PunchyP's election coverage...the major parties left us hanging on election day 2010. Why? #Corangamite #ausvotes #politics #greens

 

I went out into the Corangamite electorate to examine what was happening in this marginal seat on Election Day 2010. In sum, there was much confusion, little motivation or enthusiasm and some people did not know who to vote for before and after they had visited the polling booths! The election night was as dull as the one and only debate and any resulting hung parliament is clearly a consequence of having such an insincere, rushed and pseudo election campaign by both major parties. So watch for yourselves the thoughts of one marginal seat here in Corangamite. What's to come? A serious suck job by both party leaders and hopefully some sincere self reflection into what went wrong and why Australians did not buy their fakeness and fear campaigns. At the end of the day, it is a time to celebrate with the first Greens seat in the lower house and the beginning of a parliament that is truly reflective of what the people want from their leaders and their government - diversity, compassion and intelligent debate!

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Speech by a #refugee at the Rally for #refugees in Melbourne on Friday 13 2010 #ausvotes #greens #socialists

The second speaker at the rally was Gary Anan, a Tamil Refugee who escaped persecution and arrived in Australia in 1996, where he was sent to a detention centre.

He spoke of his false arrests, suffering and pain as a Tamil in Sri Lanka and how he finally escaped to Australia after much abuse and fear for his life. He spoke of his pain in the detention centre in Australia as a 17 year old refugee (and his experience now as a counselor for refugees) and he highlighted the fact (already obvious to me but apparently confusing for the LCD's who continue to mention some form of a queue that is supposed to be lined up in) that refugees do not have a choice, they do not have any other options and that they are escaping persecution and threats of violence.They are running from, not running to.

He also mentioned an experience he had on a tram one day, when a woman came up to him and said,

"If all the migrants left we would have some space"

which he replied "yeah maybe we should all leave and let the aborigines have their land back."

Gary ended his speech with ‘open your hearts, that is all we’re asking.’

Now that’s not that hard is it? Is it Australia? Make a stance against the derogatory terms being publicly broadcast by the major party contenders Spillard and Abbutt. Refugees are not “boat people”, the only real use of the term should be how former Prime Minister Bob Hawke recently used it, “we’re all boat people, that’s how we found the place.” And on the front cover of the Big Issue magazine this week, there was a photo of surf life savers in a boat with the title "boat people, Australia would not be the same without them!" These are the only appropriate uses of the phrase 'boat people', any association with this phase and asylum seekers is immoral, inhumane, illegal, racist and unacceptable.

 Refugees are people, they are fellow humans, they are mothers, fathers, children, they had homes that they loved and lost due to war, persecution and violence, they have friends and loved ones that they miss, they have no belongings, no tangible assets, all they have is their strength, their hearts and their torturous memories of where they have come from and what they have been through to get to a land and beg for help, some of them have spent their entire lives in refugee camps and prisons, with no clean water, no food, no clothing, they left everything to merely try and survive and make it through one more day without being killed or dying of disease. Come on Australia, open your hearts and at least form your political decisions on facts, our proven racist past and not on propaganda, lies and campaigns that focus on causing fear and hysteria in our society.

 

To see some photos and information from this rally check out melbourne protests blog

 

 

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PunchyP's election coverage...the #debate or lack there of

Sorry delayed reaction...was waiting for something interesting to be discussed but has not happened so far.

Had nothing to say about #debate from last Sunday and still don't really. Found it utterly boring on both sides
and if it wasn't for the #greens I would be lost for who to vote for. It was full of deceitful games, side-stepping and racial slurs. There
was no mention of traditional debate topics or critical election campaign issues such as Education, Health or god forbid the
Environment (which apparently the corporate honcho's still have free reign of.)

Both of their persona's (#abbutt and #spillard) are unappealing to me and it's a sad day when you choose a PM from the list of who you despise slightly less.

The day after the debate, I did however have a concerning discussion with some gen Why's? when I suggested we do our horror animation on political leaders in our present and past, however  they responded with "I don't know anything about politics, have no opinion on it and wouldn't have anything to say"... which 3 weeks out of a Federal Election obviously left me a little bewildered.  I was marching in anti-war rallies in first year uni and knew every economic policy of current and past political leaders in Australia through high school economics (and due to my teen crush on Keating and my economics teacher who lived next door to Keating's brother - however the point remains the same!)

Thus, I'm a bit concerned that there will be more donkey votes and racism induced voting in the next election to really justify any pre-election discussions from me at this point. I might instead pack my bags for Spain and leave the Gen Y's or as I say the Gen WTF's and the racists to their own demise in Australia. It's a scary time in politics and society in general at the moment. I hope some intelligent and humanitarian #debates can occur soon prior to #ausvotes

Need I remind you of the horror of the PM these people chose only a few short years ago? If so, please remind yourselves http://raws.adc.rmit.edu.au/~s3087922/portfolio/

 

Clare Peterson
Punchy Productions

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A sad sad day #spillard

What should be a great victory with having a female PM but instead is a sad sad day for the ALP and Australia. Kevin 07 saved this country from the destruction of little Johnny and set the road to move forward as a socially committed humane country that will not be bullied by right winged racist facists...and yet this is what has happened today. The corporate racist pigs have won yet again. Good news is the mining shares are up since the change and the war victims from all the countries we have helped bomb are too scared to ask us for help and try and escape their torture in our rapidly sinking society. And the bottom line is that even the liberals wouldn't do this to their abhorrent leader little Johnny would have been discarded of well before his final senile months and his resulting loss in 07. And the fact that even them wouldn't do this, unfortunately says a lot. Kevin 07 saved this country and did his best to try and START the process of repairing inept policy decisions from the reign of terror of howard. The right facists in the ALP blocked the ETS and have since pressured Rudd on his socialist stance on the refugees and his justified and vital mining tax. And he invited spillard into her leadership role and made her who she now is. Which is, by the way, the leadership team who TOGETHER made the policy decisions which have caused such controversy. But instead the corporate right win again and going into the next election we can now choose the unstable, backstabbing right (once the Left) or the Lycra wearing sexist, moronic right. That's it, I'm outta here and cannot sit by and watch a further destruction of our country. I stand by Rudd for at least he saved us from Johnny and today he chose to try and save the party from destroying itself further rather than save himself...and that is what a responsible and committed leader would do. I want a female PM who is voted in by the people of Australia and not by right corporate factions in the ALP. It's a sad sad day for the ALP and for a leader that had every substantial policy that could have made the changes the public wanted, blocked by the right factions. I voted for the leader I wanted to lead this country into change we needed and unlike the other people in our disposable society I was committed to stand by him and let him start the long term challenge of repairing this country BUT at the end of the day the miners who sell our earth for billions paid to themselves and the right factions have bullied us into a new PM today and it's this process that makes today a sad day. And an even sadder day when slimy Abbutt uses it to take the next election purely because the LCD's won't stand for a leader being chosen FOR them and not by them. Hasta Illeugo de Espana Clare Peterson

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