• Newspoll’s latest cumulative results from the last fortnight with state-by-state breakdowns can be viewed at The Australian. Roy Morgan has performed the same exercise with its data from October, providing both Senate polling and state-by-state lower house figures. Of note are ACT Senate figures suggesting Greens candidate Kerrie Tucker should easily win a seat at the expense of Liberal incumbent Gary Humphries.
• Malcolm Turnbull has been thrown a lifeline in Wentworth with the emergence of doubts about the validity of Labor candidate George Newhouse’s nomination. Newhouse’s resignation from the New South Wales Consumer Trader and Tenancy Disputes Tribunal – an “office of profit under the Crown” – was not received until the day of the formal declaration of nominations, when it appeared to be required by noon the day before. However, Imre Salusinszky of The Australian today reports on legal advice Newhouse has received from John McCarthy QC that the date of his resignation is irrelevant, because “NSW legislation stipulates that the office of any member of the tribunal becomes automatically vacant if he or she nominates for a federal seat”. Emma Alberici of the ABC says that “if history is any guide, Mr Newhouse won’t have too much to worry about” if his election is declared void, citing the electorate’s confirmation of Jackie Kelly in Lindsay and Phil Cleary in Wills. However, these episodes involved oversights that came to light after they were elected, with the voters in Lindsay taking revenge on a sore-loser opposition that had dragged them back to the polls. The Liberals would surely have the sense to take caution from this precedent, although they are currently talking tough to keep the threat of a by-election in the air. Democrats Senator Andrew Bartlett sees the controversy as “a reminder of the need to reform outdated provisions in our constitution”.
• Kevin Rudd’s campaigning this week has provided a clear pointer to very strong Labor polling in Queensland. Yesterday he campaigned in the Brisbane seat of Bowman and will today head north to Dawson, respectively held by the Liberals and Nationals on margins of 8.9 per cent and 10.2 per cent. The Dawson venture should give Kevin Rudd the opportunity to take advantage of member De-Anne Kelly’s discomfort over the Auditor-General’s damning report into the Regional Partnerships program.
• Former Labor member for Hinkler, Brian Courtice, has appeared in Coalition television commercials attacking Labor’s union influence. Quoth Courtice: “Kevin Rudd couldn’t go three rounds with Winnie the Pooh, so there’s no way he can stand up to the union bosses. They’ve thrown $30 million at this campaign to buy the election. This is about a brutal grab for power. It’s too big a risk to risk Rudd.” Courtice first made his displeasure felt a fortnight ago when he appeared at a press conference with Workplace Relations Minister Joe Hockey,
• John Wiseman of The Australian points to a $20,000 press advertising campaign as evidence that Labor is still hopeful of winning Boothby, in spite of everything. Nicole Cornes is “the only Labor candidate to have expensive press advertisements running in Adelaide’s daily newspaper, The Advertiser”.
• Labor’s candidate for Eden-Monaro, Mike Kelly, received unwelcome late-campaign publicity on Wednesday after he described as “ridiculous” the private school funding formula which Labor decided to retain when it ditched Mark Latham’s “private schools hit list”.
• In an overview of the campaign for Bass, Sue Neales of The Mercury reports that “Liberal Party strategists concede that Labor candidate and former Launceston deputy mayor Jodie Campbell has already got Bass ‘in the bag’”.
• Ewin Hannan of The Australian writes that Labor’s candidate in Deakin, Mike Symon, has “failed to persuade his party to commit to fixing a contentious local road project”. This refers to the “loathed” bottleneck at Springvale and Whitehorse roads in Nunawading, to which the Coalition has promised to commit $80 million. In other Coalition road promise news, Mark Vaile has announced that funding for completion of the dual carriageway upgrade to the Hume Highway, variously costed at $752 million and $992 million.
• I am once again approaching my monthly bandwidth limit. Donations to the cause are as always more than welcome, and can be made through the PayPal link on the sidebar. I should note that I invariably get more than I need whenever I make this appeal, but you might feel I deserve some pocket money for my efforts.
I really don’t see Hockey losing North Sydney. That electorate would have to have one of the lowest shares of blue collar workers in the country, so I doubt the Workchoices issue is going to get as much traction there as elsewhere.
On the other hand, Mike Bailey seems like a very good ALP candidate for that area, a handsome ABC weatherman will definitely go down well with the “doctor’s wives” demographic.
