In a rather tortuous (or tortured) metaphor on 7 30 last night, Chris Uhlmann proclaimed:
The political runes might just be turning Labor’s way.
I don’t think runes turn, so it might be better to stick with that tide metaphor.
A variety of recent polls, including Newspoll and Essential, have found Labor’s primary vote inching up, while dissatisfaction with Tony Abbott continues to increase.
Writing at The Drum, Peter Lewis suggests:
It’s probably just a moment of polling sunshine, but the past week shows that when the stars align, there is still hope for the ALP.
Whether or not it’s just a moment of sunshine, of course, remains to be seen. Certainly, what looked like a probability – a return to Kevin Rudd – around a month ago now appears to be a prospect fast fading into the distance. The Carbon Price legislation is set to pass the Senate, and in retrospect, the reality of its introduction appears to have coincided with the decline of the Abbott project.
We shall see.
Elsewhere: Some very interesting reflections from blue milk at Hoyden.
Update: A very graphic illustration of where the poll trend is going from Possum.
One poll doth not make a summer.
The point, though, Terry, is that it’s a succession of polls over the last little while, and all the pollsters are finding improvement for Labor.
Mumble puts it best on the trend:
http://blogs.theaustralian.news.com.au/mumble/index.php/theaustralian/comments/opinion_polls_get_interesting_again/
Don’t count all your chickens in one basket.
I, I, I, I won’t, don’t you worry about that!
Interesting that Abbott chooses to be overseas (to meet with the UK tories?? (is there a surprise Afghan visit in the offing?)) during finalisation of the carbon pricing legislation. He really is incapable of fighting a battle from a position of adversity, something that Labor of late have had plenty of practise at. Combet was again excellent on RN this morning. The only comparable voice to his and many other govt. ministers on the LNP side is Turnball and he is hamstrung by the loons (ouch!).
But seriously, and supporting Mark’s point @2, the trend is also picked up in the latest Morgan poll on Federal voting intentions.
Gillard still needs a big breakthrough moment, like Margaret Thatcher had with the Falklands (before which she was lagging dreadfully in the polls). Perhaps New Zealand could obligingly invade Lord Howe Island.
@6 – Paul, yep, there are three polls all moving consistently in the same direction.
Perhaps it coincides with The Australian no longer being free online.
Patrickb, did you hear Turnbull this morning? Fran Kelly was hassling him about Abbott’s blood promise, and he was extremely nuanced. I reckon he’s keeping right away from it in preparation for a leadership challenge.
Abbott’s days as Opposition Leader are numbered, as they always have been.
Just that it’s becoming so obvious that even the Canberra press gallery can’t ignore it any longer.
The chips are down, and the sky hasn’t fallen. In a few months the carbon price rubber will hit the road and Abbott’s chicken will come home to roost.
Pretty sure that the orientation of runes matters when they’re cast, API perhaps you should extend Uhlmann some metaphorical slack.
Er, I mean *so. Damn autocorrect.
@9 – Terry, that might be it!
Abbott’s days as Opposition Leader are numbered
Some people would say that the reason for that is that he will soon be the Prime Minister.
But I would never say that.
Malcolm Turnbull on Breakfast with Fran Kelly seemed to be distancing himself from the carbon pricing roll back by saying ‘if this is our platform’ at the election and ‘if the senate don’t go along with that (the rollback) Tony Abbott has undertaken to have a double dissolution election….’
I agree with patrickb @5: Tone is on his way to Afghanistan. he doesn’t have much to talk to Cameron about after seeing him last week in Perth and after Cameron congratulated Australia on implementing a carbon pricing scheme.
Perhaps it coincides with The Australian no longer being free online.
There’s no perhaps about it. The two events do coincide. Whether one is the cause of the other is the interesting question.
@10
My sentiments exactly. He is Blackadder to Abbott’s Prince George.
The problem with the polls previously wasn’t the low Labor vote; they were getting about what they deserved. It was that the Libs were getting 57% when they should have been getting about 1 or 2%.
Who is Baldrick?
It’s hilarious that it took Abbott to dismiss IMF donations before journalists apparently noticed that he’s been an incoherent joke with a shadow ministry not much better for over a year. T
he shame is in considering that this rennaissance could have happened under Rudd – without all the bullshit of the past year.
I have noticed the media appear to have turned on Tones of late. I wonder how long he will last with a hostile media and the opinion polls moving against him?
If he gets rolled, we should all buy Andrew Elder a beer for maintaining the faith …
It is hardly suprising that the ALP primary vote should lift from historic low levels. The question is can it recover to election winning levels?
I acknowledge the passionate hatred around these parts of the Mad Monk but to declare his leadership over when he has the Opposition in an election winning position is really self-delusional.
@OBR
An election winning position 2 years out from an election. Given how abysmal Labor has been just about anyone could have had an election winning lead now. What really matters is if there is still an election winning lead at election time. He couldn’t do it last time and he may not even be there for next time.
@21
You can take you pick but I’d plump for Barnaby Joyce.
@24
I think you mistake hatred for rational incredulity and I suspect that you ability to feel the same is hampered by your deep and abiding passion for said deranged cleric.
Newspoll has had the labor 2PP consistently trending up since Sept 2. This set of results suggest that the improvement is not all about Qantas. I may be wrong but the key change may have started when people began to realize that the government had acheived quite a bit in 12 months and had more in the pipeline.
Carbon pricing was passed this morning. Abbot wasn’t there to witness complete defeat in his main crusade. The Herald is talking about the benefits to ordinary Australians. I wonder how the debate will change from here?
I’m guessing that Abbot knows his only chance to repeal it is to get an election before July 2012. How’s he going to do that? If he colluded with Joyce over Qantas, what other nastiness is he willing to engage in?
Well well. when things looked dire the brave men behind this board threw up their hands in surrender. Not so a smart, determined and clever lady who got on with things and just minutes ago had the ETS Bills agreed to without amendment by the Senate and has started the MRRT on its way.
