Tag Archive for 'liberals'

The politics of ‘direct action’ on Climate Change

Published
by
Mark
1 month, 2 weeks ago
in Climate change and Politics
. 63 Comments

After last night’s round of interviews with Tony Abbott and Barnaby Joyce, one thing is clear about the Coalition’s climate change policy.

No one believes in it.

They’ve come to this pass because of the momentum of the twin drives to dethrone Malcolm Turnbull and the internal politics of climate change denialism in the Coalition and among the so-called ‘Liberal base’.

Abbott’s ‘direct action’ is supposed to provide a point of contrast between bike-riding muscular Tony (and don’t for a minute think all these photos and all the tv vision of him in togs and exercising is coincidental) and that blancmange of a bureaucrat, KRudd. But the Coalition is stuck with the windy rhetoric that none of them actually care for – either because they don’t believe climate change is real, or because they know it is, and this is an epic fail.

That’s another reason why the contradictions in this thing won’t easily be papered over, and selling it will be very difficult.

Keeping the New Labour faith, even unto death

Published
by
Mark
2 months ago
in Elections, Federal Elections, Foreign Elections, International, Politics and State/Territory Elections
. 10 Comments

2010 is going to be a year of elections. In Australia, we have three state elections – Victoria, South Australia and Tasmania, and almost certainly a federal poll*. In Britain, the Labour party’s future is on the line; the same party which was variously cited as inspired by the Hawke/Keating government and an inspiration for the ALP in opposition.

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.

Denial on parade

Published
by
Robert Merkel
4 months, 1 week ago
in Climate change, Film, TV, Video etc, Media and Polls
. 113 Comments

Tonight’s Four Corners has a piece on the Coalition’s views on climate change. The blurb makes clear that much of the party rank and file are denialists. That’s not news.

However, they’re also promising some kind of meta-analysis of public polling on climate change, that purportedly makes clear “…that concern amongst voters about climate change has “softened” over the past eighteen months.”

I’ll be interested to see what the poll bloggers make of it…

Bartlett to run for Brisbane

Published
by
Mark
4 months, 1 week ago
in Brisbane and Politics
. 68 Comments

Former Australian Democrats Senator Andrew Bartlett has announced he will be contesting the federal seat of Brisbane for The Greens. That’s my local electorate, and I’m looking forward to an interesting contest!

Antony Green has much more. He points out that Bartlett’s chances aren’t fantastic, because it’s easier for a minor party to take a marginal than a safe seat, as they need to outpoll one of the major parties to be in with a shot. I don’t necessarily agree with Green, though, that Teresa Gambaro brings anything particular to the Liberal cause. She was a pretty lacklustre member for Petrie, and I don’t know that the seafood angle in the name recognition stakes is worth all that much. The Libs have run fairly high profile candidates in the seat before – notably Ingrid Tall in 2004. Tall is a well known doctor whose sexuality disgracefully prompted the Nationals to run a “family values” candidate.

The Libs have usually run well organised campaigns, and Labor has been worried about gentrification and shifting demographics for some time. But the sorts of potential Liberal voters who’ve been moving into the seat are more the types who’d be attracted by a hypothetical Liberal party where Malcolm Turnbull had actually fulfilled his small l Liberal promise. Gambaro doesn’t seem to me to be the best candidate – and we still need to factor in whatever chaos the LNP label might wreak on the Liberal vote in inner city Brisbane.

Arch Bevis probably doesn’t have much of a political future – he’s unlikely to ever sit on the front bench again. But he hasn’t been the member for almost 20 years for no reason – he’s well liked and respected, and works the electorate assiduously. I think he’d have had no trouble holding it whatsoever, and I suspect that’s still more than likely to be the case, though Bartlett’s candidacy certainly promises a less predictable contest.

At any rate, I’ll now be thinking about where to direct my first preference.

A two term strategy?

Published
by
Mark
6 months, 1 week ago
in Economics, Howardia, Media and Politics
. 37 Comments

You could be forgiven for thinking that there is no such thing as Australian federal politics any more. Nothing budges in the polls. As Possum reminds us:

Remember when a party getting 55% in a poll created headlines of impending doom for their opposites? To show just how blase we’ve all become lately, 97% of all polls taken during the Rudd government have shown the ALP to be on a two party preferred off 55% or greater. Even if we just use the phone polls, 91.2% of all phone polls have shown the ALP to be on a TPP of 55% or greater.

