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The Aussie election

The New Neo Posted on by

Australia recently had an election in which the far left won. I hadn’t followed it at all till I heard the news, but the BBC calls it a “great shock to the system”:

Victory belongs to Anthony Albanese, only the fourth Labor leader since World War Two to oust a Liberal prime minister, but the 2022 Australian election was primarily a rejection of Scott Morrison and the brand of politics he has come to personify.

A politics that denied, and sometimes even mocked, the seriousness of the climate crisis – as Treasurer, Morrison laughingly brandished a lump of coal in parliament.

A politics that many female voters especially found bloke-ish and boorish…

Tumbling down have come the walls of conservative citadels. Parliamentary seats where Liberals had for generations dominated now look like barren lands.

The shoreline of Sydney Harbour, which is home to the most expensive real estate on the continent, is a case in point. It has been overwhelmed by a “teal” wave, the colour adopted by the swathe of independents who have had such a transformative effect on the country’s political geography.

Remarkably, the Liberals no longer control any harbour-side seats that stretch from the Opera House to the ocean…

It is akin to San Francisco, another great harbour city, losing all its Democrats.

That’s the BBC, of course, which considers this a Good Thing. And I often get confused by Anglosphere politics outside the US: the parliamentary systems and the nomenclature by which “liberal” supposedly means “conservative” but actually by US standards is usually decidedly nonconservative.

So, what really happened there?

More:

A party that has become fixated in recent decades with attracting working class battlers in traditional Labor strongholds has lost touch with Tesla-driving professionals in blue-ribbon seats.

For the first time in more than a decade, the electric car nudged out the coal train.

The rise of the teal independents has shattered the main party duopoly in the major cities – urban Australia accounts for 86% of the country’s population.

Before you express shock at that last figure, it may surprise you to learn (as it surprised me) that the percentage of urban dwellers is similar in the US. However, in the US it’s been quite some time – if ever – that conservatives have found much support with “Tesla-driving professionals.”

It’s the climate-change emphasizing Greens that seem to have turned the tide, with neither of the main parties (Liberal or Labor) drawing all that many votes. There’s that parliamentary system complexity again:

There was always a none-of-the above feel to the head-to-head between the main party leaders. That has been borne out in the results.

Anthony Albanese, then, has achieved an ambiguous victory. There was no great groundswell of support for Labor. Indeed, its primary vote was actually 2% down from 2019, a meagre 32%. Although he is certain to emerge as prime minister, we still do not know whether he will stand at the head of a Labor majority government.

Albanese has promised to make Australia a “a renewable energy powerhouse.” Good luck with that.

This election apparently was all about climate change, at least according to the MSM:

One topic dominated Australia’s election: climate change.

Following a string of climate-related catastrophes in recent years, Australian voters this weekend returned the opposition Labor Party to power, with incoming Prime Minister Anthony Albanese vowing to “end the climate wars” and turn Australia into a “renewable energy superpower.”…

Oquist pointed out that although Albanese’s Labor Party had won a narrow majority to form the next government, it was the Greens and the so-called teal independents — both of whom campaigned on strong climate action — who received the biggest bump in support.

“Parliament now effectively has a ‘supermajority’ in support of climate action, which can’t be ignored,” he said.

Were people also just plain tired of Morrison, who had been PM since 2018 (which includes all of the COVID years, among other things)? Perhaps. Here’s a clue, I think:

Morrison drew near unanimous condemnation for taking a holiday during Australia’s 2019–20 bushfire season and for his government’s response to the disaster…

Morrison was heavily condemned for his government’s response to the 2022 Eastern Australia floods; criticism was levelled against him for campaigning in Perth instead of being present in New South Wales, causing a relief package for flood victims to be delayed, with many critics suggesting that Morrison was prioritising marketing over the flood response.

I’m not so sure anything about Australia is transferable to the US, and vice versa. But when the far left gets in the driver’s seat (literally), bad things tend to happen.

