Hot Cock!

As in ‘what a load of…’ for Joe Hockey to claim he could double his income if only he could free himself of the Federal Parliamentary pay scales.

The Lord, apparently, helps those who help themselves, Joe. Help yourself out, and the rest of your constituency while you’re at it. Free yourself from the Federal Parliamentary pay scales by resigning from Federal Parliament. Get out find yourself a real job in the private sector which pays $410,000, plus all the perks and allowances you currently have as a Minister, on an AWA. It’s dead easy to resign and go look elsewhere. It’s damn nigh impossible to walk into something else which provides everything your little heart – and mind – desires, let alone on an AWA.
This is a measure of the desperation and abject lunacy we’re seeing from the Howardian crop of late. Wednesday, we see the Howardian cabal with nothing better to do than taunt Kevin Rudd over just who was going to front his government, if Labor wins the coming election. So, Rudd names the top three, effectively ending that line. Then we see an immediate about-face from the cabal, by collectively bagging the selection – predictably. This is good governance and policy development? Sounds and reads like typical right-wing name-calling and insults to me.
I’m particularly amused by Tony Abbott attempting to claim that Rudd was being hubristic and anti-Labor establishment by stating that he (Rudd) would name his front bench and not the Caucus. Even Gerard Henderson knows it’s not at all unusual for Labor leaders to name their own front bench. Keating did it, Hawke did it, Latham did it. No radical departure there, yet Abbott – supposedly a scholar of internal Labor politics – knows differently.
All is coming to pass as Rudd predicted months ago. We’re very close to the naming of the day and the negative anti-Labor rhetoric is ramping up to a near fever pitch. One wonders if the Howardians have a shot left in the locker or did they shoot it during that APEC week?