Poll after poll, these extraordinary results roll in and we all just go “Oh yes, there’s another one“.

Landslides have become normal. [My emphasis]

The commentary, and the shadow boxing goes on… But surely the whole theme of “this happened, and that happened, and this paper highlighted GOVERNMENT WASTE and Malcolm Turnbull’s approval rating moved by 3%” completely misrepresents what’s actually occurring, because its premise is that people are paying some attention to the Canberra political game. I suspect a lot of us are enjoying a rather protracted holiday from it all after a surfeit of political scares and alarums during the Howard years.

But the opposition, I suppose, can’t just go and take a long ski-ing holiday in Europe. And Joe Hockey has actually announced something that vaguely resembles an election agenda – a promise to slash public spending (he says $14 billion, but Bernard Keane thinks his figures are wrong and it’s more likely to have to be 30 or 40 to reach his GDP share target). It’s the logical corollary of the ‘debt and deficit’ mantra, at any rate.

Continue reading ‘A two term strategy?’

The Pearce Review – the Liberals’ CPRS Report

Published
by
dk.au
10 months, 2 weeks ago
in Climate change, Economics and Policy
. 34 Comments

With all eyes on the Liberals’ response to the New(TM) CPRS, it’s worth noting that Shadow Minister Assisting the Leader on Emissions Trading Design Andrew “climate change is the cause celebre that lefties siezed on after the fall of communism” Robb released the Pearce Report last week, and what a trooper for doing it. As if their association with skeptic loons wasn’t enough of a blow to their credibility, the report reads like it was written quickly. Very quickly. And it’s not just the spelling mistakes that make me say that, but the feeble contribution to the substantive climate policy debate it offers. Continue reading ‘The Pearce Review – the Liberals’ CPRS Report’

Bored with election speculation? There’s always leadership speculation!

Published
by
Mark
1 year, 1 month ago
in State/Territory Elections
. 18 Comments

In light of the interminable Queensland election speculation – seemingly immune to confrontation with any actual facts – there’s some interest in a leak Crikey’s Bernard Keane had from the LNP:

In the wake of yesterday’s item on problems within Liberal National ranks, an anonymous source claimed that the LNP Shadow Cabinet meeting on 19 January had been given over to debate about Lawrence Springborg’s “small target” strategy, and that there were elements of the party who thought Jeff Seeney might make a better go of challenging Anna Bligh. Just in case, the source assured us, Labor had prepared an alternative strategy in the event Seeney gets up. Springborg, whose electoral record as leader stands at 0 out of 2, rolled Seeney for the leadership of the Nationals just over a year ago.

Mischief-making, perhaps. Swapping leaders at this stage would be an impressively suicidal move for the LNP, but stranger things have happened. Just ask Colin Barnett.

It probably is mischief-making, but it does highlight the fact that the LNP – whose sole raison d’etre is supposed to be unity (as The Borg’s nickname unintentionally suggests…) – is not exactly the happy family they’d like to make out. There’s no doubt that Jeff Seeney still isn’t a happy camper, and his ominous remarks about the influence of fundies in his overthrow gave away a few clues to his future intentions.

It really is all or nothing for Lawrence, though. Seeney arguably had a greater capacity to mount an argument against Bligh, but he was far too “country” and aggressive. Aside from him, the cupboard’s bare. There’s no way the Nats would accept a leader from the Libs – even from the Santoro faction – and it’s not as if they’re particularly attractive prospects. Who’s left if the Borg loses? It’s interesting to ponder…

Obama.change II

Published
by
Mark
1 year, 2 months ago
in Activism, Sociology, The Web and USA
. 17 Comments

Some of the issues I was discussing in my recent post about Barack Obama’s web based strategy and its potential for both further political hay making and for keeping an electoral coalition together are neatly encapsulated in this article from The Boston Globe. Worth a read.

Obama.change

Published
by
Mark
1 year, 2 months ago
in Activism, Blogging, Sociology, The Web and USA
. 33 Comments

You can pick almost any American liberal blog at random for signs that Barack Obama is already disappointing “the base” – that is, if the netroots actually constitute or represent his base. I’m still a tad surprised by this phenomenon – I guess in the partisan heat of the election campaign, no one took Obama’s “post-partisan” rhetoric seriously. It was pretty obvious, I thought, that he meant what he said. It may also be that large swathes of the American liberal blogosphere are stuck in permanent negativity mode. After all, the thing didn’t exist in any meaningful form last time there was a Democratic President, and it’s always harder to write a political blog when your mob is in power.

