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Do we have a politics thread to discuss things political?

Is it just me or have Australians in general gotten more selfish and a bit judgmental in the last decade? It might just be me growing up though and it has always been like this? But it feels like society has changed. And not for the better in some aspects.

I thought Aussie’s were all about mateship and giving everybody a fair go but it seems people have become very self-centred.

One thing that really upsets me about the results of this election is realising (or confirming, a better word) that there are some wealthy older people out there that don’t care about climate change because at the end of the day it’s not going to affect them because they won’t be around and their money is obviously more important than future generations. Meshel Laurie has a point about that.

It is just something I have been noticing the past few years 😟 and I guess I needed to put my thoughts out there. 🤪
 
Keating........doing his eulogy on NOW

Keating is my political hero, with Bob Browne

Oh boy bring back the 80s, great times, real leaders with actual souls

Here is hoping for some brilliance to emerge like these great past leaders
 
I often keep ABC News channel on during the day but it has been harder and harder since Scromo took over and then the painful election campaign... only the hope of a change of government kept me going. Now that is screwed for the next three years (no thanks to pollsters "herding" their poll results) I can only take political news in tiny bites now. ABC News has crushed my spirit.

If the polls had accurately showed the Coalition being ahead all that time, would Scromo have rolled Turnbull? Would the election have been tighter (bearing in mind most people expected a comfortable Labor win... there might have been more impetus to vote if Labor was a smidge behind?)

Clive Palmer definitely skewed the results in Queensland where it really mattered. And Labor fence-sat on Adani because they knew full well that Qld voters would punish them if they rejected it. But the rest of the country would punish them if they supported it. No win situation.

Then Labor gave away too much detail on policies like franking credits and negative gearing which handed huge ammunition to the Coalition, which they peddled along with a completely fake, made up "death tax" which was never, ever, Labor policy.

But the bottom line is (as I noted on Twitter) Bill's main reason for losing Queensland was not keeping the mullet.

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Then Labor gave away too much detail on policies like franking credits and negative gearing which handed huge ammunition to the Coalition, which they peddled along with a completely fake, made up "death tax" which was never, ever, Labor policy.

But the bottom line is (as I noted on Twitter) Bill's main reason for losing Queensland was not keeping the mullet.

Labor won because they didn't run a negative campaign against the Liberals. They assumed the public was informed enough to know why voting for Scomo was a stupid idea. They assumed the public could see through the lies. Well, they didn't.

Putting forward an argument for policies doesn't work in Australia.

I have found the few conversations I have had with people who voted for Scomo interesting. It's just things like, "Bill Shorten sucks." You then ask "why?" and get nothing back.

"Stupid electric cars." You tell them that policy was literally the same as the Liberals. They act like you're talking nonsense. You tell them that all major car companies are aiming to transition to making high percentages of their new cars being electric by 2030 and so you need a policy so Australian's can actually buy new cars. At best you get a response, "is that true?" or a "nah."

Yet it's all stuff you know, saw on the news, saw debate around but these poeple didn't.

"What about those corrupt water sales?"

You get nothing.

"What about the corrupt Murray Darling basin?"

Nothing.

"What about the people stranded on Manus and swapping out families for war criminals to live here?"

They either haven't heard about that or agree it's bad.

Everything feels like it's going ok. Shorten run on, "we've got work to do and can improve this place." Scomo ran on, "everything is great, it's fine here, Shorten will ruin it." Then wins and there's nothing but bad news. Which is to be expected, Six years of the Liberals and they have achieved nothing positive. I've asked people, "what is one good thing done since the Liberals won?" The answer you get is, "ummm Gay marriage?" Then you remind them Scomo refused to vote for it and the Liberals actually did their best to prevent that happening.
 
Labor won because they didn't run a negative campaign against the Liberals. They assumed the public was informed enough to know why voting for Scomo was a stupid idea. They assumed the public could see through the lies. Well, they didn't.

Putting forward an argument for policies doesn't work in Australia.

I have found the few conversations I have had with people who voted for Scomo interesting. It's just things like, "Bill Shorten sucks." You then ask "why?" and get nothing back.

"Stupid electric cars." You tell them that policy was literally the same as the Liberals. They act like you're talking nonsense. You tell them that all major car companies are aiming to transition to making high percentages of their new cars being electric by 2030 and so you need a policy so Australian's can actually buy new cars. At best you get a response, "is that true?" or a "nah."

Yet it's all stuff you know, saw on the news, saw debate around but these poeple didn't.

"What about those corrupt water sales?"

You get nothing.

"What about the corrupt Murray Darling basin?"

Nothing.

"What about the people stranded on Manus and swapping out families for war criminals to live here?"

They either haven't heard about that or agree it's bad.

Everything feels like it's going ok. Shorten run on, "we've got work to do and can improve this place." Scomo ran on, "everything is great, it's fine here, Shorten will ruin it." Then wins and there's nothing but bad news. Which is to be expected, Six years of the Liberals and they have achieved nothing positive. I've asked people, "what is one good thing done since the Liberals won?" The answer you get is, "ummm Gay marriage?" Then you remind them Scomo refused to vote for it and the Liberals actually did their best to prevent that happening.
I find it depressing how little some people know about the policies they are voting for. I cannot vote in Australia yet I have realised during this election I am more politically aware than many people who have the right to vote. It irritates when I read people saying I went and randomly wrote numbers against names cos I had to vote. Yes you do have to vote so take half an hour out of your self absorbed life to find out some things about who you are voting for and how they will impact your life for the next few years.
 
Putting forward an argument for policies doesn't work in Australia.
That's two elections in a row Labor went ahead with a comprehensive policy platform. In 2016 it was "100 Positive Policies". Both times they failed to get across the line.

So it seems now the only way to win an election in Australia is to say very little and constantly attack the other side. What a sorry state of affairs.

And BTW I suspect the Coalition will have no choice but to stop the franking credit rort. It has blown out from $500m to $6bn since 2011, and with all the "free money" publicity it got in the campaign there will be a massive leap in the cost in the 2019/20 tax year because everyone who wasn't already on the gravy train will be clamouring aboard. Wait and see, it will blow next year's budget out of the water.
 
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This thread sometimes feels like an anti liberal thread. Some of the posts I read are fascinating but nonsense.

Particularly the ones that say that people don’t know how to vote just because they didn’t vote the same way as you did.

So it seems now the only way to win an election in Australia is to say very little and constantly attack the other side. What a sorry state of affairs.

Sorry but absolute rubbish once again. If we want to talk about attacks, let’s talk about the Mediscare campaign from a few years back and the anti Scott Morrison campaigns that were put out.
 
Oh yeah as if the Coalition isn't actively chipping away at Medicare as we speak. Wake up!

You need to wake up and stop bringing your anti liberal agenda to this thread. You make your party look bad for centrists like me.

There is a very clear reason why Labor lost particularly in Queensland and if you can’t see that, then that’s your problem.
 
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