Essential Research: 58-42

westpollgraphic141209

The latest Essential Research survey has Labor’s lead at 58-42 for the third successive week. Also included are leadership approval ratings (Kevin Rudd predictably little changed on a fortnight ago; Tony Abbott with mediocre ratings, which is much better than Turnbull had been doing); Copenhagen (important, but unlikely to reach agreement); and “Christmas spending”. We’ve also had a 400-sample of Western Australian voters from Westpoll (see right) which has federal Labor’s lead in the state at 53-47 (compared with 53-47 against in 2007). The West Australian takes this to mean Abbott “has largely proved a turn-off for WA voters”, but it might equally be to do with Westpoll’s low-sample volatility, which has seen the score go from 55-45 in February to 50-50 in May to 53-47 in December.

Author: William Bowe

William Bowe is a Perth-based election analyst and occasional teacher of political science. His blog, The Poll Bludger, has existed in one form or another since 2004, and is one of the most heavily trafficked websites on Australian politics.

2,339 comments on “Essential Research: 58-42”

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  2. [Note that at no stage in the above argument re the Internet filter have I resorted to emotional argument, ethical argument, or resorted to name calling, guilt by association/ assertion or any illogical technique.]

    Whats this then alfie?

    [Gusface

    I truly wonder what those complaining about are losing?

    I for one have my suspicions

    Guilt by assertion, eh! Argumentum ad hominem: poisoning the well! Guilt by association! ]

    But do continue,I enjoy your ditties
    😉

  3. Thanks Diog and Possum for answering my question that I posed earlier.
    Sorry I have been away for a while.

    Both of you seemed to be reluctant to answer this and you quickly changed the subject but I think that I can interpret your answers as agreeing with me that there are sites on the internet currently which contain material which should not be able to be legally
    imported into Australia or able to be viewed from Australia.

    You mention child porn. I have mentioned sites that contain porn that does not assure us (with some reliable legal backup) that the actors are consenting adults over 18. There could also be sites which contain images of something upsetting etc without adequate warning to the potential viewer.

    These sites may be based in countries in which the material is not illegal or where it is not enforced. It may be hard to determine their origin.

    My next question to you two is then, if an Australian ISP is told by the government (or anyone) the address of such a site, then what do you expect the ISP to do?

    (Apologies that I am setting out a careful argument very slowly as it seems that people
    are flying off the handle on this issue. My argument will continue)

  4. Gusface:
    [Better attempt at verballing,but still no cigar]

    No verballing, just trying to understand your position and making my best guess. Maybe I’ve missed it, but I’m not aware of any specific argument a no-filterer has made that you’ve addressed in any way, hence my previous post. As far as I can tell, you aren’t actually debating the issue.

  5. [The filter won’t restrict kiddies acces to porn or nasty sites… It won’t work]

    So using the “won’t work” analogy should we abolish all laws and close the prisons and revert to the law of every man for himself ??

  6. Andrew
    I heard Abbott on ABC 630 this afternoon saying we are back to the 70s with Christmas strikes.
    Gawd he’s hard to listen to, humming and haaring, awkward pauses while he tries to think what to lie about next.

  7. Hey why all the huffings and puffings about porns on the Web.

    Right now on the family friendly NatGeo channel is running a program called: Wild Sex. Steamy and full frontal.

  8. [No verballing, just trying to understand your position and making my best guess. Maybe I’ve missed it]

    Mate,Ive reposted 2038 3 times,clearly staing my position and posing a simple set of Q’s

    The silence is telling.

  9. Frank

    [So using the “won’t work” analogy should we abolish all laws and close the prisons and revert to the law of every man for himself ??]
    Strawman!!

    the laws are in place.

    It’s a question of what is the best way to tackle it. Why do something that is useless?
    You’ve already shown us the filter won’t prevent children stumbling onto porn.

  10. Gusface

    You can’t expect people to fall for loaded questions…

    you enjoy beating your wife,

    why is that?

    You like killing small animals

    why is that?

    You like buring down churches

    why is that?

    Yes, your silence is telling….

  11. Gusface, accurate analysis of your arguments! In case you don’t understand, here’s Wiki’s lists if fallacies you should avoid if you want credibility:

    Formal fallacies

    Formal fallacies are arguments that are fallacious due to an error in their form or technical structure.[1] All formal fallacies are specific types of non sequiturs.

