There is no polling to report, and I have my head buried too deep in my forthcoming federal election to report anything of substance on my own account. But with the announcement of the election universally anticipated on the weekend for either May 11 or May 18, a new open thread is very much in order, so here it is.
It is groundbreaking.
I wrote here that it was good stuff as Bill was announcing it.
Having someone like your good self describe it as ground breaking perhaps means I underplayed it?
I certainly think as political messaging goes it is inspired. Big picture, but personal, specific, but emblematic, dramatic, yet reasonably low cost. Bloody hard to attack. The first instinct is that it will be a big attention grabber and vote winner at the margins (which is where the elections are won and lost).
If it also has ground breaking positive effects on people’s lives once implemented then bravo to all involved. Lots of Labor people may need to raise a glass to Catherine King on election night amongst the other toasts.
Its not nath, its the Fibs. ScoFo yesterday was talking up how its all about “me or Shorto”
This is owing to a typical misreading that Preferred PM is a meaningful piece of data, which it isn’t.
PPM is simply a measure of popular recognition of incumbency, not popularity. If the PM was a bag of rocks, then “PM bag of rocks” would have a greater PPM score than the oppo leader. Thats why it’s meaningless.
All this is a clear sign the LNP have no clue and no strategy. They are headed for an epic drubbing come May.
guytaur @ #199 Friday, April 5th, 2019 – 10:38 am
That smug git Chris Richardson seems to be the flavour of the month for some reason.
Alternative views? Hah!
My point about not singling a single disease out for targeting out of pocket expenses is you go from affecting 1 out of 2 voters to affecting all voters.
You can do both. As Nicholas put it singling Cancer out is a good start.
Yes this also means you can work to bring Dental into Medicare as Whitlam originally intended.
Torchbearer@10.34 am:
Loved your list of “Can’t Dos”at 8.25 am.
Hope you don’t mind if I adopt them as a basis for informal chats with people during the next few weeks. They make a succinct summary of all that is wrong with the LNP and its approach to a worthwhile Oz. Would make a wonderful advertisement or series of advertisements for Labor.
”
Jaeger says:
Friday, April 5, 2019 at 10:38 am
Assange to be expelled from Ecuadorian embassy ‘within hours or days’: WikiLeaks
”
Good Riddance
Shorten and his whole team spent a lot of time out at ‘Town Hall’ events among others. It is most likely that this cancer-funding idea gradually solidified after numerous mentions by attendees.
The Libs don’t do such meetings anywhere near as well as the ALP.
Socrates @ #192 Friday, April 5th, 2019 – 10:29 am
Yes, you’ve got to wonder how ‘nath’ knew which painting Bill Shorten has on the wall of his office. As someone who has actually worked in Parliament House in Canberra I know that you have to be signed in by an MP to get past the security team and further to that a particular type of security pass to get access to the areas where the parliamentarians’ offices are.
From memory I don’t think I’ve ever seen or heard of which paintings or prints were hung on the walls of Bill Shorten’s office. So how did ‘nath’ know? And how did he get into Bill Shorten’s office, which would be past a receptionist/Canberra EO?
I smell a rat. Likely a Liberal rat.
This is an acute issue in the Brexit mess right now. The article details secret activities by a group spreading political disinformation and the beginnings of a response.
Jim Waterson, Fri 5 Apr 2019 05.55 AEDT
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/apr/04/inquiry-launched-into-data-use-from-no-deal-brexit-ads-on-facebook
There are two things of local interest to me. The first is Facebook’s take on what I would call propaganda. They fundamentally do not care about the content. Any untruth or smear is fine. Caveat Emptor. No responsibility. What they do care about is fake users . This is a defensive stance of their business model. They need to know who is using their platform and don’t like it when they get fooled. (Users are their product. They can’t sell what they don’t control.) They have dressed this up as a sinister activity (which it is) that Facebook will police for us. To me that is both half-hearted and disingenuous.
The second thing is the Australian connection. I think we are a touch naive when it comes to Facebook. The current smell of an election is overpowering. We should expect bucket loads of political propaganda. To some extent as a population we have managed to build up a level of resistance or scepticism towards traditional media (print, radio, TV), but social media is much more personal and much faster.
Shutting down Facebook would never work. (Although to me it is that serious of an issue.) But maybe a mass education campaign along the lines of Safe Sex campaigns could help. The campaign would have to come from a trusted independent source or even better a collection of trusted sources. (Maybe it would be worth asking Facebook if they are interested in a bit of brand recovery, but my guess is they’d be dis-interested in that.) The campaign might include warnings to be sceptical, examples of the dangers, and information about fact-check prophylactics. I know snopes got burned by allowing itself to be used by Facebook, but maybe their credibility is still good.
