Essential Research: 53-47 to Labor

This week’s Essential Research offers results on Tony Abbott and 457 visas, along with yet another boring set of voting intention numbers.

The Essential Research fortnight rolling average maintains its recent habit of shifting between 53-47 and 54-46, the latest instalment going from the latter to the former. On the primary vote, the Coalition is up a point to 37% and Labor is down one to 36%, with the Greens and One Nation steady at 10% and 8%, so that the result is in all respects identical to the week before last. The poll also finds 40% think Tony Abbott should resign from parliament, 17% that he should stay on the back bench, and another 17% that he should be given a position in the ministry. This is worse for him than when the same questions were posed in August last year, when the respective results were 37%, 21% and 25%. Other findings relate to the tightening of 457 visas: 16% said they went too far, 28% not far enough, and 39% that they were about right; 59% approved of allowing visa holders to apply for permanent residency, against 23% disapprove; 78% agreed that those applying for permanent residency should first be put on a probationary visa, against only 10% for disagree.

The Australian also had extra questions from Newspoll, which found that 70% favoured the government prioritising spending cuts over 20% for increasing taxes, but that only 30% favoured cuts to welfare payments with 61% opposed.

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.

784 comments on “Essential Research: 53-47 to Labor”

Comments Page 8 of 16
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  2. The ‘good debt/bad debt’ thing has been around for ages. However, it is now being refashioned by Morrison to mean any support for welfare is ‘bad’ whereas all else is good………..like a useless, non-cost-benefited railway line from Alice Springs to Darwin ‘good’ but Gonski and NDIS ‘bad’. Back in simpler days, it was a case of all Labor debt ‘bad’ all Liberal debt ‘good’. It was for this reason LNP politicians could belt a Federal Labor government for having ‘bad’ debt while the likes of Porter/Barnett ran up $30 billion of debt and more in WA, without a peep from said LNP politicians. I have always maintained the LNP does hypocrisy better than any other political party in Oz.

  3. And while the thought takes me, for those who are sticking the boots into UK Labour and their perceived hopeless leader Corbyn, just what approach would these arm-chair critics suggest UK Labour take? The Scots have robbed Labour of nearly all representation north of Hadrian’s Wall while the working class in the North are now all part of the Little England lot who want to keep foreigners out. Alf Garnett was always a working class Tory and I guess he now has lots of mates in what was once strong Labour areas. A bit like the Rust Belts in the US, this working class Tory lot in the UK are willing to vote to throw their lot in with the Conservatives – they being the doffing of the cap types to their betters while their betters send their kids to private schools and destroy the NHS. I hope this former lot get all they deserve as the true blue Tory will shat all over them.

  4. Peter Martin in his article today on the new debt, couldn’t resist another crack at the NBN, wtte Labor’s plan was bad debt, a waste, because there was no cost/benefit analysis.

  5. NBN Co provides more alternative facts, paid for by the taxpayer
    When do you know for certain that the folk who run a public sector project such as the NBN have realised that they will fail to achieve their goals and need to retreat into a world of fantasy? When you start seeing puff pieces in the media, paid for by the unwitting taxpayer, glorifying the project in question.
    In short, some “alternative facts”. The NBN Co has expertise in this direction and thus it should come as no surprise that it spent a goodly sum on getting 45 minutes of puff stuff put to air by Channel Nine on 13 April.

    Before going any further, you, gentle reader, can watch the programme, the first in a series called Everyday Innovators, right here. You will need to register; hurry, because the video is available only until midnight on 11 May.

    This writer hardly watches commercial TV, so it is thanks to the ABC’s Media Watch programme last night that one became aware of this waste of public money. It appears that the NBN Co has spent $2.2 million on advertising with Nine since 26 January.

