The 2007 federal election wasn’t the rout I feared , and so we are (probably…) not in the situation in which an unelectable opposition rather than good performance keeps the government in power. But a poll in today’s Sydney Sun-Herald shows the unfortunate long-term consequences of such defeats, in this case the 1999 NSW state election.
According to the story accompanying the poll:
Three-quarters of voters think the health system is poor or just fair, and almost two-thirds have no confidence that the Iemma Government can make improvements….
Only one-in-five gave the Government a tick, with 18 per cent saying its performance over the last year had been good, and 2 per cent saying it had been excellent. In contrast, 39 per cent said the Government’s performance was just fair and 38 per cent declared it poor.
But how will they vote?:
Labor has lost ground since its stunning win last March, but it would still have scraped in with a two-point margin – compared with four points a year ago – if an election were held yesterday.
The problem is that the Opposition has not succeeded in establishing itself as a credible alternative. It seems that only a quarter even know who the Opposition Leader (Barry O’Farrell) is. He’s certainly not invisible – I have seen him on TV many times despite being in Sydney only seven or eight times a year. But clearly he isn’t making a big impact. And apart from Shadow Health Minister Jillian Skinner (who used to be my local member when I lived in Sydney) I could not off the top of my head have named any Shadow Minister (here is the list).
Surely next election they will either win or do well enough to be a real danger to Labor. But the best case scenario is a more than ten year recovery period from a bad election loss, trapping NSW with a government that deserves to lose.
Andrew Norton 
In NSW over the past several years, I am not sure that politicians of the calibre of Bob Carr, John Fahey or Nick Greiner of years past are putting their hands up for preselections. It seems to be a bit of a self-sustaining cycle whereby talented and dynamic folks are likely lamenting the condition of state politics and therefore vowing to stay out of it!
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We have a similiar situation in Victoria. All Red Ted tries to do is be more left than Labor. I can’t see things changing before the next election so Brumby and co will probably stay in control. Why would the average person change their vote? The policies of both parties are almost identical.
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sfw – In this cases, the system relies on luck – Victorian Labor is more competent than NSW Labor.
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I think the federal election was a big rout — the margin was large and more than most were predicting — how much bigger a loss do you want before describing it as a rout? Unfortunately, the problem for the LP is that all the old crew that no-one likes anymore are those that seemed to have kept their jobs and they evidentally don’t seem to want to change (nor give up their safe seats), Peter Costello excluded.
Also, it isn’t just the politicians that have problems. If I remember corrrctly, the 1999 NSW election had Kerry Chikarovski as the shadow premier, who was exceptionally aweful. However, to compound that, whoever is doing the advertising campaigns are also thinking of some of the worst adds I’ve ever seen. They seem to be appealing to the dumbest blokey guys one could imagine, and almost no-one else. You may as well have voted for the guy that causes mindless fights at the pub. This doesn’t appear to have changed much, although at least the blokey gruff voice they used to use is now only moderatley blokey and gruff. The adds are still aweful. You could compare that to some of the adds in the US elections and see the difference.
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Conrad – The federal margin was much lower than anticipated during the year. Labor polled in the 55-57 2PP range for most of the year, setting them to match or exceed the truly massive defeats of 1966, 1975 and 1996. The final result was 52.7%, a comfortable but routine victory (though that was in line with the polls in the last week or so of the campaign). Labor’s majority in the House of Reps is smaller than the Coalition’s majority was 2004-2007, from which of course Labor won office.
Though given the nature of the Australian electoral cycle it is very unlikely that the Coalition will win the next election, the loss was not so large that running an effective opposition is impossible, locking us into a NSW-type cycle in which people won’t vote for the opposition because it is not a viable government, and it is not a viable government because people won’t vote for it.
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My feeling is that the reason people won’t vote for the Liberal party in NSW (or at least haven’t — I’m not up to date with more recent stuff in NSW, having left before Carr did — but I notice that the truly incompetent Iemma has been winning) is because they were more aweful than aweful, not simply because of a vicious cycle. I imagine if people didn’t know anyone in the party at all and if the Libs decided to stop running absolutely pitiful advertising campaigns evidentally designed to turn people off them, then they would have got a higher vote (they would have got the I’m really voting against Labor vote, versus the I don’t want to vote for Labor, but you’re even worse vote). It would be like having Bronwyn Bishop as the leader of the Federal Libs. I think their problem is that evidentally their membership is stacked with hard right I love Stalin Christian Conservatives (just look what happened to Brogden), so they keep on choosing people of negative value, since anyone that likes that type of politics is going to vote for them anyway.
