Boonta Vista - EPISODE 133: Teacher's Pest

Episode Date: January 31, 2020

Join us in the isolation tank as we dive into the government's rare reverse pork-barrelling manoeuvre, the opposition's brave stance on kissing the nation's boots, and the recent gold medal in Nonce Apologia awarded to Bettina Arndt. *** Support our show and get exclusive bonus episodes by subscribing on Patreon: www.patreon.com/BoontaVista *** Email the show at [e-mail]! Call in and leave us a question or a message on 1800-317-515 to be answered on the show! *** Twitter: twitter.com/boontavista Website: boontavista.com Merchandise: boontavista.com/merchandise Twitch: twitch.tv/boontavista

Welcome to Buntavista episode 133. You're here with me, Theo. We're in four separate sensory deprivation tanks. I'm just lying in here quietly. Just me and my own thoughts. Just me and just me with my thoughts. Just my thoughts? Just me and my thoughts. I am here with Andrew though.

Andrew's in his tank. He's managed to smuggle in, a whole bunch of soap, he's making suds everywhere, and he's also got a whole bunch of soap, he's making suds everywhere and he's also got a whole bunch of racist disguises and he'll be using those to act out the entire intro to the pest. How are you Andrew? I'm good. That's all. Yep, that's the classic character from the pest that we all remember. That's he doing the part where he's pretending to be a pharaoh, right? All kinds of things. He's like Groucho Marx at some point, tap in his cigar that he also has in the shower for some reason. Extremely racist Asian man, unfortunately, for a very long period of time.

Yep. And I've bought all that stuff with me today in tribute to John Leguezamo. He's having a great old time over there. We've got Lucy who is frowning and wondering why she spent the money because she was already gonna be in a bathtub with all the lights off at home anyway. And that doesn't cost you anything. What is the bloody roast of Lucy Valentine? Rude. Continue. I'm fine.

I've actually been in one of these sensory deprivation tanks and it was disappointing. It was pretty, it was okay. It's quite, it's a nice relaxing thing. It's no Simpsons, you know, like crazy drug trip, you know. Okay. Yeah. I got the feeling that if I did it more than once, that that would have helped. That's true, I feel like I was spending a lot of the time just getting the vibe of the whole thing, you know? Yeah, because when you first get into one, you're like, this is unsettling because the salt content of the water is insanely high so you can't even like push your

leg under the water kind of thing just immediately blast back up which is how you float on your back so easily yeah without having to put any kind of thought or effort into how you're floating or anything. So that's cool that they have a light that you can switch on if you're a coward. But I did not. But yeah, once you sort of get into that zone of just completely emptying your mind. You're naked in there, like a newborn, like a unborn. That's right. I was out there in the lobby and they were like, please wait until you get into the room.

Come on. It's like no time. I'm getting in the zone now. And speaking of being nude and in the zone, we've got Ben in the final tank and he is of course astral projecting through space and time into a small nude goblin-like creature in the British Columbia forests in the 1980s, performing little visitations upon the township surrounding which will eventually become the basis of an X-Files episode. Wonderful stuff. How you doing, Ben? I'm doing great. I ignored all the warning signs about not being intoxicated before going

into the sensory deprivation tank. I had three beers, a tab of acid, a couple of brownies, and I've laid back into the tub and immediately left my own body. And I'm feeling great about it. Cool. I do want to get blasted in one those. Oh God, that's the fucking dream, right? But we're not just here to get absolutely wasted in the tank. We are, of course, using our big brains, forming one mind like the precocogs for Minority Report, to put together

the world's greatest scams, the world's greatest grifts, new snake oil, all that shit. And we need all of our brains because we are competing with the world's biggest, dumbest, best grifters. I am of course talking about just about everybody that's part of the right-wing apparatus of politics, news, the griftosphere. It's just a grift fest. So we've got just an episode back-to-back, wall-to-wall grifts. And of course we are starting off with the old reverse pork barrel. What a wonderful little term. It's a difficult maneuver to pull off. It is a difficult maneuver to pull off. But Ben, do you want to tell us how exactly you pull off a reverse

pork barrel? Very carefully. Uh-huh. Cool. Look, we're going to spend some time figuring out what the words reverse pork barrel could actually mean, but we're starting with that phrase because that is how Deputy Nationals Leader Bridget McKenzie described her actions in being in control of a $100 million sports grant program that it turns out, well, I mean this is contentious because obviously she denies it, was just a massive pork barreling scheme. So the idea of this thing is,

the sports Australia, the body that looks over, you know, sort of funding and promoting sports in Australia, whatever, had a hundred million dollars to spend. They're going to give it to sports clubs, to, you know, sort of funding and promoting sports in Australia, whatever, had a hundred million dollars to spend. And they're going to give it to sports clubs to, you know, rebuild their facilities, put on events, do that sort of stuff, anything to sort of promote people's engagement in sport. The way it works is there was a committee for Sports Australia, who looked at all of the applications, and then they submitted a list to the sports minister

The then sports minister Bridget McKenzie looked at that list and said Ha ha ha ha ha crumpled up that list threw it into the bin and then did her own list and would you believe? That that that was heavily I put it to you Ben that they did not wait to see the list before deciding what they were going to do. Oh, you reckon? They they? They they? They they they they they they they? They they? They they? They they? They they? They, they? I, they? I, they? they? they. they. th. they. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. I their. I. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. then. then. then. then. then. then. then. then. then, then, then, then, then, then, then, then, then, then, then, then, then, then, then, then, then, then, then, then, then, then, then, to you Ben that they did not wait to see the list before deciding what they were going to do. Oh you reckon they crumpled up the bit of paper without even eyeballing it. Well it's just good project management, right? They know that the next step doesn't rely on the list, so you just don't wait. What's the point? I love to see efficiency in government. Yeah. So the, just an overwhelming proportion of this money was given to marginal seats that little

party wanted to retain, most prominently in the third round of funding. So there were three stages of announcements for this that split up the hundred million dollars. The third one was right before the last election. And it turned out that 73% of the approved projects in the final round of grants were not recommended by Sport Australia but approved by Senator McKenzie's office. So Sport Australia had been like, well, here's what we want you to do. Bridget McKenzie went, ha ha ha ha ha. This is a bit dry, but this is from the Auditor General from the Australian National Audit Office. They did an investigation into it, which I can't wait to tell you why to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to is from the Auditor General from the Australian National Audit Office.

