If the premise is that Twitter, Facebook and other social media enable politicians to enter into dialogue directly with voters, then, as he says, that’s unlikely. I’d add to the reasons Farnsworth enumerates that those Tweeps who discuss Australian politics are a micro-public, not “the public”. That is to say, as for instance the #ausvotes crowd became more of a community, barriers to entry also arise, and I’d observe that Twitter’s social ecology particularly lends itself to hierarchisation. In any case, we’re talking about a very very small proportion of the electorate, and probably, a much more partisan population than the citizenry as a whole. I’m not sure whether anyone has attempted to gauge just how many people joined in election related talk on Twitter, but I expect that might be one of the outcomes of an interesting research project my former colleagues at QUT, Axel Bruns and Jean Burgess, are conducting under an ARC grant (research results are regularly updated and discussed at Mapping Online Publics).

The second point to make here is that because Twitter is the media’s favourite social medium – as Farnsworth says because of its utility in driving link traffic, but also because it aids in “branding” journos and the media organisations that employ them – we can observe some of the same network effects in operation as those which restrict the discussion of politics to a small circle. Insofar as it’s more porous, than, say, letters to the editor, it still tends to centre around particular nodes – the regular #qanda commentary, #qt when parliament is in session, and comments about and to particular journos who have a high profile on Twitter (@annabelcrabb being a good example). In a textually restricted medium, moving oneself closer to the key nodes (through retweets, gaining more followers, or a mention by a leading Tweep) is often a matter of making a 140 character joke or witticism, or acting as a catalyst for conversations which start to involve a significant number of others. What’s going on is very interesting indeed sociologically, but it’s not either deliberative debate nor, I strongly suspect, particularly influential.

Incidentally, one of the other claims about social media – its ability to aggregate distributed knowledge and to disseminate it quickly, is also I think proved largely false. As Farnsworth rightly observes, the only gain in information during the Gillard/Rudd leadership contest was probably knowing the result about a minute or so before everyone else, and a lot of what was purveyed turned out to be wrong. Twitter probably best lends itself to these sorts of fast developing events, but in terms of citizen journalism, a political event is something very different from, say, a natural disaster, as people aren’t reporting on what they see or know directly, but speculating on snippets of information – and manipulated snippets – from the core inside actors.

For the first time in history, the Australian outcome means that every key ‘Westminster model’ country in the world now has a hung Parliament. These are the former British empire countries that according to decades of political science orthodoxy are supposed to produce strong, single party government. Following Duverger’s Law their allegedly ‘majoritarian’ electoral systems (first past the post and AV) will typically produce reinforced majorities for one of the top two parties.

Leaving aside New Zealand, which has not had a single member constituency system since 1996, Britain now has a Coalition government, as does India, and Canada has had minority governments since 2004, with three general elections failing to give any party a majority. These four polities all use first past the post voting, which in theory is supposed to produce inflated seat majorities for the party with a plurality of votes, and thus ensure that a government can rely on a parliamentary majority.

In all cases, the party system has been fracturing – both regionally and in terms of the percentage of votes won by the two major parties – for some time.

So, we’ve joined the rest of the “Anglosphere” and the largest democratic nation in the world, India, whose parliamentary institutions are based on the Westminster model.

Kevin Rudd with Alister Jordan in 2008

Seriously, just how many senior members of Cabinet really need to be present for every single NSCC meeting?

This leak smacks totally of senior defence and/or police personnel feeling slighted by the age of Alister Jordan sitting in as Rudd’s representative. Jordan may “only” be 31, but he was Rudd’s Chief of Staff, the most senior person in the PMO after Rudd himself, not some junior office boy. The Chief of Staff of the Prime Minister’s Office is surely entirely the right person for Rudd to delegate as his representative at meetings that he cannot himself attend. Questions that have been raised regarding Rudd’s judgement in appointing Jordan in the first place are, or at least damn well should be, an entirely separate issue from whether the PM’s Chief of Staff is an adequately serious and responsible level of prime-ministerial representation at senior-level meetings that the PM cannot, for whatever reason, attend.

