This site’s renowned BludgerTrack poll aggregate has been given a seasonal makeover, now boasting state-level federal polling trends for the five mainland states (Tasmania being almost entirely lacking in published data). Its principal insight is that Labor has – assuming always that the polls are to be believed – a problem on its hands in Victoria. Two-party swings in the other states are in a narrow band from 1.2% in Queensland to 2.1% in New South Wales, but the current reading for Victoria has it at 4.6%, enough to wipe out the advantage Labor has established there in recent years. Labor can take some comfort in the fact that the state is not rich in marginal seats, a uniform swing of that size being only sufficient to cost it Chisholm and McEwen.
The state-level measures are created by combining separate trend measures for national voting intention and the respective states’ deviations from it, the data for which can be accessed from the “poll data” tab at the top of the BludgerTrack page. The only comparable effort I’m aware of is The Guardian’s poll tracker, which also has trend measures for a range of other demographic indicators, though it doesn’t seem to be drawing on too many data points for some of them. The big difference overall between the two is that The Guardian assumes the polls to be very heavily skewed to Labor, particularly on the primary vote, and duly points to a fairly comfortable Coalition win. BludgerTrack assumes the polls to be broadly accurate, particularly Newspoll and the related entities of Pyxis and YouGov, and has for some time pointed to a near dead heat on two-party preferred.
The imminence of a federal election notwithstanding, there is inevitably not much to report this time of year, although a The West Australian yesterday related that a very firm view had taken hold within Labor’s WA branch that the Prime Minister plans to call an election for April very shortly after the state election is held on March 8. It was also revealed yesterday that Victoria’s state by-election for Werribee will be held concurrently with the Prahran by-election on February 8.
Paul ‘A’ , you are an extreme RWNJ, and i have no problems with DEI initiatives, which you attack. There is nothing wrong with giving people a go.
Rainman – thanks. I’ve been on the site about six months and know about Boer and his biases.
Nadia88 – i’ve read the posts before you dropped off the site. Don’t let them get you down. They are worthless posters, the one’s who attack you, so just ignore them.
Please come back, at least for the election, when you ready.
Cheers, Vladimir
A further bit of disaster trivia I learned today – most of the houses in Los Angeles that burned down were made of wood because simply that’s the most plentiful and relatively safest material to build free-standing houses with there. There’s no quarries nearby for stoneworks, plus there’s a very high risk of earthquakes, so it has to be timber. And so that’s how so many of them burned down in these freak fires.
paul Asays:
Friday, January 10, 2025 at 9:40 pm
The L.A. fires mess looks like a series of incompetence after incompetence.
The Mayor was overseas holidaying in Ghana – although that is now being dressed up as some sort of diplomatic issue. Apparently U.S. Mayors are now engaged in overseas diplomacy, probably only if they are Democrat Mayors.
No water in the fire hydrants – difficult to put out a fire without water. I suppose they can get the firemen to stand around and piss on the blaze, but wait for it, the LAFD is “wracked to pieces” with DEI initiatives.
=================================================
Yes we all know African Americans are better athletically and make much more competent fire fighters. Unfortunately under the DEI initiatives some lazy white trailer trash does need to be employed too. It does help with social cohesion though.
Thank god the LA Lakers don’t need to abide by DEI hiring laws like the LAFD does.
So, the Australian cricket team will play Afghanistan on February 28.
“The Federal Government has joined calls for world cricket’s governing body to stand up to Afghanistan but fell short of demanding Australia boycott a match against that nation next month.”
Bullshit and pathetic.
Afghani women can’t take their children to the park. Afghani women can’t talk outside of their houses. Afghani women can’t leave the house unless they are covered by a sack. Afghani women who don’t have husbands sit in the street and beg for bread.
How is this any better than apartheid South Africa?
Providing people are trained effectively then I fail to see how DEI initiatives could be held responsible for the LA disaster. At times nature is just so savage it is limited what can be done. It appears a number of terrible factors just came together to bring about the disaster.
Entropy @ #1903 Friday, January 10th, 2025 – 10:19 pm
You know with these MAGA fuckers it’s going to eventually get to the point where they’ll gladly reverse it around in their minds so they’ll apply their own DEI prejudices in one situation or another so that their preferred race/sex/identity get the most of theirs out alive at the expense of those that they frankly don’t care much about.
Which reminds me, nobody was actually punished for how things happened in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, right?
777 from earlier on…
I think your profile of PB is somewhere near the mark.
Labor support here ranges from the “nobody does it better” through to realistic concerns about Labor policies and their impacts.
