The Australian reports the latest Newspoll has the Coalition’s two-party lead unchanged at 51-49, with both major parties down a point on the primary vote, the Coalition to 42% and Labor to 34%. The Greens are up two to 12% and One Nation are down one to 4%. Scott Morrison’s approval is unchanged at 66%, and his disapproval is down one to 29%; Anthony Albanese is respectively down three to 41% and up one to 38%. Morrison’s lead as preferred prime minister is now 56-26, out from 56-29. The BludgerTrack leadership trends (see also on the sidebar) have been updated with these numbers. The poll was conducted online from Wednesday to Saturday, from a sample of 1512.
UPDATE: The Australian has helpfully published a PDF display of all the poll results, including for a suite of questions on coronavirus and its foreign policy implications. Opinion was divided as to whether the World Health Organisation (34% positive, 32% negative) and United Nations (23% positive, 21% negative) had had a beneficial impact on the crisis, but quite a lot clearer in relation to “Xi Jinping and the Chinese government” (6% positive, 72% negative) and “Donald Trump and the United States government” (9% positive, 79% negative). Further results are available through the link.
Bucephalus says:
Wednesday, June 10, 2020 at 7:35 pm
“We cage refugees in concentration camps”.
“Utter rot – perhaps you could ask an actual concentration camp survivor what they are really like compared to the facilities provided by Australia.”
With all due respect ….. what would someone who apparently walks amongst the gods and talks down to everyone else consistently know about either situation?
As a child of someone who spent 5 years as a POW beaten daily then left to die I know what its like to find someone you love REPEATEDLY in the dark at a flooded creek at 2am sobbing for what his country and people who talk just like you sent him off to do… at 17.
I know what its like to have that person literally disappear into the silence of the past and PTSD for months at a time.
Nothing was ever the same for dad or any of his mates that managed to come back. And none that I ever met had any time for anyone who would use their experiences to belittle anyone else who’d also found themselves in a cage – for whatever reason.
If you really have experience of either of the situations you mentioned then I’m surprised you’d speak about either of them so flippantly…
of course if you don’t then …
alfred venison @ #1644 Wednesday, June 10th, 2020 – 5:39 pm
Yeah I tend to agree. I think Trump has a relatively easy and fairly low controversy Supreme Court path to a second term, so long as he only needs the results in 2 or max 3 States flipped to get the electoral college. It isn’t like the Supreme Court didn’t hand victory to the loser on purely partisan lines previously.
The not leave when he clearly lost is a long shot, but you are right it would only require the joint chiefs and the supreme court (which the joint chiefs might need to fix just a little) and he’d be fine.
Although if he has the joint chiefs and the supreme court, he could get a supreme court ruling to stay the elections, and just ignore whatever state didn’t pay attention to the supreme court ruling.
Obviously if he can’t get the joint chiefs and the supreme court, his options are limited to the normal kind of voter suppression and cheating the republicans have been using for years and years.
Bucephalus says:
Wednesday, June 10, 2020 at 7:07 pm
WeWantPaulsays:
Wednesday, June 10, 2020 at 7:04 pm
” lets not be so stupid again.”
Definitely – don’t let idiot non-Government Senators bugger it up again.
The Liberals may need the Green to keep Labor out of power, but they need no help to piss of China.
When it come to this issues Labors problem is they have adults in charge. There not going to vote for the Greens to screw it up further.
Trump is not a happy camper.
https://www.salon.com/2020/06/09/trump-mulls-replacing-jared-kushner-after-blaming-his-son-in-law-for-tanking-poll-numbers-report/
Doubtful whether many of the survivors are left of the German model concentration camp to tell the story now, but a visit to them is enough to see how horrible they were. A lot of older Poles, for instance, have not visited Auschwitz (not that far from the city of Krakow) as they find it too hard to face.
While the Oz effort at ‘concentration’ of sundry boat people in out of the way places, is not somewhere I would like to live in, I doubt they could match places like Auschwitz or for that matter, the camps established for the Boers in South Africa by the compassionate British for those fighting against Empire in the late 1890s in the Cape Province…..
The involvement of the Oz Colonies of the day in the ‘South African Campaign/Boer War’ is not exactly a glorious page in either the annuls of the locals here or the British…..
However, “Zulu” was a bloody good film! Give or take, much the same time………as above……
A story with not much air time yet:
Military leaders from China and India will hold talks today in a bid to de-escalate tensions between the two nations, which have both assembled a mass of troops along a long stretch of border.
But neither side looks overly willing to backdown and uncertainty around what happens next is causing worry globally, thanks to the increasingly bitter rhetoric from Beijing and New Delhi.
WWP
I am glad you tacitly accept that I understand colonialism. I forgot to mention that I studied it formally at uni for a couple of years as well.