The Opposition says the revelations show that Mr Rudd is not fit to be a minister in a future Labor government.

The committee, attended by senior officials including the chief of the Defence Force and the Australian Federal Police commissioner, is where some of the most important decisions of government are made.

One senior official said that in his nearly 30 years of dealing with this committee and its earlier incarnations he could not remember a prime minister treating it with such disdain.

Deputy Opposition Leader Julie Bishop says, if true, the claims mean Mr Rudd should not be considered for any ministerial position in a future government.

The Opposition is also trying so hard to paint this leak as coming from a Labor Cabinet figure – disunity in Labor! Danger, El Ectorate, danger! – that, in combination with the quote I’ve bolded above, it only makes me more sure that it’s actually coming from an old-school-Tory-leaning defence or police official.

It’s interesting to note how the two-smears-for-the-price-of-one spin on Rudd’s first day campaigning in his own electorate as “sucking oxygen from Gillard’s federal campaign” echoed this narrative: the idea that Rudd is such a loose (and disloyal) cannon, obviously not fit for senior office and that thus Gillard is not fit for senior office either if she gives him a Cabinet position. Oh yes, how dare he get his office to send out press releases about where he would be for his local election campaign (shock! the gall!), and then not give the milling press pack any juicy #spill soundbites?

Then we get another two-smears-for-the-price-of-one spin on Rudd’s consideration of taking up a position on a UN panel for climate change:

Mr Rudd, who discussed the post further with Mr Ban when in New York last week, said the panel would be comprised of many former and current heads of government, foreign ministers and ministers from developed and developing nations.

Obviously, if Rudd is re-elected as MP for Griffith (high probability) and then given the Minister for Foreign Affairs post (also high probability), being part of such a panel would actually be part of his duties, not some part-time perk at all. Surely he should be considering the role seriously given his understanding of his future prospects, and talking about it is being transparent about how he sees what the job of Foreign Minister entails. Gillard surely should be happy to have someone so willing to look into larger aspects of the Foreign Minister’s international role. But yet again, it’s being spun as Rudd the loose cannon and Gillard being irresponsible to want him in her Cabinet.

Don’t fall for it, Julia. Don’t fall for it, Kevin. The LibNats and the media magnates are so shit-scared that there will be a rapprochement between Rudd and Gillard that will look good to the electorate, that they are trying to set up great walls of division between them. Don’t let them get in the way of the larger message.

crossposted at Hoyden about Town

I doubt that Kevin Rudd ever expected the ‘whacking’ in the polls he trumpeted. Rather, this was part of the rhetorical structure of the weekend of apologies – convincing the public that he’d already taken his medicine, and that they should think again about the government’s virtues (which he, and Ministers, have used the sorry-fest to remind everyone of) and think harder about the Coalition. A very similar line has been working wonders for Gordon Brown of late.

In other words, rather than offering the proverbial commentary on the polls, Rudd’s remarks are part of a set piece of political manoeuvring aiming to draw a line in the sand, and to establish a contrast between the government’s new policy announcements (the national curriculum and health) and the opposition’s negativity. That’s potentially quite an effective play when everything we’ve seen of of Abbott et al over the last few weeks has been pure opposition.

Incidentally, I’d repeat the point I’ve made a number of times before – among all sorts of other influences, commentary on the polls has an underlying and perhaps unexamined premise that a Liberal majority is the natural state of affairs. Otherwise, it’s hard to explain the narrative of trouble and crisis when Labor is still comfortably ahead. It’s as if the Coalition ever overtaking Labor spells doom and destruction for the Rudd government. It would not. It’s worth underlining the fact that governments are often behind in the polls, and come back to win elections. John Howard frequently appeared headed for defeat in each electoral cycle after his first win.

Trevor Cook provides a useful reminder another point of comparison – to the Rudd opposition of the late Howard years.

Speaking of which, those who talked about Howard’s comments and policy changes around the time of the Aston by-election in 2001 were making the better comparison than the chorus of ‘Beattie reborn!’ songsters. The difference, of course, is that Howard appeared headed for a genuine whacking in early 2001, while Rudd is sitting pretty.

