The latest Newspoll has Labor’s lead up again after a period of moderating results since the leadership upheaval, the two-party lead now at 54-46, compared with 53-47 in the poll a fortnight ago. Labor is up a point on the primary vote to 39%, while the Coalition is down one to 36%, the Greens are down two to 9%, and One Nation are steady on 6%. Still more worrying for the Liberals is a reversal of the tide in favour of Scott Morrison, who records his first net negative personal ratings to date, with approval down four to 41% and disapproval up six to 44%. Bill Shorten is respectively up two to 37% and down one to 50%, and his deficit as preferred prime minister has narrowed from 45-34 to 43-35. The poll was conducted Thursday to Sunday from a sample of 1646.
I agree with posters that it’s dangerous to draw conclusions on the Rush case from selective information.
For example, yesterday we heard that the actor Winter saw Rush cupping Norvill’s breast. Today we hear that some months ago he told Rush’s lawyers that he HADN’T seen Rush touch her breast. When asked what had changed he said he “had been meditating on it”. He also agreed that he had in the interim spoken to Norvill’s lawyers. He also agreed, when asked, that he had been standing BEHIND Rush and Norville at the critical moment (as can be seen from BB’s photo)
This example reinforces the feeling many of us seem to have that the evidence being presented is open to question.
Ven @ #2744 Friday, November 2nd, 2018 – 4:25 pm
What qualifications are then to required to be PM, please tell me where these qualifications can be obtained?
nath
“The genius who put Lara Bingle in a bikini and on the tv deserves to be thanked at least for that.”
I think Lara knew how to put on a bikini long before Morrison came along.
And weren’t the tv ads designed for viewership overseas?
Michael A @ #2688 Friday, November 2nd, 2018 – 3:07 pm
Michael, There is no allegation of criminal behaviour by the parties to the defamation proceedings, not by Norvill nor the Tele, nor by anybody else, like the Police. You apparently, going by your statements, believe otherwise. Do you get it? This is NOT a criminal matter. Playing silly buggers at a rehearsal, and allegedly, once, brushing one’s hand across somebody else bare back, while carrying them as part of a rehearsal, are not criminal offences. You are really making a prat of yourself.
The Tele articles went much further, saying that Rush had followed Norvill into a unisex toilet, and refused to leave. Norvill has stated unequivocally that she never said any such thing, and it didn’t happen.
I suggest that you cease digging. You are in over your head.
Kate:
Friday, November 2, 2018 at 4:31 pm
—————————————
Too many posters here have dived down among the evidentiary weeds without being in a position to do so, IMO. This whole conversation would have been better left in the realm of abstract discussion of moral imperatives, from the various perspectives of procedural justice, fair and honest media reporting, fairness of defamation laws, obstacles to the reporting of sexual assault, and so on. Instead, we have people pretending they are jurors in a trial and pontificating on how they would treat this or that witness’s evidence if it were up to them.
Several posters have refused to engage with anything I have written except through the prism of whether they show I am “Team Rush” or “Team Norvill”. As if it matters a toss to anyone which I was! We have had too many armchair judges volunteering themselves as judges in this case, as if there wasn’t an eminently qualified one judging it already.
So far, this whole conversation has generated all heat and no light. When are people going to focus on the issues at play here, and stop playing at judge and jury?
Kate at 4.31 pm:
I am sorry but you apparently have to choose between being a misogynist who supports the patriarchy or alternatively accept that Norvill is an exemplary case of a women being victimised for the sin of fighting back from sexual harassment.
I know you thought that between these 2 extremes there was a gulf so wide an infinity of views could reasonably be held but you are mistaken.
On reflection I think you must be a misogynist who supports the patriarchy. For this you receive the gift of the wisdom of Nicholas and Michael A to correct your errors.
Michael A
‘So far, this whole conversation has generated all heat and no light.’
True. So quit digging.
Michael A
Once again, you misrepresent – or misinterpret – the responses to your posts.
For example, none of my posts put me on Team Anything. I objected to your clear inferences that Rush was automatically guilty because he was rich and talented.