    * Ad hominem: an argument that attacks the person who holds a view or advances an argument, rather than commenting on the view or responding to the argument.
    * Appeal to probability: assumes that because something could happen, it is inevitable that it will happen. This is the premise on which Murphy’s Law is based.
    * Argument from fallacy: if an argument for some conclusion is fallacious, then the conclusion is not credible.
    * Bare assertion fallacy: premise in an argument is assumed to be true purely because it says that it is true.
    * Base rate fallacy: using weak evidence to make a probability judgment without taking into account known empirical statistics about the probability.
    * Conjunction fallacy: assumption that an outcome simultaneously satisfying multiple conditions is more probable than an outcome satisfying a single one of them.
    * Correlative based fallacies
    o Denying the correlative: where attempts are made at introducing alternatives where there are none.
    o Suppressed correlative: where a correlative is redefined so that one alternative is made impossible.
    * Fallacy of necessity: a degree of unwarranted necessity is placed in the conclusion based on the necessity of one or more of its premises.
    * False dilemma (false dichotomy): where two alternative statements are held to be the only possible options, when in reality there are more.
    * If-by-whiskey: An argument that supports both sides of an issue by using terms that are selectively emotionally sensitive.
    * Ignoratio elenchi: An irrelevant conclusion or irrelevant thesis.
    * Is-ought problem: where one incorrectly derives an ought from an is. The most common forms of this fallacy arise in the analysis of morality, wherein an attempt is made to derive what one ought to do from known or stated facts.
    * Homunculus fallacy: where a “middle-man” is used for explanation, this usually leads to regressive middle-man. Explanations without actually explaining the real nature of a function or a process. Instead, it explains the concept in terms of the concept itself, without first defining or explaining the original concept.
    * Masked man fallacy: the substitution of identical designators in a true statement can lead to a false one.
    * Naturalistic fallacy: a fallacy that claims that if something is natural, then it is good or right.
    * Nirvana fallacy: when solutions to problems are said not to be right because they are not perfect.
    * Negative proof fallacy: that, because a premise cannot be proven false, the premise must be true; or that, because a premise cannot be proven true, the premise must be false.
    * Package-deal fallacy: consists of assuming that things often grouped together by tradition or culture must always be grouped that way.
    * Red Herring: also called a “fallacy of relevance.” This occurs when the speaker is trying to distract the audience by arguing some new topic, or just generally going off topic with an argument.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fallacies
    Cheers!

  13. After my weekly reality check at the RSL club, I see the government spin is increasing on net filtering. The reserves have been unleashed. It’s ALL about the children. 🙂

    But – there has STILL been no answer to the question posed some hours ago.
    Again:
    How will the proposed filter achieve its stated aims, with reference to the clear points made again and again today here and elsewhere that show those aims cannot be met because of the nature of the web?

    (That is, apart from the clear aim of garnering the votes of the Christian lobby, whose idea it was in the first place).

  14. [How will the proposed filter achieve its stated aims, with reference to the clear points made again and again today here and elsewhere that show those aims cannot be met because of the nature of the web?]

    Once again I point out it is not the PRFECT PANECEA, but ONE of the many tools in the Armoury – even Conroy has admitted that – do learn to read his Media Release.

  16. Ok JV

    I’ll tackle your questions if you answer mine.

    First, do you believe that there are sites/material on the internet that should not be imported into Australia? See my examples in 2201 above.

  17. [It’s a question of what is the best way to tackle it. Why do something that is useless?
    You’ve already shown us the filter won’t prevent children stumbling onto porn.]

    See my response to Jaundiced View. If you are that thick to not be able to read a simple media release, along with the attached FAQ – the link is there, then frankly you are beyond reasoning with.

  20. Vera – Saw Abbott on SkyNoos tonight (has been mostly Abbott lately).

    He was telling Kev that he’d better not agree to any increases above 5%. I reckon Abbott knows that he won’t be able to find enough alternatives to reach even 5% so he is demanding that Kev stays on that figure. The bloke is so transparent.

    It’s like Hockey with the stimulus spending. Stop now, he says, because it will put up interest rates, but what he really means is, stop now because I want to spend a heap of money when I’m Treasurer on nothing much except handouts to my rich mates.

  22. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure

    [Everyone knows that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure and a national ban on xxxxxxxxxxx an idea overwhelmingly supported by parents, is a sensible first step towards xxxxxx]

    Who said and when?

