Gotcha!

Greetings fellow Swordians.  Today I'd like to report on a worrying trend which I have noticed creeping into political reportage of late in this country.  I am not quite sure how extensive it is yet across the country, only that I have noticed it increasingly here in Sydney on Channel Nine.  So I'd also like to know if anyone else has perceived it in their neck of the woods, and I'd also appreciate it if fellow Swordians could keep a Watching Brief to look for more examples of it, because there's one thing I do know, and that is the manifest nature of the Australian Press to behave as a herd, and once one outlet debuts a new idea for them all to follow it and push it to further extremes.

So let me just start by outlining one particular incident in this new trend, which I have christened: 'Gotcha! Politics'

On Thursday night on Channel Nine 6 pm News the newsreader, Peter Overton, in his initial summary of the night's top stories, referred to an upcoming 'Channel Nine Exclusive', “that exposes another one of Kevin Rudd's 'Broken Promises'”.  That teaser led me to expect that the Nine media organisation had done the hard yards of investigative journalism and had a scoop that exposed a heretofore unknown broken campaign promise.

With trepidation I sat and waited for the story to unfold.  I thought to myself, if it's such a big deal as to be bringing to light another broken election promise which Channel Nine have uncovered, they'll come out all guns blazing with it as their top story.  So with bated breath I waited.  It wasn't the top story.  Or the 2nd, or the 3rd.  It was the 4th story, and after an ad break!

Well, I thought, they must be going to prop Laurie Oakes up in his chair from Canberra to make the announcement of this momentous 'Exclusive'.

Thus it was to my ultimate bewilderment when, after the ad break, I, the viewer, was informed that this new 'Broken Promise' of the PM referred to the fact that Kevin Rudd had said to Dr Richard Phillips of Hornsby Hospital in NSW, in January this year, that he would visit the Public Hospital which Dr Phillips administers, and check out its dilapidated state of repair. Well, now for the scandalous part. By gum, it's June already and the Prime Minister has failed to keep his 'promise' to visit the run-down hospital, which we were shown in graphic detail, down to the last dust bunny in the corner of the wards.  We were then breathlessly informed, with a disapproving and disappointed tone in the voiceover from Peter Overton, that Dr Phillips had tried to contact the Prime Minister seven times already and had, as yet, not had the courtesy of one reply!

Now, this is where this story gets really interesting, and shows to me the extent to which media organisations in Australia are now attempting to manufacture the news and the political narrative, rather than simply reporting it.

As I said earlier, I was fully expecting this story to have been broken by Chief Political Reporter for Channel Nine News, Laurie Oakes.  He was nowhere to be seen.  Instead, this story was 'broken' by Ben Fordham, who, until as recently as last fortnight, had been a foot-in-the-door and ambulance-chasing 'journalist' (and I use the term advisedly), and fill-in compère of 'A Current Affair'!  Which is not to say that he doesn't have what it takes to be a serious political journalist, just that, looking at this specific example, that is not how his role is being developed by Channel Nine with respect to his political reporting.  Instead, what his presence on the federal political scene has heralded is the era of ‘Gotcha! Politics’, and the appearance on the scene of the ‘Gotcha!’ political journalist.

To see exactly what I mean I'll take you through the rest of the timeline of how this story unfolded.  So we started with the groundwork being laid by the newsreader, Peter Overton, creating, to me, a false impression that probably in parliament that day Kevin Rudd had been exposed by the Opposition, through forensic questioning in Question Time (well, you never know), as having broken another campaign promise.

Then, left to sit through the ad break we were left  on tenterhooks to reflect upon and reinforce to ourselves the meme of 'Rudd Government broken promises', which, to my mind, serves to build on the sense of resentment the electorate feels towards the PM and his government because of this.  At which point, after the ad break was over and the suspense had been built up sufficiently, the political ground tilled and fertilised, we were finally made privy to the story.  However, instead of a story from Canberra, we were dished up one which had been totally confected by Channel Nine News, their 'Exclusive', as they would have it styled, in cahoots with a doctor from Hornsby Public Hospital, and, I would not be surprised one bit to find out, with the federal Member for Berowra in the House of Representatives which covers the area in which Hornsby Hospital is located, one Phillip 'The Cadaver' Ruddock, and the Liberal Party of NSW.  For, as it turned out, this 'Exclusive' was a total tabloid current affairs-style beat-up, and Ben Fordham (son of media industry veteran and heavyweight, John Fordham), was just the man for the job, as the story mirrored exactly the confected outrage that 'A Current Affair' and 'Today Tonight' specialise in.  Except this time they weren't just attempting to scandalise over a dodgy Used Car Salesman, they were attempting to ensnare the Prime Minister of Australia in a totally contrived controversy of their-own mischievous making.

But Wait. There's more!

Following the Tabloid TV-esque wonky and gloomy and shaky hand-held camera shots of the dust bunnies and Band Aids holding together light switches above walls with crumbling painted surfaces, we had the extended interview with Dr Phillips himself, which, we were told, Channel Nine was 'privileged' to have been given (!?!) by the good doctor. Cough.

In exasperated tones, with appropriately stern and concerned expressions on the face of Master Fordham, we were informed by Dr Phillips that he had contacted the PM seven times since January about keeping his 'promise' to visit the hospital, and he had not yet received one reply from the PM or his office!

So, now we had not only the magnification of the 'Broken Promise' meme, but also the 'Imperious PM and Non-Responsive Office' characterisation tacked on for extra effect.

Guess what happened next?

Ben Fordham popped up in the Canberra press pack at the PM's Presser to announce that Paid Parental Leave had finally been passed by Parliament.

Guess what Ben Fordham asked about?

You got it.  Nothing to do with PPL, and everything to do with the PM's 'Broken Promise' with respect to Dr Phillips!  Groan. 

However, and thank goodness for the PM and his very smart 'Junior Woodchucks', they had come forearmed with the facts to this particular fight.  When Master Fordham, who seemed to have a camera team all to himself in tow, asked why the PM hadn't responded to the seven!!! requests from Dr Phillips to keep his promise, made back in January, to visit Hornsby Hospital, the PM calmly explained back to 'Master of the Universe' Fordham, that six of those seven communications had been via Twitter(!!!), and one by E-mail, which was the most recent, and which had been responded to promptly, with a visit having now been tee'd up to go and take a look at Hornsby Hospital.

Well, you'd think that that would've been enough to put Master Fordham and Channel Nine back in their boxes, the shallowness of their case having been exposed for the sham it was.  Well, you would be wrong.  This is the foot-in-the-door brand of political journalism that is being worked up here.  No backward steps are ever to be taken.  Instead, you take the response you have been given by the PM and develop a new line of condemnation and censure out of it.  'If at first you don't succeed...', and all of that.

I tell you, I sat there gobsmacked in front of my TV, as all this played out in front of me, on what is supposed to be the 6 pm NEWS Bulletin.  Because, as I said, Channel Nine weren't going to be satisfied here for one minute with their 'get' of the PM 'failing' to keep his 'promise' to visit Hornsby Hospital, and the implication that he had been dodging it because he would rather be seen only in neat and clean hospitals, as opposed to being filmed in a run-down hospital. No, it was onwards and upwards with the next condemnation to be heaped upon the 'beleaguered Prime Minister'. 

Wait for it.  This one is a doozy.

Channel Nine heaped outrage on top of scorn, due as a result of the PM's 'Broken Promise', because Kevin Rudd does not personally reply to every Tweet he gets on Twitter from twits like Dr Phillips!

Well I never!  The Prime Minister should be sacked forthwith!  I mean, the Premier of NSW, Kristina Kenneally had just the other day participated in a Twitter Debate, doncha know?  Ergo, communication by Tweet has now thus been legitimised, and the Prime Minister of this country ought to therefore be held to account for not responding to each and every one of his importuning constituents Tweets in real time.

How patently absurd and contrived!  But instructive, as it should, and probably has, put up in neon lights in the PM's office, just what lengths media organisations in this country are prepared to go to to trip up Kevin Rudd, using the tools of the new Web 2.0 media, and also the depths to which they are prepared to sink, in order to lay a trap for our good and kind-hearted, reformist PM, and to give the Press Gallery's pro forma anti-Rudd memes and mischaracterisations credence.

We therefore need to be alert and alarmed (ha, ha) about the new 'Gotcha Politics'.  Thus I put out a 'Call to Arms' to fellow Swordians to monitor this new development in their own media backyards and join with me in documenting each and every instance of this new type of political journalism, as I fear we haven't seen the last of it, and I doubly fear that the Liberals are behind it as well, as they seem to have vacated the floor of parliament in order to take their battle for the hearts and minds of the electorate four square into the media, with the media's help and complicity.

I don't like it!

And this woman knows all about the skullduggery, with the aid of the media, that the Liberal Party is capable of: I don't like it!  

 

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Acerbic Conehead

19/06/2010AA, Pauline Pantsdown mightn’t like it, but Kerry O’Brien certainly does. Playing with the big kids, that is. The ABC is now At their Beckon Call. So sing along with Kezza as he sings the praises of his new-found chums. It is to the melodies of Dobey Gray’s, “The In Crowd”. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Uv2wFPGJ4Y&feature=related :- ) I'm in with the 'In' crowd I go where the 'In' crowd goes I'm in with the 'In' crowd- Glenn, and Kev’s other deadly foes Any time of the year, havin’ a jeer Suckin’ up, outa their cup I breeze up and down the street E’er so keen to shuffle to Rupert’s beat I make way day or night Ready to fly the NewsLimited kite :- ) I'm in with the 'In' crowd I know ev'ry talkin’ point When you're in with 'In' crowd 7:30 Reportland is their joint It’s a spot with a loada rot Balanced fare? It ain't there! I make ev'ry sledgie count Kev’s share is always the biggest amount Leftie guys irritate us And Tones with no policies is still the greatest :- ) On the bandwagon I go jumpin’ On Kev’s case, I love dumpin’ Any time of the year, don't you hear Havin’ a bash, talkin' trash Viewers, I'll show you some real good times Just join in with mine and Shanner’s chimes I’ll show you I’m a great big fellah As I blow the Oz’s vuvuzela

Acerbic Conehead

19/06/2010Sorry, HS, I addressed this to AA and not you. Thanks for a fine article and keep up the great work. Ace.

TCEPSER

19/06/2010This is for the ABC Watch collection. Tonight's ABCHD TV news. Referring to the still yet-to-be-substantiated "grumblings" about the PM's leadership, and referring to the "disasterous ETS negotiations with the Coalition" - no mention of the fact that it was the Coalition who made a deal and didn't stand by it!

HS

19/06/2010Acerbic C., Thank you very much. :) Working away to produce more blogs stops me from focussing on things like a 25% swing away from the ALP in the Penrith/NSW State By-Election. Sigh. Speaking of vuvuzelas: - A woman burst her windpipe from blowing her vuvuzela too hard. http://bit.ly/c5AoW8

Ad astra reply

19/06/2010AC Another great piece of acerbic satire - thanks. TCEPSER Welcome to the [i]TPS[/i] family. Please come again. Could you please post the link to the transcript or the video of tonight's ABC HD TV News, and I'll copy and paste it into ABC WATCH.

HS

19/06/2010TCEPSER, Thanks for that. Amazing, isn't it how quickly history is being rewritten in the editorial suites of the ABC News division?

nasking

19/06/2010Well done HillbillySkeleton! How bloody annoying this petty GOTCHA! game has become. I'm sure the people will tire of the Rudd bashing soon enuff. The media are acting like a gang of thugs putting the boot in whenever they can. You described that Ch.9 claptrap in wonderful detail. I've put up a post tonite on my view of a Sky News show today that I feel was similarily bashing Rudd. I know some feel that Paul Kelly was "balanced" today...but I feel he is another Murdoch camp "tricky dick" who tries to corner the government...and oft adds to the boot boy activities...but in a craftier way that can give the appearance of balance: [quote] Caustic Barnaby & the Old Pontificator Tag Team[/quote] http://cafewhispers.wordpress.com/2010/06/19/caustic-barnaby-the-old-pontificator-tag-team/ [quote]I noticed today that the Newspoll weekend was serving up plenty of Rudd bashing. Per usual. One excruciatingly long show on Sky News, The Nation with David Speers, offered up a tag team consisting of Paul Kelly (pontificating editor at large of The Australian)…and Barnaby Joyce (the oft joyless & crimson-faced National party Senator). Absent was any Labor party representative to defend their title. [/quote] Keep up the great work Political Sword posters, linkers & other contributors. N'

HS

19/06/2010Nasking, Thank you! Even on this night of the nadir that the Penrith By-Election in NSW represents for the ALP, we still need to keep on fighting the good fight.

Lyn

20/06/2010Hi TCEPSER A big welcome to The Political Sword, thankyou so much for your comment we all hope you keep commenting here. [quote]"grumblings" about the PM's leadership[/quote] Surely they must give up soon, the never mention anything negative about the Coalition even the smallest. Wonder if the Insiders will be a" little bit" kind this morning.

Lyn

20/06/2010Hi Hillbilly Thankyou so much for your brilliant piece of enjoyable reading, you are magic. [i]thank goodness for the PM and his very smart 'Junior Woodchucks'[/i], The media have had a go at those smart Junior Woddchucks, in particular Peter Van Onselen had his sarcastic, remarks, I see his jealousy loud and clear.

HS

20/06/2010lyn, Thank you so much! I just try and fill in the gaps between Ad Astra's erudite contributions. :)

Neil

20/06/2010Perhaps we could twitter Ben Fordem and see if he replies to every tweet. Then complain to the Press Council, Ch9, Media Watch etc after all Fordem thinks twitter is a serious communication medium.

HS

20/06/2010I was greatly saddened this weekend to hear Peter Hartcher on 'Meet the Press', a journalist who I have had a great deal of respect for his opinions up until now, say to the United States Ambassador, no less, "Do you think President Obama will make it out to Australia while Kevin Rudd is still Prime Minister?" The look on the Ambassador's face said it all. He was gobsmacked at the audacity of such a statement. It was almost as if Hartcher was relishing the power that the Press Gallery has over our Prime Minister at the moment as they toy with his political carcass, as they see it to be swinging in the breeze already. Not only that but Ptere Hartcher wrote a column this weekend which extolled the virtues of Tony Abbott's time as a Minister in Howard's government, carefully cherry-picking his achievments to make him seem better than what we who had to live through it, know it to have been. I guess that's his opinion and he's entitled to it, however his body language on 'Meet the Press' suggested a 'Cat with a Mouse' type attitude wh ere he was choosing one mouse over the other to play with before he went in for the kill.

HS

20/06/2010lyn, How 'Inciters' could be in any way kind to the PM and his government this morning with Andrew Bolt on the couch would be a case of defying political gravity I think.

Lyn

20/06/2010Hi Hillbilly His body language was "Smart Alec" and so was the smirk on his face.

Mobius Ecko

20/06/2010It's all part of a lose/lose for Rudd and the government, that started the moment Rudd was elected Labor leader, for it doesn't matter what they do and which way they go, even if it's exactly what the MSM and/or the opposition want from them, they lose and are bashed for it. If Rudd and the government responds in any great way they will be accused of spin so they are doing the only thing they can, just as Wayne Swan did against Peter Hartcher attempting to assassinate him on Meet The Press this morning, play a dead bat and just get on with government. The people elect Abbott on the back of all this bring down a government by media then so be it. The long term outcome of that will be the media's doing not that they'll ever admit to that but as long as blogs and forums like this have the records and protests recorded they won't be able to completely hide from it even if they deny it.

Lyn

20/06/2010Hi Hillbilly This is a newbie designer label by Andrew Bolt, "Kevin Rudd is not being what he seems" On Insiders this morning.

Lyn

20/06/2010[b]TODAY'S LINKS[/b] [i]Caustic Barnaby & the Old Pontificator Tag Team,Nasking, Cafe Whispers[/i] A rivetting close-up shot revealed the experienced Old Pontificator nodding in approval as his partner Joyless farted on & on & on. http://cafewhispers.wordpress.com/2010/06/19/caustic-barnaby-the-old-pontificator-tag-team/ [i]BHP writes me a letter, Grog, Grog's Gamut[/i] This is essentially the world’s biggest mining company stamping its foot like a 5 year old and saying “it’s not fair!!!!” http://grogsgamut.blogspot.com/2010/06/bhp-writes-me-letter.html [i]Rudd faces revolt: O RLY? JJ Fiasson, The Daily Bludge[/i] Who knows if they’ll fiddle the numbers. Either way, if the poll numbers look bad for Labor, expect to see Rudd under even more pressure from the Murdoch gutter press. I’m sure that the ABC and Fairfax will join in the fun.. http://dailybludge.com.au/2010/06/rudd-faces-revolt-o-rly/ [i]Time to call an election, Kevin?, Peter Brent, Mumble[/i] One single survey will tell us bugger all about how the election’s gonna go, but will mightily influence reporting and hence the behaviour of the ALP.. http://mumble.com.au/ [i]Written and authorised by the Government?, Andrew Norton [/i] The Gruen Transfer they discussed this mining industry ad against the government’s proposed mining tax. Host Wil Anderson asked the panel about the ‘Authorised by M. Hooke, MCA, Canberra’ message at the end. http://andrewnorton.info/ [i]Senator Fielding proves once more that he is barking mad, Petering Time ,[/i] Stevo's a good example for the argument that political candidates should prove mental competency http://northcoastvoices.blogspot.com/2010/06/senator-fielding-proves-once-more-that.html

Sir Ian Crisp

20/06/2010Like you HB, I sat on the edge of my couch waiting for Peter Overton’s “exclusive”. I thought that Mr Overton must be a cruel, dastardly chap to find fault in the Rudd Government. It turned out to be a storm in a tea cup. Of more concern is the resignation of the chairman (oops, should be chairperson) of the NACMH, Professor Mendoza. Imagine my shock when Professor Mendoza said that Mr Rudd was claiming credit for increased investment in mental health which Mendoza said was the work of the Howard government. I don’t know about others here at TPS but I’m all for forming a lynch mob. People who criticize Rudd should be dispatched with great haste. With regard to unpalatable news regarding the Rudd Government, one remedy to right the ship might be to demand that all newshounds, talking heads, journos, opinion and discussion panels, et al, should read ALP press releases.

NormanK

20/06/2010Take good news wherever you find it. "Leadership speculation was dismissed by various MPs as ''absurd'', ''ridiculous'' and ''absolute bullshit''." http://www.smh.com.au/national/gillard-doesnt-have-numbers-20100619-ynvh.html

janice

20/06/2010Good morning Hillbilly - great piece as usual, and yes I too was stunned about Ch 9 and their Gotcha over Hornsby Hospital. What is niggling at me at the moment is seeing Shanahan moving out of his closet at the Oz and getting himself coverage in other outlets - ie the ABC. I'm a bit surprised that Cassidy hasn't got him on the panel of inciters as yet. There was a post over at Poll bludger by Briefly who suggested that if he was PM he would completely ignore the media - refuse to do any interviews etc and instead get his message out by using press releases/announcements. I will go back and find the post and paste it in here for all to read. I wonder if it'd be worthwhile if we bloggers did a faux poll substituting pollies with media and mining companies. For instance using questions like: 1. Who do you think would be better able to run the country: a. Dennis Shanahan b. Rupert Murdoch c. Twiggy Forrest 2. Who do you think would better manage our economy: a. Twiggy Forrest b. Clive Palmer Just a thought and no doubt worthless, but frustration and anger do affect the mind LOL.

janice

20/06/2010[quote]I think the Government needs to find new means to convey its messages. Using SMS and emails, the tube, twitter…maybe all linking to a news site on the web….Labor could develop all these. I think the traditional media are pseudo-political forces. They give expression to the political interests/inclinations/wishes of owners, editors, particular contributors, writers/talkers/performers. The media if necessity have to drum up heat/contest/drama. Without these things, they will surrender their audience. So the traditional media are an absolute dead-end for the Government. If I was PM, I would probably stop doing media altogether. I would use the Parliament and set-piece speeches and new media formats – like the tube – to get my messages out. Parliamentary sittings could be re-organised so they become a platform for the Governemnt to connect with the public without the inter-mediation of so-called journalists. I would also start referring to players like Shanahan, Bolt, Milne, Akerman, Kelly and so on as “self-appointed but unelected wanna-be” politicians. I would just get into them and I would never give them a moment of real time. The media are Labor’s enemies, basically. They should be attacked. There should be a Special Minister who has the job of keeping the media to account. There is a Leader of The Government in the House, who gets after the Opposition. There should be a similar head-butting, ass-kicking, ball-squeezing polly who takes on the media – just gets dirty hands and takes the media on. [/quote] The above was posted by Briefly on Poll Bludger.

vote1maxine

20/06/2010HS Another well researched post with forensic detail that would do Media Watch proud. :) The MSM are looking for any straw to grasp to maintain the anti-Rudd hysteria.I believe its a diversion tactic to distract from the fact Abbott is basically a policy free zone. Most voters, once they engage, will see through this whipped up anti-Rudd frenzy. I am hoping once the election campaign proper is underway Abbott will cave under scrutiny. However judging by MSM current performance I have doubts on the intensity of such scrutiny on Abbott. It will be up to the fifth estate to lead the charge. Meanwhile Mike Carlton has a lovely satirical piece on the anti-Rudd hysteria, "Kevin Rudd is facing another firestorm of criticism after Australia's humiliating 4-0 loss to Germany at the World Cup in South Africa. Already buffeted by a series of crises that have rocked the government and sent his opinion poll ratings plummeting to record lows, the Prime Minister is now under renewed pressure to take responsibility for this latest national disaster." http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/rudd-fumbles-ball-and-couldnt-even-save-sharnee-and-skye-20100618-ymmq.html

HS

20/06/2010janice, The post by Briefly that you have quoted is interesting and charming in its naivety. I think, having dissected and displayed the inner workings of just one anti-Rudd government story in the media, on one day only, here on this blog, and when we know that these News organisations get into it on a daily basis and just keep churning them out, and vaulting seemingly effortlessly from off the back of the government who may have dodged one of their bullets, into further reaching for the stratosphere of hyperbole and mendacity when it comes to this government, well, I think you would assuredly just see an even more feral response from that same media if the government stopped talking to them. They'd have a new campaign to wage against the Rudd government based upon their 'arrogance' if they tried to ignore the traditional media players in the Press Gallery. So, I think for the Rudd government, the best form of attack is defence here, and they've got to play like a class Soccer team(yes, I have been glued to my set watching the World Cup!), and craft a watertight defence against the attacks, the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, I guess you could poetically characterise it as, that they are suffering from at the hands of the media at this time in the electoral cycle. Then they just need to be also able to score a goal here and there, in order to get them over the line at the election. They don't need a Rugby or AFL score against the Opposition, more like some solid singular goals that no one can ignore the class of out in the electorate, which is where it really counts, at the only poll that counts, is on election day. Now, I do know that some of the areas of Web 2.0 that Briefly spoke about that the Rudd government should get into, they already have. I know of the 'Phoney Tony' Twitter account(#PhoneyTony), a website that has been set up to publicise the shortcomings of the Opposition and Tony Abbott, You Tube videos that are made by people such as Lindsay Tanner, and E-mail letters you can subscribe to. So I think the government gets it as far as that sort of thing is concerned, but at the end of the day it all comes back to the traditional media sources for our news that most people in the electorate still rely on. The radio, the TV, and newspapers. At the moment that's where Tony Abbott is slaughtering the Rudd government. He is much more capable than any of the government's spokespeople, even Julia Gillard, when it comes to punching through a message. His journalistic training has seen to that. He's almost the perfect political animal in that way-an expert communicator, a driven ideological warrior with a 'Take No Prisoners' approach to politics, and a saleable commodity which encompasses his athleticism. Which is not to say that those positive attributes don't come with huge negatives. I think we are all familiar with what they are, and they are pretty scary when you think about it from the perspective of whether we want to elect a man to be Prime Minister of this country who would be entirely comfortable to be running the country as a quasi-Christian theocracy, because you can be sure that he would allow those facets of government that he encouraged before as Health Minister, to creep back into the Australian political paradigm. 'Faith-Based Initiatives' was the euphemistic term that was being used by the Howard government and Bush to refer to the takeover of our Social Services by these people which was happening when they were in power. I know it's something I could never approve of our federal government bringing back to prominence. I prefer government services to not be carrying any extra baggage. So, essentially I think the Rudd government needs to hold its nerve against the torrent of abuse its copping at the moment, from the media and the ungracious Opposition, get on with the job of working towards the win with the RSPT, make the odd guerilla attack like the Treasurer did this morning on 'Meet the Press' when he called out the big Miners and the Minerals Council for heavying their business partners to not support the government's RSPT, and then call the election.

