My federal election guide is at long last open for business – note the link on the sidebar below the Crikey Daily Mail ad. It could have done with another proof read, so apologies for any broken links, misplaced slabs of text or references to Kevin Rudd as Prime Minister that might remain. Entries will be progressively updated/corrected/tarted up in the weeks to come.
Miscellaneous recent happenings:
• Nominations have closed, and the ballot paper draw will be conducted tomorrow. The Australian Electoral Commission informs us there are 14,030,528 names on the electoral roll: click here for astoundingly detailed age and gender breakdowns by electorate.
• The Age reports the High Court will hear a constitutional challenge by GetUp! against the closure of the electoral rolls on the evening the writs are issued, as provided for by the Howard government’s 2005 electoral law changes.
• ABC TV’s The Gruen Nation and The Chaser’s Yes We Canberra! cleaned up in the ratings on Wednesday, recording 1.6 million and 1.5 million viewers respectively. This brings to mind a growing field of study in the United States on the impact of “soft news” (usual suspects: Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert) as a bona fide campaign information source for those bored by or cynical of the established news media institutions.
• As in 2007, Google has put together an election site which will come into its own, at least for my purposes, when polling booth locations are added as promised “closer to election day”.
Horse race stuff:
• Andrew Probyn of The West Australian reports Labor internal polling has them at 50-50 in Hasluck and Swan, but trailing 53-47 in Canning. Labor are also said to be expecting a Greens preference split of about 65-35 compared with 76-24 in 2007. It is noted that a lower flow of Greens preferences is expected in Hasluck in particular as both the Greens and the Liberals have endorsed Aboriginal candidates.
• This is how Brisbane academic and blogger Mark Bahnisch sees his local turf:
Longman is looking good for the ALP, with 20 year old LNP candidate Wyatt Roy failing to swing voters. Petrie is showing more evidence of a swing towards the Coalition, though the LNP candidate Dean Teasdale is low profile and Labor holds it by a relatively solid margin compared to its two neighbours. (Teasdale initially expressed scepticism about the rail promise, only to have the Coalition leadership match the funding later in the afternoon.) Dickson is looking very bad for its incumbent MP Peter Dutton, with Labor’s Fiona McNamara able to capitalise on his failed attempt to defect to the safer seat of McPherson.
Electorate-level news nuggets:
Robertson (Labor 0.1%): Belinda Neal has opted not to run as an independent in her seat of Robertson, contrary to widespread earlier speculation. AAP refers to “reports Ms Neal was angling for a spot in the NSW parliament”, assuming there are any left for Labor after the voters are done with them.
Dawson (Labor 2.4%): Queensland’s Crime and Misconduct Commission has dismissed 17 allegations of misconduct relating to corporate credit card use against Labor’s candidate for Dawson, Whitsunday mayor Mike Brunker. The allegations have been the subject of newspaper advertising by the Liberal National Party candidate, George Christensen. Brunker reacted to the news by complaining of “a serial pest out there in the Whitsundays who instigated all this”.
There’s always one. In fact, there’s often several. Certainly this campaign’s had a few:
Chifley (Labor 20.7%): With less than a week left before the closure of nominations, the Liberals were forced to disendorse a candidate whose preselection marked an embarrassing failure for its candidate-vetting procedures. David Barker is a conservative Christian of marked eccentricity, and according to Imre Salusinszky of The Australian was “never grilled by a full preselection panel and was interviewed only by phone before being chosen”. Astoundingly given the party’s form with Husic, Barker wrote on his Facebook page: “We ran a big risk running a guy who holds these views against a Muslim candidate.” He was promptly replaced by grocery store owner Venus Priest.
Flinders (Liberal 8.2%): Initial Labor candidate Adrian Schonfelder was a casualty of the first week, after he said Tony Abbott’s conservative social positions were “influencing people to take their own lives”. Schonfelder apologised and soon after withdrew as candidate, saying a car accident on the Friday had left him “shocked and incapacitated”.