I don’t know. Am I paranoid?
25 years of student games.
Precisely. Pyne can fuck right off. Debases everything he touches. Sorry, I just can’t see the amusement in smirking fraudulence. Sure, spin is part of the caper, but putting the best political spin on something in order to achieve a wider good is not in the same galaxy as Pyne’s nihilistic games. It never got beyond simply winning with him. Which is why he departs without a single identifiable achievement to his name.
Barrie Cassidy sums up the actual differences in approach between Labor and The Government.
https://twitter.com/InsidersABC/status/1113945534182510592
The NDIS was Shortens first attempt to extend Medicare, before he was cut off by an unexpected series of unfortunate events.
I expect dental to be part of the second term policies.
Gradually but steadily extending Medicare to cover most health areas
Mavis
On the Greens and Field. Ben Raue on twitter makes the point about it not meaning much for the Greens. In my own words not his it means that the Greens faction wars are over and the left won the right lost. In typical fashion the right can’t handle losing so have done the dummy spit.
I didn’t even know you had to pay so much out of your own pocket if you contracted a cancer!
This one might be televised
@mereithhammat tweets
We’re excited! @sallymcmanus will be speaking at our Change the Rules rally at 12:30pm on 10th April at Parliament House. You don’t want to miss this one. It’s going to be huge. #ChangeTheRules #getexcited https://twitter.com/meredithhammat/status/1112599890251505664/photo/1
The Libs don’t do such meetings anywhere
near as well as the ALP.fify
booleanbach @ 10.49am
The Liberals spend too much time hanging out with people who are so wealthy that they essentially don’t need the state to help them with very much at all, and see its legitimate role as confined to defence, policing and border control. So it’s no wonder they want to prioritise cutting taxes for the well-off over providing services for the poorer.
Goodbye Christopher Pyne. Don’t let the door hit you on the way out:
https://youtu.be/osID-_Zi-1I
Another day, another load of boring comments from nath about Bill Shorten. FFS get over it, nath. How you can carry this level of hatred and loathing for somebody you probably haven’t even met is not healthy.
Mari was right, many months ago. I might just follow her example because I’m getting bloody fed up with this little pip squeak and his constant regurgitation of the same tired old meme.
Late Riser @10:51
“I don’t know. Am I paranoid?”
That depends upon whether everyone really is out to get you.
But seriously, it is very important that people be sceptical about what they see in any media, to be able to assess it and make up their own minds, that they can recognise bias, coloured language, attempts at manipulation and especially plain old bullshit.
That was always true with the old media, advertising, gossip and rumours, but the need is now that much more pressing with the advent and ubiquity of the new media coupled with a deterioration in the quality and reliability of what’s left of the old.
C@t
I daresay paying out of your own pocket is when your doctor initially sends you for tests etc.
If cancer is found, usually thereafter you are referred to oncology at hospital. And even if you are an outpatient, all costs of further scans etc are borne by hospital. That has been experience of the situations I am aware of
Gradually but steadily extending Medicare to cover most health areas
Exactly.
All this ‘but whaddabout x?’ crap is incredibly frustrating. We haven’t even killed off this government yet. This government and the Howard years didn’t happen because Australia is this super lefty socialist paradise. It takes time to turn around the nation. Many good things from the Whitlam years got trashed because they weren’t in long enough to make em stick. Same thing happened to many of the good things from the R-G-R years. For the same reason.
The reason the good things from the Hawke-Keating years endured is because they were able to hang around and defeat the vandals so many times that the reforms became part of the furniture.
That’s what we need Shorten and his team to deliver for us this time. Deliver the parliament that gives Labor room to go further in the future first, and then start staking your claims.
“Why is Deloittes a big multinational accounting firm always used by the @abcnews as somehow “independent”.”
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hmmm its a good point, admittedly I hadn’t really thought about this before.
Similar to how the ABC curiously only ever turn to the IPA as seemingly the only “non-left” non-politician political opinion
swamprat @ #82 Friday, April 5th, 2019 – 8:46 am
Actually, Caesar.
C@t
I see nath as one who says stuff that will distract from one line of discussion to another. And unfortunately it works.
I just find it funny and stupid and best ignored.
Hence when I noticed one of his comments earlier, I suggested he email bill shorten directly
Victoria
@beneltham tweets
Sources tell me the fire today is linked to the massive fire in Footscray last year; it’s the same criminal network
Generations to come will best remember Mr Pyne for his close association with the $50 billion subs decision noting that, in the normal course of events, subs are supposed to return to the surface after they sink, always presuming that the french can be induced to actually build one in the first instance.
allan moyes @ #219 Friday, April 5th, 2019 – 10:58 am
No mon ami. Plenty of interesting comments to interest one.
