To allow for a separate thread for the late election counting, which can be found here, here goes my first post-election summary of relevant news to kick off a general discussion thread. Which is naturally less easy to do now that there are no polls or election horse race scuttlebutt to relate. Here’s what I’ve managed:
• Peter Dutton now appears certain to be elected unopposed as the new Liberal leader at the first meeting of the party room after the election winners have been confirmed. There appears to be strong support for the notion that the deputy position should go to a woman, names mentioned including Karen Andrews, Bridget Archer, Sussan Ley, Anne Ruston and Jane Hume. There were some suggestions that Andrews might seek the leadership, together with Dan Tehan, although it always seemed clear Dutton had the numbers.
• The Nationals party room will meet on Tuesday, which could see a challenge to Barnaby Joyce’s leadership from David Littleproud or Michael McCormack. However, the ABC reports it has been put to McCormack that it would be preferable to have a “fresh start”. Mike Foley of the Age/Herald reports Keith Pitt might put his name forward on the “off chance” that Joyce declines to stand, positioning himself as the heir to Joyce’s skepticism on net zero carbon emissions.
• Following her win over Labor’s Kristina Keneally as an independent for Fowler, it has been noted that Dai Le asserted on her Section 44 checklist as part of her nomination for the election that she had never been a citizen or subject of a country other than Australia. Queried by The Australian, constitutional law expert Anne Twomey offered the inuitively obvious point that this seemed unlikely given she was born in Vietnam in 1968 and remained there until her family fled in 1975. However, while a nomination may be rejected if a prospective candidate does not complete the checklist and provide supporting documentation is required, it would not appear a nomination is retrospectively invalidated if the information provided was later shown to be incomplete. The sole point at issue is whether Le does in fact have Vietnamese citizenship, which would appear unlikely based on the account of Sydney barrister Dominic Villa.
• The projections of both the ABC and myself are that Labor will win the final two-party preferred count by 51.8-48.2, from a swing to Labor of 3.3%. This is derived from two-candidate preferred counts between Labor and the Coalition in seats where one is available and estimates of other parties’ preference flows where they are not. I have Labor winning by 51.3-48.7 in New South Wales, a swing of 3.0%; 53.9-46.1 in Victoria, a swing of 0.8%; the Coalition winning 54.3-45.7 in Queensland, a swing to Labor of 4.1%; Labor winning 54.7-45.3 in Western Australia, a swing of 10.2% (their first win in the state since 1987 and best result since 1983); 53.9-46.1 in South Australia, a swing of 3.2%; and 53.8-46.2 in Tasmania, a swing to the Coalition of 2.1%.
Bellwether at 7:59 am
Are you sure that would be wise ? 🙂
But seriously folks. They have started in that direction.fmd
.
Armed Janitors Approved To Stop School Shootings
Posted on January 11, 2013
Armed Janitors Approved By Montpelier, Ohio, School Board To Stop School Shootings
https://teacherwise.wordpress.com/2013/01/11/armed-janitors-approved-to-stop-school-shootings/
I am one who is most definitely of the view that this result, decimating the Liberal Party both in numbers and in representation geography, dates from Howard contesting and then assuming the uncontested leadership of the Liberal Party
I note the comments of Liberal Party Federal President Stone and others, including descriptions as the “divisive dwarf ” and the “lying rodent”
The fact that Howard won elections, the purpose of the Liberal Party, saw and sees him revered by the Liberal Party State branches, hence consistently rolled out including by a biased media
The message of 2007 was lost
Including because, after declaring climate as the challenge of our time, Rudd was not supported in the Upper House of the Parliament, by media and particularly the toxic Murdoch and by polling influenced by partisan media reporting across Murdoch, Stokes and Costello, a bias and tactic which continues today and will continue
15 years on I trust the maturity the Australian electorate has once again finally shown is not again trashed and reversed by media
The geography evidencing rural and regional Queensland is the seat of power for the LNP, no seats elsewhere not marginal, is indicative
The Party having the greater number of elected MP’s will always be in the prime position to lead a Coalition
Even Merkel cobbled together a Coalition government among elected MP’s
I don’t see the Liberal Party being the Party with the greatest number of MP’s on the floor of the House – the numbers and the geography of those numbers instruct
This should have been the outcome from 2007
It has taken until 2022
As a side observation, the very fact that a failed treasurer assumed the leadership of the Liberal Party is a question I cannot reconcile
Hawke inherited what he did, Rudd inherited what he did and Albanese has inherited what he has
All down to Howard and the endorsements of Howard
”
Confessionssays:
Thursday, May 26, 2022 at 6:08 am
This is a very interesting read, and something a few of us were discussing last week and the week before. I often said this election felt like 2007, and perhaps this result is what the 2007 result should’ve heralded: an end of Howardism.
