Tony Abbott

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(Leader of the Opposition)
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He's a fan of [[Rupert Murdoch]], which surprises no one, and wants to stop the flow of refugee boats arriving in Australia's northwest. Nearly every Australian newspaper and magazine endorsed Abbott for the position of Prime Minister, doubtlessly due to Murdoch's hand of influence.
 
He's a fan of [[Rupert Murdoch]], which surprises no one, and wants to stop the flow of refugee boats arriving in Australia's northwest. Nearly every Australian newspaper and magazine endorsed Abbott for the position of Prime Minister, doubtlessly due to Murdoch's hand of influence.
  
In the lead-up to the election, he made international headlines for referring to the "suppository of all wisdom."<ref>[http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2013/08/12/abbott-ridiculed-after-suppository-gaffe Oh Christ.]</ref> [[Stopped clock|To be fair]], he's opposed to involvement in [[Syria]], assessing that it's "baddies against baddies" over there.
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In the lead-up to the election, he made international headlines for referring to the "suppository of all wisdom."<ref>[http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2013/08/12/abbott-ridiculed-after-suppository-gaffe Oh Christ.]</ref> He's also opposed to involvement in [[Syria]], assessing that it's "baddies against baddies" over there.
  
 
==Prime Minister==
 
==Prime Minister==

Revision as of 03:22, 9 September 2013

The suppository of wisdom himself!
Tony "Load of Crap"[1] Abbott is the Coalition Prime Minister-elect of Australia, joining Canada as the second openly wingnut Prime Minister elected in the British Commonwealth in the 21st century.

Aussies, we wish you good luck.

Contents

Early life

Originally a boxer and a Catholic priest, Abbott was born from an Australian mother and an England-born Australian father, hence why he was elected Prime Minister despite being born in London, England (a la Julia Gillard). Earlier in his life, Abbott "saved a child who was swept out to sea. Another time, he helped save children from a burning house next to a pub where he was drinking. On each occasion, he disappeared before he could be properly thanked."

When he was employed as a journalist for The Bulletin (and later for The Australian newspaper), he was actually being courted by his friends in the Australian Labor Party to join office under their party banner, but even then, he felt uncomfortable with the role of the evil unions and declined (instead befriending Coalition Prime Minister John Howard, who convinced him to run for office as a Liberal). In 1994 he became the Representative of the Division of Warringah, a position he's held to date, and served as Minister for Health in Howard's cabinet.

This early into his career, Abbott opposed an abortion drug known as RU-486, and the Parliament voted to strip Health Ministers of the power to regulate this area of policy. He also attracted criticism for suspiciously long delays in funding for cancer diagnostic equipment (PET scanners). Abbott saw reducing the number of abortions performed each year as a national priority, promising to launch an investigation into a product called Pink or Blue, produced by an American firm called Consumer Genetics.[2]

Nevertheless, he was surprisingly on the money when he opposed Howard's WorkChoices industrial program (which exempted companies from unfair dismissal laws and restricted workers' ability to strike) on the basis that the legislation exceeded the government's mandate, was harsh on workers and was politically dangerous to the government. As Minister for Health, he created the Nurse Family Partnership, a long term scheme aimed at improving conditions for indigenous youth by improving mother-child relationships. The scheme was successful in reducing child abuse and improving school retention rates, which was uncharacteristically nice of him. He also introduced the Medicare Safety Net to cap the annual out-of-pocket costs of Medicare cardholders to a maximum amount, basically making it cheaper by introducing a restriction on how much they need to pay for it.

Leader of the Opposition

After a short stint as Shadow Minister, Abbott became Leader of the Opposition on December 2009, where he turned into a gaffe-spouting machine. On the subject of homosexuality, he admitted that "I'd probably feel a bit threatened [when near a homosexual] ... it's a fact of life and I try to treat people as people and not put them in pigeonholes." He has since apologized for this spillover, but it wouldn't be the only PR-harming thing he's said, as he's also an opponent of embryonic stem cell research and euthanasia.

He has an unsavory track record on comments regarding women. He praised a fellow electoral candidate for her "sex appeal" as opposed to her policies or stances, or anything else, really. When he bragged about having better-than-average-looking daughters, questions rose over whether or not he was just a very proud father or rather sexist for indicating that he's most proud of his daughters' looks as opposed to everything else. Considering his further attacks on Gillard's gender, like standing next to a sign that read "Ditch The Witch", we might be a bit suspect.

Abbott denies climate change (calling it "absolute crap"), but recognized that it's politically suicidal for him not to cater to voters who know AGW is real. Therefore, he weaseled his way into saying that he denies that humans cause global warming, only to then acknowledge that climate change is real and humans do contribute to global warming, but that there shouldn't be anything done about it. Abbott actively opposes the idea of a carbon tax, claiming it would be the world's largest, despite it being one of the lowest effective rates in OECD countries.[3]

He's a fan of Rupert Murdoch, which surprises no one, and wants to stop the flow of refugee boats arriving in Australia's northwest. Nearly every Australian newspaper and magazine endorsed Abbott for the position of Prime Minister, doubtlessly due to Murdoch's hand of influence.

In the lead-up to the election, he made international headlines for referring to the "suppository of all wisdom."[4] He's also opposed to involvement in Syria, assessing that it's "baddies against baddies" over there.

Prime Minister

He competed with Kevin Rudd (who unseated Gillard as Leader of Labor and Prime Minister) over the 2013 federal elections, winning the first truly majority government since the end of World War II. During his speeches after the victory, he declared that Australia is under new management and that Australia is once more "open for business," whatever that implies.

Quotes before he became Prime Minister

"No-one, however smart, however well-educated, however experienced, is the suppository of all wisdom, and I believe that we will be a much better government because we have a very strong team."

"What the housewives of Australia need to understand - as they do the ironing - is that if they get it done commercially, it's going to go up in price."

"I think it would be folly to expect that women will ever dominate or even approach equal representation in a large number of areas simply because their aptitudes, abilities and interests are different for physiological reasons."

"Jesus didn't say yes to everyone, Jesus knew there was a place for everything and it's not necessarily everyone's (asylum seekers and refugees) place to come to Australia."[5]

"Same sex marriage? I'm not someone who wants to see radical change based on the fashion of the moment."

"I won't be rushing out to get my daughters vaccinated against cervical cancer."

"If we're honest, most of us would accept that a bad boss is a little bit like a bad father or a bad husband: not withstanding his or her faults you'll find that he tends to do more good than harm. He might be a bad boss, but at least he's employing someone while he is in fact a boss."

"Abortion is the easy way out. It's hardly surprising that people should choose the most convenient exit from awkward situations."

"There may not be a great job for indigenous people, but whatever it is they just have to do it - and if it's picking up rubbish around the community, it just has to be done."

See also

  • Stephen Harper, as previously mentioned.
  • Dan Quayle, whose similarly ridiculous comments are equally hilarious and troubling.

Footnotes

  1. Enjoy your record-breaking heatwaves, ok?
  2. This test is one of several pre-natal blood tests designed to detect the sex of a fetus as early as six weeks into pregnancy. Some pro-life campaigners have raised concerns that it would be used for sex-selective abortion.
  3. Another bullshit rationalization is his oft repeated claim that it is too difficult to measure carbon-dioxide emissions because it is "weightless."
  4. Oh Christ.
  5. Tony Abbott's Asylum Sermon, Adelaide Now
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