I usually like the Guardian but this is weird and sensationalist by them. I think the conclusions they’re making are a pretty long bow - just coz irrelevant people are saying things doesn’t suddenly make them important. The best way of letting John Howard fade into the past is to not waste ink on him.
People do because times were pretty good under Howard.
They don't realize a lot of the problems we have now (failing health services, expensive private health, housing costs, energy costs etc) are the results of policies he implemented and money he wasted during a once in several life times resources boom.
We could have had a national wealth fund the equivalent of Norway's.
Instead we've got one of the most expensive real estate markets in the world (obviously over simplifying it).
Plus running the Australian War Memorial. The previous LNP government appointed him as part of jobs for mates. Then Labor think he's still the best person for the job when they re-appointed him? I wish I was kidding. Maybe it's a new thing called "jobs for political enemies that have tried to kill the party, unions, etc"?
Uncle Tones doesn't "run" the AWM, he's one of a double-digit number of members of a council chaired by Kim Beazley and containing at least one other retired Labor MP.
I hate the bible-bashing cunt as much as any self-respecting Australian does, but there was nothing inappropriate about extending the tenure of someone from across the aisle in their non-partisan volunteer role.
Indeed, but one could argue his lack of action (or even attempting to reverse progress that had already been made) on climate change rather undoes any work he puts in fighting fires. After all, is it really a good thing that he's fighting fires he actively worked to make worse?
Howard is a cunt but he did at least do gun reform. I'd say I have about the same level of respect for both. Very low, but acknowledge the one good thing they've each done.
The irony though of him firefighting while denying green initiatives aimed at lowering our summer temperatures -- while claiming that the green initiatives would cause housewives to get hit by extra electricity charges when doing their ironing.......
We're so behind where we could have been without the Libs.
Not sure that this in any way makes up for Tony's gifting Prince Philip a knighthood. That was a level of obsequiousness far beyond even that of Menzies fawning over QEII or Holt taking the country into Vietnam for LBJ.
I would say his reputation with the public is more disdain than respect. He is Thatcher lite and we all know people were dancing in the streets when that witch died. Think there will be legit celebrations when this cunt pops his clogs.
Spot on! The current laws would have stopped it easily. The police and other bodies juat didn't do their jobs... its not an isolated incident either. Just a rather horrible and public one.
I'm just gonna assume that he's next in line for liberal leadership. They're now so low on candidates anyone can recognize that they've had to dig him up out of his hole to put him back into the line of succession.
Notably, due to being a conservative politician from the late 90ies/early 2000s, he will accidentally be the most modern, forward thinking and progressive candidate in the entire party.
His views on landline telephones and Pentium desktop computers will undoubtedly cause panic in the party cabinet, as the members struggle to come to grips with these far-fetched, advanced and inherently woke ideas.
Yeah Im not sure the point here. Is it that we’d have a better chance at reform if the states all disagreed? Or that some of the announcements were work in progress from the states already. What “meaningful gun reform” will be missed?
The brightest spot on the stain of Howard’s legacy was the gun reform that passed with bipartisan support across Australia. Now he is pandering to the far right to help ruin the party he once lead.
And that in a most extreme situation when even Howard had to read the writing on the wall. Everything else he did destroyed Australia: Introduced for profit aged care, gave property investors a massive 50% capita gains tax discount, and gave mining and oil companies free reign to strip and plunder Australia.
Imo he did a lot of damage to Australia that is obscured by our country's advantages. We should easily be wealthier on average than Norwegians and even Bostonians and New Yorkers.
Th single biggest issue (besides climate change) can be traced right to Howard, the housing bubble. That demented ghoul ruined housing affordability for myself and millions more people. And he was told at the time by economists that this is exactly what would happen.
Don't forget removing conflict of interest laws for politicians. Turnbull even joked about voting on an issue he had a financial stake in, saying "I shouldn't be allowed to do this."
Pissed away the start of the mining boom on middle class welfare for easy votes. Sold off public assets to prop up a "surplus" (which is like selling the furnite to pay off your credit card). Then all in on "Workchoices" which were individual contracts, not collective bargaining. The AWB clusterfuck and "children overboard" also comes to mind.
He did enormous damage to Australia, but he was electorally very successful. Part of today's problems is that we're still living in Howard's Australia.
My hope is that, in 30 years, we're living in Albo's Australia, long after he's left office. Albo is generally taking his sweet time to build the country we need though
While I would like to see faster action on repairing the damage that Howard and his contemporaries did (and I'm not yet convinced that Albo actually wants to repair that damage), the reality is that fixing things slowly causes less blowback from opposition, and the corporate owned media, allowing him the chance to do more over a longer time, and bake in the progress.
The problems with big fixes quickly is that big changes can cause additional pain in the short term, which the rabid media and opposition can use to beat the government over the head with come election time. This gives them a platform to reverse the changes immediately, completely undoing any good work that has been done, and the cycle continues.
At the moment, the Coalition are an unelectable rabble, and a go slow and make steady improvement approach seems to be the best option. ("seems" is doing a lot of heavy lifting there, because its entirely possible that this situation, or another like it could give the opposition a target to pin them on which would mean they don't actually get to finish the job).
The article above even talks about how John Howards Gun reforms (a good idea by any metric) were a knee jerk reaction, which they were. The problem is, they seem to be advocating for another knee jerk reaction in the guise of "Strong Leadership". Just because a knee jerk reaction worked once, doesn't mean its the best thing in the future, analysis of the issues and situation and a logical solution is a much better way to go about it in reality, but in politics, that is suicide.
Oh I know. I would rather a long-term government that beds in the changes, rather than a revolutionary government that is out in six years with everything ripe for undoing
I agree with you but my view is that Federal terms are too short at every three years to introduce and implement difficult but necessary policy. If we had four or five year terms, like many similar democracies, actual reform might have a chance.
I think just about everyone is in favour of four year terms, but.... Oppositions have an incentive to oppose them at referendums. And, since bipartisan support is a precondition (but not a guarantee) of success, I don't expect change anytime soon. Pity
Keep in mind that Hawke/Keatings pro-capital/anti-worker reforms destroyed Labor's support base, leading to the rise of John Howard to be unopposed for many terms.
Plus, a lot of changes by Howard were easier and possible, because of Labor's neoliberal reforms. Corporatisation of telecom made it easier to sell off Telstra for example. Hawke's anti-strike legislation was enhanced. And more.
Who cares. They lost. Labor has 94 seats in Reps, and only needs one senate vote plus the greens to pass legislation. They can tell the LNP to get stuffed.