Parramatta (Labor 9.5%): Liberal candidate Charles Camenzuli has received unwelcome publicity in the past week after Channel Nine revealed he had been criticised by a Supreme Court judge. The court ordered Camenzuli to stop publishing criticisms of building industry rival Beechwood Homes on his website, which the judge deemed “motivated by personal spite”.
Okay- the move to replace Rudd was the right one- he was toxic and we would lose the election. Gillard is able to relate more to the 95% of Aussies who don’t give a shit about politics. it was also an opportunity to bury/change some policy that proved to be a problem.
On the mining- a home run, on climate and asylum- a fiasco, a shamozel. she is obviously being advised by the NSW Right.
We will scrape in- then i don’t know what happens
B
you offering to help change nappies?
Boerwar. When will the challenge re Abetz be dealt with. Do you know?
Frank: you’re being immature and silly today.
“We will scrape in- then i don’t know what happens”
This comment sums up my feelings precisely.
Gus
I said there would be a swing against Labor partly due to Chanto but they would still win. I was spot-on.
[Frank: you’re being immature and silly today.]
I’m not the one trashing Labor.
You are you dimwit.
Syksie
Yes, there is a history. The waters are, apparently, muddy:
http://www.tasmaniantimes.com/index.php/article/abetz-jimboooooooooooo
[ WAtoday
Labor to force people onto broadband when new national broadband network is rolled out. http://bit.ly/bktpkn 21 minutes ago via Echofon ]
Frank.
Liberals will gratefully not give broadband to anyone at all.
G
Racism, ethnicism, is so deeply embeeded in the daily life of Australia (and elsewhere in the world) that people don’t realize they are engaging in it. I would count myself in that bracket. I recognize also the basic contradiction that I have both been the target of, and the targeter of, slurs of one sort or another. In other words, it is virtually normal. When someone gets called out on it they usually do everything else except ‘fess up to it because it has become a taboo, certaintly for latte lefties. Far better to recognize it for what it is, say, whoops, sorry. And then everyone can get on with it.
As I say, I am with Frank 100% on this one.
*goes to have a cuppa with the neighbours*
[If Abetz is a dual citizen his career is over. Wasn’t there a similar scandal some years ago that I can vaguely recall?]
Yes, there’s been a few cases relating to failure to renounce foreign citizenship over the years. Most recently and famously, Heather Hill the One Nation lead Senate candidate in the ’98 election was found ineligible to stand due to failure to renounce her British citizenship.
[Labor to force people onto broadband when new national broadband network is rolled out.]
Well it’ll be an opt-out scheme, which I see no problems with. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity for our future.
Boerwar.
As a child of a migrant, I was often asked by other children,
“do you sleep with a knife under your pillow”?.
My answer would be “why would I need to sleep with a knife under my pillow”?
Answer “because you are a wog”
We should separate disgust with NSW Right about running the state for the benefit of their sleazy mates, from what Labor needs to do to get reelected. The harsh reality is that the election will be decided by low to middle income earners without a tertiary education, who live in the outer suburbs and in Queensland towns, and who think a Tamil is a muslim terrorist organisation, and that their electricty bills are far more important than greenhouse gas emissions. If Labor campaigns on issues these people can’t relate too, it risks handing government to the Liberals, who remind me more and more of the US Republicans, which is frightening. I passionately hope Gillard gets reelected by whatever means, as a far less odious alternative to Abbott. I also hope the parliamentary membership and organisational structure of the NSW ALP is completely dismantled and rebuilt from scratch.
Abetz is toast I reckon….hahahahahahahahaha. Could it be as good as this? as good as the opposition truserer in Victoria not enrolling on the electoral role in Vic 2002?
Thanks ltep, Heather Hill was the one I was trying to remember.
[Even ABC News Radio this morning had an item on the split between Nationals and Liberals on something or other]
Nick Sherry tried to talk about this and about Turnbull spruiking his ambitions for leadership but Gilbert on Sky only wanted to speak about Latham and the leaks. I gave up and switched over.
