Roy Morgan has unveiled its unpredictably timed fortnightly federal voting intention poll, which on this occasion shows Labor leading 54-46 – up from 52.5-47.5 a fortnight ago, and almost back to the 54.5-45.5 result in the poll before that. Both major parties are on 36% of the primary vote, which entails a three-and-a-half point drop for the Coalition and a one point increase for Labor. With the Greens down half a point to 12.5%, this makes room for an increase in the independents/others category that has been a pattern of recent polling, in this case gaining one-and-a-half points to 12%. One Nation is up half a point to 3.5%.
The state two-party breakdowns show Labor leading 53.5-46.5 in New South Wales, for a swing of 5.3%; 56-44 in Victoria, a swing of 2.9%; 54.5-45.5 in Western Australia, a swing of 10.1%; 58.5-41.5 in South Australia, a swing of 7.8%; and 52-48 in Tasmania, a swing to the Coalition of 4.0%, though here the sample gets very small indeed. The Coalition leads only in Queensland, by 52.5-47.5, a swing to Labor of 5.9%. The poll was conducted over the past two weekends from a sample of 2752.
Also out this week was the regular fortnightly survey from Essential Research, which does not on this occasion feature the monthly leadership ratings (we are also about due for its roughly quarterly dump of voting intention results). The poll tackles the nuclear submarines issue and related matters, finding 45% believe the deal will make Australia more secure, 36% that it will not affect Australia’s security, and 19% that it will make Australia less secure. Further questions find respondents taking a benign view of the issue generally, and also surprisingly (to me at least) towards nuclear power: 50% say they would support it for electricity generation with 32% opposed.
The poll also has the regular fortnightly questions on federal and state government responses to COVID-19 management, which give the federal government its best numbers since July: good up two points to 45%, poor down five to 30%. The good ratings for the state governments, in descending order of reliability due to diminishing sample sizes, are 53% for New South Wales, up seven; 44% for Victoria, down six; 62% for Queensland, down three; 82% for Western Australia, down five; and 55% for South Australia, down twelve. The latter result is that government’s weakest so far, but here the error bars are particularly wide. The poll was conducted Wednesday to Sunday from a sample of 1094.
If you leave YouTube on autoplay long enough, sooner or later your recommendations will be invaded by the Sea Peoples…
(It used to be this weird, 2+ hour long animated quantum physics video – I’m not sure what happened to that.)
*Meanwhile in Australia*
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cxFMlk0gYyQ
SMH….
Berejiklian will miss out on the perks available to premiers who’ve served for 5 years as she’s only notched up 4.5…
https://www.news.com.au/national/nsw-act/news/outgoing-premier-gladys-berejiklian-set-to-miss-out-on-expensive-entitlement-benefits-program/news-story/d7f5a6c3161dfb05ec40a48220417654
@hazza
“I am concerned that the apparent swing to Labor is mostly people registering a protest vote against the government”
For as long as I’ve been alive, at least federally, Labor do not win government, the Coalition loses government. All Labor has to do is not screw up and look worse (they often do).
BB,
He’s risen without trace
Again, why us?
poroti @ #1391 Friday, October 1st, 2021 – 8:51 pm
BW started it, is all I am saying. 😉
Jaeger @ #1401 Friday, October 1st, 2021 – 9:22 pm
I have racked up too many history channel subscriptions and too many hours on YT. The algorithm knows me too well now, so I get the Sea Peoples showing up pretty quickly any time I click on a history doc.
Sometimes switch to a Private Window just to dodge the algorithm and get some random hits.
JM, many thanks.
D&M, from up here: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-10-01/queensland-universities-data-science/100505156
Blanket Criticism
I think you’re right. Hoping this is their chance to win government and finally change that dynamic. They had a chance in 07 and they blew it.
It’s Quantum Physics lectures for me, the ones filmed in US college lecture theatres by university video units, ie. one camera, poor lighting, worse sound.
I’m trying to fool the Youtube algorithm by watching a lot of “Holy Koolaid” channel stuff. The guy’s a recovered Happy Clapper and has interesting insights into what makes Bible Bashers tick.
But so far no luck with shucking-off the YouTube bloodhounds. Those Quantum Physics lectures keep waking me up at 3am after I fall asleep in front of the telly at midnight watching a program on why Jesus never existed, or how Jim Bakker (yes, he’s still alive) works his televangelistic tithe scams. Most of my YouTube watching is on the TV in the living room, not the laptop.