True. When the country is looking for leadership when a leadership vacuum is evident, cognitive bias leads us to seeking one that offers a sense of stability in times of crisis. Howard, a type of patriarchal figure appeared when there was significant community distress.
The thing that always gets left out of Howard's gun reform is that Labor threw their support behind it and allowed it through.
Bipartisan support can bring about swift, solid changes. Meanwhile, we have Howard, who's been out of parliament forever, buzzing about like a blow fly with opinions........
Exactly. When Howard was PM, the opposition and cross bench parties put aside all politics and got something important done together, as elected representatives should.
When Howard finally and tragically got a chance to be on the other side, he is mudslinging and playing politics the day after the massacre. What an absolute piece of shit.
Despite destroying Australia and being a war criminal, the one thing he was universally given credit for was gun laws. This absolutely tarnishes the legacy of that one good thing. The behaviour of this pathetic old man is shameful and un-Australian.
Exactly. Being elected to government has never meant “you are now dictators for this electoral term”. Party or not, elected representatives are primarily accountable to the Australian people.
Party politics has really enforced this ridiculous two party system, where party comes before the people, and deliberately stoked this “us and them” mentality. America is the extreme example where people actually identify as a Republican or Democrat in their daily lives, instead of casting their vote and then just getting on with being a citizen of the country as a whole. We have to resist that black and white nonsense thinking here, despite the Murdoch media’s constant propaganda.
My point was more that when the two parties work or stand together, we can have a better, stronger country. When instead there's point scoring, our country gets weaker and more divided.
But with a massive majority federally and Labor governments in every state but QLD there's not really a need for bipartisan support.
Every single time a tragedy has befallen LNP governments, Labor steps in line for full bipartisan support. Shorten even used the "Team Australia" rhetoric that Abbott was using.
Labor didn't even really go hard on the fucking hypocrisy when the Libs were considering watering down gun laws by reducing the restrictions on high-capacity lever-action shotguns soon after the Lindt Siege. (After market modifications would make it 11 rounds, with ~10-12 seconds required to shoot all 11 shots. It's also worth noting that the total reload time is 12-18 seconds.
Does anyone give a shit what Howard says? They brought him out of the nursing home and let him ramble for way too long, it was like listening to your racist great uncle go off at Christmas - everyone just lets him go until he runs out of puff.
The LNP does. He's the only on they have left. ScoMo slinked off to the US with his tail between his legs, Turnbull is seen as a wet mug, and Abbott's reputation was ruined once he became PM (though he still acts as if he really wasn't that unpopular)
I'm certain now the Liberal party are going to find a way to reanimate the corpse of Howard once he finally kicks the bucket, so they can continue to wheel him out in an emergency to get the remainder of his boomer voter base still excited for the LNP.
Hawke/Keating governments deregulated finance sector and made debt easier/cheaper. Here's one article that touches on this:
This liberalisation began in the 1980s, as the Hawke-Keating governments dismantled old regulations, loosening restrictions on credit — allowing foreign banks to provide loans to households — and ultimately creating the conditions where non-bank mortgage lenders proliferated and undercut the traditional big four banks (before eventually being bought out by them).
At the same time, the move to an inflation targeting central bank, started by Keating and cemented by Peter Costello in John Howard’s government, saw interest rates fall and stay consistently lower than they had been for decades.
So, something like a property investor would leverage their property portfolio and take out massive home loans to be able to outbid home buyers for example.
It probably explains why Labor is reluctant to tackle the housing crisis. Tackling the cheap credit may mean they have to admit they had a hand in the housing crisis, so it's easier to just blame the other side.
I dunno really but for me it's less about the current gun laws and more about how these individuals were not detected/their guns taken away/arrested etc etc.
I find it disheartening how we all end up with diminished rights after these things when existing frameworks and laws were sufficient to prevent the event in the first place.
There is a general lack of understanding of how firearm licensing works in Australia, which makes conversations difficult.
I do think we should have a national licensing system, rather than the miss mash of state systems and I think we need a higher level of checks of storage etc.
I like when the Gov promised everyone a national register after the last shooting so that everyone would feel safe, not saying that one already existed that the current state police forces ignored because its too much effort for them
What I said is we should have a unified system because having a state based system means you need additional data transfer between licensing bodies which can result in errors or omissions that didn't need to happen. This was one of the key recommendations after the Wieambilla shooting as a cancelled NSW license was used to buy ammunition in Queensland.
Fair enough. I will be interested in hearing the outcome of the investigation into ASIO and how it didn't preclude the father from having firearms on an association basis. I know some people who have been barred from owning based on the street they live on.
I know someone who had their firearms taken away and a firearms prohibition order issued because of their cousin.
I know someone who had their firearms taken away because their son was charged with assault.
I know someone who had their firearms taken away over a dispute between two of their relatives, not even them
I know someone who has their firearms taken away as they were cleaning them at home when police turned up on an unrelated matter (he got them back after the court case failed)
Allegedly someone in Victoria had their licence suspended over driving offences, but I now can’t find the industry articles on that. I always felt there was more to it.
With all of this, and the existing powers, the states already have the ability to remove firearms if the believe there is a risk, and I think that’s the lynchpin here. Were ASIO or NSW police aware of the risks here
This 100% and most of the options flagged by Albanese are looking at this. I guarantee the other area is sharing of information between the law enforcement branches.
The NFA is state based because we’re a federation of states. Policing occurs at the state level, not federal.
It’s not even legislation, but rather a framework that recommends the minimum standards that states must follow when drafting their legislation.
Inter agency cooperation would be the first step. I know when I had to transition from Vic to NSW back in mid 2010s that there was very little information sharing between Vic pol FRD and NSW Pol FAR and I had to do so much of the leg work to transfer my license and collection from State to state.
Cynically though, the various police departments thought that by devoting such limited resources to firearms that they would hamper new and existing shooters and win a war of attrition. Instead the unintended consequence is that they have also knee-capped their own investigation capabilities and so events like bondi happen precisely because of the self goals kicked earlier in the game.
The NFA is state based because we’re a federation of states. Policing occurs at the state level, not federal.
It’s not even legislation, but rather a framework that recommends the minimum standards that states must follow when drafting their legislation.
Inter agency cooperation would be the first step. I know when I had to transition from Vic to NSW back in mid 2010s that there was very little information sharing between Vic pol FRD and NSW Pol FAR and I had to do so much of the leg work to transfer my license and collection from State to state.
Cynically though, the various police departments thought that by devoting such limited resources to firearms that they would hamper new and existing shooters and win a war of attrition. Instead the unintended consequence is that they have also knee-capped their own investigation capabilities and so events like bondi happen precisely because of the self goals kicked earlier in the game.
