[Kharon]

That’s a Choc Frog.

Good article from Burton.  At least one Mandarin is worthy of the name.  

This may seem administrative trivia in the scheme of things, but it is symptomatic of a culture and mindset that pervades the middle band of the bureaucracy. Caught between a highly risk-averse senior executive group and a phalanx of processes, systems and faux reporting, this middle group are not trusted enough to get on with their work. This is exactly what Louise Hand’s video identified.

After the 2013 National Commission of Audit noted how weak the Commonwealth’s reporting and accountability system is, the Department of Finance has done a lot of work to rejig the public reporting system. But in several months we will yet again see truckloads of printed annual reports littered around Parliament House. The waste of tax money producing glossy print reports for 900 agencies is symptomatic of a system moving snail-like into the digital world. At a time where we have the capacity to deliver real-time metrics across government through agency websites, endless hours are devoted to self-promoting reports that are read by virtually no one.

This system design issue is a central agency challenge and with some rare exceptions, I am simply not seeing the sort of deep policy thinking needed to both challenge and drive the fundamental change the system needs, if it is to be effective and relevant in this next era

If the cap fits.....

Not that any of this could possibly apply to our ‘regulator’; Oh no.  We have three perfect examples of how a ‘department’ should be run.   ASA perfection in airspace management; ATSB the envy of the worlds accident investigate bodies and last, but not least our very own CASA; leading the charge toward – where was it again? I forget…

Toot toot.

[Peetwo]

Fat cat bureaucrats plundering the trough -

A couple of references:

Enough of the Hollowmen & AIOS - FDS!

In the latest Ferryman Sunday ramble sums up the aviation safety bureaucracy 'paradox': 

Kharon - Irresistible force paradox.

"Wiki – “The paradox arises because it rests on two incompatible premises: that there can exist simultaneously such things as irresistible forces and immovable objects. The "paradox" is flawed because if there exists an irresistible force, it follows logically that there cannot be any such thing as an immovable object and vice versa”.

Despite the paradox – we need to move an immovable object. Difficult task; but, move it we must.

Personally I think this could be applied across a much wider spectrum of the Federal bureaucracy and is systematic of more than a decade of successive poor governance and direction at an executive government level,  Sandy dubs it the 'Canberra disease' and Ventus reckons it is a syndrome i.e. "acquired institutionalised ostrichitis syndrome" (AIOS).




 

+

Alexander 1 hour ago

By their silence Qantas, Virgin, Jetstar and Tiger have maintained their three wise monkeys stance (hear no, see no, speak no evil) so as not to offend their master CASA. Much easier to jack up the airfares to pay for the irrational, erratic and costly procedures of an all powerful but dysfunctional bureaucracy than to take a principled stand. Small aviation businesses have been taxed and ground down with unworkable rules so much so that foreign pilots are now hired on the 457 working visa list. John C points to one of the symptoms of bureaucracy, the aversion to egg on face. Very good reasons for this aversion, huge salaries and amazing working conditions. Not to mention that in the scramble by Ministers to distance themselves from responsibility governments of both stripes have created numerous independent statutory bodies like CASA.

What we've been slow to perceive is that they are not public servants at all (not subject to the Public Governance and Service Act), but a new breed of self serving bodies whose main preoccupation is to cover their failings and protect their Minister while indulging on the public purse. Alex in the Rises.

&.. from CASA meets the Press, Thorny quotes a Lead Balloon (aka creampuff) pearler from off the UP... :

Straight out of the Bureaucrat's Big Book of Looking Busy. Chapter 3 of that book, which Chapter is headed Responding to Reports by Looking Busy, is very instructive (reproduced with permission of the copyright holder): 

As we saw in Chapter 2, there are many "look busy" activities that can be undertaken at a bureaucracy's own initiative - conducting "reviews" and "restructuring" and gathering "data" etc. However, external matters may occasionally produce findings and recommendations that may be inconveniently valid and may require "work" to address. We have used the provocative word "work" deliberately, to focus Busy Bureaucrats on the point that although these circumstances create a threat, they also create an opportunity.

The Busy Bureaucrat will be left with a choice on how best to look busy: Reject and cast doubt on the credibility of the report's author/s, findings, data set, sample group, methodology etc, or accept the finding/s recommendation/s in whole or part and "commit to action". The first option is ostensibly attractive because it does not involve work. However, the second option has not only the advantage of making a Busy Bureaucrat look busier when s/he is not (Rule 2 from Chapter 1), but also provides scope for increasing the size of the bureaucracy (Rule 1 from Chapter 1).

The key to taking the opportunity created by this threat, and thereby to look busier and increase the size of the bureacracy, is to commit to impressive action that includes the creation of positions that have the name of the action that the bureaucracy will pretend to take. Examples of those actions follow. We have added efficiency scores, out of 100, that are usually achieved against the "Bigger Bureaucracy", "Look Busy" and "Delay Tactic" criteria discussed in Chapter 1:

- Create new positions that have names like "Stakeholder Engagement Group Manager" and "Industry Relations Officer" - BB: 100; LB 30; DT 100 [Editor's comment: This "action" is often undervalued as a DT. However, the appointees to these positions will always need many months to settle in and get across the facts and the options.]

- Establish a "Stakeholder Engagement Group" that pretends to provide "dedicated stakeholder engagement functions" BB: 10; LB:70; DT:60 [Editor's comment: meetings are always a good 'look busy' tactic but stakeholder groups generally include stakeholders who eventually realise it's just a 'look busy' tactic.]

- Establish an "Advisory Panel" to provide "informed, high-level advice" to be considered and rejected if inconvenient - BB:10; LB:20; DT:100 [Editor's comment: Low BB if, as is usually the case, the panel comprises 'outsiders'. However, solid DT gold.]

- Pretend that "a culture change process is underway to drive continuous improvement and strengthen commitment to consistently meeting service delivery timeframes" - BB:0; LB:40; DT:70 [Editor's comment: A brave option to take, because almost nobody thinks anything but "BS" when they hear "culture change" and "continuous improvement" these days.]

- Develop a new "Service Charter" and pretend that it means something - BB:0; LB: 40; DT: 50 [Editor's comment: A DT to be used as a last resort. Nobody believes this BS any more.]

- Undertake additional research to develop a greater understanding of the issues - BB:20; LB0; DT: 60 [Editor's comment: A good LB option, but its DT value depends on whether the issues are already obvious to even a moron.]

- Revise and Update "key manuals" to ensure there is "standardised, current information on rules, processes and how assessments are undertaken", so these can be used as "evidence" to "prove" that everything is "OK" - BB:10; LB:100; DT 75. [Editor's comment: A potentially rich source of busy work and delay.]

  
Next reference off the AOPA thread goes to the working art of spin & obfuscation of a Machiavellian Mandarin in the construct of the latest version of our Annex 19 SSP...

Speaking of weasel words, I wonder if anyone has taken the time to read the latest edition of Murky Mandarin's bollocks SSP (see HERE)? You know the one that was released with little to no fanfare on the day of the Tamworth rally and three days before Malcolm called the  ridiculous two month election campaign.

Contradiction examples from the SSP.

Eg.1 This is Murky's policy statement which supposedly, among other things, is meant to address government aviation policy:

Australia's State Safety Policy Statement

Australia's aviation safety system plays a vital role in ensuring that Australia has a safe, efficient and competitive aviation industry. Australia will continue to seek closer alignment with International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) Standards and Recommended Practices and adopt international best practices in its aviation safety system.

The Australian Government has endorsed the following safety principles that underpin the future aviation safety system:

1. Safety is the primary consideration of Australia's aviation agencies and industry in the performance of their functions;
   
2. The highest safety priority should be afforded to passenger transport operations;
   
3. Australia's regulatory approach and responses are based on a sound assessment of the level of risk associated with particular aviation operations;
   
4. Aviation agencies and industry work closely together to identify aviation safety risks and ensure that the most appropriate methods, practices and technologies are adopted to address and reduce these risks;
   
5. A strong 'just culture' approach underpins information sharing between industry and safety agencies as information sharing assists in preventing future safety events and reflects international best practice;
   
6. Recognition that Australia's safety regulatory system plays an important role in ensuring that Australia has a safe, efficient and competitive aviation industry;
   
7. Australia's aviation regulatory procedures, processes and approach to regulation is fair, transparent and promotes nationally consistent operations;
   
8. Active and ongoing engagement by industry and safety agencies will help inform future regulatory priorities and the development of simpler regulations, standards and orders;
   
9. The safety performance of our aviation safety system will be continuously monitored and measured through the Stat's aggregate safety performance indicators as well as service provider's safety performance indicators; and
   
10. Sufficient financial and human resources for safety management and oversight will be allocated; and staff will be equipped with the proper skills and expertise to discharge their safety oversight and management responsibilities competently.
    

Mike Mrdak
Secretary, Department of Infrastructure and Regional Development
6 May 2016

 
In light of the Mildura Fog duck-up; the ongoing investigation of the broken tail VARA ATR (3 years and counting); and the recent release (after 3 years) of a shambolic investigation into a pushback accident between two RPT jets; I would suggest that the Department and it's responsible agencies are already in direct contravention of No.2 :

"...The highest safety priority should be afforded to passenger transport operations..."    

..etc.

 
Which brings me to the purpose of posting on the Mandarin thread...

With all of the above in mind, today there was a fascinating and somewhat disturbing Oz article on the top Mandarins & their minions high % increases in salary and the question on whether taxpayers are getting value for money...