As the results rolled in it was difficult to grasp: the Liberals of the 2020s, eerily like the Soviet communists of the 1980s, were suddenly an anachronism. Like the Politburo, they too had become entrapped within their fervent ideologies and grown so distant from reality that they lost the moral legitimacy to govern. Power was now haemorrhaging away in a death agony of lost seats.
Morrison was widely credited as the architect of this annihilation. But perhaps he was no more than the sinister final act of a larger story that began decades earlier when John Howard was elected prime minister in 1996.
Of all Australian prime ministers, it is Howard who can rightly claim to be the most transformative, reshaping the nation so completely that, other than a Labor interregnum of six years, it has been conservative governments largely in his image ever since. Every issue that defined Morrison’s downfall had deep roots in Howard’s prime ministership.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/morrison-government-s-fall-marks-end-of-howard-era-ascendancy-20220525-p5aod6.html
”
I was just thinking about the same thing just before I opened Poll Bludger i.e. Howard was transformative leader like Reagan and Thatcher.
My thinking went like this:
The nation was not yet transformed yet in any significant way till 1998 Federal election. In 1998 federal election Howard scraped into power by about 1000 votes across electorates where Liberal candidates were females like Fran Bailey. They he changed and transformed the Liberal party and the nation in his image and rest is history.
One interesting thing about 1998 LNP election victory was they won the seats of Kooyong, Goldstein, Indi, Mayo, Wentworth, North Sydney, Mackellar, Warringah and Curtin. And in 2022 election, they lost all those seats.
Previous prolific poster now just a lurker (I think there’s a “newer” Andrew now), I want to thank William and other contributors for the best auspol blog around.
And what joy to be free of the worst PM ever.
Thanks c@t you would remember Graham Richardson in 1980s saying they would appoint more ALP ministers from Qld when we stopped sending down dills. ALP seems to have learnt it’s lesson up here even if we can only get them up in my city of Brisbane. Laming, Canavan, Dutton, Barney, Robert,Pauline,back before he moved to NSW some of these guys from regional Qld would scare the Republican party We really send down some whoppers but in my defence Brisbane is closer to Sydney than many of these places. And you are right about Freya, if you lose one argument just move the goalposts ,typical conservative modus operandi.
”
C@tmommasays:
Thursday, May 26, 2022 at 7:16 am
You wonder how useless wastes of space like Marise Payne, get as far as they do in politics?
”
C@tmomma
Tell me one LNP Federal parliamentarian who is not because I don’t know much about all Federal LNP Parliamentarians and you are.
I am not going to clap at young people dying but had Kimberley Kitching been still alive, as it turned out she would have become our Joanne Manchin.
I think that there was some degree of Divine Providence in her demise.
Commercial radio news: Foreign Minister Penny Wong is travelling to Fiji on her first SOLO trip overseas.
Implying that she needed a chaperone until now? That’s the MSM for you.
And just to add, John Warhurst, of Norwood Football Club royalty, is once again on the money with his contribution
”
C@tmommasays:
Thursday, May 26, 2022 at 7:22 am
Some parties do have ’em:
The new federal MP for the Queensland seat of Flynn was a founding member of a club formed to promote climate science denial, and was a signatory to an international statement claiming “there is no climate emergency”.