But this probably predictable development is not the most interesting aspect of the interactivity Obama’s campaign encouraged. I’ve previously commented that Obama has a potentially powerful political weapon to wield with the ability to mobilise supporters he’s identified online from the primaries onwards. But there’s a flip side to this sort of openness, and Henry Farrell has a cracker of a post at Crooked Timber on it. Farrell riffs off the huge volume of comments left on Change.Gov:

This goes to the heart of the contradictions that the Obama people successfully managed to straddle during the campaign, but are (I think) going to have increasing difficulty in dealing with going forward. The Obama people combined very tight top-down message control and campaign coordination with a fair degree of openness at the bottom to independent initiatives by volunteers. As long as everyone agreed on the same underlying goal (beating the Republicans), this worked. But as that overwhelming imperative recedes, people are going to start pursuing their own objectives – and the ‘open’ architecture that the Obama people have constructed provides them with plenty of opportunities to do this.

There are two other points here I think are salient. Continue reading ‘Obama.change’

Economic and political disconnects (and the sociology of knowledge)

Published
by
Mark
1 year, 3 months ago
in Consumerism, Economics, Government, International, Markets, Media, Sociology and USA
. 18 Comments

It’s hard to know whether to blame the pollies or the press gallery more for the sorry standard of political and economic debate in this country. Did that golden age Paul Kelly used to talk about when Paul Keating had everyone trained to cross swords on the arcana of economic levers actually ever exist? Anyway, as non-farm growth fell into negative territory and the Reserve Bank cut rates again (moving them back into an expansionary posture), all eyes were on Julie Bishop’s cat claws, and her non-performance was at the centre of the parliamentary stage.

But perhaps, although he presumably wouldn’t welcome the Bishop meltdown, Malcolm Turnbull isn’t too worried about the level of triviality in the great economic management debate. The budget deficit yardstick went missing yesterday (that was so… last week) and Turnbull might not like to be reminded of his inconsistency and constant contradiction – whatever happened to that “economic narrative” we apparently were awaiting from him? Anyway, Malcolm Turnbull doesn’t think there’s much of a global financial crisis any more – because he hasn’t heard of any “big events”. Presumably events only happen if they’re on the front page of Australian newspapers. He might like to check out the leading indicators of the credit crisis which suggest we’re not exactly back to normality. But so parochial are our political leaders and media that debates about the restructuring of global finance and the dangerous leadership interregnum in the United States are apparently off our radar.

But there’s another disconnect happening in the economic sphere too. Continue reading ‘Economic and political disconnects (and the sociology of knowledge)’

Obama: The predictability of right wing predictions?

Published
by
Kim
1 year, 4 months ago
in Foreign Elections, Media, Sociology and USA
. 104 Comments

We’ve heard all this before. Remember when Kevin Rudd won, and we were told his election was a victory for John Howard?

Right wing commentators couldn’t have been quicker out of the starting blocks to proclaim “America is still a Centre Right nation”. In fact they were at it before the votes were counted – Bill Bennett’s lugubrations on CNN is one example folks here might have seen in watching the election coverage. The memes abound. McCain still got 46%! Obama’s win wasn’t big enough!

Such exciteable commentary doesn’t stop to consider, of course, that in a two party system, without the presence of a strong third party challenger, landslides aren’t that common. Ronald Reagan in 1980 received 50.1% of the popular vote, in an election which everyone agrees ushered in an “Era”. Barack Obama did somewhat better than that. And John McCain still pulled in a significant number of independent voters – it’s not too difficult to imagine how wrong the claims that a more conservative candidate would have run better are. Let’s not forget that McCain continually sounded the note that he was someone who often differed from his own party.

Let’s make a couple of quick points here. Most of this speculation – and the accompanying predictions that Obama may be a steady as she goes moderate – is just that. It’s basically worthless, except for what it reveals about the politics of those doing the predicting. We don’t know exactly how Obama will govern. We do know that he’s stated that big challenges will require bold measures. And we do know that an agenda of de facto universal healthcare, economic revival and redressing the plight of middle and working class voters is what he won on. That’s surprisingly radical in the American context. And this election saw a lot of the anti-government rhetoric Reagan ran into town with finally kicked to the curb.

