Primary
Most people join political parties because of the issues. They want to see Labor policies enacted by a Labor government. It’s when the policy side starts slipping that people start caring about the people we put there, when you can’t expect Caucus to follow the platform that is developed, written, debated and voted on by its members.
Nielsen finds Labor would be 52-48 ahead under Rudd
I’ve got big doubts that polls which are based on counterfactuals have the meaning they’re purported to bear, but something must be going on when Nielsen has Labor’s primary vote at 27% but at 42% if Kevin Rudd were leader. [...]
The logic of Labor (and Liberal) leadership
In a post entitled “After Gillard”, John Quiggin writes: I think the return of Rudd would put the spotlight on Abbott’s total fraudulence, maybe even paving the way for the Rudd vs Turnbull election we should have had last time. [...]
A tale of two Labor post-mortems
It’s interesting to contrast reports of two ALP reflections on the election result – one in Crikey on the thoughts of Victorian MP Martin Foley, and one in The Drum on a meeting of the NSW Right, penned by Glenn [...]
The second Gillard Ministry
Julia Gillard has announced her new ministry; details are here. Kevin Rudd is Foreign Minister, Stephen Smith takes Defence, and Simon Crean has a new super-portfolio encompassing Regional Australia and Regional Development. Penny Wong is Finance Minister (I don’t think [...]
Wilkie supports Labor
News just in. Well, it looks like I was wrong and James Farrell might have been right that Andrew Wilkie’s support is the key to how the end game plays out. Labor now has a guarantee of 74 votes on [...]
The politics of the ALP-Greens alliance
I won’t bother to link to the media denunciations of the ALP-Greens agreement – suffice it to say that Paul Kelly thinks the Labor ‘brand’ is in danger (oh no!), someone or other is probably red baiting, and there are [...]
Agreement between The Greens and the ALP released
Agreement has been reached between The Greens and the ALP on the conditions for The Greens’ support of a Labor minority government. The agreement can be read here. Much of the document concerns process – both in terms of liaison [...]
The battle of the budget bottom line
The three rural Independents are meeting this morning with Treasury Secretary Ken Henry to discuss the state of the economy. Yesterday, in her address to the National Press Club [see previous LP discussion here], Prime Minister Julia Gillard made a [...]
The fracturing of the two party system
Following on from Kim’s post, with whose reasoning I agree, I think it’s worth making a point about the parallel decomposition of the two party system. This is most starkly illustrated by looking at the AEC’s national count, which distinguishes [...]
What should a Gillard minority government be like?
If there’s one thing that’s clear from the events of recent days, it is that a minority government led by Julia Gillard could not represent business as usual for the Labor party. So what should a Gillard minority government look [...]
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