Spending the Packer money. I wonder if this is the kind of message James Packer expected to be promoting when his company donated $250,000 to Bob Katter’s Australian Party?

It is certainly the kind of message that John Singleton, another recent donor apparently, could well have devised.

But surely the Packer and Singleton support has nothing to do with an independent opposing poker machine legislation in the House of Representatives.

Quite tame really. By United States standards the ad is a bit tame really. Have a listen to this little effort as Keller’s Riverside store promotes its gun sales.

A cautionary quote for the day. From Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, International Business Editor of London’s Daily Telegraph:

“We know from China Iron and Steel Association that steel output has dropped from 2m tonnes a day last year to 1.7m this year – with chilly implications for Vale and Brazil’s real, or BHP Billiton and the Aussie dollar.”

A national referendum. Populism is not always a winner. The Swiss voted in a weekend national referendum by almost two to one to reject a plan to increase annual leave from four weeks to six.

And next THE multinational referendum. The actual voting is not until May but the campaigning is well and truly underway and in the Eurovision song contest populism does count. Which is why the United Kingdom, supporter-less in recent years, has resurrected a golden oldie.

Surely Engelbert Humperdinck will waltz it in although the Crikey Eurovision Election Indicator still thinks otherwise.