I understand why the setup exists, but there is no reason a federated license system can't exist. Licensing isn't by default a state thing and we have other national registries.
Agree with this completely, I don’t think that the million or whatever registered firearms owners in NSW should be punished for this.
I don’t mind a review and tightening in the process of acquiring a license and firearms. Along with a review into the failure of intelligence services but I really don’t think we need to see sweeping changes to firearm ownership laws.
Let’s also be frank that antisemitism wasn’t confronted when it should have been in this country. We had recent headlines regarding neo Nazis with one being deported. Which is fantastic but I don’t see why the same courtesy isn’t afforded to other hateful and potentially violent people. Our Jewish communities tried to warn us and I’m not sure we really listened.
Having to comply with a firearms registry isn't punishment, any more than having to register a car and have it pass annual inspections is punishing motorists. It's the price you pay for the privilege, and as with owning a car if you don't think the benefits are worth the price you can opt not to own one.
So much of the proposed legislation is either enacting already enacted legislation, blocking access to make believe firearms, or restrictions on ownership volume which WILL require carve outs because it is both impractical and irrelevant.
So it’s a waste of time.
We already have the necessary legislation to prevent these mass shootings (the 30 year dry spell is evidence of that), but if the legislation isn’t enforced and police aren’t able to identify the threats then it’s just words on a page.
You could have all of the new proposals added and if there is still no enforcement and no resource available to detect and prevent, then it means SFA.
Yep. No one understands that law abiding citizens have to give their legally held guns (some costing tens of thousands) into the police. That’s a massive loss for those people.
The problem isn’t the gun laws, the problem was that these guys were on a watch list and the govt did stuff all to prevent something.
We don't ban cars when someone uses them for a massacre
The fact is, our gun control measures have been incredibly effective. For decades everyone had been harping on about how good they are.
Now ASIO/AFP dropped the ball, allowed two individuals on a watch list to successfully plan and execute a massacre. They didn't only fail to stop them but didn't even bother to revoke their licenses.
That is not a failure of our current gun control policies, that is a failure of the bodies responsible for enforcement and preventing these terrorist attacks to happen.
Punishing everyone and removing freedoms is a win for the terrorists.
It’s not worth the argument, these guys aren’t too bright.
They take away gun licences at the drop of a hat if anything changes on renewal (and rightfully so). But if someone’s on a watchlist and the govt fails to act, why the hell didn’t they revoke it?
Actually you do need to register it if you want to use it, you do need CTP in case you injure people, you do need a licence if you want to use it, there are places you can't drive cars, there are circumstances where it's illegal to drive/use cars, we have road rules...
And a cars primary purpose is not to maim or kill people.
If you think someone who gets a car with the express purpose of mowing people down is going to bother with CTP or road rules, I don’t know what to tell you….
As if destroying the housing market, giving all our natural resources away for peanuts and sending Aussie’s to war for 20 years for nothing wasn’t bad enough.
Naaaah, even a sewerage treatment plant does some good. Apart from the gun laws (which were completely bipartisan at the time). Howard did absolutely nothing good in 11 and a half years.
The other good thing he did was to prune out of the LNP any talent that was a threat to his chokehold on power. That's led to the terminal death spiral that the LNP is in now.
I will never forgive Howard for allowing for-profit companies to enter the aged care sector. The Royal Commission into Aged Care showed what a disaster that turned out to be, with the elderly fed dogfood to survive in private for profit aged care homes, while their corrupt shareholders roll in the money.
Of course, none of that will affect Howard. He is living high on the hog due to his super generous super payout that allows him to hire his own personal staff to look after him 24/7 in his own home. A despicable abomination of the worst kind. Tapping into the grey power vote, Howard went into aged care homes and shaking everyone's hand, promising them that he will look after them while he stabbed them in the back.
One day the definite political history will be written that shows Howard has been one of the worst Prime Ministers Australia has ever had, who sold out Australians to the highest bidder.
Cant have anyone else mess with his only decent legacy. I mean they might then realise he's a piece of shit that diverted us back into neo-liberalism and the economic mess we find ourselves in.
Bah! The only things of value I've heard so far from liberals is Malcolm Turnbull questioning why someone in a city environment needs 6 guns and Scomo mentioning in passing that the terrorists were radicalised locally (implying the issue is not immigration).
Who ever cared what that reactionary turkey thought or did. He just let things fester then scratched to maintain a fresh white Liberal scab (which eventually tony-ed into a minister for wimmin cyst!)
Talks about gun reforms are just a distraction from the real problems.
E.g how did a non citizen individual with links to terrorist groups visiting terrorist training camps own legal firearms?
We built the country with blue collars on. We won the right to be paid fair & not send most of our profits to the Crown, and were made richest employees in the Western world by the 2 PMs before him and the Unions.
He deleted our progress as a working Nation from our Curriculum. And romanticized the ANZACs as how we became who we are.
Forged in battle. Killing our Enemies... Oh but Guns are bad can't have any guns.
Wrong. Labour controls the house. Labour plus others in senate have enough votes to pass legislation. Nothing stopping meaningful gun reform legislation from being passed.
Reform needs to happen, the laws here are very good but they could be better. But those laws need to be reformed after a meaningful assement of what failed, otherwise it's just more of the same performative knee jerk governance we've been seeing for the past decade.
Take the time to let the wheels turn and come at it with data, cool heads and fire any one trying to use it as a political football into the heart of the sun.
They've just arrested an entire carload of extremist firearm owners who drove all the way from Melbourne to NSW to allegedly commit another act of violence in the vicinity of Bondi. Interesting days ahead.
You know I briefly thought he might have solidified his legacy on gun control. Firmly rebuked the irresponsible comments coming from Israel and the US. Taken a swipe at One Nation by warning of the rise of the populist right, and thrown the LNP a bone all at the same time.
But of course he didn't do that, he went for cheap talk and ephemeral political points. I'd forgotten after all this time; he's a cunt.
Why is immigration and antisemitism not allowed to be part of the conversation? We already have strict gun laws. It’s really not as simple as just tightening those laws even further
He’s right in this, it is a distraction to focus on gun control on at this time.
Lots of people trying to divert from the real cause and motivation. These sorts will adapt to use whatever means are available, think the Nice truck attack etc. they even had IEDs….
Further firearms restrictions will not make us safer.
They absolutely will. Gun laws have been progressively watered down (EDIT: or rather, have not kept up with technological and cultural changes) since the Howard reforms by governments trying to not lose votes to the shooters and fishers party.
This allowed the older shooter to obtain 6 guns in 2 years, despite his son being on an ASIO watchlist. Unbelievable.
