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This is the Australian politics thread.
Australia will go to the polls to choose between two mostly unbearable possible governments. However some possible leaders are
more unbearable then others.
And when will we do this?
August 21.
So who are the major players?
Julia Gillard
This is Julia Gillard. Her ascendancy after deposing of Kevin Rudd (see below) has made her Australia's first female prime minister. Of note is that she has sex outside of marriage, has no children, and is an atheist. She may in fact be a far better prime minister then Rudd, and at the very least Labor did a quick 1-week switcheroo which means unlike prior Liberal efforts the media hasn't had time to whip things into a frenzy.
She is the Labor prime minister in the upcoming election, and there is much hullabaloo in trying to make the exact manner of her ascendancy an election issue. Almost entirely by this man:
Tony Abbott
This man is the leader of our opposition (currently, the liberal party read: right-wing party). He is notable for having a strong Catholic belief system and waving it around in his duties as a minister (of which he used to be the minister for health - yeah). Lately he's been on a popularity up-tick, powered largely by pictures like the above though. Other strategies have included having him publically complain about the lack of a sex life when you're always travelling. Basically, great effort is going into undoing that image - and it worked, despite having no policy substance.
Going into the election he'd like to up-sell the idea that a vote for the Liberal party is a vote for Howard 2.0 which is supposed to be a vote for
Sound Economic Management(TM). But also, how can you trust a women who came to power by deposing of the party leader? I mean that's just
unthinkable.tl; dr: ITT we discuss Australian politics and topical issues related to it.
Polling numbers / discussion:
The Poll Bludger
Poll Analysis:
Pollytics
Election / Electoral System Analysis:
Antony GreenElection Result Calculator
Policy Discussion:
Larvatus Prodeowww.crikey.com.au is also good, but some of it's content requires a subscription.
Most of these are fairly left-leaning sites, if someone else want to provide right wing alternatives.
List of things which can go with vegemite:
1. Butter or Margarine.
That is all.
Posts
Is it wrong that i find Abbott more than a little creepy?
We're stuck with all parties being unpalatable, and I'm paralysed and unable to determine which is the least worst.
Labor's educational reforms are apparently decided by spinning the wheel of insanity.
We've got a bunch of wasteful stupid projects to be undertaken - like the Cleanfeed.
We've got a bunch of stupid moral bullshit - like the Cleanfeed and the opposition to gay rights.
On the other hand, we have the liberals who are lead by my antithesis, and have a track record of dismantling public systems and while giving stacks of money to their private competitors and claiming that this demonstrates the public options are broken.
The Greens are insane and idealogical in their opposition to Nuclear Reactors and the advance of technology.
I'm overwhelmed by how underwhelmed I am.
The problem of course being that it's not like there's any consistent thread of terrible. By and large the Liberals don't really have policy though, outside of "we'll not do whatever it is that labor says they'll do right now".
The main issue with Labor is the god damn internet filter. But cut that out and most of what they're doing isn't actually bad, just poorly implemented.
The funny thing is when Kevin Rudd got angry on the 7.30 Report I was actually kind of impressed. At the very least it seems like he does care about what he wants to do, at least re: climate change. Tony Abbott apparently varies this based on who he thinks he's talking to.
It would be wrong if you did not.
He has a horrifying visage and an even more terrifying view of the world.
Tony Abbott basically destroyed any chance of the Coalition getting my vote. Turnbull was actually a pretty tempting alternative, but then the Libs went crazy and completely lost me.
I think the ideal solution here is for the Labor party to elect Malcolm Turnbull leader.
Oooh ooh I can help!
If you accept that we can probably never get the Australian public to allow nuclear power plants, and that because we're a near-equatorial largely desert country, solar energy is abundant, then you need to learn about baseload solar power!
Basically, there's no reason Australia couldn't go zero-emissions on electricity production without needing to go to nuclear power.
I think the problem here is finding someone willing to pay for the infrastructure required.
I don't know. The thing about Turnbull is that he's not Tony Abbott, but I'm not exactly cut up that the Emissions Trading Scheme was strangled at birth either. It was not a good scheme, just a little progress meandering within the correct 180 degree arc of the right direction.
By and large it should be quite cheap. What we need is someone to grow some backbone and fund a pilot project in Australia to figure this out. The issue is that this rubs up against the mining lobbyists pretty directly - no coal power? Unthinkable!
On the other hand we have Abbott who's treatment of RU486 basically proves that he is unable to seperate his religious beliefs from his political actions which is one of the worst character flaws possible in a politician. I'd never vote for Abbott and this is coming from someone who has voted for both the major parties as well as the greens in various elections. The liberals also lack a coherent platform and direction, it just seems to be "not labour".
