The Liberal senator Cory Bernardi denies he has breached parliamentary disclosure rules by failing to declare his links to a right-wing, pro-tobacco group fighting gun controls.

Senator Bernardi insisted he did not have to declare his involvement with the American Legislative Exchange Council because he did not believe it posed a conflict of interest.

His defence came as Labor and the Greens called for Senator Bernardi to be stood down as chairman of the senators' interests committee, which polices declarations.

The ALEC was involved in a High Court challenge against the Gillard government last year and has financial ties with big tobacco.

The US-based council is working with the National Rifle Association to block the guns crackdown planned by US President Barack Obama after the Newtown school massacre.

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/political-news/underfire-senator-denies-conflict-of-interest-20130127-2denh.html#ixzz2JA5Q3x8M

In this election year, it's clear that history is not bunk. Last week, a Galaxy Research poll found that the former Liberal Party leader John Howard is regarded as the best Australian prime minister in the past 25 years.

Howard, on 35 per cent, finished ahead of Kevin Rudd (16 per cent), Bob Hawke (15 per cent), Paul Keating (9 per cent) and Julia Gillard (5 per cent) with one-fifth of those polled uncommitted.

Hawke was more popular than Rudd among Labor voters and Gillard and Keating the least unpopular among Coalition supporters.

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/howards-popularity-key-asset-in-abbotts-push-for-the-lodge-20130128-2dgwj.html#ixzz2JImh2Wmj
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This survey is suspect though I'm not surprised Gerard Henderson is taking it as if it was the greatest scientific work since the Hadron collider helped confirm the Higgs Boson.... This proves unofficially that John Howard Rattus lied far more than the others... And on many levels Johnnee got a lucky break when the world economy was overheating and frothing from the sweet nothings that Greenspan was feeding to the market...

Howard lied and LIED AND LIED and lied at every turn of the wheel — and of course the media lied with him... Still lying... 

WHEN THE appalling Sophie Mirabella was first running for the federal Victorian seat of Indi, she saw nothing wrong in calling for the assistance of one the Liberals most disgraced and disgraceful former members — Noel Crichton-Browne.

Of course, having had the opportunity of seeing Mirabella in full flight in the House of Representatives and on national TV, it is obvious she’s from the same mould as her former mentor. In fact, I believe that if ever two people deserved each other, it’s Mirabella and Browne — two people I, and many others, wouldn’t be seen dead with. It’s interesting that Abbott elevated Mirabella to his front bench after Peter Slipper’s voted delivered him the leadership of the once great Liberal Party.

Get it? Peter Slipper’s vote delivered the leadership to Abbott!

[Read IA's full Ashbygate investigation.]

And while we’re down there scraping the bottom of the Liberal Party’s barrel, whose name should again surface from the sludge?

Right on! Professor David Flint’s poster boy and fellow monarchist, the extreme right winger Cory Bernardi, who has once again caused Tony Abbott more angst, for which the community should be eternally grateful — though it won’t stop the pugilistic Opposition Leader’s march to The Lodge.

Most Liberals detest Abbott, like the rest of the country, but they are Liberals who won’t stoop to vote for the ALP — a decision they, and the rest of the country, will rue after a few months of Abbott running a Government led asylum.

http://www.independentaustralia.net/2013/politics/cory-bernardi-the-not-so-smart-a-l-e-c/

See toon and story at top...

If Tony Abbott  wins the next election, Rupert Murdoch will be the dark shadow behind – pulling his strings – truly ruling Australia, writes Rodney E. Lever.

TONY ABBOTT’S two fisted approach to politics was on show again last week.

It shows that he learnt nothing from the parliamentary drubbing he got last year.

His manufactured rage at Craig Thomson, now facing 150 charges of  alleged fiduciary fiddling, might well have set the standard of debate for the next eight months. It might also result in a forced appearance by Abbott before the Victorian criminal court to explain his contempt for this institution.

But his most ominous remark was his promise to amend the Fair Work Act. Will the amendment to make union officials more responsible for their member’s money be the only change he intends to make? In any case, union officials are already just as responsible as corporate managers for the money they handle – the very existence of the charges against Thomson show this.

The Labor Party has a lot on its plate in the months remaining of its current term. Prime Minister Gillard has noted her determination to complete her education program and to lift disabled Australians out of the Dickensian era of the past century.

There are many more matters of change and improvement of services on which Labor has embarked since taking office, all of which will certainly be abandoned if the Coalition takes office.

My memory of Australian politics goes back to the days when it was impossible for the old Liberal Party to gain enough votes to govern properly. So much so that they formed an alliance — a coalition with the old Country Party.

Yet even then, little was achieved because the objectives of the Country Party and its Liberal colleagues were so at odds — they could never agree on anything. Today, the Country Party no longer exists Bob Katter is making a valiant ‒ if clumsy ‒ effort to restore the rights of the countrymen of this nation. Today’s so called “Nationals” are virtually Liberals by another name.

The one issue which haunts my mind in this election year is the return of Rupert Murdoch, having been humiliated and embarrassed in his forays in Britain and America. Everybody surely knows now that Murdoch already has Tony Abbott in his pocket.

Once, he thought he had Gough Whitlam in his pocket, but Whitlam’s contempt for Murdoch ended that alliance very quickly. From then on Murdoch has savaged Labor in every election since. His control over what his newspapers publish is greater than any proprietor has ever had in the two centuries that newspapers have been able to present themselves as a reliable source of news.

Murdoch is a fearsome bully. In his time he has sacked and broken more great editors than anybody before him — all dumped because they challenged his personal views against their own knowledge and experience.

The issue of Tony Abbot’s allegiance to this modern dictator may be the most important issue of the 2013 Australian election.

What Murdoch will want from Abbott ‒ and will get from Abbott, if he wins the election ‒ will change Australia forever.

Murdoch will be the dark shadow ruling this country. Certainly his media control will be greater than ever. His links with the Republican Party in America will lead to a closer liaison and the inevitability of our continued involvement in America’s wars and in its future economic growth and/or decline.

Sadly, an independent Australia will no longer exist.

http://www.independentaustralia.net/2013/politics/abbott-the-end-of-an-independent-australia/

Household savings increase and move towards bonds

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