You can say terrorism will try anything and they will but more often than the not the other methods they will try - chemical weapons, IEDs etc - will draw attention of authorities.
In this case Howard is just a senile old man trying to protect a legacy already ruined by his own party.
Shooters and Fishers party isn’t some NRA analogue. The reform they want is stuff like allowing NSW citizens to own crossbows on a licence, allowing farmers to purchase and use suppressors so they don’t spook livestock and neighbours during pest control.
The current restrictions already did their job, and the attack would be ten times worse without the reforms that prohibit semi automatics and limit magazine capacity.
What didn’t do their job was our intelligence agencies.
"Further gun reforms? Despite every gun safety advocate in the country arguing the current framework is deficient, Howard called a press conference to dismiss this as a “diversion” and hammered Albanese on his lack of “moral leadership” in the face of antisemitism."
I mean Howard's not wrong here. "Gun safety advocates" is just coded language for "gun control advocates" so it shouldn't come as a surprise they say the current framework is deficient. That doesn't make it true. Advocates won't want to stop until no civilian is allowed to own firearms irrespective of whether there are any tangible benefits or undesirable impacts.
The Bondi attackers had legal firearms and ASIO had them on a watchlist but did nothing to stop them. There is footage of father and son at the infamous October 8th 2023 Opera House muslim hate-fest against Jews. The attackers didn't just bring guns, they brought home made bombs with them to Bondi. No amount of gun reform would have stopped people from dying that day. Removing them from the country and/or locking them up for incitement would have.
And the fact that every time Albanese goes in front of the press he talks about ASIO advice on threats, and specifically cites "right wing extremism" (near zero terror attacks) but cannot bring himself to say the words "Islamist" or "muslim" (thousands of terror attacks annually) immediately after an Islamic terror attack cost 15 lives and injured dozens more shows he still isn't willing to address the real problem. People have been inciting violence against Jews on the streets of Australia ever since October 2023. We have laws against that and they aren't being used.
Howard is right. Albanese is a coward who has shown no moral character in the wake of this catastrophe or the years of anti-Semitism leading up to it. And he is still avoiding calling out the real problem of Islamic terrorism because he doesn't want to be called "Islamophobic" and would prefer to sacrifice Australian lives on the altar of political correctness. His entire government has blood on their hands. We don't need gun reform. We need immigration reform, and the traitors in government refuse to discuss it.
But I'm sure those ISIS brides and their destined-for-radicalization children are enjoying their taxpayer funded free housing, living allowances and witness protection.
John Howard confirming once again that he is the king of cunts. The gun buyback is literally the ONLY positive thing he has ever done in his life, and that in a situation of extreme pressure where he really had no other choice. EVERYTHING else was about selling Australia to the highest bidder.
The fact that he now calls additional gun control "a diversion" shows what he really thinks.
"All but dashes"???
You have Labor Premiers in every state but QLD and Minns in NSW has a hard on for seeming tough on crime.
Premiers have already announced the reforms that they're looking to implement in the wake of this.
Why is Howard in any way relevant to this issue?
Because he’s standing in as the patron saint of the LNP whilst alan jones is facing allegations of sexual abuse (again).
Lamo.
This sums up the LNP
I usually like the Guardian but this is weird and sensationalist by them. I think the conclusions they’re making are a pretty long bow - just coz irrelevant people are saying things doesn’t suddenly make them important. The best way of letting John Howard fade into the past is to not waste ink on him.
He's basically the only member of the Liberal Party that the public have respect for anymore.
Speak for yourself. I didn't have any respect for him when he was in power. I certainly don't have any now!
Never said I respect him, it's just that many people do for some reason. That's why they keep wheeling him out.
People do because times were pretty good under Howard.
They don't realize a lot of the problems we have now (failing health services, expensive private health, housing costs, energy costs etc) are the results of policies he implemented and money he wasted during a once in several life times resources boom.
We could have had a national wealth fund the equivalent of Norway's.
Instead we've got one of the most expensive real estate markets in the world (obviously over simplifying it).
Whitlam tried to nationalise the mines, the US and UK companies made sure he couldn't get funds for it, a big part of what led to his dismissal.
How about this, the only member of the Liberal Party that FTA TV watching public have any respect for
I have respect for his eyebrows.
I have more respect for Tony Abbott. At least he's done something worthy of respect by being a volunteer fire fighter.
Like Howards gun reform, its the only decent thing Abbot has ever done with his life.
Plus running the Australian War Memorial. The previous LNP government appointed him as part of jobs for mates. Then Labor think he's still the best person for the job when they re-appointed him? I wish I was kidding. Maybe it's a new thing called "jobs for political enemies that have tried to kill the party, unions, etc"?
Uncle Tones doesn't "run" the AWM, he's one of a double-digit number of members of a council chaired by Kim Beazley and containing at least one other retired Labor MP.
I hate the bible-bashing cunt as much as any self-respecting Australian does, but there was nothing inappropriate about extending the tenure of someone from across the aisle in their non-partisan volunteer role.
yeah, as you said - mates.
Indeed, but one could argue his lack of action (or even attempting to reverse progress that had already been made) on climate change rather undoes any work he puts in fighting fires. After all, is it really a good thing that he's fighting fires he actively worked to make worse?
Oh yeah, agree 100%.
Howard is a cunt but he did at least do gun reform. I'd say I have about the same level of respect for both. Very low, but acknowledge the one good thing they've each done.
The irony though of him firefighting while denying green initiatives aimed at lowering our summer temperatures -- while claiming that the green initiatives would cause housewives to get hit by extra electricity charges when doing their ironing.......
We're so behind where we could have been without the Libs.
Not sure that this in any way makes up for Tony's gifting Prince Philip a knighthood. That was a level of obsequiousness far beyond even that of Menzies fawning over QEII or Holt taking the country into Vietnam for LBJ.
I would say his reputation with the public is more disdain than respect. He is Thatcher lite and we all know people were dancing in the streets when that witch died. Think there will be legit celebrations when this cunt pops his clogs.
Knee-jerk reactionary laws dont help when the issue is enforcement and funding to begin with
Spot on! The current laws would have stopped it easily. The police and other bodies juat didn't do their jobs... its not an isolated incident either. Just a rather horrible and public one.
I'm just gonna assume that he's next in line for liberal leadership. They're now so low on candidates anyone can recognize that they've had to dig him up out of his hole to put him back into the line of succession.
Notably, due to being a conservative politician from the late 90ies/early 2000s, he will accidentally be the most modern, forward thinking and progressive candidate in the entire party.
His views on landline telephones and Pentium desktop computers will undoubtedly cause panic in the party cabinet, as the members struggle to come to grips with these far-fetched, advanced and inherently woke ideas.
