The increasingly unpredictable Roy Morgan has released a face-to-face survey of 797 voters conducted just over a week ago, showing Labor’s two-party lead up to 60-40 from 59-41 at the larger poll conducted over the two previous weekends. Both Labor (48 per cent) and the Coalition (34.5 per cent) are down 0.5 per cent on the primary vote, with the Greens spiking from 8 per cent to 11.5 per cent, mostly at the expense of “independent/others” (down from 6 per cent to 3.5 per cent).
Reflections on the Miracle of Democracy at Work in the Greatest Nation on Earth
Morgan: 60-40
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Far que! I typed a lengthy, earnest entreaty about the need for guys to be checked for incipient or existing signs of prostate cancer. Only to hit the wrong key and have my lengthy diatribe disappear.
Neither Sam Newman nor Alan Jones allude to the traumatic implications of a diagnosis of prostate cancer.
It is made to seem like a footy thing. Heroic. Blokes, you know. It is certainly not. Death in Gallipoli may be considered preferable.
I urge all you guys, even if your sport is quoits or croquet, the bottom line is, present it to your doctor.
Stand to be corrected, again on spelling.
Doug
#197
“Whichever way things go eventually, we must try. I don’t believe there is any other choice.”
Agree with you entirely Doug , we must try Agree the polls may be ’soft’ particullarly the 77% one , sort of a motherhood question Yes the lbs are hypocrites and in fact earlier today i posted I think they’ll run a CC scare campaign around job security , jobs exported & ‘oz’ are suckers moving ahead of the rest of the world , so accept Rudd has to be measured politcally & economically What initally aroused my concern that i posted a few days ago was the free permits , i knew Garnaut was opposed in principal and Steve’s excellent link at #163 explains far better than i tried i feel the big Oily Exxons ar trying to buy time & Penny has given them that in timing & free permits , seems against Garnauts pref Perhaps as you say , the ‘process’ will deliver more favourable details however i remain skeptical after the free permits and particularly the absence in the REt scheme objects of a tangable enegy replacement sourse , other than rebates as incentives on one hand and ‘market forses’ on the other ‘creating’ the new R E industries enegy replacement
Its an issue that if not handled right could be turned on Rudd , by the above scare attacks and the voters not seeing a tangable enegy source vision for the moment rudd has played the politcs brilliantly , but voters simply (greedily) expect a solution that may involve more cost , but not less available enegy to use , which is why i’ve sort of pushed the solar grid firmly (and 2nd pref the nuclar fussion reactor using hydrogen , low waste mentioned by Diogenes , either way with govt leadership , scrutiny & involvement
Doug , you said ” do they ignore CC and blow everything for the present or do they vote for their own future and their childrens future by addressing the problem.” Sgree with you , The opportunity to influence is via subs presently , guess i’m looking for a more bolder tangable “Snowy River’ enegy 7 have less faith than you in the beaucrats
that link was #168 not 163
Crickey, I’m not sure if it’s his prostate, but Dennis certainly has something up his arse
http://blogs.theaustralian.news.com.au/dennisshanahan/index.php/theaustralian/comments/rudd_gets_final_word/
Hate to say I told youse so:
http://www.theage.com.au/environment/critics-slam-9m-green-ad-campaign-20080722-3jcy.html
It’’s not whether the charges are true, or whether the opposition is being hypocritical itself (they’ve never had any problem being that) in making them. It’s that the 30% who are holding a partisan objection to Global Warming being real are being given permission to go on denying. They can just write it off, not as a failed campaign, but as “more fluffy, hypocritical, ineffective Rudd spin”.
$9 million dollars down the toilet, wasted on the people the government needs to get on side.
Incalculable millions of political capital wasted, annoying even further those who already don’t want to listen and need an excuse not to.
It may feel good to be able to call the government’s opponents wankers and hypocrites in turn, but that’s just name-calling. They may be just that. But this ad campaign – which the opposition allegedly supported but which they have no compunction criticising anyway – has become the issue:
“Just more government bull$hit. They’re all the same… politicians”. I can hear it now out there in Voterland.
What a waste.
Ladies and gentlemen, I give you “Work Choices, Mark II”.
