The totally off-topic thread

[Foreigner]

Very sad circumstances

 

[penegal]

So I am walking down Church St in Brighton this morn when I tripped over this sign on footpath - check Tuesday nights - $10 Pizzas and $55 Moet - yep $55 Moet in a bona fide hotel in one of Melbourne's wealthiest suburbs.

AND - Sandringham train line run's past it's door for those drunkards wanting to get back into city - any takers for another MEL get together here ASPIT?

Let's do it

 

[penegal]

Securitisation and sale of HECS debt is a little silly in the context of repayments not keeping pace with new loans.

Whatever your political leaning, I think that it is perfectly reasonable that the government should take all reasonable steps to recover debt as much as possible. After all it is our tax money. Naturally there will be cases of genuine hardship where it should be written off, but there are some people not paying who probably can afford to, and should.

 

[penegal]

With regards to charlatan operators taking advantage of higher education funding, I think this is a totally separate issue to HECS repayments.

 

[whatmeworry]

The current government has got a lot of suggestions from the "Institute of Public Affairs", yet not one thought about paring back Negative Gearing or Superannuation tax loop holes. Roughly 1 third of suggestions below have been implemented.

1 Repeal the carbon tax, and don't replace it. It will be one thing to remove the burden of the carbon tax from the Australian economy. But if it is just replaced by another costly scheme, most of the benefits will be undone.
2 Abolish the Department of Climate Change
3 Abolish the Clean Energy Fund
4 Repeal Section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act
5 Abandon Australia's bid for a seat on the United Nations Security Council
6 Repeal the renewable energy target
7 Return income taxing powers to the states
8 Abolish the Commonwealth Grants Commission
9 Abolish the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission
10 Withdraw from the Kyoto Protocol
11 Introduce fee competition to Australian universities
12 Repeal the National Curriculum
13 Introduce competing private secondary school curriculums
14 Abolish the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA)
15 Eliminate laws that require radio and television broadcasters to be 'balanced'
16 Abolish television spectrum licensing and devolve spectrum management to the common law
17 End local content requirements for Australian television stations
18 Eliminate family tax benefits
19 Abandon the paid parental leave scheme
20 Means-test Medicare
21 End all corporate welfare and subsidies by closing the Department of Industry, Innovation, Science, Research and Tertiary Education
22 Introduce voluntary voting
23 End mandatory disclosures on political donations
24 End media blackout in final days of election campaigns
25 End public funding to political parties
26 Remove anti-dumping laws
27 Eliminate media ownership restrictions
28 Abolish the Foreign Investment Review Board
29 Eliminate the National Preventative Health Agency
30 Cease subsidising the car industry
31 Formalise a one-in, one-out approach to regulatory reduction
32 Rule out federal funding for 2018 Commonwealth Games
33 Deregulate the parallel importation of books
34 End preferences for Industry Super Funds in workplace relations laws
35 Legislate a cap on government spending and tax as a percentage of GDP
36 Legislate a balanced budget amendment which strictly limits the size of budget deficits and the period the federal government can be in deficit
37 Force government agencies to put all of their spending online in a searchable database
38 Repeal plain packaging for cigarettes and rule it out for all other products, including alcohol and fast food
39 Reintroduce voluntary student unionism at universities
40 Introduce a voucher scheme for secondary schools
41 Repeal the alcopops tax
42 Introduce a special economic zone in the north of Australia including:
a) Lower personal income tax for residents
b) Significantly expanded 457 Visa programs for workers
c) Encourage the construction of dams
43 Repeal the mining tax
44 Devolve environmental approvals for major projects to the states
45 Introduce a single rate of income tax with a generous tax-free threshold
46 Cut company tax to an internationally competitive rate of 25 per cent
47 Cease funding the Australia Network
48 Privatise Australia Post
49 Privatise Medibank
50 Break up the ABC and put out to tender each individual function

