If the policies result in a 4% swing against Dutton in Dickson (next door to Longman), something will have been achieved
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Rocked up to the booths in Maserati. Man of the people.
After that Red Gum singer pushed him to preferences he was that busy opening school fetes.
Will the current divide in the Liberal Party between the far right and moderates lose them votes? I’m sure there are many Inner city Libs who wouldnt be thrilled with the idea of being associated with racist nationalists. The marriage vote was telling and should have been a warning.
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Ooooooh, thanks for reminding me.
Not that I was going to vote any other way, but still.
Also, the ALP are monkeys if they don’t mention that in passing during the campaign.
Not to make to big a thing of it, but…just a little reminder of what they did and who abstained.
A looooot of people becoming eligible to vote for the first time won’t forgive.
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Thankfully the right are full of racists and islamaphobes and all the labour electorates that votes no won’t be voting Lib
He may not be as vulgar as Trump but Turnbull uses the same playbook
Greg Jericho
The Coalition government has consistently defaulted to doing what business wants at the expense of the people
There are those in Australia who look across the Pacific and wonder what it would be like to have a Trump-style government, and whether such a calamity could happen here. The correct answer, of course, is not only that it could but that it is happening right now.
Yes, some of the more horrific aspects of the Trump presidency – the alleged collusion with Russian forces, for example – are absent, but from a policy sense there is little that would see Turnbull wishing to be separate from Trump.
Tax cuts that favour the wealthy? Hell yes. The Turnbull government’s key economic policy has been to bring in tax cuts which when fully completed will overwhelmingly favour the wealthy and which will exacerbate income inequality.
Tax cuts for corporations? Yes please! While the Turnbull government has been unable to get the bulk of its company tax cuts through, there are few doubts that they won’t occur. Pauline Hanson is expected to give the government her support once the Longman byelection is out of the way and she doesn’t have to explain to voters why she supported a policy most of them do not.
A willingness to hit the racial dog-whistle? Why certainly. The signs are already here that the next election is going to be a horror show of talk about migrants and crime and blaming immigration for everything from wages to housing prices to congestion, and all coated with a very thin veneer of racial anxiety.
Trump has spent much of the past year talking up fears of the MS-13 gangs to such an extent that despite no evidence of any growing activity, 85% of those who voted for Trump now believe the gang is a very serious or a somewhat serious “national threat”.
For Malcolm Turnbull and his government, substitute MS-13 for “African gangs” in Melbourne. Last week on 3AW Turnbull responded to Neil Mitchell’s question of whether he believed “people in Melbourne are frightened to go to restaurants because of Sudanese gangs?” by saying, “Well I’ve heard that from people in Melbourne and Neil you’re a person in Melbourne. Well I’ve heard it, I’ve heard people, colleagues from Melbourne say that there is a real anxiety about crime in Melbourne. It is a real issue.”
There was a time Turnbull might have been expected to take a stand against such fear-mongering. A time when “heard it from people” would not within a sentence turn into “a real issue”. But those days are long gone.
He might not be as vulgar as Trump, but Turnbull is just as willing to appeal to the lowest common denominator.
And what about thin-skinned responses to criticism? The ongoing attempts from the Turnbull government to discredit the ABC is only marginally less subtle than Trump’s railing against the “fake media”.
The Turnbull government is not content to merely seek to have the ABC remove content it finds displeasing. This week the health department sought to have the parliamentary library take down a post which highlighted just how weak are the privacy provisions surrounding the My Health Record.
I suspect that censoring those who are pointing out reasons the public should not trust a government service is not the best way to have the public believe they can trust that service – or their government.
And finally, how about a preference for big business?
As we have seen with the company tax cuts that is certainly evident, but a perfect example of where the Turnbull government’s priorities lie came this week with the announcement of Nine taking over Fairfax.
The deal is a terrible one for those who value a diverse media. I suggested on Twitter that talk the new company would have “plenty of Fairfax DNA” was like saying the Brisbane Lions have plenty of Fitzroy DNA. But as a few people pointed out to me, at least Brisbane kept the “Lion” name and also makes an effort to keep the Fitzroy legacy alive as best it can.
That the new company couldn’t even be bothered keeping “Fairfax” in a manner similar to “Seven West Media” or “Time Warner” shows how little care there is about what Fairfax represents, and does not bode well.
You can blame the Fairfax management – and it sure as heck deserves plenty – but this takeover would not have occurred had the Turnbull government not removed the cross-media ownership laws last year.
That legislation – made possible with the support of One Nation, Nick Xenophon and Derryn Hinch – was designed to provoke such takeovers. It is not about competition in the free market, it is not about greater diversity of media voices or giving media companies a better ability to hold governments and corporations to account.
It is about – as is inevitably all pro-business legislation – ensuring consolidation of power in the market.