I too think the $9m green ad campaign is a waste! Doesn’t Rudd realise that it’s still over three years to the next election! How dare they advertise something for the public good this far out from an election. Especially when it has only 77% support…
Tom.
The Liberals seem determined to deal themselves out of the ETS issue and become more irrelevant than ever. The best way to do this is to pick a date out of the air, dogmatically stick to it while the Government gets on with introducing the ETS. The Liberals have never handled opposition well, but this decision will cost them three years of barking at the moon while the ETS is developed.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24063151-601,00.html
Meanwhile some of our (hope not) future liebrals leaders are in serious training for the rats piss up.
http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,24061736-5001021,00.html
So Santo Santoro’s faction of the Queensland Liberals has knocked the unlikely nomination of Shane Stone on the head. This would seem to suggest that they are back to having the National Party President McIvor as the only realistic candidate for President of the Pineapple Party.
We are now left with with two options this weekend, a National Party President of the Queensland Division of the Liberal Party or a Liberal Party walkout from the process. Either way the losers from the whole process are the Queensland Liberals. Springborg and McIvor have outsmarted the Queensland Liberals at every stage of the buyout and deserve to be rewarded for their cunning and persistence.
It is going to be interesting to watch all the Queensland Liberal Party assets being sold off at firesale prices during an economically tight time. The crunch for Springborg and McIvor will come when Springborg becomes a three time loser as opposition Leader at the next election – that’s when their problems really begin.
Springborg might finally get the message that it is his refusal to develop any meaningful policy, during his long tenure as Opposition Leader that keeps him in Opposition and not so much what the Liberals have or haven’t done in the past campaigns.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24063069-5006786,00.html
184
Diogenes Says:
July 22nd, 2008 at 10:22 pm
“Solar grids can never be made “energy dense” enough to be of more than token efforts.”
You are absolutely, and utterly wrong on that Diogenes.
It would take 45 sq km of concentrating solar energy to provide over 90% of ALL of Australia’s electricity. This heat can be stored overnight and during dull periods to even out the supply. This calculation is based on Dr David Mill’s recent pitch to Canberra. Meanwhile, they are doing it in California on a VERY big scale.
It is both political will and the massive shift away from the century of investment in coal that’s the problem, not ANY technological limitation.
KR look what happened to the pop corn machine.
http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,23590747-17001,00.html
211
steve
Pass the popcorn…and run! LOL
KR
I disagree with your interpretation of the term “energy dense”. I think that figure of 45 square kilometers of solar panels shows it would be extraordinarily difficult to bring in. Many of the large cities in the world (NY, Tokyo, London, Chicago) don’t get enough sun to make it feasible as the infrastructure to carry the power from 1000’s of km away is cost-prohibitive.
I’m hoping for nuclear fusion and electric cars myself, but we need a few options.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24063151-601,00.html
Headline – Liberals to stall on carbon emissions trading scheme
“KEVIN Rudd faces a delay in the introduction of his carbon emissions trading system until after the next election, with Brendan Nelson vowing last night that the Coalition will not accept a start-up date before “2011 at the earliest”.
This sentence should have been written as follows:
“Australians face a delay in the introduction of carbon emissions trading system until after the next election, with Brendan Nelson vowing last night that the Coalition will not accept a start-up date before “2011 at the earliest”.
So Nelson is playing politics with the health and safety of our nation. He and his party will stand condemned at the next election.
213 – Diogenes
I’m a chemist not a physicist but as far as I can tell (barring unforseen breakthroughs) we’re still at least fifty years from commercially viable fusion. While I agree it is the ultimate solution to our power needs we definitely need a stopgap.
I don’t see any real alternative to solar power, either in the form of straight photon to electricity or alternatively in some form of biofuel system.
Steve K, could Kevin Rudd wish for a better outcome. He now has an issue to take to the next election.
216 Charles, could the Liberals wish for a worse outcome?
They may as well practice golf, or take long lunchbreaks each day as they have made themselves redundant on the biggest issue of this parliamentary term.
Perhaps they could take extended leave till 2011 and come back when they have something to say.
dogb
I agree. It might be fifty years but hopefully more like twenty. It depends on how much investment is put into it and how lucky we are.
