Keep Josh? Will JoshKeeper Work?
Back in January of this year, Josh Frydenberg was telling us:
“With $424 billion accumulated on household and business balance sheets since the pandemic began, there is now a war chest of private sector savings to support Australia’s economic recovery, With tax cuts boosting savings, falling unemployment, a strong pipeline of business investment and one of the highest vaccination rates in the world, Australians have every reason to be confident about the year ahead.”
That was before all that demand led to inflation and the Reserve Bank increasing interest rates. Of course, when I say that it was demand that caused inflation, there’s a bit of debate about that. And when I say debate what I mean is that the government is unable to get their story straight. You see, interest rates are being caused by overseas factors like the Russians invading Ukraine and they’re really nothing to do with the government… except I have noticed the odd Liberal ad telling us that average interest rates were higher under Labor than they’ve been under Liberals. I guess this means that Labor is responsible for interest rates when they’re in power, but Scott Morrison is responsible for nothing when he’s in power because anything that isn’t Labor’s fault is someone else’s job.
But back to Josh. He’s a very worried man. I mean, why else would he agree to debate an independent in his seat. Not that isn’t a nice idea. The Treasurer taking time from his busy schedule to debate someone who has no hope of forming government. Or rather, no hope of being part of the government. There’s still a chance that the independents will play a large part in the forming of the next government.
This has led to a lot of people screeching about the need for the independents declaring who they’ll support in the event of a hung parliament. This has also led to people using the phrase “so-called teal independents” when referring to them. I presume this must be about the colour because it’s really more turquoise, so the “so-called teal” is an attempt to point out their colour blindness.
As far as the need for the declaration of support goes, this is quite interesting. I can’t recall anyone standing as an independent in previous elections being asked to do the same. Neither do the Liberals demand that the Greens, PHON or UAP tell us who they’ll support after the election if they by some miracle – which Scotty believes in, by the way – should hold the balance of power. Surely their decision would depend on such things as what part of their agenda either of the major parties was prepared to support, as well as which party was best placed to get legislation through. I mean, if one party is two seats short of a majority, then it’s a lot easier to support them than one who needs the support of every independent to pass bills.
This is quite strange when the Liberals and the Nationals tell us that their coalition agreement is a secret and we can’t know the details, but surely we need to know – before the election – under what conditions the agreement would break down.
Ok, pretty much the Liberals doing anything positive about climate change. The Nationals agreed to committing to net-zero by 2050 so long as we do nothing about it until someone else is in government. As far as the “technology not taxes” slogan goes, I wonder if any of you noticed this little contraction from Jane Hume on Radio National the other day:
Patricia Karvelas: They may not have to buy them (carbon offsets), Labor says, there may be technology opportunities.
Jane Hume: And that will cost businesses and that’s why it’s been referred to as a sneaky tax.
So technology will cost and it’ll be the equivalent of a “sneaky tax”. But only under Labor apparently.
Anyway, it seems like we’ve had a few major blunders by those facing the independents. The hardest thing about getting votes in an election is letting people you know that you exist and what you stand for. How many people would have been aware that Zoe Daniel was even standing if it weren’t for Timmy Willson’s dummy spit about the signs?
Similarly, I suspect that Josh thought that by debating Monique Ryan, he’d be able to impress people with his superior qualities. Leaving aside the terrible hubris of that, the simple fact is that giving an Independent any publicity is a poor strategic move. As I wrote the other day, if Scott Morrison were to say under no circumstances should you vote for Person X, you’ve probably just delivered them several thousand people wanting to vote for them before they even know what Person X stands for.
I was checking the betting markets on some of the individual seats. Not because I was planning to bet on them, but to get a better idea on reality. While it’s true that the polls and the markets got 2019 wrong, at least we know that the betting markets are trying not to lose their money so they don’t offer good odds on things that they think are highly likely. I notice that a number of seats that are being touted by the political pundits as a “close race” have, in fact, Labor as close to a certainty in terms of odds. The ones that are too close to call are the ones that would give Labor a comprehensive victory.
I know that this isn’t foolproof, but I find it interesting that the betting market I looked at had the independent (Georgia Steele) as the slight favourite in Craig Kelly’s old seat of Hughes.
Whatever, it’s going to be a long fortnight.
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11 comments
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Albos Elbow -
Canguro -
wam -
New England Cocky -
Terence Mills -
Kaye Lee -
GL -
Kaye Lee -
Canguro -
Harry Lime -
Albos Elbow
Return to home pageAs the Great Masterbait drags on, Labor fims to $1.35 favourite and COAL-NP blows out to $3.50 with TAB.com.au.