Excellent blog to practice one’s high speed scrolling and scanning.
If you can use AR’s most excellent extension C+ then many opportunities will exist to improve your blogging experience.
Be kind to yourself. ☮☕
Guytaur
As has now been reported, this company was issued with notice recently and their licence suspended.
From what OH gleaned from guy who accidentally started inferno, is that they were working to move stuff as part of their compliance requirements.
Of concern is the reaction of Financial Markets to the Budget, the gains pre Budget now wiped as the ASX continues to tumble today
This given the DJIA is up 2.6% from the close last Friday morning (Australian time), from 25,717 Points to a close of 26,384 this morning
So the lead from the US is not being followed due to the post Budget losses on the ASX
And on Ad Man from Mad Men and his RC announcement (with tears apparently!) his very being invites that the timing was to take the headline from Shorten’s Budget Reply address
And why spend on a RC when the problems are detailed?
Why not act to rectify (noting also the restrictive nature and term of the so called Banking RC which was contained to financial services being Insurance and superannuation NOT the fundamental problem with banking being education both of staff and of clients as the lender and the borrower)?
Instead with acknowledged problems with Disability Care confirmed by the Terms of Reference provided BY government we get spending on solicitors and a RC
What say government fix the problem instead of crying before a camera (and did Abbott provide the onions?)
End of rant but Ad Man from Mad Men drives me to distraction – and I turn off when he comes on, which really tells the story!
It’s not every day you see an aspiring federal politician with the words ‘F**K WHAT THEY THINK’ blasted across the top of his Twitter page, a model wife and an anarchist symbol tattooed on his chest.
But One Nation’s new secret weapon in its bid to take the NSW seat of Hunter in the upcoming election is defying most of the stereotypes we have about politicians.
Stuart Bonds’ social media pages show topless pictures of the hunky and heavily tattooed 33-year-old posing for arty black-and-white photos.
One Nation’s candidate to try and defeat Joel Fitzgibbon in the seat of Hunter.
I just shakes me head.
briefly @ #159 Friday, April 5th, 2019 – 7:04 am
Having been door knocking in Pearce recently too I agree. The contest for Pearce is all over bar the shouting.
Ratsak @11:04
“That’s what we need Shorten and his team to deliver for us this time. Deliver the parliament that gives Labor room to go further in the future first, and then start staking your claims.”
Exactly. Shorten needs to delivery on his mandate and start dragging the Overton back towards the centre. He and his team need to win the trust and confidence of voters in the centre. Hopefully build on and extend Labor reforms in a second and even more hopefully subsequent terms. Dismantle the vandalism of Abbott and his puny successors and especially that of Howard and Costello.
None of this can be accomplished in a day or a term. Labor has to change the country, as Howard did, but in a good way.
That’s why people like Rex here are so wrong to urge that Labor take up cudgels and fight the Government on their home turf on issues like asylum seekers. Labor can’t help them from Opposition.
Frydennerg Presser now on Adani
Apparently Shorten is too scared to tell voters the truth.
One thing is said in Batman and another in Mackay.
Up to 220 Kimberly-Clark employees are out of a job, after the US company said Huggies nappies will no longer be made in Australia. Workers at its factory in western Sydney were told that the facility would close in late July. Production will move to Kimberly-Clark’s facilities in Asia, in another blow to Australia’s manufacturing sector. However, the company will continue to manufacture other products in South Australia
Grimace
You will note I have been full of praise for Labor governments doing Human Rightts Bills.
We need to do that nationally. Like putting in a Federal ICAC it destroys using racism as a tactic to wedge the opposite political party.
Such bills give Gillian Triggs not just moral but real authority to speak about conditions in refugee camp we run and operate.
Edit: That is I see Labor walking the walk where they are actually in government.
Nath and Rex the Neggers are probably on a piece work contract: something like, for every response, they get 50c.
ratsak @ #191 Friday, April 5th, 2019 – 7:32 am
There is the small matter of the years of hard work it takes to come up with something like this…
C@tmomma says:
Friday, April 5, 2019 at 10:53 am
I didn’t even know you had to pay so much out of your own pocket if you contracted a cancer!
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People are finally beginning to wake up to the dog’s breakfast that Australian medicare has become!
I’ve said this before on this forum but I am still disappointed that Labor hasn’t embarked on a policy of full medicare on the Canadian model. It is illegal in Canada for any physician, G.P. or specialist, or hospital to send a bill to patients.
Have you got that: no private insurance for primary health and hospital care where everything is covered……everything! Cancer patients, like all who need medical care, pay nothing for diagnostic tests, surgery and continuing care.