They did an investigation into it, which I can't wait to tell you why, but their findings of the investigation were as follows. The award of funding reflected the approach documented by the Minister's Office of focusing on marginal electorates held by the coalition, as well as those electorates held by other parties or independent members that were to be targeted by the coalition of the 2019 election. Applications from projects located in those electorates were more successful in being awarded funding than if funding was allocated on the basis for merit assessed against their program, blah blah blah blah. So this is a which is like the definition of pork barreling. They're absolutely straight up saying,

tho' thi. thi, which, which, which, which, which, which, which, which, which, which, which, which is, which, which is, which, which is, which, which, which is, which is, which, which, which is their, which, which, which is their, which is their, which, which is, which is, which is, which is, which is, which is, which is, which is their,, which is, which is, which is, which, which, which, which, which, which, which, which, which, which, which, which, which is, which is, which is, which is, which is, which is, which is, which is, which is, which is, which, which, which, which, which, which, which, which is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, their. their. their. their. their. their. their. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. Applica. the. Applica. the. Applicant. Applica. Applic is pork barreling. This isn't like one of those things where an order has come out and they've sort of hedged their bits and been like, oh, the data's a little bit skewed in one direction. They've just fucking straight up said, oh, you're a pork baller-ball- you're a pork ballerina. I think that's, you are a pork baller. A lot of journalists seemed very taken aback when this report first came out by how blunt the wording was. It's weird, you never see it. Yeah, because like you said, a lot of them are like, well, this could give the appearance that favor was given on the base of this thing, but they are just saying, you know, the

merit-based assessment was not followed at all, and instead they gave the money to places where they thought that they would win votes. Hey, it might be worth noting for our international listeners, because having listened recently to our pals over at Chalpo Traphouse, when they were talking about visiting England, and they were talking about like marginal seats, and they were like, what the fuck is that? Because to Americans it's like swing states and swing voters and stuff. So that's what marginal seats mean. It means places which could go either way in an election due to how narrow the margin is. You are welcome. You are welcome for this bomb of knowledge dropped upon you. So this is my favorite part, this whole story maybe. The reason that this investigation was launched in the first place, I think you've got a theme

song for this to cue up there, Andrew. You want to... Yeah, I do, but it's, um, it's, it's pretty long, so maybe you can just, you can just start reading away while it just kind of gets itself in there, you know? Thank you so much. So this investigation was launched because of a person called Georgina Dauter, who has tried unsuccessfully to form a political dynasty of the back of her dad. She launched this investigation, well she was the cause of this investigation because in February of 2019...

I'm just gonna, I feel like I've got to let the song play out. Oh, what? I appreciate your effort to go again the tide for a while then. Are we going to play three entire minutes? No. Oh, okay. I know. Anyway, this was all because Ben wrote the pun in the notes, downer with the sickness. I'll be our film tune for anything downer related. Oh yeah, which I'm sure will come up a lot.

And I look forward to that. Father of course being his own big-time failure, former Liberal Party leader and election loser Alexander Downer. The guy sucks. A great big, tory, torie, toff dickhead, who everybody hates. Really annoying voice as well. And and they very very clearly considered the seat of Mayo, finally. They very clearly considered the seat of Mayo to be like, theirs by birthright. Yeah, their dynasty. And it's part of securing her birthright.

In the lead up to the election, she posed for a photo holding a glass of champagne with a liberal party branded novelty check for $127,323, which is made out to Yankililalil a bowling club. This is a bowling club that's in the seat of Mayo, which was the seat she was unsuccessfully campaigning in. Now, just to be clear here, this is a large check with the number, the money that they will be receiving, the amount of money that they will be receiving written on it, in the Liberal Party library.

Yep, it's got the logo in the corner. It's in the, it's got the covery. With a gigantic... I'm going down the library, rent a book. Oh, fuck off. With a big photo of Georgina Downer on it. And the impression from an outside observer would perhaps think that this was money coming from Georgina Downer from the liberal party to this bowling club.

Just through... I mean, if you were, where would you get that idea from? So you're looking at this? Yep, you're looking at the setup. You're looking from the photo of her to the amount, to the glass of champagne, to all the smiling faces in the photo, back down to the amount, back to her face and so and so on for several minutes for for for for to to to to to to to to to toe.... And toe. And toe. toe. toe. toe, the liberal. toe, the liberal. the liberal. toe, the toe, the the toe, the to the to to to the the to the to to to to to to to the to to the to thoing, thoing, to to to to to to to to th... And, th. And, th.. And, th. And, the th.. And, the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the. the the. the the. the. thea. thea. theole. thea. thea. toea. toea. toea. toea. toea. toea. toea. toe. toe. to the amount, back to her face, and so on for several minutes. And the only logical conclusion that you can come to is this is $127,323 from the Liberal Party to the Yang-Kililah bowling club. And it's very a gift, if you will. It's so important here to note that she is not a member of government at that time.

Right. So she has had nothing to do with any of this process whatsoever, that, that, that, to, what, what, to, to, to, to, that, that, to, that, to, that, that, that, that, that, that, to that, to that, that, to come, that, to come, to come, is to come to come to come to come to come to to to that you that you can that you can that you can that you can that you can that you can that you can that you can that you can that you can that you can that you to come to come to to come to come to come to come to come, is to come, is to come, to come, to come, to come, to come, the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the, tho, tho, tho, thoanananan, thoan, to to thoan, to to that to to that to that that that that that time. Right. Yeah. So she has had nothing to do with any of this process whatsoever, but she certainly is letting the Little Party take credit for it. She's letting herself take credit for it. Her response to it was amazing. When question about the appearance, Ms. Downer insisted she not broken any rules and that thethe large novelty-size-check with her name and face on it was clearly not legal tender. Like that was the issue that people were being like, wow, she gave them real money. They'll just take that giant novelty check down to the bank,

get it exchanged for real money. Is it not legal tender? Like how big does the check have to be where it's no longer considered cashable by the bank? I don't know if the size is the issue. I don't think the issue is probably A, that it's not her money to give in any capacity whatsoever. I suppose so. But I mean, also it's probably the main issue really. Even if you drew up a check that was the regular size of a check, I don't think it instantly the the the the the the thly thly thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi th is thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi. thi thi. I thi thi thi thi thi thin. I toe toe toe toe toe toeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee. toe is the thi thi. that's probably the main issue really. Even if you drew up a check that was the regular size of a check, I don't think it instantly functions as a real check. I don't know how checks work. I don't know how checks work.

I'm saying that and I'm not entirely sure. Maybe you can. Hey, this was this was the Facebook post from the Yankerlila bowling club that went along with the photo originally. Great news! Exclamation, exclamation, exclamation, exclamation, exclamation, exclamation, Wow, that's great news. It's all caps as well. Fucking great news! Georgina Downer will be at the Yankilila bowling club on Friday afternoon

5.30 p.m. to make a formal announcement about the success of the grant application to repair the green. A big thank you to Fraser Arndt who put in many hours and Petsch who provided amazing support and Georgina Downer who made her time available to the bowling club and provided support to our project. It should be noted that the person who was the MP at the time and is still the MP because she won the election the election the election the election the election the election the election the election the election the election the election the election the election the election the election the election the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the person who was the MP at the time and is still the MP because she won the election, Rebecca Sharkey, did not get told about any of this, did not get invited to the photo opportunity and saw it all in the news later. So this when she's, so this check, I'm looking the check here now and it does say the words Georgina Downer and it's a bit of glare thi thi thi thi th. th. thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi the the the the the their their their their the the the the their their their their their their their their their their their their their their the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii. Im. Im. I'm tea. Im. I'm tea. Im. I'm tea. I'm thi. I'm thi. I'm thi. Soe. Soe. I'm looking the check here now and it does say the words Georgina Downer and it's a bit of a bit of glare here but I think it says liberal for Mayo.

