Courtesy Possum, Labor has a web ad about Abbott circulating in record time:
Taking Australia Backwards from Australian Labor on Vimeo.
The use of the medium strikes me as a bit like Howard in 2007, hoping it’ll get picked up by the mainstream media and get a run for free.
But it does nicely encapsulate the overall theme that Labor will undoubtedly use to attack an Abbott-led Coalition: he was part of, thoroughly endorses, and in some ways has even more hardline views on the things that the Coalition were voted out for, and was installed by the faction in his party explicitly for his stance that he’d go back to the past on one of these key issues – even if it wasn’t the one that the ad chose to focus on.
So what is Abbott going to try to do in response to this line? And should Labor give him any time to wiggle away from his past?
So the ALP which has sold out unions nationally and especially here in QLD expects us to take it seriously. The ALP should hang its head in shame with the way it betrays unions. Look at how it sucks up to big business. Look at how it banned the teachers strike in QLD. Look at how Bligh sold the assets and sold out the unions. As a unionst I have nothing but contempt for Bligh and the federal ALP and they will be last on my ballot paper. They are Liberals in nicer clothes. At least Abbott is more honest.
They probably prepared three of these. Somewhere in the archives will be equivalent ads for Hockey and Turnbull.
Undoubtedly.
What themes would they have used?
They can tar all three with workchoices. In the case of Hockey they could have gone the angle that he might be that nice bloke on Sunrise but the hard right put him into the job, and Turnbull the fact that half his party hates him.
Just a guess.
That’s going to be a minus for the ALP. They should of just let Abbott talk himself into the ground without attacking him right away. By doing so they’ve given him legitimacy.
It wasn’t a good look when the Lib’s did it to Rudd.
If Labor just relies on Abbott’s record they will sound pretty stuck too.And the Electorate just turns off.Meanwhile there are many promises not meeting the light of day,and this will be telling!From my perspective both Gillard and Rudd are election liabilities.The ALP has stuck its head into Globalism whilst its arse drops out.Soccer,and visits by American Presidents don’t make the grade as convincing leadership.
Concern trolling, yawn.
This line of attack could work wonders against Abbott. I think the man is highly unusual in the way he he continually defines himself against the ALP and the unions (this evening he told David Speers on Sky that the Liberals don’t have Labor’s ‘Stalinist’ discipline.)
That sort of excessive tribalism doesn’t go across very well with soft voters. A Turnbull could, perhaps, finesse his just-below-the-surface support for maintaining individual contracts. Abbott will just turn it around and go all seventies ‘turn on the lights’ against the socialists as his first defence. And that’s a strategy that only worked for the tories when they had the shambolic old labour movement to run against.
I agree with Nickws that Abbott will be quite vulnerable to this line of attack.
However it will also serve to cement behind him some wavering Liberal support. If the ALP take Abbott this seriously, it gives him tonnes of street-cred as Liberal Party leader.
SATP
“it gives him tonnes of street-cred as Liberal Party leader.”
Pity the party has lost all cred with his elevation to sacrificial lamb/goat.
I think they saw this coming – Abbott’s line has already been ‘don’t judge me on the past, but on what I do now’.
Not that it’s likely to help him much.
I think it is a mistake to target Abbott in THIS WAY, attractive as this may seem but it is simpleminded and primitive and it sells the average punter way short. That is because:
1. It will quickly start to lose its edge and people will regard it as aural wallpaper devoid of real world meaning; and this is because…
2. Tony Abbott is not the government; furthermore, he has just become leader by a single dodgy vote, so he is not yet legitimate in people’s eyes; yet this is a reprise of a union campaign against a government and real laws; so…
3. This legitimises Abbott as a real threat with government-like powers, which he does not have; besides…
4. No election has been called, and in any case, if one will be called soon it will be fought on response to climate change (one would have thought – or what was the last few days all about?) and not on WorkChoices – a battle that was won;
4. And in any case, it was Joe Hockey who was Minister for WorkChoices, and he and Julie Bishop made the running on it, not Abbott who was Health and Education spokesman so in the punters’ minds he is not identified with it;
5. And this ad campaign looks a lot like it was thought up by Karl Bitar and the ALP Right in NSW, not exactly the electorate’s fav people at the moment
6. So WTF is this ridiculous ad all about? It is distracting the political battle from the main game, which is global warming; the ALP was gifted tremendous political capital and it is pissing it away;
7. If they must run ads, target Minchin and portray him as the puppetmaster who orchestrates the captive Liberals.
This is foolish in the extreme.
@9
Oh I don’t know. It’s a long way to the election but I think the ALP would be stupid not to keep the aura of extreme edginess that currently envelopes the Liberals nice and shiny, which this ad does nicely. Shine on you crazy Liberals.
At his stage the add is a cheap shot. It will have more relevance when it becomes clearer to what extent “Abbot the opposition leader” differs from “Abbot the coalition hit man”. My reading of today’s vote is that a clear majority of the party is not hard right and will resent any attempt by Abbot to go back to the past.
It is also hard to interpret what the CPRS vote meant – I suspect it did not represent a vote against climate action, merely the means.
Interesting times.
The negative commercials the libs ran on Rudd backfired because Eudd was still a cleanskin and people were tired of the Howard libs and their smear/scare campaigns anyway.
This Abbott ad is what that Abbott is about, and its already in the public domain and has been for years from Abbott’s own mouth. This ad isn’t telling the public anything it doesn’t already know. Just reinforcing it. It may have an effect on swinging voters, for sure.
I agree. Why give the mamonk the cred by even entertaining this ad. Karl Bitar has some explaining to do to those members who actually forked out the cash for the campaign.
I tend to think its a bit early in the piece to be running these sorts of ads. You don’t want to generate sympathy for the guy by jumping him with silly little set pieces like this so quickly.
Better to save those for the election campaign, after Abbott’s credibility has already been taken apart by the media and in parliament, wedge issue by wedge issue, backflip by backflip.
I guess even his own daughter has called him a ”lame, gay churchy loser” though
Time to start Copenhagen/Wong/Green threads. This Liberal thing has run out of legs.
I don’t understand why people are afraid of this putative attack campaign turning out badly. At first glance it doesn’t appear any more ridiculous (or as ridiculous) as the Coalition running against interest rates from previous ALP governments at the ’04 election.
