G20 ... Our Embarrassment Of A Prime Minister...

So the G20 is currently being held in Brisbane, the capital of the state of Queensland in Australia.

President Barack Obama spoke to several hundred students and guests at our premier university today - The University of Queensland.  He got a standing ovation and cheers by speaking on many timely topics effecting both individual countries and the world as a whole.

Our Prime Minster, the Hon Mr Tony Abbott, got up and made an ASS of himself in front of the G20 assembly.   But don't let me describe his idiocy..... let's hear from the Shadow Foreign Minister of our Parliamentary Opposition - The Hon Tanya Pilbersek.


Today Barack Obama had a chance to tell the world what he values, his vision for the future and how he thought we should get there.
In a PR coup for the University of Queensland, the President of the United States addressed thousands of students and invited guests.

The President made clear that the historic agreement between China and the United States on climate change is by no means the end of America's commitment to action. The President announced $3 billion for the UN Green Climate Fund to help developing countries deal with climate change.
The science is in, he said, and Australia and the Pacific especially need to pay attention. Extreme weather events, heatwaves, fires and the need to protect our beautiful Barrier Reef for generations to come make action imperative.

The President's commitment to further action on climate change and the restatement of the US policy of rebalance to Asia are likely to be the elements of the speech that attract the most notice in the political reporting, but there were other elements of the speech equally uplifting.
The President also spoke about inclusive growth: economic growth that invests in people, in their health and education, in aid and development.

The President spoke about equality: equality between men and women, equality for gay men and lesbian, equality and freedom that don't discriminate against minorities or on the basis of religion.
President Obama painted a picture of a world in which economic growth is environmentally sustainable and inclusive, where the poor benefit too, not just the rich, in which we work together to meet the challenges of the future.

It was an inspiring speech.

Our Prime Minister Tony Abbott also spoke today. In a speech which he had months to prepare, in his opening remarks to world leaders, Tony Abbott said he wanted to use the G20 to talk about the "politics of economic reform".
He said he made four promises during the election (and no, he didn't mean, "no cuts to health, no cuts to education, no cuts to the ABC and no new taxes") and then boasted about cutting Australia's effective market-based price signal to reduce carbon pollution.
He also took the opportunity to complain to world leaders who represent around 85% of global GDP that Australians don't like his $7 GP co-payment or $100,000 uni degrees.

Wow. 

What a day of contrasts.

Basically, our Prime Minister (whom I didn't vote for), took the opportunity in front of some of the most important leaders in the world to complain about how he failed at his own domestic health policy agenda.

Seriously - this guy needs to spend a couple of years on the "time out mat".

I am embarrassed to be Australian today.

But I am proud to be part-American.

Shalom

D
xox

....2 Confused....... My Take On The President's State Of The Union.....

........I'll preface this by saying I was a Hillary supporter all the way during the race.... I wanted that woman in the White House - she would've have been an amazing President - plus putting her in the big chair means she wouldn't have to run the country with her hand up Bill's arse like a ventriloquist with a broken dummy.

Hillary is cool.

President Obama........................................................... not so much.

BTW - I **refuse** to say Obama..... or Barack. He is President Obama. Let's remember the respect is to the OFFICE if not necessarily to the man and use the proper mode of address and not the one taught to us by CNN and FOX please ppl.

President Obama was elected on four words.... YES WE CAN.... CHANGE....

Now... he had HUGE things that he had to deal with when he first got into office. The country was NOT running smoothly nor had it been for a very long time. He had the wars and all their subsequent issues to contend with; economic crisi; DADT; et al..... so.......... the man had to put out fires. But it is HOW The President acted AFTER getting to the Office that worried me.

Now - I am a HUGE poli-junkie. I love politics. Politics give me major wood. President Obama got me hard during his great speech in the mall.......................................... I've needed poli-viagra ever since.

It appears that The President is determined to try to keep his job by not pissing off the other side of the political spectrum. And history has shown every time that an appeaser does not get reelected or - sorry - respected.

