I'm honestly mostly just sweating right now at seeing the gains a hypothetical National-Act alliance is making. They would be beyond terrible for this country at a time when we cant really affoard terrible.
But Labor is just pissing around and not doing shit all with their mandate and aaaaaaaarghs.
Yeah, it's odd. Normally when Nats make stompy business-business-romp-romp noises they usually steal from Act, but Act are holding steady while Nat gain. Now, it's also worth considering that Nats are traditionally a bigger party than Labour, so in part this is also just traditional Nat voters drifting back, but usually that's made up for with a more powerful Green wing bringing the balance to the left-right pivot, but I don't see that happening either.
I can't see the why for any of this polling as I don't think there's a lot of canny political points scoring occurring from Luxon's opposition - it's mostly discontent with the state of the world and blaming Labour, like National in any way had better answers to Covid*. Possibly Act has tapped into the reactionary fringe and expanded the voting base by expanding into a previously non-voting community, but I doubt it.
*: As always, they claim they did, but reader: they did not.
I'm honestly mostly just sweating right now at seeing the gains a hypothetical National-Act alliance is making. They would be beyond terrible for this country at a time when we cant really affoard terrible.
But Labor is just pissing around and not doing shit all with their mandate and aaaaaaaarghs.
Yeah, it's odd. Normally when Nats make stompy business-business-romp-romp noises they usually steal from Act, but Act are holding steady while Nat gain. Now, it's also worth considering that Nats are traditionally a bigger party than Labour, so in part this is also just traditional Nat voters drifting back, but usually that's made up for with a more powerful Green wing bringing the balance to the left-right pivot, but I don't see that happening either.
I can't see the why for any of this polling as I don't think there's a lot of canny political points scoring occurring from Luxon's opposition - it's mostly discontent with the state of the world and blaming Labour, like National in any way had better answers to Covid*. Possibly Act has tapped into the reactionary fringe and expanded the voting base by expanding into a previously non-voting community, but I doubt it.
*: As always, they claim they did, but reader: they did not.
Well that's the thing that bothers me. There's a lot to legit criticize labor for. But a lot of things sucking is... the world currently is on fire. and i don't see any way that mr "I own seven houses and think that having the personality of a bland religiousptoato" is going to improve matters.
I dunno, i'm frustrated and stressed about this, becuase Act/National getting in is likely to directly fuck me on numerous levels, given i'm a beneficiary. And with all the progress i've been making on stablizing and improving my own situation this year, having it ripped away by conservative fuckheads... yeah.
As you might be able to tell, i'm very anxious about these hypotheticals!
Maybe we'll get lucky and get LAbor/Greens/TOP or something.
FishmanPut your goddamned hand in the goddamned Box of Pain.Registered Userregular
I'm not all doom and gloom despite polling as I think the mood of the country at the moment is incredibly politically volatile, and Jacinda Ardern has the charisma to pull it back (and probably a slightly better list a the moment than National).
That said, Raf Manji is a smart dude and pretty canny operator, and I think he's a person who would do good things in central government. It'd be nice if TOP made it somewhere.
I'm not all doom and gloom despite polling as I think the mood of the country at the moment is incredibly politically volatile, and Jacinda Ardern has the charisma to pull it back (and probably a slightly better list a the moment than National).
That said, Raf Manji is a smart dude and pretty canny operator, and I think he's a person who would do good things in central government. It'd be nice if TOP made it somewhere.
Yeah I think all that polling reliably tells us is that people are extremely sensitive/reactive to the immediate situation. Interest rates are going to stay high and that is going to hurt people over the next year, so I wouldn't be surprised to see Labour dip further. But the election is a ways out, and National could equally put their foot in it and quickly lose a bunch of votes, or Labour could steadily climb back, or another massive wave of Covid could hit and we could once again find ourselves insulated by our position on the globe and come off looking good, or people could lose their shit if further lockdowns are necessary. Who knows. I'm not worried about it because worrying about it won't make a difference*
Liberals/Coalition voters are losing their goddamned minds that after years of Dan the Dictator the populace rising up to throw him out is not going to happen.
