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The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Auspol March - C U Next Trollday, Auspol

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

Fairfax / Ipsos poll swung a lot to the Coalition for some reason.

Ghost Who Votes posted:

Primary Votes: L/NP 42 (+4) ALP 36 (-4) GRN 12 (+1) PUP 2 (-1)
2 Party Preferred: L/NP 49 (+3) ALP 51 (-3)

Abbott: Approve 32 (+3) Disapprove 62 (-5)
Shorten: Approve 43 (-5) Disapprove 43 (+5)

Preferred PM: Abbott 39 (+5) Shorten 44 (-6)

quote:

Pollster Jessica Elgood said the mixed results reflected several apparently competing assessments by voters.

"While the Coalition share of the vote has marginally increased, the ratings for Abbott remain poor, and Turnbull receives very high ratings for his personal attributes," she said. "Voters appear to already be factoring in Abbott's potential departure. They don't like him, prefer Turnbull and assume Abbott is not long in his job."

# ¿ Mar 1, 2015 09:25

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# ¿ May 12, 2024 22:57

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

cpaf posted:

Is it a bromance? Can you even give the unshakeable unrequited love Sheridan has for Tony Abbott a flippant, hollow description like "bromance"? The article is beyond lust and well past the OH&S guidelines on masturbatory safety. An objective mind might suggest it takes a step back from the psychedelic sexual fantasy of wanting to be a Joint Strike Fighter and more comfortably to the realm of practical biological human copulation, but an objective mind might also suggest a legal order be made preventing Greg Sheridan from being within 50 metres of the Prime Minister at all times.

The Monthly posted:

How I learnt to love Tony Abbott
A bromance for the ages

BESTIES

Abbott was my best friend � We talked over everything. The meaning of life, the purpose of politics, who�d win the rugby league grand final, what girls we planned to ask out, petty squabbles we might have had with our parents. [12 September 2012]

Like Abbott, I spent some time at a Catholic seminary intending to become a priest. [22 August 2009]

In 1977, Abbott and I drove down from Sydney to Melbourne to attend an AUS [Australian Union of Students] conference at Monash University. The AUS conference was extremely hostile for two modestly conservative boys like Abbott and me. The stench of marijuana lay heavy in the air, and every communist and Trotskyist sub-group had assembled, it seemed, its entire national membership. We found the atmosphere of the conference so uncongenial, and so threatening, that we went across the road and asked the Catholic college if we could stay there for the duration of the conference. [12 September 2012]

FIRST CRUSH

Abbott and I were lying on the sand at a surf beach some distance out of Melbourne. The surf was way too rough for either of us to go in. Suddenly a woman came up to us screaming. Her son had been pulled out by a rip and was in bad trouble � Abbott was a strong swimmer and pretty much without hesitation jumped in, swam out to the kid, took hold of him, dragged him down the coastline a bit to get past the rip, and brought him safely to shore. He was not a bit interested in the mother�s thanks. [17 August 2013]

He loves to run, and swim and bicycle, and he loves to volunteer, in the bushfire brigade, in the surf life-savers, in Aboriginal communities. [17 August 2013]

Abbott is brave as a lion. [22 July 2010]

etc etc

# ¿ Mar 1, 2015 11:00

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

Ghost Who Votes posted:

Preferred ALP Leader: Shorten 29 (-1) Plibersek 19 (+1) Albanese 16 (-2) Bowen 6 (0)
Preferred ALP Leader (ALP Voters): Shorten 43 (+2) Plibersek 21 (+2) Albanese 17 (-2)

Cleretic posted:

I might've misread it, but I took it to mean that they were devoting $1.9b to fixing the problem. Which, granted, doesn't actually make much sense to me; investigating the problem and potential solutions would probably not require that amount of money into it.

quote:

The opposition said the Parliamentary Budget Office had assessed the measures as bringing in $1.9bn in revenue over three years from July.

Fruity Gordo posted:

$1.9 billion over three years seems like a really piddly amount, surely our lost revenue from corporate tax evasion would be orders of magnitude higher?

