Threat to Seselja real: Rattenbury

Garfield said :

At the final count, Seselja had 82,659 votes while Sheikh had 52,037, the Bullet Train had 15,548 and the Sex Party had 14,155. Of those 29,703 votes with the Bullet Train and Sex Parties, only 2,113 above the line votes were going to Seselja ahead of Sheikh. The majority of under the line votes were also going to Sheikh, but Seselja was getting some of them. If the preferences had been fully distributed, I think the final position would have been about 86,000 to Seselja and 79,000 to Sheikh. This would be about 35% of the vote for Seselja, meaning the Greens need a swing of 1.7% away from him to take the seat next year.

Preferences don’t need to be fully distributed for a Senate election (or a Reps election, for that matter). It is quite rare for a count to go that far in the ACT.

It’s just a matter of who gets to the quota first. Seselja was only 2 279 votes short of a quota. He picked those up relatively easily. All else being equal, if there was a 1.7% swing against him, he’d need 3 638 votes, not a big ask.

I don’t think too many voters look through every press release issued by the Greens (or any other party, for that matter) and work through the arguments made in party propaganda. I think that Australian voters tend to go with the presidential style of election campaigns, especially if they are voting above the line. They vote for the party leader more than the local candidate, in other words.

Turnbull is going to attract more votes than Abbott in the ACT. That’s a given.

Shorten is likewise going to do better than Rudd. Rudd was especially hated by the public service, and the comparatively low result for Lundy reflected this. Shorten just seems to be a fairly innocuous Labor leader. We haven’t seen him campaign, but I think he’ll make a good job of it. I’d expect both Labor and Libs to increase their votes over last time.

I think both Gallagher and Seselja will easily make quota on first preferences, simply because they are both experienced campaigners with good teams behind them, and they will be riding on the tails of party leaders who if not actually popular, are not hated and despised, which was a big factor in 2013. Turnbull in particular seems to have a good handle on the ACT demographic.

For the Greens to have a real chance at winning, they would have to mount a fantastic campaign, and count on one or both major parties making some serious campaign mistakes. I think the Greens have pretty much run balls to the wall campaigns over the past few elections and never really made a dent.

Skyring said :

rubaiyat said :

Zed didn’t get over his quota until the last preference split and had 105% against 95% for the Greens.

That’s a long way from true, according to the Australian Electoral Commission at http://results.aec.gov.au/17496/Website/External/SenateDopDownload-17496.zip

Seselja came close to a quota (82248) on first preference votes, only needing a couple of thousand:
Lundy (ALP) 84305 (2057 over)
Seselja (Lib) 79969 (2279 under)
Sheikh (Grn) 46772 (35476 under)

At the final count:
Lundy (ALP) 82248 (quota, excess votes transferred at pro-rata)
Seselja (Lib) 82659 (2690 votes gained from Lundy’s excess and excluded candidates)
Sheikh (Grn) 52037 (5265 votes gained from Lundy’s excess and excluded candidates)

The AEC figures are different to the Wikipedia figures I quoted earlier, but let’s go with the official tally. From preferences, the Greens got about twice as many than the Libs, but even at that rate the result was never in doubt.

Next time around, I doubt it will even go to preferences. Turnbull is a LOT more popular with the ACT voters than Abbott was, so the same candidate (Seselja) should poll higher.

At the final count, Seselja had 82,659 votes while Sheikh had 52,037, the Bullet Train had 15,548 and the Sex Party had 14,155. Of those 29,703 votes with the Bullet Train and Sex Parties, only 2,113 above the line votes were going to Seselja ahead of Sheikh. The majority of under the line votes were also going to Sheikh, but Seselja was getting some of them. If the preferences had been fully distributed, I think the final position would have been about 86,000 to Seselja and 79,000 to Sheikh. This would be about 35% of the vote for Seselja, meaning the Greens need a swing of 1.7% away from him to take the seat next year.

Turnbull is potentially a big positive for Seselja, which is ironic seeing that he is a strong Abbott supporter. Unless the government makes peace with the public service quickly and is somewhat generous, the long drawn out negotiations and multiple rejections will be a negative for him. Having come out publicly against Turnbull after the leadership vote, there may be some people who are hesitant to vote for him even though they like Turnbull as PM and I think this is where the Greens will focus part of their grassroots campaign. Some people who didn’t vote for him last time because he knifed Gary Humphries and abandoned Tuggeranong may come back, but people who voted against him on those grounds are likely to have long memories. The big unknown is how minor parties will direct their preferences. If the Animal Justice Party preference the Greens before the Libs, that’s a good chunk of the votes the Greens need to get in front, but its still going to be a hard task for the Greens to win the seat.

watto23 said :

The fact Zed got voted in shows the average stupidity of voters. Here is a guy that didn’t win an election, so did a dummy spit and quit. Then took down a respected liberal senator in Gary Humphries because he wasn’t on the right side of the Liberal party, yet Zed will get elected because blind voters don’t actually look at the person they are voting for. Every person who votes liberal should vote the second liberal candidate. I’ll be putting Zed last. He has done nothing for Tuggeranong, he didn’t get his way and quit and that is not the sort of person we should have representing us in the ACT.

