Comments on: Local lessons from the US: social issues really count

By: Malcolm Street

Malcolm Street — Fri, 09 Nov 2012 07:57:47 +0000

Christopher - “Republicans can either choose to join the country or secede. My hunch is they will try the latter first.”

I see parallels between the current polarisation in the US and the similar polarisation (combined with increasingly outrageous behaviour by the South) leading up to the Civil War. I can’t see any way the Tea Party will accommodate itself to reality. I don’t expect another Civil War, but I expect the logical extension of the process for the states that are Tea Party strongholds to look at secession.

By: Dogs breakfast

Dogs breakfast — Fri, 09 Nov 2012 02:44:02 +0000

Don’t worry Pav, I’m white, male, not quite old but getting there and hoping to be richer, but rich by many standards, and I’m with you.

The point is not that all OWWM’s are these selfish gorging neanderthals, but that a section of them that coincides nicely with the obscenely wealthy fit the stereotype.

And it is more about those obscenely wealthy in the US, and their conservative viewpoints.

But they don’t represent us, and we don’t fit with them. Not all of us OWWM’s are beyond help.

By: klewso

klewso — Fri, 09 Nov 2012 00:43:47 +0000

I find myself wondering if all this “obscene spending” on promotion, isn’t closely related to the sort of biased publicity the politicised media generates, and the slighted party has to counter (then their opposition has to match). The sort of spending that so benefits those controlling the medium, the “politicised media”?

To whit :- “The more you bad-mouth a party, the more they have to spend in your viewspapers, with your market-share, to counter the negative PR you’re generating!”?

By: CHRISTOPHER DUNNE

CHRISTOPHER DUNNE — Fri, 09 Nov 2012 00:34:55 +0000

Romney garnered just 2 million more votes than McCain, which was clearly not enough and completely failed to see the turnout for Obama would be very strong. In other words they constructed a bubble of falsehoods, fashioned out of their near religious conviction in their cause and little else. Here was the ‘word’s greatest CEO’ surrounding himself with yes men, arming himself with discredited ‘trickle down economics’ and an alarming ignorance of who America is today. Today, America is not the America of the 1950’s, and Mitt Romney just spent hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars to find that out the hard way.

Republicans can either choose to join the country or secede. My hunch is they will try the latter first.

By: klewso

klewso — Fri, 09 Nov 2012 00:33:24 +0000

MJPC - because they’re not all “sane” (running on prejudice, fed as that is, for the political ends of others, and afraid to have that “infallability” - reinforced as it is - challenged), but they are allowed to vote?

Murdoch’s politicsised edited view of reality, here, isn’t in competition, and thus balanced, as much as it is there - their Conservatively bent, heavily “edited high-lights” control, from it’s market share of perception-shaping, still dominates our media and our “news”.

By: MJPC

MJPC — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 20:10:42 +0000

I am surprised that this article did not broach the subject of the GFC and the matter that Romney (and his teaparty supporters) represented everything bad about capitalism. I believe that rampant capitalism is a failed philosophy in the US, because the GFC showed that the ordinary worker in the US was roundly taken to the cleaners and the big end of town was again bailed out, even though their greed bought the world economy to the brink of world wide depression.
Why would any sane voter in the US vote for a party that’s sole reason d’entre is to lower the tax for the rich and shaft the poor. President Obama, despite his faults, still offered hope for the working poor and unemployed in the US, something the Republicans never did except for their fellow travellers (remember Mitt’s recorded speech to the big end of town). The Replicans deserved to lose and I too am glad they did.
I concur with beachcomber, this is a wake up call for those who would suggest Mr Abbott for PM. The ordinary Australian has a greater social conscience that voters in the US, and the Labour party will learn a lot from the US experience.

By: beachcomber

beachcomber — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 13:02:42 +0000

“There is much for local conservatives to contemplate in the wake of the US elections. Little of it is good.” Especially not for Abbott.

Obama won with massive unemployment, minimal growth and a looming financial crisis, none of which Gillard is burdened with.

Social issues are an albatross around Abbott’s neck, and he can’t shrug them off. He will now be replaced in the New Year.

By: Wayne Carveth

Wayne Carveth — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 12:05:02 +0000

Barack Obama’s re-election was a relief. The humiliation of Rupert Murdoch & Donald Trump was pleasure.

By: Tom Jones

Tom Jones — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 07:58:37 +0000

What is interesting is how similar the views about women are with those held by the Taliban. Almost a mirror image except that women of the old rich white men are allowed to be seen and heard if they are saying how great said men are.

By: Salamander

Salamander — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 05:29:08 +0000

It’s reassuring to know that mad politics in a “democracy” can finally go too far so that eventually reality bites! The extreme right wing might have finally overreached itself in the insanity of the Tea Party. In spite of the House of Reps, it looks a bit more hopeful to me.

By: SusieQ

SusieQ — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 04:36:02 +0000

It was so much fun watching Fox News for even just a few minutes yesterday to see the disappointment and the bitterness……..

By: klewso

klewso — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 04:00:08 +0000

Murdoch has balancing competition for “edited news high-lights” there.

By: The Pav

The Pav — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 01:43:54 +0000

I am an old , wealthy white male (OWWM) and Murdoch et al do not represent me not=r does Alan Jones and his ilk.

I suspect OWWM’s are not all as the article suggests but the pperception created by a couple of prominent ones

Being an OWWM does not eradicate one’s social conscience