Does anyone here want to talk about Australian politics?

I would start a thread if I thought anyone else cared enough to use it.

so i know v. little of australian politics but was that a surprise? i thought rudd was doing fine?

You could have used a joke title like "The Member for North Sydney has gone out to lunch" or something.

the other thread seemed to be a useful enough place

Wasn't there something in the news about the first female woman being elected prime minister?

oh Phil has got internets at home again? and they say Gillard hasn't done anything to improve the country yet.

Wasn't there something in the news about the first female woman being elected prime minister?

no

BUT THE AUSTYRALIAN PEOPLES DIDN'T ELECT HER TEH UNION BULLYBOYS DID OMG

NO I DO NOT KNOW WHAT A WEST MINSTER SYSTEM IS

the other thread seemed to be a useful enough place

― how much can a koala ˁ˚ᴥ˚ˀ (sic), Sunday, 27 June 2010 10:41 (43 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink
Other thread?

In all the hullaballalullabaloo about the union scum staging a union scum campaign to install a union scum PM, the nutbars seem to have forgotten that the ALP's bad polling universally pointed to Rudd being the only problem they had. Abbott's rating barely changed and the ALP's reduced, but Rudd's personal rating was rubbish in every measure.

The dying days of the Fourth Reich: it's the 2007 AUSTRALIAN FEDERAL ELECTION

nutbars be dissemblin'

The only reason why it was down is because a large percentage of Queensland and Western Australia are populated by selfish morons too moronic that they're minor bit characters in the play that ends with shareholders walking away with a wheelbarrow full of money while these morons don't realise that they only reason they get paid $100,000 a year to drive a truck in the middle of nowhere is that it is in the middle of nowhere.

Also, racists.

The dying days of the Fourth Reich: it's the 2007 AUSTRALIAN FEDERAL ELECTION

― how much can a koala ˁ˚ᴥ˚ˀ (sic), Sunday, 27 June 2010 11:37 (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

o fuc sorry, I didn't know that thread was still going. CLOSE THIS THREAD plz

uh but it's a thread from 2007 guys

maybe a pre-emptive 2010 election thread instead?

Why not. Maybe someone wants to rename this thread and make it relevant to 2010 and/or witty.

REDZ UNDER THE BEDZ: Australia besieged by communists in 2010

Better Dead Than Redhead iirc

btw I don't think Tony Abbott "gets" irony after listening to him brag about how the Libs have got rid of one Labor leader

Dude the ALP is totally unstable. Abbott is setting an example by overseeing a party which has been kept stable under one leader for at least 12 minutes.

RED HEAD REDEMPTION 2010

i understand there was a solid zing by labor

Labor Bloc Zing Crew

In the Lower House she shook hands with Tony Biggott and said 'game on'. The 'moll' was implicit.

Former editor of the National Indigenous Times explains in full why Rudd failed Indigenous people, and touches on one facet of Howard's racism. Vital reading.

http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/stories/s2937488.htm

Gillzo refuses to be religious

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/06/29/2939879.htm

Prime Minister Julia Gillard says she has no intention of pretending to believe in God to attract religiously-inclined voters.

Former prime minister Kevin Rudd was a regular at Canberra church services and Opposition Leader Tony Abbott is known as a devout Catholic.

In contrast, Ms Gillard says that while she greatly respects other people's religious views, she does not believe in God.

THAT'S what I'm talkin' 'bout

greens mp in melbourne ftw

love the huge posters of b4ndt on swanston st

Ace.

Drove past Tanner's office on Saturday. Looked as glum as ever.

Did anyone read this shit?

http://www.watoday.com.au/opinion/politics/shacking-up-is-hard-to-do-why-gillard-may-be-leery-of-the-lodge-20100628-zexr.html

OK it is less to do with politics and more with value judgements but fuck me, was Bettina Arndt always this much of an A-grade cuntbubble?

The gist: Gillard is a bad rolemodel for women BECAUSE SHE ISNT MARRIED TO HER MAN.

