The Australian reports the Coalition has opened a 51-49 lead in the latest Newspoll, after the previous poll three weeks ago recorded a dead heat. The Coalition is up two on the primary vote to 43%, with Labor down one to 35%, the Greens down two to 10% and One Nation down one to 3%. Scott Morrison’s approval rating is down two to 66%, with the disapproval not yet provided; Albanese is down one on approval to 44% and up three on disapproval to 37%. Morrison’s lead as preferred prime minister is all but unchanged at 56-29, compared with 56-28 last time. The poll was conducted Wednesday to Saturday from a sample of 1504. More detail to follow later.
UPDATE: Morrison’s disapproval rating turns out to be up two to 30%. These numbers have been incorporated into the BludgerTrack leadership trends which you can see on the sidebar and in greater detail here. Newspoll has put to respondents the same suite of questions concerning coronavirus in its last three polls, which record soaring confidence in “federal and state governments’ performance” in managing the economic impact (60% satisfied, up 13 points on last time, and 24% dissatisfied, down nine), preparing the health system (up 19 to 78% and down 13 to 15%) and informing Australians about how to protect themselves (up seven to 82% and down seven to 13%).
Watching the big Rugby League games on tv with the sound turned down and listening to the commentary of the game from Roy and HG on radio was max 😆
Cud Chewer says:
Monday, May 18, 2020 at 8:16 pm
“Who’s the idiot on The Drum?”
Norman Swan tonight on 7:30 was forced to have to give air time to that lady economist that also featured as a panelist on Q+A. The one that reeked of “herd immunity”
_____________________________
There is something particularly abysmal about an ‘economist’ who backs up their fixed position with assumptions that are totally unprovable but stated as though they are axiomatic.
That woman spoke so much bullshit about alternative potential killers brought on by lockdown but had absolutely not a single shred of evidence for her assertions other than ‘you know it makes sense’ implications.
As for the phrase ‘herd immunity’, it is a term that has been stolen from situations where the herd protects the weaker members – i.e., the vast majority are vaccinated, thereby forming a group protection around those who cannot be vaccinated.
What this economist and the other wealthy people pushing for the Brazilian solution (pretending it’s the Swedish solution) is herd sacrifice, whereby the most powerful members of the herd hide behind the weak and powerless hoping the lion (or virus) takes them and diverting attention from these well off cowards and parasites.
mundo: “The nation got the carbon price under Prime minister Gillard.
The nation then decided it wanted Tony Abbott to take the carbon price away.
Any other reading of history is fucked in the head.”
You just don’t get it do you? For a number of very noisy posters on PB, the only acceptable reading of history is one in which everything is the fault of the Greens.
But let’s put that nonsense to one side. I reckon voters were always supportive of a carbon price in the broad. What they didn’t want was a “carbon tax”, which in their minds would presumably have ended up in the hands of government: a sort of second GST applied to products involving carbon emissions.
And then, in one crazed (and/or badly advised) decision, Julia Gillard decided to start telling the public that her emissions trading scheme was actually a carbon tax, even though it wasn’t. And that’s when voters turned on the whole thing: not only did they hate the idea of a new tax, but they hated the idea that Gillard had won an election on the basis of a lie even more. Just as they had felt about Howard’s promise to keep interest rates low in 2007 or were later to feel about Abbott’s promise to deliver a surplus without any pain. The voters simply don’t like being lied to. End of story.
Backdoor Benny was a lot better nickname than he was called by opposing teams and fans.
Four Corners is making it crystal clear. The Energy policy failure is all the fault of the LNP.
It was their party and their party alone that betrayed the national interest.
State of Origin, at its peak, before the superleague rubbish with Roy and HG was the pinnacle of sport in human endeavour.
Their work with gymnastics was a close second.
OC: “To make it political Senator Brick with Eyes liked his nickname while Back Door Bennie (who had some links with the Beagle Boys) apparently didn’t”
I’m not quite sure who you mean when you talk about the Beagle Boys: the Terrigals perhaps?
