too many tricky questions with their smart alec type reporters. I dont like too many questions when we are in power. The Packer, Stokes and Murdoch media, there's three more for - they are really pro Labor too. We need some balance I reckon or even better a pro government newspaper like the one Churchill created in the 1926 General Strike. After all Johns middle name is Winston so I dont see why not. John reminds me a lot of Winston these days - especially the year 1955 - a lot of parallels there.

Yeh Clem that ABC crowd are really pro Labor. They ask too many tricky questions with their smart alec type reporters. I dont like too many questions when we are in power. The Packer, Stokes and Murdoch media, there's three more for you - they are really pro Labor too. We need some balance I reckon or even better a pro government newspaper like the one Churchill created in the 1926 General Strike. After all Johns middle name is Winston so I dont see why not. John reminds me a lot of Winston these days - especially the year 1955 - a lot of parallels there.

Margot's been dissed by Media Watch!
Kaloo! Kalay!

But...but...what about Darp's anecedotal evidence! It can't be wrong!

Can it?

Common,

You are quite correct that a majority of the "gay" community's votes will end up with the ALP. This is very sad, as it shows the "gays" are becoming a useless, boring tribe of conformists. Fortunately I know quite a few of them who will buck the system and vote Tory, because they hate the apparatchiks of the "gay" movement so much.
Every time I read about tries like the "gays" I think of that wonderful scene in "The Life of Brian" where all but one of the eponymous hero's audience repeats after him, in unison, that they are all individuals.
As for the importance of the "gay vote", I suspect it will be limited to a few inner city electorates that are mostly safe ALP seats anyway. I don't see the "gay" electors of Patterson, or Lindsay really deciding this election, though I suppose in a World where people take Bob Brown seriously anything is possible.

Toryhere - I agree that the gay vote will be only of marginal importance and that its greatest impact will be on the inner urban areas which are left leaning in any case. Which is why I am unsure why they rated a mention in the first place.
As for gays becoming a sad tribe of conformists well any interest group tends to conform to certain patterns. Look at way the majority of top income earners vote Tory because the Tories tend to believe in more loopholes for rich tax avoiders such as family trust rorts or offshore bank accounts. They are a sad bunch of conformists too. Gays have all the traits of other interest groups - self interest being one of the dominant ones - of course.

Agreed on Downer.

Here's his letter to the AFR today, in response to a particularly odious Geoffrey Barker column in yesterday's edition:

"During more than two decades in public life, I have seen few more disgusting contributions than Geoffey Barker's comparison of the terrorist atrocity in Beslan with the situation of asylum seekers in Woomera, Port Hedland and Nauru (September 6).
This was journalism plumbing new depths.

Alexander Downer,
Minister for Foreign Affairs,
Canberra

Hey I went on to the Currency Lad website and found it to be very praiseworthy of Mr Downer.
It said he deserved praise for "making a substantive contribution to the govervance of the nation"
The govervance?
Its ironic - this website trumpeted the horrid Margot Kingswoods error using the non word "trounded" in her article.
Yet this same web site far from ridiculing Currency Lad the same way it did to Kingsfield for her error, actually recommended us to go to the "govervance" website. I suppose Downer's catastrophic success in Iraq makes it much easier to overlook "govervance" compared to "trounded"

Oh, do we have a new troll? Hey, troll, it's really funny reading your criticism of someone else's grammar when you have absolutely no idea how to punctuate or to make spaces between paragraphs or (apparently) how to preview your entry.

In any case, typos on someone's personal blog are not quite the same as the constant contempt for the English language this Margo person shows in her column in a professional media publication for which she gets paid. So you can take your pathetic attempt at so's-your-old-man and go take a long walk off a short pier.

Really Andrea - its a blog mate, my errors are due to time being pressing - if it so bothers you I will try and conform to the Queen's English even at this level. I know Alex would try as would have his father who in 1976 was still spruiking the virtues of the British Empire to Clyde Cameron, so let there be no doubt there.
And yes despite what you say, there is an amusing double standard here. This website has a go at Kingsman for using "trounded", yet sends us to a site that has the same glaring error in "goverance".
But I see you make a distinction between professional and amateur writers. In that case you should know it was the sub editor that made the "trounded" error not Kingstown.
I dont read her enough to know what she does to the English language but I'll take your word for it.
I also note that you characterised my message as pathetic, but it cant have been that pathetic as 1) - it got a response from you 2) you found it necessary to personally abuse me which means I must have hit a spot or otherwise you would have just ignored me.
As for taking your advice to jump off the end of a pier, well bottom of the harbour tax avoidance schemes are a product of your side of politics. Didnt you know? And of course the Treasurer at the time was John Howard.

It's good to see you link to a story from the World Socialist Web Site. It's one of my favourite sites on the web. The movie reviews are amusing reading.

I wouldn't call commongood a troll, but he does make long rambling posts.

Keep them down to more manageable sizes, K?

Common, if time is "pressing" then maybe you should be doing something else besides fooling around on the internet. Quite frankly nothing you've said here is either new or particularly interesting.