The NEXT coming Oz election thread!

One wonders what it will actually take, goodfielder. I thought we'd had quite a few jackboots in our faces prior to the last election, but the Libs just romped it in! I figure that change will come only after the folk who have been enjoying the financial benefits of the Lib's economic policies (at the expense of the riff-raff) have been affected. Soon, make it soon!

Lost count. But this one is an example of either (or both):

1. Sheer incompetence
2. Lies

Get me that bloody tumbril!

I lost count when I choked on my wheaties on the GST.

Anyone paying any attention to the pommy election? Conservative (at least the pom give their parties meaningful names - the liberals aren't and labour doesn't) hopeful Michael Howard has acquired the services of Linton Crosby - the little Johnny adviser who came up with 'children overboard' and all the other lowest common denominator fear driven campaigns that got Howard reelected.

When are we going to have general knowledge/current affairs exams at polling booths? Pardon my elitist scum mentality. Maybe I should go root cause and say 'When are we going to have diversified media ownership?' Come on Johnny, you're all about 'Choice'.

Linton Crosby! My goddess! Look forward to to some very interesting pronouncements from the Conservatives! Let's see what he come up with at the 11th hour. :wink:

Diversified media ownership, hinge? Pigs might fly! B wouldn't some serious political analysis be a blessed relief, though? (Like for example, the real unemployment/under employment stats for Oz. I loathe those economic "analysts" who've kept telling us what great shape the economy is in. For whom, I ask? ) These days I rely on the cartoonists for the truth! :wink: )

But I see Howard has actuallyapologised for it! Hmmmmmmmm ....

I heard him on AM. He was doing that huffing noise again. That means he's getting ready for a fight. I wonder if Tony Abbott will be sacrificed if there's a need to throw someone overboard

Medicare cuts to hit 400,000

Subsidies for 400,000 Australians with big medical bills will be axed under a major clawback of the Medicare safety net.

http://www.theage.com.au/news/National/Medicare-cuts-to-hit-400000/2005/04/14/1113251737870.html?oneclick=true


Any mention yet of the PBS? Now THAT'S one one I'm watching ...

I heard it, too.
I'm gonna watch out for that huffing noise!
Abbott overboard? :

Abbott must resign, says Beazley
April 15, 2005 - 8:54AM/the AGE

The Federal Government's broken Medicare election promise made Health Minister Tony Abbott's position untenable and he must resign, Opposition Leader Kim Beazley said today.

Claiming a Budget blowout, Prime Minister John Howard yesterday said the government would have to lift the Medicare threshold for out-of-pocket medical expenses.

Families, pensioners and health card holders will now have to spend $500 - up from $300 - before the government picks up 80 per cent of the tab.

For others, the threshold will be lifted to at least $1,000, up from $700.

During last year's election campaign Mr Abbott gave a 'rock-solid' commitment that the threshold would not be raised.

"As Tony Abbott said, when a question was raised with him, whether they would raise the rates, 'that is an absolutely rock-solid, iron-clad commitment'," Mr Beazley told ABC radio.

"Tony Abbott cannot preside over this broken promise and stay in office.

"He should resign."

Mr Beazley said the degree of deception involved had to be fully understood.

"The Labor Party told them in the last election campaign that their figures in relation to the safety net were out," he said.

"They poo-pooed it. They said absolutely, No."

- AAP

Sometimes Michelle surprises me:

John Howard taking voters for mugs
By Michelle Grattan
April 15, 2005/the AGE


COMMENT

There is no excuse for the Prime Minister's latest broken promise.

John Howard has treated the voters with total disdain in hacking into the safety net. He has absolutely no excuse for breaking an election promise that was repeated over and over, and formed a central part of his campaign.

Weeks ago Howard ditched last year's undertaking not to substantially increase Australia's troop numbers in Iraq. On Monday he'll be waving goodbye to the 450 troops he has since committed.

He justified (dubiously) that broken promise by claiming circumstances had changed. Nothing has changed with the safety net.

The blow-out in the estimated cost should have been foreseen before all those unequivocal promises were made. It's nonsense for Howard to suggest "since the election it has become apparent that the cost of it is going to be even greater than we thought at the time".