Martin Parkinson and Vote 1 Combet giving the truth about the Greens. “Utterly naive”, “unwilling to compromise”, “unrealistic”.
meher baba @ #646 Monday, May 18th, 2020 – 8:42 pm
No.
She simply (and stupidly) let a journalist frame it that way when she said wtte ‘okay if you want to play semantics call it a tax’;
It was the Liberal party who called it a tax in the first instance.
Peta Credlin proudly boasted the fact a few years ago after Abbott was booted.
Also, Gillard did not lie.
She said in the interview often cited I will not intriduce a carbon tax, BUT, I will put a price on carbon.
End of story.
guytaur @ #648 Monday, May 18th, 2020 – 8:44 pm
Only if you read between the lines.
Credlin has been boasting how she got Abbott to call it a carbon tax and it took six months after which it was gone. Heather Ewart on 7.30 was th one who pushed Julia to accept the name. I have never forgiven her.
How galling seeing Minchin! He should be hanging his head in shame.
We shouldnt be surprised that political parties fail to act in the national interest. In fact… it is a strange assumption they would.
lizzie @ #655 Monday, May 18th, 2020 – 8:53 pm
Thank you.
SK
Morrison acted in the National Interest on the pandemic.
It was Andrew Robb who spoke out in the partyroom against the CPRS, with no warning, an ambush if you like, and that’s what tipped the balance in voting no. I didn’t know that.
mundo: “No.
She simply (and stupidly) let a journalist frame it that way when she said wtte ‘okay if you want to play semantics call it a tax’;
It was the Liberal party who called it a tax in the first instance.
Peta Credlin proudly boasted the fact a few years ago after Abbott was booted.
Also, Gillard did not lie.
She said in the interview often cited I will not intriduce a carbon tax, BUT, I will put a price on carbon.
End of story.”
Que?
She promised in an interview before the election not to introduce a carbon tax and then after the election introduced something and, in another interview, acknowledged that it was a carbon tax.
Most people would consider that she told a lie before the election. I don’t, because I don’t think what she introduced was a tax. But that’s what she said. And Abbott and Credlin hung it around her neck like the ancient mariner’s albatross.
And that’s what killed the idea of an emissions trading scheme for at least a decade. Not what the Greens did or didn’t do in 2009. It was Gillard’s comment in 2011.
And I’m otherwise a big fan of Gillard. But this was a monumental stuff-up: an own goal comparable to this one.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBXiYbp6z9Q
The numbers of deaths that would follow from the the ”let ’er rip” approach to management of the Virus were estimated a few months ago as about 0.6 * 0.01 * population, about 150,000 for Australia. That still seems to be as good an estimate as any. If our experience were as bad as the USA’s, our number of deaths would be about 90,000 / 13 ≈ 7,000, with many more to come.
Actual number for Australia is 99.
Herd immunity doesn’t seem to be an option.
lizzie: “Heather Ewart on 7.30 was the one who pushed Julia to accept the name. ”
Gillard was a professional politician who had made it to the top job in the land.
Blaming the journo is not on. No excuses for Gillard.
Mundo
You’re making huge assumptions as to the intelligence and political engagement of the average voter.
The Beagle Boys were a stereotypical and farcically incompetent crime family in Disney cartoons, somewhat like the gang that ran NSW in the Late naughties
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beagle_Boys
Confessions
They were all of that and more BUT the vibe at the time was the Coalition were on board taking Climate Change action. So the Greens preening as pure hearts made no difference. At the ‘Carbon Conference’ in Queensland I was sent to Vote 1 Combet and Chainsaw were singing from the same hymn sheet. What the Greens said at the time was Meh.
Rudd and Wong were clear. They “expected” the Greens to vote for their legislation.
That’s their failure. Their assumption.
Meher
I agree it was a fatal mistake.
I will start by thanking William for drawing the line.
However, I will answer:
C@tmomma says:
Monday, May 18, 2020 at 5:45 pm
Buce,
Did your wife have any trouble conceiving your children?
Yes. Three miscarriages. Married for 11 years before having our first. Then two more miscarriages before our second.
