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Despite yesterday’s Newspoll showing that Kevin Rudd had yet to meet his “whacking day”, with all the recent talk about Kevin Rudd’s mea culpa and donning of the hair-shirt, there seems to be a definite shift against the Prime Minister in an election year.
Has the tide turned against Rudd?
Daily Telegraph
Simon Benson: Prime Minister Kevin Rudd losing support in western Sydney
The chance of Australia going to an early election has lessened, with internal Labor research exposing a negative shift in mood toward Prime Minister Kevin Rudd in key marginal seats in Sydney’s west.
The Australian
Matthew Franklin: Rudd and states set for battle on health
Kevin Rudd is headed for a confrontation with the states as he seeks to boost his flagging political stocks by taking federal control of health and hospital funding and launching local management.
Editorial: Be wary of centralising health
Remote as it is from the people and geared to policy development, the Canberra bureaucracy is not adroit at service delivery.
Paul Kelly: Rudd’s deeds need to be as bold as his ambitions
There is a confusion about this government’s character, its convictions and its beliefs. If insiders are unsure about this, the public can hardly be expected to know.
The Age
Shaun Carney: PM’s mea culpa: fact or fiction?
In a sign of the poor condition of political dialogue and the lack of faith within the community about our politicians in contemporary Australia, Rudd’s introspections and apologies have been met with perplexity.
The Punch
Brendan Brown: All ready to go to the election with no-one to vote for
But Labor has been more disappointing in recent years than this summer’s One Day cricket.
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38 Comments
Yep Rudd is on the nose, and it’s all Abbotts fault.
I only just watched Kerry O’Brien give Rudd a schlacking on the 7:30 report (via online), I have never seen Kerry be so short with a guest… Rudd did not come off very well either.
I am not a banana bender, but can anyone tell me whether there was any similarity between Peter Beatties mea culpa and Rudds? when I mean similarity, was there an Opposition that seemed capable of winning some real votes? If not, I think this might be the risk for Rudd. Perhaps, Rudd has forgotten that the remaining 5 states and 2 territories of Australia do not necessarily think the same as Queenslanders!
I am a Green, so there is no chance of winning or losing my vote but I still cannot comprehend why a PM would take the risk by saying “we need to lift our game”. I’m not sure what my boss would say if I ever needed to say that to her!
I don’t think there is any chance of the ALP losing the election but they will probably lose more seats than we thought in June 2009.
no surfer liberal person
We read sensible blogs and places like crickey and the polls essentially say
NO
it you read the correct analysis which i do,.
dont listen to abc any more read the drum or blog there
dont read the msm you get the real stories.
and most people do not read papers or even watch t.v. i see that from all my 5 working children.
tobusy they say cannot be bothered who cares they say.
so a lot of stuff just goes un read.
@ My Say, I don’t even live in Australia and can tell you that Rudd has ‘some’ problems to contend with. If he thinks like you, he will have even more. Perhaps you need to take in more forms of media that are critical of the ALP to give you a more balanced view. Newsflash, I can’t think of one perfect Australian Government, Rudd and his team are no better.
PM would take the risk by saying “we need to lift our game”. I’m not sure what my boss would say if I ever needed to say that to her!
Sorry i worked for a big corporation,. And when new products came on the market and ours where slipping a bit that is exactly what the CEO SAID..and we left the meeting inspired with new vigour.
and i think australians after 11 years with howard are not use to people apologizing for anything
.g. weapons of mass destruction, children over board. dogs on the wharf.
]children behind barb wire people deported that where actually australians.
do you want me to go on. and o work choices
the liberals all agreed to send us to a phony war.no sorry there
no sorry to aboriginals well the sky did not fall in did it when Mr. rudd did
i wonder will the cricket be ineresting
For the first time since he was elected KRudd now has some opposition, he hasn’t handled it well. As Dennis The Menace used to say every episode “I’m really sorry about that Mr Wilson”
hmmm, a preferred PM rating of 55 to 30 over Abbott - and that’s on the nose ? I would hate to see the gap if he was having a good week then !! (oh, you mean he is on the nose with Fairfax/Murdoch and some of the other MSM, not the public)
Now is the Government on the nose ? that may be a different story. One problem is that the overall percentage differences between the two parties (on a 2 -party preferred basis) has been quite small for a number of years, so given an error factor of the same proportions as the difference between the 2 parties, who can really say ?
