MARK M ALDRIDGE Independent - 2011 Depression we cant afford                 a.userlink { color: #253741; } a.userlink:visited { color: #6a818c; } a.userlink:hover { color: #005e85; } font[size="1"] { font-size:10px; } font[size="2"] { font-size:13px; } font[size="3"] { font-size:16px; } font[size="4"] { font-size:18px; } font[size="5"] { font-size:24px; } font[size="6"] { font-size:32px; } font[size="7"] { font-size:48px; } .GuestBookMessage { font-family: Arial; color: #000000; font-size: 13px; } .GuestBookMessageRow { font-family: Arial; color: #000000; font-size: 12px; } .GuestBookHeader { font-family: Arial; color: #000000; font-size: 12px; }                                                                                                                 THE DEPRESSION WE CANT AFFORDNear 5 years ago, while researching federal politics and trying to grasp the field of economics, it became apparent to me, that Australia was to face a depression by around 2010/11, and many concurred, my predictions regarding Europe were accurate and to be honest the same to some degree the future of our very own country, I was not far off. From all over the world, many in the know predicted the financial bubble created by dodgy trading and speculation, even derivative trading, would burst in or around 2008/09, but Australia found a way to keep the bubble from bursting, with short term ideals, like the massive home buyers grant, and other rebate schemes akin to telling us how to spend our money, and where. Then the federal Labor government won the lottery with the mining resources boom, with China buying up minerals, land and farming properties, a huge win for their pocket, and a night mare result for our long term future, but as to how long that would last would be the question, yet Labor not only are spending it all, they continue to borrow in the billions, going as far as raising our debt threshold to over 250 billion, and heading there at the speed of a freight train.Now here comes the pain, federal Labor need money to pay back their debt, so here comes the carbon tax scheme we can ill afford, with big money rubbing their hands together in delight, those hit hard in Europe, could now regain their losses, through carbon trading, to them and myself nothing more than a disaster of monitory trading scheme. All the big names are in on the money, Rothschilds, Maquarie, The world bank, the UN, and a host of dodgy abatement retailers, all ready to cash in, at a time when any money raised best be spent at home. Labor knew by its introduction, the $44 per tonne we were already paying in stealth taxes, could be better spent paying off debt, yet the debt bubble continues to grow regardless. China has now downgraded its 2012 estimates, and with Labor reliant on Chinas economy continuing to grow, we may be in for a bigger mess than I earlier predicted. The building trade has stalled as has retail sales, real-estate values are starting to slide and with most balancing on the edge of their household budgets, and there is little room for an increase in the cost of living. The Banks are still recovering from the financial meltdown, so pressure is on the reserve bank to keep interest rates up, the state governments have dug their own financial black hole, so continue to look for ways into our hip pocket via alternate revenue raising, increased fines, registrations, cost cutting and the increased expenses incurred with adhering to the mighty red & green tape.The manufacturing & Building sector’s have stalled due to the unknown costs of the impending Carbon tax, dare they take forward orders at today’s rates and risk huge losses, or sit back and wait to see the impact on the base line, either way the costs are staggering. Evidence of this fact can easily be seen with bail outs of companies like One Steel, GMH and others, well before the introduction of the huge new tax. The Labors governments sell of the new tax, based on changing the weather in over 100 years time, at the expense of our existing hard fought environmental protections, has not been smooth or received well by those eyes remain open to the truth, even the price is fixed, rather than the usual floating on the world market we have become accutomed with the onset of globalisation. Labor have left Australia totally reliant on how China manage their economy, yet even if China can continue to do well by valuing their own currency, the resources boom does not have the ability to pay of the huge job losses and continued move of shore of what little is left of the Australian manufacturing sector, so where too now?Value adding to our natural resources and some added protectionism by way of tariff equity appear to remain of the agenda, a change of tact by spending the entire revenue of the impending Carbon tax within our shores would be a start, but in the most the only saviour would be addressing the cost of living, so that we can share equally what little is left. Labors idea’s to fix all this, is to now allow the sale of everything that we have left, private property, the coal seam gas under our land, our infrastructure, our essential services and  even the water and farms we rely on to feed our nation, and the people continue to support their position with their vote? They are cutting back environmental schemes, increasing the cost of essential services, gorging at the price of LPG, eliminating thousands of public service jobs, desecrating country services, in fact it could be easily said, destroying the years of hard work put into taking us forward.Labor at a federal and state level, can only hear the voices of the corporate world, when this fine country was built on the back of our small business sector, farming and agriculture, and it is well past time they looked back on our history and remembered this fact, while we still retain the ability to get back on track. We have the resources, we have the ability to protect our business and manufacturing sector, we have the water and arable land, the gas and fuel, we have everything we could every need,  we have the ability to lead the world, yet we follow,  the only thing we do not have is the representatives with the balls to protect our children’s and our countries long term future, so I say use your vote to sack the lot, take a risk on new people, with grand ideals, and lets buy back the bloody farm as a point of major concern. We have great minds, top class thinkers, we have hard workers, the best farmers in the world, and all we need do is encourage innovation and hard work, reward honesty and hold dishonesty and self interest to account, and that starts right now, any person who rewards our failure of a two party system is part of the problem.Mark Aldridge Community activist and Independent Candidate 08 82847482 / 0403379500 www.markmaldridge.com  email; aldridgemark@bigpond.com                      Website Builder provided by Vistaprint