51 Privatise SBS

52 Reduce the size of the public service from current levels of more than 260,000 to at least the 2001 low of 212,784
53 Repeal the Fair Work Act
54 Allow individuals and employers to negotiate directly terms of employment that suit them
55 Encourage independent contracting by overturning new regulations designed to punish contractors
56 Abolish the Baby Bonus
57 Abolish the First Home Owners' Grant
58 Allow the Northern Territory to become a state
59 Halve the size of the Coalition front bench from 32 to 16
60 Remove all remaining tariff and non-tariff barriers to international trade
61 Slash top public servant salaries to much lower international standards, like in the United States
62 End all public subsidies to sport and the arts
63 Privatise the Australian Institute of Sport
64 End all hidden protectionist measures, such as preferences for local manufacturers in government tendering
65 Abolish the Office for Film and Literature Classification
66 Rule out any government-supported or mandated internet censorship
67 Means test tertiary student loans
68 Allow people to opt out of superannuation in exchange for promising to forgo any government income support in retirement
69 Immediately halt construction of the National Broadband Network and privatise any sections that have already been built
70 End all government funded Nanny State advertising
71 Reject proposals for compulsory food and alcohol labelling
72 Privatise the CSIRO
73 Defund Harmony Day
74 Close the Office for Youth
75 Privatise the Snowy-Hydro Scheme

https://ipa.org.au/publications/2080/be-like-gough-75-radical-ideas-to-transform-australia

 

[penegal]

Having a drink with all my friends tonight.

 

[medhead]

I'm surprised doctors would be earning such a low amount! That's ridiculous. I know people doing far simpler jobs earning much more (and no, not mining related ).

I think the first "doctors" out of the degree who do their internship and so on have quite low salaries (either low in absolute number and/or relative to the number of hours worked). It's only when you become a full fledged qualified doctor that you start raking it in, or so I have heard.

IT actually can earn a heck of a lot if you are very good. To be a very good IT worker, however, you need to be dynamic, able to change and adapt quickly, and probably have to put up with a lot of managerial and bureaucratic nonsense / ignorance. Oh, and likely be prepared to work non-conventional hours, too. Medical doctors, on the other hand, or so I had been brought up to believe, will always be in demand, so come hell or high water you'll never, ever be out of a job - the trade-off for investing 6-12 years of your life on tough training.

Sort of what anat0l said. I noticed an award pay list print out on a printer the other day. Not just interns but all the way up to those training in a Speciality. I didn't take notes but it seemed to start around $50k and the highest I remember is $80k. Pretty rough when they need to join a college (typical fee in the many $1000s) to train as a specialist. Having said that the doctor who was telling me his college fee a few months ago was also doing some kind of consulting work out of hours.

From CBR to BNE or MEL or ADL for that matter is long, noisy and boring in a Dash 8. I'll pass on it every time, though do fly CBR - SYD in one if it has the best timing for me.

but also to the disadvantaged (or in my case lazy) students who did not meet entry standards straight out of school.

Its not simple, and the current system is not sustainable. We want everyone who so wishes to have the chance of a uni education, and we don't want to burden them with excessive debt. We don't want to penalise the low-paid/part-time participants, we don't want to seize the debt from their estate, we just seem to want it all to happen somehow.

The thing about Commonwealth Scholarships, removed under Dawkins, was that they "rationed" places. We now have an un-rationed system, unregulated fees and a huge unpaid HECS/HELP debt. Don't see a way out of it myself that won't leave many people unhappy.

The entry standards is interesting. I got about my 3rd preference for uni entry. They had a method to re-calculate my entry score based on university results. After a first year at uni I'd significantly upped my entrance score be be able to get my first previous preference. I never bother and just stuck with my course. But I had a number of friends who repeated high school to get a first preference, I couldn't help think they should've done whatever uni course they could get and then upgraded.

As for the sustainability, even after HECS came in there were quotas on course. Those were removed when VET funding was added. The VET think has been rorted massively. First step re-introduce quotas. Also don't give universities the power to set whatever fee they want.

 

[Foreigner]

"...going outside local law can be a very dangerous option for all involved.”

Desparate attempt by parent to snatch children in Lebanon. Mum and Channel 9 crew in custody.

http://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/pa...d/news-story/f2d3a594ebd931ae11e62a3b3120d225

 

[Mal]

"...going outside local law can be a very dangerous option for all involved.”