If the focus groups react shockingly to this line of attack then the government will just keep it online & in targeted mailouts to specific demos (mark my words, that US style targeted electioneering will be here in either 2010 or 2013, if it isn’t already). I don’t see a backlash against Your Rights at Work throwing the next election to the Coalition, not after that message helped beat them last time around.
Nickws, I guess you risk making a fundamental if not fatal electoral error in both your comparisons in the USA and the 2007 election. In both cases the next Australian federal election will be very different. And I am happy about that.
Apologies Nickws that is to say I am happy we are differnet in those two regards. I want vitality in the political system in Australia. To simply repeat 2007 election (altough I would be more than happy to help remove Howard again just that he isn’t there and the bloke I helped get elected is makes it tricky) or to cut/paste USA I would be very unhappy with.
To be fair, Sir Henry – they’ve only had 10 minutes to work on this one!
Heard a woman on local radio today who had been Abbott’s media advisor. She reckons he is more three-dimensional than his image so far and expects that this will emerge.
She says he’s very intelligent, works hard and is good at working with others to come up with consensus positions.
She admitted that he has rough edges and says things he shouldn’t. Reckons he’ll have to watch his talk without becoming too polished and too much like a ‘politician’.
I think she said she was going to send him some board shorts for Christmas. She definitely didn’t approve of the Speedo pix.
Steve, the 2007 federal election was ‘Americanised’ by Labor in that they received a huge amount of support from a non-party campaign organisation, Your Rights @ Work.
I’m talking about Labor following that up by (a.) keeping controversial ads on the Internet, instead of broadcasting them on TV and radio, or putting them in newsprint—a practice already done in Oz elections–and (b.) using direct marketing techniques to indentify potential voters using consumer research.
I think if (b.) is used here by next year’s election then this is the kind of ‘direct mail’ message that the ALP will send out to selected households, households chosen because they meet the profile of being susceptible to this kind of message.
The ETS attacks jobs in industries that historically are highly unionised ALP territory. That is why the ALP is keen to remind people about workchoices fear and attempt to associate it with Abbott.
Brian @ 22 – interesting that that’s Annabel Crabb’s take on him too, and I think she has a pretty good built in bs detector. Interesting too that in his interview with Kerry O’B this evening he was much more fluent, less of those mannered pauses. Has he been working on that? Forgetting what he actually said (as if one could!) he came across well, clean cut and smiling. For all his athleticism he is an intelligent man, a Rhodes scholar, with the plus of a Jesuitical training. The left would be wise not write him off too soon. He’s dangerous all right, and ruthless. I think he’s been planning and waiting for this opportunity. He’s seized it and he’ll hang on by fair means and foul.
What a contrast with Sloppy Joe who literally tripped over himself and conceded perhaps it wasn’t his time. (Will it ever be?) One senses a renewed vigour in the Libs already. Come home soon, Kev, we need you! These off the cuff ads by the party hacks won’t do the job.
Nickws, data mining and tailored direct mailing was I think first used systematically by the Liberals in 2004. Their direct mail campaign in the marginals esp. that election was factors in quantity and quality beyond what had gone before. I think I rec’d at least 7-10 personalised letters from John himself.
Dear Jo, I’m just writing to you about….insert…….
Agree with Sir Henry, bottom drawer negative election-only type campaign advert. Gives him immediate cred as some scary opposition leader. If they were going to run anything they should have started with the current campaign using his own words showing as Mal himself pointed out – he’s held every position on the CPRS and the position is he holding now is merely Minchin’s. Like durr. Not scary.. just a sexist clod and sock puppet.
If the Govt aren’t going to climb down and confront the right’s ETS talking points – ‘it’s just a tax, plenty time, no-one else doing it, Rudd big noting himself’ and instead rely on workchoices…watch the polls close.
And that’s a damning piece of the puzzle re: Minchin & his tobacco denialism – used right, that should be a devastating line of attack.
Brian @ 22 – interesting that that’s Annabel Crabb’s take on him too, and I think she has a pretty good built in bs detector. Interesting too that in his interview with Kerry O’B this evening he was much more fluent, less of those mannered pauses. Has he been working on that? Forgetting what he actually said (as if one could!) he came across well, clean cut and smiling. For all his athleticism he is an intelligent man, a Rhodes scholar, with the plus of a Jesuitical training. The left would be wise not write him off too soon. He’s dangerous all right, and ruthless. I think he’s been planning and waiting for this opportunity. He’s seized it and he’ll hang on by fair means and foul.
What a contrast with Sloppy Joe who literally tripped over himself and conceded perhaps it wasn’t his time. (Will it ever be?) One senses a renewed vigour in the Libs already. I hope their confidence is as ill founded as the pundits predict and that Bob Hawke is right. But Tony Abbott didn’t look or sound very temporary to me this evening.
And just to finish up on the Mal thang…now that he is apparently going to stick around on the back-bench, this outcome and the whole Lib Leadership saga would have put a spoke in…..the Wentworth ALP campaign wheel!
Two weeks ago when he was the unscrupulous Utegate, anti-stimulus conviction-less Opp. leader there was a chance of stealing the slightly cursed jewel of Wentworth away from him, if Labor could draft a star-recruit a la Maxine.
Forget it now – he’s now the ultimate progressive Liberal martyr and climate warrior..with a swing towards as a reward probs.
I concur with Sir Henry @10. If they’re not a threat, don’t attack ‘em. Waste of time and energy building up your opponent with unearned attention.
However, if you do decide to get right stuck into your political opponents while they’re fumbling around in a corner of the ring for something to either drink and/or pour over themselves – then constantly referring to Tony A. as “Mr Abbott” is a smart dehumanizing move.
SATP: “it gives him tonnes of street-cred as Liberal Party leader.”
Probably the one thing we can all really learn from Australian political history is that the idea of “street-cred” never ever works for the Tories. Meanwhile Labor assumes “street cred” automatically flows to them.
In both cases it’s a blindfolded dork milking whatever sticks out of the nearest quadruped in the hope it may one day be passed off as cream.
Tony Abbott is a person who unreservedly will say anything at all if he thinks it is what people want to hear and it will enable him to win. And when he is cornered he simply says “well I was wrong at the time”, as was seen in his victory speech, knowing full well that the hurdle was crossed, he has won, and there is no going back. Watch as he now flip flops from climate denier to climate activist apparent, manouvering around all obstacles. First Turnbull, next CPRS, then onto Rudd. There is no place for decent people with compulsive liars, as I believe Abbott to be, in positions of power.
