The public release of Craig Emerson and Jay Weatherill’s report into Labor’s federal election campaign has inspired a run of commentary about the way ahead for the party after its third successive defeat, to which nothing need be added here. From the perspective of this website, the following details are of specific interest:
• Labor’s own efforts to use area-based regression modelling to identify demographic characteristics associated with swings against Labor identifies five problem areas: voters aged 25-34 in outer urban or regional areas; Christians; coal mining communities; Chinese Australians; and the state of Queensland. The variable that best explained swings in favour of Labor was higher education. However, as has been discussed here previously, this sort of analysis is prey to the ecological fallacy. On this basis, I am particularly dubious about the report’s suggestion that Labor did not lose votes from beneficiaries of franking credits and negative gearing, based on the fact that affluent areas swung to Labor. There is perhaps more to the corresponding assertion that the Liberals were able to persuade low-income non-beneficiaries that Labor’s policies would “crash the economy and risk their jobs”.
• Among Labor’s campaign research tools was a multi-level regression and post-stratification analysis, such as YouGov used with notable success to predict seat outcomes at the 2017 election in the UK. Presumably the results were less spectacular on this occasion, as the report says it is “arguable that this simply added another data point to a messy picture”. The tracking polling conducted for Labor by YouGov showed a favourable swing of between 0.5% and 1.5% for most of the campaign, and finally proved about three points off the mark. YouGov suggested to Labor the problem may have been in its use of respondents’ reported vote at the 2016 election as a weighting factor, but the error was in line with that of the published polling, which to the best of my knowledge isn’t typically weighted for past vote in Australia.
• An analysis of Clive Palmer’s advertising found that 40% was expressly anti-Labor in the hectic final week, compared with only 10% in the earlier part of the campaign. The report notes that the Palmer onslaught caused Labor’s “share of voice” out of the sum of all campaign advertising fell from around 40% in 2016 to 25%, and fell as low as 10% in “some regional markets such as Townsville and Rockhampton”, which respectively delivered disastrous results for Labor in the seats of Herbert and Capricornia.
• It is noted that the gap between Labor’s House and Senate votes, which has progressively swollen from 1% to 4.6% since 1990, is most pronounced in areas where Labor is particularly strong.
Other news:
• The challenge against the election results in Chisholm and Kooyong has been heard in the Federal Court this week. The highlight of proceedings has been an admission from Simon Frost, acting director of the Liberal Party in Victoria at the time of the election, that the polling booth advertising at the centre of the dispute was “intended to convey the impression” that they were Australian Electoral Commission signage. The Australian Electoral Commission has weighed in against the challenge with surprising vehemence, telling the court that voters clearly understood that anything importuning for a particular party would not be its own work.
• The ABC reports there is a move in the Tasmanian Liberal Party to drop Eric Abetz from his accustomed position at the top of the Senate ticket at the next election to make way for rising youngester Jonathan Duniam. The Liberals won four seats at the 2016 double dissolution, which initially resulted in six-year terms being granted to Eric Abetz and Stephen Parry, and three-year terms to Duniam and David Bushby. However, the recount that followed the dual disqualifications of Jacqui Lambie and Stephen Parry in November 2017 resulted in the party gaining three rather than two six-year terms, leaving one each for Abetz, Duniam and Bushby. Bushby resigned in January and was replaced by his sister, Wendy Askew, who appears likely only to secure third place on the ticket, which has not been a winning proposition for the Liberals at a half-Senate election since 2004.
• Andrew Clennell of The Australian ($) reports that Jim Molan is likely to win a Liberal preselection vote on Saturday to fill Arthur Sinodinos’s New South Wales Senate vacancy. The decisive factor would appear to be support from Scott Morrison and centre right faction powerbroker Alex Hawke, overcoming lingering hostility towards Molan over his campaign to win re-election by exhorting Liberal supporters to vote for him below the line, in defiance of a party ticket that had placed him in the unwinnable fourth position. He is nonetheless facing determined opposition from Richard Shields, Woollahra deputy mayor and Insurance Council of Australia executive, who was runner-up to Dave Sharma in the party’s hotly contested preselection for Wentworth last year.
RI @ #647 Friday, November 8th, 2019 – 9:02 pm
And voters.
The single best thing Albo has gone since repudiating Setka is repudiating the Greens. These are essential steps.