    The programme covers a number of businesses and voluntary projects that would not be possible to run in their locations unless one has fast broadband. But to portray the NBN as being a problem-free network is somewhat distant from the reality. As Media Watch pointed out, there were 13,000+ complaints about the NBN to the Telecommunications Ombudsman in 2016. The puff piece didn’t pull too many eyeballs: there were 169,000 viewers across the capital cities, and 50 other programmes, including a repeat of Hawaii Five O, did better.
    —
    http://www.itwire.com/open-sauce/77775-nbn-co-provides-more-alternative-facts,-paid-for-by-the-taxpayer.html

  6. bemused @ #355 Thursday, April 27, 2017 at 9:27 pm

    NBN Co provides more alternative facts, paid for by the taxpayer
    When do you know for certain that the folk who run a public sector project such as the NBN have realised that they will fail to achieve their goals and need to retreat into a world of fantasy? When you start seeing puff pieces in the media, paid for by the unwitting taxpayer, glorifying the project in question.
    In short, some “alternative facts”. The NBN Co has expertise in this direction and thus it should come as no surprise that it spent a goodly sum on getting 45 minutes of puff stuff put to air by Channel Nine on 13 April.
    Before going any further, you, gentle reader, can watch the programme, the first in a series called Everyday Innovators, right here. You will need to register; hurry, because the video is available only until midnight on 11 May.
    This writer hardly watches commercial TV, so it is thanks to the ABC’s Media Watch programme last night that one became aware of this waste of public money. It appears that the NBN Co has spent $2.2 million on advertising with Nine since 26 January.
    The programme covers a number of businesses and voluntary projects that would not be possible to run in their locations unless one has fast broadband. But to portray the NBN as being a problem-free network is somewhat distant from the reality. As Media Watch pointed out, there were 13,000+ complaints about the NBN to the Telecommunications Ombudsman in 2016. The puff piece didn’t pull too many eyeballs: there were 169,000 viewers across the capital cities, and 50 other programmes, including a repeat of Hawaii Five O, did better.
    —
    http://www.itwire.com/open-sauce/77775-nbn-co-provides-more-alternative-facts,-paid-for-by-the-taxpayer.html

    I saw the podcast of Media Watch. It was a good report.

    The only suggestion that the programme was paid for by NBNco was their logo next to nine’s in the last frame.

    Their was no statement of this fact.

  8. bemused @ #357 Thursday, April 27, 2017 at 9:38 pm

    barney in go dau @ #356 Thursday, April 27, 2017 at 9:34 pm

    bemused @ #355 Thursday, April 27, 2017 at 9:27 pm
    —
    I saw the podcast of Media Watch. It was a good report.
    The only suggestion that the programme was paid for by NBNco was their logo next to nine’s in the last frame.
    Their was no statement of this fact.

    I missed the Media Watch but will try to catch it in iView.
    Don’t think I will bother with that puff piece.

    Media Watch is all you need to see.
    They give you a clear idea what the programme was.

  9. For a country that has political leaders who incessantly recite “Lest we Forget” during ANZAC Day, Remembrance Day and a couple of others, they seem to forget very bloody quickly when an opportunity to start/participate in the next war comes up.

  10. ratsak @ #350 Thursday, April 27, 2017 at 8:47 pm

    Just Me, your story sadly is one of many many thousands of similar tales throughout the years. They were killed by the war as sure as being shot, but their names don’t appear on any memorials.

    Sadly, there is nothing unique about our family’s experience, for that war or any since.

    We have the barest of standard formal records (enlistment papers, etc), and a single token war souvenir he collected, as the entire physical evidence of his war service.

  11. Lest We Forget?

    The Returned Diggers, if they didn’t drink before, drank to forget.

    A bigger pack of drunks and family abusers [and extremely traumatised survivors] you couldn’t get together anywhere else [apart from on the Continent, and Russia, and Asia, and everywhere else]

    But, hey, let’s commemorate. And pretend young men didn’t die, didn’t see the worst shit ever, and were lucky to die, rather than subject their families to their terrors.

    But all I see is now, on Anzac Day, is a CELEBRATION OF DEATH. No acknowledgement from the idiots who dress themselves in flags, of death, destruction, despair, guilt, but the infantile tears of teenagers, wishing in their hearts there would be another time of romantic deprivation, that means death with sympathy.

  12. I’m starting to think Scott Morrison is a bit simple. How else can we account for the ‘good debt, bad debt’ routine today? The only other possible explanation is that it is an approach conjured in the office of Malcolm Turnbull. Well known as he is for his strategic buffonery.

    The Liberal Party today announced to the naion that debt is ballooning under their stewardship. So loud Morrison may as well have used a megaphone. He and Turnbull have wilfully given up the on advantage they had over Labor in the eyes of unengaged voters.

    At this very moment their are RWNJs rabbiting on about how the Liberal Party has increased the debt. These poor souls are meant to be the ones singing the Liberals praises. Extraordinary!

