The fortnightly Essential Research poll for The Guardian has Labor’s two-party lead down from 52-48 to 51-49. Primary votes will have to wait for the publication of the full results later today. A series of findings on energy policy offer something for everybody. Eighty per cent favoured an inquiry into the contribution of power companies to high power prices; 63% thought energy companies should be returned to public ownership; 61% believing burning coal causes climate change; and 55% thought expanding coal mining would undermine efforts to address it. However, 47% thought coal-fired power cheaper than that from renewables; 40% supported the call by some Nationals for $5 billion to be spent on coal plants, with 38% opposed. Thirty-eight per cent thought the government should prioritise renewables over coal, 16% thought the opposite, and 34% thought they should be treated equally.
UPDATE: Full report from Essential Research here.
Nope, didn’t work.
jenauthor,
Give up. Rex the twerp isn’t going to change due to any rational debate.
Victoria says: Tuesday, July 17, 2018 at 11:22 am
Oops
https://amp.thedailybeast.com/trump-and-putin-two-bullshit-artists-enter-helsinki-one-comes-out-victorious?ref=home&__twitter_impression=true
***********************************************************************
THANKS Victoria – Rick Wilsons latest is a MUST READ !!!
Vladimir Putin is sitting on his flight back to Moscow right now laughing maniacally for one reason: His spy services have achieved the most significant single intelligence coup in world history. He has entirely, utterly, and absolutely compromised and controlled an American head of state. Putin has all the proof he needs that all of Trump’s tough-guy talk, bully bravado, and fake-alpha male posturing is an utter fraud, an impotent show for Trump’s credulous base. Trump gave him the green light to run rampant in Europe and around the world—to put his thumb on the American electoral scales in 2018 and beyond.
By the end, I almost expected Putin to demur: “No, Donald, keep Alaska. It’s fine.”
Even Putin couldn’t have expected the meeting to turn out like this, with the American president capitulating passionately, obviously—and yes, it’s time to use the word—treasonously.
It gets worse:
https://www.politico.com/story/2018/07/16/trump-putin-russia-cybersecurity-689470
** Give up. Rex the twerp isn’t going to change due to any rational debate. **
Any rational debate must include the performance of the opposition and its leader. Just not to the exclusion of all else.
I would hasten to add that a lot of people are not switched on to the political contest. Even those in by-elections (as alluded to in the other thread header). An opposition leader would need to be OTT and have a supportive and even hysterical media on their side (vide Abbott v Gillard) to really cut through.
And there are those PHON preferences…..
The question is, can the ALP and Shorten rise to the occasion come the election campaign proper?
I got my shiny new Lithuanian passport a couple of weeks ago, but the way things are going with Putin I can’t help but wonder if it will remain a valid EU document
Retired general unleashes on Trump as ‘unfit to command our troops’ in wake of Putin presser
Retired Major General Paul Eaton couldn’t help but note observe that any background check of President Donald Trump would have turned up whether Russia has compromising material. Given today’s press conference, he unleashed on the commander in chief, calling him “unfit.”
Eaton thinks that Trump has been compromised.
“The only explanation for today’s appalling performance by @realDonaldTrump is the Russians have high value compromising intel on POTUS,” he tweeted Monday evening.
https://www.rawstory.com/2018/07/retired-general-unleashes-trump-unfit-command-troops-wake-putin-presser/
Australia’s population growth. Odd, how we just keep ‘underestimating’ it, because the rate of migration just keeps ramping up …
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-07-17/chart-of-the-day-population-growth-predictions-get-it-wrong/9998980
If only we had a reliable, trustworthy, independent & non-political government agency that could be given responsibility for making such statistical predictions … oh, wait … 🙁
Republican Rick Wilson reveals what he thinks happened during Trump-Putin meeting: ‘Probably a foot massage’
“I think a lot of people today saw the real Donald Trump. They saw the Donald Trump, who comes out acting like he’s the swaggering alpha male and he sat there on the stage like a whipped dog. I mean, he wanted Vladimir Putin’s approval. He didn’t care about anything else,” Wilson said.