This is why we need to hang onto ICAC for dear life:
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/nsw/my-life-s-a-wreck-nsw-mp-john-sidoti-lashes-out-during-icac-evidence-20211001-p58wdg.html
Dandy Murray @ #1409 Friday, October 1st, 2021 – 10:10 pm
Cheers. 🙂
We need an ICAC, the Greens and the Liberals might try an stop it, but Labor need to do their best.
The UK media defending the indefensible..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n3J4Ke9PsRs
This is interesting:
https://www.therobotreport.com/openai-abandons-robotics-research/
Just read this nauseating comment on an SMH Facebook post about Glady’s (possessive of Glady) resignation:
“Devastating news!
It’s a loss to the State and Australia as a whole!!!
She is a woman of integrity. People make mistakes/have a poor judgement at times … but as she said, you pick your self up learn from it, be stronger and move on …
Personally, I’ve lived with a deceitful person for 23 years and never knew what he was up to! I could feel for her and feel EVERY word she said!!
Surely, ICAC can recognise that she is the best politician the State/Australia had ever had
Shame on you ICAC!!!”
Jesus Christ. The media narrative a few months back was absolutely disgusting. How can people seriously be thinking this?
I think I just answered my own question.
Dandy
What inspired me into AI was actually the problem of mind in general and specifically the thoughts and consciousness of cows. That also send me down a path into computing, back when computers were, well, pretty limited.
Behold, our new Premier:
https://youtu.be/d7pioagkX5k
Maybe the cows in the field wonder, as far as they can, whether there is a greater purpose to life, something beyond their understanding, whether there is a greater purpose. Maybe racehorses dimly wonder the same thing.
Well, in both cases there is, although for them it is nothing particularly grand nor comforting. There is no Bovine University.
Apparently protein folding has been cracked.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVzPMZqOTo4
Hazza at 11.37pm
Call me a conspiracy theorist, but I would not be surprised to see the LNP and media buddies massaging NSW public opinion in the direction of neutering ICAC.
Budget cuts to continue – with no public outcry. Limitations placed on investigatory scope (SA parliament just did that today – unanimously!)
One day we may wake up with a right wing media bias (done) and a toothless, underfunded ICAC.
What might follow? Controversies about electoral boundaries…leading to removing those decisions from the Electoral Commission and placing them in the hands of parliament, the body that ‘responds to the people.’
Then we might look at how easy it is to vote. Does it really need to be compulsory? How about elections in mid-week, so Coalition-leaning retirees have no trouble voting, but working age people are discouraged (only works if voting optional.) Then we might look at what sort of ID people need to vote…as the Tories in Britain are.
I used to hate compulsory voting. Looking at the US has made me love it.
Cud,
I got into AI through simulation studies into the evolution of complexity and structure, e.g. norms and conventions, laws, systems of trade, and their collapse. I took a turn into “hard” AI via RL (and some message passing algos on abstract algebras), and now have an excellent collaborator on sim-to-real RL systems.
So this move by OpenAI to abandon physical RL is very interesting, because we think we’ve cracked that nut in the last few months. (It took weeks of running an RC car converted into cartpole rig on an ironing board).
hazza4257
The media’s coverage of Gladys resignation has been the media following its audience because many people have expressed sadness at Gladys resignation and many women think this about sexism.
More good stuff JM!
I note the presenter makes a point about the RoseTTa team not having the computing power of Google, so did something almost as effective with much less computing power. That’s basically where we are, taking on OpenAI and Google (DeepMind Suite).
On an ironing board with about $300 worth of kit.
Many things can be true at once.
1. Gladys has, at the very least, displayed catastrophic misjudgement in her dealings with Maguire.
2. Women in politics are subjected to conscious and unconscious sexism – no matter the stripe.
3. A woman in politics generally can expect far less latitude when it comes to lapses or outright misdeeds, intentional or not, generally regardless of the scale.
The most common discussion point I saw today wasn’t “this is because of sexism” but Gladys had to resign on the basis of an investigation, but Ward was able to stand aside and go to the crossbench, Christian Porter resigned from Cabinet (eventually) but still retains his seat. I think many women see this is a double-standard that women in public life (and in private) often have to deal with.
Having said that – had Anna P’s arrogance led to a national Delta outbreak before we were ready, and not Gladys – the Murdochracy would have whipped their base into a frenzy and I would have legitimately worried for her safety. The Lib enablers in the media are clearly worried about the further impact on the Liberal brand coming into an election – so instead of what they’d do to a Labor leader – they’re trying to push the old “unlucky in love” line and her “decency”. But they also know there’s a sympathetic audience who wants to hear this – not a Premier who has BALLSED up more than once on COVID and showed horrible judgement, if not wilful ignorance of corrupt behaviour.
