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October 11th, 2011 
FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda Updated
There was a smattering of applause at the end of what could only be termed a strong performance by Kevin Rudd.
To the casual observer, today in Parliament has all been about carbon legislation; Question Time was packed with the usual carbon tax debate and Opposition Leader Tony Abbott moved to censure Prime Minister Julia Gillard over her introduction of the price.
Tomorrow the carbon price bills will be passed and the legislation will come into effect on July 1 next year, when polluters will pay for polluting and tax breaks and welfare measures will compensate consumers.
But underneath the policy debate was the elephant in the room, the story everyone is talking about on Capital Hill – leadership.
The day began with Queensland Labor backbencher Graham Perrett making the extraordinary threat to bring his government down if it changed leaders by resigning himself and forcing a by-election.
He said it was for moral reasons, that his electorate of Moreton voted a Gillard government in and voters were telling him he had “betrayed” them by not resigning after the Gillard coup last year.
Mr Perrett may have believed he was putting pressure on his colleagues to keep their support behind Ms Gillard or lose office, but he was reprimanded by Labor’s House Leader, Anthony Albanese, who called the ultimatum a “one-morning wonder”.
Paradoxically, perhaps Mr Perrett’s only chance of survival at the next election is if Mr Rudd seizes the leadership. The former prime minister is streets ahead of Ms Gillard in Queensland opinion polls, and if an election were held now Mr Rudd would be the only Queensland Labor MP to survive.
But Mr Perrett is unmoved by opinion polls. Any MP who bases his support for a leader on polls is “not a politician, but a moral vacuum”, he told ABC News Online.
Down to business
In Question Time, Deputy Opposition leader Julie Bishop – a friend of Mr Rudd’s and one who has previously and mischievously thrown a leadership grenade into the House – got down to business.
She asked a long question about the number of countries Mr Rudd had visited and inquired how many of them had an economy-wide carbon price.
The question seemed less about carbon and more about unleashing Mr Rudd to strut his stuff in front of the Prime Minister – and so it proved.
The Foreign Minister reminded Ms Bishop – who is the Opposition’s foreign affairs spokeswoman – of what her leader had said recently about the member for Kooyong, Josh Frydenberg.
“It’s nice to have someone in the parliamentary party who understands foreign affairs at last,” Mr Rudd quoted Mr Abbott as saying.
“Julie, that is a ringing vote of endorsement if ever I heard one, and Josh – just remain calm,” Mr Rudd said to laughing government benches – all except Wayne Swan, who remained poker faced.
Still got it
For her part, Ms Gillard listened politely to her foreign minister, laughing at the funny bits and nodding sagely at the telling points.
Mr Rudd then proceeded to congratulate Ms Bishop for discovering that a foreign affairs minister, by definition, has to travel.
Then he quoted a former prime minister – none other than John Howard, from his book Lazarus Rising.
“There comes a stage when point-scoring over the cost of overseas travel by political figures demeans our national self-respect.”
Mr Rudd then went on to detail what other countries were doing to tackle carbon pollution; it was a long list and he read from a brief – no doubt the question was expected.
At the end of what could only be termed a strong performance, there was a smattering of applause and Ms Bishop, who had smiled benignly through the performance, said: “You’ve still got it.”
federal-government,
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climate-change,
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