Four observations that grabbed me from Insiders this morning. One from Barrie Cassidy:
• “Paul Keating described his win in 1993 as one for the true believers. Last night’s was not. Kevin Rudd promised to govern for all Australians. His appeal within the Labor Party itself is tempered because of his conservative cautious stance on so many issues. He will be seen as the leader the party had to have to beat John Howard. Julia Gillard will be the light on the hill.”
Three from George Megalogenis:
• “I suspect Jackie Kelly tipped (Bennelong) over the line for Maxine McKew. Her performance that Thursday morning on AM radio – my understanding of the tracking polls, a few of them went mad on Thursday night. There was actually swings back to Labor in marginals where there were previously narrowings through the week.”
• “Going into this election, 12 out of the top 30 seats for single mothers were held by the Coalition. They’ve lost eight straight off the bat, another three are doubtful, they’ll be left with one out of 30. (Cassidy: Why?) Welfare to work. Mal Brough. May have been popular in the intervention into Aboriginal affairs, but you know, he wanted single mums to go to work. And if they didn’t go to work they were going to lose their benefits. If you think that this didn’t shift votes where the government didn’t expect them … I think it did.”
• “The Liberal Party needs to have a good hard look at its membership base. This wasn’t just Lindsay, we saw a breakout at the Press Club on Thursday where Liberal Party members were heckling female journalists including Michelle Grattan, I think there was a meanness of spirit in the Liberal Party this year that came from its grass roots. I don’t know what it’s about, but Peter Costello (sic) needs to have a good look at it.”
To elaborate on the second point. I don’t have figures on single mothers specifically, but Megalogenis’s demographic tables include data for single parents which shows 11 previously Coalition-held seats in the top 30: Wakefield, Cowper, Lindsay, Leichhardt, Dunkley, Dobell, Solomon, Page, Robertson, Kingston, Bass, with Macarthur, Hasluck, Blair, Herbert and Longman not far out. The only definite survivor out of these is Dunkley, with Labor narrowly ahead in Solomon, Robertson and Herbert, just trailing in Cowper and Macarthur, and victorious in the other nine.
862 Comments
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Interesting thing about Abbott is that there was actually a very low swing against him. I think people would be ok with him as Deputy. As Leader the only purpose he would serve is to be the guy who loses the next election and keeps the real next Liberal hope (surely Turnbull, or else someone we’ve not heard much from yet) away from what will probably be a dire three years for them.
644 [Your faith is touching.]
That is what Rudd is all about. Liberals find it so different that it is almost impossible for them to get their head around the concept of actually honouring election promises. Another difference is that under Rudd every letter will be answered. A vastly different approach to the last 12 years of dysfunctional government.
Had a stand up heated argument in my wife’s Chinese Christian Church! today with an Elder…. he was still attacking Rudd using Howard/Smirk manta of no policies blah..blah. Ended up telling him in not so Christian terms to open his effing ears.
mmmmmmmmmmmm, Julie in black leather and thigh boots, sorry, forget I said that
steve @ 652,
Just like the Iemma Govt in NSW, right?
Or are there two different Australian Labor Parties?
Dyno, you need to wait for them to disappoint you and then get jaded and cynical. If you don’t hope for something better then that’s pretty sad.
Dyno,
The Iemma Government is Labor in name only. When Carr was riding high in the polls, our branch always referred to him as the best Liberal Premier NSW ever had.
Bishop’s ageing sex-kitten routine was very distasteful when viewed from the gallery, although the Liberal backbench always got a snicker from it.
LTEP,
Do you have a view on the performance of the State Labor Govt in NSW?
LTEP @ 656,
That’s probably good advice. On that note, farewell all.
I think the bigger lights of the defunct Howard era will follow Tip’s cue and move on. Ruddock, Downer, Abbott – all have had their day, and then some.
Anywhere, who really cares what the shadow team is up to! Losers.
Whats the Ministry??
655 You’ll find out soon enough Dyno, but I can assure you it will be different to the nonsense of the past twelve years.
I’m of the view that says more about the good folk of Warringah than it does about Abbott’s performance in the campaign.
For any interested- they have Rudd’s acceptance speech on his site [with Anna's intro]
http://www.kevin07.com.au/
Dyno, yes there are to some extent, it is the old story of a government too long in power (NSW) versus fresh (Rudd). Iemma will suffer the same fate as Rat if they ever get their act together in the Libs, likewise Queensland Labor is showing signs of the same malaise, too long and they get arrogant and sloppy. At least Seeney (Nats) in Qld is beginning to show some signs of being a true opposition. the Libs here are still rudderless.
