Please keep the general election campaign talk (breaking news etc) on these Open ThreadsRoundtables, and keep discussions on the other posts focussed on the topic presented by the author.
N.B. Off topic posts in other threads are liable to be summarily deleted at the discretion of the moderators.
Addendum: since apparently this point has not yet been made often enough in previous Election Open ThreadsRoundtables, the one and only election topic that is not welcome on principle on these threads is Endless Rehashing of the Labor Leadership Change.
OK. First comment. Labor’s in trouble. Discuss.
Terry – second comment. Current problems stem largely from getting behind an elected PM only to stab him in the back.
Further discussion invited.
Fran Kelly on ABC Radio National this morning drew a blooper from Disabilities Minister and ALP power broker Bill Shorten. Kelly was quizzing Shorten on real responses to a referral to the Productivity Commission to an inquiry into a national compensation scheme for the disabled.
A clearly stressed junior minister prefaced one tetchy response with “my dear” which followed some earlier responses about ALP leaks. It took the kudos away from some disability grants announced the previous day by Gillard. Bill is obviously not a fan. Kelly remained unfazed if you can judge such things on radio.
I would like to see some objective evidence that Labor is in trouble. Of course, Labor has had a terrible week according to the commentariat, but do the voters care about gossipy leaks? They might, but where is the evidence?
The campaign itself is the worst in living memory if not ever. Free Schapelle Corby? Christ Almighty.
Then there’s the theatre of Mark Latham, throwing grenades like a Bosnian Serb around Saralevo in 1993. What is truly horrible is that what he says is largely true.
Free Schapelle Corby! Julia’s on message with that one. Libs HQ will be kicking themselves they didn’t think of that first.
I think Mark Latham wants his own TV show. SKY would be the obvious place for an opinionated nutter with a small fan base.
Parliamentary Secretary rather than Minister, Pablo(I made the same mistake) and if he is promoted to a Ministry I hope he continues to have input into disabilities because he has been a very worthy and passionate advocate. The retiring Della Bosca is going to be pushing for the National Insurance Scheme from outside government apparently. I’m not sure what to think about that, but the higher the profile the better I guess.
Trouble could be a relative thing.
Fate should not be so unkind to the assembled multitude of spinners, consultants, politicians, grub streeters and spectators, as to have an event scheduled outside of circumstances they are normally habituated to, such as a snap election.
They are all woefully out of form, like tennis players having an unexpected hit in winter.
So far its been degraded to the level of a spinners election with the information skew wiff in the translation from normal to election mode.
But yes, its on.
There will have to be a bad sequence for Labor without one for Abbott for the ALP not to limp back.
I don’t think the MSM can escape some resposibility in this. I listen to the three ABC networks most of the day and some of the night. Local radio and a fair bit of Radio National allow their political commentary space to be dominated by colour and movement rather than substance. Kerry O’Brien on the 7.30 Report is a shocker, banging away about garbage and then running out of time on what he should be concentrating on.
NewsRadio is different. They have too much space to fill. If they filled it all up with garbage pe0ople would switch off. Also they actually seem to be a bit interested in the, well, news.
Their commentary is also less tendentious.
Try to catch Background Briefing on RN this Sunday, repeated Tuesday pm where investigative reporting is alive and well. I understand that Sunday’s program will be on the National Broadband Network.
‘What is truly horrible is that what he says is largely true.’
Highly unlikely given his standing in the party, and if it was, with all due respect, how the hell would you know.
5, yep, that was a little more generous than Corby got from Kelty, Howarda and co, tabloids, etc.
See what happens to ozzers when we stumble inadvertantly into the real world?
Sam @ 5, there was some reporting on marginal seat polling on Breakfast and just now on NewRadio, all strongly favouring Labor.
Two cautions. One is Mark’s about what marginal polling means and how to interpret it.
Secondly, it was all done before Laurie Oakes’ second major political intervention.
Julia’s right about our Shapelle of course. We should just send the army in to rescue her from the clutches of those foriegner’s so called legal system. Wouldn’t happen in a proper legal system like ours.
Brian, its hard not to conjecture that Scott deliberately wasted money on the new digi toy hence the expense also creating more duplication. Meanwhile more promising programming or resourcing ideas go starved of funds.
Adrian, we cant all be americans.
The most interesting story so far this week IMHO is the SMH front page article stating that Labor has asked one Kevin Rudd to assist them in the Queensland campaign.
The story says that Rudd hasn’t rejected it outright, but needs time to consider.