What in the everloving FUCK.

wow what a moron

Only just read it. She also claims Pat Rafter was bad choice for Australian of the Year because he was not married and therefore an uncommitted father. Moments like this I have second thoughts about freedom of speech.

morelike bettina arsendt, amirite

bettina arsebandt

bettina ardnthole

bettenalady cumstain

buttina hurdt

^^

http://inside.org.au/shoulder-deep-in-the-entrails/

i liked this

parents dragging children through a succession of chaotic ''blended'' families
parents dragging children through a succession of chaotic ''blended'' families
parents dragging children through a succession of chaotic ''blended'' families
parents dragging children through a succession of chaotic ''blended'' families
parents dragging children through a succession of chaotic ''blended'' families

i think bettina arnottsscotchfingeruptheanus has confused real life with saturday kitchen

bettina beats us all at our own game

http://bettinaarndt.com.au/aboutbettina.php

Bit of a Bettina Arndt

Her brand new book - What Men Want – is being published in August, 2010.

oh this will be fascinating

http://inside.org.au/shoulder-deep-in-the-entrails/

i liked this

― assiest boy in america (haitch), Tuesday, 29 June 2010 13:57 (6 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Michelle Grattan and Paul Kelly join the crowd, waxy and wrinkled as exhibits in some glass case at Madame Tussauds.

^^ perfect sentence

Her brand new book - What Men Want – is being published in August, 2010.

oh this will be fascinating

― jo jo zeppelin (electricsound), Tuesday, 29 June 2010 14:04 (29 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Ways to promote a forthcoming book:

1. Write a controversial column two months earlier

buttina hurdt

A+ lol

Guessing that Bettina's "Sex Diaries" features the not-having kind of sex.

Also...WTF??!!! Cannot believe she's sagely using Whitlam/Greer to bring her stupid argument "home". Yes, Bettina and while we're at let's examine this new trend of women wearing mens trousers and driving their own cars.

Gaaaaaaaahhh!

Love that Shane Maloney piece btw...

My mum went to school with ButtArndt.

Actually, come to think of it that explains a lot.

I took too long but I tried hard with this, so sorry for the repetition -

Yes that's how preferencing pretty much works in the House of Reps (lower house). First choice votes are apportioned to the candidates, lowest candidate removed and votes distributed to second preference, lowest removed and next pref distributed etc.
The Senate is a weird baroque system where each state has six senators, so there is a quota of 1/6 of the number of votes to get a senate seat, but candidates are grouped by party. So then if Labor get 1.5 quotas they have one senator for sure, but the 0.5 might either be the basis of receiving prefs to reach a second quota (thus 2 senators) or might not be enough to be the leader when parties begin getting eliminated and hence the 0.5 would be redistributed to others (and they stay with one senator). If that's not already complicated enough, there are 2 ways of voting, one where you number the groups (parties) "above the line" and your preferences go by the order you put the parties, or you can vote "below the line" for full chaos where you might number 39 candidates and somehow that interacts with the quotas to determine which of the people in each party actually become senators for the quotas the party got.
I know the audience have drifted off but an example of that is the Liberal party, whom I dislike intensely, had put their ultra Christian Senate bully (who e.g. verbally attacked people in Senate and harangued them because they were speaking in favour of same sex marriage) last on their list of three candidates. This made him unlikely to be elected because the Liberals would only get 3 quotas in a landslide. His supporters ran a "vote 1 for Abetz below the line" to try to circumvent this and make him a Senator even if the Libs only got 1 or 2 quotas. However I and quite a lot of other people went through the ordeal of below the line voting for the satisfaction of putting "39" beside his name.

No 'wasted votes' but it's arguably flawed as only a minority of second/third/etc preferences are ever consulted.

One way in which we mirror the US system is in the Senate, where every state has the same number of senators, regardless the population, ie Tasmania (pop. 500,000) has the same number of seats as NSW (pop. 8 million). Never heard anyone talking about reforming that though.

