I reckon that the toughest political gig at present is the one one of the common man who supports the Labor party Its damn tough having to find reasons to endorse or explain the policies of party that is doing so badly in the opinion of the public that Ivan Millat is close to being considered more trustworthy than the current PM. Ok, sarcasm aside, we may well be on the cusp of that Rudd revival that Ray has been banging on about for ages as even the Canberra press gallery has turned on Gillard and even the carrot of “compensation” for the hated carbon tax that is greater than the expected price rises won’t give Gillard any electoral joy. Anyway Ray may like this scenario of a Rudd revival published today.
Can it work to win government at the next election?
Personally I don’t think that it would claw back that much trust and faith of the former true believers but it may give just enough of them enough hope that they don’t totally abandon the party and deliver a Queensland like thrashing to the federal party. As wise and audacious as this plan may be I suspect that those currently at the tiller of the Labor party are too arrogant and too stupid to do what is necessary to stop their party ending up a total unelectable wreck for a generation at least.
Cheers Comrades
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For once I completely agree with something Andrew Bolt has said. He’s right on the two key issues – Gillard’s leadership and the carbon tax stuff-up. I just wish he wouldfn’t go on with that “conservative commentator” vs “lefitist” ones bullshit. Laurie Oakes is a leftist? Michelle Grattan? Well, to Bolt, anyone slightly less extreme than he is a lefty I guess. Anyway, Andy has nailed it better than a stuck clock does twice a day.
“anyone slightly less extreme than he is a lefty”
100% correct.
As I see it Ray anything less than the Bolt prescription is bound to fail at the poll that matters. As for Oakes and Grattan well I think that they do lean more to the left than to the right but its just Bolt’s shtick to cite them as “leftists”
It is interesting to read the ways Iain and others in the Murdoch and even Fairfax press are seeing the current problems facing the ALP. As someone who finds little of interest (or benefit) in most conservative politics, it has been interesting to sit back and see how conservatives eat themselves alive. Two broad observations:
1. The ALP has done a good job with the economy and in getting their agenda up, in spite of having to try and keep the Greens and independents happy. But they have totally failed to sell this politically and have let Abbott run the political conversation about that, instead of it being about their positive achievements.
The fact that pundits like Iain and Bolt can get away with just repeating that this is a ‘Bad Government’, purely by pointing to their political failings, is a change to the way most people view Government achievements. Some minor problems or a failure to sell a policy or decision doesn’t make it a bad policy. BER and HIS are examples of this.
2. The very political mistakes that pundits use to attack the competency of this Government are only available because the ALP leadership caves in, again and again, to the extremist bleatings of a few high profile media stirrers and extreme, right wing business lobby groups and fails to defend good policy. The ALP is failing politically because they are pandering to conservatives.
The back downs to the mining and carbon lobbies, rather than pushing back hard, the failure to explain how the stimulus spending has kept our economy the envy of the world, the failure to stand up against the xenophobia aimed at people trying to come to this country and a public lack of compassion for refugees, are all examples of how following the conservative agenda, or at least not standing firm against it, has cost the ALP core support.
I am sure Bolt would love to see Rudd back and the ALP move even further to the right, as this would continue its long term demise.
The good thing is the Greens are looking better and better. The mud isn’t sticking to them and the more good policy they are a part of, the less impact the ‘Greens will destroy us’ meme will have.
They are the centre-left party of the future so people like Ray should forget the ALP, grow up and vote/join the Greens. Some mild conservative input from people like Ray would help them to be accepted by those that don’t buy the scare campaign and encourage those at the top to push back against extremists from both sides. What do you think Ray?
This comment from Fran at Pure Poison puts it all very well….
http://blogs.crikey.com.au/purepoison/2012/04/30/outraged-that-the-pm-hasnt-exercised-a-power-no-pms-have/comment-page-1/#comment-79487
Quote added to comment by Iain
Thanks for the citation from Fran Barlow Craigy, there is a great deal in her observation that I tend to agree with but I don’t think either you or Fran are right to keep claiming that the problem for this government has been the way that it has marketed itself to the public. The problem has at its heart some really bad decisions and strategies that it has been using way beyond its use by date. The constantly invoking the name of Tony Abbott as if he were an incarnation of Satan is a good example, sure it may play well to the Greens voters like yourself Craigy but it just sounds desperate and lame to the average voter and ot makes the government look desperate, Further it reminds the average punter that Labor have no faith in themselves (so why should the voters have faith in them?)
As for the Greens well I think that they have bled the ALP of most of its Uber lefties and after the way that they have had Labor by the balls in minority government I think that many Labor voters of the centre will go coalition rather than Green next time. Likewise i expect that neither of the majors will preference the Greens next time so they will lose Bandt in Melbourne and not win any other lower house seats. Essentially they have peaked and its all down hill from here for them.