He has also separated Labor from the very silly attempt to reform dividend imputation credits from Opposition. Chris Bowen – whom I’ve met and quite like – contributed to defeat in 2016 and again in 2019. I hope he never gets another chance to cruel our prospects. His reflexes are wrong…just wrong.
Meanwhile, there are further signs are emerging that the global economy is going backwards:
Our hearts bleed for them.
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2019/nov/08/global-stock-market-rout-leaves-world-with-57-fewer-billionaires
Adani is pure Green Herring. It is trophy hunting. It is stunt politics. Labor absolutely must not get tangled up with it. Albo is correct.
If the ALP really is serious about reconnecting with small businesses it will drop its policy of attacking Family Trusts that most small businesses operate through.
“Albo is correct.”
Albo needs to get his skates on.
Shorten was accused of being “boring”, but Albo has failed to knock off Setka and … ?!
Step up, or step aside.
DP,
Whatever happened to the “Panama Papers”?
The lazy media could have lived off that for decades, but instead we get yet another “an asteroid missed us” story.
Hmm.
Now is the time to campaign on environmental issues.
When the word “unprecedented” keeps being used about fires it’s time to feed the narrative with quotes like this from NSW Fire Commissioner:
https://thenewdaily.com.au/news/national/2019/11/08/bushfire-warnings-qld-nsw/
No need to mention “climate change”. Most people will join the dots when you talk about increased energy in the system.
Environment is a Labor strength.
The BOM forecast hot, dry conditions until January.
Morrison is vulnerable because his Gov’t has refused to help rural firefighters with necessary preparations for this fire season. Now is too late .
Planning is not a Morrison strong point.
Governments are supposed to govern. They knew this would happen but did nothing to prepare..
We can characterise all his efforts now as the ambulance at the bottom of the cliff, because he didn’t build the fence at the top.
Jaeger @ #657 Saturday, November 9th, 2019 – 1:35 am
I reckon it’s because a lot of media baron types have similar type arrangements so don’t want to big a spotlight shone on it. Not to mention politicians, other business “leaders, etc.
I hear on the radio that Morrison is “very concerned” about the bushfires, and the government stands ready to help people.
Stands well away, IMO.
Just in from the Not Even Remotely Surprised News Dept.
Liberal MP misused research to support Newstart drug-test trial
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/nov/08/liberal-mp-misused-research-to-support-newstart-drug-test-trial-academic-alleges
Good Morning
I hope that fellow bludgers in Bushfire areas made it through the night safely.
I hope none of you are trapped in houses.
I hope the danger to fellow Aussies recedes soon.
Last night Bevan Shields got himself ratio’ed saying now is not the time to talk about a climate emergency.
Just like those that say now is not the time to talk about guns when news of another massacre in the US hits.
Now is exactly the time to talk about how burning coal is adding to global heating and the climate emergency.
D P
No good LNP politician would ever let facts get in the way of their ideology.
lizzie
I’m sure he’s praying his heart out.
Guytaur,
Yes, now is exactly the time to talk about global heating, and increased energy in the earth’s atmosphere.
I wouldn’t mention coal, oil or gas.
Everyone knows fossil fuels are the culprit. Leave it unstated.
Push ‘unprecedented but not unexpected’.
The LNP, state and federal, are vulnerable because their head in the sand approach to planning has led to this.
‘Failure to plan is planning to fail’ and similar statements are required to ensure people correlate the current situation with the LNP.
Talking about fossil fuels is unnecessary and can get people offside.
70%+ of the population already agree anyway.
My Rebuttal to Briefly and Company
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/nov/08/labor-must-stop-look-and-listen-while-walking-both-sides-of-the-street?utm_term=Autofeed&CMP=soc_568&utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Twitter#Echobox=1573241974
Note there is no rejection of science and lets start a war on the inner suburbs Labor voters or the Greens.
Basically its lets learn to live together like ACT Labor does.
Victorian Labor got there by appealing to Green voters and the results of that state election are eloquent.
Unlike the article I think Labor should change its tone with the LNP. Time to fight them. Call them out on their lying and chicanery. Eg. Adani. Corruption and weakness of environmental laws. No excusing the LNP for its caving into the coal lobby.
Until Labor is willing to tackle the small cohort of workers affected by coal mining its going to continue to keep losing elections. The truth sets you free. Denialism traps you in a never ending loop
@timdunlop tweets
Clearly the best response to this would be to ban street marches against climate change. And secondary boycotts. While encouraging coal mining. And denying climate change. https://twitter.com/10newsfirstsyd/status/1192685043732426752
ML
Labor needs to recognise that the environment has to come first. The costs are coming home to roost.