I noticed that in this post the writer did not mention our Prime Minister, no, instead, the polls have just turned like the tide, perhaps influenced by the moon and sun?
This place is not getting better!
@21 I vote for Joe Hockey. I am sure he would be up for a “cunning plan”.
Rupert Murdoch once boasted that under his ownership of News, Australia had never elected a Prime Minister he hadn’t wanted. In 2010 did Murdoch’s mojo run out or does Abbott not have Murdoch’s support?
So, the Coalition lost ~2% of their vote to poll 44% and the Greans lost 20% of their vote to drop to 12%, but Tony Abbot is the story?
On these figures Bob Brown’s days must surely be numbered. There will be some worried people in the Greens tomorrow morning when they sober up. If they can finally get a carbon price up, but lose 20% of their votes to labor, they might have to rethink a few things.
I think its quite clear, across several polls, that the ALP has retaken 2-3% of the electorate over the last months.
Not enough – but LNP should tune into reality: the election, when it comes, will be won by between 0.1 and 4 points, not 7, 8 or 10. These numbers are simply the signs of irritated disengagement.
Hell, with Tony at the helm, never rule out a complete collapse in voter support either.
@25 – Mindy – you are corrrect he couldn’t do it last time – but he did take the opposition from being in an unwinnable to position to missing by a bees dick – a truely remarkable performance for someone who is supposedly unelectable.
At the very least, Gillard should get some breathing space.
Now the carbon legislation is passed, opposition harping about it sounds like whingeing to the politically non-engaged.
Monsoon season stops many boats.
Australia sinks into its yuletide torpor.
These factors present an opportunity to reset.
And congrats to the ALP & GRNs for the major reforms on CO2 pricing.
Brown is right, to my mind: it will never be rescinded.
Im with Katz: Welcome to the high-water mark, Tories. Now you’re attacking a fait d’accomplit, and taking the people’s compo.
Good luck with that – you’re going to need it.
So what happened to “we will fight this tax every second of every minute of every day of every week of every month“? (Oh, wait, I guess he wasn’t reading that one from a written document?)
@31
Indeed, the LNP are in real trouble if the Greens start losing support. The ALP will benefit from declining support from both Abbott and the Greens. Mind you, the LNP have a lot more to lose.
@33
“a truely remarkable performance for someone who is supposedly unelectable”
What’s remarkable is that he didn’t win following the Rudd debacle and then failed to convince his idealogical brethren that he was deserving of their support. You see the problem with Abbott is that he’s lazy, he took the independents support for granted.
@39 – strange – Australia does not have a history of voting out first term governments – and yet now you claim it “remarkable is that he didn’t win following the Rudd debacle” – I’d be interested to find anyone on the left on record leading up to or immediately after the election espousing that view.
As for “idealogical bretheren” – the only one who partially suprised me was Katter – but he is about as predictable as a riled up Taipan. The rest were never going to side with the Coalition both on political and personal grounds.
I wish I was as “lazy” as Abbott.
As for the CO2 Bills – this legislation is illogical because it will achieve nothing for the Australian or global environment and will have a negative impact on us economically. Without a globally binding agreement that is environmentally, economically and politically effective this is just pissing into the wind. Hugely expensive symbolic grandstanding.
There will be an election – whether early or at the end of 2013, it doesn’t matter.
If the Opposition win then every single piece of legislation relating to this will be repealed – lock, stock and barrel – and if the Greens/ALP in the Senate are able to and decide to block it then there will be a double dissolution election to follow – however long it takes.
This is just the beginning of the fight.
Well as union election poster said: Labor will keep the pork rolling, I mean jobs coming.
And Abbott just has to stuff up spectacularly (how can he not), and Turnbull will be there when he trips to catch him with a nice soft matress stuffed with broken glass and used syringe needles. So maybe just maybe we’ll have another three years of this most excellent government. What a bunch of stars they have been.
OBR @41: What are you smoking?
True to form, Abbott is not around to answer tough questions on the day the carbon package becomes law.
He has run away … just like he walks out of press conferences when the questions get tricky.
Speaking of unhinged, the Pure Poison blog at Crikey is running an open thread dedicated to unhinged media reporting of the passing of the carbon laws:
http://blogs.crikey.com.au/purepoison/2011/11/08/carbon-tax-unhinging-open-thread/
zoot – if you think the CO2 tax will have any positive impact on the environment or the economy then you have been drinking the bong water.
Even a dead cat bounces.
… yada yada yada
*rinse and repeat talking points ad infinitum*
@40
Likewise Australia doesn’t have a history of tossing out first term PMs via an internal coup. I certainly thought that, with a reasonable leader at the helm, the LNP would have won comfortably and I doubt I’m an orphan there. And thanks for proving my point re: the independents. They baulked at an Abbot lead govt. Your love is blinding you.
Update: A very graphic illustration of where the poll trend is going from Possum.
@47
Gotta love this response
Important questions to ask:
1a/ Is this effective?
1b/ what does it cost?
Answer: “I’m not listening… “
Sooner or later the MSM will work out that there are two CO2 reduction plans on the table, not one.
Just out of interest: which will cost the taxpayer more?
Comment on the Daily Terror blog thread:
The principle of one person, four votes rools OK?
Carbon pricing legislated. Tony Abbott slunk away to London two days early with his tail between his legs. Coward.
46/54 (the Possum trend) is far from irretrievable. At the very least, you’d have to say that the Labor caucus would have to be brain dead to turf out Gillard now and replace her with Rudd/Shorten/Crean/Smith or whomever.
Which means it will probably happen.
So in sum:Abbott and the Coalition are now the *sole* source of market uncertainty re: the cost of Carbon.
Anyone starting to get the sneaking suspicion that Abbott’s very efffective tactics may have been concealing a really, really shit strategy?
OMG. sheer vintage wingnuttery, via Pure poison.