Abbott told his Party Room they were to focus solely on Labor and not their own stuff and it seems to be working for him with the media. No hard questions as yet for Tone.
Parramatta Centrist.
Your assessment, I’m afraid is spot on!
I have also been saying lately that the Liberals are copying the Republicans tactics in the US. They have no moral fibre whatsoever.
Frankly I doubt there’s anything in the Abetz allegations, but it’d certainly be very interesting. The article mentions the High Court’s potential to quash votes taken in the period the diaqualified senator sat in the Senate if their vote was crucial to the outcome. Given the fragile nature of the Coalition’s Senate majority over the Howard years it’d be interesting to look at some of the votes taken (for instance on the disallowance of the ACT’s civil partnership laws). I also wonder what the position on administrative decisions is given Eric Abetz’s former ministerial positions. If a minister is found to have not been validly elected does it invalidate any decisions they made as a minister?
I vaguely recall a NSW Liberal minister back in the corrupt Askin’s day-Harry Jago?-forgetting to nominate. The DLP held his ultra-safe north shore seat for a term.
Parramatta Centrist
[from what Labor needs to do to get reelected.]
But does it actually increase Labor’s chances?? Labor was going better in the polls before it descended into all this garbage. Have we forgotten all those 55/45 results already? What if the backflips and cynical stunts are not the solution, but they are the problem? They may also be all that Arbib and Bitar know. They and their supporters keep going on about how they know the ‘real world”, but they spend a lot of time with focus groups for those who know. I wonder how they would survive in an average working class pub.
[We should separate disgust with NSW Right about running the state for the benefit of their sleazy mates, from what Labor needs to do to get reelected. The harsh reality is that the election will be decided by low to middle income earners without a tertiary education, who live in the outer suburbs and in Queensland towns, and who think a Tamil is a muslim terrorist organisation, and that their electricty bills are far more important than greenhouse gas emissions. If Labor campaigns on issues these people can’t relate too, it risks handing government to the Liberals, who remind me more and more of the US Republicans, which is frightening. I passionately hope Gillard gets reelected by whatever means, as a far less odious alternative to Abbott. I also hope the parliamentary membership and organisational structure of the NSW ALP is completely dismantled and rebuilt from scratch.]
Here Here, as I’ve always said – you ignore the redneck bogan vote at your peril – why do you think Tony was campaigning on Laura Norder ?? And why are local candidates in WA campaigning on Hoons and crime ??
Wow so Abetz could be rolled? I’ll take that over Barnett getting beaten!
Is there a genuine, realistic chance, or is this just one of those stunts that happen in election campaigns?
Credability seems to be a commodity that is runnibg very low at the moment all over the political landscape. Unfortunately it cannot be bought. The only person that seems to have some is Malcolm turnbull- akthough he did lose a sizeable chunck with the Gretsch, but many have forgotten.
abbott- none, Gillard- very little, bob brown -a pinch
NSW Labor will get their long overdue cleanout in March 2011, but alas hacks like Tripodi and Obeid will still be there.
Interestingly, the trades training centre at Epping Boys High School, where my mother teaches, was officially opened last night, but no Julia or Crean to officiate, only Maxine McKew(local MP) and Greg Smith(state Liberal MP).
You’d think that might have been a golden opportunity for Gillard to promote the benefits of the BER.
Was Maxine being punished because she was a vocal Rudd supporter?
Hey, have preferences been decided yet? When’s the cut off date? I want to see in how many seats the Greens are preferencing the Liberals or Nationals over Labor.
Socrates, there’s no way of ever answering these questions and people will just use polls, polling and elections to justify the positions they already hold. You would say the polls demonstrate such tactics don’t work; others would look at the same polls and say that they do work and that the situation would be worse if the tactics weren’t used. There’s no way of proving or disproving either scenario.