And he has plenty of material to work with. The CPRS is junk legislation. Anyone who believes that you can apply a tax as a deterent, then give all of the proceeds back in the form of compensation, and still achieve something, has rocks in their head. Apart from that the whole thing is too clever by half to the extent that no one understands it, or believes that it will do anything. The whole CPRS promotion is taking on the feel and tone of Bush’s “weapons of mass destruction” sales pitch. And the public now know how many of those there were, and how successful that battle plan worked. The only thing working in the CPRS’s favour is that there are other equally confused governments singing the same song. But for how long.
Yes, there is plenty of doubt for Abbott to work with, and anyone as unconstrained by reality and honesty as he is, will have a field day. Abbott is a massive problem for Rudd. And they both know it.
I agree with that point BilB. CHagning people’s behaviour with the CPRS is not going to work. The poor and the concerned already turn their appliances off at the wall when not using them, lie on the bathroom tiles on 40 degree days instead of using t keep throwing clothes and/or blankets on in winter instead of using heaters. They are already saving power because to some of them it’s all about saving every last penny.
But do you seriously think the rich are going to be fussed and use their toys less? I don’t think so. If Abbott is smart he’ll try to reframe the debate as a tax on the poor rather than trying to save the planet.
The Path Forward
As big a danger as Abbott is, he is also the key opportunity. Abbott is committed to defeating the CPRS in the Senate. This should be allowed to happen thereby laying the path for a double dissolution election.
This means that the CPRS, a complex solution built within an economic philosophy now substantially discredited by economic collapse even before the legislative ink has dried, can be walked away from without loss of face, and a simpler more direct approach to climate change mitigation can be engaged. The election will renew the mandate and fences with key allies (Greens) can be mended in the process while further marginalising the key detractors (Liberal rabble).
To take any other course would be to slide into a slow, but certain, political decline as: interest rates increase, living costs increase, fuel supplies become less certain and more expensive, drought and other adverse climate events demoralise people, moving populations apply border pressure, water becomes more scarce, possible double dip global recession establishes, and etc. All providing endless attack material for an unprincipled aggressive political opposition. Who can forget Howard’s yapping slobering hyenas with Abbott centre stage, and those disgusting parliamentary displays. Urrphh, I, for one, never want to see our house of parliament demeaned in that way again.
Like so many others I laughed, mocked and ‘tweeted’ about the election of Abbott as opposition leader. Today I’ve woken up with this queasy butterfly-ridden stomach.
I think Bilb maybe right: Abbott could turn out to be a big problem for Rudd and the ALP.
A couple of points:
* as people have recognized, this is unlikely to appear on broadcast TV.
& tssk, you may have noticed that all the household compensation in the CPRS goes to the less well-off. Low-to-middle income households will be fully compensated. The CPRS doesn’t have to hit real incomes to work, it just needs to rejigger the relative prices of things such that lower-carbon options become more attractive than higher-carbon ones.
* I’ve never bought into the view that Tony Abbott was dumb. He’s plainly not. His problem is that his policy views are unlikely to be acceptable to the majority of the Australian electorate.
Fast. It’s almost like they’re scared or something.
Talk about all the concern trolling on this thread. Its a wonder that some of you are not hired as master political strategists by the powers that be.
Its about defining the new leader and driving the narrative. The ALP wants people (Media) asking Abbott question after question about workchoices and IR. It blunts any attack on taking action on climate change as a jobs killer. And opens up the possibility, remote though, of Abbott saying something silly about IR/workplace reform (which I think he may have already done).
Yep. Labor needs to be out there and running to counter all the chances Abbott has to say “tax”. The advertisement is just fine.
Robert, if you work backwards through your point *1 and work out who there is left CPRS uncompensated and you will start to understand why the Abbotts and the Minchins of the world are prepared to say anything at all, regardless of whether they believe their own drivel or not, to defeat this legislation. Or any legislation for that matter.
One of the many problems that I have with the CPRS is encapsulated in the “relative prices” comment. So much of Australian commerce is built around buying complete product from China for one dollar and retailing the same goods for twenty dollars. In that structure the price of carbon or electricity is irrelevent. Business simply adjusts by finding an ever cheaper supplier of goods. And China appears to have and endless supply of alternative manufacturers. When China looses flexibility there will be India. If, for example, I want to buy a 4 inch grinding machine (hand tool) for dressing my stainless steel the price range is from $600 all the way down to $25. Marginal price adjustments mean absolutely nothing when there is that much flexibility.
Hearing Penny Wong experiencing permanent interjection last night in Senate committee before the break, is a reminder of where the parliament is heading with Abbott in control. This is his idea of considered debate. Disrupt, confuse, lie where necessary, move on.
Bill: that should suggest to you that energy is not a major component of the cost of that grinding tool.
Robert. I know that the low income earners will be compensated. You know. All of us here know. I haven’t sseen it mentioned on the Daily Telegraph pages. In the time you or I or anyone else can explain it the opposition can say “$120 billion new tax” ten times.
The phalangists have taken over the asylum. Once the 2 new members arrive and Fran Bailey’s back, Malcolm should roll the A-Bot.
Sir Henry @10 I agree the ad is foolish, it’s also pretty lame. Their is plenty of specific Abbott history you could nail him on but Dotty Daphon @33 expresses my thoughts almost perfectly.
Chris Anderson @36 What concern trolling?
If Abbott is so much better than he seems and so much more electorally appealing than he was in previous elections, then he owes Howard and the liberal party a big apology for tanking all those years.
I’m in agreement with Sir Henry (if I may be so familiar) at #10, plus other reasons pointed out by other comments.
Joyce’s fillibuster rant at the close of the session in Senate last night was the first campaign speech of Fed Election ’10. The slogan will be CPRS = Massive New Tax. It will feed into a conservative strategy of colouring the ALP as big spenders, reckless with the economy, and responsible for rising interest rates.
Abbott continued Joyce’s narrative this morning on AM, going so far as to say he did not support either the CPRS or a carbon tax. This is what the ALP must focus on – the Coalition has nothing to offer in terms of what economic adjustments have to happen; we have to respond to the threat of climate change; we don’t have time to dither; a broad-based scheme such as CPRS (for all its faults) will spread the cost. Focusing on Workchoices as the main line of attack will not blunt the savagery of the Coalition screaming new tax, new tax, ALP big spenders.