Right so on that so and then has the liberal party logo yeah but you're saying she's not the member for Mayo and this is sort of more just an aspirational check that she's kind of the secreting with this check through the power of belief that she will get in. It's just that she has chosen a very strange format for celebrating the allocation of money that she has nothing to do with either being awarded or being, I guess, involved in any way, shape or form beyond writing down the big number on a big novelty check that happens, yes, it happens to have a publicity photo of her on

it, and it has her name, and liberal for Mayo, and the, you know, the logo of the political party that she's running for. It's just, it's a nice phrase. It is. Hey, I'm liberal for Mayo whenever I'm making a god damn sandwich. Oh, tell me about it. You ever put Mayo on the outside of a toasted sandwich? Oh, it's so good. I've had to try it. Oh, it's great. You got to do it. You've got to do it. Change your life. Oh, I mean, that's not a bad, that's not a good image, that's, that guess the money was going to them via some sort of like merit basis. Oh, yeah. And I suppose as long as they didn't also do that in hundreds of other communities across

the country. Wow, there's absolutely no way that that's the case. Let me just take a big sip of water and continue reading from this document. Take a big sip of beer and then immediately spill it on your couch. Hey, I haven't spilled a beer on this couch in easily two episodes. So the way this whole thing worked was sports Australia looked at everything. They had like this big hundred point scale divided in different sections, blah, blah, blah. But the important thing is they had a cutoff, right. 74 points of the cut, was was was was th, was th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th. th. th. tho, thi. thi. thi. thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. thi. too. too. too. tooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo. So, tha. So, the important thing is they had a cutoff, right? 74 points was the cutoff. If you got over that, you were considered to have a successful application and it was their recommendation that the thing be given some amount of funding.

Turns out they wasted a whole lot of their time doing that. So according to some documents seen by the ABC, 94 of the 223 projects deemed successful in the first round failed that test so they were under that successful threshold. On top of that, 21 of the 35 projects in nationals held seats given funding in the first round didn't satisfy it so that's 21 out of 35. That is most of them, which is fucking insane. And then some of the seats that did get them, despite their getting absurdly poor recommendations are just insane. There was a football club in La Trobe that got a $500,000 grant despite having an assessment score of 50 out of 100.

Contrast that with a roller derby upgrade in the safe national seat of Gippsland that didn't get a cent, even though it got a 98 out of a hundred rating. The three least worthy applications that received funding were all in coalition held seats. The project that had the lowest score was awarded $500,000 which is the maximum amount you can get. That was for Pac-in and football club to build changing rooms for female footballers and netballers. But it should be noted that the one that did receive the most money for anything, they spent the money on the changerooms because they had already received funding from other sources for the project that they actually submitted a thing for.

Yeah, they got local council, state and federal funding for the same project for the same amount. Pretty cool. So funded three times over and then they went, they had to go back and say, is it okay if we spend the money on something else because we have too much of the money? There was a another place that got the maximum $500,000 grant was for a rugby union club in Adelaide that got $500,000 to build new female change rooms despite the fact that they have not fielded a women's team since 2018 when it was embroiled in a sexism controversy. Hey, we can't get no women here anymore. This was another real like attributing their success directly to the Liberal Party as well, announcing success in securing the grant the club thanks the officers of the then liberal

MP Christopher Byne, the state liberal deputy leader Vicky Chapman, who was also a club sponsor, cool. They confirmed that the last time they feel that a women's team in the state competition was in 2018. According to the club website, it is hoping to quote reinvigorate the women's team ahead of the 2020 season, but it is not yet registered a women's team for the 2020 competition. They're going to be like, look at these change rooms, we got a palace in there. We got crappers like you wouldn't believe. There's not even any of those little holes for the men's to peep through.

There's another great example here. This one's for the Guardian. The State Dame of the Grants Program is to increase community participation. the Guardedree Gully Golf Club, a picturesque course at the foot of the Adelaide Hills. The club's 2018 annual reports as it planned to use the $190,000 to build a new foyer and install an access lift. The upgrades were in part designed to attract more functions, including weddings. And there are like multiple groups like multiple clubs and stuff like that where there's

like private golf clubs that you need to pay membership fees to join that have got money from this thing. Like the idea that it's supposed to improve community participation is very funny. Also, I'm also enjoying the guys that like had to investigate this, right, to see if it's all above board and I'm imagining one of those like detective things with the pins and the like nice velvet string or whatever. What do you reckon that red strings made out of? It's nice, it's heavy. Anyway, but instead of it being like a weird web of like tangled interests, they just take the pin from one point and they drag the string and put

a pin in the local liberal member and then they dust their hands and they walk away from the board. Just a one-step process. That's an early lunch right there. Where do you get that string from? I think it's just like red wool, like yarn. Stream watch. It looks nice, looks soft. Left up on those boards in my house, some newspaper clippings.

What would it be of? Like, what are you making a web of? I don't know. Heart's three plot. Romantic entangleness between DS9 characters. Mm-hmm, that's right. Now, look, you could look at this and you could say, all right, so the stats are a little bit off, but maybe that's just a coincidence, maybe that's just the way things shook out.

There are maybe a few indications that that might not be the case. This is again quoting for the ABC. Ministerial documents obtained by the ABC might help explain why Sport Australia might have been so annoyed. Right from the outset, it is clear the community sport infrastructure grant program was highly politicized with Senator McKenzie's office colour coding the nearly 2,000 grant applications according to the party that held the electorate. Wow.

They've just like got the Excel spreadsheet and been like, is it obvious enough that we're doing like crime here? No, no, let's just make it really clear. It's fucking sensational. Imagine being the journalist that got that. It just being like, oh, I was opening this a red sheet and it's just like blatantly color-coded. Amazing. And like it's just, it's alarming because like, you know, they've obviously tried to brush this all off.

to say it's all fine, but like all these things we've been pointing out, it sort of started off being like, oh, if you look at the numbers, it was sort of disproportionately awarded to marginal seats. Oh, and actually, like we have all these instances of people holding up checks and announcing the funding with a liberal candidate without including the local member before the funding had been announced. And there was the footage of Greg Hunt from a Facebook page for his local group that got the money and the guy who was on the video was like, oh we want to give you know a special thank you to Greg Hunt and he turns to him and goes because I know that you know you got involved and did some work behind the scenes to make sure that we got this money and Greg. You remember all those crimes you did Greg? Yeah he just wouldn'tly nods at the thing and they just

have like example after example of all these people who were just blatantly involved in saying I will get you this money and then they come back to them with the big check and say here is a gift from me to you and it just keep stacking up and then now we're right up to the point of, we literally just got a spreadsheet of all of them and said, seats we want and we'll give the money to. Well, it seems bad, but the color coding, the red is actually like red light, don't go.

And blue, commonly is the color for go. And it just happens to line up with the party divide, but that's only because the people people the people the people the people the people the people the people in the people in the people in the people in the people in the people in the people in the people in the people in the people in the people in the blue the blue the blue the blue the blue the blue the blue the blue in the blue in the blue in the blue in the blue the blue the blue the blue the blue the blue in the blue in the blue in the blue in the blue in the blue. the blue. the blue. the blue. the blue. the blue. the blue. the blue. the blue. the blue. the blue. the color for go. Yes. And it just happens to line up with the party divide, but that's only because the people in the blue seats, they got the good jeans. They got the sporting jeans. You need the clubs. Sure. That's it. Yep.

Sports. So this is the point where Bridget McKenzie starts making excuses. This is where she claims it is actually reverse pork barreling. In a statement she said originally there was something like 26% of those projects were recommended we're heading into Labour Party electorates. The reality is, thanks to my decision making is Minister, 34% of the projects delivered went into Labour Party electorates. But, but...

34% is... That's a little much lower number than like 45%. Well, so I mean, yeah, in terms of like the distribution of seats, it kind of works out close-ish, but not perfectly, but in terms of actual money they gave shit loads more to liberal held seats on average liberal held seats got 40,000 dollars more than labor held seats all up liberal seats got 12.9 million dollars in round one funding which is about 44% compared to labor which got 35 They got shitloads more cash.