[But does it actually increase Labor’s chances?? Labor was going better in the polls before it descended into all this garbage. Have we forgotten all those 55/45 results already? What if the backflips and cynical stunts are not the solution, but they are the problem? They may also be all that Arbib and Bitar know. They and their supporters keep going on about how they know the ‘real world”, but they spend a lot of time with focus groups for those who know. I wonder how they would survive in an average working class pub.]
Guess what, Focus groups are people living in the real world.
Your inner city wankism doesn’t win elections.
So, Abetz wrote to the German embassy renouncing his citizenship and never heard back from them…
But the German embassy says that whereas nowadays renunciation is automatic when you change your citizenship, it wasn’t always so:
1. Abetz admits he never heard from the embassy again.
2. The embassy says the renunciation wouldn’t have been valid unless they did write back, acknowledging the renunciation.
The article also claims that any legislation lost by the government on Abetz’s casting vote (i.e. any tied votes that Abetz was listed in the Hansard as voting for) may actually be valid, as Abetz wasn’t qualified to vote.
If the case inthe High Court is won, we may already have an ETS without realizing it.
Bludgers will no doubt have a list of other laws we may already have that were originally rejected on a tied vote.
Oh, wouldn’t that be nice?
http://www.themercury.com.au/article/2010/07/30/162211_todays-news.html
centaur 009
Turnbull lost all credibility during Grech saga.
Frank, you need some Panadol and a good lie down, or was it a late night on the grog in WA that has you all riled up? 😉
[NSW Labor will get their long overdue cleanout in March 2011, but alas hacks like Tripodi and Obeid will still be there.
Interestingly, the trades training centre at Epping Boys High School, where my mother teaches, was officially opened last night, but no Julia or Crean to officiate, only Maxine McKew(local MP) and Greg Smith(state Liberal MP).
You’d think that might have been a golden opportunity for Gillard to promote the benefits of the BER.
Was Maxine being punished because she was a vocal Rudd supporter?]
No you mypoic fool – it was probably planned WELL before the election was called.
Now take your tinfoil hat off and join the real world.
It’s funny in regards to NBN being forced onto,
1. Your gonna get stuck with DSL or RIM & Copper otherwise.
2. Deal with Telstra.
[Is there a genuine, realistic chance, or is this just one of those stunts that happen in election campaigns?]
I don’t think it’s very likely at all. In relation to dual nationality the Court will determine whether the person has taken reasonable steps to renounce foreign nationality. What amounts to ‘reasonable steps’ will depend on the circumstances of the individual case (see for instance, Sykes v Cleary). In this case, Eric Abetz claims that he sent a letter in 1993 renouncing his German citizenship and asking that if anything further needed to take place that he be contacted for this to happen. He then claims that since he heard nothing back he assumed everything was taken care of. The question is whether it is reasonable to require the person to follow up and ensure that the process was complete.
Abetz.. WAC he is.. This would be gold.
Though I suspect he will weasel his way out of it.
Merely being passed by both houses of parliament isn’t enough to enact a law. It then needs to be presented to the unelected representative of a foreign oligarch in order to obtain their blessing.
True Victoria but he fell on his sword for his beliefs- no one else did.
[http://www.themercury.com.au/article/2010/07/30/162211_todays-news.html]
To Parramatta Centrist (165), who fears the Libs are becoming more and more like the US Republicans, here is an apt quotation from H.L. Mencken:
“In this world of sin and sorrow there is always something to be thankful for; as for me, I rejoice that I am not a Republican.”
Being the constitutional nerd that I am I kind of hope Abetz is disqualified just so I can see how the Court handles all the subsidiary issues. It’d be very exciting precedent.
Outstanding post. I totally agree.
