Next federal election pendulum (provisional)

682 comments on “Next federal election pendulum (provisional)”

1. jenauthor @ #247 Saturday, April 21st, 2018 – 9:40 pm

   Very interesting segment on Rachel Maddow about the DNC lawsuit.

   Apparently they did the same thing during watergate … and it serve to keep the digging into the ties between Nixon and the espionage, slowly unearthing via legal means, closer and closer ties until it landed on the president himself. The day Nixon resigned, the DNC also won the lawsuit and got damages out of the Republicans even though, from the beginning, the republicans swore it was just a stunt (and several of those saying so, at the time, ended up in jail (sic).

   Maddow wondered whether this time, in mirroring that activity, they again have enough evidence to “know” that it does go all the way the WH. Again the republicans are being dismissive.

   It is avery interesting parallel …. something else to keep an eye on.

   Jen

   I guess you are also aware that a large number people are also being indicted for Criminal Offences by the DoJ. This matter has a long way to run, although I think that Trump is gearing up to fire Mueller. Mind you after a full 12 months I think Mueller should be asked to submit a final report and finish. If he has found anything significant send to trial. If not wrap up and get a pat on the back for thorough job.

2. briefly says:
   Saturday, April 21, 2018 at 9:55 pm
   “It’s obvious that ASIC is not relevant to supervising the conduct of banks and other financial organisations.”
   They do not appear to be good at anything more complex than providing ABNs.
   Google ASIC and read the reviews. A lot of people have nothing nice to say about ASIC.

   Quite seriously, when a corporate culture is as bad as ASIC’s the only solution is to start a new division to do their work, absorb useful staff and records/data from the old division, then shut the old one down.

3. For years, a joke among Trump Tower employees was that the boss was like Manhattan’s First Avenue, where the traffic goes only one way.

   That one-sidedness has always been at the heart of President Trump’s relationship with his longtime lawyer and fixer, Michael D. Cohen, who has said he would “take a bullet” for Mr. Trump. For years Mr. Trump treated Mr. Cohen poorly, with gratuitous insults, dismissive statements and, at least twice, threats of being fired, according to interviews with a half-dozen people familiar with their relationship.

   “Donald goes out of his way to treat him like garbage,” said Roger J. Stone Jr., Mr. Trump’s informal and longest-serving political adviser, who, along with Mr. Cohen, was one of five people originally surrounding the president when he was considering a presidential campaign before 2016.

   https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/20/us/politics/trump-michael-cohen.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news

   Surely the lesson here isn’t only that everything Trump touches dies, but that you don’t stick your neck out for a charlatan?

4. Since much of the talk lately has been about the failure of Neoliberal Economics, I thought this handy guide might help you understand why it has failed:

   

5. 

6. “I cannot see how ALP want to have alliance with Greens after ambition. I also understand in any election where ALP is just short of Majority & if they can form Majority government with Greens help, they will take it.

   In Queensland elections ‘Annastacia Palaszczuk’, was on record saying that she will not form coalition government with any minority parties or independents. It appears to have worked.”

   Not true, there were Labor strategists who had said privately it would be better long term if Labor did another stint in opposition and win a majority in its own right later on then try and form a minority government with the Greens and Independents if Turnbull failed to get a majority in his own right after 2016 federal election.

   The Gillard/Greens/ Independents minority government was just so complicated that it wasn’t just about pleasing Greens but it was the independents. It only took one independent to refused to back something to stop something getting passed. I remember one or two of them failed to back the media reforms Gillard proposed.

   Also the LNP and the Courier Mail were quite pathetic in their attacks suggesting Annastacia Palaszczuk should keep her word and not form a minority government with a Greens MP or Independents. When she said “No deals” she meant she would rule out forming government with One Nation categorically. After the election when Labor was close to scraping enough Mp’s to form a majority in its own right. LNP leader Tim Nicholls was so desperate to form government he told Palaszczuk to keep her word and allow Nicholls to attempt to form government with Greens, One Nation, and Independents. It was lame, desperate, and pathetic.

7. Good ones, C@t.

   I also think that Douglas Adams saw the early stages of neo-liberalism back when he wrote Hitchiker’s Guide. He created the Somebody Else’s Problem (SEP) field, which concealed things people did not want to see.
   In neo-liberalism, a SEP field conceals the consequences of all sorts of anti social behaviour, such as being the biggest, per capita, greenhouse gas polluters on the planet.