Every time I look at Hare-Clark, I say "that looks... pretty good, maybe" then feel like I understand it for maybe a few weeks, and then I drift back to feeling clueless about how it works again lol.

though one can tick dozens of boxes

Whoops, I just described an informal ballot lol. *Number* the boxes, innit.

in the Senate, where every state has the same number of senators, regardless the population, ie Tasmania (pop. 500,000) has the same number of seats as NSW (pop. 8 million). Never heard anyone talking about reforming that though.

Until the Parliament otherwise provides there shall be six senators for each Original State. The Parliament may make laws increasing or diminishing the number of senators for each State, but so that equal representation of the several Original States shall be maintained and that no Original State shall have less than six senators.

Also, I read in the AU version of the Guardian that state legislatures still have some horrific-yet-legal malapportionment and gerrymandering. Any chance a Labor/Green coalition puts a stop to that? Thanks!

not really, nothing like the US at all - gerrymandering is not an issue these days thanks to independent electoral commissions. there have been major historical issues with malapportionment in state parliaments but anything remaining is very minor - i think the Queensland state parliament might still have a tiny bias to a few gigantic, sparsely populated rural seats but it's not a big issue. the Western Australian parliament was the last to have significant malapportionment issues but they've been fixed in recentish times - the lower house was fixed in 2008 and the upper house last year. the federal government doesn't have any power to fix issues with the state electoral systems though. if you have a link to the article i'd be interested.

I think Labor generally needs a slightly higher percentage of the vote to win than the right-wing coalition.

this was just the way the marginal seats fell at the last election - after this election's count is finished i suspect it'll be firmly the opposite based on the numbers so far.

One way in which we mirror the US system is in the Senate, where every state has the same number of senators, regardless the population, ie Tasmania (pop. 500,000) has the same number of seats as NSW (pop. 8 million). Never heard anyone talking about reforming that though.

a referendum would be required to reform that, which would never get up due to that requiring approval of all states, so it's a non-starter. it thankfully doesn't pose the same sort of problem as the US as every state/territory is competitive for both major parties and our senate uses proportional representation so there isn't the same sort of bias as from single-member districts. if anything i'd say the senate's malapportionment as it stands actually slightly benefits the left, due to Tasmania leaning left & being the smallest state.

the Hare-Clark system used in Tasmania and the ACT is basically the same as the Senate voting system except without the option to vote above-the-line, so you're only voting for candidates and not parties.

I didn't realise that, but of course!

In that case, I fear I repeatedly misremember H-C as having some New Zealand-like features or something. *blushes*

I do remember what Robson Rotation is though. Why that's not universal is quite beyond me.

Wow, thanks to all y'all for the educational treatise on the AU voting process! I'm involved with groups in the States who seek to reform our FPTP quagmire with ranked-choice voting (our term for preference voting), and we've had success in several cities and a few states. I wish we had mandatory voting here, then we'd get to spend more time on issue discussion and persuasion, and less time fighting against voter-oppression laws.

Here's a link to the Guardian article that references malapportionment:

"Druery said reform of WA’s electoral system should deal first with issues of malapportion, which mean the votes of electors in remote and regional areas are worth up to seven times that of inner-city voter"

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/apr/07/wa-candidate-elected-to-parliament-with-less-than-100-votes-prompts-calls-for-electoral-reform

you might number 39 candidates

If I'm not suffering PTSD from the experience, the longest senate ballot I ever had to number was c. 130.

Whoa, yeah I did a few big ones when I lived in NSW. Our US colleagues might enjoy knowing that our entire system is paper based, and because of the structure of the Senate ballot it can be a piece of paper 2-3 feet wide and 6 inches tall, which we have to fold up into a small wad to fit the ballot box slot.

I’m actually kind of shocked that Plibersek was dumb enough to make those comments about Dutton, real basic shit for a senior minister to get wrong.

bring back Keating

I recall having to wrangle a HUGE senate ballot when I lived in the ACT in the early 90s. At that point they had a lot of joke parties was one reason why. LIke the Party Party Party and such. Seems to be less of that now? Or they dont allow it anyomre, I dont know.