(well from one weeks poll anyway)
Say, I don’t even live in Australia and can tell you that Rudd has ‘some’ problems to contend with. If he
]{that says it all . most of us take our que from the people in the street
not the msm and i dont beleive you are labor
the web is big big place and i suggest YOU do more research yourself}
you may be surprised at what you find.
The media does seem to have turned away from focusing on opposition personalities (remember that fellow, I think his name was Peter Costello?), both left and right, and are now going after Kevin 07, however, apart from him, there isn’t much commentary or reportage about others in the ALP (except some interesting speculation about Julia Gillard).
Rudd and his government have no credibility.
His “buck stops with me” pre-election manifesto lies in tatters after conceding his litany of failures since assuming office.
And now - after botching such a benign operation as putting insulation into houses - we are meant to believe he - and his government - can “reform” the healthcare system?
We should be asking how quickly and deeply he will stuff this one up.
History will reflect on Rudd’s one-term government as an aberrant and unfortunate corruption of the political process, where spin trumped substance and beguiling bureacrats bedazzled and betwitched sycophantic media paracletes and opinion shapers.
We should also ask how could they have been so stupid and easily mislead.
@My Say, learn to construct a sentence and I’ll take YOU seriously.
Has anyone got access to the internal ALP polling showing Rudd vs Abbott and Gillard vs Abbott?
Could be some interesting reading…
people of crikey, re: MPM, please don’t feed the trolls…..
i enjoy your short sentences more than your long ones MPM.
they are much more punchy although maybe that’s the point of sticking the longer waffly things in between the shorter ones.
just sayin…
The Headline should have been “Rudd’s On The Nose With Murdoch Media”.
Like that’s news.
Where’s the Right-wing wailing about O’Brien being soft on Rudd? For 2 years they’ve been crying about Rudd’s easy ride with the media, so is O’Brien going to get acknowledged for grilling him? Or would that conflict with Liberal dogma regarding the ABC?
@ MPM — You’ve outdone yourself!
“he - and his government - can “reform” the healthcare system?
We should be asking how quickly and deeply he will stuff this one up.”
How is it possible to make the system worse than the Libs made it????
“where spin trumped substance and beguiling bureacrats bedazzled and betwitched sycophantic media paracletes and opinion shapers.”
Exactly what the LIbs have done in recent months. The MSM have fawned over Abbott like he was the second coming …despite his nasty and distinctly unchristian attitudes.
“We should also ask how could they have been so stupid and easily mislead.”
People always believe what they want to believe — look in the mirror and you’ll see someone who has been blinkered by a reverence for a bunch of right-wing whackos.
What is it with perceptions? Why are they so important in determining voter sentiment? I vote according to how well I think someone will do the job, not on their personality or likeability.
As for @mpm, I take your point Patrick, but I just love the quaint mixture of hyperbole, alliteration and spelling mistakes!
Napoleon Dynamite in this country that word is ‘shellacking’ and ‘media’ is already a plural rendering the double plural ‘forms’ otiose so before you start crapping on about other people’s grammar and syntax remove the beam from your own eye, eh?
I suppose your unique perspective from where ever it is allows you a much greater insight into the tides and eddies of Australian politics. Will you be voting in the next election? Will you be voting for a Green government? Oh sorry I forgot, they will never get to government and like you just sit on the sidelines sling sh*t at those that do. Or in Victoria kneecapping the government’s plans to protect vast areas of outer western melbourne’s grass lands so they can scrape a few more inner-city votes by opposing any development at all. Hooray for the eunuchs!
A definite shift against Rudd, well I suppose he couldn’t remain stratospherically popular for ever but most of this commentary comes from the people who have always run down the ALP on behalf of their bosses and should be treated with the skepticism one usually reserves for Pauline Wilberforce (MPM = Pauline Hanson+soapy Sam Wilberforce). All governments lose popularity and it seems like some kind of national sport to predict that they will all be oncers even though that event is very rare. Rudd will get re-elected and his major electoral asset will be peoples fear of Abbott.