Desparate attempt by parent to snatch children in Lebanon. Mum and Channel 9 crew in custody.

Sally Faulkner Lebanon arrest: When desperate parents kidnap their own children to get them back | 60 Minutes

Fantastic news. Lock up the journalist and their crew, and the mother too.

Being a pirate means you're up for capture and punishment.

 

[cove]

Kidnapping is serious and this is unlikely to go well for any of those involved. I cannot fathom who thought it would be a good idea for tv staff to go there.It will be a tough gig to get them all released.

 

[Mal]

Kidnapping is serious and this is unlikely to go well for any of those involved. I cannot fathom who thought it would be a good idea for tv staff to go there.It will be a tough gig to get them all released.

If the rumours are true, 60 minutes paid for the kidnap to occur... Yes, a seriously bad idea by them, which is why I hope they are locked up for a long time.

 

[Foreigner]

Very poor of channel 9 being complicit in this misadventure.

 

[anat0l]

Very poor of channel 9 being complicit in this misadventure.

I realise they were struggling in the ratings, but this was a bit of a risk!


To put the other side forward, it seems that the woman may not have had much choice or no choice in the matter. If her kids were truly taken away from her against her will with no prospect of her being able to raise them in Australia, then she either would never raise them in Australia again (presumably the kids would be able to see her after they become adults), or she would have to take a risk. I'm not sure having a media entourage along for the ride was a wise idea, though.

Parenting and other emotional situations can make people do what would be, from a longer standpoint, seem like irrational things.

 

[love_the_life]

Like most situations I think there is more to this than just being reported in the media. The couple are divorced, she has remarried and has a new baby, the ex husband took the children back to Lebanon with her permission but then has not returned them to Australia, the couple used to live in Lebanon, the father's family and business are there etc etc. IMO whatever the circumstances it is not an easy case of he's right or she's right. I don't think 60 minutes has covered itself in glory here though; I always worry about motives when media put up the money ( if it is correct as is being reported).

 

[Princess Fiona]

I'll just leave this here :mrgreen:
Homeopathy - the air guitar of medicine

 

[anat0l]

I'll just leave this here :mrgreen:
Homeopathy - the air guitar of medicine

I think we have bigger problems right now with the increasing numbers of people not being vaccinated. Certainly anti-vaccination is taking a bigger stage these days, and not just the reports of people who now claim they regret not getting (or their kids) vaccinated.

Then again, we have plenty of health-related issues which are pushing for either wide societal ridicule and/or government regulation in order to "set right". For example, the "no jab" laws related to immunisation, or "sugar taxes" in order to address rising occurrences of diabetes and obesity.

 

[marki]

I'll just leave this here :mrgreen:
Homeopathy - the air guitar of medicine

Dear PF ,

diluting illness causing substances? ( That's dangerousness)

I thought it was medications that are diluted.

If that were the case astronauts would not need much oxygen as diluting will not cause a memory effect either way!

 

[Foreigner]

I read a "fun fact":

Less than 1% of the world's population have travelled to Antarctica.

Are commercial flights continuing over the continent?

ANZ did around 1980 and i recall the Mt Erebus crash.

 

[cove]

Looks like you get expensive wee if you choose a homeopath solution. Thanks PF for your post.
The anti vaccination group must have never seen the children who suffer from the consequences from an avoidable disease.

 

[anat0l]

I read a "fun fact":

Less than 1% of the world's population have travelled to Antarctica.

Are commercial flights continuing over the continent?

ANZ did around 1980 and i recall the Mt Erebus crash.

Estimating the world's population at about 6 billion, 1% would be 60 million people, or about the population of France. Yeah, I'd say it's conceivable that less than 1% has been to the cold, cold South.

Qantas, I believe, still do charter flights for everyday people (organised by a tour company) which fly over Antarctica, but not landing on it.

I'm lead to believe that NZ did similar operations, including the one which crashed into Mt Erebus.

Some flights, e.g. Australia to South Africa and Australia to South America, if I recall, fly very close or over parts of Antarctica.