With just under half the campaign to go:
• George Megalogenis in The Australian accuses Labor of spending the first two weeks of the campaign pursuing “an imaginary centre position between young and old”, instead alienating the former by being too conservative. Megalogenis explains Labor’s poll decline among older voters in terms of the global financial crisis having “ended the party for baby boomers just when they thought they had made it to a prosperous retirement”, and says the fear of falling property prices in Queensland (not shared in Sydney and Melbourne) has united young and old voters in that state against Labor.
• Milanda Rout of The Australian reports the Coalition is pessimistic about Labor’s two Victorian marginals, Deakin and Corangamite, and fears defeat not only in La Trobe and McEwen, but even in seemingly unassailable Aston (where sitting member Chris Pearce is retiring).
• Sean Parnell of The Australian offers the interesting tidbit that the Queensland Liberal National Party “allowed the federal Liberal Party to fundraise almost exclusively in the state – including through the mining debate – to fill its depleted coffers and avoid Queensland’s tougher disclosure laws”. The Bligh government reduced the threshold for disclosing donations from $1500 to $1000 in June 2008. This was presumably in anticipation of the Rudd government’s proposal to cut the threshold from $10,000 (to which the Howard government had hiked it from $1500 in 2005) to $1000, which is yet to come to fruition.
• The Adelaide Advertiser has launched a crusade against Barnaby Joyce over his rejection of Penny Wong’s call for a live debate over the River Murray in Adelaide, which Joyce dismissed as “parochial”. Joyce protests there will be “nothing much to talk about” in the absence of the water allocation plan, which the Murray Darling Basin Authority has contentiously delayed releasing until after the election.
• Phillip Hudson of the Herald-Sun reckons “ALP insiders have not seen any immediate improvement in their stocks from the PM’s pledge to unleash the ‘real Julia’.”
• Possum runs Newspoll and Nielsen state breakdowns through his fantabulous contraption and finds Labor 79.4 per cent likely to win at least 74 seats, 71.4 per cent likely to win at least 75 and 62.2 per cent likely to win at least 76 (i.e. an absolute majority).
• Antony Green’s Senate calculators are open for business.
[ltep
Posted Thursday, August 5, 2010 at 9:55 am | Permalink
didn’t even stop to think, perhaps we are party for the educated and the thinking and we a likely to piss of our support base.
I thought Labor’s base were the workers fredn. The academics are not the section of the community that win Labor elections.]
28% of eneration X and Y women (20 to 39) have degrees, 21% of men. It really is about time the Labor party stopped living in the past and started offing policies that an educated population could support. Concepts a little more complex than two syllables.
[Bakunin
The SMH reported the premier’s husband owns 3.2 million shares in the company. Sorry, I should have said the premie’s husband is an owner, not her. Still, that sounds like a pretty big conflict of interest to me. When I was a public servant, I would have been breaking the law to do that.]
He has a shareholding.
To quote Better Places company info – “Based in California and privately held, Better Place has operating companies in Israel, Denmark, and Australia.”
Management shareholdings are a common performance incentive as part of a remuneration package. It’s disingenuous to claim this is the same as being an owner of the company.
Second thing is that the article points out the NSW has a contract with one of Better Places competitors for provision of these services. The discussions were with Electric Vehicles Taskforce and it seems bizzare that such a task force should not discuss issues with a major stakeholder in the industry simply because of the political affiliations of number of the senior executives.
fredn,
That means 72% of women and 79% of men don’t have degrees. A vast majority.
[It’s insulting on two counts.
1) It is a lie. Emissions trading is NOT a tax; it’s a trading scheme.
2) It’s pure patronisation – a slogan aimed at manipulating those with the intellect / linguistic sophistication of four-year-olds. Just how lowly do the conservatives view their target audience?]
Agree. You can let it go. 😉
And just to add to my rant ltep, the crap coming out of Labor campaign head office shows an disrespect for the working class, they really aren’t that stupid.
Possums post about the new labor base.
Only a loose correlation between manual labor and ALP vote. Other no real other correlations- so broad base indeed.
There was a negative correlation with managers- so I suppose if you call workers ‘anyone but managers’ then you could be right.
fredn, I’m not arguing with you on that. I just don’t agree that Labor should market itself exclusively to ‘the educated’. They need to strike a balance, which they’re not doing extraordinarily well at at the moment.
http://blogs.crikey.com.au/pollytics/2010/04/15/class-voting-and-broad-left-demography/
So, one of the vulnerable moments for the Libs is going to be when they get their policy announcements costed. They have to have them submitted by the 16th??
