Politics is a dirty word

Craig Lapsley should not have been replaced as Emergency Management Commissioner. The position was created in 2014 and did nothing to improve the delivery of emergency services. It simply imposed another level of expensive bureaucracy. There was already (and still is), a full army of bureaucrats and politicians responsible for the administration of the various emergency services. The Minister is paid to take responsibility for overall administration so the position of Commissioner was never justified.Craig Lapsley resigned in August and was immediately replaced by Andrew Crisp. The performance of emergency management services in Victoria needs a complete review. The fragmentation of responsibilities probably led to the debacle and high cost of dealing with a scrub fire at Grantville on February 1 this year. The State has a Minister and full department of bureaucrats dealing with emergency services, so why has another tier been imposed, apart from creating more jobs for bureaucr...

Australians try to maintain an illusion that we are a ‘lucky country’ despite the reality that we have the infrastructure of a third world country. Every time the weather gets hot, the trains shut down. When an electrical storm hits, tens of thousands of us lose power or internet connections – or both. We need to have the guts to tell our politicians that we have had enough. All payment s to former senior politicians ( especially prime ministers) should be withheld until the country’s infrastructure has been fixed and the national debt has been repaid. At the next election, vote for anyone who is not a member of a political party. In particular don’t vote for any member of the coalition or the ALP.

It’s hard to understand why Australians are so gullible and gutless when it comes to politicians and Government. Throughout much of the world, people are marching in the streets, protesting against the unfairness of the system. France and the UK are just two examples. But here, we just meekly accept the crap thrown at us by politicians.

Arguments about funding the US-Mexico border wall would be quick to resolve if funding was removed from the Senate, Congress and the White House. Those parasites would soon find a solution rather than work without being paid.

In Canberra, Coalition threats to retaliate against independent MP Kerryn Phelps and two Labor MPs if parliament dares to refer the home affairs minister Peter Dutton to the high court to test his eligibility to sit in parliament, demonstrate that the Government is in panic mode. To equate medicare rebates to government funding to private child minding services is ludicrous.

The Liberal Party's woeful campaign in the Victorian State election produced an inevitable result - delivering a second term to the ALP's Daniel Andrews. The result was not all the fault of Matthew Guy, the Liberal Party machine must shoulder most of the responsibility for running an ineffective, boring and deceptive campaign. Implications for the next federal election are ominous for the party. Parliamentarians have been unable to work as a cohesive team in Government, How could they possibly hold together in opposition!

North Korean scientists have been developing new warhead technology allowing it to maintain a major missile strike capabiity without nuclear warheads. The development will allow the country to side-step any agreement with the United States to 'de-nuclearise' the Korean peninsula and will seriously embarrass US President Trump and the American military.Details about the development are closely guarded but it seems likely that it involves a kinetic energy system, an electro-magnetic pulse weapon or possibly a miniaturised anti-matter device.