Comments

The Aussie election — 45 Comments

  2. Good luck basing your governance on climate change.
    As we have started to advise Europeans: “You will want to cultivate sweaters and desperation”

    Although, Oz is a bit warmer than Germany 🙂

  4. @ Neo > “But when the far left gets in the driver’s seat (literally), bad things tend to happen.”

    Can we get a bumper sticker for that?

    I’ve also seen commentary that the Aussies didn’t like Morrison’s handling of the Covid debacle, but I don’t know anything one way or the other myself.

    Losing voters can happen for a multitude of reasons, of course.

    And as Scott says, let’s see what happens when they find out where electricity comes from.

  5. “But when the far left gets in the driver’s seat (literally), bad things tend to happen.”
    Are you talking about Teddy Kennedy?

  6. There’s no reason to interpose what happens in Australia to the US.

    The whole “climate change election” is, however, BS. The last election was touted as a “climate change election” too — which Morrison won, to the dismay of the Green tinged, who had thought it was basically a given that the left would win on the basis of their climate policies.

    Coming to power now is a bit of a poisoned chalice. Rampant inflation is never going to be fun to deal with. Coming to power now with a set of policies designed to make the middle and lower classes pay more for everything is a dead-set disaster waiting to happen.

    They have a number of other policies that they are going to either walk back or look stupid implementing. Their immigration policy is one. It will be interesting to see if they take the Biden approach — change nothing and pretend — or actually let a flood of boat people in.

  7. I’m Australian, usually a Liberal Party Voter (ie our “conservatives” in coalition with the County Party) and I work in the energy industry.
    Obviously its always a bit more complicated, but I think the result can be summed up as:
    • The Libs suffered from being the party in power during Covid, and like so many governments went too far in lockdowns – but a tough call since states had a bigger say, and a lot of people agreed with the lockdowns (but generally more on the Left than on the Right)
    • Morrison didn’t run the greatest campaign, the press was mostly against him (as usual though) and Labor did a much better hit job(s) – in general more of a swing against the government rather for Labor, who also went backwards a bit in their primary vote (but we have a preferential voting system, so they were up in the two-party preferred vote).

    When I voted, I was really lamenting the lack of choice – there just isn’t that much difference between Liberal and Labour. By American standards, the Liberals would be a little-left-of-centre while Labor would be a bit-more-left-of-centre. The difference is not the chasm it is in the USA.

    For what it is worth, I think the outcome over the next three years will be to make the Liberals a bit more Conservative, closer to the Country Party, and Labor will be on the wrong side of history. With a growing population and the pending closure of our biggest thermal generators, Labor’s more aggressive “renewable“ plans are likely to be, shall we say, increasingly problematic. Our energy system is not as bad as California, but it is rapidly heading in the same direction (and the Liberals got us here but Labor will likely exacerbate it). With inflation, possible recession, problems with China etc this term will likely have real problems, with Labor’s policies heading in the wrong direction – a bit like a muted mini-me of the Biden administration.

    The Greens and Independents are going to drag Labor further Left. Australia is often like a smaller, subdued version of the USA (a lot of Australian political operatives work back and forth between the US and Australia – especially on the Left). The craziness we are seeing with the Democrats in the US will spill over to the Australian Left now they are in power – not quite as crazy (as I said its muted) but quite possibly enough to impact the next election negatively for Labor, on top of economic woes.
    We’ll see.

    btw NEO re your comment “I’m not so sure anything about Australia is transferable to the US, and vice versa” – it does. Watch America and see something crazy, then wait a few months or so and you’ll see an echo in Australia, usually on the Left (cash for clunkers, toppling statues, attempts to start a BLM campaign et cetera ad nauseum – never anywhere near as extreme, but they always try). However sometimes it works the other way around – take a close look at Obama’s first campaign and you’ll see strong elements from Australia’s Kevin Rudd’s campaign just a bit earlier – not surprising since Labor operatives interact and work with the Democrats (it’s a bigger, seasonal job market) and Rudd’s win was an unlikely one which fitted the circumstances nicely with what Obama was trying to achieve (in brief – campaign as a non-threatening moderate, a fiscal conservative, and save the crazy stuff until AFTER you are elected).
    And of course, there is Miranda Devine at the New York Post – quite an impact lately!