LATHAM OR COSTELLO “DUMMY SPIT” COMPETITION
Latham
1/ had the guts to challenge for leadership
2/ had the guts to put himself to the voters for their political decision
Costello
did NOT have the guts to do EITHER
WINNER: Costello easily
HOWARD’s POLITICAL LEGACY : the PM who lost his own seat
COSTELLO’s POLITICAL LEGACY : the biggest’ dummy spit’ in political history
Both have now their just desserts
No 648
I believed the polls to the extent that a sizeable swing had to be expected, but that we would be able to retain government by a slim margin.
Obviously I was wrong, but I respect the decision of the people.
Guess what! Business Unions start sucking up to Labor
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22811448-643,00.html
Does anyone think it has something to do with them having 83+ seats in the new House of Representatives?
Speaking oy blog, here’s a really touchingly dumb post on it from last week. The power of self-delusion is quite amazing:
Paul Kavanagh Says:
November 21, 2007 at 11:28 pm edit
Former Democrats voters who supported the Liberals in 2004 (few went ALP or Green) are returning to the Democrats. I’m convinced of this based on the past two weeks spent at the Higgins Early Voting Centre.
The extensive and overwhelmingly positive media for the Democrats this time continued this evening with the stunning twenty-minute SBS program on the colouful campaign launch. This program went to air shortly after Kerry O’Brien spoke with Kevin Rudd on the 7.30 Report about the GST’s central role in Australia’s economic success.
Recent developments, including the regional funding review and tonight’s Lateline story about the Liberals speading hate and lies against Muslims for their own political gain should further boost the Democrats vote.
All the while the Democrats’ adveerting has been a highlight of this dreary and uninspiring election.
—-
Needless to say, the Democrats polled almost no vote at all – even Allison and Bartlett got only a bit better than a random name on a ballot would get.
ShowsOn
That just shows the Govt is going to back business over unions. Nothing for you in all that perhaps a half eaten rack of lamb from the big table
That first line should read “Speaking of my blog”
Not really ESJ, I’ve only recently moved to NSW and then only in Queanbeyan which is really in Canberra. As such I don’t really have an idea of how services run by the state government are. That being said I’ve never been terribly impressed by Iemma and think O’Farrel at least appears to be competent.
The problem with a lot of state Oppositions is it doesn’t appear they really want government. They don’t try and really get their message out and sell their leadership. After living for years in WA I still don’t know what Omodei looks like even though I’m sure I must have seen him in the news a fair bit.
I couldn’t tell you one thing the NSW Opposition plans to do with NSW and I think that’s a big problem.
That being said, I think it’s almost inevitable they’ll win government at the next election.
665 [At least Seeney (Nats) in Qld is beginning to show some signs of being a true opposition. the Libs here are still rudderless.]
Seeney was real successful with his council amalgamation scare campaign. Never won the Tories a single vote. He is performing so poorly in parliament lately that Springborg could roll him as leader before much longer.
Maybe it should read “speaking of me”
ShowsOn @ 688
Would have been nice for them to have published that before.
668, interesting, see Telstra’s relationship got a mention, being poisonous with the Howard gov. Will be interesting to see how KR deals with the godfather Trujillo, maybe deport him as an undesirable alien, methinks.
It’s JWH who has been a very naughty boy.
Abbott, a natural loser. Conflicted. Only held there by Howard’s hillusions.
This is nonsense. I have not read back, but did hear late afternoon that Pyne is throwing in for deputy leadership, behind Turnbull.
A more laughable pair I can barely imagine. In fact, I can only think of laughable pairs.
No one, Turnbull included, will be turning the bad ship Liberal around within the next three years.
They need new recruits, after and well after they have managed to get over this, get a perspective, get back to what the Libs are supposed to represent. According to their roots.
In the meantime. Its all about the fighting. In fighting. For personal position, not political representation for the country.
It disgusts me absolutely that Costello especially, having filled his and their own and their friends and overwhelmingly massively wealthy company pockets with superannuation free gifts, a zillion dollars of taxpayer’s advertising money, a zillion dollars worth of favours along the way, I could but won’t go on, Costello particularly will not even face the music. And Downer has the nerve to say, while this looting is going on, that he knew all the while they were losers.
