Yes he has certainly delivered to the hip pocket, the G.S.T. we we "never" going to have, the interest rate rises "we had to have" the lack of investment in bio fuels, so we pay $1.40 lt for petrol, ah yes true conservative hip pocket philosophy, what more could we battlers want?

I think Susan is correct to say that the majority of Australians are a lot more progressive than the policians they elect to represent them. The danger is that the conservative right wing are very effective in making their views known and I think that public sentiment is being shifted slowly but surely to the right.

When you talk to people in their 20s they think its quite normal to work a cocktail of part time jobs that have no job security. Call me old fashioned, but I didn't study at university to have that sort of employment outcome forced on me.

When you look at the high number of households that are supported by some form of social security payments currently running at $1 in $7 of household expenditure and note that existing social welfare recipients are shielded from the latest changes to the social welfare regime, you can see that the government has shielded many of the "aussie battlers" that vote conservatively from these changes.

Because many of Howard's "aussie battlers" are socal security recipients who are shielded from changes to the welfare regime and also insulated from economic downturns the government will be re-elected.

One of the most cowardly tricks a government can pull on its country is to "protect" its citizenry from the truth.

We all smirked at the antics of the communist countries who fed their people a never-ending stream of propaganda on bumper wheat harvests, how well-off they were, and how decadent, corrupt and poor the capitalist countries really were.

We are now in exactly that situation. The world is changing rapidly around us, and we are saddled with a government that is in total denial. As an economy, ours will be overtaken by countries that we presently perceive as "third world" within the lifetime of many who read this, and the impact of this change will affect all of us. Is this a discussion item in the Cabinet room? Hardly. The focus is on dog-whistle politics to ensure their re-election.

The opposition hardly inspires confidence either, being solely focussed on gaining power.

But the saddest aspect is us. According to Ms McDonald:

>>a clear majority of the population thinks Australia should not have a military presence in Iraq... Australians think the current [asylum] laws are tough enough... approve of using embryonic stem cells ... believe in a woman’s right to choose an abortion... favour making the abortion pill available... support a law to recognise same-sex unions... regard global warming as something that should be acted on now... want a republic than don’t.. don’t support IR reform or privatisation.<<

While these are all terribly worthy views, in the face of the massive economic changes that we will experience as a country over the next fifty years, bickering over them seems to be a bit of a luxury.

It is not as if we have a choice. We have built the country to its present level of prosperity on the back of economic and trade factors that are now in the past. Protectionism won't help, isolationism won't help. We have to face the reality of lowered standards of living and a less important world role.

There isn't a politician alive who will tell you this.

All I can say is yes, I agree.

I think the public impression that the coalition has managed the economy well is largely due to an effective PR campaign.

The resources boom is what has led Australia to a positive financial position.
What's more, Howard is not the lord of interest rates - that honour belongs to the reserve bank, but Howard still won an election on it.

That being said, when it comes to the economy, labour wouldn't do much better... the one piece of credit I'm willing to give Howard is that he is being a bit more of a realist - the changing world environment is going to mean that businesses are going to have to be able to be leaner and meaner, which means less rights for the unions -anathema to the labor party. Though clearly, Howard has gone too far.

The worst possible outcome of the next federal election would be the liberal party maintaining or strengthening its overwhelming majority in the senate, meaning the liberals still don't need to negotiate to pass whatever legislation they want.

The second worst outcome would be the labor party winning with such a margin, that they have the same ability to abuse their power.

I'd like to see labor win, by a comfortable, though not overwhelming margin. Won't happen though. Not until labor realises the union base isn't strong enough to support them anymore, and they become a little more open to new ideas. As it stands, it is a party made up of union hacks, and not a genuinely left party.

What's more, it hasn't chosen a leader that would revitalise the party, and has adopted the labor stance of clinging to the past with Beazley. Rudd or Gillard would have been the better choice, but it has cost labor another election to discover that.

With a leader who tries to become as small a target as is possible?
With a Treasury spokesman who is...(?)
With deputy leader who is and won't ever be leader and who's name is not male or ... Costello.
With hugely photogenic Foreign Affairs spokesman who disappeared from our TV screens, almost totally, throughtout the Lebanon invasion but who resurrected, almost miracluously, at it's conclusion, while commenting on another irrelevant issue to do with neighbours to our immediate north.
With a health spokeperson who has a surprisingly liberal attitude towards stem cell research ... unlike the Liberal Health Minister.
With an invisible spokesperson on the anti-labor legislation of the Government.
With the most virulent opposition to that legislation coming not from the alleged labor centered Opposition but from the Unions...who are largely held in contempt by the public at large.
With a seeming non-spokesperson on the excesses of the Government's recent attempt at Immigration legislation.
With the most virulent and effective opposition to that legislation coming from a mixed crew of respected liberals, a maverick but loved National Senator, an Independant who draws his idealogy from the fundamentalist Judeo/Christian belief system (Someone with who Tony Abbott has much in common).
And finally with a Liberal Heath minister who decries people who in his view are 'left/liberal'.