    Labor is going to have a party with this one. Education is now bad debt, health is now bad debt and of course tax cuts for foreign multinationals is good debt. This budget is going to be a cracker if this shit is any indication.

  13. Peter Martin in his article today on the new debt, couldn’t resist another crack at the NBN, wtte Labor’s plan was bad debt, a waste, because there was no cost/benefit analysis.

    ——————

    Martin has been sprouting that gobshite since about day one of the NBN. Just can’t admit he is wrong.

    Is he seriously suggesting that the current LNP Fraudband version is better value? Or that it is not, but somehow that is all Labor’s fault?

    He is one of the reasons I cancelled my Fairfax sub after 35 years.

  14. Just Me / Ratsak

    re’ Doing war … and the aftermath

    WW2 – My father and his brother both 2nd AIF (joined early in 1940 – 7th Div guys – my father with some experience in the British Army prior to WW2 and also some later with them). Three of my mothers brothers in the RAAF or AIF. They all came home. I recognise now that my father used to do a binge drink every 2nd Saturday … . His brother ‘liked’ a drink as well – very often. Both ‘happy drunk’ variety. The only time my father ever talked about the war was when some of their comrades were around. I don’t recall his brother taking part in the conversation (he was a bachelor and my fathers farming partner and lived with us until I was about 12).

    So WW2 didn’t seem so bad but next different.

    Vietnam – Two first cousins – One DIA and his brother, without a psychical mark on him, later crashed and burnt at 40. The first loss, I think, we understood – Mick joined the Army at 15 and had to get his parents permission to go at 19 when 5 RAR went first to establish the 1ATF HQ. He was well trained.

    His brother, a OCTU conscript, not, I’d say, nearly as well trained.

    It leaves marks on not only those who go.

  16. “Adani could easily become the Liberals Khemlani affair.”

    Showing your age there Fred.

    But seriously, what is going on with the Turnbull Government’s dealings with Adani? The Khemlani affair was bumbling incompetence, but the Adani affair? The whole thing looks dodgy as all getout. Quo bono?

  17. “It leaves marks on not only those who go.”

    The carnage doesn’t end with the war. It continues creeping out across at least the next 2-3 generations.

  18. S777

    “Adani could easily become the Liberals Khemlani affair.”

    The Libs would blame Rex Connor for the current gas problems as well if they didn’t have the memory of gnats.

    After all, he had the Moomba to Sydney pipeline built.

  23. Good morning Dawn Patrollers.

    John Hewson writes that we are at the mercy of two mad men.
    http://www.smh.com.au/sport/danni-roche-calls-for-external-party-to-conduct-aoc-review-20170427-gvtrmj.html
    A senior Liberal has come out saying that the party will be decimated and tells us why. “Turnbull has nothing left,” he said. “There are no other constituencies his government can attack.”
    http://thenewdaily.com.au/news/national/2017/04/27/liberal-party-insider-speaks-out/
    Michelle Grattan has a good look at Turnbull’s week and concludes with ” One thing that nobody around the Prime Minister has a big idea for resolving is the debilitating Abbott issue.”
    https://theconversation.com/grattan-on-friday-turnbulls-pipe-dreams-channel-ghost-of-rex-connor-76801
    Unsurprisingly gas producers are calling BS on Turnbull’s claim that gas prices will halve as a result of his intervention.
    http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/malcolm-turnbull-asked-to-justify-gas-price-claims-as-industry-pans-export-intervention-20170427-gvu1ig.html
    Peter Martin looks at how the intervention came about and how it contradicted a lot of prior ministerial utterings.
    http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-opinion/gas-companies-find-out-that-politics-affects-markets-too-20170427-gvtvtl.html
    Michael West goes deeply into the gas crisis and says it was desperation that drove Turnbull to intervene.
    http://www.michaelwest.com.au/behind-the-intervention-in-gas-desperation/
    Anne Aly’s Anzac Day experience demonstrate two things – the power and rapidity of social media and the spite of right wing groups.
    http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/muslim-mp-anne-aly-falsely-accused-of-refusing-to-lay-wreath-on-anzac-day-20170427-gvu0jb.html
    The Turnbull government is forging ahead with reforms to GP care despite fears its policy is rushed and underfunded.
    http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/malcolm-turnbull-to-forge-ahead-on-gp-reforms-despite-doctors-funding-fears-20170426-gvtf89.html
    Peter Martin on what we can expect from Morrison’s accounting gymnastics.
    http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/federal-budget-2017-reporting-shakeup-sparks-debt-spree-concerns-20170427-gvtt60.html
    The Pentagon’s top watchdog has launched an investigation into money that former national security adviser General Michael Flynn received from foreign groups.
    http://www.smh.com.au/world/pentagon-to-investigate-former-trump-adviser-michael-flynns-payments-from-foreign-groups-20170427-gvu87b.html