Bureaucrats eye $1m pay despite flat wage growth

Martin Parkinson, who heads the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, earns $861,700. Picture: Jono Searle
 
 
[/url][url=http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/bureaucrats-eye-1m-pay-despite-flat-wage-growth/news-story/50d3277374ff0ab27be9dfec457f62fa#]

• David Uren
  
• The Australian
  
• 12:00AM August 24, 2016
  

[img=0x0]http://pixel.tcog.cp1.news.com.au/track/component/author/a5278f379df8dcdf31ded99d61d3d253/?esi=true&t_product=the-australian&t_template=s3/austemp-article_common/vertical/author/widget&td_bio=false[/img]
The pay of many top public servants has soared by 70 per cent since the global financial crisis, with some approaching earnings of $1 million, at a time when growth in average earnings has slowed almost to a standstill.

The cost of running the public service, including the highly ­expensive senior executive layer, has been a candidate for budget savings at both federal and state levels as it does not require legislation for cuts.

However, attempts to close budget deficits have not stopped huge increases in salary for many of those at the top who now earn several hundred thousand dollars a year more than the ministers to whom they report.

Martin Parkinson, who heads the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, earns $861,700, which is 71.2 per cent more than his predecessor in the Howard government, Peter Shergold, was getting when he stepped down from the position in early 2008.

Malcolm Turnbull earns $517,504 and, when the last round of pay rises was awarded, received an increase of $195 a week. Dr Parkinson’s increase equated to $1132 a week as it included ­deferred increases from the ­Remuneration Tribunal.

Treasury secretary John Fraser earns only slightly less at $840,810, which is about $240,000 more than Ken Henry was getting when he was dealing with the financial crisis. Although Mr Fraser earned vastly more in his previous private sector job as head of global funds management for investment bank UBS, he is still paid more than double the $373,200 earned by Scott Morrison as Treasurer.

Department secretaries had no increase for a number of years, leading to a review in 2009-10, which led to big one-off increases intended to bring them into line with private sector chief executives with similar responsibilities.

Remuneration Tribunal chief John Conde has repeatedly ­defended the pay levels, arguing they take account of the federal budget outlook and general economic conditions.

“The tribunal considers it ­important that remuneration for offices in its jurisdiction is maintained at appropriate levels over the longer term to attract and ­retain people of the calibre ­required for these important high-level ­offices,” Mr Conde said after the last pay rise.

Other huge increases have been handed out to many of the heads of government operations. Federal police commissioner ­Andrew Colvin gets $678,920, which is 81.5 per cent more than Mick Keelty was paid in the position eight years ago.

Over the past eight years, the pay for the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation director-general, currently Duncan Lewis, has risen 73.4 per cent to $626,690.

The electoral commissioner, Tom Rogers, earns $522,240, which is a 75.9 per cent increase over the past eight years. The highest paid public servant is the governor of the Reserve Bank, with its latest annual report showing Glenn Stevens, whose 10-year term finishes next month, earned just more than $1 million last year. The Reserve Bank started disclosing senior salaries only in 2010.

Unlike ordinary wage earners who rely on the earnings of their superannuation fund, many long-serving senior public servants enjoy defined superannuation benefits, providing them with a guaranteed pension equivalent to about 60 per cent of their final salary.

Former NSW treasurer Michael Costa told Sky News’s Bolt Report that, in his experience, there were significant “back office” gains to be made in the public service. “I cannot believe the explosion in SES positions and SES salaries — they could be addressed pretty quickly, but then productivity is the challenge,” Mr Costa said.

“It means changing work conditions, means getting more sensible and flexible labour arrangements. We’ve seen significant real growth in key areas such as education, but no productivity or output gains."

The increases won by senior public service management below the secretary level have been in line with community standards, averaging about 30 per cent over the past eight years, but their level remains elevated. A deputy secretary’s salary is about $390,000 while the first assistant secretary, which is one layer below that, gets $300,000.

The federal government has tried to halt the growth in the numbers of the public service overall and the senior executive service. Since commonwealth public service numbers peaked at 153,464 in 2012, they have fallen 11.1 per cent, while the number of senior executives has dropped 10.2 per cent.

The performance of states has varied widely. NSW has kept growth in its wages bill to only 30.7 per cent over the past eight years, while its number of senior executives has been in decline since 2009. Victoria, by contrast, has 12.9 per cent increase in total public service numbers and a 30 per cent rise in the number of senior executives, which has been enough to boost its total wages bill by 45.5 per cent.

Western Australia, which has experienced a mining boom and bust over the past eight years, is managing with a public service salary bill that has risen by 63.3 per cent, while the ACT and the Northern Territory have both overseen a blowout in public service numbers of more than 20 per cent, with salaries up by 68 per cent.

Additional reporting: Sarah Elks

It is quite often stated that the primary role of M&M, & his minions like Skidmore, is to keep the miniscule's fat out of the fire, after that supposedly they become self-absorbed in diligently adhering to the Bureaucrat's Big Book of Looking Busy. One has to question whether paying these no value adding bureaucratic parasites obscene amounts of taxpayers money is truly in the interest of industry and the travelling public - FDS!  


MTF...P2

[Gobbledock]

The salaries of these rorting grubs are an absolute disgrace. And the salaries quoted exclude the perks, allowances and the highest superannuation of any worker. Quite simply, none of these department heads are worth $500k to $1m per annum, none of them.

But look on the bright side - it is obscene unjustified salaries like these that are gifted to 'mates' and abused by those who feel they are above the rest of society that are contributing to the 'great divide' and social uprising gaining momentum worldwide. The revolution is coming boys and girls.

Tick tock

[Peetwo]

Ministers, Mandarins & Minions: The road to dusty ruin -

A thread drift off the Mount NCN thread - that has major relevance to the 'state of our nation' and of course the desperate state of our aviation industry, in particular small to middle size aviation businesses, airports and private pilot/ aircraft owners both recreational & sporting - that IMO needs to be preserved and the debate hopefully continued...Cheers P2      

A vexed question - Responsibility, not laws.

Reading through the Thorny and GD offerings triggered a line of thought which needs to be aired. I’m not even sure I’ve got the right end of the stick, but it’s worth a few lines to try and tease some sense out of a jumble of stray thoughts.

One of the things I do not like about Australia is the perennial  ‘habit’ of bleating for more and more rules; at all levels. In the workplace we are drowning in ‘rules’; in industry we are submerged in ‘rules’; in our private lives, our homes, our hospitals, our cars; in every facet of life from waking to toddling up the wooden hill to bed; rules rule. I’d bet there are even rules about sleeping.  Why is it so?  The best answer I can come up with is that ‘we’ keep asking for them. All a politician can do – in reality – is pass law (well that and wind). From the town council to the Senate – law after law after law.  Miles and miles of paper; millions of dollars and a huge industry associated with ‘law’. When faced with a complex problem, I often try to boil it down and relate it to a ‘simple’ element; like algebra – once you can ‘understand’ the fundamentals; complex equations become simple as the elements break down into manageable pieces of the puzzle.

Dogs – were the first and easiest example I could work with. Lots of ‘em, across a huge range of breeds and a wide cross section of the community. There are some pretty draconian ‘laws’ surrounding simple dog ownership – at council level – some good, some silly and others used cynically as a revenue raising tool.  Take registration and micro-chip tagging of your dog; bloody good idea, no brainer.  Then look at the problems ‘off leash’ creates for a council; it totally discriminates against owners with properly managed animals and is also a great little earner.  At 6am, in an empty park, you will be fined if Fido is ‘off leash’. No matter that Fido is a geriatric, miniature poodle, four Kg over weight and toothless.  The law cannot discriminate or be flexible – it’s one way for all.  At 10 am, in the same park, some fool letting a fighting fit big pit bull run loose where the kids are playing footy, rampaging through the picnics – same fine.  What a law cannot do is teach responsibility or common sense.  The reason for the law is that through irresponsible owners, someone got offended; or, hurt, or; some fool kid decided it was great sport to torment an animal and got roughed up (lack of parental responsibility, more rules).  Same-same; there is a bleating group at council, demanding ‘they’ do something.  Council go for the quick, cheap, easy fix with an eye on the revenue.  This is easier than tackling the real problems; teaching owner responsibility and helping those who cannot train their animal to do so.  Issue a licence to those who can prove, through established tests, that ‘their’ dog is reliable and may be ‘off-leash’; provided, the owner accepts full criminal responsibility for any damage or injury caused by their dog. In short, place the responsibility and legal onus firmly where it belongs.

Australians in general always seem to want ‘something’ done by someone else. Bleat long and loud and get a new law passed. This does not prevent those determined to do something from doing it, simply gives the prosecution a platform to sheet home blame – after the fact.  There are laws against murder; many of ‘em, from the Bible through to the World court; do they prevent murder?  You know they don’t.  There are laws about dogs off leash; do they prevent the fool with a mutt running amuck at the cricket; again, you know they don’t.  So WTD has this to with aviation? Good question.

With one notable exception, every operator I’ve ever had to do with wanted to ‘do the right thing’.  Even the greedy and venal realise that there is more money to be made by operating ‘efficiently’ and operating ‘safely’ is a must as accidents cost a lot more. There needs to be a basic standard set, basic rules to prevent incident and accident; the ten commandments if you will. After that, responsible operators will always try to do the right thing – it is, after all in their best interests to do so.  But in the end it is solely ‘their’ responsibility; the law reflects that.  So why not strip away the layers of law which were produced to simply absolve the government and the department of any or all responsibility. “Thou shalt not run out of fuel”. If you do, we will come down like a ton load of bricks – unless there is a reasonable excuse.  There is no need for thousands and thousands of nit-picking, revenue generating, work creating ‘regulations’ which were created in deep knee jerk.  The responsibility for safe operation rests entirely with the operator; same as the hapless dog owner with NFI and who could care less, but penalises the rest – by default.  Simple rules are hard to break, no wriggle room.  