E: Apple alone ripped off $9b over the course of a decade, for example. http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-03-06/tax-expert-explains-how-apple-pays-193m-tax-on-27b-revenue/5303426

Apple had 9B of profit so there's "only" potentially 3B of tax revenue there.

There are also limits to what one country can do alone.

# ¿ Mar 2, 2015 00:42

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

Mr Chips posted:

Devine's not a journalist. She writes opinion pieces.

She's quite happy to call herself a journalist though.

# ¿ Mar 2, 2015 02:45

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

V for Vegas posted:

If QLD taught us anything its that polls that use preference assumptions from 'wave' elections are not very good at predicting what will happen once the wave recedes.

http://blogs.abc.net.au/antonygreen/2015/03/why-the-baird-government-is-vulnerable.html

Might be a repost but Bonham's got a long analysis of the polls too, and comes to a broadly similar conclusion

quote:

Overall it is very hard for Labor to win this unless Canberra factors trash the Coalition's primary even more. The current 2PP is enough to very likely withstand a Queensland-style change in preferences, the change in preferences probably won't be as large anyway, and the Canberra factor might be close to maxing out even if Abbott survives. The Coalition won't be going to this one asking minor party voters to preference a party that was about to lose its leader's seat.

I do think it's possible for the Coalition to lose this one as well, however. As well as the Canberra factor, any government that goes to an election proposing even the most modest of privatisations seems to leave itself open to a backlash. I don't think Labor will win at this stage, but it's a more realistic chance than it might seem. NSW Liberals who are nervous that the continuing presence of Abbott as PM might cause them to throw this one away too, have good reason to be.

Also think this is the key thing to take away:

quote:

I do, however, have doubts that the preferencing shift in NSW will be as strong [as in Qld]. Mike Baird isn't Campbell Newman; his government may be disliked by left-wingers, but doesn't bring out the same level of loathing reserved for the Newmans and Abbotts of this world. It is unclear whether a "put the Coalition last" campaign will have the same appeal as "put the LNP last" did in Queensland. And whereas Queensland Labor was seen as a small Opposition bravely recovering against almost insurmountable odds (the haplessness of the later Bligh days now forgotten), the NSW ALP may be more scarred by the damage done by Obeid, Tripodi, Macdonald et al.

# ¿ Mar 2, 2015 06:21

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

Ragingsheep posted:

Labor isn't much better. Now if the headline was something like Greens might win or get enough to hold the BoP, then maybe...

I hold out hope that the Upper House will have a less poo poo makeup.

# ¿ Mar 2, 2015 06:30

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

NTRabbit posted:

Can the Senate actually censure a member from the lower house?

Yeah, it's been done. Happened to Howard, amongst others.

# ¿ Mar 2, 2015 06:54

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

Yeah, the Government basically didn't bother starting to negotiate with the CPSU until after the previous contracts ran out; at no stage has it been in good faith.

# ¿ Mar 2, 2015 09:33

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

Mithranderp posted:

Dodgy as gently caress.

Here's hoping that Queensland Labor has the guts to look into this shitstain of a company.

They've at least already decided not to give them a billion dollars for literally no reason.

# ¿ Mar 3, 2015 00:30

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

How well must "death cult" have gone in focus groups? Spontaneous hate-boners for everyone present?

# ¿ Mar 3, 2015 03:13

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

Well it's not like him working more would improve things.

# ¿ Mar 3, 2015 07:25

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

Guy Sebastian's off to Eurovision, the Intergenerational Report Into Please Don't Mention Climate Change is out at noon, and Ricky Muir is speaking in the Senate.

Interesting day in Auspol.

# ¿ Mar 4, 2015 23:51

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

That's unfair, Lion Helm didn't get in just because people mistook the LDP for the Liberals. He was also first on the ballot and has spent years doing preference deals with other microparties.

# ¿ Mar 5, 2015 05:11

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

My Imaginary GF posted:

Watching Kevin Rudd spesk on Charlie Rose, whats the aussie opinion of him?

Was an okay PM until he imploded his party because they didn't want him as leader.

