Stephen Murray tweets that the fortnightly Newspoll in tomorrow’s Australian shows no change on two-party preferred, with Labor maintaining its lead of 54-46, and next to no change on the primary vote, with the Coalition steady on 36%, Labor down one to 36%, the Greens up one to 12% and others steady on 16%. However, Tony Abbott is up five on approval to 36% and down seven on disapproval to 53%, and has drawn level on preferred prime minister at 38-38 after Bill Shorten led 41-36 a fortnight ago. Bill Shorten’s personal ratings are also improved, his approval up four to 38% and disapproval down two to 41%.
I don’t think this is a big deal, and Tomazin was clearly lax with her data security
But Samaras broke the law and Tomazin didn’t. It’s not a hanging offence but ALP apologists should take it on the chin and stop trying to pretend (as always) that it’s everybody else’s fault.
Ross
How do we know Ted did not have similar conversations with others that were recorded? After all the other conversations on the device have not leaked.
Briefly @236: you make a good point. The LNP is demonising so many people it’s eroding its support. Wedge politics gone mad, they’ve left themselves too small a share.
Diogenes
“I still dont understand why she made such a lot of noise about it when she appears to have been much the same as Thomson and Williamson.”
From my reading of the events I won’t be surprised if Jackson’s total “receipts” were far in excess of Thompson’s. Worse, she continued her rorts apparently long after Thompson came under very public scrutiny, whilst loudly negativing him at every opportunity.
I have no doubt that there was just one aspect of Thompson’s case that contributed mainly to his downfall ….. the call girl factor, and puritanical moral outrage including on PB.
Just as the pursuit of Slipper was not about $900 and dishonesty …. it was about another aspect altogether, the Speakership disloyalty.
Greens presser then Shorten then Gillard
MartinB
indeed they do. But they are not evidence that anyone other than Samaris listened to ‘the device’ or were party to the decision to destroy it.
As I said, they’re being very careful in their use of language.
“@ABCNews24: Watch LIVE: Opposition Leader @BillShortenMP speaking after visiting an aged care facility in Melbourne http://t.co/FlRWJArtyW #auspol”
Ignorance of Politicians and Technology.
Josh Taylor @joshgnosis 2m
Ian Macdonald: “When I log on to my cloud, I don’t quite know what it means, but I thought it was something in heaven.”
Twitter makes us confront images of children with limbs blown off & intestines hanging out of their tiny broken bodies.Rows of twisted and incomplete bodies and children who look as if they are sleeping peacefully..
It’s impossible to turn away quickly enough to prevent the worst images being seared into your brain …and the images are crystal clear …and so, so brutal..
I have never been confronted in this way before …and it hurts me deeply to witness such terrible slaughter of innocent fellow humans..
I thought those awful images of scores of children un-covered in school-rooms after the China earthquake were bad enough …I can see them now in my minds’ eye. That was nature at its cruel worst ..but this is deliberate slaughter of the innocents on a grand scale ..human behaviour at its cruel worst..
Twitter is wonderful ….Twitter is terrible!!
MartinB
the issue is (supposed) to be around who leaked the interview to the Liberals.
I’m not pretending anything. I’m answering questions people are asking me, as honestly as I can, with the information I have on hand. I have clearly placed some blame on Labor (so your ‘ALP apologists’ slur must not apply to me).
“@ABCNews24: Bill Shorten: The Abbott Government is cutting services to people with dementia #auspol”
psyclaw
Jackson seems to be somewhere between Thomson and Williamson in terms of dodginess.
Martin
Labor (Samaras etc) got legal advice from S & G not to disseminate the recording.
This whole Dictaphonegate thing is hardly visible in Sydney. I am rather surprised at the Age. I thought it was supposed to be ‘Independent always’ like the Sydney Morning Herald.
The SMH is not perfect but I find it generally balanced, praising or criticising each side of politics as it sees appropriate and generally keeping news and views separate. If I were still buying the SMH (I stopped buying any newspaper a couple of years ago) and it indulged itself in this sort of campaigning I’d stop buying it.
“@joeobrien24: Former PM @JuliaGillard to speak at Greg Combet book launch in about 15mins – watch live on @abcnews24.”
You are interpreting statements in the most legalistic way possible in order to cast the most favourable possible light on Andrew’s statements, and suggesting scenarios for which there is not the slightest shred of evidence in order to downplay the possibility of ALP involvement.
Taken together Carroll’s and Samaras’s statements have a very clear interpretation: C, S & McL collectively decided to destroy the recordings including the original copy on the hard drive and Samaras subsequently did so. Interpreting it otherwise is looking for an implausible sequence of events in order to clear Andrews.
Sames, no mention of it from anyone I know – but that probably doesn’t mean much.
Martin
William of Occam would be turning in his grave to see some of the contortions here.
Regardless of whether or not they did in fact disseminate the recordings and break the law in that way, at the very least destroying the dictaphone while knowing who it belonged to was an act of theft.
MartinB
And I haven’t seen anyone here denying that, or trying to excuse Samaras for doing it.
So you’re resorting to red herrings, now.
Diog
Look, I’m surprised myself – the simplest explanation is that the ALP had the tapes, and that they leaked them.
No one – not even ‘The Age’ – seems to be suggesting that that’s what happened.
‘The Age’ instead puts forward the scenario that the ALP had the tapes and that they passed them on to someone in the Liberal party.
That seems far more implausible than any other suggestion made here.
I highly doubt that S & G’s legal advice was “Oh, no, you can’t possibly leak them yourselves – but, hey, giving them to someone else to leak, no probs.”
markjs
Agree, I’ve sen some really bad stuff lately. The CNN report on Gaza made me weep watching the children screaming in fear & pain. I’m being very careful about clicking some links these days.