Also last election there was a swing to Liberal nationally, yet in the ACT many recognised Zed is only in it for himself and that vote for the second senate spot was much tighter than its ever been. So use your brain when voting. Don’t vote above the line unless you don’t care about your preferences.

Based on your criteria what has any ACT senator done for us ever? They’re almost completely irrelevant because they hold so little actual power.

Who should we actually vote for?

rubaiyat said :

Zed didn’t get over his quota until the last preference split and had 105% against 95% for the Greens.

That’s a long way from true, according to the Australian Electoral Commission at http://results.aec.gov.au/17496/Website/External/SenateDopDownload-17496.zip

Seselja came close to a quota (82248) on first preference votes, only needing a couple of thousand:
Lundy (ALP) 84305 (2057 over)
Seselja (Lib) 79969 (2279 under)
Sheikh (Grn) 46772 (35476 under)

At the final count:
Lundy (ALP) 82248 (quota, excess votes transferred at pro-rata)
Seselja (Lib) 82659 (2690 votes gained from Lundy’s excess and excluded candidates)
Sheikh (Grn) 52037 (5265 votes gained from Lundy’s excess and excluded candidates)

The AEC figures are different to the Wikipedia figures I quoted earlier, but let’s go with the official tally. From preferences, the Greens got about twice as many than the Libs, but even at that rate the result was never in doubt.

Next time around, I doubt it will even go to preferences. Turnbull is a LOT more popular with the ACT voters than Abbott was, so the same candidate (Seselja) should poll higher.

watto23 said :

dungfungus said :

rubaiyat said :

So all it takes for The Greens to take the 2nd ACT senate seat is either a 2.5% swing to Labor or The Greens or both.

Which is a narrow margin in politics.

Just as well for the Liberals that they swapped Turnbull for Abbott because they would have got hosed here and in many other electorates. So it is up to Turnbull to not lose the faith of the electorate by continuing to implement the hard right’s policies. There are signs that Turnbull is slowly turning the SS LNP away from The iceberg it was going to hit under Abbott. Turnbull has a much better ear for what the Australian electorate wants than Abbott, who must have had some inkling or he wouldn’t have lied his way into power the way he did.

It will actually be a good result for Turnbull and the Liberals if in the next election he survives in government but loses the hard right candidates that make the Liberals unpalatable to the broader public. Reshaping his party is going to still be difficult. The hard right is well funded and supported by mining, big business and the Murdoch Press.

We have unfortunately drifted to a more US style of democracy where money counts more than individual’s votes. Money buys the electorate in the States, here it still only buys some of the electorate and even those it bought last time must be questioning what they got with Palmers party being such an erratic non event. The question is who the populist voters who turned to Palmer will vote for next time.

“The hard right is well funded and supported by mining, big business and the Murdoch Press.”
Two things, what is the “hard right” and where is the evidence that they are supported by the nominated groups/people?
I though Murdoch had lunch with Turnbull just before he shafted Abbott so are you suggesting that Turnbull is “hard right”?

Well the hard right, conservative right etc clearly do fund the liberal party. If you really don’t know that I’m sure you’ll be able to find some donations from mining companies and news limited related companies.

No Turnbull is from the liberal part of the liberal party. Not the far right conservatives that screwed the country over with Abbott and his negativity and fear mongering.

As long as Turnbull is able to put in fair policies we’ll finally have a decent government. The far right need to understand, what they wanted is not what the public wanted. So they either have to accept Turnbull as their leader and PM and allow him to put in place true Liberal policies, or they’ll be unpopular again and not win. Its very clear people in this country do not want a conservative right government spreading fear mongering policies. And to think Dungfungus you accuse the Greens of fear mongering, when the Abbott government was the best at it.

Nice try a the usual spin, again.
In fact, I was the one asking for evidence of exactly who the hard right conservatives are and who is funding them. I have already tried to find the evidence but there isn’t any so don’t try that “I am sure you can find donations etc.” stuff.
You may be unaware or you don’t want to be reminded that it was “big business” (Wotif) who gave the biggest donation on record to The Greens of $1 million!
Now, tell all about the alleged fear-mongering policies of the far right conservatives that bother you.

dungfungus said :

rubaiyat said :

So all it takes for The Greens to take the 2nd ACT senate seat is either a 2.5% swing to Labor or The Greens or both.

Which is a narrow margin in politics.

Just as well for the Liberals that they swapped Turnbull for Abbott because they would have got hosed here and in many other electorates. So it is up to Turnbull to not lose the faith of the electorate by continuing to implement the hard right’s policies. There are signs that Turnbull is slowly turning the SS LNP away from The iceberg it was going to hit under Abbott. Turnbull has a much better ear for what the Australian electorate wants than Abbott, who must have had some inkling or he wouldn’t have lied his way into power the way he did.

It will actually be a good result for Turnbull and the Liberals if in the next election he survives in government but loses the hard right candidates that make the Liberals unpalatable to the broader public. Reshaping his party is going to still be difficult. The hard right is well funded and supported by mining, big business and the Murdoch Press.

We have unfortunately drifted to a more US style of democracy where money counts more than individual’s votes. Money buys the electorate in the States, here it still only buys some of the electorate and even those it bought last time must be questioning what they got with Palmers party being such an erratic non event. The question is who the populist voters who turned to Palmer will vote for next time.