I suppose people here are sufficiently up with the Corby story to know that she is seriously mentally ill and not getting any treatment apart from hugely expensive medication that her family are supplying.
Agreed paul, but we just need to be real aussies, moving forward together.
Seriously though, the ABC seems to be deteriorating before our very eyes. I’m over the normal ‘the opposition says’ start to most news bulletins, but the standard of reporting, analysis and interviewing is really dire, almost deliberately so.
Brian, the teaser for that BB report is the lead story on ABC online. The teaser is truly dire. I hope the actual report is better quality.
I love the right wing cognitive dissonance around Latham.
“Man he really is dire. A complete nutter. We really dodged a bullet there.”
to
“…but he is sooo wise about the ALP. It’s amazing! Everything he says about them is true and free of any bias.”
All in the same sentence.I’ve even heard people flip flop between the two oppossing views without a bit of irony.
Andrew Reynolds,#2, has invited comment on the “current problems” brought on by a proposed nefarious despatch of Mr Rudd.
Would they have been so emboldened as to have moved as they did, had the opposition been more credible than they have been over a protracted period.
But viewed from afar the campaigns have been dull fare all round. A very Sunday morning after Saturday night sort of election; the oz political apparatus appears to be eating its own, or maybe its just taking time for a good clean out.
Robert @ 18, you mean this story.
In the NewRadio story, which I gather was excerpting the BB story, Quigley went on to explain that they have had a successful 3-month trial in Tasmania where 50% of people signed up as a result. Quigley says that with the engineering done you should, if anything, be able to do better than budget in the remaining roll-out.
You’ve got a contrast between a project that has been through a substantial trial phase and now needs to be upscaled in the final implementation, contrasted with a clean sheet of paper with “fibre to home” crossed out on it.
The COALition are the ones flying blind on costs as far as I can see.
The NBN is one of Labor’s strongest differentiating policies right now: they need to be pushing the success even harder. The Coalition sound like Grandpa Simpson on tech policy by contrast.
ABC News 24 is reporting that Cheryl Kernot will be running as an independent Senate candidate in NSW.
Re Kernot, Voters could do a lot worse than her, imho.
Kernot’s been doing some interesting work over the last few years on social policy.
It’s a good thing for the govt they gave telstra a great deal to agree to remove their copper network. Telstra just halved the price of some of their adsl plans making the nbn end costs look even more expensive. This way people will have no choice but to go through the nbn making it more profitable.
I’m not hearing the positives from the last 3 years of labor – they should be banging on about these rather than a negative campaign. It didn’t work for Carpenter in WA and it won’t work federally. (cue the usual suspects to derail thread with a ‘what positives? comment).
I’d also be happy to not see the moronic Paul Howes presented as a media face for labor.
Agree Nick – NBN is one of the few standouts in the bipartisan myre.
Problem is the message is slightly marred by Conroy idiotic filter proposals – which I hear they may be dumping (with any luck, or sense).
Me, Im waiting for the money shots from the ALP: GFC saviours, only OECD to avoid in recession, record emplymetn growth etc. Its this stuff, stupid!
All over red rover once these come out – and I cant imagine why they’d be holding off much longer. Airbrushing Rudd’s image post-Soviet-purge style will be the only challenge.
Here’s all you need to know about Latho’s political judgement:
- He’d have made Rudd junior minister for the Pacific.
- The Australian people made Rudd PM.
Kym, you’ve just won an argument.
Rf points indirectly at what maybe an incapacitating sore they’re carrying into the campaign; they’d better resolve things quickly.
Gillard is making progress; it seems a meaty challenge to have to step into the top job,inspire and bind the party together and get the electorate behind her government and what’s more, in campaign mode at a time when, to use a Howard expression, the electorate mood could be “volatile”.
SAM – I thought you were going to say throwing grenades like a Bosnia serb around 1914. Was gavrilo princip Bosnia though? Don’t think.
Both metaphors apt, anyway.
Fantastic. Go Cheryl.
I have vivid memories of her wiping the floor with Laurie Oakes in a 2004 interview. In the sweetest, nicest and most patient possible way, of course.
Um, 1994.
@32 – Yep, I remembered just then that the loathsome Oakes was the one who revealed details of her personal relationship with Gareth Evans, supposedly “in the national interest”.
ADRIAN – No wonder Rudd needs time to consider. First they stab him in the back. Then he gets stabbed in the back again over a cabinet position. Now he knows that after the election they will probably stab him in the back again. Yet now they want him to save their miserable cowardly hides. Didn’t they think of this before they did him in? Morons.
