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Tag Archives: Greg Combet

Labor Bashing

It’s surely not just me who has noticed the mainstream media losing their shit this week.

It’s like the very sight of Kevin Rudd is crack cocaine – sending journalists into a frenzied, chest beating fit of prediction and smear. It’s not like we can’t explain why this happens. We can. It’s because Kevin Rudd is a stick to beat Gillard’s government with. But mark my words, if it wasn’t Kevin f*cking Kevin, or Telstra’s asbestos, or Joel unhinged-Fitzgibbons or Labor backbenchers with their overnight suitcases being reported as having packed up their offices, it wouldn’t make any difference. I’m not going to waste any more time trying to find blame for this situation with the Labor Party, because surely this job has been done, and done and done and re-done many times with many more words than I could write in a hundred years. Let’s be honest. The axis of self-interests – the Murdoch, Rinehart, Abbott triangle is running the show. And they’re winning. This is a war, and the wrong side is winning. It’s a sad, humiliating fact for this great country. But it’s true. The 1% is kicking the 99%’s arse.

Labor does have a communication problem. I would like to see the best communicator in the world cut through a Murdoch smear campaign when his profits are threatened, but still, Labor does have a communication problem. But if you, like me, think it’s more important to judge someone by what they do, instead of what they say, it’s quite clear the Labor party is an incredibly successful outfit. It doesn’t matter who you are or what you’re rusted on to. This is fact. Policies, economic credentials and Labor party values intact – the Gillard Labor government is hugely successful. But this is the dagger in the heart of people like me who have been watching politics for the last three years, and have been reading mainstream news, and been incredulously reviewing the poll results. It’s becoming clear that it wouldn’t matter what the Gillard government did. Gillard could walk on water and it would be reported that she failed to swim. It’s as if we need to find a new word to outdo frustrating because it’s just getting too much to accept.

The Labor government’s policies are popular. The budget is economically responsible. The economy is outperforming all expectations compared to all other developed nations in regards to growth, unemployment, inflation and interest rates. Gillard’s renewable energy policies are restructuring the economy for future challenges. The Labor Party is doing exactly what they promised us they would do – they’re being progressive. NDIS, Gonski, a nation building NBN, a Carbon Price, the mining tax, Paid Parental Leave. But it wouldn’t matter how many successes they have – in fact the more successful they are the more the Murdoch, Rinehart, Abbott triangle ramps up their opposition. And depressingly, it would appear that the interests of the mega-rich trump public interest hands down.

How have we come to this point in our nation where we would prefer to shrink back into a bigoted, mean, selfish, stop the boats, cancel the Carbon Price, kill the NBN, scrap Gonski’s education funding, boost Gina Rinehart’s fortune, prop up Murdoch’s out of date business model instead of being brave, bold and committed to a better future for our children? A nation who hates unions and public services, but who turn a blind eye to capitalist corruption. For what purpose would anyone in their right mind behave like a irrational Iain Hall (please stop commenting on my blog) troll and think that it’s a good idea to eat shit and whip on the handbrake with a vote for Tony Abbott?

If you’re waiting for the mainstream media to wake up and realise they’re failing the country by waging a political campaign to destroy the Labor government, you’ll be waiting forever. They’re all in Murdoch and Rinehart’s pocket. When the ABC is as bad as the rest of them, you know all hope is lost. All it takes is for one bad poll for Labor and every political journalist in the country shows their true colours by waving their pom poms in the face of every Labor MP they can find. And when I say true colours, I mean the colours of their bosses. Just as one example of the priority of our journalists and the news they choose to focus on – this week Greg Combet told Parliament the Carbon Price is working – emissions have reduced by 7.4%. This is big news, I would have thought. But the radio report on ABC’s Radio National did not mention this important fact. No. Instead, their report was on Combet’s response to a question from them about what he will do if Labor loses the election. I rest my case. If this country wants Murdoch, Rinehart and Abbott’s 1% to decide their futures, they deserve everything they get.

 

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Is the ‘carbon tax’ the reason for the PM’s low popularity, or is it Murdoch?

Claims that Julia Gillard’s unpopularity were linked to her introduction of carbon pricing in 2012 don’t stack up, says Alex White from the UK Guardian. White points the finger at Rupert Murdoch and the people he controls in our country. Tony Abbott sits high on that list of puppets.

White’s article is reproduced in full below. It’s the type of truth in reporting we’ll be seeing more of in our country when the Guardian opens its doors here. What a relief that will be from the biased Murdoch bile we are currently force-fed.