# ¿ Mar 5, 2015 06:04

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

The longer story re: Rudd is something like this

After a over a decade of right wing leadership there was a perception that the previous PM (Howard) was yesterday's man and had failed to adapt to modern sensibilities while simultaneously over-reaching on industrial relations "reform". Rudd promised to address all the social stuff Howard had not done while still keeping the economy strong. He won convincingly in 2007, the right (ie the Liberals) was in turmoil, and things were looking good.

Then less than a year later the GFC hit.

Rudd and co implemented a pretty decent Keynesian stimulus package and kept the economy out of recession. He'd also made a big deal about how important climate change was, but then legislation didn't get passed because the Libs didn't support cap-and-trade to the point of junking their pro-C&T leader, replacing him with Tony Abbott. Rudd's controlling streak started getting stronger, a few bad polls came out and then his party dumped him as leader in early 2010, shortly before the election

This really put the wind into Abbott's sails and he pursued a relentless lowest-common-denominator campaign against the new Labor leader, almost to the point of winning the 2010 election. Behind the scenes Rudd was incredibly angry at losing his leadership and undermined the party constantly for 3 years until just before the 2013 election he was put back in as leader, just in time to lose the 2013 election.

My Imaginary GF posted:

Ba-wha? If you usurp power, you leave the one you usurp it from dead, you don't keep them in the loop.

How did that even work? Why? It makes no sense to keep your rival in a position of power.

After the 2010 election the balance in parliament was so close that losing a single seat (in, say, a by-election) could have meant them losing government.

# ¿ Mar 5, 2015 06:16

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

My Imaginary GF posted:

What are by-elections? Is that what you hold when someone dies and your governor doesn't have the power to appoint someone to a seat?

Think a special election in a congressional district.

The general procedure for replacing Senators here is that the party they came from gets to choose who replaces them (although there is some interesting history regarding that).

# ¿ Mar 5, 2015 06:23

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

The way Muir got into parliament was ridiculous but he's done better than a shitload of people in there.

# ¿ Mar 5, 2015 08:00

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

Buck Turgidson posted:

I mean the report is extremely barebones and doesn't go into anywhere near enough detail on the issues involved or on how this is going to be implemented (in both practical and legislative senses), making it virtually worthless, but if you single out that one sentence you are basically signalling that you didn't bother to read even what little information was provided.

A report that took climate change seriously wouldn't have that sentence as the introduction.

# ¿ Mar 5, 2015 10:21

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

Buck Turgidson posted:

The thing that should actually be leaping out at you is the lack of detail and very brief treatment of the issues.

That quote has attention because it's a dumb equivocating statement that shows how little they care about the issue. There's no other paragraph in there that captures it as much.

# ¿ Mar 5, 2015 11:21

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

Gonski and NDIS: Coalition policies.

# ¿ Mar 5, 2015 13:10

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

thatfatkid posted:

Ah Gonski. Let's ignore most of the recommendations and defund universities to pay for primary schools what a wonderful idea.

Cutting higher education was a dumb idea but the policy itself wasn't, and given how much the Coalition has tried to back out of it it's clearly not the kind of policy they're happy with.

# ¿ Mar 5, 2015 13:22

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

thatfatkid posted:

They cut higher education because they bought into the LNP's rhetoric about debt, household budgets and all that bullshit.

The Coalition's desire to cut higher education funding has very little to do with balancing the budget though; it's an end in itself. Howard was ripping chunks out of the system even when the budget was in a nominally good state.

And Rudd bought into the surplus fanaticism just as much as Gillard (and the point is a comparison of the two).

# ¿ Mar 5, 2015 13:37

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

thatfatkid posted:

I'm not talking about the Coalition cutting higher education. I'm not sure why that's being brought up...

I said that Gonski was an example of Gillard having policies (and priorities) that were clearly not Coalition ones, you brought up cutting higher education cuts. So yeah, you implicitly did.

E: And there are clear ideological differences in Gillard's cuts compared to Howard's (not that that improves the outcome much).

# ¿ Mar 5, 2015 13:50

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

thatfatkid posted:

Higher education funding was cut to fund Gonski because the ALP bought into LNP rhetoric about debt. How is that such a hard concept to grasp?

