As Coalition politicians face the reality of the election results, they are all looking for someone to blame.
It was the Mediscare lie.
It was the lawless union thugs that control the Labor Party.
It was the gays distracting everybody with their trendy self-indulgence.
It was Malcolm’s fault for knifing Tony.
Malcolm should have focused on national security and border protection.
Malcolm shouldn’t have messed with superannuation.
The excuses are endless but what you won’t hear them saying is that they have heard the message delivered by the people that they don’t trust the Coalition and they don’t like their policies.
Is it any wonder that the privatise medicare campaign was successful?
Since coming to office in 2013, the Coalition has undermined public confidence in a public, universal healthcare system with talk about budget unsustainability and the overuse of Medicare services. A surreptitious shift from public to private is occurring via increased co-payments, the abolition of bulk-billing incentives, the freezing of Medicare fees to doctors, and other measures. Out-of-pocket costs are the fastest-rising part of the healthcare budget.
Both the 2014 National Commission of Audit and the Harper Competition Policy Review advocated an expanded role and less regulation for the private health insurance sector and, in November last year, the government initiated a Productivity Commission review of how competition principles can be applied to the human services sector.
They also formed a $5 million taskforce which called for expressions of interest in privatising the payments system and gave Telstra a $220 million contract to take over the Australian National Cancer Screening Register.
Add to that the hasty sale of Medibank Private and Tony Abbott’s blatant lies about not cutting funding for health and not closing medicare locals – the Coalition lost any right to ask us to trust them. Perhaps if they looked at eliminating the $6.5 billion we pay for the Private Health Insurance Rebate we could take this talk of “living within our means” a bit more seriously.
Turnbull assures us that he called the election because he had to restore the rule of law to the construction industry. He cites the fact that there are charges against 100 union officials before the courts – which to any rational person would indicate that there are already laws in place that are being enforced.
To date, several high-profile cases resulting from the TURC have been thrown out of court. The unions themselves have done a far more effective job of prosecuting and sacking officials who have done the wrong thing.
Cory Bernardi insists that marriage equality is a “fringe” issue. He thinks that having legal and financial rights should be sufficient and that marriage should remain an exclusive institution.
What he and the other homophobes in the Coalition fail to realise is that it is about so much more than getting a marriage certificate. Until we accept the LGBTQI community as “normal” they will continue to be subjected to bullying, discrimination and vilification as was so clearly shown by the hysterical campaign led by Christensen and others against the Safe Schools program.
Right wingers are clamouring for Tony to be brought back, completely ignoring that his utter incompetence had made him a laughingstock internationally and a figure of derision domestically. His first budget killed any goodwill the public may have had towards his government, yet they persist with measures that have been soundly rejected by both the Senate and the people. The whole nation breathed a sigh of relief, albeit briefly, when Malcolm turfed him.
The right wingers also wanted to see another “Stop the terrorists coming on boats” campaign (and they have the hide to complain about scare campaigns). Their deliberate fomenting of hatred and fear has backfired, resulting in the nation having to endure Pauline Hanson again.
And as for superannuation, Malcolm’s one attempt at reining in the excessive tax concessions was handled very poorly. He did not take it to the party room for their approval and, unlike Labor’s changes to negative gearing and capital gains, some of the changes were, in a sense, retrospective (though it could be argued that most changes to taxation law are retrospective to a degree).
Regardless of the poor sell, it is apparent that the financial institutions and the wealthy benefactors of the Liberal Party will not tolerate any attempt to curb the overly generous concessions they enjoy, but there were not sufficient people affected for this to have been a significant factor in the election outcome.
Cutting down on welfare, health and education spending while giving tax cuts to the wealthy and spending hundreds of billions on strike force defence materiel was never going to go over well.
Instead of this petulant blame game, the Coalition should be doing some serious reappraisal of their devotion to “trickle down” economics. Talk of entrepreneurs and venture capitalists might be exciting in the Turnbulls’ lounge room but it does not resonate with the general public who have seen their standard of living going backwards under this government.
