Ben Phillips of the Australian National University has been hawking research showing the demographic indicators that associated most clearly with the federal election swing, with the clearest patterns relating to Christianity, which correlated with a swing against Labor, and education and income, which went the other way. Evidently the Australia Institute has done something similar, with findings reported by Ross Gittins in the Sydney Morning Herald.
In considering research of this kind, one must acknowledge the perils of the ecological fallacy, whereby inferences about the behaviour of individuals are inappropriately drawn from aggregate-level data. My favourite illustration of this point relates to American politics, wherein the Republicans’ strongest states are those of the dirt-poor deep south, whereas wealthier voters favour the more conservative party in the United States as surely as they do here. As such, it should be recognised that Christian areas swinging to the Coalition need not signify that Christian voters did.
Nonetheless, the relationship between swings and the demographic features of the areas in which they did or didn’t happen is interesting in and of itself, and really all we have to go on until the Australian National University eventually publishes its Australian Election Study survey, particularly in the absence of intensive and high-quality exit polling that is conducted in the United States.
My own number crunching along these lines has involved collecting demographic measures of the areas in which each polling booth is located, and using multiple regression analysis to determine how well they predicted the primary vote swing to or against Labor. The results were as interesting for what didn’t prove predictive as for what did. In particular, an electorate’s age profile appeared to have little impact on its swing – or at least, none that couldn’t be better explained by other variables that might themselves correlate with age. This theme was picked up on in the article linked to above by Ross Gittins, which argues against the widely held notion that franking credits was the main culprit behind Labor’s poor show.
After a bit of trial and error, and whittling it down to variables that didn’t appear to be separately measuring identical effects, the most instructive variables proved to be income, home ownership, education and industry of employment, with a few ethnicity measures registering as worth-including-but-only-just.
| Estimate | Std. Error | t value | Pr(>|t|) | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| (Intercept) | -6.9363 | 0.581753 | -11.923 | < 2e-16 | *** |
| Median Income | 0.318518 | 0.149976 | 2.124 | 0.033719 | * |
| Home Owned | 0.032418 | 0.005457 | 5.94 | 2.97E-09 | *** |
| Secular/No Religion | 0.105852 | 0.007944 | 13.325 | < 2e-16 | *** |
| PrimaryIndustry | 0.007588 | 0.008037 | 0.944 | 0.345122 | |
| Construction | -0.071534 | 0.015903 | -4.498 | 6.95E-06 | *** |
| Manufacturing | -0.115724 | 0.016538 | -6.998 | 2.82E-12 | *** |
| Retail Trade | -0.061778 | 0.018229 | -3.389 | 0.000705 | *** |
| Prof/Sci/Tech | 0.147833 | 0.021587 | 6.848 | 8.05E-12 | *** |
| Education/Health | 0.054147 | 0.01123 | 4.822 | 1.45E-06 | *** |
| Indian/Sri Lankan | 0.045852 | 0.018952 | 2.419 | 0.015571 | * |
| East/S-E Asian | 0.016341 | 0.007274 | 2.246 | 0.024706 | * |
| VICdummy | 3.132668 | 0.18731 | 16.724 | < 2e-16 | *** |
| QLDdummy | -1.626883 | 0.190881 | -8.523 | < 2e-16 | *** |
| WAdummy | -0.538074 | 0.244318 | -2.202 | 0.02767 | * |
| SAdummy | 5.385121 | 0.267704 | 20.116 | < 2e-16 | *** |
| TASdummy | -2.856952 | 0.369256 | -7.737 | 1.15E-14 | *** |
| ACTdummy | -3.811539 | 0.6012 | -6.34 | 2.43E-10 | *** |
| NTdummy | 0.879791 | 0.853752 | 1.03 | 0.302807 |
The numbers in the “Estimate” column show the coefficients, i.e. how much each increment of that variable associated with the Labor swing. Three stars at the end means the effect is highly significant, two stars somewhat significant, one star of some significance, and with no stars we can’t say with any confidence if the relationship was positive or negative.
So, to pick one of the more striking results, for every 1% of population identifying as secular or “no religion”, Labor’s vote tended to be around 0.1% higher, independent of all other factors. Or to raise the stakes a little, Labor typically did 1% better in swing terms in places where 40% of the population identified as secular as compared with those where 30% did so. Note that the “median income” refers to weekly family income, and is measured in thousands of dollars – so an area with $2000 median family income typically did 0.3% for Labor than one with half that.