No environment no jobs. Its the schism between Labor and the Greens. Normally not a problem. However when we are having extreme consequences threatening survival of our and other species its time to change.
How you get there you can argue about. The bottom line is stark.
Its Adani and only Adani that gets Labor in trouble as it follows the LNP narrative. The whole bipartisan rhetoric has to be abandoned. Its giving climate deniers too much credibility.
Good morning Dawn Patrollers.
A Labor review gives former leader Bill Shorten a dignified burial, but he ran a secretive, centralised office and the party’s defeat lies largely at his feet says Peter Hartcher.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/shorten-s-total-control-of-labor-airbrushed-from-history-20191108-p538wp.html
David Crowe says Albanese has kept the party together since May but the big fights are yet to come.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/setting-a-new-path-for-labor-albanese-s-monumental-challenge-20191108-p538mc.html
And he adds to this by writing that Albo has up a fight over Labor’s tax-and-spend agenda which he admits the party got wrong at the election.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/albanese-warns-education-health-spending-plans-may-need-to-be-scaled-back-20191108-p538qo.html
Paul Bongiorno looks at the post mortem and the rather moribund Morrison government.
https://outline.com/yDCySY
And Richard Ackland opines that here we are six months after the federal election and it has dawned upon swaths of citizens that they have bought tickets to a flop. If it’s cringeworthy now, imagine another two-and-a-half years of this clapped-out music-hall routine.
https://outline.com/TgqE6B
In this detailed look at the Labor post mortem report Katharine Murphy writes that Labor must stop, look and listen while walking both sides of the street.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/nov/08/labor-must-stop-look-and-listen-while-walking-both-sides-of-the-street
Ross Gittins says that the RBA can keep waiting, but our economic problem won’t go away. He opines that the conclusion that best fits our circumstances is that our persistent demand problem has structural causes.
https://www.smh.com.au/business/the-economy/the-rba-can-keep-waiting-but-our-economic-problem-won-t-go-away-20191107-p538e1.html
Tom Switzer warns that Morrison would be better off enforcing present laws to stop street violence rather than drafting new laws to ban protesters from boycotting companies.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/beware-unintended-consequences-prime-minister-20191108-p538t1.html
Meanwhile global funds management giant Aberdeen Standard Investments has rejected prime minister’s Scott Morrison’s call for companies to listen to “quiet shareholders” as part of a comprehensive rebuff of the government’s attack on activist investors and the environmental movement.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/nov/09/global-funds-management-giant-rejects-scott-morrisons-attack-on-activist-investors
It’s easy to find fault in some people trying to help save the planet, but there is a grey area when it comes to hypocrisy, writes Dr Nick Pendergrast.
https://independentaustralia.net/environment/environment-display/dont-shoot-the-messenger-environmentalism-and-hypocrisy,13292
Although the Coalition is talking tough about criminalising consumer advocacy, legal experts say any attempt to do so will be hamstrung by reality writes a fairly angry Mike Seccombe.
https://outline.com/ySKGyc
Jennifer Duke reports that REA has blamed regulators and governments for intervening in the property boom and causing the most difficult market for real estate sales in decades.
https://www.smh.com.au/business/companies/about-as-bad-as-it-can-get-rea-boss-bemoans-worst-market-for-property-in-decades-20191108-p538ow.html
This week saw the Melbourne Cup dwindling while more corruption emerged from the Liberal Party, writes John Wren in his weekly political roundup.
https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/wrens-week-melbourne-cup-and-taking-out-the-trash,13291
Luke Henriques-Gomes reveals that a leading academic has accused the Liberal MP Jason Falinski of misusing his research after the MP cited his study on the health of Newstart recipients to argue for the controversial welfare drug-testing trial.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/nov/08/liberal-mp-misused-research-to-support-newstart-drug-test-trial-academic-alleges
Rick Morton explains how a wide-ranging review of Australian mental health has pointed to the welfare system, particularly the troubled jobactive program, as a key driver in the crisis.