“The sun rises every morning and sheds light, vanquishing the night’s darkness. The rooster also rises every morning only, unlike the sun, he simply makes noise. But the darkness of the night is dispelled by sunshine, not by the rooster’s crowing. The world can use more light and less noise. More solvers and fewer blamers. More folks showing a better way and fewer folks complaining about how much better things used to be. More folks offering help and fewer folks wringing their hands about the problems. More hope bringers and fewer hope killers.” (Steve Goodier).
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Are psychopaths good at this?
My “friends” on Facebook are making all sorts of noises. Their bleating hearts are to me, the noises one hears in the background, but which never rise beyond their own embarrassment, disbelief and astonishment that they may have misread their own tea leaves.
They are so fool of themselves that just before the election come with the idea to cut in welfare. How can be so stupid and inept in political strategies?
News.com blames the loss of the western suburbs in part to the loss of Abbott. Interesting, but Tony Abbott had a swing of 9.1% swing against him with a good portion going to James Mathison (save the fig trees, pro gay marriage) and the X team. In spite of the Murdoch media still having a love affair with Abbott, the rhetoric doesn’t seem to have played out in Abbott’s own electorate.
Good article Kaye Lee!
I also liked this commentary from Kristina Keneally.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jul/03/shorten-fought-on-policies-while-turnbull-sat-back-waiting-for-the-people-to-elect-him
What better example do we have of the Coalition priorities than their decision to extend the temporary freeze on the superannuation guarantee while abolishing the temporary levy on high income earners.
You can’t keep squeezing the poor to make gravy for the rich. THAT is what is unsustainable.
Indeed Kaye ! … “…more light and less (distracting) noise …….” …..
On the topic of “light” Kaye …. the ‘ light ‘ which has emerged from this campaign (rampage of part truths/deceit ) is that of the Labor Party led by Mr. Bill Shorten, who is emerging as a STATESMAN ! ….. much of our populace will struggle to come up with the word, least of all understand it’s real meaning! …. it’s been a long time!! …..
STATESMANSHIP embraces the welfare of ALL! ….. knowing that good times spread UP and OUT! …..
I fervently pray that the Labor party can hold the line and not be induced into (modern) politics of duck – weave – & spin !! … with the accent on SPIN!! …..
Remove $$Big Money$$ from the ‘Table’ and kick Spin way down the road !!
If there was ever going to be a time to become Fair Dinkum in Aus. politics …. the Time is NOW !!
As for Tony’s appeal in the Western suburbs, he made a lot of promises out there which he then broke. That was before his attack on family payments and before his full frontal assault on Muslims. That was before he slashed funding to public schools and hospitals. That was before Malcolm and Scott decided investors were more important than housing affordability.
Spot on with it all Kaye Lee, what about:
Turnbull should have stuck to a progressive agenda instead of allowing the far right Christian nut jobs to decide policy.
Turnbull shouldn’t have made really DUMB statements telling people that if they want to get ahead, that they should buy their baby an investment property.
Turnbull/Morrison shouldn’t have made the ridiculous statement that those earning well over $80,000pa is ‘average’.
Turnbull shouldn’t have tried to ditch federal funding for public schools while retaining funding for elite private schools for himself.
Morrison/Cormann shouldn’t have announced a ‘crackdown’ on pensioners on the cusp of an election, boasting that they would save $1.1 billion (or thereabouts) in ‘clawback’ from granny.
Out of touch and elitist while caving in to far right nut cases is probably something to do with ‘progressive’ Mal not doing as well as expected.
Am grateful the uber-rich are only 1% of population and the rest of us still actually get to vote.
Anyone think we could build on this fact?
They never learn
Cory Bernardi has blamed Saturday’s uncertain election result on Malcolm Turnbull’s shift away from the party’s conservative base.