Another big problem with huge solar grids is that they form “non-scale networks” rather than random networks. The “node” of the 45 km2 would be unbelievably attractive as a terrorist target. Any nutcase with a few crappy munitions has an unmissable target which would wipe out power across Oz in about five minutes. You can’t rely on a few “nodes”.
The politics of nuclear fusion are the hard bit. Try explaining the difference between fusion and fission to the voters.
Crickey Whitey # 201 (I don’t know how this got on poll bludger but:)
Other than an emotional feeling that any treatment is better than none do you know of any scientific evidence that the current treatment of prostate cancer is in anyway effective?
Dio
Twenty years seems very optimistic to me but it’s a thumb suck either way to be perfectly honest – here’s hoping you’re right. As far as selling it to the public I don’t think it’s going to be a big problem. In the last few years I’ve personally witnessed a state government (QLD) basically ignore the potential political damage and go ahead with a massively unpopular water recycling scheme because there was no real alternative.
Large scale fusion will be the same. It will be so important and so cost effective that governments will simply be unable to ignore the benefits. They’ll try to sell it to the people but ultimately, even if it’s hideous unpopular, it will still go ahead.
On solar – I agree about the vulnerability of large scale solar grids. I tend to think the best system would be fairly well distributed (panels on domestic roofs, small ‘community’ storages, multiple connections to grid etc) but I’m guessing, like everything else the human race does, it will develop in a fairly ad hoc manner and security will be a problem that needs to be addressed.
Diogenes, Dogb…
The beauty of photovoltaic solar power is that it scales easily.
You can either build one 45 sq. km. station, or forty-five 1 sq. km. power stations with only modest commissioning overheads per station, much more modest than having to build lots of little coal-fired stations.
Scalability is why the domestic solar cells thing was started, but in my opinion, that’s too small, too inefficient.
Most likely, the optimum size for a commercial solar station is in the 1 sq. km. range and less. Given that your average available suburban roof space is 25 sq. metres., a 1 sq. km. station is the equivalent of 40,000 suburban installations. a quarter sq. km. station (500 metres square, plus something for installations) is 10,000 suburban rooftops.
No climbing up on wonky roofs, no special OH&S insurance for climbers, no tree shadows impeding sunlight at various times of the day… and no bloody ugly solar cells ruining the amenity of the neighbourhood. You’d have economies of scale in installation because no climbing would be necessary. Installation would go from an inefficient “boutique” industry to “industrial” overnight. A small gang of workers, or three, working 3 lots of 8 hour shifts (night work possible because of no hazardous roof climbing), could put up hundreds of cells per day in a solar farm situation. Everywhere there was a spare bit of otherwise untenable waste land, a solar farm could be located there.
Spread out in smaller farms, we’d negate the terrorism threat instantly.
Big farms could be built outback. This would bring new industry and prosperity to towns now facing desolation and ruin due to the very thing solar farms are perfect for exploiting: cloudless skies.
If people wanted to invest, they could invest for as little as the cost of one solar panel, getting a re-jigged rebate from the government for it in recognition of the expense. These shares would no longer be tied to a particular house. They would be portable. In other words: proper, saleable investments.
221 BB
Makes you wonder why we’re not doing it already doesn’t it.
dogb check out the CSIRO website. It will inspire you.
I forgot to point out that storage might not be practical in smaller solar farms. So what? These could still be used for peak power requirements, allowing coal-fired generators to be shut down part of the time, or even mothballed, reducing overall emissions.
We must not forget, that we don’t have to solve the entire problem with one solution in one fell swoop.
There are many ways of storing solar power. The Yanks proposed compressing air and storing it in underground caverna (existing technology, used for LPG storage in America). But why not use solar power to desalinate sea water and store that. It could be pumped into dams and used for hydo generation at night, or just as straight drinking water. Remember, once the solar technology is installed, the power for it is free.
Work could be generated just in maintenance. Think thousands of people with feather dusters. Well, OK, maybe not feather dusters, but there’s a lot of work to be done anyway.
