Does anyone here want to talk about Australian politics?

"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