Perhaps the issue is that the public is giddy with magical thinking that the Libs aren't offering. In 2022-23 power prices will increase about 50% and 650,000 immigrants will arrive creating more strain on services and housing. So far the public thinks it will all smooth over but it may not in which case the ALP honeymoon is finished. If 'the Voice' gets up some of the negative predictions may eventuate. Smart alecky pronouncements from Albanese will start to gall.

Therefore the Libs should hold their nerve. I'm not sure why but women voters don't like either Morrison or Dutton both with fairly tough images. A future Lib leader needs to avoid that.

The Liberal Party has been going downhill ever since the Howard defeat, and it is now close to rock bottom.

All 'leaders' have been "insipid" since that time, and the current one, Du(d)on, is a real doozy. He looks to be in a trance.

"....remember the lessons of their founder, Robert Menzies ….". Would most of them even know who Menzies was? Would they care? Politics these days is just a job: people want to be politicians as a well-paid career, for their own benefit, not the country's or the people's. They have zero values.

The sooner the Liberals go, the better. This country needs Conservatives. The problem is though, there are not enough voters with the sense to realise this, and Australia looks like being Communist red all over for a long time yet. It is probably pointless to even discuss the Liberals any more.

This country needs Conservatives.
ttbn,
yes and, it also needs people with a sense of responsibility ! The Goaft literally out-lawed responsibility & the drug-ridden alcoholic dumb took it up with gusto !
The Gene pool is stagnant because of all those oxygen thieves got free passes !

The Libs will be in the back blocks for years to come unfortunately. Life today is about ME, ME, and Me again and the younger ones don’t t care who pays. Required today is free or cheap housing, free medical, education, child care and numerous other “free” life style requirements. The Libs over the years have made an effort to balance the books whereas Labor don’t care and spend, spend and spend some more. The day of reckoning will come but the labor pollies will be long gone and wont worry as they live life to the full on their government pensions.

Good to see Finnland go Conservative over the weekend.

Branch stacking saw an influx of conservative elements, the retirement of moderates and the emergence of the TEALS. The liberal party is not liberal in any sense of the word, but conservative and becoming more hard right with every branch stacked outcome. I believe there's no longer a home for the moderates in the party, who would do better for themselves and the country as TEALS.

As such able to remain fiscally conservative and socially progressive as Sir Robert Menzies. Who presided to a large extent of the most prosperous period in this nation's history when we were the third wealthiest nation and a creditor one to boot!

We need a giant of a leader and reform to force the hard right conservatives to join political organisations that reflect their political philosophies.

We need to undo the harm done by idiotic ideological imperatives and those driven by the same. We need to return to cooperative capitalism and the co-ops that served the national interest and our rural and regional communities so well!

We need pragmatism and bipartisan support for good ideas no matter where they came from, as Sir Robert would have so ably exampled.

Policies needed include rapid rail down the eastern seaboard and nuclear power, as MSR thorium, to force down the ever-rising cost of living or doing business in this country. And we need to restart manufacture and a pragmatic plan to drought proof the nation!
Alan B.

It is all a matter of communication.
The liberal party is still based on sound objectives and procedures I am sure.
It is just that we don't know about them.
Instead we are getting a lot of badly explained nonsense.
That is how I see it.
Time for them to shape up and start showing us the way.
Time for them to start LEADING?

Good to see Finnland go Conservative over the weekend.
ttbn,
Well, the Finns are a fair bit ahead of drugged-to the eyeballs Okkers !
Besides, who needs a civil war when you have wall to wall Labor ? Just you wait till they start bouncing off those walls !

It could of course be said that some/many of current financial problems are the inevitable result of policies put in place by John Howard. Policies which were and are in effect "welfare" policies for the then and now relatively well off middle class and even the very well off or rich.
But even so we now live in a completely different milieu to the Menzies era. An era in which everyone and everything is instantaneously interconnected, and even more importantly an era in which countless billions (even trillions) of dollars are traded each day on the global capital markets - casino "capitalism". Countless billions which have no relation to any kind of the necessary tangible items upon which everyone's prosperity depends.

No tears for the losing crime syndicate. The other crime of course is forcing people to vote against their moral principles, by pain of fine.

The author wants a return to the days of 'Pig Iron' Bob Menzies, and he wants to know why the Liberal Party is in deep sh!t, ask yourself with that suggestion. Menzies was a sycophantic fascists lover, don't forget 'Pig Iron' Bob was party leader in 1943 when the UAP crashed and burned!

Well with a leader that looks like he just walked out of a 'B' horror movie, (The Dud is the preferred choice for PM by 24% of voters), and the party has absolutely no policies, except to say "NO" to everything. The conservatives formed a party a few years back and it received less that half a percent of the popular vote, it was a disaster. The Liberal Party is lucky to get 1 in 7 votes from those aged under 40, no party of significance can survive for long with that low a number of young voters. If an election was held tomorrow the Noalition would be annihilated with the loss of another 10 seats, including the seat of the Dud himself.

ttbn and Indy, I agree you two should be in conservative Finland, talking nonsense to the reindeer's.

Thanks for the article Scott Prasser.

It's difficult to create a new brand and organisation- I think that any path is going to be difficult- but I agree that the Liberal party has lost touch with the grass roots- but maybe the grass roots have lost touch with reality too- perhaps because there is too much red tape in business.