Check the howling and baying and misogyny and homophobia. There are a lot of remarks like “I’m praying for Australia on this dark, dark day.” Mate, if I were to say that it’d be because of the comment threads in the Tele.
Mediatracker @ 54, Abbott……obviously to get an urgent top up of certain to fail bad advice from Christopher Monkton.
This is the ALP’s WorkChoices except worse because it is really the Green’s.
Interesting to see whether the Libs will be quite as crazy as Labor was last year following some poor polling. My bet is that if this trend continues for a few more polls the whispers speculating about the Liberal leadership will become deafening.
Or maybe Abbott senses his position and decided to take a quick trip for his last as the leader of anything, significant.
Hey Razor, I see you’ve been commenting at the Punch. You’ve not only been promiscuous, but reckless. Unprotected commenting at News blogs could see you catch something really nasty.
I’ve never ‘unfriended’ someone of Facebook regardless of their position on various things until this afternoon:
“In a parallel world I would take the BITCH out permanently! In this world I would like to kidnap her and teach her a few lessons for fucking with the people. May God save me, cause nothing will save Juliar Gillard.”
I’ve never seen this sort of thing before even from the really diehard ‘Howard Haters’ of days gone by. What is happening out there to cause this sort of hatred?
Nothing’s happening out there, Ronson. It’s always been in their minds. Pathetic and sad. So much of it has to be about misogyny.
Hellen 57,
Piers Ackerman is off his tree over this.
Nice.
His problem is that he has put so much support behind the negative and denialist position he now has the dilemma of how to carry forward and still seem vaguely believeable. So the mortally wounded act is intended to buy sympathy support from his wingnut brigade while he flounders around to find some future purpose.
IMHO.
Eh:
1) The Coalition still holds a crushing lead.
b) Julia Gillard is still as welcome as a fart in a phonebox.
iii) This past couple of weeks is one of the few times this year Labor’s managed not to shoot themselves in the foot – how long before normal service resumes?
Fourthly, carbon pricing is not going to rapidly win popular affection, there will be glitches in the implementation and the BER and insulation programs don’t portend well for this Govts ability and willingness to defend itself.
This has been a brief period of easing in what’s been a nine-month period of utter mayhem, to actually fix this requires either Gillard suddenly getting some political nous or Rudd taking over, and paradoxically a respite in the polls not going to help with the latter and the former might be impossible (after the second Malaysia bill I have no confidence in her judgement).
For all that commentators have started pointing out that Abbott is a policy black hole with the gut instincts of a pyromaniac the public have been aware of this all along (hence the high 50s disapproval) and still were dishing out 57-43 TPP to the Libs. The benefit of the doubt remains with the Coalition for as long as Labor’s authority and credibility languishes, and the hung parliament magnifies that weakness.
I wouldn’t call 53-47 a “crushing lead” at all. Certainly a handy one, but the dynamics have now shifted. We may well be being treated to an object lesson in how political fortunes are not static. The Coalition’s lead has always been soft, and that’s consistently been indicated by Abbott’s own very poor ratings.
Nothing’s happening out there
I disagree. This issue lights up the passions of the wingnuts more than all the others combined. But why? There’s plenty for right wingers to get all steamed up about, yet climate change and the policy responses to it pushes all their buttons times 1000.
What is it about this issue that causes the wingnuts to send death threats to climate scientists? You don’t see refugee advocates getting death threats or words like treason being thrown around on that issue.
Could it be the presence of the Greens in the policy process? Possibly, but the wingnuts were just as nutty back in ’09 when the Greens were dealt out of it, so I don’t think that’s it.
Misogyny? A contributing factor, no doubt, but again, 2009 …
It really is weird.
Yep, but it’s completely irrational! “Nothing is happening out there” in the sense that climate change science and the associated policy responses are disproportionate to the wingnuttery.
Something that has happened in the past couple of months is that Gillard has got a new strategic advisor, some Pom who apparently worked wonders for Blair.* Astute observers will have noticed that the Prime Minister has elevated herself above the day to day fray (apart from a moment on Qantas in Parliament when she was in her comfort zone).
The idea is to make her look like a leader, and let her ministers do the brawling. That Abbott is a brawler’s brawler reinforces the strategy.
* For a while. These strategies always have a limited shelf life, but Gillard is only looking to the next election.
“”"I wouldn’t call 53-47 a “crushing lead” at all.”"”
It was enough to be called a Ruddslide
@63 – “I’ve never seen this sort of thing before even from the really diehard ‘Howard Haters’ of days gone by.”
You weren’t looking very hard.
dear Tom back @ 13
uhlman gets no slack from me for this one – its a stupid figure of speech; one i’d expect from a puffed up phony, so par for course. runes are an alphabet, that once were used for writing german languages, before the latin alphabet was adopted for written german. metaphors expressed in the language represented in runes may indeed turn, but never the runes themselves.
yours sincerely
alfred venison
Greens feeding the press gallery after the legislation. Until the heavens open.
Any negativity like water off the ducks back there today.
Oops sorry, wrong thread
53-47 is pretty crushing, Howard put the finishing touches to the Howard Myth on 2004 and that was in the same ballpark. Similarly, unless your opponent is in NSW Labor territory most largish leads _are_ soft, I don’t think this is surprising considering how many of federal Labor’s wounds are self-inflicted
What makes me sceptical about any big shift in dynamics is that I don’t think Labor have found a way out of their issues with authority and credibility and I think the high Coaliton lead _in spite of_ Abbott’s poor ratings suggests that this is more important to voters than the fact the opposition leader is a shameless, destructive opportunist.
alfred, runes are also a method of augury, that you throw and then read according to their relative positions. Depending on which form of hocus-pocus you believe, some runes are reversible and their up-or-down-ness relative to the observer (or, I suppose, the fixed stars if you’re doing it with some astrological new-age blend) determines whether they’re good or bad. Also, if on repeated throws of the runes you are always predicted to win the election, then one day they predict you’re going to get wiped out, then they can be said to have turned (on you) even if they are all positively oriented relative to the fixed stars (or mecca, if you’re doing it with some orientalist new-age blend).