While we’re talking polls, I’d also recommend a squizzy at Possum’s fascinating tables on the Essential Research questions about the assessment of leaders’ attributes.

Writing in The Guardian, Seamus Milne has an interesting piece on the failed coup attempt against Gordon Brown last week. Theatrics aside, he sees it as a contest for the future of the party, with the Blairite forces trying to enforce the New Labour line through a proxy contest over personalities and electoral tactics:

But by exploiting the coup attempt to demand a change of direction, and making the prime minister’s closest ally, Ed Balls, their fall guy, the cabinet’s anti-Brown majority has unmistakably called time on the Keynesian-inspired and progressive tax measures that have won public support but caused such alarm in the City, Treasury and media.

Milne goes on to argue that the (now) Brownite position makes more economic and political sense.

There’s a big irony here, given that New Labour’s success derived from an argument that the Labour party had sacrificed electoral success on the altar of ideological purity.

There’s also an Australian parallel, as the Coalition appear determined to avoid competing for the centre at any costs, all in the name of ‘defending the legacy’ and ‘differentiation’. So, it seems that the tendency for parties to curl up in an ideological ball in the face of defeat afflicts those of the right, as well as those of the left.

*In theory, Rudd doesn’t have to go to the polls til April 2011.

Elsewhere: Ben Eltham on the year ahead in politics.

On Lateline tonight, Liberal frontbencher and new Immigration shadow minister Scott Morrison, claimed, in defending Barnaby Joyce’s mad ravings, that folks didn’t want “clones and drones”.

Let’s make a number of further points about this claim, and Joyce’s effusions.

(a) It may well be that some Labor ministers can be represented as clones and drones (though others, like Julia Gillard, are able to get the message across with more than a bit of wit and verve). But they’re not just on message – unlike the Libs, who continue to be, in Terry Flew’s words, chronic attention seekers, and will make themselves the story even when not openly brawling with each other – they’re also appearing as calm, measured, assured, apolitical. And Kevin Rudd is a much better communicator than he’s given credit for. He saves the bureaucrat-speak for his COAG performances and the like, where he actually doesn’t want the soundbite widely disseminated. Watching what does actually get on the 7pm news shows that his poll ratings are not an artefact of chance, or the lack of a good opposition, or whatever.

(b) Following on from that observation, it is just nuts to have the more savvy members of the media (that is, those that aren’t busily writing stories about the excellence of a frontbench that will take up the ‘fight’) competing with ministers to goad either Abbott or Joyce into sillier and sillier statements.

(c) Joyce’s populist stuff plays to a rural and regional base with a petit bourgeois mentality. At best, it’s targeted to farmers and small business; at worst, it’s pretty close to LaRouchite speak. There are just not that many voters with a mindset receptive to this sort of thing who aren’t already voting for the Coalition, and the fiction that ‘battlers’ will go with know-nothing nativism ignores the rock of WorkChoices. How many times will Eric Abetz have to deny that he still believes penalty rates are evil?

(d) Constantly carrying on like a pork chop might appear to an illusory base, or rather help to reconstruct such a base, but flicking the switch to populism disguises the change in the nature of right wing politics away from neo-liberal reverence for the market. It won’t be to the taste of big business. It’s not dissimilar to the worldview of elements of the state Nats in Queensland (surprise, surprise). As Andrew Elder has argued, Tony Abbott isn’t just captive to Nick Minchin, he’s effectively become Barnaby’s patsy too. Barnaby won’t so much care about winning the next election. He’s more interested in keeping the Nats alive, and in an echo of the Queensland LNP, working for the National-isation of the federal Coalition.

It’s interesting to watch, but it isn’t a path to federal electoral competitiveness.

(e) The Abbott/Joyce mob, in the absence of the shift to a more robust level of public funding (and those bills are likely to have a long ride through to Senate passage), may be anticipating that kicking the populist can will lead to some sort of grassroots effusion of donations. It didn’t work for ‘Joh for PM’, but then he didn’t have the internet.

But the problem here is that they’re then captive to their base, and it will make it harder for them to make the sorts of noises they need to make to be seen as ‘responsible economic managers’.