People should be running little cottage industries out of their houses- but apparently the government stops them doing it. You don't need formality- just productivity- keep things simple- live off the land- pull yourself up by your bootstraps. This is the protestant ethic- the western way.

People should be able to run hot dog stands on the street- but can't- they should be encouraged to exploit their business creativity to support themselves rather than being dependent on the government for their life and meaning.

The government has a role in creating platforms for opportunistic self sufficiency. Perhaps they think they do but they don't.

CM,

"little cottage industries....protestant ethic....live off the land...hot dog stands"

Get a grip on reality son! The Liberal Party has a grip on it, but if they keep jerkn' it too hard, it'll fall off. Its not that Labor are all that great, they are not fantastic at all, the are not led by the new messiah, its just that the Noalition is pathetic. In typical conservative fashion some are saying, batten down the hatches, ride out the storm, the good days of plenty will return, EVENTUALLY!

I said Dud Dutton looks like he just stepped out of a 'B' grade horror movie, but if you look at the supporting cast, you can see why he's team captain. The Liberal Party is like a cricket team where the captain can't score runs, or take wickets, but he keeps the captains job because he's still the "best" player in the team.

ttbn- Respectfully I think Dutton is a source of hope. But the odds are stacked against him- the well has been poisoned. Multiculturalism creates mistrust in society so that they are unable to work coherently as a team. When groups nurture divisive destructive forces in society and are not controlled the society breaks down. Society must control itself- that includes the government, business, immigration, etc. Communism is a sickness within most nations- some sicknesses can't be cured- some patients don't want to take the medicine- parasitic illnesses kill their hosts- dangerous fauna can kill long after the bite.

Australia is currently showing what happens to a country when it has far too high a percentage of it's voters born in another country. The Ukraine is showing us the end game for such a country.

God help our grand kids, Albo wants to bring in another 600,000, to be housed before locals, anything to buy a vote I suppose.

Dear Hasbeen,

What a crock mate. Albo is bowing to business interests over the ordinary punter on immigration. They want a virtually indentured workforce that they didn't have to pay tax money to educate. Simple as that.

What they love is old farts like you is floating immigrants as the problem to all your woes, yet here you are doing just that.

As to the article it is just a mish mash of thought bubbles trying to make the case that the Liberals need to go more conservative.

I would happily support that as it will keep them in the wilderness for far longer.

So you go ahead mate, agree with them when they call changes to superannuation on accounts over 3 million, communism. You back the big end of town of which you clearly are not part of.

At some stage you may just wake up and see this for what it is. A big bloody scam on their part.

ttbn,
>This country needs Conservatives
That depends what you mean. Some people who identify as conservatives oppose giving everyone a fair go. Australia doesn't need people like that!

________________________________________________________________________________

Indy,
>The Goaft literally out-lawed responsibility
What exactly are you referring to?

________________________________________________________________________________

GBC,
>The Libs over the years have made an effort to balance the books
>whereas Labor don’t care and spend, spend and spend some more.

The problem is that the Libs have always resorted to false economies to balance the books (even when balancing the books is not the economically responsible course of action). Labor do care, and have no option left but to spend more.

________________________________________________________________________________

Hasbeen,
>Australia is currently showing what happens to a country when it has
>far too high a percentage of it's voters born in another country.
>The Ukraine is showing us the end game for such a country.

How, exactly? Do you seriously imagine Britain would try to reconquer its former colonies the way Russia is?

Aidan

Hasbeen is right. You apparently don't know that Ukraine broke down into civil war in 2014. Immediately after a democratic election. So don't think democracy will save you.

The civil war is between the European Ukrainians,and the Russian Ukrainians who have lived in Ukraine since WW2 This is how multicultural societies usually end up as the tribal numbers build up. Each side wants territorial control of the country or at least a piece of the country.

It was reported that
Selenski's side (the European side) had death squads targeting Russian Ukranians.

Russia suddenly moved troops into the areas lived in by the Ukrainians
Of Russian lineage. When asked why? Putin said, "he had come in to prevent the civil war and the slaughter of the Russian Ukrainians."

CHERFUL,
Who's Selenski? When I looked up the name, I was directed to the Wikipedia page of Paige Selenski, an American (field) hockey player who competed at the London Olympics.

If you mean Volodymyr Zelenskyy, you're completely wrong: he's a Russian Ukrainian! What you, and warmongers like Armchair, don't seem to get is that most Russian Ukrainians were n the Ukrainian side, and opposed the Russian backed paramilitary scumbags who managed to take control of a few parts of Eastern Ukraine while the Ukrainian army was distracted by the Russian invasion of Crimea.

This was not immediately after an election. 'Twas immediately after their leader fled to Russia and the parliament elected a new leader, but well before a general election was held later that year.

With the army failing to crush the Russian backed insurgents, nationalist paramilitaries also formed to defend Ukraine. And yes, they could be described as "death squads" though that was not their primary purpose or activity, and certainly wasn't the reason Putin invaded. He invaded because he could, on the same pretence that Hitler used to invade Czechoslovakia in the 1930s. 'Twas a pack of lies then, and it's still a pack of lies now!

Even more in a disarray are the voters & those who voted Labor will be the first to stir !

Australia has moved on, but libs have not. Australia is not the USA. Libs have to do well in either Victoria or NSW or both to win. The hard right has no idea.