Yes Iain, Fran nailed it for me, I wonder what poor ol’ Ray thinks about this? (Got to laugh at his call to bring back Rudd, something supported by Bolt….ouch!).
Thanks again for your views on the Greens Iain, but like most partisan political commentary, it doesn’t reflect whats really going on at all. People have been claiming the end of the Greens and that they would win no more seats since they first arrived in Tasmaina back all those years ago, yet they keep on gaining support… What makes you think your right this time? What big stuff-ups have they made? (There’s a free kick for you…)
When it comes to Tony Abbott, he may win this next election but he is not popular, even with many conservative voters. Why do you think this might be? Would you rather see someone else in charge?
Have another read of Fran’s diatribe, Craigy. That explains why I could never join or vote for the Greens much better than I could. The Govt should have marketed themselves via YouTube? Seriously? The Greens rejection (three times) of Rudd’s ETS was his fault? Seriously? The ALP should have adopted every Greens policy? Seriously? Look, she’s over-complicated it; here is the reason for the ALP’s current woes:
In June 2010 some backroom ALP faction-leading idiots conspired to dump Kevin Rudd as PM and install Julia Gillard, who subsequently proved to be: inept, unlikeable, untrustworthy, two-faced, of-no-substance, a flip-flopper, no conviction, visionless and a straight-out phoney. The electorate don’t like her and that’s reflected in the harranguing her govt gets in the media (it’s the egg that comes first, not the chicken, Craigy). Rudd would have won the 2010 election with a reduced majority, but still a majority, and would not have been beholden to the independents. Furthermore, his decision to put the ETS on the backburner following the Copenhagen non-event (ie following the rest of the world not supporting it) and following your beloved Greens thwarting of it (3 times!) actually is now proving to be the right one, given how unpopular Gillard’s carbon tax is electorally. Have another read of Bolt’s article today (the full article, if you don’t have access to the paywall I can show you how to get around it) because this time ol’ Andy is actually 100% on the money. And if the ALP follow his advice they can make a fight out of the next election yet.
Hey Iain, are you on a commission from News Ltd or something? You’ve got the ad linking to the paywall ‘sign up’ in your extract!
I did read Bolt’s full rant this morning Ray in the Hun on the train, it made no sense as usual.
Your support for the ALP to move further to the right is why your party of choice is going down the drain. You can’t see it and for some reason neither can they. Kind of explains your problem don’t you think?
As happened to the Democrats when they supported John Howard, they miss calculated how non-conservative their voters were and I think you do the same with ALP voters. Rudd won the first election with strong policies which he allowed himself to be talked/frightened out of by the noisy right and its well supported media pundits. It’s not about following Greens policies, they just need to work out who they are and stick to it. Get some progressive back bone.
40% of people will still vote ALP on the 2PP polls, that’s still a large vote but they will bleed more if they keep trying to be ‘Tory light’. They need to stand for something and we already have one conservative party for the big end of town, we need a strong workers party to push back hard…….Workchoices is only an election away again, are you suggesting they put Rudd back in and cancel the mining tax and carbon tax and state support for Australian workplace agreements and ‘turn back the boats’……This is not the ALP of old, you won’t be able to tell them apart from the Lib/Nats and they do conservative support for the big end of town much better.
Craigy
Adam Bandt only won his seat on Liberal preferences and they won’t preference him again so he won’t win the seat next time. The Carbon Tax may be killing the Labor party but it also has a negative effect on the Greens because the ordinary folks actaully don’t like the fact that they made Gillard do the back-flip to get into the lodge. Further now that the “soft and cuddly” face of the party has been replaced by the glaring zealot of Christine Milne with a possibility of Lee Rhiannon making a power play the greens have lost their safe environmental mantle and taken up the militant socialist banner instead which is far less attractive to their well meaning demographic.
No. It’s only the carbon tax they need to dump. As for the mining tax, I reckon that’s actually a vote winner not a loser, In fact the current one (engineered by Gillard) is actually a much watered down version of Rudd’s proposal so, on that basis you and the Greens should be supporting a Rudd return too. And did you forget that it was Rudd who threw out the Libs’ WorkChoices?
Craigy
What Bolt is suggesting is that the ALP move back to the centre (not to the right as you claim)a position it moved away from to woo the Greens anything less than that will mean their desolation, not just at this coming election but for the next few at least. They don’t have to be “Tony lite” they just have to prove that they are no longer going to let the independents and the Greens wag them like they are a compliant Labrador. Its time for Labor to those overblown bit players that back us of back Abbott but don’t expect us to dance to your tune. Gillard is incapable of doing this (despite her reputation as a negotiator) so maybe Rudd will.