Ad astra reply

20/06/2010LYN'S DAILY LINKS updated: http://www.thepoliticalsword.com/page/Lyns-Daily-Links.aspx

HS

20/06/2010NormanK, '"Leadership speculation was dismissed by various MPs as ''absurd'', ''ridiculous'' and ''absolute bullshit''." As I have just outlined above, the government just has to hold its nerve in the face of the current 'Shitstorm', and get on with the job of getting concrete results for the Australian people. We of the 5th Estate just have to keep on doing what we are already doing, slicing and dicing the media and the Opposition, and covering the government's back against attack. On the other hand, when the government deserves criticism, we should make it, but it should be constructive as opposed to destructive, there's enough people out there trying to destroy them already.

HS

20/06/2010Sir Ian Crisp, See my above reply to NormanK. I don't think that I should be wasting my energy criticising the Rudd government, when that would only add to the Opposition and media campaign. I'd far rather accentuate the positives, for there are many, despite the constant carping of certain sections of the media and the Opposition about the negatives. They can fight their own battle, I'm not going to help them.

NormanK

20/06/2010HS Great post. I had no idea of this "gotcha" tactic in relation to hard news. Your North Queensland Liaison Officer can report that this particular virus doesn't seem to have manifest itself up here yet. But you're correct in asserting that once one outlet starts something, the lemmings will follow. I'm very impressed by Mr Rudd's junior woodchucks. I'm always in awe of the amount of material someone like the President of the US (as a big example) has to stay across. Who'd want that job? Obviously the PM is in a similar albeit smaller boat so I'm impressed that he had a response at his fingertips. His head must be full of such semi-trivial information just in case someone asks a gotcha question. AC Good one. Had a very good laugh. Janice I suspect a large part of the government's inability to 'cut through' is because press releases are just going straight into the bin at some media houses. I don't know the protocols involved but I would love to see regular addresses to the nation where the PM would be able to reduce his use of unfortunate preambles (which do annoy me but I forgive them) and he could finish a sentence without being interrupted. More importantly, he could set the agenda and have a decent stab at explaining complex issues. By surrounding him with fluff and noise the MSM don't allow any coherent explication or serious debate. Briefly's suggestion of a special minister is not terribly practical. Can you imagine such an officer under the control of Howard or Abbott. There does need to be a watchdog with teeth but they must be independent of government and major players. I am trying to research our current set-up and they all seem to be slower than treacle to act and have 'pipers to pay'.

HS

20/06/2010Neil, Media pros like Ben Fordham are immune to criticism, sadly. He's got that way after years at 'A Current Affair'. Although I will say that Miranda Devine lost it on Twitter this week, so anything's possible. :)

Ad astra reply

20/06/2010Folks There is a sound and well-referenced article on [i]Left Focus: The Mining Super-Profits Tax Debate – an analysis[/i] that I recommend for those interested in the facts surrounding this debate, rather than the fiction. The link is: http://leftfocus.blogspot.com/2010/06/mining-super-profits-tax-debate.html

nasking

20/06/2010Hi all, I've just put up a new post: [quote]Watching ‘Insiders’ Is Like Having a Hard Dry Dump[/quote] http://cafewhispers.wordpress.com/2010/06/20/watching-insiders-is-like-having-a-hard-dry-dump/ [quote]I’m not too fond of the show Insiders with Barrie Cassidy. After waking from a beaut sleep to a typical Queensland gorgeous blue sky morning in the garden, followed by chomping on a superb mixed grill cookup, watching the ABCs putrid political analysis of a Sunday morn is like having a hard dry dump…it’s bloody long & painful. So what did that dump offer up us masochistic viewers today? Well yes, you guessed it…it was our Prime Minister who actually got dumped on over & over again by a media panel representing the types who think/believe/dream: WE INSIDERS FROM THE MEDIA RUN THIS COUNTRY NOT THE LABOR GOVERNMENT[/quote] Cheers N'

Acerbic Conehead

20/06/2010HS, AA and NormanK, thank you for your kind words of encouragement. All these beat-ups about Kevin Rudd’s leadership put a wry smile on my face. If Julia Gillard gets the big job, do you think all these jokers won’t do the same to her? “State ergo succincti lumbos vestros in veritate et induti loricam iustitiae.”

molly

20/06/2010WEll kevs news conf with telsta to day i wondered if they wanted to be tweeted if i was he i would tell the media nothing

NormanK

20/06/2010HS Synchronicity rules. At the same time as you were drafting your article, I was pecking away at my keyboard. Is this a "gotcha" moment? Beat-up? What beat-up? The Australian 22 June 2010 Peter ven Arseholensen IMPROBABLE DEATH - GUTLESS PM IMPLICATED A 53 year-old man was struck down by lightning on Friday and Kevin Rudd is to blame. In a quiet picnic area at Maloneys Beach east of Canberra, veteran public servant Ian Chappell was struck by lightning and killed as he emerged from his car at his favourite fishing spot. Senior Sargeant Dennis Lilly, who spoke to us from the scene late Friday afternoon, said Chappell was barefoot when he stepped from his beloved ute and was struck down out of a clear blue sky. “It was like a bolt from the blue,” Sargeant Lilly said. “Every last stubbie in the carton he was carrying was smashed. Death was instantaneous. He would have to be the unluckiest man alive.” Or would he? The Australian can reveal something more sinister at play here. And it goes right to the top of this despicable big-spending government. This story starts several hours earlier in the corridors of power at Parliament House in Canberra. Mr Chappell had been a loyal servant of the people for thirty-two years and had worked for governments both good and bad. In recent years he had the onerous task of accommodating a gutless backflipping spineless do-nothing mine-hating delay delay money-wasting house-burning great-big-taxing policyless Labor government. Being a man of big heart Mr Chappell (Chappello to his mates), recently sent a text message to a co-worker graciously proclaiming: “I don’t give a f**k who’s in power. They’re all w***kers.” Kind words indeed from a man who was soon to meet his premature demise because of one of those w***kers. Through patience and hard work, Chappello had risen to Senior Keyholder To The Great Big Stationery Cupboard (so-named during Lord Howard’s tenure). At 2.55 pm on last Friday afternoon, Chappello had just locked the Great Big Stationery Cupboard Door and was making his way to his office to clock off for the day when a staffer from the Prime Minister’s Office confronted him in the corridor. It seems there was a national emergency. The Lesser Stationery Cupboard was out of green highlighter pens and the brow-beaten harangued overworked anxious staffer, fearing for his life, was unwilling to go into the weekend without adequate supplies. Understanding he had a part to play in keeping the wheels of government turning, Chappello put personal considerations aside and gave up valuable time to satisfy the beleaguered attractive young assistant. Little did he know how his generousity was to be repaid. The Australian has acquired a leaked email sent earlier on Friday from Mr Chappell’s office to his wife. A man of few words, Chappello wasn’t to know this would be his last communication with his beloved wife. “Going fishing”, he wrote, “Give me dinner to the dog. If he’ll eat it.” In a tearful exclusive interview with this paper Mrs Chappell said: “’Course we had our differences, ’specially over that slut Tanya at the pub, but he was always a good provider. He never come home without a coupla fish. If he didn’ catch nothing, he didn’t come home. He was always good to the boys, always, if anything he showed them too much affection.” A senior Labor source told us off the record that a mate of his said that Fishing Inspector Rod Marsh remembers Chappello as a ‘stand-up bloke’. “Yeah, he always stuck his hands up every time we caught him with undersize fish or a couple of jenny crabs. Never had to chase Chappello. Though he wouldn’t have got far in that beloved ute, would he?” our source said that his mate said that he said. And so it came to be that Chappello left work at 3.15 on that fateful Friday. A service station attendant at Braidwood, who asked not to be named so we’ll call him Geoff Thomson of 119 McKellar Street, Braidwood, NSW 2622 (just down from the hospital) (you can’t miss it, it’s got a green gate) (watch out for the dog, though) is reported to have told police it was definitely Chappell who bought fuel and ice from him at 3.58 that afternoon. “I’d know that beloved ute anywhere,” he is believed to have said. This is how it came to be that Chappello pulled on to dusty Hibiscus Close at 4.39 pm with nothing on his mind but a couple of fat flathead and a barmaid named Tanya. Any other time and any other place and the nation would still have the services of this fine fine man. An act of God? Or are there signs of the hand of Satan? In the latest chapter of what the Parliamentary Press Gallery, at their wise and witty best, have dubbed “highlightergate”, Tony Abbott blasted the inept spineless backflipping Prime Minister during Question Time yesterday. “Who was it, Mr Speaker”, he bellowed forcefully from handsome lips, “who was it that, with flagrant disregard for a loving wife of 35 years, who will never look into her husband’s bloodshot eyes again or feel the touch of the back of his hand, who was it, who was it Mr Speaker, with flagrant disregard for three loving sons who will never again enjoy the tough love and attention of their beloved father, who was it with scant regard for 7 grandchildren who will never pull ‘sleepy Pop’s” whiskers again or marvel at the number of lollies in his deep pockets, who will never again be tucked in by their loving attentive Grandfather, who was it Mr Speaker, who was it that ANGRILY insisted on using a GREEN highlighter? This Prime Minister!! That's who!! This Prime Minister Mr Speaker!! So I ask the Prime Minister when, how many more people have to die before he gives up this ANGRY obsession with green highlighters?!! How many, Prime Minister?!!” How many indeed. How many drunken wife-beating paedophiles have to die before Labor wakes up and dumps this angry angry angry Prime Minister? Surely a redheaded lefty dyke can’t do a worse job? Related stories: Julia caught snacking in the House.

HS

20/06/2010NormanK, By George, I think you've got it! You have made much out of a tiny morsel of truth, and, following up the whole 6 degrees of separation, you found your way to the Prime Minister AND gave Phoney Tony the opportunity to grandstand in parliament as a result! You get the Gold Star on the back of your hand for today. If you keep going like that it will be noticed, and you might just get Warren Entsch knocking on your door up there in FNQ seeking your services for the cause of Orwellian government in Australia. :)

Eddie L

20/06/2010HS, I was watching 'Meet the Press'when Peter Hartcher asked the US Ambassador about the Rudd & Obama meet and the look he got in reply.

FFreddy

20/06/2010Watching the Colbert Report this week in which SC had a parody of President Obama’s language used during his Pres. address over the oil spill ( long words!! ) and no doubt referring to a much broader campaign about his ‘intellectual approach’ in general I was struck by the similarities to the campaign here in Oz by the msm against PM Rudd. Throw in the ‘familiar’ scandal twelve months ago about PM Gordon Brown’s anger and treatment of staff and I was wondering what is the common link amongst these three countries??? Inevitably to ‘Insiders’ this morning at one point Barry Cassidy attempted to try and build on the theme he has been running in his articles in the Drum about the govt. being unwilling to talk about their achievements and resorting solely to smearing that delicate petal Tony Abbott. He did this by using seriously edited footage from Anthony Albanese’s interview with Leigh Sales on Lateline this week in which AA appeared to say that yes the government had a good record they were prepared to talk about and then spoke of nothing else except TAbbott. I watched that interview and when AA could finally get a word in he did enthusiastically list the things he thought the govt. had done well and especially in his portfolio of infrastructure. However if you just watched the footage presented by BC and the panels comments after you could be forgiven for thinking that not only was AA unwilling to talk about his govt.’s achievements he was disinterested as well. This was a completely false representation of the interview that took place. Finally I have noticed quite a few posts here and in PB and LP about the disconnect between what actually happens in federal parliament and what is reported. Of course the ABC is doing its bit to maintain that disconnect by broadcasting ‘Order in the House’ at 12.10am Monday morning. Better the taxpayers get Andrew Bolts analysis of the week in parliament rather than getting an opportunity to watch it themselves! With the World Cup all around us and being an english soccer fan old enough to remember when the weekly highlights show ‘Match of the Day’ was screened at 7.30pm on a monday night free to air I would, with indulgence, characterize the ABC’s decisions with regards to Insiders and Order in the House this way …its as if the ABC had replaced the “Match of the Day’ broadcast with a panel show with a rotating panel of guests who were all either staff, ex-players or rabid fans of one club and with a host who could barely conceal his allegiance to the same club. They’ve then broadcast the actual highlights of the weeks play ie. ‘Match of the Day’ after midnight and thought this was acceptable. It’s a decision that defies logic

HS

20/06/2010FFreddy, You are so right, the ABC is also manufacturing 'Gotcha!' moments, like the one you refer to involving Anthony Albanese. It now appears that if the MSM can manufacture a line they will, because they can.

HS

20/06/2010Eddie L, That moment on 'Meet the Press' was truly an enlightening encapsulation of all that is wrong with the political journalist class in this country today, from the way, as lyn noted, that Hartcher had adopted a louche pose on the couch, to his belief that he could get away with pronouncing that our good, reformist Prime Minister was a 'Dead Man Walking', just made my blood boil. It's just such a pity that there appears to be no appetite for one segment of the Australian journalistic class to attack the other for this sort of egregious behaviour. I can only imagine that if that is what Peter Hartcher felt confident enough to say about the Prime Minister on national TV, we can only imagine how much worse must be the things that these journalists say about him behind closed doors.

janice

20/06/2010HillbillySk, Of course I agree it is naive to think the Government would get away with not talking to the media and therefore we, the people and the Government, have no means with which to fight this disgusting campaign being run to bring down and sully our PM and discredit our government. The 5th Estate is nothing but a voice crying in the wilderness in the face of this concentrated campaign by pretty well every media outlet in the country. I have a sneaking suspician that there is a great big slice of the voting public who have not engaged in the brainwashing that has been going on this past 12 months and will not bother to think about where they'll place their vote until they get to the polling booth. I have been stunned on many occasions listening to quiz shows, to find that even people with acadamic qualifications cannot answer simple questions regarding which politician leads which party etc.

john

20/06/2010Someone mentioned a minister to look after the media. I know Whitlam had a Minister for the Media, but Fraser scrapped the portfolio. I can't find any information on what he did, though.

Miglo

20/06/2010Hi Eddie L. My little black heart beats with pride to see that you've joined the blogospere. So glad to see you here and over at the Cafe.

HS

20/06/2010john, Media massaging maybe? :)

HS

20/06/2010Miglo, 'One for all, and all for one' I think sums it up best. Btw, you can only bribe me to come back to Cafe Whispers with this: http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_L8BTRutV0uk/SYn0DxMdxeI/AAAAAAAAKCQ/dQp5QhzA35o/s400/Gilbey%27s+Gin+1970.jpg

Lyn

20/06/2010Hi Eddie L A very big welcome to you and thankyou for your comment on "The Political Sword" we all hope you keep coming back. Peter Hartcher!!!! well you know, what can we say.

Ad astra reply

20/06/2010Eddie L, Neil Welcome to the [i]TPS[/i] family. Please come again.

john

20/06/2010Stephen Conroy broke Telstra! http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/06/20/2931852.htm

Lyn

20/06/2010Hi John Thankyou for the interesting ABC link. This is wonderful news for the Government and for all Australians. I wonder if the MSM will stop giving Stephen Conroy such a hard time.

Ad astra reply

20/06/2010NormanK A delicious piece of satire. If you keep this up, you might get roped in to write for [i]TPS[/i] Thank you all for your enlightening comments and perceptive analysis.

Ad astra reply

20/06/2010Folks With this piece HS has set a theme that we might all usefully follow – expose every instance of media skulduggery we see. Several commenting here today have expressed similar feelings. Anyone so inclined could post them here on [i]TPS[/i], and I will paste them into a new page which you will find at the foot of ‘site pages’ in the right panel. Rather than copying the ABC title [i]Media Watch[/i] I've called it [i]MEDIA ALERTS[/i]. [i]Gotcha![/i] is the first entry. In addition, as is fashionable, let’s give the examples a rating. I suggest a THUMBS DOWN rating for the those that are unprincipled, inaccurate, biased, and unbecoming of a professional journalist, and let’s have the usual five point scale that assigns THUMBS DOWN, DOWN, DOWN, DOWN, DOWN for the very worst. But to acknowledge the journalists who do their job well – there are a few – let’s have a THUMBS UP award, also on a five point scale. So the whole scale is ten points, five on each side of neutral. Check out the new [i]Media Alerts[/i] page at http://www.thepoliticalsword.com/page/Media-Alert.aspx Please post on [i]TPS[/i] any examples of good or poor media performance and I'll paste them to [i]Media Alerts[/i].

Lyn

20/06/2010Hi Norman K What a delightful piece you have written for us today, thankyou so much. You know, we would enjoy a topic column by you on "The Political Sword" that's if you want to, why don't you ask Ad Astra. Love this name "Peter ven Arseholensen" brilliant.

Lyn

20/06/2010Hi Ad Peter Brent, think I will be asleep, I am really, really. too scared to see the results. Kevin Rudd's Primeministership depends on these figures, the MSM said so. Newspoll here tonight at 11.30pm Peter Brent, Mumble http://mumble.com.au/

Ad astra reply

20/06/2010Folks I’ve just witnessed one of the rudest interviews of any Prime Minister of Australia, this one by Tara Brown on Channel Nine’s [i]Sixty Minutes: The trouble with Kevin[/i]. The intro is at http://sixtyminutes.ninemsn.com.au/stories/1071956/the-trouble-with-kevin; the full transcript will be available tomorrow. What I found most distasteful was Tara’s repetition of what she says people are calling Kevin Rudd – ‘a gutless wonder’. She is entitled to hold any view she wants, and even to regurgitate what others are saying, but to repeatedly and rudely confront the PM of this nation with ‘people say you are a gutless wonder’ to provoke a reaction is unseemly, arrogant and disrespectful, not just to Kevin Rudd, but to the country’s Prime Minister. Who on earth does she think she is? What entitlement does she feel she has to insult and demean our PM in such a public forum? There are courteous ways of approaching accusations of him being a ‘gutless wonder’. She could say, for example, “How do you feel when you hear some saying you are a gutless wonder for shelving the ETS. Does that seem to you to be a fair assessment of your decision?” That would have given Rudd a chance to acknowledge that while some may feel that way, there were cogent reasons for that decision. Despite Tara’s belligerent approach to the interview, he kept his cool under extreme provocation and did point out that the Opposition had blocked the ETS legislation three times, not that this satisfied her at all. The look on her face told her viewers that she intended to pursue her ‘hard’ questioning, no matter what happened, no matter how disrespectful she sounded. Was she trying to match her macho male colleagues, or just joining the bash-Rudd brigade? I am deeply offended by the bad-mannered, discourteous approach so many journalists are exhibiting when interviewing our elected representatives, particularly the leader of our nation, OUR PM. I would be just as offended if Tony Abbott was so interviewed. It is simply not becoming, and encourages the public generally to exhibit the same disrespect. This is not healthy. Fortunately there was a poignant moment when Tara was interviewing Therese and Kevin Rudd together. Confronted with the (David Marr) accusation that Rudd was driven by anger, Therese teared-up when she said that there was only one thing that drove Kevin – compassion. I hope the people heard that loud and clear. I have added this episode to [i]Media Alerts[/i] at the end of today’s batch. A sadly depressing batch I must say? What do you think?

Lyn

20/06/2010Hi Ad [quote]‘people say you are a gutless wonder’ to provoke a reaction is unseemly, arrogant and disrespectful, not just to Kevin Rudd, but to the country’s Prime Minister. Who on earth does she think she is? What entitlement does she feel she has to insult and demean our PM in such a public forum? [/quote] Ad I agree with you totally, that was disgusting, the way Tara Brown was trying to belittle Kevin Rudd. I was running around the house, saying how dare she confront Kevin Rudd with gutless wonder, who is calling him gutless wonder, the ony one I heard say that was Phoney Tony. Wonder what pecentage Rupert ownes of channel 9, Tara brown stinks, that interview was disgusting, leaves all the other gotcha's for dead.

HS

20/06/2010Not that he can spell, but this just in from Stuart Robert, a Qld. LNP MP: 'Launched the No New Minig Tax bus on the Gold Coast with Steve Ciobo and Karen Andrews' I see the Coalition are back to Howard's old tricks of putting spurious info on the backs of trucks and driving them around the place.

Miglo

20/06/2010I'd love to Hillbilly, but by the looks of your gravatar I don't think you could hold your grog.

BH

20/06/2010I don't get free to air TV (no reception in this area) so I missed the Ch9 piece by Fordham. I was wondering whether the way to go would be to let the owners of Ch9 know that these 'gotcha' moments might be turning viewers away from their programs. Alternatively, what about taking note of the ads and letting the businesses know what we think.

HS

20/06/2010Ad Astra, All I can say about the 60 Minutes interview is that, like me, most of Australia wouldn't have bothered to watch it, preferring instead to watch something positive like MasterChef. Nevertheless that interview is out there now, so can be used as a springboard by other journalists(and I use the term more advisedly than normal in this instance), to sink even further into the gutter than that, like down into the sewers. The other journalists will all look at it and gauge what they can get away with now, secure in the knowledge that the PM can't bite back when they bite him because if he did lose his temper as a result of their rudeness then that would become the next condemnatory story about him. He's in a lose/lose situation and they know it so they are trying to be ever more provocative in order to get him to snap before the election and display the bad temper that it is said he possesses behind closed doors. Pathetic and pitiful and not journalism in any way, shape or form. Contrast this with the positively sycophantic way the media, in Sydney at the moment, and Channel 9 again in particular, are sucking up to Liberal Opposition and Leader Barry O'Farrell. Last week Kevin Wilde, the Channel 9 State Political Reporter, went to a Bar-B-Que at Barry's house(!), and, contrary to the known history of the man which says that he sacrificed his family on the alter of politics, what we were served up was a completely confected 'Happy Family' story about the O'Farrells, which stated how much Barry loved doing the ordinary good Dad things with his children, like giving them driving lessons. The contrast with how this organisation reports the Labor Party couldn't be more stark. Finally, I have just seen a News Update on Channel 9 wherein the newsreader stated with a straight face, "Rumours are rife that the Prime Minister will step aside in favour of Julia Gillard". Sorry, I missed that, I must have sleep-walked through last week. I thought there had been universal denials of that fact by federal members of parliament in the government. The only rumours that are circulating are those coming from the rumour-mongering media. I find this sordid behaviour by the media absolutely reprehensible, especially as the Liberal Party are being given the polar opposite type of treatment. Just who do the media in Australia think they are? The saddest thing of all is that those of us who are concerned about this can do nothing meaningful about it other than what we are doing here on the blog, as the wheels of complaint to the representative bodies turn slowly if at all.

HS

20/06/2010Miglo, Sad but true. One drink and I'm soaked. I enjoy it as it's going down though. :)

nasking

20/06/2010[quote]That moment on 'Meet the Press' was truly an enlightening encapsulation of all that is wrong with the political journalist class in this country today, from the way, as lyn noted, that Hartcher had adopted a louche pose on the couch, to his belief that he could get away with pronouncing that our good, reformist Prime Minister was a 'Dead Man Walking', just made my blood boil.[/quote] Hillbilly & Eddie...I know exactly how you feel. When I watched Hartcher make that flippant comment having something to do w/ "if Obama comes here in 2010 he might get to see Kevin whilst he's still Prime Minister" I lost SOOO much respect for the man. I thought, "great, here's another quality journo/commentor who's been leant on...or just decided to hitch his wagon to the Rudd Bashers United Front so as not to be left out"...and the more I thought about it the angrier I felt. The nerve of him! My wife was also very annoyed w/ Peter Hartcher. The media are bankrupt. We decide who our PM is, not that lot of puppets of the CORPORATE ARISTOCRACY. N'

nasking

20/06/2010Ad astra, thankyou for the feedback on Sixty Minutes. How pathetic of Tara Brown. [quote]I was running around the house, saying how dare she confront Kevin Rudd with gutless wonder, who is calling him gutless wonder, the ony one I heard say that was Phoney Tony. [/quote] Lyn, tells us something I reckon. N'

HS

20/06/2010BH, I've actually tried to contact Channel 9 before after another particularly offensive piece by Jayne Azzopardi. It's not made at all easy to get your complaint through to anyone of any seniority in the organisation. After ringing Channel 9 I spoke to Reception who put me through to the Newsroom, there I spoke to a Producer's Assistant to whom I complained about the story. All that she said she would do was mention it to the Producer of the story. She didn't ask for my name or number and then she hung up. I heard nothing further, of course, because they didn't bother to take my details. Things haven't improved, in fact they only seem to have gotten worse. These people are answerable to no one it seems.

Agnes Mack

20/06/2010Ad, I thought Tara Brown was deliberately rude and provocative for a couple of reasoms : The first and obvious motive was a crude attempt to make the PM lose his cool - even the slightest evidence of displeasure would have headline making powers sufficient to send Kerry O'Brien into a jealous rage. The second was prosecution of the media's arrogant assumption that they have the right and the power to make and break political leaders. Tara Brown's offensive questions were simply a variation of push polling on a grandscale. Her facial expression while Therese Rein was speaking was supercilious. She had trouble concealing the sneer which threatened to contort her lips. The contrast between Ms Rein's warmth, sincerity and obvious honesty and the cold calculation in Tara Brown's demeanour probably undermined the effectiveness of Ms Brown's 20 minutes of vituperation disguised as a political interview.