Aye well, it is Sunday and a ramble is allowed (rules). Not certain I’ve made the point, actually I’m not sure there is a point; except I’m sick to my back teeth of pointless, mindless acres of ‘rules’ which will never prevent those who intend to break ‘em, doing so.

Enough of random thoughts and trying to solve puzzles. There are folk cleverer than I who have tried to solve this riddle – probably all went mad trying. So, I shall cease and desist while the old brain is still capable of hunting down a second coffee; and perhaps a Blueberry muffin.

Toot toot.

K, you are on the right right tram but maybe jumped off in frustration before terminal conclusion. This is a place that has glittering prizes provided one can eschew and forgo the mind lolly comfort stations. Don't we grumble about government planners but in the end acquiesce and succumb to the keepers of Crown Privilege? Then there's the discomfort to perceive the vast money flows guided not by Adam Smith's invisible hand of free enterprise but by political influence.

Australians rail against Authority but cry "there should be a law against that". We foolishly accepted that we were recipients of a government gifted "privilege" to fly. We accepted Aviation Mediclals and huge piles of regulations and everyone has an opinion about how everyone else should technique their job.

We set up Canberra, our biggest mistake. A model capital without that messy free enterprise stuff. A souless city of stratified socialist control, near 400,000 that must extol the necessity of planning and the virtue of deleting risk from life. Guess who pays the bill? Where a $600,000pa public servant can walk out of his five year contract after less than two years with no explanation to taxpayer or industry. He was head of his excruciatingly named Tiger Team, the Exemption inventors for the $300 million dollar new and unworkable aviation rules.

Melbourne said to be the World's most liveable city, how smug can you be? Yes fine if you already own a piece of it and accept the traffic jams and grotty bits of planner frozen wastelands. You have your little piece of dirt, your number one asset;  value artificially pushed up by "planning", read government control, to stratospheric levels thus bloating banks with mountains of mortgage moneys and leaving the not so well off and new comers out in the cold with little to do but take the dole, make trouble and wonder how previous waves of migrants did so well (ie. Before Planning). To you younger people yes BP was a time. In the 50s, 60s you could make an airstrip where you wanted. I bought seaside building blocks for $400 each realising, correctly, that the artificial land zoning would create a price hiking shortage. There was practically no unemployment. You could by a house in Brighton for $16,000. Before Planning, early 70s, really started to bite we made it to USD$1.50 for one of ours. Imagine shopping in the US at that rate. We've become so stupid that we think, like Glenn Stevens, that it's a good thing our dollar is devalued. Everything in Australia is worth less to the world than it was before, even your cups and saucers. How's that for clever country?

We have to get past the ifs and buts, freedom works, great prosperity, better environment (EPA laws are good) is within reach if we go for property rights and cause government to relinquish its mindset of micro management by institutionalized bureaucracy. We can't afford the present trajectory, something has to give, it can go well if we try, otherwise we continue to muddle along downhill.

'K' - Edit - Choc Frog Sandy.

[Peetwo]

Gobbles addition to above..

The economic ship is listing.....abandon ship abandon ship

Sandy, well said. Top points.

However sadly, history is born to repeat itself. It's the dent in our DNA cake tin - no matter how hard people try to bake the perfect cake, it always comes out with the same dent in it. Financially, each cycle lasts around 40 years give or take, then it's Shitsville! We are at that cusp again.

Look at this pathetic world. Three examples only;

1. Start with Germany. Thought they had learned from the currency collapse and hyperinflation of 1923? Nope. Frau Merkel, who has spent years promulgating the 'too big to fail' Deutsche Bank and how it is the worlds strongest banking institution is now realising how wrong she has been. Not long now til Deutsche Bank runs out of printer ink and can no longer keep it's Ponzi going. Too bad for the German sheeple the
morning after the inevitable 'bank holiday' and they wake up to the realisation that all those electronic digits that make up their bank accounts are gone! Tick tock the time bomb is coming.

2. Surprise surprise, roughly 40 years later, another continent and more shennanigans. For our American friends 1971 was one of the most significant in history in which the unilateral cancellation of the direct international convertibility of the United States dollar to gold. Gold standard Goooone! The Central Banks pulled puppet Richard Nixon's strings and the rest as they say is history. The Banksters will forever do their utmost  to rid the world of precious metal value because you can't fake it, print it, replace it with digital numbers on a computer. Do the USSA get a tick tock? They sure do. That treasonous act back in 71 has set the framework for where we are today. Again roughly 40 years between the destruction of the gold standard and GFC 2008 (which incidentally was just the precursor bubble to the big bubble sitting out our doorstep). Tick tock, you got that right.

3. That brings us to 2016. Dear oh dear, what an abhorrent mess. As Sandy pointed out, Australia is itself evidence of a broken corrupt system. Medium price range for a city shitbox in Sydney - $1m. Say no more! But I will. Toronto house prices  crashing up to 60% in the past two months, New York (yes the worlds greatest city) with an increase in the homeless by 23% in the past 12 months. The great USSA where the average wage is $30k and 99% of the wealth created in the past 8 years under Obama has gone to the 1%, the worlds richest.

And not to forget the final desperate move of the rule changers who rig the system and keep the Ponzi scheme going - Abenomics! Yes, that nifty idea out of Japan called 'negative interest rates'. That's right, you, the little person get to put your money in the (not so safe) bank, and you pay THEM for the privelege by copping negative interest rates! Yes, it costs you money to let them look after your worthless paper. What an effing farce!

So let's see what the next year or two bring under the stewardship of Goldman Sachs Turnbull and his conga line of silver spoon millionaire ministers. But from where I sit the global wrecking ball has gathered immense speed and the pain has yet to begin.

TICK TICK. Christ yes.

[Sandy Reith]

Sometimes it's instructive to go back to basic principles, we should be schooled in how society causes civilisation, bearing directly on how much governing do we really require.

One notable architect of the American revolution being Thomas Paine. Architect in the sense that he wrote forceful essays which inspired the American colonists. The following excerpt courtesy the Foundation for Economic Education, a US libertarian think tank.

Quote:


"In The Rights of Man, fifteen years later, he wrote that the great part of that order which reigns among mankind is not the effect of government. It has its origin in the principles of society and the natural constitution of man. It existed prior to government, and would exist if the formality of government was abolished. The mutual dependence and reciprocal interest which man has upon man, and all the parts of civilised community upon each other, create that great chain of connection which holds it together. The landholder, the farmer, the manufacturer, the merchant, the tradesman, and every occupation, prospers by the aid which each receives from the other, and from the whole. Common interest regulates their concerns, and forms their law; and the laws which common usage ordains, have a greater influence than the laws of government. In fine, society performs for itself almost everything which is ascribed to government.


By way of example, Paine pointed out that for upwards of two years from the commencement of the American War, and to a longer period in several of the American States, there were no established forms of government. The old governments had been abolished, and the country was too much occupied in defence to employ its attention in establishing new governments; yet during this interval order and harmony were preserved as inviolate as in any country in Europe.… The instant formal government is abolished, society begins to act: a general association takes place, and common interest produces common security.


It is not true, according to Paine, “that the abolition of any formal government is the dissolution of society,” for in fact the abolition of formal government “acts by a contrary impulse, and brings [society] the closer together.” For it is but few general laws that civilised life requires, and those of such common usefulness, that whether they are enforced by the forms of government or not, the effect will be nearly the same.


To no one's surprise, The Rights of Man was suppressed by the English government. By the beginning of 1792, it had become a crime to be found with a copy of The Rights of Man in one's possession. A warrant was issued for Paine's arrest."

End quote.

A "few general laws" would do very well in aviation remembering that in regard to safety, by the statistics, by far the greatest general rule is recency. In other words the more that an individual flys his safety increases exponentially. Therefore Government get off our backs.

[Peetwo]

In a parallel hemisphere -

This one is for Sandy...

Background: From over on the Mount NCN thread:

Murky & his minions - A bureaucratic dictatorship?

Oh Gobbles you sure know how to raise the blood pressure of this fellow IOS comrade in arms -

Hmm...think I summed up quite well my sentiments on Dr Hoodoo Voodoo :   


Which, as you will see, kind of gives me a good lead in to the next ICAO USOAP audit critical element - 'Airworthiness'.

Now being a simple knuckle-dragger, whose aeronautical engineering knowledge I could probably write on the back of a postage stamp, I am well out of my league on LAME/AME, MRO and aerospace design/manufacturing. However I do know someone who is full bottle on such issues and that is KC and his AMROBA clan -  

Okay a bit of an intro because this area is kind of taking us full circle on the Mount NCN thread:

Treaty

A treaty is an agreement under international law entered into by actors in international law, namely sovereign states and international organizations. Wikipedia

You will recall that certain business from the 44th Parliamentary Treaties committee was carried through to this Parliament for further inquiry and review. In particular there was the  Implementation Procedures for Airworthiness - USA treaty:

Treaty under consideration
The following treaties were tabled on 12 September 2016:

Amendment 1 to Revision 1 of the Implementation Procedures for Airworthiness covering Design Approval, Production Activities, Export Airworthiness Approval, Post Design Approval Activities, and Technical Assistance between Authorities under the Agreement on the Promotion of Aviation Safety and Addendum to the Implementation Procedures for Airworthiness between the Government of Australia and the Government of the United States of America

• Treaty text (PDF 161KB)
  
• Related documents:
  

NIA (PDF 190KB)
Cover Page (PDF 30KB)
Regulation Impact Statement: not applicable
Letters: not applicable

            
As it sometime happens ( ), yesterday KC & his AMROBA clan put out a 'breaking news' bulletin that is extremely topical to international 'Airworthiness' deals and the above treaty inquiry...

