Australian Politics

Politics in australia has become so predictable, that i could write labours policy overview just by reading the liberal policy sheet and doing the opposite. It seems John Howard says one thing, then Rudd disagrees, not because he has any original ideas but he plays the for and against game of winning votes. Not once through australian history have i heard a prime minister do things he knew were going to be extremely unpopular to the voting public. I mean , if you were coming up to an election and you knew 70% of people were against joining the war in iraq, the sane thing to do would be wipe your hands clean of it and say "no war for aussie troops". John Howard doesn't do things because they are popular, he does them because they are the morally right thing to do. Whatching a show this afternoon called "saddams road to hell" , the show confirmed to me that ridding the world of saddam "at all costs" was nessesary. About a decade ago, saddams troops murdered over 8000 people and buried their bodies in shallow graves in the centre of iraq. This show was the story of the now free iraqi people digging up the bones to finaly give peice of mind to loved ones that had been "waiting" for their safe return or confirmation of their deaths. As skeleton after skeleton was removed from these shallow graves, clues were given to how each person was brutally murdered, some where blind folded and shot, others seemed to have been bounded and buried alive, small children were thrown in pits with their mothers. body after body was exumed and added to the pile for identification.

Over 8000 people were found in this one area, and searches are still uncovering grave sites all over iraq, so the number of people murdered may never be known.

Saddam was the modern day hitler, he controlled his army and used them in the genecide of his own people. Saddam tried to invade kuwait, hitler tried to invade europe. Both these men needed to be stopped.

In america, if you plan to kill someone and murder them, depending on which state your in, you yourself will be killed, if you take ONE life, you are no longer fit to coincide with society. So why does someone who kills more then 10 000 people not become a worldwide priority to invade a country and remove that person from society. Morally it should of been done the instant the americans new about the crimes, but there was a coruption of interests "oil".

America probally had some idea of Saddams ways in the begining of his reign, but to interfere would of meant loosing access to the vast amounts of oil iraq produces. So rather then make waves, they turned a blind eye to it all, sent donald rumsfeild to iraq on the odd occasion to sip tea and pose for the cameras, just to confirm their right to iraqi oil supplys.

The kuwait war was an exercise of the might of america, and the protection of kuwait and saudi arabias oil feilds, but it did lead to an important idea.....that saddam was dangerous and must be stopped. Clinton tried to rid him from the earth, but failed, but the negative exposure damaged saddams image, leaving him open for a future attack.

Then 9/11. Basicly what followed was a desition of the american goverment to either retreat or attack, and i dont think terrorist cells bargained on george bush to attack in such a way as to knock down their doors and enter their country.

Now, going back to politics, and in paticular the buffoon known as Kevin rudd. He is the ultimate vote junkie, i dont think a word comes out of his mouth without the little voice inside his head saying "will this win me votes" Of course thats what his hired to do , try and win an election, but i think smart australians will see through his "for and against ideals"

Recent debates in parliment have shown a side of kevin which i think the whole of australia should whatch, Firstly he is an extremely arrogant individual, asking the same questions over and over again, trying to "catch" the prime minister on a technicallity or his beloved phrase

"did you not say, on the 12th october 2003 that.....blah ,blah,blah.

Basiclly he has no real original input to make other then look through the prime ministers last 10 years of office and "find" contradictions and mistakes.

Then, once he asks such a question, rather then listening to the answer, he sits down, starts fumbling through his paperwork titled "The life and times of J Howard" and appears to ignore the answer, like he's so happy with the question that the answer is not worth listening to. On top of this, he also turns his back and speaks to fellow labour colleagues, like a child ignoring an authority figure. Kevin knows the retreat of the coalition troops prematuraly will devastate iraq and lead to the regrouping of terrorist cells, but he also knows the voting public dont really care what happens to iraquis, as long as aussie troops are safe in there own beds and he becomes prime minister, he will be fulfilled and thats why he will not answer the question posed to him by the prime minister.

The funniest thing in the recent debate over john howards comments about senater obama policy of troop withdrawel, is rudd wants to say "you have damaged ties with a person who may well be the new resident of the united staes" well yes thats correct, but at the start of the war the labour goverment condemmened george bush for going to war , and on many occasions stated that bush and blair had alterior motives for the war and that both both bush and blair lied to the world about weapons of mass destruction. I'm sure from where george bush was sitting he would of found those comments damaging in nature, and he WAS, still is , and could still be the president for the next few years.

So it seems rudd thinks the practice of having a say is irresponsible if it comes from john howards mouth but it's ok for him to have an opinion because,,,, well i don't know to be honest. Rudd will be the worst thing to happen to this country, because his going to follow the popular vote rather then the "right thing to do "actions. combined with the affiliation with the unions, and his inexperianced labour team, i am scared to see labour come into power.

The years before john howard was elected were statiscally atrocious, foreign dept was massive, unemployment was high, taxes were scattered and difficult to understand. He has been tough and unpopular , but at school i seem to remeber the tough and unpopular teacher were the ones who tought you the most. you might of disliked them { dont get me wrong "i" like john howard}

but at the end of the day they acted and behaved that way to get the best out of you,

Making money from the web

Now that i run my own buisness i have found time to try and enlarge my earnings using the net, ebay is a great source, as i can sell stuff that i don't need ,or even sell stuff that i manufacture {like water features i build}. In the last few days i have sold about 50 bucks worth of stuff, and it seems there are some cool people using ebay to get a bargain. so i have have a great deal of confidence in the ebay system. The other alternative is online surveys and compitions. At first glance it sound very rewarding to join such sites to earn "reward points" which accumulate to real money rewards, but can you really get money for opinions? In the last few days i have signed up for a dozen or so of these type of money making options and so far it looks like i have $1.80 worth of rewards.

