There probably won’t be any polls this week, with the fortnightly Essential Research and tri-weekly Newspoll having dropped last week. But there will of course be a Northern Territory election on Saturday, which is the subject of its own thread here.
Other news:
• Sue Bailey of the Launceston Examiner reports that Eric Abetz is expected to retain the top position on the Tasmanian Liberals’ Senate ticket at the next election, contrary to earlier reports that Jonathan Duniam was planning to topple him, after the two “kissed and made up”. However, the report further says that “another senior Liberal” is doing the numbers for the third candidate who will be seeking re-election, Wendy Askew, who filled the Senate vacancy created last year when her brother, David Bushby, took up a diplomatic post in the United States. Also: “It is believed Prime Minister Scott Morrison wants the pre-selection delayed until next year so as not to be a distraction during the COVID-19 pandemic.”
• Michael Koziol of the Age/Herald has a story on the willing Liberal preselection contest in Warringah, which Tony Abbott lost to independent Zali Steggall at last year’s election. Abbott loyalists are said to be advancing the claim of Sacha Grebe, a former Scott Morrison staffer and employee of lobbying firm DPG Advisory, whose principal is David Gazard, a Morrison ally and candidate for Eden-Monaro in 2010. Grebe backer and local party activist Walter Villatora is engaged in a seemingly forlorn bid to have the preselection held as soon as possible. Others said to be in the hunt are “state MP Natalie Ward, state executive member Alex Dore and Menzies Research Centre manager Tim James”.
• There has been a change in the party balance of the Senate with Rex Patrick’s resignation from the Centre Alliance to sit as an independent. The Advertiser ($) has also reported the party’s two remaining members, Stirling Griff in the Senate and Mayo MP Rebekha Sharkie, are the subject of approaches from Liberals to defect to the party, although the notion is meeting bitter resistance from conservatives.
• The results of Tasmania’s recent upper house elections have been finalised, and as expected have resulted in the election of Labor’s Bastian Seidel in the seat of Huon south of Hobart, and of Liberal candidate Jo Palmer in Rosevears. The former was achieved over independent incumbent Robert Armstrong by the comfortable margin of 7.3% at the final count (12,284 votes to 9,152), but the latter proved a close run thing, with Jo Palmer landing 260 votes clear of independent candidate Janie Finlay, 11,492 votes (50.6%) or 11,232 (49.4%).
[citation needed]
BB,
Yes, Michael West has been a bit of an “outsider” ever since he had a column called Margin Call in the financial pages of the Australian. Always did a great job of calling out the vested interests, but strangely his career didn’t seem to prosper as a result.
Does his homework. Wish we had more like him.
Me her Baba writes:
Although I don’t think you meant to, you have done a far better job of condemning the Morrison government in those words above than I ever could.
Incidentally he specifically fingered the DHHS, but neither he, nor 4 Corners, nor anyone on the ABC mentioned that DHHS is a Commonwealth outfit. The implication was left open that “the government” – could have meant the Andrews government.
Most viewers aren’t up on the nomenclature of government departments and the hierarchies they belong to.
Mavis @ #1244 Tuesday, August 18th, 2020 – 11:58 am
There’s clearly some issue with Greg….hasn’t affected his mental acuity though. I always ecpected him to make PM……those days are long gone.
Bushfire Bill
Michael West is the most consistent and accurate with his reporting on the issues in Aged Care. He has continued reporting even during times when the horror effect of the Four Corners program had worn off and the MSM lost interest.
“As a senator he relied on the evidence put forward by US intelligence that Iraq had WMD. Had he not voted for the war, and WMD were found or used against the US or its allies, it would have labelled him forever as a traitor.”
***
Ah yes! The good old John Howard defence! Poor Biden was tricked by the oh so trustworthy Dubya.
That delivery of yours was about as good as this one…
Is there an opening in Hunter coming up? He has excellent pedigree for that electorate.
lizzie @ #1241 Tuesday, August 18th, 2020 – 11:54 am
Quite possibly the same woman who had sex with the security guard in Melbourne at Rygers because Dan said that was ok…?
Kristina K for PM.
Please take note Albo, she’s smashing some Border Force drone. It’s great.
Not that I want to get involved, but all of us that marched in the streets could tell that the WMD “evidence” was a sham, so I think Joe and all the others would have been prudent to apply some healthy skepticism.
Nope. Howard would have had his own intelligence that would have said ‘WMD? Yeah, nah’. Howard was the leader of a country that went to war. He has no ‘out’.
Going to war was dumb. It was wrong. But war crimes do not belong to a senator in a party that was not in control of how it was waged and the postwar debacle.
How many times on this blog have you accused Dick Cheney of warcrimes compared to Biden? You are not just up the wrong fruit tree – you are trying to climb the blackberry bush two orchards over.
wombat, I’m not out and about that much, but I worry that the mask on/off issue has captured the public attention as the major ‘must or should do’, at the expense of hand washing. I’ve been into town (Sydney) once, and was pleased to see lots of sanitisers about, at lifts, reception desks, etc.
