Celebrate/Good Times/C'mon!
GET ON BOARD THE VENGA BUS, PEOPLE OF TASTE.
'TONY JONES: Tensions between the Prime Minister and his anointed successor spilled onto the streets today and it's hard to see how this highly successful duo can again work together harmoniously. John Howard has for years denied there was any deal between him and Peter Costello over the handing over of the Liberal Party leadership, but today, Peter Costello directly contradicted him. Jim Middleton reports.
JOHN HOWARD, PRIME MINISTER: Hello there!
(TEENAGE GIRLS SQUEAL WITH EXCITEMENT)
JIM MIDDLETON: John Howard's been called a lot of things in his time...
TEENAGE GIRL: You're so cool!
JIM MIDDLETON: And 'cool' is not generally one of them.
TEENAGE GIRL: And you're our favourite politician.
JIM MIDDLETON: But he's certainly not Peter Costello's.
PETER COSTELLO, TREASURER: He told me that he intended to do one and a half terms as Prime Minister and then would hand over. I did not seek that undertaking, he volunteered it, and I took him at his word. Obviously, that did not happen. I didn't stand on my digs; I continued to work for the Government to the best of my ability in the interests of the Australian public.
JIM MIDDLETON: With that, the Treasurer directly and profoundly contradicted the Prime Minister's account of a meeting in December 1994 as Mr Howard was lobbying to wrest the Liberal leadership from the struggling Alexander Downer.
JOHN HOWARD: The situation is very simple - there was no deal made.
JIM MIDDLETON: But the Treasurer says there was, and he's backed up by Ian McLachlan, the third man at the meeting, who says he's kept a written record of Mr Howard's undertaking to Mr Costello. Liberal MP Alex Somlyay revealed today that Mr McLachlan had shown him his note.'
Things that are sweet about this:
1. Before:
After:
2. 'JOHN HOWARD, PRIME MINISTER: Hello there!
(TEENAGE GIRLS SQUEAL WITH EXCITEMENT)'
This pleases me in about eight thousand different ways; I can't really explain how exactly.
Just read it and try to picture it.
Then attempt to picture it without laughing so loud the dog walks out of the living room to stare at you.
3. 'Calling the news conference abruptly over, Mr Howard turned on his heel for a rare prime ministerial promenade down the Opera House concourse.
Stunned families waved back as Mr Howard loudly declared the weather to be fine*. The students of Perth's Penrhos College went gaga, mobbing the Prime Minister.
'You're our favourite politician,' they screamed as Mr Howard, and the trailing media, joined them for some hearty glad-handing** and pictures.
'It's pretty cool to meet John Howard in person,' said 16-year-old Olivia Loxley. 'We'd all vote for him if we were 18***.'
'He's pretty short in person. Oh my god, I'm taller than John Howard,' said another student, Brittany Lynch.'
*You can just imagine this can't you? Striding around in an overbearingly obnoxious manner, shouting about the weather in order to cover his awkwardness like some ruddy-faced uncle on Christmas day who has had too many sherries.
**Not to be confused with hearty tea-bagging, hearty gang-banging or hearty ass-to-mouth-ing.
***Remember! These people also enjoy Lee Harding, tampon applicators and the word 'LOLZ'. They will grow out of all these things eventually.
487 days til the next election.
Comments
Fight you bastards. Fight, fight, fight! Oh, it's just like being in high school again, except they're brawling on the front page of The Age instead of behind the shelter shed!
Isn't it pleasing? I was wholly cheered when opening my newspaper this morning.
hahahaha!
What was it Phillip Adams said "The great unflushable turd of Australian politics?"
I'd say ol' Grinner has reached for the chain and has a coathanger handy to ensure a safe, skiddy free flush.
thomasr
this has put a big smile on my face too.
what a game of you said, no i said.
Very pleasurable. Like political fellatio.
Who will be evicted from Big Parliament House?
Btw Fits I had a dream last night that involved two people, I think you were one. Don't worry, it wasn't that sort of dream.
I was in a boat with 2 people. The boat had two anchors. I started pulling the boat towards one anchor to lift it out of the mud, you were sitting in the middle, the other person (who I am unable to remember clearly) got out of the boat onto the mud to get the other anchor and was eaten by a crocodile.
I have no idea what that means, but I had to share! I'm from the NT, into politics, there's probably an allegory combining the leadership stoush with that story about the poor girl who got eaten- I watched both on telly before going to bed last night.
Back to leadership. Costello will probably lose. A relative shame because he's less of a prick than the rodent.
He's also far easier to beat in an election, Armaniac.
p.s. Your dream is highly unnerving, as I will be in the NT in a month's time.