Breaking News 
Government Restricting Trade
October 8, 2016 Ken Cannane
government-trade-restrictions

Reference page 3:    

Dear Malcolm, Barnbaby & Dazzling Dazza please take heed: Stop listening to the weasel words of self-professed aviation safety gurus & academics - like Dr Aleck (see pic above) & Dr Walker. There is much empirical and circumstantial evidence (e.g. 3000+ notified differences to ICAO/ 300+ million dollars on CASR RRP/ PelAir & beyond all reason) that relying on such individuals to set aviation safety policy is doing irreparable damage to our reputation internationally and to our industry prosperity domestically.  
Start listening to the words of wisdom from industry advocates like KC:

As you can see the problems are complex but the solutions could be comparatively simple. However while we continue to have a minister and government that allows the bureaucrats to run the show unimpeded by proper governance and lording over industry with its 'mystique of aviation safety' and its aviation isolationist policy, industry businesses will continue to fail; or to survive businesses will have no choice but to export their business and expertise overseas...

Well it would seem that in the US we have a somewhat equivalent to our 'do as I say not as I do', big 'R' regulator CAsA, & that is the USA EPA. Via the US American Enterprise Institute:

Has Bureaucratic Dictatorship Arrived?



President Obama’s Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson got rock star treatment at the U.N. climate change conference in Copenhagen this week.

The crowd of global environmental elites loved her, and one reason why may be that she continued her administration’s unseemly practice of blaming its predecessor for all the world’s ills.

But Jackson’s biggest applause line was when she said she was “proud” of the EPA’s announcement earlier in the week that it would regulate greenhouse gases as dangerous pollutants.

“That is a decision that has been a long time coming,” Jackson said.

And it’s true, a bureaucratic dictatorship has been a long time coming in America. And with this latest EPA ruling, it may have finally arrived.

The Obama administration seems to regard government of the people, by the people and for the people as an inconvenience rather than a blessing.

Just as the polls are showing a dramatic decline in Americans’ belief that climate change is a serious problem, Obama bureaucrats have conveniently come up with a way to make the polls meaningless. They are seeking to achieve “command and control” over the U.S. economy by bureaucratic dictatorship rather than democratic process.

For a nation under siege by the popular culture and the left with environmental alarmism, government regulation of greenhouse gases may at first glance seem like a reasonable step.

But take a step back and consider what this ruling means in practice. According to the EPA, greenhouse gases include carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and a host of other gases that are emitted whenever people heat their homes, drive their cars, mow their lawns, tend their farms, or, for that matter, breath.

Without so much as a vote being cast, the EPA regulation suddenly micro-manages all of this. It makes all economic activity more expensive. It makes creating jobs more difficult.

It puts government bureaucrats, not entrepreneurs, at the center of our economy.

The ruling is alarming in its breadth, but perhaps even more disturbing is what it reveals about the Obama administration’s view of democratic and constitutional government.

The Obama administration seems to regard government of the people, by the people and for the people as an inconvenience rather than a blessing. If the peoples’ representatives in Congress do what it wants, great. If not, they will use their power to get their way by any means necessary.

Apparently, that includes issuing open threats to another branch of government. Here’s what an anonymous senior administration official told Congress, speaking through the New York Times:

“If you don’t pass this legislation, then . . . the EPA is going to have to regulate in this area,” the official said. “And it is not going to be able to regulate on a market-based way, so it’s going to have to regulate in a command-and-control way, which will probably generate even more uncertainty.”

The arrogance and totalitarianism of this statement are breathtaking. Not only does it reveal shocking contempt for the rule of law, but the official concedes that he or she will allow the EPA to further damage the struggling economy–i.e. “generate even more uncertainty”–in order to enact the administration’s climate change agenda.

With this bullying gesture, the Obama administration reveals its true goals. It’s not interested in protecting the American people or our environment. It’s not interested in creating jobs, no matter how many big-government “stimulus” packages it proposes.
Its interest is in power, and there is a word for a government whose primary purpose is the accumulation and exercise of power over the citizenry–totalitarian.

The fact that this totalitarianism takes the form of a bureaucratic dictatorship earnestly claiming to protect the environment doesn’t change what it is.

A Congress that allows itself to be threatened and intimidated in this way will not long serve its purpose of representing the American people.

And an American people who allow the representative branch of government to be nullified by an imperial executive branch will not long have representative government.
Most of the international elite applauding the Obama EPA power grab in Copenhagen this week made their peace with bureaucratic dictatorship long ago. The question now is whether America will follow the same path.

Newt Gingrich is a senior fellow at AEI.

 
Hmmm....sounds very familiar -


Over to you Sandy - 


MTF...P2

[Sandy Reith]

Newt Gingrich obviously has a point and in our context it points to the dissatisfaction of government by the half million that voted for Pauline Hanson. To bad Pauline does not appear to have the knowledge or instinct to steer the tiger she has helped to uncage, unlike Margaret Thatcher. The US system has layers and layers of politically determined public service appointments which is a driver to their system. We used to have a more publicly minded public service but this has been eroded by the creation of the likes of CASA and a myriad of other government 'corporate bodies', sometimes referred to as 'quangos'. Or quasi autonomous government organisations, these bodies have been in vogue now for thirty odd years, they were created with the good intention of being the 'independent umpire', removing decision making from the dubious and possibly malodorous machinations of politics. Added attraction for governments that these bodies could deflect criticism from the Minister and be at least partly self funding, or the complete untruthful delusion, government business enterprises, GBEs. Hey presto government by remote control, and a new paradigm of technocratic efficiency.

So what's the verdict? Has government become less expensive? Are these corporate bodies more responsible and efficient? Are they respectful of citizens and their rights? Do they work hard for moderate pay to benefit society? What is their natural incentive in all these possible areas of motivation? Should public monies be expended by those not directly employed by government?

Government should be built on principles, principles that have been tested, considered and shown to be sound and economical. The quango movement, a failure of gigantic proportions, has never had the spotlight play on its ugly mass. Just a few people lighting matches and hoping for a controlled blaze.

We might not like politics, and our system is far from perfect and certainly needs upgrading with a much greater emphasis on personal liberty, responsibility, private property and justice. How to make it work better? Your representative is there to represent you. If your representative doesn't know your opinion then the system falls down. End of sermon, see if I can negotiate down the pulpit steps without tripping on my gown.

[Kharon]

Choc Frog Sandy.

There are many modern versions available, but for me Virgil said it first and said it best.

The gates of hell are open night and day;
Smooth the descent, and easy is the way:
But to return, and view the cheerful skies,
In this, the task and mighty labor lies.

Selah.

[Sandy Reith]

Choc Frog Sandy.

There are many modern versions available, but for me Virgil said it first and said it best.

The gates of hell are open night and day;
Smooth the descent, and easy is the way:
But to return, and view the cheerful skies,
In this, the task and mighty labor lies.

Selah.

It has certainly become a mighty labour today in this country to view the cheerful skies.

[Gobbledock]

Culture war in offshore detention....More from the Sir An(g)us vault

In August 2012, former chief of the Defence Force Angus Houston offered his report on immigration to then prime minister Julia Gillard. It contained 22 recommendations, one of them to process asylum seekers on Manus Island and Nauru. At the heart of the report’s logic was the “no advantage” principle, whereby “irregular migrants gain no benefit by choosing to circumvent regular migration mechanisms”.

Full article here;

https://www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/news...0548003887

Yet another high level decision that Houstoblame has been involved in that turned to utter shit to add to the $1.5b OneFarce debacle and a legacy of other problems in multiple areas under his command. The list is endless. Yet this weakling gets promoted gleefully through government departments one after the other, in overpaid plum positions based upon what reason exactly?

He always tends to slither away before the shit hits the fan behind him. An uncanny ability, but not surprising, from the seasoned expert in obsfucation, greasy pole sliding, and bus conducting.

[Gobbledock]

Nigerian Mandarins anyone...


Stumbled across this little number today. Amusing yet worrying. Perhaps they picked up some tips from CAsA;

"How Internal Politics Is Preventing Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority From Carrying Out Proper Aircraft Safety Duties".

http://saharareporters.com/2016/10/25/ho...out-proper

'Safe Nigerian skies for all'? Hmmm, jury is out on that one!

[Peetwo]

"Make our industry great again!" -

In the aftershock of the USA Presidential Election result, which like the Brexit vote IMO is more about a world wide rebellion against the Establishment, Sunfish off the UP suggests...

Sunfish

Can We Borrow Donald Trump Please?

---

We need a Donald Trump to drain our local swamp - Canberra.

---

&.. Jabawocky

YES PLEASE x 10^6

The constitution/bill of rights too while we are at it.

---

titan uranus

I think the US has just commenced the genuine reckoning that's well overdue for the inane political correctness we've all had to endure both in politics and corporations.

