Auspundits

The Federal Liberal Party Presidency

After the Liberal Party's federal electoral loss adding to the terrible arithmetic of coast-to-coast Labor state governments, it would appear that the Liberal Party needed a little bit of a revamp. As I mentioned at the time, Dr Nelson's ascension to the leadership of the federal parliamentary party should give Liberal Party supporters cause for excitement.

That was a great first step. However, that should not and will not be the end of it. The Liberal Party presidency is up for grabs with current president Ms Chris McDiven presiding over devastating and disappointing state electoral losses in several states. She has been tapped on the shoulder and shown the door. Her likely replacement is Alan Stockdale. According to The Australian, Mr Stockdale is a member of the party's Right faction and is expected to:

...bring to the party presidency a strong commitment to the principles of individual liberty and private enterprise, and to tackle factional infighting, which has been particularly destabilising in NSW.

Works well with Dr Nelson's message of economic (and increasingly social) liberty. I've only been a member for about a month or two and am already quite encouraged:

...a senior NSW party source said any opposition to Mr Stockdale had evaporated.

Welcome to the Brave New World

The "Green War" against prosperity has opened another front in Australia with our newly elected Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, starting the largely symbolic process of ratifying the Kyoto Protocol. More important is his trip to Bali, where the pressure will be on for him and other delegates to announce steep cuts in CO2 emissions by 2050 in a post-Kyoto world. Australia has (to date) accrued a Kyoto liability of 1% or roughly $60million at current European carbon credit prices and in this regard is much better off than the rest of the world. This cost is based on our CO2 emissions increasing by about 9% since 1990. Imagine what the cost will be if Australia agrees to cut emissions by more than 50 percent by 2050 as some have suggested.

Ironically, the U.S., a non-signatory to the Kyoto Protocol and which inspired Huxley's Brave New World, reported that its carbon emissions fell by 1.5 per cent in 2006, which, according to this report, is [emphasis mine]

the first decline since 2001, and only the third reduction since 1990.

I strongly suspect that very few European countries can claim a similar record and know that their trading system has and is being rorted.

Dr Nelson on The 7:30 Report

Annabel Crabb seems to think Dr Nelson needs time to adjust from the media vacuum his previous portfolio afforded him to the constant glare his new job as leader of the Opposition will foist on him.

Dr Nelson - New Leader

This is the how some parts of the media greeted Dr Brendan Nelsons ascension to Liberal Party leadership thus becoming the Opposition Leader.

Looking forward to the next three years. Also, having my Liberal Party membership forms mailed out.

Update 29/11/2007 6:00PM AEST: Andrew Bolt is not impressed. I am also prepared to disagree with him on a point or two:

1. Nelson having been a former Labor Party member may be a minus for insiders (no pun intended), but I think it will resonate well with swinging/independent voters. Is a personification of what Coalition supporters want to see happen in 2010: people who voted Labor in 2007 swinging back to the Liberals in 2010.
2. I think Abbott's leadership contest was a ploy designed to swing support behind Nelson (a more proven and tested conservative) in his bout with Turnbull. And it worked. Abbott's "reserving the right to challenge in the future" is I think a rearguard against a hot and bothered Turnbull or Costello: according to some accounts, Abbott has greater partyroom numbers than Costello had they gone head-to-head and toppled Howard. This is Abbott signaling the Right's warning to the Moderates.
3. Being from Melbourne, I understand Bolt's concern about the Victoria's absence in the leadership of the Opposition. Short of seeing a justification for why he thinks this absence may have "electoral consequences", I say "who cares?".

Nelson's first statement was to support Rudd's moves to ratify Kyoto. At first glance, this is bad news. But read how he presented this decision:

I have heard the message from Australians that was delivered on Saturday and whatever some critics of the Kyoto Protocol might actually think, it's symbolically important to Australians.

Kyoto is symbolic. He also said that any Rudd government initiative at next month's Bali conference "...must look after Australia's interests at the UN climate change meeting in Bali next month." I have not seen evidence to suggest Saturday was about Kyoto, but if there is, then Nelson's approach to Kyoto is very intelligent: support ratification but look out for Australian interests before all others.

He has also urged Rudd to continue the NT aboriginal intervention plan. So far so good.

Liberal Party Leadership and The Media

Saturday's electoral defeat of the Coalition has resulted in the Prime Minister losing his electoral seat and thus the leadership of the party. There were three contenders earlier today, but one, Tony Abbott, left the race this afternoon, leaving him to comment that:

It's pretty obvious to me that Malcolm and Brendan [the two other leadership contenders] have more support and so I am announcing today that I will be withdrawing my candidature and I won't be running tomorrow.

Regeneration commencing

Here are some of my thoughts regarding where the Liberal Party should be heading over the next three years:

The Inherent "Conservatism" of Australia's People

When the narrative of the federal election campaign gets written, many will wonder why a government with such a good economic record was voted out by the people of Australia.

Rising from the Ashes

Australian Politics has undergone a significant shift today.  Kevin Rudd has been elected Prime Minister, and John Howard has had a long career ended by his own electorate.

Election '07 - Updates Below

Two bits of news regarding Australia's federal election, both suggesting a photo finish in today's election:

1. Over the last three or four days we have seen two polls released that suggest the Prime Minister has eaten away at Labor's massive lead: yesterday's Galaxy poll has Labor up by 4% on a 2 party preferred basis with today's Newspoll showing a halving of Labor's 2 party preferred lead to +4%.
2. The betting markets have, over the same period, seen a collapse in the probability a Labor victory, although Labor are still predicted to win with a probability of 72.8%.

Updates below the fold.

Bad News for Coalition supporters

As Australia heads into the last week of the election campaign, Labor is wiping the floor with John Howard's old tracksuits. The odds of a Coalition victory at Saturday's poll have blown out with a market implied probability of a Labor victory rising rapidly into the high 70s.

Little good news here. The culture wars and our contribution to the Long War are now seriously in play. The good news (if you can call it that) is that Labor have now rebranded themselves as economic conservatives. Based on the amount of pork that both parties have thrown at the electorate over the last three weeks, I would say that this is definitely not the case.

Update 18/11/2007 12:00PM AEST: Maybe there is some good news: latest Galaxy poll suggests a cliffhanger; newspaper editorials uniformly backing Howard. And there is better news.