‘The conservative revolution needs to start within the Liberal party or it will end outside it, and I think we’ve seen just a taste of that this weekend,’
‘However you look at it, it’s a disaster for the Liberal Party. The brand has been damaged substantially by hubris; by an arrogant contempt for our traditional base and the abandonment of any founding principle,’
It appears the a petition is on the Herald Sun
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/dear_mr_turnbull_please_resign/
Isnt it odd that as soon as they are no longer standing outside the “brand”, ex-Liberal politicians go straight down the gurgler. Because most Lib voters don’t vote for the candidate, they just vote for the brand. Which is why Bernardi and his ilk will never leave the Libs. But they are happy to make an awful lot of noise from inside their safe castle walls.
I just saw Pauline do a presser. She asked why don’t Muslims stand with her in condemning Islam – seriously. She also said there has been no empirical scientific evidence about climate change. She wants mosques to be closed because they preach hate but she also wants section 18C of the racial discrimination act abolished because she should be able to say whatever she likes. She mentioned George Christensen as being sympatico. And her first piece of business will be to abolish the family court and to have some form of committee of the common man decide custody issues.
The woman is stark raving mad.
Spot on. It is ridiculous that we have an ex merchant banker with money in tax havens, named in the panama papers, at a time of growing inequality, telling us to give money to big buisness, because one day big buisness will use that money to help pay for basic social services… How did that work out in America Malcolm you stupid f*ck, its been 30 years and the poor there are PROPER POOR and are dying because they cannot afford medical treatment. I can’t believe why anyone who isn’t a corrupt obscenely rich businessman would vote for them.
Still its good to watch that smug f*ck squirm.
Pauline has internalised the values of patriarchy to the point where she can do nothing else but regurgitate them. I have not seen anything about her so called rationale for the ideas regarding Family Court but I would bet that it is based on father’s ‘rights’ discourse and other MRA lies.
This is their policy statement. It is naive beyond belief just like everything else I have heard her say today.
http://www.onenation.com.au/policies/family-law
WHOEVER gains government will have to negotiate around the demands of the new force of angry men, led by that angriest of angry women Pauline Hanson.
Those demands include the abolition of the Family Court and a better custody deal for fathers, issues associated with men who believe they have been deprived of rights in family break-ups.
http://www.news.com.au/national/federal-election/how-angry-man-vote-resurrected-pauline-hanson/news-story/d23c6a63859bd957ac95c57e3a984f33
Pretty much as I suspected, Kaye, only worse.
Even this web page is rigged! Cannot even write a comment and have it printed! Need I say anything else! Could it be because I support Pauline?
And that makes you an expert too right? Anyone who thinks outside the square there has to be something dreadfully wrong with that person. No bloody wonder this country is stuffed. If we only had more people with balls like this woman and we could be a great country again.
No, the web page isn’t rigged. Your abusive, racist, threatening comments simply don’t pass moderation.
Further, if you continually demean people who don’t agree with you then even more of your comments won’t pass moderation.
It’s up to you.
Maybe the truth is a little more than you can bear perhaps? I am not a racist nor am I threatening. I’m just saying there is more truth that what the comments here are stating. Maybe you should be looking and reading about what you are all saying about Pauline. You tell me? one sided or not. Abusive or not, Racist or not! You talk of demeaning people, what do you think you are doing in relation to Pauline Hanson? A lot of good people voted for this woman and for a lot of good reasons. She cares about this country and so do I!
Fed up, Pauline’s commentary is pro maintaining of existing social divisions/conditions. It is pro status quo and therefore very much INSIDE the square.
[Labor Party led by Mr. Bill Shorten, who is emerging as a STATESMAN ! ]
Uum, sort off. I still think anyone with more personality would have led the ALP to a majority victory.
Bill is better than even last year, but still just average as a political salesman. His level of effort was very good.