It may not be pretty, but it's sends a powerful message.

---

&..Duck Pilot

From what I hear he is pretty aviation savvy.

Luv him, hate him it ain't gunna change him from being the most powerful man in the world for the next 4 years.

It's gunna be fun.

At least he will change the status-quo, we certainly need some of that here.

 
Hmm...just saying??
While contemplating the above have a read of this:

Public service bosses score $6000 pay rise

• [/url]Noel Towell
  [url=http://www.smh.com.au/national/by/Noel-Towell-hven2]
  

Department of Human Services secretary Kathryn Campbell. 

Public servants at the giant Department of Human Services haven't had a pay rise since 2013, but their bosses just scored rises of up to $6000 a year.

The pay rises for the 168 members of its senior executive service come against a background of three years of industrial strife at the department, which runs Centrelink, Medicare and the Child Support Agency.

The main workplace union is angry about what it calls "no-strings-attached" pay gains for the DHS elite, but the department says everyone who works there can have a 2 per cent pay rise simply by voting yes in a forthcoming enterprise agreement ballot.

The department's annual report shows the top pay band of a band-3 senior executive moved from $339,500 to $345,000 in 2015-16.

Band 2s went from $248 000 to $252,000 while band 1 executives' top pay went from $196,000 to $199,000.

The base salaries don't include the public servants' taxpayer-supplied car, superannuation contributions of up to 15.4 per cent, fringe benefits or other allowances, and departmental secretary Kathryn Campbell can approve wage deals outside of the official band at her discretion.

Ms Campbell's own annual salary has increased by nearly $50,000 since 2013 and she now earns a $731,000 a year, a sum that includes super and other benefits.

The vast majority of the department's 36,000 workers, in contrast, have been on the same pay scales since 2013 after twice rejecting workplace deals developed under the Coalition's controversial public sector bargaining framework.

Human Services has been a key battleground in the wider public sector industrial battles with negotiations growing so heated at DHS at one point that a senior human resources executive claimed he was threatened with a knife through the heart by an angry employee.

But the department has repeatedly said that everyone who works there can have a pay rise simply by voting yes in the third ballot, starting on Monday.

A departmental spokeswoman did not answer questions about the executive pay rises but said staff were getting the opportunity next week to vote on their own pay.

"The department attempted to provide staff with a 2 per cent pay rise as part of the February 2016 proposed agreement vote," she said.

"Next week ... staff will vote on a proposed agreement that includes a pay rise of 3 per cent on commencement, followed by a 1.5 per cent increase on both the first and second anniversaries of the agreement."

Community and Public Sector Union national secretary Nadine Flood came swinging on Tuesday against the executives' deals.

"Is this a sick joke?" Ms Flood said.

"Senior management in the department have given themselves a no-strings-attached pay rise while continuing to push a staggeringly unfair enterprise agreement on rank-and-file DHS staff.

"Staff morale was already rock bottom and this is hardly going to help."

Ms Flood said the new pay bands simply reinforced the massive gulf between DHS senior managers and the department's ordinary workers.

"This is a pain-free pay rise for a few hundred senior executives who were already on base salaries of $153,000 to $345,000 a year," the union leader said.

"In contrast, a working mum on under $60,000 a year like the majority of DHS staff faces her third Christmas without a pay rise because she can't afford to give up the workplace rights and conditions that allow her to juggle work and picking up the kids."

"Draining the Can'tberra swamp" - gets my vote, when do we start GD...
 
MTF...P2

[Gobbledock]

Oh P2, the presidential reality show really has been vomitus.

P2;

"Draining the Can'tberra swamp" - gets my vote, when do we start GD...

I'm ready when you are mate. Shall I prepare the houseboat? That's a bloody big swamp. Where would we put all the extracted dross? Sydney harbour?

All countries and their Governments need to take heed of recent goings on - Brexit, US election, even our own election where more independents got voted in than ever before. The people have had enough.

The public are waking up finally. Everyone has had a gutful of lying smooth worded politicians who are never held accountable for anything, who load their pockets at the poor struggling taxpayers expense, who wear red power ties when needed or blue soft ties when required (sorry Pollies but we too have had training in psychology), who are mostly all overpaid multi millionaires, who won't answer questions etc. The peasants are starting to revolt. You can only push people so far for so long, and you muppets are just about out of time. The revolution is coming whether you like it or not, and you have nobody to blame except for yourselves....just sayin.

And it was nauseating to watch Malcolm 'Goldman Sachs' Turnbull kissing Trumps ass while declaring that Australia's balls aren't in Uncle Sam's hands! Ha. How pathetic. Don't worry Malcolm, the Don will have your former employer on his hit list!

And who let that nauseating brown-nosing taxpayer bleeding ass licker of a human Bob Carr out of his mansion to provide his views on the US election? Bob, piss off and go play with your millions you irrelevant worm. No one cares to hear your conceited ramblings.

And Kim 'fat boy' Beazely, another bloated Australian brown-noser who worships the USSA, giving his opinion from WA. Who cares what you think you Uncle Sam footstool. The only part of Beazely that you could see hanging out of Obama's ass over the past 6 years was fat boy's toenails and one of his tits!

Now, would you like to know what unreality think?

TICK TOCK goes the revolutionary clock.

[Peetwo]

Senator Leyonhjelm on bike helmets & the Nanny State -

A couple of days ago LDP Senator David Leyonhjelm made a speech in the Senate which IMO goes to the very core of what is fundamentally wrong with the overly prescriptive and cost prohibitive regulatory burden imposed by the nearly 30 year CASA RRP...

Read & contemplate the parallels...

Senator LEYONHJELM (New South Wales) (18:27): This is generally known as the 'nanny state inquiry'. During that 'nanny state inquiry'—which I chaired—in the last parliament, mandatory bicycle helmet laws were nominated by many submitters as a primary example of nanny state paternalism. They argue that individuals should be able to manage the risks involved in a bike ride and that the ability of the individual to do so is constrained because their assessment of such risk is overridden by the state.

They questioned why Australia cannot trust its citizens to assess their circumstances and make that choice for themselves. They said things like:

If we need the law to protect us from ourselves, then what does that say about ourselves? The helmet law is an insult to our civil liberty.

It was argued that the state can only justify interference in the conduct of individual citizens when it is clear that doing so will prevent a greater harm to others. It was argued that helmet laws do not meet this test, because an individual's head poses no plausible threat to the safety and wellbeing of others. Indeed, it was suggested that helmet laws are a textbook example of where the state overreaches itself in imposing norms of behaviour where the matter should be left to the individual.

Other related arguments included the view that the individual and societal benefits of cycling and cycling more frequently outweigh the costs of not wearing a helmet and therefore the health and social costs. In this regard the view was put that mandatory helmet laws have had a negative impact on cycling participation rates in Australia as they deter people from cycling. It was suggested that mandatory helmets were responsible for the low participation rates in Australia's two public bike share schemes, which have the lowest usage rates in the world. It was argued that helmet laws involve unnecessary use of law enforcement resources and misuse of police power. One witness to the inquiry described being arrested and strip searched for failing to pay fines arising from not wearing a helmet. Even claims that helmet laws have achieved any meaningful reduction in the rate of brain or head injury were questioned by witnesses.

Australia was the first country to enact mandatory helmet laws, which became nationwide in 1992. New Zealand and the United Arab Emirates followed, and a number of countries enforce a helmet requirement for children. But that is it. The rest of the world has not adopted Australia's approach. The requirement for the use of helmets is included in the Australian Road Rules, national model legislation which is adopted by the individual states and territories. However, a number of submitters noted that the states and territories introduced mandatory helmet laws in order to comply with a Commonwealth 10-point road safety program, which included bicycle helmets, and thereby secure Commonwealth funding under the black spot road program—that is, they were either bribed or blackmailed.

There have been reviews of mandatory helmet laws. In November 2013, the Queensland parliament Transport, Housing and Local Government Committee recommended a 24-month trial that would exempt cyclists aged 16 years and over from helmet laws when riding in parks, on footpaths and shared cycle paths and on roads with a speed limit of 60 kilometres per hour or less. The Queensland government did not support the recommendation, insisting that 'the weight of evidence confirms the importance of wearing a bicycle helmet while riding.' In 2010, the New South Wales parliament's Joint Standing Committee on Road Safety noted that the majority of submissions and bulk of evidence received by it support the current mandatory use of helmets for bicycle riders. This weight and bulk of evidence, so convincing to the Queensland government and the New South Wales road safety committee, but unconvincing to the rest of the world, was equally unconvincing during the inquiry.

As I said, whether helmets actually reduce injuries is contested. Some witnesses suggested they merely change the nature of the injuries sustained. The point was made that if helmet legislation had been effective in preventing head injuries, there would be a fall in head injury incidents but not in other injuries. Yet the committee was informed that a 1996 study in NSW and Victoria found that the decline in cycling was at least as substantial as the decline in head injuries. In other words, if people are not cycling they cannot incur head injuries. One witness put to the committee that a person cycling two hours per week for 50 years would cycle for a total of 5,200 hours and, over that time, only have a one per cent risk of hospital admission for serious head injury. Yet it was suggested that even if one traumatic brain injury was avoided, it was worth it. A reduction of civil liberty was said to be preferable to the long-term effect of a head and brain injury on a victim's family, carers and society.