Does anyone have any informed opinion as to when the analysis of those costings will be released??
Treasury would have to turn them around in a couple of days wouldnt they??
Oh, watched Gruen Nation and the Chaser last night. Well worth picking up from iView for anyone who missed them. The “Pitch” segment on Gruen was particularly good!!
[ KEVIN Rudd last night admitted to having “a great bucket load of anger” after his ousting by Julia Gillard but denied he was the high-level Labor leaker. ]
-what an obscure angle for adelaidenow to take… and in the context Rudd used those words, he was clear that he followed his mother’s advice NOT to carry such a bucket. Disgraceful reporting. This should be a Media Watch item.
[BigBob
Posted Thursday, August 5, 2010 at 10:07 am | Permalink
fredn,
That means 72% of women and 79% of men don’t have degrees. A vast majority.]
It comes down to the demographic that supports labor doesn’t it, as blue_green pointed out possum has looked at that, it just might help Labor if the dimwits in head office read what he wrote.
[Treasury would have to turn them around in a couple of days wouldnt they??]
I think 48 hours.
*Off to vote*
The Financial Review today contains an editorial ‘Don’t flirt with Greens’ which urges against allowing a hung parliament and explains the risks of a Senate with Greens balance of power by running through a ‘undergraduate wish list’:
[The Greens stand for more accountability for unions, guaranted minimum incomes for all, a 5o per cent tax on $1 million incomes and intercity high-speed rail with a price tage to rival the national broadband network and no cost-benefit study. They would heavily vet skilled immigration and oppose using population to boost the economy or counter the effects of demographic change – despite population being one of Treasury’s “three Ps” weapons for dealing with it. Corporations would be shackled by stakeholders and social and environmental campaigners, company tax would be increased to 33 per cent, private health insurance (and much of the health industry) would be wiped out and private school grants slashed if the Greens go their way.]
It’s a spirited effort, but people are voting for the Greens to protest against the two majors more than for the Greens ideas.
I was very comforted, listening to Rudd last night – how I’ve missed him!
But I want him to get well first before he gets into full campaign mode. 🙂
imacca,
I’ve harped on this before, but I wouldn’t be counting on anywhere near the full policy suite being submitted on time.
I expect those Coalition policies that have a sound costings base (not many!) to make it.
Anything rubbery, won’t make the cut.
They’ll rely on the closeness to the election date to ride out any negatives for not costing the lot. Expect lots of excuses.
A Labor win in McEwen would be even sweeter, considering how Rob Mitchell was robbed of a legitimate victory last time. 🙂
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6M9vnkok8Q&feature=channel
Quite Scary stuff. 🙂
Socrates
Thanks for your comments.
One last comment on the Better Place beatup:
http://www.carsales.com.au/news/2010/better-place-battery-scheme-signs-deal-with-unsw-20220
[It has been revealed that the husband of NSW Premier, Kristina Keneally, is the head of marketing and strategy for Better Place Australia — which has been lobbying the government to support its proposed battery-swap scheme for electric cars.
The newspaper also reported that, according to company documents, Ben Keneally bought $185,000 worth of shares in Better Place Australia in October last year — one month before his wife became the Premier of NSW.
A spokeswoman for the Premier told the paper: “To avoid any perceived conflict of interest, all briefs and meeting requests relating to Better Place or electric vehicles are referred to the Deputy Premier.”]
It says something that the Carsales.com.au has more intelligent and earlier reporting of issues than the SMH.
To put Ben Keneally’s shareholding into perspective HSBC invested $350million in return for a 10% stake in the company. On that basis Keneally’s holding represents a 0.052% stake.
It is pretty obvious that if the rabble get in all overseas doctors will have to pass the Kevin Andrews Haneef test.
Brisbane’s Curious Snail is reporting the Rudd story like this:
[KEVIN Rudd has strongly denied being the anonymous source of leaks targeting Julia Gillard and vowed to ”absolutely” campaign for Labor’s re-election.
In his first major interview since the election was called, the former prime minister revealed he wanted to continue contributing to public life.
Mr Rudd said he was ”completely relaxed” about whether he was appointed foreign minister if Labor was re-elected and had already made clear he wanted to serve again in the government.]
http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/national/kevin-rudd-denies-leaks-and-pledges-to-fight-for-julia-gillard/story-fn5z3z83-1225901382332
[*Off to vote*]
Vote early and vote often…
Listened to Barrie Cassidy on ABC radio. He said WTTE that Abbott has exceeded all expectations in this campaign including from his own party. Abbott has been successful in presenting a simple message with his slogans. They have been very effective and people are listening to it.
