octave

I can't believe you think this innocuous line is such a big deal for you. Trump will not govern like Biden but will be different. What am I missing here? By the way, you haven't told me what you think about Trump's pardon of Jan 6 rioters including the violent ones?

GON I struggle to categorise "Trump will do things differently" as being negative, it surely is neutral. In any job I have been in when one boss leaves and another takes over often the departing boss will make a speech handing over the reins and saying the the new boss "will put their particular mark on the job. GON I assume that you don't think Trump is different from the presidents that came before. It seems that Trump and his supporters are great at name-calling but are amazingly thin-skinned such that an ambiguous comment like Wong's is so distressing.

It is obvious that Trump is not like any other and does do things differently. Trump would see this as a compliment, he doesn't pretend to be like any other president. Someone on here said we should judge Trump by what he does rather than what he says. Now he is president he is doing things that we can judge him for. Do you support pardons for violent Jan 6ers who assaulted police?

You sure seem to be obsessed with Penny Wong. Her job is to represent the best interests of Australia not her own personal feelings. It is not in our country's interest to get on the wrong side of this guy because we know that is not in our interests.

We have no idea if the victim and their family were asked and declined to comment, I guess people will come to different conclusions but this article makes me want to ask some of the questions that OME posed. I can't really see much opinion in this story. It seems mainly to be quotes. If the victim (who is probably traumatised) doesn't want to comment does that mean that no story is written or that no quotes are included?

Dont forget white supremacists https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christchurch_mosque_shootings

PM are you OK with Trump's pick for Health Secretary? An anti-vaxxer nut job. Do you believe the worst of the Jan 6 rioters (refer to https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/video/2021/jan/10/police-officer-crushed-in-doorway-by-rioters-during-capitol-breach-video Do you believe it when Trump says this? Do you think in Springfield they are eating the daaawgs? (dogs)

Trump pardons give Jan 6 defendants nearly everything they wanted Police officer crushed in doorway by rioters during Capitol breach – video

I do find it somewhat sad that some of his supporters who are struggling in life believe that Billionaire Trump and his billionaire picks for positions in his administration will improve their lot. Does anyone really think Musk will do anything for them? No I think he and Trump and the other billionaires are in it for themselves (and I used to be a Musk fanboy) I saw an interview with a Trump supporter who said they were looking forward to Trump ending Obamacare. When the interviewer asked what they relied on for health care they said the ACA (Affordable Care Act.) They were shocked and dismayed when the interviewer pointed out that Obamacare is the colloquial name for the Affordable Care Act. Trump's talent is convincing people that things that will be bad for them will be good. When asked during the debate about his health care plan Trump said he "had a concept of a plan" As far as I am aware this is still the best he has but I guess time will tell.

I searched for videos of speeches from presidential candidates who lost. Without exception and regardless of party, they were full of grace and dignity. Compare this to P**** Grabber's election night (2020) and inauguration speech.

The character of two different men.

These are the people that Trump refers to as patriots and political prisoners. In my mind pardoning these dangerous morons alone marks Trump as a hideous person, not fit to hold office.

Amidst the doom and gloom, life is still pretty good, isn't it??? Mrs Octave and I went for a walk this morning to the community garden that we are a member of. We pay $20 a year and can be as involved as much as we like or not. The only request is "Pick a weed and take what you need" I am just air frying some potatoes and zucchini and Mrs Octave is throwing together a salad.

I think it is right to fear his appointments. Kennedy (a vaxx denier, if allowed to will be a disaster for public health.

I am not even sure if Wong will be meeting Trump "Senator Wong confirmed she and Mr Rudd would attend Trump's swearing-in ceremony on January 20 and would meet with members of the Trump administration and congress during her visit." Trump has signalled that he wishes to use tariffs against other countries. During Trump's first administration, he intended to impose tariffs on our steel but was dissuaded during a visit by Turnbull. Wong going to the inauguration is not the "Gothca" moment you think it is GON Trump does not give a toss about Australia therefore it is the job of our politicians (from all sides) to work to lesson the damage to Australia.

Government ministers often meet with leaders from other countries even if they find them objectionable, this is part of their job, The reality is that Trump won and as a country we have to suck it up and deal with it the best we can. It would be absurd if politicians only met with those they admire. Trump seems to loathe Trudeau but met with him and vica versa. It would be a bad politician who did not attempt to further the interests of our country.

Having botched the COVID response Trump now seeks to appoint a rabid anti-vaxxer to head the Department of Health and Human Services. He seeks to appoint someone with little experience running a huge department such as Defence, even though he seems to have many serious character flaws. I find it hard to understand how anyone can listen to Trump and not think he is deluded. Remember this Trump suggests 'injection' of disinfectant to beat coronavirus and 'clean' the lungs Whilst many politicians over-promise and under-deliver Trump excels at this "going to build a big beautiful wall and the Mexicans are going to pay for it" Of course this never happened. This from his last term so maybe be we should consider current promises. End the war in Ukraine within 24 hours? End inflation although he is now walking that one back. Make Canada the 51st state? Take over Greenland? He even refused to rule out economic OR military means. He thinks windmills kill whales. He thinks that tariffs are a tax on other countries. He claims he will deport millions of undocumented workers without taking into account those businesses that rely on these people to do jobs that Americans won't do. Business owners warn Trump’s deportation plan could shut them down Turning back the clock regarding a woman's right to choose. He wants to bring back prayer to school and remove drugs but doesn't seem to give a sh1t about the proliferation of guns. To me, a great leader needs many qualities but an important one is humility. The man literally cannot say anything without telling how wonderful Trump is. "My last inauguration, the biggest crowd ever, everyone says that, there has never been a crowd bigger" He can't even accept that in 2020 he lost. If you search out concession speeches from past presidents Dem or GOP they are magnanimous in accepting the result. In my opinion, he does not have the character for the job.