Vic Libs are so clearly a basket case he's going to easily go to reelection. Which is a shame. He's mostly done a good job through covid, but I'd had issues with him over his treatment of the fire fighters and paramedics unions, the lockdown of the public housing when some of it's residents were covid positive while Toorak and the wealthier suburbs faces nothing of the same severity despite being far larger outbreak points.
I'd like to see him see some challenge, but it looks like most gains in the state election will be seen by the Greens and some other independents.
Liberals/Coalition voters are losing their goddamned minds that after years of Dan the Dictator the populace rising up to throw him out is not going to happen.
Vic Libs are so clearly a basket case he's going to easily go to reelection. Which is a shame. He's mostly done a good job through covid, but I'd had issues with him over his treatment of the fire fighters and paramedics unions, the lockdown of the public housing when some of it's residents were covid positive while Toorak and the wealthier suburbs faces nothing of the same severity despite being far larger outbreak points.
I'd like to see him see some challenge, but it looks like most gains in the state election will be seen by the Greens and some other independents.
Was he perfect? Fuck no. But outside of one major fuckup (the handling of hotel/public housing quarantine), he did an adequate enough job to warrant not changing.
The irony is, the people that are all "Dan the Dictator" pandemic weenie dipshits would have been just as furious under a Liberal Party government. Noone was going to go full YOLO on the pandemic like some of the American states did. It was simply never going to happen.
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-Loki-Don't pee in my mouth and tell me it's raining.Registered Userregular
edited October 2022
Case in point - Gladys locked NSW down mega hard as well, and got a lot of hate.
I think we are. Look at the privatisation of healthcare systems. Most other utilities are privatised, or have had the guts of them privatised (for example water authorities do little if any actual design and construct work, it’s all monitoring). Our mainstream news media is in a deplorable state and while yes, it’s not quite Alex Jones level yet, everyone with a brain should be deeply concerned about it.
I’d also say if Dutton doesn’t scare the fuck out of you (general you) for what he represents I don’t think you’re paying attention.
Actually on Dutton, I’m sort of coming to the opinion that maybe I overestimated his canniness? I mean, he’s a nasty piece of work but he seems largely a boofhead? I had worked him up in my head to be some kind of Beria figure, but watching him in charge I don’t know if that’s the case.
I think we are. Look at the privatisation of healthcare systems. Most other utilities are privatised, or have had the guts of them privatised (for example water authorities do little if any actual design and construct work, it’s all monitoring). Our mainstream news media is in a deplorable state and while yes, it’s not quite Alex Jones level yet, everyone with a brain should be deeply concerned about it.
I’d also say if Dutton doesn’t scare the fuck out of you (general you) for what he represents I don’t think you’re paying attention.
Actually on Dutton, I’m sort of coming to the opinion that maybe I overestimated his canniness? I mean, he’s a nasty piece of work but he seems largely a boofhead? I had worked him up in my head to be some kind of Beria figure, but watching him in charge I don’t know if that’s the case.
He has even less charisma than Scomo, which is impressive in itself. Scomo at least had what I'd describe as a "used car salesman" level of charm; effective against the hard of thinking and anyone already predisposed to like him, but otherwise an empty suit. Dutton doesn't even have that much. He actually scares me less as a leader than as an underling simply because I think he has less chance of actually winning an election and getting an opportunity to fuck anything up than riding on the coattails of someone more likeable and being put somewhere, unelected.
On privatization, interestingly enough Dan made a post just a couple of days ago on Facebook about how he wants to "bring back" the state's energy infrastructure that was privatized. Pretty vague on how he actually plans to do that other than bringing back the SEC, but its a good idea and I'm actually impressed that he'd publicly put something like that out there when its going to very obviously paint a big target on his back vis-a-vis the usual right-wing fucktards who are going to scream SOCIALISM!
