Categories
Open Thread Politics

The Next Election

June 26th 2013, Julia Gillard is toppled by Kevin Rudd. In doing so the stage is set for the ‘The Next Election’. Will Rudd’s popularity win the day, or will memories resurface? What about the question of political conviction? Is the fragmentation of the Labor party the instrument through which Australia migrates to a multi-party political model? Serious days. So many questions. So many opportunities.

217 replies on “The Next Election”

I can’t stand Kevin Rudd. But he is not nearly as loathsome as Tony Abbott – hopefully Labor can staunch the bleeding and make this election into a winnable contest.
This is politics at its worst and it reinforces the need for a new approach so hopefully people will use their vote to send the clearest of messages to both the old parties that we want genuine vision and action not internal power playing from our politicians.

And some good news: the US Supreme Court has overturned DOMA. Gay marriages solemnised by states must now be legally recognised by the federal government of the United States of America. 🙂

The US is the light on the hill indeed at this time.

Chris B,

From the previous thread, I am not sure how that refutes my point. The Republicans, the anti-reality freaks that they are, were in full denial of the polls. The polls were right, as they almost always are.

Watching Stephen Smith’s farewell speech in parliament.
He really was impressive at taking on the misogyny in the armed forces. He’ll be missed. 🙁

Stephen Smith is certainly one of the good guys.

It is a pity that Conroy and Ludwig are not resigning from parliament, but at least they no longer have ministries.

Rob Oakeshott’s speech was superb.

Superb in its words.

And superb because he meant them.

Vale Oak and Tony Windsor.

Enjoy your lives.

7 David Gould Conroy has done a great job on the NBN. But before that stuffed up the internet censorship issue badly. That has completely gone as an issue and won’t resurface again. Dead and buried. I hope we get someone good in charge of the NBN.

David.

Kris Perry & Sandy Stier, Prop 8 Plaintiffs, Tie The Knot In California’s First Gay Marriage In Over 4 Years.
Proposition 8 plaintiffs Kris Perry and Sandy Stier experienced a huge victory earlier this week when the Supreme Court left California’s gay marriage ban for dead. On Friday, the couple’s triumph came full circle when they tied the knot in first same-sex marriage held in the state in four and a half years. The move was prompted when the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals issued a surprise order dissolving a stay it had imposed on gay marriages during the legal challenge.

(Watch video of their ceremony above.)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/28/kris-perry-sandy-stier-gay-marriage_n_3519462.html

There must be a huge rock in his throat. 🙂

Kevin Rudd overtakes Tony Abbott as voters’ choice for PM while his former assassin Bill Shorten wins praise.
OPPOSITION Leader Tony Abbott says he is not surprised opinion polls have tightened since Kevin Rudd took over as prime minister.

“I always have said winning government from opposition is like climbing Mt Everest,” he told reporters this morning.

“We’ve always said that the polls would tighten, they would have tightened under Julia Gillard, of course they have tightened under Kevin Rudd. That’s what I would expect.”

Policies plus personality = landslide. Kevin’s got the right ammunition to make this a big win for Labor. Its up to him.

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/special-features/kevin-rudd-overtakes-tony-abbott-as-voters-choice-for-prime-minister/story-fnho52jj-1226671943567

Megan. I just watch the Red Wedding in The Game of Thrones. If you were upset by Eddard Stark’s beheading. This would have really tied your stomach in knots. Regardless. I am still totally engrossed.

Live it that Windsor slaped Sophie on Insiders.
My facebook campaign begins…
Facebook.com/Greens4Indi

Do your best work ChrisB :))

OOOoooooooohhh!!!!
Go get her Jen, but you will have to get right to the bottom of the sewer to rech her.

Slogans like
Where there’s a Will
There’s a way
Sophie will find you.

Where there’s a Will
there’s a way
Sophie will find him cos he’s probably 80 and living in a shed.

Greens candidate Jenny O’Connor said: “Sophie Mirabella is such a deeply unpopular political figure, it is time for the people of Indi to use their vote to change their representation.

