On and off again

The 2019 federal election pollster failure gets probed and prodded, as the dust settles on the Queensland election

The site experienced issues yesterday that prevented comments from appearing, which are now more-or-less resolved. However, this involved a lot of plugin updates that might cause certain of the site’s features to misfire for a while. One issue seems to be that comments pagination wasn’t working on the previous thread, hence the need for a new thread despite me not having all that much to relate. Except:

• The Association of Market and Social Research Organisations has published its report into the 2019 opinion poll failure, which is important and a big deal, but such has been the pace of events lately that I haven’t had time to really look at it yet. Kevin Bonham has though, and he elaborates upon the report’s analysis of historical federal poll performance by looking at state polls as well, which fail to replicate a finding that polls have a general skew to Labor.

• Recounts in the Queensland cliffhanger seats of Bundaberg and Nicklin confirmed Labor’s narrow victories, by nine rather than the original 11 votes in Bundaberg, and by 85 rather than the original 79 in Nicklin.

Simon Benson of The Australian reports privately commissioned post-Queensland election polling by JWS Research found 24% rated “economy, jobs and living costs” as the most important issue, with COVID-19 on 15%, the state’s border arrangements in response on 14% (one might well think the results for these two responses should be combined), environment and climate change on 9%, health on 8% and infrastructure on 6%.

Author: William Bowe

William Bowe is a Perth-based election analyst and occasional teacher of political science. His blog, The Poll Bludger, has existed in one form or another since 2004, and is one of the most heavily trafficked websites on Australian politics.

1,015 comments on “On and off again”

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  1. I had the font problems yesterday (enlarged font size and differing type of font to the usual one) but it’s all back to normal today.

  2. When I was there (admittedly 20 years ago) there were a few good people in the Lindsay branches who had been on council and had a profile but I think most of them drifted away due to the stacking and other issues that made the branches non-functional. A parachute job might have worked but they usually don’t.

    I guess the key question is whether Emma would have won.

  3. How very unsurprisement

    Christopher Wylie ️‍
    @chrisinsilico
    ·
    4h
    Parler is funded by the former owners of Cambridge Analytica. They always wanted to create a new social network to collect data and disseminate propaganda. And now they have.
    WSJ News Exclusive | Parler, Backed by Mercer Family, Makes Play for Conservatives Mad at Facebook,…
    The libertarian-minded platform aims to challenge tech giants through a focus on free speech. Hedge-fund investor Robert Mercer and his daughter Rebekah, who have previously financed a number of…
    wsj.com

  4. Oakeshott country @ #102 Sunday, November 15th, 2020 – 11:27 am

    When I was there (admittedly 20 years ago) there were a few good people in the Lindsay branches who had been on council and had a profile but I think most of them drifted away due to the stacking and other issues that made the branches non-functional. A parachute job might have worked but they usually don’t.

    I guess the key question is whether Emma would have won.

    I get the feeling Emma would’ve been very ‘relatable’ with her constituents. Always a great electoral asset.

  5. MADEC the charity allegedly helps the following

    Who the charity helps:
    Youth – 15 to under 25
    Unemployed persons
    People with disabilities
    People with chronic illness (including terminal illness)
    People in rural/regional/remote communities
    People from a culturally and linguistically diverse background
    People at risk of homelessness/ people experiencing homelessness
    Overseas communities or charities
    Financially disadvantaged people
    Families
    Adults – aged 65 and over
    Adults – aged 25 to under 65
    Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people

    https://www.acnc.gov.au/charity/fd90d5b3e2ccb2951298a4a3834c98b4#overview
    I guess the gouging and ripping off of workers is done to help fund the “charity” LOL . As for “non profits” . A nice little earner that took off after ‘reforms’ by The Rodent. All sorts of non profits suddenly had the “need” to pay top dollar executive salaries.

  6. lizzie @ #86 Sunday, November 15th, 2020 – 11:02 am

    Has anyone done a reliable study on whether pork-barrelling in an electorate actually affects the result to any degree? How many change their vote because one section of the community gets a sports facility?

    FWIW and not likely to be widely applicable, anecdata

    Since the Greens took Ballina in NSW from the Nats in 2015, according to the local Greens MP Tamara Smith, funding from state government into the electorate has increased by 48%.

    The Nats are regularly outed in local media for organising announcements or govt funding and specifically excluding the local MP because she’s a Greens MP. The cheap and desperate tricks they use is pretty transparent to many I’d say, and often results in more questions for them on why they exclude the sitting democratically elected local MP.

