Tony Abbott signals extending military campaign to Syria 

As wonderful as your company has been, I suspect that’s enough for Monday. The enduring lesson from Ian Macdonald is a good one for all of us – always back away from an open microphone before your latest idea seems too compelling not to share.
Let’s follow our orderly habits and summarise today, Monday.

• Tony Abbott said Australia would play its role in taking displaced people from the Syrian conflict, but having rashly dispatched his immigration minister Peter Dutton to Geneva to talk to the UNHRC, the fine print remained moot.
• Bill Shorten saw a vacant moment and grabbed it, announcing Labor’s preferred option would be a one-off increase in the humanitarian intake of 10,000 and a boost in funding for the UNHCR.
• Abbott also gave his strongest hint that Australia would shortly extend military action beyond Iraq and into Syria. Shorten gave an equally large hint that he accepted the prime minister’s rationale about the legality of any such action. It will be interesting to see how that notion goes once it hits the Coalition partyroom and the Labor caucus. A sharp eyed sort might point out that boosting the humanitarian intake might make it easier for some anxiety inclined sorts to cope with bombing Syria. Then again, it might not help a jot given an intensification of military strikes in Syria will likely increase the current displacement.
• Separately to Syria, the prime minister insisted he had The Plan and was Sticking to It after Newspoll showed for the 30th poll in a row that Labor would win any federal election held now. Inquiries about what the plan was yielded a slightly fresh intra-day formulation from Tony Abbott: the government was in favour of lower taxes, more infrastructure, and freer trade. Speaking of freer trade, Labor was absolutely against that because the ACTU/CFMEU was making Bill Shorten (the well known cat’s paw) oppose the China FTA. So perhaps The Plan won’t work without Labor helping to make it work. I know. I should stop waiting for things to make sense.
• Alan Jones fronted a greenie advertising campaign against the so-called lawfare changes being sought by the Abbott government. Ian Macdonald heard on Facebook that the Middle East was leaving Syria in the lurch and, postscript: why can’t these people just sort themselves out. The prime minister was reasonably sure that Joe Hockey would still be the treasurer next year but not entirely certain. The foreign minister was absolutely sure that she had first floated the idea that the current government should follow the Howard government in supporting a special one-off absorption of displaced persons just as John Howard had once done with Kosovo – and not Josh Frydenberg – and Julie Bishop was also certain that she would be telling Peter Dutton what Australia’s humanitarian response would be when he hit the tarmac in Geneva because that’s what foreign ministers do.
• Parliament for its part indulged a debate on legalising same-sex marriage that spanned 10 whole minutes. It indulged a much longer debate on whether children’s school backpacks were too heavy.

There was more, but that’s enough.
Thanks for your comments, here and on the Twits. We’ll be back, bright and early, doing it all again tomorrow. See you then.