Chaos is the New Black

All the shocks and surprises of this new senate have left the press gallery with a serious case of the vapors. Its as if the current drama was unknowable, unseen and unreadable pre-September. Well, atleast this is what folks like Mark Kenny want you to think, or want to believe themselves.

Polling and the realities of the senate were well understood before the last election. And in the subsequent months our knowledge of the senate has only increased. Why all the shock then?

You see, people like Kenny have this funny idea about how our federal democracy works. They seem to think that if a party 'wins' government, it wins everything, the whole house. Clean sweep. However, the reality is the party that 'wins' only ever wins a majority proportion of seats in the lower house. So we have an opposition, which represents a substantial minority of the population. It only ever wins a proportion of places in the senate, in this case a minority.  So it then has to 'negotiate' the passage of its manifesto through at least one of these houses. To complicate this Australia is also a federal system, with states and territories, who usually have their own ideas about how the joint should be run. And to complicate things even further there is all this governmental, and not so governmental, bureaucracy that is to varying degrees answerable to the federal government. Examples of this are the ABC board, Treasury, Tim Wilson the new human rights commissioner, and ARENA. To put it bluntly, nothing happens overnight. This ship is too big to turn on a dime, and some things will simply NEVER be possible.(I'm lookin' at you state based 'taxes')

Is that an iceberg ahead?

This isn't a bad thing: as an off-shoot of the Westminster parliament, with some very important bits borrowed from the U.S of A, our democracy has hundreds of years of political drama, subterfuge and bastardry to draw on. We have all these 'checks and balances' because our history has taught us they are necessary. One only has to look to the utter shamozzle of Queensland to see what happens when you tinker too much with the system; A unicameral parliament shoe-horned into a bicameral polity. We will never know for sure how the current Queensland drama would have played out if it still had its upper house, but I doubt it would be quite so lop-sided or prone to flights of fancy like this Chief Justice malarkey.

We have a 'hands off' attitude to some appointments of government connected organisations to avoid politicising such organisations. It may only be a fig leaf, but it is an important fig leaf and should not be down-played: much of our system of government involves "conventions", and they only work because all players agree that they should work. In a sense its all an illusion, like money or what constitutes good table manners. We have all agreed that broadly this how things should work, and because we all agree on it that is why it works this way.

So many rules

History has taught us that revolutions make for great art.......

Now I'm not suggesting the LNP is trying to subvert Australia's democracy, although you would get such an impression from reading some of the drivel pumped out by journos like Kenny. Not as a call to arms, mind you. Not because he believes the running of government is being subverted by anti-democratic and unconstitutional monsters, which is clearly a bad thing. No, because he apparently wants our government and democracy to be subverted! As do many others in the press gallery.
They all just want to see 'things' get done, and to hell with how this effects Australia's democratic system.

"We had an election!" they all cry.

"Mandate!" they all shout.

.......however they don't end for the best, you know?

While ignoring the fact that we do not have a winner takes all system....which is exactly how a successful democracy should work. Culturally, this was learned the hard way. Endless civil wars, assassinations, putschs, revolutions, have all taught the collective West (and many of the Rest) that "winner takes all" systems are bad: they are not stable, are not good for economic development, are not good for the people, and do not last. That our democracy has lasted so long is a testament to the success our system has had in convincing both winners and losers that their aims are best served by maintaining all the built in checks and balances, and to not try and make a blind grab for unparalleled power.

How the press gallery imagines the 2013 election.