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Conrad – Certainly the factional disputes – in which the left is as guilty as the right – haven’t helped. But the electoral rot set it long before the right took over, and the right’s influence isn’t obvious at the policy level.
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The reduction of a party to a small rump means that it is very easy for it to be taken over by fringe figures, and thast’s what has happened in NSW. In the case of NSW it’s the so-called Uglies; people who could politely be called extreme conservatives, veering towards outright fascist. A classic liberal such as yourself would find it far easier to vote for a mediocre Labor government such as Iemma’s.
Their ads are awful because they’re what the Uglies think are appealing (hence the gruff middle aged male voices). Plus of course no business in its right mind would want to be associated with them by giving substantial donations.
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dd – Though I’ve known O’Farrell slightly for many years, and the idea that he is an extreme conservative, let alone an outright fascist, is ridiculous. Ditto for the other frontbenchers I have met over the years (even if I did not know what their shadow ministries were).
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But Andrew, there are no longer many factional disputes because the Uglies have now won pretty completely.
And the right’s influence is very obvious at the policy level – such as a near-obsession with laura norder (ie making the NSW police, with their miserable history, even more powerful and less accountable).
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The people who control the NSW Liberal party are obsessed with homosexuality and foetuses, to the exclusion of all else. The people who vote in elections care hardly at all about homosexuality and foetuses.
Therein lies the solution to the mystery of how the Iemma government was, and probably will be again, re-elected.
The NSW Liberal Party is akin to the Victorian Labor party circa 1970, run (but not led) by extremists, with the hapless Barry O’Farrell in the Clyde Holding role.
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Leaving aside the specifics, it is possible to recover from really bad defeats – the 1966 Federal election left Labor decimated, but they very nearly won in 1970, and won comfortably in 1972.
My view is that the Rudd government could easily be a one-term government with bad economic luck, which it may get. The government has its own factions and personality clashes and under such pressure they’ll start squabbling. So if I was Brendan Nelson I’d be looking around for wedge issues, and I’d be reasonably optimistic.
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“but they very nearly won in 1970, and won comfortably in 1972.”
It was 1969 when they nearly won, and they won only narrowly in 1972.
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Though Labor is better equipped for opposition than the Liberals, because they are under-written with millions of union dollars and can draw on the political training of the union movement. While some of these people are the seatwarming hacks of Liberal parliamentary scorn, the union movement does produce talent – Combet and Shorten being the two most recent to enter Parliament.
The main financial supporters of the LIberals, by contrast, become more donation shy in opposition, and talented would-be MPs realise that they have better things to do than sit around in opposition.
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“talented would-be MPs realise that they have better things to do than sit around in opposition.”
Whatever happened to politics as a vocation? If Winston Churchill had had that attitude, then he would have left politics many many years before becoming PM.
Closer to home, many members of the current cabinet stuck it out through the entire opposition period, 1996-2007 (Smith, Tanner, Albanese, Ferguson, FitzGibbon, Macklin, Crean, Faulkner, Carr, McClelland, and probably others as well).
They are now doing what they set out to do.
And while the salary is not investment banking, it’s not that bad, and the perks are great (first class overseas travel every year), and the pension is sensational.
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I agree with DD about labor losing if bad economic conditions hit, even through no real fault of their own.
However, I think I’d replace “So if I was Brendan Nelson” with “So if I was Malcolm Turnbull” as I’ve noticed he’s already becoming slightly too convenient for the media to ask about things if Brendan Nelson is not around. If he has enough power when he gets in and can get rid of all the old horribles, or at least demote them to obscurity, I think he’ll make a world of difference, especially if chose someone relatively likeable and popular like Jo Hockey as his deputy.
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I’d like Sophie Mirabella to become Liberal leader.