    At the most recent NSW election Tamara’s PV (+4.7%) and 2PP both went up and what was once a Nats heartland seat had gone Green again despite all the pork barrelling and subterfuge the Nats threw at it. With >55% 2PP it wouldn’t even be considered marginal anymore, but it is noted by locals including Tamara Smith how much more the government is throwing the electorate’s way when the Nats appear so desperate to get back.

    I would suggest locals are currently happy to see the extra funding but realise it is probably only because the Nats can’t take anything for granted anymore in the area, which is largely the reason.

  7. Re Muskiemp @11:06

    It may not change votes however, it is still pork-barreling.

    As with a lot of the chicanery and shenanigans we see in electoral politics, and this extends to biased media reporting, the purpose is to shift a relatively few votes at the margins, especially among the unengaged and low-information voters. If you can shift 1% in a marginal seat that can be enough.

    So in a marginal seat we’re promised a new sports stadium:

    – Now I couldn’t care less, but many would, at least regarding the ridiculously exaggerated number of jobs we will be told it would create
    – I wouldn’t believe the promise anyway
    – It won’t shift my vote. Even if I wanted the stadium, I don’t want to inflict PM Abbot/Morrison on the country. Ditto a Labor MP misusing his credit card.
    – However, some votes will be shifted, especially among those who have a same-same view of the “duopoly”.

  8. Muskiemp:

    The Cashless Debitcard. Another money-making scheme for the LNP friends, tax dollars coming back to the LNP via political donations. They can certainly run a business but they cannot run a country

    A contrivance where money issued from government goes round and round in circles and into the pockets of various people is not “running a business” nor anything like it.

  9. Parler, Backed by Mercer Family, Makes Play for Conservatives Mad at Facebook,…
    The libertarian-minded platform

    Wish the media would stop describing these right-wingers and their works as “libertarian”. Too generous by half.

  10. Biden’s projected share of the popular vote will be 51%-52%: the highest for a challenger since FDR since 1932. He rebuilt the blue wall and flipped 5 states from Trump. He flipped indies in Georgia by 20 points and Arizona by 14 points. Last time Georgia was blue was 1992 and Arizona in 1996. Biden wins the electoral college by 306-232.

    Granted, the Democrats would have been disappointed in not doing better in the Senate, a poor performance with Latinos and losing some house seats, but overall it was an impressive, disciplined performance by Biden. There is some debate in Dem quarters as to whether Biden’s messaging should have attacked Republican policies more and tied them to Trump rather than focus with the argument about values, character and “saving the soul of America”. Although the counter to that criticism is that Hillary focused on policy in 2016 and the electorate pretty much ignored her and went for Trump’s emotional message.

    One thing is for sure, Trump won’t have the bully pulpit and Twitter (amplified by the right wing media machine) any more to drown the world with his daily toxic soup of lies, narcissism, deflection, stunts, misinformation, division, hatred, paranoia and general demagoguery. The world has definitely become desensitised and worn down by him. Now that Trump has the stench of sore loser about him, I believe Trumpism will slowly but surely subside. How and when a 30 million odd Trump cult is deprogrammed though, I don’t know.

  11. Q: Who said these things?

    He says declining union membership has been bad for Canada, because unions were an essential part of the balance between what’s good for business and what’s good for workers.

    ‘It’s time to take inequality seriously’

    “Free markets alone won’t solve all our problems,” he said.

    https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-11-15/canada-conservative-party-erin-otoole-speeches-australia-link/12884606
    A: Canadian Conservative Party leader Erin O’Toole

    Interesting read.

  12. ‘I was told last night that Joel Fitzgibbon’s problem wasn’t that he is in Labor and Labor have a more Progressive stance on Climate Change policy it’s that he is a lazy, no good Local Member.’

    @cat Spot on. Pat Conroy is in the next seat and he had a small drop in the last election but he really works hard. Is always trying to find new, clean jobs for his area but Fitzgibbon has done nothing. Doesn’t even speak about them.

    Friends who live almost on Fitzgibbon’s doorstep (further up the electorate than us) came for lunch this week. They’ve never been political so we’ve always avoided the subject with them. But, this week they were full on about almost everyone they know wanting Fitzgibbon gone and a cleaner Hunter.

    He won’t stand again, betcha.