What of the supposed "chaos" of the last few weeks? This apparent "chaos" is primarily due to the media's credulity and the inability of this government to successfully prosecute the politics of the changes it wishes to make. It is the government that has dropped the ball, allowing everyone else to hog the middle ground. Making bold statements about your legislative agenda is just so much hot air. If you don't have the numbers, then too bad. This government is in complete legislative turmoil because of its own bizarre failings. This is the story the media should be reporting on, but instead we get drivel about how Palmer is wrecking the joint.

looks pretty civil to me

That Palmer should be seeking now to claim his pound of flesh is besides the the point. Everyone, including the media and the government, should have seen this coming and reacted accordingly. This is not the 90's; there is no such thing as a 'mandate' to do anything in the senate. There are now many more cross-benches and minor parties, all elected  by their own electors, who have their own agenda's. Why should they help a floundering and unpopular government? Just so they can be dragged down as well? This is a mess of the LNP's doing, let them sort it out themselves. The government will have to compromise and it will have to do a dirty deal(s).

Welcome to politics.

lol

At the end of all of this, I would just like to quote a few words from the man who has done the most to show that the emperor really does have no clothes on; Clive Palmer:

Asked whether the government had tried to trick PUP, Palmer said: “It could have been, but you never want to underestimate the incompetence of the Abbott government.”

Says it all, really.

Palmerama

Clive Palmer and Al Gore. Just think about it for a second.......yup it actually happened.

I've woken up in stranger situations

Lets have a quick run-down on how we got here.

You see, Clive Palmer rode into Canberra last year on a beast named 'anti politics'. Canberra had never seen such a sight before......well at least not for years. What did it all mean?

Clive, for his part, couldn't quite believe what he was seeing either: everything was fake. All the structures the insiders were so very proud of were just cardboard cut-outs, like movie sets. Once Clive got close enough it was blindingly obvious. Why couldn't they see?

Yet, when he asked all the thronging insiders "what do you see?" they all shouted "RESPONSIBLE ADULT MAJOR PARTIES WITH VERY IMPORTANT POLICIES"

"Ah!" Clive thought, "They're all under a spell!"

So he decided to see what would happen if he just gave it all a little.....push.

And everything began to collapse!

And all the insiders shouted as one "STOP YOU BUFFOON! YOUR STUNTS ARE WRECKING ALL THE WONDERFUL THINGS THE RESPONSIBLE ADULT MAJOR PARTIES HAVE CREATED!"

But Clive said "Its not real, you idiots! The people should see! Why are you hiding this from them?"

And he didn't stop, he kept pushing and pushing.

And all the insiders were VERY angry with Clive! Naughty Clive!

Such is the fairytale of current politics in Australia.

Stating the obvious is not allowed in politics in this country

So now we are up to date, what does it all mean? Is it a stunt or a joke?

I think the press gallery keeps making the mistake of casting Palmer as a buffoon or a joke. It stops our political journalists from actually being able to see what is going on. I understand it's difficult: what to do with a very powerful political figure that doesn't fit neatly into your left-right schematic of Australian politics?

Palmer has created a many headed hydra of a problem for the government. Firstly, Carbon pricing as an idea will now be debated up until, and past, the next election. This is not the clean ending Abbott and co wanted. In fact, when you take into consideration the building international pressure to act, it's the worst possible scenario you can imagine. It means that it is almost certain we will have some sort of ETS as a policy post 2016, or whenever Abbott is turfed.

Secondly, a large and important part of the mitigation mechanisms is going to be left in place. This is another headache for the government, and especially Abbott because it serves to remind his supporters and party backers just how impotent he really is. The risk for Abbott is that after he gets a double dissolution trigger, he will feel forced to pull it for fear of looking weak. Nobody should be under any illusion on how that will turn out. It will mean an election where everyone else but the LNP has a viable climate change policy, in an international situation of building pressure, and a business community that can now clearly see the writing on the wall. It will mean certain defeat because of the government's toxic unpopularity; and it will mean a bunch of nutters will fill the senate, making it far worse and unworkable than it is now.

But you don't really get a sense of this new reality from what is being written or said about Palmer and Gore. As an example, watch last week's 'Insiders'. Yes, I know it's really boring. What you will notice though is just how angry Farr and Coorey are about the whole thing. Like, really pissed. They do not like Clive at all, he upsets them.

Why?