If one is elected on the platform of Change - one has to affect change. One has to aggressively pursue, fight for, and if necessary LOSE for change. One can not be elected on a platform of change and then go to the middle of the road..... and then make one small step to the right.. which is fundamentally what President Obama has done.

I do not believe his State of the Union speech was anything but more of the same.

President Obama has been deserted by the majority of his Democratic base. Republican moderates love him because he plays to their needs. Democrat moderates tolerate him because they still have hope in his moderateness evolving into the more progressive Democratic policies they are used to. I do not believe it would happen. Ever.

The measure of a President - is his first two years. Whether for ill or for better - how He (or She - I hope in the future) handles that first two years defines them. President Obama is a silent apologist. He has decided that given his unique status - First African American President - he must be cautious in his aggressiveness.

Cautious in his aggressiveness....................... two words not to be used in the same phrase.

Sadly, I believe President Obama has been spooked by the radical Right and their more militant soldiers of the Right Wing Press and the blatant racist elements in American society.

Many people are saying "Well, he promised to end DADT and he has.... so maybe he just needed some warm up time". Actually, President Obama did not end DADT. Public opinion; public pressure; military resourcefulness; military brain bleed; and the over the top shrieking of the right wing homophobes ended DADT. President Obama merely stood by as the process left in the dust.

Whilst I wanted Hillary in the White House, I was hopeful that President Obama's youthfulness, energy, passion for change, and unique status would spur him on to do amazing things for my second homeland.

It has not.

And now, when American genuinely needs change - genuinely needs progression - genuinely needs a President that cares for the health and welfare of ALL Americans - we as Americans (Myself included) have been given a President who got scared - and his fear made him an appeaser of the Republican Right.

Appeasers do not get reelected.

President Obama - I like you as a man - but I do not respect you as a President.

And that makes me very sad.

Shalom

Damien
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.............President Obama's First Year..........................

..................this amazing article was in my national paper written by their Washington correspondent - Alex Spillius.

For you haters - some food for thought - for us supporters - some hope.

Thoughts?

We all know that honeymoons come to an end, and even on that sparkling January day a year ago when Barack Obama made it official with the American people, both sides realised that bliss could not be eternal. But no one foresaw that the honeymoon would end so soon, with the bride of public opinion packing her bags in the holiday hotel, leaving the groom to plead: ''I never said this would be easy . . . come back, I can still bring change.''

Americans have fallen out of love with their charming President at a fast rate, even as his popularity has remained high abroad. As early as October, his approval ratings had tumbled from 65 to 70 per cent to the high 40s. Obama's inheritance from George Bush was two wars, the worst recession for 70 years, unemployment heading for 10 per cent and a $US1.2 trillion deficit. It guaranteed a first year of unprecedented challenge.

Not content with that, Obama decided to tame the monster of health care, tackle energy reform, sign a global green treaty, embrace the Muslim world, bring peace to the Middle East, establish a universe free of nuclear weapons and talk sense to the Iranians. Americans have baulked at the mind-boggling sums involved in his domestic reform: a $US787 billion stimulus bill, a $US1 trillion health-care bill and plans for carbon emissions trading that will cost industry dearly.

In Congress, his fellow Democrats are fretting about losing seats in November's mid-term elections. The party has already lost the governorships of New Jersey and Virginia in the first major post-Obama votes. And the President has confessed to disappointment at breaking his vow on changing the political culture. ''What I haven't been able to do in the midst of this crisis is bring the country together in a way that we had done in the inauguration,'' he admitted to People magazine. ''That's what's been lost this year . . . that sense of changing how Washington works.''

Overseas, Obama may still be seen as the great anti-Bush, but at home the standard narrative is that he has taken on too much, lost the ability to inspire, can't impose his will on Congress and been too soft abroad. That said, it has been a remarkable first year. Obama is on the verge of seeing reforms passed that will for the first time provide health insurance for every American. Plenty of presidents have talked about that since 1947; none have done it.