I’d be enforcing compulsory sanitisers at any and every entry and exit of any and all premises. Clean going in, clean coming out. And within major venues, likewise for certain areas – dining rooms, toilets, appropriately placed. It’s little use washing your hands inside the toilet to then catch it from droplets on the door handles. Likewise escalators, lifts, buses, tram doors, every train carriage etc.
That masks stop you touching your face is a major given, but dare I say, the instructions should include sanitising/washing your hands after taking the mask off and disposing of it carefully.
Etc
How are you reading the public domain and the public awareness campaign?
south @ #1259 Tuesday, August 18th, 2020 – 12:08 pm
Mundo has been entertaining the thought that KK maybe the current senior Labor member with the chutzpah for the job of leader….she’s alive and kicking at least…
“How many times on this blog have you accused Dick Cheney of warcrimes compared to Biden?”
***
Thankfully, Dick Cheney is not running for president.
I have mentioned before though that he should be in prison, along with Bush, Howard, Blair, Biden, etc etc… They are all evil. Biden helped them to destroy so many lives. There is no excuse for what he or any of them did.
There you go, the Republicans have all spoken. It took barely 5 minutes between all of them and the message was basically Trump sucks and Biden is objectively better – and it’s worth crossing party lines to clean out the problem this time.
There was no montage to celebrate Reagan and the Bushes. No motion to change the platform. No big speech spruiking right wing values. None of that nonsense. Looks like the fear peddled by the overdramatic, online broken-brains was overblown yet again.
Meyer Baba
The Aged Care auditors are supposed to,check that a home has sufficient staff to continuously provide the appropriate level of care. They are also supposed to check the level of preparedness for an infectious outbreak.
In the tick box culture that is our federal bureaucracy, this is currently done by looking at the number of staff on the roster, not how often they work. If questioned the standard response of access to agency staff is accepted. Anyone with half a brain would know that during a flu outbreak the chances are high that the demand for agency staff will limit the availability and the potential for them to bring the flu into your facility is high. The fact these facilities had trouble gaining staff is an exacerbation of the norm but should have been foreseeable.
Unfortunately the tick box approach to infection control also applies and the idea you can teach staff about the use of PPE by video is laughable.
I mean, anybody who remembers anything before 2015 already knew this was a standard thing that parties do at their convention when they can. But whatever. Gotta get that Twitter cred.
The DNC technics are excellent.
This fatherless daughter in breaking me up.
Firefox @ #1265 Tuesday, August 18th, 2020 – 12:18 pm
So it’s okay to be a war criminal, as long as you don’t run for president afterwards? Thanks, noted.
Michael West is an okay journalist but sometimes his headlines come across has playing to his audience’s prejudices.
“Going to war was dumb. It was wrong. But war crimes do not belong to a senator in a party that was not in control of how it was waged and the postwar debacle.”
***
It certainly does belong to Biden and the 28 Democrats who voted with him to give Bush the power to go to war. The Iraq War happened as a direct consequence of Senator Biden’s vote. That vote resulted in up to two and a half million deaths.
Kennealy – failure as Premier of NSW.
B grade Senator (only there as boofhead Dastyari resigned)and couldn’t win a lower house seat anyway.
“So it’s okay to be a war criminal, as long as you don’t run for president afterwards? Thanks, noted.”
***
Uhhh did you even bother reading the sentence underneath that where I said Cheney should be in prison? Obviously not…
Ha. I bowl well enough.
I was among the 200,000 in Hyde park. The lack of accountability of the thugs, idiots, greedy bastards and power hungry psychos that pursued it and made all the dumb decisions through it still angers me… and the disaster is still unfolding.
There were many reputable people who supported going to war with Saddam Hussein. They are in the “R2P – Responsibility to protect” brigade. I respect their opinions but in the case of Iraq, going to war was a mistake in itself – an even more diabolical one because of how it was implemented. Because they bald faced lied to gain international support and had no f’ing clue how to manage the resulting ‘win’.
So by all means question Bidens vote. As I have said, he was presented evidence that would have made it very difficult to vote against. For me, it is very clear who is responsible for the war crimes and Biden isnt in the picture.
Mundo can confirm Albo is out there. Just got an email which ends..
‘We’ll keep working to give a voice to those who need it for one simple reason: to make a difference to people’s lives. That has been Labor’s guiding mission and it always will be.
Stay healthy. Stay safe.
Anthony’
Mexicanbeemer
Of course none of the MSM ever print headlines that are anything but factual and relevant to the content of the article.
Just like i thought. The night duty manager leak was a furphy to try and get the security guards off the hook.
Dr Alpren testimony unable to pinpoint the exact transmission event.
Simon Katich @ #1273 Tuesday, August 18th, 2020 – 10:33 am
Watch out.
