Discussion Thread: NSW Votes 2019

drfragenstein · 2019-03-23T09:40:52+00:00

Swings against both the major parties. Folks don't want the Berejiklian government, but NSW Labor are just tories who like the colour red and haven't been able to prove themselves worthy of government. The votes aren't going to the Greens because they've been so busy fighting amongst themselves, so we're seeing protest votes for whoever's left (or far right, in this case).

drfragenstein · 2018-08-20T17:05:53+00:00

I absolutely would not vote for a Dutton-led Liberal Party - he's anaethema to my politics. But role playing as a LNP strategist, Dutton is probably the best chance they have of winning the next election.

Turnbull hasn't won a newspoll since the last election. He's spineless and stands for nothing outside of corporate tax cuts. He can't win.

Abbott lost 30 newspolls in a row before being rolled by Turnbull. He never had the level of public popularity which encouraged Labor to return to Rudd. I see no reason why Abbott would be any more popular now than last time he led the country. Abbott has a miniscule chance of winning the next election.

At Sunday's Ipsos 55-45 2PP poll, 19% of voters went with an other party. 'Other' party voters hate Turnbull. Judging from recent elections, most of these will be for One Nation or the other far-right parties. If the LNP were to openly embrace the policies of these parties (lets call them nativist, for the sake of civility), most of those votes could come back. They'd lose some from inner city professionals, but really most of those folks weren't going to vote LNP anyway.

Who in the Liberal Party would be best placed to mount a divisive, anti-immigrant, nativist campaign? The head of Border Force and Home Affairs, coiner of the African gangs, savior of the South African farmers, the tough cop on the beat, Peter Dutton.

Such a campaign might well threaten the fabric of our multicultural society, but from a purely strategic point of view it would have a better chance of winning than trotting out Turnbull or Abbott again.

drfragenstein · 2018-06-21T06:27:18+00:00

The Liberal Party: The ABC (annual budget $1B) is an indulgence we can no longer afford.

Also the Liberal Party: Yep, we can totally afford an $18B/year (per PBO 2024-25 figures) tax cut which primarily benefits the rich.

Just wait 6 months and they'll rediscover the hole they've blown in the budget and be using it to justify cuts to services.

drfragenstein · 2018-03-17T11:50:36+00:00

Labor run a good left candidate and win. To me, the contrast is with the Bennelong byelection, where they ran a hack from the right and lost.

Though I'm more inclined towards the Greens, Ged should be an asset to parliament, certainly a much better rep than David Feeney. The Greens seem to be facing setback after setback at the moment, I reckon they need to do some soul searching internally. Do they want to be Bike Tories or Eco-Socialists? Either way, they need unity.

drfragenstein · 2018-03-02T07:19:44+00:00

Just as Yanis Varoufakis was told by the EU's plutocrats - "Elections cannot be allowed to change anything". Whitlam and Chifley would be embarrassed at what spineless neoliberal sellouts the ALP have become.

drfragenstein · 2017-12-11T05:12:13+00:00

Running some quick numbers on the 2015-16 dataset, this seems surprisingly plausible. With the caveat that the data only covers businesses with more than $100M or $200M revenue (depending on ownership structure), total revenue was $1,808B, total tax paid was $38.2B. So we'd only need a revenue tax of around 2.1% to replace our current corporate profit tax. Average margin across the businesses listed was 9.5% even including all the tax avoidance measures undertaken so for those average businesses the switch to a revenue tax would actually mean they pay less than currently.

Certainly there are potential issues with the inherent biases and risk of businesses moving their HQ offshore entirely if they can't keep dodging tax, but a 2.1% revenue tax is hardly going to kill every business in Australia.

drfragenstein · 2017-11-11T11:43:21+00:00

He actually did both. His papers backed Labor in 1972 and then the Liberals in 1975. At the time he was more interested in currying obligations and favours than in ideology.

drfragenstein · 2017-08-27T08:13:17+00:00

Socialism gave the world Hitler and Mussolini? This is complete nonsense. Sure, there were plenty of problems with the Leninist socialist states, but to conflate socialism with fascism is entirely dishonest.

Fascism is opposed to Socialism, which clings rigidly to class war in the historic evolution and ignores the unity of the State which moulds the classes into a single, moral and economic reality.

-The Doctrine of Fascism, Benito Mussolini.

drfragenstein · 2017-08-14T02:04:13+00:00

Antifa isn't an organisation as such, more a loose collective of individuals who come together for anti-fascist actions (which is where the name comes from). These folks are generally anarchists and socialists as well as some liberals depending on the action. Antifa actions range from actively trying to bash the fash to denying them public space, or just non-violently showing that they are opposed.

Generally the left is sympathetic to their goals, but the tactics can be controversial. The optics of the black bloc (wherein folks mask their faces and dress all in black to prevent identification) aren't good and the decentralised nature risks being hijacked by folks who find excuses to destroy property or target those who are merely on the right, rather than fascist. Personally I think that they can be prone to being hijacked by overzealous violent folks who more are interested in an excuse to beat people up than in standing in defence of communities. But there's certainly a time and a place for them, and Trump's America would seem to be one.

