Sky News reports:
On a two party preferred basis, Labor’s support is up two per cent to 55 and the Coalition’s is down from 47 to 45 per cent. The survey, published in The Australian, shows the Coalition has lost two points in the primary vote down to 40 per cent, while Labor remains steady at 48.
UPDATE: The Australian’s graphic here. John Howard is down 3 per cent on both performance satisfaction and better prime minister.
558 Comments
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I am not in favour of privatising the ABC, f them seriously, those slack bastards will show The Bill instead of the campaign launch and are streaming it online instead wtf is wrong with the ABC???
No wonder nobody is interested in politics they never give the people any bloody info on it!
The MSM does something that still surprises me. Every day the print this huge two/three page spread of the stock, shares etc. I mean it would be less read than the Wagga Dogs. The only reason I can see for the Daily “Finance/business” section is that it reinforces this notion that we are in an economy and not in a society. I know that the papers have other sections but every day they trot out these strange experts on economics and business. Can you imagine what the effect would be if they had a whole section every day dedicated to Global Warming and the $billions of dollars worth of opportunities and job creation through the non-carbon energy markets. Sorry, what was I thinking, their major supporters are from the existing economy not the Future reality.
Back to thread, Just trying to find Kubler-Ross on death and dying, I remember that the first stage is denial, followed by bargaining, part of bargaining is tidying up the house/affairs. Can anyone hear the shreders going?
sorry ‘now’
Serenity Now!
Gippslander 397. The HECS charges for Teaching and Nursing are already heavily discounted. A new ‘cluster’, as DEET calls them, for these degrees was brought in about three years ago. The demand for engineering and medicine far outweighs the places available. The problem is supply of capacity, not demand.
cheers,
Alan H
Follow the Preferences at 402, the mainstream media do that (devote large spaces) to business/finance news for two reasons:
1/ The financial services industry is a big advertiser
2/ Most of us now have to take responsibility for our own retirement income
Family First try to explain their support for Pauline Hanson at their campaign launch, yesterday. Very wierd.
http://www.grods.com/post/1615/
re 402 and 405
But the pages of stock prices seem redundant to me.
If you need to know that stuff, you need to know the price now – not yesterdays’ close. If you don’t need to know then why print it.
The articles / opinions / rumour pages are widely used by the banks, however.
Glen: Serenity now
Well Glen, I agree it is over, barring a bizarre twist in world events or a stuffup of historic proportions by Rudd, and I think he’s too disciplined for that. At least you have come through this campaign with your credibility intact which is more than I can say for many of your comrades in the Liberal bunker. Hope you keep posting on these forums after 24 November, as its valuable to get both sides POV, rather than the usual wind up statements. I’d get a DVD of the Great Escape to watch for election night.
kind regards
Socrates
394 Socrates- Point well taken. I often wonder why we get five minutes of Finance in every news bulletin. A few shares go up or down, the dollar goes up and down a bit and commodity prices change. Surely no-one bases any financial decision on this information which is never analysed, except by Alan Kohler. If you were going to make a financial decision, you’d go to a financial expert or if you had a pretty good idea, you’d DIY using the AFR etc. The 5 minutes seems like a filler.
403 [sorry ‘now’
Serenity Now!]
Glen, Name the other 24 Nuclear Power sites now.
btw, why “MSM”?
407 Rates Analyst, you’re right, the stock tables are redundant, but editors who have tried to get rid of them immediately are bombarded by thousands of angry letters (letters, not emails) from silly old buggers who scan the stock tables every day with a magnifying glass. I kid you not. It’s a generational thing.
I forgot to add a third reason that economic/financial news uses up so much space. It’s cheap to cover. You can write 15 stories off an ABS economic data release without calling anyone or leaving the office.
alan h, actually a bigger problem with nurses is that they’re leaving the profession in droves. it’s not a shortage of them to begin with, necessarily, but there are so many other more pleasant ways to earn a living than, say, getting bullied at RNSH. kevin’s idea of paying them a few grand to return, though, might just work!
I agree, the plethora of finance reporting is superficial to the point of meaninglessness. It is like hearing the tote on the Wagga dogs. I’m not sure superannuation plans are so time critical that up to the minute or even daily stock prices are essential to ensure good returns – or if they help at all. As many found out in the stock slump of a few years ago, it’s better to keep an eye on it and get out of high risk options but that doesn’t require millions of print miles and banal recitations of the all ords, which, unless you have bought the index, doesn’t really mean much. I agree its only plausible function is to convince us how connected we are to markets and to remain compliant while handing power to the financial elites.
AlanH
Thanks for the information in 404, of which I was ignorant.
As you have implied, it is difficult to “kick start” education programs in areas that been neglected for years without at the same time increasing problems in the delivery of services.
Do you think we need to increase skills based immigration to make up the shortfall?