…Welcome to Barnaby’s Wombat Trail.

Update: Barnaby and the CEC.

Elsewhere: John Quiggin.

Update: More from Andrew Elder:

In 2007, the Liberals could not get used to the idea that Howard was leading them into perdition. In 2009, the Abbott Experiment is all about the idea that Howard-style conservatism is an idea that has not been properly tried, let alone exhausted. It’s an idea held by nobody who doesn’t vote Liberal/National/CEC already.

It’s interesting to set these remarks aside a leak from the Coalition party room yesterday – apparently Malcolm Turnbull mentioned that there may be a need to raise tax in the future. Predictably, this was howled down as being “contrary to Liberal philosophy”.

Therein lies the rub.

Aided and abetted by a quite unique set of economic circumstances, the Coalition’s “economic management” over the last few terms of the Howard government basically translated to reducing personal income tax while maintaining the rate of corporate tax. Add to the mix a crazed melange of transfer payments and electoral bribes, and for a while they had a winning electoral strategy.

It did, of course, trash “core Liberal philosophy” if that meant what John Howard supposedly stood for in the 1980s – ‘dry’ economics. Reduced to a few slogans, the Liberals have proved themselves completely incapable of arguing any economic direction which even vaguely makes sense ever since their defeat in November 2007. Turnbull’s comments, and Tanner’s remarks, suggest that the political playing field of the economic game will be a much transformed one over the next few political cycles. Labor seems to understand this. It’s highly questionable if most Liberals even grasp what’s going on. That absent centre at the heart of their ideology and their political strategy will prove a bigger problem for them than their leadership and their day to day political tactics and messaging. The dysfunctions of the latter are only a symptom of the underlying disease.

But while most Australians probably had other things on their mind, John Howard’s former Workplace Relations advisor and Alexander Downer’s replacement as Mayo MP, Jamie Briggs, found time on Boxing Day to denounce third party campaigns as a “a growing cancer in our democracy”.

Briggs named GetUp! and the ACTU’s Your Rights at Work campaign as examples of what he was talking about.

I don’t have any particular problem with disclosure of funding for third party campaigns, though I would object to caps on donations. But the hyperbole from Briggs (and no doubt his views are shared by Nick Minchin and others) is absurd and dangerous. Props to Andrew Norton for sounding the alarm. Norton refers to Briggs’ call for disclosure and observes:

He hasn’t even noticed that they already provide this information, with another report due early February 2009. Last year’s was really not that interesting, telling us a) that political campaigns cost money and that b) left-wing persons and organisations provide that money to left-wing campaigns.

What GetUp! and the ACTU are doing in their campaigns is crystal clear from the campaigns themselves. They are in a very different situation to political parties, which may privately offer favours to donors.

Briggs’ attitude, plus conversations I have had with other Liberals, makes me worried about the Party’s response to the Rudd government’s green paper on election funding and regulation. I fear that they will agree to draconian restrictions on political freedoms in an attempt to control the left’s current political ascendancy. As with the Howard government in its later years, they are too concerned with short-term problems, and show too little interest in the systemic consequences of their actions.

Sean Tevis’ innovative method of raising internet funds in his venture to oust and replace his current State Representative (basically equivalent to one of our State MPs?) in Kansas is an online comic strip.

When Sean Tevis decided to run for a seat in the Kansas Legislature, he faced a serious problem: money. Local political advisors warned the campaign novice that he would need a war chest of at least $26,000 to compete against his entrenched Republican rival.

Having calculated that if he could get 3000 people to donate $8.34 each, he would reach that target, he created the comic strip to garner attention from potential online donors. He’s sort of a one-man Get Up! campaign.

Apparently, no other candidate for State Representative in Kansas has ever had more than 644 donors, so there was a built-in news narrative if he could make it work. So did it? Well, there’s a bunch of news coverage online, as well as many bloggings.

How many similar efforts are we going to see in election contests in the immediate future, do you think?

H/T to one of my Best Mates on a mailing list (and crossposted on Hoyden About Town)