It’s not Independence Day for Australia, just “Independent’s Day”. Anyone but the majors…
Election Tomorrow: How-to-vote suggestions for climate skeptics
CarbonSense have posted a list of dedicated skeptics in Australian politics
HOUSE
- David Archibald, Australian Liberty Alliance candidate for Curtin in WA
- George Christensen, LNP Candidate for Dawson in Queensland
- Dr Dennis Jensen MP, Independent Candidate for Tangney, WA
SENATE
- David Leyonhjelm, Liberal Democrats for NSW
- Bob Day, Family First for SA “No more windfarms”
- John Madigan, Manufacturing and Farming Party
- Malcolm Roberts, No 2 on ticket for Pauline Hanson in Queensland
- Dr Mark Imisides, Christian Democrats, WA.
Rafe Campion recommends the http://ConservativeRevolt.wix.com/HowToVote .
My method is to choose your local candidate carefully, based on individuals not parties. Know your candidates. I lean Delcon. Like John Stone who links to the list of Turncoats. There is no small government major party any more. Shorten would be more-terrible in the short run, but we might get a good opposition and a decent Senate. (Blessed are the Gridlocked, whose MP’s cannot pass laws.) In the long run Turnbull could stop us getting both good government and a good opposition. In the short run, the dire option of another Labor-Green government with some Senate control is still a risky possibility (latest IPSOS poll is 50:50). I don’t trust polls, but that doesn’t help. Predicting preferences in this election is a wildcard. Voters can’t vote for a gridlocked parliament, only for each candidate.
“Better to have a real conservative opposition than a fake conservative government.”
In the campaign, I hoped someone would explain how we can fix the Liberal Party while they hold power. No one did. But being in opposition didn’t fix the Labor Party either. The answer is probably in a long term grassroots movement that is organized and networked. That isn’t going to happen tomorrow.
The voters are going to surprise the major parties tomorrow
The new voting system will not work the way the majors hoped. It was supposed to stop minor parties doing tricky preference deals and getting in a senator “by accident”. It will not work. By getting people to number the boxes above the line, rather than just sticking in a “1” they are bringing the preferences concept to life. People will think more about their choices rather than less. Instead of wiping out the minorities it will increase them.
The “accidental senators” were never an accident — they personally got a bit lucky — but if it wasn’t them, it would have gone to one of the other small, non-establishment protest candidates. The protest vote was real, has got larger, and isn’t going away. All the talk of people winning on 0.1% of a primary vote was just another deceit that hid the fact that a large percentage of voters ultimately wanted any minor candidate more than they wanted a major one.
Both major parties have lost their heart and soul — deserting their bases
Australian politics is a parody.
Labor fights to stop plebiscites that would ask the workers what they really want (how bad can that be?). It rages for same-sex marriage, a topic that affects 2% of voters, and not in a life or death way. Labor tries to galvanize the crowd to change the weather in 2100, even though voters don’t vote much on environmental issues, and choose other environmental problems when they do. The party of workers supposedly worries about the rights of non-workers from outside Australia who apparently escaped death and tyranny but aren’t grateful for food, shelter, and allowances in safe locations. Labor lied about bringing in a carbon tax and hasn’t yet admitted it was the wrong thing to do or said sorry for doing it.
The Liberals have given up on free speech and smaller government. They are not even pretending. The ABC pours scorn on half of Australian voters and does so with permission of the Coalition. The Liberals won the last election on a blood oath to stop the carbon tax, but they tossed out the leader who did that, and a carbon tax started today. They tax as much as almost any government in Australia ever has, and enthuse that governments really can control the weather, stop storms and make floods go away. The Liberal Party cannot keep this up. Will they split, or will a new force arise from the forgotten base?
Curiously a couple of Bellwether voters I know, who only see mainstream news and mix in mainstream circles in median suburbs, have told me they’ve already voted and they went “totally independent”. They know almost nothing about Brexit. When asked why they are fed up with the major parties, the answer is “they both lie”. And some of them put the Greens last, after the majors.
The independent movement in Australia is immature, disorganised, not networked and not focused. There’s no Trump here, no Boris Johnson or Farage. Yet there is anger and passion here for the galvanizing. Who will do that?