The lurch

Monday, 28 July 2008   Tactics  Comments Off 

Liberals head to Canberra for the party meetings this week with the salutary lesson from what has just happened in Queensland. The media likes to call it a merger but in fact it was a political collapse.

Liberals get ready to lurch – an update

Thursday, 24 July 2008   Tactics  Comments Off 

As senior Liberals jostle for position ahead of next Wednesday’s coalition meeting, it is important to remember what this row on climate change is about.

Only the beginning

Monday, 14 July 2008   State of the parties  Comments Off 

Nine months ago senior Howard Ministers were crawling all over Garret’s ‘gaffe’ that Labor might sign up to emission targets without China or India as a sign of the eco-extremism of Labor’s front bench. Roll forward to July 2008 and it is the leader of the Liberal party who gets into trouble from his own side for suggesting that a carbon-cap ETS should not go ahead without China or India.

Breathing down his neck

Friday, 11 July 2008   Political figures  Comments Off 

Nelson is caught here in the position he has always been in since he assumed the leadership, between the old leadership who lost control of its party and a challenger who was unable to take it.

Turnbull’s challenge begins

Thursday, 10 July 2008   Political figures  Comments Off 

Turnbull’s appearance on Lateline last night was very significant.

It marks the beginning of something that keeps being talked about as a constant fact of Australian political life, but we haven’t actually seen before, Turnbull’s real political challenge for the Liberal leadership.

Liberals get ready to lurch – Part 2

Thursday, 26 June 2008   Political figures  Comments Off 

It has been surprising how little attention was given to Abbott’s response to yet another poll showing the end-of-the-honeymoon-that-never-came. It is significant.

Liberals get ready to lurch

Wednesday, 25 June 2008   Tactics  Comments Off 

If the Liberal party is a car suspended momentarily up a cliff, there are signs that it is starting to move – and the direction is not up.

Another honeymoon ends – an update

Tuesday, 17 June 2008   Media analysis  Comments Off 

The Australian thinks Nelson has blown his fuel ‘edge’ but that’s only because they thought he had one in the first place.

Rats all at sea

Tuesday, 3 June 2008   Media analysis  Comments Off 

It is almost as though the government and the electorate are having a private conversation with each other while the media is left out, unable to understand what either is talking about.

More than five cents worth

Monday, 2 June 2008   Tactics  Comments Off 

Nelson is doing quite a few things wrong but what he is at least attempting is the empathy thing, and trying to make the government look out of touch.

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