With the excitement of the British election over and done with, now begins the extended nothingness of the silly season. A few points worth noting to keep things ticking over:
• A by-election looms in the Northern Territory for the Darwin seat of Johnston, not far out from a territory election scheduled for August 22. This follows the retirement of Ken Vowles, who has held the seat since 2012. Vowles served as a minister after Labor came to power in 2016, but was one of three members expelled from the party caucus in December 2018 over a feud with Chief Minister Michael Gunner. Labor held the seat with a 14.7% margin in 2016, an election at which it won the two-party vote 58.5-41.5. A heavy swing at the by-election seems inevitable, but the Country Liberal Party to this point appears to be dragging its heels on naming a candidate. Labor has chosen Unions NT general secretary Joel Bowden, a former Richmond AFL player who says he’ll be putting in a 100% team effort. Former Chief Minister Terry Mills’ CLP breakaway party, Territory Alliance, is running Steven Klose, who according to the Northern Territory News held the curious position of “political adviser at the Northern Territory Electoral Commission”. Also in the field will be Braedon Earley of the Ban Fracking Fix Crime Protect Water Party.
• In other by-election news, there isn’t any. Confident speculation a month or so ago that Eden-Monaro MP Mike Kelly would be gone by Christmas has less than a fortnight to bear fruit, and there also are no visible signs of progress on suggestions that Mark Dreyfus and Brendan O’Connor would be pulling the plug in Isaacs and Gorton.
• Michael Koziol of the Sydney Morning Herald reports on jockeying for the Liberal preselection in Warringah, where the party faces the difficulty of its branches being dominated by conservatives in a seat whose voters gave Tony Abbott the flick in favour of independent Zali Steggall. Included on the watch list are “NSW upper house member Natalie Ward, Menzies Research Centre manager Tim James, Downer EDI executive and former Scott Morrison staffer Sasha Grebe, as well as management consultant and NSW Liberal Party state executive member Alex Dore”, along with Manly barrister Jane Buncle. Mike Baird, former Premier and now senior executive at NAB, set the hares running when he declined on opportunity to seek the position of chief executive at the bank, but “several Liberal sources doubted Mr Baird would want to take the pay cut to go to Canberra”.
• A number of victims of the Liberals’ 2018 Victorian election disaster are identified in The Age as potential successors for Mary Wooldridge’s Eastern Metropolitan seat in the Victorian Legislative Council, following her retirement announcement last week: John Pesutto, Heidi Victoria and Michael Gidley, respectively the former members for Hawthorn, Bayswater and Mount Waverley.
RI @ #4934 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 5:42 pm
It is the Labor right and the LNP that are addicted to coal.
It is your own obsessions you are projecting onto the Greens.
I came across this article a short while ago.
https://thenewdaily.com.au/finance/consumer/2019/12/22/rba-rates-increase-decrease-pain/
Low interest rates are presented as a problem of confidence.
But it ends with an interesting analogy for low interest rates. Low interest rates is like medicine for an illness. Raising interest rates would be like stopping the medicine.
I like two things about the analogy. First, since low interest rates haven’t cured the patient, what might the illness be? Second, since the dose is steadily going up, and it looks like the dose will go up again in February, presumably the illness is getting worse.
Hi PageBoi, thank you very much for the acknowledgement. Best wishes for Christmas and the New Year. I look forward to reading your posts. 🙂
“No matter what Labor does it has to counter the narrative of the right. Not boost it.”
No, they need to have a narrative that will win them votes. I think they need to move away from having a positive environmental message. As far as the environment goes, they need to emphasise how useless the LNP is.
There own policies can remain a mystery.
@guytaur
I am expecting the possibility of international trade sanctions to be imposed on Australia, for failing to reduce it’s greenhouse gas emissions.
Blobbit @ #4941 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 5:50 pm
The first step is trivially easy – stop supporting the opening of new coal mines.
Labor currently cannot even seem to take that tiny step. How can they possibly tackle the really difficult ones? 🙁
citizen @ #4943 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 6:20 pm
A few days to go now and she’ll all be sweet.
“It is the Labor right and the LNP that are addicted to coal.”
’cause it appears to have delivered government at the last election.
Ultimately the parties will go with what will win them an election.
Anyway, that’s the ready problem, stop burning coal. Are you going to consider the hard problem?
Blobbit @ #4954 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 6:27 pm
They’ve certainly achieved that one! 🙂
Blobbit
Then you are not thinking how things will have changed.
You are still running the last election.
Learn the lessons. Don’t give up.
Lesson 1.
Counter the right wing message.
Run the debt truck around. Point out that taxes pay for things voters need. That the high taxing LNP wastes tax dollars on pork barrelling.
