No politics please, just want to acknowledge the passing of a great Australian.
by the way, who in the hell do you think you are dictating what we should or shouldn't comment on? I think discussing Gough in any way we please is completely acceptable. In one way or another, for better or worse, he affected pretty much all of us......and now is the perfect reminder.
I think its fair enough to reflect on him as a person rather than getting too political for a day or two. After all, I'd hate to sink to the disgraceful lows of The Left in the wake of Thatcher's death, for example.
What do you think? If I have to spell it out; when a figure of The Left passes, it's "please be respectful". When a figure of The Right passes, it's "sink your boots in".
I just wasn't sure if you were making a point or clueless I've read comments where people are simply that unaware of what they type.
Surely the most incompetent Prime Minister of Australia in recent history. Oh hang on, I forgot about Rudd and Gillard :doh:
Lol! A lot of the time I have no idea what I've typed (especially the following morning), but not this time.
Ah they were the good old days. The Loans affair, just to back door a lazy 4 or was it 5 billion between mates, Rex Connor and friends, and those lovely long lunches. Jim Cairns and his personal research assistant Juni Morosi, mmm sound a bit like Sir Les Patterson. Rex, Jim, Gough and Khemlani.
Having just finished watching ABC's memorial(for want of a better description)of this bloke, He did quite well in digging Aussie out of an awful conservitable hole that had been dug,for quite some time.Gorton and Macmahon,et al eeerk! I'm not a particularly polictically interested bloke BUT he certainly brought Aussie into the wider/mainstream/worldly way of thinking. Land right's is/are a particular interest up here,but so is responsibility in managing those rights(don't even go THERE!!!!) Conscription,sucks....sorry I don't agree....hence my hatred of firearms. Into the land of the living with voting @18,the US is still @ 21(I think)yet you can kill someone in a car @ 16 YO,and apparently go to a milkbar,hire an UZI and destroy a family. He certainly changed the lives of 10's of thousand's of Aussies' with free uni,medicare ,mostly for the better,(some of whom reside around here). It's a pity he couldn't afford(or was let) to achieve all his goals. ABC didn't spend a great deal of time on his failings(.....um,surprise)(mainly Khemlani ,Cairns/Morosi,inflation) I'm sure I'll get fired upon for these remarks....bring it on....
The curious, and telling thing, about Gough the man (as distinct from politician) is he and Malcolm became great friends sometime after the Dismissal. Gough was able to distinguish between self-serving and doing what you think is right (however deluded!). It's also interesting that Malcolm moved in Gough's direction, not the other way around. In 1975 I hated M with all the passion a teenager could muster; his actions during the Vietnamese boat-people years tempered that and now I can say I respect the man. What took me 30 years, Gough managed in 10 or so. Yes, he was spectacularly flawed, and unfortunately had very few around him to provide any balance but he was Icarus flying for the sun who fell and burned... how different from the simpering Heep's who make up today's politicians!
You're right - Malcolm is a bit of an embarrassment these days. Honestly, I think Gough was a 70s version of KRudd. Had some excellent ideas and managed to implement one or two, but ultimately forgot that he was spending other people's money in the process. Kind of a fundamental lefty flaw, really.
Malcolm changed his views completely when he lost his life savings to the Lloyds scam ran by the very toffs he so admired. He got very bitter about that. And what about Gough going to the Baath Party in Iraq/Syria to get funds for his election campaign? People have compared that to the Liberal Party getting money from BHP. Yeah right. BHP is the same as Saddam Hussein and Hafez Assad - NOT. Oh and free uni. Uni was free for the top 25% in matric WITH an added tax free living allowance BEFORE Gough. He allowed it to become a free-or-all. That just drove the standard down and down. Of course the subsequent Liberal "Dawkins reforms" made it even worse. Gough did some OK things but the total f*uck ups outweigh them 10 to 1. Now it looks like he was a saint according the the ABC. Soon it will be St Kev and St Julia.
Gough put Australia on the path from obligation to entitlement. His "ideas" were nothing more than a cut & paste from UK and Europe socialism and worked just as well.