So I think the metaphor, while incontrovertibly shite, is possibly correct.
But we all know that Tony Abbot reads auguries in the entrails of sacrificed babies, rather than using anything as unmanly as runes. So I think a better metaphor would be to say that he got the wrong end of the shit stick, or something.
53-47 that was three months out from an election and had been static for 18 months would be absolutely crushing.
53-47 two years out from an election with at least some evidence of volatility is, as you say, very handy.
There is still the inherent weakness of polling: ‘if an election were held today’ is a counterfactual of diminishing relevance to the next election the further you are from it.
My personal feeling is that if the ALP are to win the next election it will be through a slow steady clawing back of votes and going to the poll with the electorate against them on carbon pricing ~55-45 but accepting that they at least have some kind of record (however flawed) and plan (however dubious) compared to the shysters opposing them.
You’re too easy on them, Mark!
I don’t think the craziness of the response by some to climate change policy is misogyn-ism, but related to the tradition and cultures of some types of industries– for example, truck drivers, timber, farming. Industries, which are perceived (at least) of being the losers, when climate change policies are introduced. It’s a secondary characteristic that these cultures also happen to be (generally) misogynistic, as well as: paternalistic, anti-intellectual, sympathetic to corporal punishment, etc. etc. etc. basically just plain pure 20thC conservative. It’s also a characteristic of the times, that this kind of Lebensphilosophie appears so out of tune with the present that it’s very easy to perceive it as insane and crazy. It’s kind of conceptually related to the Amish (probably a bad example), or other people who dearly wish that they could just get off the bus: if only time would just stop. The problem is, that this kind of conservatism is not only fantastical it harms others– it has at the very least, the potential to harm others. Just dogmatically ignoring, for example, climate change, is going to cause a great deal of hardship for many people. And further, the obscurantism and the ar6e-hattery, I mean, the way in which the issue has actually been politicised (there were/are other options– see Turnbull, Merkel, etc), is pretty close to being just downright evil.
@Leinad
Insulation program was under Rudd, so I’m not sure a return to Rudd would see the sort of leadership you are thinking of. I suspect that if there was a real danger of Abbott becoming PM then the disapproval rating would play more of a part as media scrutiny really focussed on Abbott and the two party preferred would tighten up fairly quickly. Or Turnbull would challenge and the Libs would probably romp it in.
“The Tide Turns for Labor’… So does that mean the end of those myriads of blog comments from Deliverance Country constituents calling for an end to Juliar and her incompatent goverment?
I think we should get all those “Juliar” freaks and give them free buses around the country.
They’re ugly, ugly folk.
sg@75
“But we all know that Tony Abbot reads auguries in the entrails of sacrificed babies, rather than using anything as unmanly as runes.”
True, but what do you mean runes are unmanly? Vikings invented runes and they would have to be the most hairy-chested men in history! If anything, you could say that Tony Rabbit is unmanly, squibbing off to the UK in the middle of the Senate hearing for the Carbon Tax like he did and no doubt having lunch with his Tory mates.
Lefty E @81
I think they must be all clones actually, since they all keep saying exactly the same thing over and over and over and over and….
As for the next Coalition leader ( Lib/Nat not ALP/Green) Smokin Joe is da man.
Look at his Wiki bio.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Hockey
His Dad was born in Bethlehem fa christ sake!!!
Is there anything in this , that a regular Ozzy, would be repulsed by?(ok, yes adrian, he’s a conservative. But other than that)
And he even answers questions straight up!!!??!!1?
Everyone loves a chubby family guy.
Hockey v Gillard = goodbye ALP/Greens “power share”
Sam asked:
It’s existential (tax is existential for rightwingers) — like “boats” is existential (what is authentic Australia? — but with the opposition encouraging them to think that intimidation and abuse can make a difference (which it obviously can’t on “boats” since everyone knows the opposition can’t stop them either). The word “tax” is key here, because tax is in their view not only “evil” but
a) is emblematic of the ALP (big taxing and spending)
AND
b) a breach of promise –> manifest as “Juliar” — which suggests the government lacks legitimacy.
The key failure here was by the regime for allowing this own goal (allowing it to be called a carbon tax) of course.
True Megan, I didn’t think of that; but aren’t the Vikings part of “old europe” now, full of limp-wristed metrosexuals who’re being overrun by Teh Muslims? And let’s face it, the runes do involve reading, which is a bit poncey.
Also going to London was a strategic retreat. Or perhaps it was a pre-organized retreat. Or something.
Thanks for the link love.
For the first time in a very long time I have had the sense that Labor could actually be in with a chance of winning the next election.. strange days indeed.
“and I think the high Coaliton lead _in spite of_ Abbott’s poor ratings suggests that this is more important to voters than the fact the opposition leader is a shameless, destructive opportunist”
I disagree and I don’t think that someone as unpopular as Abbott can afford to run a campaign without policies. His entirely negative style will start to fall apart when the election looms and the govt. start to iron the suits and produce the policies and the pork.
The midterm unpopularity of the govt. is nothing unusual, the only difference ATM is that the govt. is in a minority and I suspect that the electorate will fix that next time round. However I don’t think it’s wise to base a prediction on current polling outcomes. Trends are what matters and if the LNP continues to go backward this far out from a general poll then they have serious problems.
I thought you were more of a pseph than that, Leinad. There’s still two years to go before an election, assuming nothing goes wrong.
Surely, you’d hardly expect the Liberals to retain this lead even by mid-2012 when the compensating goodies for carbon pricing kick in. The hostility up to recently has been along the lines of we’ll all be ruined. It’s hard to see how that will be sustained after they find out the world as they know it won’t end.
