The obvious answer as to why we have a Coalition government at the moment is that the majority of people voted that way at the last election. But why?
Many people were sick of the white-anting and disunity from a party which removed two sitting Prime Ministers. I am wondering how they feel now that the Liberals have done exactly the same thing. Should this government be labelled ‘illegitimate’ with calls for an immediate election? Eric Abetz, Kevin Andrews, Andrew Nikolic, Cory Bernardi, Tony Abbott and others are unlikely to accept a smooth transition any time soon.
Others were convinced that the warnings about climate change were ‘alarmist’ and that scientists were only doing it to get funding. Or that they were part of some UN new world order with Zionist banks ready to send us all into subsistence slavery under Agenda 21. I am wondering how they feel as every year more heat records tumble and extreme weather events cost us billions.
Many voted Coalition so they would fix the ‘debt and deficit disaster’. Labor was spending like drunken sailors! How are they feeling as government spending continues to rise, the debt continues to grow by about $50 billion a year, and we experience the biggest deficits on record?
There were those who felt we were being invaded by a horde of potential terrorists coming by boat. We have stopped the boats arriving and in so doing, been condemned by a world coping with an enormous tide of displaced people due, in part, to our aggression in the Middle East and likely to continue as we withdraw foreign aid and replace it with military expenditure. Are they happy that to stop the boats we are prepared to torture children?
Those that were angry that “Bob Brown’s bitch” was making deals with the Greens must have been somewhat disappointed when one of Joe Hockey’s first actions was to make a deal with the Greens to eliminate the debt ceiling. I am wondering how they feel as Victorian Liberals look set to preference Greens ahead of ALP.
Some people were concerned that the Labor government was spending tens of billions on a national broadband network that would just be used to play video games and download movies. Malcolm could get us a system that would cover all our needs for much cheaper and get it finished by 2016. Or not. All this talk of digital disruption and innovation must be making them wonder what’s going on, not to mention cost blowouts of $15 billion due to Malcolm’s multi technology mix which, it turns out, will take a lot longer than anticipated to provide a system that will be outdated before it is finished.
Others were cynical about Kevin Rudd’s ‘dishonest negative scare campaign’ regarding cuts to health, education, the ABC, family tax benefits and the schoolkids bonus not to mention the raising of the GST. But we know that was all lies, right? Or maybe not.
Many were very concerned that Labor’s changes to the fringe benefits tax which required people to only claim business usage for their cars when they actually used them for business would destroy the car industry and lead to job losses. Thankfully the Coalition got rid of that quick smart and saved all those jobs . . . oh, wait.
One thing that we can always be certain of is that the Coalition will be better economic managers. It’s in their DNA. Except every single economic measure has gone backwards under their stewardship.
They promised to expose the corruption of the evil unions and the rorting of politicians’ entitlements through the revelations by their heroic whistleblowers, Kathy Jackson and James Ashby. Just don’t mention the 10 NSW Liberal MPs who have been exposed by ICAC or the fraudulent misappropriation of millions by their Victorian state director or Bronnie’s helicopter rides.
The Liberal Party promised to be a transparent accountable government, unless it is an operational or onwater matter, or commercial in confidence, or anything to do with our offshore gulags and the sexual, physical and psychological abuse suffered by the people who came to us seeking help. And don’t dare ask about how much tax big corporations and rich people pay. That’s none of your business.
Thank goodness we now have a very popular Prime Minister, but what use is that when the urbane, sophisticated Malcolm Turnbull leads the same party that thought Tony Abbott would be a good idea?
The policies haven’t changed and the personnel who brought you those lies still occupy the government benches.
Despite Malcolm’s ‘new paradigm’, I am still left wondering why exactly we chose a Coalition government.
own the media…own the people
” Many voted Coalition so they would fix the ‘debt and deficit disaster’. Labor was spending like drunken sailors! ”
This lying spin was designed as a distortion of reality in order to make people afraid of the consequences of government spending. Most people have been misled into believing that federal government budgets operate according to the same principles as household budgets. They do not! A monetarily sovereign government can safely spend in circumstances where there is vast unmet demand, unused capacit and excessive levels of unemployment. In these circumstances there is no risk of inflationary pressures or of rises in interest rates as a consequence of government deficit spending. Government ministers tried to gain political capital from this widespread ignorance and confusion about how the economy operates, by portraying their political opponents as incompetent on economic matters. However the opposite is much closer to the truth.
If you only get one side of the story from the media that is what people will believe.
The media, including the ABC I am sorry to say, have become basically the propaganda arm of the LNP, so it is hardly surprising that people are not informed of the facts.
A prime example of this is in the Essential poll from this week where people were asked to compare the attributes of the two parties. One of the comparisons related to which party was the most divided – the result was 56% of people thought the LNP was divided and 58% thought the ALP was divided.