The individual party members have behaved very well under Bill, which has been handy and demonstrates at least some leadership – though who knows what would have happened if the ALP had been leading by an unbeatable margin pre-election.
I have doubts Albo or any other potential contender would have done better.
I would suggest that it’s you who can’t handle the truth, FU.
Mediscare ?
Lest we forget :
http://www.canberratimes.com.au/national/public-service/business-plots-medicare-takeover-20151021-gkemej.html#ixzz3pFdBtSdd
Fed Up, what are you doing here?
Your values and ideology is so far out of the views of the bloggers here that for sure you have to feel out of place.
If you think that your comments are constructive, forget it, they are treated as a scam.
Just read and perhaps you can learn something.
Well Pauline has won her seat in Parliament. people don’t vote for you unless you have something to offer over the big 2 leaders. Shorten, giving more spotlight will be a good leader for this country, Turnbull always looked like someone didn’t write the right script for him. He is not a statesman, nor will he ever be one. Shorten was by far the better spokesperson overall and would make the better leader of the two. Is that nice enough for you Mr Michael Taylor?
“Pauline has internalised the values of patriarchy to the point where she can do nothing else but regurgitate them. I have not seen anything about her so called rationale for the ideas regarding Family Court but I would bet that it is based on father’s ‘rights’ discourse and other MRA lies.”
Of course, Deanna. Just let her try getting rid of the Family Court. Hundreds of lawyers will mobilise into action. The LNP will block any attempt because they will be helping their lawyer mates maintain their income. The Greens, ALP and NXT will block it due to DV issues and as a much needed service to provide for children and dependent spouses. Pauline has rocks in her head if she thinks she is going to achieve that.
If Medicare was not raised as a political issue at this election the Liberals would have won and that would have been the end of Medicare
as we know it today. Turnbull was forced to back down on the privatisation. He had nowhere else to go! And to Freethinker, my views are as good as yours. Yes I agree they are different from your bloggers. I am entitled to my opinion just as you are your. Have a nice day all. I’m quite bored with all of you.
If she truly wanted to help she would be advocating for achievable things like a restoration of funding for legal aid, more funding for emergency refuges and longer term affordable housing, restoration of funding for Headspace and other community groups that provide counselling and support, and an increase in the single parents payments. There are several groups dedicated to assisting men which are doing good work. She should be publicising them and referring men to where they can get advice and support if she feels they are being discriminated against.
Hanson offers no practical solutions.
Shaun Micallef, Charlie Pickering and their writers are probably overjoyed at how easy it will be to write their shows each week.
Exactly, Kaye Lee
Like others who gain power by whingeing – a lot of noise and no idea. Part of practical solutions includes people she is against, too difficult for Hanson to think through – helping children and fathers requires helping mothers as well. Duh.
If Hanson was to enact her ‘immigration policy’ such as it is, most of Australia would have to leave, including her. Hanson is not First Nation is she? 😛
Kaye. Have you done a blog on the scare/denigration campaigns run by the Coalition? Just to compare them to the whinge they are now having about the Labor Medicare campaign.
I get:-
Negative gearing smashing house prices and driving rents up.
Return of the boats and immigrants.
Superannuation changes (before the election campaign in response to the Labor proposed changes).
Debt black hole (Scott Morrison’s $67B plane crash press conference).
War on …(Scott Morrison’s plane crash press conference on the five things Labor had declared war on).
Labor/Green alliance.
Senior ministers saying Anne Aly had provided support for a terrorism suspect and asked for lesser goal times.
They are the major ones that stick in my mind.
Would any of them justify the bringing in of the AFP?
Would stealing the diary of the Speaker of the House require bringing in the AFP?
Would laundering illegal donations through slush funds (Free Enterprise Foundation and others) require bringing in the AFP?
Would diverting public money through a private company (Parakeelia) then on to a political party require bringing in the AFP?
Would the chairman of a private company seeking government contracts (AWH) making donations to the party of which he is Treasurer require bringing in the AFP?