Still, Kevin, do some praying and fasting and reading of the good book and then rise above it and do your duty. Helping them will be the best revenge.
ZOMG! On ABC News 24, Gillard is being asked by a reporter whether she’s frustrated by being asked constantly about Kevin Rudd!!!
RF – they can’t talk about the positives because they axed the man who brought the positives. Didn’t the idiots think about that before they dumped Rudd? Rudd could be out there talking broad-band morning noon and night. Now, all they’ve really got is conran, who is doing OK but isn’t the leader.
Yes Mike, it’s as though none of these perfectly obvious consequences were even considered. It’s starting to look like the biggest own goal in Australia’s political history.
As you say, they’re trapped in a conundrum of their own making – most of the positives that they could be talking about are at least partially thanks to Kevin Rudd who was so bad that they just had to get rid of him.
The tightening of the polls raises another issue. If Julia just scraps back in, what is her political life expectancy. I would have thought it would be pretty short. Will Combet be plucked from behind a curtain and acclaimed to caucus?
adrian, I thought it was more that they’re joining the opposition in either rubbishing or plainning to destroy any of the “positives” that Rudd inflicted on us. I expect that any day now we’ll hear the ALP explaining that they will never, ever consider a stimulus package in the future but will instead guarantee surplus budgets no matter what the cost.
Kim, it was probably revenge. I remember the 1994 interview because I was writing a TV column for Eureka Street at the time and looked at the way Nine was manufacturing news by running Oakes’s regular political interviews on Sunday and then running sound-bite highlights from them as headline news. I find it utterly depressing that I wrote this piece sixteen years ago: anyone would think the ink was not yet dry. Except, of course, for the departure of what used to be a good solid serious current affairs show on a commercial TV station. Hard to imagine now.
Is it crazy to imagine that we could get a clearer political future if the far left in the ALP consolidated with the greens, that the moderates of both the ALP and Libs merged and the far right of the Libs joined the various other tea party leaning groups?
@41 – yep, Dr Cat, my sense is that the meejah have got a lot worse.
@42 – In some ways, if we had PR instead of the single member system for the lower house, we’d get a much better policy debate, without the focus on the marginal voters in marginal seats. And more honest political options.
Im starting to wonder if the reason the ALP isnt already running ‘GFC saviour’ ads is the difficulty with airbrushing Rudd out.
If so – its a major campaign problem. Thats the main chapter of the good news story.
Id be running it anyway – withoput pics, just graphs and tables. No mention of Gillard or Rudd – just ALP Logo. Put Swan’s head in the background if they absolutely have to have one.
This is where the nullifaction of incumbency comes home to roost. Abbott’s only real chance is to take the ALP off this deadset-win turf.
Kim, the question is whether we’d get the bizarre outcomes that most PR countries get, or whether we’d keep the comfortable solidity of the Harridine and Fielding years. Either way it’d be a huge improvement, but I wonder where we’d end up while the legacy parties got their heads around it. Can you imagine what the NSW ALP machine would make of a parliament where they had 35% of the seats and needed Greens cabinet ministers rather than just preferences?
Kim @ 34, that’s so self-referential, the media will disappear up its own arse any second, with luck.
That was Kim @ 36. I need to clean my glasses.
Lefty E – the filter proposal has never made a lot of sense to me. I can’t see the people who really think it’s a good idea voting for Labor anyway, and I have direct experience of smart and otherwise vote-gettable IT professionals being hugely turned off the ALP. I have tried to suggest the committee-isation of the proposal probably means it’s dead but there’s a level of trust that’s just gone gone gone.
#41, he certainly has a trophy cabinet.
What a slime bucket.
http://www.smh.com.au/federal-election/in-richos-footsteps-labors-new-mr-fixit-20100729-10y5j.html
I don’t know if this has ben raised before but an interesting article on one of the geniuses that have put Labor where they are now (fighting for political survival or cruising to victory depending on your point of view lol).
NBN to be an opt-out system http://m.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/labor-to-force-people-to-connect-to-broadband-20100730-10yi4.html
Interesting way to improve take up rates.
It sounds reasonable to me. After all Chris, if they (or successors) want to connect later there will be a premium and it might be that the government will have to end up paying it.
If they really don’t want it for some bizarre reason, then let them make an activer choice.