Actually, on that note I have seen very little comment from our awful PM & FM, Palestinians don’t count, a bit like Srilankans.
More ignorance:
Josh Taylor @joshgnosis 2m
“Most of what you’re talking to me about, I have no idea what you’re talking about” Ian Macdonald
Renai LeMay @renailemay 7m
Secret study identifies more cuts at the ABC, writes @KnottMatthew: http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/secret-study-identifies-more-cuts-at-the-abc-20140726-3cm8t.html …
Looks like some of the Murdoch papers are highlighting the “poll bounce” in the Morgan instead of the non-movement in Newspoll. Not hard to do considering the last Morgan was very skewed towards Labor.
Watching from afar, I am more interested in the Ted tape affair as an example of how the media works.
Presented with a number of facts, which may or may not be related, The Age has put them together to construct a narrative to suit an agenda.
MartinB
because, as I’ve repeatedly stated, I know how these guys work, having being subjected to rough edges of pineapples from them myself, and this is exactly what they do.
Where I have put forward absurd scenarios, I’ve said they were absurd. (But once you’ve eliminated the probable, the improbable is all you’re left with).
And I haven’t denied that.
The question was whether Andrews office had anything to do with ‘the device’. It appears (looking at their careful use of language) that they didn’t. I have made it clear that I accept they listened to the tapes.
I’ve had years of involvement with the media and the ALP. I know how their minds work in these situations. The use of language in these cases is very specific and very deliberate, and that’s why you focus on it if you want to work out what actually happened.
“@latikambourke: Former PM @JuliaGillard says importance of Combet’s book is that it gives the context social and modern media misses, in her view.”
Sri Lankans I mean.
I wasn’t here making any point about what others had said except to back up my point that mbers of the ALP have (in a relatively minor way) broken the law.
But since you mention it, there was that time that you suggested that the “lost property” could be legally claimed by the finder…
Watching FPM Julia Gillard launching Greg Combet’s book, I am reminded of what a loss we have suffered by this woman leaving our political sphere.
…and if I said to someone, “You’d better get rid of those tapes” I would expect that they would delete them, not destroy the device.
MartinB
and it can be – I’ve claimed lost property in exactly that way myself, from a police station.
Puff
+1
Richard Chirgwin @R_Chirgwin 3m
Steve Dalby up at the Telecommunications Interception Act Senate Inquiry.
Josh Taylor @joshgnosis 3m
.@Steve_Dalby and @MsLods from iINet now appearing before the TIA interception hearing.
Renai LeMay @renailemay 3m
Listen live to iiNet’s @Steve_Dalby + others testify before @senatorludlam + others on surveillance, data retention: http://www.aph.gov.au/News_and_Events/Watch_Parliament …
And here we go —
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost,_mislaid,_and_abandoned_property
Well done, Greg Combet. He is someone I admire.
The ABC will pay the price for trusting Abbott.
Poor Hockey no live cross to his book launch
player one
The ABC is suffering from Stockholm Syndrome. How would anyone like to be Mark Scott with Albrechtsen and Brown on the board.
Well said, Greg Combet. In the early settlement years, Convicts who tried to collectively bargain for increased rations were lashed, had their sentences lengthened or rations reduced.
As Tony Greig used to say:
BRING BACK GREENTARD!
Greg Combet: The Abbott gov’s budget is a a statement of their values.
I agree – there seems to be an element of:
1. a blame shifting (their reporter lost a dictaphone at a party conference containing sensitive material – their reporting seems to be ‘look over there!’ rather than facing their own incompetence. how many times have they used similar ‘illegal’materials in the past?)
2. a sense they want to even up a 10-point winning poll margin to make it interesting (napthine need to lose only one seat – he’s a goner, but The Age needs to keep it closer to sell more papers)
3. the ALP right trying to get Andrews – the left was never meant to get the premiership, he was there to lose in 2014 so a right ALP bod could win in 2018 after giving the left ‘a turn’. If they could oust him before November they’d be back on script.
If the Libs were smart, they’d get some dolt in the party to lie and claim they’d be sent and distributed the email and name andrews as the source.
the lingering question remains – why would Labor be so stupid to try to damage Napthine when he’s a dead man walking? have they learned nothing from the wedging of turnbull (who I think was set up by his own party with the gretch email)? I may have been watching too much House of Cards or playing too much chess, but could some labor right aspirant have used it a la Gretch’s email to damage both the libs and andrews in order to get the premiership?
Combet: Stand up and fight!
Raaraa
In the dictionary they used “poll” = “Dead cat” .
Martin B
who didn’t claim it, in this case.
Moot point, however, as no one is claiming this is what eventuated. It was a scenario I possited before Samaras made his statements. Even at the time, I made it clear it was only a possibility.
Let’s get back to basics – people have asked me, given my knowledge of some of the personalities involved, to give my point of view of what happened. That’s what I’ve done. I’ve never pretended to do anything else.
My point of view of what happened has changed as the information has changed, which is what you’d expect would happen. So yes, I have suggested possible scenarios which further information have shown to be incorrect. No biggie.
So far almost all of your attempts – if not actually all of them – have served to reinforce that much of what I’m saying is, in fact, correct.
I can understand that upsets you.
On the other hand, I don’t give a r*ts if I’m 100% correct, or if every statement I’ve made here proves to be wrong. All I have been doing is giving my point of view – if it’s wrong, it’s wrong, and I’ll accept that.
both she and combet leave the others looking like midgets – I see the launch and think ‘there’s the two best politicians of their generation, and we wasted them’. there’s something wrong with a system (ALP, Media) that wasted people such as these and rewards the likes of Rudd and Abbott.
Vote 1 Combet.