Those protein folding AIs still have a way to go in terms of being push the button and out pops a trusted structure.. but they are making real progess.
I used to commit some CPU time to Folding @ Home.. was fun watching it happen.. ever so slowly.
Diogenes
Yep. They originally supported it because it would be a way for them to signal some virtue and let it catch a few small fish to give the public enough peace of mind. As soon as its existence became inconvenient for them, rather than improve their own behaviour, they decided to kill it. SA has some of the most dodgy and shadowy shit in its halls of government. It’s no wonder why populists like Nick Xenophon get traction in this state.
jt1983
The most common discussion point I saw today wasn’t “this is because of sexism” but Gladys had to resign on the basis of an investigation, but Ward was able to stand aside and go to the crossbench, Christian Porter resigned from Cabinet (eventually) but still retains his seat. I think many women see this is a double-standard that women in public life (and in private) often have to deal with.
———————————————-
That’s a fair way of summing up much of the discussion.
Mexican
You are probably right. Just like the usually right-leaning West Australian worshipping Mark McGowan and depicting Palmer as Jabba the Hutt.
Tom
I’m hesitant to extend my conspiracy theories beyond the Murdoch papers, but it’s easy to jump to that conclusion with Gladys’ departure leading the public and media to question the role of the ICAC. Remember that the recent watering-down in SA was supported by Labor, Greens etc also.
Agree with the sentiment about the slippery slope into a shit political system. I reckon if the Liberals somehow won a Senate majority, they would love to institute a First Past the Post system. I was surprised to learn that in the UK, the left parties got more votes in total than the right parties – the problem is that the left vote is split among more parties, whereas the Conservatives are better able to unify the right vote. In other words, a preferential system would’ve seen Labour win but they’re kept out of power by FPTP.
RE compulsory voting – I’m heavily in favour of it. I’d like to think that it encourages more people to pay attention to politics since they know they have to vote, but I’m not sure that’s really the case. The main benefit is that you don’t have to convince people to get out and vote – you just have to convince them to vote for you. It seems campaigns in the US and elsewhere are half about getting people riled up enough that they actually bother to vote. That’s one of theories as to why Trump had his shock victory in 2016: lots of Hillary supporters didn’t bother voting cause they thought it would be a landslide. It’s a spanner in the works that makes things complicated.
Or maybe none of that is true. Campaigns here are also full of emotion and dishonest claims. Not all US presidential campaigns are run on a premise of getting people angry.
If you’d asked me who would be the first vaccine refusal MP never would I have picked Russell Broadbent!
Has he seen who is more likely to die or be admitted to ICU if they catch COVID? It’s unvaxxed people.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/unvaccinated-veteran-liberal-mp-risks-being-locked-out-of-office-20211001-p58wjl.html
Hazza,
Some of the comments on SMH Facebook are just lols
Confessions at 6:08 am
Given his age he’ll be a good candidate to earn a Nelson Muntz and to ‘win’ a ticket for a ride on the karma bus.
From this comment he’s ben spending time in the undergrowth hanging out with the nutters.
The ‘experimental vaccine’ has been very ‘popular’ for some time among the antivaxxers. If the dickhead doesn’t like the “experimental’ he can go for AstraZeneca.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/nsw/it-is-a-terrible-pity-but-gladys-berejiklian-had-to-go-20211001-p58wiw.html
LOL!
poroti:
It’s entirely appropriate that he be blocked from attending his workplace until he becomes vaccinated. Think of all the people that MPs come into contact with: his elected peers, his partyroom, his office staffers, the hundreds of people who work in Parliament House, the numerous people at Canberra and Melbourne airports, his drivers.
All of whom would be put at risk by him commuting to and from Victoria and spending time in PH.
Meanwhile in Quinceland.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/queensland/queensland-lnp-health-spokeswoman-is-a-member-of-anti-covid-vax-union-20211001-p58wfd.html
jt1983 @ #1419 Friday, October 1st, 2021 – 10:45 pm
Berejiklian didn’t “have to resign” from Parliament because of the investigation, she chose to.
Where was the pressure for her to do so, after all the investigation was only announced yesterday.
It was certainly appropriate that she stood aside as Premier, but anything beyond that was her choice.
his drivers
Which is exactly how the latest greatest Delta outbreak began but in reverse.
I guess Russell Broadbent could be told to Zoom for the rest of the term of parliament. The Department of Parliamentary Services are going to be the ones who make that decision.