Acerbic Conehead

20/06/2010HS, the Federal Liberal Conference was on this weekend and one of the items on the agenda was the awarding of gongs to their chief propagandists – those leading spin-merchants who are ensuring the heat, by fair means or foul, is kept on Kev and his team. So, there were three prizes – gold, silver and bronze. Suitably, the compere is John Howard, the Man of Steel. Johnno: Urrr...Ladies and gentlemen...good afternoon...and it is my great pleasure to award these three medals to the deserving winners...But first of all, I would like to acknowledge our sponsors – Twiggy Forest for the gold, Clive Palmer for the silver, and Andrew Peacock for the bronze...heh...heh...only kidding, Andrew...just my little joke...But, again, it’s my great pleasure to firstly call up to the stage the winner of the bronze medal – Joseph Goebbels! Joseph – come on down! [to rapturous applause, Joseph clambers onto the stage and takes the mic from Johnno] Joseph: Thank you, Herr Howard...Now, as you all know, I was hired because of my expertise at composing and endlessly repeating the Big Lies...and in your case, the GREAT NEW BIG TAX ON EVERYTHING! [thunderous applause from the gathered throng greets Joseph’s stilted rendition of his mantra] Joseph: However, friends, I want to now announce my plans for marketing Herr Abbott’s maternity leave proposals... [at this, the din in the hall starts to become a tad less exuberant, as if many in the audience are anxious as to what might be coming next] Joseph: I believe, friends, that we need to give the BIGTOE to the Rudd Communist government and Herr Abbott’s idea is just what is needed – I am going to call it the Big Innovative Great Tax On Employers! [at this point, you could have heard a pin drop in the stadium. Suddenly, however, the ice is broken by the farcical sight of Glenn Milne staggering onto the stage, making a bee-line for Joseph. As security bundle both Glenn and Joseph off the stage, Glenn is heard to protest, “I’m the real Poison Dwarf around here – he’s just an imposter!”] Johnno: Urrr...and moving right along folks...and our silver medal has been won by...Lord Haw-Haw! Your Lordship, come on down! [HS, to cut a long story short, Lord Haw-Haw won the silver for teaching Tones his funny laugh. However, when His Lordship starts to announce that Tones, to get back in with the gay community, will go on the campaign trail dressed up as Bruno Gehard, a trap-door on the stage opens, and Lord Haw-Haw is now Lord No-Saw] Johnno: Urrr...erm...ladies and gentlemen...without further ado...I will now announce the winner of the golden gong...and it is none other than our very own...Godwin Grech! Grechie, come on down! [huge applause for the champion the crowd believed had engineered the sting that brought about the demise of that hated communist, Malcolm Turnbull] Grechie: My friends...I am over whelmed by the reception of this award...It means so much to me...And...I would like to take this opportunity to inform you of my suggestions for the way forward...Firstly, let us bring back WorkChoices! [huge applause] Grechie: And...build a nuclear power plant and waste-dump in every suburb! [applause level is somewhat more muted] Grechie: And...as a gesture of solidarity with our righteous leader, Dom Abbott, let us announce that after the election, all women will wear a nun’s habit, and all men will be forced to adopt the tonsure hair-style! [by this stage, the applause is non-existent. Special white-coated security bundle Grechie off the stage] Johnno (to himself): Jeeze...what a shemozzle...That was an exhibition of Godwin’s Law if ever I saw one – the first one to mention the Nasties, loses...

HS

20/06/2010Newspoll guys: 52:48 Labor's way. :) http://mumble.com.au/?p=2589#comments

BH

20/06/2010HS - I was thinking more along the lines of writing to the Board of Ch9 owners. I think that it's no longer Packer but some o/s mob so that may carry more weight now Packer's gone. Newspoll 52-48 posted on Pollbludger

Ad astra reply

20/06/2010[i]Newspoll[/i] Primary: Labor 35 Coalition 40 Greens 15; last [i]Newspoll[/i] 3 weeks ago Labor 35 Coalition 41 Greens 16. TPP using preference flow at last eletion: Labor 52 Coalition 48; [i]Newspoll[/i] 3 weeks ago 51/49. PPM Rudd 46 Abbott 37, last time 49/33. Rudd: Satisfaction 36 Dissatifaction 55, virtually unchanged, Abbott: Satisfaction 38 Dissatisfaction 49, virtually unchanged. I wonder what Dennis Shanahan et al will make of that?

Ad astra reply

20/06/2010[i]Newspoll[/i] link. Go to [i]Mumble[/i] http://mumble.com.au/ and click for main tables, a pdf file.

Ad astra reply

21/06/2010Folks I see nothing on [i]The Oz[/i] website yet. Is this because there was no intention of Shanas making a headline, as he usually does when a [i]Newspoll[/i] is announced on a Monday night, or is it because he's lost for words. I predict his analysis will focus on the continuing low primary vote for Labor, the unreliability of the TPP of 52/48 based on the flow of preferences at the last election, and the narrowing gap in PPM now at 9 down from 16. He will probably concede that 'Rudd has had a reprieve', but will still push the perilous nature of his position. I bet he will not point out that the TPP in the last four [i]Newspolls[/i] were 49, 50, 51 and now 52.

Bushfire Bill

21/06/2010Dennis didn't do any of that AA. He just ploughed on as if nothing had happened. One article praised Abbott's brilliant "discipline" in avoiding the public. Another went on about how Abbott was a country mile ahead of where all the other Opposition leaders had made it to in PPM (failing to mention he was still substantially behind Rudd). He's sticking to the idea that Wednesday's caucus meeting may well bring up a spill motion. It was an alternate universe, governed by laws of physics as yet undiscovered by humankind. The Fairfax papers had obviously been caught short by Dennis' gazumping of them by running Newspoll on Monday instead of Tuesday. Grattan was her usual useless, predictable self. There was an article by the disgraced ex-member for Parramatta, Ross Cameron, that was positively lyrical in praise of Abbott and comprehensively sneering at Rudd. They both mentioned this Newspoll as "The Decider" (or wtte), clearly not aware as their copy went to press that it was already out and had come up OK for the government. Phil Coorey in the SMH was more circumspect, but still fell for the "Ghost Of Newspolls Future" trap. All in all, it was a very disappointing performance from the doyens of our media, the senior journalists who have got little right about Rudd and Labor for three years now. I agree with you there's a visceral hatred against Rudd. I can't see why, myself (but I [i]would[/i] say that, wouldn't I?). Carney tells us again (The Age, Saturday) that the Gallery dislikes Rudd, doesn't even think his jokes are funny (!) and seems to finally reveal his moral inclinations by saying that's "fair enough". I doubt whether the momentum drummed up by Shanahan and his little helpers at the Oz will dissipate anytime soon. There's too much energy - negative energy but energy just the same - for it to happen. Even the PPL scheme and the Telstra deal are being portrayed as stunts, just to get Rudd out of the supposed hole he's in at the moment. It's 24/7 negative for some time I fear. These people have a hide the way they treat the PM. I didn't see the 60 Minutes interview because I never watch (and never have watched) the show and had a foreboding as to what it would be like. It sounded (from descriptions) to have been appalling. But that's no surprise to me. 60 Minutes has always been pompous and too full of itself, since day #1. But they also have a hide in the way they treat their readers. They - as admitted to by Carney on behalf of his colleagues - have decided they don't like Rudd, and that's apparently that. We have to cop their nastiness, because the Gallery has spoken. Policy doesn't matter. It's all a stunt anyway (don't y'know?). What they're doing is not only demeaning themselves and their profession, they're demeaning the process of politics. A bunch of cynical, over-paid, over-fed, boozy hacks in a tight little circle jerk deciding the fate of nations and their governments. It's incestuous, its dangerous and it's bad for democracy.

john

21/06/2010If the 60 minutes interview was that bad, maybe we should all go to the media watch website and complain.

Lyn

21/06/2010[b]TODAY'S LINKS[/b] [i]Newspoll 52 - 48: RUDD VINDICATED, JJ Fiasson[/i] the drop was not what Shanahan and his merry band of Conservative sycophantic pranksters at The Australian would have liked http://dailybludge.com.au/2010/06/newspoll-52-48-rudd-vindicated/ [i]Newspoll says 52 to 48, Peter Brent, Mumble[/i] We need some idea of two party preferred. In each seat, it’s what wins. http://mumble.com.au/ [i]Newspoll: 52 - 48 to Labor, William Bowe, The Poll Bludger[/i] Labor’s 52-48 lead is a slight improvement on 51-49 from three weeks ago, and under the circumstances will come as an enormous relief for the Prime Minister. http://blogs.crikey.com.au/pollbludger/ [i]Telstra Deal is Good News for Rudd, Reb, Gutter Trash[/i] Rumour has it that Bronwyn Bishop has slammed the idea as “an outrageous waste of taxpayer’s funds” and has sent a telex advising her constituents of her stance. http://guttertrash.wordpress.com/2010/06/20/telstra-deal-is-good-news-for-rudd/#comment-30539 [i]Standby for much higher phone and broadband charges - today's agreement, Peter martin.[/i] The Australian Government today welcomed the announcement by Telstra and NBN Co that they had entered into a Financial Heads of Agreement. http://petermartin.blogspot.com/ [i]How out of touch can you be, Jeremy Sear, Pure Poison[/i] Gottliebsen has spent the last month or so writing very bitter attacks against the RSPT wherever he can – one sided, shameless pieces advocating for the interests of the Big Three mining companies against everyone else. Fear campaigns designed to hit confused voters from every angle. http://blogs.crikey.com.au/purepoison/ [i]Five reasons Rudd will lead Labor to the next election, Ben Heraghty, The Punch[/i] chief among these achievements is that Rudd and Swan successfully shepherded Australia through the Global Financial Crisis and came out shining. The fact is that the government’s stimulus package worked, http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/five-reasons-why-rudd-will-lead-labor-to-the-next-election/ [i]Ringmaster's return ,Josh Gordon The National Times[/i] With so much chest thumping, it would be easy to declare - as Herald Sun columnist Andrew Bolt did recently - that Kevin Rudd is ''finished'' http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/politics/ringmasters-return-20100619-ynth.html

HS

21/06/2010ROFLMAO. Abbott's preferred PM rating goes up when he shuts up for 2 weeks!

HS

21/06/2010john, Great idea! I'll go to the Media Watch website today!

john

21/06/2010The Australian has been predicting a liberal win since 2006. They have very low influence on public opinion. People make vote based on economics and policy, and Kevin Rudd dealt much better with the economy than the libs owuld have, and he actually has policy, which the Oppn. does not. Big Kev's gonna win the election with an increased margin!

HS

21/06/2010Go BB! Come back to the top of the page soon. :)

Ad astra reply

21/06/2010LYN'S DAILY LINKS updated: http://www.thepoliticalsword.com/page/Lyns-Daily-Links.aspx

john

21/06/2010I think to win back the ABC we have to do the same thing the LIbs did to get control of it in the first place. We have to complain about every little thing, send in a written complaint for every time the guy on ABC2 Breakfast just reads out an Australian column, every story distorted by the Coalition line. We have to be endlessly vigilant, complaining at eve a hint of bias, and even when a commercial journalist is being balanced, complain about it anyway. Especially complain every time Bolt, Ackerman or the Milne is on. This tricky, but I think one person writing a general letter that can be filled in with details of the problem, and maybe a page that alerts people to stories they should complain about woudld be all we need.

janice

21/06/2010Hillbilly, I've been reading JTI's and George M's blogs and, of course, your posts. I hope you don't mind me saying that your contributions are hard to read because there are no paragraph spacings. The only way you can get paragraph spacings over there is to put a fullstop between your paragraphs i.e. enter key, fullstop, enter key. Hope that isn't as clear as mud LOL. It is a trick other posters over there came to realise some years back when the one-eyed ANNE was known as dotty because she used a dot (fullstop) after every phrase and people noticed she got paragraph spacings.

janice

21/06/2010Bushfire Bill wrote: [quote]But they also have a hide in the way they treat their readers. They - as admitted to by Carney on behalf of his colleagues - have decided they don't like Rudd, and that's apparently that. We have to cop their nastiness, because the Gallery has spoken. Policy doesn't matter. It's all a stunt anyway (don't y'know?). What they're doing is not only demeaning themselves and their profession, they're demeaning the process of politics. A bunch of cynical, over-paid, over-fed, boozy hacks in a tight little circle jerk deciding the fate of nations and their governments. It's incestuous, its dangerous and it's bad for democracy.[/quote] Spot on Bushfire Bill. I've been trying to work out why the media hate Rudd so much and I've come to the conclusion that it is because they don't like the way the Rudd Government has structured its 'board of management'. It is too disciplined and therefore leaking is minimised so that the cynical, overpaid, overfed, boozy hacks have been sidelined. It was brought home to me this morning when I read a comment by JTI wte that Labor policies were okay but the problem was leadership and the closed cabinet. JTI is considered and "Insider" and I expect he is also suffering from being shifted from an insider to an outsider looking in.

Agnes Mack

21/06/2010There are grounds for suspecting tonight's Australian Story on Julia Gillard will be another ABC effort to fuel the leadership speculation currently rife in MSM. It seems Julia , anxious to avoid giving credence to the MSM/ABC stories, refused to co-operate with the program's producers. Ironically, my evidence for this is a story in the Oz, here http://www.theaustralian.com.au/politics/heat-on-pm-as-beazley-backs-gillard-for-top-job/story-e6frgczf-1225882022348 It seems the story uses 4 year old clips of Julia answering leadership questions. In view of the present media frenzy on the issue, this reliance on old material verges on the dishonest, even if its date is revealed. Would be interested to hear if anyone is aware of any other Australian Story on a political subject going to air without the participation of the subject. The ABC has been running promos for this week's Australian Story, without mentioning the DPM's non-involvement. The result, viewers would have assumed that Gillard was making a pre-coup run for the leadership. That is enough to judge that the program is basically about mischief making. I suspect tonight's program will provide more evidence that the ABC is hell bent on outdoing the MSM in partisan reporting and undermining the Government.

Lyn

21/06/2010TODAY'S LINKS JUST IN [i]Newspoll and horsefluff,Possum Comitatus, Pollytics[/i] some actual piece of objective evidence for pushing their little billy cart of bluster on leadership speculation (in some professions, that sort of stuff is [b]called “making shit up”). [/b] http://blogs.crikey.com.au/pollytics/2010/06/21/newspoll-and-horsefluff/

vote1maxine

21/06/2010Hi All I posted earlier that the MSM are looking for any straw to grasp to maintain the anti-Rudd hysteria and its a diversion tactic to distract from the fact Abbott is basically a policy free zone. But the Abbottistas have really outdone the MSM. This has gone beyond the pale: "Tuckey links missing mine magnate with super profits tax plan June 21, 2010 - 10:32AM Outspoken federal Liberal MP Wilson Tuckey has linked the government's proposed super profits tax with the disappearance of six Australian mining executives in Africa." http://www.smh.com.au/national/tuckey-links-missing-mine-magnate-with-super-profits-tax-plan-20100621-yq1o.html Maybe Mike Carlton wasn't being so much satirical as prescient: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/rudd-fumbles-ball-and-couldnt-even-save-sharnee-and-skye-20100618-ymmq.html

Tyson F. Gautreaux

21/06/2010ESPNN WORLD CUP http://espnnn.com

Bushfire Bill

21/06/2010Agnes, I think the "Julia For PM!" bandwagon has left town. There are a few scraps of tinsel, some old tattered posters still on telegraph poles, garbage bins full of shredded dirt files, the odd stray dog, journos with helluva hangovers sleeping in gutters, and tumbleweeds blowing down Main St. "Julia for PM!" only exists in the rarefied ether of News Ltd, its transcribers at the ABC and Fairfax, and on the surface of a bizarro universe planet in a galaxy far, far away. The star herself has not turned up, never was going to, and her alleged fan club failed to fill the seats in the front row we were assured had been booked-out for her performance. Instead we got a cheap comedian doing jokes we've all heard before. Have you heard the one about the one-week ultimatum Dennis Shanahan gave the Prime Minister of Australia? Well, it goes like this... I agree it's pretty egregious for the ABC to run a rehashed interview with Gillard and play it like its fresh and current, with snippets here and there, tops and tails from non-players to give it a bit of contemporary zing. Too late. There is no challenge. There will be no challenge. Dennis got it wrong, again. He succeeded in getting Rudd into power over Beazley, but that was four years ago. The attempted reprise is as much a matter of Dennis' embarassment over directly contributing to the political death of John Howard by pushing for Rudd, as it is of his unhinged mindset and megalomania where he seems to truly believes he can set the national agenda [i]and make it stick[/i]. "Julia for PM!" had all the hallmarks of the Beazley push. There was the appearance on Lateline: journos interviewing journos. There was the bootstrap campaign, right down to a few hours on Sunday where the Age and SMH actually ran a verbatim transcript of Dennis' Saturday article on their front pages, as their lead story. There was even a dirt file ready for Julia as there had been for Rudd. Dennis was so confident, he boasted about its existence in an Oz article recently. I think the word he used was "vicious", but this was only in understandable counterpoint to Labor's own allegedly "vicious" campaign where they had started pointing out that if you voted Coalition you'd actually get Tony Abbott as Prime Minister. Talk about a [i]scare campaign![/i]. I mean, how [i]low[/i] can you go? The Coalition "wet affairs" guys just had to douse that fire. You can't blame them, really, can you? In my more unhinged moments I sometimes wonder whether Dennis doesn't harbour a little half-belief that the funny, nerdy guy he agitated for wayback when in 2006 [i]owes him[/i] a little gratitude. Is there an element of Dennis giveth and Dennis taketh away in there somewhere? I have no doubt the promos for A/S are trying to play up the "Julia For PM!" schtick for all it's worth. But they'll have to concede the interviews are several years long in the tooth and that the "players" they've put up as spruikers are not really connected to the centre of power. I can see a few Labor apparatchiks and hangers-on who thought they'd make heroes of themselves by agreeing to be interviewed about how Julia was going to rule the world - by tomorrow, if Dennis had had his way - squirming in their soiled underpants wondering if the PM's office will ever again return their calls, answer their tweets or even offer them a cup of Nescafe when they come crawling next time for favours. The public - their heads swinging from side to side like so many spectators at a tennis match - will be finally starting to twig that the boy has cried "Wolf!" one too many times on the matter of Julia. So, if there's a challenge, where are the challengers? Why is everyone smiling? How come the girl herself is making no move? Sure, there's a bit of momentum out there still. Fairfax, left out of the initial lacing of the boots, got into the game too late. They made do for several hours with front-paging Dennis' claptrap about ultimatums, but it wasn't until Sunday that they sent Josh Gordon out into the streets to find the malcontents. Clearly La Grattan and Phil Coorey were away for the weekend. They must have failed to read their own newspapers before putting pen to paper (as it were) to describe a non-event slotted for Tuesday that existed only as a brainfart in its creator's mind. At least Dennis would have gained some satisfaction by making fools of his competitors, but that would have only been a consolation prize. Instead of trusting Dennis, Michelle and Phil should have made it easy on themselves and just phoned their junior colleague Josh. Better to get the bad news out of the way quickly, even if it meant connecting with reality for a few seconds. So today we have a PPL scheme in place, a Telstra deal done (with a 5% surge in Telstra shares just this morning), and the inquisitor into the BER saying it's been run pretty well, excellently, in fact. We have our favourite large-girthed bunch of bores, the mining billionaires, having to pay people to be their friends with $30k bribes. The dollar's rising again, house prices plateauing, unemployment low, inflation low, interest rates the lowest for years, an economy that is the marvel of the industrialized world and a government supposedly tanking the polls that has increased its 2PP metric in the Oracle-like Newspoll by a steady single point in each of the poll's last four editions, to a present 52-48. Not a bad effort for a bunch of inept bunglers, eh? The momentum will carry on for a few weeks yet, but even the political savants at Fairfax will have to face facts soon enough: Kevin's on the comeback trail. As for Dennis Shanahan, he still has those little pieces of paper he slides around his ouji board, fortelling doom and gloom for Labor, somehow, somewhere. And if his pieces of paper fail him, he always has Glenn Milne still on staff at the Oz, to whisper sweet nothing into his ears when he has trouble sleeping nights.

Holly Wood

21/06/2010How much can a Koala bear?? Wilson Tuckey today has indirectly blamed the Government for the disappearance of a team of Australian 'mining magnates' in Africa. They were flying over Zambia, or somewhere, looking for new iron-ore mining sites because the RSPT has made it unprofitable to mine in Australia!!! So he's shamelessly linking togther, the tax and the miner's possible plane crash to further paint the government as villians. As usual, the media is lapping it up. I thought it was sweet when Kevin Rudd's daughter defended her dad when Tara Brown insulted his badly ironed shirt. Ohhh...that's rude, she said... This poor guy has been blamed for everything from plane crashes, housefires, not shouting a round of beers, reckless spending... etc etc. He's been vilified to hell and back, but top marks for his daughter to put Tara in her place.

janice

21/06/2010Bravo Bushfire - you lost it a teeny weeny bit for a little while but thankfully you're back to your very best. You make my day so don't go away.

Ad astra reply

21/06/2010Folks I've also posted this on [i]Who cares about the next Newspoll[/i] where it best belongs, but in case it might get missed there I'm posting it here: As mentioned in [i]Who cares about the next Newspoll[/i], [i]“...in Alice in Wonderland style, ‘stats can mean whatever you want them to mean’. Dennis Shanahan, The Australian’s commentator-in-chief on Newspoll, has a well earned a reputation for that.”[/i]. Well Dennis never disappoints. Here he is at his old games again, analysing today’s [i]Newspoll[/i]. I wrote about this Shanahanian habit as far back as December in [i]Dennis Shanahan is at it again[/i] http://www.thepoliticalsword.com/post/2009/12/08/Dennis-Shanahan-is-at-it-again.aspx shortly after Tony Abbott became Opposition Leader. Then he had resumed his habit of interpreting [i]Newspoll[/i] stats according to the meme he was currently running, as he did during the final year of the Howard Government. Today the [i]Newspoll[/i] ‘news’, in the order presented in the [i]Mumble[/i] table, was: Primary votes virtually unchanged; Labor still on 35, Coalition 40, Greens 15 TPP 52/48 based on preference distribution at the last election The last four TPP’s back to the end of April, have been Labor 49/51, 50/50, 51/49 and today 52/48 Approval ratings for Kevin Rudd and Tony Abbott virtually unchanged PPM rating Rudd 46 Abbott 37 as against Rudd 49 Abbott 33 three weeks ago. Given those facts, what does Dennis write in [i]The Oz[/i]. No prizes for getting it right. [i] Tony Abbott narrows gap on Kevin Rudd[/i]. His first three paragraphs read: [i]“Tony Abbott has narrowed the gap on Kevin Rudd as the preferred national leader. “Labor has failed to lift its primary support and the Prime Minister has reached a new high in voter dissatisfaction. “Although the Opposition Leader continues to maintain record high levels of personal dissatisfaction with voters, he has halved Mr Rudd's lead as the preferred prime minister in the past three weeks.”[/i] It is not until he gets to his seventh paragraph that he says: [i]” Based on preference flows at the last election, calculated on an 80 per cent flow of Greens preferences to Labor, the government is ahead on the two-party-preferred figure of 52 to 48 per cent. This is based on a Greens primary vote of 15 per cent, down one point in three weeks.”[/i] No mention of this being an election-winning lead, no comparison with the TPP at the last election of 52.7/47.3, no mention of the three point improvement in the Labor TPP number since late April. In other words, Dennis has a meme that Rudd is slipping, Labor is bogged down in its primary vote, Abbott is catching up to Rudd as PPM, and the stats are used to support that. The fact that if these results were repeated at an election and the preference flows were similar to last time, Labor would win comfortably, is not mentioned at all. This is in marked contrast to the recent [i]Nielsen[/i] poll where the TPP was Labor 47.2 Coalition 52.8 which would have given a very convincing win to the Coalition and installed Abbott as PM. But there is no mention by Dennis that today’s [i]Newspoll[/i] is almost a mirror image of the [i]Nielsen[/i] poll. Now there’s no value in us huffing and puffing about Shanahan’s disingenuousness in presenting the [i]Newspoll[/i] stats. That’s just the way he is – if we’re not already used to his journalistic deceitfulness and misrepresentation through cherry-picking the data that suits his meme, we had better get used to it, because he will continue in this way until the election. I’ve awarded him a THUMBS DOWN, DOWN, DOWN for his efforts on [i]Media Alerts[/i]: http://www.thepoliticalsword.com/page/Media-Alert.aspx [b]Please give me some feedback about [i]Media Alerts[/i]. It it worthwhile keeping a record of gross media misdemeanours for reference now and in the future? Are you interested in posting examples for recording on [i]Media Alerts[/i]?[/b]

Bushfire Bill

21/06/2010Trust Tuckey to come up with a clanger like that. Is this guy thick or is he thick? Even the media are giving the story the Laural and Hardy treatment. Check out the library photo they've used in the SMH: http://images.smh.com.au/2010/06/21/1620063/tuckey420-420x0.jpg Abbott can either bury this one (he [i]will[/i] be asked about it) or can hype it up even further, saying that while the Sundance Mbala project is a mature one (and thus not connected to the RSPT) this is the kind of thing Rudd The Thug is trying to force our heroic miners into. The "heroic" bit is already in place. Ken Talbot, due to stand trial in a few week's time for allegedly bribing a Queensland minister, is already being airbrushed into a quiet, modest Australian who likes only to do good works. http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/mining-energy/benefactor-ken-talbot-stayed-true-to-his-roots/story-e6frg9df-1225882038849 Abbott's advisors will be telling him, "No. No. [i]No Tony![/i]" But will he listen? You'd have to say that even Abbott wouldn't fall for this one, but you never know. At the very least he'll be advised to smack Tuckey down, but what's going to happen when the other loose-cannons in the Coalition do [i]their[/i] doorstops?