And it is not as though the Government is going to be down to its last dollar of the surplus.

For years, Howard has reminded voters how Paul Keating put his tax cuts into law and then walked away from some of them. Howard has done precisely the same with the safety net.

Sometimes there is a case to justify ditching election promises. That you have won the election and will soon have the numbers to get almost anything through the Senate doesn't amount to such a case.

Howard got the decision out immediately so it would not cast a pall over the budget, which could be tricky enough to sell with the complex welfare package that will have plenty of losers.

But it had been leaked well beforehand, as ministers battled it out. It would be interesting to know whether, in the debate between them, anyone said: "This is not very honest."

The PM yesterday added insult to injury by throwing in the line that Labor would have abolished the whole safety net, as part of its alternative health policy. This is irrelevant to the current issue, which is not what each promised but the breaking of a promise by one side.

And what does Peter Costello have to say for himself? "The parameters of the Medicare Safety Net will not change," he said before the election. And then he targeted those very parameters to get some budget savings - a point to remember, perhaps, if it's Peter Costello, rather than John Howard leading the coalition in the 2007 election. No doubt he figures people will have forgotten by then. Or perhaps he and the PM think that punters who believe politicians can be taken for mugs. And, on the latest evidence, perhaps they can.

~

Michelle better watch it - Rupert will lean on her if she starts this up around election time...

I am hoping that this story has legs. I was listening to local ABC radio this morning and the point was made that in the Murdoch press a reader has to search for the tiny paragraph on this but the Corby case is all over the front of the paper. That's only hearsay of course. Anyway I really hope this one bites. He's still huffing and that's a good sign. There's more to come, more promises to be broken. People need to get cranky.

On a separate note and not wanting to get away from the theme, at least Howard has the guts to get on radio himself (but that's probably indicative of the seriousness of this latest broken promise). In SA we're used to the applicable Minister getting a belting when having to break bad news but when there's good news the Minister is trampled by Premier Mike Rann who can't wait to grab a microphone. Good News Mike. Bah!

I'm still dyed in the wool but Mike is rapidly becoming a pain.

Sorry, parochial SA politics - back to the main topic.

We should get a spreadsheet going to record the broken promises. I hope the ALP can get on this one and go for the throat. I haven't heard a lot from Kym yet but hopefully he will allow Howard to spout and then go for him.

Kym just doesn't have the narky streak that I cherished in Latham and Keating. I can't see him going for the jugular without looking like he's jogged up the empire state building, and therefore looking a little silly.

That's true. To paraphrase Denis Healey - it would be like being beaten up by a half-asleep koala.

But he has to find some mongrel in him now. Howard is exhibiting hubris. It might well be that his own lot knife him in the back. Costello might be desperate enough to find some backbone and go for him. Either way I know it's a long way out from the next federal election but Labor has to start belting the Libs and particularly Howard. Get the list of broken promises out, start a book on the next one to go down. They have to finally expose the Axis.

Unfortunately, Kym's strategy is to do nothing & let Howard & co. hang themselves. This works fine at times like this (check the polls), But doesn't win too many votes at election time.

Yes. The "strategy" during the election he lost was transparently foolish. But let's hope that they learned from that debacle. Small target indeed. When Howard's hubris mixes with the urge of the Axis to wield power through what they see as their ownership of the Senate it may well be that the Axis loses the election themselves. But Labor can't afford to be passive. It might be an old saw that governments lose elections but not without a bloody good shove from the Opposition they don't.

Yes!
Couldn't agree more, goodfielder. Unfortunately, Labor appears to have totally exhausted any desire to create genuinely alternative policies, following Latham ... Almost like they can't risk doing anything even vaguely risky these days, just in case it's TOO risky!


(Actually, I LIKED a number of Latham's policies!)

Just curious ... who exactly would lean on journalists at the AGE/SMH? Rupert can exert his subtle influence on the Australian, but what makes this lot so conservative at election time? (The Age, following article after article about "truth in government", integrity, etc, etc, came out & supported the Libs at the last minute, last year. The editorial recommendation, that is. Made the readers furious, I can tell you!)

The cartoonists are (still) having a field day with this one!: