Tony Abbott was reported yesterday as musing why “good government” had not paid off for the government. George Megalogenis is the thinker who has uncovered the answer, or at least a good part of the answer. It is the “two speed economy”.
Prime minister
Annihilation watch: 46 seats to go
Everybody knows that if a swing’s on, the Prime Minister could lose Bennelong. But did you know that on the current polling it would be possible for Deputy PM Mark Vaile to lose his 13% plus seat of Lyne? asks Christian Kerr.
Acting in a Prime Ministerial way
John Howard did not need this morning’s Newspoll to tell him that acting as a Prime Minister doing Prime Ministerial things was his only hope of still being in the job at the end of the year.
Brendan Nelson: special subject, the bleeding obvious
That John Howard has steadfastly refused to link oil and the invasion of Iraq has only been influential in undermining his own credibility, writes Richard Farmer.
Your Say: Daily Mail readers' feedback: Crikey Says – 5 July, 2007
Has oil got anything to do with the war in Iraq? What a difference three and a half years can make.
Howard’s other side of midnight
The Prime Minister has a habit of tackling major issues at “five minutes to midnight”, Labor leader Kevin Rudd claimed on Lateline last night.
The Iraq backflip theory takes a blow
Remember how the Howard government’s WorkChoices backflip worked earlier this year? First, a prominent newspaper story saying that a policy switch was being planned. Then a prompt government denial. Wait a couple of weeks, then the announcement of pretty much what the original story had alleged.
Wanted: a prime ministerial chief of staff
The Prime Minister’s former chief of staff Arthur Sinodinos is sorely missed, Coalition insiders say. Concerns have been expressed to Crikey that the organisational health of the government has been compromised, writes Christian Kerr.
How the PM took the questions out of history
This is a draft of the Australian history curriculum that the government has refused to release, writes Sophie Black.
The terror script changes
Australian police are continuing to question the Gold Coast Hospital registrar over the failed car bombings in London and Glasgow, but the usual terror script isn’t being followed. The dynamics are different.
Pearson’s strident criticism of “naysayers” doesn’t help
It was with increasing anger that I watched the Lateline interview with Noel Pearson in which he attacked “naysayers” who are criticising those aspects of the Federal Government’s Northern Territory intervention operation that relate to the compulsory acquisition of leasehold title over land and the scrapping of the permit system, writes Northern Territory MP Marion Scrymgour.
Wills not the model of a modern governor-general
Royal history has a funny way of repeating itself — and William of Wales’s desire to live at Yarralumla bears a spooky remembrance to the remarks made by by his father to your correspondent at a Foreign Press Association gathering in London way back in 1979.
The left defend failure – and fail to respond
Guy Rundle and the facile left have long since decided that militant Islam’s hatred of America more than compensated for its hatred of democracy, diversity and tolerance. They apply the same reasoning at home, so it’s no surprise to learn that they aren’t prepared to slaughter their sacred cows for the sake of a few boong kids.
As white Australia saw it
How commentators, pundits and talking heads saw Howard’s Aboriginal emergency.
Richard Farmer: time to play Prime Minister
Six months spent sniping at real and perceived character weaknesses of Kevin Rudd have not ended the new Labor Leader’s honeymoon. A popular budget with tax and other handouts for all, while still maintaining the reputation for fiscal rectitude, has come and gone with the opinion polls hardly bouncing.
Your Say: Daily Mail readers' feedback: Crikey Says – 22 June, 2007
Rudd does a Beazley.