Any debate about Afghanistan would be well received by this voter:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/video/2010/jul/29/afghanistan-war-us-military
In the obvious sense I can see why that flashback is depressing PC @ 41. Plus ca change and all that.
Surely though it’s a great basis for a really strong and timely article from you about the toxic impact of this so called ‘doyen’ of our national press gallery and his long- term employer on our body politic?
His poisonous capacity for winkling out damaging leaks and habit of intervening with them in debates of serious import to the country has had such a pernicious influence that our politicians have of necessity become guarded and stilted. We need openness and transparency if a democracy is to be healthy. These so-called revelations do not contribute to that.
Think of the value we have lost in very able politicians whose credibility and reputations he has so unfairly destroyed. There are also important issues which were never properly canvassed because he so often sidelined debate with stupidly manufactured sensations. It’s appalling that precious time on the 7.30 Report on our national broadcaster which should have been spent giving us information on the country’s economy was wasted by yet another leading journalist wanting to speculate yet again about Laurie Oakes’s leak story!
Why isn’t there legislation to protect the confidentiality of Cabinet discussions? Surely there are affairs of state needing that? As I read your really incisive critique of
Oakes of sixteen years ago I became even more convinced that the influence of journalists like Oakes are a threat to national security with their unprecedently unequal and destructive powers. This is a distortion of democratic freedom.
Fran – I’m sure you’ll still get to pay a connection fee upfront. This decision is probably more driven by wanting to increase uptake rates so it can be declared a success and so they get the revenue asap.
Absolutely Patricia WA @ 55. And you didn’t even mention the threat from the Terrurists!
Make all journalists subject to secret wiretapping, eavesdropping etc without necessity for a warrant is my advice. Incarceration for life for treason.
Come to think of it, politicians have ‘unprecedently unequal and destructive powers’ too. Wait, so do business executives, and judges, and … hell with it, just rendition anyone who hurts the national interest. We can get Cheney to act as a consultant in setting up the machinery.
(Mine was satire BTW … not sure about yours.)
No Ken, no irony from me this time, though I’m no fan of censorship as a rule. Here I’m so incensed with Laurie Oakes and his role in this election I’m not coherent enough to get my tongue in cheek. I am well aware of the legislation that could put public servants into prison for breaching cabinet confidentiality. So why not politicians, the ministers themselves? And yes, politicians and governments of both persuasions use leaks from time to time for their own purposes. Are they in the long term national interest? Aren’t open democracy interests sufficiently served by the time limit on the confidentially of cabinet papers?
Re coherence. I am really missing the former review feature for comments to LP. It helped with syntax, paragraphing and content when one could read one’s opinion set out in full before pressing ‘Submit’.
“though I’m no fan of censorship as a rule” That’s what they all say.
Oakes is pretty bad, but he was just doing his odious job. No journo would sit on this type of info, and has been said before, any fool could predict this was going to happen.
Just not the fools involved.
Labor only has itself to blame this time.
In other news, Rudd has been taken to hospital for a gall bladder operation. Get well soon, Kevin.
The whole thing is boring and depressing. Labor can’t control the leaks from within, even though all of them. apparently, believe the leaker is Krudd. (And if he was behind the garbage, denied by Glllard, that he’d been asked to campaign in other Queensland seats, it is quite outrageous.) Disendorse the bastard. Expel him from the party. Turn him into a Latham. just get rid of him, and do it NOW!
PATRICIA – as I read your contribution I started thinking about the watergate tapes. Tricky dickey didn’t like government leaks either. Made it very hard to bomb places like cambodia on the quiet, etc etc. That’s why he formed a group called the “plumbers”.
Settle down Paul, nobody knows who it is but I bet it’s not Rudd.
C’mon Paul. He’s a saint and a martyr. He would never do anything unethical.
Rudd in hospital for a gall bladder op. I hope he gets well. But it ain’t gonna stop him from being Procopius with a mobile. In fact, it might be even worse, if he’s got nothing to do but lie in a hospital bed and leak.
PAUL – any your evidence is?????
There was an article I read on line from the SMH which stated that all the politicians in the ALP believed it was Rudd. Now, I know newspapers aren’t always the most reliable primary saources at times, but it didn’t sound like a beat up.
PAUL – Yup. That’ll do me. Take him out and hang him.
PATRICIA – in fact, I would have thought that if anyone hears cabinet ministers telling fellow cabinet ministers that they shouldn’t give benefits to certain individuals because they don’t usually vote for the government, that person has a duty to leak it. Certainly, Julia is fully entitled to deny such an allegation without breaching “cabinet confidentiality” because that is not something that cabinet confidentiality should protect.