Ray It went to the piece when I did the google trick 😦
What Australia really needs is a party that actually has sustainable development as its core policy, without all the social engineering that the Greens feel Australia should endure. That’s why I despise the Greens – they have taken a worthy cause and hitched it to dead-end socialist utopian rejigging of society, basically beacause they are against the capitalist, Christian basis of our society more than anything else.
“Utopia is not under the slightest obligation to produce results: its sole function is to allow its devotees to condemn what exists in the name of what does not.” – Jean-François Revel
Now tell me that that doesn’t exactly encapsulate the Greens.
Your link is to the H-Sun article, Iain, which only takes us to the heading and the login page. So that your readers can access the full article you need to link to the Google search of the H-Sun article’s url, which in this case, is this one:
http://www.google.com.au/webhp?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8#hl=en&gs_nf=1&cp=100&gs_id=4&xhr=t&q=http://www.heraldsun.com.au/opinion/my-advice-for-labor-bring-back-rudd/story-e6frfhqf-1226345126857&pf=p&safe=off&output=search&sclient=psy-ab&oq=http://www.heraldsun.com.au/opinion/my-advice-for-labor-bring-back-rudd/story-e6frfhqf-1226345126857&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&gs_l=&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_qf.,cf.osb&fp=fbfa53bcc7ff6d03&biw=1440&bih=717
fixed the link Ray
“Adam Bandt only won his seat on Liberal preferences and they won’t preference him again so he won’t win the seat next time. “
Says you Iain, he is doing a great job and should win in his own right. We will see who’s right. Do you want a box of Twinings on it?
“The Carbon Tax may be killing the Labor party but it also has a negative effect on the Greens because the ordinary folks actually don’t like the fact that they made Gillard do the back-flip to get into the lodge.”
The Greens didn’t force the ALP to do a back flip, that was the voters who came up with the hung parliament, the Greens always had a carbon price policy.
“Further now that the “soft and cuddly” face of the party has been replaced by the glaring zealot of Christine Milne with a possibility of Lee Rhiannon making a power play the greens have lost their safe environmental mantle and taken up the militant socialist banner instead which is far less attractive to their well meaning demographic.”
Ah the ‘Greens will destroy us’ and they are SOCIOLISTS no….no…. COMMUNISTS, who want shrines built to chairman Mao……Don’t you think this smear is getting a bit stale Iain, the Greens have been around a long time and I am yet to see a policy to dismantle capitalism and subject us all to a totalitarian communist system……. If that ever happened they would lose all their support in a free market country like ours, don’t you think?
“That’s why I despise the Greens – they have taken a worthy cause and hitched it to dead-end socialist utopian rejigging of society, basically beacause they are against the capitalist, Christian basis of our society more than anything else. “
Bloody hilarious Luzu, is it no wonder sensible debate isn’t possible with so many christian conservatives when they make statements like that. And people think Bob was mad for talking about “Earthians”, your statement boarders on the bat shit insane.
Oh and it doesn’t even come close to encapsulating the Greens, go and do some research, you are sounding foolish….
Ray,
“As for the mining tax, I reckon that’s actually a vote winner not a loser”
I agree, but watering it down has lost them votes. Imagine what they could have done with the 70 billion they have given up since it was first proposed.
Rudd was his own worst enemy Ray, he should have stood up for, well for….um….whatever it is he believes in. By the way, what does he stand for again??
The Greens shouldn’t take sides. So far they have done a good job of maintaining their integrity whilst being stuck with the ALP, a position not of their making. And a bloody good job of it.
A box of Twinings sounds fine Craigy, Earl Grey of course and I prefer the tea leaves rather than tea bags if you don’t mind.
Come off it, a carbon tax was the price for the Greens support and the numbers to govern you can’t blame the voters for the way that Labor played the cards dealt to them, that was all Gillard’s decision and I think I showed what a poor negotiator she really is. She got a deal alright but it was just on such unfavourable terms that it has ham strung her government form the get go.
The truth never gets stale and I predict that the Greens are going to be riven by internal conflict between their socialist and environmental factions in the very near future.
Gee, Craigy, what a gentleman you are. The Greens are utopian first and foremost. Do you actually understand the quote I posted?
And sensible debate from you? Don’t make me laugh. Whatever you disagree with or anything that denigrates your beloved Greens elicits a response categorised by bile and nastiness.
Okay luzu if you are not just spouting nonsense, please provide a link to the Greens policy on creating a socialist utopia. Or any claim by a Green that states that is their aim. If not i stand by my claim that Christian conservatives like yourself are B.S. insane.
What Ray wants to hear 😉
here
I can hear him now muttering “if only it were true”….
Good speech. Unfortunately it makes too much sense. Possibly because it was written by Andrew Bolt. Where are the usual ‘Ruddisms’?
Yes GD it all makes too much sense and I expect that Labor will do a good job of snatching utter political genocide from the jaws of mere total defeat, given the results in NSW and Queensland they have real form for it