Clive makes the media look very silly. Here they are just trying to report what this government they shoe-horned into power is doing, and Clive makes them into idiots and liars before the week is out. When a minister vomits out a press release and journos like Coorey just reprint the talking points verbatim, it must be pretty upsetting to then have it all made to look so mistaken by Clive. The same can be said about all the cross-benches. It's as if the press gallery says to itself:

"How dare these buffoons and bumpkins come to our parliament! Who do they think they are? They are certainly not the sort of people we want making decisions!"

The subtext, of course, is that they are the sort of people that should be making the decisions.

"If You Wanna Be My Cabinet Minister, You Gotta Get With My Friends"

What the hell is going in the Coalition? Right-wing shock jock attacks on cabinet ministers; smugly   self satisfied leaking of an internal Liberal strategy designed to screw the Nationals over.....what the hell is going on?

We started the week off with a series of grenades being thrown by right wing shout mouths, Alan Jones and Andrew Bolt, at the 'dignified' figure of Malcolm Turnbull.

All of which was seemingly kicked off by a rather tongue-in-cheek Twitter campaign: #libspill

Why Bolt would give two shits over a 'leftist' twitter campaign is at first glance a mystery, but any criticism at this point in time of Abbott and his budget is just too much to bear for the hard right.

Jones and Bolt then proceeded to saddle up their drama-llamas and blow the whole thing into an epic shit-storm, because.......does anyone even fucking know?

This guy might 

All of this is because, of course, the government has continued to languish in polling hell. And so it should. This governments budget is awful, plain and simple. Don't take my word for it, look at the most recent polling; people like it less now then they did when it first appeared, which is really saying something!

But even worse is Abbott's own personal ratings: we hate him. I've seen plagues that were more popular than this man. And of course this has led to another social media 'campaign': #morepopularthantonyabbott. 

So we know the reason for all the angst amongst Abbott's supporters; bad, bad polls. You can't keep recording such dire polls and personal ratings without the spectre of leadership rumours rearing its ugly head. Morons like Bolt and Jones should probably be aware of this. And maybe they are? And maybe in fact what they are doing is destroying the man whom they see as Abbott's greatest threat?

In that case they should really be going after this guy:

Its become pretty clear that Abbott is a weak leader. He is weak externally, with the public, and weak internally, with the party. What is also now clear is that Abbott well and truly realises this, hence all the fire directed at Turnbull. I don't doubt for a second that the PM's office and his ministerial supporters have had some involvement with Bolt's extraordinary attacks, and more than likely Jones's one's as well. We have been told by many in the media that the PM "assured" Turnbull that his office had had no hand in egging the two on, but remember: "Never believe anything until its been officially denied". Now we essentially have confirmation from Turnbull's supporters, that there is indeed a campaign to destabilise him coming from the PM's office. And it all just gets more bizarre. Here's Fairfax with some leaked incendiary gossip:

"Fairfax Media understands that messrs Bolt and Jones have asked Labor for ammunition to use against Mr Turnbull, particularly in relation to his stewardship of the national broadband network."

What on earth?!

That these two commentators would be considered valued contributors to the modern conservative movement is beyond a joke. Abbott appears more than willing to listen to what Bolt and Jones have to say, but the public? They can go jump. The irony is that the relationship between the Coalition and these two men has always been seen as a positive, as a strength. The story goes that Bolt and Jones have a "real" connection to the Australian majority, or whatever. The reality is is that both these men are members of an insulated elite, who are both too busy smelling their own farts to really give a flying fuck about what the average voter thinks. This is the true danger for the Coalition: this crisis is proof of just how detached and distant they are from the concerns and needs of ordinary Australians. 

Our next crisis come to us for completely unknown reasons. I am flabbergasted that news of internal Liberal wheeling and dealing against the National party has come to light. Whose bright idea was that?

Independents unite!

What happened to Sophie Mirabella in Indi can easily happen to any other country Liberal or National, if they choose to ignore the wishes of their electors. That this 'smart' political maneuvering is also happening when Palmer is stalking the National party's base  raises serious questions about the strategic thinking of some in the Liberals. Do they think these electoral pressures will just disappear?