Colin Boyce did not respond to questions as to whether he is still a member of the Saltbush Club, a group which published commentary during the election campaign that said the climate crisis is “a fraud”.
He would not say whether he still supported the “world climate declaration”, which he signed in 2019 alongside figures such as Ian Plimer. At the time he was the only Australian MP – state or federal – to publicly support the document, which repeats long-debunked talking points on climate change that are contradicted by scientific institutions and academies around the world.
Boyce, a one-time boilermaker who resigned as a Queensland MP to run for the federal parliament, shot to prominence during the election campaign when he said the Coalition’s net zero pledge was “flexible” and left “wiggle room”.
A search of Queensland Hansard showed that in his four and a half years in state parliament Boyce repeatedly criticised and rejected climate science.
In a 2019 speech, Boyce claimed that pollution-prevention measures in the Great Barrier Reef catchment were “based on flawed, manipulated science that is driven by a socialist political agenda”.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/may/26/new-coalition-mp-was-founding-member-of-club-promoting-climate-science-denial
And Peter Dutton is going to have to answer for this guy. He’s from Queensland and Dutton would have known him and approved his candidacy.
”
C@tmomma
What do they say in political advertisements in US. “I approve that message “. Is it possible Dutton said that for Boyce? 🙂
And one more thing. Boyce was a Tradie, who was captured by Howard idealogy.
The Lying Reactionaries have obviously learned nothing from their defeat. However, they can take comfort from knowing that the Labor-phobic Greens will be with them in the clinches.
I wonder if in the next election Climate 200 will promote Senate tickets. They should be getting ready. There will probably be a DD, following the obstruction of Labor’s program in climate change, anti-corruption and a first peoples’ parliamentary voice.
Boice has competition the bigest deal in canbra is qld lnp senator Gerard Rennick the leading anti vackser who makes hanson and kelley look sensable he spread rummers about fizar side effects on facebook with out checking acurasy qld also had jorje christinson bob catter and still has james mcgrath and yuntil tuesday vick libs had berney finn how can libs get elected
C@tmomma
What do they say in political advertisements in US. “I approve that message “. Is it possible Dutton said that for Boyce?
That’s the point. Wouldn’t he have had to? Being the most senior federal MP from Queensland you would think he could have stopped the candidacy of Colin Boyce dead in its tracks if he wanted to. That he didn’t says it all, really.
Princeplanet says:
Thursday, May 26, 2022 at 7:48 am
“During the 80s politics was all about capturing the centre ground, has Australia really changed so much that the LNP thinks they can win with a far right agenda? Freya thinks so, I’m not so sure.”
I don’t think I can recall a major party in Australia outright repudiating the centre of politics in the manner undertaken by the current Coalition.
Ven @ #56 Thursday, May 26th, 2022 – 8:25 am
I think we are in a transition phase, Ven, where Labor at least are picking some really well-qualified people to become MPs. Maybe the Coalition will catch up one day? 😉
Cronus,
It’s the Trumpian manifesto. However, Australia just proved last Saturday that we are not America.
Interesting useless fact/Easter egg in the Senate:
There will be Senator Barbara Pocock and Senator David Pocock.
There will also be Senator Pauline Hanson and Senator Sarah Hanson-Young.
Let’s hope none of them ever get into a fist fight with each other.
Steve Bloom at 6.05
Isabella has an Aussie-born mother!
But, I’d be ‘happy with Harry’ – as long as he became naturalised!
We could just have a somewhat-Australian hereditary head of state, with the same job description as G-G, just not appointed by, or answering to, the British monarch…
Morrison has shown what happens when leading MPs set out to control preselections. The NSW Liberal Party was essentially suspended for the election and is riven by intra-tribal dissension. This will probably get worse.