Best possible case he gets challenged from the left with more votes from the greens et al, imo
Yeah, I'm hoping for a repeat of the generals. Climate 200 had waaaay more impact on the elections than anyone could have dared to dream, and with Victoria unlikely to flip to the liberals any time soon (thank fuck) it would be nice to give Dan some pressure from the left. Though it looks like they're currently only supporting 4 candidates in the Victorian election and none of them are in my district.
Possibly this is because they're only targeting seats that they think they can actually flip, and my district is deep deep red. Which I hate, because as much as I'd prefer Labor to the Liberals, it does mean they think they can do pretty much whatever they want because they have a mandate.
I think we are. Look at the privatisation of healthcare systems. Most other utilities are privatised, or have had the guts of them privatised (for example water authorities do little if any actual design and construct work, it’s all monitoring). Our mainstream news media is in a deplorable state and while yes, it’s not quite Alex Jones level yet, everyone with a brain should be deeply concerned about it.
I’d also say if Dutton doesn’t scare the fuck out of you (general you) for what he represents I don’t think you’re paying attention.
Actually on Dutton, I’m sort of coming to the opinion that maybe I overestimated his canniness? I mean, he’s a nasty piece of work but he seems largely a boofhead? I had worked him up in my head to be some kind of Beria figure, but watching him in charge I don’t know if that’s the case.
Yeah Dutton is more of a sentient potato than a master tactician, or at best he's a retread of Abbot with the pointy bits filed off. He's pretty thick.
Which is not to say he's not worth worrying about, but he's definitely from the shallower end of the LNP gene pool. I would expect anyone savvy and hankering for leadership to be biding their time until the stank from ScoMo has evaporated a bit.
-Loki-Don't pee in my mouth and tell me it's raining.Registered Userregular
However, do not underestimate the rights tendency to vote for utter idiots because they're not left.
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Dhalphirdon't you open that trapdooryou're a fool if you dareRegistered Userregular
Defeating the privatisation of Western Power in 2016-2017 has turned out to be one of the most pivotal moments of WAs political history, along with the domestic gas reserve policy from the early 2000s.
What is the electoral review? Well, it's this thing where the government of NZ is asking the public if they think democracy can be improved.
Things like lowering the voting age, removing anonymous donations, public funding instead of corporate lobbying, STV, those kinds of thing that could improve the process.
Of course, the alt-right authoritarian groups are also aware of the review, so there's been lots of submissions on voter ID, making votes publicly accessible and removing anonymity - you know, basic authoritarian fear-mongering against invisible boogeymen with the very real effect of cooling engagement and a nice side of suppression of marginalised groups.
Worse, despite the fact all this is not fact-based, there's a very real chance if the far/alt-right flood the channel that freedoms on democracy in NZ would actually become less, because the results of the review would determine that 'the NZ public' wanted this to be how democracy works in this country. It's not great!
So it's probably actually really important! But even less exciting than actually voting!
FishmanPut your goddamned hand in the goddamned Box of Pain.Registered Userregular
Ow, rough. Get well soon, buddy. I've had a couple friends and colleagues get it the last few weeks (as well as my 94-year old grandfather).
Honestly, I just whipped off something in 20 minutes without thinking it through much. I hit each question, rattled off my thoughts if I had any, called it a day. Admittedly, my particular pocket of public servant nerds make politics and election regulation basic barbeque talk, so I have pre-defined positions on how half of the election process could be improved.
Voting age is supposedly a particular focus of the review, and the Make it 16 group have a form field available at https://www.makeit16.org.nz/submit (provided you support lowering the voting age).
At the other end of the scale Mis/disinformation and foreign interference seems probably important, and I have opinions... but few solutions, so I kinda gave that a "fuck knows" shrug.
