Fine line between pleasure, polls as Plibersek snubs 18C survey

Plus ‘The Credlin Eye for the Government Guy’ changes Australian men’s fashion forever.

Phillip Hudson reports on growing support to change 18C, The Australian, yesterday:

The poll of 1000 people taken last month shows 48 per cent approve of calls to remove the words “insult” and “offend” from section 18C, an increase of three points from the previous survey in November. Some 36 per cent of people were opposed to the change. down from 38 per cent

Tanya Plibersek poo-poos the poll, RN Breakfast, yesterday:

Being able to insult and offend people on the basis of race is not a mainstream issue. What are we really lacking in Australia in terms of free speech?

Plibersek protests policy by poll? Oh please, House of Representatives, May 2, 2016:

We don’t need a plebiscite. The Parliament can, and should, get marriage equality done.

Seven in ten Australians support marriage equality.

A total of 48 per cent approved of Labor’s plebiscite stance, The Australian, September 27, 2016:

More Australians now support a vote by politicians in parliament to decide whether to allow same-sex marriage than the Coalition’s election promise to hold a national plebiscite next February, according to a special Newspoll.

The Australian’s surveys once had Bill Shorten smiling, Twitter, September 27, 2016:

The more Aus hear about Mr Turnbull’s plebiscite the less they like it. Parli should do its job & have a free vote.

Polls show the more Australians hear about 18C the less they like it, Mr Shorten, Victorian Labor Party Conference, November 13, 2016:

Friends, we think safeguards against hate speech will not create one single new job. Giving a green light to racism won’t support traffic jams on the south eastern freeway. Softening the Racial Discrimination Act won’t help pensioners in Frankston pay their bills. This is a vendetta driven by prejudice — aided and abetted by a (Liberal) leader too weak to say no.

Who cares about polls anyway? Not Bill and Tanya, AAP, October 31, 2016:

Tanya Plibersek remains well ahead of Bill Shorten as favoured Labor leader, sitting on 25 per cent ahead of Anthony Albanese on 24 per cent — with Mr Shorten unchanged on 14 per cent. Ms Plibersek has been the preferred Labor leader in the last four polls.

After all, free speech isn’t a mainstream issue, The Australian, yesterday:

I PA director of policy Simon Breheny said the poll also showed that 95 per cent of Australians rated freedom of speech as important with 57 per cent saying it was very important.

And former Prime Minister’s chief of staff Peta Credlin has one message for Australia’s male politicians: sharpen up your work attire, The Spectator Australia website, yesterday:

Grown men who persist with a dinky schoolboy knot just amplify the fact that they haven’t grown up. Even worse is the MP who thinks a full Windsor is a good option ...

Never forget the cardinal rule of buttoning the suit closed ...

Aside from their wife, the politician’s closest relationship should be with his iron ... closely followed by a tin of nugget. I was known at university to kill off an otherwise worthy suitor if his shoes were a slip-on style, had velcro or any variation thereof.