Bill Shorten has been leader of the ALP since shortly after the election, with no hint of division in the party EXCEPT for what the media tries to stir up. The Liberal party gave Tony Abbott the boot after two years (for that they must be thanked) and Abbott’s supporters in the party haven’t stopped sniping and whinging since.
So why does 58% of Joe public arrive at the conclusion that the ALP is divided. BECAUSE THE MEDIA TELLS THEM SO. We need to get laws put in place like the ones they have in Canada which forces the media to TELL THE TRUTH.
Currently the media is telling everyone that Malcolm Turnbull is the greatest thing since sliced bread – what they are not bothering to mention is that the policies are Abbott’s policies – nothing has changed except the salesman, and it annoys the hell out of me that people in this country are gullible enough to believe anything they are told without critically examining whether what they are being told is fact or lies.
Stop asking of the stupid questions Sergei.
It is because our Mad uncle rupert told them to.
Simples.
John Hermann:
True.
Of course the “distortion” was made far worse by the ALP buying into the argument. Back then, as now, they were unwilling od unable to challenge to Coalition bullshit. Rather the chose to play by Abbotts rules and made promises they new were unrealistic. Then they were forced to back down and look like fools.
Labor is still letting the Coalition set the game rules.
Now the same old media hacks are telling gullible Australians that Turnbull will be re-elected and even more, will be PM for a decade, or even decades.
Not one mention anywhere in the mainstream media of the many scandals and corruptions in Turnbull”s past though. Not a squeak. Nothing about HIH/FAI. not a word about his dodgy rainmaker funding that enriched Rupert’s nephew, nothing at all about Turnbull’s involvement in environmentally disastrous logging in the Solomon Islands and of course, never a mention of UteGate and Godwin Grech.
And yet the same media hacks who seem to have taken a vow of silence on the past of St Malcolm once spent all their time writing about Julia Gillard doing a bit of free legal work for her then boyfriend. There would not be a solicitor in the country who has not done exactly the same thing – giving a quick once-over to an application for a perfectly legal incorporated association – for a friend or a community group. But it was a crime of immense proportions when Julia Gillard did it.
Kaye, of course you and I both know the answer. It is how the coalition is pampered by the media and how Labor and the Greens are hammered and ignored by them. While your article is a great summation of the ignorance of the voting majority and deserves to be widely read, it will always be seen as “leftie squawking” in the minds of the wider public. Labor had a go by creating the Labor Herald but its message is even failing to arouse interest within the ranks of the committed.
Keep trying to get the message across Kaye, but you are battling the big guns that own the presses, own the transmitters, control the ABC, and will soon completely control social media. They in turn, are controlled by the wealthy of the world.
I am not quite so pessimistic. Murdoch and the MSM in general have little influence over young people who are far more likely to get their news online. Climate change and Malcolm’s sellout to get the leadership (signing an agreement with the dinosaurs to never put a price on carbon) will come under closer scrutiny at Paris. All those young people who visit sites like Delimiter know how he stuffed up the NBN. Morrison can bluster all he wants but sooner or later has to fess up to the increased debt and deficit – I can only hope that the bs about “our debt in a kazillion years time will be less than what it would have been under Labor” gets the bollicking it deserves.
As for Malcolm lasting decades, he is 61 and filthy rich. Why would he want to work such long hours till he is 70? I know he and Lucy are enjoying the limelight but I would imagine it will wear thin. Morrison as Treasurer and Dutton in Immigration will continue to be liabilities, not to mention Brough who the police have finally decided to ‘visit’. Not a good look when your Special Minister of State is under investigation by the AFP for an offence he has already admitted to on national tv. Pyne and Roy also rated a mention on the warrant.
Malcolm and his mob can’t help but favour wealthy people and we can thank Tony and Joe for sensitising people to check the fairness of budget measures a little more closely.
Then again, I thought Tony Abbott was unelectable so what would I know.
It’s NOT about policy.It’s about personality of the leader for most,because they do NOT understand the complexies of policies.Abbott has the double special – A moronic personality,and what really matters: dud policies. While Turnbull has the (shallow) personality,but the same policies (Booting Knights and Dames an exception.)
Enough gullible,ignorant,non-thinking brainwashed voters to believe the LYING & BIASED MSM.The MSM just a promotional tool of the Liberal party. Then another group of the public who don’t care,and don’t even bother being (ill)-informed by the MSM.They are ignorant too.
Then you have a small minority (people that come on sites like this.),that are NOT brainwashed by the MSM,and are well informed.Sadly,we are the minority and are held hostage in our fraud of a democracy by a CLUELESS MAJORITY.
Democracy does NOT work.When the MAJORITY are either easily manipulated by the MSM or don’t care.
Malcolm Turnbull is cherry picking what of the Previous Abbott governments platform and promises he will uphold, that in itself is enough reason to feel we need an election.
They wont look at marriage equality now because they promised, yet the attempt to get promise breaking cuts through continues.