“Even though there are differences in our approach, we (Greens and independents) are all strongly united in wanting to change our representation from Sophie Mirabella to someone who is truly representative of the people of Indi,” she said.

http://www.bordermail.com.au/story/1607598/windsor-gives-mirabella-the-nasty-prize/?cs=53

Sorry Jen. Can’t help much with Facebook. It doesn’t have the features. But the Bordermail does. I 1+ it and Tweeted it. I sent it a bit of love as well. 🙂

This Rudd personality thing I don’t understand. Bob Hawk I did. But Rudd? Having said that. Now I know why Julia’s figures didn’t rise. The voters didn’t forgive her for knifing Rudd. Go figure. Tony Abbott’s got no chance.

Thanks CB –
and have had great fun today on the local tv news on Prime and Win whacking her :))))
Will post links if I can find them

Alison Lundergan Grimes Running For Kentucky Senate.

Kentucky Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes announced Monday that she would challenge Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) in 2014.

“I have met with supporters, we had a great conversation,” she said at a press conference in Frankfort, Ky. “We can next make the best move, the best difference by running for the U.S. Senate.”

Grimes is the first Democrat to mount a challenge against McConnell. Actress Ashley Judd had considered running against him, but ultimately decided not to.

A poll conducted by the Senate Majority PAC in late May showed Grimes and McConnell tied in a hypothetical matchup.

One of the very few senate seats the Democrats can win in 2014.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/01/alison-lundergan-grimes-senate_n_3529983.html

Here’s a link to my campaign page – so Ticksters do your worst and use all your best contacts
on.fb.me/1aZhphG

Murdoch aware of police payments from day one
.

Media mogul Rupert Murdoch admitted that his journalists paid British police for news tips ‘‘from the day I first bought the News of the World’’.
.
In an ironic twist, it appears that Mr Murdoch has been entrapped by one of his own journalists, who secretly taped a meeting that took place in the boardroom of his company’s Wapping headquarters in London in March this year.
.
Mr Murdoch travelled to London to address some of his journalists after they had been arrested.
.
The tape has allegedly been obtained by British investigative website ExaroNews, which has released a full transcript on its website. ExaroNews says it will soon release an audio file of 13 minutes of the 45-minute meeting.
.
According to the transcript, Mr Murdoch tells senior staff at The Sun that he was aware his journalists had been bribing police and public officials from the day he bought its sister paper, the News of the World, in 1969.

More here…
http://www.theage.com.au/business/media-and-marketing/murdoch-aware-of-police-payments-from-day-one-20130704-2pd94.html

Tasmania signs up to Gonski reforms
*****************************

Tasmainia joins New South Wales, the ACT and South Australia in agreeing to the needs-based school funding package.
Tasmania has signed on to the federal school funding reforms in an agreement worth an additional $380m between 2014 and 2019.

The agreement made public on Tuesday follows a meeting last week between the newly appointed federal education minister, Bill Shorten, and the Tasmanian premier, Lara Giddings.

Tasmania joins New South Wales, the ACT and South Australia in agreeing to the new needs-based school funding package, which was the former prime minister Julia Gillard’s signature policy reform.

Shorten remains in talks with the Victorian and Queensland governments ahead of the passing this weekend of a deadline set by the prime minister, Kevin Rudd, for the states to sign on to the Gonski package. Senior officials in Canberra are hopeful that a deal can be struck with Victoria within that deadline.

More here…
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jul/09/tasmania-signs-up-to-gonski

In the meantime …
How TF does the AbC allow Uhlmann to get away with his crap???
He out- disgraced Abbott in his interview on the ” turn back the boats” nonsense policy when he asked what he would do if the asylum seekers threw their children overboard .
Are you freaking kidding me ?
Not sure who is worse . Both are shockers.