Come on Paul, surely you can do better than that:
- Rudd has denied it, so he’s also a liar
- There’s no rational reason for him to do it
- Swan virtually stated it wasn’t Rudd
- Both Hartcher and Oakes stated that there were multiple sources
- Mark Latham said it was Rudd
- Rudd has agreed to campaign across Qld in support of the ALP and Gillard.
- I don’t think the article you referred to said ‘all’ politicians in the ALP, if it’s the same one I read.
“Disendorse the bastard. Expel him from the party. Turn him into a Latham. just get rid of him, and do it NOW!”
Would that hold for the parties leaking all year against PM Rudd, and recently against ex-PM Rudd, Paul? Cos Gillard will lose a fair whack of her cabinet under that rule.
Shorto, Arbib – gone!
Me, I think its unlikely Rudd leaked – I’d say he really does want the Foreign Minister job, and he’s no fool. Id like to see the SMH piece, but most senior journos and hints from pollies Ive read appear to be pointing in a different direction – and specifically at an unnamed senior figure who no longer has skin in the game.
But i also feel the whole thing is rather inevitable given the way Rudd went down. Leaking to Bolt?? Who sort of degraded, unprincipled idiocy possessed those leakers?
It could be Shorten. His game plan might be to kill both Rudd and Gillard. Suppose Labor loses the election. Then Gillard has to go. Who replaces her? The contest will be between Shorten and Combet. This will be straight Right v Left and the Right will have to numbers. Sure, Shorten will only be opposition leader, but he’ll reckon he could topple Abbott in 2013.
I started writing this post facetiously. But it actually makes some sense.
‘Who sort of degraded, unprincipled idiocy possessed those leakers?’
Good question.
Sam, my view is the whole deal was largely about getting Shorto one up the queue.
Of course, I actually meant “*What* sort of degraded, unprincipled idiocy possessed those leakers?”.
I quite agree its a sound question.
Nothing like a leadership change to energise and unite the faithful.
Compare this campaign with the 2007 effort 3 weeks out … well the justification for getting rid of that loser Rudd is self-evident. This one is going SO much better.
I knew the Labor hard men’s motto was ‘whatever it takes’. I always thought the rest of it was ‘to win elections’, but now I’m really confused. Maybe it’s ‘whatever it takes to be the Labor hard men’.
MIKE @ 62, yes, remembering ‘the plumbers’ and Watergate and ‘Deep Throat’ I take your point. Surely though, someone like Pavlov’s Cat could have a go at the odious Oakes? Kerryn has sufficient stature and has participated enough in generating our MSM’s collective memory to express in print the views she has made so clear on this thread.
Re. poor old Kevin if he really is in hospital. I was wondering when something would finally give. Not surprising that it’s problems with his gall bladder, metaphorical seat of bile and rancour. Therese will probably be hugely relieved so long as this is not life threatening. Interesting that it gives him a graceful ‘out’ in time for another candidate’s selection.
Paul, don’t assume it’s Rudd. I’ve decided not to speculate about this. Swan intimated they knew who it was and it’s clearly not Rudd. He also hinted we’d be surprised when we do know. When he/she is finally outed will be the time for outrage
the whole deal was largely about getting Shorto one up the queue
No question. Shorten gives grasping ambition a bad name.
SAM – interesting thought experiment. But if Julia goes under a bus, I can’t see how Shorto isn’t finished. Even his mates will pin the badge of shame on him.
Ha Lefty E, I actually read it as ‘What..’
Does every thread have to turn into a whinge about what happened to Saint Kevin?
I think there are dedicated posts for this.
Its an open election thread, Fine.
Though perhaps Senator Conroy could be prevailed upon to ban all discussion of it on teh nets!!
Yes, god forbid that we talk about the actual reasons that Labor is putting in a less than stellar performance.
But you guys are absolutely obsessive about it. Whatever the subject matter, you return it to the one issue. It’s just rehashing the same old arguments that everyone has heard so often before and pretty much everyone has made their mind up about it.
Rudd has a bile build-up?
Sam@ 77 Re, Shorten, contradicting my own advice to Paul immediately above and before I read your comment on Lefty E’s, I am inclined to agree with you both.