  8. I’m Australian, YOU’RE not. I know what I’m talking about YOU DON’T. I preface this comment by saying I’m so pissed I can barely type. The liberals (conservatives in Australia) lost SIXTEEN POINTS. Labour (the left in Australia) lost ONE POINT FIVE. This was NOT about people suddenly loving labour. This was about furious conservatives abandoning the liberals for independent parties. This election was about one thing: People like me, lifelong conservative voters, and EVERYONE I KNOW, voting to PUNISH OUR OWN PARTY OVER THE CORVID BULLSHIT AND WE GET NO CREDIT FOR THAT.

    IT WAS ABOUT NOTHING ELSE . Not global fuckignwarming, not wanting to support the left, NOTHING ELSE. We were utterly furious about the lockdowns, the mandates and the draconian measures. And we are getting NO CREDIT for destroying our own party on principle. We did it to punish them for their authoritarianism. YOU FUCKERS in America spent months criticising Australia for becoming a fascist covid state (Australia is lost!! wail), THIS IS THE ELECTORIAL PAYBACK, THIS IS THE CORRECTION and you shitheads are saying we’re dumb because all of a sudden we love the left????????????????? FUCK YOU.

  10. Pull your head in Pete, there are plenty of Aussies here and your argument is not helped by caps lock.

    I’m sitting here in bed with the Flu Manchu (not jabbed at all and it feels like a really sh!tty cold). As I was reading today’s headline in a major newspaper about how the Labor party has assembled simply the best of the best economic advisers, my better half wandered in to say the TV news says energy prices will go up by 130% this year. 130%.

    So, once inflation and supply shortages in all key sectors really bite here, say from the third quarter, Labor will discover that not only are they in no position to govern well (their socialist policies are historically incoherent inflationary rubbish), they have also been handed a poisoned chalice that no one can control. The world is on fire, our major ally is so anti-development and so heavily compromised we are almost alone now and no matter what Labor does, we are largely stuffed.

    On a small plus side, after three tears of Labor/Greens control, the future electoral backlash should be hugely entertaining and severe.

  11. What do you want, Pete? A medal? It sounds like you didn’t so much “destroy[ y]our own party on principle” as destroy your own country. You chose to punish the lesser of two evils and the result is the greater of the two evils — by far — will now rule the country.

    I get wanting to punish idiots who go too far with the Wuhan Flu — really, I do — but when the left is so crazy, so arrogant, so stupid, so vile, you just can’t let them have power over the country. You are about to learn that the hard way, I’m afraid.

  12. They gave the world The Seekers. For that, we can forgive them for inflicting Robert Hughes on us.

  14. Soooo, the government that implemented Australia’s insane COVID response got thrown out at the polls? This is my shocked face.

  15. ” . . . when the far left gets in the driver’s seat (literally), bad things tend to happen.”
    What gives with the superfluous “tend” qualifier? That is akin to saying “When you touch a stove with all burners going full-bore, it tends to be warm.”

  16. They (libs) deserve what they get.
    Unfortunately a lot of normal people are gonna get clobbered too.

  17. This election is excellent for America. As Australia experiences blackouts and soaring energy prices, we can learn and not head down that path.

  18. They were already in the hysterical covid bandwagon. Adding climate is the icing on the cake

  19. Yesterday, Biden said the high prices were painful but necessary for the energy transition.

  24. The Seekers: Mega-dittos! Plus Mad Max maven George Miller, M.D. (And a bunch of tennis greats, led by Rocket Rod Laver.)

  26. South Australia was already having brownouts last summer (our winter). I suspect there was a lot of resentment about the Covid idiocy but this is going to be a very expensive way to express it.

  27. A lot of talk lately about shortages of food and high prices. My Cousin and her Husband farm in Central Illinois and I ask her about the situation there. Here is her response.

