Australian Politician Caught Viewing Porn

destinyland writes "An Australian Parliament member has resigned after admitting he'd used government computers to access porn and gambling sites. McLeay 'gave an uncomfortable press conference outside Parliament House,' notes one technology site, 'during which he admitted he had acted in a standard not expected of cabinet ministers.' Paul McLeay was also the Minister for Mineral and Forest Resources as well as the Minister for Ports and Waterways. In resigning, he apologized to his constituents and parliamentary colleagues, as well as to his wife and family."

Comments

What I care about

[Sonny Yatsen]

I don't care if a politician was caught watching internet porn. A lot of people (if not most) do it and politicians are no exception.

I do care if a politician was caught paying for internet porn. That tells me a lot about whether he's able to spend money wisely.

Re:What I care about

[DaMattster]

Well, we know the CEOs, CIOs, and CFOs have admitted to it. Yes, it is a misuse of taxpayer funded systems but I don't think it is really that bad. It would be worse if said politican were railing against pornography all the while engaging in it. Nothing pisses me off more than a hypocritical politican so I guess I hate most, if not all politicans.

Re:What I care about

[xtracto]

I do not care if a politican is caught watching porn, or if he buys porn.

I DO care if a politician watches porn DURING HIS WORK TIME or using his workplace resources. Mainly because he is wasting our hard earned tax money of which they get a helluva lot.

Re:What I care about

[DrgnDancer]

What I can't figure is: what's so hard about "don't watch porn on work computers"? No is saying "don't watch porn", just don't use company/government resources to do it. It's not a hard concept. It's not a foreign concept. Hell most of us carry around portable, largely untraceable Internet devices in our pockets these days. If you GOTTA have a fix, get some head phones and use that.

Personally I've never seen the draw of porn at a time when I can't really conveniently... eh.. use it. So to speak.

Re:What I care about

[c 0xFF]

I care if he watches porn if he then votes for internet pornography filters. I can't stand hypocrites.

Note that I don't know if this is the case, but it wouldn't surprise me at all.

Re:What I care about

[Kilrah_il]

If he was caught updating his personal Facebook account during work, would you be upset? And if he checked his personal mail? Or maybe just browsed a shopping site for half an hour, looking for a new oven (because his wife was pestering about her wanting a new one)?
Actually, for people who are not paid by the hour, this is less of an issue. If I pay you X$ (AU$) an hour to do a job, I want you to be working during that hour. If I pay you Y$ a month/year to do a job, I don't care how long you are in the office. Do whatever you want, just get the job done.
If you don't have a problem with the above scenarios, but you have a problem with him watching porn in his office, then we have a different discussion. I myself think porn is perfectly OK, and if no one is around while you do it, I don't care (If other people are around, they might be offended because of their personal beliefs, so I wouldn't open a porn flick near them). Of course, this is my opinion, and everyone is free to have his own opinion... although I am sure that I am correct and you are not! :)

Re:What I care about

[ljgshkg]

Agreed. I don't care if he's watching internet porn or not during any time. I only care if he's doing his job well. A politician spending all of his time working for his own benefit (or for his next election? hence doing "his job", or so it seems) might well be doing a worse and less useful job than a politician watching a bit of porn using tax payer funded systems.

Re:What I care about

[darthdavid]

Anon.Clown was a little ham-handed is his phrasing, but to say it better, anyone who builds an entire career based on publicly decrying something which is seen as immoral by some but not all of their constituents has a pretty good chance of having skeletons of that nature in their closet. The phrase "Methinks the lady doth protest too much" springs to mind. It's a well known psychological phenomenon that people trying (incompetently) to hid embarrassing personal habits are often the loudest voices shrieking about how awful those habits are.

That doesn't mean that every person who speaks out against something is guilty of it, it just means that you should look carefully at the people with nothing better to do than talk about how immoral someone else is, because they might just be trying to divert attention from their own indiscretions.

Re:What I care about

[sycodon]

Because if you can't find free porn on the internet, you're an idiot and have no business running the government.

Re:What I care about

[teh kurisu]

I do care if a politician was caught paying for internet porn. That tells me a lot about whether he's able to spend money wisely.

What if he (or she) is caught trying to claim it on parliamentary expenses?

Re:What I care about

[linzeal]

Who cares, unless it affects his work duties?

No, it can't be...

[the_one_wesp]

Oh no!!! A human being doing things that human beings do! I demand that government officials be MORE robot like, not less!

Re:No, it can't be...

[Farmer Tim]

That would be a good point, except this guy is a member of the state branch of the same party that proposed the internet filter. Besides, using a work computer for looking at porn and gambling on company time would get you fired from any other job, so it's a matter of being held to the same standards as everyone else, and as a New South Wales resident and taxpayer I don't see why I should be subsidising his personal habits.

There's another example of the same kind of hypocrisy from the same state parliament, this time a Christian right politician. 200,000 sites is research? Yeah, right. Resign you wanker!

Not for the reason you'd think...

[Drakkenmensch]

The reason why they're making such a fuss over his porn and gambling is that he had to bypass the Great Firewall of Australia to access them. When it comes to accessing sex and gambling on the internet, that's where Australia draws the line!!!

Trust /. to miss the point entirely

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not about the fact that he was looking at porn; it's that he was doing it using government funds and on government time. If he'd been doing it on his own time with his own computer and internet connection... well, he'd probably still be in the shit with family values groups, but he wouldn't have had to resign for it.

Re:Trust /. to miss the point entirely

[bill_mcgonigle]

t's that he was doing it using government funds and on government time

No, it's the porn. People do personal stuff at work all the time - call their doctors' office, make a photocopy, answer personal e-mail. In fact, I'm sure other Australian government workers do those things all the time, and nobody really cares.

Re:Obama

[Sonny Yatsen]

If this was about Obama, you'd probably be one of the loudest voices criticizing him.

How do I know? Because this article isn't about Obama, but you managed to bring him up anyway.