What Biden did was within the current law. Taking advantage of current law whilst admitting that it should be changed may be less than perfect but better than nothing. As far as I am concerned I think it would be fair to prosecute and punish Hunter to the level of any other citizen having committed the same offences. Likewise, I do not believe that being elected president should shield anyone from prosecution. The P***y grabber-in-chief was convicted by a jury of his peers but has so far been spared the punishment that an ordinary person would suffer. This seems to be a far bigger injustice. Pardoning the worst January 6 is also more hideous.

No need to worry about me GON , baiting the far right is somewhat of a hobby of mine, I even have an email address specifically for this purpose. When I get bored I will block them.

I will unsubscribe and block but I might have a little fun first. 😃

I did not know whether to post this under politics or religion but I suspect religion is closest to the point. I received a political flyer from the ACL (Australian Christian Lobby). I do have a "no junk mail" sign on my letterbox and I do realise that for some reason political flyers are exempt. I do however think that where possible my wishes should be respected. I emailed the ACL stating that I was disappointed that their flyer ended up in my mailbox. This was not really a big deal, I suspect I will over the next few months get flyers from all sorts of organisations. I did think their reply was slightly tone-deaf, especially this sentence "We are a Christian political lobby group and as our fliers are definitely political, they can go into every letterbox." but, whatever, happy to move on with my life. However, I then received an email that led with this: Dear Friend, Thank you so much for signing up to receive insights from the Australian Christian Lobby! It’s great to be in this together with you. You’ve joined a grassroots movement of over 250,000 other like-minded Australians who are propelling God’s truth into the public square. WTF, I was complaining not trying to join them I replied: Unbelievable! "You appear to think I have signed up as one of you whereas I complained. It seems that as well as not respecting my wishes communicated on my mailbox you also wish to force yourself into my email inbox." Also in the fine print: You are receiving this email because you have either requested to receive emails from ACL or you have participated in an ACL campaign. To which I replied "I clearly I did neither of these things" I thought that would be the end of but then I received this gem, an email with the heading ""Dear Valued Supporter, " These people can not seem to believe that anyone could possibly disagree with them

The only fees I can see on my statement are a couple of international transaction fees for some items bought from overseas. The card I have (Mastercard Platinum) has 44 days of interest-free and we usually pay it off every Friday. The card has a yearly fee of $50 but this is more than offset by rewards points that we use for Bunnings vouchers (about 4x$50 per year) some merchants occasionally charge extra fees but most businesses don't seem to. If I were to pay my rates with a credit card there would be a couple of dollars surcharge which seems irrelevant on the sort of amount however I usually would such bills by bank transfer. When it comes to banking we also don't pay any fees. We bank with Bank Australia which is a customer-owned bank. Whilst other banks are mainly concerned with pleasing the shareholders with this bank the customers are the shareholders. Whilst we don't pay any bank fees the bank does have some fees but we are able to avoid them. https://www.bankaust.com.au/banking/everyday-accounts/everyday-account-rates-and-fees#Basic-Access I think the banks with unreasonable fees rely on people's reluctance to shop around.

OK although I dont really participate in this forum anymore I do occasionally have a poke around. I can't let this illogical statement go unchallenged. It is true that an EV is only as clean as the source of power used to recharge its batteries. It is also true that the petrol we burn here in Australia has been brought here by a fuel-hungry tanker ship burning pretty dirty fuel. Let's look at the rational facts. Do EVs in Victoria rely on brown coal for charging? The first point is that your statement seems to indicate that you believe that all of Victoria's power comes from brown coal. The fact is that 37.8% of Victoria's power comes from renewables. The projected and achieved targets are: 25% by 2020 (achieved) 40% by 2025 65% by 2030 (previously 50%) 95% by 2035 (new). It should be understood that the trajectory is towards cleaner power; therefore, with every year that passes, these vehicles get cleaner, whereas petrol cars remain pretty much the same. As of today the average EV is charged at least a third by cleaner electricity. I personally pay a couple of cents per KWh for green power. Yes I am aware that the actual power I get comes from a pool of electricity but my retailer buys the amount of power from renewables that equals what I use. I also generate twice as much power as I need. I have done some calculations and I believe my rooftop panels could drive an EV for 14000KM per year. I would suggest that an EV even when powered by the standard mix of power from the Victorian grid is still much cleaner than a car that's fuel is shipped in a tanker from abroad and refined (electricity hungry process) and then is put in a road fuel tanker and driven to the petrol station using more fossil fuels which by the way also come to this country in a tanker ship.

If I were to compile a list of ceremonial or celebratory events that I don't believe in I doubt that smoking ceremonies would be top of the list. Are smoking ceremonies more numerous than Christmas festivities or Christian ceremonies? I am a pretty hard line atheist however I don't really mind what others do. I understand that things that mean little to me may be meaningful to others. For me it comes down to kindness and empathy. I really can't understand why you guys spend so much emotional effort on this.