The biggest surprise for me is that “primary industry” – percentage of the workforce in mining, agriculture, forestry and fishing – had no significant explanatory power in and of itself. This doesn’t sit well with the drubbing Labor copped in central Queensland and the seat of Hunter, for which I can’t offer a ready explanation, except perhaps that I should have broken out mining and measured it independently of the others.
However, a significant negative effect is recorded for the other blue-collar industries of construction and manufacturing, together with the generally low-wage retail sector. This, remember, is independent of the effect of income, such that Labor would have suffered a combined whammy of the various effects in low-income areas with large workforces in the aforementioned industries.
On the other side of the coin, the “professional/scientific/technical” industry designation recorded a strong positive association with the Labor swing, and this too needs to be understood as part of a double whammy with the income effect. This was evident in the large-but-useless swings Labor picked up in blue-ribbon metropolitan seats. The positive effect recorded for education/health is interesting, perhaps suggesting a public-versus-private sector effect.
A fair bit has been said of Labor’s bad show with the Chinese community, but it was actually found that the “East/South-East Asian” population had a slight positive correlation with the Labor swing. However, the recorded effect is very likely drowned out by the strong positive result for “secular/no religion” variable, which records the effect of the swing against Labor in the various ethnic enclaves of Sydney and, to a less extent, Melbourne.
Finally, the “dummy” variables simply record how much of the swing could be explained by the state in which a booth was located, again independent of all other factors. Note that no measure for New South Wales is included, as it serves as the benchmark against which the other states and territories are being measured. The strong positive result in South Australian reflects that this is a primary vote measure, and both major parties rose in South Australia off the demise of the Nick Xenophon Team.
The r-squared value for the model is around 0.25, which is to say that all of this explains only about one-quarter of the variation in the Labor swing. In a future episode, I might take a closer look at what the model fails to predict by looking at individual electorates that bucked the various demographic trends just noted.
Note also: the new post below on the count for the Senate, in which only Queensland appears still in doubt, and the ongoing one dealing with close races in seat for the House, albeit that yesterday’s counting provided essentially nothing new to report.
Lizzie,
D&M
They have caught the man who did it. Another homeless person.
https://www.theage.com.au/national/parkville-victim-tried-to-call-former-boyfriend-hours-before-she-was-killed-20190526-p51rc2.html
Thanks for letting me know. This is a tragedy. If neither were homeless, Courtney would still be alive, and the perpretator would not spend the rest of their life in jail.
Mental illness, the lack of support for sufferers, and the way that mental illness is now seen as a moral problem rather than a medical problem, is nasty and lethal.
On a miserable day when ScoMo can make promises he may never keep.
Peak hour on the #OverlandTrack! Cradle Mountain-Lake St Clair N.P. Tas. – wombats
https://twitter.com/i/status/1132526826088271872
Good morning Dawn Patrollers
When Arthur Sinodinos takes over as Australia’s next US ambassador, he will have to deal with Trump’s concerns, says Shane Wright.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/sinodinos-tapped-for-us-role-as-trump-raises-questions-over-australia-20190526-p51rbd.html
Ross Gittins sees risks for Labor if it adopts a small target strategy. He makes a number of good points.
https://www.smh.com.au/business/the-economy/the-risks-for-labor-in-adopting-a-small-target-strategy-20190526-p51r8c.html
David Crowe describes Morrison’s reshuffled ministry as “deliberately humdrum”.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/scott-morrison-s-reshuffled-ministry-is-deliberately-humdrum-20190526-p51rc5.html
Michelle Grattan says that Morrison’s new ministry mixes stability with dashes of innovation, box ticking, and the rewarding of friends.
https://theconversation.com/view-from-the-hill-morrison-rewards-friends-avoids-making-enemies-and-announces-new-ambassadors-117806
David Wroe praises the choice of Arthur Sinodinos as our new US Ambassador.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/sinodinos-the-steadiest-pair-of-hands-for-these-unsteadiest-of-times-20190526-p51rb9.html
The AFR explains how the Liberals got inside voters’ heads.
https://www.outline.com/Z8VbjX
John McDuling sets out Paul Fletcher’s “to do” list as Communications Minister.
https://www.smh.com.au/business/companies/a-to-do-list-for-paul-fletcher-australia-s-new-communications-minister-20190526-p51rca.html
Chris Wallace tells us that for Labor to work out how to win in 2022 id needs to look at the lessons of 2019. A good read!