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Some wag has spliced some Insiders footage of Barrie Cassidy interviewing with Corey’s ACA appearance to show Corey as the next Liberal leader (“best party ever, that’s what everyone’s been saying”).
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“I could not off the top of my head have named any Shadow Minister”
But you’ve gotta admit, they’ve chosen some memorable names. Is there another right-wing party in the world whose front bench includes Hazzard, Stoner and Gay?
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Smith, Tanner, Albanese, Ferguson, FitzGibbon, Macklin, Crean, Faulkner, Carr, McClelland, and probably others as well).
And while the salary is not investment banking,
Dude, can one make me one solemn promise? The moment you hear one of these guys getting a job with an investment bank, inform me straight away. Don’t waste any time as it could be hard finding anyone lending out the stock to short as it could be in very short supply.
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The reduction of a party to a small rump means that it is very easy for it to be taken over by fringe figures, and thast’s what has happened in NSW. In the case of NSW it’s the so-called Uglies; people who could politely be called extreme conservatives, veering towards outright fascist.
Dare to name names and the evidence, DD or is the accusation enough?
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JC, I wrote “investment banking” as a synonym for “very big”, just to see if I could get you to bite, and you didn’t let me down.
You’ve made my day.
I’ve got no idea how many Rudd government ministers will follow Bob Carr to Macquarie Bank (or Babcock and Brown or wherever), but some of them will. Short the stock? I reckon the boys at Macquarie know a bit more than you about how to make a shekel or three. When they hire someone, it’s because they reckon that person is going to make a profit for them, and much more often than not, they are right.
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JC, on the subject of fascists in the NSW Liberal Party, you can start with Lyenko Urbanchich. He has his own Wikipedia entry, and the first paragraph in it is reproduced below.
“Lyenko Urbanchich (alternative spellings: Ljenko Urban?i? and Urbancic) (1922-2006) was a Slovenian-born Australian political activist. He was the most powerful of the central and eastern European Nazi collaborators and war criminals who infiltrated the Liberal Party of Australia from the 1950s and coalesced with Australian rightists to form the ‘Uglies’ faction [1].
A charismatic and highly motivated extremist leader, Urbanchich died without ever publicly acknowledging his role as a senior Nazi collaborator and propagandist in Slovenia during World War II. In private, he acknowledged that his wartime anti-Jewish tirades were bound to have offended many Australians, although he persistently pursued anti-Semitic causes at all levels of his political life.”
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I din’t ask for your opinion, Spiros. All I asked for is that you simply notify me if any of those names you mentioned ever appear on an investment banks payroll. You do the notifying and I’ll do the thinking thanks very much. Think of it as a specialization of duties.
JC, I wrote “investment banking” as a synonym for “very big”, just to see if I could get you to bite, and you didn’t let me down.
Exactly. The stupidity of that suggestion was even clear to you.
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In private, he acknowledged that his wartime anti-Jewish tirades were bound to have offended many Australians, although he persistently pursued anti-Semitic causes at all levels of his political life.”
He did this publicly? The party knew about his background?
Here I”ll raise you.
Gough whitlam informed US intel authorities that it was very dangerous to pass on inel information to his governmetn as DOCTOR jim Cairns leaked it to the sovs.
A current member of Iemma’s party signed the petition to have Ugo Chavez come here and teach our lefties a few lessons. That’s pretty friggen ugly in itself hey?
Take a look at the union officals who signed that letter of friendship and are still on the list.
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I thought I’d give you my opinion anyway, as a public duty to the disadvantaged. And I gave you a name of a Labor Party figure who is already on an investment bank’s payroll.
“Here I”ll raise you.”
But you didn’t. You underbid. The Chavez stuff is trivia compared to what Urbanchich did.
Got a source for the dirt on Cairns? That’s a very serious accusation.
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Spiros, don’t bother with JC – he never lets his ignorance be a barrier to his opinions.
Though I too am intrigued about the source of the Jim Cairns slander – it sounds like the sort of myth common on the far right, but who knows? I can certainly imagine Cairns being indiscreet – he was, in Gough’s words, “that foolish, passionate man” – but I remember seeing him give a speech where he compared the wickedness of the US in Vietnam with that of the Soviets in Hungary and Czechoslovakia. He was on the New Left, and they generally loathed the Stalinists (and vice versa).