I hope you enjoy the article:

Since the disappointment of Copenhagen in 2009, Australia has witnessed a concerted scare campaign against action on global warming. The scare campaign has been led by senior commentators in (Murdoch owned) News Limited papers, by conservative radio shock-jocks on the airwaves, and in parliament by extremist opposition party leader Tony Abbott.

From the moment Australia’s carbon pricing legislation package, the Clean Energy Future Act, was announced Tony Abbott has barnstormed from one end of Australia to another, declaring a “blood oath” that repealing the carbon price would be his first priority if elected:

“I am giving you the most definite commitment any politician can give that this tax will go. This is a pledge in blood.”

Behind this incendiary phrase is Abbott’s own climate change policy, a mishmash of ineffective handouts to industry to “clean up” polluting power stations and industrial plants, a tree-planting program, investment in bio-char, and token efforts towards energy efficiency.

Collectively, these programs are termed “direct action”, which can be boiled down, in the words of shadow minister Malcolm Turnbull, to the Liberal Party’s sop to the climate change deniers in their ranks:

If the theory of climate change was proved to be nonsense, then obviously there would be no point in cutting emissions at all. If the rest of the world ultimately resolved to do nothing then we would very likely be better off spending the resources available on adaptation – moving to higher ground and so on.

The fact remains that the direct action policy, which aims to reach the same 5% carbon emission reductions as Labor’s carbon price, is mostly a mishmash of unanswered questions and wishful thinking.

Viciousness and personal attacks have characterised the blood oath carbon price repeal campaign. Abbott and other senior conservative front-bench MPs have spoken at rallies where posters and banners have depicted Prime Minister Julia Gillard as a “witch” and a “bitch”. Tony Abbott, for a time, defended conservative radio host Alan Jones for claiming at a Liberal Party fundraiser that Gillard’s father “died of shame”. Independent MP, Tony Windsor, who voted for the carbon price, received death threats.

Unsurprisingly, over the past three years public support for the Gillard government has declined to record low levels. Many in the media, and some within the government, blame the introduction of the carbon price for the low polling numbers. Unfortunately, these claims don’t stack up.

The graph below shows the decline in the two-party polling for Labor, matched alongside the total support and oppose polling for the carbon price. The polling figures are from Essential Report, a fortnightly Australian poll.

 

Australian polling of the carbon price and Labor two-party preferred rating

 

Australian polling of the carbon price support, Labor’s two-party preferred rating and Tony Abbott’s dissatisfaction rating (source: Essential Report)

Prime Minister Gillard announced the carbon price in February 2011, after winning the election the previous August. By this stage, the fall in the government’s polling numbers is already visible.

The Clean Energy Bill passed through the lower house in October 2011 and the Senate in November. The carbon price came into effect the following year from 1 July 2012. In this time, support for the carbon price dropped to rock bottom and opposition sky-rocketed. Despite a massive pro-carbon price campaign run by Australia’s environment movement, Tony Abbott’s “blood oath” scare tactics won out through 2011 (although as is clear, his personal approval suffered).

Something happened after 1 July 2012 however.

The apocalyptic predictions made by Tony Abbott did not come to pass. The sky didn’t fall. Mining and manufacturing towns weren’t wiped off the map. Regional airlines didn’t double their prices. The carbon price wrecking ball, python strike and cobra squeeze has not impacted Australia’s interest rates, employment levels or inflation.

Support for the carbon price, and opposition to it, narrowed and equalised.

What didn’t happen was an increase in Labor’s vote. Throughout 2011 and 2012, while the carbon price’s stocks fell, Labor’s also remained low. From 1 July 2012, the two numbers decoupled. Labor’s polling remained stuck, while opposition to the carbon price declined and support increased.

This month, we passed an unprecedented milestone: global carbon levels exceeded levels not seen in over 3 million years. The carbon price in Australia has contributed to a 10-year low in carbon emissions. Few in Australia have noticed either turning point. Meanwhile, conservative state governments have quietly been dismantling carbon reduction policies established by the previous Labor governments, wilfully ignoring warnings by the scientific community of the risks.

It is unlikely that the election will be fought on climate change, or that Tony Abbott will follow through on his threat to make the election a referendum on the carbon price.

If Tony Abbott does win the Australian election on 14 September, he has announced he will do everything he can to abolish the carbon price, which would leave Australia the only nation in the world to remove carbon pricing laws. No doubt, an Abbott-led Australia will accelerate exports of fossil fuels, but it remains to be seen if he can dismantle the carbon price.

 

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