There's probably stuff about how the electoral commission should run local government elections and 3-versus-4 year terms, but honestly you could go to the first general section put in a response about how it's important to not curtail freedoms by introducing voter ID or any other requirements known to suppress marginalised groups, drop the Makeit16 response in the voting age section and call it a job well done.
There’s a whole piece about anti-trust, regulatory divestment/anti-capture policies, and a restructure of how advisory committees interface with politicians and the major govt service providers that sorely needs to be addressed.
We need to break up the news media ecosystem specifically. You’d out that under anti-trust but it’s absolutely critical we get onto it before we end up as bad as Australia.
A re-booted State Electricity Commission would be enshrined into the Victoria’s constitution if the Labor government is returned to power.
Speaking at Yallourn on Tuesday, Premier Daniel Andrews promised to safeguard the commission.
“The last thing we want to do is build this up, make it better than it’s ever been for people not profit to then have a future Liberal government,” he told reporters.
“They simply wouldn’t be able to resist selling off such a big and successful entity and turning it again into a profit centre for multinational companies.”
The government has made a big push this election about how it would re-establish state-owned energy, mostly from renewable sources.
The constitution promise comes as a new opinion poll shows Labor has lost skin amongst voters.
And this is why its so helpful to have more progressive parties threatening Labor from the left to keep them honest.
Mr Guy on Monday pleaded with Victorian voters to back his “safe” and “centrist” party, after he had to distance himself from Liberal candidates labelled as “extremists”.
The Liberal leader pointed to party policies to fix the health system, tackle cost of living pressures and giving Victorians a “fresh start”.
Meanwhile, Deputy Liberal Leader David Southwick demanded Mr Andrews apologise for using the term Nazi when describing some of the candidates running for parliament.
And he's not the only Liberal asking for an apology. (For context, the Liberaral party have preferenced this independent candidate above the Labor Party)
The candidate feels a bit differently.
When Premier Dan Andrews accused the Liberals of preferencing Nazis last week, Baker-Pearce retweeted it with a comment: “Not talking about me now is he #Flattered”.
On Tuesday, it was reported that the Victorian Liberals had listed Tylere Baker-Pearce fifth on their how-to-vote card above Labor candidate Gary Maas after Labor MP Josh Burns tweeted a picture of the independent’s anti-Semitic tweets along with a photograph of him smiling at a Holocaust concentration camp.
However, an archive of his online footprint captured by anti-fascist research group The White Rose Society reveals a much deeper engagement with white supremacist ideas and communities.
Baker-Pearce frequently posted in Australian neo-Nazi Telegram channels, including sharing updates about his candidacy in the state election.
Other posts include sharing pictures of Hitler and pictures of extremist groups’ stickers, as well as using anti-Semitic, racist and homophobic slurs.
The email he used to register as a candidate with the VEC is fuhere1@gmail.com, seemingly a play on “Führer” and a reference to Hitler. On top of running a business called Adventure Tourism Australia, Baker-Pearce has also registered a business “Australian Deportation Service” using his ABN.
Meanwhile, Deputy Liberal Leader David Southwick demanded Mr Andrews apologise for using the term Nazi when describing some of the candidates running for parliament.
If the shoe jackboot fits....
You don't want to be seen as a Nazi sympathizer, maybe don't sympathize (or preference) Nazis?
Ah cool we’re getting to that part now too, huh? Good times ahead
Not quite. Not yet. At the moment it appears to be a preference sharing thing with an independent, rather than tacit support of a party member. We're not right up to the line yet, but you can see the line from here.
The other option to agreeing to a preference sharing is to NOT do it, and if asked about it, say you don't want anyone who supports a Nazi to preference you at all. I don't think there's anything you can do to stop the Nazi from doing it, and he's not going to preference small L liberal over the conservative, so you get the benefit for the most part, as well as not looking like assholes.
Side note, I did a little democracy on Sunday, and posted in my Victorian election ballot.
Need some of the that real 1850s - 1910s energy back up in here. Time to make our grandparents proud imo.