Also, what would reverse pork barreling mean? Right? Because you're essentially saying, either way, you're acknowledging that it wasn't based on merit, right? You're saying, no, we just put it deliberately against our interests. Pretty cool one. Because where you go to the club on like a weekend, and you just do like do do do doeys on the the they's ths on ths on ths on thoes thoes thoes on thoes on thoes thoes on thoes on thoes on thoes on thoes on thoes on thoes on thoes on thoes on thoes on thoes on thoes on thoes on thoes on thoes thoes thoes thoes thoes thoes thoes thoes thoes thoes thoes thoes thoes, thoes, thoes, th, ths, ths, ths, ths, ths, thoes, thoes, thoes, thoes, thoes, thoes, thoes, thoes, thoes, thoes, thoa' thoa'a'a'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'a'n'ea'n'a'n'a'a'er. tho'n to the club on like a weekend and you just do like doeys on the yard

or something and say like don't vote for me fuckfaces? The thing that's very funny to me about this is that like it doesn't make any sense because that's not what pork barreling is. No it's trying to buy the votes of an electorate that you want to vote for you. By giving the pork. Yeah, whether that is, you start rolling out the big barrels full of pork and feet, all that kind of thing. I'm just googling, pork barreling. Please continue.

I got 40 liters of ham for you right here. It's a terrible unit. Oh, th th. Oh, don't th. Oh, don't, don't, don't, don't, th. th. th. th. th. th. tho. tho. tho. tho. tho. tho. tho. thoom. thoom. thoom. thoom. tho. tho. thoom. thoom. thoom. tho. tho. tho. tho. tho. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. tho. tho. to. to. toooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo. It. It here. It's a terrible unit. Oh, don't worry, don't worry, it's all pickled so it'll keep. But yeah, like, it's mostly just gel by this point. The, the, the, just the, the sheer, like, confidence of her trying to pass it off as, well, some of the money went to seats that we don't hold. Therefore, it can't be pork barreling, despite that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, the that, that, the th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, the, the, tho, tho, thi, thiol, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, tho, thi's is is is is is thi's is is thi's is is th is th is th is th is th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, thi, thi, thi, is they's thin, is they's thin, thooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooom, tha, tha, the money went to seats that we don't hold. Therefore, it can't be pork barreling, despite the fact that, as we said, the example to tip the whole thing off in the first place was Georgina Downer running in her family's dynasty seat, a marginal seat, held by Rebecca Sharkey, with a big fucking check

with her name on it, saying, hey hey everybody, the Liberal Party is giving you a delightful gift of $127,000 for your local community stuff. Isn't the Liberal Party so generous, the Liberal Party is so nice? It's also worth pointing out that at this stage, there is sort of like in everyone's peripheral vision, just sort of like a bus kind of starting to do the rounds, and everyone's doing like the mental arithmetic bus kind of starting to do the rounds and everyone's doing like the mental arithmetic to work out how to not be the person that is pushed in front of that bus. So I just see this is like a half-hearted kind of like attempt to get away from being

the person that is pushed in front of the bus. Because I assume they don't want to like nail the deputy nationals leader to the wall if they could at all.... the the the the the the the to the the the the the the to the the the the the th all all all all all all all all all all all to the the the thall. I thoe to the the the thoeil. I will will. I will. I'll theal. I'll to to to to to to to to to to to to to to their their their their their their their their their their to to their to their to work. I will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will will.nil the tol.nil.nil. I will. I will. I will. I will. I will. I will. I'll the. I'll theile. I'll theile. I'll the.e.eile.e. I'll just just just. I'll just. I'll just just. I'll just. I'll just just toel. I'll tol. I'll tol. I'll to like nail the deputy nationals leader to the wall if they could at all nail someone else to the wall someone that they don't like so much. Well here's this is where I think the whole thing gets really interesting in that's like what I feel like what we're seeing here is everybody has this expectation of oh they have been caught out blatantly using like a massive community grants program, like a thing that is supposed to be for the benefit of the populace at large. They have been caught out red-handed using that as a political slush fund.

There's no other way to put it. There's no other way to explain it, there's no other way to explain it, they haven't done a particularly good job of explaining it. The defenses have ranged from actually we're giving money to our enemies out of some kind of spite. We're putting money into seats that we really want and don't currently have. So how could that be bad? How can that be pork barreling? The defenses range from that to a lot of versions of technically no rules were broken, which also is kind of not true. I feel like some rules were maybe a little bit broken. Pretty sure some rules are broken. Yeah, that's, the big thing has been saying, well, they were all eligible.

That were eligible to receive the money, but most of them weren't recommended by the body that was meant to make that decision. So eligible here doesn't really mean anything. And as they said, like, they wrote their own version of guidelines that said the minister can do whatever they want. And they said, we followed the guidelines. So, you know, extremely unconvincing attempts to defend this stuff. But. But. But. But th. But th. But th. But th. But th. But th. But th. But th. But th. But th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. the th. th. th. th. th. th. th. thi thi, thi thi the the the th. Most th. Most th. Most th. th. Most th. Most th th their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their they were they they were their their their they their they were their their their their their the, the, the. the. the. they were they were theeeeeeeee. Most thee. Most the. Most the. Most they were they were the. Most, they were they were they were they want. And they said, we followed the guidelines. So, you know, extremely unconvincing attempts to defend this stuff. But I feel like we're in this interesting situation where what everybody is expecting to happen is what has happened in the past, which is a minister has been caught red-handed doing this stuff.

You know, the position is untenable. She clearly needs to resign, but the Liberal Party only have a two-seat majority, the Liberal National Coalition, only has like a two-seat majority. So they are in this position of, as soon as they lose one person, then the pressure is on to examine all of the other blatant corruption, you know, like all of Angus Taylor's cool stuff that he's always doing. Cool guy. Angus Taylor.

All of Angas Taylor's cool crimes that he's always committing. And like the pressure would be on about that, and if they had to have another person step down, then all of a sudden they'd be a minority government and things would be even harder for them to do than they are now. And I feel like if there's one thing that we've learned from, you know, Scott Morrison, from Donald Trump, from Boris Johnson, all of these things, it's that the idea of what normal means, you know, political norms, all the institutions that everybody understood as being normal 20 years ago or whatever, a lot of that is kind of going out the window. You can just do anything now. It doesn't mean anything. No one's, nothing will happen.

Nothing happens. And I've, I think that- People check and then everyone's like, shut the fuck up, nerd, and then you're on to the next thing before you know it. Well I mean the Liberal Party has very clearly made like a habit over the last hell of an years of saying like when something comes up they go what if we just refuse to talk about this for several weeks until the news cycle moves on to something else the end and a lot of the time it works. But what I find interesting about this is, the longer that this goes on, normally what would happen in the old world is that they would say, all right, this is making us look really bad, we're taking hits in the polls,

you've got to fall on your sword. If they had done it quick enough, they could have said, just go to the back the back the back the back the back the back the back the back the back back back the back the back back back the back back the back back back the back back back the back back said just go to the back bench which is also ridiculous in Australian politics that you can say I am resigning to another job like I will I will just go and sit on the back bench and continue to draw a massive salary and be employed in the same political party around I think about all my crimes there's like a great Australian media tradition of like running headlines that are like, you know, what's his name, Minister, forced to resign amidst blast scandal and everyone's like,