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DD, of course it’s not true. If the Deputy PM in the Whitlam government had been leaking secrets to the Soviet Union,we would have heard about it.
Not even Gerard Jackson, who set the benchmark for Cairns-hating, made no mention of it in his obituary in Brookes News on 13 October 2003.
Cairns may have been naive about the USSR but to accuse him of treason says a lot more about the accuser than the accused.
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All the talented Liberal politicians have been trying to get into the Howard Government.
Now you’ll see them trying to get into state parliaments because they’ll calculate it as their best bet, meanwhile the reverse will happen with Labor.
Everyone loves a winner, and wants to go where they can have immediate effect.
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DD, don’t project your own inadequacies on to me by reversing roles here. And you shouldn’t transfer bad blood to other blogs. The only reason you’re sore at me is that I laugh out loud at most of your opinions and views because I can’t believe anyone could such silly, inane things as you do.
Cairns was a senior member of a “peace group” that was financed and supported by the sovs during the cold war. It was basically a soviet front. This wasn’t a secret either, by the way.
He was cold warrior all right; only thing is the treasonous disgraceful bastard was working for the sovs. Even Whitlam couldn’t trust the disgusting animal.
Cairns may have been naive about the USSR but to accuse him of treason says a lot more about the accuser than the accused.
Like the Urban… guy you mentioned was ignorant of Nazi atrocities? Don’t be a dipstick, Spiros. The loonie commie knew everything that was going on in the Sov like we all did and he still supported and excused their actions. So argue that swill at Leftwrites where you may just get away with it with the deranged Sparrow triplets.
DD Says:
but I remember seeing him give a speech where he compared the wickedness of the US in Vietnam with that of the Soviets in Hungary and Czechoslovakia. He was on the New Left, and they generally loathed the Stalinists
Showing once again why I always make fun of you.
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JC, I’m glad to see you’ve withdrawn the accusation that Cairns leaked intelligence to the Soviets.
BTW, who are the Sparrow triplets?
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Cairns was most certainly a boofhead of large proportions but he didn’t offload any ‘secrets’ to any Government.
If one lived around at the time then one would know if this was true the Intelligence agencies wouls have leaked themselves or would have let the US intelligence agencies do it for them.
As DD has stated he was quite critical of the Soviet Union.
JC has never been one to let the facts get in the way of a story.
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Cairns’ place in history has yet to be settled, and when it is, it won’t be written by the likes of JC.
In the meantime, it’s worth pointing out that his successor plus one as the member for Lalor is Julia Gillard. Long may the tradition continue,
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<JC, I’m glad to see you’ve withdrawn the accusation that Cairns leaked intelligence to the Soviets.
Nice touch, Spiros. I don’t mention it in one comment and spiros thinks I have withdrawn the accusation. Not on your life.
Whitlam was many things, he was an economic buffoon and everything else, but Whitlam was not treasonous against his country. He couldn’t trust Cairns and was deeply worried about classified intel getting into commie hands through Cairns.
It’s always good to see a DD and Homer meet up on a thread, as you always know it’s going to end up in some cul de sac of metal derangement.
1. Cairns ran the “peace movement “ storefront that was in the pocket of sov pay masters. They actually received money from the sovs.
2. Cairns was openly for a North Vietnamese victory. In other words there was nothing to confuse anyone that his anti-war stance was some hippie with a beard thing. Cairns actually wanted the communist north to succeed in overrunning the south without any equivocation.
3. Cairns in 1965: “communism has, so far, shown no evidence that it is a military expedition”. The evidence was to the contrary and Cairns was stooging for the commies by coming out with horrendous lie.
4. Cairns in 1975: “Soviet Union was a workers’ paradise”.
Not even a retarded person in a sheltered workshop could have believed this to be true even allowing for what Cairns knew.
5 Cairns celebrated the victory of the North Vietnamese by sitting under a portrait of Ho. Later he lied and told an interviewer that he didn’t support the North Vietnamese victory and the people in the peace movement were not his friends. They weren’t just his friends; they were his brothers and sisters commies in arms.
The only thing I’m unhappy with wes that during one Cairns pro north victory parties the demonstrating Vietnamese didn’t get to him as they would torn him limb from limb.