https://outline.com/9Drkzd
And he explains how the disability royal commission has kicked off with convers that it is too soon for some and too late for others.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/nov/08/harrowing-stories-add-to-the-tension-of-a-disability-royal-commission-dismissed-by-critics
Judith Ireland tells us how the National Disability Insurance Scheme Minister Stuart Robert says existing federal government plans to get younger people out of nursing homes are “enough”, despite the aged care royal commission’s demand for increased action to address the problem. Yes Stuart, we all believe you.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/enough-morrison-government-defends-plan-to-get-young-people-out-of-aged-care-20191107-p53877.html
Karen Middleton reveals that while Australia’s domestic spy agency, the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation, was running a foreign-intelligence operation early last year, its officers broke the law.
https://outline.com/YZCDd5
Labor Shadow Minister for Industrial Relations Tony Burke has called for a comprehensive inquiry into the wage theft epidemic currently plaguing Australia.
https://independentaustralia.net/business/business-display/labor-demands-action-on-wage-theft-epidemic,13289
A new study highlighting systemic racism in the Australian media has called for stronger guidelines to regulate against both overt and covert prejudice.
https://outline.com/DujYjy
Adele Ferguson explains how the giant insurance company TAL (which got the treatment at the banking royal commission) is still acting against the Australian Spam Act with its thousands of contacts trying to sell funeral insurance.
https://www.smh.com.au/business/consumer-affairs/deadly-combination-insurance-giant-under-fire-over-spam-email-campaign-20191101-p536gx.html
In an open letter Peter FitzSimons says, “Dear Mrs Court, honouring a homophobic zealot is problematic for us”.
https://www.smh.com.au/sport/dear-mrs-court-honouring-a-homophobic-zealot-is-problematic-for-us-20191108-p538rs.html
As the ATO circles the controversial Chinese billionaire Huang Xiangmo his Australian asset sell-down could total $1.1 billion if he’s able to quickly offload a North Sydney office tower.
https://www.afr.com/politics/huang-xiangmo-s-property-fire-sale-as-ato-circles-20191108-p538nu
The NSW Rural Fire Service has said firefighters were in “uncharted territory” and at the peak of the crisis, when a record 17 blazes burned simultaneously at emergency level last night.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/we-need-vigilance-two-homes-damaged-as-fires-blaze-across-nsw-20191108-p538pr.html
Parents at an eastern suburbs primary school are angry after they were told to buy $500, 7th generation iPads for their nine-year-old children under the school’s new Bring Your Own Device policy. In public schools this should NEVER happen! Obviously Apple has its ubiquitous claws well into this mob.
https://www.smh.com.au/education/sydney-public-school-tells-parents-to-buy-500-ipad-for-nine-year-olds-20191108-p538ov.html
Amanda Meade reports that the ABC has pulled Q&A’s ‘confronting’ feminist debate from iview amid investigation. I must admit that I endured one minute before turning it off.
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2019/nov/08/abc-pulls-qas-confronting-feminist-debate-from-iview-amid-investigation
Talk of 5G replacing the NBN has been little more than idle chatter for a long time. But this week talk turned to action when Optus announced a new 5G push.
https://www.afr.com/companies/telecommunications/looming-5g-threat-to-nbn-just-got-real-20191108-p538rq
Josh Taylor reports on the last day of the trial over the AEC lookalike election posters.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/nov/08/liberal-party-lawyers-say-its-laughable-chinese-language-election-signs-swayed-voters
The conservative commentator and Sky News host Chris Kenny is among those chosen to design the process for an Indigenous voice to parliament, the Indigenous affairs minister has revealed. Well how would you be!
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/nov/08/chris-kenny-added-to-group-working-on-indigenous-voice-to-parliament
When the coroner looked at how to cut drug deaths at music festivals, the evidence won. But what happens next asks Professor Nicole Lee from the National Drug Research Institute
https://theconversation.com/when-the-coroner-looked-at-how-to-cut-drug-deaths-at-music-festivals-the-evidence-won-but-what-happens-next-126669
A high-profile obstetrician and gynaecologist who is also a professor with the University of Sydney made remarks to peers attending a medico-legal conference in Melbourne that were so sexist and condescending that some attendees were in tears and conference organisers vowed never to invite him back.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/nov/08/sydney-obstetrician-said-women-should-sign-a-consent-form-for-vaginal-births
Matthew Knott writes about how everyone in Washington knows the name of the whistleblower the mainstream media gatekeepers are standing united and keeping quiet. Even FoxNews!
https://www.smh.com.au/world/north-america/it-s-washington-s-open-secret-so-here-s-why-media-won-t-name-the-whistleblower-20191108-p538ko.html
The Washington Post has got hold of a copy of an anonymously written book that describes the disaster that is Trump and his government.