And and the lame will walk and the seas will be bountiful and children will sit contentedly at the feet of Julia “Medicare Gold” Gillard and peace will reign under the benevolent eye of dear Leader Kevin ….
[And and the lame will walk and the seas will be bountiful and children will sit contentedly at the feet of Julia “Medicare Gold” Gillard and peace will reign under the benevolent eye of dear Leader Kevin ….]
I’ll woof, woof to that.
But no, this still doesn’t count as a very good post ESJ.
Rudd started campaigning the minute he was made opposition leader and came out with Education and Broadband as major themes and they have been all along.
I don’t know how it can be said Labor hasn’t had a theme. It has had the same ones right from the start.
Education revolution, broadband, Climate Change were such strong popular and well run themes that Howard had to adopt them to try to negate Rudd’s strength. Throw in with that the canning of WorkChoices you have quite a good campaign that has been running 11 months.
That Rudd has been so far ahead for so long must indicate a brilliant campaign by him – brilliant selling of his ideas and himself. Rudd has been exceptional in undermining Howard’s claim to economic credentials by foucssing on micro economics and, interest rate rises only served to reinforce the point. AND this is in a time of economic prosperity where it should be very difficult for a government to lose.
If Rudd wins this election 53-54 a lot of people will be looking at his tactics and doing the same. Rudd did play with Howard’s mind in Parliament and public so much so that he was just about to toss in the towel after APEC.
The only critiscism I have [but I guess they must know exactly what they are doing or, lack funds] is the lack of tv adverts during the last weeks.
Rort claims: PM looking down the barrel:
A DAMNING report on the Howard Government’s $328 million regional projects fund has reignited claims that the scheme has been blatantly used by the Government for pork-barrelling in Coalition electorates.
The report, by the National Audit Office, found the scheme had been plagued by political interference, disregard for rules and guidelines and a lack of transparency.
http://www.theage.com.au/news/federal-election-2007-news/pm-hit-by-rort-claims/2007/11/15/1194766869064.html
So LTEP, you are saying:
– Rudd has run a better campaign, but it’s crap
– Howard has won 4 times with crap campaigns
– whether the campaign is crap or not is not a good predictor of the result
Conclusion: ?
[Frank
What is the goss re Pearce, outside chance or possible gain.]
Have no idea, but Moylan has done absolutlely NO press advertising at all, despite one flyer with her “achievements”.
I reckon there might be a chance, but Pearce covers quite a few country areas affected by the drought etc.
Hard to say though.
ESJ,
My grandmother always told me “If you’ve got nothing good to say, then shut up!” Isuggest that you and a number of other people, on both sides, take her advice.
@190
Channel 7 political coverage generally is a JOKE,
as is their current affairs,
and anna coren?
give me a break.
PM @ 497
Hear hear.
Matt Price has always said workchoices is a dog of a policy. Perhaps that’s what ESJ is getting at with his “woof woof”.
“woof woof”
Hey ESJ,
‘what goes on tour stays on tour’ 😉
[Rudd started campaigning the minute he was made opposition leader and came out with Education and Broadband as major themes and they have been all along.]
I don’t think the theme of the election is Labor’s to make. The theme is by default John Howard. Howard sympolises someone who has been there too long, told too many lies, and should go. All Labor have to do is not be John Howard. They can adopt similar policies, but when Labor promotes a policy it is their policy, not John Howard doing the selling.
All this stuff about themes and narratives goes over the average voter’s head. People have just decided that Rudd isn’t going to do anything particularly bad, and they think he is new and decent, and not old like Howard
for 85% of people that’s enough.
Does anyone know people that go to political party webpages and actually read the policy documents? To me they are just filler to support the leader. They don’t really change many votes.
499 Ed StJ
And it will rain more. It always does under a labor government look at the rainfall variability charts 83-96 and compare 96-07.
Just saw Mad Monk on Skynews Agenda, even with their sycophantic questioning he sounded like a loser. Waffling and twisting trying to weasel his way out of trouble, god help us if he ever gets to lead the Libs.
BTW I wonder what the chances are for Deearn Kelly to lose now, or don’t the voters care about blatant corruption anymore? I have probably already answered that question for myself.
Poor old Morgan get bagged so much. I hope they are the most accurate on the 24th.
I am hurt comrades.