He has propped up the economy, albeit with an inflated and, in places, misdirected stimulus bill. The housing market has bottomed out, and consumer confidence is returning. The possibility of a double-dip recession remains, but if most forecasters are right, unemployment should begin to fall. Belatedly, Obama and Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner have acknowledged popular outrage over the bail-out by proposing a special bank tax, a start towards easing resentment over Wall Street's preferential treatment.

Contrary to Obama's big-spending image, he has cut more superfluous spending programs in Congress than his Republican predecessors, and Congress has passed more legislation supported by a president than any before him.

Furthermore, he has banned torture, ordered the closure of Guantanamo Bay and sent the 9/11 suspects for trial in the civilian courts. Federal funding has been restored to stem-cell research, women's rights to equal pay have been improved, and new emissions standards have been set for vehicles. This is not a president who can't get things done.

Critics have lambasted his foreign policy for appeasing terrorists, kowtowing to China and bowing to monarchs of far-off lands. With all this negotiation and reaching out, they want to know where the results are. But who seriously expected Mahmoud Ahmadinejad or Kim Jong-il to respond to overtures when their existence depends in part on vilifying America? In his Egypt speech last June, Obama said: ''I've come to Cairo to seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world, one based on mutual interest and mutual respect.'' Those are powerful words. In time, they could come to mean something.

He has made mistakes in foreign policy. Allowing his speech to students in China to be suppressed by the authorities should not happen to American presidents. Nor should arriving at the Copenhagen summit without a climate deal. And his decision to increase the number of US troops in Afghanistan while setting a deadline for withdrawal could prove a disastrous lack of incentive for allies in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

In the heady early days leading to his inauguration, Obama's admirers forecast greatness. Would he be a Lincoln or a Kennedy or a Roosevelt, they pondered fondly. Such talk was grossly premature - and remains so. But who knows? Ronald Reagan is regarded in the US as one of the best presidents of the post-war era. He came into office in 1981 with ratings just above 60 per cent, but by 1983 they had plummeted to below 40 per cent as the economy slid into recession. Less than two years later, he trounced Walter Mondale.

Obama does have some defects to correct. He needs to stop blaming Bush for his problems and to find some of Bush's fire in the belly when it counts. There were encouraging signs of the latter when he delivered a forceful reaction to the Haiti disaster.

The good news for Obama, and for all of us dependent on his success, is that he has shown he can learn from his mistakes. There was a long period at the start of the marathon 2008 campaign when his performances were lacklustre and his debating skills blunt. Possessing a self-awareness rare in politics, he identified his problems and corrected them.

Obama's first year has not been nearly as bad as the received truth in Washington would have it. Having swooned for him in the campaign, the media has overcorrected its earlier collective abandonment of balanced reporting. But if he wants to win back those Americans he has lost, Obama needs to appreciate that, as he often said on the stump, their relationship isn't about him, it is about them.

................Gays in the US & Obama....................

There seems to be a serious division in the gays in my 2nd homeland of the United States.

One camp is all "He's done nothing for us and isn't keeping any of the promises he made to us to get elected!"

The second camp is "He has only been in office four months - these things take time and we need to be patient. Civil rights is not something that happens overnight !"

I find President Obama perplexing myself. Having been employed in both Local and State government, I know and understand how slowly the wheels do grind within those particular machines. It is incredibly complex to get anything done and its quite frustrating to many a civil servant, and is usually made up of teams of people working behind the scenes.

On the other hand, one usually hears about the little steps that make up progress. And it usually goes something like this....

• Committee is set up.
• Committee agrees to the terms of their review
• Committee talks to different focus groups
• Committee issues periodic statements regarding progress.
• Etc etc.

Unfortunately, I think the issue here is lack of communication.

For all we know, President Obama's people could be working hard on these issues. But, there is no communication regarding their activities.

Add to that a Press Secretary who is still finding his feet and coming across as a little wobbly, people are starting to ask serious questions.