  24. Section 2 . . .

    The Queensland CCC is ignoring the big question: why are councillors such targets for corruption writes Dr Cameron Murray.
    https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/queensland-cccs-operation-belcarra-missing-the-point-on-corruption,10240
    Here’s what Trump’s first 100 days have done for women.
    http://www.huffingtonpost.com.au/2017/04/27/heres-what-trump-has-done-for-women-in-his-first-100-days_a_22058434/?utm_hp_ref=au-homepage
    Weleed Aly says that Turnbull’s “tough” stance on migration is doomed to fail.
    http://www.smh.com.au/comment/malcolm-turnbulls-tough-stance-on-migration-is-doomed-to-fail-20170427-gvth38.html
    Labor has denounced the move for a super-sized homeland security ministry, calling the Turnbull government’s consideration of the idea “deeply concerning” and a “power grab” by Immigration Minister Peter Dutton.
    http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/plan-for-homeland-security-ministry-a-peter-dutton-power-grab-says-labor-20170427-gvtni3.html
    Barnaby pooh poohs the Productivity Commission’s report on decentralisation of the APS. The guy is barking mad.
    http://www.smh.com.au/national/public-service/barnaby-joyce-dismisses-productivity-commission-warning-on-decentralisation-20170427-gvtr57.html
    Laura Tingle launches a tirade on government IT being a black hole in every sense of the word. Google.
    /opinion/columnists/laura-tingle/government-it-a-budget-black-hole-in-every-sense-of-the-word-20170427-gvtu9x
    Australia’s electricity and gas transmission industry has intensified a call for a market mechanism to drive orderly transformation in the energy sector, warning a lack of clear regulation will result in higher prices for consumers and a less secure grid.
    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/apr/28/australians-could-save-100bn-on-electricity-if-government-had-clear-policy
    LOW-cost airline Jetstar has been rated as the worst in the world by travellers who blame long delays and lack of cost transparency as their biggest gripes. Nice work! Google.
    /travel/travel-news/jetstar-ranks-as-the-worst-airline-in-the-world-with-lengthy-delays-and-poor-service-to-blame/news-story/4666b12ef40edda94a4e6b0b672d4211
    Angela Merkel has delivered a sidewinder at the illusions Britons have about an easy ride out of the EU.
    http://www.smh.com.au/world/angela-merkel-warns-the-uk-against-illusions-about-brexit-in-hardline-speech-20170427-gvu7y1.html
    Can Marine Le Pen still win the French election if her opponents don’t show up to vote in the run-off vote on May 7?
    http://www.smh.com.au/world/marine-le-pens-path-to-victory-is-much-narrower-than-donald-trumps-was-in-2016-20170427-gvu80q.html