Without being too politically partisan I think our treatment of Dr Haneef, and demonisation of other ethnic groups doesn’t help our prospects
Mr Denmore, you are absolutely right, But the financial security thing. When most of us think about investments, I’m sureyou research with a bit more depth than the movements in the stock and bonds in the Herald Sun. If you want a sure bet here’s one. Stop buying the crap papers, annual saving say $500, Invest in any reputable way. Do that for 30 years, you will get somewhere close to $100K
402 Follow the preferences. The five stages of grieving are
1. Denial
2. Anger
3. Bargaining
4. Depression
5. Acceptance
They are not always sequential, and they often overlap. Poor Dennis is still stuck in Denial so he’s got a lot of therapy to go.
Gipslander
I agree Kenneth Davidson is good. In fact, in transport (my own field) I read him quite often. I was a bit restrictive in my comments because we get the SMH at home and the AFR at work, but I trust you will still appreciate the general point.
401
Glen Says:
November 12th, 2007 at 12:14 pm
I am not in favour of privatising the ABC, f them seriously, those slack bastards will show The Bill instead of the campaign launch and are streaming it online instead wtf is wrong with the ABC???
…
Who wants to privatise the ABC? What a strange notion! I am very content watching The Bill. It is better than politics anytime: it’s well-scripted, has strongly constructed characters, enough dramatic tension for my jangled nerves, and is not aimed at duping me. Can the launch!
I actually think Dennis is at 3. Bargaining.
which is why he was trotting out numbers like PM satisfaction and handling the economy.the man’s bargaining with himself. i think he’ll hold this until the election, then move on to the next stage.
Glen on the other hand has breezily swept through the 5 stages and is on to stage 6; cheerfulness.
can anyone spell it out for me…wtf does MSM stand for?
MainStream Media
ahhh! thanks SL
i thought melbourne-sydney-media
I have noted a bit of chatter about reducing HECS. Can I just say that most students don’t give a toss about HECS. That just defer it and forget about it. Sure they might think about it in latter life when they are being taxed more, but by that point any reduction in HECS for future students would only irritate them because they had to pay the full wack.
HECS is not an issue. The rise in HECS of 25% barely raised a noise outside of the militant student union circles. If the ALP thinks it will get anything out of cutting it then they are kidding themselves. The price of text books and accomodation are more an issue for uni students because actually have to pay for them when the cost is incurred. Anyone who thinks HECS is an issue will already be voting Labor anyway. I’d bet your average ‘aspirational voter’ probably thinks the current HECS subsidised system is overly generous as it is….
Liberal launch/wake on Sky 1.00PM, link below:
http://www.news.com.au/live/popup
or melb-syd-monopoly
out west, we live in a news desert. the west looks like a newspaper, but us a mirage….the oz is like grit up one’s shorts: veryr very annoying
Thank you Diogenes,
The moment I’m looking forward to the most on election night is Howards speech. Do other people remember how he behaved when the poms won the world cup, well I know he’s a sporting tragic, but I reckon this is going to really piss him off. My money is on something really bitter,
Sound economic management eh? This isn’t going to help El Rodente:
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/rba-rate-rise-alert/2007/11/12/1194766554622.html
Perhaps Howard will announce that he is going to buy Newspoll so that he can learn to “understand it” like Shanahanamanabana and thus figure out how to bounce back?
ND
I don’t know what your source of information on students is but the ones I deal with (ex engineering students) care a great deal. It is an expensive degree, and they will have to pay the HECS as soon as they start working.
I think today’s ‘Newspoil’ showing the Libs going nowhere will see a few MSM journos jumping ship over the next week. If Rupert decides to back Labor, it will be interesting times for some of the GG and Tele sycophants.
414 and 416, you’re right, the daily noise of what’s happening in financial markets should be irrelevant to most people, for whom the best solution is just to buy a low-cost, tax-aware index equity fund, some government bonds for safety, a little bit of property and a reserve of cash. The rest is irrelevant.
But it’s in the interests of the financial services industry to keep people chopping and changing and turning over their portfolios by picking stocks and trying to time the markets. This is how the industry – a giant fee machine – earns its profits.
One fund manager seeks to differentiate itself from another by talking up its ability to “beat” the market. And the media is happy to take their advertising dollars.
The best journalists are the ones who provide context – and the ‘why’ – of what’s going on the markets and the macro-economy. People like Gittens and Davidson and Kohler and Barrie Dunstan in the AFR.
The irony is all this “economic management” nonsense debate in the election campaign is being reported on by Canberra-based political journos, nearly all of whom are economically illiterate. Gittins (in two recent columns) and Kohler (with a single graph in his ABC news spot) blew apart the myth of the coalition as superior economic “managers’. But the editors somehow think senior political journos (who spend the campaign behind their PC) are better placed to comment on this.
My theory is that this all stems from a misunderstanding among editors that the financial markets and the economy are the same thing. They are not. And if they weren’t treated this way, Howard would not have been able to fool the electorate for as long as he has.