Johnfromplanetearth@4
But Rudd doesn’t have any “real” opposition. Tone and his front bench is almost as much of a joke as his policy is on a whole number of issues. The guy is so inconsistent in his positions on issues like climate change Alexander Downer would cut him to shreds in the media. Just think, you say you think climate change science is “absolute crap”, then withdraw from that by claiming you were just pandering to your audience (!), call Rudds ETS a scam when you yourself voted for an identical policy when in government and then go on to produce a scheme that instead of taxing polluters taxes individual people to fund polluters! Then you decide to bring back the core of WC!?! You think that is a “real” opposition? Garrets head was on a platter and they couldn’t finish him. Turnbull a was more effective opposition leader pre utegate, at least his criticisms of NBN and stimulus spending were logical and plaid to the coalitions traditional strengths.
No, whatever is happening to the government in the polls it has nothing to do with Tony Abbot. The punters perception of Rudd and his government is shifting and whatever the cause is it’s coming from the governments side of the house, and it needs to be addressed.
P.S. then again polls traditionally narrow during an election year. Maybe we are getting ahead of ourselves?
If Turncoat was effective then where were the results? The tide has turned considerably these past 3 months, it has plenty to do with Tony Abbot.
No it doesn’t. You are assuming causality when logically there is none. What action/policy/statement/speech do you think has “turned the tide” in the coalition’s favour? Appointing Joyce as finance minister!?! Telling girls to hold onto their virginity until marriage?!? Maybe it was that cracker of an IR policy he seems to be musing???
The fact is there are other factors are at play here and a major one is the electorate’s perception of Rudd himself.
By the way cute name for Tunbull. Why is he a Turncoat? Because he voted for a bill that his party room backed, that his cabinet approved while in government and that his party took to the last election as stated policy? He’s a turncoat for voting for that bill? Right… As for effectiveness, well he got Fitzgibbon’s head over having a Chinese friend, Abbott cant get Garret after 4 dead installers and plenty of crying, scared grandmothers on talkback radio. Talk about inept.
The context of the day to day political debate has changed and it has very little to do with King Tone, he is half the politician Howard was & 3/4 of Turnbull.
Rudd was seen as the messiah before Abbott was on the scene. Abbott said he would expose Rudd to the Australian people, and that is exactly what he has achieved. Turnbull called Rudd a phoney, he was also correct but didn’t know how to expose him.
We all know he’s a phoney surfer but the electorate has always prefered a sane phoney to some loopy idealogue.
I may be blinded by my rigid adherence to socialism but can anyone tell me of an election where the government lost when both unemployment and interest rates were at historically low levels?
So how, what, where and when did King Tone expose Rudd? On what policy issues? Which statements? What questions?
See the thing is you are assuming that any decrease in the popularity of the incumbent MUST be attributable to the performance of the opposition. Well my friend that just ‘aint so…
P.S. How exactly is Rudd a phoney?
Abbott’s playing the small target, but once the election campaign begins we’ll see how he holds up to scrutiny.
SBH
None in the post war period I can think of. Apart from 2007 virtually every government defeat was accompanied by high unemployment, and even then Howard was dealing with strong inflation and reasonably high interest rates.
Yeah, that’s what I thought o snowy one, I just can’t see the punters booting out this government. They’d have to prove incredibly incompetent or have a financial catastrophe. It is possible that the lack of differntiation between the parties will play a role though but I can’t see it being big enough.
Rudd will win the next election. There is no real doubt on that one. Australians are risk adverse. At the moment, the economy is only just getting back on its feet and the Liberals aren’t looking like a safe pair of hands yet.
Abbott is just hoping to stem the flow by appealing to the Lib/national base and fighting the good fight. Minimise the damage.
Personally, I won’t be voting for him until he gets a better economic team. Joyce as Finance minister is a frightening proposition.
Especially when it comes to the mainstream media, there is a gap between the narrative and the facts.
The NARRATIVE is that Rudd is on the nose, that he’s all about spin and political tricks and not about fixing real issues, and so on.
The FACT is that Labor is still ahead in the polls, Rudd still has high satisfaction ratings and a high preferred PM rating, and the government is on track to win the next election, at least as far as current and historical polling suggests. In fact, Labor has been ahead of the coalition in EVERY Newspoll since late 2006.