8. Maud Lynne,
   We are finally starting to see the pus oozing out after the scabs have been picked off. Or, to put it in a kinder gentler way, now that the genie has been let out of the bottle it will be almost impossible to get it back in. Neoliberalism and the Austrian School of Economics are in their death throes.

9. In HHGTG, the SEP field allowed an alien space ship to land in the middle of a sports field with thousands watching and no one actually seeing the space ship.

   Kinda like how some things (like the current account) aren’t visible to the media while the Libs are in power.

10. daretotread. @ #251 Saturday, April 21st, 2018 – 7:16 pm

    …

    This matter has a long way to run, although I think that Trump is gearing up to fire Mueller.

    So it’s not close to being finished.

    Mind you after a full 12 months I think Mueller should be asked to submit a final report and finish.

    But Mueller should get what he has now and call it quits.

    If he has found anything significant send to trial.

    The President can not be tried in a Court whilst they are the President.

    Mueller has no power to impeach the President, so how do you suggest this happens?

    If not wrap up and get a pat on the back for thorough job.

    Well done Robert!! You tried hard but enough’s enough, we can’t let possible criminality get in the way of running the Country.

    You do work in very strange ways!!

    Closing down an on going investigation could well be construed as obstructing justice!

11. I’ve decided that it’s not that AUS voters are stupid, it’s simply that Libs have stuck SEP fields over a lot of things. It’s we poor unfortunates who are immune to the SEP field effect.

12. Anyway, it’s time for bed. G’night all

13. Maude Lynne @ #261 Saturday, April 21st, 2018 – 8:37 pm

    I’ve decided that it’s not that AUS voters are stupid, it’s simply that Libs have stuck SEP fields over a lot of things. It’s we poor unfortunates who are immune to the SEP field effect.

    SEPs have been in place in many Western Societies for decades.

    We see it with the whole culture of “it’s not my fault” that has become so prevalent! 🙂

14. https://www.alternet.org/enoch-powell-and-concerning-popularity-his-racist-speech?src=newsletter1091323

    Racism has very deep roots in Britain….unsurprising considering its monarchic/colonial/imperialist history. It could hardly be possible to embark on the violent dispossession and subjugation of other peoples on a global scale without also having a supremacist frame of reference.

    This supremacism is very persistent and has been instrumental in an act of idiotic self-harm, Brexit.

15. I reckon the banking royal commission, if it isn’t already, will be the death knell for this government. If there’s one thing that truly unites ALL Australians, it is hatred of the big banks. And this government took their side over the Australian people.

    Moving from baseball bat territory to dropping a piano on their heads.

    What do bludgers reckon?

16. JimmyD:

    I reckon the banking royal commission, if it isn’t already, will be the death knell for this government. If there’s one thing that truly unites ALL Australians, it is hatred of the big banks. And this government took their side over the Australian people.

    Yes. The impact made even worse by the Prime Minister being a banker, on record with his vocal opposition to the Royal Commission, and a stash tucked away in the Cayman Islands. It’s not a good look, and it’s not going away any time soon/before the next election, whenever it is held. Might as well stick a fork in Malcolm; he is finished.

    The next round of polling should be interesting.

17. Perhaps an incoming Labor Government will demand the repatriation to Australia of all Australian owned or controlled funds in foreign tax havens, and the payment of all taxes avoided by this artifice.

    Failure to do so by individuals or companies could be penalized by the doubling of an ATO assessment of tax so avoided, and enforced against the Australian assets of those individuals, and the personal assets of the directors of those companies.

    Let’s see how Trumble and co will like them apples.

18. From Nature magazine:

    Global warming transforms coral reef assemblages

    Global warming is rapidly emerging as a universal threat to ecological integrity and function, highlighting the urgent need for a better understanding of the impact of heat exposure on the resilience of ecosystems and the people who depend on them1. Here we show that in the aftermath of the record-breaking marine heatwave on the Great Barrier Reef in 20162, corals began to die immediately on reefs where the accumulated heat exposure exceeded a critical threshold of degree heating weeks, which was 3–4 °C-weeks. After eight months, an exposure of 6 °C-weeks or more drove an unprecedented, regional-scale shift in the composition of coral assemblages, reflecting markedly divergent responses to heat stress by different taxa.