Ad astra reply

21/06/2010Folks I'll be on the road for a few a hours - back at my computer this evening.

Michael

21/06/2010Isn't it remarkable how the Liberal Party crows about Abbott's Preferred Prime Minister rating going up when he has purposely kept a low profile for 3 weeks or so? The less people see of TA, the more they like him, this poll says. Pity (for the Coalition) he'll have to put his head up 24/7 during an election campaign.

Daisey May

21/06/2010I think what we are seeing here is a desperate chase for the advertising dollar and nothing else. Journalism as we have traditionally understood it is dead. We no longer have straight reporting of the facts at hand without bias but stories purporting to be true that are little more than entertainment shot through with cheap theatrics and even cheaper ethics. Murdoch will introduce aspects of his paywall into the Australian media landscape from July 2010 and no-one seems to have noticed what effect this is having on his employees. Frankly, they are shitting themselves. Empty vessels always make the loudest noise and the usual suspects are screeching at cacophonus levels at the moment. Why? Because once the Australian public is asked to consider whether they will pay for the odious drivel that Bolt, Milne, Sluiceham et al vomit out of their tiny little brains, there will be a stampede of customers to their competitors who have insufficient gall to ask their own readers to pay for similar excrement. Hence the parade of fith rate writers showcasing their underwhelming gaucheries like a pack of baboons exposing their hemorroidic arses to the world. What has become abundantly clear is that out of about 50 regular writers in the MSM only a handful can write well, even handed accounts on a daily basis without being shown up as giant ignoramuses by better informed bloggers. A pack of aging hacks who no-one has any respect for and for whom time is rapidly running out are getting shriller and shriller and have no idea why newspaper sales are in free fall. Time has and is, running over them and with no remorse, no plans for a memorial and no desire to subscribe to their pathetic notions of superiority. People will probably pay for good reporters and the jettisoned art of real journalism but in the wash up all those fat, lazy, lying arseholes who currently warm their own hands over the pain and misery brought about by their own ineptitude are about to be introduced to Dante's eigth rung of hell. Harsh? No way. If anything, a little lenient.

BH

21/06/2010Lyn - have a look at the headline on ABC Online and then read the body of the article. http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/06/21/2932669.htm

NormanK

21/06/2010Daisey May "the parade of fith rate writers showcasing their underwhelming gaucheries like a pack of baboons exposing their hemorroidic arses to the world. " That about sums it up. You may have answered the question of why other media houses are not taking a more contrary stance to cash in on the polarisation created by the Murdoch press et al. Surely there is a market for things anti-Murdoch and pro-government. But if it is a waiting game, well they don't really need to do anything. Roll on paywall.

Lyn

21/06/2010Hi Holly Wood A very big welcome to the Political Sword and thankyou so much for your comment. We do hope you keep coming back here, it's a good place to talk. [i][quote]This poor guy has been blamed for everything from plane crashes, housefires, not shouting a round of beers, reckless spending... etc etc. He's been vilified to hell and back, but top marks for his daughter to put Tara in her place. [/i][/quote] I agree with you, it is just plain wicked what the MSM and the Coalition ia doing to our Government and Kevin Rudd. Thankyou to the bloggers with the wonderful honest, reliable, information they are providing daily, MSM stories are not working. I am thinking after this election there should be a lot of red faces with egg splashing around.

Lyn

21/06/2010Hi BH Thankyou so much for the link to the ABC It reads to me like they have provided a topic for a column to knock Kevin Rudd,and advertise tonights Australian story. Also I think Australian Story interviewees will be misconstrued, words left hanging, in an attempt to blacken Julie Gillard and further bash Kevin Rudd. We will soon know.

Lyn

21/06/2010Hi Ad Liberal party that whinges about the Labor party playing dirty. Here is their new Advert. video playing the man. Kevin O Lemon http://www.liberal.org.au/Latest-News/Blog/2010/06/Kevin-0Lemon.aspx?utm_medium=email&utm_source=SwordEmailer&utm_content=507014180&utm_campaign=RuddAd-Kevin0Lemon&utm_term=image

john

21/06/2010They really are scum.

Sir Ian Crisp

21/06/2010I think the winner to emerge from the latest poll is Tony um, er, ah, um Abbott. He is happy to see Rudd’s slide into a political abyss ease slightly. Rudd will stay put and continue in his role as the Lib’s best asset. So for now the ALP knives will be sheathed. Abbott knows that he would have a real tussle if the Bird of Paradox was handed the baton. The ALP unrest and ructions continue. The Beached Whale from WA performed his own ‘laying on of hands’ ceremony when he said the Bird of Paradox would make an excellent PM. The Beached Whale also said Brian Burke would make an excellent State Premier and we know how well that went. The people at the Vatican are still doing an audit. If the Bird of Paradox is handed the baton Australians could for the first time have a female PM who doesn’t speak English.

Lyn

21/06/2010Hi John Thoroughly agree.

HS

21/06/2010Hello! Back from going to the farthest reaches of this earth to attend the Oral Surgeon's Rooms with my son. Phew! And, of course, you tack a million other things onto the trip as well, so you get back at Sunset, v.tired and v.emotional. Sigh. So, can I open the batting with a comment on the new Liberal ad about the PM. It is tasteless and offensive, like Tony Abbott himself, and the Coalition he leads. As coarse and vulgar as were the comments by Wilson Tuckey today outside parliament linking the RSPT to the deaths of the Mining 'Entrepeneurs', or should that be more appropriately, 'Exploiters'? As condescending and haughtily arrogant as Tara Brown's(Hmmm, wonder if she learnt her bitchiness craft at her exclusive Private School?), interview with the Prime Minister and his wife, Therese Rein. As casual with the truth as a Dennis Shanahan article. Thank goodness for the Internet, or I'd be moving to New Zealand, where they have a superior MSM to us, and now they play better Soccer than us too.

HS

21/06/2010Sir Ian Crisp, Did you go to the same Private School as Tara Brown? Confusing acid-laced bitchy retorts with substantial commentary is not a good look, darling SIC.

HS

21/06/2010Larvatus Prodeo appears to have had it with the ABC too: http://larvatusprodeo.net/2010/06/21/monday-morning-musings/ By Mercurious: 'Some isolated points that occur to me this morning. Feel free to riff on any or all of them: * Scanning this morning’s Murdoch and ABC news media, the order of stories and editorial lines are identical. * An opinion poll result is considered bigger news than the national broadband network. * Rudd’s preferred PM rating is 11 points above the ALP’s primary vote. * Abbott’s preferred PM rating is a few points below the Coalition’s primary vote. * An aggregate 1 in 4 voters are giving their primary vote to either ‘Green’ or ‘Other’ * Labor’s 2PP trend result in the last several Newspolls is 49-50-51-52. Meanwhile the media has been going ape that this is Rudd’s leadership in terminal decline. * If the Murdoch press really believed that Rudd is going to lose the election, they wouldn’t be screaming for him to be replaced as Labor leader. * I turned on the teev to see Phil Kafcaloudes “earning” his taxpayer-funded paycheck by reading Dennis Shanahan’s opinion column live to viewers on ABC2. * Can’t the ABC just run some nature documentaries? My personal favourite is ‘Bugs F***ing To Mozart‘. That would represent better value for my taxes than their present second-rate Murdoch mirror site.

Lyn

21/06/2010Hi Ad [i]Essential Report – Leaders Leaders Leaders Edition,Possum Comitatus, Pollytics[/i]washes out into a two party preferred of 52/48 to Labor http://blogs.crikey.com.au/pollytics/2010/06/21/essentia-report-leaders-leaders-leaders-edition/

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21/06/2010Folks Back on deck again. Watched [i]Australian Story[/i] about Julia Gillard. Interesting and will certainly do Julia no harm, nor stir takeover speculation, but what was the point of the ABC running what was almost entirely 2006 footage? Curious. Off now to watch [i]Media Watch, Q&A and Lateline.[/i] Back tomorrow.

Lyn

21/06/2010Hi Ad [b]A must read for everybody [/b] [i]The Most important Newspoll ever, Piping Shrike[/i] despite the recent decline, this government approaches an election six months out in probably the most comfortable position in a generation. http://www.pipingshrike.com/

john

21/06/2010Man, If Sarah Hanson-Young is anything to go by, the Greens aren't very good at politics.

Lyn

21/06/2010Hi John Richardson showed Hanson- Young losing the plot. ("What you are not going to direct preferences") Craig Emerson showed Turnbul losing the plot.

john

21/06/2010I didn't like the Labor-Green dynamic. The left tearing themselves apart isn't a good look. The Greens are behaving very badly, attacking the Govt on everything, but letting the Liberals get away with some atrocious climate change policies, and racist policises about aborigines and refugees.

john

21/06/2010also, they should knowbetter than to get into a fight with Labor. Labor will crush them any day. They're in danger of following the One Nation model of Australian 3rd parties.

HS

21/06/2010Miss Prissy is at it again on Lateline. Leigh Sales said, "More bad news for Kevin Rudd in tomorrow's Newspoll(funny, I thought Newspoll day was today, oh well, nothing like having 2 bites of the cherry), with bad news in the marginals." Now, Dawson, Flynn and Longman in Queensland, plus Lindsay in NSW, equals 4 seats. Even if the Rudd government lost those seats it would still hold power. I can't see how that is such bad news, especially as this supposed bad news is wrt the poll taken last weekend, in the teeth of negotiations around the RSPT.

HS

21/06/2010If The Greens keep saying, "No" to Labor government policies they will go the way of all the other Australian political Dodos like the Australian Democrats.

HS

21/06/2010The Greens need to learn about realpolitik. Politics is the Art of compromise. Politics is about pragmatism, it is not about ideological purity. That's for High School governance exercises.

john

21/06/2010I'm not sure about that, HS. The Dems. survived until they lied about the GST. Ideological purity is the only thing that keeps 3rd parties around. Slagging off at the Government for everything is not going to win them any friends. They'll end up as grubby as everyone else, and they aren't big enough to get away with it.

HS

21/06/2010john, Sarah Hanson-Young was hoist on her own petard tonight by that questioner from the audience re the ETS vote in the Senate. Where has ideological purity on Climate Change and the ETS got the Greens? With NO ETS, with the PM having to take it off the table until the next parliament if the ALP wins, and suffering in the polls as a result, but worst of all, with the very real prospect of Tony Abbott winning the next election and never going within a bull's roar of an ETS in his political lifetime.

john

21/06/2010If she had said that they wanted a better ETS, and had said she supports the Govt, but they had been unfortunately misled, etc, she would have got away with it. You have to attack the people who are actually responsible, that is, the Libs.

HS

21/06/2010john, Agreed.

Holly Wood

22/06/2010Thanks for the nice welcome Lyn. I was thinking no one had noticed me - bashful as I am. QandA tonight was a neat microcysm of today's disfunctional political scene. When Turnbull and Emerson went head/head blaming each other's parties on the demise of the ETS Sarah Hanson Young interjected, as the sage voice of reason, and said pointedly: "See this is why people are disconnecting from the major parties today. There's so much shrill bickering between Labor and Liberal. That's why voters are coming over to us... etc." I even think she got some warm applause for her effort and looked rather smug. Then it went pear-shaped. Emerson and an audience-member had a go at HER and the Greens for stalling the ETS: 'You should have negotiated what was on the table. Something is better than nothing", they all said. I think a twitter also came in saying: 'Why should Greens wait for purity? Start with something and add to it later'. So then SHE got stroppy at Emerson and Turnbull separately...and a little arrogantly too, I might add! She was argued passionately (and shrill), but this time, no-one clapped. A tweet came in with: Gee I used to like the Greens until I met this poppet (Sarah H.Y) I almost tweeted in to say: "Any wonder why Rudd ultimately SHELVED the plan?" It's called irony. There it is folks. An action replay of the whole 2 year process performed on stage, complete with 'you saids - she saids". Percentages and double-d's were thrown in. Comparsions of the words "Crap" and "shit" were disected and analysed. It was on for young and old. All 3 parties at logger-heads right before your eyes. See, I always vote Greens. They're my tribe! But now that they're into double figures, Both Bob and Sarah are wearing some new attitooodes and smart-alec-ness. (the stuff we don't like Kevin for). There's too much of the "our door's open, Kevin should come in for a chat. We hold the how-to-vote cards bla bla...". Shouldn't THEY walk into the PM's door for a chat? And humbly? Nicely? Kevin Rudd's still being shamed for 'running scared and dumping the ETS'. Enogh already. Hanson Young was on her high horse about that tonight. But now that they're experiencing their own giddy heights of POWER ! I'm not sure they wouldn't do the same thing, in the same prediciment.

Sir Ian Crisp

22/06/2010No HS, I did not attend the same school as Tara Brown. I am merely holding a mirror up to the TPS blog. I can be just as bitchy as any of those ALP luvvies.

HS

22/06/2010Holly Wood, Please excuse me for not welcoming you yesterday, I wasn't at my computer from early in the morning till late at night. So please accept my warmest welcome to TPS. :) I'm sure we all hope you will enjoy our company and keep coming back. You have encapsulated 'The Greens' zeitgeist neatly. With the whiff of the Balance of Power in the Senate coursing through their nostrils they are starting to behave like just another bunch of politicians, as they rip into the Left flank of the Labor Party in order to peel off votes for themselves, with some absolutely incoherant stances when you look at them in the cold light of day. I mean, how can you support the total collapse of any prospect of an ETS being enacted, and then at one and the same time say that you are the party of action on Climate Change? As I said last night, ideological purity is the stuff of High School governance debates, realpolitik is the Art of Compromise. I just like to think how many wars would have been lost, both ideological and actual, if the insurgent force had not tried to establish beacheads and only been satisfied with outright victory? Just think about it in practical terms. How would you go if you didn't allow your children to take halting baby steps before they could walk properly and then run? The way 'The Greens' are going on about Climate Change policy, it's as if they want that baby to break the world 100m sprint record at its first attempt, or it can stay lame in the cot forever.

HS

22/06/2010Can someone remind me, who was it that was going to run the "filthy election campaign" again?

HS

22/06/2010The ABC are just going from bad to worse. This morning on NewsRadio, the announcer, Glenn Bartholomew laughed as he announced the round-up of what was in the daily papers(which has just become a poor excuse and justification for the News Ltd. echo chamber on ABC, hasn't it?), specifically referring to the Newspoll analysis of the marginal seats results in today's 'Australian" (And, isn't it suspicious how 'The Australian' has decided to focus on the marginal seats after Mike Rann's successful marginal seats campaign in the SA election? Leave no stone unturned in your attempted political assassination of the ALP,huh?), he laughed as he said, "Ha, ha, it looks like there's more bad news for Labor in 'The Australian' today". !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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22/06/2010Holly Wood First, may I add my welcome to you to the [i]TPS[/i] family. Do come often. I enjoyed reading your summary of last night's Q&A, with which I am in accord, Add to that the obvious dissonance between Malcolm Turnbull and Tony Abbott on climate change and how best to tackle it, and another layer of complexity is added to an already complex issue. The to-ing and fro-ing we saw last night illustrated the pointlessness of open dialogue across the political divides as a mechanism for resolving such issues. It is only in back room discussions among the parties with all the facts at hand, and with well informed advisers to assist, that progress is possible at all. This seemed to have been the case when Penny Wong, Ian MacFarlane, Malcolm Turnbull and Kevin Rudd discussed the ETS and arrived at a compromise, the one that Tony Abbott killed, along with his leader. I also got the feeling that Turnbull and Abbott were not exactly aligned about the RSPT either. Turnbull is never as convincing when he's arguing a case in which he has not got his heart. I sensed that was so when he was arguing the validity of Abbott's trenchant opposition to the RSPT. As you indicate, Q&A last night was a microcosm of the way politicians behave when contentious issues are being discussed in open forum.

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22/06/2010Folks I'll be away until late afternoon assisting a sick relative. Lyn I'll post your links when I return.

HS

22/06/2010I'm here today. :)

Lyn

22/06/2010[b]TODAY'S LINKS[/b] [i]Dear Press Gallery,Bill, The Daily Bludge[/i] so could you try reporting about things that are actually happening, rather than the things you wish were happening http://dailybludge.com.au/2010/06/dear-press-gallery/ [i]Rudd and Abbbot a case of double disillusion,Mungo MacCallum, Crikey[/i] it had finally dawned on even the ultimatum-threateners of The Australian that you can’t have a challenge without a challenger. http://www.crikey.com.au/2010/06/21/mungo-rudd-and-abbbot-a-case-of-double-disillusion/ [i]Essential Report – Leaders Leaders Leaders Edition,Possum Comitatus, Pollytics[/i] washes out into a two party preferred of 52/48 to Labor http://blogs.crikey.com.au/pollytics/2010/06/21/essentia-report-leaders-leaders-leaders-edition [i]Rudd, Abbott spend the night making special promises to conservative christians where you can’t hear them,Jeremy, Anymous Lefty [/i] I wasn’t allowed to listen in to what our taxpayer-funded parliamentarian leaders were telling them either. http://anonymouslefty.wordpress.com/2010/06/22/rudd-abbott-spend-the-night-making-special-promises-to-conservative-christians-where-you-cant-see-them/ [i]Monday by the Magazine Rack, Reb, Gutter Trash[/i] The Australian and ABC online are both leading the charge with headlines screaming “Abbott narrows gap on Rudd,” http://guttertrash.wordpress.com:80/2010/06/21/monday-by-the-magazine-rack-39/ [i]Monday Morning Musings, Mercurius, Larvatus Prodeo[/i] If the Murdoch press really believed that Rudd is going to lose the election, they wouldn’t be screaming for him to be replaced as Labor leader. http://larvatusprodeo.net/2010/06/21/monday-morning-musings/ On the Qt: Newspoll: ALP 52 - LNP48(or, take that, narrative) Grog, Grog's Gamut And given Essential records its vote from a two week average, this also suggests that the ALP vote has increased a bit more than 3% in the past week. http://grogsgamut.blogspot.com/ [i]Telstra accepts the inevitable ,Gary Sauer-Thomspon, Public Opinion[/i] The Coalition, of course, has continued with its naysaying and said that it would cancel the deal if elected. http://www.sauer-thompson.com/archives/opinion/2010/06/telstra-accepts.php [i]Come here McCrann, I need you, Dave Gaukroger, Pure Poison[/i] like a pre-verbal caveman could never have understood the worth of the invention of the telephone by Alexander Graham Bell. http://blogs.crikey.com.au/purepoison/ [i]Wilson Tuckey, & give the mad uncle an iron bar again, Dorothy parker, Loon Pond.[/i]By golly, chairman Rudd is responsible for a lot of mischief in the world. http://loonpond.blogspot.com/2010/06/wilson-tuckey-and-give-mad-uncle-iron.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+LoonPond+%28loon+pond%

HS

22/06/2010Sadly, this blog, which was brought to my attention this morning, is fantastic.: http://notionfactory.wordpress.com/2010/06/22/democracy-by-lines-and-the-cult-of-celebrity/#comment-11 Why 'sadly'? Because I was going to write something similar myself! Now I have to think of something new. :)

HS

22/06/2010Well, well, well, Mst of the Universe Fordham HAS been a very busy little boy: http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/a-concoction-of-abject-horror-but-who-was-the-real-mastermind-20100621-ysbs.html

NormanK

22/06/2010HS We may have to refine the definition of a "gotcha". Your example is a "rolled gold" fake gotcha and Sarah Hanson Young's effort last night on Q&A was a "solid gold" gotcha. There is a place for gotcha journalism when it produces Tony Abbott's gospel admission although to be fair his and Ms Hanson Young's were partially self-inflicted. I was so glad to hear that question asked and the subsequent debate cheered me up a lot. I thought last night's Q&A was a good indicator of what we are likely to see in an election campaign. The Greens torn between selfish seat-acquisition and a genuine desire to influence the political landscape - if they continue to try to have a bob each way by bashing Labor they will make themselves irrelevant. Unless they actually think they can win government in the next ten years. Wow. The Liberals biting their tongues to avoid disunity when there is clearly a huge split running right through the middle of their ranks. "Lie to Me" analysts would have had a field day with Turnbull's face - he does so often wear his heart on his sleeve. Joe Hockey will only be able to keep it up for a limited amount of time before he lets something slip and as we know, in the rarified air of an election campaign, falling out of step makes big headlines. The Nationals not even invited to dinner. Labor drawing on all of the ammunition that they have been storing up to refute the claims of waste etc etc and a very clear policy path for the next ten years and more. On a slightly different tack, I was inspired by Mungo MacCallum's item linked above to wonder if we could send our 'leading political journalists' off for a spot of paid 'life experience'. Say once every six months they have to go to a remote working environment - no laptop, no mobile, in fact no phone and access to only those other media sources which the local community use. Send Andrew Bolt off to serve up food in a mess hall in a remote mining camp for instance. Surely part of the circle-jerk mentality is that their working environment is so tiny and incestuous that they must inevitably become self-obsessed and self-important. Perhaps if they were reminded on a regular basis that there are literally millions and millions of Australians who couldn't give a rat's arse what some ponce in Canberra thinks because they are too busy getting on with their lives instead of microscopically examining bellybutton lint. I feel obliged to pass on my 83-year-old mother's remarks from last night. This is a woman who rarely swears (but is no prude) and with whom I rarely if ever talk politics. Over dinner last night the TV was blathering on in the next room about more dismal poll results for Labor when out of nowhere this great-grandmother exclaimed : "Oh bullshit!" and no more. Guess they haven't convinced her that the sky is falling.

HS

22/06/2010NormanK, Your mother was erudite in her simplicity. Would that Kevin Rudd could take some 'erudition in simplicity' lessons off her, as Tony Abbott, policy vacuum and empty vessel that he is, is creaming the PM because, day in, day out, TA comes up with killer lines. They may be essentially meaningless, but boy they sound convincing!

Lyn

22/06/2010Hi Hillbilly Malcolm Farr has written a fairly truthful column [b]Tiny Tony has big problems, Malcolm Farr, Telegraph[/b] Even if he continues to be Tiny Tony, the shrinking Opposition Leader, he will remain a target—for voters. http://blogs.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/malcolmfarr/index.php/dailytelegraph

NormanK

22/06/2010HS Tony Abbott's one-liners will be negated when he has to sustain the bluster for more than 30 seconds without his minders. He will be torn between what he has been told to sell and what he really thinks. I haven't seen this mentioned elsewhere, but I've always believed most of what he says 'off-the-cuff' is what he truly thinks and his considered statements are what the party allow him to say. "Phoney Tony" is the real deal and "Gospel Tony" is the fake party spokesperson. Personally, I find this more scary because this is the version which will come out of hiding if he were to become the hero of the Conservatives. Some of Phoney is one-upmanship (that's not a knife) which is another trap for him in unscripted debate. AA, HS and Lyn I have been remiss in not thanking you for your encouraging words. Thank you.

Lyn

22/06/2010[b]TODAY'S LINKS PART 2[/b] Wonderful piece to cheer everyone, about Kevin Rudd On Line Opinion: [i]Kevin might actually win?!, Dilan Thampapillai, On Line Opinion[/i] Kevin Rudd, a degree of admiration for him and a sense that he’s [b]almost perfect for the role of Prime Minister [/b]barring a few key flaws, all of which can be fixed. http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=10587 [i]Newspoll in the marginals: Labor gone? , Peter Brent, Mumble[/i] They surveyed Lindsay on the same weekend as the Penrith by-election, which very likely boosted Liberal support at the expense of Labor. http://mumble.com.au/?p=2625 [i]Marginal Seat Newspolling, Possum Comitatus, Pollytics[/i]. [b]Whoever thought that was a smart idea needs a cup of tea, a Bex and a good lie down. T[/b]http://blogs.crikey.com.au/pollytics/ [i]Time to bring the troops home?, Media Wrap, Crikey[/i] The Australian government’s resolve to stay in the war in Afghanistan has again been called into question http://www.crikey.com.au/2010/06/22/time-to-bring-the-troops-home/

janice

22/06/2010HS said: [quote]Tony Abbott, policy vacuum and empty vessel that he is, is creaming the PM [/quote] No Hillbilly, Abbott is not creaming the PM but the rotten-to-the-core pack of media hyenas are doing the creaming. Left to his own self, Abbott would already be political road kill.

