Polity: Bonza

Written By: - Date published: 11:56 am, November 17th, 2014 - 39 comments
Categories: australian politics, climate change, International, science - Tags: ,

Reposted from Polity.

Poor old Tony Abbott. Thrust into the limelight of hosting the world’s biggest economic meeting, and his true colours come out for everyone to see. Here’s the Los Angeles Times:

For Australians it’s not so bad — most of the time — to be so far away, so overlooked, so seemingly insignificant as to almost never factor in major international news. The lifestyle makes up for it.

But occasionally, there’s an awkward, pimply youth moment so embarrassing that it does sting. Like when 19 of the world’s most important leaders visit for a global summit and Prime Minister Tony Abbott opens their retreat Saturday with a whinge (Aussie for whine) about his doomed efforts to get his fellow Australians to pay $7 to see a doctor.

And then he throws in a boast that his government repealed the country’s carbon tax, standing out among Western nations as the one willing to reverse progress on global warming — just days after the United States and China reached a landmark climate change deal.

The Group of 20 summit could have been Australia’s moment, signaling its arrival as a global player, some here argued. But in all, the summit had Australians cringing more than cheering.

Ouch.

And, for a domestic perspective on the cringe around Abbott’s climate change stance, here’s The Age’s political editor Michael Gordon:

But climate change, not economic growth, was the subject that captured imagination on the summit sidelines and, for too log, Abbott sent a defensive signal that it was simply not a priority for discussion.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called it “the defining challenge of our times”. Turkey’s prime minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, (who will chair next year’s summit), dubbed “the biggest challenge to all humanity today”. And Obama delivered his clarion call to young Australians to make their voices heard.

Yet the climate change reference in the declaration was squeezed in at number 19 of 21 paragraphs and the endorsement of the Green Climate Fund being championed by Obama was equivocal…

Not a happy weekend for Tony Abbott and, by extension, for Australia. Sadly, I think many Australians are getting used to that.

39 comments on “Polity: Bonza ”

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  1. Tracey 1
    17 November 2014 at 12:10 pm

    ” when 19 of the world’s most important leaders visit for a global summit ”

    A moments silence please for Mr Key’s ego

  2. adam 2
    17 November 2014 at 12:14 pm

    Tony Abbott is probably the worst PM the Australians have ever had, and they have had a few. Does beg the question why people think John Key looks any different on the international stage? Key might have the cool bloke image here, but he comes across as a prig to the rest of the world.

    • srylands 2.1
      17 November 2014 at 12:28 pm

      “Key might have the cool bloke image here, but he comes across as a prig to the rest of the world.”

      Can you please post your sources for this assertion?

      • adam 2.1.1
        17 November 2014 at 12:42 pm

        Sure when you answer my questions 🙂

      • Hanswurst 2.1.2
        17 November 2014 at 1:06 pm

        I am overseas. He comes across as a dick.

        • Once Was Tim 2.1.2.1
          17 November 2014 at 2:29 pm

          And how he ever got termed as being “charismatic” is beyond my comprehension – but now thinking back, the term was probably more of a media construction than anything. Rather in my mind at least…..
          Used car salesman
          Rote learner – complete with all the lingo that comes into vogue
          The Language mangler
          The expert in de-contextualisation
          The expert greaser
          All that crap about being attractive to women (if they only knew what a flabby, knock-kneed lazy cnut) lay behind a taylor constructed Armarni suit – designed to disguise) – just as the cast of hundreds of other ‘aspirationals’ clamour to prop up their icon
          Poor boy got rich as a sef made men
          These days … expert to all on matters of everything.

          I’m reminded of a Shadbolt phrase from eons ago – ‘all built “on a foundation of solid bullshit”‘ – which I suppose is why the dairy industry uz so fekun umportent to the specimen.

          The harder they rise – the harder they fall (and usually the louder they scream in protest as they do).
          I just can’t be fucked waiting around to see it happen when it’ll all become a replay of history when passive and peaceful natives eventually get restless.
          (Sometimes they just string em up from the nearest lamppost whilst the die-hard icon-emulators clutch their pearls and wonder …. Why .. Oh Why – how could this have happened)

          • David H 2.1.2.1.1
            18 November 2014 at 8:41 am

            You forgot those ‘Dead Eyes’, and that sharp intake of breath (sign of lying) when ever he utters anything of importance.

        • Ross 2.1.2.2
          17 November 2014 at 2:31 pm

          ditto

        • the pigman 2.1.2.3
          17 November 2014 at 8:24 pm

          I am overseas and can confirm, he appears to be a flaccid, dangling dick of a man.

        • miravox 2.1.2.4
          17 November 2014 at 11:33 pm

          Yep. I am overseas and I’m embarrassed by Key and his government.

      • Lanthanide 2.1.3
        17 November 2014 at 2:49 pm

        Might want to go watch his Hard Talk interview.

      • North 2.1.4
        17 November 2014 at 6:35 pm

        You ask for “sources” SS-Lands ? For TheGaucheKey being an arse ?