holy shit, they're out of office. You're like, no, they just no longer have the portfolio for sucking off coal. Now they go on the backbench and then they spend more time on Sky News. Cool. Yeah, so you don't even really actually lose your job or any of that sort. th. th. th. th. th. th. th.. th. th. th. th. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. th. thi. their. their. their, their, their, their, their, their, their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. their. It. It. It. It. It. It. It. It. It. It's. It's. It's. It's. It's. It's. It's. It's. It's. It's, their. It's, their. It's like. It's like, their. It's like. It's like. It's like. It's like. It's like. It's like. It's like. It's like. their. their. their. It's like. It's like. It's like, so you don't even really actually lose your job or any of that sort of shit. But instead because they've said, hey, if we make her quit, that'll be a whole problem for us. We'll have set a precedent that we will make people quit when they do crimes and we can't be having that, which means that like the media keep looking at this thing and the longer they look at it, the more and more things like th th th. like th. like th. like th. th. th. th. th. th. tod tod. th. tod. tod. tod. th. tod. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. thi thi thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. Because thi. Because thi. Because thi. Because because because because because because thi. Because thi. Because because because because thi. Because thi. Because thi. Because th. Because th. Because th. Because th. Because th. Because th. Because th. Because th. Because th. Because th. Because th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. the. the. the the the the the the they they they they they they they're they they're they're they're they're they're the they're the they're the the the the longer they look at it, the more and more things they're digging up. The more and more things, like, I mean, today was the color coding thing.

More and more examples of how incredibly blatant was. I feel like there were three news stories today. One of them was that Bridget McKenzie's own staffers came to her chief of staff and said, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, the, the, the, their, the, their,, hey, this is going to look really bad. Like it's going to look like criminal activity. And he said, well, the minister said, this is how they want to do it. And we've got to do what the minister says. There was also the report that Sports Australia had already gone to them and said, we strongly advise against doing this because it's bad and wrong and makes us look bad and like we're doing criminal shit and they went, nope, we're very

deliberately choosing to do it this way. And then somebody's leaked the thing about the color coding which has made it even more blatant. There was the Greg Hunt thing, there's been all the different people who keep getting dragged into it. And it's like, where, where is th, th, where th, where th, where th, where th, where is th, where is th, where is th, th, where is th, thi? thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, and, thi, and, and, thi, and, thi, and, and, and, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th. thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi. thi. thi. theeeat, thi. theeat, thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. it and it's like where where is this one going to end I don't think it's going to end in people quitting personally know about this liberal party just kind of bad vibe yeah yeah what like where do they go from here I genuinely don't know because I feel like they've kind of they've like doubled and tripled down on this and Scott Morrison said that he's referring it to his own what what? what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, th, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I don't, I don't, I don't, I don't, I don't th th thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi, I th th thi, I don't th thin, I don't th th thin, I don't th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th thi thi thi thi thi thin thin thin thin thin, I don't thin thin thin thin thin thin thin thin thin thin thin thin thin thin thripled down on this. Scott Morrison said that he's referring it to his own, what, his own chief of staff?

Yeah, the secretary of the office of prime minister and cabinet. I'm sure it'll all be fixed up then. Yeah, which is, it's not like a legal investigation, that's like checking for a breach of ministerial standards. And those are the same same same same same same same same same same same same same same same same same same same same same same same the same the same the same the same the same the same the same the same they they they they they they they they they they they they they th. they th. th. th. they th. th. thi. they're thi. th. th. I th. I th. I th. I th. I th. I th. I th. I th. I th. I th. I they they they they they th. I they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they're they're they're they're they're they're they're they're they're th. th. th. the. the. the. thean. thean. thean. thean. thean. thean. thean. thean. thean. the. I the. I they're ial standards. And those are the same ministerial standards that have things like, you can't fuck someone you work with. So the real important stuff. Yep. But if we recall.

Just imagining Barnaby Joyce doing the home as Simpson. They have that rule because of me. Yeah, I just, I don't know where it goes because like, yeah, she's been caught out so blatantly, very obviously violating, you know, the code of conduct and all that kind of stuff. And I've, like, have they left it too long to say, oh, we're gonna do a reshuffle of cabinet and move her somewhere else. Because all of this is happening, she's not even in the sports portfolio anymore. It's not like they can do the, oh we're going to have a cabinet reshuffle and put you into

something else because she's not even in that. So what do they do with her beyond saying, oh you can resign to the back bench? But how long does this go go go go go go go go go go go go go. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. they, th. they, they's th. they's th. th. th. th. th. th. thi. they're the. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. they. they. they, they. they, they, they, they they they they they they they they they they they're they're they're they're they're they're the. they're they'll they're they're they'll they're they're they're they're thee. I. I. they're they're the. the. to the back bench. But how long does this go on before the public is just like, come on, man? I feel like they've definitely done the thing where they've said, I'm confident that there's been no wrongdoing too many times, that they'll look dumb, if they actually do something about it. If they go, oh, by the way, there was clearly a lot of wronging wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong the way, there was clearly a lot of wrongdoing there. Oh, you hate to do wrong. And sometimes you just want everyone to do right. Do the right thing, you know?

And what's the right thing, but brainwashing your children with nationalist propaganda. Yeah. So this was from this week, this was a thing that kind of, you know when you see a little bit in the news and your brain immediately starts to heat up as though you are boiling a cabbage in a big pot. Yep. Brain's going into Bitcoin mode. Yes. I read this and my brain immediately started overclocking. And then I clipped through the office floor. So on Saturday, Tanya Plibersek shared an article from the Daily Mail with the headline,

Labor MP Tanya Plybysk calls for all Aussie school children to pledge allegiance to the country, democracy, and the rule of law. She captioned her tweet, yes I do. Fucking dickhead. Cool, that's fucking dope, dude. Awesome. Remember as kids you'd like, just make stuff up and you'd like write it down on a piece of paper and then you'd recite it back to yourself and then agree with it. And she's just doing this in public. Hey, here's a pledge I just to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to the to to to the the to to the to the to to the to to to to to the to the the their their the their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their twee twea. twea. twea. twea. twea. twea. twea. twea. twea. twea. twea. twea. twea. twea. twea. twea. twea then agree with it. And she's just doing this in public.

Hey, here's a pledge I just made that I agree with. Our teacher is the best. And I should get 15 lollies tomorrow. Yes, I do. My God. So, you know, the, the angle that she's taking is that this horrible summer of bushfire season and all of our great, cool, mad, Max Fury Road style weather events has shown Australia like it its most generous. She says, without pause or hesitation people have accepted their duty

to each other as citizens, as neighbors, as fellow human beings, she says. This has been patriotism at its practical best. Patriotism as the thread connecting us all as Australians. Not sure that's what patriotism is. But okay. So she's going to give a speech calling for all school students to be taught the Australian citizenship pledge, which states, Lucy, do you want to do taught the Australian Citizenship Pledge, which states, Lucy, do you want to do the pledge for us?

Do you the twaddiest voice? Do it for the national? From this time, give us to us from this time forward. I have to whip it up so I can read it. Ah. Geez, a loo. I don't like it. I can tell you that. I tha I the thea thea thea thea thea thea thea thea thea thea to thea thea to the thea to to to the to to the to to to to to to to to to the the to the the to the the to to to the the to to to to to to to to to to to the pledge the pledge to the pledge the pledge the pledge to the pledge the pledge to to the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the th. th. th. th. the. the. the. theat. to. teat. te. te. te. te. too. too. too. toe. toe. toe. toe. toe. toe. it. I can tell you that. I did not enjoy seeing the tweet and I don't enjoy having to think about it. Well, while we wait. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Oh shit. Got it down with a sickness. That would have been so much sicker.