In defending the legislation this week Turnbull stated that “all the media companies strongly supported these laws”. It was a view parroted by the communications minister, Mitch Fifeld, justifying the legislation because it was supported by “Nine, Seven, Ten, WIN, Prime, Southern Cross Austereo, News Limited, Fairfax, Free TV, Commercial Radio Australia and Fox”.
Yes, companies wanting to buy other companies and companies wanting to be bought by other companies liked the legislation. I am shocked.
It does highlight how the government will default to doing what business wants rather than what might be best for workers, or in this case our democratic society.
If business says it is what is needed, well then that is what is supplied, and that is how it is justified.
It all makes for a pretty awful mix. And while those in the US are wondering whether the changes wrought by the Trump presidency can ever be undone, here too the impact of the Turnbull government will be long lived.
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Still though and all.
■■■■ Fairfax.
Love Greg Jericho’s work.
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Neo-Libs gonna be Neo-Libs and Neo-cons gonna Neo-Con, corrupted idealogies gonna be corrupt.
I regularly have arguments with conservatives regarding the disparity in their values.
The conservatives bang on about upholding the great Australian principles and values. Ie. traditional family, supporting small businesses, small government, etc. And in small ways tied into Nationalism.
Yet they kick sand in the face of the greatest Australian values of all.
‘Looking after your mates’;
‘a fair go for people doing it tough’.
These are the values that Australians fought and died for in world wars. This is the identity that Australia claimed during world war 1, to seperate themselves from the pretentious hierarchy of the British empire.
These values are simply lip service for the LNP, because time & time again they ignore people in poverty, the indigenous communities, the elderly, people with disabilities, people dying in detention camps, single parent families, alternative education opportunities, people that live rurally, young people, people on minimum wage… the list goes on.
They have no regard for Australian values and still treat the Australian population with disdain. The Australian population is a thorn in the side of the Liberal party, as they are getting in the way of the policies they want to implement… for the Australia they seem to envisage.
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It’s hard to distill Australian values from Australian history, considering a good chunck of it includes genocide and the white Australia policy, which happen to coincide with the better aspects that you elude to.
Barrie Cassidy admitted that the journos got sucked in to Turnbull’s agenda that Braddon and Longman were a test of Shorten’s leadership, when there were policy decisions that affect people in real life. No journo did an analysis to that effect.
Perhaps voters don’t care that much who leads the parties.
As for the comment that Keay did not increase her majority in Braddon, the Australian system is constructed on preferences. No explanation given why most of the fisherman’s preferences went to Labor.
Sally McManus is having fun showing the humble pie charts in the five electorates.
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Also, …
xinhuanet.com
Record growth forecast for Australia’s Victoria state - Xinhua
2 minutes
SYDNEY, July 23 (Xinhua) – Australia’s Victoria state is set for record economic growth, with business investment, household consumption and the job sector helping to fuel the country’s fastest-growing economy, authorities said on Monday.
The state is forecast to record “above trend growth of 3.7 percent of gross state product for the 2018-19 financial year, which would be the strongest growth rate in Victoria since 2005,” according to a statement from the office of the state’s Treasurer Tim Pallas, citing latest business outlook findings.
Business investment including 20 billion Australian dollars (14.84 billion U.S. dollars) of commercial projects and strong household consumption were cited as key contributors to the outlook.
The state has been the country’s fastest-growing economy since November 2014, adding an estimated 48 billion Australian dollars (35.63 billion U.S. dollars) in real terms.
It has also reported employment growth of more than 340,000 new jobs in that time - "more than a third of all jobs created across Australia."
Infrastructure investment over the next four years is forecast to average 10.1 billion Australian dollars (7.5 billion U.S. dollars) annually over the next four years.
"The strength of the Victorian economy is a result of our continued investment in our unprecedented infrastructure pipeline - driving skills, jobs and opportunities for all Victorians, right across the state," said Pallas.
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Oh, … and the Gov just got the Cops a few more Bearcats, … obviously to deal with “teH gANgS”…
It’s a shame that the media can’t offer up this kind of self-reflection when it actually matters, such as during the campaign. I’m sure that if Shorten had lost one or both of these seats, Barrie and his friends would still be pushing the leadership angle.
Apparently that happens al the time in by-elections and they were, like, totally expecting that and stuff.
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Going to be interesting watching the LNP gnawing off all of their limbs in order to survive. Who do they turn on. Banks? Coal? Religious right? Uncy Rupe is already publishing articles about Trumble’s leadership. He’s not going to go for any of that.
I was thinking it’s a bad thing there was such a demonstration against them in the Bye Elections, … now he might consider backing off on the ridiculous Tax cuts for Big B’s, and Banks etc, … and take away a major Labor bat, … (again).
Then drag the election out to full term, and initiate high volume Murfuch propaganda in the mean time.
Would really be happier if they didn’t get the heads up and took their current stance & policies into the next Ballot.
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Lol.
Try the unemployed, muslims, boat people, African gangs, renewable energy etc.
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