  13. Mavis Davis:

    [‘Bob Ives tied with Rosemary Varty, but won the seat with a casting vote by the returning officer, who drew Ives’ name from a hat. Adding to the drama, the seat decided control of the Legislative Council. Before Ives could take his seat, the result was subsequently voided by a Court of Disputed Returns on the grounds that 44 votes had been incorrectly excluded from the count, and the court ordered a by-election. Varty then won the by-election.’]

    Why did they not simply count the 44 votes that had incorrectly been excluded?

  14. Muskiemp:

    It looks like Fitzgibbon has misread his electorate.

    People in the Hunter are really proud of their community and really believe that by hard work the community working with the government can improve the standard of living for the region. There is nothing they would like less than an MP with an obvious aversion to hard work.

  15. Puzzling over Scotty’s popularity and “best Leader” assessment, when he’s achieved nothing beneficial, comments by zoomster and others about announcements and pork barrelling have given me a light bulb moment.

    (I’m sure many of you other smart people realised this before I did.)

    Scotty has achieved the ultimate in marketing himself and his government. He makes constant announcements, accompanied by photos and praise from the MSM, but never follows through with the money, because he knows that people will have forgotten it by the time of his next announcement. How good are savings!

    He has also learned the art of brushing questions aside by saying he’s already achieved the desired outcomes. Cf also Angus Taylor over emissions and all the others in QT who simply reel off yards of budget figures which may mean nothing.

  16. Re Phoenix Red @12:19.

    It looks like the USA has quietly passed a quarter of a million deaths in the last couple of days, about 1/1300 of the population, with the rate of new infections and deaths still escalating. Divide by 13 to get the per capita equivalent in Australia -> about 19,000.

    At this rate the number of US Covid deaths will exceed 300,000 by Christmas and be approaching 350,000 by Inauguration Day.

  17. lizzie @ #122 Sunday, November 15th, 2020 – 12:27 pm

    Puzzling over Scotty’s popularity and “best Leader” assessment, when he’s achieved nothing beneficial, comments by zoomster and others about announcements and pork barrelling have given me a light bulb moment.

    (I’m sure many of you other smart people realised this before I did.)

    Scotty has achieved the ultimate in marketing himself and his government. He makes constant announcements, accompanied by photos and praise from the MSM, but never follows through with the money, because he knows that people will have forgotten it by the time of his next announcement. How good are savings!

    He has also learned the art of brushing questions aside by saying he’s already achieved the desired outcomes. Cf also Angus Taylor over emissions and all the others in QT who simply reel off yards of budget figures which may mean nothing.

    Welcome in Lizzie.
    Now you’re fully initiated into the world of Scrooter and his adoring public.
    He doesn’t actually need to achieve anything to be popular. It’s probably better he doesn’t.
    The punters prefer the status quo.
    Scrooter is going to prevail for some considerable time to come.
    Don’t forget we had to wait 11 years to see the back of the Rodent.
    Scrooter has rat cunning to spare.
    But, having said that….GO ALBO!!!!!
    Scrooter is toast!
    .
    .
    .
    .
    .
    .TOAST I TELLS YA!!(*^%%$@#!!!$%@#$%^&*!!!^%&^#$!!!!!@$%$^%$&^%&*^%&*!!!!!!!!

  18. S777 @ #127 Sunday, November 15th, 2020 – 11:47 am

    At this rate the number of US Covid deaths will exceed 300,000 by Christmas and be approaching 350,000 by Inauguration Day.

    Is that assuming a linear death rate?

    Deaths lag infections by about a month, so the deaths they’re reporting now are from when they were averaging “only” 50k new cases a day. By mid December it’s going to be at least double what it is right now. Or more if ICU capacity is overwhelmed.

  19. S777says: Sunday, November 15, 2020 at 12:47 pm

    Re Phoenix Red @12:19.

    It looks like the USA has quietly passed a quarter of a million deaths in the last couple of days, about 1/1300 of the population, with the rate of new infections and deaths still escalating. Divide by 13 to get the per capita equivalent in Australia -> about 19,000.

    At this rate the number of US Covid deaths will exceed 300,000 by Christmas and be approaching 350,000 by Inauguration Day.

    *******************************************************

    From Lucian Truscotts Salon column that I posted bits of earlier :

    That is where we are: beyond counting, beyond being able to measure the tragedy and loss of COVID. Statistics can’t do it for us anymore. We’re reduced to comparisons, a doctor quoted in the New York Times on Thursday comparing 1,000 deaths a day to “two jumbo jets dropping from the sky. If every day, two jumbo jets would drop from the sky and kill everybody, don’t you think that everybody would be in a panic?” asked Dr. Carlos del Rio, an infectious disease specialist at Emory University.