Morrison made a public call for an inquiry into the origins of the Virus. No more. No less.
Xi has responded by killing our barley, beef, tourism and student services trade.
Should Australian democracy, in the person of our prime minister, buckle to Xi and ONLY say things in public of which Xi approves? Your answer seems to be yes. Your reasoning seems to be that Xi is powerful therefore we should only say what Xi wants us to say.
You seem to be saying that it is OK for Xi to treat us like he is treating the Uigher, the Tibetans and the people from Hong Kong because Xi is powerful. Further you seem to be saying that Morrison has no alternative other than to fatalistically accept that this is so.
Essentially you are saying that Australian human rights and Australian democracy are as dead as Uigher, Tibetan and Hong Kong human rights.
All that is left for us is to acknowledge that this is so, and to try to make the best of it.
boerwar
There was no reason for Morrison to pretend he was trumps deputy sheriff.
Ive noticed Smoko wearing less baseball caps recently.
I would not last 5 minutes barefooted and out in the bush during a Vic winter. Have very poor circulation. Even in the office it is 2 pairs of explorers during the winter months.
I wonder what WWP would have advised Hawkie after the Tienanmen Square massacre? Send them all back – don’t want to piss off the CCP.
Broadly speaking, a concentration camp is a constrained area where enemies of one sort or another are concentrated for one purpose or another. One element of the purpose is always to control.
Hitler used concentration camps to control political enemies and to commit genocide.
Australia has a particularly rich history of concentration camps.
Palm Island is, IMO, an iconic exemplar of Australian concentration camps.
Indigenous survivors from large swathes of Queensland were hoovered up and dumped at Palm.
Polite usage for Palm was that it was a ‘reserve’.
It was the sort of ‘reserve’ where you had to get permission to get in, to get out, to get work, and to marry. Naturally your wages was stolen from you.
boerwar
And I will add, China has some real issues at the moment. You don’t poke a bear when he has a serious belly ache. Uigher, the Tibetans and the people from Hong Kong are only part of it. Xi is now a dictator, where that leads who knows and their economy has stopped growing. China in trouble leads to trouble for Australia.
‘frednk says:
Wednesday, June 10, 2020 at 8:20 pm
boerwar
There was no reason for Morrison to pretend he was trumps deputy sheriff.’
My view is that Mug Morrison buggered it up big time.
That said, a democratically-elected Australian prime minister has the right to call for an inquiry into the origins of the Virus. In doing so he was giving effect to both our human right to free speech and was, in his person, acting as an expression of our democracy.
Belting Australia around the economic ears is, IMO, a direct assault on our sovereignty.
As noted the other day, we face an existential choice here. Do we become a vassal state or do we tough it out in order to maintain our sovereignty, our values and our democracy?
I further criticize Morrison for not leading a national debate about this. He is, instead, hunkering down while the back room boys try to fix an out. That fix will only be temporary. Because if Xi wins on this he will be back round for more next time.
We urgently need an informed national debate on this, IMO. I thought Hartcher’s article the other day was a good start. But we need much, much more.
As noted previously, a corrupt government is not the best government to have when an existential crisis hits.
WWP wants us to return taxing powers to the states.
Not good news if you live in the mendicant states Tasmania, South Australia and the Northern Territory.
How are they going to make up their revenue shortfalls?
Bucephalus says:
Did you support Hawkie after the Tienanmen Square massacre? He did against the advise of the foreign department.
In my view, unlike Morrison getting up and playing Trumps deputy sheriff it did some good. We hoovered up a lot of educated young people and in the long term strengthened out ties with China.
boerwar @ #1658 Wednesday, June 10th, 2020 – 6:17 pm
Morrison made a public call for an inquiry into China.
If his call was so reasonable, why did most Countries, including France and Germany, reject his proposal?
boerwar @ #1602 Wednesday, June 10th, 2020 – 6:41 pm
Yeah, the second thing. There was never any substantive issue with China and C19, just a political pissing match between Trump and China that Trump instigated. There are plenty of valid reasons to criticize China, like human rights abuses, or everything that’s happening with Hong Kong, or the land-grabs and militarization in the South China Sea, etc.; but Trump’s C19 bullshit isn’t one of them.
And of course the third thing is no accident. It is, however, what we should expect to get if we side with Trump in his pissing contest. Why anyone thinks Xi/China would or should just let something like that slide is beyond me. If you lie down with dogs, you get up with fleas, etc., etc..