The dying towns of the west could become centres of industry, education, whatever you like. With unlimited power water could be pumped there instead of power cabled to the coasts. The possibilities are endless.
CPI rose 1.5% in June quarter making 4.5% increase for the year.
http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/mf/6401.0?OpenDocument
OVERVIEW OF CPI MOVEMENTS
* The most significant price rises this quarter were for deposit and loan facilities (+9.5%), automotive fuel (+8.7%), rents (+2.2%), hospital and medical services (+4.0%), house purchase (+1.0%), furniture (+3.1%), and spirits (+6.1%).
* The most significant offsetting price decreases were for other financial services (–2.9%), fruit (–7.4%), vegetables (–6.5%), domestic holiday travel and accommodation (–2.0%) and electricity (–1.4%).
We’re not doing it already because the coal and oil lobbies are too strong. It’s that simple.
This all comes back to my idea that Rudd needs to grasp the bull by the horns and talk of a new, great future for Australia, not only making the best of a bad thing in fighting Global Warming, but triumphing over it, and prospering from it.
At the moment his progess model is two steps forward, one step back. everyone’s whingeing: the advertising companies, the hypocritical Lib and Nat pollies going on about the ad campaigns, the workers afraid of changing their jobs, the pensioners, the opinion writers whipping it all up.
Rudd may get some satisfaction out of “process”, winning through using classic methods of bureaucratic manipulation. But it could be so much easier for him. Like Tom Sawyer, he’s digging his way out of jail with a spoon, when he should be using a bulldozer.
Many here get a certain amount of satisfaction out of seeing the Opposition tying themselves up in policy knots. It’s all very jolly and funny. We love to slam “deniers” and goofy un-scientific theories that say the Earth is cooling, or the seas are falling, or it’s all down to water vapour, or cosmic rays or the Big Spaghetti Monster… or whatever the latest anti-GW schtik is. It’s a kind of masochistic pleasure we all get, from time time time our of believing we are right and that our opponents are not only wrong, but stupidly so.
But the pleasure is self-defeating. We argue and rant and rave (I certainly do) in the mistaken belief that the Earth gives a $hit about what we say. The Eart doesn’t. No political point scored in the world is going to ameliorate Global Warming. No “gotcha”, no prissy bit of obstructionism in the Senate, no wedge of the Greens, or whatever (and certainly no opinion poll, perhaps the most idiotic thing to rely on of all). All we get from those, no matter which side we are on, is a moment’s mental pleasure at the discomfort of our opponents, while the main problem – that the Earth as we know it is heading down hill – just gets harder to solve.
There is more to politics than just winning the day. Rudd can win the decade, the century if only he quits trying to fight the Opposition and their cheer squad and the terribly afraid of change on their own terms and goes his own way… soberly, carefully, but inexorably setting himself apart from the grubby street fighters squabbling over political crumbs.
And wait till your neighbourhood gym harnesses all those kilojoules now going to waste. A little power station in every suburb!
Not really a joke – as entrepreneurs will surely see the business opportunity and appeal for an energy self-sufficient gym. I’m pretty sure there’d be R&D going on right now.
The guy pumping iron powers the chick’s treadmill. Probably a metaphor for something.
BB@227
Nice rant…can only agree.
On solar & viability – see the example of Woking in the UK for what a local authority can do right now: ie; http://www.woking.gov.uk/council/planning/publications/climateneutral2/energy.pdf
Not a “perfect” solution but clearly possible to make significant changes without large scale social dislocation.
227 BB
Exactly what I was saying to my wife this morning. Rudd shouldn’t be talking of challenges. He should be talking of this as the greatest opportunity of the last hundred years. A bit of vision wouldn’t go astray.
We should be looking at what Spain is doing. They’re doing their best to set themselves up as the power generation site for Europe. They think they can do it because they have lots of open land that’s only marginally useful otherwise – and they have lots of sun.
We have lots of land, lots of sun.
BB
I agree about Rudd. He is clearly no brave visionary. He is a classic bureaucratic manipulator who will embark on a very intensive laborious process which is more about minimising negatives than being positive. But those are the political realities in this “climate”.
oakeshott country Says: @ 219
{do you know of any scientific evidence that the current treatment of prostate cancer is in anyway effective?}
Not sure of the effectiveness of most current treatments, but there does seem to be some progress being made.
