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Tony Abbott for PM

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dutchie said:
"My own view is that I'm running to become Prime Minister of Australia, not to be prime minister of the world, and I'll be spending my time here in Australia between now and polling day."
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Except of course if he WAS PM then he'd milk being seen with the Great and Powerful as much as possible.

Both sides milk the benefits of incumbency as much as possible

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Abbott wants to introduce a paid parental scheme that will cost $5B a year. How does he pay for it? Oh by introducing a great big new tax that will costs a lot of the top business in Australia more than the carbon tax does.

Lets not forget that TA was in the prior Govt that brought it half the middle class welfare that is bankrupting this country.
 
sydboy007 said:
Lets not forget that TA was in the prior Govt that brought it half the middle class welfare that is bankrupting this country.
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While I would agree that the middle class welfare was overdone in the latter years of the Howard government, I would suggest that it's been Labor's waste and mismanagement that has largely contributed to our current budget position.
 
drsmith said:
While I would agree that the middle class welfare was overdone in the latter years of the Howard government, I would suggest that it's been Labor's waste and mismanagement that has largely contributed to our current budget position.
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Could you elaborate on your position here regarding what you believe the budget position is?
 
drsmith said:
That highlights the problem well.

All those billions from Labor's failed fantasies all add up.
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Fantasie, sums it up well doc, see how Tony Burke says, they failed to act quickly enough.lol

From my memory, they had to be dragged kicking and screaming to act at all.lol

Good ole Kev, spinning up new history.

You can throw a new dashboard on the old banger, but at the end of the day, it is still the old banger.
 
drsmith said:
That highlights the problem well.

All those billions from Labor's failed fantasies all add up.
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Ill add that confidence matters and that business has been left to rot under labor. And they wonder why their budget bottom line keeps failing to deliver. They are blowing too much money in too many areas that have little benefit to the economy.
Abbott is addressing these areas where as labor is making things harder. Lets face it IR just isnt sexy enough for Rudd.
 
Zedd said:
Maybe it's me that's out of touch, but IMO Australia in the coming decades needs to be ever more involved in global politics.
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While that's quite true, there are real problems right here at home that very much need to be fixed first, eg the barriers to productivity that business has been so complaining about for some time.
Mr Abbott, however, isn't helping this with his substantial additional tax on big business for his stupidly generous parental leave scheme.
It leaves a hollow sound for the electorate when he criticises the cost imposts on business by Labor, yet fails to recognise the similar impost his own policy involves.

I think the average voter realizes this and I don't think Abbott realizes does. .
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I'm not sure that the average voter thinks enough to come to any such conclusion. They are, if the recent polls are to be believed, easily taken in by showmanship.

An example of Kevin Rudd's disingenuousness today was his 'plea' from the Northern Territory where he has again been mobbed like a pop star, for the Opposition to adopt a bipartisan approach to recognising aboriginal rights in the Constitution.
This received repeated media attention, giving the clear impression that the Coalition needed to be dragged into such co-operative attitude.

The reality is that Tony Abbott some time ago offered 100% bipartisan support for this.

This kind of manipulative behaviour from Rudd is what I despise so much about him. He will say absolutely anything to get a headline or create an erroneous impression about the Opposition.

Abbott et al need to quickly get his measure and formulate a suitable plan of response. At present they appear to still be stunned and impotent in the face of Rudd's nation storming.
 
Julia said:
I'm not sure that the average voter thinks enough to come to any such conclusion. They are, if the recent polls are to be believed, easily taken in by showmanship.
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I can't stand Rudd and I would never vote for him, but he is far more confident and intelligent than Abbott. Unfortunately Abbott thought he could sail to victory by doing and saying nothing. Now he has a new opponent, he has no backup plan. He is so afraid of saying or doing the wrong thing, that he does and says nothing; commits to nothing. On camera, he comes across as a rabbit in the spotlight. Pathetic. I'll probably give my protest vote to the mining magnate.
 

Rudd isn't more intelligent than Abbott quite the opposite but Rudd does excel in public speaking and image......until you look closer which the electorate did last time he was in, and will do again given enough time.
 
MrBurns said:
Rudd isn't more intelligent than Abbott quite the opposite but Rudd does excel in public speaking and image......until you look closer which the electorate did last time he was in, and will do again given enough time.
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The polls can talk it up as much as they like, it was only as the election was nearing that Gillard's polling fell off the cliff.