“The hard right is well funded and supported by mining, big business and the Murdoch Press.”
Two things, what is the “hard right” and where is the evidence that they are supported by the nominated groups/people?
I though Murdoch had lunch with Turnbull just before he shafted Abbott so are you suggesting that Turnbull is “hard right”?

Well the hard right, conservative right etc clearly do fund the liberal party. If you really don’t know that I’m sure you’ll be able to find some donations from mining companies and news limited related companies.

No Turnbull is from the liberal part of the liberal party. Not the far right conservatives that screwed the country over with Abbott and his negativity and fear mongering.

As long as Turnbull is able to put in fair policies we’ll finally have a decent government. The far right need to understand, what they wanted is not what the public wanted. So they either have to accept Turnbull as their leader and PM and allow him to put in place true Liberal policies, or they’ll be unpopular again and not win. Its very clear people in this country do not want a conservative right government spreading fear mongering policies. And to think Dungfungus you accuse the Greens of fear mongering, when the Abbott government was the best at it.

The fact Zed got voted in shows the average stupidity of voters. Here is a guy that didn’t win an election, so did a dummy spit and quit. Then took down a respected liberal senator in Gary Humphries because he wasn’t on the right side of the Liberal party, yet Zed will get elected because blind voters don’t actually look at the person they are voting for. Every person who votes liberal should vote the second liberal candidate. I’ll be putting Zed last. He has done nothing for Tuggeranong, he didn’t get his way and quit and that is not the sort of person we should have representing us in the ACT.

Also last election there was a swing to Liberal nationally, yet in the ACT many recognised Zed is only in it for himself and that vote for the second senate spot was much tighter than its ever been. So use your brain when voting. Don’t vote above the line unless you don’t care about your preferences.

dungfungus said :

rosscoact said :

dungfungus said :

By civilized world standards you have it wrong and if you are disgusted with me I won’t lose any sleep.

That’s a shame Dungers, you’re not the person I thought you were. Over and out.

Hey, Bill Cosby and Rolf Harris were leading double-lives and everyone loved them now they find they are not the people they thought they were. Strangely, Bill Clinton is still OK (with the left).
I am up-front about what I believe in, “true-blue” in the Australian vernacular if you like and I don’t look the other way when I see something that is out of order with the Australian values I subscribe to.
We don’t live in a perfect world you know.

Would that be the Australian values you are throwing overboard?

rosscoact said :

dungfungus said :

By civilized world standards you have it wrong and if you are disgusted with me I won’t lose any sleep.

That’s a shame Dungers, you’re not the person I thought you were. Over and out.

Hey, Bill Cosby and Rolf Harris were leading double-lives and everyone loved them now they find they are not the people they thought they were. Strangely, Bill Clinton is still OK (with the left).
I am up-front about what I believe in, “true-blue” in the Australian vernacular if you like and I don’t look the other way when I see something that is out of order with the Australian values I subscribe to.
We don’t live in a perfect world you know.

dungfungus said :

By civilized world standards you have it wrong and if you are disgusted with me I won’t lose any sleep.

That’s a shame Dungers, you’re not the person I thought you were. Over and out.

miz said :

Mr Stanhope is hopefully enjoying his retirement. While he was certainly one of the few truly competent MLAs, and I did think he had personal integrity, I think by the end we had all had a gutful and he picked the right time to pass on the baton.
I have noticed that Ms Gallagher seems to have a talent for getting out before stuff hits the fan, then landing on her feet somewhere even cushier!
The primary problem with the ACT Government is the general and apparently ongoing incompetence and neglect at local (as opposed to State/Terr) governance (with a few notable exceptions) – probably because MLAs like the recognition and benefits you get at the State/Terr level. This is completely the opposite of what constituents actually want.
(Exceptions to this generalisation are Mary Porter and former MLA John Hargreaves who both recognised the importance of improving local services and constantly acted on it to improve things ‘where the rubber hits the road.’)

Mr Stanhope should be enjoying his retirement but I fear he isn’t (judging by the passionate letters to the editor he writes).I think it was assumed that when he retired from the ACT Legislative Assembly he would accept a couple of Federal Governmnet sinecures (which he did and who could blame him for that) before coming back to the ACT and being pre-selected for the ACT Senate seat which was relinquished by Ms Lundy (I have forgotten her first name). Other people had different ideas and was gazzumped by Katy Gallagher so now there is now way Labor would endorse him as number one (or would they?).
Jon could stand as an independent (he would make a good Green actually).
I am also noting with interest that Kim Beazley will be returning to Australia soon and it wouldn’t surprise me if he takes over as Vice Chancellor at ANU. That is usually how it works.

