There was more effusive praise for Rinehart’s fellow billionaire pal Elon Musk, appointed by Trump to run the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) with another billionaire, Vivek Ramaswamy.
Rinehart finished things off with a gushing tribute to another foreign leader, Argentina’s arch-libertarian President Javier Milei.
“This year I’d like to leave you with a quote from another brave, outstanding leader, the president of Argentina: ‘The collectivism and moral posturing of the woke agenda have collided with reality and no longer have credible solutions to offer to the actual problems of the world’,” she said. “The Americans and Argentinians have recognised the reality of this and voted.”
It was all very fawning, but when you’ve got Rinehart’s level of wealth and a captive audience of miners, you really can say whatever you like.
Poisoned chalice
One of the most cooked jobs in Australian politics is yours for the taking, dear readers, with the NSW Liberals putting out an advertisement for a party affairs manager. It is, according to the job ad, the party that “values the importance of family, freedom and individual enterprise”.
The lucky candidate will get the unenviable task of managing often cranky local branches, and dealing with the many internal squabbles that have plagued the state division over the past few years. After years of dysfunction, which culminated in the failure to lodge nominations for numerous candidates at this year’s local government elections, the Liberal Party’s federal executive launched a takeover of the NSW division.
CBD hears that the feds, with the backing of Opposition Leader Peter Dutton, are plotting a suite of reforms to the state division intended to minimise said dysfunction, including shrinking the size of the state executive and streamlining preselection timelines.
But they are not likely to be pushed until after next year’s federal election, to avoid further infighting. It’s the kind of overhaul that has been flagged previously, most recently in a similar form by former Mackellar MP and state president Jason Falinski. That push fell apart after the hard right effectively filibustered them.
All of this should serve as a word of warning for any prospective candidates looking for a job in politics. This one could be more trouble than it’s worth.
Mosman Movers
To Mosman now, where the bulldozers are getting a workout on some of the country’s most exclusive clifftop real estate at Wyargine Point.
Mike Messara, chief investment officer at Caledonia, the fund manager to Sydney’s harbourside set, has lodged plans to give the family’s Seacliff mansion a $9.9 million facelift. Messara bought Seacliff off his father, John Messara, a renowned horse breeder and former Racing NSW chair, for a handy $23 million in 2019. He’d bought the street-facing house, part of the same compound, two years earlier for $10 million.
Messara’s plans involve rebuilding the front villa, with alterations, including a new pool, to the clifftop mansion out the back. Caledonia’s performance over the past three years has been ordinary if we’re being generous. Looking at Messara’s grand home reno plans, you’d hardly know it.
Read the full article here
