Is spending time with his newborn more important than campaigning for Zed? [With Poll]

Madam Cholet said :

johnboy said :

I dunno, it’s not like babies arrive without warning.

if he wasn’t in a position to give it his all he didn’t have to knife the incumbent.

I stopped my husband travelling interstate within a month of the expected birth. And I would not have been happy if he had chosen to go to work when the moment came. Not that I expected him to go to the office at 2am. They could however probably have planned ‘trying for a baby’ slightly better. But sometimes with the best of intentions, it just happens.

All that matters really is that anyone should be allowed time to be at the birth of their baby, and time to support their partner through the following weeks (which is harder than you might expect). If anyone objects, they don’t have to vote for him. If he had done the opposite he’d have been subject to comments as well.

Ok, I’m done talking about Zed and procreation.

Considering that there is 13 years between their youngest child and the new baby, I’d hazard a guess that there was no planning at all involved in this child – more a “whoopsie”. I’d be more involved in planning to prevent it happening.

Pure speculation of course.

I wonder if Zed has worked out what it is that makes babies.

Seriously, tho, he’s been completely mission in action for the whole campaign, save for a few safe love ins. I’m not aware of any policy being pushed by the ACT Tories. Spending time with your newborn makes perfect sense, but he could have gotten out and about in the previous weeks. And months, for that matter.

And why not send along one of the other candidates in his place to any of the things he’s missed? Surely they’re across Liberal policy and able to string a sentence together. I think it’s because he’s confident enough that he’ll get in that he can show complete contempt for the electorate.

In contrast, a mate of mine was new to C Town before the last election and wanted to meet the candidates. Andrew Leigh, a shoe-in for Fraser, agreed to come and meet him at the pub, bought him a beer, and talked policy for half an hour. Respeck.

What does the Stable Population Party think about this?

Darkfalz said :

I put him second to Nash.

I put Nash at 1, Zed was a long way down my list; backstabbing turncoat.

I pity the AEC worker who has to figure out where my vote goes.

I’ve tried to structure it so my vote exhausts before it gets to any of the likely candidates.

cranky said :

Rabbott has been promising to decimate the Canberra PS (if elected) for three years.

Meanwhile, Labor have been doing it. You seem ok with it.

I put him second to Nash.

Ghettosmurf87 said :

chewy14 said :

It’s neither here nor there.

I’m far more interested in someone who’ll be working hard for three years as opposed to someone who’s really good at campaigning for a few days/weeks.

So either way Zed was never getting your vote 😉

Probably third last on the ballot at this stage, he really inspires confidence. Lol.

johnboy said :

I dunno, it’s not like babies arrive without warning.

One minute you’re using your democracy sausage. Nine months later: boom!

Jethro said :

I look at it this way.

If/when he gets elected, he won’t be taking his seat until halfway through next year, so he will have a whole lot of downtime to spend with the family after Saturday.

Now, I don’t think anyone would begrudge him family time when the baby is just born, but spending a few hours a day at community forums, etc would still give him entry of time to spend time with the family.

If you are running for office you should at least make the occasional appearance. If you knew you were going to be having a baby and wouldn’t be able to make that commitment, perhaps you shouldn’t have made that commitment.

I’m pretty sure in the territory’s our two senators get elected every election and go straight into the senate, unlike in the states.

Also I don’t blame Zed at all for taking time with his new baby, we would all be dumping shit on him if he kept campaigning while his wife was in hospital. However Zed has been MIA all election not just since his wife went into labour. He has attended very few forums, and obviously he turned up to the Christian lobby love in.

It’s a real shame he missed story time at smiths, as mentioned in the article he declined last week before he knew when his wife was going to give birth. The four story’s at smiths were great Zed really could have let us know about himself by attending. Other than he is from a migrant back ground and was born in Canberra I don’t know anything about him at all.

But at the end of the day he will hold the Liberal senate spot, so why not take it easy, he could have been holidaying in Europe the last few months and he still would have been elected. His battle was against Gary not Sheikh

cranky said :

Rabbott has been promising to decimate the Canberra PS (if elected) for three years.

Perhaps probable election date, probable difficult questions, probable backlash from knifing Humphries, can all be solved by a well timed birth.

Cynical – Who me?

We have a winner!

I think it’s Mr Damiano that’s using the convenience of Zed’s bub for political gain. At best, he’s no better than Zed’s opponents.

Spending time with newborn actually raises rather than lowers him in my esteem. Mind you, from his actions he comes across to me as a devious, lazy, self-serving weasel entirely unsuited for public office, so that may not mean much!

Well if he intended to keep working he knew the timing might be crap and should have planned around it but we don’t know the circumstances, maybe mum or bub was a bit sick or they don’t have much family around to help.

Jethro said :

If/when he gets elected, he won’t be taking his seat until halfway through next year, so he will have a whole lot of downtime to spend with the family after Saturday.