  25. Section 3 . . .

    The charming family man Ross Cameron is appealing his suspension from the Liberal Party.
    http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/ross-cameron-appealing-suspension-from-nsw-liberals-20170427-gvtqwq.html
    Optus and Telstra are complicit in a predatory multimillion-dollar billing scam. Another good exposé from Michael West.
    http://www.michaelwest.com.au/optus-and-telstras-billing-scams-hit-customers-in-droves/
    Richard Olger writes that Macron is the moderate revolutionary that France needs.
    http://www.smh.com.au/comment/emmanuel-macron-is-the-moderate-revolutionary-france-needs-20170427-gvthnm.html
    Josh Gordon previews Dan Andrews’ “make or break” budget to be announced next Tuesday.
    http://www.smh.com.au/comment/daniel-andrews-make-or-break-budget-approaches-20170427-gvtltp.html
    The “Aussie values” test will get very tricky says this contributor.
    http://www.smh.com.au/comment/testing-for-aussie-values-gets-awfully-tricky-awfully-quickly-20170425-gvselr.html
    Andrew Street and the national anthem Australia deserves.
    http://www.smh.com.au/comment/view-from-the-street/the-national-anthem-australia-really-deserves-20170427-gvtmh4.html
    Faced with a national crisis that killed 71 women last year, the government has responded with little more than empty words and crocodile tears. If that mindset goes unchallenged, domestic violence runs the risk of becoming an issue we only care about when something particularly awful happens. Alex McKinnon gets stuck in to Brandis and Cash.
    http://www.smh.com.au/comment/the-governments-commitment-to-domestic-violence-funding-is-hollow-20170427-gvtjn0.html
    Madonna King says that if Yassmin’s comment was out of line her attackers were worse.
    http://www.smh.com.au/comment/that-thinking-feeling/if-yassmin-abdelmagied-was-out-of-line-her-attackers-were-worse-20170426-gvtb7t.html
    The AOC is descending into clusterf**k territory!
    http://www.smh.com.au/sport/danni-roche-calls-for-external-party-to-conduct-aoc-review-20170427-gvtrmj.html
    An Australian initiative that seeks to combat food wastage and feed those in need has opened its doors in Sydney.
    http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/food-rescue-group-ozharvest-opens-supermarket-to-help-vulnerable-people-20170427-gvttj1.html

  26. Section 4 . . .

    Richo reviews Trump’s first “wacky” days in office. Google.
    /opinion/columnists/graham-richardson/this-white-house-working-on-a-whim-and-a-tweet/news-story/e8eaea381bacd4f284a218efc891df83
    Underworld figure Mick Gatto has used his formidable negotiating powers to settle a $15 million tax bill by paying less than $4 million. It did cost him $1m in legal expenses.
    http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/gatto-settles-15m-tax-bill-for-less-than-4m-20170426-gvsqx3.html
    White House Press Secretary Sean (Comical Ali) Spicer tried to blame President Obama for Trump hiring Mike Flynn because Trump never did another background check of Flynn but used the same one that Obama administration did years before.
    http://www.politicususa.com/2017/04/27/sean-spicer-blamed-obama-trump-hiring-mike-flynn.html
    Stockland and Mirvac, the country’s two biggest residential developers, will focus on providing more affordable housing through mixed-use urban redevelopments.
    http://www.smh.com.au/business/property/stockland-mirvac-home-in-on-affordable-housing-as-profits-tick-along-20170427-gvtihg.html
    Workplace induced mental illness is costing toxic businesses plenty.
    http://www.smh.com.au/national/health/mental-illness-workers-compo-claims-cost-toxic-businesses-double-20170427-gvu0j4.html
    The aviation safety watchdog is advancing plans to finalise controversial rules allowing fewer cabin crew on Australian aircraft, a move that has angered unions but that airlines insist will bring them into line with global standards. Google.
    /business/aviation/casa-pushes-case-for-fewer-flight-attendants/news-story/fa23a3c3910e2165d4458dddb777c3ff
    The stage has been set for extraordinary scenes in the NSW upper house next month, as a parliamentary committee into toll roads considered whether to compel a senior executive of WestConnex to appear before it and reveal his salary.
    http://www.smh.com.au/comment/the-public-has-the-right-to-know-westconnex-boss-salary-20170427-gvtj2h.html
    Network Ten could be broken up and sold off for the benefit of its bank and three billionaire shareholders by the end of the year if a transformation project fails to improve its fortunes. Yesterday its share price got pummelled again, dropping 19%.
    http://www.smh.com.au/business/media-and-marketing/network-ten-facing-fire-sale-if-turnaround-fails-to-improve-earnings-20170427-gvtxl1.html
    Coles will cut promotions to stamp-out shopper distrust in the supermarket giant as intense competition forces it to invest in service and every-day low prices to stay ahead of the game.
    http://www.smh.com.au/business/retail/supermarket-specials-breed-distrust-says-wesfarmers-20170427-gvtspz.html
    The fall of Joe Gutnick into bankruptcy and angry courtroom scenes.
    http://www.smh.com.au/business/bankrupt-joseph-gutnick-grilled-over-debts-20170427-gvu0o6.html

  27. Section 5 . . . Cartoon Corner Part 1

    Matt Golding on the gas problem.

    Cruel work here from Andrew Dyson.

    Simon Letch continues in the same vein.