Kevin Rudd resurgence looks like more than a sugar hit
********************************************

Labor’s leadership change has made the election look suddenly like a close contest, as polls move into 50-50 territory.
.
.
For the second weekend in a row, Morgan is the most bullish about Labor’s prospects, with Labor up 11 percentage points on first preferences over the two weeks since Rudd’s return. The gain in TPP terms is 10 points, with Morgan estimating that Labor’s TPP support is 54.5%. Note that Labor’s best ever actual TPP result is 53.2% (recorded in 1983). Morgan is using a mix of interviewing modes (SMS, internet and face-to-face), yielding large sample sizes (n = 3,521 last weekend; by way of contrast, note that Newspoll typically uses sample sizes of about 1,100). The Morgan sample size is sufficiently large to allow us to rule out sampling error as the reason that its 54.5% ALP TPP estimate is so much higher than Newspoll’s (50%) or Essential’s (48%).

More here…
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/the-swing/2013/jul/12/rudd-resurgence-more-sugar-hit

Clunk clunk watch yer fingers there Mr Murdoch.

Wish they would hurry up and do the world a favour.
It would probably turn out that he would be jailed in a prison run by private enterprise and he would own the company running it.
That’s my luck.

Rupert Murdoch could face criminal charges in America after he was secretly filmed telling journalists at his newspapers that bribing police officers for stories was “the culture of Fleet Street”.
US lawyers said that if the admission undermines his testimony to regulators, it could leave the News Corporation chief exposed under Title 18, Section 1001, which makes it illegal to lie to law enforcers.

…

Breaches of Section 1001 carry a penalty of up to five years in jail.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/07/11/1222728/-Murdochgate-Rupert-Faces-Possible-US-Charge-of-Lying-to-Law-Enforcement-5-Years-in-Jail#

It seems to me that the Australian election has turned into a bit of a personality campaign. With Abbott avoiding debates the policies are hidden in the background. Although I have struck some education adverts online and some for the disability scheme. I’ve seen nothing for the NBN yet. Still there is plenty of time yet. If the ALP uses Rudd’s personalty effectively and combines the policies such as the NBN, the Disability Scheme and the Education Revolution to great effect. Then we could be in for a landslide.

49 chris

The old bastard always seems to be able to buy his way out.

He is already negotiating with the FCPA though it sounds like it might cost him a lot more than was first thought.

Not sure whwe this latest one sits with respect to the FCPA but hope it is a clear case that he did lie to US Legislaters and they do give him 5 years.
No body would jump higher for Joy than me.

The Republican Party’s War on Women provides a perfect opportunity for the Democrats to win big in 2014. The Republicans have turned back the clock on abortion in so many states. They have also attacked Planned Parenthood and attempted to noble them. The perfect person to lead the fight against the Republicans War on Women and turn the tide is Hillary Clinton. With Hillary leading the charge the Democrats have a great chance in getting some good female candidates in place. Maybe Hillary could get Ashley Judd to reconsider in for the Kentucky senate. Hillary could lead street protests against the War on Women. Similar to the Tea Party protests. What better way is there to get a high turn out of women voters in 2014?

This needs to go in to every home in Australia.
The utter bullshit that Turnbull speaks on their Fraudband and the lies he tells about the FTTH NBN is criminal.

This interview has demonstrated exactly how far Mal is willing to go to defend his myopic, substandard waste of money. There is no line he would cross, no lie gone untold, & mostly, no data he will reference, in his singular goal of “destroying the NBN”.

I end with this:

http://sortius-is-a-geek.com/?p=3164

Moved into new home in Beechworth and after 3 weeks wait have been informed by Telstra that we can’t get broadband as no further ports available. WTF????
Apparently as the NBN may arrive ( one day in the very distant future ,if ever, in such a safe seat) Telstra has decided it to increase the current level of ports because …. Because they are pricks.
Fortunately a certain member of local government *ahem* has taken up the cause and is going to give the local member for Indi total grief.
: twisted:

The Republican Party’s War on Women provides a perfect opportunity for the Democrats to win big in 2014. The Republicans have turned back the clock on abortion in so many states. They have also attacked Planned Parenthood and attempted to noble them. The perfect person to lead the fight against the Republicans War on Women and turn the tide is Hillary Clinton.