    This is the original paper in Nature :

    https://goo.gl/6zLXcf

    And below, an article in the Atlantic, based on the article in Nature:

    From:
    https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/04/since-2016-half-the-coral-in-the-great-barrier-reef-has-perished/558302/?single_page=true
    
    Since 2016, Half of All Coral in the Great Barrier Reef Has Died
    A new study warns it has become a “highly altered, degraded system.”
    A bleached coral reef
    David Gray / Reuters
    Once upon a time, there was a city so dazzling and kaleidoscopic, so braided and water-rimmed, that it was often compared to a single living body. It clustered around a glimmering emerald spine, which astronauts could glimpse from orbit. It hid warm nooks and crannies, each a nursery for new life. It opened into radiant, iris-colored avenues, which tourists crossed oceans to see. The city was, the experts declared, the planet’s largest living structure.

    Then, all at once, a kind of invisible wildfire overran the city. It consumed its avenues and neighborhoods, swallowed its canyons and branches. It expelled an uncountable number of dwellers from their homes. It was merciless: Even those who escaped the initial ravishment perished in the famine that followed.

    Many people had loved the city, but none of them could protect it. No firefighters, no chemicals, no intervention of any kind could stop the destruction. As the heat plundered the city of its wealth, the experts could only respond with careful, mournful observation.

    All of this recently happened, more or less, off the east coast of Australia. The Great Barrier Reef—which, at 1,400 miles long, is the longest and largest coral reef in the world—was blanketed by dangerously hot water in the summer of 2016. This heat strangled and starved the corals, causing what has been called “an unprecedented bleaching event.”

    Though that bleaching event was reported at the time, scientists are just starting to understand how catastrophically transformative it was. A new paper, published Wednesday in the journal Nature, serves as a kind of autopsy report for the debacle.

    After inspecting every one of its reefs, and surveying them on an almost species-by-species basis, the paper reports that vast swaths of the Great Barrier Reef were permanently transformed in the summer of 2016. The reef’s northern third, previously its most pristine section, lost more than half of its corals. Two of its most recognizable creatures—the amber-colored staghorn corals, and the flat, fanlike tabular corals—suffered the worst casualties.

    But damage was widespread out across the entire ecosystem.

    “On average, across the Great Barrier Reef, one in three corals died in nine months,” said Terry Hughes, an author of the paper and the director of the ARC Center of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, the Australian government’s federal research program devoted to corals.

    “You could say [the ecosystem] has collapsed. You could say it has degraded. I wouldn’t say that’s wrong,” Hughes said. “A more neutral way of putting it is that it has transformed into a completely new system that looks differently, and behaves differently, and functions differently, than how it was three years ago.”

    “It’s a confirmation of our worst fears,” said John Bruno, a marine biologist at the University of North Carolina who was not involved in the study.

    Yet it was not the end of troubles for the Great Barrier Reef. In the summer months of 2017, warm waters again struck the reef and triggered another bleaching event. This time, the heat hit the reef’s middle third. Hughes and his team have not published a peer-reviewed paper on that event, but he shared early survey results with me.

    Combined, he said, the back-to-back bleaching events killed one in every two corals in the Great Barrier Reef. It is a fact almost beyond comprehension: In the summer of 2015, more than 2 billion corals lived in the Great Barrier Reef. Half of them are now dead.

    What caused the devastation? Hughes was clear: human-caused global warming. The accumulation of heat-trapping pollution in the atmosphere has raised the world’s average temperature, making the oceans hotter and less hospitable to fragile tropical corals.

19. JimmyD says:
    Sunday, April 22, 2018 at 1:47 am
    I reckon the banking royal commission, if it isn’t already, will be the death knell for this government. If there’s one thing that truly unites ALL Australians, it is hatred of the big banks. And this government took their side over the Australian people.

    Moving from baseball bat territory to dropping a piano on their heads.

    Yup….scorn, disgust, contempt, fury…the banks and their political subsidiary, the Liberal Party, are going to reap a whirlwind.

    Of course, it’s far from over yet. Far more dishonesty, greed, indifference and straight-out criminal conduct is yet to be traversed.

20. The banking royal commission and in particular the massive failure of the under resourced and misdirected ASIC and the bleed over into lack of trust of other under resourced authorities is a very significant issue.