Should I stay away from muddy waters?
I mean, obviously the other person in your dream was eaten first, but WHO KNOWS WHAT HAPPENED AFTER YOU WOKE UP.
For some reason I see Peter Costello as less evil that John Howard.
Or not, maybe Tim's the good brother and Pete's the evil one.
As for the teens- I weep for the future.
Hmmm, i'd love to agree with you and say they will grow out of it, but i'm not as optimistic as you are ms fits.Apparently Penrhos College used to Methodist Ladies College, and the price that these little darlings of the futures parents are paying at the moment is $12,132 a year. One would imagine that they are beinf taught the values education that Winston would like all children in Australia to be taught. Having looked at the website it seems these girls are not exactly mixing in a multicultural educational facility. I suspect these girls will be voting the way Mummy and Daddy do for quite a while, no need to worry about AWA's for these little treasures.
I saw a phone in poll this morning where 54% thought Costello was more likely to be lying than Howard. WTF? Where have they been for the past ten years? Also, I grew up in the NT, don't get out of the boat!
OH MY GOD I AM GOING TO BE EATEN BY A CROCODILE.
Teenage girls from snooty private schools drove me insane when I was a teenager. Largely cos they wouldn't put out for a surfer who turned up to parties in boardshorts and couldn't give a fuck about social standing and Beverly Hills 90210..
But the "we love you johnie" shit from these vacuumous ninnies with loaded parents is soooo much more frustrating.
A pox on all their houses.
Crocodiles are fine.
It's the locals you'll need to keep an eye on.
There are more crocodiles now in the NT than any time since the early days of hunting, decades ago.
Post more detail about your plans, I'll post some advice in return.
I live in kakadu for 6 years as a child, and I was only stalked by a croc once.
As for last night's teenage cohort, they filled me with despair. I have this Nazi propaganda image of sweet flaxen haired girls pushing asylum seekers into the shower rooms and switching on the gas, all the while uttering "cool" and "like, that's hot".
OH MY GOD I AM GOING TO BE EATEN BY A LOCAL.
...gav, you are obscene.
i was once a teenager at a snooty private girls' school. but i also remember going on the "it's time" alp campaign march thingy before gough was voted in, and then seeing my mum and dad shocked when gough was sacked.
FITS, DON'T GET OUT OF THE BOAT.
i believe in dreams, i really do. take it from me. i'm a bit of a sayer of sooth.
I believe the children are our are future
Teach them well and let them lead the way
Show them all the beauty they possess inside
Give them a sense of pride to make it easier
Let the children's laughter remind us how we used to be
Everybody searching for a hero
People need someone to look up to
I never found anyone who fulfill my needs
A lonely place to be
So I learned to depend on me
*cries*
Peter Costello joins in for the rousing chorus:
I decided long ago
never to walk in anyone's shadows
If I fail, if I succeed
At least I live as I believe
No matter what they take from me
They can't take away my dignity...
Maybe they can have a debate on TV with that worm thingy...or better yet...polygraphs on.
Costello, after he's rolled:
.."bittersweet... memo-o-ries...that is all, I'm taking, with me-e-ee."
Don't go soft on Cozzie. He's demonstrably five steps to the right of Howard on IR.
I am loving watching this shit go down. My only fear is that the voting public (whom shocked the shit out of me last election) might have had enough of Howard but decide to give Sime a go, assuming he can toppled that particular Jenga tower of PM-hood.
That would be BAD(tm)
You'll be fine. Just make sure you know how to use a 12 gage. Or stay close to locals/Aboriginal people (who do) and don't be a what they call a 'silly bugger' and swim in deep rivers etc.
It's amazing there aren't more tourists taken by crocs, I've seen them swimming under 'Danger Crocodile' signs.
Here's a little croc incident that happened to me last summer...
It's a bit hunter-becomes-hunted, all part of the spiritual experience.
OK, no more trackbacks I promise.
Those screaming schoolgirls scared the absolute living Bejesus out of me. He's their "favourite politician"????
What does that even mean? He's best at it? They have a full set of parliament house swapcards, but he's the only one they carry with them?
I guess, as qualifications for "politicians" go, he is the sleaziest most dis-honest, festering, pustulent open sore on the infected arse of a maggot in the whole of our Federal Parliament. But by jingo he's got some fierce competition. Seems they teach them that way on their side of the house...
