11 posts tagged “election”

Kevin Rudd, our new PM

What a fantastic night.  You did it, Australia.  I had my doubts, but you did the right thing and kicked Johnny to the curb.  He looks pretty certain to lose his seat too, making him only the second Prime Minister in history to get completely ousted from Parliament in an election.  It's quite a message we've sent him!  Hard to believe that complete arsehats (to borrow a term from Mikey) like Abbott, Nelson, Downer, Andrews and Turnbull didn't get the boot too, though.  I really can't understand how they could be voted back in when Australia has so convincingly sent a message saying we don't like their policies.  Oh well, they can say what they like from the opposite side of the house, I guess.

I am so excited about the new Government, it's really a new dawn for this country.  As mentioned over on Sarah & Gam's blog, let's just hope that Rudd doesn't get complacent, that the machinery of Government doesn't wear him down, and he stays true to his promises and values.  They have so many opportunities to bring back the 'fair go' now, and I think they will.

And to have our first ever female as the Deputy Prime Minister is a great thing -- can't believe it's taken this long.  Julia Gillard will be PM one day.  It has to be.

To Howard, you have changed the country for the worse these past 11 years, and we have nothing whatsoever to thank you for.  I despise your way of thinking and your way of governing.  I leave you with this song entitled 'Get Fucked' by The Fauves.  Written specifically for you, it says exactly what I'd like to say.  Good riddance to you and your cronies, and I hope history treats you unkindly:

When the first punch knocks you down
and you're lying prostrate on the ground
in your sponsored tracksuit
and all your soldiers are disarmed
remember to stay alert but not alarmed
while I hit you

cos' you're a liar, and we are tired
we are sick of compromise
diminished by the fucking lies
sick of being patronised

well you've been power walking now for hours
sickly sweat frosting your brow
your minders don't know how
to tell your their solemn vow to step in.
That was a non core promise
you're mine again

cos' you're a liar and we are tired
we are sick of compromise
diminished by the fucking lies
sick of being patronised

Get Fucked

The Fauves

Saw this today in the city.  Great take on the old 'do the right thing' litter campaign.

Anti-WorkChoices sign on the side of a wheelie bin

I've never spoken to my dad about politics before. We don't talk that much really, and it's never come up. What I had in my mind about him from years ago when I lived at home was that he voted Labor. I never analysed it, but I just assumed he still would, as he's a smart enough guy.

Well. We had a full-on heated debate on the phone last night during what started out as an innocent call to thank him for paying rego on our trailer which is still in his name. He mentioned, by the way, that it looked like we'd get a change of Government on the weekend, but he seemed saddened by this. "Hang on", I said. "You're not voting Johnny are you?".

It was on.

I threw all the arguments at him, big business, discrimination, fear-mongering, individualism blah blah blah. He seemed very uninformed himself, as he spouted all the Coalition scare campaign stuff and media sound bytes like me-tooism, not many AWAs being knocked back visa vis the system works, Unions bad, economy good.

"Lets talk in 5 years and see if you still feel the same way" he finished with. What this should be interpreted as is "let's see if you are personally better off financially in 5 years". Why this pissed me off so much is because that is not the mark of whether my vote was worthwhile. "Lets see if society is better off in 5 years" would have been my response if I was quick enough. To which the answer will be "it is".

So this is the fundamental reason why both ends of the spectrum can think they're right, I guess. We're basing success on completely different benchmarks.

The other thing that my wife and I took some degree of offence to is his statement that he feels more young people will vote Labor because they think Johnny is too old and past it. This is how he's rationalising it in his mind as to why people could feel different to him. Not that we've informed ourselves and will vote accordingly, but because we feel the current Government has been in a while and a change might be nice.

I was disturbed. I know my old man is a different person to when I lived with him (for various reasons), but he now bases his set of beliefs on a fundamentally opposing viewpoint to my own, one that I really despise. That's hard to deal with when a) it's your dad and b) you didn't notice that it had happened. Even though I should have.