Chris, i would have thought those reasons would be reason to select a Democratic Male Candidate.

The Republican disdain for women will already drive the female vote to the Democrats all by itself.

If the Dems can shore up the Male vote, they will be in a very strong position.

The Clinton Circus is over. The country has moved on.

The last ones to admit that is going to be the ageing Clinton media power base.

You know it’s a dark day for the country, when the Bolter is cheering on Rudd.
Kevin “Bonhoeffer” Rudd has not actually jumped the shark.
Just thrown a boatload of refugees into the water to distract the bogans of western Sydney.
Deeply ashamed of my country right now. 🙁

Lenore Taylor on Rudd’s latest piece of populism

Kevin Rudd’s boat fix shows good sense has sailed
Labor’s asylum policy switch might be a political game-changer, but it could be very costly indeed

http://is.gd/MT1nnL

What a horrible experience Voting Day is going to be for many many many Australians of all political persuasions.

What an abyss that Murdoch and Singleton have reduced the level of politics too.

When Murdoch and Rattus collaborated to let the racist genie out of the bottle, a part of this country’s heart died.

The Party of No Flirts With Yes as Mitch McConnell’s Grip on the GOP Slips
… this is the week that Mitch McConnell lost his iron grip on the Senate Republican caucus.
http://is.gd/TGOxIc

While the Australian political scene spirals down the toilet of racism and dog whistle politics, Obama manages to remind me, why he really *is* such an impressive politician.
What a remarkable presser.
Obama: ‘Trayvon Martin could have been me’
http://t.co/enlLNXK0Qr

#62 HarryH Nothing can win the white male vote in the south. In order to do that the Democrats need to lean to the right. We don’t want that. Hillary still is odds on according to the polls.

HarryH: David Axelrod: ‘Hillary Clinton Probably Will Be The Candidate’ In 2016.
.

Democratic strategist and former White House adviser David Axelrod said Friday that Hillary Clinton, who he helped then-candidate Barack Obama beat in the 2008 Democratic primary, will likely end up being the party’s presidential candidate in 2016.

“I think that Hillary Clinton probably will be the candidate,” Axelrod said Friday on MSNBC.

Of course, that’s only if she decides to run, a decision she’s kept close to the vest.

More here…
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/19/david-axelrod-hillary-clinton_n_3622901.html

Paddy@ 67
We are so far away from having a decent person, much less a remarkable one like Obama leading the nation –
Rudd sending asylum seekers to PNG , and then if they are proved to be legitimite refugees ( as over 90% always are) leaving them there to rot.
What The Fuck.
I am angry to my core.
And utterly ashamed to be seen by the rest of the world as represented by the despicable bastards leading the two major parties.

Nate Silver leaves the NY Times to go to ESPN.
*************************************

What Were the Odds That Nate Silver Would Leave the New York Times for ESPN? Only Nate Knows.
.
Statistics whiz Nate Silver brought huge traffic to the Grey Lady, and now ESPN stands to win big. Brandy Zadrozny on what’s next for the oddsmaker.
When news broke Friday that superhero statistician Nate Silver was leaving the New York Times for sports network ESPN, the media circus quickly piled on.
.
“What were the odds?” tweeted Politico’s Blake Hounshell.

“With Nate Silver at ESPN, there’ll be no reason to watch games — we’ll know the results beforehand with 98% certainty,” tweeted Huffington Post’s Robert Elisberg.

Silver is best known for accurately predicting the outcomes of the 2008 and 2012 presidential elections. Among the chattering class, Obama’s victory was arguably as big a deal for Silver as it was for Democrats. During the last election cycle, his FiveThirtyEight blog reportedly accounted for 20% of the traffic coming to the Times. His contract was up next month, and he was in the middle of negotiations, according to reports.