A week or so ago I came back from a fund raiser at which Shorten spoke, pretty smitten with his style and general persona, as I commented in fairly maudlin verse on LP while unable to sleep. Too much fine wine had been consumed at that dinner! I suspect by Shorten too because I seem to have heard an aside from him as he worked the room that encouraged me to contemplate his own probable leadership ambitions. I even incorporated that whiff of ambition I’d sensed in him into my general understanding of and forgiveness for Labor’s up and coming aspirants. Where would we be without the ambition of PJK, Hawkie et al?
But this is different. The idea that the cause is worth less than one’s own ambition, particularly if it means the ascent to power of Abbott! Added to the above was a fleeting glimpse of Shorten’s discomfort behind Gillard when she made the Disability policy statement and then answered yet another question about ‘the leak’ – no cabinet positions for leakers. If it is Shorten will he now desist, or step up his efforts?
Patricia @76: nominations closed yesterday. The timing could not be more interesting.
Interesting comment Fine, since we would seem to be washing our hands obsessively at the same tap. Hello again!
Peace Lefty E.
My mistake then, for taking out the original admonition that the one topic not welcome on these threads was Endless Rehashing, thinking that perhaps people might have got the message by now.
It’s bad enough that the media can’t get past it without it dominating every discussion here as well. Yes, it is a factor, but it’s a factor that has already had plenty of oxygen and where threads to discuss it remain open. How about we look at some of the other factors that people will vote on, please?
Fair enough Tigtog. Im happy to take my obsessions to the isolation ward, but they aren’t going away.
Singing!!1!
Cos Im here
to remind you
of the mess you left
when you
etc
Frankly, I wish there were more “other factors” to distract me – but that’s the problem. Where are the inspirational, nation-shaping policy debates of this campaign? Its all one evasive and gutless fence-hopping from the ALP, and reams of utter quackery from the Tories, topped off with mind-numbing “connecting with voters on values” memes from state politics.
Vote Green.
Good to hear Rudd a) refer to Gillard by name today in his statement prior to entering hospital & b) that he will join the PM in campaigning for Labor’s re-election outside of his electorate when he gets out next week.
I’d like to think that LP could pull together to form an island of perspicacity where we continue to look past the fripperies and spin to what is and isn’t being said about various policies, LE. We don’t just have to repeat the MSM headlines du jour and not move outside their lines.
Er did anything remotely interest, significant or important happen today? In terms of policies.
@93 – yes, adrian, further detail on how the NBN will work. That’s been covered in a post by Rob.
I don’t know tigtog, there are plenty of posts on the issues, or what should be the issues, and most of us have commented on them.
It’s difficult to comment on the election when a certain event that’s affecting it more than anything else can’t be commented upon.
Fair enough it’s your blog, but it’s now officially a semi-open election thread.
I would be astonished if there were not some announcements made by candidates on policy matters recently that have hardly made a blip in the MSM headlines, so why not do a bit of digging and highlight those announcements in discussions here instead of buying into the latest MSM beat-up?
Here’s the latest news pages on the official national websites of the Liberals, Labor, the Greens and the Nationals. Why not actually discuss what they’re saying instead of only discussing what the media is reporting?
P.S. if people want to discuss how Labor needs to play with its spin due to the negatives arising from #spillard, they could always take it to the weekly Spotlight the Spin thread, where so long as people stick to actual analysis of spin tactics and messages (rather than repetitive recriminations) such commentary is more than welcome.
Okay. The destabilisation of the Labor campaign by internal leaking has destroyed Gillard’s message on disability and economic policy and Swan’s low interest rates etc.. The latter two are very important big ticket items that certainly influences how people vote. Disability policy is Labor territory and, because of all the good it apears to have done, especially this Labor government’s, policy. (Or maybe that’s just Shorten blowing his own trumet? I don’t think so. Its something the ALP believes passionately.)
Okay. I’ll shut up now, before I get censored.
Point taken Mark and tigtog, and I should have remembered the NBN announcement since I commented on the thread.
@Paul Burns, pointing to the fact that the Labor campaign is being destabilised is fair comment and I’m not about to censor any such thing. Engaging yet again in repetitive recriminations about the Labor leadership change’s contributions to the pattern of destabilisation is tedious and unproductive.
I have confidence that most regulars actually do have enough grasp of nuance to appreciate the distinction and stay on the right side of the line. Any protestations to the contrary seem disingenuous at best.
I apologize for my earlier flip comment, gall bladder removal is serious business.
I love the right wing cognitive dissonance around Latham.
Not cognitive dissonance tssk. We knew he was barking mad all along. Now, he’s also funny!