Oz Federal Election 2013 - Discussion and Comments

[Skyring]

Emotionally I would say she will always be young at heart. I remember the day she rocked up to the house in her doc martins!

Yeah, great publicity. She always gave great value for her voters. She aimed for the youth market and was a refreshing change from all the middle-aged white guys. Should be a LOT more diversity in Parliament IMHO. And I say that as a middle-aged white guy.

However, she wasn't equal value for the party members, a lot of whom had joined on a basis of keeping the coughs honest. As party leader, her objectives - and those of her voter support base - were different to those of the party as a whole. The Greens found it a lot easier to hijack the same voters NSD was looking for and Bob Brown was smart enough to keep everything running along.

I always found him a tightly-focused operator and a very sweet guy on a personal basis. He had the consideration for the small guys that NSD didn't.

Christine Milne, in my opinion, is busy making a hash of the formidable operation Bob Brown created.

 

[Sprucegoose]

As opposed to Tony who is neither?

I've never ever seen a more negative person in politics before, he single handedly is the only reason the polls are close.

If its a choice between a Tony dimwit and a Julia dimwit, we are going to end up with a dimwit.

All I want is a viable alternative, that's not too much to ask?

Abbott is a Rhodes Scholar, please credit where it is due.

I saw a Galaxy poll where he is now outpolling Gillard on the female vote.

Australians dont often get it wrong and when they do it does get fixed with some rapidity. Re Gough.

As to you viable alternative, never give up hope!!!

 

[Sprucegoose]

Yeah, great publicity. She always gave great value for her voters. She aimed for the youth market and was a refreshing change from all the middle-aged white guys. Should be a LOT more diversity in Parliament IMHO. And I say that as a middle-aged white guy.

However, she wasn't equal value for the party members, a lot of whom had joined on a basis of keeping the coughs honest. As party leader, her objectives - and those of her voter support base - were different to those of the party as a whole. The Greens found it a lot easier to hijack the same voters NSD was looking for and Bob Brown was smart enough to keep everything running along.

I always found him a tightly-focused operator and a very sweet guy on a personal basis. He had the consideration for the small guys that NSD didn't.

Christine Milne, in my opinion, is busy making a hash of the formidable operation Bob Brown created.

yes how refreshing it is when you enter parliament without battle scars and baggage!

I have rarely seen a smarter political operator than Brown, definately in the Howard camp there.

 

[Simo]

209 days until the election.

Is Rudd going to make another run at PM's job before the election?

 

[Pukka]

Well that's the choice we all have to make. Of course, super is a long term system really. The thing that frustrates me is that they have practically removed the ability to make larger extra contributions once your 50 or 55+, so no more $100K top ups later in life when I can afford it. Which means I really should be putting in extra now to compensate for that, but I can't afford it and paying the mortgage is going to give much greater returns. I don't think the system is broke, but there are significant limitations.

Hopefully that will change. I just put all my extra cash in my mortgage offset account which works well as I can get it anytime & I pay less interest on my mortgage.

On the subject of politicians super, I read somewhere that Wayne Swan can retire now (which might be a good idea ) with a pension of about $160k pa which apparently means anyone else would need a fund if $5.5 million to generate that income.

Anyone know what Julia can get if she retires?

 

[Simo]

Hopefully that will change. I just put all my extra cash in my mortgage offset account which works well as I can get it anytime & I pay less interest on my mortgage.

On the subject of politicians super, I read somewhere that Wayne Swan can retire now (which might be a good idea ) with a pension of about $160k pa which apparently means anyone else would need a fund if $5.5 million to generate that income.

Anyone know what Julia can get if she retires?

Julia will get all the past PM perks such as serviced offices and a small staff as well with heaps of free travel and the like.

She will never have to look for a few bucks to pay the bills.

Krudd will get the same when he finishes up as well.

I found the below info on line

Former prime ministers are entitled to an office, a secretary and administration costs. They also qualify for the lucrative lifetime Gold Travel Pass as long as they served a minimum one year as PM. This Gold Pass entitles veteran holders a lifetime of 25 return business-class flights a year.

I also saw they get Limo's as well some past PM's have spent over 30K in a year on these.

i would guess there security detail would reduce the longer they are out of office.

 

[Simo]

The old Gold Pass use to be unlimited domestic travel and some past MP's have done over 140 flights in a year.

it has now stopped.


It is like WP1's for everyone.

 

[Hvr]

<snip>

i would guess there security detail would reduce the longer they are out of office.

There was an article in The Age (16/02) about Malcolm Fraser, who with his wife Tammie are having an open garden this weekend. It briefly mentioned that there was no requirement for security.

This is a wonderful part of Australia where we don't need over the top security and pollies are generally free to interact with the public throughout their daily lives.