And yeah what Apo said about the Greens makes me hesitate before voting for them.
We need a solid sane third party similar to the British Lib Dems with actual progressive policies on both the environment and economy.
The CSIRO and some uni were working on flexible plastic solar panels that you could print out like plastic money.
Someone is always working on those and every time I follow it up, far less has been accomplished then is desireable or an expensive metal is in the mix (Ruthenium being the favorite). Anyway, that's also less efficient then solar thermal - basically the punchline is, since a black surface absorbs pretty much 100% of the incident solar energy on it, you're harvesting 100% of the sunlight. You then use that to heat water and run a regular commercial steam turbine - and since you can use commerical stuff, you use exactly what those coal power stations run.
And those coal power stations have gotten pretty god damn efficient - upto about 40% efficiency (compared to the best commerical solar panels which sit at something like 22%).
So basically - counter-intuitively - one of the most efficient ways to harvest solar energy can be solar thermal power, and it pretty much uses off-the-shelf gear to do it. Of course getting the baseload thing to work is more complicated, but you're starting from a huge advantage. EDIT: And before anyone wonders - yes - I am trying to figure out how to design my future dream-home such that the roof has a gigantic aluminium parabolic sun concentrator. 40% efficiency would mean I'd only need to cut my energy use by a third to be totally off the grid.
So start one then, I'll vote for you
I thought the idea behind these proposed flexible cells isnt efficency but economy. As in they are super cheap to produce. Basically just set up huge solar farms in the desert sort of thing.
http://www.electroline.com.au/articles/39285-Bright-outlook-for-flexible-solar-cells
Seems like at least some progress is being made.
So greens or labor it is, shame the democrats died out.
Which is a shame as with revenues collected from its use and increased business efficency it would probably pay for itself pretty quickly.
Not even that, so much as the fact that fibre-to-the-home is pretty much endgame as far as communications are currently concerned. It doesn't rust or degrade just by existing (to any degree appreciable compared to how often people are going to end up putting a spade through it), and to upgrade it you only replace the boxes on the ends of the cables, rather then the cables themselves.
The way I like to see it, we'll never need another upgrade until quantum entanglement communicators are developed (I am aware it is possible this will never happen).
I'm all for a discussion of nuclear power as being not the optimal solution for Australia given other alternatives (see ELM's post earlier), but the ideological opposition to it is something that really frustrates me.
I know i should be calling him a silly goose, but this goes so far beyond that.
Sadly there's no charming British gentlmen we can fly in to destroy him on national TV like Richard Dawkins did to Steve Fielding on Q&A.
This election is horrid, one of the worst I can recall. It's like standing in a hardware shop trying to decide between two paint swatches of near identical beige. And that's the most positive view of the situation. In reality both sides are not only aggressively bland, but both have hideously distasteful policies that make me incapable of voting for either.
Actually, not so. More support nuclear power than oppose it.
But that doesn't stop the Greens shouting CHERNOBYL CHERNOBYL at the top of their fucking shrill lungs over and over, and the total apathy of both major parties about the issue. it enrages me given that we sit on the motherlode of uranium and we're squabbling about even fucking mining the shit. Aaaaaargh. :x
Off the nuclear tangent, I think Abbott's awfulness is being rather understated. Considering some of the statements he's made, I have absolutely no doubt that the full extent of his batshit views would only be fully displayed after winning an election.
In my view it's pretty much a contest between an extreme populist (though my only major beef with them, albeit very major, is the internet filter), a batshit fundie, and an ent with an identity crisis.
Old PA forum lookalike style for the new forums | My ko-fi donation thing.
Polling numbers / discussion: The Poll Bludger
Poll Analysis: Pollytics
Election / Electoral System Analysis: Antony Green
Election Result Calculator
Policy Discussion: Larvatus Prodeo
www.crikey.com.au is also good, but some of it's content requires a subscription.
Most of these are fairly left-leaning sites, if someone else want to provide right wing alternatives.
Abbott will fall on his sword, and old 'pops Turnball will return with action on climate change and hopefully not batshit crazy ideas.
Well, that's what I believe.
The Australian.
I also want to see Labor ultimately get in so as to ensure the continuation of the NBN and to continue their thus far pretty successful economic strategy. Albeit with a sprinkling of the Greens so as to mean their precious filter would need either the support of the Liberals or the Greens to pass, which it'd never get.
Old PA forum lookalike style for the new forums | My ko-fi donation thing.
He asked for interesting sites
Double snap!
I just can't wait for The Worlds Best Treasurer to lean in with some sniping from the peanut gallery. Regardless of what you think of Keating, his comments are always rather funny. 8-)