https://theconversation.com/how-might-labor-win-in-2022-the-answers-can-all-be-found-in-the-lessons-of-2019-117742
It’s baffling that politicians like George Christensen and Peter Dutton achieved swings towards them at the Federal Election and further evidence that a National Integrity Commission is needed, writes Dr Kim Sawyer.
https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/rewarding-rorting-and-bad-behaviour-why-many-lnp-politicians-were-re-elected,12737
Environmental lawyer Ariane Wilkinson says that it would be a sensible and fair measure for the Queensland government to fix the law so the Adani Group’s track record is properly scrutinised. Currently there has been no accountability for their past actions and no proper scrutiny of their suitability to operate in Queensland.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/adani-is-an-environmental-health-risk-we-can-t-afford-20190524-p51qy0.html
The West Australian resources industry is under renewed attack from the environmental watchdog and looking to governments for immediate answers, writes Jennifer Hewett.
https://www.outline.com/ykxGAb
Fairfax-Lite in an exclusive reveals that a coalition of alt-right Facebook groups working with Fraser Anning’s staff and associates of the United Australia Party produced fake news, racist memes and messages against voting for Labor or the Greens, which were liked or shared more than a million times during the election campaign.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/alt-right-facebook-memes-pushed-anti-labor-message-20190522-p51pvy.html
Anne Davies wonders if Wentworth’s ‘modern Liberal’ Dave Sharma is a hawk on Iran.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/may/27/dave-sharma-is-wentworths-modern-liberal-a-hawk-on-iran
Jennifer Duke reckons David Speers is expected to face a pay cut by taking a role with the ABC replacing Insiders host Barrie Cassidy.
https://www.smh.com.au/business/companies/sky-s-david-speers-expected-to-take-pay-cut-for-abc-job-20190526-p51rbw.html
The Guardian’s Knaus and Karp ask how can we ensure truth in political advertising.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/may/27/designed-to-deceive-how-do-we-ensure-truth-in-political-advertising
The plethora of racist, white supremacist and Islamophobic parties and candidates rolling up for the May 2019 Federal Election, all directing their preferences to the Liberal-National Coalition, suggested a yearning amongst very vocal fringe elements for the past certainties of Australian society.
https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/this-election-saw-the-revival-of-white-supremacy-nationalism-and-exclusion,12741
Amanda Vanstone struggles here to hide her hubris.
https://www.smh.com.au/federal-election-2019/labor-pollsters-got-caught-in-the-canberra-media-bubble-20190524-p51qui.html
Sarah Danckert reveals that five of the biggest investment banks in the world, including UBS, Barclays and Citibank, have been accused in an Australian class action lawsuit of operating a foreign exchange cartel using secret chat rooms titled “the Cartel”, “the Bandits Club” and “the Mafia”.
https://www.smh.com.au/business/markets/hunting-the-mafia-big-investment-banks-face-australian-cartel-claim-20190526-p51r96.html
The 2017 election and the Brexit challenge brutally exposed Theresa May’s flaws. She unleashed a Brexit monster, now a new leader has to get it back into the box.
https://www.outline.com/XEWDqg
The Washington Post examines the path to Trump impeachment proceedings.
https://www.smh.com.au/world/north-america/for-pelosi-the-biggest-test-awaits-impeach-or-not-impeach-20190527-p51reg.html
Surely this was an Act of God!
https://www.smh.com.au/world/north-america/lawyers-for-noahs-ark-theme-park-are-suing-its-insurance-company-for-rain-damage-20190526-p51r9z.html
And for “Arsehole of the Week” we have this 20 year old charmer.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/she-never-paid-woman-accused-of-sydney-rent-gouging-cops-china-ban-20190524-p51qvk.html
Cartoon Corner
Outside No. 10 with David Rowe.
Jim Pavlidis with Morrison’s revenue hand.
Pat Campbell and the polling universe.
From Matt Golding.
Jon Kudelka and polling areas.
Sean Leahy and the Tory Brexit line.