Every state but QLD and Tas*
Labour in tasmania...
Yeah Im not sure the point here. Is it that we’d have a better chance at reform if the states all disagreed? Or that some of the announcements were work in progress from the states already. What “meaningful gun reform” will be missed?
Basically Howard is openly blessing the transformation of the Liberal Party into a far right extremist party. Sussan Ley is done.
The brightest spot on the stain of Howard’s legacy was the gun reform that passed with bipartisan support across Australia. Now he is pandering to the far right to help ruin the party he once lead.
Even a bigoted clock is right twice a day. Howard was only right once in an entire lifetime
And that in a most extreme situation when even Howard had to read the writing on the wall. Everything else he did destroyed Australia: Introduced for profit aged care, gave property investors a massive 50% capita gains tax discount, and gave mining and oil companies free reign to strip and plunder Australia.
Do you remember when he knowingly lied about refugees throwing kids into the ocean?
I can't stand the bloke. But he got that call right.
And now he's going to undo all of his work.
Oh, he'd undone any of that by the next Parliament he led. He has been the most damaging politician we have ever had
Yeah sorry, i wasn't clear. His work around gun reform.
If the far right won’t vote for the LNP, who will? 🤔
Why does that piece of shits opinion matter at all at the current moment?
The lnp base practically wants him canonised, so they'll make their MPs listen to him
Imo he did a lot of damage to Australia that is obscured by our country's advantages. We should easily be wealthier on average than Norwegians and even Bostonians and New Yorkers.
Th single biggest issue (besides climate change) can be traced right to Howard, the housing bubble. That demented ghoul ruined housing affordability for myself and millions more people. And he was told at the time by economists that this is exactly what would happen.
also that we have no real national airline or telco.
Hey I said single biggest, don’t get me started on everything else.
Let’s get it started, Let’s get it started in here!
In fairness, the loss of Qantas was a Keating cock up. I hate Howard too, but credit where it's due.
Don't forget removing conflict of interest laws for politicians. Turnbull even joked about voting on an issue he had a financial stake in, saying "I shouldn't be allowed to do this."
The only reason Clive Palmer got into politics was to vote against mining taxes, and that's the only time he ever actually showed up to parliament
Don't forget the universities
Pissed away the start of the mining boom on middle class welfare for easy votes. Sold off public assets to prop up a "surplus" (which is like selling the furnite to pay off your credit card). Then all in on "Workchoices" which were individual contracts, not collective bargaining. The AWB clusterfuck and "children overboard" also comes to mind.
He did enormous damage to Australia, but he was electorally very successful. Part of today's problems is that we're still living in Howard's Australia.
My hope is that, in 30 years, we're living in Albo's Australia, long after he's left office. Albo is generally taking his sweet time to build the country we need though
While I would like to see faster action on repairing the damage that Howard and his contemporaries did (and I'm not yet convinced that Albo actually wants to repair that damage), the reality is that fixing things slowly causes less blowback from opposition, and the corporate owned media, allowing him the chance to do more over a longer time, and bake in the progress.
The problems with big fixes quickly is that big changes can cause additional pain in the short term, which the rabid media and opposition can use to beat the government over the head with come election time. This gives them a platform to reverse the changes immediately, completely undoing any good work that has been done, and the cycle continues.
At the moment, the Coalition are an unelectable rabble, and a go slow and make steady improvement approach seems to be the best option. ("seems" is doing a lot of heavy lifting there, because its entirely possible that this situation, or another like it could give the opposition a target to pin them on which would mean they don't actually get to finish the job).
The article above even talks about how John Howards Gun reforms (a good idea by any metric) were a knee jerk reaction, which they were. The problem is, they seem to be advocating for another knee jerk reaction in the guise of "Strong Leadership". Just because a knee jerk reaction worked once, doesn't mean its the best thing in the future, analysis of the issues and situation and a logical solution is a much better way to go about it in reality, but in politics, that is suicide.
Oh I know. I would rather a long-term government that beds in the changes, rather than a revolutionary government that is out in six years with everything ripe for undoing
I agree with you but my view is that Federal terms are too short at every three years to introduce and implement difficult but necessary policy. If we had four or five year terms, like many similar democracies, actual reform might have a chance.
I think just about everyone is in favour of four year terms, but.... Oppositions have an incentive to oppose them at referendums. And, since bipartisan support is a precondition (but not a guarantee) of success, I don't expect change anytime soon. Pity
They may have been a knee jerk but they where written in the late 80's so where somewhat coherent.
Today we have people talking about all the belt fed shotguns in civilian hands!
It will be a interestingly ridiculous one jerk
Keep in mind that Hawke/Keatings pro-capital/anti-worker reforms destroyed Labor's support base, leading to the rise of John Howard to be unopposed for many terms.
Plus, a lot of changes by Howard were easier and possible, because of Labor's neoliberal reforms. Corporatisation of telecom made it easier to sell off Telstra for example. Hawke's anti-strike legislation was enhanced. And more.
I'm so tired of railing about this. These pricks are exhausting
Who cares. They lost. Labor has 94 seats in Reps, and only needs one senate vote plus the greens to pass legislation. They can tell the LNP to get stuffed.
It's the LNP. The only exist to delegitamise Labor so they can get back in power so that their donors can start sucking money out of our pockets.
There is a reason why they are called the lying nasty party.
I would say his opinion is relevant seeing as he is the most recent prime minister to deal with a similar situation
True. When the country is looking for leadership when a leadership vacuum is evident, cognitive bias leads us to seeking one that offers a sense of stability in times of crisis. Howard, a type of patriarchal figure appeared when there was significant community distress.
He's living by his ethos "There's no such thing as morals in a time of crisis".
So when the country is reeling and grieving, he's out to score point
Source: you can see the crusty old fuck say it direct to camera on the ABC's 'Nemesis' doco.
The thing that always gets left out of Howard's gun reform is that Labor threw their support behind it and allowed it through.
Bipartisan support can bring about swift, solid changes. Meanwhile, we have Howard, who's been out of parliament forever, buzzing about like a blow fly with opinions........
Exactly. When Howard was PM, the opposition and cross bench parties put aside all politics and got something important done together, as elected representatives should.
When Howard finally and tragically got a chance to be on the other side, he is mudslinging and playing politics the day after the massacre. What an absolute piece of shit.
Despite destroying Australia and being a war criminal, the one thing he was universally given credit for was gun laws. This absolutely tarnishes the legacy of that one good thing. The behaviour of this pathetic old man is shameful and un-Australian.
Oh, he was doing that when he was in opposition in the 80s.