Sorry estela but thank fuck

Sorry guys, the Toto account is not being run by Albo, Albo’s team team, Labor or Toto.

— Matt Burke (@matttburke) May 24, 2022

Also re: preferential voting, this cartoon explains it very well.

https://www.chickennation.com/voting/

"Druery said reform of WA’s electoral system should deal first with issues of malapportion, which mean the votes of electors in remote and regional areas are worth up to seven times that of inner-city voter"

yeah this was fixed in the WA upper house reforms last year, along with other significant issues there. Druery was very good at exploiting some of the other issues in the WA upper house electoral system (that also were fixed in last year's reforms) & was just cynically saying "let's only do one thing at at time"

i don't think ranked-choice voting is ideal (multi-member districts with proportional-representation are significantly better, single-transferable vote like we have in the senate here is pretty great) but it's the best option for single member districts for sure

You can’t judge someone on either comments they’ve made, or decisions they’ve done when they’re exercising their either personal conscience or their particular viewpoint.

Just because someone’s got a different view to the ABC, respectfully, doesn’t make them terrible or wrong.

It simply gives them a different view, and that has got nothing to do with the size of his heart or the quality of his character or the capacity of his intellect, respectfully.

stuart robert on new opposition leader peter dutton. not sure this is going to go well for them lol

Unless the Labor govt is catastrophically incompetent (quite possible I guess), there is no way Peter Dutton can win a federal election. They'd have to win back at least some of those teal seats and he can't do that. My guess is he'll stick around for a couple of years and then they'll kick him out for someone more palatable.

yeah i think even abbott was only so successful as opposition leader because labor were disastrously tearing themselves apart for four years straight and dutton really just emphasises all the reasons morrison was hated

there is no way Peter Dutton can win a federal election.

Not so fast! They’re on the case, ready to reform:

The party’s internal analysis of its election performance will be led by Liberal elder statesman Brian Loughnane, who was federal director for more than a decade, and senator Jane Hume.

Sorry estela but thank fuck

🐦[Sorry guys, the Toto account is not being run by Albo, Albo’s team team, Labor or Toto.
— Matt Burke (@matttburke) May 24, 2022🕸]🐦

In an extended interview with Nine Newspapers on Sunday, Ms Keneally was asked by columnist Peter FitzSimmons whether the loss was because she went up against a local candidate while she was a "wealthy white woman from distant parts parachuted in."

"I think the impact of the COVID lockdowns had far more to do with it and was far more at play on the day," Ms Keneally replied.

Some wag has suggested that KK is a shoe-in for next Governor-General and that would be both hilarious & awful at the same time.

also props to Fairfax/Nine for letting Old Red Bandana Mate ask the softball questions, in case it wasn't enough of a wankfest with her Morrison-esque worldview

With Labor stuck on 75 seats it's becoming ever clearer what a monumental cock-up it was to parachute KK in

they're more likely than not to get at least one of the remaining seats but it would be very funny if that was the decisive factor in them missing out

Kristina Marie Kerscher Keneally

https://frinkiac.com/meme/S08E13/91056.jpg

I am wondering what kind of dirt she has on the Labor mavens, for them to repeatedly trot her out to an electorate which has demonstrated its dislike for her several times.

Worth adding: There is no Teals stealing seats from the Libs - they earned them. There is no Greens stealing seats from Labor - they earned them. If you can't mentally adjust to the notion that a diverse community believes in more than two parties can provide, get a new job https://t.co/9mBLRrMflB

— Possum Comitatus (@Pollytics) May 29, 2022

A zillion times this.

Some days it feels almost like the ABC might even be the worst offender here with their "both sides of politics" and the sheer amount of staff and airtime invested in a stiff Labor vs Coalition "show-business for ugly people" contest forever. It may as well still be the '70s.

agreed, burn the parties to the ground, false dichotomy is boomer politics

I am wondering what kind of dirt she has on the Labor mavens, for them to repeatedly trot her out to an electorate which has demonstrated its dislike for her several times.

she only got her senate seat due to shorten's personal backing, and then didn't have enough internal factional support to keep a winnable spot on the ticket when actually up for election this time. she's close to albanese so he wanted her parachuted into a safe seat in the house so she could remain on his frontbench. it probably would have worked if a strong local candidate in dai le didn't see the opportunity to run against her, i doubt the lib candidate would have posed the same threat at all on their own.

