Post by wheelspinner on May 3, 2012 4:21:56 GMT -5
For a government that guided the country comfortably through the GFC, has steered more than 250 pieces of legislation through a hung Parliament in 18 months and instituted major reforms such as a price on carbon and a national disability insurance scheme, Julia Gillard's Labor party enjoys astounding low approval ratings of less than 30%. At times you have to wonder just what would satisfy some Australians, and what the hell they expect by way of the good life.
Mind you Labor do themselves no favours. They absolutely suck at communicating their achievements, and consistently lose the 24 hour news cycle to Tony Abbott's relentless naysaying. This has resulted in a government that handled the GFC better than any other OECD country somehow being rated inferior economic managers to an opposition found to have an $11 billion hole in their costings at the last election. Astounding.
Gillards latest stuffup is, in the week leading up to the budget, to sack one of her backbenchers and shift him to the crossbenches because of his involvement in a union scandal, which predated him entering Parliament. She has been defending this guy for over a year; suddenly he is indefensible. Likewise she has backed off supporting the Speaker, who is the subject of allegations re expenses and sexual harrassment, even though she only just manouvred him into the job to shore up her slim majority. Gillard has managed to wear the blame for Slipper's misbehaviour even though he is not a member of her Party. Tony Abbott is able to attack her with impunity for relying on his vote, even Abbott's party had Slipper elected as one of their members at 9 consecutive elections.
Any halfway sensible politician would have buried these announcements in the post-budget period, where the papers are filled with analysis of the Budget. The Opposition would still have screamed, but the story would not have got focus, and they would have been forced by convention to concentrate on their budget reply.
Instead, Gillard is now subject to yet another round of leadership speculation. The Age's top political correspondent called for her to "fall on her sword", and that's nohting compared tomwhat the Murdoch press are writing about her.
I am convinced that Australians, including our political and media class, are incapable of dealing with minority government. The fundamental requirement that policies be negotiated with other parties in order to pass legislation is vehemently portrayed as weakness, incompetence and lying to the public by not sticking to pre-election commitments. I despair of the stupidity, ignorance, mysogyny and viciousness that I read in our newspapers every single day.
The end result of this will be the election of a hard-right government that has promised nothing other than to undo everything that has been done here in the last few years, and have zero economic competence. The Liberals will sell us all out to the mining and media oligarchs, massively slash governemt services to anybody who genuinely needs them, and kill off any investment in infrastructure or the environment. They will be a disaster for us, and the fools who are screaming for them to be elected are going to get a very nasty shock once their team gets in (unless they happen to own a coal mine or two).
Mind you Labor do themselves no favours. They absolutely suck at communicating their achievements, and consistently lose the 24 hour news cycle to Tony Abbott's relentless naysaying. This has resulted in a government that handled the GFC better than any other OECD country somehow being rated inferior economic managers to an opposition found to have an $11 billion hole in their costings at the last election. Astounding.
Gillards latest stuffup is, in the week leading up to the budget, to sack one of her backbenchers and shift him to the crossbenches because of his involvement in a union scandal, which predated him entering Parliament. She has been defending this guy for over a year; suddenly he is indefensible. Likewise she has backed off supporting the Speaker, who is the subject of allegations re expenses and sexual harrassment, even though she only just manouvred him into the job to shore up her slim majority. Gillard has managed to wear the blame for Slipper's misbehaviour even though he is not a member of her Party. Tony Abbott is able to attack her with impunity for relying on his vote, even Abbott's party had Slipper elected as one of their members at 9 consecutive elections.
Any halfway sensible politician would have buried these announcements in the post-budget period, where the papers are filled with analysis of the Budget. The Opposition would still have screamed, but the story would not have got focus, and they would have been forced by convention to concentrate on their budget reply.
Instead, Gillard is now subject to yet another round of leadership speculation. The Age's top political correspondent called for her to "fall on her sword", and that's nohting compared tomwhat the Murdoch press are writing about her.
I am convinced that Australians, including our political and media class, are incapable of dealing with minority government. The fundamental requirement that policies be negotiated with other parties in order to pass legislation is vehemently portrayed as weakness, incompetence and lying to the public by not sticking to pre-election commitments. I despair of the stupidity, ignorance, mysogyny and viciousness that I read in our newspapers every single day.
The end result of this will be the election of a hard-right government that has promised nothing other than to undo everything that has been done here in the last few years, and have zero economic competence. The Liberals will sell us all out to the mining and media oligarchs, massively slash governemt services to anybody who genuinely needs them, and kill off any investment in infrastructure or the environment. They will be a disaster for us, and the fools who are screaming for them to be elected are going to get a very nasty shock once their team gets in (unless they happen to own a coal mine or two).
