A day is a long time in politics

[tcpip]

There was a hint a few days ago that the Coalition was going to play a little grubby. First they attempted to claim that a number of Labor candidates were ineligible to stand. That fell apart quite badly. Then there was the hysterics about if Labor wins socialists and unionists will corrupt the minds of the youth.

But now they've really screwed the pooch. It would seem that NSW Liberal Party State Executive member Jeff Egan and the retiring candidate's husband and the candidate's husband, Greg Chijoff, for the marginal seat of Lindsay, Gary Clark, have been caught trying to distribute fake election material from the "Islamic Australia Federation" to support Labor. A copy of the leaflet is available. Worse still, Jackie Kelly has tried to work her way out of it in a (MP3 file ABC radio interview and on television. I don't think I have ever seen Laurie Oakes so angry.

Paul Keating gets his revenge on moral grounds. Bob Hawke gets his on economic grounds. Even Malcom Fraser - a little more carefully - gives his considered opinion. Finally, Catherine Deveny really does have a way with words.

If we do not seize this opportunity for change we will go down in history as the most greedy, gullible, mean-spirited, selfish, short-sighted, tight-fisted generation in the history of Australia. How will it feel sitting in front of that $5000 plasma TV watching reruns of American reality shows, wearing clothes manufactured in a sweat shop and sitting on a sofa made by Third World slaves? How will that feel when our public education and hospitals have been gutted and our environment corroded to a point of no return? How will it feel knowing we have turned our back on people who need us most: the poor, the broken, the scared, the sick, the elderly and the vulnerable? How will it feel when you turn to your children and say, "I believed him"?

There is no way any decent human being could vote for the Liberal Party, or even give them a major party preference, after the events of the past twenty-four hours.

Comments

[msss.livejournal.com]

Well, judging from the last 10 years, it doesn't matter as long as you're ablt to have your mind numbed by the plasma TV and reality shows.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

People can be amazingly distracted by the most meaningless technological gadgets.

"Television, the drug of the nation"

[silverblue.livejournal.com]

I literally wanted to vomit when the 'look, we're rescuing child refugees! On boats! Honest! Forget about the Overboard scandal!' thing came up.

I rather like weasels as an animal. They are neat, sharp, intelligent, and attractive.

The man is rather a leech.

[msss.livejournal.com]

Oh yes. And then locking them up in a detention camp. But that's out of sight and out of mind on Christmas Island.

So that's okay.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

I was quietly impressed by the rat fanciers who didn't agree with their favourite animal being referred to as a rodent.

How about a lamprey? Predatory, parasitic and a bottom-feeder...

[greylock.livejournal.com]

I take it you are not in WA and so did not see the West Australian's front page today:
"Boat people early winners under Rudd".

Yep - The West made their own Tampa.

[zhenzhi.livejournal.com]

lets hope then, that the majority of voters are decent human beings!

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

Apparently if you plug in today's Newspoll on a state-by-state basis and make a couple of reasonable assumptions about the ACT/NT results to Antony Green's election calculator Labor ends up with 100 seats.

I'm beginning to think the majority could even be greater.

[mr-figgy.livejournal.com]

It's good that Gandalf appears to be riding over the ridge with reinforcements for your Helm's Deep like country.

Mixed news from this front; the federal government created the biggest wildlife sanctuary in Canada, coincidentally in a place where Trudeau thought we should put one back in the day. A lot of people are happy, especially with the land put aside for native claims.

The other side of it is that it's relatively easy to create a big wildlife sanctuary in Canada, where we do have more land than we use, especially up in the Northwest Territories where this one's been created. Easy compared to doing something about Canada's greenhouse gas emissions, which doesn't appear to be happening.

Though I welcome new native land claim areas and wildlife sanctuaries, I also heard that all the federal opposition parties are uniting to pursue information on this scandal that's also been in the news. I take it the sanctuary thing may be a huge smoke screen, apart from it being seemingly the easiest, cheapest way to silence a few environmental critics.

[silverblue.livejournal.com]

Always got to start somewhere. I think something to embrace if you're a lefty are the victories - accept and celebrate them. Then use the energy they create as a springboard to continue. Sure, you had the land, but the formalisation of it as a park has immense value, and if it is positive, maybe you can build on that.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

It's good that Gandalf appears to be riding over the ridge with reinforcements for your Helm's Deep like country.

This is more like the Witch King of Angmar deciding to commit suicide on Pelanor Fields... :-)

... coincidentally in a place where Trudeau thought we should put one back in the day

Goodness, someone should unveil his archives just to implement everything he suggested.

I take it the sanctuary thing may be a huge smoke screen, apart from it being seemingly the easiest, cheapest way to silence a few environmental critics.

Perhaps; but it won't work if the enviromentalists stay on their message.

[http://users.livejournal.com/raven_/]

http://www.domain.com.au/Public/PropertyDetails.aspx?adid=2006832414

ROFL!

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

I hope that stays up for longer than 48 hours.