Eventually the Liberals will have to offer an affordable alternative. “Bring back the Howard years” won’t cut it.
dear sg
i understand the i-ching and the use of coins or yarrow stalks to arrive at trigrams that are combined to make hexagrams supposedly readable as bearing insight into the situation of the supplicant. i read richard wilhelm & carl jung and that i get, and understand that its ancient & well attested to/documented.
the same cannot be said of supposed runic divination & finding a tool of divination in runes is the syncretism of later ages yearning for some kind of “authenticity” by a “return” to faux “ancient truths” in recoil from materialism & alienation/anomie; ages like ours, given to crediting crystal therapy & other divertissements and resource wars. no doubt though people like alastair crowley & wb yeats may have credited runic divination in their age, one given to crediting séances & manifestations of ectoplasm in antidote to excessive positivism & creeping militarism.
in any case, uhlman’s metaphor was labored, clumsy, pretentious & senseless. it had no rhetorical point but showing chris off. your “abbott left holding the wrong end of a sh!t stick”, or something demotic like that, wouldn’t have shown chris off so well, so new age, so up to date.
yours sincerely
alfred vension
Hah, when did I earn a reputation for that? Easy come, easy go, I guess
Sure, a poll is two years away, but that cuts both ways. In the meantime the Coalition remains in a remarkably strong position, despite its policy vacuity. I’d love for that particular show to be over but disco is not dead yet.
I doubt it will be as smooth as that. For one, it took a whole election cycle for people to be won over on the GST, and while this package won’t be the technical nightmare the BAS was it has baggage that won’t be unpacked in nine months.
Furthermore, the immediate destruction claims can be parlayed into persistent linkage of every energy, water, fuel and hamburger price hike to the carbon price. Combine this with the inevitable scammers, regulatory glitches and stir in some of Barnaby’s Patented Global Crisis Gonzo Word Salad in what could well be a double-dip year and there’s a story to be told about how a government has just made everything worse at the moment when taxes need to be lifted and pensioners unsqueezed.
You’d like to think so, but it seems to me this is predicated on Labor batting well above its 2009-2011 average for political nous and Julia Gillard building leadership authority in a hung parliament deeply inimical to the task. In the last two years Labor has done well to systematically dynamite the ‘benefit of the doubt’ credibility that the voting public tends to bestow on incumbents and I’d argue restoring that, more than any Peak Abbott moment will be central to re-election.
Lienard: The last 4 Newspolls had Labor improving its 2PP performance with a move from 41% for 2/9 rising to 47% now. If this rate of increase continues Labor would be ahead by xmas.
All we can really say is that the electorate is very volatile with a large percentage of voters willing to change their vote. The next election could be a landslide either way.
Gillard sees light at the end of the tunnel now.
Media pack have become sick and tired of their own voices (never have so many said so little so often) and out of boredom have started listening to the answers Gillard, Swan, Combet, Wong, Shorten etc are giving.
The govt both under Rudd then under Gillard has performed very well in exceptionally difficult times. Only big stuff up was failing to get the Greens on board with the first ETS. But even with that they were unlucky, with Abbott suddenly rising from the swamp.
Jumpy,
Hockey’s biggest problem is himself (Hockeynomics).
A very good day finally getting the carbon tax through thanks to the Greens dragging Labor kicking & screaming to this and special mention to the courageous decisions by the Indy’s in Windsor & Oakeshott being able to lead and do the right thing despite conservative electorates.
I love how feral the Right go over this they really lose their minds and seemingly truly believe it’s all some scam cooked up by scientists for the One World Government or something.
To paraphrase Keating from 7.30 on Monday night you don’t worry about trying to sell this stuff the people need to get sold. I doubt the carbon tax will be much of an issue at all at the next election in late 2013 as it would’ve been in for nearly a year and a half at that point.
You think its bad here: Chomsky was telling a story about how the state govt of Indiana had to remove certain road signs which had some production code written on them.
Why? Too many people thought they were navigation and landing signals for UN black helicopters, and the One World Govt.
USA: a nation of some ….very primitive peoples.
Kazakhstan: a nation of some ….very primitive peoples.
Pakistan: a nation of some ….very primitive peoples.
Bolivia: a nation of some ….very primitive peoples.
Papua-New Guinea a nation of some ….very primitive peoples.
Iran: a nation of some ….very primitive peoples.
Germany: a nation of some ….very primitive peoples.
Hey, this is easy. One can slag off at whole nations on the basis of a bit of odd-ball behaviour of a few of their people.
Cuba: a nation of some ….very primitive peoples.
Venezuala: a nation of some ….very primitive peoples.
India: a nation of some ….very primitive peoples.
Canada: a nation of some ….very primitive peoples.
Not the slightest bit of ignorant prejudice involved.
Sam @ 68, the reason that the right go so feral about climate change is because they realise (not necessarily consciously) that it means growth capitalism must end if we are to survive.
Sam @70
As well as Ministers throwing the punches, leaving Gillard room to look Prime-ministerial, I’ve also noticed Doug Cameron lobbing a few – dare I say – populist policy options from the far left flank over the last month or so. Countering Barnaby and EricA, perhaps? Shifting the Overton window?
Speaking of Barnaby, the unhinging continues. On the ABC this morning he was ranting on about the end of large cities because of the carbon price legislation- ‘say goodbye to Woolongong, say goodbye to Newcastle, blah blah blah…’
Definitely one of Labor’s best assets.
Yes Adrian. “Goodnight Irene!” You know when Dad or Embarrassing Uncle cracks it and his voice goes up several registers? Like that.
Maybe it’s just me, but there’s a “used car salesman” vibe about Hockey that I find offputting. He smiles a lot, but I don’t always get the feeling that he believes what he says.
GregM: there are lots of hunter gatherer tribes around the world that unsympathetic people could classify as “primitive”. Personally, I reckon they’re the second coming of Derrida compared to those frightened fundie freaks in the US. There’s animism, and then there’s stupidity.