Dutton has not tried to exercise the same sway in Queensland. Very wisely. The LNP remain unified (albeit, in their stupidities) and are still electorally dominant in federal seats in that State.
”
Princeplanetsays:
Thursday, May 26, 2022 at 7:41 am
Looking at the new member for Flynn and knowing a bit about his history you’d have to say the Qld LNP sends some real dills to Canberra, but also the electors of this area have some questions to answer. Freya is living in Disneyland if he/ she thinks these guys are going to sweep back in in three years.
”
PP
A couple of weeks ago, I was responding to Cronus post and said that ALP should not depend upon QLD for any extra seats for their election victory in federal election. Their victory should come from other states. Any extra seats from QLD is a bonus.
And QLD didn’t surprise me. I am very disappointed with the way they voted but it is true to their form.
Thanks BK. Enormous effort. Fabulous writing from Flanagan; read it, save it, send to everyone you know, and don’t know, and then read it again.
There’s two things I’m saving for ever. That Flanagan piece, and the pic of Albo stepping out from the plane in Tokyo.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/morrison-government-s-fall-marks-end-of-howard-era-ascendancy-20220525-p5aod6.html
And they wheeled the fossil out, walking dead, the past embalmed. With that Deves woman!. As Grace Tame said, Deves was the package, Howard was what you got. She knew, Grace Tame knew.
By the way, before I have to go, if you didn’t watch Gillard last evening, and you didn’t did you, give it a go. There’s a bit of wash in time, but then she starts. She is so beautifully articulate, and a humanitarian of whom we can be so proud. One of our rare gifts to the world. The contrast with the detritus who are now nameless in my lexicon couldn’t be greater.
Here’s Julia (give it a few mins of worthwhile tribute to another of our great gifts to the world, David Cooper)
https://youtu.be/mP7ndM-oO04
This was blindingly obvious from the beginning, although some here were less than compassionate implying that if they weren’t back by a certain time it was the persons fault.
I know personally if I’d still been based in the UK, I would have been in serious trouble.
The pubs were shut, so I would have no work or accommodation, and I certainly wouldn’t have had the funds to cover the inflated airfares a return to Australia would have required.
Let’s see how long Dutton can maintain his new smile. All those never-before-used muscles will cramp up into a rictus grin sooner or later.
Bludging:
“… the Labor-phobic Greens …”
Show us on the doll where the bad Greens touched you.
bc @ 2:39 am
“I was just looking at Deborah O’Neill’s Wikipedia entry. I’m not sure what attribute puts her ahead of KK or Jenny McAllister?”
The attribute that puts her ahead of McAllister is her faction; the Right get the #1 and mostly-unwinnable #3 spot and the Left get #2.
As to what got her ahead of KK, you’ll need to ask the NSW Right.
Feels like we have scorched the earth on the Ms Keneally issues
Oliver: “Show us on the doll where the bad Greens touched you.”
In the 2007 and 2010 ALP governments.
I meet J W Howard in 1974, in Canberra when he had just been elected.. he was a prejudiced snivelling little shit then, he still is.
His Wikipedia says “ He was a commercial lawyer before entering parliament”, he was a snotty suburban conveyancing solicitor.
Goodness me re covid
Vic 19 deaths
NSW 30 deaths
Martin B @ #75 Thursday, May 26th, 2022 – 8:59 am
Nothing as nefarious as that. Simply it is that her base is the NSW Central Coast and a redoubt where Labor have been holding their own during the Coalition interregnum and building our fortunes back. We have essentially kept the Coalition at bay up here. So there’s that. 🙂
Cronus says:
Thursday, May 26, 2022 at 8:36 am
Princeplanet says:
Thursday, May 26, 2022 at 7:48 am
“During the 80s politics was all about capturing the centre ground, has Australia really changed so much that the LNP thinks they can win with a far right agenda? Freya thinks so, I’m not so sure.”
I don’t think I can recall a major party in Australia outright repudiating the centre of politics in the manner undertaken by the current Coalition.