Canbra Dave

22/06/2010This article from Peter van Onselen is amusing. http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/opinion/julia-needs-to-act-to-save-the-party/story-e6frg6zo-1225882500751 With his deadline having passed and gone with nothing happening van Onselen is now openly calling on Julia Gillard to challenge Rudd. His claim is that it is in 'the best interests of the Labor party' but his political science degree seems to have fallen by the wayside as any half-way competent political commentator could tell you that switching leaders a few months out from an election is a sign of panic and would do more damage than good. Then again it would make dashing good reading.

jason

22/06/2010Hi HBS, Just watched David Spears try a gotcha with Nick Champion over the ETS and being gutless on not going to a dd on the matter, to which Mr Champion's reply was we had a mandate from the last election we put it up 3 times and it was still knocked back and there was no garantee it would be passed in a joint sitting.Spears moved on to the polls Champion said the only ones talking about leadership were journos. Spears would have none of this until Champion said I was door koncking on the weekend no one he spoke to wanted rudd to go, they in fact were interested in the NBN and parental leave etc, Spears asked why cant you get that message out there then? Why indeed? LTD News doesn't have an interest Mr Spears would be my guess Seems to me Spears is another LTD News

Lyn

22/06/2010Hi Jason David Speers is so pro Liberal it's unbelievable. He constantly buts in on Labor interviewees, tries to put words in their mouths and cuts them off constantly when they don't say what he wants. Speers is quite Rude in his quest to get rid of Kevin Rudd, if the polls are good for Kevin Rudd (when they were) he will not want to talk about them. As for get the message out there, if Speers and the other press gallery galahs would talk about Government policy instead of faux leadership challenges, and polls. the public would then know and understand what is going on.

Lyn

22/06/2010Hi Canbra Dave van Onselen has lost the plot, he is now employed by Murdoch, so his credentials for fair analysis and reporting have been flushed down the sink. Most of the stuff he is scribbling up is utter rubbish, pure gossip, actually not much better than Glenn Milne, Dennis Shanahan, and Bolt.

Lyn

22/06/2010Hi Ad and Hillbilly This column is well worthwhile reading, enjoy: [i]Galahs and polls, Malcolm Farnsworth, unleashed[/i Recent weeks have been especially trying for us simple souls attempting to work out whether Kevin Rudd is a dead duck. http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/stories/s2933377.htm

nasking

22/06/2010Great links all. I'm gonna put some over at the Cafe too "courtesy of The Political Sword"...and as usual top effort Lyn. :) I've put a new post up: [quote]Abbott’s So Plain Speaking They Had To Gag Him[/quote] http://cafewhispers.wordpress.com/2010/06/22/abbotts-so-plain-speaking-they-had-to-gag-him/ N'

Lyn

22/06/2010Hi Nasking You are just a wonderful big handsome bear, thankyou for your kind remarks. Glad you enjoy the links, all my friends on "The Political Sword" just make my day. That's an excellent idea to post the links at he Cafe Whispers, saves your commenters a lot of time and bother chasing around. Thankyou for letting us know you have a new post, I am going straight over there. [i]Abbott’s So Plain Speaking They Had To Gag Him, Nasking, Cafe Whispers[/i] Yea, Abbott’s so plain speaking they had to gag him. http://cafewhispers.wordpress.com/2010/06/22/abbotts-so-plain-speaking-they-had-to-gag-him

BH

22/06/2010Jason - "Why can't you get that out" (Spiers). I always have a longing for Labor pollies like Nick Champion to say 'because journalists like you are determined to ensure it doesn't get out because you ask stupid questions about leadership and polls instead'. I long for the day.

nasking

22/06/2010Yer so kind Lyn, you sweet yellow bird...I've just linked to yer "Daily Links" by way of the word 'Political Sword'...and an article I found useful from The Daily Bludge. Referred to you as [quote]link-seeker Lyn [/quote] Gracias. :) N'

HS

22/06/2010NormanK, Just off twitter: the real Tony declared in the Coalition Party room this morning, "We are within reach of a famous victory!" There's that Howardesque hubris creeping out again. :)

HS

22/06/2010BH, I think that that is exactly what MPs should say given even half a chance. Don't even wait for the question about the subject, just tack that statement onto the end of the answer to the question about leadership, polls, yada, yada...

HS

22/06/2010lyn, I'm a follower of Malcolm Farnsworth's Tweets.

NormanK

22/06/2010How's this? If the speaker doesn't follow his cues, just add it in anyway. Linda Mottram putting words in the mouth of the Chinese Vice President no less. http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/connectasia/stories/201006/s2933682.htm "In his opening speech and keynote address, Xi Jinping, was enthusiastic about Australia .. despite an element of uncertainty created not just in China but elsewhere by the Rudd government's planned new mining super profits tax, though there was no specific mention of that issue."

nasking

22/06/2010Hillbilly, I noted yer exasperation w/ the ABC earlier. Ya know, I turned off the 7:30 Report halfway thru last night...the first time ever I deleted that recording w/out finishing. N'

Jason

22/06/2010BH & HS, Bob Mcmullen on PM Assaination Speers asked about the polls McMullen said the only ones taking about dumping Rudd was the press gallery and he hadn't heard of any within the party that wanted a spill, He also told Speers that the Australian is dishonest in the way they interpret and wite about Newspoll.

Lyn

22/06/2010Hi Jason I watched agenda, Bob Mcmullen told golden boy straight didn't he.

BH

22/06/2010Jason - thanks for the McMullen piece. I missed it on Agenda although I saw a little of Mark Kenny who tries to be fair. McMullen is one who actually can come out and say what he thinks because he is retiring. He is clear speaking and perhaps he is the one theGovt. should be using.

Lynchpin

22/06/2010TPS, further to one of the central complaints running around at the moment re the ABC - I was listening to Tony Delroy last night and he has taken up the habit of inviting Dennis Shanahan onto his show to have a political chat. This seems in keeping with the Murdochisation that seems to be occurring. Dennis had the insight to tell the listeners last night that Rudd's RSPT is like Howard's selling of the Snowy Mountains Scheme - ie something close to all our hearts which has some sort of cultural significance. Balderdash and bunkum. If anyone else is concerned re Shanahan's creeping into the ABC, could I suggest we write to Delroy to suggest some balance - eg get Laura Tingle on.

HS

22/06/2010nasking, I have been truly liberated as a result of not slavishly hanging off every word that the ABC utters about politics. Thank you Masterchef! If it's really important NewsRadio replays the quintessential interview from either the 7.30 Report or Lateline the next morning. If it's really, really necessary to track down a part of the show then there's always iView or transcripts. Lately, however, it's been such a simulacrum of News Ltd. there's been no need to bother. * I loved yer blog today, 'N. It made me think that the Coalition have Abbott out front now as a sort of combination between Howard and George Dubya. All the political markers are there, the ostentatious athleticism, the snappy soundbites, the floating policy provisions which bend with the prevailing breeze of public opinion and particular audience, the seeming geniality hiding a covert arch-conservative agenda that the press never asks about, so fixated are they with the government, which is exactly how the conservatives have manipulated the situation to their advantage. 1996 all over again, in other words, except with the superficial gloss of generational change in the form of Abbott.

HS

22/06/2010NormanK, That example of agenda running is worthy of ABC Watch. Doesn't it make you sick? I mean, when you watch Question Time and see the superior performance of the Rudd government cf the Abbott Opposition, and run through the achievments of the Rudd government over 2 and a half years and compare that with what Howard didn't do over 12 years, it makes you wonder how it is that the Opposition are nipping at the heels of the Rudd government in the opinion polls. Well, there's 2 main reasons, the media's got their back, and the Opposition have superior media strategy and soundbites.

HS

22/06/2010Lynchpin, That's horrifying to hear that Shamaham has infiltrated Tony Delroy's show. It's almost as if the ABC announcers have been ordered to have him around. I guess we don't get to hear the dulcet tones and fair and reasonable analysis of Laura Tingle because she's not a political whore.

Johnny Button

22/06/2010Canbra Dave Like I asid on PB this morning, why would 'Bang & Olufsen', Shamahan and News want Gillard to take over if she is more likely to beat Abbott? Because it isn't true. They know that Rudd will beat Abbott one on one, so that is why they are pushing this line. In addition, I'd say they would have a little grubby campaign against Gillard if she did takeover. It is all suspect if they want Abbott to win and yet they are talking up Gillard's ability to beat Abbott.

HS

22/06/2010Jason, I have always respected Bob McMullen. It was a pity he never got back onto the Front Bench. Actually, I believe that the PM may have deliberately let a few MPs loose onto the airwaves to speak their mind in the run-up to the election, as playing nice with the media certainly hasn't worked. There were those who said he should have done it sooner because the Murdoch Press was never going to play ball with him, and, as we have seen to our horror, the ABC has been all too willing to follow in News Ltd.'s wake. So what has the Rudd government got to lose? Certainly not the Press Gallery's respect, they never had any for Rudd.

HS

22/06/2010Canbra Dave, Of course we all know that as soon as the ALP changed leaders to Julia Gillard the stories about a 'panicked government' would start. Then they'd ineluctably move into the 'fiasco' of the BER and beat her about the head with that until the election.

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22/06/2010LYN'S DAILY LINKS updated: http://www.thepoliticalsword.com/page/Lyns-Daily-Links.aspx

NormanK

22/06/2010HS "Well, there's 2 main reasons, the media's got their back, and the Opposition have superior media strategy and soundbites." I can only agree with half of this. Not for one moment do I believe the ALP have a slack media strategy - we just haven't seen it yet. As I've said elsewhere, there is little to be gained by launching an assault now - a couple of polling points just aren't worth the energy this far from an election. The government is doing just enough media to keep things ticking over and are instead concentrating on implementing policy. The Opposition would be very foolish indeed to believe Tony's "we're almost there, they're on the ropes" bravado. This would be a very big trap to fall into. The only concern for Labor is party unity and it seems this is strong. Wait 'til the dogs are let loose and enjoy the sport.

nasking

22/06/2010"It made me think that the Coalition have Abbott out front now as a sort of combination between Howard and George Dubya. All the political markers are there" Thnx Hillbilly. Funny ya should say that...I've always thought it eeerie how both Abbott & Bush luv their cycling. And both are the types to promote themselves to the ladies like they are "God's gift to women". But I think the Australian population need to remember that GW Bush was also an economic dunce, or at least disinterested...and an impetuous & volatile religious war-mongering crusader like Tony abbott Abbott. And the experiment w/ Bush led the American people off the Iraq war & GFC cliff. http://media.pegasusnews.com/pegasus/img/photos/2009/01/11/crash2_t520.jpg I think the same will happen here if Abbott gets in. His focus on cycling & other pursuits in order to get his zealot feelings and angst/anger out. N'

HS

22/06/2010N', You forgot that jock walk that Abbott and Dubya effect. :)

HS

22/06/2010NormanK, We can only hope they are that organised in the federal ALP. There was one report recently that said that, behind the scenes the PM's office was chaos. Probably hyperbole and you hope so.

Lyn

22/06/2010Hi Jason Hubris inflicted Phoney, has fell in the soup I think: Here is a linnk to Bob McMullan words: [i]Abbott tells MPs victory within grasp , Sandra O'Malley, SMH[/i] Retiring Labor backbencher Bob McMullan believes it's almost impossible for the government to lose from its current position in the polls. http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-national/abbott-tells-mps-victory-within-grasp-20100622-yvh6.html

john

22/06/2010It could be good for Labor. Being seen as the underdog, I mean.

Jason

22/06/2010Thanks Lyn, I did enjoy McMullen giving it to Spears, he's had the shock of his life today with Nick Champion giving it to him at lunch time although I didn't see AM edition taking kids to school as (Occupation is house husband). LTD News will now circle the wagons Liberals from now on to bag Rudd as they haven't any policy except ban unions and border protection.Is Abbott Kim Jong Il by any chance they seem to have a lot in common?

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22/06/2010Folks Thank-you Lyn for a fabulous set of informative links. I’ve read them all along with all the comments that arrived during my absence. We see a continuation of the bootstrapping of the ‘Rudd must/will soon be replaced meme’, a pathetic attempt to create rather than report the news. Having failed to get the poor outcome for Rudd from Monday’s [i]Newspoll[/i] that they wanted, they are trying to use, without much success, the marginal seats polls today to drive home the ‘Labor is sinking’ meme. David Spears seems to have joined the ‘get Rudd’ throng. Jason, it’s good to see Bob McMullan, for whom I have great respect going back to the Whitlam years, taking on Spears. I believe it’s ‘gloves off’ time with the media. Government ministers have to call them for the disingenuous frauds so many of them are. Is this the worst performance from MSM journalists we have seen in recent years? They seem to be driven by News Limited’s extreme determination to get rid of Rudd. ‘They will decide who governs this country, not the electorate.’ The media will internally combust when Rudd is re-elected – it will face another three years of demonizing our PM before he faces another election. That will create for them intense fury and frustration, but who cares?

Lyn

22/06/2010Hi Everybody Ummmmmmmmm [b]Abbott denies 'famous victory' comments Posted 7 minutes ago [/b] http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/06/22/2934133.htm 'Victory within our grasp' says Abbott , News Com "Victory is within our ready grasp," he told them. "We are in reach of a famous victory." http://www.news.com.au/breaking-news/victory-within-our-grasp-says-abbott/story-e6frfku0-1225882931369 Abbott tells MPs victory within grasp , Sandra O'Malley, SMH Retiring Labor backbencher Bob McMullan believes it's almost impossible for the government to lose from its current position in the polls. http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-national/abbott-tells-mps-victory-within-grasp-20100622-yvh6.html

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22/06/2010Lyn Thanks for these links. Abbott wants 'underdog' status, but hubris is killing that. So he back-tracks, back-flips, denies what he said to his party room. After all, he only SAID it, he didn't WRITE it down. So it might not be true at all.

Lyn

22/06/2010Hi Ad I love it when you get back, I love seeing your lovely smiling gravatar on the page. Hope you had a nice day. Yes Phoney, has decided to [b]say[/b] he din't [b]say[/b] what he [b]said[/b]

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22/06/2010Lyn Your comments are a delight to us all. I did have a nice day - the sick relative is now fine. I'll be around all day tomorrow. Good night.

Daisey May

22/06/2010I wonder how long the little love affair between Murdoch and the ABC will continue given that the old buzzard is trying to buy a controlling share of BSKYB? Many people are rightly concerned that the contract for the international broadcasting arm of the ABC run Australia Network which is due for renewal in August will fall into the hands of Sky News which is about to be taken over by Rupert the Grave. Given that the vituperous old viper has been spitting his charmless brand of poison at the "content thieves, plagiarists and kleptomaniacs" on the net front, how long before he trains his guns upon the ABC? No doubt he is loving the free ride the ABC is giving him and the shameless promotion of the Australian newspaper in contravention of the ABC's charter to avoid such partisan rubbish, but it won't last for too much longer no matter how many Liberals are on the board. The ABC is a direct competitor with News Corp and the disgraceful seduction and slow motion undressing of the National Broadcaster in full view of the Australian population is both warped and alarming to witness. In this Pas de deux, News is all sinew and braggadocio and unfortunately, the haplessly nicknamed Aunty lives up to her monicker with sagging chest afore puffed out, scabby knees revealed in every lift and an intellectual derriere that sinks faster than an anchor lonesome for the bottom of the sea.It is the most unsightly mismatch in living memory. An aging despot with the morals of a civet cat intent on befouling the very air we breath with his feotid scent intent on wooing an aging Southern belle who he plans to denounce with extreme prejudice shortly after deflowering her. I am supposedly paying 8 cents a day to watch this tawdry melodrama unfold and rumour has it that Unkie Rupes will only charge us 1 or 2 dollars a day for his verbal vomit. The ABC was once a respected instituion but its slide into chasing ratings has made it little better than an extended version of Today Tonight or god forbid, A Current Affair.

jimbo

22/06/2010over the past couple of days i have been reading pieces by journalists who i feel havent lost their ethical standards and are reporting the facts without fear or favour and in an unbiased manner which i have found quite invigorating, as well i have found the number of these journalists increasing,albeit sowly,but increasing all the same.also i read about wison tuckey the convicted criminal who attacked an aboriginal man with an electric cable but still needed a couple of blokes to hold the person even though tuckey had a weapon,(i also thought to myself that all these attackers needed was a uniform,a white pointy hat to fit their white pointy heads and some white gowns).now we have a liberal party i didnt think could get any lower and surprise surprise out comes tuckey,even before it was known if the miners had survived or not,telling all and sundry it was the rspt that had caused this even though the miners were there to check on mines that were already operational,to me that puts tuckey lower than a snakes belly,what a total loser this bloke is and after seeing the photo on the internet he looked like a paraletic yoda.concerning the polls labour is in a reasonable position considering the mining companies attacks,the media bias and the opposition rubbish.also andrew robb a few weeks ago told us that he had a stint in polling and that you could make a poll say what you wanted just by a bit of tweaking but even still this crap that abbott has closed the gap on preferred prime minister is total fabrication as a poll like that has a plus or minus three percent so it may have been a twelve to fourteen point spread so knowing shanahan he would go for the lower spread.knowing the unaustralian is having trouble with decreasing patronage maybe a way to keep that slide going is to keep up the scrutineering of their stories that are suspect and get the real story out on the blogoshere,also if people remember some of the tv channels had a similar problem a few years back when people wouldnt watch their shows channel nine being the latest one and one they have only just gotten over,seven and ten also went through it and who was it that did that,viewers and who helped them get back viewers did.i for one dont watch the abc anymore i watch masterchef and the weekend cartoons or movies or dvds.AA your idea about a media watch with thumbs is good and should continue but i would go through all the blogs on the political saword and the journalistic links and post them have two rows one for bias and one for unbiassed and then give both a number of thumbs either up or down as the case may be.

Holly Wood

22/06/2010Here's what probably qualifies as another Gotcha moment. Nikki Savva, Peter Costello's forner press secretary writing a piece for The Drum, in which she cites Kevin Rudd's speech at the Mid Winter Ball where he told the miners: 'watch out guys, we have long memories etc etc'. Of course that was a VEILED THREAT! Not a bad joke from someone who is famous for not making good jokes, but a veiled threat. After all, veiled threats should ALWAYS be done in full view of hundreds of well-dressed collegues, journalists and people who basically hate you. Nikki's piece, of course, outlines that the remark was not without precedence as she has it on good authority that Labor has a great history of punishing its detractors. """""A few weeks ago, the Minister for Infrastructure, Anthony Albanese, was overheard telling people the government would win the fight against the miners, would win the election, and would remember who had sided with the government and who had sided with the opposition. Especially those who had allowed themselves to be filmed in Tony Abbott's office. No one then was in any doubt about what Albanese meant. This is a step above the regular attempted bullying and intimidation by Rudd's media minders of journalists deemed unsympathetic. Labor has a long and not very proud history of punishing those who cross it""""". I love the ominous 'no one was in any doubt about what Albanese meant'. I mean really... Anthony Albanese just radiates brutality right? HE'S the bully right? And as we all know, the Libs are filled with ole softies like Wilson Tuckey.

Jason

22/06/2010Radio Bolt, Melbourne’s newest radio station, MTR 1377, has failed to make an impact, attracting an average audience of just 10,000 people and a market share of 1.7 per cent in this morning’s ratings report. I guess in multicultral Melbourne there's not much call for Dog whistle radio, this explains why he's on Insiders he's not heard in his home market.

vote1maxine

23/06/2010Hi HS Your comment @ June 21. 2010 08:48 PM "...New Zealand,... and now they play better Soccer than us too." really hurt but the Truth can hurt. But we wish the All Whites the very best as long as ..... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwYpY4IxibE

Lyn

23/06/2010[b]TODAY'S LINKS[/b] [bOur good friend Grog with another Enjoyable piece, thankyou Grog[/b][i] On the Qt:Little Red Corvette Edition, Grog, Grog's Gamut[/i] easy Question Time for the Government, mostly because the opposition asked the same question to Rudd on the RSPT four times, http://grogsgamut.blogspot.com/2010/06/on-qt-little-red-corvette-edition.html [i]Is Kevin Rudd the Victim of Media Group Think?, KevinRennie, THEANGLE. ORG[/i]theangle’s Kevin Rennie details why reports of the prime minister’s political death are greatly exaggerated. . http://theangle.org/2010/06/22/is-kevin-rudd-the-victim-of-media-group-think/ [i]ABBOTT'S AT IT - AGAIN, Petering Time, North Coast Voices[/i] Sorry mate, I'd like to believe you but your lips were moving at the time! http://northcoastvoices.blogspot.com/2010/06/abbotts-at-it-again.html [i]Victory within grasp, Abbott tells MPs, Emme Rodgers, ABC[/i] Mr Abbott said the Opposition was within reach of a famous victory http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/06/22/2934000.htm [i]POLITICAL PERFORMANCE: The good, the bad and the funny, Vex News[/i] Last night’s QandA show was great for those who want to see the future of the Greens political party. http://www.vexnews.com/news/9775/political-performance-the-good-the-bad-and-the-funny/ [i]Put down your weapons" - Ken Henry, Peter Martin[/i] I think there are occasions on which economists might, at least for a period, put down their weapons and join a consensus"... http://petermartin.blogspot.com/ [i]The Resources Super Profits Tax and Decoupling: Is Australia still coupled to America, Nukestrategywonk, The Vile Maxim.[/i] The RSPT is a part of the government’s strategy to ease our way through the inevitable big boom. http://vilemaxim.wordpress.com/ [i]Marginal seat polling and the Rudd government's position, Mark, Larvatus Prodeo[/i] misinterpretation by Newspoll’s owners (egregious comments from Dennis Shanahan implying that the three marginals surveyed in Queensland could be translated into a state wide swing are just the start). lhttp://larvatusprodeo.net/ [i]Downer On Rudd : Studious, Bright, Passionate, Qualities Shine Through Darryl Mason, The Orstrahyn[/i] Kevin Rudd, PM, knows stuff, speaks a foreign language — and a hard one at that — and works day and night with barely a break to sleep. http://theorstrahyun.blogspot.com/2010/06/downer-on-rudd-studious-bright.html [i]The Australian, firmly steering the ship of state to the right, Loon Pond, Dorothy parker[/i] Peter van Onselen's Julia needs to act to save the party, written with the kind of rhetorical flourish we usually associate with Chicken Little announcing that the sky is falling down. http://loonpond.blogspot.com/2010/06/australian-firmly-steering-ship-of.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+LoonPond+%28loon+pond%29

HS

23/06/2010Jason, Jack the Insider has a blog about the DPRK. Maybe you should put your comment about Kim Jong-Abbott there!

HS

23/06/2010Tony Abbott's been caught out 'clarifying' the report of his hubristic remarks to the Coalition partyroom yesterday. How could he ever be elected Prime Minister of this country when he is such an obvious duplicitous liar? Or is that perennial 'clarifier'?

Johnny Button

23/06/2010Morning All Read the link below it will give you clues to the Libs answer to the RSPT. A rise in the GST. We were discussing this on PB last night and the potential for it to be between 15-20%. Shame Liberals Shame. We'll just hit everyone instead of getting a fairer amount from Miners. http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/if-its-tax-reform-you-want-try-the-gst-20100622-yvgq.html

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23/06/2010LYN'S DAILY LINKS updated: http://www.thepoliticalsword.com/page/Lyns-Daily-Links.aspx

Augustus

23/06/2010Nasking, your comment June 22. 2010 06:22 PM, "But I think the Australian population need to remember that GW Bush was also an economic dunce, or at least disinterested...and an impetuous & volatile religious war-mongering crusader like Tony abbott Abbott." I am currently reading "Ambling into History" Frank Bruni "The unlikely odyssey of Goerge W. bush" I have to agree with you I have been drawing the same conclusions about tony Abbott myself, but after reading this I am genuinely worried that Abbott with a lot of help form the MSM and now the Minerals Council will somehow steal Government. H.S. I saw Red Kerry trying for more Gotchas last night with Nicola Roxon. Sigh!!!

NormanK

23/06/2010AA Our letters to 7.30 Reportland are not getting through. Between 3.00 pm Friday and 11.00 am Monday only half a dozen letters were posted. I tried again Monday - no joy. Tried again this morning - not holding my breath. Democracy at work. What is going on with Kerry? Analysis of last night's Roxon interview transcript shows not much difference from his usual style and content but he was practically apoplectic with anger. Why has this become so personal for him? Surely he is too experienced a campaigner to have let 'Angry Kevin' and 'Phoney Tony' fame go to his head. Last night I wouldn't have been surprised if he had come out with : "Yeah but you told Mum and now I'm in big trouble," like a petulant four-year-old. I wonder does he realise that he is making a fool of himself. I also get the impression that the ALP have got his measure and refuse to be goaded and in fact defuse him by agreeing with some of the criticism.