But it was very clear today who the boss was in that room and who wears the dog collar.”
https://www.rawstory.com/2018/07/republican-rick-wilson-reveals-thinks-happened-trump-putin-meeting-probably-foot-massage/
Simon² Katich® @ #205 Tuesday, July 17th, 2018 – 11:37 am
It’s obvious to most non-partisans that we have a dearth of real political leadership in this country. The type of leadership that inspires. The type of leadership that engages. The type of leadership that is honest.
A UK Brexit ‘toon.
Rex Gillard tried honesty and look how that turned out.
One for vic and phoenix:
DavidWH
Double ‘like’ to that comment.
Rex that is bullshit.
You see the policy releases (though often played down/censored by media)
Shorten has seen off Abbott. Shorten gained 17 or 18 seats last election. Labor has been polling in front for this entire term.
I’m too frightened to go the The Lobster cave……
Dan Gulberry says: Tuesday, July 17, 2018 at 11:52 am
One for vic and phoenix:
***********************************************
Thanks Dan …… I think ITS TIME for Robert Mueller to start opening those rumoured sealed indictments and start taking down some of those people who act against the interests of their own country ….. including Trump
Dan G/P
I am hoping it is closer now. This shit show has felt like an eternity. Heck it has taken this long for the treasonous word to finally be said out loud!
Oops don’t know what happened to the rest, but above post was also directed to PhoenixRed
Victoria says: Tuesday, July 17, 2018 at 12:02 pm
Dan G/P
I am hoping it is closer now. This shit show has felt like an eternity. Heck it has taken this long for the treasonous word to finally be said out loud!
*************************************************************
John SchindlerVerified account @20committee
Dear America:
You elected a traitor whose loyalty is not to the United States, a country he seems to hate, rather to a murderous thug in the Kremlin.
When you get around to it, maybe ask yourself why that might be. *
In the meantime, Mueller is preparing dozens of indictments.
________________________________-
* Retired Major General Paul Eaton Eaton thinks that Trump has been compromised.
“The only explanation for today’s appalling performance by @realDonaldTrump is the Russians have high value compromising intel on POTUS,” he tweeted Monday evening.
Counterchekist
Counterchekist
@counterchekist
·
3m
I’m laughing at the sheer number of people who ONLY TODAY have come to the realization that tRUmp’s deference & fawning towards Russia/Putin isn’t normal.
Where the f—k have you been since 2016?
Counterchekist
Counterchekist
@counterchekist
·
2h
Narrator: But it wasn’t fake news. Donald tRUmp had lived a life of no limits. However, on Wednesday January 11th, 2017 with 140 characters, that changed. He & friends violated the universally understood truth: If committing treason, don’t do so over the phone.
Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump
Intelligence agencies should never have allowed this fake news to “leak” into the public. One last shot at me.Are we living in Nazi Germany?
To try and get away from the hysterics thats going on, lets consider why the Australian democratic system is superior to the USA;
1) Preferential voting, and
2) AEC independence and redistribution
Also more specific to the ALP, power is fought over by fairly equal factions, mostly composed of party members (but some famous heavyweights).
Contrast this to the democrats, they appear to me to have more of a three way battle, with an extra faction representing the party administrators.
I hated factions when i was an ALP member, but i think it could be worse without them.
bug1,
Enough with this constant accusation of ‘hysteria’ already. I honestly can’t see why, with your avowed love of the Australian democratic system, that you can’t see how Turnbull’s enablers, both within and without the government, wouldn’t love to do some more tinkering with our electoral system to entrench themselves in power!?! With the help of The Greens and the Conservative Crazy Clown Car on the rest of the Cross Bench.
What Trump does has consequences. What Trump does, Turnbull scrutinises closely. Then he tries to find a way of applying it to his advantage here. Most recently with his attempt to ‘Presidentialise’ the by-elections. There’s nothing hysterical about commenting on all of it at all. Just an abundance of caution.
Cat
I love your sense of humour. Oh wait, you mean it.
So much influence and power wielded by a single person who is nothing more than an ordinary citizen with an interest in what sort of society I live in.
I understand why claims of a “misogynistic” campaign against ALP Garrett is of no concern. as the selective outrage / faux outrage rages on here 24/7.
Now there is an accusation of death threats:
https://www.theage.com.au/politics/victoria/labor-investigates-garrett-murder-tweet-20180717-p4zrvp.html
Nothing to see here, move along folks.