Canadians, including the medical profession, have accepted for half a century the idea that the cost of health comes out of general tax revenues. Those with higher incomes pay a medicare levy according to their income. But when you need medical services you only need to show your health card and you are never billed, regardless of the type of illness or condition.
Labor seems quite happy to continue to subsidize the private insurance industry instead of killing it. Rather than directly supporting public health in providing essential care for things such as cancer.
“In Western democracies like Australian and New Zealand everyone is free to dress how they see fit and anyone wearing a head-scarf is doing so by choice. Telling a woman what she can and can’t freely choose to wear is the oppressive thing. Doubly so when she’s choosing to wear it in a deliberate display of solidarity with a community that’s just been brutally attacked. You should listen to the message that’s being sent instead of substitution one of your own invention.”
Over time, observing nath’s “comments” it seems to me that “it” is here as some kind of irritant to disrupt sensible discussion and sharing of inside info and ideas. The similarity to the methods used in the Rupert media is striking. The interesting thing for me has been how my own views have hardened against the LNP as a result of its presence. I wonder whether there has been a similar reaction to that media’s relentless propagandising.
booleanbach @ #207 Friday, April 5th, 2019 – 7:49 am
An environment where the invitees are carefully vetted and you have to present ID in order to be admitted is not conducive to development of ideas or open mindedness.
There is the small matter of the years of hard work it takes to come up with something like this…
You don’t need to worry about years of hard work when over a few beers at lunch you can come up with some business tax cuts, drop the top marginal rate a percent or two and get some suggestions from the Murdoch press on what smears you should run.
#liberalpartyprocesses
Grimace
Where Rex is right is that Labor should have stuck to the line drawn in the sand about human rights.
Maybe just maybe it would have shown the LNP for what they are sooner and not taken a terrorist attack in NZ to wake voters up. See the Democrats winning in the US to see how upholding and fighting for human rights stops the right shifting the Overton window in the first place as the Democrats won big in the Mid Terms and look to do so as well in 2020 as Trump tries to follow the Howard playbook on demonising immigrants.
And to add, the 10 Year Bond Yield is off by a full 100 basis points since the start of November to the lowest yield quote ever – as a description of the moribund economic circumstances of the Australian Nation
I did note that the 10 Year Bond Yield was referred to by Shorten in his Budget reply speech last night
Interesting to see the cartoons with ScoMo protrayed in a Borat mankini. 🙂
FFS…is there anything our Super Shouty Add Man touches that doesn’t get turned into a joke and PR FAIL??
Would really like to see where the polling is at the moment. At the moment it makes sense to me that the polling mobs will wait until the election is actually called before releasing any polling that may have been done in the last three weeks or so to create a “baseline” to compare the rest of the campaign with.
Which means next week before any numbers come out to drive the PB despair / elation cycle. 🙂
“Having been door knocking in Pearce recently too I agree. The contest for Pearce is all over bar the shouting.”
interesting, bludgertracker has it being retained by the libs on a knife-edge 0.6% margin. Either way, not looking hopeful for Mr Porter.
Question for grimace and briefly and anyone else involved in this electorate – is this mainly a demographic shift? Electoral boundary change? Or is there some personal sentiment against Porter himself?
ratsak @ #222 Friday, April 5th, 2019 – 8:04 am
Whataboutism (also known as whataboutery) is a variant of the tu quoque logical fallacy that attempts to discredit an opponent’s position by charging them with hypocrisy without directly refuting or disproving their argument, which in the United States is particularly associated with Soviet and Russian propaganda. When criticisms were leveled at the Soviet Union during the Cold War, the Soviet response would often be “What about…” followed by an event in the Western world.
The term “whataboutery” has been used in Britain and Ireland since the period of the Troubles (conflict) in Northern Ireland. Lexicographers date the first appearance of the variant whataboutism to the 1990s or 1970s, while other historians state that during the Cold War, Western officials referred to the Soviet propaganda strategy by that term.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism
“Over time, observing nath’s “comments” it seems to me that “it” is here as some kind of irritant to disrupt sensible discussion and sharing of inside info and ideas. ”
pritu, you always get some people on a blog who appear to just get triggered by certain events or certain posters. They aren’t actually into discussion, just rants, and seem to easily tip into nasty stuff. Hey , i dont always manage it but best to scroll on by and try not to get involed in the slanging. My prob is i think i am funnier than i actually am with a tendancy to lame humor. 🙂 And although i try to be a beter person these days sometimes after glass of wine or two my inner bitch comes out to play when one of those post something really annoying. 🙁
we are all human….well most of us…..i suspect the Bree Bot of silicone in the head……
Labor party people
Its ok to say we want Medicare to be truly Universal. Thats not whataboutery or whatever. Thats arguing for the original concept of what Medibank was supposed to be and what Labor argues is its goal for Medicare.