Genuinely jazzed about nationalising Vic power again. Hope it emboldens the rest of the states.
New media/monopoly laws should get done this term too. Once the left coalition gets going, the crypto fascists are gonna try pull out all the stops. Would be good to solve our issues using the established channels without resorting to other means imo
In case you were wondering where the Australian Liberal party was headed. I'm not surprised and yet for fuck's sake.
Anyway, I'm also feeling salty with Labor right now who seem to be slowly watering down Federal ICAC. I voted "Federal ICAC Now" as my number 1 preference in the Senate, and it looks like I'll be doing that again till we have an actual strong ICAC.
You know, also because mysteriously someone firebombed FriendlyJordies house
Labor cannot be trusted on it, which is why I started side-eyeing them the second they said they wanted to pass their own rather than either of the two resting in the Senate that got near perfect marks from the international anti-corruption body.
Everyone should have been side-eyeing them after this came out last month.
Mark Dreyfus has refused to reveal when federal Labor added the high bar for public hearings to its anti-corruption bill, saying to do so “would be detrimental to the public interest”.
In confidential correspondence to the national anti-corruption commission legislation committee, seen by Guardian Australia, Dreyfus refused to say at what point in the bill’s drafting the controversial “exceptional circumstances” test for public hearings was added.
The attorney general claimed public interest immunity over the information sought by MP Helen Haines and Greens senator David Shoebridge, saying in the letter that sharing it would disclose deliberations of cabinet.
They are now working with the Liberal party to pass a bill that both of them are happy with that won’t have nearly enough teeth.
It’s not acceptable for them to cross independents specifically elected on an ICAC to work with the more conservative party that just ended a period of government absolutely rife with corruption.
If they’re not made to pay electorally this shit will continue.
It's very telling how quiet the media has been on the attempted murder of Jordan Shanks.
I seem to recall it being the first piece of news on every report and front page for weeks when the police went through a journalist's sock drawer and how it was such an attack on free press, but an actual act of domestic terrorism against an independent investigative journalist and it barely rates a mention apart from going out of their way to doxx him in the reporting.
It's very telling how quiet the media has been on the attempted murder of Jordan Shanks.
I seem to recall it being the first piece of news on every report and front page for weeks when the police went through a journalist's sock drawer and how it was such an attack on free press, but an actual act of domestic terrorism against an independent investigative journalist and it barely rates a mention apart from going out of their way to doxx him in the reporting.
Because the big networks don't think the people on YouTube with their own news channels are real journalists.
The only people journalists really care about are other journalists. I don't think they're being malicious about it, it's just that they care about things in their circle, like most people do. I always remember the post Covid update questions, and the obvious difference between the questions about regular people's pay being subsidised by the govt and the questions about journo's pay being subsidised by the govt. It was apparent that they actually cared about the latter.
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MorninglordI'm tired of being Batman,so today I'll be Owl.Registered Userregular
The only people journalists really care about are other journalists. I don't think they're being malicious about it, it's just that they care about things in their circle, like most people do. I always remember the post Covid update questions, and the obvious difference between the questions about regular people's pay being subsidised by the govt and the questions about journo's pay being subsidised by the govt. It was apparent that they actually cared about the latter.
He is a journalist. Theyre just bigoted, like all groups.
(PSN: Morninglord) (Steam: Morninglord) (WiiU: Morninglord22) I like to record and toss up a lot of random gaming videos here.
He’s made it a point to go after them (journalists) for being the unprincipled, corrupt, capitalist-cheering hacks that they are. Of course they’re neither willing nor able to cover it satisfactorily. I do wonder who came for him, he does have plenty of enemies.
Well I guess we're going to be getting some results from the Victorian state elections soon.
I guess we'll finally get to see if people have bought the "Dictator Dan" propaganda or if they're actually happy with the way he handled COVID, because it sounds like that was a big driver behind a lot of people's votes. To the point that there was a "Sack Dan Andrews Bring Back Democracy" party below-the-line. Gosh, I wonder if they're a bunch of lunatics?