CUNCE THE LOT OF EM
wow about time there was some instability in that coagulated lump for political stability that is the lib party.
i guess this was only going to work for so long:
http://images.google.com.au/imgres?imgurl=http://sc.groups.msn.com/tn/C4/A0/ProspectYac/1/1.jpg&imgrefurl=http://groups.msn.com/ProspectYac/shoebox.msnw&h=96&w=64&sz=3&hl=en&sig2=sAc62cmGtmzXxCqWZpnv1Q&start=119&tbnid=uSfb1yI2oYXiQM:&tbnh=76&tbnw=50&ei=gFezRKTIF8SOJPGolZoB&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dhoward%2Bcostello%26start%3D100%26ndsp%3D20%26svnum%3D10%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26safe%3Doff%26rls%3DGGGL,GGGL:2006-23,GGGL:en%26sa%3DN
But really if costello hadn't noticed howard was a compulsive bender of the truth yet then i'd question the efficacy of his running this country.
try that again
http://groups.msn.com/ProspectYac/
shoebox.msnw?action=
ShowPhoto&PhotoID=1
bloody hell im useless (how do you embed links in comments).
Oh, I know it's wrong:
http://www.newdirection.ca/s_johnh.htm
What does "LOLZ" mean? I can't stand my own generation.
Laugh Out Loud...then...have a bit of a sleep. Is my guess.
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Back to leadership. Costello will probably lose. A relative shame because he's less of a prick than the rodent.
He doesn't mind throwing the switch to prick for the sake of appealing to mouthbreathers, however. Lately, his rhetoric has become more alarmist and, oddly for Australia, religious. Hillsong constituency, I suppose.
It's obvious that he's been positioning for a stab at the leadership. I think Howard's the one in the difficult position here. He can't stay forever, and his hand might just have been forced. But who knows? His teflon coating has proven pretty impervious for the last decade.
If he does decide to go, get prepared for an orgy of reactionary cunt appointments to whatever august institution he can lay his hands on. Windschuttle is not the last of the ideological bastards that he will attach limpet-like to the nation's cultural foundations. His curse will live on.
Oh, Jesus Christ! The visits to the Channel 9 commentary box in his dotage! The biography! The talking about the fucking biography in the fucking commentary box! It'll be a nightmare we won't be able to wake from!
Oh well. At least he can't be Sir John Winston Howard. Sucked in, you mediocre shit.
"You're so cool!"
I knew there was a reason I was leaving this country,however I didn't realise it would involve so much vomiting.
Oh, and Alexander 'Fishnets' Downer owes me a television in compensation for the one I smashed when he dared to claim that little Johnny 'Super Accountant' is the greatest Prime Minister Australia has ever seen.
Sure thing Alex, do you want a tissue to wipe that shit off your nose?.
I'm a bit unclear on this...Does Howard HAVE to hand over power to Costello or can he give it to whomever he wants?...If so I wouldn't be at all surprised if he chose someone else as a final fuck you to Costello.
Does Australia have a set line of succession like the u.s.?
The Liberal Party in a nutshell:
One Liberal MP, Peter Lindsay, says Mr Costello should not have spoken out.
"This is a matter which should stay in the Government and never ever publicly surface," Mr Lindsay said.
... but remember, the ALP are BAD BAD BAD because they have FACTIONS. Remind me again about the whole Kroger/Costello vs Kennett forces in the Victorian Libs? At least there's a vague hint of principle behind the idea of factions, rather than being a matter of "I don't like that fucker".
If we're really lucky, maybe someone will catch Costello on a mobile phone and we can get him calling Howard a cunt, just like Kennett did.
There is nothing wrong with applicator tampons.
NOTHING.
Arrrrrgh! I hate those penhros chicks!!!!
Scott I - If you're still reading.
The parliamentary leader of a major party is selected by a vote of its members of parliament. Technically the PM doesn't have the right to just decide who will succeed him. But if he's going out on top he can pretty much dictate who will. The MPs are all still willing to just do what master says, basically.
Hmm, well i am a penrhos girl..and i was actually there when that event occureed, through i can say that i was not one of those shouting "we love you johnnie" - although living in perth does this to you..being so isolated even the prime minister has the breif glimmer of fame.
as for your all your comments, i think this instead highlights a broader issue of the wider public being un-educated, unaware and ignorant of todays political issues, as although there were those who were proclaiming John Howard as their favourite politician, they do not comprise of the whole student body.
as for me, i know i will personally be a swinging voter, intend to vote for those who i see fit to be my representatives. although studying the political system at my school, i have become somewhat disenchanted, because that in itself has problems, issues and flaws.
but when i cast my vote at the next election, it will not be the way my "mummy and daddy vote" but will instead be based on my own opinons after studying the subject of politics [at...let me see...penrhos college] , and a continued awareness of the political issues of the time.
Regards, anonymous student.
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