Abbott is a far right ideologue and imho his leadership is logical. it’s a return to base right ideas – racist, anti-abortion, anti-women, anti anti anti…this appeals to a party in defeat and disarray since last election. he is not “the past”..he’s the opposition leader and he’s one of the few real facists in Australian politics, because of this he’s very dangerous…in the same way that the BNP is dangerous in the UK…he will bring back hanging if he can…he’s that insane..and many post-one nation flag wearing aussies and disaffected white christian youth will go with him……he will push harder and faster than howard ever did if he gets the chance…he’ll align himself squarely with the nationals (just listen to joyce’s elation) and he’ll die on his sword rather than give up what he just won….we need to be vigilant, otherwise he’ll win the big one – he represents a strongly held set of Australian Values – and new labor is vulnerable, Rudd is, after all, an administrator not a visionary – he needs a very very hard hitter now on the front bench – just as Howard had Abbott.
Abbott is a religious Zealot whose homophobic and anti-women quotes are on record. He is unelectable outside of the USA, so I don’t know why anyone would even have the slightest concern about that he poses any threat to the ALP.
I think ALP strategists should dig up the footage of him from a few years ago on the 7.30 report when it was still hosted by O’Brien. Kezza quizzed him about apparently taking political advice from George Pell. The cameras were still running after the interview, and caught the mad monk frothing at the mouth telling O’Brien that he was going to go to hell for what he did. It was hilarious, and really exposed Abbott as the insane fringe dweller he is.
@ 46 “telling O’Brien that he was going to go to hell for what he did”…yes indeed that in itself is the reason he’s such a threat to new labor….he means it….
oh and, forgive me..he’s not a bloody fringe dweller he’s the leader of her majestys’ opposition
That’s a lot of antis, Eric. Why don’t you just out with what you’re thinking and say he’s the antichrist?
Ah c’mon people, this is lefty self-doubt taken too far. It’s a fucking shit sheet on youtube, not an Archibald entry.
I recognise Tony Abbott, in Hunter Thompson’s famous words, in my blood. He’s my kind of people. He’s to the Liberals as Latham was for us: and I liked Latho because he was the first ALP leader who was prepared to speak and act like he actually, genuinely, intelligently hated the other lot. He was the most conviction-led ALP leader in the last decade, he went to the polls on issues he himself chose, and he got caned like a dusty carpet in spring.
Abbott’s an ideological warrior of just the same deep convictions and long held hatreds, who’d much rather the other side lose than his side win. That’s going to come across in his campaign no matter how disciplined his team is.
Think of the ALP selecting as Latham again as Leader or worse an inner-city beret-wearing smartarse like me and you’ll start to imagine how Abbott’s going to come across in the unengaged electorate. The next election’s going to be absolutely brutal.
have you guys lived in Australia long? cause it sounds like you don’t know the place that well.
One difficulty that does come from the advertisements approach is from the use of the term “extreme”. That traditionally has been used against the Greens by all parties and fringe groups.
It might mean that it has the effect of devaluing that previously effective branding.
Liam, consider the possibility that Abbott becomes PM, performing his version of “truth” and reality on the international stage. That is the kind of thing that starts wars and isolates one people from another. If you think that that could not happen then you are not seeing the sorry lot of State leaders in about 30% of the world not to mention the US re-electing Bush. War, Isolation, convince me that that is not possible.
The neglible leverage of a marginal increase of a marginal cost was the very point, Robert.
From ABC on Abbott’s climate change directions:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/12/02/2759303.htm?section=justin
Stating that the government has now NO electoral mandate to go forward on CPRS or ETS,
“We’re now in a pre-election period.Their mandate I guess eventually expires and is replaced by our desire to provide the people with a contest, and that’s what they’re going to get under my leadership.”
Presumably the magical moment for that expiration occurred yesterday at 10am with Abbott winning the Lib leadership.
Interestingly, “Mr Abbott decided to stand for the leadership after several MPs and senators said they were inundated with emails from the public urging them to block the ETS.” Several? A party’s position is reversed because of several spooked MPs and senators? Can we look forward then to political parties changing policy because of an email chain?
O’Brien said to Abbott that he will be going to the next election without any climate change policies. Abbott replied that the lebierals will have a climate change policy, just that it won’t be a unilateral one.
The hypocricy of Abbott is amazing. Where is this guy you are all telling me about who has convictions and is some kind of policy devotee?
“The science isn’t in… Anyway, Howard’s ETS was different… global warming is crap… we are going to look bad in the next elections if we are more brown on the environment than Hoaward was in the last election”….etc, etc
Abbott has been all over the shop on this issue and I don’t believe it is a strong held belief of his that has propelled him to the leadership. Which is supposed to be what Abbott is all about, no?
This ad will disappear into the eather. Abbott will not. He is a dangerous opponent for Rudd and for Labor and should be recognised as such. This next election is going to be a battle to the death, for the heart and soul of OZ. Be afaraid, Be very afraid. OMG, I hope Labor wins.
I have, Eric. I’m guessing longer than you. There is an old Australian poem my dad used to quote whenever some panicky person started going on about something and exaggerating the threat as if it was the end of the world. He used to say “We’ll all be rooned!” sarcastically while rolling his eyes. Many years later I looked up the poem: “Hanrahan Said”
What is it about the left and panic?
The Liberal Party are in the process of self destruction.
Sit back, break out the popcorn, chardy and watch the show.
Easy, BilB. In Australia, voting’s compulsory. You have to appeal to people who don’t give much of a shit about politics. You know: people who just don’t think like we do.
Someone like Bush who depended on a very organised very disciplined large minority of active voters would never have got up here.
yeah Liam I recognise him too for the same reasons but I’m not convinced the ozzie electorate will punish Abbott like they did Latham. For the record I thought Latham was crazy brave at times but he was pretty inconsistent, I liked him when he sprouted his left wing ideology but he tied himself up in knots trying to be moderate and I think that killed him more than his left wing pov.
not to be a concern troll but I can easy see Abbott’s appeal and I am far less certain of the middle of the road tendencies for Oz. The right is pretty deeply entrenched in our social fabric, look at the number of people working as contractors and doing quite well for themselves thankyou very much. Then there are the landed gentry who have seen their property values continue to climb, and the last time I looked about a third of all home owners own their property outright and another third own more than 50%. Then there is the one nation fan club who might have lost their star attraction but will never lose their convictions, remember Cronulla? What about Melbourne and the Indian students?