Larry Pickering ITS TIME I used to say that I would go to Margies funeral to pay my respects but I would go to Goughs funeral to make sure he was dead. Of course that is quite uncalled for and in extremely bad taste now that he has gone. But to be honest, he disliked me intensely and I detested him. As the Left today will recall with sombre reverence his many legacies, I will remember him for the irreparable damage he caused this nation, damage that will continue to last generations. I recall his economic illiteracy, the unwavering belief in himself, his disdain of mere mortals and his self-acclaimed intellectualism, it was painful. Had he been competent in the slightest, it was a pain I could have endured. Gough, with his corrupt Cabinet, was unable to serve one complete term of Office and what he did serve was utter mayhem. The Left decry his sacking but Gough, bereft of supply, was quite prepared to go down in flames and take the nation with him. The ensuing general election was an exercise in what the Australian people really thought of him. Crean, who printed money like there was no tomorrow. Connor, who tried to borrow even more from a shady loan shark called Khemlani. Cairns, the unabashed communist root rat. Attorney General Murphy, who escaped jail by dying. Grassby the drug lord who dressed with the light off. Goughs team made Gillards look like the Luton Boys Choir. Just one example of Goughs economic empty headedness was his grand idea to provide housing for young Labor voting couples who could not break into the housing market (much like today). He dumped a borrowed $500 million (a lot in those days) into the banking sector at a ridiculously low rate of interest. Instead of assisting young couples, the banks predictably lent the money to existing home-owners who upgraded to bigger, better homes. Why not? After all they had the security in their current homes the banks wanted. Not one new house was built and the resultant increased demand on existing houses put them even further out of reach of the young couples, who were supposed to vote Labor, but in the end they didnt. But Goughs real crown of thorns was his Schools Commission and his fixation with phonetic spelling. The real legacy left by Gough is the kids of today who cannot spell, or construct a sentence. But never mind, Gillards Labor fixed that with a multi-billion Gonski scheme that will do nothing to educate teachers, but will certainly ensure they are paid better. Kids now lack communication skills, the ability to express themselves, and there is no-one to teach them because the teachers of today were Goughs pupils of yesterday. English Expression and Latin are lost subjects, exchanged for ethereal ideological Social Studies subjects that extol a global-warming hoax and a One World Government. Yes, thats the real legacy of Gough... kids without communication skills who in frustration resort to violence to explain themselves and journalists without the ability to sub-edit their own work. Most wars are fought between nations who dont speak the same language and if one has lost the art of its own language what chance has interpretive negotiation? Prepare for an avalanche of teary tributes today but my tears are for my kids and my country.
Mike McDonald I was 21 in 1972 when Whitlam was swept into power on the "It's Time" campaign. He was Australia's JFK and, I was enamoured with his promise of a better life, and the withdrawal of troops from Vietnam. I loathed the "Born to Rule" attitude of the Libs in opposition, and hated the millionaire patrician, arrogant opposition leader, Malcolm Fraser. In 1975, I hated Kerr with a passion, and went to several rallies where Gough rallied us "true believers", before that phrase was invented, and threw my hard earned dollars into the buckets that circulated through those rallies to help get Gough back. I was devastated when the "ignorant" Australian voting public, vindicated Kerr's decision to sack Gough and voted Fraser into power with a landslide victory, in December 1975. It was another 10 years before I eventually grew up, and studied the true history of the idiosyncratic Whitlam government, and its key players so well described above, by Larry. Whitlam presided over the worst government in Australia's history. What the eulogisers won't speak about in the next few weeks is the record inflation rates, record unemployment rates, attempts to borrow Saudi money to prop up his unbudgeted economic excesses, and record interest rates. There are none so ignorant as the "true believers." Image Unavailable, Please Login
Just one little reminder of a FACT. Gough's minister Al Grasby vilified the anti drugs campaigner Donald McKays family after he disappeared. Gough's mate Al was saying under parliamentary privilege that his family were responsible for his disappearance. It turned out Al was protecting his Griffith mates who happened to be Robert Trimbole et al who were organised crime dudes. Major drug lords and killers. Oh lets forget about that. Minor detail that a federal government minister in Gough's government was in the direct employ of those types. Where was Saint Gough to stop his minister doing that? Oh and comrade Cairns taking his mistress on overseas junkets. I have ZERO interest in that except I PAID for that. Where was Saint Gough to stop his minister doing that? Those people were all about "the people" in their fancy speeches but in reality were narcissistic, egotistical, selfish, deluded, incompetent pricks who had zero interest in the well being of all the WORKING people who funded their BS. And now they seem to forget the REAL story or at least gloss over it with "Oh he had some minor faults." Stop it or you will go blind.
I rarely hear of prime ministers that were good. It seems that everyone thinks they are all bad. I think running a country for a short tenure of 4 years in some cases is pretty difficult to actually make any long term significant changes. Running an ASX corporation would make you responsible for 300,000 people in some cases. 25 million is a different ball game. Plus the compensation isn't even close. I commend anyone brave enough to take on the prime ministerial role with half a government set up just to oppose everything you say.