    This has been a very challenging year. A large portion of the corn belt had a very wet cold spring. We usually start planting in April, but this year our first day of planting was May 11th.. We had a week before we were rained out again, and we were able to plant all but 40 acres. The latest planting report shows that corn planting is 63 to 66% complete, average would be 79%. We did switch some corn acres to wheat because our anhydrous prices went from $500/Ton to $1500/Ton. Potash,phosphate, and other forms of nitrogen rose significantly too. I don’t have to tell you about diesel prices because I’m sure you see them posted at your stations. We have a 1000 and a 500 gallon tanks to fill! Thank goodness we filled them in December so we were able to farm awhile with cheap gas.
    I don’t know how you feel about it, but I am scared about what is going to happen in the coming year. I think our producing a record crop this year is possible, but slim with all the challenges we’re facing. The Ukraine will not be able to plant all their acres. Their farmers are planting in flak jackets and helmets and having to worry about land mines in their fields. They are a top supplier of corn and wheat to countries in their area. South American crops were lower than expected so they will not export what they usually do. If we don’t raise bumper crops, I can see a major food crisis.
    I’ve probably given you more information than you wanted, and I am sorry if I have alarmed you. I’m probably being pessimistic. We have a lot going for us. Our suppliers were able to provide the fertilizer, and if we can get the seed in the ground we still have a chance at record yields. The genetics they have developed in the seed is nothing short of amazing. It can compensate for a lot of adverse conditions.

  28. “A renewable energy superpower”…certainly! Lots of sunshine in Australia, so it’s obvious!

    It seems very difficult for people to grasp the TIME factor in electricity…that a kwh generated at 11AM on a sunny day is not the same thing as a kwh needed at 7pm on a hot afternoon when people need air conditioning, or a kwh needed at 2am on a winter night when people need heating…or a kwh needed by an electric arc furnace in a steel mill, which absolutely needs continuous power.

    People tend to assume that electricity is a commodity like coal or gravel which can be piled up until needed. It isn’t.

    One doesn’t need to be an electrical engineer to grasp the above facts, but it seems very hard to get them across.

  29. This election is excellent for America. As Australia experiences blackouts and soaring energy prices, we can learn and not head down that path. — Cornhead

    It’s a comforting thought, but I have no confidence that will happen. Germany and Spain have been screwing up their countries with green policies for at least 1.5 decades. California has had a few of summers with scheduled blackouts. Oh, the weather got too hot. Too bad. Move along.
    ____

    I love the Australian commenters. All of them.

  30. Australia is a major exporter of uranium, so historically they’ve been friendly, or at least not hostile, to nuclear energy. Have the Greens there reassessed their views on nuclear power, as some European Greens have?

  31. I appreciate Pete’s comments and outright anger about the insanity of draconian Australian lockdowns. Even worse in Kiwiland. At the time I thought “Australia has lost it. I’m done with them. They can’t be trusted. And now they’re bowing to China.” Meanwhile, Aussie conservatives/patriots are seething at their own leadership. Here in rural Arizona we remained somewhat sane, with minimal lockdowns and masking. Somehow we survived. But the same disappointment in “Conservative” RINO leadership is rearing its head. Now we find out our leadership from Mike Pence on down betrayed us. Very disappointing. We vote them into power. They do nothing, or the exact opposite. Seems we need to follow the money.

  32. Biden and the Democratic Congress are a disaster, but one has to recognize that, for the first time in half a century or more, the American right has caught a bit of luck since 2020. Biden and the Democratic party couldn’t help themselves but to spend like sailors high on LSD, so they’re going to take all the blame for inflation, despite Trump’s (comparatively modest) profligacy. I’ll give my grudging respect to Trump too for at least not taking a maximalist position on lockdowns like the ousted Aussie PM. All of that angst is going to be pinned on Democrats too. And they’ll be set up in 2024 with an 82-year-old incumbent who is clearly not up to the job and an incompetant VP who they can’t dump.