Greens great value at $126.00, might take a little each way and the trifecta. https://www.tab.com.au/sports/betting/Politics/competitions/Australian%20Federal%20Politics
Hilarious, if it weren’t so tragic…
Barnaby after a few sherbs… “I do trust the prime minister…”
It has already been a bloody long ache for a old worrier, rossleigh.
In the morning I will be taking the last one standing of the old rabbottian ladies, to vote and I will negate her votes.
ps
Albo’s elbow,
Are those quoted odds on providing the PM?
Whilst it is vaguely possible for the vic seats, macnamara and wills, to follow the bandit in taking labor seats can’t be bothered looking for the other 7, but I’m sure they are there somewhere. Still 126-1 is about 0.001 of the real odds
Oh dear Rossleigh, you have again questioned the right of the born-to-rule Liarbrals and Nazional$ to make all the rules suit themselves and to hell with the country. Seem to remember reading about France at the end of the18th century having much the same problem until the people took action to stop the starvation, derelict housing and inadequate schooling.
Now about the New England representative of the Nazional$, the Beetrooter. If his lips are moving you have disconbobulation. If his hand is in his pocket look around for a pretty face or wait for a handout. The only reason that the COALition agreement is secret is that it relieves Beetrooter of any obligation to remember who he is representing … naturally himself to the exception of any alleged electorate.
Being in New England makes you realise how silly it is to give a representative of the Nazional$ a 16+% election margin. With Beetrooter buzzing arounds Australia buying votes with COALition largess we see Shepparton Victoria getting multimillion sports arena handouts while Armidale Regional Airport languishes without suitable equipment to land planes either at night or in difficult weather. The excuse that Armidale is the highest commercial airport in Australia has rung no bells among the self-serving Nazional$ who fly out of the expanding and well equipped Tamworth Regional Airport 100km south of Armidale.
Even the Mafia are reputed to have always looked after their neighbourhoods ….. but Nazional$ politicians only look after themselves.
The less said about the poorly moderated second leaders debate the better.
What Labor have to recognise is that the Liberal party have a God given right to rule and any attempt by the Labor Party to challenge that right is seen by Morrison and his cronies as an impertinence.
I’m not sure that Albanese is the right man to lead the country but I am absolutely positive that Morrison is the wrong man.
On the positive side, I hear this morning that polls are showing that Clive Palmer’s UAP probably won’t win a single seat in either House and that Craig Kelly will definitely lose his seat of Hughes ; so it’s not all bad news out there.
Albanese has to learn how to deal with that better. You don’t engage in a shouting match where no-one can hear what is being said. If Morrison interrupted me, I would ignore him and ask the moderator if my one minute to answer had started yet. I would wait until Morrison spluttered out, then ask him if he was finished before I began (or continued) my answer. Don’t let the distraction technique work. Scotty needs something to fight against. Don’t let him bully you into engaging. Let the moderator tell him to shut up so you get the focus back on your answer…..”As I was attempting to say before I was interrupted….” or “In answer to your question…”. The more belligerent Morrison gets, the more controlled Albanese should be. If it’s your turn to speak, don’t even listen to what Morrison is saying let alone respond. Direct your comments to the panel and the moderator.
Are you sure that “debate” wasn’t an episode of that garbage Married at First Sight? To me it had almost all the hallmarks of a Channel 9 puerile reality (snort, snigger) show.
They thought Lego masters was more important. What’s that tell you?
I hope David Crowe is feeling embarrassed. It wasn’t fascinating, David. It was a debacle. As for 2GB’s Deborah Knight…really? Why?
The Guardian’s Katharine Murphy’s take on the ‘debate’. Not impressed!
A genuine shit blizzard.
I could not watch it,it appears it was worse than I could have imagined,besides anything on channel 9 is guaranteed to be shit.Murphy is right..bring on the fucking election, and let’s be done with the Fake and his stooges Everything Morrison has ever touched has turned to shit,has the average punter woken up yet?
wam,
they are the odds for the party that wins the election and provides the PM, so Albo v Scomo v Brandt.
Don’t underestimate the Greens. I believe the Greens have the best policies and hope one day Albanese has the Italian testicles to adopt some of them.
Labor is just matching anything Scomo says and is the people’s choice only as the “best alternative of the worst two” and will probably fall over the line a-la-Bradbury.