News remains thin on the ground over the summer holiday period, although we may possibly hopefully see the polling cycle crank up again as of next week. Two pieces of federal preselection news to relate:
• A report in The Australian today raises further doubts about the security of Craig Kelly’s preselection in Hughes – not for the reasons you would hope, but because he has failed to raise any campaign funding for head office since July 2019, according to leaked party documents. He is not alone in this distinction, however, with Farrer MP Sussan Ley, Robertson MP Lucy Wicks and Lindsay MP Melissa McIntosh likewise having come up empty. Kelly was saved from preselection challenges by prime ministerial intervention before both the 2016 and 2019 elections, and a Liberal source cited in The Australian says “there’s no appetite in the party to save him a third time”.
• Ken O’Dowd, who has held the central Queensland seat of Flynn for the Nationals since 2010, announced on January 5 that he will retire at the next election. Queensland Country Life reports that Colin Boyce, who holds the partly corresponding seat of Callide in the state parliament, will contest the preselection. The report quotes Boyce complaining about the failure of David Crisafulli, who replaced Deb Frecklington as Liberal National Party leader after the October state election, to have promoted him to the front bench. It also suggests he may face competition in Flynn from Gladstone councillor Glenn Churchill, who was the party’s unsuccessful candidate for the seat in 2007 and challenged O’Dowd for preselection ahead of the 2019 election.
With the Western Australian election now two months away, two bits of data have emerged from a Painted Dog Research poll conducted for The West Australian in mid-December, which as always do not encompass voting intention:
• Three weeks after Zak Kirkup replaced Liza Harvey as Liberal leader in late November, the poll found him with a 19% approval and 14% disapproval rating. While this compares favourably with Harvey’s 10% and 37% from September, but is obviously remarkably mostly for the 67% uncommitted rating. The poll also found 36% saying Kirkup would be a better leader than Harvey and 11% saying otherwise, with 53% uncommitted.
• With Ben Wyatt to bow out at the election, the poll found 21% favouring Health Minister Roger Cook to succeed him as Treasurer, with Rita Saffioti on 9%, Bill Johnston on 8%, “someone else” on 13% and 49% uncommitted.
Trump to pardon a corrupt NY politician — prosecutor says it is proof of his empathy: report
“Among those under consideration for a pardon or a commutation is Mr. Silver, who was convicted twice on corruption charges and sentenced to prison last summer, two people briefed on the discussions said. Mr. Silver was prosecuted by Preet Bharara when he was the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York. Mr. Bharara was fired by Mr. Trump in 2017, and has since become an outspoken critic of the president’s handling of the Justice Department,” the newspaper noted.
Bharara offered his analysis on Twitter, arguing it was proof of Trump’s empathy.
“People who say Trump has no empathy are wrong. He has the utmost empathy for degenerate, corrupt, disgraced politicians who perhaps remind him of himself,” Bharara argued.
https://www.rawstory.com/preet-bharara/
Large parts of Queensland are still in drought.
Morrison gets what the inner urban ‘progressives’ do not get.
It is that regional seats are keeping him in government.
A visit to ANY drought area is a reminder to every single regional seat that Morrison will look after you when it is YOUR turn to suffer from a drought.
meher baba @ #1088 Tuesday, January 19th, 2021 – 11:07 am
So, a good outcome is a good thing.
The reason there are good outcomes is because travel has been severely curtailed. State borders are the natural boundaries. You can’t applaud the outcome but question the reasons for it.
Why should the lack of international travel has any bearing on whether we should relax our state border controls. If you accept that restrictions in international travel are a valid tool, then you accept that state borders are equally valid. Both have the same purpose – restrict movement, contain the virus.
Yes, tourism does need a boost. And yes, border closures are a major disincentive to internal travel. That is their purpose.
Your solution to your problem seems to be to wind back what is solving the problem.