————————
I suggest the problem is not that they repudiated it. They wrongly thought they WERE it. I assume they were in some sort of bubble in which the Murdercrats, Stokes’ outlets and Costello’s 9/Fairbfax plus the daily feed of the Shocks/Sky After Dark ALL told them they were in the centre. The polls had Morrison level pegging with Albanese on 2PP. The Coalition primaries are way ahead of Labor’s.
I suspect they got caught in the same way I got caught in terms of what I thought would happen: the extremes gained votes at the expense of the centre, assuming the centre is represented by by the two majors. In the case of the left the preferences of Labor, Teals and Greens reinforced each other reasonably well. In the case of UA and PHON (9% combined primary) was not nearly as effective.
IMO the ‘triumph of the progressives’ is a house built on shifting sands and on large degrees of uncertainty. The key to this? 77% of voters gave their primary vote to parties which promised no new taxes. Another 5% (Teals) carefully made no promises about taxes at all.
If Labor runs into the next election with unemployment starting with a six, inflation running at 10+, COL sky high, and a hundred thousand home owners with negative equity then Dutton will romp it in.
“And QLD didn’t surprise me. I am very disappointed with the way they voted but it is true to their form.”
Queensland did surprise me, as a lifelong Queenslander. And I am very delighted with the way they voted.
I recall a conversation here a few weeks back about reports that the LNP was in trouble in the ostensibly blue-ribbon Ryan: did that mean that Labor or the Greens were in contention? That question was answered decisively last Saturday.
Welcome to Greensland.
UK Cartoons:
As noted previously, poor behaviour by Plibersek.
It is good to see that she is not doing what Morrison ministers would have done – deny and/or double up. She has apologized, as she ought.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-05-26/peter-dutton-recast-image-tanya-plibersek-voldemort-comment/101100708
Seriously. He should f@@k right off.
Samantha Maiden
Former PM Scott Morrison reflects on 2GB re reasons why he lost.
“Sometimes people like to change the curtains, because they just like to change the curtains.” https://t.co/yFerbtNdhj
Victoria @ #85 Thursday, May 26th, 2022 – 9:15 am
Erm, no. 😐
Great overview from Richard Flanagan in The Age.
25 yrs of Howardism and the Murdochracy has greatly harmed this society.
Hopefully this new parliament can begin to instil a sense of decency, tolerance and fairness back into our communities.
‘Oliver Sutton says:
Thursday, May 26, 2022 at 9:14 am
“And QLD didn’t surprise me. I am very disappointed with the way they voted but it is true to their form.”
Queensland did surprise me, as a lifelong Queenslander. And I am very delighted with the way they voted.
I recall a conversation here a few weeks back about reports that the LNP was in trouble in the ostensibly blue-ribbon Ryan: did that mean that Labor or the Greens were in contention? That question was answered decisively last Saturday.
Welcome to Greensland.’
===============
Self-delusions abound. TPP to the Coalition is 54.3-45.7
‘Victoria says:
Thursday, May 26, 2022 at 9:15 am
Seriously. He should f@@k right off.
Samantha Maiden
Former PM Scott Morrison reflects on 2GB re reasons why he lost.
“Sometimes people like to change the curtains, because they just like to change the curtains.”’
——————–
Classic narcissism.
Victoria says:
Thursday, May 26, 2022 at 9:15 am
Seriously. He should f@@k right off.
Samantha Maiden
Former PM Scott Morrison reflects on 2GB re reasons why he lost.
“Sometimes people like to change the curtains, because they just like to change the curtains.” https://t.co/yFerbtNdhj
______________________________________
And sometimes people change the curtains because they are infested with deadly black mould.
Oliver Sutton says:
Thursday, May 26, 2022 at 8:56 am
Bludging:
“… the Labor-phobic Greens …”
Show us on the doll where the bad Greens touched you.