GregM’s gone Barnaby.
@101
Yes I heard a bit of it, he was really off his tree ranting about “sending them back to university”, “green jobs”, “they can get arts degrees”. Who the hell was he addressing? You’d think any group of normal, well adjusted Australians would find this kind of performance excruciating.
I especially enjoy Barnaby’s repeated references to the manufacture of “wind chimes” in Nimbin. I’m not sure that there are any wind chime factories in Nimbin, but if there aren’t and this leads to them starting up, that would be good right? If there are wind chime factories elsewhere I suppose he fancies that they should be sneered at, but again, I’m not sure why.
I assume the allusion it to “airy fairy” (and thus figuratively insubstantial) things — he also mentioned “wind turbines”. I see him as a prattling noisemaking windbag, so I do see his metaphor, though personally I’d prefer the sound of a wind chime or even a turbine to his output.
Yes, why does Barnaby Joyce hate small business?
Chimes? Wind? Small business development….even aeolian harps maybe, ringing from the wind blowing through empty cities, the former greatness of ‘stralia left decaying to be picked over by arts graduates living in teepees…
This endless stream of monumental idiocy from Joyce must be recorded and remembered for the future, the insane monologue of a dying culture…especialy given how spot on David Irving (no relation) @ 99 is…
I see GregM took the trollbait
Patrickb @ 104 – well have you seen them in the same room together?
@110
That’s Black Helicopter territory … but …
Duncan @51
Duncan, content-free talking points aren’t “questions”. The questions you have raised have been answered in great detail, which you’re probably aware. However, given the general vacuity of all the comments you’ve made on this blog, I don’t really expect you to read the volumes of policy literature on this subject. Toddle off now.
Yes, Senator Joist outdid himself this morning. I had coffee coming out of my nose.
Actually when one gets back to the GST people found out reasonably early the GST did not have all if any of the alleged problems that were spouted by the then dishonest Opposition.
It was BAS and only BAS that continued the anger.
All bets are off for the next election until we see the reaction to the ETS.
My guess is that it will be similar to the GST but without any BAS baggage.
Swan’s strategy is transparent. Tighter fiscal policy offset by looser monetary policy from the RBA. A ‘Surplus’ and lower interest rates.
That could unravel into slower than expected growth.
On the other hand questions will then be asked about the Opposition’s obvious bogus ‘savings’. The point of making the ETS the major issue on the next election will die.
the question no-one knows is what will people do?
Realise Abbott has wood-ducked them or they do not care?
dear Down and Out in Sai Gon
“I don’t always get the feeling that he [hockey] believes what he says.”
in over 35 years of teaching undergrad & post grad at sydney uni, joe hockey was the only student my tough-as-nails, german-trained, read-every-original-source-no-exceptions professor refused to write a reference for. only one. the man never had a position that didn’t change to the majority view before the end of any seminar. and not because he was convinced by argument, no, he watched the majority viewpoint emerge & joined it as it became clear what it would be. in this lies the root of your “feeling”.
the liberal campaign against ted mack in north sydney, that saw hockey in, was heavy with veiled, and less than veiled, threats made against mack supporters in the community. police did not follow up complaints made at the time; essentially, hockey got away with voter intimidation. ted mack, you may recall was the independent representative & popular former mayor who, among other things, traded in the council limo for two holdens. i think he also famously wore sandals, but it was a long time ago.
i loath hockey & everything he stands for. like the natives used to say in the old country, “he speaks to lie”.
yours sincerely
alfred venison
… and what’s more, you were drinking tea!
The Barnabarian. Transmutational comedic value.
Interesting straw floating in the wind:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204190704577026360072268418.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
The collapse of the neoliberal hegemony appears to be quite advanced. Ohio is an habitual swing state.
Well done LTP on including so many three-character initialisms in one post … LOL
Abetz claimed that the ALP had achieved a very difficult thing with this measure — something that will hurt the economy and the environment.
I didn’t hear anyone challenge Abetz to explain his rationale for the last part of that claim.
Woohoow, a conversation about Senators behaviour, cool.
Anyone catch the bit where Brown tried to suspend standing orders , to try and waste senate time , to try and propose a motion, to try and stop another senator (conservative) from trying to standing in Bobs camera shot, while Bob was trying to be seen?
What a guy.
Voted down obviously, but through no lack of trying.
His new (or long held ) sense of ” godliness” , power and vanity will make him a Green liability on the march to the next election.
ALPs best chance is to wait as long as they can to call it.
The ALP (not so) faithful are waking up. Another 12 months should do the trick.
Alfred Venison, you really should not make stuff up. Hockey was elected in 1996. Mack retired at that election and so did not contest the seat.
In fact, as I recall, on election night 1996 Mack praised Hockey as a fine man and a worthy successor in North Sydney.
Which isn’t to say that Hockey isn’t a turd’s turd. But there’s enough real stuff to get him on that you don’t need to fantasise.
“The ALP (not so) faithful are waking up. Another 12 months should do the trick.”
Indeed they are. The Laborites who jumped ship for the wingnuts last election, will return to the family.
“to try and stop another senator (conservative) from trying to standing in Bobs camera shot, while Bob was trying to be seen?
Does anyone have a clue what this is about? It’s seems very Barnabyesque (i.e. incoherent)? OMG, has ever noticed that you never seen GregM, Jumpy and Barnaby together and yet they sound so similar (i.e. nonsensical)?
If you want to locate BARnaby these days, just look in the first three letters of his name…
…meanwhile, John Hartigan resigns. The media inquiry is working!
Patb/leftyE
I heard it live, you can visit Hansard.
It will become ” sensical ” .
*(As it happens Barnaby, GregM and I have never met , but not ruling it our in the future)
ops, ” not ruling it out“
No-one has ever seen me and the Dalai Lama together and he spouts a bit of political uncorrectness and unconventional thought from time to time, which is your measure of nonsensical, patrickb.