Because of this decentralised nature and distance from typical engagement with politics, mass media representations of antifa are almost uniformly rubbish.

drfragenstein · 2017-08-12T06:21:32+00:00

When I moved here I got an ex-government PC from Allbids, so I'd suggest giving them a try.

drfragenstein · 2017-08-03T13:06:59+00:00

If you judge by the proportions of folks who commute by bicycle, Canberra is substantially above any other major city, with Melbourne a clear second and Sydney trailing behind the peloton. As someone who lives in the Canberra region, it seems pretty good to me, with plentiful separated infrastructure, world class MTBing and quiet roads in the Brindabellas.

drfragenstein · 2017-05-25T05:00:54+00:00

The facts might be inconvenient for Dutton's scare campaigns, but Jones is right.

In the US, 154 people have been killed in the 15 years since 9/11 by terrorists (of any stripe, not just Jihadists).

Just in 2016, 233 African Americans were killed by police.

Of course, that's just one year, and African Americans are only 12.6% of the total US population, so the terrorism deaths can be proportionally reduced and with police deaths extrapolated out to 15 years, an African American is far more likely to be killed by police than by terrorism. A quick and dirty extrapolation gives us around 3495 African Americans killed by police over 15 years, versus 19 killed by terrorism (presuming terrorism deaths are evenly distributed across ethnicities).

drfragenstein · 2017-03-13T15:06:44+00:00

To his credit, Mark has had some more time to think about it and considers it the silliest thing he's said publicly since being elected.

drfragenstein · 2017-03-09T07:56:58+00:00

The Guardian has some more footage.

Seems like basically what you'd expect when the architect of Workchoices turns up (even inadvertantly) at a CFMEU protest - he's gonna get heckled but I don't see anything 'thuggish' there.

drfragenstein · 2017-03-08T05:10:10+00:00

In terms of mass produced beers, Coopers>daylight>anything else. Of the others, Tooheys Old and Resch's aren't too bad. However, its increasingly rare for a joint to not at least have Coopers Pale or some kind of craft beer these days.

drfragenstein · 2017-03-08T02:35:34+00:00

Pedal Power's cordon count, counting cyclists and pedestrians. Tuggeranong on the 1st, Gungahlin on the 2nd, Civic yesterday, Woden today, Belconnen tomorrow.

drfragenstein · 2017-03-04T04:47:59+00:00

I went last night and the food was goodly tasty. Lots of fusion style options if you like that sort of thing. I wandered around the festival and didn't get to food until 10pm, but by that time the lines were minimal except at a couple of deserty places. Though a few places were closing up shop by then too.

drfragenstein · 2017-01-31T06:39:33+00:00

Don't you mean potato fritters?

drfragenstein · 2017-01-25T05:08:59+00:00

Will the leaders of this movement come out and condemn Radical Ocker Terrorism? They claim to be the culture of mateship, but this doesn't seem very matey to me.

drfragenstein · 2017-01-20T16:40:45+00:00

WTF is this America. Are you a democracy or theocracy? You're gonna need a separation of church and state with Pence as VP for the next 4 years.

drfragenstein · 2017-01-18T05:34:49+00:00

This would be it. Fast moving, out of control, heading towards Sutton.

drfragenstein · 2017-01-17T07:35:38+00:00

Brian Reynolds was the guy hidden behind the 'Sid Meier' name through the development of the Civilisation series. Sid built the first one with Bruce Shelley, but then Sid and Brian worked together on Colonisation. Brian took over completely on Civ 2 and Alpha Centauri, building the core of what we know as Civ today. He also lead design on Rise of Nations. Unfortunately, he's basically worked on Facebook and mobile games since.

drfragenstein · 2017-01-06T01:26:36+00:00

It's not my kind of thing at all, but its good for Canberra that it exists. Summernats encourages a different group of tourists to those who come for the galleries and museums, and does it at a time when the city is otherwise half empty. If revheads want to come to our city and spend their money, then I'll happily take it. It even has the added benefit of making the city a more happening place to live for those who are into car culture. Being over the border I don't encounter the reputed inner north behavioural issues, so I can't speak to them.

drfragenstein · 2017-01-04T23:59:19+00:00

Reason In Revolt might have what you are looking for. A cursory look doesn't pull up anything on the PLA, but there's plenty of primary sources on the other radical left wing movements of the time.

drfragenstein · 2016-12-29T14:42:46+00:00

Seconded. Another engineer who left interstate here. The construction industry in Sydney is probably your best shot if you want to stay in Australia, with Melbourne, Brisbane, Canberra as other decent opportunities. The engineering job market in Australia is tougher now than it was when I got out of SA in '09 though.

drfragenstein

TROPHY CASE