Johannes Leak puts the boot in.
https://cdn.newsapi.com.au/image/v1/11a4c93a56042266c4df3fd67ef63007?width=1024
From the US
Trump News!
https://www.breitbart.com/clips/2019/05/26/maxine-waters-there-is-a-growing-unrest-among-dems-to-open-impeachment-inquiry/amp/
https://amp.smh.com.au/world/north-america/for-pelosi-the-biggest-test-awaits-impeach-or-not-impeach-20190527-p51reg.html
https://amp.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/may/26/trump-impeachment-democrats-beyonce-barr
https://www.politico.com/amp/story/2019/05/26/rashida-tlaib-house-democrats-impeachment-1345024
Too much reward for being a Tasmanian?
https://www.sbs.com.au/news/the-feed/australia-s-new-youth-minister-is-a-baby-boomer
A good analysis of what went wrong, IMO. It was not a well-organised campaign.
Plus:
https://theconversation.com/how-might-labor-win-in-2022-the-answers-can-all-be-found-in-the-lessons-of-2019-117742
Great post William!
Thank you William. That’s quite interesting analysis. One suggestion. Have you considered using occupation categories rather than industry? It’s a subtle difference but can be significant. For example a marketing executive from BHP may have different behaviour to a rigger, even though they are both in the same “industry”.
I’m afraid Albo lacks the polish needed to be an effective political leader.
Washington Posts Conservative Jennifer RubinVerified account
In federal courts, Trump’s bluster counts for nothing. His lawyers’ ludicrous claims of executive powers get swatted away. The separation of powers, which is at the heart of our system of limited government, is reinforced. The rule of law prevails.
Distinguished persons of the week: They can stop Trump
When historians render a verdict on this era, they will excoriate Republicans in Congress for their spinelessness, conservative donors for their greed, right-wing pundits for their hypocrisy and a good deal of new media for frivolousness. Democrats who took seriously their obligations and restrained excessively exuberant partisans will get a nod of approval. The plaudits and gratitude, however, may well be reserved for the judges who stood up to the bullies and stood by the Constitution. This past week alone, they halted President Trump’s autocratic aspirations three times.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/05/26/distinguished-persons-week-they-can-stop-trump/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.c0bf6ca0c823
The death in Parkville is another sad loss of life and yet another reminder of the failed welfare state but yeah Dan has a $ 1 billion dollar surplus, well done Dan maybe it is time to actually fix the homeless problem as housing and mental health services are state government issues.
Land isn’t a problem because there is a large open park not far from where this crime occurred that once had large buildings on it, so simply reclaim that park and rebuild those large buildings could be the first step.
phoenixRED,
And even though Trump may carp that those judges are ‘Obama activist judges’, in the end they are simply judges who were appointed by President Obama who are simply applying the law of the land.
BK @ #12 Monday, May 27th, 2019 – 8:14 am
+1
Good stuff William!
Waiting for the analysis of interaction effects… Choose your variables judiciously 🙂
I predict that the issue of climate change is going to radicalize the Australian electorate in the next three years, like Brexit has done in Britain. Especially if this drought continues and it does not break in the next year or so.
I argue Brexit has literally shipwrecked Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership, due to his handling of it. The European parliament election results have shown, that a large slice of those peoiple who vote for Labour in 2017, have gone to the Brexit Party, Liberal Democrats and the Green party. Because all those parties have a clear position on Brexit either way.
Anthony Albanese is a a great communicator and is somebody who would be a quite popular Labor leader. I never had that feeling about Bill Shorten.
However he seems to starting to show worrying signs that, he could be seen as wishy-washy on climate change, like Corbyn has been seen on Brexit.
C@tmomma says: Monday, May 27, 2019 at 8:35 am
phoenixRED,
And even though Trump may carp that those judges are ‘Obama activist judges’, in the end they are simply judges who were appointed by President Obama who are simply applying the law of the land.
******************************************************
I think it is all due to Trump believing he is ABOVE THE LAW and all its institutions that depend upon it being applied fairly and without fear of his retribution
…… and as long as judges apply the law/constitution without bias then Trump will keep losing
If I’m reading the analysis correctly with a negative t-value indicates a swing against the ALP.
Then here are two points that stand out, construction and retail. I would have thought retail would be positive due to it being largely a younger group and the penalty rates issue and construction kind of throws into question how strong is the ALP’s relationship with what would be seen by some as its core base.
If Albo is such a great communicator, why wasn’t he out there communicating?
He’s been part of the Labor team for longer than Shorten was part of the Labor team. He’s been in some powerful positions in government (and out). Yet there are few signs that he’s used these roles to push Labor’s agenda effectively or that he has been in any way a particular asset for Labor.
He may well be Labor’s equivalent of Tony Abbott – men look at him and think, yeah, I could watch a sports match or drink at the pub with this guy, whereas women don’t understand what the fuss is about!