 

[777]

I saw a Galaxy poll where he is now outpolling Gillard on the female vote.

Classic piece of News Ltd spin. If you read the article (not the headline) it shows that the Liberals are outpolling Labor among women - which is not surprising given the polls across the board. It pointedly does not say that Abbott is more popular than Gillard among women -- last i looked the only politician in the country less popular than Gillard is Abbott.

The "female voters choose Tony Abbott" appears to have been a fiction for the headline. Buried deep in the article: "Female voters are supporting the Liberal Party despite concerns about Tony Abbott," Galaxy's David Briggs said. "The majority of female voters - 62 per cent - do have some concerns about Tony Abbott."

 

[ReLoad]

Abbott is a Rhodes Scholar, please credit where it is due.

What a totally irrelevant piece of information, he has no concept at all of what the average Australian goes through every day.

Equally so Julia who while she may understand the average Australian she wouldn't have a clue how to run a country.

High intelligence and the proven capacity to memorise a curriculum does not make a prime minister.

I have an old work colleague with a double doctorate, but sadly he would be lucky to hold a conversation about the weather.

 

[eastwest101]

The "female voters choose Tony Abbott" appears to have been a fiction for the headline. Buried deep in the article: "Female voters are supporting the Liberal Party despite concerns about Tony Abbott," Galaxy's David Briggs said. "The majority of female voters - 62 per cent - do have some concerns about Tony Abbott."

I think we may be in furious agreement 777 but I read that as both Gillard and Abbott are fairly unpopular, with all voters, and also with women voters.

Here is the original Galaxy poll of 800 women only (no males interviewed) its all pretty self explanatory - but what I cant understand is how David Briggs got the statement that "62% of female do have some concerns about Tony Abbott" because it isn't defining as what "some concerns" actually are, and I don't see that number 62% anywhere in the original document.

http://resources.news.com.au/files/2013/02/16/1226579/518416-galaxy-poll.pdf

Am I just stupid or am I looking at the wrong source? Or are they extrapolating that 62% from somewhere in the raw data?

 

[Pushka]

Didn't the polls show that Gillards rant about misogyny put her onside with some female voters but put more males offside?

 

[777]

I think we may be in furious agreement 777 but I read that as both Gillard and Abbott are fairly unpopular, with all voters, and also with women voters.

Here is the original Galaxy poll of 800 women only (no males interviewed) its all pretty self explanatory - but what I cant understand is how David Briggs got the statement that "62% of female do have some concerns about Tony Abbott" because it isn't defining as what "some concerns" actually are, and I don't see that number 62% anywhere in the original document.

http://resources.news.com.au/files/2013/02/16/1226579/518416-galaxy-poll.pdf

Am I just stupid or am I looking at the wrong source? Or are they extrapolating that 62% from somewhere in the raw data?

That raw data just goes to show what a shonk of a poll it is. It doesn't actually ask people whether they like Gillard or Abbott just asks a bunch of leading questions to pad a headline.

The 62% is the number who aren't the 38% per cent who said they didn't have any problem with Tony Abbott (based on clearly leading questions). This stuff is basically junk.

 

[browski]

That raw data just goes to show what a shonk of a poll it is. It doesn't actually ask people whether they like Gillard or Abbott just asks a bunch of leading questions to pad a headline.

The 62% is the number who aren't the 38% per cent who said they didn't have any problem with Tony Abbott (based on clearly leading questions). This stuff is basically junk.

The real question is when women actually are in the voting booth, will they in good conscience be able to tick the candidate representing TA or JG. So Julia doesn't have to be popular; she just needs to be more popular than TA; which as the polls show is not hard to do. I have an african american, New York based brother-in-law who is more neocon Republican than Dick Cheney. He espoused the virtues of each Republican candidate endlessly. Yet when he was in the booth he still voted Obama. I don't understand why, but the voting booth does appear to have sobering effect. John Howard was well behind in the run-up to most of his elections but the strong economy (Tick: Julia) and Low Unemployment (Tick Julia) and Low Interest Rates (Tick: Julia) always got him over the line. Then there is the Grey Vote which should be heavily skewed to TA 1950s vision for Australia. And then there is the Youth vote which will skew JG's way since Julia is seen as progressive (Defacto, Atheist) and TA is seen as a lame, gay churchy loser.

Let's see what presents itself in the ides of March.

 

[TheEmu]

That raw data just goes to show what a shonk of a poll it is. It doesn't actually ask people whether they like Gillard or Abbott just asks a bunch of leading questions to pad a headline.

The 62% is the number who aren't the 38% per cent who said they didn't have any problem with Tony Abbott (based on clearly leading questions). This stuff is basically junk.