Cuppa. See, speaking to us like children by the Liberals is apparently working (Sigh!)
[The Financial Review today contains an editorial ‘Don’t flirt with Greens’ which urges against allowing a hung parliament and explains the risks of a Senate with Greens balance of power by running through a ‘undergraduate wish list’]
The Fin does a pretty good job of making the Greens sound like an attractive option!
imacca
The Gruen Transfer pitch re Abbott is quite scary.
Interestingly enough, this has perfectly encaptulated my perception of Abbott!!
A compliant uncritical media has done their part too.
I’m just voting the once bakunin 🙂
sorry the word is “encupsulated”
victoria @ 174,
yep, for all the people on here going on about stupid lines, they work. That’s why politiciaons use them.
Of course, we would like an intelligent discourse on the issues. Unfortunately, most people are not engaged by politics, and short, sharp slogans work.
FFS, why do you think companies spend billions on advertising in short grabs.
leftwingpinko@177
It goes without saying, what our wonderful media has done!!
[That means 72% of women and 79% of men don’t have degrees. A vast majority.]
Why are “educated people” a group who can be ignored? If 21-28 percent of the population was virtually any other demographic group then there would be howls of outrage if a party actively ignored them.
Plus it is possible to have policies which cater to both the educated and less educated.
The real problem, as usual, is preferential voting. No doubt Labor figures that any left leaning intellectual types will at least preference it anyway, so it has no reason to earn their votes. I personally hope the Greens snare Melbourne and start to threaten in other seats to shake Labor out of this complacency.
BigBob
Yes, in part I do agree.
But it is quite sad to think that adults in this day and age with all the knowledge at our fingertips. Hearing such slogans such as stop the boats and GBNT can influence us so dramatically. Really, how dumbed down is this society??
one more try – the word is “encapsulated”.
My fingers are dyslexic!!
[BigBob
Yes, in part I do agree.
But it is quite sad to think that adults in this day and age with all the knowledge at our fingertips. Hearing such slogans such as stop the boats and GBNT can influence us so dramatically. Really, how dumbed down is this society??]
without entering the mire of another ets debate. They never fought back.
Victoria – he would not have been as successful if the media had not given him a dream run.
Allowing him – day in, day out – to walk away from pressers when the questions get too curly has just been unbelievable, particularly when they have had the direct contrast of Julia (and her Ministers) standing their ground and answering question after question, regardless of how inane, irrelevant or insulting. You’d think the ALP would get brownie points for that but, sadly, no.
If Labor continues to put the economy at the forefront of the campaign, though, then one hopes that the attention will turn to the Coalition and the costing of their policies. It shouldn’t just be up to the few reputable journos like George M to be asking the proper questions, they all should be doing it.
I’m not despairing yet, but if the quality of the coverage of this election doesn’t improve by the end of next week I can’t see how Labor can win the election, regardless of their record or their plans for the future.
Great, just what we all wanted: a country ruled by the media.
I think Peter Brent has been the commentator most on the money so far.
—Ducks—
Labor lost a swathe of younger voters over one stupid policy – internet censorship – which they still haven’t killed off.
When Conroy declared that filtering would go ahead, regardless of strong opposition by voters, and particularly younger people, the polls started slipping for Labor. The media won’t cover it. Labor won’t admit it. A lot of people on here won’t face it. But Labor betrayed thousands of younger voters, from safe to marginal seats, who supported them at the last election.
That sense of betrayal is still raw.
Today, a lot of younger people no longer trust Labor to do the right thing or to act with good intentions. With a lack of action on climate change and other dumb policies, they see a deeply conservative party that is NO DIFFERENT to the Liberals. So why not punish Labor by voting Liberal? With no obvious difference between the parties, at least voting against Labor allows them to express their anger.
Labor should have been soaring in the polls right now, heading toward a landslide victory, after guiding this country safely through the GFC.
Instead, they have spent the past two years trying to be the Liberal Party dreaming up stupid, unnecessary policies that have alienated the people who gave them power in 2007 and eliminating the differences between themselves and the Liberals. Utter madness.
Labor may yet get across the line later this month, but they sure know how to make life hard for themselves.
Victoria,
Look at what has been embraced by us in the way of technology.
Applications like Facebook and Twitter.
Neither of which lends itself to exploring issues in depth – it’s all about the now.
How much communication about a policy can you do in 120 characters or less?
The wealth of knowledge available to us and the ease of communication haven’t helped our comprehension of the real issues.