Why has Kathy Jackson not faced the courts?
As to previous scare campaigns, don’t forget the carbon tax. Pauline has just added to the ranks of climate change deniers. I would count their hysteria about unions in the scare campaign category too.
Athena, my comment was just speculation about the possible under-pinning ideology of Pauline’s’ ideas’. I haven’t made any comment on the likelihood of her having any success implementing them. Pauline may be naive to think she can just abolish a court of law but we’re naive if we think her future contributions to public discourse around family violence are not going to be very harmful indeed. She will be sowing in very fertile ground.
Correction: People don’t vote for you unless they *think* you have something to offer.
Pauline reminds me of Jacqui Lambie when she first started, They make big promises but show they have no idea what they are talking about. Pauline wants a referendum to change the constitution’s definition of marriage – except the constitution doesn’t mention marriage. It’s like when Lambie said she thought the carbon tax should be 3 or 4% showing she had no idea what the carbon tax was but there she was voting for it to be abolished.
Pauline wants to style herself as a voice for ignorant ill-informed people. I don’t mean to imply that the people who are sucked in by her are bad people – just very naive about how things actually work.
Spot on Kaye.
I also recall seeing Turnbull being interviewed about Labour’s negative gearing policy. He tried to claim it would send house prices plummeting and when asked for his evidence to prove this basically stated that because he says so you should believe it. He is still such an arrogant egomaniac. If he says something it must be true and it must be correct, you don’t need evidence when malc is around. There were one or two other interviews I saw where he said similar things.
As for his petulent, smarmy election night speech where he made the first campaign mention of why he called the DD. Then he started his whining about Labour’s mediscare campaign as if this was the most awful thing ever done in politics. Seems he can dish it out……. We won’t even talk about budget emergencies or anything else Abbott came out with at the last election.
In any case this arrogant egomaniac tried playing dirty and changed the Senate voting rules and called his spurious DD and boy didn’t he end up with some egg on his face. The whole carton I reckon. Of course Australia must now suffer because he has now saddled the country with Pauline for the next 6 years.
Hansen has had some interesting experiences. She ran a hard and humble business in Ipswich (not a privileged location). She cannot possibly be a friend of the Liberal Party after they first dropped her and then adopted most of her policies the first time around. She was victimised personally by Tony Abbott. She is (as far as I know) the only one of all the politicians to have done serious gaol time. She has certainly brushed shoulders with a societal group that most of us here do not really accept the existence of, or willingly allow a voice to. I don’t like much of what she says, but I think we should listen and learn, through her, about the opinions of those who lean to the extreme right. We don’t have to change our opinions, we certainly don’t need to support hers/theirs, but knowledge is a first step to finding ways to communicate.
Well considered and written, Kaye Lee
Indeed she has.
Indeed. (again). When will the MSM ask and investigate how she moved from being a humble barmaid in an Ipswich Pub to an owner and operator of a Fish and Chip establishment? And I won’t mention how she became the owner of a substantial (rural) property on the outskirts of Ipswich.
Sometimes it’s rewarding to chat up the old bloke sitting at the end of the bar.
If in doubt, just ask Pauline. Explore virgin territory. In the intellectual sense.
For me, the brief comment by the poster alex, much earlier…that is all.
James Ashby is now working for Pauline Hanson.
He was a strawberry farmer. She was a fish and chip shop owner.
I don’t like anchovies, on top of strawberries and cream…
You never quit do you Kaye Lee? You are obsessed with Pauling Hanson. Maybe it’s because she was a “Simple barmaid” and a Fish & Chip shop owner that’s the issue with you. At least this woman has fought and fought for what she believes in and what a lot of Australians from humble backgrounds believe in. Just what do you believe in Kaye Lee? seeing as you have an opinion on everything Political! Or are you just a couch politician? You may not like her policies but there a thousands out there that do and I hope she does well in Parliament.
