For all his faux blokeishness and Western Sydney credentials, Latham had no more ability to relate to the electorate than any insider Labor hack.

Preparing for war

Sunday, 24 March 2013   State of the parties, Tactics   42 comments 

You think it’s about Rudd v Gillard? You ain’t seen nothing yet.

Crean was trying to find a compromise between a party power structure that has lost its relevance and a challenger whose popularity rests on not being part of it. It failed because things have gone past the point where a compromise is possible.

What is more important is that Gillard and Labor, detached as they (like the Coalition) are, can be seen to relate to someone in society.

It is the loss of that social base that Labor is struggling to adapt to, not some problem of ideology.

It will be the breakdown of the factional system that will be the necessary precondition for the return of Rudd, but not sufficient.

Through the looking-glass

Monday, 4 February 2013   Tactics   8 comments 

To anyone to look at the events in Canberra last week, barely any of it would have made a lick of sense.

Lame duck

Thursday, 31 January 2013   State of the parties, Tactics   18 comments 

In Australia, a Prime Minister facing even the most inevitable of defeats still holds to the end one power of incumbency – deciding when it will happen. Now even that has been thrown away.

Last dance

Monday, 14 January 2013   State of the parties   14 comments 

The old will have to give way in 2013.

Top end upended

Monday, 27 August 2012   State and federal politics   43 comments 

Far from being “out of it” some politicians have been working hard to make the remote communities in the Northern Territory and Queensland practically avant-garde.

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