This is the nub of the issue. Such an assertion is based on an assumption of socialised medicine. In other words, the cost of health care is socialised via Medicare and other taxpayer funding. This is a slippery slope. If we are to minimise the burden of health care on each other, then all of us must ensure we avoid risks, and insist others do the same. Every glass of wine, every cigar, every potato chip, every piece of chocolate is potentially increasing the cost of the health system to our fellow Australians. Where does it end? A better option is to consider health as a private matter and not the business of the government. This merely requires each of us to have health insurance, with public funding limited to paying for insurance for the genuinely poor. In the end, the committee simply recommended a review of the mandatory helmet laws. I would go much further than that.

I believe a cost-benefit study would show the impact of helmet laws to be negative, given the low prevalence of cyclist head injury, notwithstanding the seriousness of individual traumatic brain injury cases, and the negative effects of the policy. I also maintain that, in the absence of compelling evidence demonstrating a substantial social benefit, there should be a bias in favour of individual choice and responsibility. It is especially not the role of government to protect individuals against the consequences of their own choices when the risks, particularly, are small, foreseeable and borne personally. I would remove the obligation from all cyclists to wear helmets, while making it clear to parents that their responsibility to their children should include serious consideration of wearing one. I seek leave to continue my remarks.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.

MTF...P2

[Peetwo]

The age of political discontent & bureaucratic distrust -

Quote from 4D Chester's thread (via news.com.au article today) - Dick backs Pauline - "Match made in heaven":

“So many of my friends who normally voted Coalition reckon they are going to vote for Pauline Hanson,” he said. “You only have to look at what happened in America with Trump. “People are so disillusioned with our present party politics. Our politicians don’t tell the truth. They’re all actors.”

And Dick on the aviation front:

“Myself and the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association will come up with what needs to be done and I will give her some suggestions,” he said.

“I think she would get tens of thousands of votes from the aviation community because they have been let down by the ALP and Liberals.”

Then from the RAAA on the continued bureaucratic obfuscation of the ASRR :

 
Which brings me to the following excellent article courtesy of the Mandarin on tackling the cycle of government & bureaucratic distrust:

Opinion is king: how governments can end the cycle of distrust

    

---

by
Emily Jenke & Emma Lawson
06.12.2016



Distrust between government and citizens goes both ways, but deliberative democracy offers opportunities in this age of individualism. The convenors of SA’s citizens’ juries consider how government can recover the trust of citizens.

It seems of late that opinion, no matter how uninformed, rules.

We all want to have our say and have our political leaders respond to our every whim.

The fact that our politicians can’t respond positively to every whim without causing internal conflicts seems to be lost on us.

We, individually and collectively, bear a considerable level of responsibility for the unrealistic expectations placed on our politicians and for the elevation of our own opinion to something akin to fact, even where we haven’t read a thing on the subject matter.

However, governments bear considerable responsibility as well. Over many decades there has been an erosion of many of the vital foundations of democracies and this has alienated large segments of the population from the decision-making process.

We have seen:

• A significant trend towards political parties promising one thing in an election campaigns and doing another when in government.
  
• A focus on careful phrasing and clever, mealy-mouthed sound bites that say nothing but try to placate.
  
• Years of running community consultation sessions — but not listening to a word people say and instead pursuing a predetermined outcome.
  
• Community consultation that allows opinion to rule and doesn’t seek to enable a two-way conversation that starts from the sharing of information.
  
• The nation’s economic gains not flowing through to a large segment of society.
  
• A rift between the social priorities of the community and the government.
  

All of this has resulted in an electorate prepared to vote for people who don’t sound or look like your traditional politician — politicians like President-elect Donald Trump in the United States and Senator Pauline Hanson in Australia, who appear to say what they think and provide simple solutions to complex issues.

Can we bring people to consensus around a way forward?

The major risk of this trend to policymaking as we know it is that governments are increasingly responding to the opinion of the day. The results for policy and the future of our country are increasingly confused. Policy is often ill-founded and, hence, doesn’t work. Policy has increased volatility, causing a lack of sustainability, so when created it doesn’t even get a chance to establish and start to deliver change.  Or even worse, reform just doesn’t get past first base as it is impossible to get the ideas through a risk-averse bureaucracy, Cabinet and the Parliament. There is reduced trust in the institutions of government and increased political instability.

The upshot: reform to protect the environment and or to secure our economic future is becoming increasingly difficult to achieve.

We can point to a long list of high-profile policy roadkill from recent years: the carbon tax, taxation reform in any guise, reform to the superannuation system, Murray River Basin Plan implementation — just to name a few significant scalps.

It is not a pretty picture and we are seeing it play out every day, largely without comment.

So, what can our politicians and institutions of government more broadly do about it? Well, there are the obvious things:

• Be honest about their intent and plans. If their plans must change, for reasons outside their control, be honest about why.
  
• Listen.
  
• Be prepared to hold a genuine, respectful conversation where ideas are exchanged.
  
• Establish and respect institutions and processes that hold governments to account.
  

But how do we address the issue of uninformed opinion? How do we improve the level of information available to the public and give time for considered discussion around the issues about the best way forward? How do we move beyond an individualistic approach and enable the community to reconcile self-interests? How do we address conflicting values and perspectives?

The answer is yes, we can bring the community to consensus and we can do it through the clever application of deliberative democratic techniques to wicked and complex policy issues. What’s more, we would argue that we have no choice but to apply these techniques. It is vital that we introduce currently excluded voices into a conversation with government. Either this, or governments will continue to succumb to the lowest common denominator. Then we will all suffer the impact of poor policy making on our economy, environment and society.

The SA nuclear citizens’ jury

The nuclear waste storage facility citizens’ jury of 350 people — which we convened — recently returned a verdict that didn’t neatly advance the government’s agenda. Some have since argued that citizens’ juries don’t offer a useful approach to democratic decision-making. After all, the jury voted down the government’s proposal that a nuclear waste storage facility be hosted in SA. It is widely understood that the government wanted further consideration of this issue.

“We all want to have our say and have our political leaders respond to our every whim.”
 
However, after six days of formal deliberation and countless additional hours of reading and analysis, a large portion of the jury (66%) found that this was not a proposal the state should pursue.

But what is interesting is why — and in particular the issues that the jury didn’t raise in their report. It is what they didn’t say that highlights the power of citizen juries or similar deliberative processes to help the community understand the facts in a way not possible through the media or traditional opinion polling.

In over 40 pages of feedback, the jury explained its findings. What is quite astonishing is that the issue you might have expected to cause the jury most concern hardly rated a mention.

The chief obstacle facing those in the nuclear industry in the establishment of waste storage facilities or nuclear energy generation has been public concerns about safety.
Concerns about leaks, concerns about the potential impact of terrorism, concerns about the risks of radiation to human health and impact on food chains all feature highly in the public’s consciousness.

Several significant events globally have fuelled these concerns to the extent that they have become firmly embedded in the psyche. The combined impact of Chernobyl, Three Mile Island, Maralinga and most recently Fukushima have created an entrenched view that nuclear is high risk and a direct threat to humanity. Significant market research by the nuclear industry has found that these issues raise concerns in people’s minds about the pursuit of initiatives in the nuclear fuel cycle. Yet safety and fears of radiation did not feature in the jury’s report to government.

The jury called 14 witnesses from both sides of the debate on the safety of nuclear waste storage and the safety of storage and transport. Scientists and experts came together to brief the jury and respond to their questions. With the assistance of these experts the jury explored and analysed the transport of waste, the storage vessels used for waste, the arrangements for above-ground storage, the impact of radiation on health and the construction of underground facilities.

They explored the issues and delved into the science, and through this process it appears they resolved a lot of concerns, as safety hardly rated a mention in their report. In fact one juror remarked “the most influential witnesses were the speakers in the safety session — I am now satisfied with this aspect”.

This is the power of deliberative process — exploring the issues from both sides with experts chosen by the jury enabled them to resolve the issues that generally plague the public about the nuclear industry.

This is significant and points to the power of deliberative processes in enabling the community to understand and reconcile issues in a way that other more traditional forms of engagement can’t do as well. 

Instead, the reasons for the strong ‘no’ vote from the jury related to issues beyond the reach of science and facts (as we understand them). They raised concerns about consent from Indigenous communities, economic benefits, reliability of modelling and, especially, trust in government.

The issue of trust in government goes to the heart of the issue facing all democracies and the rise of ‘non-politicians’ like Donald Trump and Pauline Hanson in democracies worldwide. That is, trust. The jury raised concerns about the ability of the government to manage such significant projects successfully and raised concerns about the lack of transparency around government-community engagement processes.

Therein lies the rub — unless governments change their current modus operandi and start bringing communities into their decision-making processes in a way that is robust, honest and transparent, communities will continue to distrust them.

A key lesson from the nuclear citizens’ jury process and jury report is that trust is earned from opening up conversations. It is a brutal mistake to think that citizens will simply rubber stamp a government proposal. Jurors will view that cynically as an attempt to manipulate them.

Rather, those commissioning a deliberative process should focus on establishing a process with integrity with a well-constructed open question which goes to the heart of the problem that needs to be addressed. In doing so they can expect to be challenged. But they can also expect innovative, comprehensive and evidence-based solutions which don’t second guess politics (because jurors are the politics!) and ideas which will resonate with the common sense of the electorate.

Establishing trust is at the heart of deliberative process — governments trusting citizens and citizens trusting government.

If the community don’t understand or trust politicians, public service or institutions of government, they won’t support them, and will continue to express their discontent by voting for those who seek to address complex social, economic and environmental challenges through simple solutions that have perceived direct benefits for the individual. Trump-esque.

Is that the kind of democracy we want or need?

All sounds very familiar doesn't it??

MTF...P2

[Gobbledock]

A wee article and example below of American government incompetence, obsfucation, deliberate manipulation of transparency and corruption. The same shit goes on down under;

Pentagon Buries Study Revealing $125 Billion In Waste On "Bloated Bureaucracy"

The Pentagon's goal was simple, empower the Defense Business Board (DBB), a federal advisory panel of corporate executives, to retain consultants to identify potential cost savings in the Department of Defense's $580 billion budget. But, when the DBB study revealed a "clear path to saving over $125 billion," a level of waste which spoke to the egregious mismanagement and incompetence of DoD leaders, it was clear something had to be done to bury the story. Now, according to the Washington Post, that is exactly what happened.

The Pentagon has buried an internal study that exposed $125 billion in administrative waste in its business operations amid fears Congress would use the findings as an excuse to slash the defense budget, according to interviews and confidential memos obtained by The Washington Post.

Pentagon leaders had requested the study to help make their enormous back-office bureaucracy more efficient and reinvest any savings in combat power. But after the project documented far more wasteful spending than expected, senior defense officials moved swiftly to kill it by discrediting and suppressing the results.

The report, issued in January 2015, identified “a clear path” for the Defense Department to save $125 billion over five years. The plan would not have required layoffs of civil servants or reductions in military personnel. Instead, it would have streamlined the bureaucracy through attrition and early retirements, curtailed high-priced contractors and made better use of information technology.

The study was produced last year by the Defense Business Board with help from consultants with McKinsey and Company. Their report revealed for the first time that the Pentagon was spending almost a quarter of its $580 billion budget on overhead and core business operations such as accounting, human resources, logistics and property management.

The data further showed that the Defense Department was paying a staggering number of people — 1,014,000 contractors, civilians and uniformed personnel — to fill back-office jobs far from the front lines. That workforce supports 1.3 million troops on active duty, the fewest since 1940.

Pentagon officials had hoped to use the cost-cutting report to identify opportunities to eliminate "waste" that could be converted to direct spending for troops and weapons. But when the report highlighted too much waste, senior officials grew concerned that Congress might attempt to reduce their budget instead. So, they did what any bloated, corrupt government organization would do when faced with the same choice...they made everyone sign confidentiality agreements promising to never speak of the study and removed all copies of the report from public websites.

For the military, the major allure of the study was that it called for reallocating the $125 billion for troops and weapons. Among other options, the savings could have paid a large portion of the bill to rebuild the nation’s aging nuclear arsenal, or the operating expenses for 50 Army brigades.

But some Pentagon leaders said they fretted that by spotlighting so much waste, the study would undermine their repeated public assertions that years of budget austerity had left the armed forces starved of funds. Instead of providing more money, they said, they worried Congress and the White House might decide to cut deeper.

So the plan was killed. The Pentagon imposed secrecy restrictions on the data making up the study, which ensured no one could replicate the findings. A 77-page summary report that had been made public was removed from a Pentagon website.
Now that the cat's out of the bag, Pentagon officials have no choice but to discredit the study at all costs.

After the board finished its analysis, however, Work changed his position. In an interview with The Post, he did not dispute the board’s findings about the size or scope of the bureaucracy. But he dismissed the $125 billion savings proposal as “unrealistic” and said the business executives had failed to grasp basic obstacles to restructuring the public sector.

“There is this meme that we’re some bloated, giant organization,” he said. “Although there is a little bit of truth in that . . . I think it vastly overstates what’s really going on.”

"We will never be as efficient as a commercial organization,” Work said. “We’re the largest bureaucracy in the world. There’s going to be some inherent inefficiencies in that.”
Frank Kendall III, the Pentagon’s chief weapons-buyer, did the same saying the cost savings estimate was nothing more than "a ballpark, made-up number."

“Are you trying to tell me we don’t know how to do our job?” he said, according to two participants in the meeting. He said he needed to hire 1,000 more people to work directly under him, not fewer.

“If you don’t believe me, call in an auditor,” replied Klepper, the board’s restructuring expert. “They’ll tell you it’s even worse than this.”

In an interview, Kendall acknowledged he was “very disappointed” by the board’s work, which he criticized as “shallow” and “very low on content.” He said the study had ignored efforts by his agencies to become more efficient, and he accused the board of plucking the $125 billion figure out of thin air.

“It was essentially a ballpark, made-up number,” he said.

Still, Kendall knew that lawmakers might view the study as credible. Alarmed, he said, he went to Work and warned that the findings could “be used as a weapon” against the Pentagon.

"If the impression that’s created is that we’ve got a bunch of money lying around and we’re being lazy and we’re not doing anything to save money, then it’s harder to justify getting budgets that we need,” Kendall said.
Of course, while every effort was made to hide this $125 billion in "made-up" cost savings, we suspect there may be some in the incoming administation that may like to dive a little deeper.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-12-06...ureaucracy

[Gobbledock]

Honouring the dishonourable. May the longtime tradition continue

Stumbled across this nauseating article. After reading it I needed two buckets and filled both to overflowing! Not only Rudd receiving an honorary doctorate but the greasy Bus Driver Houston also! For contributions to Australia, of all things! WTF? These two have presided over scandals and poor decisions that have individually cost Australia billions of dollars....

Kevin Rudd to receive honorary doctorate
12 Dec 2016

Former prime minister Kevin Rudd and his wife Therese Rein will receive honorary doctorates from the Australian National University.

Former prime minister Kevin Rudd will receive an honorary doctorate for his contributions to Australia.

He'll be sharing the honour with his businesswoman wife Therese Rein, who's also being recognised with a doctor of laws degree from the Australian National University on Friday.

The pair will receive their awards at separate ceremonies, recognising their contributions to the nation as well as international affairs, business, human rights and philanthropy.

Former Defence Force chief Sir Angus Houston, who has managed the search for missing Malaysian Airlines flight MH370 and oversaw the repatriation of victims of the MH17 crash, and former Indonesian foreign minister Marty Natalegawa, will also receive honorary doctorates from the university this week.

http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2016/...-doctorate

The only thing these two muppets should be given is a giant foot up the arse. What an effing joke.

[Gobbledock]

“So he’s a c***,”. “So what?”

Interesting article below. I hope you're reading this Goldman Sachs Turnbull and Bill Short'one. 2017 is being called the 'Year of the populist'. The silent are getting a voice and the sleepy are awakening. The article pretty well sums up why a drongo like Trump walked straight into the Oval Office of the street. The days of red power tie wearing Wall Street bankers and Oxford graduates running countries (running them into the ground) is losing its flavour. Your bullshit veil has been lifted and the people are having a voice;

This is why it doesn’t matter when Donald Trump lies
JANUARY 23, 20178:15PM

AMERICA: White House Launches Attack on Media During Inauguration Weekend January 21

IN the dying days of the Gillard government, as the PM and the Labor Party lay prostrate in the polls, factional hardheads contemplated the once unthinkable: A return to Kevin Rudd.

Rudd was politically more dangerous and electorally more popular. The only catch was just about everybody in the ALP hated him.

But when this reservation was put to one party elder he simply shrugged his shoulders.

“So he’s a c***,” he said. “So what?”

In other words, in politics it doesn’t matter whether you’re a c*** or not. All that matters is whether you’re a c*** that wins.

On November 8, 2016, around 63 million Americans reached the same conclusion about Donald Trump. They felt so angry, so abandoned by the system, that they were prepared to vote for anyone who promised to tear it down.

“But,” protested the establishment, “he’s a vulgar, sexist, racist, uncouth, billionaire reality TV star!”

“So what?” they said.

It wasn’t that they liked or even agreed with all the crazy stuff he said, it was that they just didn’t care — and they liked that he didn’t seem to care either. They didn’t vote for him because he insulted war heroes or assaulted women, they voted for him despite that. Because they were so pissed off with the usual political establishment they were prepared to get in bed with Satan himself if that was what it took to upend it.

Unfortunately many in the American left and liberal media still seem wholly incapable of seeing what drove Donald Trump to power and are thus hopelessly ill-equipped to remove him from it. The only trick in the playbook seems to be to dig up one more scandal, one more “gotcha” moment, and hope that this will be the one that sinks him.

If Einstein is right that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result then it’s not Trump who is the crazy one.

This brings us to the latest outrage about Trump’s inauguration numbers and the fact that he has been caught out shamelessly making claims about crowd numbers that are demonstrably untrue.

But the real question isn’t whether Trump’s numbers were bigger than Obama’s or not or whether he was lying about the turnout. It’s “So what?”

For example, The Huffington Post covered the crowd size issue with the headline: “Trump And His Press Secretary Flagrantly Lied On Their First Full Day In Office. That Matters.”

Actually, no it doesn’t. If Trump talking crap mattered even remotely to his supporters Hillary Clinton would be in the White House right now.

After all, they just voted for a guy who bragged about grabbing women by the pussy; it’s unlikely they’ll turn on him for bragging about crowd numbers. If that is the best strategy Trump’s opponents can come up with he might just get another four years.

Indeed, one of the great ironies of the Trump phenomenon is that the US political and media establishment is so assured of its own intelligence and so convinced of Trump’s idiocy yet is constantly being outsmarted by him. And it is questionable whether Trump is even trying.

When it comes to promises and policy Trump is the human equivalent of a million monkeys at a million typewriters. He just blurts out whatever thought pops into his head whenever it does so. Far from deliberately crafting deceptions, there appears to be little if any deliberation at all.