{A POWERFUL new drug to fight the deadliest forms of prostate cancer could put thousands of men into remission and lead to effective treatments for other hormone-driven cancers.}
http://www.theage.com.au/national/prostate-cancer-drug-advance-hailed-20080722-3jcj.html
oc
For very small prostate cancers (the type picked up by screening), there is much debate about whether to treat or not as most don’t ever cause any problems. For larger prostate cancers treatment definitely improves the prognosis (surgery, radiotherapy or hormonal) and even quite advanced disease can be controlled effectively in many patients.
Diogenes,
Look at Mitterand, had it for 17 years before he departed to meet his socialist entity.
“There is more to politics than just winning the day. Rudd can win the decade, the century if only he quits trying to fight the Opposition and their cheer squad and the terribly afraid of change on their own terms and goes his own way… soberly, carefully, but inexorably setting himself apart from the grubby street fighters squabbling over political crumbs.”
Forget about the politics. Rudd just needs to get out their and promote this grand vision. Make increased bills and costs in general a virtue (if anything will put people off this spin will). Let the opposition go there own way and dominate the media with their negativity. Just ignore the lot and plough on.
Rudd should get on telly and have the whole country glued to their TV sets taking in every word. They will flock to him. There won’t be a detractor or CC denier left in the country. The opposition will eventually melt away and vote for every CC bill i the government puts forward in the Senate because they too can see the vision.
A noble sentiment but naive. Political reality just doesn’t allow for this approach.
Yes, GB, and I suppose the current effort is working so well? Full of clarity, truth and noble intentions?
To the man with a hammer everything looks like a nail.
Rudd is a “details man”.
To the man who revels in details, everything looks like a multi-disciplinary, complex set of interlocking challenges that require a balanced mix of goal-orientated methodologies and outcomes.
Crap.
The greatest politicians in history are those who have been able to cut through with their message and create opportunities out of adversity. The rest are jusy hacks, or amateurs.
If you think this is the end-game, some sort of last gasp of the deniers that we’re seeing now, you’re wrong.
This is just the beginning of the $hit fight. It’ll only get more muddied, more complex and more interwoven with pressure groups and special pleaders.
We need big ideas, concepts that are simple to utter yet powerful in their ability to inspire. We don’t need step-by-step incrementalism, playing this faction off against that lobby. If ever there was an opportunity and a challenge – the end of the world as we know it – this is the time for such inspiration.
Sure, deatils will be needed, there’ll be lots in infighting, but we need to get away from the competing portraits of various forms of up and coming misery that seems to be dominating this debate.
Forget the TV ads. Rudd should get up on national TV and tell us how great we can be. Then let’s give Nelson equal time to match that with his 5c off a litre of petrol guff.
I don[’t think Rudd is personally in a crisis, at least not yet (but that could come sooner rather than later). But we are in a crisis if something’s not done. At the bottom line, it’s us ordinary folk that I’m concerned for, not Rudd’s poll figures.
Where’s the passion Gary Bruce?
I’ll take that as a compliment, coming from you ESJ.
Bushfire Bill – LOL LOL
“If you think this is the end-game, some sort of last gasp of the deniers that we’re seeing now, you’re wrong.”
I don’t believe that at all but the approach you’re advocating will not stop this happening either. It will just give them free reign.
“The greatest politicians in history are those who have been able to cut through with their message and create opportunities out of adversity. The rest are just hacks, or amateurs.”
In Australia we see all politicians as snake oil salesman. Rudd won’t overcome that overnight. Our most successful politicians have been snake oil salesmen. Howard was one of the best and lasted 11.5 years.
“We need big ideas, concepts that are simple to utter yet powerful in their ability to inspire. We don’t need step-by-step incrementalism, playing this faction off against that lobby. If ever there was an opportunity and a challenge – the end of the world as we know it – this is the time for such inspiration.”
Got this message earlier. Noble but politically naive and impractical. The real political world, at least in Australia and with a hostile Senate, doesn’t work like this.