Hrm, older patients died in Norway after receiving vaccine.
https://nypost.com/2021/01/15/23-die-in-norway-after-receiving-pfizer-covid-19-vaccine/?fbclid=IwAR1wT_Tvi90taApAUk-h2ZbCgZLTvY0fZ3BqxEnXYYuoRusz9xREZQNd8ts
Not sure if the elderly patients have pre existing conditions, or effects of the vaccine as virus is continuing to mutate.
Some states are encouraging intra-state holidays to assist the tourism industry. Vic? Qld?
Is NSW?
Feds give money to poor mendicant Qantas.
From spewscrap, so it’s a grain of salt moment-
https://www.news.com.au/world/north-america/us-politics/joe-biden-inauguration-what-donald-trump-doesnt-want-you-to-see/live-coverage/443846c0c34e58818dc7c84b3d5877ad
If true, his vile, nasty and childish vindictiveness strikes again. Then again, what else should we expect from the Orange Looney.
Forrest got Covid, and doesn’t money help.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/western-australia/mining-billionaire-andrew-twiggy-forrest-reveals-covid-19-diagnosis-20210119-p56v6c.html
Washington DC when they don’t want people storming the Capitol, as opposed to when they do.
https://youtu.be/OiyHlJ2YiSU
2 days to go before Inauguration of Joe Biden (America is day behind).
Kronomex @ #1106 Tuesday, January 19th, 2021 – 11:58 am
That also should have come with a Melania (fuck Christmas) Trump warning. I made it to 45 seconds – honour, goodness, my country, my arse.
We still have 11 covid cases in NSW that are still under investigation. These include cases that Gladys and Kerry were happy to declare when they were announced as “believed to be connected to X cluster”.
These unresolved cases date back to December 21. That’s 5 weeks ago. What new evidence do they hope to land in their lap? Why are they so keen to keep cases under investigation rather than be honest and put them down as unlinked?
We’ve got 5 cases under investigation in the past 14 days. The most recent batch of cases (“believed to be linked to the Berala cluster”) is still unlinked.
What we’re seeing here is the virus spreading in the community in people who aren’t being detected. That gels with the fact that testing is low and a lot of people are being complacent.
And yet, Gladys says we are “mopping up”…
Apart from Canberra residents, most Australians can go a long way without crossing a State border. There are now few if any restrictions on intrastate travel.
Barney in TB,
Okay, so I apologise for saying ‘White Privilege’. But no, I don’t quite get the ‘First World Privilege’ thing either. India, which I still maintain is not a part of the ‘1st World’ is embarking on a massive program to immunise their country, even producing their own vaccine to do it.
As far as the governments of the 1st World seeking to get the vaccine for their own citizens first, well, you can kind of understand that, can’t you? Wouldn’t there be an outcry in all of those countries if their governments didn’t do it? Altruism is great but in the teeth of a global pandemic it kind of goes out the window, understandably.
As I did point out previously, I believe that all the 1st World countries should tithe to the WHO to enable a massive ramp up of vaccine production for the poorest countries in the world then a massive outreach, possibly by Medicins Sans Frontiere, to vaccinate their people, should occur. I believe vaccine production is able to be ramped up. For example, CSL in Australia could be tasked with it. And wouldn’t it be great if our federal government volunteered them for the task? Inoculating our 25 million could be achieved quite quickly and then they could move onto production for the 3rd World. However, sadly, it appears to be beyond the wit and wisdom of this government to do that.
Gladys being deliberately obtuse. I’m beginning to feel contemptuous of this woman.
ItzaDream @ #281 Tuesday, January 19th, 2021 – 12:09 pm
You left out her gormless ‘Be Best’ branding exercise as well. *spewemoji*
Does she think the Capitol Insurrectionists were being their best American?
Steve777
If it’s just a change in the weather they’re looking for, most states can provide it, north to south or east to west.