The music being that Costello knows he would never be the Leader of even the most abject Opposition.
And, in the meantime, the electorate has voted on the disgrace of Work Choices.
Roll on the double dissolution, if needs must. The electorate will not stand for any more nonsense.
Ahh! Old fashioned thinking based on division and false dichotomies.
No, it simply demonstrates that business unions are always last to support Labor, even if the Tory’s are pissing billions of taxes up against a wall, the default position of business is to think Labor could and would do worse.
The last Labor leader to be genuinely suspicious of business was Calwell, all the rest have been very much pro-business. But you wouldn’t think that from the way the business unions carry on.
Labor still has some messages to get out their and some history to correct and some facts to relate.
1./ They need to get it clearly understood that our economy prospers because of Hawke/Keating reforms and global/China boom.
2./ They need to emphasise that Howard totally wasted a decade of prosperity on vote buying or whatever [the Chief Economist of the ANZ Bank backs that up]
3./ The social divisiveness of the Howard govt.
4./ And the Howard/Liberal governments readiness to betray working Australians.
Labor has suffered at elections because of Howard’s misleading them on reality. Labor need to get these messages out often and clearly until they become accepted as matter of course….bit like the Liberal b/s mantra on 17% interest.
How long before Labor MPs stop saying “Kevin” and start saying “the prime minister”? It took Kerrie O’Brien 11 years to start addressing John Howard as “Prime Minister” rather than “John Howard”, which may reflect the adoption of the fawning American mantra of “Mr President” – even to ex-presidents.
Herring, Chris Curtis. Get back to the real issues.
They’ll start calling him Prime Minister on Friday.
Until then, Prime Minister-elect is probably the most suitable title.
I was a bit shocked when Anna Bligh called him “Prime Minister”, not even “the NEXT prime minister” or “P.M.-elect”.
Edward, it was you mentioned my blog. Were you born a conceited twat or do the Libs have a secret conceited twat training school somewhere? Don’t answer, I’m going to bed. Tomorrow is Day One In Power and I have to be up early.
Can anyone find the full text of Rudd’s victory speech?
I wonder when the tories will decide the leadership??
Still Nelson and Turnbull are front runners with Julie B&D Bishop inline for the deputy leadership by a long way.
I’ll be shocked if it isn’t done by Friday.
Howard will probably concede tomorrow based on these figures…
highlight of the campaign for mine was Howard’s own little battler Jackie Kelly on AM that morning, with the call waiting pinging off in the background, she was at once trying to justify the racist ploy and perhaps blame it on union thugs, truely a chaser moment.
please, no hagiography of this despicable liberal government or any on its members, if there was every any decency in any of them they all subverted it to that disgusting clarion call of racism from Howard and the vicarious pleasure so many people get from seeing others suffer.
Howard a deluded self serving petty man, who, its members will soon comprehend, has irrevocably damaged his party, (I would love it if that ego on wheels Turnbull took charge)
I take pleasure in knowing that in fifty years he will be remembered for kids overboard and hopefully, like Stanly Bruce aprime minister that lost his seat
Of course, it was Liberal HQ calling her to tell her to hang the phone up.
On my own, admittedly, topic of double dissolutions, is it possible to dissolve the Senate without dissolving the Reps?
I mean this, seriously.
My brow, lightened for a while, is furrowed again.
It would be for the best, it is obvious McKew would win the by-election.
The term ‘Liberal government’ has now become an oxymoron. None exist
ShowsOn at 685.
Yep. I have it.
It is possible to have a senate election, without a House of Representatives election yes.
The Senate isn’t actually dissolved though, unlike the House of Reps, it is an ongoing body, hence the different change over time.
Well we used to have half senate elections when the House was being elected but this stopped in the early 1970s…i dunno whether PM KR can do this now.
Crikey you can hold a half-Senate election but only at a certain cycle in the government.
In fact Gough was going to ask for a half-Senate election on the day he was dimissed if I recall correctly.
half senate elections were held in between federal elections, but it stopped.
We had a half senate only election in 1970. This is one reason we had a double dissolution in 1974, so that the terms could be synchronised again:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_Senate_election,_1970
Crikey Whitey,
No. The Senate has fixed terms. You can have a separate Senate election, but the term remains three years.
Cheers,
Herring
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