    It’s an astounding fact that more than a million Americans have been diagnosed with the coronavirus since Trump lost to Joe Biden on Election Day. More than 10,000 have died. And what is he doing in the White House? This week, he was busy firing the secretary of defense, Mark Esper, and installing two acolytes of the execrable Rep. Devin Nunes in important positions in our national security infrastructure.

    We’ve got more deaths from this virus than the number of soldiers killed in World War I, World War II, Korea, Vietnam and the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan combined.

    MORE : https://www.salon.com/2020/11/14/trump-is-going-out-the-way-he-came-in-a-loser-a-liar-and-a-cheat/

  20. Someone posted earlier( If I recall correctly) a reference to a radio interview Pat Conroy gave on his local station. I would suggest posters have a read of the transcript and take in what I believe to be a masterclass of what and how labor needs to be framing its climate action policies. It is clear, simple and strong.

    Perhaps Conroy would be a excellent choice as the climate action shadow minister. His messaging is simple and his commitment clear. Mark Butler has had six years in the role, gone to two elections and achieved nothing. I have posted more than once Butler should have gone from the shadow portfolio after the last election. I stand by that. Pat Conroy would be a effective replacement.

    Mark Butler is incapable of presenting a message to which the Australian voter is prepared to listen. He is too complex, too wrapped up in the minute detail and not prepared to accept he needs to adapt to the realities of Covid Australia.

    Mark Butler is a dud. Pat Conroy working alongside Ed Husic may give labor and the future of this planet a real chance.

  21. Another comparison for the USA: a 9/11 every three days.

    Re ar @12:55.

    I was guesstimating assuming a rate of about 1000 – 1200 per day (i.e. linear). If the figure continues to escalate it will be worse. If it peaks and eases off it won’t be as bad. I have no idea how it will go.

  22. Regarding PB system issues, I couldn’t access the site yesterday evening after 6:00 PM (was doing other stuff earlier). Today I’ve had no problems accessing but the site has been unstable at times, crashing and/ or randomly signing me out.

    Off to do other stuff.

  23. E. G. Theodore:

    Sunday, November 15, 2020 at 12:14 pm

    [‘Why did they not simply count the 44 votes that had incorrectly been excluded?’]

    I’m unsure but the Court of Disputed Returns (Starke, J) ordered a by-election resulting from irregularities by returning officers, with the result that the Tory candidate (Varty) beat the Labor candidate (Ives) by 49.2% to 39.2% thereby giving control of the LC to the Tories.

  24. Opinion: Trump Gives Putin A Cherished Parting Gift With Election Loss

    Loser Donald Trump has rewarded Russian president Vladimir Putin with nearly everything he demanded over the past four years, and now that he is an official loser, Trump is giving Putin the gift he’s lusted after for decades.

    It is no revelation that Vladimir Putin detests everything about the West, with a particularly vehement animus towards the United States of America and its so-called representative democracy

    Trump is giving Putin the grand prize – the peoples’ mistrust of the American electoral process and by extension distrust of the government. It is more dangerous a threat to America than any hostile foreign power could present.

    It is important to remember that like Trump sowing antipathy among Americans towards NATO and the global community, nothing would please Putin more than millions of Americans losing faith in their own government

    https://www.politicususa.com/2020/11/14/opinion-trump-gives-putin-a-cherished-parting-gift-with-election-loss.html

  25. Parler- a competitor to Twitter set up with Russian money, and luminaries like Rudy Guiliani as shareholders – is getting airspace as the goto place for MAGAt supporters. They are able to echo chamber themselves with post like this…

  26. Mark Davis
    @PoroMark
    ·
    1h
    Important story. Aust farmers prefer visa workers because they can steal their wages, sexually exploit them, starve them, put them in accommodation not fit for pigs, and generally act with impunity.

    As an aside,
    @TheNewDailyAu
    should have named the farm.

  27. Trump, like other presidents (e.g Clinton), has been obsessive with his hair. Absent a strong wind when boarding an aircraft, it has been a wonderful work of art. Moving onto his recent presser, his hair’s gone from a stunning orange to dismal grey, matching his mood, suggesting he knows the gig’s up, the only question being is whether he’ll leave on his own volition or will he be escorted from the W.H. by the Secret Service.