  33. the lockdowns that had a rather brutal character specially in victoria, had their impact as intended by xi and klaus schwab, I’m sorry but the latter is a much greater threat then putin, the road warrior is not supposed to be a how to manual, but here they are, Morrison who didn’t fall for the skydragon (the fatuous reasoning behind these draconian measures) enabled those who did,

  34. Pingback:Australia Just Went Hard Left | Tai-Chi Policy

  35. Pete’s right. They needed turfing. They treat conservatives voters as totally locked in and pander to the left, moving the culture that way in the process. That cycleneeds to be broken.

    The seats lost to the harbour sid e independents held the hard left of the Labour Party aka ‘moderates’ to the Orwellian mainstream media. They would be ideologically comfortable following AOC. Although Tim Wilson (basically Libertarian) is an honourable exception.

    Australian conservatives need to take back their party from the left, just as Trump beat the Republican RINOs in the USA.

    A party of the right which does things like appointed its esafety commissioner needs radical change. No wonders the country repeatedly lurches to the left. Pandering to the left is not the way for a party of the right to survive in other than name only. Good enough for those in it for the money and power, but not for those in it on principle. Culture is not constant, it evolves. Think 20% LBTQ+ youth in the USA.

    Australian eSafety comm issioner Julie Inman Grant tells the World Economic Forum we need a “recalibration” of freedom of speech.
    https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022/05/24/world-economic-forum-australias-esafety-commissioner-calls-for-recalibration-of-human-rights-free-speech/

  36. I think the takeaway is not just what they accomplished, but how they accomplished it. How do you get independents that you can support elected into an entrenched political system?

    “It has been overwhelmed by a “teal” wave, the colour adopted by the swathe of independents who have had such a transformative effect on the country’s political geography.”

  38. Two observations..FWIW
    1. I read an article titled “Scott Morrison: A Weathervane Trapped in a Man’s Body”. Pretty spot on description. He’s just not that bright a guy and rode whatever wind could fill his sail.
    2. Two to three generations of “nanny state save us” style government and you get every heart quaking to climate fear and pandemic terror yet nary a public challenge to queer ideologies that are more destructive by far.
    3. This one’s for free…Nominal Christianity has surrendered to secular “just be tolerant”-ism and there you have it.
    Aussies gonna get it good and hard.
    Love these folks…but they’ve got trouble comin’.

  39. He sounds like an Australian version of Jeremy Corbyn. Not good at all!

  40. They gave the world The Seekers. For that, we can forgive them for inflicting Robert Hughes on us. –Art Deco

    You sure don’t speak for me.

    By coincidence, the other night I started re-watching Robert Hughes’s brilliant “The Shock of the New” series on the 20th Century and modern art. The episodes can be found for free on YouTube. I heartily recommend them.

    –“The Shock of the New – Ep 1 – The Mechanical Paradise”
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J3ne7Udaetg&list=PLFtSvldL7Mh4ismj4BgH33pBR9hbtBkxz&index=1

    Conservatives might imagine a well-regarded art critic would be hopelessly in the bag for the full boat of modern art foolishness. However, “Shock of the New” ends on a disconsolate note summed up at wiki thusly:
    __________________________

    Episode 8: The Future That Was [End of Modernity] – The commercialisation of modern art, the decline of modernism, and art without substance. Land art, performance art, and body art
    __________________________

    Pope Deco is an opinionated moron who imagines that his Naughty and Nice lists matter to anyone else. Enforcing these lists appears to be his primary motivation for commenting.

    Why anyone takes Deco seriously or politely is beyond me.

    (Good grief, he had to take a shot at neo’s love of the BeeGees to tout Mama Cass!)

  41. I used to follow Aussie politics until it all went behind paywalls. But in July 2020 I met an Aussie bloke in a hotel in Mexico. We were both there to get our teeth fixed. I commented on the then-recent video of Victoria police dragging a woman off the street for not wearing a mask. Understand, the idea that police would be so brutal to a woman posing no threat was unthinkable before this.