Steve777 @ #1112 Tuesday, January 19th, 2021 – 12:15 pm
We’ve two lots of friends who separately have been camping along the Darling, and others just called in on the way back from mountain biking in Thredbo. Neighbours went to the south coast for a few weeks. Sister in law and extended family went to Blueys. And so it goes.
https://www.pollbludger.net/2021/01/16/kellys-zeroes/comment-page-23/#comment-3543938
NYP (Murdoch Infotainment)?
There are more recent posts/ articles that refer to no direct link …
Bring. It. On! This guy has more money than sense:
Kyle Griffin
@kylegriffin1
This is fun: My Pillow CEO Mike Lindell told Axios, “I want Dominion to put up their lawsuit because we have 100% evidence that China and other countries used their machines to steal the election.”
https://www.axios.com/dominion-mike-lindell-my-pillow-ceo-trump-meeting-df5ec714-0528-4d7a-b70d-5c7a5a012a7e.html
arrrr shucks, so much for freedom, no guns allowed anymore:
ItzaDream says:
Tuesday, January 19, 2021 at 12:29 pm
Did they also include military weapons ? Or Cannons?
When did this rule happen?
I’m sorry I’m posting so much today, but I don’t have enough energy to do anything else.
Latest Essential poll
https://essentialvision.com.au/category/essentialreport?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Essential%20Report%20-%2019%20January&utm_content=Essential%20Report%20-%2019%20January+CID_13491410adaf88c506d09f423f53a80c&utm_source=campaign%20monitor&utm_term=View%20the%20Essential%20Report
C@tmomma @ #1113 Tuesday, January 19th, 2021 – 11:15 am
No, not really. They should all be better than that. It’s Trumpy of them (very much in an “America first!” kind of way) to not be.
Maybe, but so what? Governments have to exist for something more than avoiding outcry. Particularly such short-sighted and unscientific outcry. The pandemic is a global problem; it needs a global solution.
Barring indefinite border closures (which most first-world nations seem to oppose), solving the problem in one nation does nothing if the virus is left to fester in a bunch of other, poorer nations. It’ll just keep coming back.
Altruism to one side, self-interest also says that wealthy/developed nations should be helping poorer ones get their populations vaccinated. It’s the only way the problem stays solved.
Straya has a new world champion.
.
.
Australian lungfish has largest genome of any animal sequenced so far
Siegfried Schloissnig at the Research Institute of Molecular Pathology in Austria and his colleagues have found that the lungfish’s genome is 43 billion base pairs long, which is around 14 times larger than the human genome.
The result took roughly 100,000 hours of computer processing power, Schloissnig estimates.
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2265127-australian-lungfish-has-largest-genome-of-any-animal-sequenced-so-far/
Why go all the way to Quilpie when you could just pop over to Dubbo?
BOM tells Dubbo to expect rain, but massive dust storm sweeps through NSW instead
https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/rural-news/2021-01-19/13068920
lizzie @ #296 Tuesday, January 19th, 2021 – 12:36 pm
I’m stuck in a house minding 2 dogs while their owners go camping with the kids before school starts up again next week, so me too. 🙂
That ABC duststorm story is actually an accidental repost from this time last year.
Morrison has this week spoken with Pence and Pompeo. I thought Biden and Harris were incoming, but what would I know.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/morrison-talks-with-pence-pompeo-but-not-trump-20210119-p56v5j.html
Cud Chewer
I agree with you, until they find all the links there are people out there who have the virus or have recently been infected. If the virus manages to go undetected for any length of time it could start popping up anywhere and everywhere. The testing figures in NSW in particular are too low, testing occurs primarily by people who are concerned citizens. If an infected person is self centred and thinks it’s just the flu and remains socially active and mobile the virus is happy to go for a ride. I would have been happier if all Premiers had stuck to the no transmission for 14 days standard for the whole state. Who can be sure that someone from a lockdown suburb hasn’t spread it to Dubbo or Broken Hill or some other well known travel route.