In terms of ALP strategy imo targeting Abbott with work choices even as a youtube shit sheet is a complete waste of time and focus. They should get their own crap together and start delivering worthwhile results to australian ppl esp on carbon and climate change and give the Australian ppl a reason to accept the leftist approach to government. They aren’t there for looks, ppl do strangely expect governments to actually do something.
Nickws@6: “this evening he told David Speers on Sky that the Liberals don’t have Labor’s ‘Stalinist’ discipline…”
I have heard that stalinist crack three times this week so far, and again from Christopher Pyne last night on Lateline (Tony Jones cutting across him impatiently: yes, yes, now let’s get back to the question..)
Being called a Black-Hearted Stalinist used to be a mark of honour for some, back in the student glory days, and Abbott’s repeated use of this phrase (and by junior mouthpiece Pyne) speaks volumes about where he is coming from. Fighting the old student union battles, one more time. Recommended ALP strategy: go back there too, and remember to always play the man.
It already came across in the events of the last couple of days. Everything he did, he did so that Rudd wouldn’t get what he wants.
Well, and for other reasons. But mainly that.
Yes, thats right.
The people that voted for One Nation live on Mars now and don’t vote here. Otherwise Howard would have won the last election. Apparently Abbott is about to move them back here. Right after he gets an agreement from all the moderate swinging voters not to desert the libs when he introduces tight wing, One Nation type policies into the mix.
Well, at least they’re not calling the ALP radical.
I don’t think the Stalinist schick will work. But the innate conservatism of the Australian electorate so ably expatiated by David_h is what’s worrying me.
It ain’t panic, Lefty, its reality.
Nicely put, DavidH last para.
The problem with someone who uses the bare faced lie, as Abbott does, is that in a debate the liar comes across as the stronger player. To put down a lie often takes time and rarely has the same audience, by which time the battle is lost. And a bare faced lie is all too often passed off as a “different opinion”, arguably equally valid. Unfortunately our profit driven world encourages flexibility of truth as a valid commercial device. With the likes of Abbott the same has flowed through into politics in an extreme form.
Which voters is Abbott able to attract that Howard wasn’t?
Paul Burns @64
If Australia is innately conservative, it won’t likely vote in a radical right wing guy like Abbott.
“Conservative” starts to lose its intended meaning when looking at Abbott’s more extreme views.
Have a look at yesterdays figures. 55 to 29 against supporting the CPRS. Only 36 primary votes to conservative Abbot vs 49 to the pro ETS moderates. Some of that 36 probably reflected a strong distaste for the CPRS rather than support for the conservative right. There was no vote to determine how many voters were opposed to any significant action on climate change.
So the reality is that this leaves Tony as leader of a party that doesn’t really support his conservative values. My guess is that this will actually be to Tony’s advantage. It will reduce the temptation/pressure to support right wing policies that most of the more moderate Liberals are opposed to.
Tony will be dangerous if he comes up with a better climate action plan than CPRS. If I was Rudd I would use the blocking of CPRS as an excuse to do something more direct to drive down emissions instead of giving Abbot time to develop an alternative policy.
Hason lived and stood in Hanson territory. Even she could not safely hold a seat in the reps with an entire party behind her.
Never over estimate the far right wing here.
They are at their best working behind the scenes in an established party like the LP. Make them leaders – put them out in front for everyone to examine in the light of day – and they fizzle out very quickly.
Hanson lived and stood in Hanson territory. Even she could not safely hold a seat in the reps with an entire party behind her.
Never over estimate the far right wing here.
They are at their best working behind the scenes in an established party like the LP. Make them leaders – put them out in front for everyone to examine in the light of day – and they fizzle out very quickly.
Hanson lived and stood in Hanson territory. Even she could not safely hold a seat in the reps with an entire party behind her.
Never over estimate the far right wing here.
They are at their best working behind the scenes in an established party like the LP. Make them leaders – put them out in front for everyone to examine in the light of day – and they fizzle out very quickly.
PC@62: “Everything he did, he did so that Rudd wouldn’t get what he wants.”
Agree, PC.
Abbott and Minchin (and the Ghost of Wollonstonecraft) are determined not to allow Rudd any credit for “strutting the world stage” – which could also be read as raising Australia’s profile internationally and reparing the damage done by Howard over a decade of UN-bashing, climate denialism, deputy sheriffism, etc. This appears to be nothing more than staggeringly stupid male jealousy, together with a stubborn refusal to acknowledge the fact of their electoral defeat in 07.
And notice that The Australian and the ABC have virtually ignored Rudd’s progress overseas this week – apart from a couple of quick shots of him entering and exiting planes? You have to look in the back pages, or listen at the end of the radio bulletin between the finance news and the weather to hear anything at all about what Rudd said at the Commonwealth Conference in Jamaica, or in his visit with Obama. There are some really big exciting moves happening OS with climate change negotiations (the position of Canada is appalling, for example) but we are left in the dark puddling around in opposition mud-flinging and infantile posturing.
While much of the Abbott/Turnbull/Minchin game-playing was admittedly good sport and fun to watch for a while, the ABC seems incapable of paying sufficient attention, at the same time, to what the actual leaders of our country, and not the pretenders, are doing.
The plain fact is the extreme right have engineered a coup to frustrate the will of the majority of Australians as clearly expressed at the last election.
The CPRS is necessary before Copenhagen because we are the single most carbon-intensive economy in the whole world, in part because Howard permitted us to persist as such. We will have no credibility at Copenhagen as the most grotesque carbon pigs on the planet.
The extreme right hates the majority of Australians and refuses to accept democracy. One wonders what their next violent excrescence will be – a coup de etat?
Paul, the innate conservatism of the Australian electorate manifests itself most strongly in the preference to give governments more than one term.
The Australian political landscape of 1949-2007 is probably gone. The reason? It’s very hard to emerge from the state education system with anything less than contempt for the Liberal Party. I can see the need of non-Labor political forces to rebuild themselves into something that is more acceptable to young people who are fed on a solid diet of Liberal=evil.
And now that Tony Abbott is Leader of Her Majesty’s Opposition, that is not going to change. The vitriol directed at Abbott just in the last 24 hours has been of a staggering level (I’ll avoid any critique of the vitriol – just making a comment about the volume).
I really feel wonderful when it is assumed I am evil because I am a member of the Liberal Party (it also happens when someone finds out I am Catholic, but that is hopefully beside the point). I am a member of the Liberal Party partly because the ALP is really bad at running … stuff.