Yeah, and the cuts were dumb but Gonski itself wasn't, what's your point? Rudd bought into the surplus bullshit just as much as Gillard, and anything good with Gonski had far more to do with Gillard than Rudd.

thatfatkid posted:

Plain packaging should've been introduced for junk food and alcohol as well if they were really concerned about the health of the citizenry. It was simply a cynical attack against the tobacco companies to buy votes.

Hahaha, get hosed.

# ¿ Mar 5, 2015 13:58

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

thatfatkid posted:

And plain packaging for junk food and alcohol is a bad thing as opposed to plain packaging for cigarettes because...

If you can't solve every problem then you're just doing a cheap political stunt.

# ¿ Mar 5, 2015 14:04

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

Funding bowel cancer research instead of lung cancer research is in my opinion cynical

# ¿ Mar 5, 2015 14:12

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

thatfatkid posted:

I vote Greens and consider myself a socialist. Jesus Christ some of you people can not grasp the simple fact that criticising the ALP does not equate to LNP flagwaving.

If a thread full of Greens voters has trouble working it out the problem might lie somewhere else.

# ¿ Mar 5, 2015 14:20

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

I like that we've all ignored Labor's policy on alcopops.

# ¿ Mar 5, 2015 14:34

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

Yeah, I should have phrased that differently; the alcopops thing was a hilarious fuckup, and my point was that we were all ignoring it because it was so forgettable and dumb.

# ¿ Mar 5, 2015 14:40

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

My Imaginary GF posted:

Alcopops? Are you talking Mike's Hard Lemonaid or are you talking Crispin Hard Cider?

The former.

Labor decided (for whatever reason) to increase the tax on pre-mixed drinks in 2008. While sales dropped it didn't really have any good public health benefits since people switched to other drinks (ciders and spirits).

# ¿ Mar 5, 2015 14:45

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

Adnar posted:

Didn't that tax never even pass senate, despite it being collected for a period?

I think so, although they might have done the thing where they collect it and then ask for retrospective permission.

# ¿ Mar 5, 2015 14:49

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

I think the lockout laws were having some good effect although I can't remember the details and wouldn't trust my memory.

Newcastle's another good example to look at too, since the laws there have been in effect for longer than in Sydney.

# ¿ Mar 5, 2015 16:44

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

Kim Jong ill posted:

Listening to my managers at work happily talk about the gentrification of Redfern and how good it is that most of the aboriginals have been pushed out. loving hell.

Is there anything good to read about the history of Redfern? I'm curious why (and when) it ended up as an Aboriginal ghetto in the first place.

# ¿ Mar 8, 2015 04:54

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

People on the right have been pushing phonics for years (the Reading Wars), it's not something Pyne dredged up by himself.

# ¿ Mar 8, 2015 05:54

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

There was a bit of a push for it under Howard I think, and it's a pet issue of a few people (like Miranda Devine) so it never completely disappears from the sphere of public debate.

# ¿ Mar 8, 2015 06:06

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

Smegmatron posted:

How to destroy phonics in one easy step:

Ask them what sound 'ough' makes.

/f/, /ɒ/, /oʊ/, /ʊ/, or /uː/ depending on the word it's in.

Once I started calling him "Goo Whitlam" it became hard to stop.

# ¿ Mar 8, 2015 08:00

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

Andrew Bolt thinks the Mardi Gras wasn't anti-ISIS enough.

# ¿ Mar 8, 2015 09:23

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

SadisTech posted:

Putin is convincing when he acts macho.

He's really not.

E: Like, I know he's ordered the deaths of people but he's still a short, balding guy with manboobs who spends a massive amount of time and money cultivating his public image.

Doctor Spaceman fucked around with this message at 09:45 on Mar 8, 2015

# ¿ Mar 8, 2015 09:42

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# ¿ May 12, 2024 22:57

Doctor Spaceman: Jul 6, 2010; "Everyone's entitled to their point of view, but that's seriously a weird one."

Hi ASIO.

# ¿ Mar 8, 2015 10:06

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Auspol March - C U Next Trollday, Auspol

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