Territory senators take their seats immediately. 🙂

Jethro said :

I look at it this way.

If/when he gets elected, he won’t be taking his seat until halfway through next year, so he will have a whole lot of downtime to spend with the family after Saturday.

Now, I don’t think anyone would begrudge him family time when the baby is just born, but spending a few hours a day at community forums, etc would still give him entry of time to spend time with the family.

If you are running for office you should at least make the occasional appearance. If you knew you were going to be having a baby and wouldn’t be able to make that commitment, perhaps you shouldn’t have made that commitment.

Don’t Territory senators sit right away? He’ll be straight to work won’t he?

chewy14 said :

It’s neither here nor there.

I’m far more interested in someone who’ll be working hard for three years as opposed to someone who’s really good at campaigning for a few days/weeks.

So either way Zed was never getting your vote 😉

It’s neither here nor there.

I’m far more interested in someone who’ll be working hard for three years as opposed to someone who’s really good at campaigning for a few days/weeks.

Well bugger me – the next time I get someone up the duff I’ll just call the Canberra Times and let them do the bloody campaigning for me. God forbid if they lost the copy and paste function on their computers.

Madam Cholet said :

They could however probably have planned ‘trying for a baby’ slightly better. But sometimes with the best of intentions, it just happens.

Well, the ACT election was almost exactly 9 months ago. Looks like we know what he was doing on election night.

I am with CC. I think this bloke is a wanker and am really disappointed that when he visited my suburb on Sunday that he wouldn’t come have a chat with me despite his aide letting him know I was interested in a frank and honest chat.

But in this case I don’t think it unreasonable for him to be MIA. Now if he was like a whole heap of other libs who have not turned up for community debates elsewhere (as reported in NSW), then yep reason for complaint, but the birth of your child is a reasonable excuse.

That said lets all ensure this wanker doesn’t get in! Power to the greens in the Senate I say.

johnboy said :

I dunno, it’s not like babies arrive without warning.

if he wasn’t in a position to give it his all he didn’t have to knife the incumbent.

Maybe this baby was some sort of immaculate conception and Zed didn’t know anything about it until the last minute, so wasn’t able to plan things better???

If it was any other candidate then Zed, I say this was a valid excuse – but as he appears to be one of the laziest politicians around, I’d say it just another excuse to get out of doing his job properly.

*entry = enough … Damned iPads.

I look at it this way.

If/when he gets elected, he won’t be taking his seat until halfway through next year, so he will have a whole lot of downtime to spend with the family after Saturday.

Now, I don’t think anyone would begrudge him family time when the baby is just born, but spending a few hours a day at community forums, etc would still give him entry of time to spend time with the family.

If you are running for office you should at least make the occasional appearance. If you knew you were going to be having a baby and wouldn’t be able to make that commitment, perhaps you shouldn’t have made that commitment.

Rabbott has been promising to decimate the Canberra PS (if elected) for three years.

Perhaps probable election date, probable difficult questions, probable backlash from knifing Humphries, can all be solved by a well timed birth.

Cynical – Who me?

He’ll get in anyway. If that’s the case then good on him for spending a little quality time with his newest before the real stuff begins.

After he’s elected, if he’s elected, is when Canberrans should have a right to expect him to to be working hard.

If he doesn’t want to bust a gut campaigning, that’s his look out.

johnboy said :

I dunno, it’s not like babies arrive without warning.

if he wasn’t in a position to give it his all he didn’t have to knife the incumbent.

I stopped my husband travelling interstate within a month of the expected birth. And I would not have been happy if he had chosen to go to work when the moment came. Not that I expected him to go to the office at 2am. They could however probably have planned ‘trying for a baby’ slightly better. But sometimes with the best of intentions, it just happens.

All that matters really is that anyone should be allowed time to be at the birth of their baby, and time to support their partner through the following weeks (which is harder than you might expect). If anyone objects, they don’t have to vote for him. If he had done the opposite he’d have been subject to comments as well.

Ok, I’m done talking about Zed and procreation.

It’s a similar question to should you go and visit your dying mum or go campaigning. Anyone who would put politics above the birth or death of a family member is a shit human being.

If only all fathers could be so lucky to spend their busiest time of year work-wise with their newly born babies!

Or should I be skeptical and conclude that Zed’s just making s#@t up?

People who have read RA for a while will probably know I am not fan at all of Zed. But using a new born as a political tool is quite low. Simon Sheikh should take the high road and not enter into this sort of garbage. Maybe he could instead use his time learning about the place he seeks to represent so he can finally talk about it. In every interview, he goes off about “Abbott proofing” the Senate and barely mentions Canberra.

Zed’s been an MLA for a long time, people know generally where he stands and what he’ll do. They know he’s a conservative and rather unimaginative individual.