With less than a week to the election I think my wife and I have decided to vote Greens. It's something we considered in the past but we were always hesitant to 'waste' our vote -- more important than voting for a minor party whose ideology most closely aligned with our own was ensuring the Coalition were removed. That's more important than ever this time but I think we understand the whole preference thing a little better now. The Greens have a preference deal with the Labor party, so if the Greens candidate for the House of Reps is knocked out then our vote will go at full value to the Labor candidate. As the Greens candidate will definitely be knocked out, then we're in effect voting for Labor.  The point is that we're registering a vote for the Greens to send a message to the Government, even if that's Labor, saying we agree with more left-leaning socially inclusive, environmentally friendly policies. Hopefully there'll be a bigger than usual percentage who feel the same way this time around.

I am genuinely excited about a Labor government, and would be happy enough to vote for them. But, as the Greens pamphlet says, we can have our cake and eat it too by voting Green.

In the Senate our vote will be for the Greens candidate as I feel that any Senate majority is a bad thing, even if that's Labor. Greens keep the place honest and aren't as easily swayed by the almighty dollar. It's a no-brainer to vote Green in the Senate.

Three days to go to what must surely be a change of Government and the beginning of a new era for Australia. I can't wait to see those arseholes given the boot, and I especially hope Johnny loses his seat. Roll on Saturday.

Mind the gap

A comment by vongruzzly the other day on one of my posts got me thinking more about this bogus claim by Howard and Costello that the economy is the most important factor in this election. This point of view is so skewed from what humans and humanity is all about that I can barely believe they can say it with a straight face. But the problem is that people seem to truly believe that it's either the most important, or at least one of the most important factors on which to base their vote. This 'egoism' as vongruzzly put it, or 'individualism' as I call it seems to be one of the the biggest, most fundamental changes to Australia since Howard got in back in 96.

It's bogus because, as long as we don't fall into a depression, I reckon the majority are in the same position whether the economy is deemed to be booming or lagging. OK, so we're supposedly in a boom now. I earn a bit more perhaps, wages might be higher in general. But my fucking home loan has gone up by something like 6 times the rate of inflation since Howard came to power. My grocery bill is out of control trying to feed the 3 kids, and our child care costs are out of this world, rendering my wife's full-time return to work pointless and leaving us with no choice but to be basically a one-income family. Woo-hoo for the fucking economic boom.

Of course, those who are in a nice cushy position are free to reap all the benefits of this 'boom'. They were doing fine before too, but the rich get richer as the saying goes. They are very much the minority though, as the capitalist model dictates. In reality, then, the boom simply widens the gap between rich and poor.

For the majority, it doesn't change a  fucking thing at the personal level. I think the reason people are worried, though, is because they are living so close to the edge that they mistakenly believe that we need to keep this boom going or they'll go under. This is the message/fear-mongering that Howard is happy to perpetuate, because it gets him votes from these people afraid for their families, and any continued boom of course benefits his core voters of big business and the wealthy.

Labor are appealing to this sense of 'good' economic management being important by emulating the Coalition in their "fiscal conservative" stance. They have to tap into that if they're gonna win, but from speeches and policies I don't believe they place it up there as being the most important element of our society. Of course, the Libs are clinging to this position so strongly because they've got nothing else to really hold over Labor -- this is the only issue where opinion polls still give them the edge.

All the Coalition's conservative little eggs are in this one basket now and we'll need to wait to see if people cast a vote to keep the country as it is now out of fear, or if they vote for a change and a more positive, socially progressive future.

clipped from www.smh.com.au $150m 'homes for homeless' Opposition Leader Kevin Rudd has unveiled a $150 million plan to provide 600 new houses and units for homeless people. He said Labor's aim was to halve the number of homeless people turned away from shelters each year within five years and close the gap within a decade to ensure all homeless obtained shelter. "This is all part of reaching out with a helping hand to Australians in need," he told reporters. "It is part and parcel of our Australian set of values, having a bit of heart and soul and doing the right thing for all those Australians out there who have run into one of life's walls."