But with a massive majority federally and Labor governments in every state but QLD there's not really a need for bipartisan support.
Support of the Greens in the upper house in most states/federally will ensure legislation gets through.
That's not the point, the point is that this shit is important and bipartisan support stops division on important issues.
Exactly. Being elected to government has never meant “you are now dictators for this electoral term”. Party or not, elected representatives are primarily accountable to the Australian people.
Party politics has really enforced this ridiculous two party system, where party comes before the people, and deliberately stoked this “us and them” mentality. America is the extreme example where people actually identify as a Republican or Democrat in their daily lives, instead of casting their vote and then just getting on with being a citizen of the country as a whole. We have to resist that black and white nonsense thinking here, despite the Murdoch media’s constant propaganda.
My point was more that when the two parties work or stand together, we can have a better, stronger country. When instead there's point scoring, our country gets weaker and more divided.
The NT has a Liberal government.
Every single time a tragedy has befallen LNP governments, Labor steps in line for full bipartisan support. Shorten even used the "Team Australia" rhetoric that Abbott was using.
Labor didn't even really go hard on the fucking hypocrisy when the Libs were considering watering down gun laws by reducing the restrictions on high-capacity lever-action shotguns soon after the Lindt Siege. (After market modifications would make it 11 rounds, with ~10-12 seconds required to shoot all 11 shots. It's also worth noting that the total reload time is 12-18 seconds.
Does anyone give a shit what Howard says? They brought him out of the nursing home and let him ramble for way too long, it was like listening to your racist great uncle go off at Christmas - everyone just lets him go until he runs out of puff.
The LNP does. He's the only on they have left. ScoMo slinked off to the US with his tail between his legs, Turnbull is seen as a wet mug, and Abbott's reputation was ruined once he became PM (though he still acts as if he really wasn't that unpopular)
John Howard is irrelevant
I'm certain now the Liberal party are going to find a way to reanimate the corpse of Howard once he finally kicks the bucket, so they can continue to wheel him out in an emergency to get the remainder of his boomer voter base still excited for the LNP.
While he was creating more division, did he apologise for the ridiculous price of housing that he started that has divided this country?
Hawke/Keating governments deregulated finance sector and made debt easier/cheaper. Here's one article that touches on this:
So, something like a property investor would leverage their property portfolio and take out massive home loans to be able to outbid home buyers for example.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-03-09/property-prices-investors-first-home-buyer-generation-affordable/105011858
It probably explains why Labor is reluctant to tackle the housing crisis. Tackling the cheap credit may mean they have to admit they had a hand in the housing crisis, so it's easier to just blame the other side.
Really just cashed in all of the integrity for the one good thing he did to score political points out of a tragedy.
I dunno really but for me it's less about the current gun laws and more about how these individuals were not detected/their guns taken away/arrested etc etc.
I find it disheartening how we all end up with diminished rights after these things when existing frameworks and laws were sufficient to prevent the event in the first place.
There is a general lack of understanding of how firearm licensing works in Australia, which makes conversations difficult.
I do think we should have a national licensing system, rather than the miss mash of state systems and I think we need a higher level of checks of storage etc.
I like when the Gov promised everyone a national register after the last shooting so that everyone would feel safe, not saying that one already existed that the current state police forces ignored because its too much effort for them
The states already have ample options to deny and remove access to firearms if they feel someone, or someone near them is a threat.
Nothing I said relates to that at all.
What I said is we should have a unified system because having a state based system means you need additional data transfer between licensing bodies which can result in errors or omissions that didn't need to happen. This was one of the key recommendations after the Wieambilla shooting as a cancelled NSW license was used to buy ammunition in Queensland.
I wasn’t disagreeing, more adding to your points
Fair enough. I will be interested in hearing the outcome of the investigation into ASIO and how it didn't preclude the father from having firearms on an association basis. I know some people who have been barred from owning based on the street they live on.
I know someone who had their firearms taken away and a firearms prohibition order issued because of their cousin.
I know someone who had their firearms taken away because their son was charged with assault.
I know someone who had their firearms taken away over a dispute between two of their relatives, not even them
I know someone who has their firearms taken away as they were cleaning them at home when police turned up on an unrelated matter (he got them back after the court case failed)
Allegedly someone in Victoria had their licence suspended over driving offences, but I now can’t find the industry articles on that. I always felt there was more to it.
With all of this, and the existing powers, the states already have the ability to remove firearms if the believe there is a risk, and I think that’s the lynchpin here. Were ASIO or NSW police aware of the risks here
My theory is ASIO never told NSWPF.
This 100% and most of the options flagged by Albanese are looking at this. I guarantee the other area is sharing of information between the law enforcement branches.
The NFA is state based because we’re a federation of states. Policing occurs at the state level, not federal.
It’s not even legislation, but rather a framework that recommends the minimum standards that states must follow when drafting their legislation.
Inter agency cooperation would be the first step. I know when I had to transition from Vic to NSW back in mid 2010s that there was very little information sharing between Vic pol FRD and NSW Pol FAR and I had to do so much of the leg work to transfer my license and collection from State to state.
Cynically though, the various police departments thought that by devoting such limited resources to firearms that they would hamper new and existing shooters and win a war of attrition. Instead the unintended consequence is that they have also knee-capped their own investigation capabilities and so events like bondi happen precisely because of the self goals kicked earlier in the game.
The NFA is state based because we’re a federation of states. Policing occurs at the state level, not federal.
It’s not even legislation, but rather a framework that recommends the minimum standards that states must follow when drafting their legislation.
Inter agency cooperation would be the first step. I know when I had to transition from Vic to NSW back in mid 2010s that there was very little information sharing between Vic pol FRD and NSW Pol FAR and I had to do so much of the leg work to transfer my license and collection from State to state.
Cynically though, the various police departments thought that by devoting such limited resources to firearms that they would hamper new and existing shooters and win a war of attrition. Instead the unintended consequence is that they have also knee-capped their own investigation capabilities and so events like bondi happen precisely because of the self goals kicked earlier in the game.
I understand why the setup exists, but there is no reason a federated license system can't exist. Licensing isn't by default a state thing and we have other national registries.
How would a national register have prevented this incident?
Bingo, because knee jerk reactions are a mask to cover up failures of the existing framework. But it works every time.
I agree. It's not like law enforcement is going to say something like "sure the laws are fine, we just f$%ked up the implementation".
Saying the laws aren't strong enough means keeps the spotlight off them. If they need more funding or reform, we should be having that conversation.
Agree with this completely, I don’t think that the million or whatever registered firearms owners in NSW should be punished for this.