Reality is Turnbull is popular, he is not Abbott and people love him for that.
Two weeks ago the CSIRO released a survey showing that barely one in four Coalition voters accepts climate change is mostly caused by humans, with more than half of Liberal voters believing changes to global temperatures are natural.
The wide-ranging report, which summarised the findings of five surveys of Australian attitudes from 2010 to 2014 before the program was axed earlier this year, was released without fanfare on Nov 4.
Of 3789 respondents since the September 2013 election, 52 per cent of Liberal voters thought climate change was happening but it was natural, compared with 42 per cent of Nationals voters, 31 per cent of Labor and 17 per cent of Greens voters, the survey found
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/csiro-survey-most-coalition-voters-reject-humans-to-blame-for-climate-change-20151103-gkpgf8.html#ixzz3rtUj49pw
I cannot believe that farmers will continue to deny climate change as they watch their properties become unviable.
October’s temperature was the most above-normal month in history. It was 1.76 degrees Fahrenheit (0.98 degrees Celsius) above the 20th-century average.
This was the eighth month this year when a heat record was set. That’s a record number of broken records in any year. Records go back to 1880.
NOAA climate scientist Jessica Blunden said 2015 will be the hottest year on record….again.
http://www.thestar.com/news/world/2015/11/18/earth-smashes-monthly-heat-record-with-october-as-hottest-month-of-the-year.html
How long can Andrew Bolt continue saying that the earth hasn’t warmed since 1998?
I thought we had a conservative coalition government because the Libs have always used the Nats as a tool for power.
If Labor can get over the fact that moving to the right is not achieving anything, maybe they can start to work with progressive parties such as the Greens as well as Independents. OOOh, sorry, I forgot; both Labor and the Libs believe in the 2 party system we rarely had.
We have this government because approx. half the working class are as dumb as a bag of hammers. The Liberal party are experts at getting one half of the working class to beat up on the other half. Added to this and I give credit where it is due, John Howard played a blinder with his aspirational’s. He turned a whole generation of working class people into small businesses. A ute full of tools and a B.S.B. number and voila a veritable entrepreneur. It ain’t rocket science.
I think that perhaps its time that journalism became a “profession”, like law or medicine, such that you can have your license removed if you are caught telling porkies. Is it any wonder that the news papers are dying? They’ve just turned into infotainment.
How long can Andrew Bolt continue saying that the earth hasn’t warmed since 1998? As long as Rupert says so. To quote Rupert, “Climate change has been going on as long as the planet is here, and there will always be a little bit of it. At the moment the north pole is melting, but the south pole is getting bigger.”
Lots of reason we have a conservative governemt. The conservative mentality is opportunist and exploitionary and th e different arms of conservatism cooperate- they want the power, be it Murdoch and big business and or politicians.
The people are easy going yet often neurotic and techniques of spin make them vulnerable to persuasion for consent manufacture, the techniques of propaganda have been honed to a sharp edge.
The Opposition on the other hand is under resouced, not willing to to try some thing diffferent or think outside of the box, too happy to just go along with the neolib/neo con version on issues and not keen to rock the boat by presenting an alternative vison, like the one in 2007.
“…To quote Rupert, “Climate change has been going on as long as the planet is here, and there will always be a little bit of it. At the moment the north pole is melting, but the south pole is getting bigger.””
Does this mean his brain is melting and his penis is getting bigger? Probably a good deal if you’re as old as hell.
Mr Turnbull said he was worried that the TPP might be held up by the American senate WTF; http://www.citizen.org/TPP
My view of this has always been that the LNP didn’t win – Labor lost. That people voted in part against the leadership turmoil and in part because Abbott was successful in controlling the MSM rhetoric around things like the Carbon Tax and the Mining Tax – both of which were great for the country, but which Abbott somehow managed – against all logic – to convince people would be the end of the world as we know it.
Why? I see working class people vote against their own interests consistently.We voted down a carbon price and a tax on large mining companies that for most part pay bugger all tax. We voted in the biggest moron PM in history. I see people exuding optimism that for most part is uninformed and abject self delusion. We are a nation of self interested ignorant dumbos. US Republicans are the world leaders of stupidly… and we are coming up a fast second. It’s difficult not to be depressed about what this country has become. Don’t get me started on the TPP.
Thanks Kaye. Love the juxta-positioning of what is said about Labor with what is done by the Liberal National Party Coalition in Government. It seems to come back to a question of seeming legitimate. The attitude that the Liberals are somehow the ‘natural party of government in Australia’ means that any Labor government, no matter what its majority or how effective it is as a government, is always somehow wrong, not as good as the Liberals would be. This leads to this constant return to a mediocre, conformist and business oriented party.
The mainstream media continue to support this view which is why they can portray the internal party ructions of the ALP as the behaviour of a treacherous rabble, while the Liberals are seen as acting responsibly when they have a leadership change.