If you don’t understand what you meant by your own posts, as apparently you don’t, you’re probably unable to understand what other posters are saying, either.
Any evidence given against Rush in the defo matter was always liable to be fiercely contested, not least in the wider twitter / bloggosphere. The reason for that is the long running fatwa Newscorp through the Tele has been running against Rush, and any other actor that might have expressed an opinion. (see esp Kate Blanchette, “our Kate” when she wins any award but otherwise to be condemned.)
In those circumstances there was always a likelihood of changed stories and “rewards” for juicy evidence, cuch is the Newscorp reputation.
I have no opinion re Rushs culpability, but I have deep deep reservations about “facts” discovered by the Telegraphs shit sheet writers that support a long running campaign of villification such as that run against Rush.
”
The Silver Bodgie says:
Friday, November 2, 2018 at 4:37 pm
”
The beauty of PM experience is that you don’t get it till you become one.
yabba says:
Friday, November 2, 2018 at 4:42 pm
—————————————
I will repeat what I have said many times before: I have no view about Rush’s guilt or innocence and I have no interest in discussing Rush’s guilt or innocence. I am interested in discussing whether or not people here think our defamation laws are fair to those who can be trampled upon by the press but have no “reputation” as such to be protected. I am interested in discussing whether or not people here think there are still too many obstacles in the way of abuse/assault victims pressing charges. I still think it is pathetic for anyone to get precious over damage to the reputation of someone living with wealth and privilege.
All the issues I raise are normative, not substantive. People here may find such discussions meaningless. That is perfectly OK. They can scroll past my posts. But some have imputed to me accusations against Rush that I simply have not made. That is dishonest, and I will always fight back against that.
”
Boerwar says:
Friday, November 2, 2018 at 4:48 pm
Michael A
‘So far, this whole conversation has generated all heat and no light.’
True. So quit digging.
”
BW, that I agree
Michael A
It is not all about you, pal.
The federal government should increase its net spending into the domestic non-government sector by whatever amount is needed at the time to ensure full employment with price stability. Note that when I say full employment, I mean a NAIBER full employment, not a bogus NAIRU full employment.
A major part of ensuring full employment with price stability is for the federal government to make an unconditional offer of employment at the minimum wage. This would eradicate unemployment and underemployment.
JG jobs would be designed flexibly around the interests and abilities of the job-seeker.
A JG would permit job-seekers to choose their weekly hours of work (up to a maximum of 35 hours per week of JG and non-JG paid work).
A JG would take job-seekers as they are instead of expecting job-seekers to fit into a pre-defined role.
A JG would enable people with disabilities, mental health issues, and low levels of education and skill to contribute to their local communities in accordance with their abilities.
A Job Guarantee workforce would expand during a recession (as people lose private sector jobs and move into the minimum wage Job Guarantee sector). A Job Guarantee workforce would contract during a recovery or a boom (as Job Guarantee workers move into higher paid jobs in the private sector).
A JG operates as a price stability mechanism, not just as a public sector job creation program.
The JG does just the right amount of federal spending at any given time to ensure full employment with price stability.
The JG wage would establish the wage floor for the entire economy. Private sector employers would have to at least match that wage if they wanted to attract workers.
It is necessary for any economy to have a price anchor. At present we use an inhumane and wasteful price anchor: a buffer stock of miserable unemployed people.
A JG uses a much better price anchor: a buffer stock of employed people who are doing socially useful, environmentally sustainable tasks that are interesting and meaningful to the workers, and that promote skill development, positive social interactions, self-esteem, community esteem for the workers, and good mental and physical health.
Unemployment and underemployment are by far the biggest and most destructive forms of waste that occur in our society.
The federal government has the power to abolish involuntary unemployment by instituting a Job Guarantee at the minimum wage.
BW
Explain me one think. Why did PBers believed or at least wanted to believe ‘Christine Blasey Ford’s story’ with regards Brett Kavanaugh. It supposed to have happened over 35 years ago?