I don’t mind a review and tightening in the process of acquiring a license and firearms. Along with a review into the failure of intelligence services but I really don’t think we need to see sweeping changes to firearm ownership laws.
Let’s also be frank that antisemitism wasn’t confronted when it should have been in this country. We had recent headlines regarding neo Nazis with one being deported. Which is fantastic but I don’t see why the same courtesy isn’t afforded to other hateful and potentially violent people. Our Jewish communities tried to warn us and I’m not sure we really listened.
I don't think any government in the last fifty years has done more to combat antisemitism. Have you not been paying attention since Oct 7?
Having to comply with a firearms registry isn't punishment, any more than having to register a car and have it pass annual inspections is punishing motorists. It's the price you pay for the privilege, and as with owning a car if you don't think the benefits are worth the price you can opt not to own one.
There already is a registry though.
So much of the proposed legislation is either enacting already enacted legislation, blocking access to make believe firearms, or restrictions on ownership volume which WILL require carve outs because it is both impractical and irrelevant.
So it’s a waste of time.
We already have the necessary legislation to prevent these mass shootings (the 30 year dry spell is evidence of that), but if the legislation isn’t enforced and police aren’t able to identify the threats then it’s just words on a page.
You could have all of the new proposals added and if there is still no enforcement and no resource available to detect and prevent, then it means SFA.
Yep. No one understands that law abiding citizens have to give their legally held guns (some costing tens of thousands) into the police. That’s a massive loss for those people.
The problem isn’t the gun laws, the problem was that these guys were on a watch list and the govt did stuff all to prevent something.
As usual when someone says something like this, literally everyone understands that
Watch how little I care.
If you hunt/shoot as a hobby you can find a new hobby. A hobby isn't worth the risk of massacres.
If you use them for work you will still be able to use them for work.
We don't ban cars when someone uses them for a massacre
The fact is, our gun control measures have been incredibly effective. For decades everyone had been harping on about how good they are.
Now ASIO/AFP dropped the ball, allowed two individuals on a watch list to successfully plan and execute a massacre. They didn't only fail to stop them but didn't even bother to revoke their licenses.
That is not a failure of our current gun control policies, that is a failure of the bodies responsible for enforcement and preventing these terrorist attacks to happen.
Punishing everyone and removing freedoms is a win for the terrorists.
It’s not worth the argument, these guys aren’t too bright.
They take away gun licences at the drop of a hat if anything changes on renewal (and rightfully so). But if someone’s on a watchlist and the govt fails to act, why the hell didn’t they revoke it?
This is almost word for word what people said in 1996.
We do tighten restrictions on where cars can be used and sometimes on who can apply for a licence.
Cars are also not primarily a weapon, they're a transportation device.
You don’t need a licence to own/buy a car.
Actually you do need to register it if you want to use it, you do need CTP in case you injure people, you do need a licence if you want to use it, there are places you can't drive cars, there are circumstances where it's illegal to drive/use cars, we have road rules...
And a cars primary purpose is not to maim or kill people.
Again, you don’t need a licence to own/buy a car.
If you think someone who gets a car with the express purpose of mowing people down is going to bother with CTP or road rules, I don’t know what to tell you….
Again a cars primary purpose is not to maim or kill people.
We still heavily regulate them because they can be dangerous.
But they're not designed to only be used to maim or kill people.
An object whose primary purpose and only use is to maim or kill needs to be heavily regulated.
End of story.
The ownership and purchase of cars is not heavily regulated. Anyone can just go and buy one off Facebook with cash anytime they want.
Firearms are already heavily and adequately regulated.
End of story.
So, the people doing competition shootings, going to Olympic Games, commonwealth etc should just stop their career?
All because the govt did something wrong?
Also, you do realise the police won’t pay out for that monetary loss when you hand them in.
So we’re ok with judging the majority of law abiding gun owners on the extreme actions of a few?
I have another group we can talk about if that’s the case.
Kinda makes you wonder what weight a police check holds in general if they didn't pick this one up?
The world is getting more divided and hateful by the day. I am so disappointed to see it happening.
The man had two tricks as PM, tax cuts and Islamophobia - he’s not a politician anymore so he’s only gone one card to play
Howard keeps doing damage to this country.
As if destroying the housing market, giving all our natural resources away for peanuts and sending Aussie’s to war for 20 years for nothing wasn’t bad enough.
Ignore this fool.
And yet no following government has done anything really different. They are generally all the same.
That's because his worst trick was making the fuckwitted masses think his way of doing things was the right way.
I think Is Rupert Murdoch Dead needs a companion page - IsJohnHowardDead.
Fuck this dinosaur.
I think we need a campaign of naming bad things after Howard. The John Howard Sewerage Treatment works would be appropriate.
Naaaah, even a sewerage treatment plant does some good. Apart from the gun laws (which were completely bipartisan at the time). Howard did absolutely nothing good in 11 and a half years.
The other good thing he did was to prune out of the LNP any talent that was a threat to his chokehold on power. That's led to the terminal death spiral that the LNP is in now.
Is he saying he didn't enact gun laws to protect people in 1996, but simply as a cynical political stunt?
Little Johnny Howard and his backers probably think this is Liberals best shot at reigniting the push to gain votes for the next election.
Geriatric coward, much like Keating, chimes in as a sad and pathetic attempt to remain relevant.
At least Keating will call out his former party, that's a step up.
John Howard can retire peacefully away from the public
I will never forgive Howard for allowing for-profit companies to enter the aged care sector. The Royal Commission into Aged Care showed what a disaster that turned out to be, with the elderly fed dogfood to survive in private for profit aged care homes, while their corrupt shareholders roll in the money.
Of course, none of that will affect Howard. He is living high on the hog due to his super generous super payout that allows him to hire his own personal staff to look after him 24/7 in his own home. A despicable abomination of the worst kind. Tapping into the grey power vote, Howard went into aged care homes and shaking everyone's hand, promising them that he will look after them while he stabbed them in the back.
One day the definite political history will be written that shows Howard has been one of the worst Prime Ministers Australia has ever had, who sold out Australians to the highest bidder.
Cant have anyone else mess with his only decent legacy. I mean they might then realise he's a piece of shit that diverted us back into neo-liberalism and the economic mess we find ourselves in.
Bah! The only things of value I've heard so far from liberals is Malcolm Turnbull questioning why someone in a city environment needs 6 guns and Scomo mentioning in passing that the terrorists were radicalised locally (implying the issue is not immigration).
Who ever cared what that reactionary turkey thought or did. He just let things fester then scratched to maintain a fresh white Liberal scab (which eventually tony-ed into a minister for wimmin cyst!)