It is like being stabbed in the guts when the old Aunts keep asking when you’re having kids. And when are you having another
And males are completely ignored when it comes to grieving for losing a child to miscarriage.
When your having an ultrasound and the radiographer says “I just need to go and get someone” is almost the worst words in the world to hear when you know what it means.
And both my sisters can’t have kids so I’m the only one producing grandkids for my mum and late father.
So to put it politely – go fuck yourself with an auger.
poroti:
Bob Brown sounded like a whiny child on 4Corners. He said the reason they voted against the CPRS is because the govt wouldn’t negotiate with them.
That’s like something you’d expect from Jacqui Lambie or Pauline Hanson.
Australian climate change policy?
It is a bit like discussing why the Roman Empire declined and fell.
Its history.
It does not matter that Brown and the Greens fucked up his, and their, one big chance to do something useful in a lifetime of politics.
It does not matter that Rudd flubbed it when a DD was necessary.
It does not matter Turnbull could not carry it.
It does not matter that the depressed Robb was prepared to sink the knife in or that Minchin was in the thrall of the miners.
It does not matter that Abbott was the quintessential rotten apple.
None of that matters.
Not a bit.
The question now is whether it is entirely too late or just mostly too late to do anything at all to slow down or stop global warming.
IMO, it is likely that the Virus has killed the last chance that the world will act effectively and quickly to prevent runaway global warming. My reason is that for the next five to ten years desperate governments will have one thing in mind: how to prop up sagging economies.
Steve777: “The numbers of deaths that would follow from the the ”let ’er rip” approach to management of the Virus were estimated a few months ago as about 0.6 * 0.01 * population, about 150,000 for Australia. That still seems to be as good an estimate as any. If our experience were as bad as the USA’s, our number of deaths would be about 90,000 / 13 ≈ 7,000, with many more to come. Actual number for Australia is 99. Herd immunity doesn’t seem to be an option.”
Letting it rip is definitely an option (albeit not one I’d favour).
Herd immunity is not. As far as I can see it’s unachievable without a vaccine and possibly not even then: vaccinated people and even people who have had the previously had the virus might only be able to significantly decrease their chance of catching it again. There might be no such thing as prolonged immunity.
Confessions
Rudd and Wing are professional politicians. They failed to get the Greens on board. They just assumed the Greens were on board.
Then The Greens with the Balance of power were negotiated with. Bill passed. A working Emissions Trading scheme.
Greg Combet rightly proud.
Bucephalus,
Then you, more than most, should have understood how low was your blow.
And no, I don’t accept the premise of your insult. Learn how to speak respectfully about Labor women!
Play the ball. Not the woman.
guytaur @ #675 Monday, May 18th, 2020 – 9:02 pm
Not really. Greens should have compromised instead of killing good legislation for nothing.
ar
In order to compromise you have to be in negotiations
C@tmomma says:
Monday, May 18, 2020 at 9:08 pm
I know nothing of her reproductive health.
She looks and sounds like a Soccer Mum.
We give both my sisters Mothers Day cards because they are Mums to their puppies.
Herd immunity is a policy option.
It is possible to aim for a very large majority of the population to catch the Virus and to develop enough antibodies either to resist reinfection or, if reinfected, to get a milder case of COVID.
As with most policies, there are costs and opportunities.
Confessions: “Bob Brown sounded like a whiny child on 4Corners. He said the reason they voted against the CPRS is because the govt wouldn’t negotiate with them. That’s like something you’d expect from Jacqui Lambie or Pauline Hanson.”
Well I’m not aware of too many instances in which a government got the Senate crossbenchers to vote for a piece of legislation without making any effort to talk to them about it.
It’s always been the rules of the game. You can say it oughtn’t to be so, but it is.
It’s little wonder those who spent years trying to get carbon pricing in place are highly disappointed with the Greens. The Greens crow about a policy they helped Labor pass that only lasted for 2 years, if that.
Had the Greens voted to pass the CPRS a decade ago we would still have carbon pricing today.