(I maintain the right to change my mind on this if he surprises me, but on the other hand, he’s been around long enough that you’d think the signs were there…)
I’m reading it that way too. Surprising given Labor pledged to restore penalty rates, something you’d think would resonate with retail workers.
Not surprising on construction – didn’t the union for that sector campaign against Labor?
Zoomster:
Albanese reminds me of Morrison. That same blokey, knock about persona, trying to be everyone’s every man. It does not appeal to me.
Mexicanbeemer
Bases change. Parties need to recognise this and develop new bases if necessary.
…the Labor party’s ‘core base’ used to be shearers.
@Mexicanbeemer
I agree, I am also that many problems can be solved like this in USA as they have large landmass and millions of empty abandoned homes across the USA.
Fix them up and give homeless a home give them some services.
Gods would be smiling.
It will be popular amongst welfare groups and other religious groups as well.
Fess
The only thing I can think off to explain the retail number is could the retail group have gone to the Greens but I am assuming its based on TPP and if that is the case then I cannot think of too many cases where the Greens achieved a swing. Melbourne and Kooyong are about the only examples I’m aware of where the Greens had a swing.
Zoomster
That is true but when people think of construction they think of the CFMMEU which according to some people is a key part of the ALP base.
lizzie @ #9 Monday, May 27th, 2019 – 7:32 am
To be fair, she did vote in favour of something – privatising the ABC.
I’m not a fan of that Conversation analysis. A few of their points I think are wrong, the twee ‘Lesson:’ stuff is just … superficial, and mostly consists of “do better” rather than being insightful.
Except that the polling figures for Labor’s PV were mostly quite wrong as well … I don’t think the preference assumptions were that big a factor in the end were they? And yeah “get more primary votes” is hardly revelatory.
Ok, I get this is basic management terminology, but I guess I’m a bit dumb because this sounds mostly meaningless to me. What, specifically, would a “ground up” campaign look like that would have been superior to what we got? If this is just trying to say “find out what the people of Mackay want and give it to them” … well, I guess?
So in an article titled “How Labor might win in 2022” the proposed ‘Lesson’ is to (from opposition) change legislation. Unless the Libs have shown some heretofore non-apparent willingness to actually do something about donation and campaign finance reform, this is magical thinking.
Ok, this is just a bit ridiculous. Labor wouldn’t have won the election by having better relations with the Greens. The Adani convoy was clearly not in Labor’s interests, but the concept of ‘strategizing constructively’ on that is … laughable.
And yeah, a lot of ‘do better’ lessons … brilliant, I bet Labor wouldn’t have worked that out without someone saying it.
It appears that no-one predicted the election result and the few with claims to the contrary were way off the mark in their reasoning.
Bookmakers never pay out early! They too had discounted any notion of an outsiders chance.
Both sides of parliament seem to lack a depth of talent.
Morrison is prepared to have crooks in his ministry.
The young libs may have had their head around a message to shift votes and young labor were outgunned in their campaign strategy.
Very rich characters with money still wield very large sticks in a still very young Australia.
The election has not solved, and the new government is unlikely to solve, the most divisive issues within Australia.
Shorten and Labor were correct in not committing re Adani. The few Australians with a knowledge of large corporations would understand the folly of restricting Adani. Adani would make easy profits in the law courts.
Coal is a slow dying sunset industry and the new job believers
need look to further than Sydney’s new driverless trains.
Australians are addicted to gambling and easy money and quick fixes as the election indicates.
The election results gives great hope to the increased expansion of the poker machine industry, lots of spins and nil chance of a change of fortune.
I wonder if Labor’s promise to get wages moving spooked some low wage and insecurely employed people into thinking that if that happened their bosses would simply sack them
Perhaps the main emphasis should be on “more jobs”, which was the subliminal message in Morrison’s “strong economy”
If you want my take on Retail then I think they are in the same economic/voting boat as the Mining/Coal workers-they fear for their jobs and livelihood now as they look at intelligent automation coming at them and their jobs at a million miles an hour and have voted for the party who reassured them that nothing much would change and the economy would remain strong, as opposed to the party that was speaking about a Brave New World.
Not that the party promoting stability is actually for that. They are the ones that have the business community foursquare behind them, the ones introducing the automation, transnational job relocation to low cost countries and importation of workers from lower cost countries to do jobs here…and thus cause the job displacement that those Retail and Mining people fear.