The other point is that for all those people wanting premiers to stop shutting borders there is a solution. Invest in a world class quarantine system that includes prevention of airborne spread. Just as there is no scientific proof that airborne transmission does occur, there is no proof that it doesn’t. Have the quarantine facility in a regional area that can be easily locked down. When we have no further leaks from quarantine of returned Australians attention can then turn to students, farm workers and immigration.
With Morrison at the helm we are no better prepared for another pandemic, no closer to resolving any issue nationally. It’s a pity the media is not focused on that rather than individual states doing what’s best for their populations.
I just listened to the points Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has been making and I agree with him that the elderly, >70 and health workers, in poorer countries who can’t afford to purchase the vaccine for them, should be given it before the young of 1st World countries. Though he doesn’t define, ‘young’. Less than 50?
Though then you get into the co-morbidity dilemma for young people.
Cud Chewer
For you.
https://twitter.com/i/status/1351290572540174337
lizzie
Morrison covers the Department of Announcements and is Minister for Announcements.
Are their any other reprentatives in the Morrison’s government that I’ve missed?
Dictatorship by choreographed media non identities perhaps.
As Boerwar suggested, the government that doesn’t exist just concentrates on the regionsl/rural gamebreakers.
And Australia, including paid political representatives are concentrating on poker machines, horse racing, cricket and supermarket spending while developing diabetes type 2 and heart disease.
Its hard not to be cynical. Those poor tennis bots!
Assantdj
“testing occurs primarily by people who are concerned citizens. If an infected person is self centred and thinks it’s just the flu and remains socially active and mobile the virus is happy to go for a ride.”
Think it’s an awful lot more complex than that, with a lot of socio-economic factors in play.
And besides, with the Northern Beaches having the best testing response by far of any community in Australia, this would be at odds with the PB thesis that NB residents are self-centred arseholes.
Lizzie
That does not surprise me. Channel Seven and Sky News are the worst.
Despite all the angst about Peter Costello and channel nine. There is no comparison with channel 7.
A worrisome coronavirus variant is being found in more and more outbreaks in California — including a large outbreak in San Jose in which an air-powered Christmas tree costume led to 90 infections, according to news reports.
Scientists don’t know yet whether the variant, called L452R, is more transmissible than other strains of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. But its presence in multiple unrelated outbreaks has health officials on guard.
“The fact that this variant was identified in several large outbreaks in our county is a red flag and must be investigated further,” Santa Clara County health officer Sara Cody said in a statement.
The L452R variant is different from the B.1.1.7 variant first found in the United Kingdom and subsequently discovered in Colorado and nine other U.S. states. Researchers calculate that the B.1.1.7 variant is between 50% and 74% more transmissible than the standard coronavirus strain. That new strain may dominate U.S. coronavirus cases by March, given its propensity to spread. Fortunately, vaccines will likely work against the B.1.1.7 variant, but it could put severe pressure on the health care system and cause deaths to rise before most of the general population can be vaccinated.
Less is known about L452R. That variant was first detected in May 2020, but it’s become increasingly common since the fall. According to the Eureka Times-Standard, the L452R variant was found in about 3.8% of cases that were subject to gene sequencing in November. By late December to early January, the variant was represented in 25.2% of sequenced virus samples. However, relatively few samples have been sequenced, and sequencing isn’t done evenly across the state. According to the Santa Clara County Public Health Department, the new variant has been found in Santa Clara County, Humboldt, Lake, Los Angeles, Mono, Monterey, Orange, Riverside, San Francisco, San Bernardino, San Diego and San Luis Obispo counties. But it’s too soon to say how many cases overall in California are due to the L452R variant.
Are the tennis players actually whinging, or is this a media beat up.
Cos I’m not sure in whose interest this will serve, if it continues.
a r says:
Tuesday, January 19, 2021 at 12:39 pm
Altruism to one side, self-interest also says that wealthy/developed nations should be helping poorer ones get their populations vaccinated. It’s the only way the problem stays solved.