Even boomers had the aphorism of being team players in the lower house but voting Dems in the senate “to keep the bastards honest” - the sincerity of that principle has persisted but been wildly unfocused in this century, flickering wildly between Houses and a range of nutbars, grifters, sincere indies and Palmer. This election feels like a potential sea-change away from two-party domination for a generation or so.

(And of course ppl have the example of our only functional legislature this century being a minority government…)

tbf the other govts were flat-out shovelling grants and tenders to their cronies and enshrining generational inequity, you didn't expect them to *run the country* as well did you?

dai le is a conservative ex-lib (she was suspended from the party for running against their mayoral candidate in the council she's on when she lost pre-selection) but has very strong ties with the local liberal branch still. the only reason she's stayed an independent is because she seems to see an advantage in not having the baggage of a political party, the libs have repeatedly tried to re-recruit her to the party as a star candidate, having been very willing to overturn her suspension. will be interesting to see how much she diverges from the liberal party line in parliament now that she's more than a councillor.

i'm not sad i'm laughing actually

"I suppose you think I am sad. Not really." @Barnaby_Joyce #auspol pic.twitter.com/PzFG6fAQs1

— Political Alert (@political_alert) May 30, 2022

congratulations to the future shadow treasurer of Austraalia

“I read about this numerology theory that if you add the numbers that match the letters in your name you can change your personality,” she told The Australian.

“I worked out that if you added an ‘s’ I would have an incredibly exciting, interesting life and nothing would every be boring. It’s that simple.

“And once I’d added the ‘s’ it was really hard to take it away.”

no, angus taylor of a million corruption scandals fame is reportedly the likely shadow treasurer

Fantastic. Great move.

It was nice to have eight days of looking like we had the best-case-scenario result, but ABC has called 76 for Labor. Probably close enough to recount preferences in Macnamara, but if they're confident enough to update now, looks like it. (Lab also ahead 50.1% to 49.9% in Gilmore at current count.)

((btw ufo u may have missed my extremely elaborate joke about arithmetic))

you meant shadow treassurer?

Can't talk about a republic now (the Queen hasn't died yet and she's been Queen... well, for quite some time)
Can't talk about a republic now (the Queen has just died, how distasteful)
Can't talk about a republic now (he's only been the King for a few months, give him a chance)
Can't talk about a repub--

Pull the fucking ripcord before kerchunking any Chazcoins ffs

But not before the public holiday!!

Nothing was going to happen before the next election anyway. I'm not exactly optimistic, but Charles is a pretty odious character and if Labor can get a healthy majority next election who knows...

Yes I saw some of the proclamation stuff and thought ugh, this guy? seriously? I would imagine with Liz out of the picture the monarch isn’t a popular notion any more.

labor had previously announced that their plan is to hold a republic referendum during their second term (if they get one) because their focus re: constitutional reform at the moment is the indigenous voice, so it's not anything new that they're not going to have a republic referendum immediately. i do expect that once the voice referendum is out of the way we'll hear more about how they're going to go about holding the republic referendum, deciding on a republic model, etc.

I really hope they don't have anything to say about which republican model and just opt for an up/down vote on whether you want an Australian for head of state or not. Once that's done, the options for which model can be the subject of a further referendum. Putting a specific model forward from the outset just risks the disaster of 1999

when shorten was labor leader he announced plans to do something like that, idk if exactly that is still their policy but i think they're well aware of the failings of the 1999 process at least

my preference would be to remove the governor-general/monarch or any equivalent completely, formally codifying all the unwritten convention of the current constitution, making the pm the head of state, & specifying reasonable procedures to deal with the existing grey areas that the g-g has responsibility over