21. You’d have to look at ASIC / banks as a failure of actual regulation and wonder for a moment how effective self regulatory codes of conduct and the like are.

22. Good morning Dawn Patrollers. It’s slow Sunday!

    Katharine Murphy reckons Frydenberg’s NEG task might well be beyond him.
    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/apr/21/frydenbergs-neg-challenge-is-like-climbing-everest-with-no-oxygen
    Greg Jericho is unsurprised at this week’s royal commission evidence. He says it’s exactly what capitalism intends. This article is well worth reading.
    https://www.theguardian.com/business/grogonomics/2018/apr/20/what-happened-this-week-is-not-a-shock-it-is-capitalism-as-intended
    Michael West writes that there is no easy way to fix systemic corruption.
    https://www.michaelwest.com.au/royal-commission-no-easy-fix-for-systemic-corruption/
    The number of students attending private schools in Australia will flatline over the next decade, according to federal government projections, as more parents choose to keep their children in the public system.
    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/private-school-enrolments-projected-to-flatline-as-parents-choose-public-20180420-p4zaru.html
    Jacqui Maley says the minute a conservative politician (and it tends to only be conservative politicians) drops the “free speech” bomb, you know it’s going to be in the service of something pretty dreadful. A good discussion here.
    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/the-right-to-free-speech-doesn-t-make-really-bad-ideas-any-better-20180419-p4zalc.html
    Following on from this federal Labor will move to crack down on gay conversion therapy if Bill Shorten wins government, vowing to work with the states and territories to ban the discredited practice.
    https://www.theage.com.au/national/federal-labor-vows-to-crack-down-on-gay-conversion-therapy-20180421-p4zawu.html
    The Nobel laureate economist Joseph Stiglitz has declared war against ‘know-nothing’ Trump.
    https://www.theage.com.au/world/north-america/nobel-laureate-economist-declares-war-against-know-nothing-trump-20180417-p4za3y.html
    A good contribution from Peter Greste on the basis and flexibility of history.
    https://www.smh.com.au/national/we-owe-it-to-monash-to-see-the-facts-of-history-with-clear-eyes-20180420-p4zau7.html
    Are live sheep exports worth the moral cost?
    https://www.smh.com.au/national/live-sheep-exports-are-not-worth-the-moral-cost-20180421-p4zawf.html
    Rachel Lane advises people to crunch the numbers before committing to a retirement village,
    https://www.smh.com.au/money/super-and-retirement/crunch-the-numbers-before-you-commit-to-a-retirement-village-20180418-p4zaeg.html
    Plummeting sales of diesel cars have driven Britain’s auto industry to the brink of a crisis, with the axe falling on thousands of manufacturing jobs, and dealerships threatened with savage restructuring.
    https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/apr/21/dieselgate-uk-car-industry-sales-slump
    Tesla: The brilliant company that may meet a spectacular end.
    https://thenewdaily.com.au/life/auto/2018/04/21/tesla-financial-performance-uncertain-future/
    If there’s just one lesson consumers should take away from the AMP train wreck at the banking royal commission this week, it’s this: when it comes to picking a financial adviser, watch out for big banks.
    https://thenewdaily.com.au/money/finance-news/2018/04/20/amp-financial-advice-royal-commission/

    Cartoon Corner

    Jon Kudelka with Turnbull’s surprise catch.
    
    Glen Le Lievre explains how to bash a bank.
    
    Paul Zanetti sums up the royal commission.
    
    More in here – with lots of Matt Golding’s.
    https://www.smh.com.au/national/victoria/best-of-fairfax-cartoons-april-22-20180421-h0z2sz.html

23. Puffy, good idea to check the fees you are paying. Also check the insurance policy you are paying for in your fund. They are probably wasted. Fees in Industry funds are extremely low. Some charge below .3% of your capital pa.

24. ‘Too little, too late’: Attorney Avenatti accuses ‘panicky’ Trump of ‘kissing Michael Cohen’s a**’ with flattering tweets

    Never one to miss an opportunity to needle both President Donald Trump and his personal attorney, Michael Cohen, the lawyer representing adult film star Stormy Daniels responded to Trump’s ode to Cohen in a series of tweets Saturday morning, saying the president is kissing his lawyer’s ass in effort to keep him from flipping.