        ‘The Standard’ my man…….’The Standard’. Noted, scroted, s-troll-er Herr SS-Lands pugnaciously defending TheGaucheKey…….that’s a source and proof in itself. Click link below –

        http://thestandard.org.nz/polity-bonza/#comment-926298

      • Murray Rawshark 2.1.5
        18 November 2014 at 1:34 am

        I only know three people in Australia who like Key, and they don’t matter. He’s thought of as an idiot, albeit not as bad as Abbott.

        By the way, addressing the post, I don’t get the impression Australians are getting used to Abbott. I get the impression they’re getting sick of him.

  3. stever 3
    17 November 2014 at 12:15 pm

    I’m in Sydney working at NICTA at the moment…and today Angela Merkel is visiting 🙂

    It’s seen partly as a political statement…it’s one of those pesky science places that Abbott is going to cut the funding for…and Dr. Merkel (physicist) asked on her only private visit while in Aus to visit NICTA and see what’s going on 🙂

    Abbott is no doubt seething…and sad we have nothing like NICTA in NZ too!

  4. Daz 4
    17 November 2014 at 12:23 pm

    Australian men are so misogynistic that they voted to get rid of their Prime Minister Gillard because she was a woman.

    They wanted a penis, and they certainly got one.

    • tc 4.1
      17 November 2014 at 12:40 pm

      CT spin lines, MSM onside and labour self destructing with the Julia/Ken struggle pretty much anyone would have got elected as long as Rupert approved.

      It was Kev they voted against Daz and IMO it’s a downside of compulsory voting as radio red neck rant land (Jones/Hadley etc) plays a big role in ensuring if they have to vote then lets make their choice an easy one.

    • Chooky 4.2
      17 November 2014 at 1:07 pm

      @ Daz…lol…he looks like ape man in his speedos

      • Once Was Tim 4.2.1
        17 November 2014 at 2:59 pm

        Try putting John Key in speedos tho’ and stand him next to Tarn Yabbit. There’d be the reality of the charismatic Nu Zullner many people seem to see as an oik-on.
        It’s all staged as we know, but I was just thinking how this fake image of our dear leader – I mean as a ‘person’, and as being charismatic, and as being something we should all aspire to, has come to pass.
        It’s all bulshit.

  5. tc 5
    17 November 2014 at 12:25 pm

    crikey summed it up nicely:

    “Coming after Abbott so visibly failed to follow through with his rhetoric of aggression toward Putin — he “shirked the shirt-front”, as one TV news bulletin put it — the deal means the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation summit has been a wretched experience for Abbott…..maybe it’s political karma for all those years in the early 1990s when the Coalition bagged APEC as one of Labor’s grand follies.”

  6. yabby 6
    17 November 2014 at 1:15 pm

    Well, Abbott was born in the UK you know. I’ve often thought that we Antipodeans owe a lot of the emergent moaning and whining tendency to letting too many ten pound POMS in….

  7. Sable 7
    17 November 2014 at 2:46 pm

    Not to mention his silly comments about Vladimir Putin with regards to the M17 downing. All in all a bit of a clown but then what more can be said about a man who makes gaffs in public like “the suppository (repository) of truth”. Duh….

    • North 7.1
      17 November 2014 at 5:41 pm

      I’m just so bloody relieved that Abbott all pumped up ‘look at me look at me my speedos are bulging’ took an early tilt at Putin.

      Had he not you could be assured TheGaucheKey would’ve leapt at the gap in the market and done/said something tragic. To demonstrate to the world, viz. Obama and Cameron, that he’s coming along just fine in Little Churchill 101.

      He might’ve got all feverish and called for war on Vladivostok, as he did, arse-wipe school prefect like, re North Korea a few years ago.

      Jeezuz……Helen Clark and Ban Ki Moon must chuckle when they sit around having a few green teas after 5…….

  8. Tracey 8
    17 November 2014 at 3:43 pm

    the g20 cost HOW much ????

  9. Clemgeopin 9
    17 November 2014 at 6:30 pm

    I thought it was very rude of Abbot as well as the other western leaders to demean Putin at this meeting. Surely, these are world leaders who should know how to behave and interact with other world leaders with courtesy and diplomacy to sort/solve issues out. What is so great about not joining Putin and rudely letting him have his dinner all alone by himself. It is simple stuff like this that stuffs the world. Childish and dangerous strategy.

    • b waghorn 9.1
      17 November 2014 at 8:30 pm

      I quite often wounder what would happen if the Obamas of this world stopped in for a cuppa in places like north Korea and Iran occasionally on a no strings basis . be inclusive in stead of exclusive

    • Olwyn 9.2
      17 November 2014 at 8:39 pm

      The media reporting was on the same childish, ill-mannered level; “Look, here’s a shot of Putin, left eating all by himself at the special dinner” and so on. It has been said that pitching to the reading age of 15 nets the largest number of readers. We seem to have extended this idea to functioning at the psychological age of 13.

  10. Rodel 10
    17 November 2014 at 7:25 pm

    Putin -“F*** you Mr. A. I’m going home. Got more important things to do”.

  11. Mike Steinberg 11
    17 November 2014 at 7:55 pm

    Wasn’t it thanks to Abbott that NZ were able to attend this conference?

    The LA Times article seems to be pushing for Australia to have a significantly larger population, while at the same time claiming concern about climate change and the environment.

    Australia having a relatively small population is a good thing from an environmental perspective. That makes me consider that the writer has a particular agenda against Australia.