Nice pic of Trump and Putin holding hands while Trump puts a gun to America’s head.
Boerwar @ #176 Tuesday, July 17th, 2018 – 11:06 am
So Packer and the Murdorc scions are Pluto Pups ?
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2018/jul/16/archaeologists-find-earliest-evidence-of-bread
You mean, at the time, like the ALP’s ever-changing specious rationalisations for not tinkering with the entrenched senate voting process with its group voting tickets.
Next, let’s tinker with our electoral system by legislating proportional representation in the lower house.
Both major parties will resist such a change to the death as after all, it entrenches the status quo of the political duopoly.
Re all the excitement today around Trump’s meeting with Putin, I can’t help making the following observations (which are certain to be unpopular):
1) When I was growing up, it was the right wing of politics which seemed to believe that it had a divine right to rule in Western countries. However, in 2018 – more than 18 months after Hillary was defeated – it’s the left wing which can’t seem to rid itself of an obsession with the idea that Hillary was unjustly robbed of some sort of innate right to become President.
2) When I was growing up, all the left-leaning people I knew thought that the CIA, FBI and other US intelligence agencies were key functionaries in an evil conspiracy on the part of the US and right-wingers everywhere to crush the poor and disadvantaged people of the world. Today, Trump is being attacked by left wing people around the world, including on PB, for “betraying” the CIA, FBI, etc.
3) When I was growing up, left-leaning people everywhere had nothing but contempt for the nationalism and national pride of the USA. Today, they are talking about Trump as a “traitor.”
4) Until Trump came along, the attitude towards Putin of most left-leaning people I know could be summed up with the word “meh”. Sure, they thought he wasn’t a nice guy, and he did some bad stuff, but he was basically someone else’s problem. When Abbott made his unfortunate comment about wanting to “shirtfront” Putin (I still reckon he meant to say “buttonhole” and got his clothing analogies mixed up), they all laughed at Abbott (and I’m certainly not suggesting that it wasn’t appropriate to laugh at Abbott). But now there seems to be a rapid rise in concern about Putin’s various trangressions which coincides neatly with Trump’s visit.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m no fan of Trump. And perhaps something interesting will eventually come out of all these investigations into him: and, if it’s interesting enough, he might have to leave office.
But I still can’t help feeling that, for many people in the US around the world who are carrying on about the Trump-Putin meeting, the issue still all goes back to their refusal to accept the legitimacy of any result in the 2016 election other than a victory for Hillary.
Having never been a member of the Hillary cult, I continue to find myself a bit bemused about all the carry on.
New ACTU president elected.
https://www.theage.com.au/business/workplace/new-actu-president-michele-o-neil-vows-not-to-pull-punches-20180716-p4zrsq.html
‘Nothing to see here. Move along’.
Sure, Pegasus, that’s why those death threats against Jane Garrett are being investigated and why the Andrews government and Bill Shorten are discussing how they can help her.
But you keep putting up your misleading links, that’s a good Green with an immovable anti Labor chip on her shoulder.
Confessions@9:28am
” Democrats Chances of winning house=74%”. I have seen a lot of projections during 2016 presidential elections for Clinton especially after the Hollywood video. Projections are one thing and actual winning is another. You do not win till you win. Noam Chomsky once said that GOP is the most dangerous organisation in the world. As I said in earlier post do not underestimate evil.
Pegasus: “New ACTU president elected.”
From the former and long declining TCFU which – someone correct me if I’m wrong – I believe has now merged into the CFMEU.
The hard left O’Neil-McManus combination at the top of the ACTU is probably not going to be all that helpful for Shorten, I suspect. For his sake, I would hope that the two of them would have enough sense to keep a lid on it until the next Federal Election.
Thanks to J341983 for clarifying significant drawbacks facing the Democrats in this midterm Senate election which will impact on the potential for impeachments of Trump and Pence.
After the 17 June 1972 arrest of Nixon’s Plumbers breaking into DNC’s Watergate office, my colleagues on Senator McGovern’s campaign hoped that incisive journalism being reported by WaPo and NYT finally gave us a shot at turning the election into a close contest.
Reality was that voters didn’t give a rat’s arse about Watergate. Nixon’s winning popular vote margin of 18 million is still a record, and McGovern won only 18 of 538 in the Electoral College.