    The bloke said, more or less, well sometimes the government has to do what it has to do: As he stood there wearing no mask, in Mexico, a country with seriously authoritarian police.

    Harbinger, yeah, it was. I guess I never thought I’d see even a wanker like Trudeau call his truckers Nazis, either, or seize the bank accounts of single mothers who gave the drivers a bit of money.

    Aussies punishing the Liberals for the lockdown? Sure, why not? There are plenty of conservative Americans who voted not for Biden, but against Trump. Good and hard, baby.

  42. A couple of things:

    re Pete: on May 24, 2022 at 5:17 am
    maybe just re-read my earlier post before going off the deep end. Take a few deep breaths! The whole thing about there not being much difference between Liberal and Labor sort of covers the disappointment conservatives have with Morrison (and Turnbull more so before him). I voted Labor in 1983 (lol who didn’t!) and never since. This time I would have voted United AP had Palmer not been in charge and if I was sure their preferences would go to the Liberals (an effective way of sending a “not happy” message without trying to elect the other side). As it was I voted Liberal as the best available option, but with misgivings.

    re John Guilfoyle: on May 24, 2022 at 4:40 pm
    “. I read an article titled “Scott Morrison: A Weathervane Trapped in a Man’s Body”. Pretty spot on description. He’s just not that bright a guy and rode whatever wind could fill his sail.”
    …is a pretty accurate observation. Morrison wasn’t that bad per se, remembering that Turnbull squandered Abbott’s near record majority, and left Morrison struggling to win the previous election at all. But that said, he was too pragmatic, and therefore failed to make a stand on issues. I not entirely sure about Dutton’s political skills, but I’d expect he will take principled stands rather than just taking the populous route driven by the press et al.

    re Energy: as I’ve commented earlier, I work in the energy industry and the next decade or so will be problematic. Someone mentioned South Australia, which already experiences brownouts. That SA is not worse off is because it can import energy from Victoria, but as NSW and Victorian thermal power stations are decommissioned, and those states are struggling, SA is going to be in a bad position.

    While Labor and the Greens energy policies are badly naïve, it was a national Liberal Government that got us here. And it won’t be easy to turn around – its not just a case of choosing not to close the thermal generators. Most are at the end of their operational life, and to extend that will require major investment for upgrades and maintenance, and that should have started years ago. It is doable of course, but not easy, cheap or quick. One of the key drivers here is legal – if people die due to plant failure, the operating companies, their executives and directors can all be sued. Its already happened at Yallourn PS in Victoria, and its only good luck that no one was killed in the Queensland Callide PS explosion only a year ago. Luck-based survival is not a good basis on which to operate a power station.

    The biggest failure however has been the transmission system, which is designed around the major existing power stations. Moving to wind and solar is one thing, given the lack of reliability and inability to match generation and demand (and batteries have a use, but cannot fill the gap). But to go down that path without expanding the electricity transmission to connect geographically spread-out wind and solar generators is just negligent…..or intentional IF the goal is demand management to get people to use less power (anyone own an electronic vehicle?).

    Transmission is expensive (a lot of the delay is who/how it will be paid for), needs to obtain the land easements to be built, then jump through all the environmental hurdles, and then takes time to actually build.

    The silver lining is Labor are more likely to get this moving than the Liberals had been – they need transmission to expand “renewable” generation, and don’t give a stuff about the rural populations’ objections to land easements….they don’t have any rural electorates to answer to! Their problem is the new lines will not be built in time to save them.

  43. At least one can’t describe the situation in Oz as being hijacked by a criminal political party that then claims a “mandate” to destroy the country.
    FWIW.
    Wish Oz the best of luck…

  45. }}} I’m not so sure anything about Australia is transferable to the US, and vice versa. But when the far left gets in the driver’s seat (literally), bad things tend to happen.

    “Far” left?

    There is no other kind, these days.

    The left is so far out in Left Field these days that the Olden Dayes Left Fringe, Ralph Nader, cannot be seen from where they are with the Webb Telescope.

    The modern left thinks Ralph Nader is indistinguishable from John Birch.

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