That said, I believe the ground beneath Labor is shifting dangerously, and the reason is simple. This government has comprehensively alienated the progressive side of politics. From the always-doomed-to-fail CPRS to internet censorship, and across many other issues, Labor has been way too conservative.
At first glance, that might not seem like a problem. After all, lefties won’t vote Liberal in a fit, and if they vote Green, then Labor will pick up their preferences, right? Yes… but. It’s a “but” because progressives were the friends Rudd could really count on in the last election. They were out there talking up Labor on the blogs, urging friends and family to vote Labor, and generally pushing for change. It’s the old snowball effect.
This time, all that has changed. In my experience, many progressives no longer care. They now see how indistinguishable the two major parties have become. Many are also particularly incensed over the government’s plans to waste millions of dollars trying to censor the internet.
So, while Labor may still end up with the progressive vote, many progressives are out there slamming this government - on blogs, at work, at home, out socially. All this continues to feed the narrative of a government that has already lost touch with the real issues, is engaged in too much spin and propaganda and not enough substance, seems only interested in moralistic rubbish, and so on. Progressives and conservatives are coming from two different sides of the political spectrum, and each have different reasons for hating this government, but both are agreeing about the NARRATIVE.
It is this single, powerful narrative that is dangerous for Rudd and the government, as those who swing between Labor and Liberal pick up the narrative and swing back to the Libs. Labor only has an 8 seat majority in the lower house - it’s not much of a buffer.
Rudd really needs to sort himself out. Playing mea cupla tricks won’t work. He needs to start making some real friends. In fact, he needs to get his old friends back. He can do that by canning stupid policies like internet censorship and start bringing some real vision to the table. Without the friends he had at the last election, he will struggle this year.
My 2 cents.
I liked your 2 cents worth, ANTHONY.
You raise some excellent points.
Rudd is on the nose because people are finally wising up to him. He talks the good talk but that’s all he does. Oh, and also hobnob with world leaders.
Rudd should remember that the main reason why he won at the last election was not because he was Kevin 07, but he was the Un-Howard. Voters couldn’t get rid of Howard fast enough.
Rudd has shown himself to be not much more than a snake-oil salesman, and his recent apology is yet another example of his skills in that area.
The only problem with Rudd going is that we’d probably get that vacuous self promoter (in the RJL Hawke style) Gaza Gillard.
I for one could never accept the Airhead Redhead as leader of anything…no political values except acquiring personal power at any cost…totally in it for the bright lights……as much an ALP Prime Minister as well er…..Rudd.
Gillard…the BIG disappointment of the ALP…her support for her ultra right wing Zionist “friends” is pewkworthy in the extreme…her cherry picking of the New York schools rating system says it all…all show, no go.
I reckon its time some new leadership figures emerged in the ALP…How about Chris Bowen OR Greg Combet?
The media need to grow up and stop conducting themselves like silly lovesick teenyboppers swooning at this Abbott guy’s feet.
Start asking him the hard questions already. Do some stories on the ideology and past exploits of the other extremists he has sitting with him on the Coalition front bench.
Ask them why they have a climate change ‘policy’ when they believe climate change is “absolute crap”.
Ask them how much further they intend to go with WorkNOchoices.
Ask them whether they are for or against Third World sweatshop working conditions for our grandchildren.
Put it to them that, being committed to a harsher SerfChoices, and refusing to reduce homelessness, they accept there will be a mushrooming of shanty-towns and beggars across Australia.
Ask them to admit their intention to ‘privatise’ the ABC and Australia Post.
Ask them if they would do as they did last time they in government: that is, reduce funding of public health and education.
Ask them if they would institute religious indoctrination of our children via compulsory Bible Studies.
I’m sure if the media stopped popping the Viagra tablets over this Liberal Opposition they could think of plenty of hard questions of their own to ask the Mad Abbott and his grim gang.
Stop the fawning and grovelling, and do your bloody job, you bunch of big girl’s blouses!
@ Cuppa, some might say it is the same thing the media should have done to Rudd in Kevin07. Of course, he won that election without the help of the media, agreed?
Cuppa
I dont think i’ve ever seen such a slaughter on the 7:30 report.