Yep I'm proudly liberal, recognise liberalism in others, and am not intending to vote for John Howard because of Tony Abbot, who is so fundamentalistly captive that he besmirches liberalism and liberals, his supposed supporters and allies, with attitudes and beliefs that are absolute anathema.

Conservatism is tolerated so long as it is marginalised to economic issues and that was the point of the article. I agree and I've said the same thing ... differently and pointedly.

I have to wonder how much of Howard's "good economic management" is simply dumb luck.

Howard has benefited from significant reforms put in place by Labor between 1983 - 1996. He has also been lucky with demand for world commodities and the impact that has had on our exchange rate.

Having made the (right) decision to give the RBA carriage with interest rates it is rather hollow to claim great success for his Government in keeping rates low, it was the RBA that did it.

And if the last Labor Govt had been taxing the guts out of us like Howard then "Beazley's black hole" would have been a massive surplus.

I also have to wonder that if he is such an economic genius why was Australia so buggered when he was Treasurer between 1977 - 83 ?

Seems to me the answer may be less to do with the skills of John Howard and more to do with decisions taken by Deng TsiaoPing ?

The writer gives me hope.
Being perhaps too ignorant of, not the law, but what lawyers can make of it with the Government at their back and engendered popular support, I have allowed myself to be too isolated. Any grouping might be construed against some law or other, newly enacted.

So the writer indicates that not only a large number do not agree with current policy but that such numbers imply that many are better informed than our media would allow us.

Granted we are not in America in which Record of a Paper by Friel and Falk shows a sycophantic press, wrong by omission of facts and context referring to the, well never mind there is probably a SLAPP order in the wings, buy the book. Such analysis is yet to be done in a systematic way in Australia so who knows how much we have missed!

Agreed the opposition has hardly shown fight on these issues. But like the Libs they too apparently agree with Renouf’s book The Frightened Country and find safety in the American camp. Funny NZ finds no such need, why?

Two questions arise why the repeated return of the coalition? You answer this in a post by saying it’s the economy stupid. Are we so self centred? Or is the majority that rules in Democracy so ill informed so trusting of politicians who poles purport are not trusted?

Or are we so fearful that though mouthing though shall not kill or do unto others etc and striking postures of morality , cognitive dissonance (holding opposing ideas simultaneously), rules?

Secondly from where does the information that makes the many informed, come from or is it a sceptical approach relatively uninformed?

The provision of correct and full Information since without it one cannot make an informed vote, needs assessing.

Too true, untutored mind. The coverage the courier mail is giving the state election isn't what you'd call penetrating. Sure, they're giving a blow by blow account, but you don't get any reasoned analysis in a historical context, nor even a decent commentary. P'raps we should sponsor Matt Price to take a trip here at the next state election.

As for your comments about NZ... the NZ government has always had a little more independence than the aussies, largely because they don't have to kowtow to the US so much... that's why they've resisted nuclear proliferation, and that's why they've been excluded from free trade negotiations (a rather spiteful US effort I might add).

That being said, the kiwis have the luxury of having Australia as a buffer zone. The Australian's won't let anything happen to NZ. There are plenty of reasons - one, it would smash the whole 'cultivate western allies to protect us' concept that has backed Australian foreign policy throughout history, and lets face it, the kiwis are benign, they're a lot like the Aussies in culture. if something catastrophic happened to them, they could only become more hostile. So in effect, the kiwis have the luxury of going it alone, and the Australians don't.

Ultimately, the message of this article is that many of the coalition voters aren't voting to make a moral stand, they care more about how much their next mortgage repayments will be (convincing them that the libs could safeguard that was a fantastic piece of political spin).

And ultimately, Labor has the perception that they can't fight the views of the coalition when it comes to issues like terrorism, because the voting public is clearly an ignorant fearful mass.

When the interest rate issue became central to the last election, Latham didn't point out the folly of claiming to protect against interest rate rises, instead he said he'd keep them low too. This is a prime example of what is wrong with the labor party.

The main thing wrong with the labor party is that it tries to buy the votes of this author, & you lot.
This makes it unelectable in this country.