OMG, could I be the Dalai Lama?
On the other hand has anyone ever seen patrickb and Ivan Milat together?
OMG, could patrickb be Ivan Milat whiling away his hours as a guest of her majesty with access to the internet and nothing better to do and nothing important to contribute?
I think that others will get the point patrickb, You should too, but I’m not sure you can.
You shoudn’t take cheap shots for laughs too readily.
I think the momentum is with Labor now. The public, and more importantly the media, have grown bored with Abbott’s strategy of saying no to everything. Most of all, Gillard is quite sensibly just getting on with the business of governing and not allowing Abbott to set the agenda as she was before.
Nearly all the electoral damage Labor has suffered since the Rudd election in 2007 has been self-inflected. Whoever has been advising them on communications has been abysmal. Essentially, they behaved as if Howard was still in power and wasted an awful lot of energy buying into News Ltd’s manufactured agenda. That appears to have changed in recent weeks – they have been acting and talking as if they are in power.
Perhaps also the public is starting to click, finally, that the hysteria about ‘pink batts and school halls’ was a talkback radio/News Ltd/ABC construct and that our governance through the financial crisis has actually been sound. Most economists – at least those not on the payroll of mining companies or the IPA – think carbon pricing and the resources tax are sound and sensible policies.
Finally, it is becoming evident that the internal tensions in the Liberal Party between it’s business-supported dry faction (personified by Peter Reith) and Abbott’s DLP-style populist we’ll-say-anything circus will spill into the open as the Mad Monk’s kamikaze strategy now unravels.
The brinksmanship was only going to work for so long.
dear Sam
thank you for the reply. i’ll stand corrected in detail only. i have it from a source i trust, that ted mack did not contest the 1996 election out of concern about the threats & intimidation directed at his supporters in the electorate by the hockey machine. what mack said publically about his reasons for not running & on election night in regard to joe hockey & his character, was done for the cameras & for the sake of protecting his supporters’ personal & professional safety. like i said, i have no reason to doubt my source; for 35 years he taught undergraduate & postgraduate university to many various people, some of whom have gone on to become judges, barristers, political advisers & at least one minister of the crown; he has connections & i trust him. you’re welcome, of course, to take what i say with a grain of salt.
yours sincerely
alfred venison
@126
I heard enough of it on the news and AM to know that is was the typical foaming-at-the-mouth stuff that Barnaby seems to revel in, hence it was a load of good old fashioned tent-preacher rubbish. Perhaps there’s a certain demographic in Queensland that enjoys this kind of stuff but that cohort has shrunk (like Barnaby’s brain) since the days of Joh, who was helped immensely by the gerrymander I understand. Basically you’re supporting a fairly unstable personality who has demonstrated a minimal understanding of how to run an economy in the current circumstances and little grasp of the complexities of modern society (hence his appeal in the bush, it’s actually a plus there).
It’s a bit odd, what’s happened to our Barners. When he farted his way into the Senate back in 04 or whenever he offered the prospect of being a real maverick in the McCain style. It now appears that he was a loon all along and that the rest of the party just had to start smoking his homegrown anger weed. Now all would appear to be, a somewhat paradoxically angry, bliss. Except Mal, he’s sticking with Vaucluse bud.
Perhaps my recollection is erronous, but I had been under the impression at the time(s) that Ted Mack, being opposed to the concept of parliamentary pensions, quit both his state & federal seat just before he was eligible for a parliamentary pension. Not for any other reason.
Not so much a grain, Alf, as a truckload. In fact, I don’t believe a word of it.
yeah that’s what i remember about ted mack retiring, steve @ the pub. very admirable, that pension should be means tested imo. maybe, if austerity measures are ever needed, that sort of over-generosity to themselves can be the 1st to go. comfortable pension yes, free flights etc: no.
talking about coalition leadership, how about julie bishop?
she berated TA for even thinking about cutting educational aid in indonesia, was a good sport on the chaser, and isn’t overly nasty. i liked the bougainville joke too. she got caught out with the passport comment… and probably lots of other negatives. but… either her or turnbull for my money.
Actually Mack retired from his state seat in 1988 not so that he woudn’t get a pension but because he knew that 8 years later he would need the same pretext to retire from his federal seat (which he would not win until 1990) because Joe Hockey (whom nobody had heard of in 1988) would be harassing his campaign workers – in 1996.
Such prescience!
Maybe the replacement of Hartigan at News Limited means the Murdoch Press thinks a more truthful approach to the reporting of the Gillard government’s adventures might be approriate.
Maybe the replacement of Hartigan at News Limited means the Murdoch Press thinks a more truthful approach to the reporting of the Gillard government’s adventures might be approriate.
“Murdoch Press” and “truthful approach” should never be used in the same sentence.
@ 136:
Somehow, I have some doubts about that.
Both Sam and Terangeree are probably right but the appointment of Ken Cowley and Murdoch’s simultaneous shift to Chairman of NL suggests change is in the wind and that part of that change is a decision by Murdoch to stop pursuing Gillard at any cost. This strategy has already cost NL dearly – think Australia Network for example. Expect the worst but hope for better.
Sorry I meant Kim Williams not Ken Cowley. Stephen Mayne at Crikey also seems to think change is in the wind. “Hartigan’s departure is a big blow for Abbott, as the two remain very close. Now that the carbon pricing legislation has cleared both houses, News Ltd’s nuclear strategy of pushing for regime change in Canberra will have to be reconsidered.
The commercial and reputation damage has been substantial. Foxtel’s Austar takeover bid is in doubt, Sky News has been thrown out of the Australia Network race courtesy of completely unsubtle leaks to Harto’s great mate Mark Day and the dynamic Ray Finkelstein QC has a blank canvas on which to cross-examine News Ltd practices.”
Perhaps it is a bit of a stretch on my part to relate this to greater truthfulness.