  23. [So the freedom fighters resort, as usual, to personal attack.]

    It is the standard modus operandi of those of the St Bob view of Politics – no wonder the Average Joe call for a filter if they have to put up with that crap.

    Oh and speakimng of St Bob and Parental Control – here is an interesting link to his calls to ban Junk Food Advertising – note he says how Parental control on the issue is “Hopeless” against “Pester Power”, yet he and his acolytes want Parents to take responsibilty for their kid’s net use.

    The standard reference to Kitchen Utensils applies yet again.

    http://bob-brown.greensmps.org.au/taxonomy/term/157/all

  25. [I heard Abbott on ABC 630 this afternoon saying we are back to the 70s with Christmas strikes.
    Gawd he’s hard to listen to, humming and haaring, awkward pauses while he tries to think what to lie about next.]

    Don’t worry, News Radio edited out most of the “humming and haaring” and made him sound like Winston Churchill.

    Then they asked the President of the Chamber Of Commerce whether Tony was right about the return to Christmas strikes?

    Then they asked him whether the NSW state government had been a bad employer in letting the strike happen?

    Then they said that seeing the NSW government had been hopeless, was this yet another instance of their hopelessness?

    Good God, now even New Radio has been nobbled.

  26. BH
    Malcolm at least caused me a little concern at first, (I thought he might make things a bit more of a contest with Kev) but Abbott is just a joke, I can’t even be bothered listening to him.

  29. BB – send all those points to NewsRadio and ask for an explanation. They’ll send back the usual complaint answered letter but at least they’ll know we’re wise to their agenda.

    I absolutely loved Robert Hill’s reply to Trioli on ABC2 this morning. Trioli was rabbitting on about the PM bullying Tuvulu and the response to the bullying. Hill said that he hadn’t read or heard the Tuvulu response in the same way and there was no point in dealing in suppositions instead of fact. It set Trioli back a step or 2 for a minute. There was much cheering for Hill in this house this morning.

  30. Frank C

    For what its worth, I accept your argument about ‘imperfect panacea’. Knowing you can’t stamp out something entirely is not a good reason to hold back on measures.

    Just letting you know this in case you are getting a bit exasperated.

    However, it doesn’t mean I like Conroy’s gizmo and his oh- so-superior assumption that our society has no better means of dealing with threats to our childrens’ innocence.

    I think he has confused ‘protection of children’ with ‘censorship’. The two are different concepts.

  32. Dr Good
    I asked my question first 🙂

    As to your question, internet pages are not ‘imported’ or ‘exported’. They just exist, and can be obtained from anywhere and sent anywhere on the world wide web. Filters cannot change that. (see China) The issue is not about whether some sites should be considered ‘good’ or ‘bad’, or be allowed to be ‘imported’. No-one can change or filter web content to the extent that your question has any meaning in its context.

    Now it’s your turn to answer my question.

  33. Actually, The Fallacy Files is a far better reference. Try the blue “buttons” on Taxonomy of Logical Fallacies and you’ll never have to ask again

    In fact, you could look at the blue buttons and identify how many others you managed to make in your Filter posts: emotional appeal, appeal to consequences guilt by association …

    Guilt by assertion, a form of The Big Lie and If you throw enough mug some of it is bound to stick consists of repeating a lie as if it’s true, until it’s accepted as truth. Weapon of mass destruction CPRS is Rudd’s great Big Tax … all those Lib/MSM memes about Rudd.

  34. Frank – at least you have the understanding to say you gave me a ‘response’ rather than assert it was an ‘answer’. 🙂

  35. Frank Calabrese “2212

    Once again I point out it is not the PRFECT PANECEA, but ONE of the many tools in the Armoury – even Conroy has admitted that – do learn to read his Media Release.

    Frank, what part of my oft-repeated “Which the government knows, and admits that it knows!” did you not understand?

    Or are you trying to find a logical fallacy I don’t recognise?

  36. JV

    I do not count that as an answer to my question. Let me be more precise. Is there content of any web pages which you think should not be allowed to be imported into Australia? (The material exists in a certain form on a server overseas and it can be communicated to Australia and decoded in a very standard way to present eg an image
    to an Australian viewer). is there content of any form that you think should not be legally imported in such a manner into Australia.

    My answer to your questions about how this might be checked will be informed by what you say. Just be honest and don’t evade the question.

  38. [Frank

    Every time we raise a Q, they respond with personal abuse.