He’s always been insufferable, arrogant and opportunistic. Party over country, always.
Talks about gun reforms are just a distraction from the real problems. E.g how did a non citizen individual with links to terrorist groups visiting terrorist training camps own legal firearms?
Looks more like a systemic issue than a gun issue
Would that not, by your own logic, be a relevant question to gun law reform?
Yes.
We built the country with blue collars on. We won the right to be paid fair & not send most of our profits to the Crown, and were made richest employees in the Western world by the 2 PMs before him and the Unions.
He deleted our progress as a working Nation from our Curriculum. And romanticized the ANZACs as how we became who we are.
Forged in battle. Killing our Enemies... Oh but Guns are bad can't have any guns.
And we've had an explosion Feral numbers.
Somehow he's a Champion.
The Gun reforms were coming. He took the credit.
Wrong. Labour controls the house. Labour plus others in senate have enough votes to pass legislation. Nothing stopping meaningful gun reform legislation from being passed.
Reform needs to happen, the laws here are very good but they could be better. But those laws need to be reformed after a meaningful assement of what failed, otherwise it's just more of the same performative knee jerk governance we've been seeing for the past decade. Take the time to let the wheels turn and come at it with data, cool heads and fire any one trying to use it as a political football into the heart of the sun.
Only if you listen to a spent and rejected ex politician that is about as relevant as betamax.
Hey now… Josh Frydenberg is going to milk this as best as he can to revive his career… wait, wrong one
They've just arrested an entire carload of extremist firearm owners who drove all the way from Melbourne to NSW to allegedly commit another act of violence in the vicinity of Bondi. Interesting days ahead.
Yes I'm sure they were registered firearm owners
Im going to wait for more details on this one, we know pretty much nothing at this point.
Source?
You know I briefly thought he might have solidified his legacy on gun control. Firmly rebuked the irresponsible comments coming from Israel and the US. Taken a swipe at One Nation by warning of the rise of the populist right, and thrown the LNP a bone all at the same time.
But of course he didn't do that, he went for cheap talk and ephemeral political points. I'd forgotten after all this time; he's a cunt.
Why is immigration and antisemitism not allowed to be part of the conversation? We already have strict gun laws. It’s really not as simple as just tightening those laws even further
Iraq Iraq Iraq. No more needs to be said about his legacy
He’s right in this, it is a distraction to focus on gun control on at this time.
Lots of people trying to divert from the real cause and motivation. These sorts will adapt to use whatever means are available, think the Nice truck attack etc. they even had IEDs….
Further firearms restrictions will not make us safer.
They absolutely will. Gun laws have been progressively watered down (EDIT: or rather, have not kept up with technological and cultural changes) since the Howard reforms by governments trying to not lose votes to the shooters and fishers party.
This allowed the older shooter to obtain 6 guns in 2 years, despite his son being on an ASIO watchlist. Unbelievable.
You can say terrorism will try anything and they will but more often than the not the other methods they will try - chemical weapons, IEDs etc - will draw attention of authorities.
In this case Howard is just a senile old man trying to protect a legacy already ruined by his own party.
Just to confirm, by watered down, you mean additional legislation and regulations.
Since the original NFA:
Magazine limits on pistols as a result of the Monash university murders
Caliber limits on pistols as a result of the Monash university murders
Appearance laws to limit the association with semi auto rifles because reasons
Limitations on permit to acquire within the first 12 months of licensing to limit the potential for rapid acquisition of firearms for new shooters
Changes to safe storage requirements based on volume and type of firearm including the need for additional security measures beyond safes.
And still no suppressors for cat C and D shooters that have a legitimate WHS need for them.
So if by watered down you mean extra legislation then yes, they have been watered down.
Shooters and Fishers party isn’t some NRA analogue. The reform they want is stuff like allowing NSW citizens to own crossbows on a licence, allowing farmers to purchase and use suppressors so they don’t spook livestock and neighbours during pest control.
The current restrictions already did their job, and the attack would be ten times worse without the reforms that prohibit semi automatics and limit magazine capacity.
What didn’t do their job was our intelligence agencies.
Despite the narrative, there has been no “watering down” of laws since 1996.
There are mechanisms already that could have been used to take firearms from the father.
Seems like their IEDs didn’t draw any attention this time? And what are you going to do about vehicles being used as weapons?
"Further gun reforms? Despite every gun safety advocate in the country arguing the current framework is deficient, Howard called a press conference to dismiss this as a “diversion” and hammered Albanese on his lack of “moral leadership” in the face of antisemitism."
I mean Howard's not wrong here. "Gun safety advocates" is just coded language for "gun control advocates" so it shouldn't come as a surprise they say the current framework is deficient. That doesn't make it true. Advocates won't want to stop until no civilian is allowed to own firearms irrespective of whether there are any tangible benefits or undesirable impacts.
The Bondi attackers had legal firearms and ASIO had them on a watchlist but did nothing to stop them. There is footage of father and son at the infamous October 8th 2023 Opera House muslim hate-fest against Jews. The attackers didn't just bring guns, they brought home made bombs with them to Bondi. No amount of gun reform would have stopped people from dying that day. Removing them from the country and/or locking them up for incitement would have.
And the fact that every time Albanese goes in front of the press he talks about ASIO advice on threats, and specifically cites "right wing extremism" (near zero terror attacks) but cannot bring himself to say the words "Islamist" or "muslim" (thousands of terror attacks annually) immediately after an Islamic terror attack cost 15 lives and injured dozens more shows he still isn't willing to address the real problem. People have been inciting violence against Jews on the streets of Australia ever since October 2023. We have laws against that and they aren't being used.
Howard is right. Albanese is a coward who has shown no moral character in the wake of this catastrophe or the years of anti-Semitism leading up to it. And he is still avoiding calling out the real problem of Islamic terrorism because he doesn't want to be called "Islamophobic" and would prefer to sacrifice Australian lives on the altar of political correctness. His entire government has blood on their hands. We don't need gun reform. We need immigration reform, and the traitors in government refuse to discuss it.
But I'm sure those ISIS brides and their destined-for-radicalization children are enjoying their taxpayer funded free housing, living allowances and witness protection.
John Howard confirming once again that he is the king of cunts. The gun buyback is literally the ONLY positive thing he has ever done in his life, and that in a situation of extreme pressure where he really had no other choice. EVERYTHING else was about selling Australia to the highest bidder.
The fact that he now calls additional gun control "a diversion" shows what he really thinks.
With all due respect, Mr Howard, just hurry up and die, please.
Well I'm glad given that "reform" means disarming even more people who haven't done anything wrong
Only a puppet of the invisible puppet masters