I’m happy to take the hit if the principles behind it are right. But taking the hit for the sake of being Trump’s propaganda mouthpiece is just plain stupid. On C19 we may as well apologize to China and start badgering the U.S. about when (if ever) they expect to actually get their outbreak under control. At this point it’s the U.S. that’s going to fuck things for the rest of the world, virus-wise. 2 million cases and 20k new ones every day; they’re a disaster!
boerwar
Bullshit it was just a simple “we need an inquiry” , it went a lot further than a “no more, no less” . Icing on the cake though was doing it moments after trumpeting a Trump phone call.
boerware
In my view once Morrison made a complete fool of himself Labor had no choice than shutup for the reasons you articulate.
Great care must be made to separate the Chinese government from the Chinese people; rednecks and the Australian press do not help, Morrison stupidity even less so.
BOB LYNCH @ #1666 Wednesday, June 10th, 2020 – 6:33 pm
I don’t really, but it is the only path to the ‘States responsibility / nothing to do with the commonwealth’ fiction that rwfws are very fond of there is an LNP govt.
nath,
C@t challenged me to give a substantial critique of Jim Chalmers beyond his Cry Baby moniker. After spending a little time perusing his PhD thesis I have to say I am not impressed. More to come.
So, I issue you a challenge. If I post the link to my (badly scanned) PhD thesis, will you match this by linking to your PhD thesis?
We can both critique both each other’s thesis, and Jim Chalmers’ thesis, to provide some sort of baseline comparison.
Every now and then I have done education research, and so learned how to do quantitive research with qualitative inputs.
Buce:
If you’d had any sustained contact with “our” detention Refugees particularly from a Psych basis you’d know that a lot exhibit the same PTSD type symptoms and health issues that POW’s etc exhibit. Not surprising when you consider the suicides etc. and relentless hopelessness and brutality – some officially condoned some not.
Having a bar fridge while you’re living in a cage for years at a time doesn’t make the cage or the oppression any less affecting particularly for those that fled such barbarity only to find another cage and even more barbarity at the other end.
Of course Buce if you know better – then like everyone else here – I’ll have to bow to your incomparable knowledge and extensive experience of.. well pretty much everything I guess.
Or are you just another poster on a blog confecting outrage to generate conflict who refuse to ever walk back or even acknowledge their BS being called out?
Douglas and Milko @ #1677 Wednesday, June 10th, 2020 – 8:51 pm
Cheeky lady. 😀
Bec Carver says:
Wednesday, June 10, 2020 at 8:52 pm
A cage for years? Give it a break. On Nauru they had businesses, jobs and free range of the island – some even went on holiday to Fiji. 40 people who went to the US asked Nauru if they could come back.
Bec Carver says:
Wednesday, June 10, 2020 at 8:52 pm
“Or are you just another poster on a blog confecting outrage to generate conflict who refuse to ever walk back or even acknowledge their BS being called out?”
If I’m factually wrong then happy to be corrected.
I’m just calling out the BS on this site that others won’t.
Some of my favourite beaches under threat..
https://www.newsofthearea.com.au/rising-sea-levels-and-east-coast-low-changes-landscapes-around-port-stephens-55388
Case in point: A Psychiatrist I know took a 3 year old in detention a Birthday cake for her birthday. She didn’t even know what it was until they put candles on it and started to sing.
And Australia’s brave state sponsored response:
The guards destroyed it in front of the little girl and her sobbing parents.
Equivalence?
Bob Lynch:
Tax the transfers to the biggest mendicant (Queensland)
C@t:
I thought today’s Bulwark interview was great. It’s always interesting when you get the party insider stuff from the interviewee. If Trump gets voted out then where the GOP goes after that is going to be fascinating.
https://podcast.thebulwark.com/tim-alberta-on-the-end-of-the-law-and-order-gop
Rex
I generally am not in favour of tearing down statues but I’m happy to make an exception for Leopold II.
All those piles of hacked off hands.
Bob Lynch:
I’d be interested in being convinced of this
metrology?
Bec Carver says:
Wednesday, June 10, 2020 at 9:06 pm
“The guards destroyed it in front of the little girl and her sobbing parents.”
Why hasn’t this been reported in the media? Why would the guards do this? I’ll put that story in the same basket as the accusations of the RAN sailors holding peoples hands against hot exhausts to burn them.
A career that spans great heights and depths 🙂
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-06-09/ex-nasa-astronaut-first-person-to-space-and-challenger-deep/12337374
Douglas and Milko
says:
Wednesday, June 10, 2020 at 8:51 pm
nath,
C@t challenged me to give a substantial critique of Jim Chalmers beyond his Cry Baby moniker. After spending a little time perusing his PhD thesis I have to say I am not impressed. More to come.
So, I issue you a challenge. If I post the link to my (badly scanned) PhD thesis, will you match this by linking to your PhD thesis?
We can both critique both each other’s thesis, and Jim Chalmers’ thesis, to provide some sort of baseline comparison.
_________________
Sounds like a hoot but I will pass. hehe. Seriously though, if either one of us are spoken of as potential Prime Ministers then all our written work will come under scrutiny. And finding a PhD thesis unimpressive is sadly not an uncommon experience.
