The NEXT coming Oz election thread!

Awwww. I wanted that to become the next coming election thread.

The way it is now... I REALLY don't like the ending.

Hi Olga

I'm in - by the way did you know you're 2 a2k years old tomorrow?

OK, Adrian, I'll see what I can do!

How's that, Adrian?

Oh, good! We can continue to whinge, commiserate & plan our revenge!

Yep, hinge, I'm two tomorrow!

Book mark.

OK! So, first thing, get out there and join a local liberal party branch. Then once you're embedded, start registering "friends". What we want is to control the preselection. Come next election we want every liberal party candidate to be as much like Alexander Downer as we can POSSIBLY get.

Right?!?

The only other pressing issue is... No matter WHAT msolga says... Don't vote green next time... Especially not in the senate... :wink:

I posted this to the US election (for non-US folk), but I think it's just as appropriate here:

Kerry's man tells (Oz) PM: mind your manners
By Peter Hartcher in Washington
November 1, 2004

An adviser to the Democratic presidential challenger John Kerry has criticised John Howard for publicly wishing for victory for George Bush in this week's election.

The Prime Minister last week said of the US President: "I hope he wins."

A senior defence official in the Clinton administration and prospective senior official in a Kerry administration, Kurt Campbell, said this was "a little inappropriate". Dr Campbell told the Herald: "I remember when Australians thought there was too much playing of politics here, when the Bush Administration was talking about Australian politics.

"I would remind Australians that the same applies at home. Such comments about our politics are a little inappropriate."

In June, Mr Bush criticised the Labor leader, Mark Latham, for promising to withdraw Australian troops from Iraq by Christmas.

Dr Campbell's comments herald the likelihood that a Kerry administration, while still well-disposed toward Australia, would not be as intimate with the Howard Government.

"Obviously, a Kerry Administration wouldn't be as warm and cuddly with the Howard people as a matter of personal relationships," said a Democrat and political analyst at the Brookings Institution, Tom Mann. "But Kerry will bend over backwards to be conciliatory to coalition partners."

Dr Campbell added, however, that there was likely to be some initial anxiety, regardless of which man won: "If it's another Bush term. Australia's best friends in the Administration, the Secretary of State, Colin Powell, and his deputy, Rich Armitage, are unlikely to remain in place," said Dr Campbell, the head of security studies at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies. "So you are likely to have new players who will need educating or re-initiation into the high priesthood of the alliance."
Further, the Australian Ambassador to the US for the past five years, Michael Thawley, has advised the Government that he will resign to look for a job in the private sector in the first quarter of next year.

So the topmost officials in the daily conduct of the US alliance in Washington are set to change, on both sides of the relationship, regardless of who wins the election.

The two biggest joint ventures of the alliance, however, are expected to continue with only minor change.

First, the Free Trade Agreement, whose implementation has been delayed by US concerns, is likely to take effect from January 1 as planned, informed officials said.

Second, the next administration, whether under Mr Bush or Mr Kerry, is expected to ask US allies for fresh contributions to the occupation of Iraq.

Before the FTA can enter into force, its terms require the two governments to exchange letters attesting that enabling legislation has been faithfully enacted.

This exchange is supposed to occur at least 60 days before the agreement takes effect, a deadline which expired at the weekend. But Richard Mills, a spokesman for the US Trade Representative, said that this 60-day requirement could be varied with mutual consent: "In previous cases like Chile and Singapore, exchange occurred less than 60 days before entry into force, and we are continuing to discuss with Australia implementation measures."

Officials said Australia would need to amend the enabling legislation on technical points on the treatment of intellectual property before the US would agree to implement the FTA.

Also, talks were continuing on details of the pharmaceutical benefits scheme.

On the question of the contribution to Iraq, Australia's response, according to well-placed officials, would be to offer some flexibility in the components of the Australian deployment, but without substantially increasing the total number of troops, which is around 900.


http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/10/31/1099219993094.html?from=storylhs

_________________

Right! "Embed" ourselves in the Liberal Party? Right! Gotcha! Good strategy! :wink:

And might I say, Adrian, that Labor didn't need any help from the Greens to stuff up it's representation in the Senate. Their supremo wheeler-dealers were too clever by half with their preference deals. :wink:

msolga.

Yeah, it was a pretty poor effort all round really.

Oh well, Telstra goes.
Costello becomes PM.
Unions are dead?

My post election haiku.

Does the PM appoint when will the election held in 2007?

Back to the DLP.

Barricades!!!!

The ABC worries me - did anyone else hear the arrogance of Abbot in refusing to answer questions in AM this morning?

Any thoughts on Manne's analysisn of the situation?

Howardism triumphant
by Robert Manne, professor of politics at LaTrobe University.
November 1, 2004/the Age


Australia's political left is struggling to find a remedy for the damage John Howard has inflicted on it, writes Robert Manne.

No one now doubts that Margaret Thatcher changed the political landscape of Britain forever. No one should any longer doubt that, in Australia, John Howard has done the same. The more difficult question with Howard is, in what way?

....Carmen Lawrence has argued that the ALP's fortunes can be reversed through the recruitment of a new, vibrant party rank and file.

....An alternative, left-liberal analysis has come from Barry Jones. Jones argues that since Keating, Labor has become almost ideologically indistinguishable from the Coalition. To revive Labor's fortunes, he advocates a return to the Whitlam-Keating program of progressive cultural reform.

...In my opinion Jones has comprehensively underestimated the impact on Australia of the Howard years. Just as British Labor did not find its answer to Thatcherism by looking back to Harold Wilson or Michael Foot, so is Australian Labor unlikely to find its answer to Howardism while it yearns for a return to the social justice visions of a more optimistic, more generous age.

It is not only Labor but also the left-liberal intelligentsia that is presently faced with a crisis of identity. It seems obvious to me that many of the issues of greatest concern to us are of little interest or are even anathema to the majority of our fellow citizens.

...In the era of Howard's conservative populism there seems little alternative but for the Labor Party to move culturally, if not necessarily economically, to the right.

If this is so, members of the left-liberal intelligentsia have essentially three political options from which to choose. The first is a movement to the Greens. The second is to remain inside Labor, under the discipline of a self-denying ordinance, while waiting for the arrival of more hopeful times. The third option is for the left to conduct the struggles for the causes in which it believes, outside the framework of party politics, temporarily at least.

...Just as the scope for action has narrowed in recent years, so has the need for action, independent of government and outside the framework of party politics, become even more vital in these unpropitious times.

(complete article)
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2004/10/31/1099189931263.html

It DOES feel rather like that, Deb.

No. What happened?
(Actually I was extremely worried that the ABC didn't get a run as election issue, considering the past few years.)

Dlowan.

You're not allowed to ask questions about religion... but he's a very proud Catholic... what does it matter whether or not he went to see Archbishop Pell... anyway, why shouldn't he?

<petulant silence, stuck out bottom lip>

Ooops, double post.