Instead it his critics who seek to ascribe weight and meaning to every untrue or uncouth statement while Trump just drops bombs and moves on.

He made his latest comments after veering off script at a CIA function, saying the crowds “went all the way back to the Washington monument” despite clear photographic evidence they did not.

For Trump it was all over in a matter of seconds while to counter him The Huffington Post used three reporters, more than a dozen sources and almost 1000 words. And I doubt it changed a single vote.

Indeed, the problem with being perpetually offended and outraged by everything Trump says and does is that it’s exhausting, while being Donald Trump is a breeze. If this is a war of attrition he’s already won.

There is also the very real possibility that Trump doesn’t even know he’s lying. As the great George Costanza has taught us: “It’s not a lie if you believe it!”

And so, with a completely straight face, Trump told an audience at CIA headquarters “I am so behind you” despite publicly rubbishing its work just a couple of weeks earlier.

A former presidential aide told me she’d heard the atmosphere in the room at the CIA function was excruciating but Trump cheerfully tweeted afterwards:

“Had a great meeting at CIA Headquarters yesterday, packed house, paid great respect to Wall, long standing ovations, amazing people. WIN!”

Like The Great Gatsby’s Tom and Daisy Buchanan, Trump sows chaos then simply retreats back into his own happy world. And like Homer Simpson, he appears able to eradicate all memories of any unpleasantness and replace them with nymphs dancing around a maypole.

And this is what the US political and media establishment still don’t seem to get: They keep complaining that Donald Trump is breaking the rules yet Trump is not even playing the same game.

Indeed, with Trump even the laws of nature are contestable. When challenged about the bogus crowd claims his adviser Kellyanne Conway said they were simply “alternative facts”. Wicked.

This is the much talked about “post-truth world”, in which fake news and real news are indistinguishable and facts are simply whatever you believe.

The great irony is that just like the invading aliens in Independence Day — the most instructive political documentary ever made — Trump is using the left’s own defence systems against it.

Thanks to the complaint that Hillary Clinton lost the US election because of the spread of fake news (which mysteriously only seemed to infiltrate midwestern swing states) Trump now just declares any news report he doesn’t like to be fake. And given the sloppy desperation by some outlets to discredit him in some cases he may even be right.

Besides, it was the left who invented post-truth in the first place. Long before the internet started throwing up conspiracy theories or bogus stories, postmodern academics were encouraging their students to challenge notions of rationality or objective reality. Trump and his supporters are just doing the same thing off campus.

So maybe Trump’s a liar, maybe he’s a c*** or maybe he’s just a fool. So what?

Instead of getting outraged by everything he says over and over again or protesting his very existence, Trump’s opponents should find out why people voted for him in the first place and offer them a better alternative.

After all, if he’s as bad as they say he is how hard can that be?

http://www.news.com.au/world/north-ameri...ddb87eebe9

Can you hear that clock ticking Malcolm, Barn'baby and the 'eloquently manscaped super beautiful human Chester'? That's your political clock ticking down to zero. Hmmm, the USA, France, Spain, soon to be Germany and then........Straylia.

TICK TOCK most definitely

[Peetwo]

Being err..Trumped, Trumpefied, Trumpeted...

Excellent catch Gobbles...   

Along the same theme I note that Janet Albrechtesen wrote an equally enlightening piece in the Weekend Oz :

President Trump: la-la land still doesn’t get the big disrupter

New York’s finest stand guard outside Trump Tower in New York.

• Janet Albrechtsen
  
• The Australian
  
• 12:00AM January 21, 2017
  

Columnist
Sydney
@jkalbrechtsen
[img=0x0]http://pixel.tcog.cp1.news.com.au/track/component/author/0a4bdd8b11e675171253a4b174dab20c/?esi=true&t_product=the-australian&t_template=s3/austemp-article_common/vertical/author/widget&td_bio=false[/img]
Crossing Fifth Avenue on to East 57th Street in New York this past week, a policeman manning the corner grunts a rhetorical: “Where ya’ goin’?” Everyone passing through the inquisition is headed to one place — the 58-storey Trump Tower between East 56th and East 57th.

The shining gold tower that once screamed the success of a celebrity businessman now marks the remarkable arrival of Donald J. Trump, 45th President of the United States.

A few metres beyond the corner, a young blonde employee from the nearby Chanel store complains sales have plunged 38 per cent because gun-toting police, guard rails and cement blocks impede the joy of shopping. Her moan about Chanel losing money won’t echo beyond the Manhattan bubble.

A few steps further, at the entrance to Trump’s golden tower, a mother barks at her young son to look happy as she photographs him standing near half a dozen of New York’s finest holding machine­guns, with fingers close to the triggers.

“But I’m not happy. You haven’t bought me anything,” the child grumbles, oblivious to what all the fuss is about.

Inside, it’s arguable whether the permanent posse of journalists filling the foyer with their cameras pointed at the gold elevators comprehend what the fuss is about ­either. A coup for them is The Don­ald stepping out from the elevator.

He’s done that just five times in two months, a journalist tells me. Most days, they are lucky to see a visitor to Trump’s 26th-floor office.

A wider and longer lens is needed to understand why Trump has become President of the US. Start by juxtaposing Hollywood’s latest offering, La La Land, with Hillbilly Elegy, a book that sits at No 1 on The New York Times’ bestseller list.

The former is a movie by Hollywood about Hollywood and lauded by Hollywood’s Golden Globe awards.

In fact, it’s a second-rate, try-hard musical with an insipid plot and singing that wouldn’t pass first-round auditions on American Idol. But in Hollywood they are going gaga over La La.

Hillbilly Elegy, by contrast, digs deep into an America that couldn’t be further from the aptly named La La Land. Its a gritty, gut-wrenching memoir of a class of American outsiders worn down by lost jobs, cast adrift from a foreign culture, left behind by Wall Street and forgotten by Washington.

Without mentioning Trump’s name, the book by JD Vance, a hillbilly from Kentucky, explains why millions of outsiders were drawn to another outsider, albeit a very wealthy one, who rose to become president.

More than anything else Trump said during his colourful and controversial campaign, a few words that resonated the most: “Drain the swamp.” Three words that are as visual as they are ­visceral.

[img=558x366]http://cdn.thinglink.me/api/image/878753626028244994/1024/10/scaletowidth#tl-878753626028244994;1043138249'[/img]

Trump’s inauguration marks the triumph of the voiceless outsider over the self-proclaimed superior class.

After decades of being ignored by institutional elites, the primeval, gut reaction of outsiders was to teach the insider class a lesson. Big-time, by embracing a man who has altered not just the tone of politics but also the locus of political power, not to mention its method of operation. And that’s why, not even a day in, Trump’s presidency already demands a prominent place in history.

No political insider could get away with what Trump has said about everyone from Mexicans to Muslims, from fat people to prisoners of war. Who else but Trump could say that he prefers a soldier who is not taken prisoner by the enemy? Establishment politicians are trapped in a rule book they have written over decades. They would be fleeced, if not outright destroyed, by the first whiff of a possible pussy-grab or a spray at minorities or the obese.

Trump has been able to break every rule because millions of Americans were ready to look beyond the literal to the symbolic — a man taking on decades of political correctness, saying things with enough of a kernel of truth to resonate not just in hillbilly Appalachian territory but the suburbs of Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania.

While Democratic presidential heir apparent Hillary Clinton campaigned and partied with celebrities and rock stars, Trump’s rise was fuelled by outright disdain for the sanctimonious ruling cartel that has hogged politics and hijacked culture for the past four decades.

Trump breaks the rules daily, hourly, even by the minute via Twitter not just because he is an outsider who can, but because the very breaking of the rules delivers him support from voters who have had enough of the DC rule book that has sidelined their concerns.

From building a wall — a symbol of controlling borders — to speaking honestly about Islamic terrorism and blue-collar jobs sacrificed to globalisation, Trump understands human nature better than the professional political class.

When asked during a Tuesday interview on Fox News about celebrities who said they declined to attend or sing at his inauguration, Trump said they weren’t invited. “I don’t want the celebrities. I want the people.” (Big tick.)

Trump slays every sacred cow of tone and substance with delight, understanding the more conniptions he causes to the Left, the more he secures his place as the outsider willing to drain the swamp of progressive pieties that long ago hijacked politics and culture from mainstream Americans.

This week when Obama commuted the 35-year sentence of Chelsea Manning (formerly Bradley Manning, before transitioning to a woman) who leaked almost 750,000 pages of highly classified information, it helped Trump. Also this week, business and political elites decamped to Davos on someone else’s dime to schmooze. Davos delegates were invited to simulate life as a refugee by crawling around on hands and knees pretending to flee from persecution. That will help Trump.

Last week, The New York Times Magazine described Trump’s son in-law, Jared Kushner, as “president-in-law”. While political and media elites gnash teeth over Kushner becoming de facto president, beyond this bubble, it doesn’t matter a jot that Kushner, another political outsider, will be one of Trump’s closest and most trusted advisers.

The success of Trump’s presidency won’t hinge on Washington’s rule book, and what media and political elites expect of him. His presidency will succeed or fail on whether he delivers to those ignored by Washington: creating jobs and boosting economic growth, controlling US borders, eschewing political correctness and staying true to what his presidency represents.

It’s a political rupture that the la-la land Left is yet to ­understand.

Plus on twitter Brendan O'Neill seems to be in the know when the question was asked - "TRUMP?! HOW DID THIS HAPPEN??" :

MTF...P2