Mr Stanhope is hopefully enjoying his retirement. While he was certainly one of the few truly competent MLAs, and I did think he had personal integrity, I think by the end we had all had a gutful and he picked the right time to pass on the baton.
I have noticed that Ms Gallagher seems to have a talent for getting out before stuff hits the fan, then landing on her feet somewhere even cushier!
The primary problem with the ACT Government is the general and apparently ongoing incompetence and neglect at local (as opposed to State/Terr) governance (with a few notable exceptions) – probably because MLAs like the recognition and benefits you get at the State/Terr level. This is completely the opposite of what constituents actually want.
(Exceptions to this generalisation are Mary Porter and former MLA John Hargreaves who both recognised the importance of improving local services and constantly acted on it to improve things ‘where the rubber hits the road.’)

rosscoact said :

dungfungus said :

rosscoact said :

dungfungus said :

drfelonious said :

The Greens don’t have to win the seat – they simply have to point out what Zed has done in the Senate and Zed will lose the seat. As the saying goes, Oppositions don’t win government, Governments lose. So it goes with our boy Zed.
All the Greens and Labor need to do is:
1 print up a heap of posters superimposing Zed with his best mate Tony, including pictures of Zed with the ex-PM on the night of Tony’s fall
2 highlight the fact that as a Senator from Canberra he sees a key part of his job in representing us as being one of the Parliament’s leading opponents of same sex marriage
3 Point out that a vote for Zed is not a vote for Malcolm Turnbull, but rather that Zed is part of the internal opposition to Malcolm.

Zed’s team could play the same game by placing posters of Sarah H-Y hugging refugees on the way to Europe while she was on her taxpayer-funded trip to the Mediterranean earlier this year.

Now treating a humans like humans is considered a bad thing by the hard right regressives? Appalled but strangely only a little surprised.

I have some photos of a train the refugees trashed between Budapest and Graz. It’s hard to believe it was humans who were responsible for the disgusting mess they left behind.
Even surprised a hard right regressive like me.
I am sure you can find the pics on the internet.

I’ve seen the pictures but I’m not sure of your point.

Those people left behind some rubbish and that’s what you’re appalled at? Not the fact that hundreds of thousands of people are fleeing destruction and death, leaving their whole lives behind and going to heavens knows what, walking for weeks, being prayed on by criminals and thugs, and then having to camp in worsening weather beside railroad tracks? Yet because they leave refuse behind you seem to be suggesting that they are less than humans.

Please tell me I have this wrong Dungers. If I have misunderstood you then can you clarify? If what you wrote is what you meant then I’m disgusted.

By civilized world standards you have it wrong and if you are disgusted with me I won’t lose any sleep.
I don’t think you have seen the same pictures that I am talking about but if I attempted to post them the moderators would bin them.

dungfungus said :

rosscoact said :

dungfungus said :

drfelonious said :

The Greens don’t have to win the seat – they simply have to point out what Zed has done in the Senate and Zed will lose the seat. As the saying goes, Oppositions don’t win government, Governments lose. So it goes with our boy Zed.
All the Greens and Labor need to do is:
1 print up a heap of posters superimposing Zed with his best mate Tony, including pictures of Zed with the ex-PM on the night of Tony’s fall
2 highlight the fact that as a Senator from Canberra he sees a key part of his job in representing us as being one of the Parliament’s leading opponents of same sex marriage
3 Point out that a vote for Zed is not a vote for Malcolm Turnbull, but rather that Zed is part of the internal opposition to Malcolm.

Zed’s team could play the same game by placing posters of Sarah H-Y hugging refugees on the way to Europe while she was on her taxpayer-funded trip to the Mediterranean earlier this year.

Now treating a humans like humans is considered a bad thing by the hard right regressives? Appalled but strangely only a little surprised.

I have some photos of a train the refugees trashed between Budapest and Graz. It’s hard to believe it was humans who were responsible for the disgusting mess they left behind.
Even surprised a hard right regressive like me.
I am sure you can find the pics on the internet.

I’ve seen the pictures but I’m not sure of your point.

Those people left behind some rubbish and that’s what you’re appalled at? Not the fact that hundreds of thousands of people are fleeing destruction and death, leaving their whole lives behind and going to heavens knows what, walking for weeks, being prayed on by criminals and thugs, and then having to camp in worsening weather beside railroad tracks? Yet because they leave refuse behind you seem to be suggesting that they are less than humans.

Please tell me I have this wrong Dungers. If I have misunderstood you then can you clarify? If what you wrote is what you meant then I’m disgusted.

Masquara said :

Does anyone know why Simon Sheikh has chosen not to run? No longer resident in his beloved Canberra?

Simon who?

rosscoact said :

dungfungus said :

drfelonious said :

The Greens don’t have to win the seat – they simply have to point out what Zed has done in the Senate and Zed will lose the seat. As the saying goes, Oppositions don’t win government, Governments lose. So it goes with our boy Zed.
All the Greens and Labor need to do is:
1 print up a heap of posters superimposing Zed with his best mate Tony, including pictures of Zed with the ex-PM on the night of Tony’s fall
2 highlight the fact that as a Senator from Canberra he sees a key part of his job in representing us as being one of the Parliament’s leading opponents of same sex marriage
3 Point out that a vote for Zed is not a vote for Malcolm Turnbull, but rather that Zed is part of the internal opposition to Malcolm.

Zed’s team could play the same game by placing posters of Sarah H-Y hugging refugees on the way to Europe while she was on her taxpayer-funded trip to the Mediterranean earlier this year.