Sally

23/06/2010NormanK Two (or more) possibilities re getting your letter/post through to Aunty. First is that they have been bombarded with criticism and have decided to heavily censor them. Alternatively, as I have read on several other blogs, they are identifying your IP or email address and using that to filter out individuals. I've come up with a solution to the latter (not that I've had any problems to date but others have). I emailed AA offering to write up something which he could distribute to those interested but I guess with a sick relative and other more important issues he has either overlooked the email or not got around to reading it.

janice

23/06/2010Johnny Button, I read the discussion re GST on Poll Bludger this morning. I agree with you all that Abbott will increase the GST to 15% at least and more if he thinks he can get away with it. If Abbott was questioned about this (and I won't be holding my breath that it will be brought up) he will deny it. However, in my view the voters will lapse into a hysterical freak out if they have even a remote suspicion that Abbott will raise the GST. It is up to the 5th Estate to sow the seeds of a raised GST out there and watch them grow.

Holly Wood

23/06/2010Tony Abbott has been flying under the radaar for far too long. Hiding him from the media is a good trick while it lasts, but pretty soon he'll have to stick his head up for air. Hopefully the Government can capitalise on Abbott's mortgage findings and really hold him accountable. Craig Emerson made a nice start below... “Tony wants to be the prime minister of Australia, and I guess it does raise some questions about his capacity to run a trillion-dollar economy when he forgets that he's got a $700,000 mortgage to declare.” Abbott was lamenting (or joking) in January that losing government was not just loss of power, but loss of income as well. The government could have a field day with this latest finding, why not remind battlers that if Tony can't survive on a minister's salary complete with perks and super, why does he think (the rather perk-less) WorkChoices will be fair on 'working families'? Why is he opposing the Super Profits Tax that'll help families with a smaller income than his...? and so on...

NormanK

23/06/2010Sally Thanks for that. Although suspicious by nature, I hadn't really entertained the thought that the ABC would use IP filters. At worst I suspected they might be achieving "balanced debate" by only posting an equal number from each side but if that means that when 50 people complain and 5 people approve, they only post 5 of each then they are not at all serious about wanting feedback. Lip service at best. I didn't follow-up your earlier links regarding IP addresses because at the same time I decided to follow Janice's (I think) advice and not give News Ltd my clicks and so haven't been back there since. I should add, it's a bit like dropping sugar from your diet - in a remarkably short time you don't miss it. I can only hope that Media Watch is having a long look at comments sections re filters, censorship and blacklists.

Lyn

23/06/2010Hi Ad Wonder if there is more to this story, leading to something underhanded. Wonder why this wasn't recorded for nearly 2 years. Seems a massive amount, $710,000 to send 2 girls to school & living costs, WOW! Tony Abbott's secret $710,000 home loan , Simon Benson, The Daily Telegraph Abbott took out loan on his family home May be in breach of Parliamentary rules Cash used to fund cost of living, school fees http://www.news.com.au/national/tony-abbotts-secret-710000-home-loans/story-e6frfkvr-1225882959756 Failure to declare mortgage has Tony Abbott under new loan stress , Joe Kelly, The Australian The Opposition Leader took out the mortgage after losing his ministerial salary when the Howard government was ousted, to help cover living costs including private school fees for two of his three daughters. http://www.theaustralian.com.au/politics/failure-to-declare-mortgage-has-tony-abbott-under-new-loan-stress/story-e6frgczf-1225883125818 Abbott's campaign correction,Alister Drysdale, Business Spectator Tony Abbott forgot to declare a $710,000 mortgage loan on his pecuniary interest file for a couple of years – an “oversight” his office calls it Abbott must realise that throwing dirt is no guarantee it will not blow back. http://www.businessspectator.com.au/bs.nsf/Article/Abbotts-campaign-correction-pd20100623-6P3NB?OpenDocument

gusface

23/06/2010Hola Swordians Apparently Abbott is going to raise the GST to between 15-20%

nasking

23/06/2010"am currently reading "Ambling into History" Frank Bruni "The unlikely odyssey of Goerge W. bush" I have to agree with you I have been drawing the same conclusions about tony Abbott myself, but after reading this I am genuinely worried that Abbott with a lot of help form the MSM and now the Minerals Council will somehow steal Government." Hi Augustus...yes, it's quite possible. Does bring back memories of Gore/Bush. The Neo-CONS & their allies are a desperate lot of money grabbing mongrels & zealots who will do anything to regain power here & in America. I've put up a new post: [quote]Coalition Brings in Dump Truck Whilst Pointing At Labor Shovel[/quote] http://cafewhispers.wordpress.com/2010/06/23/coalition-brings-in-dump-truck-whilst-pointing-at-labor-shovel/ [quote]Poor Tony Abbott. Get out the hankies & violins. It seems that the Liberal’s ”Master of slime, vitriol & backstabbing” is now to be protected like the boy in the plastic bubble. And apparently his minders in the Liberal Party are so concerned about his welfare they are prepared to go to any length to ensure the good people of this country are made aware of the fact that the Federal Labor Party are the equivalent of a chimera created from the genes of Kyle Sandilands, Rush Limbaugh & Eric Cartman from South Park. That’s right, apparently the ALP during this election year are the ultimate bullying professionals bringing a swarm of locusts and rain of poo down on our fragile victim Mr. Authentic[/quote] Thnx for the links Lyn. I'm heading off for a couple of days...back lunchtime Friday. Keep up yer great work PS. N'

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23/06/2010Sally In a post on 14 June you mentioned about how to overcome having one's ISP address recognised: [i]"TPS people, Have a quick look at these two sites just to prove how easy it is to record your ISP and have it recognised immediately, AND, more importantly, how to possibly overcome it. There are also freebie sites but I don't know anything about any of them including the ones I'm sending. Just for general info. I'll pursue in greater depth. http://www.hide-my-ip-address.com/hideip/?pu=false http://www.torproject.org/overview.html.en[/i] The only email from you I can find, on 30 May, was on another subject, to which I replied. Anyway, if there's any information that visitors to[i]TPS[/i] might find useful in preventing their IP address recognised, please post it here.

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23/06/2010NormanK I followed up to see if my comment was ever posted on the [i]7.30 Report[/i] 'Letters' but my two never appeared - now I've lost track of where that programme was. I guess one has to get in early and stick to 100 words or less. I'll try again when the opportunity arises. Lyn I've added the links on Tony Abbott's mortgage to LYN'S DAILY LINKS. Thanks for forwarding them. I'm working on something for tomorrow: [i]Kevin Rudd talks funny - so we're knocking him off[/i]

NormanK

23/06/2010AA I have no idea how the posting system works but suddenly one of mine is up. You tried to post twice on June 18 after June 17 interview with PM. All very odd but a bit of a relief.

HS

23/06/2010Ad Astra, 'I'm working on something for tomorrow: Kevin Rudd talks funny - so we're knocking him off' I think, after what I just heard on the 7PM ABC News about a move against the PM, that you should wait and see what happens tonight.

john

23/06/2010One of the wort pieces of journalism I've ever seen. I urge all of you to make a complaint. http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/06/23/2935224.htm

Johnny Button

23/06/2010You guys following what's going in Canberra? A potential spill in the Labor Party.

Lyn

23/06/2010Hi Ad Sky News have gone into overdrive, a huge frenzy. David Speers, Kieren Gillbert, Ashleigh Gillen Peter Van Onselen, there is a spill in Canberra right now to over throw Kevin Rudd.

Lyn

23/06/2010Johnny Button You must be watching too.

Lyn

23/06/2010Hi Ad Talks to oust Australia's Prime Minister Australia Network News http://australianetworknews.com/stories/201006/2935256.htm?desktop Labor figures plot to dump Kevin Rudd - report , News Com, 7.32pm http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/national/labor-figures-plot-to-dump-kevin-rudd/story-e6frf7l6-1225883383543

Snoozer289

23/06/2010This B--lshit, If the labour dump Rudd they will lose the election, this is the Media going into Hyper Drive to try and disstabile the Government as they can see Phoney Tony will not cut the mustard.

Lyn

23/06/2010Hi Snoozer 289 [quote]this is the Media going into Hyper Drive [/quote] I hope you are right. Please let you be right

Daisey May

23/06/2010Unless Gillard comes out strongly in a presser and denounces this shit once and for all then I will only have grim conclusions to draw. Surely the ALP will not fall for all the bullshit and let Abbott win the upcoming election. Stupidity is not the sole provence of the Coalition though and i shudder to think what an Abbott led government will do to this country after all the horrors of the Howard government. Heaven help us.

Snoozer289

23/06/2010The Media are try to justify all their speculations and have built this speculation up to justify there ongoing attempts to undermine the PM and Government over the winter break and lead up to the next election. You only need to hear and see the reaction of key figure like Faulner and Crean. As I said if they do change leaders the will be doomed and this is the type of speculation the media want to distract from the Government achievements and take the limelight of Abbot. For the last 2 weeks abbot has kept a low profile, the 1st time he pops his head up (party meeting) his mounth runs off and he is suddenly the headline for the wrong reason. So the MSM have stepped in to save his ass.

Lyn

23/06/2010Snoozer 289 [quote]So the MSM have stepped in to save his ass. [/quote] I still hope you are right

Snoozer289

23/06/2010Lyn, If I am wrong, then I will not be voting in the next election, I am a very loyal Labour person and I think Julia is a good potential leader, but, I will not support this type of Crap. The MSM are the problem not Rudd and if the Right winger want to take over the party they can stick it.

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23/06/2010HS It is my intention to post the new piece in the morning. It's satirical. This nonsense tonight will subside in 24 hours. Kevin Rudd is off to Canada tomorrow for the G20 so there is less than 24 hours for anyone to make any moves, and Julia's not interested. Rudd is the one best placed to fight Abbott - Rudd's performance today in QT was superb. Can you believe that the move is said to be coming from VIctoria and John Faulkner knows nothing about it!!!!! Labor will not change its leader now. I suspect this is an ABC beat-up based on almost nothing, which is being bootstrapped by the rest of the media hungry for a some sensation.

Lyn

23/06/2010Hi Snoozer289 I think you were right because, they have just had Helen McCabe chatting, now they have Graham Morris. They are all Liberal supporters. Peter Van Onselen, David Speers, Ashleigh Gillan, Keiren Gillbert, Helen McCabe, Graham Morris, not one Labor supporter. They are all still in a frenzy, Julia Gillard won't come out of Kevin Rudd's office, David Speers has never seen anything like it. Speers has had an SMS that all Liberals have been told to shut up.

jimbo

23/06/2010was watching masterchef and a breaking news came up about a leadership crisis and kev is going to talk to julia gillard i hope this is more msm rubbish.

jimbo

23/06/2010is it true abbott is considering hitting the worst off with a fifteen or twenty percent gst i wouldnt put it past him.

Lyn

23/06/2010Hi Ad Here is our best friend Grog, brilliant piece, thankyou Grog [i]On the Qt: The ALP : How to completely Screw it up. Grog, Grog's Gamut[/i] [b]those people behind it in the ALP should be taken out back and gently slapped around the head with a 4x2 plank of wood. And I volunteer to be the one wielding the first slap.[/b] http://grogsgamut.blogspot.com/

Holly Wood

23/06/2010I can't believe this!!!!!!!!!!!! It's just so damaging to the party even if Rudd survives this!! It's all so surreal, it seems like a media beat-up but it's becoming more scary by the second.

Lyn

23/06/2010Hi Holly Wood [quote]It's all so surreal, it seems like a media beat-up but it's becoming more scary by the second. [/quote] I agree, it's scary all right, and it is getting worse by the minute The Punch (of Course) has a live Blog: [b]Live blog: Rudd’s leadership under threat http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/live-blog-rudds-leadership-under-threat/ [/b]

Holly Wood

23/06/2010The big winners in this...Tony Abbott and mainstream media!

Lynchpin

23/06/2010All, I tend to agree. I cannot believe it. I left work tonight thinking Labor is back on track. Watching 730 report and Kerry puts the question to Faulkner about a leadership push in Canberra. I thought he was talking about Turnbull ousting Abbott. This is madness. My wife, whom I consiedr to be a good barometer, thinks Australians won't vote for Gillard because she does not have the profile. So the outcome - Labor loses 2 leaders and is out of Govt for 6 to 9 years. Madness, complete madness. I blame Arbib.

Lyn

23/06/2010Hi Ad Still getting worse: can listen here to 2UE Julia Gillard in Leadership Spill? Posted by: 2UE | 23 June, 2010 - 9:12 PM http://www.2ue.com.au/blogs/2ue-blog/julia-gillard-in-leadership-spill/20100623-yz2p.html

Lyn

23/06/2010Hi Ad Mark Kenny reporting on Sky, Kevin Rudd has agreed to quit. Kevin Rudd, press conference in 5 minutes.

Snoozer289

23/06/2010We will all hold our breath. The MSM have gone beserk, they are convinced that their campaygn to dsstablise the Government has worked and regardless of the outcome they have justified their attacks. This is driven by the MSM, I will continue to say this, and if they successed the furure for Australia and our economy is stuffed (F-----), because we will elect an idiot who cannot manage his own family budget and who is going to be controlled and managed by Big Business and the MSM. I will say this again, if Rudd goes, the Labour will never ever get my support again. I will sit back and begrudgerly accept and live with the decisions of the idiots, as I will finally reliase I cannot have any influence, which is a real shame.

Lyn

23/06/2010Hi Ad The best News conference by Kevin Rudd ever: Kevin Rudd is not going down without a fight. I was elected to do a job. I intend to continue to do that job, and am telling certain factional leaders. There will be a special meeting of the Caucus at 9am tomorrow. Kevin Rudd plans to contest the leadership ballot. I was elected by the people of Australia to do a job. I was not elected by the factional leaders. I think I’m quite capable of winning tomorrow.

jimbo

23/06/2010im with you snoozer i will never vote again my papers will go in blank because if msm and a wrinkled old bastard like murdoch as well as the mining multinationals can change an elected government and impose their own then democract is down the shit shute.if kev gets through this spill he should sack the five or so people involved especially conroy as he is a backstabbing bastard.

Lyn

23/06/2010Jimbo and Snoozer We need to borrow Grog's plank of 4 x 2 wood to slap certain factional leaders.

jimbo

23/06/2010yes lynn stephen conroy first because he is an utter moron and the sooner he gets th flick the better.

jimbo

23/06/2010if kev wins he needs to win by a good margin and vice versa for julia gillard or it will be seen as labour in crisis.

Lyn

23/06/2010Hi Jimbo Well I am a cheer leader for Kevin.

NormanK

23/06/2010Gutless gutless gutless bastards.

Ad astra reply

23/06/2010HS The piece I prepared today is no longer suitable so I'll let yours run until I can prepare another. I thought this action tonight was precipitous and would come to nothing, but we now know there has been plotting behind the scene for weeks, and that if all the news reports are accurate, Julia Gillard will be PM in the morning. Time for bed - it's going to be a long day tomorrow.

NormanK

23/06/2010How's this for an optimistic thought - leadership spill and no-one challenges? Shut the factions up, shut the press up - works for me.

Lyn

23/06/2010Hi Norman K I love your opinion [quote]leadership spill and no-one challenges? Shut the factions up, shut the press up - works for me.[/quote] Works well for me too.

HS

23/06/2010Hi guys! I'm still here. :) I've just been watching in horror and concern for what may eventuate, but may I say that, after listening to Paul Howes voice his concerns on Lateline just now I can say that I now have a better handle on things. He spoke of the pent up frustration that many in the Labor Party were feeling at Kevin Rudd's inablity to get a message across, even when the party had a good story to tell the Australian people. I must say that I concur with him on that front. If I remember rightly, as I haven't gone back to it, but I think I said the same thing myself when I tried to give the PM some sound advice about how he should change his style of governing to arrest the slide in the polls. I used the word 'prolix' and said he had come across recently as sounding a lot like Kim Beazley. Actually, now that I think about it, he is more of a cross between Kim Beazley and Barry Jones. Both highly intelligent men with the best interest of the country at heart, but not 'Foreman Material', not leaders of men or the nation. I fear that Kevin Rudd has fallen into this category. In the collegiate atmosphere of decision-making wrt the GFC, he shone, taking advice and coming to a conclusion. But that's not real leadership, is it? Contrast that with how Julia Gillard stared down the Unions over the ABCC, and the Teachers over the Naplan tests, and how she took on a swathe of portfolios and handled them all with aplomb. That's real leadership. It is that which the party has seen that it needs up front of the show. Thus, and it is with heavy heart that I say this, I can see what Paul Howes is getting at. He is afraid, very afraid, of what Australia will be moulded into if Tony Abbott and the Conservatives(as there is no way that they are Liberals), come to power. So it is in the best interests of the nation therefore, in order to give the ALP the best chance of retaining power and preventing Tony Abbott and the Conservatives from getting their hands on the levers of power, that Kevin Rudd must go. Of course, the Conservatives will trot out the lines that Julia is just a tool of the Union movement as a result of this coup. However, as I have explained above, that is certainly not the case. It is more the case that certain people who can still effect a change while it can mean something, are attempting to do so. Before it is too late.

HS

23/06/2010NormanK, Please don't be sucked into this villification of the factions meme that the Conservatives and their bumboys in the media will push. I think it's more a case of 'interested parties' within the Labor movement having had enough of a high-handed operator who was running the government without the care and concern for those around him in his parliamentary team. Not very collegial or inclusive. They'd had enough, and had perceived that the electorate had intuited the same sorts of things. So they moved against him.

HS

23/06/2010lyn, Don't jump to conclusions about supporting particular individuals. Think of all of the people that are on the bus with Kevin Rudd in this government and how their political lives are being imperilled by his loss of the plot recently. Think of the country. Think about what is needed, which is winning back the electorate to a good party, but who appeared to have become resolutely disenchanted with Kevin Rudd.

Daisey May

23/06/2010I am so heartsick it hurts. If the majority of this country elects Tony Abbott I will survive but be a very sad person indeed. After 12 long years of Howard fucking up this great country it is simply inconcievable to me that punters would want more of that crap. I can only hope. There is a passage somewhere in the bible where a woman is taken to task for waiting in hope for the crumbs that fall from a table to give her some nourishment. I hope to god that sanity prevails but I am not hopeful. Why oh why does the ALP do this sort of shit? Paul Howes in particular is little better than a dog that returns to its own vomit and I am ashamed of him pretending to be a true believer after stabbing Kevin Rudd in the back in such a cowardly fashion. Just when things were starting to look good for Labor we get this lot of badly dressed Cassandra's wading in like a pack of complete idiots fucking it up for everyone. I am truly disgusted and part of me wishes Labor to lose just to show these moronic dickheads that self interest is not necessarily the same as the national interest. If labor loses then Paul Howes, Mark Arbib, Feeny et al will go down in history as the lowest types of dogs in the history of labor. Make no mistake, forever their names will be blackened and deservedly so. The Paul Howes interview on Lateline in particular was so disgusting to watch that it made my blood boil. How he can claim to speak for the Labor faithful is beyond disgraceful and frankly despicable. I hope he is happy with his handywork. He is a young pup and is about to find out what being an ignoble dickhead can do to your electoral fortunes. Labor will now lose the election I think. Good one ALP. This is just fucked, fucked, fucked and we deserve to lose. I absolutely hate this shit. Ahead in the polls? Call a leadership spill months from an election. This is just dumb, dumb, dumb and you dickheads are going to lumber us with fucking Abbott for 3 years. Thanks a fuckin lot.

Lynchpin

23/06/2010HS I agree with you re the feeling I have after Howes' interview on LL. I think Gillard is a good strong communicator. The Libs will run the Union/factions puppet line etc, like they did against Kenneally. Not sure it will work. It might. What will the swinging voter think? Will they respond to a woman PM? Will this damage or strengthen the ALP federally? Who knows? I still think Turnbull will challenge Abbott. I notice the Murdoch press running the story re Abbott's failure to declare the mortgage. Why would they do that? So much not like them. Has Gillard got enough time to put her stamp on things and get the electorate confortable with her. I know my wife is cranky about the disloyalty and reckons she won't be voting for Gillard. Will people punish disoyalty? Not sure - they didn't punish Abbott for knifing Turnbull. I guess we will know all the answers on a Sunday in about 4 months. I must say though that as the news of Gillard's impending elevation sinks in, I do have a spring in my step and feel less heavy of heart. Kev will always be remembered as the one who delivered Govt from the Odious Rodent.

Holly Wood

23/06/2010Just watched Paul Howes, who I used to like, on Lateline. The way he was talking you'd think he ran the country and it was up to him to replace Rudd with Julia for the good of the nation. I don't remember voting for him or Julia. I am so upset!!! I thought the polls were encouraging and he had turned a corner. I mean the sort of stuff Rudd's been bashed with over the past 2 weeks, including Marr's Essay, and he still managed to beat Abbott in PPM. If the media relented a bit, his stocks would have surely risen. They've really misjudged this!!! People who were ticking Julia or the Greens in recent polls were just flirting! They would have gone back to Kevin at the election. I've been hearing that Kev's only 'factional support' was The Australian and when that ran out, they dumped him. It's so sad! Chewed up and spat out!!!

nasking

23/06/2010Short getaway for sanqween & I, unfortunately. That’s politics. NEW POST: The Attempted Dismissal Of Our Prime Minister http://cafewhispers.wordpress.com/2010/06/23/the-attempted-dismissal-of-our-prime-minister/ What a bloody awful night. N’

You must be kidding

23/06/2010WTF are these young turks doing to the Labor Party. The people voted Rudd in not Arbib and howes and the people sould have the right to determine the future of the PM. So sad that the Party is now seen to be run by faceless men who tink nothing of trashing a brand based upon a poll. Go Kevie!!

HS

23/06/2010Lynchpin, Please remind your wife that this spill was not of Julia Gillard's making. She has resisted it strenuously from the get go. She is a reluctant participant but it is a necessary move I feel and she has realised that.

HS

24/06/2010Now is not the time to abandon the best party to run this country. Politics is a brutal bloodsport. I have seen it up close and personal. Sometimes it necessarily has to be this way. At least the Labor Party had the courage to do to Kevin Rudd, once the electorate had stopped listening to him, that the Coalition could not do to John Howard when the same thing happened to him before the 2007 election. The Coalition lost that election remember? I don't want the ALP to lose the upcoming election, do you?

HS

24/06/2010You Must Be Kidding, That's rich coming from you. In fact I don't believe a word of it. You are concern trolling.

HS

24/06/2010An apt piece from afar from Penbo: http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/julia-gillard-is-the-tim-cahill-of-politics/

countryhick

24/06/2010dear swordians I have been reading and enjoying this blog for several months, and join many of you in lamenting what seems to be happening to the political processes in our country. This blog is an oasis of sense in an increasingly malevolent world of opinion-pushing, news-stitching, and democracy-subversion (yeah, I'm feeling a bit paranoid - but that doesn't mean it's not true.) And now this. It feels like complete craziness. Whatever happens looks like a huge win for perversion - perversion of good government, perversion of public opinion, perversion of the role of the media. I pray that good will come of it, but there is so much potential for evil mischief here. I don't think this necessarily strengthens the poisonous position of the Coalition - they have their own stench that lingers in the nostrils of many, many people. But whoever comes out as PM tomorrow will have to hope this clears the air and lets the Government get on with its job, because there will be concerted forces seeking to exploit this for the benefit of opposition and their vested interests. (And for the crescendo of news hunger the press owners require to carry people over the subscription rocks and into their pockets.) It's not that the Govt hasn't made mistakes, but it's the cynical hysteria and dishonesty of much of the criticism that has got us to this point. For the sake of the country, may tomorrow and the coming days bring us some good sense.

nasking

24/06/2010Hillbilly, If Rudd goes like this it will be seen as a BLACK MARK in Labor history. Australia’s history. A DISMISSAL by their own team. Think of the RAMIFICATIONS. The Libs will just turn around and say: "See, we told ya Rudd was a LEMON…just like Latham. Even the Labor party know it. That’s why they PANICKED and got rid of him. They can’t be trusted to run this country by just rolling out lemons.” N'

nasking

24/06/2010Hillbilly, THE PUNCH is a tentacle of the the Murdoch empire. And you listen to them? N'

HS

24/06/2010countryhick, Your avatar looks like a Bushranger! Anyway, welcome to TPS and thank you for your kind words of support. I agree with what you have said and I believe that, if handled properly, we will get that breath of fresh air with Julia coming to the fore. Don't worry, she won't take any shit from either Abbott or the conservative media. :)

HS

24/06/2010Nasking, Nay it is you who appears to be doing the dirty work for the Murdoch empire and the Conservatives. You are trotting out for them all the lines that they will be using tomorrow. Problem is, a cold, hard look at the situation with the Rudd government atm suggests otherwise. Who do you think will be laughing all the way to the ballot box if the 'True Believers' desert the ALP in this, their hour of need? Would you rather the ALP lose nobly? As was mentioned elsewhere(Twitter I think), the ALP had polling about KR that would make your toes curl. Thus, as realpolitik is a brutal bloody sport for realists, not idealists, hard-headed decisions had to be taken, because, as Paul Howes said, if the Conservatives get back in under Tony Abbott, WorkChoices gets back in.