1. This is an insult to anyone who has been sexually assaulted.
2. Read the polemics of The Apostasy. They really very obviously hate Labor.
3. Consider the promises made by The Apostasy wrt Labor: that is, to blackmail them, to procure their betrayal.
Fuck the Greens.
C@tmomma says:
Thursday, May 26, 2022 at 8:37 am
Cronus,
“It’s the Trumpian manifesto. However, Australia just proved last Saturday that we are not America.”
+1, indeed we are not. We seem to have avoided the very worst aspects.
Beto O’Rourke talking truth to power. And power does not like it one little bit. Note the various aggressions in the background calls:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/may/25/beto-orourke-press-conference-abbott-texas-shooting
‘TPOF says:
Thursday, May 26, 2022 at 9:22 am
Victoria says:
Thursday, May 26, 2022 at 9:15 am
Seriously. He should f@@k right off.
Samantha Maiden
Former PM Scott Morrison reflects on 2GB re reasons why he lost.
“Sometimes people like to change the curtains, because they just like to change the curtains.” https://t.co/yFerbtNdhj
______________________________________
And sometimes people change the curtains because they are infested with deadly black mould.’
=================
And sometimes they pull down the whole house because of the corruption of thieves lurking in it.
Re Liberals “explaining” their loss…
I don’t think they’re likely to air many honest opinions publicly.
Moderates will say “we lost our heartland.”
The hard Right will say “we were too Left (look who lost.)”
They’ll stick to these lines for two reasons: 1) the struggle for factional control of the Party; 2) “talking” the electorate into believing the stated viewpoint.
FWIW, I think Boewar is right: if the economy tanks, Coalition could win in 3 years’ time – even without winning back Teal seats.
I also think Labor could make inroads in Qld, by managing the economy well and rolling out infrastructure that visibly creates jobs/opportunities in regional Qld.
Key question: can Labor both manage the economy well (probably) and BE SEEN to be managing the economy well (much more difficult, given the biased media environment)?
BK
Matthew Knott explains why Kristina Keneally’s parachute failed, and Andrew Charlton’s worked.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/why-kristina-keneally-s-parachute-failed-and-andrew-charlton-s-worked-20220525-p5aohi.html
—————-
Matthew Knott has “explained” that the reason Andrew Charlton won was because he faced a Liberal candidate (with a small effect of funding promises) and the reason Kristina Keneally lost was because she faced an independent candidate.
The character of the two candidates were not in any way a factor. He is saying that a thick plank would have won Parramatta for the ALP and the most charismatic candidate would have made no difference in Fowler.
He may well be right though it’s no endorsement of Andrew Charlton and it does conveniently excuse Kristina Keneally and the NSW Labor establishment of any and all responsibility.
NRA convention happening in Houston on Friday.
Apparently Governor Abbott, Ted Cruz and Trump were going to be in attendance to celebrate American Freedom.
Beyond nauseauting.
Mass murder has become a signal for RW mobilisation in the US. Dreadful really. They are very close to adopting the ritual celebration of mindless slaughter. Human sacrifice is practically a civic responsibility. The RW are absolutely depraved.
Rex Douglas at 9.20 re ’25 years of Howardism’…
Howard, like the C18th inventor of capitalism Adam Smith, understood the power of self-interest.
Self-interest is what makes capitalism work and what gives capitalism its energetic advantage over other systems.
Self-interest brings costs: global heating is simply the latest form of pollution.
Howard’s worst contribution? “Aspirational.”
A few elections ago I saw an ABC 730-type story about some undecided voters. One suburban couple said they’d make their final decision by getting the calculator out and working out which party was better for their household bottom line. No mention about the quality of society etc etc.
Theologians (along with a bunch of others) often say the measure of a society is in how it treats its most vulnerable members. This measure cuts across self-interest. The love of self-interest is often the root of great evil.
Morrison is being his usual disingenuous self. Toppling the Reactionaries is much more fun than changing the curtains. It’s really more like setting fire to the profanities, the deceits, the insults and the stupidities.