Now treating a humans like humans is considered a bad thing by the hard right regressives? Appalled but strangely only a little surprised.

I have some photos of a train the refugees trashed between Budapest and Graz. It’s hard to believe it was humans who were responsible for the disgusting mess they left behind.
Even surprised a hard right regressive like me.
I am sure you can find the pics on the internet.

Does anyone know why Simon Sheikh has chosen not to run? No longer resident in his beloved Canberra?

dungfungus said :

miz said :

The fed Senate race is influenced by the local political scene, given that we now have had four former MLAs in the Senate – Smyth (now back in Assembly), Humphries, Seselja and Gallagher.
re Track Records:
Former Senator Lundy did not seem to do much at all until a few months before the election, and still got in every time. I always found that amazing.
I suppose it’s possible that Gallagher is a bit more popular than Lundy, but I personally cannot vote for her after what she did to hospital waiting lists.
Re the Greens candidate, I vividly remember when Brindabella voted Greens in. We were hoping for a third voice in the Assembly, but they just voted as a bloc with Labor, so they just got voted out again (which is why Rattenbury is the only Green now). So they don’t get my vote either. Sorry. (Not really).
Zed got a huge personal vote , but then almost immediately abandoned Brindabella for the Senate. He has not been very visible except as a nodder behind Dud Abbott. If he does not lift his game, Da Dow.
Sooooo, I sincerely hope there will be a good Independent candidate with transparent preferences in the Senate race this time. If not, Eeyore may get my vote, which would be a waste, but may possibly be the only truthful way I can express my views.

“Sooooo, I sincerely hope there will be a good Independent candidate with transparent preferences in the Senate race this time.”…….
Jon Stanhope?

😀 That would fit the criteria but I’m thinking Miz is less fond of JS than she makes out.

dungfungus said :

drfelonious said :

The Greens don’t have to win the seat – they simply have to point out what Zed has done in the Senate and Zed will lose the seat. As the saying goes, Oppositions don’t win government, Governments lose. So it goes with our boy Zed.
All the Greens and Labor need to do is:
1 print up a heap of posters superimposing Zed with his best mate Tony, including pictures of Zed with the ex-PM on the night of Tony’s fall
2 highlight the fact that as a Senator from Canberra he sees a key part of his job in representing us as being one of the Parliament’s leading opponents of same sex marriage
3 Point out that a vote for Zed is not a vote for Malcolm Turnbull, but rather that Zed is part of the internal opposition to Malcolm.

Zed’s team could play the same game by placing posters of Sarah H-Y hugging refugees on the way to Europe while she was on her taxpayer-funded trip to the Mediterranean earlier this year.

Now treating a humans like humans is considered a bad thing by the hard right regressives? Appalled but strangely only a little surprised.

drfelonious said :

The Greens don’t have to win the seat – they simply have to point out what Zed has done in the Senate and Zed will lose the seat. As the saying goes, Oppositions don’t win government, Governments lose. So it goes with our boy Zed.
All the Greens and Labor need to do is:
1 print up a heap of posters superimposing Zed with his best mate Tony, including pictures of Zed with the ex-PM on the night of Tony’s fall
2 highlight the fact that as a Senator from Canberra he sees a key part of his job in representing us as being one of the Parliament’s leading opponents of same sex marriage
3 Point out that a vote for Zed is not a vote for Malcolm Turnbull, but rather that Zed is part of the internal opposition to Malcolm.

Zed’s team could play the same game by placing posters of Sarah H-Y hugging refugees on the way to Europe while she was on her taxpayer-funded trip to the Mediterranean earlier this year.

Skyring said :

I generally start number from the bottom up,

I always number from the back and also number up the columns to counter the party apparatchiks’ choices.

The Greens don’t have to win the seat – they simply have to point out what Zed has done in the Senate and Zed will lose the seat. As the saying goes, Oppositions don’t win government, Governments lose. So it goes with our boy Zed.
All the Greens and Labor need to do is:
1 print up a heap of posters superimposing Zed with his best mate Tony, including pictures of Zed with the ex-PM on the night of Tony’s fall
2 highlight the fact that as a Senator from Canberra he sees a key part of his job in representing us as being one of the Parliament’s leading opponents of same sex marriage
3 Point out that a vote for Zed is not a vote for Malcolm Turnbull, but rather that Zed is part of the internal opposition to Malcolm.

rubaiyat said :

So all it takes for The Greens to take the 2nd ACT senate seat is either a 2.5% swing to Labor or The Greens or both.

Which is a narrow margin in politics.

Just as well for the Liberals that they swapped Turnbull for Abbott because they would have got hosed here and in many other electorates. So it is up to Turnbull to not lose the faith of the electorate by continuing to implement the hard right’s policies. There are signs that Turnbull is slowly turning the SS LNP away from The iceberg it was going to hit under Abbott. Turnbull has a much better ear for what the Australian electorate wants than Abbott, who must have had some inkling or he wouldn’t have lied his way into power the way he did.

It will actually be a good result for Turnbull and the Liberals if in the next election he survives in government but loses the hard right candidates that make the Liberals unpalatable to the broader public. Reshaping his party is going to still be difficult. The hard right is well funded and supported by mining, big business and the Murdoch Press.