Beyond this we have the (mainly) Green dreamers and beyond this a smallish group of genuine contributors from the Liberal side .
But after this, it is all downhill into the regions of the rabid right/looney left lot.
Fortunately, the scroll button is handy to pass over the stirrers, malcontents and just plain aggressive/persistent souls who bring their comments but leave their brain somewhere else.
Kirsdarke & Vlad
No one on the right is concerned about whether an applicant is white, asian, black, gay or a fucken vegetarian. It’s about getting people into a job based upon merit. Pushing people up through the ranks based upon their inherent ethnicity/sexuality/gender or other characteristics alone, is in fact discriminatory.
If someone is capable of doing the job, great. But the determinant shouldn’t be their gender etc etc etc, or their political ideology. This pathway leads only to the collapse of an organisation.
You’ve seen a lot of private sector firms abandon DEI initiatives. Boeing, I believe, closed it all down just before Christmas. Gov’t sectors and the universities are a different space. They are run by the left, so that will take some time to break down.
The pair of you completely misread the DEI space. If you’re into it, well vote accordingly, but you have to understand there is a significant subset of the population who are opposed. You can call them all sorts of names like “MAGA fuckers”, if that makes you feel good when you press the “enter” key, but it doesn’t change the way they vote.
… and Vlad – sorry vladimir. PB is not a quasi dating site. It’s a politics site. Bit cheesy of you.
If posters decide to drop off the site, they drop off. It ain’t hotel California.
But for what it’s worth, I too hope she comes back. She is a very prescient poster, and not bad on the old sports tips either.
paul Asays:
Friday, January 10, 2025 at 10:51 pm
Kirsdarke & Vlad
No one on the right is concerned about whether an applicant is white, asian, black, gay or a fucken vegetarian.
==================================================
Doing well to just before vegetarian, then your obvious right wing prejudices could no longer be contained it seems.
Steve777says:
Friday, January 10, 2025 at 7:30 pm
”how closely does PB mirror Australian society?”
I don’t think that it would be close. For a start a majority of PB posters vote and support Labor, way more than the general community.
_____________________
Have always had a theory that it does even out a bit after 6pm and on the weekends when the Liberals have knocked off from work.
Not many Liberals on the Monday to Friday dayshift. That shift is for retirees, pensioners and public servants logging on during working hours.
Day shift/night shift….
Lot depends on what time it says on the local clock.
The ghouls and ghosties come out after 9 pm WA time on PB for the most part.
Time for most to be elsewhere.
Merit based employment does not exist because all hiring managers and recruiters have likes and dislikes and most jobs are obtained through networking but DEI can be misused but has a role in helping marginalised groups into employment.
I’m not a “Green dreamer” have no affilation to them, if Labor was still a labour party I’d vote for them. It’s hard to identify what the Labor, or Liberal party represents now, they are both very disconnected from voters.
Some here can’t handle negative predictions about Labor but there’s a chance Nadia might be right.
The way it’s looking Albo has little to stand on to be reelected and has no known immediate or future agenda. Labor would be best to go to an election sooner rather than later in that context. Albo lucked himself into the role of PM but is clearly unsuitable. As is Dutton who may ride that wave.
Come back Nadia!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UofYl3dataU
The hacks like to drive people like Nadia away, she may come back in spite of them.
paul Asays:
Saturday, January 11, 2025 at 12:02 am
Yep, looks like I’m getting deleted
Farewell all
=========================================
Only your last topic and news source was deemed to extreme. Your earlier posts are still there.
mj says:
Friday, January 10, 2025 at 11:44 pm
The way it’s looking Albo has little to stand on to be reelected and has no known immediate or future agenda. Labor would be best to go to an election sooner rather than later in that context. Albo lucked himself into the role of PM but is clearly unsuitable. As is Dutton who may ride that wave.
****************************
Governments are getting turfed out everywhere. Apologists keep saying that it’s not their fault that the economics of it all is beyond their control. Of course it’s their fault. All this centrist bullshit makes me want to puke. Capitalism has failed the people. People are struggling to get by while unelected billionaires just keep getting fatter and richer and even now start interfering in other countries’ politics.
Well i have to say, that was swift.
When the guillotine drops, it drops.
Thanks Entropy, if you had a hand in it.
Thanks Mr WB.
Vladsays:
Saturday, January 11, 2025 at 12:23 am
Well i have to say, that was swift.
When the guillotine drops, it drops.
Thanks Entropy, if you had a hand in it.
Thanks Mr WB.