    “As I predicted, panic has set in at the WH,” Avenatti tweeted. “So much so, that we now have bogus tweets aimed at kissing Mr. Cohen’s a** and giving him a false sense of security and friendship with the hope that he doesn’t tell the truth and bring the house of cards down. Too little too late.”

    https://www.rawstory.com/2018/04/little-late-attorney-avenatti-accuses-panicky-trump-kissing-michael-cohens-flattering-tweets/

25. ‘Helping this president is akin to treason’: Here is why Trump can only hire unknown lawyers and Giuliani

    Twelve partners from seven top-tier white-collar criminal defense attorneys turned down President Donald Trump before former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani was brought on, the Boston Globe reported Saturday.

    “Rudy Giuliani has always been available,” former California Roger Cossack suggested. “Hiring Rudy Giuliani only underlines Trump’s dilemma in finding a lawyer who will work for him.”

    The rejection of President Trump has no parallels in American history.

    https://www.rawstory.com/2018/04/helping-president-akin-treason-trump-can-hire-unknown-lawyers-giuliani/

26. Recently an inmate on Nauru set himself on fire and died. Dutton argued in response that people self-immolate so they can get to Australia. It took 30 years of brutal behaviour for a remark like this to be possible and for Australians not to notice how truly remarkable was the Minister’s brutality.

    Our current uniquely harsh anti-asylum seeker policy is grounded in the absolutist ambitions that can, in my view, best be explained by Australia’s long term migration history and its associated culture of control. It has become entrenched because of the force of bureaucratic inertia that has seen the system grow automatically while any interest in, or understanding of, the relation of means to ends has been lost. And it is presently maintained by an irrational but consensual mindset that has Canberra in its grip: the conviction that even one concession to human kindness will send a message to the people smugglers and bring the whole system crashing down.

    https://www.johnmenadue.com/robert-manne-how-we-came-to-be-so-cruel-to-asylum-seekers-2/

27. Yet another example of the toxic legacy of The Rodent.

    The aged care crisis can be traced back to Howard’s Aged Care Act. We need a new act
    Dr Sarah Russell

    ………….. researchers like myself need access to data. We need data on quality indicators such as pressure sores, medication errors, weight loss, falls, infection rates admissions to hospitals, staffing levels and training. However, these data are not publicly available.

    Who decided that data on residents’ safety and wellbeing in aged care homes must be kept top secret? To answer this question, we need to go back more than 20 years when the Aged Care Act 1997 was drafted. John Howard’s Coalition government proved a turning point for aged care policy in Australia.

    Under the Coalition’s Aged Care Act 1997, there was an increase in private investment. Private equity firms, new foreign investors, and superannuation and property real estate investment trusts entered the residential aged care market.

    The dean and head of the University of South Australia’s law school Wendy Lacey has slammed the Aged Care Act, arguing that there is “a complete absence of any positive and mandatory legal obligation on the part of facilities to take proactive measures to promote mental health and wellbeing of their residents”.

    Rather than tackle the disgracefully inadequate staffing requirements contained in the 1997 Aged Care Act,

    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/apr/20/the-new-aged-care-watchdog-is-like-shifting-the-deckchairs-on-the-titanic

28. “Underpinning the Liberal party’s ethos is that governments need to get out of the way to let businesses thrive.
    The problem is in these past two week we have seen how they like to thrive.”

    Nice work Grog.

29. Good Morning Bludgers 🙂
    Now that Mr Trumble is in Germany discussing ‘Free Trade’ with Angela Merkel, I wonder whether he will take on board and acknowledge the fact that Free Trade can be conducted with a strong Union movement and the Economy doesn’t collapse, in fact it thrives?

30. Alastair Nicholson‏ @alasnich

    TheGovernment’s proposal to drastically increase penalties for corporate crimes is premature. First it is a thought bubble political fix response that doesn’t affect crimes already committed, Secondly why doesn’t it wait for the RC recommendations and give a considered response

31. Lizzie, good point.
    But increasing the penalties does absolutely nothing since the culprits are not prosecuted. See Glen le Lievre’s cartoon above.
    Politics demands they do something.
    So Our Glorious Gov’t has given the appearance of doing something, whilst doing nothing. Again.

32. Politics demands they do something.
    So Our Glorious Gov’t has given the appearance of doing something, whilst doing nothing. Again.