    Cutting too close to the quick?]

    Agreed – pity we can’t use your original term for the Freedom Fighters – it was the perfect description like how certain males react when they can’t have their booze.

  39. [Every time we raise a Q, they respond with personal abuse.]

    Clearly I imagined last night being referred to with a term that has since been banned from use.

    Dr Good: obviously there is illegal content that should be banned here. I thought this was answered earlier by Possum?

  40. Vera at 2224, I agree. I thought Turnbull was the best choice to challenge Rudd. The MSM just love Abbott because he will just spout off and Rudd-bash, which is their favorite pastime

  41. Re: 2234

    Definitely Perez Hilton. His content should not be imported into Australia. Even if costs $230 million.

    But certainly, I agree that in a perfect world we would be able to block all kinds of content. I would assume, if its illegal on DVD, then it should be illegal on teh interwebs.

    However, in a slightly more perfect world we would realise that the availability of this illegal content on teh interwebs is not the most pressing problem. Rather, its that the content is actually being produced in the first place, and that our millions and millions of dollars should be put to use bringing child pornographers etc, who will be even marginally affected the so called clean feed, to justice.

    I just think we should be putting a broad reaching censorship tool in the hands of the government, particualrly when this tool will be completely useless at protecting anyone from anything.

  42. [Every time we raise a Q, they respond with personal abuse.

    Cutting too close to the quick?]

    Even poor old Kate Lundy got it from the Freedom Fighters as well, and she has more of a clue with IT issues than anyone else. And they even have the gall to post this rubbish:

    [Chris Hewitt
    Posted December 17, 2009 at 9:47 pm | Permalink | Reply

    “I use the Internet and I Vote”…SMH Poll has what, 95% (of thousands) opposed? There’s a couple of senators down the tube…

    Nuts.]

    http://www.katelundy.com.au/2009/12/17/my-thoughts-on-the-filter/

  43. [Clearly I imagined last night being referred to with a term that has since been banned from use]

    Like astro’s little effort at 2210

    I really wonder about some people?

  44. [Like astro’s little effort at 2208]

    I think you mean 2210, but stfu does hide the post number as well as the post 🙂

  45. [Frank – at least you have the understanding to say you gave me a ‘response’ rather than assert it was an ‘answer’.]
    response – rely(n) – one of its synonyms is ANSWER.

  46. Gusface #

    Frank

    Every time we raise a Q, they respond with personal abuse.

    What personal abuse?

    BTW: Accusing people of personal abuse when what they have done is rationally rebut your misrepresentations (or failure to read what is written), is Guilt by assertion; that is, in the same category as WMD.

  47. Zoomster, if I recall correctly you got all huffy when I deigned to ask a poor old grandmother (this is completely irrelevant btw, but nice try at emotional appeal) what proactive she had herself taken before demanding the government protect her from the horrors of the internet. You took this entirely valid question completely out of all proportion.

    I am sorry if you feel that I am rude, and perhaps I could be less strident in my tone, but if I am to do that, then you should also pursue your arguments less dishonestly. You should not:

    – Deliberately misrepresent what I am saying as you have done twice already
    – Resort to special pleading about being “personally attacked” when no such thing has happened
    – Claim to know what *all* children are like and what *all* children will do on the internet

    Don’t get me wrong, I am not some hysterical Christianista outrage-junkie but what you seem to fail to understand is there’s a lot more inappropriate content on the internet other tha just sex. I’d be much less concerned about kids seeing a bit of TnA than some of the online violence, which is truly shocking, and very easy to find. Chat rooms can also pose dangers for young children, even young teenagers as per the link I posted before. You might think its intrusive to monitor a kids internet use for this kind of thing. I think it is responsible, but we’ll have to agree to disagree.

  48. Also, regarding Conroy’s all protective, paternalistic border protection gizmo, is there anything to stop me just signing up to an offshore ISP?

    I mean if I could afford the bills, why not just get around it that way?

  49. [ Vera, Abbott has made it clear there are no rules: oppose, scare and smear is their strategy ]

    Yep. If they can just find a way to replay 1975.

    But is just not going to happen.

    Looking forward to election night 2010 🙂

  50. [Also, regarding Conroy’s all protective, paternalistic border protection gizmo, is there anything to stop me just signing up to an offshore ISP?

    I mean if I could afford the bills, why not just get around it that way?]

    Nope 🙂

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