Colen

24/06/2010Hi All, I left but after the news tonight I just had to write in. "AND SO IT HAS COME TO PASS" VERY RELIGIOUS AND VERY APT.

HS

24/06/2010N', I know exactly where 'The Punch' lives. I am also not so one-eyed that I will dismiss it out of hand simply for that reason.

HS

24/06/2010Nas, Go to Twitter if you don't believe me. Julia Gillard is trending higher than the World Cup! People are saying, "You go girl!" There is a spring in their step again for the ALP.

HS

24/06/2010Colen, Good to see you again! Very Shakespearean also methinks. :)

Daisy May

24/06/2010This is a sad and disgraceful day for the ALP. The next few weeks will expose the simpering dogs for all the world to see. Not the mutts of News Ltd or even the mongrels within the ABC but the architects of the downfall of the ALP in the coming election will be plastered from pillar to post and rightly so. After the flush of praise for Gillard's leadership has passed does anyone expect her to last against the onslaught of the Murdoch empire that will follow. The wider public deserves Abbott as the new leader and Gillard as the doomed opposition leader. The ALP will live to regret this decision. I am so shaken by this that I will not post again. The bulbs in my garden need attention and it is probably better to focus on a living thing as opposed to a dead thing. This site is wonderful and I wish it the best.

nasking

24/06/2010"You are trotting out for them all the lines that they will be using tomorrow." Gimme a break Hillbilly! Don't you understand that the Libs have been planning for Julia for ages? Why dya think they did the "lemon" ad. I'm not telling them anything they don't know. What a cheek for you to accuse me of such. I've been one of the most strident critics of the Murdoch empire since the early 2000s...and the Coalition. It's not me who LINKS to them to support their DESPERATE case. When I was on Road to Surfdom all those years ago and fighting other Laborites to pick Rudd/Gillard...and then spent hour after hour. day after day commenting on there to help bring Labor out of the 12 year long drought...and when so many other commentors FLED because they worried of the repercussions if Howard won again...yet I stood FIRM...noone...and I mean noone dared accuse me of trying to help the Murdoch media & the Coalition. The Coalition right-wing think tanbks, Crosby-Textor all that lot aren't freakin' stupid. They did the :lemon" ad for a reason. Get it! N'

HS

24/06/2010Nasking, It's rich of you to accuse me of being a traitor to the cause. I had a blog on LaborFirst as well a long time ago, and I have actually been fighting the good fight over at the Murdoch rags ever since they had blogs, because you have to take the fight up to them, and not rant away on the other side of the political universe. If you want to know how long and hard I fought for Kevin Rudd to get the leadership of the Labor Party, go as Christian Kerr, a friend of mine from Crikey days. He'll tell you that I was pushing Kevin Rudd on him from the Beazley days. However, I am not so blind as those who will not see. Sometimes, as the saying goes, a person gets promoted beyond their pay grade. I have come to the conclusion that Kevin Rudd is not leadership material. Julia Gillard is. They both love the ALP, and I love both of them. I also love the ALP. I actually spent yesterday in a campaign office, setting it up for the upcoming election. Which I will fight tooth and nail for the ALP to win. Now admit it, the KevinOLemon ad was potent because it resonated. Ergo hard decisions needed to be taken for hard times. The 'True Believers' were still listening to Kevin Rudd. Mr and Mrs Tradie in Marginal ElectorateLand were not. That was the problem that needed a solution. Fast. Or the ALP could slowly bleed to political death.

HS

24/06/2010Daisey May, Anger is an energy. Use it to get behind our new leader. Support what the ALP was too timid to do in the first place. Elect julia Gillard as leader. She was always the right one for the job.

nasking

24/06/2010"It's rich of you to accuse me of being a traitor to the cause." EXCUSE ME! I don't recall saying that. You condemned me. "and I have actually been fighting the good fight over at the Murdoch rags ever since they had blogs, because you have to take the fight up to them, and not rant away on the other side of the political universe." What a load of trosh. I also commented on Blogocracy...I commented on bleedin' Fox News sites way back during the Gore/Bush fight. So don't accuse me of not taking the fight to them. And that "ranting" comment will not be forgotten Hillbilly. And BTW, I meant to say the other day, ya know why I don't listen to the 'Happy Mondays': [quote] It came as no surprise when, following the dismal commercial/critical response to Yes, Please!, Happy Mondays called it quits. Megastardom had hit the Manchester bands hard, and this particular group had taken full advantage of the situation. While Stone Roses were busy flinging paint on record company walls and preparing for a five-year hibernation, the Mondays were out spewing racist, homophobic nonsense in the press and pissing away hundreds of thousands of Factory Records' pounds. In short, they had become the archetypal rock'n'roll ruffians with money to burn.[/quote] (trouserpress .com) That's why. N'

john

24/06/2010@ HS This is the same kind of shit behaviour from the people that left NSW labor where it is today. THis is the kind of thing that got Steven Fielding elected to parliament of Labor preferences. We have Kevin RUdd, a Prim Minister who is doing his best to make this country a better place, about to be unseated by a self-serving, two-faced puppet of the AWU. And how will they explain it to the public? Kev was mean to the Caucus? Kev was a bit behind in the polls? WE're not talking about an opposition leader here, Kevin Rudd is the Prime Minister. The only reason this is happening is that the Right is losing power and relevance, and the NSW party is going to drag the federal party down with it into failure.

janice

24/06/2010Firstly, please don't start attacking each other HS and Nasking. This is a good blog and I'm sure I speak for all when I say we need you both. Secondly, Like everyone else I am still shellshocked but my anger has dissipated somewhat and replaced by sadness and trepidation about the possible consequences. Like Hillbilly, listening to Paul Howes enabled me to come to some understanding as to how this has come about and that is when my reaction softened and sadness set in. For me, I feel I can only support the Labor Party and the government in its quest to get re-elected. I also think it is counter productive to lash out and blame Arbib et al because when it comes down to it, these people have been in the thick of the goings on in electorates and we cannot blame them if they hold extreme fears that a good and progressive government will lose the election because the media and others don't like our PM.

Sir Ian Crisp

24/06/2010HS, although you may want to I would ask you to forbear from branding the Bird of Paradox a liar. Following my urging may discommode you and see you branded as biased – just like Ad Astra – but for the good of the party you must fall in behind the new leader if she gets the nod.

nasking

24/06/2010Hi janice, i appreciate yer views... I'm known for my passion. It's how I work. :) As for Arbib...I just don't dig the guy. Nor the NSW Right. However, I don't blame Julia Gillard. I don't think she had any option. She would make a better PM than Tony Abbott. But it's sad it had to happen this way. If it does. I have a heavy heart this morning. Having fought so hard for Ruddy...and been there 3 & 1/2 years ago on RTS fighting hard against the Beazley camp/supporters to bring him & Julia into the leadership roles. N'

Lyn

24/06/2010Hi Janice Janice you are just the biggest Sweetheart, [quote]This is a good blog and I'm sure I speak for all when I say we need you both. [/quote]

Lynchpin

24/06/2010Hi All I have been reading some of the blogs - there is no point in fighting or pointscoring against each other. This is politics. The leader is elected by the party, not the people. Rudd deposed Beazley (albeit in opposition). Hawke deposed Hayden to win the "drover's dog" election. Keating did Hawke over and won the unwinnable election. Kevin's problem is he has no real base in the ALP. He is a hero in my eyes for getting rid of Howard. But after Copenhagen, he lost the thread and never really developed a coherent narrative. This was helped in no small part by the media-led assassination. Gillard must win today, or the ALP is doomed for the next election. I tip she will win 69 to 46. Gillard will be a good, strong leader. Abbott won't quite get a handle on her for a while. He is a Catholic trained (I think) by Jesuits. He doesn't understand women.They will trot out the "faceless machine men stuff". Will it work. Dunno. Gee, and to think it was only a year ago that we had Utegate. I still think Turnbull will challenge Abbott before the election.

Lyn

24/06/2010[b]TODAY'S LINKS[/b] Ad I can hardly lift the links this morning, my heart is too heavy for my wings. I think Julia Gillard is an excellent performer, so maybe this will turn out to be for the best in the long run. I will be a crazy tragic cheer leader for Julia Gillard too. [i]Call It What It Is, A Coup Darryl Mason, The Orstrahyun [/i][i]Murdoch media, who have been all but hysterically demanding Julia Gillard replace Kevin Rudd as prime minister for months.[/i]http://theorstrahyun.blogspot.com/2010/06/call-it-what-it-was-coup-by-darryl.html [i]Rudd faces overwhelming challenge from Gillard, Bernard Keane, The Stump[/i] Rudd held a press conference at 10.30 this evening at which he finally provided the sort of direct, blunt communication that had been missing from his performance for most of 2009, declaring he would not be driven to the Right on the issues of asylum seekers or climate change. However, his performance, in which he railed at party factional powerbrokers, looks too little too late to save his position. http://blogs.crikey.com.au/thestump/2010/06/23/rudd-faces-overwhelming-challenge-from-gillard/ [i]Prime Ministerial Spill Thread, Tobias Ziegler, Pure Poison[/i] The reports suggest he has pretty much no chance of winning this ballot. Are they right? http://blogs.crikey.com.au/purepoison/2010/06/23/prime-ministerial-spill-thread/ [i]Rudd finally meets his match in Julia Gillard – and party powerbrokers,Bernard keane, The Stump[/i] “I was elected by the people of Australia, not by the factional leaders,” Kevin Rudd said tonight, appealing bluntly to his party’s instinct for electoral self-preservation. http://blogs.crikey.com.au/thestump/2010/06/23/rudd-finally-meets-his-match-in-julia-gillard-and-party-powerbrokers/ [i]The Attempted Dismissal Of Our Prime Minister,Nasking, Cafe Whispers[/i] it wouldn’t surprise me if these idiots have managed to hand the election to Tony Abbott due to their obvious & repeated LACK OF SPINE. SHAME!!! http://cafewhispers.wordpress.com/2010/06/23/the-attempted-dismissal-of-our-prime-minister/ [i]IT'S ON : VOTE AT 9AM, JJFIASSON, THE DAILY BLUDGE[/i] It was understood Ms Gillard was reluctant to have a messy challenge and it is understood there were efforts being made to push Mr Rudd to stand down. http://dailybludge.com.au/2010/06/ruddy-hell-open-discussion/ [i]On the Qt: The ALP : How to completely Screw it up. Grog, Grog's Gamut[/i] those people behind it in the ALP should be taken out back and gently slapped around the head with a 4x2 plank of wood. And I volunteer to be the one wielding the first slap. http://grogsgamut.blogspot.com/ Smart and tough: the rise of Julia Gillard,ABC Leader Tony Abbott has steadily risen in the preferred PM stakes while saying less and less. http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/06/24/2935454.htm

Ad astra reply

24/06/2010Folks I retired from regular blogging during the evening to watch the drama unfold on TV. I see you were busy here last night and again this morning. We are not alone in being surprised at the sudden turn of events. My first reaction on hearing the rumours was that they couldn’t be true as even John Faulkner, a very influential figure in Victoria where much of the plotting seems to have occurred, had not heard about the move even while being interviewed for the [i]7.30 Report[/i]. I was wrong. Within a couple hours it was clear a massive upheaval was occurring. Thank you all for your comments. Opinions about the relative merits of Kevin and Julia will populate blog sites and the MSM for days and weeks. As in politics views are often held with great conviction, even passion, it is all too easy to allow those feelings to spill over into comments. We have been a happy family here at [i]TPS[/i] even though we have not always been of the same view. I hope we can continue in that vein in the transitional period, as it seems from all accounts that Julia will be PM later today. Let’s not get too caught up in post mortems too soon. The analysis of this enormously complex situation needs thoughtful consideration. I will attempt something in the next few days. There will be more than enough commentary from the MSM to digest. So the satirical piece I had ready to post this morning will be put into the might-have-been category, a victim of latter-day fast-moving politics. Much as I would like to be sitting in front of my computer and the TV today to watch events unfold, I have family commitments that require me to be on the road from about 9.30 am until late afternoon. I’ll post Lyn’s links before I go. As most of us who comment here hope for a continuation of a Labor Government, let’s pull together and remain an even-handed, close knit group that can discuss rationally and calmly any changes that occur. No matter what eventuates in the Labor Party, keeping the Abbott Party at bay is more important than anything else. countryhick Amidst all the political turmoil, we all welcome you to the [i]TPS[/i] family. I hope you will come often.

Lyn

24/06/2010Hi Countryhick A big welcome to you, thankyou for your comment, and joining in on "The Political Sword" We all hope to see you lots more, and often Cheers lyn

HS

24/06/2010Nasking, I have one question only for you and all of us to ponder this morning...Do you think that Kevin Rudd would have been able to win the election? I had hoped so but after seeing a Vox Pop in Griffith earlier this week where, amongst the people on the street, anger &/or disappointment at KR was patent, even though this man was Prime Minister of Australia there seemed to be no well of affection for him in his own electorate. In the cold light of day all I could see ahead was a slow bleeding to death of Kevin Rudd in the electorate in general if this was the case in his own electoral home base, being as a result of all that has happened in politics this year I feel. I was still prepared to fight to the death to get the ALP re-elected though because it is the policies and the party that I support, as opposed to individuals. Notwithstanding the fact that I have supported Kevin Rudd for years and years, I have seen Julia up close and personal in federal parliament and she has that 'It' factor that leaders have. Kevin was simply not in possession of that. He was a very nice guy, of that there is no question, and I have evidence of that given to me over years and years, but as John Howard used to say, "You may not like me but you know where I stand." I believe this is the quality that deserted Kevin Rudd, people in the electorate had decided he didn't stand for anything once he ditched the ETS, when, in hindsight, we now know he should have just delayed it instead of ditched it. So, what do you do when the electorate has already signed your death warrant? Also, don't think that I am part of the dreaded NSW Right, either. I led the push to get rid of that animal of the Right, Belinda Neal, so I am comfortable in my political skin. Thus what I have had to say has been purely my opinion, for what it is worth. I'll take my lumps from you, but still stand by my assessment.

HS

24/06/2010Sir Ian Crisp, I make my mind up independantly and I get behind the party, not people.

Ad astra reply

24/06/2010LYN'S DAILY LINK updated: http://www.thepoliticalsword.com/page/Lyns-Daily-Links.aspx Thank you Lyn for gathering these links on an emotionally charged day.

HS

24/06/2010Ad Astra, Sorry to have to correct you, but John Faulkner is a Senator from NSW. Robert Ray was the influential Senator and powerbroker from Victoria, now retired, as David Feeney who replaced him is in this instance today the powerbroker from Victoria. I just heard that John Faulkner didn't know what was happening because he is not as influential as he once was. Now Mark Arbib has taken his place it seems.

Ad astra reply

24/06/2010Folks It's done - in an orderly and courteous way. I'll be back late afternoon. I look forward to reading your comments on my return.

janice

24/06/2010Well, we have a new PM. I wonder whether the feral media will embark on tearing her apart as they did Rudd. I have no doubt Julia will do an excellent job but I feel so sad for Kevin Rudd who, I think did not deserve the treatment he's been getting for past few months.

nasking

24/06/2010I've just put up a new post: Julia Gillard, First Female Prime Minister of Australia http://cafewhispers.wordpress.com/2010/06/24/julia-gillard-first-female-prime-minister-of-australia/ N'

nasking

24/06/2010Hillbilly, I do believe Rudd had turned the corner...and the focus was just starting to go onto abbott again. And this is a dangerous move. But, the decision has been made. It's time to UNITE and stand behind PM Gillard. Tony Abbott does not deserve to win this election. N'

Sir Ian Crisp

24/06/2010HS, you said previously that you were fair and balanced in your contributions to TPS. This is what you said on June 23: Tony Abbott's been caught out 'clarifying' the report of his hubristic remarks to the Coalition partyroom yesterday. How could he ever be elected Prime Minister of this country when he is such an obvious duplicitous liar? Or is that perennial 'clarifier'? This article captures the mood of the Bird of Paradox: ACCORDING to Julia Gillard, Kevin Rudd has nothing to fear. Unless she puts on a pair of footy boots and a space suit and gets into a yacht with Brad Pitt. Phillip Hudson From: Herald Sun May 18, 2010 12:00AM http://www.heraldsun.com.au/opinion/julia-gillards-loyalty-program-is-the-one-thing-kevin-rudd-needs-most/story-e6frfhqf-1225867931001 That leaves you in an awkward situation; brand the Bird of Paradox as a liar and prove you are fair and balanced or give her a pass. I hope that I haven’t flushed out another whited sepulcher here at TPS. There is no law against a self-administered wedgie HS, but try and limit them to once a week.

Colen

24/06/2010Hi All, This is the political game and us the voters are mere players. There are the political power brokers from all parties and they get their finances all from the same source and if you antagonise the financiers you are going to get the order of the boot. What Rudd must have done to Murdoch who knows but he antagonised him enough to have all the News Limited resources after him. I believe, there are a lot of political machinations and off the record stuff between the Pollies and Press, that of course we are not privy to. Rudd as I listened to 3AW interview with Dean Mighell, lost his connection with the proletariat and I agree with that. The fact that I had no affection for him at all is no matter. I just could not hold sway with his policies. He always reminded me of an attack dog. He did not seek cooperation. It was always his way or the Highway.

Lyn

24/06/2010Hi Colen It's good to see you, we appreciate your opinion. [i]What Rudd must have done to Murdoch who knows but he antagonised him enough to have all the News Limited resources after him. [/i] I agree with you, they haven't got all they wanted yet, so I suspect the MSM will start tearing down Julia Gillard now. The MSM want the Coalition back in Government, they don't care who the Prime Minister is. Cheers

Ebenezer

24/06/2010Well I will be sad for a while because I don't believe Rudd should have been taken down this way. Next time the polls go sour for a while due to the mining lobby and the MSM, who will the machine men turn to then? Swan. Good luck to Gillard but she and Labor will have to wait until the following election before I vote for them again. I say bring back PJK. Cheers Eb :)

Canbra Dave

24/06/2010Now Tanner is going to stand down at the next election. With this the Greens have a very real chance of claiming Melbourne at the election. Even with the profile of a powerful Minister and long time incumbency Tanner was going to struggle. There is usually a swing away from the incumbent party when they sitting member resigns.

NormanK

24/06/2010A sad and quiet day at TPS. HS - thanks for the positive comments - they did help and have made more sense as the day unfolded. Kevin Rudd behaved with great dignity this morning and I was overjoyed to hear him say that he would stand again for Griffith. The saddest aspect for me was that we were losing this great HONEST talent - not a great leader perhaps but full of promise and good will. Ms Gillard has intimated there might be a place for him in a future Ministry and this would be a wonderful outcome. I am sure most would agree that she spoke well this morning and accounted for herself in QT. The King is gone, long live the Queen.

Sir Ian Crisp

24/06/2010Looks like I have my own "gotcha" moment here at TPS. All I did was present the facts... unlike the views offered in opinion pieces.

Macca

24/06/2010Apparently the internal ALP polling showed that Kevin Rudd was unelectable. The Ludwig corporation, also known as the AWU pulled their support. I find this strange as the far right in NSW helped also in helping Rudd to the PM'ship. There is know doubt in my mind that Rudd would've won the next election on his own merits, without the help of the AWU and others. Given that Rudd had no affiliations with those entities, and he won the next election, their power would have dissipated as quick as a fart in a cyclone. Perhaps the polls were too good? Another question which should be asked, and answered, but wont be: What dirty little deal has the AWU done with the Mining Industry? Expect a CMFEU and AWU turf war in the near future. Who is going to govern this country? Tony Abbott repaying the neocons? Julia Gillard repaying backroom thugs and union leaders? Both pretty odius choices and a pox on both their houses. For the first time in nearly thirty years I'll be voting Independent in the house and Green in the senate.

mick smetafor

24/06/2010this has left me gobsmacked, but now that i have time to think,there is one thing i would like like to say publicly and that is thank you mr. rudd you made me feel proud to be an australian again after so many years and good luck for you and your's in the future.

Macca

24/06/2010mick smetafor....I agree.

Ad astra reply

24/06/2010Folks Back again. Not much comment today – I suppose we’re all stunned by the events and the rapidity with which they unfolded. The speeches by Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard were impressive – generous, dignified, full of what’s been achieved, and promise. I feel proud of both Kevin and Julia. While the process was brutal, the main participants were gracious and acted in the best interests of the party. I’ll write something about what’s happened and why over the next few days. I looked closely at these interviews and at that of Tony Abbott. Was that fear in his eyes as he launched into his usual attack-dog mode? You can bet there will be no analysis along those lines in the MSM. I’ll be interested in seeing Andrew Bolt’s reaction to today’s events. He’s pushed the Julia Gillard line heavily. As it was arguably just his way of playing an anti-Rudd line, let’s see if he still supports her now that she is PM, or whether he starts an attack on her. That will be a real test of Bolt’s genuineness on this issue. I hope Sir Ian I can be as gracious as our leaders have been today in responding to your jibe at HS about Julia Gillard’s ‘honesty’. It is hazardous judging the motives others. For one, every time Julia said she was not interested in challenging for the leadership, I believed her, as I believe that it was only after she concluded that Kevin was doubting her loyalty yesterday that she agreed to challenge. You believe she is a liar – I don’t. You can’t prove your point, neither can I. We just see things differently. Let’s not indulge in ‘gotcha’ here.

Snoozer289

24/06/2010Dear ad Astra and other TPS contributors. I would like to suggest that if possible could you set up a tribute?Acknowledgement Blog for Kevin Rudd. I like many other bloggers have been attracted to this and many other similar sites as we have all had an ambition and desire to defend and when necessary to critise the Government and in particular Kevin Rudd, but in a balance way. We all got offended and disturb by the bias and negative way in which a large part of the MSM and ABC attacked the Government but even more concerning the personnel way they attacked Kevin Rudd. The events over the last 24 hrs has shaken all of us one way or the other, and as a lot of us are not politcal people we have struggled to understand the why's and wherefore's of what has occurred. Some of us will remain confused and bitter ( as with my initial reaction and I am still struggling to understand the why's). But what I am coming to the reliasation is that we all want a Government that is there for the people of Australia and to develop reforms and plans for the future of Australia. Whilst being bias, I believe that this current Labor Government are the right people to do this. The hard relisation is that whilst Kevin Rudd has been the inpertise for all of this and I still believe he would have been the right person to take us forward, the reality is the the MSM and the Mining industry had combined to destroy him, and if the move on Kevin had not happened then we as a group of people, the country and the Australian people would be worst off. Julia Gillard is not going to move away from the reforms that Kevin has started, and doing this she will build on his legacy for the future. So as I would like to follow on from Mick and say the following about Kevin Rudd. He consolidated and united the party when in Opposition He won Government for the Labor party He instilled descipline into the party (this has been highlighted in the last few days despite the turmoil the party didn't fracture and the transition was quick and smooth) He brought a new style of Government and Governance to this country He was forward thinking He made us proud, and he made this Country a stand in the World economy There are many more achievement, which I would like to leave to other more accomplished commentators. My final words to Kevin Rudd are thankyou for everything you have done for this country and for the long term legacies you will leave us. Thankyou and may I wish all the best to you and your family for the future.