Exactly Mike @ 73. They are even prepared to overturn the decision of their own party.
The moderates have been shown to be inept at the sort of tribal game playing that the extreme right have hard-wired into their DNA, and the fix is on as far as the media is concerned. Every News Ltd paper in the newsagent had triumphialist hedlines re Abbott “I can win’ etc etc.
Whenever the election is held it will be one of the dirtiest on record, as nothing is beneath this bunch of lying desperadoes.
Hilarious. Howard, you obviously haven’t read the papers lately. Your mob is in absolute disarray. The Libs can’t run themselves
The problem for Abbott John D is that the kind of solution you’d like would be anathema to almost all of his key supporters. They didn’t roll Turnbull so that they could have something better than the CPRS and even less to develop a pervasive regulatory regime to control emissions.
They rolled Turnbull because they don’t believe that climate change is caused by humans and even if it is, their first duty is to protect the interests of the filth merchants.
So Abbott can’t and won’t propose an alternative plan. If you heard him on Fran kelly’s Breakfast this morning, he repudiated his own carbon tax proposal explicitly and had an each way bet on whether there would be ever a price on carbon emissions.
Devising a new system is not something that Abbott or anyone in the coalition has the wit to do, especially if it has to avoid falling victim to his own populist rhetoric and not offend his key backers.
Who want’s a terrible, terrible, mental image?
http://twitpic.com/rox33
C/- jimbob on MeFi
gah, want‘s ?? What’s wrong with me.
Howdy!
Launching this ad at the precise point that Abbott ascended to the throne is poor form and a cheap shot.
The timing suggests that labor are shit scared of Abbott, which clearly isn’t the case.
As has been said by others, Labor would’ve been better off to just let Abbott speak for himself.
He’ll self-destruct in no time.
However, I for one will certainly be looking forward to question time becoming more entertaining.
If the first 24 hours are anything to go by, it’s going to be hilarious!
Rumour has it that Abbott is already ressurecting Kevin Andrews from the crypt to be on the Front Bench possibly with the climate change agenda!
A united National Front!
http://guttertrash.wordpress.com/2009/12/02/tony-abbotts-new-united-national-front/#comment-12308
To paraphrase James Carville, it’s the global warming, stupid.
Until now the ALP was working on the scare the bejesus out of them model. Now that Tony Abbott is shaping up, Labor party should seize the historic opportunity to put their political opponents to the sword.
Global warming is a gilt-edged campaign cause for the ALP because it will galvanise people who may not be natural Labor voters and thus split wide open the LP/NP Coalition like a rotten watermelon, marginalising the conservative side of politics for decades or longer, if global warming actually starts to negatively impinge on the lifestyles of the rich and famous.
Choosing global warming as casus belli is analogous to what communism in the unions debacle was for the ALP; and note, B.A. Santamaria, Abbott’s mentor, was instrumental in the Big Split that put the ALP out to grass until 1972.
ALP has stumbled upon an entirely new set of battle lines to appeal to the “doctors’ wives” who hold the key to a swag of Liberal urban seats who do not give a rat’s arse about Work Choices (indeed they like the idea because it helps them to sack the maid more easily). It would be relatively easy to say to those voters, never mind the horny-handed unionists and the Tammany Hall Sussex St machine that Liberal strategists have been using to scare mums and dads – instead the call is now “help us save the Earth from destruction”. It can be done: a communist unionist was able to galvanise politically the Liberal heartland against Liberal Robin Askin in silvertail Hunters Hill – remember Jack Mundey and the Green Bans campaign? That too was about saving the environment.
But why go to a double-dissolution election? The ALP should do Minchin slowly. Consign Abbott to irrelevancy by way of “once an attack dog, always attack dog” and that he is just doing his masters’ bidding – show him for what he is – a tool of powerful sinister forces behind the scenes. Abbott’s biographer Michael Duffy conveniently told us that Abbott is a passionate believer in top-down hierarchy and thus a committed soldier beholden to structured authority – the Queen, the Pope, Mr Howard. Here is the simple and sad fact of Tony Abbott, the authoritarian personality in action. See more here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Authoritarian_Personality
You’ve been looking at that image for far too long! Aaarh. 30 seconds and its ruined my day!
Well CPRS is down and out. And I couldn’t be more thrilled about that. The big question is, what happens next.
http://www.theage.com.au/environment/senate-rejects-ets-20091201-k3uw.html
Can anyone explain this for me given Abbott’s previous remarks on both global watming science and the ETS.
This is supposed to be the guy that is the straight talking, honest broker from the hard right.
He now believes in climate change. A day after he knocked off his leader because he didn’t believe in climate change because it was a leftist conspracy.
The Liberal Party have gone stark raving mad if they think this guy can lead them.
This is pure bollocks, HC. If the Liberal Party really thinks the reason it’s out of power is because of a Labor conspiracy to brainwash the kids, you’re in more trouble than I thought.
“The big question is, what happens next.”
WorkChoices 2 – Son of WorkChoices.
But under a new guise of course “FlexiSlave” or something warm and fuzzy like that…
Have sent that twitpic to a few of my leftwing mates. Expect e-mails with howls of laughter any moment. Now, that is what the ALP should run as an ad.
“And yet: There was People Skills on Sunday, prancing about in the shallows wearing naught but a scrap of lycra, a lifesaver’s cap and a fascinatingly goatish pelt.”
Annabel is right he does look a bit like a goat. Tony the satyr.
Karen Middleton has just reported Abbott as saying “we won’t have an ETS going to the next election, nor any new tax”.
She then added Remember that, folks. As unforgettable as the fit-inducing photo via Wilful.
wilful@78: that is sooo disgusting, I confidently predict it will balloon as the next big thing on the blogosphere.
Joe 2, this is not panic. It’s just the left being alert before we have real cause for alarm. Perhaps many of these comments do look like “lefty self-doubt taken too far”(thanks Liam) but it’s better than complacency.
Without knowing much about Tony Abbott’s childhood I thought Sir Henry C’s description of him as an “authoritarian personality” was probably spot on not only for him but a few others on the far right. Perhaps we can take comfort from knowing that the vast majority of Australians have not had the “excessively harsh and punitive parenting” which is supposedly responsible for this character type.
Look at the Aussie reputation for larrikinism and resistance to authority figures. Isn’that why most of us are republicans?