[Michael A says:
Friday, November 2, 2018 at 4:50 pm
yabba says:
Friday, November 2, 2018 at 4:42 pm
—————————————
But some have imputed to me accusations against Rush that I simply have not made. That is dishonest, and I will always fight back against that.]
I have stated you have made the accusation that Rush should be criminally prosecuted for his behaviour.
I have explained ad nauseum why that accusation contains an assertion that Rush is likely BRD to have committed a criminal offence.
You have not meaningfully responded and you have not directly renounced the validity of the post that contained the assertion you seek to walk away from.
How is it dishonest of me to hold you to that assertion?
Ven
I can’t speak for the rest but what I wanted – a proper investigation by the FBI – I did not get.
Boerwar says:
Friday, November 2, 2018 at 4:48 pm
Michael A
‘So far, this whole conversation has generated all heat and no light.’
True. So quit digging.
————————————-
I’m not digging. I’m rebutting the false suggestion, made on multiple occasions by multiple posters, that I have made any accusations against G. Rush. I am commenting on the unfairness of a system. You disagree with my view on defamation: that is fine. But what is curious is this hysterical clamour for me to retract an accusation I have never made. The Tel made it. The complainant herself didn’t. The police haven’t seen anything worthy of charging. The STC have not done anything definitive. Geoffrey Rush is suing the Tele for damages. Amongst all this, all I want is a discussion on how newspapers can be called to account for character assassination of those for whom defamation proceedings are a pipe dream.
Michael A
Quit digging, pal.
A shag on a rock is more crowded than you are.
Michael A is conflating quite different legal worlds with his defamation vs abuse victim comments, along with the concepts of criminal vs civil.
Defamation suits are more often than not big business vs big reputation issues, and go to much more of a business cost (acting is Rush’s profession but reputation is his business).
Big business has big money. Think IP lawsuits, patent infringement etc.
Abuse is a criminal issue, usually between individuals, however nice it would be, where is the money coming from for the victims?
Where these concepts do overlap is institutional abuse a la the church.
Nothing to do with anything about Rush’s case.
So, there you have it.
Di Natale is Nicholas.
Come on out, Dick!
Zeh
Michael A has spent a couple of days shoveling shit uphill and gravity has done its grand job.
Observer
Q: “Why did Howard as treasurer freeze all salary and wages increases?”
A: Because he is an ideologically driven Johnny Hunt?
Michael A @ #2767 Friday, November 2nd, 2018 – 4:59 pm
I’m sure, if such a case were floating around. Many a decent, or not so decent lawyer would freely offer their services for the chance of a juicy pay cheque.
I think we need examples from you of this so-called unfairness.
This is video about Oprah knocking doors to campaign for Georgia Democrat candidate for Governor Ms. Tracey Abrams. The reaction of voter is priceless. 🙂
https://twitter.com/briantylercohen/status/1058084058205323264
Michael, you have presented us with irrelevant propositions, such as “People are poor, Rush is rich, we should have no sympathy for him” and “I knew someone who was molested, therefore Rush is guilty”.
I think there were some other silly arguments, but they might have come from Nicholas, and even I wouldn’t want to accuse you of being him.
We’ve also heard that he should just have apologized and none of this would have happened. This argument presupposes he’s guilty of something to apologize for, which is why everyone’s in court: to see if he is.
Norvill made a secret complaint and specifically asked that Rush not be informed. How could he apologize if he didn’t know there was a complaint? And WHY should he apologize if he believes he didn’t do anything wrong?
The reason Rush is in court now is precisely because member of the Puritan League such as yourself and Nicholas assume he must be guilty of something, simply because a young woman has given very confusing and contradictory evidence in various forums to suit her purpose at the time of giving it. For the newspaper’s benefit she was all sweetness and light for Rush. For the judge’s benefit she was humiliated and sexually harassed by Rush.