[artbroken.livejournal.com]

It's just been a cavalcade of shonk this week - and badly mismanaged shonk at that. I was expecting dirty tricks, but I wasn't expecting them to be executed so incompetently.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

This might be the worst election campaign I've ever seen - and I'm trying very hard to be non-partisan about it.

Do you think all this is worth another 1.5-2.5% on TPP? After all the "last minute, swinging voter" isn't going to be terribly impressed by this performance.

[tomusan.livejournal.com]

This is a display of complete and utter desperation on the part of the Liberal Party. Their campaign is one of the worst examples of political manuvering and communication - whoever studies this in fifty years time will lambast us for putting up with such a government for so long.

I thought they pushed themselves over the edge with the "Labor = Anarchy" advertisments, as well as the profound tactic of patronizing the majority of their electorate and basically chastising them for voting in "wall to wall" Labor state governments.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

The advertising campaign isn't working because it's so contradictory - on one hand they're saying the economy is so strong because of us and on the other they say the economy is really fragile, don't let Labor stuff it up. You can't have both.

As for "wall to wall" governments, one thing that the Labor people can say is that provides unprecedented opportunity for state and federal cooperation.

And to think that's their two big points!

[greylock.livejournal.com]

Woah.
I don't think I have ever seen Laurie Oakes so angry either.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

It's like he's ready to throttle someone.

He's looking a lot thinner and quite older these days as well.

[splodgenoodles.livejournal.com]

I'm too much of a pessimist to predict a liberal loss I'm afraid. I keep thinking of all those other unwinnable/unloseable elections.

Although when commercial networks start turning on the government...well that's something.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

I keep thinking of all those other unwinnable/unloseable elections.

I was pretty sure Keating was going to win the 1993 election. I remember watching Hewson do a big rally in Perth city; about 20,000 people turned up being c7,000 supporters, c7,000 protesters and c7,000 neutral. The protesters had a field day with him - I remember leading a "Loser! Loser!" chant which caught on with great popularity. I also admit for feeling a little sympathetic when Hewson stared in our direction looking genuinely sad and hurt.

The last opinion poll published a couple days later predicted a very slight Labor lead, the first time in the campaign.

At that point I knew Hewson would lose.

Although when commercial networks start turning on the government...well that's something.

Quite. I wonder what sort of stuff up the Tories can manage tomorrow?

Laurie Oakes ...

[imajica-lj.livejournal.com]

looks like someone just pinched the last of his prize claret.

What are you doing for Saturday?

Re: Laurie Oakes ...

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

Voting in the early morning, going to Werribee open zoo for the day and possibly a post-election party after that...

Interested in any of the above?

[lederhosen.livejournal.com]

Fraser has been criticising the Howard government for quite some time now, on one front and another. I don't know that he's characterised Labor as better, but he's certainly made it clear that he thinks the Coalition's lost its moral compass. Did you see the letter he and Whitlam wrote on the lack of accountability in modern government?

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

Yep, caught that. I'm surprised they didn't get Whitlam to write an article as well.. Mind you, he's probably getting a bit long in the tooth..

[reddragdiva]

My goodness Keating is a flame warrior.

I wonder what Fraser makes of the last twenty-five years. He hasn't changed a single opinion in the last thirty, but he finds himself somewhere to the left of Rudd. Um, what?

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

That final line of Keating's is a classic...

Yeah, centre-right thirty years ago is centre-left now. :(

[nomnivore.livejournal.com]

You'd think so, but Australians just don't care.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

Oh, I think we'll find out on Saturday evening whether they do or not.

I'm sticking with 97 seats to Labor at this stage.

[ruth-lawrence.livejournal.com]

I totally agree...but then I was involved in student politics and have often been a scrutineer and therefore already know that a section of the Liberal party is like this.

They game the population, and have respect for no-one.

I won't put 'in my view' as I regard this as a fact not an opinion.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

The New South Wales right ("the Uglies") are particularly bad, as are their friends in Western Australia who associated with Mr. Noel Criteon-Browne-Handy-With-His-Fists-In-Domestic-Matters.

Not to say that the NSW Right or the WA Right of the Labor Party are particularly charming people either...

[zeemverse.livejournal.com]

Love your journal. Am referring people here for election coverage. Hope this is okay.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

Please go right ahead. Glad I can write something that's vaguely interesting.

[velvetink.livejournal.com]

The scary thing is that most people will most likely vote by the last tv advert they last saw. I'm hoping for a change but think the country is mostly full of idiots.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

It is true that a percentage of the population does make up their mind on the day; which is part of the reason that I put in enormous effort when given polling booths to manage; and every single time, I'm proud to say, there has been a swing to Labor said booths - even when the swing has been against Labor in all the others.

By my rough estimations and experience, performance of the polling booth staff make a difference of about 3%. It's incredible, but true.

The youth of today...

[khrysha.livejournal.com]

...could use a damn lot of corrupting.

Self-serving trolls they are.

YAY! ELECTIONS! YAY! NO MORE HOWARD!!

[evil-genius.livejournal.com]

any updates?

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

Yep; our side won and fairly convincingly. Will post to socialists today..