President Obama made commitments to his GLBT followers.

As a politician, he has absolutely no requirement to fulfil those promises - he is a politician after all, and they make promises to get elected.

However, President Obama is in a unique position as being a member of a minority that has benefitted from progress in civil rights. As such, he has a higher duty to exemplify those principles and to act accordingly.

He is the President of ALL communities in the United States, and a global recession is certainly something that would take up much of his time, but he has staff aplenty and, as any good leader would, can delegate the grunt work to make progress on an issue.

The Obama administration is new, and they are finding their feet. But their inability to accurately relay their message is hurting them and - by definition - President Obama.

"Don't Ask Don't Tell" is an issue that is hurting and haunting America. At a time when every member of the Defence Forces are needed - hundreds are being discharged. Some of these are Arab linguists, others are officers with decorated careers, others are grunts who simply wish to serve their country.

I hope for the GLBT brethren in the US that President Obama and his administration start to make some progress on this issue, otherwise it could very well become the Achilles Heel of the President.

.......President Obama's first 100 days...............

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Okay - I hear you - why is an Aussie living in NZ interested in an American President.

Two reasons - One .. I am part American - and Two... my partner is American - oh..... and considering he is the leader of the only true superpower out there - you really should take notice too.



I did not like Senator Barack Obama as a candidate - not at all. He came across as arrogant, pretentious, and,at times, disrespectful to his fellow Democratic candidates. Many said that his in-experience being a first time Senator resulted in a very human reaction of over-compensation which resulted in the above personality traits. That's one that could be argued long and loud - but suffice to say I was a Senator Hillary supporter - now Madame Secretary of State and a rather kick-arse one at that.

However, I like President Obama very much.

He has clearly learnt from his time on the campaign trail and has surrounded himself with good people who are clearly ten times more informed and more intelligent than the advisers of the previous administration. Most importantly - President Obama appears to listen to them - which is extremely comforting.

Indeed - I believe President Obama to be the change that America and the World desperately needed. Why? ....... he is human.

"Duh, Damien - we're all human ya know!!" - Actually we aren't.

I'm not talking simple chains of deoxyribonucleic acid here folks... I'm talking about a personal morality and integrity.

I never liked Bush Jr, and it wasn't because he was a Republican - it was because he had no humanity. None. And no - his response to 9/11 had nothing to do with humanity and everything to do with shooting first and asking questions later. I have NO idea how I would have reacted as President - but the words "You are either with us or your against us" will be President Bushes legacy - long after the other mistakes of his presidency are forgotten. By the way, as a member of a country who has been a long term ally of the USA... even with the tears still in my eyes from the devastation of 9/11 - I was deeply offended by this statement.

President Obama on the other hand is reaching out to the world - all corners of it. Even those people who aren't very nice. Why? It's called diplomacy people. You don't just kill your enemies - you reach out to them with your own ideology and passionately engage with them about how it could be THEIR ideology as well. You won't always win - but in most cases - and a republican President by the name of Reagan demonstrated this all too eloquently - you might actually get them to the middle of the road.

He has also shown that he can lead by example. He and his family have planted a kitchen garden at the White House, the first since First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt. Why should we care - because it's a good thing. It promotes gardening - which in turn promotes carbon capture. It shows how even the smallest action can help the environment and guess what happened - kitchen gardens are popping up all over the US.


He has also spoken publicly about his battle to quit smoking. He spoke of his wife's desire to have her husband be a role model in action not just words. Has he fallen off the wagon a few times? - he has freely admitted it and by doing so has shown the power of nicotine addiction and why it is so hard for people to quit, and so important that young people don't start.

President Obama has also led the charge for the perception of the Office of the President and the White House to be updated to reflect modern times. Now this is more than just a redesigned web site, this action says that here is a President who wants not just the Office to grow, but his country to grow as well. This could not be more vital in this day and age of rapidly changing global politics, economics and sociologies.