I have a sense that we are back in a phase which the world was in pre-WWI, pre-WWII, in the late 1950s, and in the mid to late 1980s. That is, what certain arrogant individuals and groups believe that “realpolitik” rules – we are all expected to operate under the assumption that all humans are ruthless, greedy, selfish and wholly self-interested; nationalism/jingoism is in; it is regarded as acceptable for governments to behave on a “whatever it takes” basis internationally and domestically; and all moral and ethical debate is framed in terms of relativism. Short-term decision making is not only accepted, it is required. Anyone who states that they hold any goal higher than money, sex or power is dismissed as a kooky latter-day hippie.
In less extreme forms, we see a high degree of apathy about things like corruption and lies from our political leaders. Barely any attempt is made to call them out on these things because there is an underlying assumption that “they all do that” and that anyone who would replace them would be just as bad.
An eye-opener for me recently has been on the seemingly trivial matter of football. I’m a massive Geelong fan and the whole Gary Ablett/Gold Coast saga has been a startling display of current views of things like loyalty, fidelity, tradition and honour. Ablett has been offered a choice between taking less money and staying in a depressed town where every man and his dog reveres him and his father and he is a living legend aged 26 at a great sporting institution, and playing in a very successful team – or, he can take a bit more money and move to a manufactured sporting franchise on the Gold Coast which is unlikely to achieve anything in the near future. In my mind there would be no choice, you stay in Geelong, of course – but I have been startled by the number of people (at least 75%) who think that he has no choice but to go. Why? Because he’ll go from three quarters of a million bucks a year to $1.5M bucks a year. Apparently none of the other stuff matters a damn.
In my mind, this is dangerous territory for a society. When everything is relative and we are all expected to act according to our baser instincts because that is what the “real world” is about, we start dismantling the foundations of our greatest achievements as a species – institutions which are designed in a way which allows them to rise above those baser instincts to permit us to pursue higher goals as a species.
[Though I suspect he will weasel his way out of it.]
Would he have to have a copy of the letter he sent to the German Embassy. Surely just saying you wrote and didn’t receive a reply is not good enough in any Court.
Will it be heard before the election. Is he up for re-election this time or in 3years?
BTW when is the Labor launch, please?
That Latham article about Rudd must be very close to being defamatory, unless Rudd actually was the leaker.
Itep- it is all hear say and conjecture- does he have a copy of the letter? how do we know he ever posted it. The Germans are not sloppy, and I find it remarkable that they would not write back to confirm.
I had to get a visa there (in Gernmany) and was thoroughly impressed by their efficiency. They had every man and his dog at the consulate but managed to do it same day minimal hassle.
BB
There is a delicious irony in all this.
[Is he up for re-election this time or in 3years?]
He’s up for re-election and is the lead Liberal candidate in Tasmania.
[Itep- it is all hear say and conjecture- does he have a copy of the letter?]
I’m not sure. The story only says the following from him:
[“I renounced my German citizenship in (a letter to the Germany embassy in 1993), full stop”
“That letter said that I understood my German citzenship had been forfeited back in 1974 when I became an Australian citizen, but that they should let me know if there as anything further I needed to do”
Senator Abetz said he never heard anything further, leaving him convinced he did not hold dual citizenship that could make his Senate nominatoin invalid.
He said he had never held a German passport or European passport]
The last sentence appears irrelevant to me, I’d imagine plenty of citizens of countries have never held a passport for that country.
All humans are “ethnic”, so the same could be said of almost any reference to any institution which is not by its nature multi-national.
Ridiculous to run screaming like a toddler to hide behind the skirts of political correctness, especially when Frank has simultaneously been belittling every single poster who disagrees with his ridiculous posts all day.
[TAbbott says grieves him too that so much of the Hawke-Keating legacy has been squandered over the past 3 yrs – says they’re ‘wasted,’ yrs.
about 1 hour ago via TweetDeck ]
http://twitter.com/latikambourke
Somebody give him Zoomster’s list of what has been done in the past 2.5 years. Somebody please give him a list of what has been blocked in the Senate. I’ve yet to hear a mention of that in this campaign when Abbott says nothing’s been done.
There are so many comebacks Labor could use against Abbott but they use NONE! It’s infuriating.