Lyn

24/06/2010TODAY'S LINKS PART 2 [i]Gillard our new PM, MEDIA WRAP, Crikey[/i]http://www.crikey.com.au/2010/06/24/will-gillard-win/ [i]What ALP policies, if any, will Gillard change?, Jeremy Sear, An Onymous Lefty[/i]Does she immediately move to end the intolerable situation where we’re detaining refugees http://anonymouslefty.wordpress.com/ [i]Gillard: Stooge for the party bosses, The Piping Shrike[/i] Rudd’s appeal to the parliamentary party may be a bit stronger than the media suggests. Secondly, that in the still likely event that Gillard gets up, she is no more in favour of the faction bosses than the one she replaced. http://www.pipingshrike.com/ [i]First bid – what was Ruddism? Guy Rundle, Crikey[/i] Good God, I’m in the most complex country in the world, during the biggest sporting event in the world, and Australia is more interesting.That takes anti-talant on someone’s part. http://blogs.crikey.com.au/thestump/2010/06/24/first-bid-what-was-ruddism/

Lyn

24/06/2010[b]TODAY'S LINKS PART 3[/b] [i]Julia Gillard and tyranny of the present, Peter Brent, Mumble[/i] Her decision to not move into the Lodge until after the election is silly and counterproductive. So the prime minister is not really a full prime minister? http://mumble.com.au/ [i]Spill, Possum Comitatus, Pollytics[/i] first PM to ever be removed from office while having a strong election winning lead, and possibly the first in any western democracy for decades, giving us our first ever female PM. http://blogs.crikey.com.au/pollytics/ [i]The longest night, Andrew Elder Politically Homeless[/i] not PM material, he'd embarrass a half-decent ticket of student politicians with garbage like "Kevin O'Lemon", he has no policies and no vision and will inevitably let his true self slip - the misogynist, fear-mongering, economically retarded narcissist who insists that he be taken at whatever face he presents at any random time. Gillard is his worst nightmare: she has it all over him and he knows it http://andrewelder.blogspot.com/2010/06/longest-night-last-night-was-winter.html [i]Julia Gillard’s first four hours as PM, Bernard Keane, The Stump[/i] it was one of the more remarkable press conferences in Australian political history, in the same vein as Bob Hawke’s emotional breakdowns as Prime Minister or the stoic Malcolm Fraser’s post-defeat tears. http://blogs.crikey.com.au/thestump/2010/06/24/julia-gillards-first-three-hours-as-pm/ [i]Rudd v. Gillard: Gillard's communication problem, Mark, Larvatus Prodeo[/i] The plotters will need to articulate something much more persuasive than ‘the polls made us do it’ http://larvatusprodeo.net/2010/06/24/rudd-v-gillard-gillards-communication-problem/ [i]How Rudd's bad advice won Gillard power, Christopher Joye, Business Spectator.[/i]Rudd’s decision to surround himself with youngsters who acted as echo chambers of his own opinions was a mistake of both stunning and catastrophic proportions. http://www.businessspectator.com.au:80/bs.nsf/Article/Rudd-refused-the-best-advice-pd20100624-6PUZL?OpenDocument&src=kgb [i]Julia Gillard, First Female Prime Minister of Australia, Nasking, Cafe Whispers[/i] moved us towards a “fairer” country…helped us survive the GFC intact. He will be missed by this commentator. http://cafewhispers.wordpress.com/2010/06/24/julia-gillard-first-female-prime-minister-of-australia/ [i]Life on Mars[/i] The former PM never really ,understood the party he led,Norman Abjorensen, Inside Story We never quite got to know Kevin from Queensland – the actor lucky enough to score a role as Kevin07, but who never quite managed to establish the character. http://inside.org.au/life-on-mars [i]Labor enters new Territory, Chris Owens, Sportolotics[/i] The Australian have been reporting it as a possibility and now it looks like they were right. Either that or they caused it. http://sportowens.wordpress.com:80/2010/06/24/labor-enters-new-territory/ [i]UNTHINKABLE: Rudd is a goner but will stay in Parliament! Vex News[/i] And to add shock to surprise, Rudd in his valedictory remarks has indicated that he is willing to serve in any capacity he’s required (code for being a minister) and he will be staying in Parliament as the member for Griffith. What a classic. http://www.vexnews.com/news/9785/unthinkable-rudd-is-a-goner/ [i]Julia Gillard Takes PowerBy Ben Eltham, New Matilda[/i] [b]Rudd’s concession speech was his best in many months, indeed, one of his best in office. Flanked by his children and wife Therese, Rudd ticked off a long list of his Government’s achievements,[/b] http://newmatilda.com/2010/06/24/julia-gillard-new-prime-minister [i]Julia Gillard's first press conference as Labor Leader, Mark, Larvatus Prodeo[/i] An Kevin Rudd's last press conference as Prime Minister. [b]VIDEO'S [/b]http://larvatusprodeo.net/

Lyn

24/06/2010[b]TODAY'S LINKS ABC[/b] Rudd's downfall: he never really got it, Barrie Cassidy, ABC, The Drum Tony Abbott is not without material and no doubt he will try and portray Gillard as a puppet of the factions. http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/06/24/2936317.htm Drum wrap: the morning after the fight before, Jonathan Green, The Drum a group that did more than most to propel the sense of hysterical inevitability the burst open last night. http://www.abc.net.au:80/news/stories/2010/06/24/2935486.htm?WT.mc_id=newsmail Timeline: Rudd's rise and fall,ABC Unleashed Here is a timeline of his career. http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/06/24/2935680.htm Smart and tough: the rise of Julia Gillard, ABC Tony Abbott has steadily risen in the preferred PM stakes while saying less and less. http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/06/24/2935454.htm

Lyn

24/06/2010Hi Ad The link above to Larvatus Prodeo doesn't work to [b]Rudd v. Gillard: Gillard's communication problem, Mark, Larvatus Prodeo [/b] but this one below should be ok [i]My Piece at The Drum on the POLITICAL EXECUTION OF KEVIN RUDD, MARK LARVATUS PRODEO[/i] broader implications of the extraordinary series of events we’ve witnessed over the last 24 hours or so http://larvatusprodeo.net/2010/06/24/my-piece-at-the-drum-on-the-political-execution-of-kevin-rudd/#more-13507

HS

24/06/2010Sir Ian Crisp, Sorry to disappoint you but you cannot satisfy yourself with a 'Gotcha' moment here today. Such a petty preoccupation you have, but I will address it. The Julia Gillard example you give is trivial compared to that of Tony Abbott. She stood by her commitment not to challenge until yesterday, when the momentum for change became too great for her to resist. She did not seek out the leadership behind Kevin Rudd's back. Hence she was not duplicitous. Tony Abbott lied, or 'forgot to remember' about declaring his almost $3/4 Million mortgage on his home to the Pecuniary Interests register. Also, he attempted to rewrite history over his hubristic statements to his partyroom about a famous victory being within his grasp, when it became obvious that it had gotten out into the media and was being seen for what it was, Howardesque hubris. Two completely different kettles of fish.

HS

24/06/2010Snoozer289, Fine sentiments. I thank you for them. I, myself am too cut up at present to pen a tribute. I think I'll do it over the weekend.

Ad astra reply

24/06/2010Snoozer289 Many would share your sentiments. I’ll get something together over the next couple of days to which you and others can append your tributes to Kevin Rudd.

HS

24/06/2010lyn, You are a true gem and a trooper for our cause. Bless you! Thank you for today's links, an effort above and beyond the call of duty, carrying them to us as you have, with a heavy heart.

Ad astra reply

24/06/2010LYN'S DAILY LINKS updated: http://www.thepoliticalsword.com/page/Lyns-Daily-Links.aspx

Lyn

24/06/2010Hi Hillbilly You are a big sweetie pie, look at the wonderful pieces you write for us, thankyou Hillbilly. Gathering the links for The Political Sword is always a pleasure, today was very sad, Kevin Rudd's speech was heartbreaking, and to see him on the back bench in question time today was too much. Then to top everything off, did you hear Phoney's speech on Kevin Rudd's departure, all I could think of was Phoney's past words coward, gutless, liar, inept. Today most of the links were from our favourite bloggers, they share our sentiments, that helps a lot.

john

24/06/2010I've been betrayed by the party one too many times. I'm voting invalid.

Lyn

24/06/2010Hi Ad and Hillbilly This is a particularly good piece, worthwhile taking time to read: [i]Julia did not "Backstab" Rudd, Admin, the Daily Bludge[/i] Let me say this one more time: you do not vote for the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister, the Opposition Leader and their deputies are elected by their respective parties. When you vote for your MP, you give them that vote http://dailybludge.com.au/2010/06/julia-gillard-our-democracy/

Lyn

24/06/2010Hi John You have my sympathy, I know how you feel, but don't do that. Read the link I just put up to the Daily Bludge, explains briefly the system, story is quite good medicine.

john

24/06/2010I understand the system, and the labor party,very well, thanks Lyn. My great-grandfather was under the tree of Knowledge at Barcaldine, and his son was expelled from the party during the DLP split because he was a Catholic, even though he'd campaigned harder against the Communist party banning referendum than anyone else, so I understand betrayal by Labor as well. I have voted Labor all my life, like my parents and theirs. Julia Gillard is a puppet of the AWU. She will do the NSW Labor trick of being so right wing, to be any further right wing would be electoral suicide. She will work with the AWU to screw the workers, and she will not do anything like the good that Rudd would have done on climate change. The policies that are actually hers on education have made her hated among teachers, and the fact she rolled the first Queensland Prime Minister since Andrew Fisher means she is going to lose the base in Queensland, she is going to lose swinging voters who only voted Rudd because he was from Queensland, and only solidify the lefty inner city set that will get a rush of delf-righteousness for voting for the first female Prime Minister, who wold have voted Greens 1, Labor 2. I know that we have a parliamentary, not presidential system, but the last forty years have seen it turn into a popularity contest, helped very much by the media. And no-one trusts a traitor.

Lyn

24/06/2010Hi John Thankyou for telling me your story. I hope I didn't say the wrong thing, I didn't mean too, but just thought that was a very interesting piece in The Daily Bludge, because it cheered me a little bit.

jimbo

24/06/2010after some time thinking over what has happened i have decided to vote for julia at the next election as i refuse to stand by and let that wingnutt win the next election without a fight and i definately wont help him gain control of the senate which is what all labor supporters should be trying to stop.dont get me wrong i am furious at what some factions in the labor party have done and so after this election because my vote doesnt count according to these factions,the media,canberra press gallery,rich mining multinationals and rupert murdochs media empire i will no longer vote in any state or federal elections henceforth as australia to me is no longer democratic.

Kersebleptes

25/06/2010One frightened horse, here. Nothing so transparent as "internal polling". I am extremely ashamed & sad at the offhanded scapegoating of an admirable and inspiring leader. I am also unconvinced that things will improve, despite my complete agreement that Gillard's political skills outshine Rudd's. Bloody gutting.

janice

25/06/2010I will be voting Labor. I am extremely sad and very angry about the events of the past couple of days and it will take me the rest of my life to get over seeing a good and decent, competent and compassionate Prime Minister being forced to stand down. Having said that, I find I am unable to blame those in the Party who instigated the move to change leadership, nor the AWU for getting behind them. We all know there has been a concerted campaign by conservative forces and the media pack of hyenas to sully the PMs character and discredit a good government. The message from the government and its supporters was drowned out with negative claptrap and we saw the voters believing the disinformation and not thinking past it to reflect on the long list of achievements that have made such a difference to this nation since 2007. IMHO the success of the anti-campaign was on-going and nothing, other than a brutal shock, was going to stop it long enough to allow rational thinking in the electorate. I believe the Labor Party saw the writing on the wall and came to the conclusion that Kevin Rudd had to be sacrificed in the interests of firstly, the nation and secondly, the party. I really do not believe that any player in the decision to sacrifice Kevin Rudd did so without deep thought and heavy hearts. They would, I think, have felt like I have felt each time I have had to make the decision to euthanase a loved pet in order to stop its pain. I urge all Labor supporters not to judge too harshly and to keep on supporting the party.

john

25/06/2010Oh, come on janice. Do you think the media campaign came out of nowhere? All those stories, with 'unnamed Labor sources'? It was the right-wingers. They used their favourite dirty tricks to oust a Prime Minister who wouldn't do what they said anymore. As much as I hate to admit it, the media didn't start this, they were just complicit. Arbib and Shorten created the media circus they needed to get rid of Rudd, and we all fell for it. The 'faceless men' that Whitlam brought out into the light, and that Keating buried have just banded together to hamstring the party. Julia Gillard is Hawke mk2, and she'll be at the beck and call of the AWU, just like the bad old days. I'm a fifthe generation Labor party member, so I can't bring myself to vote for the Libs, but I won't be voting for those DLPers either.

Lyn

25/06/2010[b]TODAY'S LINKS[/b] [i]On The QT: Nothing like a dull News day, Grog, Grogs Gamut[/i] His staying on in Griffith also I think shows that he is perhaps not as ego driven as people think. That he turned up to Question Time today showed that he is not as cowardly as people believe. http://grogsgamut.blogspot.com/2010/06/on-qt-nothing-like-dull-news-day.html [i]Thirty Seconds is a long time...Emmjay. The daily Bludge[/i] Three leaders in three years (the last with a single vote majority in their caucus) and all they can come up with is a budgy-smuggling bike riding swim god. Pathetic. http://dailybludge.com.au/2010/06/thirty-seconds-is-a-long-time/#comment-1272 [i]RUDD R.I.P Revenge of the Factions?, Rich Bowden, TheAngle Org[/i] [b]Australian media turned on the man[/b] who had led the country away from economic calamity during the global financial crisis, apologised to the stolen generation and was about to deliver major health reform. http://theangle.org/2010/06/24/rudd-r-i-p-revenge-of-the-factions/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+theangleorg+%28theangle.org%29 [i]The Gillard faceless men putsch, Guy Beres[/i] driven by people who care more about polls and the state of the spin cycle than just about anything else. http://guyberes.com/2010/06/24/the-gillard-faceless-men-putsch/ [i]POLITICAL COUP: RUDD'S DEMISE, wmmbb, Duckpond.[/i] Rudd’s demise means is that from now on the consensus will be put about about who holds the power in Australian politics, and who sets the agenda http://wmmbb.wordpress.com/2010/06/24/political-coup-rudds-demise/ [i]Labor enters new territory - UPDATE. Chris owens, Sportolotics[/i] Welcome to Australia, where [b]our Government is controlled by Rupert Murdoch and big mining[/b]http://sportowens.wordpress.com:80/2010/06/24/labor-enters-new-territory-update/ [i]Thursday 24th, June, 2010. Darryl Mason, The Orstrahyun[/i] no opposition leader as unpopular as Tony Abbott at this point in the cycle had gone on to win. http://theorstrahyun.blogspot.com/ [i]The Wealthly and the Desperate, Leon Delaney[/i] Those who would aspire to be Prime Minister can’t afford embarrassing “oversights”. http://leondelaney.blogspot.com/2010/06/wealthy-and-desperate.html [i]Mungo MacCallum on PM deaths,[/i] http://blogs.abc.net.au/queensland/2010/06/mungo-maccallum-on-pm-deaths.html?site=brisbane&program=612_afternoons [i]Goodbye Kevin, hello Julia,Tony Kevin, Eureka Street.[/i] Rudd is a decent, highly intelligent, energetic and well-motivated man, who has made great contributions to Australia. I wish him a continued, useful and satisfying role in public life. He would make an excellent Foreign Minister, if Stephen Smith were to move on to another portfolio. http://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=22101 [i]It's a girl!, Moira Rayner, Eureka Street[/i] [i]The turning of the media pack on 'lovable Rudd' [/i]— our golden lad, our TinTin — was dramatic, fierce and destructive. I'm not sure it was fully deserved. Gillard will know the lesson to be learnt. Today's media darling, Gillard, could be tomorrow's dead Jezebel, eaten by dogs. http://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=22100 [i]Moving forward with Gillard,Tony Smith, Eureka Street[/i] The policy that seems to have broken Rudd's hold on power is the mining super profits tax. It is probably a sign of how timid Labor Governments have become http://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=22106 [i]Gillard's win a loss for feminists,Catherine Marshall, Eureka Street [/i] how the Labor Government operates, unsheathing the swords, wrenching power, cutting down a leader before he has had time to really prove himself. Imagine what it will do when that leader is a woman. http://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=22105

HS

25/06/2010Oh, come on John. You may be a '5th generation Labor Party memeber', but it's obvious to me you don't have the best interests of the party at heart, fecklessly decamping to who knows where at the drop of a hat with your vote. Do you want the Coalition to win? As they certainly will with people like you flouncing off to who knows where with their vote and deserting the party. Now is the time to pull together to see off the threat that the Coalition poses to this country. If you want to see the return of WorkChoices by another name, if you want to see Refugees villified and brutalised all over again, and if you want to see Public Social Services decimated, then take your vote to the Greens or whoever, because there is no way the Greens can form a government in this country, only the ALP can stop that conservative tide. Voting Greens saw no ETS. Is that what you want? The Greens voted against it with the Coalition with their puritanism trumping pragmatism. I'm sorry, but I think something is always better than nothing, though I will admit that Kevin Rudd gave away too much in the end to get the Liberals support for the ETS in parliament. However, if you want an ETS, and all the other things I mentioned then you have to stick with the ALP. Finally, to villify the factions the way you have is disingenuous in the extreme. Don't you think the Liberals have factions too? Ever heard of Alex Hawke and David Clarke? Nick Minchin and Christopher Pyne? They are just some of the factional overlords of the various factions of the Liberal Party. The Liberals are just too gutless to admit it. In fact, it is they who operate behind closed doors, clandestinely. Look, admit it, the ALP turned to the best performer in parliament to salvage them in the upcoming election. That's all.

Ad astra reply

25/06/2010LYN'S DAILY LINKS updated: http://www.thepoliticalsword.com/page/Lyns-Daily-Links.aspx

janice

25/06/2010John, I disagree. The media campaign, especially in the Murdoch papers, started almost the day after the Rudd Government was elected as they supported the fallen Coalition Parties. During the election campaign itself the Coalition scraped the very bottom of their dirt barrel as they tried to discredit Rudd. The Grech Affair was a beat up scandal designed to bring down an elected government and you would be quite naive if you did not see that the Murdoch press were right in the middle of that disgraceful attempt to overthrow the Government. Then, of course, the media went out of their way to write up the nitpicks regarding hair dryers, foul language, bullying air hostesses etc etc. We saw live interviews of Rudd and his ministers announcing policy or addressing issues put to them by these so-called expert political journalists, and then we got to read the 'analysis' that skewed the words to fit a particular perception they wished the voters to believe. The campaign became more and more vicious this year as journalists openly showed their contempt for Rudd personally. Whilst I personally forgive human idiosyncrasies and put them in the unimportant basket, I was not immune to the knowledge that most people are more inclined than not to downgrade a person in the popularity stakes for that reason. I live in a pro-labor electorate where labor supporters are loyal to their traditions and beliefs, yet there were few who admitted that they 'liked' Kevin Rudd and many who said they 'hated' him. It is, then, easy for me to see how anti-labor forces can wage a campaign to highlight personal traits and succeed in changing voter perceptions and, eventually, change their voting habit. Now, knowing how avid labor voters around me had a distinct dislike for PM Rudd personally, I have no doubt this was possibly a lot more widespread. While the perception was there that the Labor Government would win this election the labor voters (and the governments parliamentary reps) were willing to put their dislike for the man himself aside. However, as soon as the anti-Rudd/Labor campaign began to whittle away support and promote a return to the Howard years, the horses began to pull at their reins and become very tetchy. When the horses became so frightened they finally kicked in the stable door and there was no stopping the stampede.

HS

25/06/2010janice, Hear, hear! Anyone who thinks that the ALP did what they did to Kevin Rudd because the factions wanted to reassert their power within the party, so close to an election, has been dropping too much LSD lately. It would be political suicide to do what they did unless there was a defined and positive benefit to come out of the move. In other words, the movers and shakers in the ALP realised that to have any show of winning the upcoming election they had to replace an increasingly poor performer with the one that could take the fight up to Abbott, as there is only one person that was ever really able to do that, having juggled 3 massive Ministries successfully, got the legislation through parliament(she managed to put the political sword to WorkChoices ferchrissakes!), and still perform well in parliament; and that person was Julia Gillard. Politics is a bloodsport and not for the feint-hearted and puritanically-ideological. Julia Gillard is the right and proper person to lead the team in that game. Kevin Rudd was too nice and too beaurocratically-oriented.

Beerme

25/06/2010At first, I didn't know what to say when I heard the news. Then I saw this article which sums it up nicely for me: http://larvatusprodeo.net/2010/06/24/my-piece-at-the-drum-on-the-political-execution-of-kevin-rudd/#more-13507/ (Quotes): "Let’s make no mistake. It is a historic day for our country to have a female Prime Minister." "But it is also a historic tragedy that a first term Prime Minister, the first Labor leader to win a national election since 1993, has been politically executed by his own party. It’s a tragedy which will set a disturbing precedent." "Julia Gillard has become Labor leader at the wrong time, for the wrong reasons, and through the agency of the wrong people." "Kevin Rudd has not been permitted to face the people as Prime Minister." (End quotes) A salute to PM Rudd for his dignity and conduct throughout this whole sorry affair.

Augustus

25/06/2010Hi All From all of yesterdays saddness, someting positive that brought a smile to my face TONY ABBOTT put a brave face on Labor's last-ditch leadership change but privately the Coalition was desperately disappointed that it would not face an election against Kevin Rudd. "And it was utterly dismayed the mining industry had - as one source put it - ''succumbed to [Gillard's] guile'' by agreeing to her offer of a negotiating truce in the mining super profits tax war and to take the industry advertisements attacking the government off the air." Lenore Taylor http://fw.farmonline.com.au/news/nationalrural/agribusiness-and-general/political/new-leader-leaves-abbotts-plans-in-disarray/1868356.aspx

left of the right & right of the left

25/06/2010Hi All, I haven't absorbed much commentary over the last few days as I would have liked – TPS was my first port of call, but from what I have seen so far, no one is discussing an interesting parallel between Turnbull and Rudd. The RIGHT elements of both of their parties rolled/knifed a moderate/progressive/centre-left leader. I’m finding it hard now to decide how to vote. Ever since the day Abbott was elected as opposition leader, my vote for Rudd was decided. With Rudd gone I’m no longer as definite. I have the greatest admiration for Gillard, I can just imagine how much momentum had gathered by the time she made a decision. Something like, ‘he’s being replaced, either by you or someone else’. And it was nice to see her gun for Denis (I assume Shannahan) at her press conference yesterday. I also note that nothing she said yesterday, could not also have been said by Rudd and taken to the people at the next election. The next few weeks will be interesting – I’m tipping an early October election (pretty well after the AFL/Ruby finals).

HS

25/06/2010Nasking, I'm sorry if I offended you. However, wrt to my advocacy for JG and the moves made to move on KR, and 'facing the music' quality of my commentary, combined with an assessment of the quality of Julia's actions, the kernel of truth that erupts from it all is that that is the nature of leadership. Difficult calls at difficult times. Then you take the people with you, and make 'em realise that what happened was for the best in the long run.

NormanK

25/06/2010A gentle nudge for people who remain undecided. Look on it as voting AGAINST Abbott rather than FOR somebody else. I may only be soothing a troubled heart, but if one of the main drivers for ousting Rudd was the fear of an Abbott win then we owe it to Rudd to vote Labor. If you vote for anyone other than Labor, you will contribute to empowering Abbott. Make no mistake, an Abbott government will be a draconian nightmare. Remember he loved Santamaria. He is the scariest leader we have had in Australia in my politically-aware lifetime and no extreme is beyond him if he gets even a small mandate. Keep him out for one election and we may see the return of moderates in the Conservatives.

Jason

25/06/2010HS, Rubbish work choices isn't completely dead, one of my comrades here in Adelaide Mr Ark Tribe now faces 6 months gaol http://www.smh.com.au/national/may-day-call-for-a-mate-facing-jail-20100501-u0ag.html

HS

25/06/2010left of the right & right of the left. I'd hardly have called KR 'a moderate/progressive/centre left leader'. I'd say he was a bit like the Curate's Egg, all of those things, in parts, combined with his conservative centre right side. Interestingly, now we have a PM who has come to the centre right from the hard left. We live in interesting times, huh?

HS

25/06/2010Jason, No not completely dead(esp. the ABCC), but definitely neutered. Ark tribe is a good man fighting the good fight. Julia is the PM trying to hang onto power for the ALP. Different motivations, same track. She has to do what will keep get the ALP back on track and keep them on track to the election so the Victory train pulls into the station, not the Abbott Ark.

HS

25/06/2010I bet Poll Bludger went into meltdown over the last few days. :)

HS

25/06/2010I've joined Julia Gillard's Facebook page, have you?

Lyn

25/06/2010Hi Ad So it's already started, David Speers had [b]Mark Latham [/b]on Agenda this morning for a whole half hour. Of course Sky would have to seek anyone, that is going to speak badly of labor, Kevin Rudd and now Julia Gillard. Latham was reasonably OK I suppose, but said nothing other than, what we would expect from him. He did say Gillard will have to watch her back. Now the headlines are: Latham launches a scathing attack.

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25/06/2010Folks Bushfire Bill will soon be back on [i]TPS[/i]. Later this morning his latest piece [i]Thank you, Kevin[/i] will be posted for your comment.

HS

25/06/2010This is a lovely link to the Illawarra Mercury and the nicest one I've seen so far wrt Julia PM: http://mumbrella.com.au/apparently-julia-gillard-is-a-redhead-28889#comment-45619

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25/06/2010Folks Bushfire Bill's latest piece: [i]Thank you, Kevin[/i] has been posted. http://www.thepoliticalsword.com/post/2010/06/25/Thank-you-Kevin.aspx

HS

25/06/2010This is the lowdown on the coup plot, from the inside, by Chris Uhlmann: http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/06/25/2937066.htm

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26/06/2010Folks As we're now attracting only spam, I'm closing comments.
I have two politicians and add 17 clowns and 14 chimpanzees; how many clowns are there?