On August 20 the day before the election in 2010 Gillard said; ‘I don’t rule out the possibility of legislating a Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, a market-based mechanism. I rule out a carbon tax’
On February 24, 2011, the government’s press release said:
The two-year plan for a carbon price mechanism will start with a fixed price period for three to five years before transitioning to an emissions trading scheme..
Anything else said about the carbon price is bullshit.
Confessions
The Greens are right to crow.
The Greens are not responsible for the Liberal Party.
The Greens did put their money where their mouth was. The legislation passed.
Stop blaming the Greens for LNP bastardy.
The virus has done more to reduce emissions than any of the various policies proposed to reduce them over the years could ever have hoped to achieve. Similarly pollution levels the world over are at historic lows. Blue skies rather than grey. The likely slow recovery provides opportunity to change the electricity mix. Likely to be ignored, but it is there.
Interesting talk. He talks about flu evolution in 2014
Spanish flu wasn’t Spanish, it originated in the USA.
Q and A at end.
H1N1 was reintroduced i the 1970, escaped from a Russian or Chinese lab.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=48Klc3DPdtk&t=974s
Where was the interview with Martin Parkinson saying the ETS was not a tax when the country needed it?
Bucephalus @ #683 Monday, May 18th, 2020 – 9:10 pm
Without being able to be the ‘Mum’ bit. Surely, now that you do know, you can come up with another appropriate put-down?
I see tonight’s episode of the Poll Bludger comments is a rerun.
Here we go again…the woman saying ‘year after year goes by without action being taken’
Labor.
Under. Gillard.
Did.
It.
Already.
The
Liberal.
Party.
Shut.
it.
Down.
Call
it.
by’
it’s
name.
What! The Mundo sayeth:
Let me (try to) be the first to say it:
There – it is said – now no-one else need say it – huzzah!
Rational Leftist @ #694 Monday, May 18th, 2020 – 9:18 pm
Okay, how about, the best team won Lego Masters?
The Greens and the Liberals are as responsible as each other for the anti Labor rhetoric. It is and it will for ever be thus. It has real world consequences. The greens are a blight on Australian politics.
And Fess: those who want to attack the Greens for their behaviour in 2009 can’t have it both ways. You report Parkinson and Combet as saying, they were “unwilling to compromise”, but how can that be the case if – as everyone admits – Labor made no effort to negotiate with them.
And, anyway, the Greens didn’t have the balance of power in the Senate in 2009 except perhaps – in theory – for that very brief moment when a couple of Lib senators crossed the floor. And if the Greens had voted with the Government, those same Libs might not have crossed the floor.
The Wong-Chainsaw idea of trying to find a bipartisan position was a really good one. The Liberal Right decided to tear it down. I don’t think this was so much on behalf of vested interests as it was to further their goal of controlling their party. The history books show that they won that battle, got their man into the leadership, managed – mainly through a series of lucky breaks – to have him elected Prime Minister and…
he turned out to be the biggest joke in Australian political history and an international laughing stock, even sillier than Big Ears McMahon.
And then they tried it again last year with Dutts and, having learnt their lesson, their MPs wouldn’t have any of it. (Although to be fair, Dutts would have proven to be an infinitely shrewder PM than Tone.)
Alas, I fear we haven’t seen the end of these losers.
RL: “I see tonight’s episode of the Poll Bludger comments is a rerun.”
It’s because of coronavirus. No new material. Hollywood is facing the same problem.
mundo says:
Monday, May 18, 2020 at 9:12 pm
“Anything else said about the carbon price is bullshit.“
“Professor Dirkis, who is an expert in taxation law, also says there is no practical difference between a carbon tax and a fixed carbon price.
“Its impact is the same – to drive up the cost of energy to bring about a reduction in energy use,” he said.
According to Professor David Stern, an energy and environmental economist at the Australian National University, “a fixed emissions price is effectively a tax when the government sells permits to firms.”
Dr Ben McNeil from the Climate Change Research Centre at the University of New South Wales agrees the fixed price stage of the ETS is effectively a tax.”
https://mobile.abc.net.au/news/2013-09-18/julia-gillard-carbon-price-tax/4961132?nw=0