Obviously not a lot of data out yet at this state, but Antony Green is saying that we're seeing big swings away from Labor in the areas that were affected most harshly by lockdowns, but also big swings towards the Greens, presumably because of *gestures vaguely around*. Given that the Greens usually preference labor pretty highly I'm wondering if those will end up cancelling each other out.
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Yeah, it's odd. Normally when Nats make stompy business-business-romp-romp noises they usually steal from Act, but Act are holding steady while Nat gain. Now, it's also worth considering that Nats are traditionally a bigger party than Labour, so in part this is also just traditional Nat voters drifting back, but usually that's made up for with a more powerful Green wing bringing the balance to the left-right pivot, but I don't see that happening either.
I can't see the why for any of this polling as I don't think there's a lot of canny political points scoring occurring from Luxon's opposition - it's mostly discontent with the state of the world and blaming Labour, like National in any way had better answers to Covid*. Possibly Act has tapped into the reactionary fringe and expanded the voting base by expanding into a previously non-voting community, but I doubt it.
*: As always, they claim they did, but reader: they did not.
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Well that's the thing that bothers me. There's a lot to legit criticize labor for. But a lot of things sucking is... the world currently is on fire. and i don't see any way that mr "I own seven houses and think that having the personality of a bland religiousptoato" is going to improve matters.
I dunno, i'm frustrated and stressed about this, becuase Act/National getting in is likely to directly fuck me on numerous levels, given i'm a beneficiary. And with all the progress i've been making on stablizing and improving my own situation this year, having it ripped away by conservative fuckheads... yeah.
As you might be able to tell, i'm very anxious about these hypotheticals!
Maybe we'll get lucky and get LAbor/Greens/TOP or something.
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That said, Raf Manji is a smart dude and pretty canny operator, and I think he's a person who would do good things in central government. It'd be nice if TOP made it somewhere.
Yeah I think all that polling reliably tells us is that people are extremely sensitive/reactive to the immediate situation. Interest rates are going to stay high and that is going to hurt people over the next year, so I wouldn't be surprised to see Labour dip further. But the election is a ways out, and National could equally put their foot in it and quickly lose a bunch of votes, or Labour could steadily climb back, or another massive wave of Covid could hit and we could once again find ourselves insulated by our position on the globe and come off looking good, or people could lose their shit if further lockdowns are necessary. Who knows. I'm not worried about it because worrying about it won't make a difference*
Liberals/Coalition voters are losing their goddamned minds that after years of Dan the Dictator the populace rising up to throw him out is not going to happen.
Vic Libs are so clearly a basket case he's going to easily go to reelection. Which is a shame. He's mostly done a good job through covid, but I'd had issues with him over his treatment of the fire fighters and paramedics unions, the lockdown of the public housing when some of it's residents were covid positive while Toorak and the wealthier suburbs faces nothing of the same severity despite being far larger outbreak points.
I'd like to see him see some challenge, but it looks like most gains in the state election will be seen by the Greens and some other independents.
Was he perfect? Fuck no. But outside of one major fuckup (the handling of hotel/public housing quarantine), he did an adequate enough job to warrant not changing.
The irony is, the people that are all "Dan the Dictator" pandemic weenie dipshits would have been just as furious under a Liberal Party government. Noone was going to go full YOLO on the pandemic like some of the American states did. It was simply never going to happen.
Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better
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Worst case is still worst case.
Thankfully for as bad as they can be, the LNP are barely a shadow of either the UK or US conservative parties.
They're getting worse in some regards, but at a slower rate than those two. Fuck me if we were facing that.
I’d also say if Dutton doesn’t scare the fuck out of you (general you) for what he represents I don’t think you’re paying attention.