Do I have to read this? Yep. Yeah, imagine that you're standing up in front of the class. All right, I'm standing up front of the Assembly because I'm me when I was eight years old. I'm like the, I'm like a little Hillary Clinton. She will soon be bullied out of me. Ms. Plibersek is standing there mouting the words of you while you're doing it. Mm-hmm. From this time forward, I pledged my loyalty to Australia and its people, whose democratic beliefs I share, whose rights and liberties I respect, and whose laws I will uphold and obey. Oh no, now it's the bad dream where you're farting in front of the school assembly.

Maybe while you're reading it out, maybe you could like imagine there's an Australian flag on the wall and kind of just raise your arm towards it to kind of point to it as if you're agreeing with it. Just sort of powerful kind of gesture. Extend your right arm out from your shoulder, palm flat facing the floor and they just lifted up like a good I don't know 30 35 degrees. Imagine you're blocking out the summer sun with your entire hand and it's just going out towards the flag because you love Australia as you pledge your loyalty. It's just loyalty pledge.

So she says she's rejected the argument that patriotism is about exclusion and defining the boundary of who doesn't does not count as an Australian. She says quote patriotism like mateship is about solidarity. God it's so patroni I've never heard that word maidship apart from in the context of a political party. Yeah just just jingoistic nationalist bullshit. Patriotism is the knowledge that we're not alone in this life. Is it? Is it though?

That our neighbors are there to share our struggles, that we have 25 million people in our corner when we need it. I've seen a fair. Our neighbors are not here to share our struggles. They cause our struggles. They're here to spray us in the dick with a hoa- They're dodgy electricians. They're dodgy plumbers. Oh, to love your country is not to assume it's better than others.

Patriots don't need to feel superior to feel proud. It's so weird. I just, that's just not, it's not what I've seen from Patriots. It's the softest like hand-ringing bullshit to be like, yeah, we should all be Patriots because of bloody, we wear the flag capes as well, but that doesn't mean necessarily we think our country is superior to others. Patriotism means friendship. I keep thinking of there is a line in the Simpsons where Principal Skinner is getting railed by everybody about something for like, you know, saying that girls are better at math or boys are better at something, you know, and everybody's getting mad for Adam and everything he tries to say, he's getting rinsed. And I just, I keep thinking of this line, he says, which is,

all I know is that everybody's better than everybody else. Oh no, I'll flub it. All I, all I know is that no one's better than anybody else and everyone's the best at everything. And this is what like 2020 Labour Party is to me. Yeah, that's right. It's the most pathetic hand-ringing, soft, trying to please everybody bullshit, and this recalibration that they're doing to, somehow we're going to be like more racist and more right wing than the liberal party. I was going to say, I feel like this is so tone deaf and that it's not even just like, you know,

garbage-centrism that the Labour Party normally is. It's like blatant right-wing appeal. It's just so so transparent. Like, I mean, I know that that's stupid to even say. But the other thing we were just talking about before we started recording was Christina Kinelli, who has had this thing going lately of trying to draw attention to how many asylum seekers arrive in Australia by plane. And she's like, she keeps trying to call them airplane people, which to anybody, any like progressive person in Australia should just send a fucking

chill down your spine. Because the thing, like the thing that has absolutely destroyed any ability to have like discourse about like asylum seeker or refugee policy in this country, is the term boat people, is how deliberately we turn this thing into like, you know, the mode of transportation by which you arrived deems you to not be a human anymore. But I think they also think that they actually have something like the liberal party on the hook for this, right? As if, yeah, like they're gonna be like, oh, yeah, but you don't care about airplane people.

As if the liberal party I'm gonna turn around and just go, shut the fuck up, nerds up, like, you want to try and out out out we'll invent new ways of being racist. Just... Well, it's that or Peter Dunton turns around and says, great point. You should increase my powers to stop and frisk everybody on the plane before they get off and come in the country. And if it turns out that they're trying to seek asylum, we'll just shackle them right there and then and turn the fucking the plane tha tha tha tha tha tha tha tha tha tha tha tha tha th and then and turn the fucking plane around. And it's like we've asked like 400 times on this show in the last 18 months or so,

whenever the labor does anything, whenever they put out any messaging, it's like, who is this for? This is for nobody. This is angering everybody. And she tries to kind of temper it with like, right the very end of the notes here we've got this quote from her says, you can be a progressive and love your country. I certainly do. And everyone is just going like, boo, shut up. Everyone is groaning at her shit.

It's just like, you know, hire more women prison guards bullshit. It's like, it's for nobody. It's for nobody at all. Like, the problem is that if she believed the shit that she was saying, the end of this paragraph, right? To love your country is not to assume that it's perfect. Patriotism is not above self-reflection and self-improvement. You can be proud of your citizenship and dedicated to progress.

You can cherish this nation and want to make it better. You can be a progressive and love your country. I certainly do. You can think all of these things and not think that you need to make people blindly parrot an oath of loyalty to the concept of a fucking country as a child. Like if the, I mean, we already saw how even the liberal party supporters reacted to like Tim Wilson when he was trying to do his weird like fucking the flag thing. Oh God, it was so fucking creepy.

You know, he was trying to do like a weird saluting the flag thing on Remembrance Day with having his hand over his heart and shit. You can see this classic photo, all these people like in a loose sort of crowd around him and every one of them is looking at him like you would look at, you know, the person on a crowded train who is pissing into a seven-up bottle. Like everyone's, no one wants to get involved, but they're all like, I don't know why this is happening. Yeah, it's like, who is this for? I feel like, for all of our horrible bullshit, this is one thing that Australians as a whole do not support from both sides of the political spectrum.

Like, we don't like this stuff. And yeah, but also, once again, like Theyos said, who's this for? Because the most die-hard, flag-fucking, love it or leave it, you know... They're never going to vote for you. Yeah, none of those people were ever going to vote for the Labour Party. So this idea of we're going to push ourselves further to the right to eat into the Liberal Party's votes because we, I don't know, we think that we are guaranteed all of the votes that are like center and anything to the left of center? Like, do they think that they're going to hold that left flank by just trying to out-nazi

the liberals? I don't fucking understand it all. It cooks my brain. And like we said, if there's one thing that no Australians seem interested in at all, it is importing this extremely right wing, weird patriotism, flag respecting, you know, kiss the troops kind of shit. A thing that I find really genuinely disturbing when I see it is every time that there is a viral news story from the states, you've seen those ones where it's like, hey, this little

boy was coming up the walk to this house and he saw a flag flying off the front of the house so he just dropped his bike and stood there and robotically recited the Pledge of Allegiance in an empty front yard. He saluted the flag and he cried. Yeah, the footage was captured on the fucking front door cam that everybody has to make sure that nobody's stealing the packages that they have delivered because they'd rather use like wage slave shit than go out to a store and interact with somebody. But like like like th th th th th th th th th th th th th like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like th th th the like the like the like their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their wage slave shit than go out to a store and interact with somebody. But like, when those things are cast, is like, oh, isn't it great to see somebody showing respect

to their country? It's like, kids fucking eight. Why should he have any concept of the idea of, you know, his country being important or superior to other ones? or the fact that when he sees a flag he must stand th th th th thand thand thand thand thand thand thand thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi, thi, thi, thi because thi because thi, thi because thi, thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thiiiiiiiiiii thiiiiii thi. thi thi. they'd they'd they'd superior to other ones or the fact that when he sees a flag he must stand with his hand over his heart and just loudly recite his loyalty oath. It's very America-centric and they have a brain disease here and we can forgive them for that because their brains don't work properly

but I would like to think that we're above that. If you you see a flag taken up by wind and then it kind of just flies over and lands on high voltage power lines, as an American, it is your job and your duty to climb those power lines and get that flag down. Like does anyone see those bits of footage of like when somebody's eating and it chilies and the national anthem starts playing over the loudspeakers and everybody just stands up and puts their hand over their art it's fucking psychotic. They love that shit. And especially with like kids like who is that for? Like if you're forcing like an eight-year-old to recite a Pledge of Allegiance, it doesn't mean anything to them. They don't know anything about it. It's some weird perverse joy that you as an adult making them doing

