Re your reply about Tony Abbott's strengths, which read: "the strength to get Australia out of the shit that labor and the greens got them into."
That's clearly wrong!
From the same article from Paddy Gourley I quoted from earlier: "... The 'deficit disaster' is essentially the responsibility of a government in which Abbott, Hockey and the ever colourful Kevin Andrews were ministers. ..."
"... Responsibility for the budget deficit can be more widely shared. It's the cumulative product of decisions taken over many years, including by Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard but also others before and after them. Indeed, Abbott can put his hand up on account of his generous maternity-leave scheme, trying to drop the carbon and minerals taxes, and his absurd promise, against the recommendation of Tony Shepherd's audit commission, to restore defence spending to 2 per cent of gross domestic product.
Since 1945, significant budget surpluses have been achieved only rarely: once by Ben Chifley, three times by Bob Hawke, and eight times by John Howard, who shared another with Rudd, who was elected during the 2007-08 fiscal year. ..."
