Hello, Mr Abbott? Ms Gillard? I can help you

Eskimo says:

08:00am | 17/02/11

The first concept you learn in economics is Opportunity Cost. The cost of spending money is the lost opportunity on spending the same money on something else, essentially you can’t have your cake and eat it too. Consequently, the more efficiently you spend your money, the lower the Opportunity Cost.

The poor budget management of the Government in blowing the surplus on half-baked schemes means we must now choose between schools on Indonesia and building in Queensland. While both are worthy objectives, we must choose how to split the remaining funds on each.

Tony of Poorakistan says:

08:30am | 17/02/11

Doesn’t read like much of a resume to me.

You are quids in for a job with the ALP, then.

Gregg says:

09:42am | 17/02/11

Somehow, I’m reminded that historians ought to stick with history more so than the present time claims of knowing what might be good or bad policy.
History will show you that spendathon governments need to be followed by a government with greater fiscal responsibility just as if one splurges on their credit card whilst also having a massive housing loan they’ll need to be very conscious of what they can afford.
In Gillards case, she and the likes of Garrett have so much egg on their faces that they are hardly looking more something else for another layer right now, so it’ll be stay out of the firing line as much as possible.
Re the levy and looking at where spending can be readily pruned from that which the government is doing, you ought to have a read of Tory Shepherd’s article on financing of Indonesia and then take a wider view so you know that foreign aid is just one area Tony Abbott had raised.
Abbott and many others believe a government should be fiscally flexible enough that financing of infrastructure works ought to be coped with within the the normal NDRRA arrangements between federal, state and local governments, that also being a historical arrangement of some standing.

But if you want to dress up history as just more support for the ALP, go for it and remind us all of historical failing.

Wilma J Craig says:

10:36am | 17/02/11

Peter M,
You say “Whaling, mercifully, seems to push few of Julia Gillard’s buttons & thankfully that has resulted in smoother Australian/Japanese relations.”
It would appear, Peter, that you support the obscene, totally unnecessary Japanese Whaling Programme. Why? Whilst in Japan did you acquire a taste for it?
The Japanese, rather than earning a little respect by admitting that their entire programme is to kill whales so they can eat them, dishonestly claim their programme is 100% for “Purposes of Scientific Research”. To use an old Australian expression: “That is Bullshit”
Tell me, please, how many years has Japan been indulging itself in this lie? 20? 30? 40? years or more?
By now they should have more than enough of the “scientific knowledge” about Whales than they could possibly ever need or even use.
The entire programme is a disgrace & insult to Humanity.
It would seem that in order to maintain “smooth relations” with Japan you expect the Australian Prime Minister to betray the vast majority of Australians who are opposed to this “Programme of Annihilation”.
Why should we sacrifice our principles in order to keep on-side with Japan or any other country?
Japan would not do it for us.
If our Legitimate Opposition to this outrageous behaviour by Japan is to be buried simply to placate Japan then we may as well tell Japan that, despite their having lost WW2, we have now decided they can absorb Australia into the New Japanese Empire.
Whaling has been shown, proven, call it what you will, to be totally unnecessary for we can manufacture out of many renewable materials every thing which, in the past, these gentle creatures of the deep were hunted for and hunted almost to extinction.
Given your diatribe against Abbott & his Coalition Parties I doubt very much they would even grant you an interview for the position of “Advisor”
Given that the vast majority of Coalition Voters have said they are totally opposed to this Japanese obscenity, it is doubtful they would ever vote for it in the unlikely event you did get such a job.
Though you were very gentle in your treatment of Julia Gillard I doubt very much that you would succeed with the ALP either.
In the event that you did get appointed (every bit as unlikely) Julia may as well resign & quit politics altogether for not only will the Coalition & minor Parties have a field day the Voters of Australia would see to it that at the next Federal Election they did to the ALP what the Japanese are trying to do to Whales. They would be deservedly annihilated.
Stick to teaching History, Peter, it really is a very enthralling & exciting subject.

Alan says:

02:01pm | 17/02/11

Let’s get some history and current events facts straight: Truman did not win “re-election even as he prepared to lay the Marshall Plan before Congress”.  The Marshall Plan, or European Cooperation Act was passed by Congress and signed into law by the president in April 1948; the election was seven months later. European aid and the reconstruction of Germany was proposed in January 1947 and promoted in a speech by Gen George Marshall in June 1947 and delivered more than $13b in aid, not $10b. Tony Abbott did not call for the “scrapping” of the Indonesia education aid program; he considered deferring it.

St. Michael says:

02:13pm | 17/02/11

Poor example of the Marshall Plan.  For one thing, the money spent by the US in the Marshall Plan was *fully repaid* by Germany by the 1980s or so.  Ain’t seeing much repayment from Indonesia.

Second issue is that the US and the Allies were just learning from their mistakes at Versailles 30-odd years earlier.  The war reparations demanded against Germany after WW 1 basically sent the country bankrupt and pushed it into Hitler’s arms.  At least they figured out that you have to help rebuild a Western country after basically blowing it into smithereens with every weapon short of the atomic bomb.  Indonesia, as far as I can see, has not been laid bare by a full scale conventional war recently.