Wait untill Rudd calls the election date, then you will see how the silent majority are leaning.

We are giving a lot more respect to our pollsters, than we are to the intelligence of our fellow Australians.
 
I don't like to agree with you Trawler, but in this case I do.

I don't buy into all this "polling" bull****. The "polling" companies are always trying to create a "contest", because without a "contest" they are out of business.
 
Gringotts Bank said:
I can't stand Rudd and I would never vote for him, but he is far more confident and intelligent than Abbott.
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I don't particularly think he is more intelligent than Abbott, but he definitely has more political smartness.

That's my impression too. If Mr Abbott doesn't formulate a plan to deal with the resurgent Kevin pretty quickly and begin offering the electorate some positive and thoughtful policies, rather than endlessly repeating "we'll stop the boats", he will have lost all chance of winning what was the unloseable election.

Macquack said:
I don't buy into all this "polling" bull****. The "polling" companies are always trying to create a "contest", because without a "contest" they are out of business.
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No, they're not. Newspoll anyway. The CEO of Newspoll was questioned about this in an interview a year or so ago and their political polling comprised less than 10% of their total business, I think. It was a very small proportion anyway.
If you look at the historical polls, most of them have been pretty close to the eventual actual election result.
It's not in their interest to not be ethical about how they conduct the polling. Their reputation is everything.
Don't you think the politicians would be all over them in hysteria if there was even the slightest bit of shenanigans?
 

I agree. He is becoming tedious with his continuous repetition of just a few phrases: "stop the boats", "the faceless men", "another new tax" etc. That may have worked in the past, but not anymore.
 
bellenuit said:
I agree. He is becoming tedious with his continuous repetition of just a few phrases: "stop the boats", "the faceless men", "another new tax" etc. That may have worked in the past, but not anymore.
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Yes and Now we are copping the same thing from Rudd: endlessly ranting on about "Abbott's Negative Politics".


Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/federal-polit...uly-11-2013-20130711-2prgx.html#ixzz2YhlC6KQD
 
Maybe TA can articulate thoughtful policies that respond at least in style if not substance to K Rudds efforts at transforming the political debate. But so far he just doesn't seem to have the capacity to say anything beyond a 3 word slogan.

Meanwhile, on the sidelines licking his lips, Malcolm Turnball will start talking. And he is always worth listening to.

From a Liberal perspective at the moment Malcolm Turnball would be a far better match up against Kevin Rudd than Tony Abbott. Perhaps another couple of weeks of falling polls and a non competitive Tony Abbott will cause a change.

Whatever happens it needs to be done quickly. If Krudd does call an election for late Aug/early September as suggested the announcement could come within a week and I don't know if the Liberal Party could change its leader in the middle of the actual campaign.
 
basilio said:
From a Liberal perspective at the moment Malcolm Turnball would be a far better match up against Kevin Rudd than Tony Abbott. Perhaps another couple of weeks of falling polls and a non competitive Tony Abbott will cause a change.
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The problem with that analysis is that history has demonstrated Tony Abbott to be much more competitive than Malcolm Turnbull against Kevin Rudd.
 
basilio said:
Maybe TA can articulate thoughtful policies that respond at least in style if not substance to K Rudds efforts at transforming the political debate.
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I don't think there's any chance of that, basilio. Mr Abbott is what he is, and that is a person who simply lacks good verbal skills. He's fine when delivering a pre-prepared speech, but his constant habit of being so hesitant in answering questions, giving the impression that he is pausing to evaluate every word before actually delivering it, is also giving the impression that he's a bit shifty. This is in contrast to either Rudd or Turnbull who speak with easy conviction, regardless of any underlying sincerity or otherwise.

The irony is that I believe Mr Abbott is fundamentally more trustworthy and less maniacally self interested than either of the other two above.

Surely to god there's some decent coaching out there?

Meanwhile, on the sidelines licking his lips, Malcolm Turnball will start talking.
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He already has. After being obediently quiet on climate issues in recent months, a couple of days ago he reverted to saying he believed in an ETS and managed to sound politely doubtful about the Coalition's plan.

drsmith said:
The problem with that analysis is that history has demonstrated Tony Abbott to be much more competitive than Malcolm Turnbull against Kevin Rudd.
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That's true, but that was then. Kevin is smarter now, and probably so, too, is Malcolm Turnbull. Mr Abbott, in contrast, seems somehow diminished in stature and in confidence.
 
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