We have unfortunately drifted to a more US style of democracy where money counts more than individual’s votes. Money buys the electorate in the States, here it still only buys some of the electorate and even those it bought last time must be questioning what they got with Palmers party being such an erratic non event. The question is who the populist voters who turned to Palmer will vote for next time.

“The hard right is well funded and supported by mining, big business and the Murdoch Press.”
Two things, what is the “hard right” and where is the evidence that they are supported by the nominated groups/people?
I though Murdoch had lunch with Turnbull just before he shafted Abbott so are you suggesting that Turnbull is “hard right”?

rubaiyat said :

Skyring said :

rubaiyat said :

The Greens just missed out on a senate seat last time so it depends on the publics mood next time. But they do have a chance.

Not true. 246,742 formal votes were cast. A quota is (FVC/3)+1 = 82,248 votes needed for election.
ALP’s Kate Lundy received 84,974 first preference votes, so was elected first.
Libs’ Zed Seselja received 81,613 first preference votes, needing 635 votes to make quota, which he did easliy.
The Greens candidate received 47,553 votes, which meant he would have had to pick up 98% of all the votes cast for all the other candidates to beat Seselja. Given that there were some fairly right wing candidates in the mix, this was never a remote possibility.

The Greens, and the Democrats before them, are in it for one reason: that electoral funding. Their Senate candidate picks up less than a fifth of the vote and has next to no chance of being elected, and the two Reps candidates even less chance, but it translates into a truckload of dollars out of the public pocket.

Zed didn’t get over his quota until the last preference split and had 105% against 95% for the Greens.

The last remark tells us a lot, but not about the candidates.

We also need to rid ourselves of above the line voting for Senate seats and institute optional preferential voting.

It would give a much more accurate picture of the electorates wishes.

I believe that most people will not differentiate Federal and local politics at election time, therefore bringing the local political motivations to the polling booth next year. The tram, rates, local government promises and such will be in the minds of the Canberra people when deciding which party is in control of the country. Unfortunately as we’ve seen in the past, our two seats don’t make a lick of difference in the grand scheme of things anyway and we don’t even have the option to vote for the party we want to support and are limited to choosing between either Liberal, Labor or a lapdog of either one. Nobody really stands out any more with ideals that truly compel us to vote for them, especially knowing that our voice will be quashed in the quagmire of schoolyard name-calling that goes on in both houses.
Good luck to us all while faced with the difficult decision of having to vote for one party locally and another federally.

miz said :

Sooooo, I sincerely hope there will be a good Independent candidate with transparent preferences in the Senate race this time. If not, Eeyore may get my vote, which would be a waste, but may possibly be the only truthful way I can express my views.

In my eyes, the major parties are as bad as each other, full of insiders, dynasties, nepotism and backroom deals. It’s time for a change in the ACT, and the next election looks like it’s going to be a referendum on the tram, but I still have no confidence in the Libs to do any better.

The major parties want to keep independents out of the hunt and are setting the rules to make life difficult. They would prefer that Independents be lumped together in a column on the ballot paper headed “Losers”, for example.

But I can guarantee that an Independent will get my first preference vote. And my second, third, fourth and so on. I generally start number from the bottom up, in any case. There’s always someone on the list I absolutely want to make sure does not get a chance at my vote, and putting them dead last guarantees this.

Curse this pillbox view on the iPhone. That should be a 5% swing which whilst a harder ask is still possible if the ACT electorate decides to send a message to the government. Same sex marriage, better infrastructure and a cleaner energy policy may be enough to hold the generally more liberal, in the true sense of the word, voters in the ACT.

It is about time the ACT got another House of Reps seat as well, which would give us more say in the lower house.

So all it takes for The Greens to take the 2nd ACT senate seat is either a 2.5% swing to Labor or The Greens or both.

Which is a narrow margin in politics.

Just as well for the Liberals that they swapped Turnbull for Abbott because they would have got hosed here and in many other electorates. So it is up to Turnbull to not lose the faith of the electorate by continuing to implement the hard right’s policies. There are signs that Turnbull is slowly turning the SS LNP away from The iceberg it was going to hit under Abbott. Turnbull has a much better ear for what the Australian electorate wants than Abbott, who must have had some inkling or he wouldn’t have lied his way into power the way he did.

It will actually be a good result for Turnbull and the Liberals if in the next election he survives in government but loses the hard right candidates that make the Liberals unpalatable to the broader public. Reshaping his party is going to still be difficult. The hard right is well funded and supported by mining, big business and the Murdoch Press.

We have unfortunately drifted to a more US style of democracy where money counts more than individual’s votes. Money buys the electorate in the States, here it still only buys some of the electorate and even those it bought last time must be questioning what they got with Palmers party being such an erratic non event. The question is who the populist voters who turned to Palmer will vote for next time.

Skyring said :

rubaiyat said :

The Greens just missed out on a senate seat last time so it depends on the publics mood next time. But they do have a chance.

Not true. 246,742 formal votes were cast. A quota is (FVC/3)+1 = 82,248 votes needed for election.
ALP’s Kate Lundy received 84,974 first preference votes, so was elected first.
Libs’ Zed Seselja received 81,613 first preference votes, needing 635 votes to make quota, which he did easliy.
The Greens candidate received 47,553 votes, which meant he would have had to pick up 98% of all the votes cast for all the other candidates to beat Seselja. Given that there were some fairly right wing candidates in the mix, this was never a remote possibility.