Her prime corroborative witness at first said he did not see the events, then “meditated” upon this blindness and suddenly remembered, but only after seeing the film clip in the Daily Telegraph’s lawyers’ offices. It was there that he realized Rush could not have grabbed Norvill by the right breast, because it was physically impossible. So he did what any rational person would do: changed his story, and contradicted Norvill in on a point she had made particularly important to her story..
Even if a breast was brushed at some time (on purpose or otherwise, we will probably never know), and Rush may had flirted with Norvill, seriously or jokingly, or had air-cupped her bosom during rehearsal in front of witnesses (as she herself stated was the kind of thing he was wont to do, and that she appreciated this sense of humour)…. so WHAT? It’s hardly a capital crime, or any crime at all. Certainly not something worth ruining Rush’s career, the STC’s reputation and that of the director and stage staff, plus co-stars who were eventually lumped in, then accusing them of a multi-level sexual assault conspiracy – simply as a justification for Norvill changing her tune so many times as her story became more and more complicated and qualified.
I don’t know whether Norvill has a career left to ruin, but it must certainly be surmised that, if she does, it’ll be subsisting on low rations. It’s no that she would be being punished for reporting sexual harassment in the workplace. It’s that yo’d never know where you stood with her.
You’d never know whether today’s sweet lady publicly professing friendship and admiration was going to be tomorrow’s informer accusing you, your co-stars, the theatre, the director and the entire industry of all kinds of evil things and nasty behaviour.
Kambah Mick,
All the best regarding the bushfire threat.
Testing?
Very
Windhover,
Post these proceedings, would Norvill have grounds to sue the Tele herself?
Probably should have done so from the start. Her career will suffer more than anybody’s because of this
With the 50th anniversary of the White Album coming up, here’s a musical interpretation of Nicholas’ Job Guarantee :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zobzZlNwTbk
Observer
Because in the battle de jour of the day,fighting inflation, it seemed like a cunning plan. The Baldrick logic of the plan was that workers’ wage increases were to blame for inflation. Over in NZ Piggy tried a wage and price freeze. Unfortunately that could only apply locally so inflation was still 14%.
It is not umitigated bullshit. It is a fact that she had two stories, two takes on the same events, and that she gave differing versions to different outlets. I am informed that she was cross-examined the day before yesterday on this very contradiction.
What is also indisputable is that she was prepared to change her story to suit the circumstances. This is not the action of a reliable witness, whatever her motivations. In both instances – to the newspaper and in court – she could have kept silent, but chose not to do so.
Her co-star, Mark Leonard Winter, is in an even worse position. He has changed an altered his story enough times to fill the Pickwick Papers.
You should never use a witness’s readiness to change her story to suit the context of its telling as proof of how reliable and truthful she is. It’s a contradiction in terms, and bound to fail.
No wonder Nicholas likes MMT, Infinite Inflation-Proof Money, the UBI, the UJG, the Peoples’ bank, an ADF armed with sticks and stones, the rampant destruction of Australia’s Agricultural industries, the closure of Olympic Dam and a net migration of 200,000 a year for evermore.
Like a frog by a snake, N is mesmerized by contradictory evidence.
It hits him in the didactic lobe of his brain.
This is, of course, located on the Far Left Side.
Boerwar says:
Friday, November 2, 2018 at 4:55 pm
Michael A
It is not all about you, pal.
————————————-
I have every right to contest contentious interpretations of what I say. Others have seen fit to pursue this so doggedly. I have said nothing lately on this except in direct response to some such accusation.
Ven @ #2753 Friday, November 2nd, 2018 – 3:57 pm
Many reasons:
1. Ford was just one of multiple claimants, who all alleged similar things and who all could demonstrate that they were in the right place at the right time to have crossed paths with Kavanaugh.
2. What Ford alleged was literally nothing short of attempted rape.
3. Ford originally spoke about her allegations years before Kavanaugh was on anyone’s radar, and had evidence to prove it.