Secondly, let’s consider the fact that the “liberal” scare didn’t work (and the sorts of voters who were ready to believe Obama to be a “socialist” were always going to be in the GOP tent):

Perhaps the most revealing post-election data on that question came from within the defeated McCain campaign. In an interview with Roger Simon of Politico, the Republican candidate’s speechwriter and friend, Mark Salter, disclosed that in the campaign’s own internal polling data, 60 percent of Americans regarded Obama as “liberal.” The campaign thought that would be enough to defeat him, which is why it hammered on the “left-wing” themes.

Baiting the liberals didn’t work this year. Disgusted with the Republican right, voters wanted something different and weren’t afraid to look leftward. That is what “realignment” means.

Continue reading ‘Obama: The predictability of right wing predictions?’

Après le Deluge…

Published
by
Kim
1 year, 4 months ago
in Blogging and Foreign Elections
. 6 Comments

So, the netroots thing has its role to play in inspiring enthusiasm and turnout, combating stoopid talking points, etc, etc, but what future for the liberal/left blogosphere in the States in the event of an Obama win?

Michael Bérubé recalls the wonders (ahem) of the Clinton administration, and has some advice for the collective(ist) tubes:

But perhaps the left blogosphere could be of some use in this regard, no? It needn’t be consolidated fully into Obama Enterprises Inc.; it could serve instead as a forum for writers dedicated to things like “hope” and “change” and “arguing that Obama was wrong to cave on FISA and better not do that kind of thing as President.” Of course, it could also serve as a forum for charting and mocking all manner of Ace-of-Confederate-Red-State-Yankeespade wingnuts as they venture into new realms of sheer barking lunacy that even the world’s sheerest barkingest lunatics have hitherto been unable to imagine. That might be fun. And it could do “shorters” and cat blogging and Theory Tuesdays and Friday Random Tens too. It’s a blogosphere. It’s a big place, with many many tubes.

The Canadian election: Déjà vu all over again

Published
by
Phil
1 year, 5 months ago
in Elections, Federal Elections, Foreign Elections and Politics
. 20 Comments

Liberals 76 (26%), Conservatives 143 (38%), NDP 37 (18%), BQ 50 (10%), Greens 0 (7%), Other 2 (1%)

The Canadian election is all over and the result is yet another minority government for the Conservatives. The turnout was low and it looks like Canadians went with the devil they knew given the current economic climate.

The Liberals failed to make a dent, the NDP improved but to no effect. As is usual the Greens failed to garner much support on a percentage basis let alone win a seat and Bloc Quebecois did it’s usual thing in winning the majority of seats in Quebec.

Yes the Conservatives increased their representation and would like to claim some kind of mandate but a minority is a minority no matter how you spin it, so, Canadians will probably be back here again in a couple of years with the Conservatives vainly looking for a majority, quite possibly with a new leader – there is no question there will be a new Liberal leader; the academic Stéphane Dion failed to impress.

I suppose the good news is that any potential excesses of Conservative rule will be tempered by a wall of notionally progressive voices in the opposition benches; working together seems to be the political meme de jour right now anyway.

By the way, I was really interested in these hypotheses mentioned at the Poll Bludger because the Canadian election was mentioned.

Hypothesis one, from Peter Brent at Mumble: “Canada’s one-term government going for re-election (after only 18 months), amidst world economic turmoil, should provide some clue as to how Rudd & co might fare at the next election.”

Hypothesis two, from Adam in Canberra at this place: “It’s curious that the financial crisis seems to be working in favour of the incumbents in NZ (on the basis of one Morgan poll) and (I think so far) Australia, but against the incumbents in the US and Canada. That would suggest that conservatives are being blamed, not incumbents.”

Based on this one result it looks like the economic climate may favour the status quo, as long as they are seen to be doing something, so as Peter Brent mentioned, maybe this does hold a clue to the future for the Rudd government; now that it’s finally found a media narrative to run with.

The Canadian Election: Lost in translation

Published
by
Phil
1 year, 5 months ago
in Elections, Foreign Elections, International and Politics
. 3 Comments

The Canadian Election has finally reached its final weekend (Tuesday vote) with all the usual campaign he said/she said stops along the way to polling day and strangely featuring an episode of duelling plagiarists, one which drew our very own former PM John Howard into the campaign.

As expected the early Conservative lead in the polls has narrowed, to the point where the Liberals may be in a position to pull off a surprise win; or it’s gonna be a Groundhog Day minority Govt all over again.

As it currently stands the Conservatives sit in the lead just outside of the MoE on 32, Liberals 27, NDP 19, Greens 12 and Bloc Quebecois 8.

Continue reading ‘The Canadian Election: Lost in translation’