    What’s the bet the government of Trumble and Scrote line up a fall guy or gal for a show trial they can showboat about before the next federal election?

33. “You’d have to look at ASIC / banks as a failure of actual regulation and wonder for a moment how effective self regulatory codes of conduct and the like are.”

    Self regulation = No regulation.

34. I don’t see anything wrong with increasing both fines and jail terms (particularly minimum jail terms), but it is surely not even part of the response to broad institutional unlawfulness and underfunded ineffectual regulatory / oversight bodies.

    And it makes the ‘we don’t need ICAC’ view of some even more stupid than it already was.

35. Internet outraged after Trump used Bush memorial to promote Mar-a-Lago as the ‘Southern White House’

    Donald Trump bought the 126-room property in 1985. Post had dreamed of it becoming the “Winter White House,” and as President, Trump has tried to make that nickname stick.

    Mar-a-Lago is Trump’s private business, but he has made clear he sees no wall between his businesses and his role as president.

    He initially took to calling Mar-a-Lago the “Winter White House,” but increasingly is referring to it as the “Southern White House.” And many people are furious.

    On Twitter, many expressed outrage, with some focusing on the racist “dog whistle” aspect of calling Mar-a-Lago the Southern White House, and others commenting on his monetization of the presidency for personal gain.

    https://www.rawstory.com/2018/04/internet-outraged-trump-used-bush-memorial-promote-mar-lago-southern-white-house/

36. “Rudy Giuliani has always been available,” former California Roger Cossack suggested. “Hiring Rudy Giuliani only underlines Trump’s dilemma in finding a lawyer who will work for him.”

    trump wanted to appoint Giuliani as AG, but the WH knew he would never get past confirmation hearings – this was covered in the F&F book.

    Comey worked for Giuliani in the Southern District of NY many years ago as an Asst US Attorney. Giuliani was a legend back then according to Comey, but he adds it was always about Giuliani and heaven forbid anyone who took credit for successful outcomes over the boss.

37. lizzie @ #280 Sunday, April 22nd, 2018 – 7:23 am

    Alastair Nicholson‏ @alasnich

    TheGovernment’s proposal to drastically increase penalties for corporate crimes is premature. First it is a thought bubble political fix response that doesn’t affect crimes already committed, Secondly why doesn’t it wait for the RC recommendations and give a considered response

    The mind truly boggles at what additional scumbag practices are waiting to be uncovered in the wider business community.

    Bring it on!

38. Maude Lynne @ #281 Sunday, April 22nd, 2018 – 7:33 am

    Lizzie, good point.
    But increasing the penalties does absolutely nothing since the culprits are not prosecuted. See Glen le Lievre’s cartoon above.
    Politics demands they do something.
    So Our Glorious Gov’t has given the appearance of doing something, whilst doing nothing. Again.

    Interesting to recall that howard as treasurer had little option but to act and crush the spivs involved in the infamous ‘Bottom of the Harbour’ tax scam back in the 1970’s.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bottom_of_the_harbour_tax_avoidance

    Turnbull has bugger all authority and little credibility.

    Labor will have to deal with it.

39. Just a few observations

    Turnbull was a solicitor turned MERCHANT banker – think FAI and HIH

    His reputation was a dollar too high and a day too late

    Someone else’s fault

    Think privatisation of public assets and the most effective form of regulation being self regulation

    And Stiglitz who was in Australia in the last few years on a lecture tour including at the University of Melbourne is brilliant

    Plus the RC is only touching the surface with populist issues – not core issues of propriety and responsibility

40. From the US but would be a familiar story here.

    Bad Bankers Drive Out Good Bankers: Wells Fargo, Wall Street, And Gresham’s Law

    …………………Hambek says. “Every morning, we had a conference call with all the managers. You were supposed to tell them how you were going to make your sales goal for the day, and if you didn’t, you’d have to call in the afternoon to explain why you didn’t make it and how you were going to fix it. It was really tense.” Achieving sales goals wasn’t easy. Ellensburg is a small town, and there were seven other banks.