4. Ford took and passed a polygraph test; Kavanaugh did not even attempt one (that we know of).
5. Ford’s public testimony was highly credible, with even GOP members/Kavanaugh supporters admitting as much.
6. Kavanaugh’s public defense was just awful, and at a minimum littered with small lies and perjuries.
7. The handful of people who disputed Ford’s testimony (and who weren’t named Kavanaugh) had strong personal incentive to do so, because corroborating Ford’s testimony would tend to make them either a co-offender or an accessory to Kavanaugh’s attempted rape.
8. The people who supported Ford’s allegations in providing statements that Kavanaugh would drink to excess and become aggressive when doing so had no such conflict of interest.
9. The allegations (from Ford, and everyone else) at a minimum warranted a proper investigation, but no such thing was ever going to happen because…politics.
Telegraph trying to bring in another witness to amend their defence.
https://www.theage.com.au/national/ej-norvill-returns-to-court-as-telegraph-seeks-to-amend-rush-defence-20181102-p50dkp.html
ar@5:27pm
Thanks for the summary
Michael A
Of course you have every right to make a fool of yourself.
You have exercised that right for hundreds of tedious posts day after day after day.
Every attempt by numerous posters to get you to wake up to yourself has, to date, failed miserably.
The known unknown here is whether you will ever get a couple of the required synapses.
Me?
I doubt it.
That said, I acknowledge that you are an intellectual giant compared to Nicholas with his MMT mania and with his utterly reflexive lynch mob grip on reality.
Ven
Explain me one think. Why did PBers believed or at least wanted to believe ‘Christine Blasey Ford’s story’ with regards Brett Kavanaugh. It supposed to have happened over 35 years ago?
_____________________________
Actually I had no view on that. People who saw Ford’s testimony (including Republicans) were convinced that she was assaulted and that it left a life-long impact on her, but some were desperate that some one else was the perpetrator.
All I saw (for 10 minutes until I could stomach it no longer) was Kavanaugh’s whiny, self-pitying miserable pointing of fingers everywhere. From what I saw, Kavanaugh should not have been confirmed. Not because of the allegation but because of his dissembling response.
BTW ar, PhoenixRED, Confessions, William Bowe & other psephologists & others interested in US mid-term elections. Here are some early voting numbers, which are very interesting
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2018/11/1/1809152/-Early-Voting-Toplines-Update-10-31
”
TPOF says:
Friday, November 2, 2018 at 5:35 pm
I agree with you on why Kavanaugh should not be confirmed as SCOTUS judge
It’s easy. Tribal allegiance explains the inconsistencies in how people respond to “he said, she said” situations of alleged sexual misconduct.
The Western Australian woman who alleged that Barnaby Joyce sexually harassed her was widely believed by ALP supporters because the alleged perpetrator is an enemy of the ALP.
I happen to agree that the WA woman is far more credible than Barnaby Joyce.
But the Geoffrey Rush defamation case is complicated by the fact that the defendant is the Daily Telegraph, a tribal enemy of the ALP. I dislike the Daily Telegraphy intensely. But I see a larger issue here: a highly credible woman making an accusation of sexual misconduct against a rich and powerful white male who has a lot to gain by throwing his weight around and punting (rationally) that Australia’s pro-rich defamation laws will come to his aid.
Labor partisans and old white males with expansive blind spots on issues of disparities of power and sexual misconduct are much more focused on the fact that the Daily Telegraph is on trial than the facts of the case.
Eryn didn’t want to make a public complaint. She wanted the STC to discreetly change its protocols to prevent a recurrence of inappropriate behaviour in the STC workplace. She was adamantly against punishing Geoffrey Rush.
But someone at the STC leaked the vague outlines of the complaint to the Daily Telegraph, and the Daily Telegraph decided to publish.
Then Geoffrey Rush decided to sue, which has resulted in Eryn and Mark providing testimony under oath about Geoffrey’s unacceptable behaviour.
Geoffrey Rush has brought this on himself. You’d think that an experienced thespian would be attuned to cultural norms. Sadly, that is often not the case. He behaved in a way that is no longer appropriate. He needs to apologize, change his ways, and move on.