Accordingly, I have negligible confidence that enough Democratic Party Midterm voters will wait in lines for an unpredictable number of hours, often lose money on a workday, and perhaps endure miserable weather to win critical Senate seats in No. Dakota, Missouri, Indiana, and Kentucky.
Otoh, millions like my brother (living the luxurious retirement of a Lockheed Martin manager in Florida) will enjoy the few minutes it takes in his leafy suburb to vote for the entire Republican ticket, as always.
To borrow the fundamental point from a line addressed to Senator Dan Quayle in the 1992 Presidential election’s Veep debate: I know Americans. I served America in the diabolical Vietnam War and then worked on McGovern’s futile campaign the same year that Whitlam was elected. And you, Americans, are no Australians.
Michelle O’Neill has been saying the same things for years, to no discernible change in ALP policy:
I think she better start her term in office at the ACTU by having a word to Left Faction Convener, Anthony Albanese. He doesn’t agree with her either. 🙂
Ven: “Noam Chomsky once said that GOP is the most dangerous organisation in the world. As I said in earlier post do not underestimate evil.”
Back in the 1970s, in relation to Pol Pot, Chomsky didn’t just underestimate evil, he comprehensively failed to see it.
I’ve always thought of Chomsky as simply being a very important contributor to our understanding of the philosophy of language. As a political commentator, his views seem to me to be totally warped by his obsessive self-hatred for his being both American and Jewish.
Meher baba
For me personally, it has absolutely nothing to do with Clinton. In fact it never crosses my mind.
If she were voted in, the hysterics on the right side of politics would be almost unbearable. Imagine what JGillard went through in our insignificant part of the world and times it by one thousand. Clinton would have already been impeached by now. Despite this horrible spectacle, I am so glad she is not a factor going forward.
THE Trump saga has actually been a Clarion call for us all
Hopefully it will awaken the citizenry
C@tmomma: “I think she better start her term in office at the ACTU by having a word to Left Faction Convener, Anthony Albanese. He doesn’t agree with her either. ”
And rightly so. This comment is quite extraordinary:
” When you turn a boat around, you are sending people onto an unsafe journey in unsafe circumstances. Once they reach land, it is likely they will face abuse, exploitation and torture.”
As the only boats that have ever been turned back are those coming from Indonesia carrying third party nationals, it appears that Ms O’Neill believes that the Indonesians would be likely to torture boat people who are turned back to Java. Not even the likes of SH-Y have suggested this!
One thing people seem to disregard about Trump and impeachment is the legacy of Nixon’s perfidy is far greater now than what it was at the time.
The American people re-elected Nixon despite the wrong-doing but the years that followed, the publicity and movies and books and everything that went with that has loomed large as a pivot point in US democracy.
If the Trump thing shows to be something similar — I hope the American people take the lesson of history and get rid of him before the next election
Meher Baba
When it comes to Trump and Russia, what im seeing is far Left and Right are on a unity ticket when it comes to Trump and Russia.
Everyone else between is a very mixed bag to be honest, you like to say the left has flipped on views of the state and Russia, but wouldn’t you agree the right has as well?
You got people like Pauline Hanson who say they admire Putin, says it all really.
Maude Lynne@10:12am
I repeat what I posted yesterday to C@tmomma that private schools are in dire need of Math and English teachers.
Yesterday it was Wayne and today it is Michael. They can not count properly and Wayne cannot read English. Wayne interpreted that Newspoll 51/49 is in favour of LNP.
Also, we have ScoMo as Treasurer and his ex-staffer as Treasury secretary. Since Scomo cannot count or read he said debt and deficit disaster is fixed although the debt has doubled. And he gets this advice from his staffers and ex-staffers. SCARY!
Far left and far right. Same side of coin In my view. Not helpful at all.
Victoria says: Tuesday, July 17, 2018 at 1:00 pm
Meher baba
For me personally, it has absolutely nothing to do with Clinton. In fact it never crosses my mind.
**************************************************
I am like you Victoria – Clinton lost, the end – but the parts that interests me are – was the US system of voting compromised, did outside/foreign sources have any effect on voting/non voting, is Trump a compromised person due to some Russian ‘kompromat’ ….. is he a Russian Puppet Manchurian Candidate , what effect, if any, did Cambridge Analytica have on both Brexit/Trump election …….. how will Trump effect Australia and the rest of the world/trade …….and so on and on …… endless questions ….
