You've got to see this video. Salt and cronies rattling on at an industry talk-fest.
Warning: Likely to cause anger, nausea or both. An even bigger chance of dying laughing at these unselfconcious antics of the Property and Growth Lobby.
http://australianpropertyforum.com/topic/9032052/1/
The powerpoint slides and Salt monologue give way to footage of Co-conspirators... well conspiring.
One of those present is the CEO of Parramatta Council. All those on-stage seemed completely naive to the notion of democracy or the public interest. This was a 2011 talkfest by KPMG and the Property Council of Australia which has been sitting in our draft articles for some time, but age has not tarnished it.
Debating them would be like debating the three stooges - which is perhaps why they never debate any of the counter-growth lobby.
They seem utterly clueless regarding the nature of their opposition.
There are comments below the video on the above site from people who seem amazed at these antics. Most of candobetter.net's readers would not be amazed, but amused to see what we knew to be true actually played out on stage. There are also comments about some nasty sock-puppets who seem to be located in Prosper Australia. One of them is noted to attack people who want to stop undemocratic population growth in Australia. The same guy seems to get around a lot - from the Refugee Alliance and their friends in Right to Life, amongst shouter-downs in the Greens, the Socialist Alliance and even in Bicycles Victoria. (What do all these organisations have in common that could interest him? - Political turf.)
This page from another site also carries the same video and discusses the issue of online property shills and astroturfing.
http://www.differenthere.com/2011/08/on-internet-nobody-knows-youre-dog-or.html
This page, also from the site above, is also very interesting. It discusses the commercial collapse of The Block'
http://www.differenthere.com/2011/08/real-estate-in-crisis-block-auction.html
Here's an example of a comment posted after watching this video:
"This is very disturbing.
KPMG's Bernard Salt is advocating the creation of groups of paid shills and spruikers, backed by big business and the property industry, to 'counter the negativity' by posting on opinion pages of newspapers, forums, social media, twitter and the blogosphere. He wants these groups to take on the 'doomsayers' by seeking out and 'balancing extreme views'. He says individuals can't do it but there are ways to fund groups to do it.
His guests say the property council used to do this a lot to promote the property industry but vacated that space in recent years and he recommends they return with broad campaigns at the PR level to fight negative sentiment in the property market.
It makes you wonder whether they've already been successful in doing this, and the bulls and spruikers on forums like this one are bankrolled by the real estate industry and big business to sow seeds of uncertainty and doubt among the dominant (and correct IMO) bearish viewpoint. Would it surprise you if our one-eyed permabulls and their socks are puppets of the propaganda arm of the real estate industry, here to manipulate public opinion and drown out reality? Who to trust?"
Comments
Darren Mitchell (not verified)
Wed, 2012-01-11 15:09
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Trolls and Spruikers
quark
Thu, 2012-01-12 14:48
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Torture
Anonymous (not verified)
Sat, 2012-01-14 07:09
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Immigration juggernaut is frightening
Geoffrey Taylor
Sat, 2012-01-14 09:18
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'Fair competition' advocate uses citizenship to sell 'education'
I note that University of NSW Vice Chancellor Fred Hilmer, who is peddling this scheme, is the same Fred Hilmer who was commissioned by the Hawke/Keating Labour Government to chair the National Competition Policy Review Committee, which led to the introduction of National Competition Policy in 1995. At the time the report (http://www.ncc.gov.au/images/uploads/Hilmer-001.pdf - pdf 42M) was released it was greeted by our newsmwedia with sycophantic adulation and was subject to almost no informed critical scrutiny. It become the retrospective justification for Paul Keating having foisted his extreme "free market" dogma on the Australian public without any elctoral mandate in 1983 and was to become the dogma with which all Australian Governments thereafter were expected to comply --- or have hell to pay. Essentially, government was to privatise as many wealth-producing and and service providing entities as possible wealth-producing and service proving entities as possible and, as far as possible, not regulate the "free market".
That, in order to give the Australian tertiary education industry a competitive advantage over foreign universities, Hilmer is prepared to offer prospective foreign students a still easier path to citizenship as well as paid employment denied to many Australian residents, reveals what a sham Hilmer's professed belief in fair competition always was.
Student's father (not verified)
Sat, 2012-01-14 19:50
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Curse Hilmer, Hawke and Keating
Ruby Red (not verified)
Sat, 2012-01-14 19:54
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Not laughing - angry at growth lobby antics
CSI (not verified)
Sun, 2012-01-15 16:40
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Developer's Mindset
Primo Levy (not verified)
Sun, 2012-01-15 22:32
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Land development has no rational economic purpose
NIMBY (not verified)
Mon, 2012-01-16 14:23
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Straightening out BANANAS?
Tigerquoll
Tue, 2012-01-17 00:01
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Growthists are 'buildophiles'
It's time to seriously defend home.
It's time to label growth lobbyists, developers as 'buildophiles'. The term has a nasty ring to it and the more it is used it will catch on unwelcomingly to the target.
I have just concocted it and I plan to use it and it is free to use, unlike those selfish American pseudodemics who try to patent every friggin term they concoct.
Go forth, use it liberally....
Tigerquoll
Suggan Buggan
Snowy River Region
Victoria 3885
Australia
Anonymous (not verified)
Sun, 2012-01-22 21:25
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Bernard Salt the new Page 3 Murdoch girl
Michael (not verified)
Sun, 2012-01-22 22:59
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Knighthood, beatification
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