But making them do it again like it's such a fucking weird empty Gestature. It's so fucking perverse just let kids fucking not care about this shit because they fucking Have to well, I mean more like I don't know any other way to take it beyond hey it's very important when people are extremely young to drill some idea into them that they owe something they owe some type of loyalty. I think so the country that they live in. So we're going to drill this thing into your head so that you think that you need to do military service, or you think that you need to never question a police officer

when they're strip searching your eight-year-old kid, or any of these fucking things, and like, you know, all I'll say is I'm very glad that the Australian party that traditionally is there to represent workers in the working class is getting some really good priorities out there. Like making sure that if you come here asking for help, that we will also hit you on the head with a trunch and whether you arrive by a plane or a boat, and also making sure that your kids are little nationalist zombies. Fucking great stuff. It's good to me that we kids are little nationalist zombies. Fucking great stuff.

It's good to me that we will have a liberal government for the foreseeable future. Forever, yep. Forever. But hey, Bernie Sanders, it's looking good. It's true. Um, we had, we had something else. Something else happened this week, which is, uh... Something else, there's already too much.

We had an Australia day. I'm doing inverted commas around it. Mm-hmm. Because we all know what it really is, invasion day, right? I think we can all agree on that one. We can all agree on that. I think overwhelmingly Australia is starting to agree on that one that that that that. I think overwhelmingly Australia's starting to agree on that one and that's quite nice. Hmm. Well, you'd say that in your little left-wing bubble, wouldn't you? In my little bubble, that's right. Hey, but the important thing is that Labor Leader Anthony Albanese got out there and he put forward a strong position which was, hey, we should all just keep Australia Day on the 26th,

but also just try to be nicer to indigenous people about it. Once again, once again proving that he is the master of making all sides of the political spectrum happy simultaneously. It's just pragmatism to rival Lenin, you know, it's incredible. Yep, and if like when they post shit like that their social media media, and their thirty, and th, and th, and th, and th, and th, and th, and th, and th, and th, and th, and their, and their, and their, and their, and their, and their, and their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their their their their their their their their th. 26, th. th. th. th. th. th. th. their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, to rival Lenin you know it's incredible. Yep and if like when when they post shit like that to their social media you look at the replies and there's just these right-wing people going, oh more woke bullshit to appeal to the greenies and it's like these people think that you saying let's keep Australia Day on the day you want it to be on. It's like bullshit. Why are you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you th th th th th th th th th th thi thi th thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th thi thi thi thi thi thi to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to thi to thi thi thi thi thi thi thi the day you want it to be on. Is it work bullshit? It's work bullshit. Why you trying to appeal to them?

It's not working. But anyway, as part of, quote unquote, Australia Day, they also do the Australia Day honors, which is an honor system where they have like the Australian of the year, they have a few different grades, they give people the order of Australia, which is the, I believe the third highest, third highest like civic rank, that's true, and what are the other two? Best friend of Australia, correct, yep, and kissing partner of Australia. Wife of the country. Wife of the country. But a person who received the order of Australia this week I'm really I'm really still struggling with this one.

Yeah. I'm feeling mad. I'm feeling angry. It's putting it out before it. That well known, that well known, I'm really still struggling with'm feeling angry. It's putting it out before you go ahead. That well-known sex therapist since the 1970s and social commentator and advocate for men's issues. And we're not talking about back issues of men's health, you know? Mm. Not talking about prostate cancer, folks. That's right. No. We've been having a too having a too damn good. Women, these women, they're always making up sexual assaults

and trapping men with pregnancies probably. We are of course talking about, Bettina Aunt. Can I hear that name one more time? Betteina aren't. You know that a, the screenshot that's from like a... I can't remember what console it is, but it's, but it's, but it's, but it's, but it's, the, the, the, the, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, that, that, th, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, they's, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, th, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, toke, toke, toke, toke, toke, toke, toke, toke, toke, toke, thi, thi, thi, that a screenshot that's from like a, I can't remember what console it is, but it's like a fucking retro game that's an American baseball thing

and it's got all these names in them? They're meant to be like, a Japanese game and it's like fake American names. Yeah, it's exactly what sounds like. But it's almost there. It's got like it's almost and it's almost there. It's got the right letters but it's just not quite right. So hey some of the some of the items on her CV in the Governor General's website when talking about the great reasons to give her this honor. Some of her services include online dating

coach 2001 to 2017. Mm-hmm. Uh-huh. That's what I would put on my resume if I was unemployed. Just sitting next to like some guy. No, put the camera up higher and point it down towards yourself before you make your RSVP.com profile picture. Also contributor to Jordan Peterson's Think Spot since 2019. It's a spot for thinking. And campus tour since 2018. They don't really go into a lot of info about it but my

understanding is that the campus tours are where she goes to campuses and says the cancel culture and women making up sexual assaults and rapes at universities is out of control. It was the latter of those two. This tour was specifically the one that she's still doing is the campus rape is fake one. That's her thing at the moment now she has a book called hashtag men to mmm you see she's put the letter n into me to

transforming it to be about men uh... this makes me very angry You're going to get angrier. But also the other books, all the other books that she wrote in like the 80s are like, Love making tips for men. Love making tips for women. And then after she released those two, she released another book just called, like, love making. She's like, you know what, I'm done with the gender segregation. Here's a comprehensive volume. Get this one. th one. th one. th o one. th o tho, tho, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, thi. thi. thi. thi. thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. th. Get this one.

Yeah, it's very not good. So, this is pretty upsetting. Content warning on some of this, if you would not like to hear about, convicted pedophiles, I guess. So, this is the kind of like men's rights advocacy that she does. In 2018, she interviewed convicted pedophile, Nicholas Bester, and posted it online with the title, Feminists Persecute Disgraced Teacher. Oh, I mean, that total by itself is perfectly accurate. Yes.

What? Every word of that is true. Once again, I am persecuted simply for my crimes. The former Tasmanian teacher was jailed in 2011 for grooming and repeatedly raping a 15-year-old student. He was jailed again in 2016 for producing child exploitation material after boasting online that his crimes were quote awesome. That's not it. That is not it. So basically she she did this like long-ranging, very uncritical, friendly interview with this guy,

um, in which he went on to say hey hey these girls you know they just can't leave me alone and she was like yes women do the to be like that. so he wrote online the majority of men in Australia envy me. I was 59, she was 15 going on 25. It was awesome. I feel like that number is pretty closer to 15 going on 16. Yeah, that seems more accurate.

So in this interview, she said, over the years I've talked to many male teachers about sexually provocative behavior from female students. Sensible teachers of course run a mile from these girls but the teachers are really still vulnerable because they can easily be subject of false accusations if they reject or offend the young woman in question. Well you know how it is to be a teacher. You either have to have sex with the 15-year-old against your will, or be falsely accused of having sex with the 15-year-old if you refuse to have sex with the 15-year-old.