“Forget the TV ads. Rudd should get up on national TV and tell us how great we can be. Then let’s give Nelson equal time to match that with his 5c off a litre of petrol guff.”
Got this message earlier too but still don’t believe the average person will listen to a talking political head or even read about what he said. You need to hit them in their living rooms while watching their favourite show. I’ve given my reasons why I think this approach is the best of a bad bunch of ways of tackling this communication problem on this issue (it won’t work with all issues).
“At the bottom line, it’s us ordinary folk that I’m concerned for, not Rudd’s poll figures.”
The poll figures are important only in this respect, if he doesn’t take the people with him 3 years will be it for him and then we’ll have the deniers back. You know it and I know it. Then we’ll really be in the poop.
Gary Bruce = Compromiser
Tony Benn said there were 3 types in politics, maddies, straight men and fixers.
Give me the maddies any time – conservative or liberal.
Your view is really the defeatist progressive view – if your principles are worth fighting for then why disguise them?
As a urologist, allow me to finish this debate, which really does not belong on pollbludger and can become very tedious with the quoting of newspaper interpretations of scientific journals and even of conflicting scientific papers. At present (as in 1966 when the president of the American Urology Association first said it) “we can cure cancers of the prostate that do not need treatment but we can only treat cancers that need a cure”.
Since the introduction of PSA testing in australia in 1988 the incidence of CaP has gone from 50/100,000 to 180, at the same time the mortality has fallen from 16/100,000 to 14 (NSW cancer registry). This is despite a massive shift in staging that means cancers are now found at a previously unbelievably early stage.
Proponents of mass prostate screening tend to massage these figures significantly (e.g. this is a 12% improvement in mortality) but when it comes down to it, this early diagnosis has only had a very limited effect on patient survival. It has however kept many a urologist in his or her beemer and makes some of the layity feel warm and gooey. The cost has been significant, not only in terms of Medicare expense but also in terms of patient anxiety and the not insignificant complications of treatment for a disease that may or may not have endangered the man’s life.
Yes, Diogenes, since 1940s (and including the latest Telegraph ‘breakthrough’) testosterone deprivation has eased symptoms in late stage disease but it has never been shown to extend longevity.
Sorry to be cynical and I am very hopeful that a way of significantly decreasing the mortality of Ca Prostate is close but I feel the health dollar can be better spent on things other than mass PSA screening. I should also admit that i have a yearly PSA.
i drop in today to see pessimissm & scientists puting come confusing pictures to me Well this solar grid crusade is only a week old & not derailable by negatives of why it cann’t be done St.ff th rest of the world argument & st.ff the terrorists threat argument , and st.ff the scale argumentt because super solar does work in my shanty 7 over square miles of outback farms The CC problam
is solvable , its the vision & the will & nerve thats the problam
My #186 IS AN EXISTING SCINTIFIC SOLUTION , its a super solar grid It dustbins fossils , it dustbins CO2 , it dustbins conniving big Oily Exxons pressuring Politticans , its the sun , and the sun takes no holidays , and th Sun has no $10 million a year slick CEO’s , and the Sun comes up everyday for us on the horizon so it’ll be always there
Its a John Curtin/Chifley equivalent of the Snowy River schem , big vision , and importantly big reward A CC solution & a sounder economic ‘oz’ future creating more jobs & ‘oz’ jobs longterm I’m gonna write to Kevin07 and say the voters demand the SAME enegy as now for there machines & toys & aircons , and they may be prepared to pay abit more for the enegy power cause they have good CC hearts , but only IF you offer dem a ‘future’ vison of jobs , no CC and the same enegy as now
But you must offer dems the same enegy as they’ve got now because your faithfull voters are reely greedy boys Those greedy voters will chose ‘dirty’ coal over there good CC hearts unless sir Kevin you offer them an tangable enegy alternative To thems voters , ‘process’ is NOT an enegy alternative and ETS to voters is NOT an enegy alternative , to voters they are just fluffy words , and CC may get sidetracked by words rather than a big vision alrernative
politcs Kevin07 ? Brendan says wait till 2011 , thats only so Horatio can run a 2010 scare electon campaign And as for Brendon saying wait for Copenhagan meeting in 2011 for the US & china to agree ? Hell the US has not even agreed to ratify Kyoto & may never because Obama & Mccain are p.ss weak on CC So thats another Horatio furphy , sir Kevin the US & China are not probably never gonna agree , so look after ‘oz’ , thats your job , and be bold with big vision on solar
Sorry the figures for mortality should be 36/100,000 (pre PSA) and 33 (post PSA). I was lookng at the graph upside down but my interpretation is the same.