I’ll just leave the good bits:
KERRY O’BRIEN: Yes. In the Parliament today you don’t think putting out carbon is any form of pollution in the context of climate change.
TONY ABBOTT: I want to reduce emission, that’s why I’m proposing to spend $10 billion over the next decade to do that. But I think we have got to accept that carbon dioxide is an essential trace gas as well.
KERRY O’BRIEN: By the same token, are you really saying that you are doing this because politically you are forced to, or are you doing it because you believe that the level of carbon dioxide emissions in the globe are a serious contribution to climate change.
TONY ABBOTT: Look, I want to do the right thing by the environment. And I think there’s enough evidence that carbon dioxide might be a problem, to try to reduce emissions. I tell you what else we are doing here; we are buying objective environmental improvements. We are getting, we hope, a million extra solar roofs, we are getting 20 million more trees, and the sorts of things that we’ll be funding, under our emissions reduction fund, are the sorts of things that are objective goods, such as higher soil carbon content, which will have more productive farmland, trying to use carbon dioxide and other waste from power stations to produce things that can then be made into biodiesel and stockfeed. We are trying to do objectively good environmental benefits with this policy.
KERRY O’BRIEN: Mr Abbott, you are using terminology like there’s evidence evidence that carbon dioxide might be a problem. When you put that alongside what you told that audience in regional Victoria in October last year, “The climate change argument is absolute crap, however the politics are tough for us because 80 per cent of people believe climate change is a real and present danger”. In other words, the only conclusion you draw from that is that you are saying, “We have to have a climate change policy because the people believe it’s a danger, but I believe it’s crap”.
TONY ABBOTT: Well no, and as I said before, there was a little bit of rhetorical hyperbole in there which does not represent my considered position, I am not as evangelical about this as Prime Minister Rudd is. I am not theological about this the way Prime Minister Rudd is, but I do think it’s important. And that is why I’m prepared to invest $10 billion over the coming decade to bring about things which will be good regardless, good for the environment, regardless of your views on the role of carbon dioxide in climate.
KERRY O’BRIEN: So when you say a bit of rhetorical hyperbole in that conversation with that audience you say you adjust the message to whatever audience you are playing to, if that’s the case, how do we know you haven’t adjusted your message for this audience?
TONY ABBOTT: Casually all of us are loose with our language, that was an occasion when I said what I shouldn’t have said. It didn’t represent my correct position.
KERRY O’BRIEN: There’s nothing loose about the meaning of a term, nothing loose about the meaning of a term that says “absolute crap”.
TONY ABBOTT: And I think what you’ll find, if you go back to the comments, is that it was the so called settled science of climate change, that I thought was to be described in language that I wouldn’t use on a family program.
KERRY O’BRIEN: In the Parliament today you described the Government’s Emissions Trading Scheme as a giant emissions trading scam. If so, if it is a giant scam, then it’s a giant scam originally introduced by the Howard Government with you in his cabinet, and until two months ago, it was supported, a giant scam supported by the then Liberal Leader and the vast bulk of the Shadow Cabinet including the man who stood beside you as an environmental spokesman endorsing this plan. Why did John Howard, Peter Costello, and Malcolm Turnbull in Government and more recently the Liberal Shadow Cabinet support an emissions trading scam?
TONY ABBOTT: I think the world has moved on, particularly since Copenhagen. The world has moved on. The only person who hasn’t moved on is Kevin Rudd. And you know, with his Emissions Trading Scheme, Kevin Rudd is now in a terrible bind. He can’t drop it, and yet he can’t deliver it. Kevin Rudd has no Plan B. If his scheme can’t pass the Senate, and it won’t pass the Senate. I have the Coalition has a clear and effective climate action plan, Kevin Rudd doesn’t.
…………
Slaughter.
Sorry forgot the link:
http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2010/s2808321.htm
OzBlizzard,
Thanks for that link. What a blinding hypocrite is the Mad Maggott. If the Australian people fall for his “rhetorical hyperbole” - ie lies and spin - they will get the government they deserve!
Napoleon Dynamite,
Ask the Liberals whether they are for or against Third World working conditions for Australians. I think the answer (if it’s honest) may disturb you…