Just IF the US election system WAS compromised – are they going to do anything to admit/fix it ….. or will every other election have the same questioning …….
Victoria: “The Trump saga has actually been a Clarion call for us all. Hopefully it will awaken the citizenry.”
But what’s it a clarion call about? What is it about Trump that the citizenry need to get awakened to?
My main criticism of Trump so far is his inclination towards economic protectionism, but I suspect this is not a vote loser for him as the strongest criticism of it appears to be coming more from within the Republicans than the Dems.
Trump is, of course, a bit of an oaf who delights in directing objectionable comments towards a wide range of people and groups of people. But, again, I’m also not sure that this is a vote loser for him.
Many people on the left seem to be particularly upset about Trump’s admittedly clumsy efforts to improve relations with Putin and Kim Jong Un: two individuals who possess weaponry capable of denying any future whatsoever for our children. My view is that, while I might be far from convinced that Trump is going about it in the best possible way, I am in support of his intentions. And I find the suggestion that I see coming from some of his critics that he should effectively have spat in Putin’s eye to be quite odd.
And I continue to interpret the strong anti-Putin sentiment among many on the US left to arise largely from their feeling that Putin acted to prevent Hillary from gaining what was rightfully hers.
When you look at Trump’s performance so far, is it really the case that he is vastly worse than, say, Dubya (who followed up on stuffing up the Middle East with trashing the global economy so badly that it hasn’t yet fully recovered)? Or, to take a Democrat example, Jimmy Carter (who stuffed up almost everything he touched: including, to digress a bit, Bill Clinton’s governorship of Arkansas)?
It’s not beyond the realms of possibility that, despite his very clumsy ways, Trump could still end up doing something to lower the temperature of the conflict between the US and both Russia and North Korea. And even his emerging trade war with China could possibly end up in forcing the latter to modify some of their anti-competitive practices re intellectual property, etc. That’d be a better set of results than Dubya managed.
Trump is highly unlikely to go down in the history books a great, or even a particularly good, president. But, 18 months into his presidency, I reckon the Dems would do well to drop the endless born to rule “we wuz robbed” whinge and start focusing on developing some policies that might appeal to the working class voters who abandoned them for Trump. Or else the mid-term result won’t be the triumph that they seem to have persuaded themselves is all but certain.
Nicko@1:07pm
“Far left and far right is on unity ticket when it comes to Trump and Russia”
Gerard Henderson is suppose to be main stream Right winger. But on “Insiders” last Sunday he was in praise of Trump and called his European trip a success. Do you think he became far right winger overnight? No US right wing and OZ right wing was/is always like this
And as mentioned in past, Australia signal intelligence as part of FVEYs passed on important info…
The Australian
The Australian
@australian
The PM contradicts Donald Trump over Russian interference in the US election, declaring spy agencies’ evidence ‘compelling’
meher baba
For someone who says they don’t like identity politics, I rarely see a post of yours that isn’t framed in terms of identity.
meher baba at 12.39pm
But I still can’t help feeling that, for many people in the US around the world who are carrying on about the Trump-Putin meeting, the issue still all goes back to their refusal to accept the legitimacy of any result in the 2016 election other than a victory for Hillary.
_______________________________________
Meher, the longer post I quoted the above from suffers from the right wing disease of misrepresenting opposition to one position as the extreme opposite of that position, with sneering colourful language thrown in for good measure. You are capable of doing better than that.
The question of whether Hillary Clinton was ‘robbed’ does not flow from any god (or other supernatural being) – given right to be President but from all the evidence that has since flowed from various sources, Hillary Clinton was denied the necessary electoral college votes (she had millions more popularly cast votes) by interference from foreign agents.
As Victoria says, the rules were always different for Hillary (and indeed her husband), who were both crucified for conduct, alleged conduct or outright deliberately false accusations that pales into insignificance against the treasonous and internationally dangerous behaviour of Donald Trump since being elected.
Oh, and by the way Meher
There is not so much a paradox as you suggest. The same people who hated the CIA, etc and railed against America then are the loudest apologists for Putin even today. Even on this blog.