Make corruption the issue.
That can include fossil fuel lobbyists buying off politicians.
Hanson is busy with the special interest buying politicians narrative.
It’s not an argument voters won’t buy.
Oh dearie, dearie me.
Such wise political judgement!
Such pearls before the swine.
No new mines!
Trivially easy!
The Greens opposed it I believe.
And how did that end up going for them?
Trivially easy?
Or easily trivial?
Blobbit @ #4958 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 6:29 pm
Yes, of course.
Boerwar @ #4961 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 6:34 pm
You are clearly not prepared to even take the first relatively simple (but by no means trivial) step.
What use are you going to be when things get tougher?
Fortunately the policies of the Liberals and the Nationals, and the Greens are on the table now and for another three, six, nine, twelve years. Whatever.
With one slight difference.
One lot implement their policies.
All the same old same old time.
The other lot criticize everyone else for not having their policies.
Trivially easy to sort that one out!
Winners and losers.
Ho, ho, ho.
Blobbit @ #4957 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 6:29 pm
Apparently, Climate Change politics is the only game in town.
Whatever happened to hospital schools, social welfare and our telecommunication policies.
While a small minority fret that they are not in control and everybody should/could die, most Aussies are just getting on with life.
Politics 101
A policy that does not get implemented does not get implemented.
It should be trivially easy to understand that one.
But some people have difficulty with it.
They really trivially easily do.
Tristo @ #4954 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 6:27 pm
As Gough once said, ‘This is a devastating announcement. But, what does it mean”.
Tristo @ #4955 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 6:27 pm
Yup. Carbon tariffs are currently being discussed in various forums as a real possibility.
If it eventuates, the Australian economy will be severely impacted.
Greensborough Growler @ #4965 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 6:38 pm
And that life will, sadly, be shorter and more miserable than it should have been.
Boerwar @ #4966 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 6:38 pm
You must have slept through that lesson, since you appear to be another one of those who believe the opposition should just support the government.
You and Joel Fitzgibbon. What a surprise.
guytaur @ #4955 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 6:32 pm
All sensible ideas put forward in previous posts by Mundo.
There’s more though.
Education – history.
People forget, or don’t/never know/knew.
41 year old well educated friend, Labor voter, wasn’t sure but thought Howard introduced the PBS.
I wanted to weep, but instead gave him a short punchy history lesson.
It made a huge impression on him.
There are millions of him out there who simply don’t realise how much they owe previous Labor governments.
Run the debt truck out, sure.
But introduce the Did You Know bus as well.
Time to take back the initiative.
Time to set the record straight.
mundo @ #4970 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 6:52 pm
I see a dish and spoon running away.
Danama
Absolutely.
The Brexit referendum was posed without giving voters an honest and accurate account of what they were voting for.
There was an opportunity to pose a second referendum on a far more specific question. Do you support Brexit as presently negotiated and agreed or do you support remaining?
An infinitely fairer and more honest approach and one with a guaranteed outcome either way.
Now we will never know
Merry Christmas to the preference whisperer’s cat:
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/the-cat-that-s-bidding-to-join-sydney-s-annual-dog-race-20191223-p53mgr.html
My OH is generally non-committal about most political issues (sort of a “quiet Australian”). However in the last few days she has expressed a deep dislike of Morrison holidaying in Hawaii while Australia has been burning.
Only one person in this instance, however…
Greensborough Growler @ #4967 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 6:55 pm
You’re right of course.
The idea that Labor could take back the initiative and push back against right wing crapola is a fantasy.
We seemed to have negotiated the Summer Solstice yesterday with only 3 or 4 million hectares burnt.
Of course, the suns charged particles operating under LNP science rules are yet to make a difference and we must wait to see wot effect that will have – although early signs indicate that ordinary Gummint fuckwits are operating at an enhanced fuckwit level. 🤯
Goodnight all. Cricket. 🏏📺💤
P1
The Liberals announcing two new gas fired power stations, you must be over the moon.
CC
So, there’s an argument there that Remainers failed dismally in causing enough concern to convince voters to vote against change.
Sorry, but Remainers completely botched the Brexit issue right up to the recent election.
guytaur
I am expecting the possibility of international trade sanctions to be imposed on Australia, for failing to reduce it’s greenhouse gas emissions.
And as we have had the Greens working hard to keep the Liberals in power will they take their share of responsibility? Bet they don’t.
frednk @ #3452 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 7:15 pm
Another example of Trumpism infiltrating the Labor partisanship.
Ready made dams or just a way to let miners off the hook and not rehabilitate mines?
Rex they may well have.