I wish I knew where to start out on the subject of your cynicism, GB.
The ad campaign is already a dead duck. Fluffy messages, hacked to pieces as partisan advertising by the hypocrites on the right. Did you see Barnarby Joyce’s comment? He shamelessly admitted that the WC campaign was wrong in order to label Rudd an equal hypocrite to Howard. Sheesh… just as I predicted yesterday… not too naive there, was I?
However, one of the criticisms by one of the advertising gurus in the article struck a chord. He argued that the ads told us the problem, but not the solution.
I guess Rudd would see the solution as being “an inclusive and balanced mix of goal-orientated methodologies and multi-dimensional outcomes for all participating stakeholders.” Sexxxxxxxy!. Try selling that to the Footy show audience.
Curtin had his “every man, woman and child” war policy. Kennedy had his “We choose to go to the moon…” speech. Churchill had his, “We shall fight them on the beaches…” broadcast. Rudd has, “The devil’s in the details”.
Which three of the above are regarded as great leaders? All four had or have existential challenges – the Japanese invasion of New Guinea and thence Australia, the technical and military supremacy of the Russians in the early 1960s, the looming threat of Hitler, and lately the big one… Global Warming.
Sure there were a lot of “multi-dimensional challenges” and outright political knife fights involved for all of them. But the direction was clear.
Rudd has not shown us a direction we all want to follow. Rather, he is promising us doom and gloom, and lots and lots of details as the lobby groups duke it out over nuances of political and financial advantage. He’s like the surgeon telling the patient that he’ll wake up in agony after the operation, when he should he holding out hope for not only a cure, but a better life… and bugger the pain in the short term. That’s how you get people to do unpalatable things: you inspire them to think of a brighter future.
“Bushfire Bill Says:
July 23rd, 2008 at 11:38 am
There is more to politics than just winning the day. Rudd can win the decade, the century if only he quits trying to fight the Opposition and their cheer squad and the terribly afraid of change on their own terms and goes his own way… soberly, carefully, but inexorably setting himself apart from the grubby street fighters squabbling over political crumbs.”
Agreed Bill.
Irrespective, the ALP will win the next election, it will increase its majority by about five or so seats, and will probably increase its two party vote by up to 0.5%
Ari, I hope you’re not saying that winning the next election means Rudd shouldn’t at least try to inspire us and lift our spirits for the coming fight?
Bushfire Bill: a lot of pessimism from you! Why write off Rudd only 6 months into his first term? It seems to me you’ve been spooked by the Liberal Party cheersquad in the MSM.
BB @ 245,
The key difference between Rudd at the moment and the three leaders you mentioned is that in the case of three leaders, there was virtually unanimous agreement what the problem was – in the case of Curtin and Churchill, it was the Axis powers in WWII and for Kennedy, it was the Soviets going to space.
What those speeches were useful for was to define the nation’s response to those problems. What’s different for Rudd is that there is a significant minority still in Australia that refuse to believe that climate change is occurring. As such, Rudd is facing a doubly-difficult task compared to the three leaders you mentioned, in the sense that not only must he clearly state his solution to the problem of climate change BUT also must convince people that climate change is a problem in the first place.
To do this, he needs to take each step incrementally. Hence, the ads talking about climate change being a problem. Once he can get a strong consensus (not amongst scientists, but amongst the general public) behind this, then he can go out and set out his grand vision for dealing with climate change.
To set out a grand vision for dealing with climate change without getting this strong consensus first means that he is open to two lines of attack:
1. Based on a denial of climate change happening and/or it being detrimental to the country; and
2. based on his proposed solution to climate change.
Those ads need to start talking about HOW the ETS will work
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