Too right. The underlying point is the virus does not recognise distinctions of wealth, geography, nationality, race, ethnicity, gender, religious orientation or political allegiance. Poor countries lack medical infrastructure of all kinds, including the ability to source and deliver vaccines. In some cases, wealthy countries are unwilling to supply these facilities even to their own citizens on a needs-first basis. This applies particularly in the US. To some extent, it also applies in this country, where the most vulnerable – the aged – have been denied relevant protection by the responsible government/s. It applies as well in the UK, where the least well-off have carried the greatest burdens of disease and death.
Unless and until governments recognise that to protect all of us they must also protect each one of us the virus will continue to win. It really is the great leveller of the age.
Spray
It actually reinforces it. To get tested is of bigly benefit to your self interest 😉
poroti @ #1144 Tuesday, January 19th, 2021 – 1:16 pm
Think you missed my point, which was in reference to Assantdj’s comment.
lizzie @ #1114 Tuesday, January 19th, 2021 – 12:18 pm
Gladys must be profiting in the polls by attacking other state Govts.
Perhaps she should focus more on improving NSW testing numbers …?
Still throwing grenades on the way out the door –
Trump moves to lift some Covid-19-related travel restrictions, but Biden plans to block the order
(CNN)President Donald Trump on Monday lifted coronavirus-related travel restrictions for much of Europe, the United Kingdom, Ireland and Brazil, effective on January 26 — a move that President-elect Joe Biden’s administration has promised to block.
Biden is set to take over the presidency on Wednesday and his incoming press secretary, Jen Psaki, said that his administration would not lift the restrictions.
“With the pandemic worsening, and more contagious variants emerging around the world, this is not the time to be lifting restrictions on international travel,” Psaki said on Twitter. “On the advice of our medical team, the Administration does not intend to lift these restrictions on 1/26. In fact, we plan to strengthen public health measures around international travel in order to further mitigate the spread of COVID-19.”
https://edition.cnn.com/2021/01/18/politics/trump-covid-travel-restrictions/index.html
Victoria @ #1142 Tuesday, January 19th, 2021 – 1:11 pm
MSM clearly salivate at any criticism of Victoria’s quarantine rules.
Some of the players though only know the way of life in their privileged bubble. A bit sad really.
How Trump allies stoked the flames ahead of Capitol riot
(CNN)Steve Bannon evoked the beaches of Normandy. Michael Flynn drew comparisons to Civil War battlefields and spoke of Americans who died for their country. Roger Stone called it a struggle “between the godly and the godless, between good and evil.” Rudy Giuliani called for “trial by combat.” Ali Alexander said it would be a “knife fight.”
As 2020 faded into 2021, some of President Donald Trump’s most influential supporters — among them members of his inner circle who were in direct contact with the President — spoke in ominous and violent terms about what was coming on January 6.
“All hell is going to break loose tomorrow,” Bannon, Trump’s former top White House adviser, promised listeners of his podcast — called “War Room” — on January 5.
The next day, Trump himself gave a rambling speech near the White House where he claimed the election “was stolen from you, from me and from the country,” and called on supporters to “walk down to the Capitol.”
https://edition.cnn.com/2021/01/18/politics/trump-bannon-stone-giuliani-capitol-riot-invs/index.html
Spray
I acknowledge that socio-economic factors play a part and whilst Andrews plugged that gap in Victoria, the government assistance in other states is still tied to citizenship, not that that would be a big factor in this case.
On the Northern suburbs, yes they did come out in droves for testing. They may be self centred but that doesn’t stop them from worrying about their health and that of their immediate family and friends. They knew it was spreading in their area, although we still don’t know how it got there, and they probably didn’t want to spread it. It is also likely that when Gladys locked them down and said your stuck at home with no visitors till we have no cases and good test numbers, they came out in droves to try and limit the pain of isolation.