Doesn’t change my opinion on how bad Brexit is or on the fairness/validity of the process or on the fairness of a,second referendum.
Politics 101.1
‘Winning’ an argument never got the political losers anywhere.
Just ask the political losers.
Smoko is right.
Winners are grinners and losers can whinge about coal all they like.
You got me thinking KayJay. A few days ago my adult daughter asked two of her younger family members during a discussion on how old their dog was, “So, how many times have you been round the sun?” She was being cute, not trying to be a smarty. They looked at her uncomprehendingly. “You know the earth orbits the sun, and a year is once round?” Still they didn’t know what to say. They eventually got it. Some ideas are hard to establish.
Trade sanctions – good.
Wonder if they’ll be on our LNG exports?
citizen
Coal has a wonderful collection of carcinogenic polyaromatic hydrocarbons. I wonder how much will leach into the water ?
frednk @ #4978 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 7:11 pm
You would prefer coal-fired ones?
Nader and the Greens were as ‘right’ as Rex and nath and P1 and Guytaur.
The Naderites were right all the time.
They were so right they sank Al Gore.
Blobbit @ #4986 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 7:25 pm
Yes. But since they will be based on the amount of carbon emitted, they will be lower on LNG than on coal.
Boerwar @ #4984 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 7:22 pm
Smoko has clearly won you over. You are excused from further rational debate.
Boerwar @ #3461 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 7:27 pm
More Trumpism ‘alternative’ facts from the Labor partisanship.
I’ll settle for the fact that Bush voters sank Al Gore.
Thanks be to dog we are going to have same old same old taxpayer subsidized CO2-emitting new power stations that are going to last for 50 years.
This does not meet either the 82%/2030 OR the 100%/2040 threshold tests.
Di Natale to the youngsters: Organize Two New Convoys!
GG
To get trust on the environment Labor has to destroy voters impression of the LNP being the Good Economic Managers title. Not just in Queensland.
Using a familiar debt truck to prove the high taxes paid under the LNP don’t go to voters should be issue 1. Communicate that message hardest in Murdoch Media concentrated areas.
It’s the economy stupid.
“Yes. But since they will be based on the amount of carbon emitted, they will be lower on LNG than on coal.”
I wonder if they will. Why bother with sanctions at all? The most effective sanction would be for countries to simply stop buying coal and LNG.
Any sanctions are going to be on anything other than fossil fuels, more than likely. Any country that will put a tariff on coal will be one that isn’t using it.
Gore lost to Bush by less than a thousand votes.
Rex’s Nader and Rex’s Greens knocked off over a million votes.
Oooooh Yeeeaaaah!
Let’s do it again and again and again.
What have we got to lose?
Late Riser @ #4985 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 7:23 pm
The real question remains unanswered.
How many times has the dog been around the sun.
I rather suspect the dogs being the wonderful creatures that they are – somehow manage to do the Superman trick – travelling at the speed of ……
https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/43161/can-superman-reverse-time-in-comics-by-flying-faster-than-speed-of-light
Now that I have thoroughly confused myself – back to the cricket. 🤯 (that’s a shocked and exploding head emoji).
“To get trust on the environment Labor has to destroy voters impression of the LNP being the Good Economic Managers title. Not just in Queensland.”
That’s a bit of a non sequitur.
Part of the QLD problem was people did trust the ALP on the environment. They just didn’t like what they thought was going to be done.
cc
Cud Chewer says:
Monday, December 23, 2019 at 2:59 pm
Just reflecting on the Daily TellMeCrap article
About “reckless” climate targets. The fundamental problem here is the idea that reducing carbon emissions will be expensive, costly, reduce your standard of living, etc.
All complete nonsense. But its an idea that’s been unchallenged, even by advocates of climate action. The reality is that the measures we need to take to reduce emissions are actually going to create economic growth.
Its high time that Labor directly takes on this wrong idea. (In fact its time the Greens put a bit more effort into this). Its also time the (non Murdoch) media started running stories about how more aggressive emissions reductions actually spells growth and new jobs.
Its those “low information voters” that is the problem and they generally think that deep cuts to emissions is going to hurt. That needs to be fixed.
+100
At the moment we have a serious political problem. Perhaps Labor should not be trying to calm the horses, but there are a lot of wankers at the moment beating dirty big drums.
citizen @ #4982 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 4:18 pm
Three obvious questions:
1) Where is the water going to come from to fill these lakes?
2) What happens to these lakes when the water evaporates from them as it does with other bodies of water (rivers, creeks, lakes, dams, reservoirs, billabongs, puddles, etc)?
3) How is the water going to get from these lakes to where it will actually be needed?
Another brainfart that doesn’t add up when even the barest minimum of thought is applied to it.