Actually on Dutton, I’m sort of coming to the opinion that maybe I overestimated his canniness? I mean, he’s a nasty piece of work but he seems largely a boofhead? I had worked him up in my head to be some kind of Beria figure, but watching him in charge I don’t know if that’s the case.
Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better
bit.ly/2XQM1ke
He has even less charisma than Scomo, which is impressive in itself. Scomo at least had what I'd describe as a "used car salesman" level of charm; effective against the hard of thinking and anyone already predisposed to like him, but otherwise an empty suit. Dutton doesn't even have that much. He actually scares me less as a leader than as an underling simply because I think he has less chance of actually winning an election and getting an opportunity to fuck anything up than riding on the coattails of someone more likeable and being put somewhere, unelected.
On privatization, interestingly enough Dan made a post just a couple of days ago on Facebook about how he wants to "bring back" the state's energy infrastructure that was privatized. Pretty vague on how he actually plans to do that other than bringing back the SEC, but its a good idea and I'm actually impressed that he'd publicly put something like that out there when its going to very obviously paint a big target on his back vis-a-vis the usual right-wing fucktards who are going to scream SOCIALISM!
Yeah, I'm hoping for a repeat of the generals. Climate 200 had waaaay more impact on the elections than anyone could have dared to dream, and with Victoria unlikely to flip to the liberals any time soon (thank fuck) it would be nice to give Dan some pressure from the left. Though it looks like they're currently only supporting 4 candidates in the Victorian election and none of them are in my district.
https://www.climate200.com.au/candidates/victoria
Possibly this is because they're only targeting seats that they think they can actually flip, and my district is deep deep red. Which I hate, because as much as I'd prefer Labor to the Liberals, it does mean they think they can do pretty much whatever they want because they have a mandate.
Yeah Dutton is more of a sentient potato than a master tactician, or at best he's a retread of Abbot with the pointy bits filed off. He's pretty thick.
Which is not to say he's not worth worrying about, but he's definitely from the shallower end of the LNP gene pool. I would expect anyone savvy and hankering for leadership to be biding their time until the stank from ScoMo has evaporated a bit.
Luxon, National party leader in NZ everyone.
I hope he gets *fucking dragged* over this bullshit, and all the otehr horrible shit he's been spouting recently.
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It’s not a very important country most of the time
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Hit me up if you ever wanna hang out!
Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better
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https://electoralreview.govt.nz/have-your-say/
What is the electoral review? Well, it's this thing where the government of NZ is asking the public if they think democracy can be improved.
Things like lowering the voting age, removing anonymous donations, public funding instead of corporate lobbying, STV, those kinds of thing that could improve the process.
Of course, the alt-right authoritarian groups are also aware of the review, so there's been lots of submissions on voter ID, making votes publicly accessible and removing anonymity - you know, basic authoritarian fear-mongering against invisible boogeymen with the very real effect of cooling engagement and a nice side of suppression of marginalised groups.
Worse, despite the fact all this is not fact-based, there's a very real chance if the far/alt-right flood the channel that freedoms on democracy in NZ would actually become less, because the results of the review would determine that 'the NZ public' wanted this to be how democracy works in this country. It's not great!
So it's probably actually really important! But even less exciting than actually voting!
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Honestly, I just whipped off something in 20 minutes without thinking it through much. I hit each question, rattled off my thoughts if I had any, called it a day. Admittedly, my particular pocket of public servant nerds make politics and election regulation basic barbeque talk, so I have pre-defined positions on how half of the election process could be improved.
Voting age is supposedly a particular focus of the review, and the Make it 16 group have a form field available at https://www.makeit16.org.nz/submit (provided you support lowering the voting age).
At the other end of the scale Mis/disinformation and foreign interference seems probably important, and I have opinions... but few solutions, so I kinda gave that a "fuck knows" shrug.
There's probably stuff about how the electoral commission should run local government elections and 3-versus-4 year terms, but honestly you could go to the first general section put in a response about how it's important to not curtail freedoms by introducing voter ID or any other requirements known to suppress marginalised groups, drop the Makeit16 response in the voting age section and call it a job well done.
