Category Archives: Liberal
A Line in the Sand
I used to think the argument that Prime Minister Gillard has been excessively targeted for abuse was a pretty dubious proposition. I used to think that although there was clearly some elements of sexism amongst some of the criticism and abuse, you could easily find equivalents in, say, the casually anti-catholic nature of some of […]
A bribe by any other name
Why do we allow corporate donations to political parties? At all? This is a question that occurs to me every year, surprisingly enough when the AEC release the (by now already dated) data on political donations. This is not an in-depth look at the numbers. I imagine one of our more details-oriented writers is presently […]
Are we left with the right centre?
The other day, on the AusVotes2013 Facebook page, we received a concisely-worded piece of feedback. Apparently, AusVotes has become, in its brief lifetime, a hive of Coalition Groupthink™. Never mind the piece I wrote the other day suggesting that I couldn’t conceive of a rational argument for voting for the coalition, or lambasting Joe Hockey […]
Whither the progressive voter?
As Australia careers towards an Abbott government, a question that routinely occurs to me is: “is it really conservatives voting for this party?” There really is nothing conservative about what the Abbott coalition is offering. Rather, it is a strangely inverted conservatism; a big-government, socially regressive proflicracy. How could the fictional classic conservative that exists […]
Ready to Lead
Is Tony Abbott ready to be Prime Minister? Or, more to point, is the Australian public ready to vote for him? Of course, the answer to that question depends on what version of Tony Abbott we are thinking of. Is it the man that Annabel Crabb famously dubbed the Mad Monk – the socially conservative […]
How Values influence Policy
This word ‘values’ flys around the politicians and media players; but like many English words it seems to have many meanings. This is not in the slippery or weasel-wordish way, it is just a word that most people seem to feel they understand, and are entitled to use in any old way that they mean […]
Parenting leave – two strong policies with a deep divide
Stupid hashtag misquotes of Tony Abbott (and equally stupid reporting thereof) aside, recent weeks have seen a bump in the presence of policy discussion in Australia. Both parties have been forced to discuss substance in view of the upcoming budget and in the absence of parliamentary sitting days to fill with ephemera and shouting. One […]
Fiscal dissonance
It’s budget time again. And as the kabuki-like rotisserie of bullshit continues to twirl its way to May 14, Joe Hockey gave a serious speech to the IPA which touched on several important issues relating to Australia’s long-term future budgetary health. Ranging from discussion of a rapidly ageing Chinese population to a series of local […]
Safety Trampolines, One World Government and Giving People a Reason To Join A Party – The Whitlam Institute gives time for Thought
On this May Day that has passed, the University of Western Sydney’s Whitlam Institute organised a political forum called It’s My Party, as a part of the Behind the Lines exhibition that is being hosted at Parramatta’s Riverside Theatres. Labor’s John Faulkner, the Liberals’ Joe Hockey and the Greens’ Bob Brown were invited to outlay […]
“Twitter” and “Teh Left”
In the wake of Leigh Sales’ most recent interview with the Opposition Leader, the Kabuki-like response began right on cue. Prior to the interview, after Sales announced on Twitter that she would be speaking to Tony Abbott, the usual suspects began salivating over the prospect of an evisceration akin to his previous 730 effort, when […]
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