Well, I guess that's what happened last time.

Much has been made of the ideological and political connections between this government, and John Howard's first term. As much as I'd like to see the Spice Girls back in the charts again, this isn't the 1990's. The Coalition is not inhabiting the same political world as Howard did. Two examples that spring to mind are the fractious nature of today's media, and the uncertainty of America's global role. Nor is the current Coalition embarking on the same platform, or enacting the same vision that Howard had for Australia. Watching Howard and Hawke at the National Press Club made me all too aware of just how different this government is from the Howard era, although I imagine if you put this to current cabinet members they would probably laugh in your face. Now much of what these two old codgers had to say was pretty self serving, but there were some nuggets of insightful truth. Firstly, both Hawke and Howard made the point that Australians intrinsically understand fairness, and politicians of both sides of the house would be well advised to remember this. Secondly, they also made the point of that politicians shouldn't assume to know more than the voting public, especially on 'bread and butter' economic issues. And lastly, a party that descends into ideology is a party that wont be warming the government benches for very long.

As this government appears to be descending into squabbling factions, which leak and background different Fairfax papers (or sometimes the ABC), it appears as if these three truths have been well and truly forgotten. 

Carbon Copy Crisis?

Is the "greatest moral challenge" steaming back into Australian politics?


The last election, if you believe some pundits, was a repudiation the certain policy known as the ETS or the 'Carbon Tax' (remember:everything you don't like in politics is called a 'tax', 'cause mouth breathers hate those......don't they?)


The story goes that when Mr Abbott came to town the good burghers of Oz saw a chance to smite the Wicked Witches of the Carbon......

Because Mr Abbott hates taxes. What? Oh........

And they did, giving the Coalition a resounding election victory and a clear mandate!


Ooooor, maybe not.

Dad, Stop it!

But we can safely assume that "Axing the Tax" is still a goer, can't we?


Wellll, maybe not.

Looks like he's been breathing in too much carbon

Obama's announcement of sweeping cuts to U.S emissions via the EPA and the  Clean Air Bill has completely thrown Abbott's policy of repealing the ETS into disarray.

Although, I'm not sure he fully realises this change in the metrics of the debate. 

That Obama should be about to embark on a program designed to quite quickly reverse US emissions policy is a momentous event for the Australian political class. It means that our policy debate, which is centred on how to repeal the ETS, will now be on whether repeal is appropriate in light of international politics. 

In the next few months be prepared for relatively high levels of  U.S media scrutiny (from both sides of the political spectrum) on what our political system is doing with regards to climate change policy. I am sure the News Ltd publications will love that. This will all be kicked off with Abbott's very timely tour of North America. Abbott is about to meet Obama just as this debate flares up in the US. Can you imagine the joint press conference PM’s and Presidents usually hold? How will Abbott avoid openly contradicting the most powerful man in the world, and our greatest “friend and ally”? 

Will he avoid the whole thing? That in itself will be momentous: “Abbott snubs Obama!” 

But over time it gets worse for Abbott.  The next Conference of Parties (COP) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) is to be held in Paris in November next year. The conference will seek to establish an international agreement on a post-2020 regime that will bind all the nations of the world, including the biggest emitters of greenhouse gases, by a universal agreement on a response to global warming and climate change.

There will now be the focus and pressure on the Abbott government to commit to major CO2 reductions at COP 2015; there will be the decline in income from our largest export earner, and; there will be direct pressure from the US to respond positively on climate change.

All this will be compounded by the impression on the public mind created by the imminent El Nino weather system that is likely to cause drought and record temperatures across much of Australia over the next 12 to 18 months, once again pushing climate awareness to the front of the national mind.

I’ll put it bluntly: Due to changes in US domestic politics the Obama administration is pledging to cut its emissions substantially. It will pressure other countries to do the same. It will make this a focus of US policy for at least the next 2 years, and with the likely ascension of Clinton, also in the next term. This global debate will be happening at the same time as our national debate is heading in the opposite direction, and with our economy and environment under visible strain. 