I feel a higher performance standard applies to my comments then to others on this blog. I am to inform and entertain but even I can have an off day!
Mathew Cole – Fight the matriachy, theyll always try to control you!
[Matt Price has always said workchoices is a dog of a policy. Perhaps that’s what ESJ is getting at with his “woof woof”.]
Possibly. More likely he has just run out of nihilistic things to write.
No idea how he expects to run his own blog. I mean he said is meant to be about machinations in the Labor party, but if that is what The Oz wanted, wouldn’t they actually get someone who knew something about machinations in the Labor party – Andrew Landeryou perhaps.
473 Chris,
Surprised that they let Nelson out of the strait jacket 😉 ….. well the cricket is going nowhere fast at the moment, Aussies batting and have only lost Hayden before lunch. I will watch for awhile 🙂
Why Do Liberals Hate Their Own?
http://blogs.theage.com.au/koutsoukis/archives/2007/11/why_do_liberals.html
Malcolm Fraser was asked by the ABC’s Fran Kelly on Monday whether he would be voting Liberal at this election. He declined to answer. That a former Liberal Prime Minister as ruthless as Fraser could refuse to endorse his own party a few days out from a federal election says a lot about the way the Liberals treat their former leaders. They’re an unsentimental lot aren’t they? Is this because, when it comes down to it, Liberals don’t really believe in anything?
Let’s hope for the Liberals’ sake that they treat John Howard with a bot more respect than their other former leaders after next Saturday. But going on past form, and the likely magnitude of the defeat they are about to suffer, I suspect that it won’t take long before those left behind start to trash his legacy.
So the Libs have lost this week very badly. Week 5. Even the Australian has started to take notice (read it and weep ye of the right). The Auditor Scandal and Abbott will play the whole weekend and ‘the insiders’, and set up another unclear drifting week, THE last week for a Lib meltdown. The polls may still narrow, infact I predict The Australian next Sat 24th will run a newspoll that will show some narrowing. But the ‘it’s time’ and Kev factors will have a strong effect and counter the ever reliable last minute vote to the conservatives. Labor 53.7-8 Libs 46.3-2
I thank you.
Gerr. I used to work with Anna’s sister. Hubba Bubba!!!
No Samuel K. I never said Rudd has run a good campaign. I remain unconvinced about Rudd to be honest. A lot of what the Coalition says about him is pretty spot on. He’s hollow, inexperienced, stands, noticeably for nothing, lives off of slogans etc. I’ll still be voting for Labor for the first time in the Reps (ex Greens voter). I made up my mind a long time before the campaign started.
A good campaign, however inspires people to vote for you. The Coalition, going by the polls has inspired at least an extra 1% of people to preference them. I’m not really sure how much of the ALP’s vote can be put down to their campaign. WA perhaps? But what have they done in WA?
484 LTEP
The ALP policies aren’t exactly what I want either, but I will disagree on the poor campaign assertion – not violently mind you – but it’s a better topic of discussion than ‘swat the fly’ that’s been going on today.
Have a read of this:
http://petermartin.blogspot.com/2007/11/tuesday-column-why-labor-stands-for.html
Hotellings Law
The ALP strategy was planned from long ago and based around this principle, and 1 other – lag time.
In twelve months the ALP have shifted their ice cream cart to the middle of the beach, and every time JWH has turned his back, they’ve walked it slowly to the right. Not fast enough to discourage too many from walking from the left end of the beach (lag) but fast enough to convince those just to the right of the centre of the beach that they’ve got a choice. The further to the right they walk – the more people can see that there are 2 carts.
It’s only an analogy, but it’s a well understood economic principle.
My democracy hat suggests that someone should open up a cart down the left end of the beach, though I suspect that those down the right end are a mite greedy and they’ll be starting at least one cart up soon.
Nelson is going very presidential in his closing address, covering all the bases.
Mentions the strong coalition of Howard, Costello, Downer, NELSON…!!!
Still looks very seedy with his bags under the eyes look. Lightweight.
Hinkler/Herbert error and wrong Newspoll link finally corrected.
Thanks Julie, living in Tokyo, completely forgot it was on. Labor at shorter odds to win than the cricket team, who are going for 13/14? straight. over to cricinfo for an update
@516
Ok I get your point….lets not throw out the baby with the bath water…..