Homer, you put yourself out as a Christian yet you’re defending this human scab. Some Christian.
Spiros, you still wanna compare?
The Sparrow triplets are the three siblings who run leftwrites, obviously human DNA that became warped when it was handed down.
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Cairns could run a raffle. He talked and talked but didn’t run anything. He was hopeless.
I merely said he didn’t give away any secrets. Whitlam didn’t owe him any favours. He would have been the first in line to use the information.
That isn’t defending Cairns by any means.
JC,
I thought then as I do now that South Vietnam was worth defending.
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Cairns actually didn’t want the North Vietnamese to win he wanted the vietcong to win.
There was a large difference.
There were some around who did say the VC would do all the work but the NV would take over. That is how it eventuated.
Still a corrupt Sout Vietnamese government was always preferred to a VC or NV Government.
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JC, you still have not provided a single source, much less evidence, that Cairns leaked anything to anybody.
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Cairns actually didn’t want the North Vietnamese to win he wanted the vietcong to win.
Which is why he was sitting under a pic of uncle Ho to celebrate the victory years later, hey Homer. Oh, I almost forgot, he went to N Vietnam during the war because he liked their salt bath spa.
Let’s see:
Recently you were advocating nazi economics and now you’re stooging for a Stalinist supporter and possibly a traitor.
No wonder you and DD get along.
Homer you may want to explain to Spiros why you were spruiking Nazi economics recently as this argument started over some idiot in the liberal party who spiros says was a nazi apologist. Spiros, however attempts to deflect the left’s vampires in the coffins by suggesting DOCTOR Jim was a misunderstood Randian.
DD you have any comment on this issue?
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Only possibly a traitor now? That’s some progress I suppose.
What’s a Randian?
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Spiros:
It’s a blog, not a school assignment, so do you own homework and prove it wrong.
Only possibly a traitor now? That’s some progress I suppose.
Sorry.. Omit “possibly” and insert “villainous”.
What’s a Randian?
See above about doing your own homework instead of lifting other people’s. Sharing and socialism can only go so far
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One day, JC, you will slip and defame someone who is alive. They will sue and you will lose your house and much else. Your family will not be impressed.
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Spiros, actually technically I believe if anything defamatory was written in the comments here, it’s poor Andrew that would get it. This is what happened to Crikey when it was first set up. The letter writer who made a defamatory comment didn’t cop it. Stephen Mayne as the publisher did.
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No JC not only are you running away from previous allegations you are mixing up Cairns with Jane Fonda.
Cairns was a hopeless cause. He did think it would be better if the Vietcong took over South Vietnam.
I disagreed with that.
It would be nice one day someday if you could actually get some facts right.
That idiot was Urbanovich who indeed was a nazi sympathizer.
big deal
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Jason, both Mayne and the letter writer could have copped it. If the letter writer didn’t cop it, it would have been because his pockets weren’t deep enough to make it worth the victim’s while to sue.
Publishers of internet sites are particularly vulnerable, as Dow Jones & Co. Inc. v Gutnick showed. They can be sued anywhere in the world.
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Really Spiros?….no problem with that, always tackle a problem head on. And here’s an open dare. I wouldn’t have a problem defending myself against any leftie any time in a court of law. I will win and will do my level best to ruin them financially even if I have to garnish their wage to repay my legal costs-even if my counts were 10:1.
Examine your own comment, which started the whole thing rolling as your dishonesty, and double standards are troubling. However for a lefty it is not at all surprising seeing that most only function with a political philosophy based on hypocrisy.
You started this by sliming some dude in NSW accusing him of having Nazi sympathies and suggesting that a good portion of the Liberal Party are what you called a bunch of uglies. Remember? Take a look up top.
I presented Cairns as an example for you that your own back yard is full of live vampires in coffins ready to come out each night.. Of course you defended that slime ball – DOCTOR Jim, as though he was the next best thing to Jesus Christ.
DD got into the act as he has never seen or heard of a hard lefty he wouldn’t defend no matter if it was someone as figuratively repulsive as Jim Cairns and tries to slime me as a result of some bad blood at another blog.