  28. Mavis @ #144 Sunday, November 15th, 2020 – 2:06 pm

    Trump, like other presidents (e.g Clinton), has been obsessive with his hair. Absent a strong wind when boarding an aircraft, it has been a wonderful work of art. Moving onto his recent presser, his hair’s gone from a stunning orange to dismal grey, matching his mood, suggesting he knows the gig’s up, the only question being is whether he’ll leave on his own volition or will he be escorted from the W.H. by the Secret Service.

    The hair will probably leave of its own accord. Trump will have to be dragged out.

  29. sprocket_ @ #142 Sunday, November 15th, 2020 – 12:55 pm

    Parler- a competitor to Twitter set up with Russian money, and luminaries like Rudy Guiliani as shareholders – is getting airspace as the goto place for MAGAt supporters. They are able to echo chamber themselves with post like this…

    There’s nothing subtle about that parl(?). But maybe there’s another way to think of Parler, that certain groups are retreating. And maybe it makes it easier to keep an eye on the more dangerous? And for a US politician using “Putin-Twitter”, it opens her up to a political attack. She’s afraid to put her case to the public. She’s afraid to be honest with her public. She relies on Russian money. She can’t be trusted. etc.

  30. Looks like the bonking ban has not filtered through to the NSW Liberals…

    ‘Annette Sharp, Columnist, The Sunday Telegraph
    November 14, 2020 6:00am

    The NSW Skills and Tertiary Education Minister Geoffrey Lee is expecting a child with his former media adviser Carmel Melouney.

    The 52-year-old minister on Friday confirmed, via a spokesman, and to this column, his relationship with the woman who joined his office last year.

    “Mr Lee and his partner Ms Melouney are in a happy relationship and are delighted to be expecting a child next year to welcome into their household.”

    The couple’s relationship – which insiders say began last summer — has been, until now, a well-guarded secret on account of Melouney, a media and communications graduate, joining the Parramatta MP’s staff in May 2019.

    News the couple will soon welcome their first child has stunned members of the NSW Liberal Party, coming in a week in which questions are being asked about relationships between politicians and staff.

  31. Player One @ #136 Sunday, November 15th, 2020 – 1:36 pm

    lizzie @ #122 Sunday, November 15th, 2020 – 12:27 pm

    Puzzling over Scotty’s popularity and “best Leader” assessment …

    There’s no puzzle if you consider the calibre of the opposition 🙁

    Brutal. But true.
    Although, Albo is doing a bang up job at the moment. Really building the cofidence.
    Cutting through on a daily basis.
    Scrooter has nowhere to hide!
    .
    .
    .
    .
    .
    Nowhere I tells ya^%$^#$!!!!@#$%^#%$#@#@!@%$#@*_)*+*_)*(&&*(^&$$%$@#!!!

  32. And who is this NSW Bonking Liberal Minister? And his staffer has been shuffled off to another office – which seems to be the modus operandi for when this behaviour happens..

    ‘Like Campion, Melouney is a former journalist who once worked for News Corp, publisher of this newspaper.

    Unlike Joyce, who was married to wife of 24 years Natalie and had four daughters, Lee, a former horticulturalist who owned a garden centre before entering politics, is divorced from his first wife Sue-Maree. The couple separated in 2008 and had no children together.

    So acrimonious was the couple’s break-up, in 2010 police obtained an AVO on the businessman’s behalf against his ex-wife after Mrs Lee conducted a letterbox-drop distributing 6000 flyers attacking her estranged husband on personal and professional grounds.

    It coincided with Lee announcing his candidacy for the seat of Parramatta. The AVO was later withdrawn.
    Around the same time, Lee was one of three people named in a protected disclosures complaint to ICAC that was made by a former university colleague accusing the trio of being involved in “cronyism”, “conflict of interest” and “inappropriate management practice resulting in corruption”.

    Lee said, at the time, he was unaware he’d been named in the ICAC complaint and denied any wrongdoing. No action was taken against Lee.

    Melouney had a varied media career before joining Lee’s office in 2019. Her LinkedIn biography states she has worked for The Wall Street Journal, The Sunday Telegraph and Fairfax Media and had her work published in The Guardian, The Australian, The Sydney Morning Herald and Vogue and Elle magazines during a 14-year media career that preceded her employment at Lee’s office.

    Now in her late 30s, Melouney was recently transferred to another government department and works for Education and Early Childhood Learning Minister Sarah Mitchell.

    Melouney could not be reached for comment on Friday.

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