Dio
Tearing down statues. There’s a challenge for Ballarat people. Tony Abbott.
Diogenes @ #1682 Wednesday, June 10th, 2020 – 7:09 pm
On what basis would an educated person as you are, support the protection of the idols of history?
https://www.eurasiareview.com/10062020-robert-reich-the-deadly-fox-news-trump-syndicate-oped/
BK
I turned up, solo, to Beijing about 2300 hrs after a (long) series of flights from Australia around 18th December 2017. I had booked a reasonably priced hotel close to the airport, which had a website in English, and promised to meet my flight. Also, it was freezing.
After waiting for an hour where I was supposed to be picked up in the carpark at Beijing International airport, and after ringing the hotel and realising that no one spoke English, I went to the help desk in the airport, which by then was staffed exclusively by the Red Army.
Presumable, not wanting a “situation” on their hands, the senior officer directed the junior officer to take me to the hotel. The junior officer complied, and knew the hotel. However, before letting me out of the car he wanted money. I had no local currency, and he eventually settled for the $AUD 70 or so I had in my possession.
When I got to the hotel reception,. they looked at me really strangely, but eventually gave me an electronic key to the room, with glass windows to the bathroom, and a 24/7 porn channel.
The room service did not have much in English, except for an exotic array of sex toys. I was exhausted, so I slept.
After also visiting Taiwan later several times, and staying in hotels close to the airport, this now seems like what you expect.
In Taiwan, I was waiting near the sex toys dispenser in front of my room for a taxi to the local HVT station. The taxi was late, and so I waked to talk to management.
On my way I passed a couple of English female backpackers, sitting in from of their sex toy dispenser. We all dissolved in laughter.
These are my gems of memories about travel.
Dio
On a more serious note. I like Germany’s approach to Hitler.
No honouring of him. No rewriting history to hide the horror.
Senator Fierravanti-Wells crossed the floor today.
Anyone want to remind us what would happen to an ALP Senator that did that?
Bucephalus @ #1692 Wednesday, June 10th, 2020 – 7:26 pm
WOW and what a difference she made!!!
When was the last time a Coalition Member or Senator crossed the floor and it was decisive in the result?
Bucephalus @ #1696 Wednesday, June 10th, 2020 – 9:26 pm
Won’t happen. We’re a united party. 🙂
No, I jest. It’s happened before when the party decides to have a conscience vote on an issue. I’m pretty sure it happened wrt the SSM votes over the years and there were no consequences.
‘frednk says:
Wednesday, June 10, 2020 at 8:29 pm
boerwar
And I will add, China has some real issues at the moment. You don’t poke a bear when he has a serious belly ache. Uigher, the Tibetans and the people from Hong Kong are only part of it. Xi is now a dictator, where that leads who knows and their economy has stopped growing. China in trouble leads to trouble for Australia.’
Uh huh. The Australian prime minister of the day should not comment on matters that might upset a genocidal dictator on a bad hair day.
I strust that Mr Churchill never said bad things about Hitler if he was having a bad hair day during the thirties.
I trust that Mr Churchill never said bad things about Hitler if he was having a bad hair day during the thirties.
Churchill had hair!?!
It does rather seems as if it is the Bludger consensus is that Xi is doing the right thing by smashing our barley, beef, tourism and student services industries not because of anything Morrison actually did but because Morrison’s words quite rightly upset the genocidal dictator’s feelings.
Folks, Xi knows exactly what Xi is doing.
He always does.
He is destroying our sovereignty. He is destroying our freedom of expression – however nauseating those expressions might be – and he is destroying one of the fundamentals of our democracy.
The Nev Chamberlains have been busy on Bludger tonight!
nath
OMG – I have been trying to place your personality.
You are Franny Roote, an excellent character invented by the British writer Reginald Hill.
Of course you are not exactly Franny, but you are a Senior Lecturer in the humanities, and will almost certainly have Franny’s cunning way of (deliciously) using words to his advantage.
I unfortunately, am one of those “northern chemist” STEM types, whose prose is terse, compact, and mostly without adjectives.
As for the statue of Leopold II, Dio is onto something, IMO.
Maybe they should cut the hands off the statue and then leave it where it is?
The Belgians would then have a sort of hands-on aide memoire.
My best moment for the week was watching that statue of Colston go head first into the river.
Beautiful!
“C@t challenged me to give a substantial critique of Jim Chalmers beyond his Cry Baby moniker. After spending a little time perusing his PhD thesis I have to say I am not impressed.”
Nath seemingly has a case of PhD envy.
Academics with that particular condition are more bitchy than unpublished authors over the winners of the Miles Franklin award, or some such literary bauble …