She then added that young women needed to quote behave sensibly and not exploit their seductive power to ruin the lives of men. Oh my god this is so disgusting. It's so mad that anyone has acknowledged her as a human being because she is a disgusting piece of shit. Yep. Absolutely piece of shit. In response to Bester's comments that his crime was awesome aren't laughed and said it was pretty stupid but that quote I can imagine how easily this happens. So basically just big time rape apologist big time pedophile offender. Number one on the non squad.

Probably cried when Jeffrey Epstein died, but Tina aren't. And of course, if you would like an example of the massive brain thinking that she is capable of, here's, this is Theo's favorite. Here is a tweet that she posed. And this is after Unicode announced the new emogees. And one of the, one of the emoges on it was the hand held up with thumb and forefinger, measuring it small distance.

No more than one or two inches between them. It's just a little bit. You know, yes, the international symbol for a little bit, a little bit, please. The international symbol for someone saying. How much pepper would you like on there? Do you want a second piece of cake? Just a little one, just a sliver.

How much more can I reverse the car in? Just this little bit more more thp? thp thp th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. thi. thi. tho th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. It. th. It. th. It. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. the. to, to to, to the to to to thee. the the. the. the. the thooooo. the the. the car in? Just this little bit, just this little bit more. It's a small distance. But if you are, Bettina Ars, you look at this and think to yourself, this is probably a woman asking a man, hey, how much pathetic penis do you have to put inside me? And then the man has to hold up. Just a little. I'm sorry, it's just a little. She has posted on Twitter, imagine how feminists would react if new emoges included a symbol of a roomy vagina to signal sneering at women with a emoji of what she could only assume is the tiny dick emoji. What would it look like? I'm just trying to picture like a guy taunting me with like a just like a large circle he's making with his like his fingers. Imagine imagine you're on Twitter and you've just received like the 15th unsolicited nude photo from a woman for the day.

You're just sick of it. You're sick of this treatment. You're thinking about closing your DMs because this happens all the time. Yep. But Unicode, they've got you covered and they've got the roomy vagina emoji for you to just bounce back and just shut the conversation down. That's right. They're constantly taughting me with their big pussies. How do you become like this woman? I mean, how do you get to that age and still be like, he's gonna pick me, you know? It's not gonna pick you, sweetie? It's absolutely inexplicable. And of course, we've also just had some stuff pop up in pretty much today. The, I think, a new Matilda, independent outlet, new Matilda has done a long-running investigation and said, despite being passed off by the

Australian media as a psychologist and clinical psychologist, more recently doctor aunt in the Australian newspaper and in federal parliament, it turns out that she is not a doctor, has never obtained a PhD and nor, as it turns out, is she a psychologist or clinical psychologist. So that she's just a big fucking idiot. But you know, I don't know how people do it. Confident scy, I think. Run in a great scam with nothing in her brain. Just believe in yourself, you fake it that's living proof. Like Georgina Downer, she's th, she's th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thus thus thus thus, thus thus, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi. So, thi. So, thi. So, thi's thi's thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi's thi's thi's thi's thi's thin, thiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii. So, thi. So, thi Downer, she's doing the secret.

It's speaking of faking it, can I read just a couple of my favorite of those Japanese baseball names? Please do. They start out coming out the gate strong with sleeve McDicle. I love them so much. Onsen swimming. Good. Ray Mc Swimmy. Good. Ray McSriff. Rawl Chamgalane. Mike Truck. Oh very good.

Mike Truck is my favorite. I reckon, but my favorite, I think just a simple one one right at the very end Todd Bonzales They're all just so close they're just you know like all a letter or two away for being perfectly fine today today today bonzales it's a me tooday bonzales. Wonderful, well it's good to end on a slightly lighter note because I think it's safe to say that this this appointment has single-handedly ruined the honors system in Australia. Sure has. I remember when we gave Prince Philip the knighthood? And then everyone changed their Twitter name to

Sir Knight for like two years. That's why we can dame Sir Bogdad on Twitter. Sir Mr. Nightington. It's a cool system. Hmm. I just hear. I don't get it. I don't. Welcome to the Grift Universe. You can fucking do anything you want. Actions don't have consequences unless that action is you grifting and the consequences you get shitloads of money. Words don't have meaning. There's no justice to the universe. It's 2020 baby. That's it. That's the future that we live in now. We live in the grift future. Well in Bettina Arts defense, she says that the media were largely to blame for the future that we live in now. We live in the grift future. Well, in Bettina Art's defense, she said that the media were largely to blame for the widespread misidentification. They should do their homework. My CV has been up on my website for years and years and

years, Ms. Aunt said. I don't call myself a psychologist. I say I trained as a clinical psychologist. Oh. Uh-huh. That's cool. I went to law school school the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media media the media the media the media the media the media the media the media me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me the m. the m. the m. the m. the m. the m. the m. the m. the m. I the m. I the m. I the m. the m. the m. the m. the m. the mc. the m. the the the th. the the th. the the the the media. the media. the media. the m. the m. a clinical psychologist. Uh-huh. That's cool. I went to law school for like a semester too. You know you trained as a lawyer. That's right. And then she goes on to say, you can't start every interview by correcting your host. I feel like you could start like one or two of them that way. You could just do it once which ones. See how it's out. Like, she says, you can't start every interview by correcting your host. I mean, I do sometimes.

I have done many times, many times. But I've done, I don't know, how many thousands of interviews in my life. When you have a two-minute television interview and I have an important message to say, I'm not going to spend the first first first first first first first first first first the first the first the first the first the first the first the first the first the first the first minute going through my qualifications am I? I feel like if you did it like 20 times in a row, people would stop calling you that? It's almost like it's good for her somehow. But then you only have a minute 50 to say how the broads have it too good. Hmm. That's true. So, um, terrible, terrible shit. There's really no one that anyone can complain about, complain to about this or anything. So we just thought we would share it with you because...

Well, we're complaining to you, the audience. Yes, yes. If you could do something about it, that would be great. Yeah, if you currently have your hands on the levers of control, if you are in possession of, of like the mechanism to make change, when you do something about it. But if you are, why are you listening to this podcast? Yeah, get up your eyes and do something, please. Go to some activism. God damn. Well that's all of our activism done for the week. We can pop ourselves out of this tankle, pruned and shriveled. Thank God. Thank God. thi thi. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well. Well, th. Well, th. Well, th. Well, th. Well, th. Well, th. Well, th, thi. Well, th, thi, the, th, thi, thi, you, thi, thi, thi, the, when you you, when you you, when you you, when you, when you, when you, th you, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, to, to, to, to, to, to, th, to, to, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi thi thi thi thi thi then- woan thi thi thi thi thi thi thi woan thi wo-n-n't you thi, We can pop ourselves out of this tankle, pruned and trivled. Finally. So salty, I'm licking Theo's back, he does not like it at all. I'm so calm. I've just been such a relaxing experience.

Oh good God. I've had so much time to spend alone with my regrets. As always, if you would like to send us in a letter or a correspondence or some such, you can send that into mailbag at Buntavista.com. And if you would like to get an extra bonus episode every single week shot right into your dirty, waxy earholes, you can head on over to Patreon.com slash Buonvista. And that is it for us for the week. Thank you very much for joining us. And from all of us, especially Ben, especially Ben,

tearned. Goodby. Why am I saying goodbye more than anyone else? You know what? Ben saying it twice as loudthan anyone else. Especially then. You know what. Been saying it twice as loud as everyone else. There's nothing untoward going on. It's just a normal goodbye.

Bye. Goodbye. the