Maybe we should actually beef up the ETS? How will repealing affect our trading position? The conservatives, both in the media and in the parliament, are not in any way prepared for this eventuality. Abbott’s position may become untenable not because of anything the ALP does, but because of external events well beyond our borders.

When Budget's Attack

I'm a big fan of blogger Piping Shrike.  Shrike's blog revolves around the idea that the two party system has run its course, and that this ending has brought about a crisis in the Australian political class. Both parties now no longer represent a coherent sectional interest. This has left our major parties floundering in search of a reason to exist. In the end both parties became clones of each other (pre 2007) as they sought to capture the middle ground.They had nothing relevant or new to offer. As far as the average Australian voter was concerned ideology was dead. If they suspected you...you know, believed in things, the gig was up. Welcome to the opposition benches. 

What goes up....

But what happens when one side of the two party equation decides that many of the policies of the last 30 years are wrong? That ideology is back baby, didn't you miss it? That the agreement (or grudging acceptance) over an ‘Australian Compact’ is now over?

I think the ‘revolutionary’ aspects of this governments budget are doing exactly that. As an example even Howard and the British Tories shied away from touching the universal nature of healthcare. As small as this co-payment may be (to some, remember, lets not forget life goes on outside our gilded cages) , it is purely ideological, it has absolutely nothing to do with maintaining or increasing the health outcomes of Australians(in fact it will probably be shown to erode health outcomes). Charging people for ER visits is even more extreme in its ideological bent.

This isn’t incremental change, in line with previous regimes; this is a complete reorientation of the whole health system.

When being called a liar is the least of your problems

Many bloggers, including Shrike,  made some broad predictions of how an Abbott government would behave. Many stated, even this blogger did, that he would be an uneventful leader, that he would be a populist, and wouldn't rock the boat too much. However, this is clearly not the case. In fact he has set out, for whatever reason, to stir up a hornets' nest of opposition against his government. I very much doubt that this was what Abbott had planned, but it’s pretty clear that his backers have confused the result of the last election as a ‘mandate’ to enact sweeping changes to the fabric of the nation. I do not think this is what the vast majority of voters expected post September 2013. If anything Abbott was elected to repeal two pieces of legislation that had come to be seen as attacks(however weak and marginal) on the ‘Australian Compact’: the carbon tax and the mining tax (I’m aware that one was far more unpopular than the other)

The Abbott tax rises are almost irrelevant, they are a smoke screen to the real issue here. Focusing on them (whether from political parties or bloggers) is wrong-headed. It is the changes to the social welfare state that are the main game. None of this was even mentioned pre election. Cuts? Yes maybe. Complete reconfiguring of health, education, welfare, and the relationship with the states? No, that was not even remotely suggested or even imagined. The Coalition have basically stated that vast areas of the Australian social compact are kaput, finished, O-V-A-H.

The fact that every other major political party in the land has now signalled its intention to block key parts of this governments agenda highlights just how divisive a budget it really is. Everyone, but this government, can see ways to make political mileage out of this budget.   All have signalled a willingness to take this all the way to a Double Dissolution if needs be. One should always take DD threats with a boulder sized pinch of salt. However, polling has consistently shown that this is an unpopular government, with a very unpopular leader. The government has everything to lose, and really little to gain. DD never pan out as governments intend them to. It would be highly unlikely that this government would be able to frame subsequent debate; we only need to look to the shamozzle of the Commission of Audit, and this budget. Would the Coalition command a majority in both houses after such an election, considering it is now at a high water mark of support? I imagine there are a great many government back-benchers and ministers (mostly in Queensland) now wondering if indeed the man they have come to dislike and distrust is about to throw them under the bus. 

He's the man you love to hate.

So, is this the rebirth of the raison d'être of the two party system? Whatever it is, it certainly has put some wind up a few sails.