Whoops! So why aren’t we there yet?
“The problem with someone who uses the bare faced lie, as Abbott does, is that in a debate the liar comes across as the stronger player.”
Interesting, BilB. I was thinking it might be nice to employ someone like that “Lie to Me” bloke. I’ve forgotten all I knew (which wasn’t much) about body language, but I noticed a tendency by Abbott (when confronted with a really curly one from Kerry) to go “um-um–um-um” before breaking into a spiel. Suggested to me that he was struggling with the truth or abandoning it. Would be good to have a pro analyse it.
Agree with most on the thread. ALP HQ has got this wrong with a negative attack. Let him speak for himself.
Patricia WA Tony will not inspire complacency. On the contrary, he will help rally the troops. The left have someone to loath as much as Howard and will be out and about handing out leaflets with added vigour. I know I will.
Turnbull was more of a challenge because the misguided were starting to warm to him.
Abbott is unelectable and a christmas gift to Labor. I say be vigilant but in a relaxed kind of way.
Seriously, Don, wrong? A negative attack on Tony Abbott on youtube costing—at the most—a day of a junior staffer’s time is wrong?
Just to be clear, the Liberals electing Abbott as their leader is just as bizarre as if the ALP were to dump Rudd for Meredith Burgmann (and I say that with a great deal of sincere respect for my comrade). We both know what the Liberals would very effectively do.
If punishing your enemies is wrong, I don’t wanna be right.
I don’t think abbott is a threat, but Labor having sat on the sidelines allowing the Liberals to attack each other needs to explain the ETS to the public, and how few will lose out.
Also on Fran Kelly this morning, when Abbott was asked about the fact that they took Howard’s ETS into the elction he said that they’d taken any number of policies too awful to talk about now into that election which they’d now abandoned.
He declined to elaborate.
Suzanne White’s The New Astrology pretty well sums up the Scorpio/Rooster Abbott [born 4 November 1957] You can see an abridged version on FB. Laugh ’till you cry!
I think there’s a bit of freaking out going on here. Australia is a conservative country. That’s why we’ll vote for Rudd and not Abbott. That’s why we rarely change governments. They have to be stinking to high heaven and the ALP govt is extremely popular.
Sure, Abbott has to be treated as a serious opponent. But I take heart from the quote from Red Julia yesterday; “I hope you’re the leader of the opposition for a very long, long, long, long, time’, They’re going to do him slowly.
Tim@85
Counter to your point, we’re not the ones who usually believe in conspiracies.
However, most state school teachers are ALP partisans who aren’t shy about voicing their beliefs. Not so much a conspiracy as an unfortunate confluence of events.
Well, I have very much enjoyed the turn towards the eschatological in the musings on this blog in recent days. Indeed it’s like the blog itself has been reinnervated after a long lapse into “wtf do we talk abut now’ kind of stasis following the Labor victory. To this end, I also look forward to the Passion of the Tony in the coming months and I marvel at the way this new Tony, whose first act was to offer an apology for being himself, has become rather christlike already – bringing out the very best in people here. Like Liam, for instance, and the sheer purity of his glee, flowing ceaselessly, like light and air at an open window. Like, LOL. And then like, Tssk, and his Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds moments. Gold, you know. Like the the glory days of the blog. Like, thank you Tony thank you.
Hear, Hear Casey @ 100! I’ve had some great laughs today reading comments not only here but elsewhere, even the Punch’s thread was worth a visit to read Tory Maguire on Julie Bishop as the Stepford Deputy…..
“Maybe she’s exactly what the Liberal Party needs. Or maybe she’s a bad luck charm. Losing one leader is unlucky, losing two is downright careless. If she loses Mr Abbott, her loyalty might start to be considered a liability.”
She may not be what the Liberal Party needs, but essentially she is all they have and clear evidence of their lack of any viable alternative, male or female.
Sometimes when Julie Bishop is her usual awful self in public I cringe on behalf of Australian women. Tory Maguire has unintentionally suggested I adopt a different response, an affirmation for the Liberal Party Deputy Leader. So…
I am truly glad Julie Bishop has proved such a “loyal girl” alongside a succession of Liberal Party leaders. We couldn’t have chosen a better female of the species to sic on to them. I trust her shallow smile and her glassy gaze to produce a deadly self enveloping venom with special web-like qualities which expands to embrace those around her. Go Julie!
Go too, Julia! Just make sure though you stay on the other side of that Table and just the way you are!
As per #99 & Mr Cunningham’s remark : “However, most state school teachers are ALP partisans who aren’t shy about voicing their beliefs. Not so much a conspiracy as an unfortunate confluence of events.”
Not quite which staff rooms he’s been sitting in of late… presumably Riverview?
John D @68, totally agree with you!
“Tony will be dangerous if he comes up with a better climate action plan than CPRS.
If I was Rudd I would use the blocking of CPRS as an excuse to do something more direct to drive down emissions instead of giving Abbot time to develop an alternative policy.”
Totally agree.
They could do worse than passing some of the more practical legislation proposed by Greens senator Milne. Labor + Greens + a few liberal moderates would get it passed in the Senate.
Labor would thus underscore that they are genuinely serious about dealing with climate change, not just playing politics and having “trophies” for Copenhagen.
Fran @77: “The problem for Abbott John D is that the kind of solution you’d like would be anathema to almost all of his key supporters.”
Had me going for a minute there, Fran.
Umm, ahh, so that means you think John D’s idea for undermining any potential credibility for the LNP is GREAT. Right?
Because it is an anathema to Abbott and almost all of his key supporters.
What a great idea then!!!
My point was, Elise, that Abbott wouldn’t be adopting it, so whatever the merits of what John was proposing, it would be moot.
Fran @105, you are probably right, but it doesn’t really matter what Abbott does, Fran.
Rudd and Wong only need to persuade Labor voters and swinging voters that THEY are sincere. Abbott and Joyce will be whistling Dicksey in the wilderness.
Given your fondness for the nuclear solution, I am confidently predicting that you will be taking out membership of the Liberal party any time soon.
If you join the dots on Abbott’s proclamations since getting the leadership, that is where Abbott is taking the LNP, under the fearless steerage of Minchin.
It will probably wedge the Labor party nicely, since they don’t have even a “pre-feasibility” concept mapped-out for how to reach their targets. They are hoping that ETS and the invisible hand of the market will find the answer for them.