The Greens, and the Democrats before them, are in it for one reason: that electoral funding. Their Senate candidate picks up less than a fifth of the vote and has next to no chance of being elected, and the two Reps candidates even less chance, but it translates into a truckload of dollars out of the public pocket.

Zed didn’t get over his quota until the last preference split and had 105% against 95% for the Greens.

The last remark tells us a lot, but not about the candidates.

miz said :

The fed Senate race is influenced by the local political scene, given that we now have had four former MLAs in the Senate – Smyth (now back in Assembly), Humphries, Seselja and Gallagher.
re Track Records:
Former Senator Lundy did not seem to do much at all until a few months before the election, and still got in every time. I always found that amazing.
I suppose it’s possible that Gallagher is a bit more popular than Lundy, but I personally cannot vote for her after what she did to hospital waiting lists.
Re the Greens candidate, I vividly remember when Brindabella voted Greens in. We were hoping for a third voice in the Assembly, but they just voted as a bloc with Labor, so they just got voted out again (which is why Rattenbury is the only Green now). So they don’t get my vote either. Sorry. (Not really).
Zed got a huge personal vote , but then almost immediately abandoned Brindabella for the Senate. He has not been very visible except as a nodder behind Dud Abbott. If he does not lift his game, Da Dow.
Sooooo, I sincerely hope there will be a good Independent candidate with transparent preferences in the Senate race this time. If not, Eeyore may get my vote, which would be a waste, but may possibly be the only truthful way I can express my views.

“Sooooo, I sincerely hope there will be a good Independent candidate with transparent preferences in the Senate race this time.”…….
Jon Stanhope?

The fed Senate race is influenced by the local political scene, given that we now have had four former MLAs in the Senate – Smyth (now back in Assembly), Humphries, Seselja and Gallagher.
re Track Records:
Former Senator Lundy did not seem to do much at all until a few months before the election, and still got in every time. I always found that amazing.
I suppose it’s possible that Gallagher is a bit more popular than Lundy, but I personally cannot vote for her after what she did to hospital waiting lists.
Re the Greens candidate, I vividly remember when Brindabella voted Greens in. We were hoping for a third voice in the Assembly, but they just voted as a bloc with Labor, so they just got voted out again (which is why Rattenbury is the only Green now). So they don’t get my vote either. Sorry. (Not really).
Zed got a huge personal vote , but then almost immediately abandoned Brindabella for the Senate. He has not been very visible except as a nodder behind Dud Abbott. If he does not lift his game, Da Dow.
Sooooo, I sincerely hope there will be a good Independent candidate with transparent preferences in the Senate race this time. If not, Eeyore may get my vote, which would be a waste, but may possibly be the only truthful way I can express my views.

rubaiyat said :

The Greens just missed out on a senate seat last time so it depends on the publics mood next time. But they do have a chance.

Not true. 246,742 formal votes were cast. A quota is (FVC/3)+1 = 82,248 votes needed for election.
ALP’s Kate Lundy received 84,974 first preference votes, so was elected first.
Libs’ Zed Seselja received 81,613 first preference votes, needing 635 votes to make quota, which he did easliy.
The Greens candidate received 47,553 votes, which meant he would have had to pick up 98% of all the votes cast for all the other candidates to beat Seselja. Given that there were some fairly right wing candidates in the mix, this was never a remote possibility.

The Greens, and the Democrats before them, are in it for one reason: that electoral funding. Their Senate candidate picks up less than a fifth of the vote and has next to no chance of being elected, and the two Reps candidates even less chance, but it translates into a truckload of dollars out of the public pocket.

rubaiyat said :

dungfungus said :

Mayor Rattenbury should refer to the factual comment on another thread about voting predictions namely “The famous election eve (2012) poll which predicted an Assembly with only 6 Liberal MLAs is a reminder of opinion polling “margin of error” problems in this town”.
How many Green seats were won in the South of Canberra?
Zed is the man.
Mind you, Ms Hobbs credentials are very good, for a Green candidate.

It is actually a mark of The Greens that they are mostly extremely well educated and professionals.

It is also their Achilles heel because they mistakenly assume the public they are addressing actually reads and thinks before they vote.

Better that they appealed to the publics baser instincts of fear, greed and envy. Like the major parties.

Higher rates of tertiary education (not “extremely well educated” as you claim) does not actually mean they are more intelligent or more knowledgeable on any particular subject. An arts degree is still an arts degree.

But yes, it is their Achilles heel because they believe their ideology should trump other’s self interest. Particularly when it’s a choice between the major party’s vote buying and other people paying for the Greens ideological wet dreams.

Of course if they ever got any real power, they’d fall apart as a party (ala the Democrats) when they had to deal with the reality of competing priorities and community interests over pure ideology.