This defamation action is a big waste of everybody’s time. Ultimately Geoffrey Rush loses the most by publicising a story that would have died down without his stupid intervention.
And what we do know now is that settlement talks at the start of this week came to nothing and that is known to the presiding Judge
There are consequences when settlement offers are made so tactics may be in play
The failure to reach a settlement sees Swier for the lady seek to introduce a new witness, being considered by the presiding Judge
The success or otherwise of that request may be telling
GG
Is it now all about the size of the money settlement, the page on which the apology is published, and the size of the font?
Interesting development in the Chris Crewther case. It appears the Mad Katter has taken on the role of kingmaker in the federal parliament, until the election:
https://www.themonthly.com.au/today/paddy-manning/2018/02/2018/1541133748/katter-saves-crewther?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=The%20Monthly%20Today%20-%20Friday%202%20November%202018&utm_content=The%20Monthly%20Today%20-%20Friday%202%20November%202018+CID_8ffd0072361d26c7b7f8135aac064c51&utm_source=EDM&utm_term=READ%20ON
There’s no way Labor can give him their preferences now!
Z:
I cannot see any basis upon which Norvill could sue the DT.
Norvill may have a claim against the STC for negligence/breach of confidence.
The basis of the claim would be that the STC owed a duty of care/confidence to protect Norvill from the unrestricted exposure of her complaint. It could be argued that the STC had an interest as her former employer in receiving the complaint. The STC interest was to ensure that actors engaged by the STC are treated respectfully and without being harassed. Having agreed to receive the Norvill complaint on the condition it be held in strict confidence it might be considered reasonable for the law to impose on the STC an actionable duty of care/ duty to maintain confidence.
The duty of care/confidence in this circumstance is novel in Australia but IMO is strongly arguable. As a case it would advance the cause of “the tort of privacy” a peg or two.
It is unclear whether there is evidence the STC released the Norvill complaint to the DT. STC may or may not be vicariously liable [that is liable as if its employee’s actions were its own] for the actions of the leaker (if known and an agent of the STC). It may but probably doesn’t have a non-delegable duty to ensure that the complaint was held in confidence no matter who was responsible for the leak. STC (by its employees or agents) might otherwise be liable for so negligently storing the complaint that the risk of malicious 3rd parties accessing it was reasonably foreseeable.
None of the above clearly implicates the STC as having caused the leak.
If the STC can be found to have leaked the complaint as discussed above then it has certainly breached the duty of care/confidence it putatively owed Norvill.
Finally at least some of the damage Norvill has suffered (if not all of it) is at least a foreseeable consequence of the breach of the duty of care/confidence. That is to say the STC knew or ought to have known, particularly in the metoo age, that the leaking of the Norvill complaint might readily expose her to public notoriety as a witness in defamation proceedings brought against those who published her complaint.
BB, no, suggestions Rush apologise whether he was guilty or not didn’t come from me. I would disagree with such a suggestion if it was put to me directly. Sounds pretty unfair to me. Believe it or not, you and I don’t disagree on everything.
3. Ford originally spoke about her allegations years before Kavanaugh was on anyone’s radar, and had evidence to prove it.
That’s the kicker. The only alternative explanation to the fact that she at least believed what she was saying and had in fact said many years ago is that she had a time machine and went back in time to set it all up.
She may have misremembered the events and or had set out to ‘get’ Kavanaugh. But if so she was doing that many years before even the idea of him being on the SC was even the remotest of possibilities. That’s a damn long bow to be drawing. The far more likely interpretation is that Blasey-Ford truly believed what she alleged Kavanaugh of doing way back when she first spoke of it.
Two articles worth a read:
Stressed out and very lucky there were people that worked it out:
https://www.theage.com.au/national/i-was-a-young-doctor-about-to-kill-myself-when-i-heard-a-knock-at-my-door-20181101-p50dcg.html
And a response from one of the interns that worked it out.
https://www.theage.com.au/national/dear-steve-i-was-among-the-young-doctors-who-decided-to-knock-on-your-door-20181031-p50d7s.html