429
Evan Says:
November 12th, 2007 at 12:45 pm
Sound economic management eh? This isn’t going to help El Rodente:
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/rba-rate-rise-alert/2007/11/12/1194766554622.html
…
Yes Evan. Howard’s given us the trifecta: hish government spending, rising inflation and rising interest rates. He may not want to say he’s sorry, but he’s sure going to feel sorry on Nov 24.
Blindoptimist, I’m glad Swing Lowe has elucidated MSM for you. It can be annoying when all the Bloggers stand back, waiting for someone else to reply!
In my case I was wondering what “corflutes”were…well I’d worked out they were placards, but never knew why they were so called. I had dozens of MarK Latham ones left over from the last election.. even the Garbos didn’t want to take them! I imagine the Kevin Rudds from this year will become collectors items
I don’t know what JWH’s election concession speech will be like but I hope it includes congratulations to Maxine. In any event it is sure to be a rich and gratifying telivisual experience.
Yeah, my GF is extremely unimpressed with her $30,000 HECS debt. Obviously takes a lot longer to save for a house when you are paying off HECS instead of putting the extra money into a kitty.
Slashing existing HECS debts in half would certainly win a few votes!
433 Mr Dinmore
Exactly, which is why I regard the crosses to ComSec and all the market wraps as little more than product placements and programming filler. You might as well ask the Real Estate Institute whether its the right time to buy a house.
have ever seen Howard (half) naked? http://www.livenews.com.au/static/articles/14797/F_14797_john-howard-david_320.jpg
he is better than I imagin
433 Mr Dinmore- Thank you for that insight. My lamp might have found an honest man!
435
Gippslander Says:
November 12th, 2007 at 12:49 pm
I had dozens of MarK Latham ones left over from the last election.. even the Garbos didn’t want to take them! I imagine the Kevin Rudds from this year will become collectors items.
……
For sure, Gippslander, much like any holy relics left from 1972 & “It’s Time”. I think it would be worth grabbing some Howard junk too – especially images that have been touched up by the voters. I might try and get some on e-bay, for curiosity’s sake.
Ha ha andrew robb on sky – he is seeing “The Narrowing”
‘Almost’ makes you feel some sorrow for the tosser – but not much
442
dave Says:
November 12th, 2007 at 12:57 pm
Ha ha andrew robb on sky – he is seeing “The Narrowing”
….
Well, as you move away from two pints, the distance between them appears to narrow. Robb must be retreating from reality, giving rise to this illusion.
ND
The point about HECS debts isn’t about winning votes, but using Government policy to attract people into certain careers (medicine, teaching, nursing) at the expense of others (law, accountancy), and to make the delivery of services in rural and regional areas more attractive to young professionals. that’s he sort of thing “Education Revolutions ” are made of. That’s how you get our brightest brains to stay in Australia and solve Climate Change problems. it’s also how you get more plumbers!
FTP 428 – I said here the other day that I don’t believe howard will make a concession speech on Sat nite. He will deny the outcome and state that he is waiting for all the postal votes to come in or some such. When he accepts the inevitable, he will call a press conference at Kirribilli or in his Sydney office and announce the outcome. This assumes the Libs lose and he loses. If the Libs lose and he holds Bennelong, he will stick around for a few weeks then quit.
438 Socrates, those silly Commsec crosses are cheap TV. The networks effectively outsource their finance “coverage” by crossing to some vapid screen jockey reading out lists of prices.
This is emblematic of how the media trivialises the huge transfer of risk to the individual in capitalist economies in recent years. Our economic lives are reduced to a racecall of individual stock prices.
John Quiggin has described this as a central idea of the early 21st century – the transfer of risk from governments and businesses to individual households – risks for our work and careers, our health, our education, our retirement.
Read his paper here.
http://cpd.org.au/sites/cpd/files/u2/JohnQuiggin_The_Risk_Society_CPD_July07.pdf
I’m not sure Howard could bring himself to make a concession speech full stop. We’ll probably see Costello doing it instead.
Not the other Tim: I can see it now, Howard will put Cossie up there because ‘We’re a Team’. Perhaps Janette could make the speech, or will she be racing off to Kirribilli to collect all her valuables?
If it’s comprehensive he’ll concede on the night, possibly about 10.30. I predict he’ll be defiant, saying how proud he is of his record. The tone will be pleading, like that now infamous 7.30 Report interview (”please reelect me”). The bottom lip will be quivering so much he’ll look like a ventriloquist’s dummy. There will be crosses to various party faithfull, many of whom will be bawling.
Cross to my loungeroom, where I’ll be raising a glass of Clicquot and shouting, and stamping. Laughing. Tears of joy. Whoo! Yes ratty, we’re gonna hammer you into the ground like a tent peg.
Dolly now on sky – “when it comes to polling day I doubt they will take the risk of labor”
Dumb smuck – his voice almost pleading…..
ho h ho !
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