That is so true Athena. There are a lot of people out there that don’t agree with the 2 big parties policies. Pauline may not be right on all her policies but she sure is on some and it’s time these big parties started to see exactly what the “ordinary Australian” wants and if it takes this woman to bring it to their attention then good for her. It really seems to me that most of the bloggers here are terrified of her! One thing about Pauline Hanson that I admire so much is she is a battler, she’s a fighter for what she believes in and she is now back after all that the major parties have done to her in the past. Pauline is a winner in my book! Kind of reminds me a little of Don Chip. Keeping the bastards honest!
Why don’t you look at all her policies. No you have to pick out just one and run with it! I have more admiration for this woman for coming out on top after all her struggles in politics. They even threw her in jail and she is still here standing up for what she and many Australians believe in for this country! Sounds to me like many of you bloggers are so afraid of this woman! Go Pauline, keep on fighting!
When things are good it’s, “Yay, look at how wonderful we are.” When things go bad they suddenly develop selective amnesia and blame the previous government and everybody else for their mistakes. MSM does not stand for Mainstream Media it is Murdoch Sleaze Media. The LNP can’t change because they have allowed themselves to corrupted by the big end of town for so long that it has become part of their political DNA.
Deanna Jones, I haven’t said anything about Hanson’s contribution to public discourse on DV either. All I said was the Family Court isn’t going anywhere.
What I have heard from both sides is, they have failed to sell their message adequately. Listening to the electorate is only to evaluate the effectiveness of their sales pitch.
You can’t polish a turd but, you can roll it in glitter. I expect to see a change in poopaganda tackiness.
@FedUp
I agree Pauline Hanson is tenacious and a battler. I must admit that I have not heard anything from her with which I agree; Asians, Muslims, Immigration, and DV.
However, you asked us to look at all her policies. This is difficult to do, given her comments on people she thinks are different to her; isolationist rather than inclusive. I have the same problems with religion for often very similar reasons – anyone who is too different is regarded as unacceptable.
Not trusting anyone outside of one’s own ‘tribe’ is a common human trait I get that.
Perhaps, you could state why you agree with Hanson.
What is it about her policies that are better than what the Lib/Labs have to offer?
For the record, I agree that the 2 party system no longer is working for people, especially when both major parties are in near close agreement with regard to economics and the treatment of people seeking asylum. Lately Labor has tried to temper their policies with more socially geared policies – but many of these policies do not redress the cuts made by both the LNP and Labor. For example, increasing Newstart, or reinstating a pension for single mothers and father who have to go on Newstart after their children reach school age.
Does Ms Hanson address such issues? If so, how?
Athena, we have our wires crossed I think. You kept saying the family court is here to stay as if you were under the impression that I thought it wasn’t.
Fed up, I am from a very humble, public housing background myself, and Hanson is appalling to me.
FedUp,
Apart from the more questionable (eg overtly racist and bigoted) aspects of One Nation’s anti-immigration platforms (like the desire for a publicly funded inquisition into the classification of Islam), there are other serious problems in their overall platforms, especially regarding their ‘climate-change’ stance.
They happily embrace the Monckton view (the accepted orthodoxy of climate science is a conspiracy of deception based on a sinister agenda), and are agitating for a pogrom against the fields of natural science that study climate influences, as well as seeking to actively sabotage renewable energy industries.
Basically, I don’t think Pauline is all that informationally clever, but worse, I reckon she listen to some really crappy advice.
Me thinks, Pauline is going to get the education she did not get when she was younger – except it will take valuable time and be more expensive for all of us.
It makes sense to consistently invest in infrastructure – education, shelter, working with nature, health, cooperation, collaboration, etc
England is out of Europe. Now let’s build walls around Australia, so those weird coloured people can’t come here and ruin our crime-less Christian paradise…
Go away you Muslin hating redhead, the country has enough problems without you.