    That’s when Hambek began to see things that shouldn’t have been happening: …………the manipulation and/or misrepresentation of sales or referrals . . . in an attempt to receive compensation or to meet sales goals,” was supposed to be a big no-no, so Hambek called the Wells Fargo EthicsLine, and he told his supervisor what he’d found. “I said, ‘This is blatant gaming,’ ” he recalls, but nobody seemed to care. Later that summer, after 35 years of service, he retired in order to avoid being fired for lack of productivity.

41. Sunday morning in Perth. BK’s dawn patrol, some thunder and rain on the roof.
    Ipads (or any tablet for that matter) are great, I don’t even have to get out of bed

42. I think the Banking RC has wider implications than just the the finance sector.

    All that pesky red tape getting in the way of business doing what ever it takes to make a buck.

    I think this meshes nicely into the equality debate and what business really owes the Society that allows it to function and flourish.

    The RC should provide ample evidence for redressing the balance between the Society and business and allow a future Government, who is interested in these things, to act. 🙂

43. I should have included the following in my post above .

    The statistics are staggering – almost 7000 companies involved. The same type of spivs now baying for a tax cut – yet caught out fleecing the public yet again –

    Bottom of the harbour tax avoidance was a form of tax avoidance used in Australia in the 1970s. Legislation (below) made it a criminal offence in 1980. The practice came to symbolise the worst of variously contrived tax strategies from those times.

    In its 1986/87 annual report, the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) stated a total 6,688 companies had been involved, involving revenue of between $500 million and $1 billion.

    The operation at the heart of bottom of the harbour schemes was simple. A company would be stripped of assets and accumulated profits before its tax fell due, leaving it then unable to pay.

    Once assets were stripped, the company would be sent, metaphorically, to the “bottom of the harbour” by being transferred to someone of limited means and with little interest in its past activities. The company’s records were often lost too.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bottom_of_the_harbour_tax_avoidance

44. Isn’t it a tragedy that these moderates seem to have no power. Thanks, Turnbull, the great leader.

    The Saturday Paper‏Verified account @SatPaper

    Moderate Liberals open up about the prospect of Dutton as PM: “He’s nothing but a pre-Fitzgerald corruption inquiry Queensland walloper”. http://satpa.pe/turnb66fae

45. Just to add on banks and working in banks, when there was significant provisioning a peer group review of that advance file was conducted

    I got to attend a few!

    In instances where appropriate I included HR and the process to appoint the lending Manager under review because the expertise to manage such complex businesses appeared absent

    Made some friends!!!

    The politics within a bank is what it is and mitigates against questioning minds and recalcitrance when everyone is nodding in agreement – again think Williams and HIH, all “yes” people

46. I mentioned an interesting segment on Maddow’s Friday show and how it researched parallels between the DNC Watergate civil suit and the one they launched earlier this week. How its purpose then likely mirrors the purpose now despite the immediate knee-jerk responses form Trump sympathisers that it is a stunt of some kind. The pundits on various US shows (which I often watch) came up with a variety of responses including that Mueller has had enough time, that it should just report etc. etc.

    Actually, just read DTT’s response to my email … it parrots the sentiments of Trump’s coterie of sucker-uppers quite well with the same contradictions.

47. Morning all. Thanks BK and Cat for some fine posts on capitalism over night. The banks are not the only corporations behaving badly. Uber is proving itself a highly unethical firm on several fronts in recent times. Uber Eats is another one. Personally I refuse to use them.
    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-04-22/uber-eats-criticised-over-conditions-on-restaurant-owners/9662814

    If Uber’s practices are legal here the Trade Practices Act needs to be rewritten. If they are not legal Uber, l8ke banks, should be prosecuted by Asic.

48. I think the LNP moderates are moderates in the same way that Republican members of congress and senators are. They still put party and personal interest ahead of the country, would coverup and run interference to thwart investigation of crimes and corruption, but they’d feel a little poorly about it.

49. TheGovernment’s proposal to drastically increase penalties for corporate crimes is premature. First it is a thought bubble political fix response that doesn’

    This is similar to the point of an article in the AFR earlier this week, warning against a ‘knee jerk’ response to the RC.

    Possibly if a proper investigation had been held many years ago and those responsible held to account with existing penalties then this might be possible. Now tougher measures are needed.

    As regards penalties, in spirit of finding a middle ground, I note the lamp posts along Northbourne Ave in Canberra are available.

50. “If Uber’s practices are …”

    Ah a union free gig economy where you profit by ripping off workers and small business … the dream of LNP types