We need to break up the news media ecosystem specifically. You’d out that under anti-trust but it’s absolutely critical we get onto it before we end up as bad as Australia.
Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better
bit.ly/2XQM1ke
WOOOOOOOOOOOOOO GO BLACK FERNS YEAHHHHHHHHH
you may now return to the regularly scheduled crises
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And this is why its so helpful to have more progressive parties threatening Labor from the left to keep them honest.
And he's not the only Liberal asking for an apology. (For context, the Liberaral party have preferenced this independent candidate above the Labor Party)
The candidate feels a bit differently.
When Premier Dan Andrews accused the Liberals of preferencing Nazis last week, Baker-Pearce retweeted it with a comment: “Not talking about me now is he #Flattered”.
If the shoe jackboot fits....
You don't want to be seen as a Nazi sympathizer, maybe don't sympathize (or preference) Nazis?
Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better
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Not quite. Not yet. At the moment it appears to be a preference sharing thing with an independent, rather than tacit support of a party member. We're not right up to the line yet, but you can see the line from here.
The other option to agreeing to a preference sharing is to NOT do it, and if asked about it, say you don't want anyone who supports a Nazi to preference you at all. I don't think there's anything you can do to stop the Nazi from doing it, and he's not going to preference small L liberal over the conservative, so you get the benefit for the most part, as well as not looking like assholes.
Side note, I did a little democracy on Sunday, and posted in my Victorian election ballot.
Genuinely jazzed about nationalising Vic power again. Hope it emboldens the rest of the states.
New media/monopoly laws should get done this term too. Once the left coalition gets going, the crypto fascists are gonna try pull out all the stops. Would be good to solve our issues using the established channels without resorting to other means imo
Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better
bit.ly/2XQM1ke
Democrats Abroad! || Vote From Abroad
In case you were wondering where the Australian Liberal party was headed. I'm not surprised and yet for fuck's sake.
Anyway, I'm also feeling salty with Labor right now who seem to be slowly watering down Federal ICAC. I voted "Federal ICAC Now" as my number 1 preference in the Senate, and it looks like I'll be doing that again till we have an actual strong ICAC.
You know, also because mysteriously someone firebombed FriendlyJordies house
Everyone should have been side-eyeing them after this came out last month.
They are now working with the Liberal party to pass a bill that both of them are happy with that won’t have nearly enough teeth.
It’s not acceptable for them to cross independents specifically elected on an ICAC to work with the more conservative party that just ended a period of government absolutely rife with corruption.
If they’re not made to pay electorally this shit will continue.
I seem to recall it being the first piece of news on every report and front page for weeks when the police went through a journalist's sock drawer and how it was such an attack on free press, but an actual act of domestic terrorism against an independent investigative journalist and it barely rates a mention apart from going out of their way to doxx him in the reporting.
Because the big networks don't think the people on YouTube with their own news channels are real journalists.
He is a journalist. Theyre just bigoted, like all groups.
Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better
bit.ly/2XQM1ke
Seeing it watered down by the LNP is so fucking irritating.
I guess we'll finally get to see if people have bought the "Dictator Dan" propaganda or if they're actually happy with the way he handled COVID, because it sounds like that was a big driver behind a lot of people's votes. To the point that there was a "Sack Dan Andrews Bring Back Democracy" party below-the-line. Gosh, I wonder if they're a bunch of lunatics?
Obviously not a lot of data out yet at this state, but Antony Green is saying that we're seeing big swings away from Labor in the areas that were affected most harshly by lockdowns, but also big swings towards the Greens, presumably because of *gestures vaguely around*. Given that the Greens usually preference labor pretty highly I'm wondering if those will end up cancelling each other out.
Ahem... lol lmao
It turns out the Mudoch & Costello/9 press are full of shit and no-one actually agrees with them.