Finally, some real, proper, socially conscious policy. This, my friends, is the fundamental difference between the parties. After all the mee-tooisms that are being flung around during this campaign, here is where we find a real difference between what you're voting for:

• Do you feel that all people deserve a helping hand and inequity of wealth is an issue that needs addressing? or
  
• do you subscribe to the social darwinism school of thought where it's survival of the fittest and you see homeless people as nothing more than a blight on civilised society?

The Libs, being out for big business and the rich, would never announce a policy like this. I was starting to think Labor never would either, so I'm very glad to see the socialist side of them emerge regardless of Latham's heavy defeat in 2004 due, in part, to his "dangerous" social views.

Let's face it though, this one isn't a vote winner. If you think this way, you're either voting Greens, Democrats or Labor. All this might do is pull a few votes from these minor parties. It's symbolic, I guess, but a gesture I'm glad they made.

Today is Blog Action Day!  Take action by posting about the environment in your own way.

The best thing I can write to help the environment in my own small way during this election campaign is to encourage anyone who reads this to not be fooled by Johnny-come-lately's faux-environmental stance.  He doesn't care about the environment or he would have done something about it during the 11 years he's been in power.  No, it's suddenly "in" to care about the environment, so now Johnny must appear to.

The amount of money spent on expensive lush blue/green toned TV advertising with spinning wind farms doesn't change the fact that the Liberal Party are the WORST choice for environmental management.  Now, Labour's not perfect, the Greens are better in almost every way on environmental issues obviously, but as the only viable alternative in this extremely critical election, the ALP are clearly the better choice -- they have Peter Garrett as their environmental minister, their policies are largely positive and Al Gore says they're OK.  The two big differences as far as I see it are:

• The ALP will ratify Kyoto, and the Coalition will follow the Bush stance of some kind of alternate emissions target blah blah wank wank dodge dodge
• The Coalition will push to implement nuclear power like the old school neo-cons they are (even though they're not talking about it during the election) and the ALP will pursue viable alternatives.

So more important than me crapping on about our enviro light bulbs is to ask you to make a choice that will change the way Australia views the environment, and one that will force big business to look at their shithouse practices and do something different if they want to stay relevant.  Something the Government cannot claim to be.

People who have fallen for the Government's promised tax cuts

Okay. So I get it, right. People are fucking idiots. At least, that's what the government is banking on with yesterday's announcement of $34 billion in tax cuts. Maybe it’s more about ignorance and selfishness, which is in turn a product of the state of western society with its rampant individualism, and not necessarily just plain stupidity. Whatever you call it (and I think I’m erring toward stupidity) this is squarely the demographic that the government is hoping to win over with tax cuts that really amount to about $20 a week for most people.

Now, it seems to me that a rational person would see this as nothing more than a shallow attempt to purchase your vote. What else can it be perceived as when there is no benefit to the country from this plan, in fact this announcement is sure to raise interest rates and entirely negate the benefit. Ahhh, but the government knows that people are individualists (stupid) and think only with their hip pocket. The government also must have an incredible belief that most people really pay no attention to politics and can be bought over with sound-byte journalism.

What has been rammed home to me today which I have tended to forget as I get swept up daily in leftist discussions with my wife and friends and read only my left leaning newspapers is this:

THEY'RE RIGHT.

I had not really considered that the nasty, evil, corrupt, out-of-touch, and most importantly unpopular incumbents could actually win simply by giving people money.

Now I think about it, the huge opposition to ‘WorkChoices’ (which was polling as the most important election issue in a SMH poll the other day) is probably not ideologically-based as it is for me. No, it's more likely that the unions and Opposition have managed to appeal to people on the grounds of “you will get less money” rather than on the moral and social grounds. Because people are stupid.

So its then conceivable that the nasty, evil, smug, rude, pompous, dictatorial-leaning, unpopular government could simply offer more money and win.

How fucking depressing.