Prime example being their rejection of Kevin Rudds CPRS. The could have compromised with a scheme that could be ramped up over time but their ideology prevented them from compromising on a workable solution. Instead, we now have nothing because of it.

rubaiyat said :

dungfungus said :

Mayor Rattenbury should refer to the factual comment on another thread about voting predictions namely “The famous election eve (2012) poll which predicted an Assembly with only 6 Liberal MLAs is a reminder of opinion polling “margin of error” problems in this town”.
How many Green seats were won in the South of Canberra?
Zed is the man.
Mind you, Ms Hobbs credentials are very good, for a Green candidate.

It is actually a mark of The Greens that they are mostly extremely well educated and professionals.

It is also their Achilles heel because they mistakenly assume the public they are addressing actually reads and thinks before they vote.

Better that they appealed to the publics baser instincts of fear, greed and envy. Like the major parties.

Your first sentence was good.
It was all downhill from there.

Acton said :

Ghettosmurf87 said :

She’s not running for local government, aka the ACT Legislative Assembly. She’s running for the ACT Senate in the next federal election.

That notwithstanding, entering into politics at any level is not necessarily a wise career move

Yep – I realised that about 10 minutes after submitting. Mea culpa. Glad she is not standing for local government and good luck to her running for the Senate. But ACT Liberals should have enough support to get their candidate over the quota.

The Greens just missed out on a senate seat last time so it depends on the publics mood next time. But they do have a chance.

dungfungus said :

Mayor Rattenbury should refer to the factual comment on another thread about voting predictions namely “The famous election eve (2012) poll which predicted an Assembly with only 6 Liberal MLAs is a reminder of opinion polling “margin of error” problems in this town”.
How many Green seats were won in the South of Canberra?
Zed is the man.
Mind you, Ms Hobbs credentials are very good, for a Green candidate.

It is actually a mark of The Greens that they are mostly extremely well educated and professionals.

It is also their Achilles heel because they mistakenly assume the public they are addressing actually reads and thinks before they vote.

Better that they appealed to the publics baser instincts of fear, greed and envy. Like the major parties.

Ghettosmurf87 said :

She’s not running for local government, aka the ACT Legislative Assembly. She’s running for the ACT Senate in the next federal election.

That notwithstanding, entering into politics at any level is not necessarily a wise career move

Yep – I realised that about 10 minutes after submitting. Mea culpa. Glad she is not standing for local government and good luck to her running for the Senate. But ACT Liberals should have enough support to get their candidate over the quota.

Acton said :

I agree with Mr Dungfungus that Ms Hobbs has impressive credentials. Her resume includes working with the United Nations World Food Program and in Nepal following the earthquakes. I think she has gained terrific life experiences. But does she have the experience and aptitude to be a good local government representative?

Why waste her talents in local Government dealing with the frivolities of trams, rates, dogs, roads, schools, planning regulations, garbage collection etc? Surely the world outside the ACT borders has greater need, interest and challenge.

I won’t vote for her to save her from making a terrible career choice.

She’s not running for local government, aka the ACT Legislative Assembly. She’s running for the ACT Senate in the next federal election.

That notwithstanding, entering into politics at any level is not necessarily a wise career move

Acton said :

Why waste her talents in local Government dealing with the frivolities of trams, rates, dogs, roads, schools, planning regulations, garbage collection etc?

Why not? Many of those issues are beyond our “delusions of grandeur” local council to deal with successfully.

Mayor Shane seems to forget that the Zed Man himself always attracted a huge vote down south in the local derby. I think Zed won’t be losing any sleep over the recycled posturing by the Greens. Besides, can you imagine what a Liberal federal Government would do to this town if it had no support base here?

I agree with Mr Dungfungus that Ms Hobbs has impressive credentials. Her resume includes working with the United Nations World Food Program and in Nepal following the earthquakes. I think she has gained terrific life experiences. But does she have the experience and aptitude to be a good local government representative?

Why waste her talents in local Government dealing with the frivolities of trams, rates, dogs, roads, schools, planning regulations, garbage collection etc? Surely the world outside the ACT borders has greater need, interest and challenge. I won’t vote for her to save her from making a terrible career choice.

well, we might as well hope…

Sorry Shane. If the amazing and super-popular Kerrie Tucker couldn’t get into the Senate after making a great contribution as an MLA, this Jenny-Come-Lately won’t.

Mayor Rattenbury should refer to the factual comment on another thread about voting predictions namely “The famous election eve (2012) poll which predicted an Assembly with only 6 Liberal MLAs is a reminder of opinion polling “margin of error” problems in this town”.
How many Green seats were won in the South of Canberra?
Zed is the man.
Mind you, Ms Hobbs credentials are very good, for a Green candidate.

Geez. We get this every election. The Greens make a big noise about whatever new candidate they’ve managed to persuade to run, and they run a distant third on election day, with both major parties easily achieving a quota. The last time the result was even close was when One Nation first put up a candidate.

I wouldn’t think Katy Gallagher is all that popular, to be honest, and she’s going to be handicapped by Bill Shorten’s presidential election campaign, which I suspect won’t be one to remember.

Malcolm Talkbull, OTOH, should win an easy victory and Seselja will cruise on his coat-tails.

Thank you Charlotte for the thoughts of Mr Rattenbury.
I might wait a while and see what Mr Antony Green has to say about it. Or indeed has he already ? I must have a look.