willedoo

I was just reading this article about inter and intra generational tax inequality. In the article the ANU Tax and Transfer Policy Institute director is calling for the primary residence family home to be taxed and included in asset testing to qualify for a pension. Note that he keeps referring to means testing, but I think he means asset testing. I don't think his idea would be too popular with pensioners. Under the current system the family home is exempt along with two hectares of land. For example, if you have a house on four hectares, two hectares of it is taken into account as assets. Under this bloke's plan, every pensioner living on a suburban block in town would be shafted. I can't see how any government would survive politically if they introduced a system like that. A lot of retirees are not rich and own their house and not much else and are cash poor. https://www.afr.com/politics/federal/4m-pensioners-how-australia-s-tax-system-subsidises-wealth-over-work-20260227-p5o666

Five counts of war crime murders the news reports are saying.

Regarding stored fuel, I'm planning to set up a proper diesel backup generator for thunderstorm and cyclone seasons. When we had the cyclone last year I bought a little 2kva petrol generator from Kings and had to run it for 40+ hours, but got caught with about 20 litres of petrol left over and not much to use it in. At least with diesel it will store for a lot longer and stored fuel can be rotated through the vehicle. On another note, over the years there has been a fair bit of diesel theft from farms where thieves come in with empty storage on a ute or small truck and clean out the farmer's overhead diesel tanks. I wonder whether there has been an increase in that activity since the price hike.

I was referring to the Greens. The Greens don't consider themselves far left but a lot of the rest of the country does. Labor faithful probably don't. Most people right of centre do.

I beg to differ Marty, I would say I'm bang on the point. That's just my opinion, you're entitled to yours. I'd consider myself centre right politically and you support a far left party so we're never going get an echo chamber thing happening here.

The only reason we are talking about One Nation is because they are experiencing a fairly significant rise in support which could rock the politcal boat a bit. In previous times they have had around 6-10% support, similar to the other main fringe party, the Greens. One in ten voters think the Greens are worth voting for and nine out of ten think they are not. One Nation was in a very similar position on the opposite end of the spectrum, but things have changed in their favour lately. The Greens will never attract more than that one in ten voters and what you see is what you'll get with them, but One Nation's numbers are on the move and nobody really knows for sure how far they will go. It won't be all the way to the top, I know that much.

Marty, you're dreaming if you think One Nation will ever get close to replacing a major party in government I think. The protest vote will have an impact, and that impact will be to force the major parties to lift their game. Or the option is to just keep voting for the same old status quo in the naive belief that they will magically one day lift their game by their own choice, ie; bend over and keep copping it up the rear end.

Fuel prices are starting to hit tourism. Over the whole four day Easter break, the Pink Roadhouse at Oodnadatta had two tourists visit, compared to the usual 50 to 100 per day.

A lot of people can't see the woods for the trees. Some who are unhappy with the rise in popularity of One Nation delude themselves that the problem is all One Nation and it's supporters who their critics perceive as a bunch of ignorant, redneck idiots. Fact one: One Nation wouldn't be having this rise in popularity if the major parties were doing a half decent job. Fact two: The major parties have been complacent for too long, and as long as they have their comfortable two party system of your turn/my turn without any major threat to their voter base, they will never get any better. For sure, a lot of the rise in One Nation is a protest vote against that laziness, complacency, and disregard for ordinary Australians that a lot of people see in the major parties. The voter erosion to One Nation is the kick in the pants that the status quo needed and still needs. They won't voluntarily get any better, so they need a boot up the rear end like this to to make them get off their backsides and start performing better to provide Australians with what they want and need from a government. If the threat of losing voters in possible election losing numbers keeps the major parties on their toes, in my opinion that has to be a good thing and an incentive to provide good government. I'm not defending One Nation or any other party, but just trying to point out the small minded nature of just blaming One Nation and their supporters and dismissing them as fools. Throwing rocks at them is not going to make them go away. You need to ask yourself why. Why are so many people abandoning parties they have supported for years. The problem the major parties have is not One Nation. The problem is within themselves. They need to ask themselves why do so many people not want to vote for them any more. To be honest, nothing much in politics surprises me, but I have been surprised lately by the sheer numbers of people I run into who say they are changing their vote to One Nation at the next federal election. A lot of these people are the last people in the world where I would have expected to see that. There's a problem for the One nation critics who are stuck in that rut of name-calling, ridicule and stone throwing in their stereotyping of supporters. While they're so distracted doing that, they're not seeing what's really happening. There's a big groundswell of a protest vote building, and I think it will keep rolling. I don't personally think what's happening now is just a flash in the pan. The way I see it, the Greens are immune from it. The Coalition has already taken significant hits and a lot of it by their own hand. And Labor, well I wouldn't be too complacent about if I was one of their supporters. At the moment, they are almost guaranteed to win the next election, and that's about as far ahead as most pollies can think, but they are already starting to bleed blue collar votes and that loss will continue to grow. For anyone who doesn't want to see One Nation grow in size, the challenge is how to create an environment where those lost voters will return. That's where they need to spend their energy. Ridiculing and blaming those lost voters for leaving in the first place is unproductive, and as I said earlier, small minded.