More here…
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/07/20/what-were-the-odds-that-nate-silver-would-leave-the-new-york-times-for-espn-only-nate-knows.html

The place with the fastest internet in the USA is Chattanooga Tennessee. Businesses a flock there for the fast internet. Internet businesses are liberal businesses. Yet another USA state turning blue. So far we have Texas with an influx of Hispanics. Virginia with an influx of people (liberals) in northern Virginia from Washington and North Carolina with an influx if computer companies as well. It will not change instantly and the Republican Party will/is fighting it all the way with gerrymanders and voter suppression. But in the end they will lose and lose big time. Yay!

Ellis: The coming Rudd landslide explained.

With Kevin Rudd back at the helm, The Liberals are headed for an historic defeat and oblivion thereafter, says Bob Ellis. WHAT HAPPENED was this …

… Keating, because of ‘the recession we had to have’, a bullying parliamentary style and a belief that mild-mannered Howard would change nothing but govern more ably, lost power in 1996.

Howard then changed everything and, in 1998, scored 400,000 less votes than Beazley.

Bound for a drubbing in 2001, he was saved by 9/11 and a world war and the myth of ‘the Taliban on the Tampa’ and narrowly survived.

With the Greens in the Senate.

More here….
http://www.independentaustralia.net/2013/politics/ellis-the-coming-rudd-landslide-explained/

Radio Broadcaster Will Dump Limbaugh and Hannity
“In a major shakeup for the radio industry, Cumulus Media, the second-biggest broadcaster in the country, is planning to drop both Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity from its stations at the end of the year,” Politico reports.

“Cumulus has decided that it will not renew its contracts with either host, the source said, a move that would remove the two most highly rated conservative talk personalities from more than 40 Cumulus channels in major markets.”

Awesome!
http://politicalwire.com/

Ellis is good for a laugh. 56.8? So ridiculous that it is pointless a redundnacy to call it impossible. Rudd could get to 52 with a very good campaign. But the polls at the moment are predicting a very close race, and Labor are coming into it with quite a few disadvantages, given that they need to win seats to retain government and that they are very likely to lose two in Tasmania and at least one in New South Wales. That means that they need to pick up a total of seven from Queensland and WA – very tough to do.

I wondered how long before something like this came out.
.

A man allegedly sexually abused by a Catholic priest as a teenager says Tony Abbott should not have vouched for the priest’s character in court.

John Gerard Nestor, 50, was a priest in the Wollongong diocese in NSW when he was charged with the indecent assault of the then-14-year-old altar boy.

In his 1997 court case, the priest admitted he had slept on mattresses on a floor with the boy and his younger brother in July 1991, but denied assaulting the boy.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/abbott-criticised-for-supporting-priest-20130324-2gnjm.html#ixzz2adG1Msct

Kentucky Senate Poll Shows Alison Lundergan Grimes A Serious Threat To Unpopular Mitch McConnell.

New poll numbers released on Thursday hold troubling signs for Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).

According to the survey — conducted by the Democratic firm Public Policy Polling on behalf of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee and Democracy For America — Alison Lundergan Grimes, Kentucky’s Democratic secretary of state who officially entered the race on Tuesday, leads the longtime senator by one point, with 45 percent to McConnell’s 44 percent. While her lead is within the margin of error, the poll also underscored some broader issues that McConnell is likely to face as he campaigns for a sixth term.

PPP are usually very reliable. A long way to go yet. Maybe Obama could put in a couple of appearances.

More here..
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/01/kentucky-senate-poll-alison-lundergan-grimes-mitch-mcconnell-_n_3688273.html

21 Reasons To Love George Takei.
.

George Takei is lovable for countless reasons — but to name a few: he played the unforgettable Lieutenant Hikaru Sulu on Star Trek, he’s a fierce gay rights advocate and he happens to have one of the best social media presences of any celebrity out there. His Facebook profile boasts 4.3 million very engaged fans

A great way to start the day. With George Takei.