(Umm just between u and me….what was she like? I want details, names, numbers, photos, bank acc numbers etc etc.)
Oh, the “Do the right thing” isn’t going to work anymore since even the government doesn’t do the right thing without having scrutiny.
I’m now getting visions of a court room, the Australian people are the jury, the government is the defendant, and the Labor party is the prosecution.
Defendant’s Lawyer (JWH): “Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, there is no case here. My client has done nothing wrong, in fact it has been the best citizen of this great country. The prosecution will tell you that my client was asleep at the wheel, and was drunk. He has never shown hard evidence to prove anything. You, the people, have never seen my client do anything wrong. The prosecution will make you believe that its my client’s fault that you can’t afford a house or to get your teeth checked. I urge you to look at the big issue, look at what he has done over the last 11 years and how great it has been. If you convict my client, you will only give control to the unions, of which I might add that the prosecution lawyer is a member of.”
Prosecution (KR): “Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, the defense asks you to ignore all the recent facts. They tell you that you’ve never been better off, but they ask you to ignore everything that goes wrong but asks you to look at everything that is going great. The defense was caught pedaling little blue pills when they said ‘Go for growth’, and they try to bribe you with tens of dollars a month only to be forking out more money on your loan. They ask you to trust them, but they’re corrupt and waste your money like a drunken sailor. They’re doing what Cher couldn’t do, and ‘turn back time’ with the Industrial relations and education. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, don’t be fooled, I urge you to look very closely at all the evidence, not just the evidence the defense wants you to.”
Shows On.
“Themes” and “narratives” when spoken about as concepts and in those terms do certainly go over the normal (i’ll refrain from using average) voters head. But they still absorb the messages, and its through absorbing them “unconsciously” if you will, that they form their generalised veiw that one leader is MoD, safe, new and the other is old and tired.
My thoughts for what they are worth.
#517 a good campaign for the ALP was never going to be about trying to inspire more people to vote for them. All they had to do was maintain the status quo, which everything suggests they have managed to do.
Why do people keep referring to what Kroger has been saying? The guy is full of hot air, even worse than Howard. Guys like that who try to argue black when everyone can see it’s white just end up looking like idiots.
Hot off the press, Howard has promised to build 100 comfort stops around the nation at a cost of $100 million. This campaign is getting bizarre, 100 one million dollar crappers strewn around the countryside, they must have gold plated toilet seats, what a fitting epitaph for the lying rodent, I always though he was as cunning as a shit house rat.
This policy announce marks the turning point of the campaign, let the narrowing begin
[“Themes” and “narratives” when spoken about as concepts and in those terms do certainly go over the normal (i’ll refrain from using average) voters head. But they still absorb the messages, and its through absorbing them “unconsciously” if you will, that they form their generalised veiw that one leader is MoD, safe, new and the other is old and tired.]
I see your point. But I think one of Rudd’s strongest messages is that he will be a careful P.M without being John Howard.
It is like you can have a Howard who is younger, not a climate change denier, and who is more interested in every day living costs than bizarre economic statistics.
So Labor has presented Rudd as different in important ways, but the same in other areas that voters care about.
I think that has been the success of Labor’s campaign.
People, people please. Stop talking about Workchoices and what its impact is now.
Workchoices wasn’t designed for a booming economy, it was designed for a contracting economy.
It was designed so employers could cut wages and sack workers at will when the economy started to go belly up. It was designed so that unions would have no say in how to help companies that were struggling. It was designed as the perfect set of rules to allow the simplest options for employers when their business runs into trouble – punish the workers.
Will Kroger be on Lateline tonight.Look forward to more of his “the american tanks are not massed on the border” analysis.
‘Tis champagne comedy – he’s looking more and more like Ray Martin these days.
@517 LTEP
No, way. Rudd has rund a very good campaign after a shaky start (see my comment in Shanahans article today for reference material).
People may be getting somewhat complacent as to the magnitude of a possible Labor victory in terms of counter wedging the wormtounged rodent – partic this last week.
Rudd has played Howard like Wellington played Napoleon, He played defensive bigtime because he had to then in the final stages counterattacked to effect. it was the ONLY way to play. Have ppl forgotten whose side the media has been oin until this last week??????? Rudd maybe some of thise things you say, he may be none of them.