Not to be outdone, homer steps and decides he’ll ruin your argument by “helping”, as well as taking a pot shot at me.. Sure enough he too finds kind words to say about the peace loving tyrant wannabe suggesting that Cairns was simply some misunderstood humanitarian.
And now you change the subject thinking you can instill fear in me. Dream on.
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JC, learn to read.
Neither I nor DD found any kind words for Jim Cairns.We merely provided evidence that your assertion backed by no facts at all was wrong.
learn to ascertain the difference.
Jim Cairns like you good self never understood economics.
He was hopeless as a minister and indeed lied in a libel action to gain money.
He never gave out state secrets to the Soviet Union. Moreover he was never a great fan of Stalin.
the left back then had more factions than you have had hot dinners.
do some homework before you let off your mouth
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No JC not only are you running away from previous allegations you are mixing up Cairns with Jane Fonda.
Running away, Homer? Hardly. Those new pills you’re taking are making even more delusional than ever.
And no, I’m not confused. Cairns was an Australian with traitorous intentions, while Jane Fonda was an American with traitorous intentions. I’m not confused here. Homes.
.
Cairns was a hopeless cause. He did think it would be better if the Vietcong took over South Vietnam.
Oh the Vietcong of course were the Vietnamese version of the LDP that had no connection with Uncle ho and his merry band of totalitarian slugs. Hey, it was ok to support the Vietcong then, as they would have told Uncle ho a thing or two if he tried to cross the border. Stop being a clown homer.
I disagreed with that.
Nicely too, I guess. Did you apologise for your support?
It would be nice one day someday if you could actually get some facts right.
I did, check the quotes I nicely presented for you to gloss over. Did you read them?
That idiot was Urbanovich who indeed was a nazi sympathizer.
Possibly, I’ll take your word for it as I don’t know who he is or ever heard of him.. But I suggest you don’t open the sealed coffins in Spiros’ backyard, as those vampires are ready to pounce.
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Here’s DD’s slivering apologia for that appallingly repulsive character- DOCTOR Jim.
Though I too am intrigued about the source of the Jim Cairns slander – it sounds like the sort of myth common on the far right, but who knows? I can certainly imagine Cairns being indiscreet – he was, in Gough’s words, “that foolish, passionate man” – but I remember seeing him give a speech where he compared the wickedness of the US in Vietnam with that of the Soviets in Hungary and Czechoslovakia. He was on the New Left, and they generally loathed the Stalinists (and vice versa).
Yep, America was sure attempting to create a totalitarian dictatorship in Vietnam along akin to the sovs in Easten Europe. And DD knows for sure the fine Doc loathed the Stalinists despite Stalin himself and later Brezhnev funding Doc Jim’s lil old peace movement. DD again adding value.
Here’s Homer adding his unique input and as always excusing totalitarian sympathies and/or behaviour:
Cairns actually didn’t want the North Vietnamese to win he wanted the vietcong to win.There was a large difference. There were some around who did say the VC would do all the work but the NV would take over. That is how it eventuated.
Here’s Spiros who just can’t bring himself to stare at the truth in the face as he would have to look in mirror and frighten himself stupid at what and who he is defending.
Cairns’ place in history has yet to be settled, and when it is, it won’t be written by the likes of JC.
The three friends of liberty.. The three amigos, or more like the three stooges and the gang that couldn’t shoot straight.
Fellas:
For every Urban (what’s his face) I raise you 10 hard lefties whose views would repulse any normal human being. Work on a ratio of 10:1.
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JC, you either have walked away from your absurd allegations that Cairns gave state secrets to the Soviets or you still are claiming it.
Make up your mind and produce some evidence.
You have mixed up Fonda with Jim Cairns. Nor surprising as they did look alike.
Only a complete imbecile would agree the Vietcong and the North Vietnamese were the same.
for heaven’s sake please do some reading before you display even more ignorance.
Learn to read as well.
I supported the US carrying South Vietnam. I didn’t like Cairns nor supported him.
however unlike you I was around at the time and have actually read on the subject.
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“Tokyo Rose only wanted the Japanese to win, not the militarists who had the nation by the balls in a tight vice like grip. There is a world of difference between the two. Only a complete imbecile would think they were the same”.
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