    Matt Golding and the reality show that is Network Ten.

    Jim Pavlidis on our defence “shield”.

  28. Section 6 . . . Cartoon Corner Part 2

    Cathy Wilcox nicely starts off the ridiculing of Morrison’s god debt-bad debt mantra.

    Mark David also has a crack at debt redefinition.

    Of course David Rowe has a go at Morrison’s debt statement.

    Jon Kudelka has a good slant on Morrison and debt definition.
    http://cdn.newsapi.com.au/image/v1/9617dc2b629d34d648d1fce3fafb68d7
    Broelman on free speech (for some).

    A very good contribution from Mark Knight and Turnbull’s gas supply intervention.
    http://cdn.newsapi.com.au/image/v1/2b2cfc41f9352b2fe10b004c1fc39033?width=1024
    Today’s cartoon prize goes to David Pope on Morrison “upgrading” the debt truck.


  29. Just Me
    Friday, April 28, 2017 at 12:02 am
    “It leaves marks on not only those who go.”
    The carnage doesn’t end with the war. It continues creeping out across at least the next 2-3 generations.

    Yes; I was raised by a step dad because of the WWII. I effects you and because you had no father role model, it effects your children.

  31. Morning bludgers

    Thanks BK for today’s offerings. Particularly Enjoyed the Liberal insider piece re how the party is stuffed!!

    Meanwhile, I am still trying to figure out Carter page in the Trump imbroglio. Keep changing my mind. Now I see this from Claude Taylor, whom I have been following and believe he has his finger on the pulse.

    1h
    Claude Taylor @TrueFactsStated
    Of course he’s an informant. The question is how long has he been one? Was he already one on his fateful tape-delivery mission to Moscow?
    Tracie @traciemac_Bmore
    Replying to @TrueFactsStated
    I think Carter Page is an informant? What are your thoughts?

  32. On Wednesday, President Donald Trump signed an executive order directing the Department of the Interior to review all national monument designations made over the last 21 years. The order asks the agency to reassess monument designations under the Antiquities Act of 1906 to ensure they meet the “requirements and original objectives of the Act,” while protecting the “landmarks, structures, and objects against the appropriate use of Federal lands and the effects on surrounding lands and communities.”

    The order comes after Republicans have asked the president to reconsider the designations of two monuments in particular: The Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument in Maine and Bears Ears National Monument in Utah. In a fact sheet, the White House said the two monuments “represent the book-ends of modern Antiquities Act overreach.” According to The Los Angeles Times, the Bears Ears monument is being reconsidered because it “holds promise for oil and gas, mining and other potential development.”

    https://www.good.is/articles/trump-sells-monuments-to-big-oil

    This may be able to be stopped by the courts.

  34. Tricot

    I hope this former lot get all they deserve as the true blue Tory will shat all over them

    I hope they enjoy every bit of shit that will be dumped upon them.

  38. Morning all. Apart from the delusion isn over good and bad debt, I was particularly struck by the reported words of Turnbull on infrastructure:
    “Prime Minister has also grown weary of states taking credit for infrastructure projects part-funded by the Federal Government.”

    WTF? The Libs now only part fund city roads and rail, make states take responsibility for overruns in time or cost and insist on dud projects like Perth Freight Link and still want to take the credit when things go right? ROTFL

  39. Can someone advise me why the government can not MAKE the gas exporters to supply gas to the Australian market at the same price as export price? What is hard about it? Or does the local market buy at that price now?

  40. Malcolm doesn’t sound like he’s making the gas exporters DO anything.

    He’s asked them to make sure Australians get supplied with gas at ‘the international price’, they’ve said they would, and between chaps, that’s all that needs to happen.

    Doubting their word would be downright unAustralian.

  42. Domestic solar and batteries to lead the charge to zero emissions, with no expanded role for gas. Even the conservative network operators are talking zero electricity emissions by 2050. But if the government doesn’t get it’s act together quickly we’ll lose 100 bn through a chaotic transition.
    Governments and the main market players never adequately factor in exponential growth when developing policy.
    In the context of this growth in solar, wind and batteries, Snowjob 2.0 and the hydro expansion in Tasmania could never reach fruition.
    http://reneweconomy.com.au/households-will-be-at-centre-of-australias-transition-to-100-renewables-55080/

  44. Sigh…Frydenberg makes his 250th appearance on AM this year.
    What gets me about these interviews is the sheer pointlessness of them. Sabra Lane asked a few ‘difficult’ questions, but Frydenberg’s blatant lies went unchallenged and the bullshit flew thick and fast.