More here…
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/31/21-reasons-to-love-george-takei_n_3681867.html

Morgan Poll: ALP drops slightly but still leads.
This week’s Morgan Poll shows a small gain for the L-NP. with the ALP is down 0.5% to 52% on a two-party preferred basis, ahead of the L-NP on 48%.
The ALP primary vote is 38.5% (down 3%), ahead of the L-NP primary vote at 41.5% (up 0.5%).

Among the minor parties Greens support is 10.5% (up 1.5%) and support for Independents/ Others is 9.5% (up 1%) – including within that support for Katter’s Australian Party of 1% and support for the Palmer United Party of 1%.

Note: Calculation of the 2PP vote is based on how preferences for minor parties are allocated

The Morgan Poll allocates preferences of minor party voters based on how electors surveyed say they will vote: ALP (52%) cf. L-NP (48%). When the Morgan Poll allocates preferences by how Australian electors voted at the last Federal election – the method used by Newspoll, Fairfax Nielsen and Galaxy – the Morgan Poll shows a much closer result: ALP (50.5%, down 1.5%) cf. L-NP (49.5%, up 1.5%). This is virtually identical to the most recent Galaxy poll, which has the parties dead even on 50-50 (2PP).

Although not everyone votes ‘the card’, how the preferences of minor parties are allocated on Election Day will depend on the ‘deals’ that are done by various parties and the ‘cards’.

(Finding No. 5070 – This multi-mode Morgan Poll on Federal voting intention was conducted over the last few days via Face-to-Face, Internet and SMS interviewing, July 26-28, 2013 with an Australia-wide cross-section of 3,575 Australian electors aged 18+, of all electors surveyed 1% (unchanged) did not name a party. For more information visit the Roy Morgan website.)

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Australia License

3,575 voters is a pretty large number. Internet Face to Face and SMS. To me that sounds like there is little room for error. Not being an expert on the subject. But if I was Kevin Rudd I would take the 52%.

A side issue. The NBN. I was checking out some of the towns around where I used to live in Gippsland. Briagolong has a population of 947. Boisdale has a population of 603. The minimum size of a town is 1,000 for the NBN. 500 if the backbone is going through that town. Both towns put the total over the average required. Briagolong being after Boisdale and at the end of the line. I wonder how flexible they are at the NBN. They are not that far from Maffra which is over 4,000 I think. Otherwise those two towns would be a bit stiff in missing out.

16 Reasons Why Hillary Clinton Will Win 2016.
*************************************

As a lifelong Republican, I am not pleased with my own prediction—nothing would thrill me more than if a conservative were to win back the presidency. But my political reality instincts lead me to believe the following. (And I’ve been right before: in January 2011, I cowrote “12 Reasons Obama Wins in 2012.”)

Unless there is a radical change of circumstances within the Republican Party and its crop of presidential wannabes, or some unforeseen cataclysmic national event that dramatically alters the current economic and political landscape, or a serious deterioration in her health, Hillary has it locked up.

Here are 16 reasons why Hillary Clinton is poised to be elected the next president of the United States, in order of importance.

More here…
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/08/03/16-reasons-why-hillary-clinton-will-win-2016.html

Destroy Rudd, destroy the NBN. (Conspiracy Alert!).
.

Someone in the mainstream media has finally caught on that Rupert Murdoch wants Labor to lose the election because the NBN effects his Australian business interests:
Why Murdoch wants Rudd to lose the coming federal election is not merely political, it is commercial. News Corp hates the government’s National Broadband Network (NBN). The company has formed a view that it poses a threat to the business model of by far its most important asset in Australia, the Foxtel cable TV monopoly it jointly owns with Telstra.

Not surprising, the article has gone viral in social media.

.
They really have some geniuses in the mainstream media. If I could work this out more than two years ago why couldn’t they?
http://cafewhispers.wordpress.com/2013/08/04/destroy-rudd-destroy-the-nbn/

Comments are closed.