Basiclly most sites offer you a chance to accumalate reward points, the more surveys you answer the more money you are offered, but is it really worth my time to be involved in such offers.The typical advertising behind these sites is answering questions to make money, the more surveys you answer the more points you are rewarded, meaning the more money you can "aquire".
So far it seems i have spent alot of time answering questions, with very little "reward points" being given, but the main premise is "we will email you more surveys which offer better reward points, and so far i haven't received any of these high paying surveys. Now ,although i have only been involved in these sites a few days i just have to wonder if these promises will be fulfilled. Who knows , i may just be inendated with high paying surveys very soon, but chances are the original questionare is there main focus. Of course market research plays a huge role in larger buisnesses, they want to know what people are willing to purchase via the net, but the chances someone can make decent amounts of money just by answering a few questions seems a bit too good to be true
What i did notice is that the majority of these sites offer a bonus if you "tell a friend", similar to a multi level marketing buisness. They say"Tell ten friends, and when those ten friends tell ten freinds each we will give you ....such and such" . a paticular example was a site i saw which claimed it would give me a digital camera or an xbox 360 if the above process was fulfilled. I looked through my contacts and thought "fuck yeah, i have ten people to email" but then i also thought "those ten people wouldn't be bothered emailing ten people and would delete the email as soon as they read it." and a spose i would be the same.
A little bit later i realised there are alot of people who are looking to make a few dollars via the internet, in one way or the other, and a wondered if there was a way to use contacts in such a way to build up process of "recomending"

For instance, it's extremely easy for me to make another email adress, lets say i made one "damos surveys@hotmail.com" and then ten people who read this blog sign up for an account using "there name"survey@hotmail.com. i would be able to recomend that paticular account as a potential person to survey. you would then log into the site , complete the survey and then be given the choice of "recomending a freind" Now this is where the catch is....

if you were then to reccomend ten contacts, and the other nine people did the same. i personally "would" {unless theres a loop hole i do not see} be rewarded a digital camera. Now of course that means there are 100 people involved in the system, but the internet has millions of people hunting for "money making options" but the beauty would be the system would be there "to be utilised the next time a survey panel offers such a reward system"

What it really means is having a seperate account for "surveys"which you log into maybe once a week, surveys which are found by me. Alot of of the surveys don't actually give you an actual prize , they might give you extra "reward points" but if you accumalte these points and prizes it's money you can make just for a few minutes of your time.

Of course at this stage the only person benefiting grately would be me, except for minmal reward ponts gained by yourself, but once ten people are my contacts, any other person to join would be added to your system, below you so as you yourself would have a contact list of ten.

Once a system is set up, the only real thing for each person to do is check there emails for surveys, complete the survey then " recomend all of there contacts to the site"

To me, i think it would work, and prizes/bonuses could then be sold on ebay for profit, and also the sites do give you a little bit of money for the involvement. My counter says nearly 1000 people have seen my site, if only 25% of those people reacted to such a system that would mean 250 people would be invoved, which would bag myself and quite a few others a substantial reward.
I would apreciate any feed back on the system, positive or negative. tell me what you think and we could always give it a trial run to see if it works

The birth of MEGAFEATURES

At last, i have created a buisness. Over the last few years i have trialed and partaken in a few different ideas regarding buisness adventures, and most {actually all} of these haven't evolved.

{ which is probally a good thing"} From Gambling to greyhounds , from plants to "multi level marketing" I was always on the forefront of "i'm gonna do" buisness adventures. But now finally the step has been taken to commit to this buisness, not because i'm out of ideas but because this IS the idea. A brief stint at flower power has showed me that water features & fishponds is something that i can excell in, and working with this idea i can grow my buisness into not only a maintenance and construction based buisness but also produce water features for retail sale. Everything related to this industry interests me,,,from pond plants to fish species, from cement statues to water fountains, somewhere throughout my life these aspects have taken an interest to me.
As "i" look back over the last few years, i now see the evolving of Megafeatures. From the small plaster of paris sphynx i tried to chisel, to the two shelf plant shelving i nailed together, Two things were common....education and creation.........and it will be these two things which will build my buisness into something alot of people don't expect it to be.
An extremely important part of that education comes as a surprise, but i feel it must be said, but my time with amway WAS not a waste of time.....or money.........I may not have made any money....in fact it cost me a bit of money and possibly a few freinds along the way, but the "life education" which i gathered from the experiance has been beneficial...and i now realise that not once have i ever said to myself "that was a mistake"....and infact if i saw a way to build an amway buisness again i would jump at the chance....because the idea is right ,,,it's just a matter of finding people who belive the idea is right for them at THAT precise time in their lives..
Amway taught me how to be a buisness person,,and what it would be like to be "in charge"of a buisness. I had proof of this when i took over paint wholesalers revesby. The previous year before i took over as manager the store turnover was about 180 000. My first year turnover was just under 250 000 and the year that i left it was just over 300 000. And the reason for this was that i followed the amway mindset...."make a friend, make a costomer, not just a sale"
Theres hundreds of books around that teach you "self help" techniques but the ultimate has to be "how to win friends and influence people". I remember it was the first book that shane my amway "dude?" gave me. i read the first few chapters and was hooked, not only that ,was eager to put the ideas to good use. And from day one i could see the results in the sales.
Just before i left the paint shop, i lost the motivation to continue with the attitude, infact, motivation not here, and it combined with other circumstances shook the foundations of those around me. They were the best of times , followed by the worst of times....you gain a friend, then loose a friend, but the education involved is priceless.........{S>Q}