In reality, I think we are far less equipped to deal with assimilating information and coming to the right decisions now.
We are overloaded by both the speed and enormity of the information available to us. What happens is that we retreat to our comfort zones – sites like this, where we get our views reinforced and are rarley challenged.
The Queensland National Party doing its bit for seniors in marginal Queensland seats.
[SENIORS are pounding the pavement in their own political campaign.
Gladstone Branch of the National Seniors Association met with Member for Flynn Chris Trevor on Monday to discuss local and national concerns facing seniors.
Branch president Roy Jones said members had contacted Liberal National Party endorsed candidate Ken O’Dowd for a meeting but were still waiting for a response.]
http://www.gladstoneobserver.com.au/story/2010/08/05/seniors-big-slice-of-vote/
Bakunin
[One last comment on the Better Place beatup]
It is NOT a beatup! Public servants are obliged to declare any POTENTIAL conflicts of interest. Under the legislation I was familiar if there was an actual material conflict of interest you had to dsiqualify yourself from any decision making role.
As for how big an interest has to be before you ahd to declare it, it was any potential for a personal gain over $50. This also applied to spouses and family members. financialintrests by persons you were associated with were also covered. This would not have been permitted for a public servant. Maybe the rules are weaker in NSW.
If Kenneally didn’t want to do the same, he shouldn’t have been involved in negotiations with the NSW government while his wife was premier. Simple.
Consider the case of Therese Rein: she sold her shares in her business when Rudd became PM. Should a lesser standard apply at State level?
Good point, BigBob
[Listened to Barrie Cassidy on ABC radio. He said WTTE that Abbott has exceeded all expectations in this campaign including from his own party. Abbott has been successful in presenting a simple message with his slogans. They have been very effective and people are listening to it.
Cuppa. See, speaking to us like children by the Liberals is apparently working (Sigh!)]
Barrie said nothing negative about Abbott, then, I take it?
I believe on
OnesidersInsiders the other week Barrie Cassidy and/or the panel were amusing themselves by COUNTING the number of times Julia used the “Moving Forward” slogan.I can’t recall Barrie or any of his panel commenting on the number of times Abbott has recited the slogan Great Big New Tax. And Abbott’s used it a LOT MORE and for a LOT LONGER than Labor has used theirs.
So it seems that while they COUNT Julia’s, they PRAISE Abbott’s piece of patronising dishonest rubbish.
Double-standards as usual from the wonderful ABC…
Hi Folks – I hope with the return of the Ruddster the mood of many contributors on this post will again head back to the overconfident optimism that characterised the first week of the poll. I am not over confident but if we can perform ok for two weeks I believe we will win.
The ranger is in beautiful Townsville and once again on the front page of the Townsville bulletin. This is becoming a habit and you just have to like the Bully for it. Rabbit hear day before yesterday no front page and not much coverage. I still think I am on the money (or should I say in the money) with Herbert.
http://www.townsvillebulletin.com.au/article/2010/08/05/160501_news.html
Noocat,
How many reasons do you need to reject Tony Abbott?
Here’s a good one, from an article by Michael Perusco, the CEO of Sacred Heart Mission (that’s right, an organization apparently theologically aligned with the Opposition Leader):
[I was in Canberra last week and had the opportunity to ask Opposition Leader Tony Abbott whether a government under his direction would continue with the Rudd government’s goal of halving homelessness by 2020. His answer was no.
In justifying his stance, Abbott quoted from the Gospel of Matthew: ”The poor will always be with us,” he said, and referred to the fact there is little a government can do for people who choose to be homeless.]
Did I hear the radio correctly? Gillard has promised Rudd Foreign Affairs if Labor win!!!
Abbott continues to target the female voters:
[HeraldSunMatt Safe pic opp at hospital to say 2800 new beds for health system. Asked wife Margie to hold one 4-day-old because she was “the baby holder”]
(Latika twitter)
Sorry, here’s the link from the Brisbane Times of 16 February 2010
http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/opinion/bible-bashing-the-homeless-abbott-style-20100215-o2tj.html
And that’d be after he said, on attaining the leadership of the Liberal Party:
[“I probably should, I suppose, apologise now for all my errors of the past, and make a clean breast of them, if you like, and ask the public to judge me from this point.”]
[Did I hear the radio correctly? Gillard has promised Rudd Foreign Affairs if Labor win!!!]
I think she said WTTE he was accomplished in foreign affairs.
Diogenes: is that really a surprise?
Stephen Smith could easily be shifted to another senior portfolio.