(Disclaimer Howard is to Napoleon what a Datsun 120Y is to the latest BMW)
😉
[Why do people keep referring to what Kroger has been saying? The guy is full of hot air, even worse than Howard. Guys like that who try to argue black when everyone can see it’s white just end up looking like idiots.]
Because there WAS a time when Kroger was quite an insightful conservative commentator.
But it seems that time has passed, now he is just another campaigner.
Talking about commentators. The biggest loss to this campaign has been Matt Price. He wrote one article and said he would try to contribute. The fact he hasn’t makes me worry that his health is very bad.
His humour and even handedness would’ve been an assett to the campaign coverage. Even a political junky like myself is feeling fatigue heading into the final week.
kev 482
For all you Adelaidians I just heard an ad that Nicole Cornes will be featuring on 5AA with “arch enemy” Amanda Blair form after 1. Should be interesting…..
Kev, I rang 5AA. Nicole is on at 3.30.
In the meantime, how could anyone listen to that insufferable drongo, Amanda Blair.
If Nicole can’t cream her, I’ll listen to Leon Byner for a whole morning.
Have 13, looking for 14 straight wins I believe.
Shows On.
I agree. I see it similar to when you get a pop up message from iTunes saying updates have been made to iTunes or iPod and do you want to dowload them. You trust that its going to be as good as what you’ve got except its had the rough bits fixed and its keeping you up to date.
Great site. Reading all of your comments is very entertaining. I often wonder though if psehologists and political fancyists alike, get it wrong because they can’t see the forest for the trees?
For example, while Abbott’s gaffe may seem like the last straw to some, I just can’t imagine that it swings votes…Laborists will love it (myself included) and Liberales’ will shrug it off with whatever spin Abbott/the party put on it after the fact (e.g it was doctored, it is a dirty trick)…Average Joe-Couldn’t-Give-a-Rats-About-Politics just isn’t going to register that story in my opinion.
Having said all of that, maybe I’m just cycnical cause I have lived in Abbott’s electrorate for too long…what a ship of fools we are 🙂
I think it is funny that Abbott is saying that the video footage of was “doctored”. It is hilarious seeing another Liberal politician go all post-modern on us and say that the camera some how lied.
What he was saying was extremely clear. Workers and lost protections, the IRC had lost powers, and he thought that was GOOD.
Well, that is basically what WorkChoices has done, he may think it is good, but what he seems incapable of doing is explaining WHY those policies are good.
Re Howard’s Shithouse led recovery 🙂
[The federal Transport Minister says a re-elected Coalition Government would spend $100 million over five years to build 100 new rest stops along Australia’s highways.
The Trucking Association has been lobbying hard on the issue, arguing there are not enough places for drivers to take a break when they are fatigued.
Mark Vaile says the money hinges on state and territory governments providing matching funds.
“We want them to pay as much attention to road safety in their areas of responsibility as we are prepared to do,” he said.
“We want the states across Australia in aggregate to match the amount of money we want to spend on road safety in this measure.”
He made the election promise outside of Ballina in the marginal Nationals seat of Page on the New South Wales north coast.]
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/11/16/2092960.htm?section=justin
Abbott is now having his own “sorryunsorry” moment:
http://www.theage.com.au/news/federal-election-2007-news/abbott-flipflop-on-ir-claims/2007/11/16/1194766911384.html
Federal Health Minister Tony Abbott has said he stands by comments he made about protections being cut under WorkChoices legislation — despite having disowned the claims in a separate interview.
The LNP primary will not be 43 on election day. It will be 41 and if their vote implodes this week due to Abbot and Grantgate it may get close to 40.
[Also interesting to note AC Nielsen has the LNP vote diving a few points on election day at each poll 1998 to 2004].
Crean used the “C” word this morning on AM. Hope they use that sound bite – “Corruption”.
Kroger (Krocker (- sh*t) is a party hack, looking for the truth emanating from his mouth is like expecting Warney’s phone to have text messaging disabled. It aint gonna happen.
Also he’ll probably be on with Rod Cameron, who is suffereing some sort of twitching dementia. At least he has some more tenuous grip on reality that Krocker (-sh*t).
ps If the Coalition get ousted…does that mean Murdoch stops sitting on the fence…cans Shanahan/Albrechtson et al. and we can start reading the Australian?
Abbott is Labors best performer. Geezuz, if you were Howard youd be pulling your hair out…..