https://www.smh.com.au/world/north-america/book-by-anonymous-portrays-a-presidency-on-the-brink-20191109-p538ya.html
Michael Bloomberg looks like entering the Democratic Party presidential nomination race. Already Trump is calling him “Little Michael”.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/nov/08/does-america-need-another-billionaire-in-the-2020-race-bloomberg-thinks-so
John Crace excoriates Nigel Farage saying that the Brexit party leader only continues because he’s worried he may no longer exist if he stops.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/nov/08/farage-brexit-party-politician
It’s been a taboo-busting start to the Tories’ election campaign. But the spectacle of their leader is the most grotesque of all writes Marina Hyde.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/nov/08/boris-johnson-control-tories-election-campaign-leader
Jacqui Maley tells us how Harvey Weinstein’s assistants tried to protect themselves. What a pig of a man!
https://www.smh.com.au/culture/celebrity/two-pairs-of-tights-how-harvey-weinstein-s-assistants-tried-to-protect-themselves-20191108-p538qb.html
NSW Police Minister David Elliott is doing his best to be nominated for “Arsehole of the Week”.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/police-minister-denies-grabbing-arm-of-17-year-old-during-alleged-road-rage-incident-20191108-p538kr.html
Cartoon Corner
Two from David Rowe.
Alan Moir knows his craft!
John Shakespeare and the Coalition’s economic problems.
From matt Golding.
Where Jim Pavlidis sees Albo.
Andrew Dyson and the aftermath.
Zanetti puts Shorten onto the couch.
Michael Leunig and modern hopscotch.
From the US.
Agreed, Guytaur.
The environment must come first.
guytaur
I’d like the Greens to realise that the environment comes first.
Most of the major environmental pushes I’ve been involved in have been notable by the Greens vacating the field – and claiming credit afterwards.
For example, in the campaign to remove catttle from the High Plains – which arguably cost at least two Victorian Labor MPs their jobs – there wasn’t a Green in sight. (The local Green candidate apologised for this to me years later).
When issues such as dams come up locally, it’s up to people like myself to get out there and explain the problems. The Greens never do.
The Greens don’t talk about climate change, unless it suits them to. They focus instead on issues such as refugees.
When the Greens put the environment first, and spend every chance they have talking about the need for action on climate change, I’ll have a bit more respect for them.
BK
Thanks for another Patrol. After skimming the headlines I see its back to the Labor tax and spend rhetoric.
So much for Labor’s tax cuts.
Time for Labor to go full on tax and spend for real. At the very least it will wake people up to what tax and spend really is. Tax the carbon. Tax the multinationals and campaign on taxing Rupert Murdoch and Gerry Harvey and Gina Rinehardt.
This time don’t back down like Rudd did. Keating did it. He was not even a socialist.
guytaur
How did Keating do it? I don’t remember an example.
zoomster
First you like others in Labor need to understand when someone talks about Labor’s failings it doesn’t mean time to attack the Greens.
That pavlovian response is a large part of the division in progressive politics Labor has to address to get back on the same general side of science instead of being forced to follow the LNP narrative.
I am not saying the Greens are blameless. It takes two to tango as the saying goes. I am saying Labor can and should do something about itself.
Bushfire Bill @ #624 Friday, November 8th, 2019 – 9:07 pm
I see Bushfire Bill has landed like a termagant upon Pegasus and I again. It only proves what a flat track bully he is. Plus ca change…
Now, if he really knew what he was talking about, or was honest, he would have seen that I have given Pegasus no quarter since she returned. However, I haven’t, like the cock sparrow BB is, told her to GAGF. He, apparently, if his above missive is any guide, still thinks that is a perfectly okay way to speak to a woman he does not know. I don’t. But then, he has form.
Hey, BB, how’s your stout defence of George Pell going? He’s going to be exonerated any day now, that Appeal to the High Court will clear him. Oh wait…
So I guess that makes you just another apologist for paedophile priests.
zoomster
Ah, but you had to google. So you made your original comment without really knowing, which was what I thought had happened.
C@
But it’s OK for peg to attack me? Which is what BB was commenting on.
zoomster
😆
So now providing links to prove a point is too much for you.
zoomster,
Up our way The Greens wait until an environmental issue fires up the local community, usually propelled along by local Labor people indefatigably pushing it, then they slyly come along, make a heap of pamphlets about the issue with their branding all over it, and try to own it. Once they just put their branding straight over the top of a pamphlet we had made, and then start turning up at protests with their placards as if they owned it. It happens all the time like that. They just don’t want to do the hard yards. They are essentially a Performance Art political party.