He has even demonstrated that he is a President of considered action. When an American citizen was recently held hostage by Somali pirates, he sought the input of his advisers, but then made the decision to act quickly - knowing the buck stopped with him and the President is the one responsible. As such, he sent a fatal message to those who would harm or extort the lives of American citizens. Do I have any compassion for the dead pirates - none - why? - do you think they had any compassion for their victims? How would you feel if it was your husband / father / brother being held at gunpoint with a more than 50/50 certainty of being shot anyway?


The critics of President Obama appear to be running around in circles screaming "The sky is falling! The sky is falling!" - Only because they have nothing to truly get this guy on - which is the favourite past time of critics everywhere. Don't try to work with someone - just criticise and/or scandalise them. Why be part of the process of change when you can simply derail it and thus make everyone elses life worse? Because it is all they know.

I've seen conservative rallies where placards read "Impeach the Kenyan" - "Where do I start" (and yes the dude forgot correct pronunciation and left out the question mark - oy vey) - and "Obama Leading US to Evil" (this one in response to President Obama meeting with those countries not thought of well in the USA).

I'm happy to make a generalisation here and say that these people are the ones that would not change their underwear if they didn't have to. These vocal but ill-informed protesters belong to the "good old days" - when only men worked, women wore taffeta and high heels at home whilst the black maid cleaned, and every second son had the word "Junior" tacked on. In other words - these people cling to the past whilst sitting in dark corners regurgitating the "good ol days" like mouthfuls of stale vomit whilst bemoaning the approaching storm of gay marriage. Again... oy vey.

President Obama bowed to Saudi Arabian King Abdullah. Conservatives went absolutely crazy that he would do this. But why? He should bow - because it's the customary sign of respect of the land. Just like she should bow when meeting Queen Elizabeth II. If nothing else, it shows the class of the man respecting other cultures and the involved protocol of meeting other heads of state.

Thomas Lifson at the American Thinker blog ( http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/04/obama_doubles_down_on_the_bow.html ) called the bow an insult to American sovereignty. Firstly, America does not reign over Saudi Arabia - even tho he and others may wish it did. Secondly, to even try to couch a diplomatic RIGHT as a diplomatic WRONG is the sign of an individual for whom all rounds are spent - he has nothing left to shoot. Thirdly, to comment without exploring the WHY of an action or word demonstrates an intentional ignorance that seems to be common to conservative pundits. THIS is an observation and not a crit. In reading many of the conservative blogs and media there is a common thread of WHY being consciously overlooked. Intentional Ignorance was also the providence of the Nazis - it's how they defined themselves. I caution conservatives against this tact.

In no way did the bow diminish his standing or the standing of America internationally - it actually raised it. Because here is a President willing to meet other leaders as an equal - like he should. It doesn't matter whether it's a small nation with no firepower - or a country like the UK, the leader of a nation SHOULD show respect to others - because that results in respect being shown to him AND his country. It says 'Let me work WITH you rather than AGAINST you".

President Obama is even facing criticism from the mainstream black community - because there are those who say he is too "white". I simply do not understand this. Sincerely do not understand as I do not have any cultural reference to explore this. Perhaps it is because President Obama treats his community just as fairly as all communities that may be the problem. Because he is not making it all about being black, the hard line community voices believe he has forsaken them. As I said, I really do not know so I'll move on.

The future 100 days for the President will be difficult. He has not only a national economy in recession, but a global economic recession that he must assist with. He has auto companies who think nothing about spending a hundred thousand dollars on a private jet flight to Congress but have no clue how to properly manage their industry. He has conservative pundits pulling out shot after shot of meaningless attacks that do nothing but clog a news cycle with the journalistic equivalent of sewerage outfall. And, he has to do all this whilst attempting to heal the national and international wounds of Bush Jnr's fractured legacy.

I wish him well. And I look forward to seeing how this truly inspirational President does in the near future.

I didn't like him as a candidate - but he is an exceptional President.

G-d Bless President Obama - and may G-d bless the United States of America and all countries.

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