Lies, damned lies and statistics. We have 7 more months of these rubbish "polls" and stories to look forward to.
You can prove whatever you want to prove with judicious use of statistics and interpretation, provided you ask the "right" questions, as you mentioned.
For example: if 32% of road fatalities involve alcohol, it follows that 68% don't (involve alcohol).
Conclusion: its safer to drive drunk as you're two thirds more likely to be involved in a fatal crash if there's no alcohol involved!
Cheers!

 

[TheEmu]

I think we may be in furious agreement 777 but I read that as both Gillard and Abbott are fairly unpopular, with all voters, and also with women voters.

Here is the original Galaxy poll of 800 women only (no males interviewed) its all pretty self explanatory - but what I cant understand is how David Briggs got the statement that "62% of female do have some concerns about Tony Abbott" because it isn't defining as what "some concerns" actually are, and I don't see that number 62% anywhere in the original document.

http://resources.news.com.au/files/2013/02/16/1226579/518416-galaxy-poll.pdf

Am I just stupid or am I looking at the wrong source? Or are they extrapolating that 62% from somewhere in the raw data?

A recent poll showed that 76% of the journalists responsible for 82% of news stories for major sources made up their own statistics over 50% of the time!
Or something like that.

Actually, I may have made some of those statistics up.

Disclaimers: 1) I am not a journalist.
2) I have never claimed to be responsible.

 

[Pushka]

And posters here say liberal voters in the next election have blinkered vision.

 

[777]

And posters here say liberal voters in the next election have blinkered vision.

IF you're suggesting that i'm blinkered just because i can do a primary school level comprehension exercise then whatever...

Really, just look at the actual poll data, the leading (and in some cases Anti-Abbott) questions that they asked, the obvious one they didn't ask (do you prefer Abbott or Gillard?) that somehow made it into the headline, and tell me it isn't a junk exercise completely designed to generate a newspaper headline?

 

[Pushka]

Not directed at you 777. Just a general comment.

I think it is way more relevant to ask who you are going to vote for, rather than who you like. The first determines the result, the latter a popularity contest that ebbs and flows.

 

[drron]

The real question is when women actually are in the voting booth, will they in good conscience be able to tick the candidate representing TA or JG. So Julia doesn't have to be popular; she just needs to be more popular than TA; which as the polls show is not hard to do. I have an african american, New York based brother-in-law who is more neocon Republican than Dick Cheney. He espoused the virtues of each Republican candidate endlessly. Yet when he was in the booth he still voted Obama. I don't understand why, but the voting booth does appear to have sobering effect. John Howard was well behind in the run-up to most of his elections but the strong economy (Tick: Julia) and Low Unemployment (Tick Julia) and Low Interest Rates (Tick: Julia) always got him over the line. Then there is the Grey Vote which should be heavily skewed to TA 1950s vision for Australia. And then there is the Youth vote which will skew JG's way since Julia is seen as progressive (Defacto, Atheist) and TA is seen as a lame, gay churchy loser.

Let's see what presents itself in the ides of March.

Which just goes to show you how statistics are manipulated.Our GDP is going gangbusters according to the official figures so why when I go to work in regional centres every time there have been more business closures?Maybe these figures from the ABS give some insight-
1301.0 - Year Book Australia, 2012

See the graph for Real GDP and then GDP per person.At no time in the Howard years was the growth in GDP per person lower than it is now.Maybe that is why some people are really feeling pain.

Then there is employment.And boy aren't those figures manipulated.First you put people on all sorts of welfare so they are no longer counted.Then you base the figures on who has actively looked for a job recently rather than those who actually want a job.An interesting reference is the Roy Morgan polling and the unemployment rate they get compared to the "official" figures-
[Roy Morgan Research] Morgan Poll

Just look at the bottom of the table and the figures for unemployed-10.9% and underemployed-8.8%.That means that 19.7% of Australians are either unemployed or under employed.Seems a better explanation for the pain i see around regional Australia.That means January 2013 sees a record number of people unemployed or under employed.
So when it comes to the ballot box the thought of individual Australians will be with their personal circumstances not what the official figures say.This is reflected in the current polls of voting intentions.

And as to the low interest rates-well this is a sign that the country's economy is not going well.Here is the Governor of the RBA's statement this month-
RBA: Media Release-Statement by Glenn Stevens, Governor: Monetary Policy Decision

In particular see why he felt a need to ease monetary policy in 2012,ie reduce interest rates.

During 2012, there was a significant easing in monetary policy. Though the full impact of this will still take further time to become apparent, there are signs that the easier conditions are having some of the expected effects: the demand for some categories of consumer durables has picked up; housing prices have moved higher; there are early indications of a pick-up in dwelling construction; and savers are starting to shift portfolios towards assets offering higher expected returns.

So interest rates were lowered to increase demand-not what you have to do if the economy is going gangbusters.

PS correction to ABS quote.