Regarding the recent rise in One Nation opinion poll figures, Newspoll has released their quarterly analysis which includes a breakdown of polling from January 12 to March 16. The initial figures quoted here are for Queensland voting intention if a federal election was held. One nation has hit the lead in the primary vote at 30%, followed by Labor at 27% and the LNP on 23%. As far as I know, the LNP still leads over One Nation in polls regarding a state election due to the relatively popular incumbent LNP state government. Federally, One Nation is running in second place everywhere except Victoria where the coalition has a 1% margin over them. One Nation's popularity with voters aged 18 to 34 had also risen to 19 per cent from 8 per cent during the last quarterly analysis in December, while also becoming the third most popular party (19 per cent) for younger Australians behind Labor (30 per cent) and the Greens (26 per cent). The polling found One Nation had also had a rise in support from female voters (26 per cent) as compared to male (25 per cent). The support of Australians from diverse backgrounds, who spoke a language other than English at home, for One Nation was also up from 9 per cent to 19 per cent. While the new figures brought it level with the Coalition, both parties trailed Labor’s 35 per cent majority in this group.

Not a smart thing to do, 30 Nurofen in two days. it's a wonder he's still got a liver. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15705659/Nurofen-counter-drug-left-clinically-dead.html

I've got a few motors to get running so plenty to do. There's a 2H motor, a side valve Howard L motor, a couple of Honda pump motors and a Honda compressor motor to work on as well as this Lister.

Get it off the back of the ute for a start. Then clean it up, put some parts on it and see if it's going to be a motor or a boat anchor. If it's ok, I might put an alternator on it for a backup.

It doesn't seem that long ago that a V8 was $800, but I think it's up around the thousand now.

That's probably a similar rego cost for a four cylinder here in Qld.. All up somewhere in the 800 range; I pay 600 and something with the pension discount. I'd be lot better off if it was a pay per mileage charge as I often only drive on the road once or twice a week, and not very far at that. A tank usually lasts a couple of weeks or three.

Picked up this little air cooled 7.75 hp Lister SR1 today for bugger all. Most of it is there except for the fuel tank, air cleaner, fuel filter and some missing fuel lines. It's the clockwise running version. The 7.75 hp is the rating at full revs, 2,500rpm. At 1,000rpm I think they make 4 or 5. Hopefully it won't take too much to make it a runner. There's a place about 100 klm away that sells unaffordable genuine parts and reasonably priced non genuine parts. Everything is still available for them.

My grandfather used to grow red pontiac potatoes and he would bed them down in straw on the floor of the laundry outbuilding to keep them a long time. That was in a cool climate though. I don't know how he kept the rats away from them. I guess I'm an embarrassment to my Irish ancestors, not being a potato eater.

Grumpy, what's a greenslip?

They talk all the time about the projection of hard power in regard to foreign policy.

onetrack, I'm a bit confused by your post and think you've misunderstood that. By hard power thay are not referring to Europe relying on US energy. The hard power refers to American military power, not America supplying energy. Hard power is a term the Americans use often to describe their military capability and the exercising of it's influence. I think he's saying that Europe relies on American protection but doesn't help finance it or respect it.

Jerry, you dared critisise a Labor government. Go and wash your mouth out.

Idaho is a beautiful state. I know people in Idaho as one of my best mates was from there. He was out here last year visiting and we got to catch up after a lot of years, but sadly he died suddenly three weeks after he went home. When he left here we were discussing his next trip back here in a couple of years time and the possibility of me going over there for a visit in the interim, as I haven't been there since the mid 80's. It's a very scenic place with the mountains and rivers and a nice slow, relaxed lifestyle a bit like we had here several decades ago. Not a big popuation, the capital has only 235,000 people. According to the mate, it hasn't changed much since I was there 40 years ago. His family live on the Snake River; attached is one of his photos of a canyon near their place.

Time will tell. The Victorian election later in the year will be the test of how lasting the swing is. If they do well there it will get the peanut gallery well and truly hyperventilating.

The Liberal Party ended up with five lower house seats so they will retain their opposition status.

One Nation won the recount today on the last undecided lower house seat. The narrow win by less than sixty votes over the Liberal candidate brings their election seat tally to seven; four lower house seats and three upper house seats.