    These charades devoid of meaning are bread and butter for parts of the MSM. And they wonder why their audience is fading.

  45. This is an important warning for Democratic office-holders:

    Hillary wrecked her campaign with three crucial miscalculations:

    1. Emphasizing what she was against, not what she was for. In outspending her opponent two-to-one, Clinton conducted one of the most negative campaigns in recent history that focused almost entirely on discrediting and demonizing Donald Trump. He helped with that process, of course, but at least ordinary Americans got some idea of what he meant to do as president. Building walls, banning Muslims, scrapping trade deals, blowing up alliances and building up the military may be simplistic promises, but at least they’re comprehensible notions. Can anyone recall, six months later, what Clinton promised to do? Even one memorable pledge? Could anyone predict with confidence what she would have done if she had won the November election?
    2. Relying on identity politics rather than mass persuasion. The Clinton campaign’s overconfidence stemmed from slicing and dicing the American electorate by race and gender and concluding that their pieces of the pie added up to more votes than Trump’s. They counted on the same overwhelming support from people of color that had elected Obama, and felt sure that their glass-ceiling-smashing candidate would add her own special appeal to her fellow white women. As it happened, Hillary lost white females (37% of the electorate) by a decisive 9 points to the reviled misogynist in Trump Tower, and that same accused “hate monger” did slightly better among voters of color than did the earnest and able Mitt Romney. Among the white working class, even a significant number of self-identified liberals shifted their support to Trump, in part because Clinton made no serious attempt to persuade them that she’d serve their interests directly or effectively.
    3. Remaining deaf to the message that “inside” is out. Every time her well-meaning supporters or slick TV commercials emphasized Clinton’s standing as “the most qualified candidate in history” it simply re-enforced her status as the ultimate insider. The sudden popularity of the independent socialist (and septuagenarian) from Vermont who waged a credible battle for the nomination should have alerted the former first lady that many if not most voters didn’t care about governing experience or power structure connections. Trump’s defiance of political correctness, convention and even of common decency may have scared some voters but seems to have delighted even more.

    Today, the Washington Democrats self-destructively determined to make the same three mistakes.

    https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2017/04/26/gop-repeat-hillary-mistake-identity-politics-column/100877816/

  46. darn @ #365 Thursday, April 27, 2017 at 11:37 pm

    This blog has been as slow as treacle all day. Where the hell is everyone?

    It seems trolls like P1 took a holiday as did certain other prolific posters who don’t necessarily add much. All quantity vs quality.
    Not having the time others seem to have, I thought it was a good day.

  47. Hillary’s ‘crucial miscalculation’ was to focus on winning votes over all rather than being more targetted.

    It’s sort of ignoring the actual outcome to say she didn’t do the ‘mass persuasion’ thing.

  48. phoenixRed

    If you are about. In addition to Jason Chaffetz announcing last week that he would not recontest in 2018, what do you make of his reasoning for being away from Congress for next four to six weeks? It all rather smells………

    Jason Chaffetz @jasoninthehouse

    Almost 12 years ago, I shattered several bones in my foot which required 14 screws and a metal… (link: https://www.instagram.com/p/BTXlsQtgAXr/) instagram.com/p/BTXlsQtgAXr/

  49. If you get the chance have a listen to Turnbull on 3aw this morning trying to explain to an old age pensioner who can’t afford to keep her heater on in the cold weather because the gas costs too much. Her name is Greta and Mitchell asked Turnbull if he can guarantee that Greta’s bills will go down as a result of his negotiations with the gas companies.

    As far as I could discern from the interminable waffle, his answer was wtte that a small portion of Greta’s bill (about 20% of it he said) MIGHT fall by an indeterminable amount. I’m sure while she is shivering in the cold this winter that will give her great comfort.

    As with all of Turnbull’s attempts to convince us that he has the answers to Australia’s problems, this one has disaster written all over it.

  50. Darn

    I appreciate your feedback from 3aw land. shorten did a presser yesterday and basically asked that the Gas companies to confirm Turnbull’s statements that gas bills would be halved. Turnbull is way over his head on this

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