ABC early news all about the “resiliance” of the muslim community in the face of threats to a mosque.

Treasonous r’soles. They never once expressed support for the Jewish community in the face of genuine terror enacted by the ABC’s beloved muzzies.

If you are seeking a winner Dutton, hold a referendum on defunding the ABC.

As you enjoy your morning coffee, remember…the world was far more civilised in 1959.

The Paywallian’s former US correspondent Adam Creighton is now doing good work as chief economist at the Institute of Public Affairs:

Listening to the two major parties a few days out from the budget, you’d think there is no significant constituency in this country for cutting government spending.

There certainly should be, given the nation’s increasingly dire fiscal outlook and the decline of Australia’s decade-long resources boom.

Even the extra billions of dollars in revenue raked in every year via bracket creep can’t keep pace with Canberra’s old spending commitments, let alone the new ones bound to emerge at next week’s budget.

It’s a depressing time for anyone hoping to wrench Australia away from shuffling mindlessly down the path to European-style economic sclerosis. But voters could be persuaded for some tough economic medicine, if only our political leadership would rise to the challenge.

It turns out around four times as many Australians would prefer the government to cut spending as opposed to increasing taxes to fix the budget, 57 per cent to 13 per cent, when presented with the basic fiscal facts.

That’s according to a survey of 1000 Australians commissioned by the Institute of Public Affairs earlier this month and carried out by independent polling outfit Dynata. Only 15 per cent opted for “no change – debt isn’t a problem”.

It won’t be a shock that only 29 per cent of Canberrans wanted cuts, but it might be that calls for a little “austerity” were greatest in Victoria (59 per cent) and Tasmania (62 per cent), the two states that face the greatest fiscal challenges.

The surprises didn’t end there. Asked whether government overall in Australia was too big, too small or about right, 45 per cent opted for too large and only 11 per cent for too small, which is about the same primary vote as the Greens.

It seems voters have the right intuition, even before either side of politics begins to make the case for more expenditure sanity.

Donald Trump and Elon Musk deserve credit for highlighting waste in the vast US government, which hasn’t been exposed to a proper efficiency review since the early years of the Reagan administration.

Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency has turned up some amusing examples, such as $US20m ($31.56m) for an Iraqi Sesame Street, $US59m on luxury hotel stays for illegal immigrants, and even $US1300 each for 25 coffee cups for the air force.

After trawling through thousands of US government contracts across dozens of departments and agencies, DOGE reckons it’s found around $US115bn in savings.

Musk still has a long way to go to reach his target of $US1 trillion, let alone find enough to close America’s gigantic annual budget deficit, which is easily double that. But his admirable efforts have reminded Americans just how bloated the government can become without regular scrutiny.

In Australia, a similarly determined effort could easily find spending ripe for pruning.

My own cursory examination of new measures introduced over the past few federal budgets reveals $38m to “increase diversity in STEM education”. There’s $22m for a First Nations Digital Support Hub, and $56m to establish a “Building Women’s Careers program to drive structural and systemic change”.

DOGE found that Washington’s USAID had been funding LGBTQ+ programs in Uganda and transgender operas in Colombia. Our own foreign aid arm, once dubbed AusAID, now under the auspices of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, will almost certainly be a source of similarly absurd expenditure programs.

It recently launched a New International Gender Equality Strategy, which aims to “prioritise gender-responsive and inclusive climate action on mitigation, adaptation and response … and promote disability equity and rights and LGBTQIA+ equality”, according to the DFAT website.

One can only imagine how these programs must go over in traditional developing countries, such as Indonesia and Papua New Guinea. Maybe a security pact with China would be preferable for Solomons Islands to a moral lecture from DFAT bureaucrats!

In fairness, closing small programs piecemeal here and there won’t be enough to bring public finances back to a sustainable path, even if such cuts would help restore some much-needed integrity to public spending after the crazy Covid years.

Serious savings will require making serious inroads into health, welfare and the National Disability Insurance Scheme, which in a few short years has become as expensive as Medicare and the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme combined.

Other Western governments have successfully made the political case for drastic spending cuts in the past, such as Sweden and Canada in the 1990s, which both had to slash vast chunks of their welfare states as they teetered at the edge of economic collapse.

Argentina is going through a similarly painful adjustment period now under President Javier Milei. Since World War II Australia has never had to take the axe to spending to the same extent, but the longer we wait the more painful the adjustment will ultimately be. The revenue tide is bound to go out in the coming years, exposing the unsightly wreckage of social programs unaffordable outside the boom years.

For all the reluctance to talk about cutting spending, these post-Covid years may actually be the opportune time to advocate for less intrusive and profligate government.

In the same survey mentioned above, the IPA also asked Australians what they blamed for the surge in inflation since 2021: lockdowns, government spending, big business, or foreign conflicts. The first two potential causes attracted the most answers, a combined 56 per cent.

Only 13 per cent opted for foreign conflicts, which politicians around the world have typically tried to blame.

The voters in our survey have a better understanding of our true economic position than politicians give them credit. They are just waiting for one of the major parties to rise to the challenge.

Link.

The IPA used to publish a chart tracking the growth in government spending as a percentage of GDP, which is now pushing towards half of every dollar in Australia like Europe, where government spending (last time I checked) had pushed well past 50% of GDP.

With Adam Creighton now at the IPA, I hope he commits to publishing the government as a percentage of GDP chart annually.

Rita Panahi in stupid cat lady news:

Veteran football reporter Caroline Wilson launched a bizarre attack against Port Adelaide great and board member Warren Tredrea last week.

According to Wilson the premiership captain’s “strong” political views are causing all sorts of concern at Alberton Oval.

Of course she didn’t name a single person who is troubled, nor identify what particular view has been deemed so “unusual” as to cause consternation at the club.

Apparently holding mainstream conservative views is highly unusual, as is supporting the duly elected president of the United States or other wildly popular figures such as Elon Musk and Robert F Kennedy Jnr.

“It’s definitely raising eyebrows across the footy world, across the Alberton fraternity – even at board level,” Wilson claimed on Channel 7.

“He has some very strong and unusual political views.”

Curiously, Kane Cornes, whose Port Adelaide links and contacts are impeccable, has not heard of any disquiet at the club about Tredrea’s political views or posts.

Funny how Caro didn’t name or shame the many football figures who pushed the Yes vote in the Voice referendum such as Nathan Buckley and Patrick Dangerfield.

Port Adelaide also joined in the divisive activism, releasing a statement in August declaring the club “wholeheartedly supports the recognition of First Nations people in the Constitution”.

Now that was an “unusual” political opinion, particularly since more than 64 per cent of South Australians voted No in the referendum.

But, according to Caro’s sources, it’s Tredrea’s tweets that are causing a stir.

Wilson also labelled the Port great’s desire for transparency as “unusual”.

She said: “He’s an unusual board member; he’s member-elected … and he’s making some big demands at the board table too … he wants board meetings to be completely transparent.”

Lord have mercy!

Transparency and people power.

How can the footy world tolerate that?

This attempt to shame and silence a board member for having perfectly mainstream views is frankly pathetic and bound to fail.

Perhaps Wilson should declare her own Leftist worldview and associations before such attacks.

Possibly the only reason she is tolerated is because of the fact she is a daughter of a former Richmond president.
Because she has no idea on any issue in the football sphere. Terrible work.