And so perhaps not such a generous appointment as it seems?
People say the ALP didn’t commit to Adani but in fairness Bill Shorten did say on a number of a occasions that the project needed to pass all the approvals and be commercially viable without needing government support. In my mind that is a clear statement.
Jackol
At this low stage in Labor confidence, perhaps the “lessons” are as much as can be absorbed. (not quite sarc)
zoomster says:
Monday, May 27, 2019 at 8:52 am
If Albo is such a great communicator, why wasn’t he out there communicating?
I might have more trust in your judgement Zoomster if you hadn’t already shown you know hardly anything at all about Albanese – trying to blame him for Obeid, as a member of the Sydney Lebanese community – when stories have appeared even in Melbourne about his reconnecting with his Italian father…
Snap C@t
C@tmomma
That whole changing technology and the workplace is like an unspoken area where no politician openly discusses either because they don’t see a problem with it or they don’t understand it or they don’t want to know about it.
Retailing is being hit by the general lack of growth in consumer demand, technological change and the growth of e-commerce. Workers in this sector are among the worst paid, least secure and lowest skilled of all. If they’re anxious about their prospects, they have good reasons.
Why are we destroying earth?
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/04/3-reasons-we-should-all-care-about-biodiversity
@briefly
Voting liberals won’t save their asses.
The next 3 years is going to be worse, like in 2008 GFC.
But unlike GFC, the liberals are in charge and do massive cuts.
Morning bludgers
Excellent analysis William! Thank you.
With respect to the homeless women bashed to death by another homeless person.
Services are available for people who either develop mental illness due to drug abuse or take drugs to manage mental illness.
Unfortunately, the effects of drugs and being addicted are an insidious and difficult thing to manage.
I can speak from the experience of at least three families I am close to, who are going through this nightmare.
Their children were also rough sleeping at times, and have had close calls of nearly ending up dead in a gutter.
They come from very financial and comfortable and loving homes.
There are plenty of services and in fact, special units attend your home each and every day during times of need after a stint in rehab etc.
It is not even a lack of support by parents and families.
It is the nature of the effect of the drugs and how the people affected by them respond.
One family I speak of, are extremely financial and have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars for rehab and any health service to get their child well again. Nothing has worked. Their child sleeps rough and gods knows where they are.
And from the reports I have seen with regard to this young girl, she too came from a supportive background.
As saying goes, all roads lead to Rome.
The curse of drugs leads to most of the crimes that occur in our society today.
Mexicanbeemer says:
Monday, May 27, 2019 at 9:07 am
People say the ALP didn’t commit to Adani but in fairness Bill Shorten did say on a number of a occasions that the project needed to pass all the approvals and be commercially viable without needing government support. In my mind that is a clear statement.
And if Labor stick to that policy it won’t get built. Palaszczuk is getting the approvals done; Adani will have to put up or shut up. The Greens will be so disappointed the mine isn’t viable and Adani will have to fold, won’t be there in three years time to screw over Labor. Oh how sad.
filr
Fair enough, but can you deal with the base question?
(Actually, aren’t you reinforcing what I’m saying? Here I am, a Labor activist, involved in the party for a few decades, and even basic facts about Albo haven’t resonated with me….)
lizzie @ #34 Monday, May 27th, 2019 – 9:06 am
Oh, it’s all easy peasy lizzie – living in New York with ambassador status, and parroting whatever the US says.
Victoria:
How did your son’s big day go?
https://www.propertyobserver.com.au/finding/commercial-investment/retail/98991-australia-s-retail-investment-market-under-pressure-while-beijing-surges-real-capital-analytics.html
Real estate investment transactions ebbed in Australia ahead of federal elections on May 18, with deal volume down 27% to US$3.0 billion compared with the same period of 2018. The biggest contributor to the decline was the pull-back in cross-border capital flows.
More broadly, Australia is facing larger challenges with housing prices falling for over a year, led by Sydney and Melbourne.
ItzaDream
A little light humour is always useful when facing the dead hand of a conservative government. 🙂
Jackol,
I agree with your condemnation of the managerialisation of politics and the rise of the surface sheen of leaders. It’s why I am wading my way through the Shelley Gare piece from a couple of days ago. Well worth it if you want a fine analysis:
https://www.theage.com.au/business/banking-and-finance/how-phonies-and-self-promoters-came-to-rule-the-world-20190521-p51pm4.html