Minister for Women
In his desire to distract the general public from the depth and breadth of the country’s increasing contempt for him (with the exception of Gerard Henderson, bless) Prime Minister Tony Abbott has resorted to the good old conservative standby, fear, in an effort to somewhat fancifully reinvent himself as the nation’s protector.
As part of this cunning stunt (no doubt thought out by someone in his office I’m not naming anyone but I wouldn’t employ them to wash my dog and he’s dead) Abbott announced that anyone perceived to be a potential terrorist would no longer be given the benefit of the doubt.
Immigration and Centrelink have been touted by the PM as two possible areas for increased scrutiny. That is, don’t admit possible potential maybe somehow some day terror suspects in the first place. Failing that, it is incumbent on someone behind the Centrelink counter to exclaim oh my! Immigration missed that this person might potentially possibly somehow maybe some day somewhere be a terrorist and I must not give him/her the benefit of the doubt even though Immigration did, damn their eyes, and I’m not giving them any welfare and I have now foiled a terror attack.
Man Haran Monis, perpetrator of the Martin Place Lindt Cafe horror, passed through both Immigration and Centrelink. He was also well-known to police in matters of domestic violence for which he was on bail, and there were a string of allegations of the sexual assault by him of some forty women.
Strangely, we have not heard the Minister for Women Tony Abbott once mention that anyone who perpetrates domestic violence ought to be noted as a potential terror suspect, and definitely not given the benefit of the doubt.
If Immigration and Centrelink are to be burdened with the task of identifying potential terror suspects and withholding the benefit of the doubt, why not police who are at the front line of domestic violence allegations?
Of course, the idea of expecting either Immigration or Centrelink to have the capacity to assess a potential terrorist is ludicrous, as is my suggestion that police assume terrorist potential in every person they arrest for domestic violence.
What is interesting, however, is that Abbott did not even go to the latter option, which out of all of them makes the most sense in a triad of bone-achingly senseless options. Obviously, no agency has the capacity or the training to identify terror suspects unless they are so bleedingly obvious as to have already embarked upon their ghastly vocation.
The number of ways in which the Minister for Women avoids the topic of domestic violence are spectacular. What other Minister in any government ever in the history of Western democracy has remained so consistently silent on his portfolio and kept it?
No Place For Sheep 
Greg Hunt as “Minister for the Environment”?
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Even he has spoken to his portfolio on more occasions than Abbott, but I take your point!
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How can we give this man Abbott for anything that spills out of his mouth. As for him supporting women, well that truly is a joke.
Abbott is on the nose with most people in this country because he is pugilistic by nature & I believe he’s had one punch too many to his head. This is probably now starting to show because there is definitely a disconnect between his brain, his ears & what comes out of his mouth.
I think that the members of his backbench have come to realize that he is now a liability.
Shouldn’t be too long now before he gets his dismissal tap on the shoulder.
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I’m still torn about that – as long as he stays the more likely they will lose the next election. Turnbull could turn that around aaaaargh!!!
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Should have added the words ‘the benefit of the doubt’ after Abbotts’ name in the first sentence. Sorry folks. Got a bit distracted.
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Yep, in the end it comes to down to a fearful denialist mentality.
.Pell, Abbott and many others have known about abuse within religious facilities, for example, but have been unable to respond in an adult manner, any more than they have been able to respond in an adult way to Financialised Capitalism’s form of Globalisation-actually also feudalistic as is the recourse to repressive fundamentalism within society, to also suppress ugly truths and justifiable resistance.
We need leadership, we get dumbed down denialism and reactive violence inside and outside of the West.
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My thoughts exactly!
This gunman, Monis, was known to police and some in the community by the moniker “Fake Sheikh”. He was bailed on multiple charges of sexual assault and one of accessory to murder. He’d been in the country for nearly 20 years having initially worked as a security guard where he was licenced to carry a firearm but later exhibited obvious mental health problems fluctuated wildly in his religious leanings and came to police attention on several occasions initially in connection with hate mail campaigns.
If his isn’t the ultimate litany of red flags over anyone’s character, be it cry for help or big red target saying arrest me NOW, then I don’t know what is?
Yet after all that Abbott expects us to believe that we might’ve caught him if only we’d had access to his metadata!?
As for the wife whose murder Monis was implicated in….. Well, Abbott can’t invent a narrative that serves his political agenda so she doesn’t rate a mention!
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HG, if you had watched tonight’s 4 corners on the unemployment system, you’d know I agree so totally with your comments.
The system has been white anted and corrupted to the extent that for vast numbers of people, an encounter with the systems so-called remedial apparatus is bound to create grief rather than solutions.
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We all know who is the real Minister for Women. She is probably also the Prime Minister, except when Abbott gets off the leash for a captain’s pick.
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