Stephen Mayne at Crikey also seems to think change is in the wind
The News Ltd site, today, has a headline “Three million to suffer under Labor’s carbon tax”. Their exemplar of the suffering? A stay at home Mum whose husband earns $150K.
The horror, the horror.
Change would need be in the hurricane yo make an appreciable difference.
He actually earns over $150K, and they don’t say how much over. Oh the humanity!
dear Sam
i don’t expect you to credit me, of course, you don’t know me from a hill of beans. i have known my source well for 30 years & I trust him on this; he has more insider knowledge than barry cassidy’s band of merry mates & has been more often correct in his analyses of politics, local & international, and the motivations of political actors, than anyone I know.
and I’m told it wasn’t so much or only mack’s campaign workers who were affected but his local small & medium sized business supporters as well. if he was indeed dissuaded through such means from bucking past form & committing to represent his constituents for longer than two terms, then, given the circumstances, I do not take at face value what mack said in public, about hockey’s character, or about his own reasons for not seeking a third term. it would not be the first time in public life that a person concealed something about their real motives in order to protect people he/she cared for.
i’m not seeking to persuade here, i know that’s not possible. and I don’t want to distract the thread any more than to state here that I know & trust my source, and, as you neither know me nor my source, your scepticism is both expected & appropriate.
yours sincerely
alfred venison
OK Alf, whatever you say … chuckle chuckle.
Maybe Rupert figured that Tony Abbot didn’t need his help while Craig Thomson was still around. Wonder what will happen to the polls when that one blows up.
The decision to fund the Commonwealth’s share of the wage increase for SACS workers should boost the popularity of this government. So many people depend on SACS workers that this is a win for social equity and inclusion as well as for gender equity. The government is having a very good week.
Oh gawd, not another sob story about a poor, poor family struggling along on $150K+.
“I don’t see why we have to suffer because he earns slightly more.” Oh, where is that tiny, tiny violin??!
Oh, and I meant to say, “slightly more”: Try “Double our household income, and then some.” FFS.
I like how they’re naming them the 3 million. Because “14%” doesn’t sound quite so compelling as “3 million.”
@Helen,”slightly more” — grr, it takes quite a lot of money to be that divorced from reality. Reminds me of Catherine Tate’s aga-saga woman.
Her ” slightly more” is quadruple the current average wage of those SACS workers.
“A stay at home Mum whose husband earns $150K.”
They think we’re all idiots.
Oh, and also, and too, when I say they earn twice as much as we do and then some, I should add we don’t define our household as poor!!!
Where do they find these people? Is there a survey designed to find selfish gits in a particular demographic who they can call on for an interview?
hi su, are u talking about the 12k payrise for carers/community workers
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-11-10/gillard-in-equal-pay-pledge/3657700
i think the timing is important, mostly because it’s clearly not pre election pork barrelling. a good move, the polls next week will be interesting.
Yes, Jusme, I don’t want to give Labor too much credit, it shouldn’t have ever been in doubt– not funding the gap after a successful wage case would have been indefensible, and would surely have led to cuts in services to clients already in dire need. I don’t know how tricksy they get with their strategy and whether some initial dissembling on issues that will involve increases government spending is to be expected, but I doubt that it is purely coincidental that Swan has been talking about the timetable for a surplus in the same week.
@128
“You shoudn’t take cheap shots for laughs too readily.”
Er … I think I get your meaning and I know, I know, it’s a bad habit, but well when you’re presented with such succulent, low hanging fruit such as yourself it’s just so damn tempting.
Kim said:
Ive been arguing for most of the year that the tide would turn for the ALP as the carbon tax legislation passed through parliament and gained the legitimacy of law. On 23 JUL 2011 I predicted:
So much so that earlier this week I laid down $40 at 2-to-1 odds with a close friend, overly generous iMHO, but worth it just to prove a point and because I feel sorry for him at the moment.
I have no prediction about whether the ALP will dump Gillard and put up with Rudd as PM. I doubt it as Rudd is not popular in the party and dumping another PM in the run-up to another election would be a sign of desperation.
Hope not, Gillard is a good PM, sheperding through a workable progressive tax regime, resource rent and carbon tax. Strong on border protection plus against the slow motion disaster of “Big Australia”.
I salute the Prime Minister’s announced support of a substantial pay rise for community workers. A good example of the positive differences a Labor government can make.
34. Occam – not supposedly, definitely. In the first week of the campaign the Coalition momentum stopped dead when people finally realised a vote for the Coalition is a vote for Abbott PM. Near enough isn’t good enough in politics, otherwise Andrew Peacock would’ve had another go at Hawke in 1987.
42. No, it’s the end. It will take two or three elections before all of Abbott’s ducks line up and nobody will give him that mandate time after time after time. In politics you can’t wait until everything is neatly in place, yet Abbott insists that is the way it has to be. We’ll see about that.
59. No, it’s Labor’s GST. Only the pundits think it’s bad for the incumbents, the rest of us will just get on with it.
71. Earlier this year the Coalition had 7% more than it does – *that* was a crushing lead. This is a waystation on the way to defeat.
129. Well said Mr Denmore, well said (once again).
132, 134. On Mack’s first day as a Federal MP he became eligible for his NSW pension. Whether or not he collects it is, strangely, a matter on which Mack becomes litigious. He quit Federal politics because he was going to be replaced by Joe Hockey.
@158 andrewelder your points are all worth taking. I have recently your blog is even more perceptive than usual.
I want to comment on Mr. Denmore’s point;
I wonder if the fact that Europe’s in the process of meltdown has anything to do with this? In that, Australians, who maybe 18 months ago thought that the whole “GFC” thing was a little overblown (because we missed most of the bad effects), are now confronted with the reality of what happened and is happening right now in Europe and maybe, just maybe, come to the slow realisation that the reason we missed most of the bad effects the first time round was, among other things, the result of timely intervention by the ALP government?