Game on: PUP veterans, Greens pacifists, journalism slacktivists, take your best shot!
FOR Jacqui Lambie, the rallying call is God, Queen, country — and Clive, always Clive.
Lambie rattles the sabre after Clive Palmer’s China gaffe, August 18:
IF there’s one thing I’ve learnt after serving my country in the Australian Defence Force for 11 years and listening closely to our veterans, it’s this: The price of liberty is eternal vigilance.
Nope. Just for the boss. Lambie interjects in the Senate yesterday:
NO more dead soldiers!
Never forget the real enemy — America. Christine Milne in parliament, yesterday:
WE are simply running behind President Obama.
Scott Ludlam has his 10c worth:
WE are once again ... acting at the behest of the United States government, not the people of Australia.
Bill Shorten tries to explain the situation to them in the House of Representatives, yesterday:
THIS is not 2003 ... Today the Iraqis are seeking our assistance.
And like it or not, there are Australians already in Iraq. Julie Bishop on ABC Radio’s AM, yesterday:
I BELIEVE Australia has a responsibility, particularly given that there are Australians involved in fighting with ISIS, indeed I understand that there are Australians who figure prominently in the leadership of this barbaric terrorist organisation
Activist journalists doth protest too much. Jenna Price shoots the messenger in her Twitter response to Sharri Markson’s report, yesterday:
POOR Shaari (sic). Doesn’t realise the difference between a columnist and a reporter.
As does Margo Kingston:
@SharriMarkson activist non-journalism by used-to-be-a-newspaper
And Wendy Bacon:
@SharriMarkson so remarkably lacking in selfreflection on your activism & understanding of Journalism & it’s (sic) history. People laugh at you
Problems of policy implementation. Sir Humphrey, Yes Minister, 1981:
I DO see that there is a real dilemma here in that while it has been government policy to regard policy as a responsibility of ministers and administration as a responsibility of officials, the questions of administrative policy can cause confusion between the policy of administration and the administration of policy, especially when responsibility for the administration of the policy of administration conflicts, or overlaps with, responsibility for the policy of the administration of policy.
What it means. Report of the Royal Commission into the Home Insulation Program by Ian Hanger:
WHILE I do not doubt that the officials working on the HIP were busy, I question whether they were being utilised effectively. When the public servants, therefore, speak of great pressure in their work associated with the HIP, I would question how much of the work they did was directed in an efficient sense to fulfilment of substantive tasks.
What happens. Hanger again:
MUCH of the work of officials ... was directed to process, and process which came at the expense of substance. Endless emails were exchanged, and meetings and committees were convened. Very many officials (probably too many) attended the meetings with industry. Yet no one was able, despite this, to see that the Risk Register had omitted an important risk ... Much of the (HIP) work ... is likely to have been misdirected and to have drawn resources, time and attention away from very important matters of substance which were either entirely overlooked or deliberately ignored ...
And how it happens. More Hanger:
PUBLIC officials ... focus on process at the expense of substance. They may be busier than they once were, but I do think that much of their effort is poorly directed to the more agreeable and easier activities of process rather than substantive action.