===================================================
Nothing to do with me. Though like you i thought it was a dodgy article, to say the least. In the end it’s WB’s call to determine where the boundaries of acceptable discussion should occur and end on this site.
Rainmansays:
Saturday, January 11, 2025 at 12:14 am
mj says:
Friday, January 10, 2025 at 11:44 pm
The way it’s looking Albo has little to stand on to be reelected and has no known immediate or future agenda. Labor would be best to go to an election sooner rather than later in that context. Albo lucked himself into the role of PM but is clearly unsuitable. As is Dutton who may ride that wave.
****************************
Governments are getting turfed out everywhere. Apologists keep saying that it’s not their fault that the economics of it all is beyond their control. Of course it’s their fault. All this centrist bullshit makes me want to puke. Capitalism has failed the people. People are struggling to get by while unelected billionaires just keep getting fatter and richer and even now start interfering in other countries’ politics.
______________________
Yeah, but what does this have to do in Australia? Since 2022, the worker share of national income has been rising (reversing a falling trend), wages are rising faster that profits, and union membership share is up for the first time since 2011.
Why are you fighting foreign culture wars here?
Hi Bizzcan,
I have no interest in culture wars, foreign or otherwise. In democracies around the world, people have lost patience with do nothing centrist free market governments. People understand that there is a crisis – economic, environmental or ongoing existential wars. Centrist governments just keep telling people that everything is fine and their party hack fans just abuse their critics as being stupid. But the reality is either a world wide swing to the far right or the far left.
Am I wrong?
Rainman says:
Saturday, January 11, 2025 at 12:57 am
Am I wrong?
____________________________________________
Yes, you are.
Because we currently have a government that tried to tell the Australian public things are not fine, and is getting punished viciously for it.
It tried to tell Australians that the conditions of indigenous people were unacceptable … 60% rejection of the Voice.
It tries to make Australians stakeholder in the renewables transition … policies for re-industrialization and battery minerals blocked and dismissed as “interventionist”. Farmers protesting against transmission lines, green groups fighting against offshore wind, and so much more.
Policies that improve worker bargaining power? Dismissed as increasing costs for business and “jobs for union mates”
Record hiring and spending in health and education? Dismissed as inflationary.
And so yeah, I’m frustrated, frustrated that every time Labor proposes some sensible step forward there is some massive media and political pile on … happened to the MRRT, Carbon Tax, the 2019 election proposals, hell we even just saw a Qld Labor government turfed because it raised coal taxes!
I think you misunderstand “people”, most Australians don’t want those issues solved, they wanted them to “go away”, hence why we saw a decade of LNP “resets” to great electoral effect.
And so we currently have a Labor government falling back and doubling down on what it knows – workers. It is hiring health and education workers left right and center (good), it is boosting construction and infrastructure (good to mixed), it is supporting mining jobs (good, to mixed, to bad). Hence why I highlighted that the conditions for Australian workers are improving.
I’m not going to dismiss your comments as stupid, I just simply state that grand statements about “centralist capitalist” governments are not a helpful (or accurate) diagnosis in the Australian economic context.
I’ll restate that we currently have a government that has put workers above all others – for good or for bad. Workers are being put ahead both billionaires and welfare recipients, workers are being put ahead of renters and retirees, perhaps even ahead of the environment. But that’s how we get to a world of policy by stealth – a renewables transition happening by stealth, a resetting of our international relations by stealth, re-empowering of workers by stealth.
Because when it comes to the alternatives, what you call the far left and far right are frauds and shysters promising painless change – all their hopes and dreams for not a penny more or a single job lost.
PB has always been dominated by Labor supporters, with a smattering of Greens in there too. Of course that isn’t reflective of the electorate as a whole.
If Nadia has left the blog, that is a tremendous shame because I always find her comments about polling to be analytical and insightful.
The problem with PB is a few regular posters who all barrack loudly for one side of politics love to throw their weight around and act as if they run the joint – the intimidation directed at anyone who questions the prevailing orthodoxy always was there, but it has gotten worse in recent times.
New thread.
@Democracy Sausage.
Agreed – seems to be more far left posters on here than any right leaning ones.
EG: Barely anyone has mentioned Governor Gavin Newsom or Mayor Karen Bass by name when talking about the L.A. Fires – even though while not responsible for the actual fires, were responsible for the handling of it which was terrible.
Hardly a ripple from anyone about either of them on here – had they been Republican politicians, no doubt their names would have been bandied about far more than anyone else. Seems 1 law for the left, etc. No fair balance at all from most of the regular posters on here – who are often wrong.