No one expects the Firefox Inquisition! 🙂
“There was no montage to celebrate Reagan and the Bushes. No motion to change the platform. No big speech spruiking right wing values. None of that nonsense. Looks like the fear peddled by the overdramatic, online broken-brains was overblown yet again.”
I’d argue there was a spruiking of values. Biden is pretty much a moderate republican already; these republican endorsements will likely serve to buttress resistance against any move to the left on policy should he win.
You think?
mundo:
Tuesday, August 18, 2020 at 12:03 pm
Mavis @ #1244 Tuesday, August 18th, 2020 – 11:58 am
Listening to Greg Combet on RN this morning, it was a great loss for Labor that he stepped down ‘over health concerns’.
[‘There’s clearly some issue with Greg….hasn’t affected his mental acuity though. I always ecpected him to make PM……those days are long gone.’]
So did I. He appeared to be at his prime when he resigned. And whatever his health issues, it’s certainly not related to cognition.
“Despite the Prime Minister’s grand announcements just four days earlier, Australian Border Force were unable to stop passengers from disembarking from the ship and were unable to stop the ship from even arriving.
Now, this is so typical of Scott Morrison. I mean he might be the Prime Minister of Oz, but he’s more like the Wizard of Oz. He’s standing up making these big announcements but when you pull back the curtain, you realise it’s all just smoke and mirrors there’s nothing much of substance there.”
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/live/2020/aug/18/coronavirus-australia-latest-update-victoria-nsw-community-transmission-quarantine-inquiry-daniel-andrews-aged-care-live-news?page=with:block-5f3b14e88f08f8e2a854b4ae#liveblog-navigation
Great going. Kristina. There’s a beaut ad in the last sentence.
Assantdj says:
Tuesday, August 18, 2020 at 12:38 pm
Mexicanbeemer
Of course none of the MSM ever print headlines that are anything but factual and relevant to the content of the article.
———————————–
Assantdj
I`ve made that point countless times because all media play to their audience and it doesn’t change my point about Michael West playing to his audience.
Taylormade @ #1276 Tuesday, August 18th, 2020 – 10:38 am
It was not and did not.
It showed exactly what the good Doctor is saying.
If they all have the same viral strain with no mutations then it is unlikely that you will be able to say who caught it from who.
Bernie speaks and it’s all about policy. What a Legend.
The DNC presentation is extremely slick, most of the speakers from the political-class putting many of our pollies to shame, evidencing that we’re not well served in this country.
Michelle Obama is a class act!
Tasmania’s borders will remain closed until at least December 1, the Premier has announced.
Speaking in Parliament on Tuesday afternoon, Peter Gutwein said restrictions would stay in place until at least December “to allow sufficient time for the COVID-19 situation in Victoria and the threat posed to other states to be clearly controlled”.
https://www.pollbludger.net/2020/08/16/preselections-defections-state-elections/comment-page-26/#comment-3465583
… same when SOS ‘blot on my record’ Powell presented on behalf of Cheney/ Dubya to the UNSC, 🙁
boooooo!
Michelle Obama’s Convention keynote speech has astonished me. Indubitably, this was one of the most powerful, riveting and effective keynotes since I first listened to the Democratic Party Convention in 1960.
Simon,
this is great news,
I can probably get a nice quick OL track walk and maybe an empty frenchmans cap summit.
There are upsides you know!
Sanders trying to heal the split in the Democrats and remove Trump…unlike his apostles here, who are still effectively rooting for Trump.
Yes yes. The question on everyone lips…. will they publish a 1st night Eva Longoria highlights real.
So what use is the “deep clean”?
And Gutwein will be blasted by Morrison for preventing free travel within Australia?
Or does Morrison attack only Labor premiers?
The Virtual Convention today felt a little weird at first but, once you got used to it and started going with it, it was decent.
Sanders and Michelle Obama both stood out as great speeches. I also appreciate the coherency of the overall message. It marks that Biden is the anti-Trump – politically and ethically, and draws a distinction. While “everyday people” speaking at conventions is not new at all, I feel like the stronger focus on having random people tell their stories over Zoom or whatever added a much more personal touch.
I did find a couple of the notable speakers (like Whitmer) seemed to speak more in a style that’s for a crowd, with the pacing designed to bounce off of crowd cheers. Doing that to a quiet audience made it feel a little awkward but not terrible. If there’s one thing I didn’t like is how they cut to random delegates (or whoever they were) to applaud after somebody speak. Because of how few there were on the “call” at any time, it sounded like a weak applause. Frankly, no applause is better than a weak one. But at least they didn’t inject in fake crowd sounds to synthesise an enthusiastic large audience.
Decent first night (usually the weakest night of a convention) over all. I look forward to the rest of the week.
citizen @ #1296 Tuesday, August 18th, 2020 – 11:24 am
Don’t be silly, Tassie’s not part of Australia. 🙂
Boooooo!
I want to go back to Hartz Mountains NP. Last time I was there I walked for hours and hours and only saw 2m of ground ahead of me. The rest was thick immovable fog.