Hmm … very amusing
In the mouths of the Liberals, this is another rfed herring. They raise nuclear only to wedge the other side and to make coal look good.
Abbott quickly added that it wouldn’t happen any time soon, to underscore the point.
Way to give into the paranoia, brother.
You realise you’re posting on a blog where people happily bitch and moan about Rudd, Garrett and Wong being a bunch of unspeakable modern Labor ecorat sellouts? That obviously means that everybody here believes the Rudd govenment are tweedle dum to the Libs’ tweedle dee—ergo, the majority of people here, state educated I assume, all hold the ALP in contempt. And these posters are obviously entirely representative of society.
See? My logic is no worse that your’s, therefore I must be right about state school graduates holding Labor in contempt to their very bones…
Sir Henry, I think you’ll find that “I learnt everything I know at Bob’s knee” is a conceit of Abbott, it’s not founded in reality. Santamaria had very little personal hold over any Sydneysider who wasn’t an NCC cadre, and the Monk doesn’t fit that particular profile.
I’ve pointed out elsewhere that Abbott is largely a poseur.
I think he is no more reactionary than say, Alexander Downer—it’s just that someone like Downer plays it close to his chest (and it’s not as if that ex-pollie isn’t a pretty ultra-conservative Thatcherite), while the Monk’s whole schtick is that he is compelled to ram his convictions down our throats.
“Look at me, sodomites and republicans, I’m a social traditionalist! And you’re not!”
All I can say, under our system, is put your money where your mouth is.
If the tweedledum/tweedledee argument held any water, every one of you would vote 1, 2, 3, 3, tweedledum ….
I know where your votes will eventually end up.
Howard, the only reason that I don’t follow the Langer Protocol is because, since the Electoral Act was changed, it would result in an informal (and hence wasted) vote.
Howard @109: “I know where your votes will eventually end up.”
That is MOST impressive. Was “your votes” referring only to Nickwas, or do you claim that the behaviour of all posters here can be predicted a priori?
Given that I am one of those dreaded swinging voters, and have swung both ways, where will my vote eventually end up in next year’s election/DD? I’ll write it down and check in a year’s time.
Incidentally, with such profound insight into human behaviour, one could make a fortune many times over! Care to share your secret with us here? LP could become the Millionaires Club of the future.
You got to admit, there aren’t many people who have voted Liberal commenting on this blog. I was more right than wrong, but take the point about generalisation.
I think voting Green is wasting a vote, David Irving, but potato, potato.
HC said:
I can certainly see how you might conclude that, assuming your standard is “getting someone elected who can implement policy”.
Of course, voting for the people who form the opposition is by that standard ‘a wasted vote’. Then again, voting for someone who is on the backbench is also a wasted vote. Voting if you live in a non-marginal seat is a wasted vote. And voting for someone who is determined to implement poor policy is a wasted vote.
Really, voting in general is arguably a waste of time. As the saying goes, if voting could change anything it would be illegal. It’s clear that the majority want urgent action on climate change, but do we have that now? Is it even being offered prospectively by anyone near policy? No. So all those people have wasted their time voting.
Most people think we shouldn’t be in Afghanistan, but is that even a talking point within the political class? No. Most thought we shouldn’t invade Iraq in 2003, but that too was irrelevant, at least in terms of policy. Most people thought kids in administrative detention was a bad idea, but has that made a difference? Nope.
So plainly a different standard for evaluating voting is needed. People vote because it makes them feel good, or at any rate, less bad. On this basis, voting for the Greens or the ALP or the LNP is not a waste of time. People get to declare their culture and hope that somehow, it makes some difference. Really though, unless what you want coincides with what the most privileged people want, your chances of being satisfied are poor.
Fran, I was just suggesting that it was a waste to vote Green, because they’re policies are terrible. I’ll be on my own a bit here on that.
The only time we get any real idea of what “most people think” is at elections, because everyone has to vote. Everything else is a focus group, or a limited poll, albeit modified through well established techniques to make the data more “accurate”. A bit like what they were doing at East Anglia, but not that much.
I don’t subscribe to the two party system, although I am a member of one of those two parties. If you want to vote Green, then fine. The reverse side of that coin is that previous behaviour indicates there is roughly an 80% chance that Green vote will end up an ALP vote when the rubber hits the road. So if you think the two parties are truly as bad as each other, then don’t vote or vote informal. I’ve read on here calls for civil disobedience, and this is just another variety of that.
I suppose Howard, that if a person is elected on Green preferences, they may conclude that those supporting them think Green policies are preferred and accordingly, supporting such policies will tend to support their re-election while abandoning them may subevert their chances.
That said, I would prefer a sortition-based system with elements of direct democracy to what we have now. That way, the parties would be kept at arm’s length from the decision-making process and the process of policy formation would be deliberative and accountable.
Bob Ellis – oiliest spiv in Sydney – on Tony Abbott:
Earlier this year, Ellis wrote for ABC’s Unleashed: “Though he sued me and cost me income and influence and a lot of public dignity (I wrongly alleged he listened to Tanya Costello’s views on politics – a shocking thing to do, it seemed in those far-off days, to listen to a woman, for it cost my publishers a million dollars) I find him in person curiously disarming, and I find myself agreeing with him uncomfortably and often.
“The person he most resembles, I’ve just decided, is Scott Fitzgerald. The classic good looks, big flashing smile, easy Irish eloquence, angelic writing style, self-doubt, Catholic guilt, hot temper, Gatsby-like yearnings for past relationships long gone and luminous in remembrance, fondness for football and self-flagellation and his need for a son, all bespeak a literary genius drawn by Life and lesser pursuits into spiritual shallows and drunken remorse like Scott, poor Scott. We have lost thereby good books he might have written, and gained – what? – a cheery, self-mocking buffoon? Or the Tories’ last, best hope of power?”
Sometimes Bob Ellis gets it so-ooo wrong.
I am simply loving the unctuous Ellis’s Mr Collins to Tony Abbott’s Lady Catherine de Burgh. Ellis, you see, has never been a lefty. He has always been driven by snobbery and a social fear of the confident upper classes. He would love nothing more than to be an aristocrat. He is a wheedle. He contents himself with this sort of public frottage against the outer thighs of sexy, intelligent men like Abbott.
This “I didn’t mean it Tony, I made a big mistake” is the cry of a schoolyard loser.
I don’t know why people think Ellis’s writing is good – he’s sort of florid through and through. Tony is the better man on all fronts including literacy.