Cat
Blaming the Greens does nothing for Labor. It doubles down on ignoring Labor’s faults.
Daniel Andrews did not lay down the welcome mat for the Greens in his campaigning. He did campaign to win and worked in government to make the Greens irrelevant to voters.
zoomster,
No, of course it’s not okay for Pegasus to attack you and if I had seen it I would have said so. Sorry but last night I was closely monitoring whether my parents house was going to burn down, with them in it because they couldn’t get out. I was merely commenting this morning on the side swipe from Bushfire Bill at me. Oh, and I still don’t approve of the way he spoke to Pegasus, no matter how hypocritically she has swung back into action again.
I also definitely do not approve of the way nasty nath treats you. Which is telling because he has lit upon you now that he knows I have him well and truly in the bin. Just goes to show what his modus operandi is. Exactly like a Liberal. Though, The Greens are getting a lot like that too.
C@
We don’t have Greens up here any more. They’ve all joined the independents mob.
Although the Labor vote has also suffered because of the indie push, the difference is that actual Labor membership hasn’t been affected. The Greens membership has collapsed.
guytaur
Right. So Labor would be correct to, like Dan Andrews, refuse to deal with the Greens – the opposite of what you normally argue.
Grow up, guytaur. You ignore The Greens’ faults every day, because it suits you to.
zoomster
Daniel Andrews has acted on the environment.
He did not campaign against the environment.
Unlike Federal Labor and Queensland Labor with Adani.
I am not saying Andrews is the best approach. I cannot deny the election results he had though.
Cat
Grow up. I ignore the Greens a lot because unlike you I am not attacking them for just existing.
zoomster,
I reckon The Greens are on the path to Australian Democratsdom. 🙂
Really fine politicians like Jordan Steele-John would be better off joining Labor. Just about all the rest of The Greens in parliament are hacks.
zoomster
says:
Saturday, November 9, 2019 at 7:11 am
Ah, but you had to google. So you made your original comment without really knowing, which was what I thought had happened.
_________________
Yeah Guytaur, you didn’t just go with what was at the top of your head. You had to double check it and provide a link. You monster. 🙂
guytaur
He didn’t particularly campaign for it, either. He waited until he had power before he acted.
Regardless, the take out seems to be: Labor should ignore the Greens.
of course your real crime was proving that Keating did do it and making zoomster look wrong. Never make a bully look wrong.
Oh, I didn’t say he was a monster. Far from it.
I just know guytaur!
And, of course, he hasn’t proved that Keating did anything out of the box, which was his claim. All governments tax and spend. It’s what they’re there to do. So proving that Keating did some taxing and spending didn’t really prove guytaur’s assertion.
zoomster
says:
And, of course, he hasn’t proved that Keating did anything out of the box, which was his claim. All governments tax and spend. It’s what they’re there to do. So proving that Keating did some taxing and spending didn’t really prove guytaur’s assertion.
___________________
Guytaur wasn’t talking about tax and spend. He was talking about standing up to powerful vested interests.
nath
Oh, and Rudd didn’t?
Fair enough.
It’s great that guytaur has someone to interpret his posts for us. We’ve been struggling to work out what he means for years.
Keating also ended the gold tax exemption which was a nice earner for the gold industry for a long while.
nath
I see zoomster is up with the revision again.
Hoping the point that income tax cuts did zero to help Labor gets lost in the mix.
Can’t have any concept of socialism community good taking hold in the Labor party.
Nah instead we have to pander to the LNP Neo liberalism and offer tax cuts and pretend that a surplus is the way to go every time.
Despite what economists are actually saying
guytaur
says:
Saturday, November 9, 2019 at 7:44 am
nath
I see zoomster is up with the revision again.
______________________
zoomster is basically a Nat. I’m not sure why she bothers with the whole Labor charade.
guytaur
‘…and pretend that a surplus is the way to go every time.’
Um, given that I have criticised Bowen’s surplus obsession here quite frequently, that’s an absurd characterisation.
I was an invited guest to the recent celebration of Bracks’ 20 year win. I was there at the behest of the Socialist Left. That is, of course, because they regard me as a raging right winger.