That anyone believes the, because sexism, line just shows how good at their job the Berejiklian spinners are.
As this Shannon Molloy piece points out so succinctly and well:
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/analysis-nsw-premier-gladys-berejiklian-is-popular-and-well-liked-so-her-resignation-is-sad-but-dont-cry-for-her/UNU7KJFEMTHH5V5YE4WQYHYD6Q/
https://content.app-us1.com/EkLAg/2021/09/29/797671c5-bc16-4835-9d3c-7983e6fc96e8.jpeg
🙂
Morrison and his cronies on the front bench would all be out of politics today if there was a true independent federal ICAC or integrity commission
It’s beginning to feel a lot like an election is looming.
…
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-10-02/gladys-berejiklian-fell-power-list-scott-morrison-raced-ahead/100508252
I don’t see any sexism in the treatment of Gladys – if anything, quite the reverse.
She’s getting away with the ‘I was unlucky in love’ line.
This is frankly insulting to women. We’re not helpless victims of our impulses and emotions, who cast aside our moral compasses because we all love a bad man.
Gladys, by portraying herself this way, is using sexist memes to her own advantage.
She absolutely knew whatsisface was corrupt and turned a blind eye to it.
She didn’t have to resign, either. She had several other options open to her, a few of which an honest person would have automatically jumped at. The most obvious one was to simply retire to the backbench, knowing that once her name was cleared she would be a shoe in to at least return to the Ministry.
Instead, she’s getting out all together – a totally unnecessary move and one which in itself suggests there’s more happening than we know about.
The wait for an oral antiviral against COVID-19 may almost be over. Friday, Merck reported its prospect halved the risk of hospitalization and death in phase 3, spurring an early end to the study and a race to get emergency use authorization.
An effective oral treatment for mild to moderate COVID-19 is one of the big remaining gaps in the pandemic drug arsenal. Vaccines are stopping many people from developing symptomatic disease altogether, and treatment of severe COVID-19 has improved throughout the pandemic. But options for recently infected, high-risk people are limited to relatively expensive and logistically challenging anti-SARS-CoV-2 antibodies.
Molnupiravir could be a cheaper, oral way to stop people developing severe COVID-19. Merck, which is developing the drug with Ridgeback Biotherapeutics, has interim data from 762 mild to moderate patients who had at least one risk factor associated with poor disease outcomes.
In the molnupiravir cohort, 7.3% of participants were hospitalized or died through Day 29, compared to 14.1% of people who received placebo. There were eight deaths in the placebo group. None of the 385 recipients of molnupiravir died. Delta, gamma and mu variants accounted for almost 80% of the cases.
https://www.fiercebiotech.com/biotech/merck-s-oral-covid-19-antiviral-slashes-hospitalizations-prevents-deaths-phase-3-sparking
It shows the corrupt behaviour of the federal lib/nats and lib/nats propaganda media units , if it was the NSW Labor Opposition leader who had to resign
There would be no sob or gender storys by the media , the federal lib/nats would be on the attack , calls for Anthony Albanese to condemn the NSW state leader or resign
Another ICAC ‘woe is me’ NSW pollie.
.
.
‘My life’s a wreck’: NSW MP John Sidoti lashes out during ICAC evidence
NSW MP John Sidoti was urged to calm down and take a deep breath during “chaotic” evidence to the Independent Commission Against Corruption in which he accused the counsel assisting of impugning his reputation by calling him a liar.
Mr Sidoti, the independent member for Drummoyne – who was previously a Liberal Party minister – conceded on Friday that part of the evidence he previously gave to the ICAC inquiry investigating his property interests was not correct.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/nsw/my-life-s-a-wreck-nsw-mp-john-sidoti-lashes-out-during-icac-evidence-20211001-p58wdg.html
The smh:
No Peter, they were only a laughing stock in the eyes of right-partisans and those with no foresight. You’ve essentially admitted that you and your mates in the CPG had the poor judgement to uncritically regurgitate the Coalition’s lines.
Berejiklian’s demise highlights the value of an ICAC.
It shouldn’t be left up to the press, Parliament or even the police to push these issues one way or the other, they all have their own bias and/or constraints.
She should have walked after she appeared before ICAC with the revelation that she was willing to tolerate suspected inappropriate behaviour as long she didn’t know about it.
It might be a little slow at times, but it fills a void that should not exist in a society.
DisplayName @ #753 Saturday, October 2nd, 2021 – 7:23 am
Has Chris Uhlmann apologised yet for his intemperate and uninformed outbursts?
*crickets*