Belly, your monocular approach to politics prevents you from being able to see clearly.

Not living in Victoria, I have a poor grasp of the local issues there, but it seems 'not a shock' to see the end of a long serving government.

But the replacement of one backwoods mob with another backwoods mob is hardly something to crow about.

The Greens at least inject some vaguely alternative thoughts that other politicians might be well advised to consider for a while, even if they reject them ultimately.

Shorten works from a script, so 'he would say that, wouldn't he?'.

The NSW ALP will be smashed, so it seems, and so will Bligh.

In NSW there may be a Green win, or two, but there is no chance of that in Qld.

So, we are to be lumbered with a bunch of rightwing pretend-xtians here in Qld once Bligh evaporates, although, frankly, the ALP is as bad as the Coalition when it comes to pretending to be xtian.

That is not a good recipe for the state, or the nation Belly.

While you gush adoringly over your rightwing chums in the ALP, and your equally rightwing chums in the unions, the nation is falling apart because our 'politics' has been thoroughly undermined by halfwits desperate to appeal to an absolute minority, as your Baptist PM shows.

Really Belly, we all need a few extra ideas in politics to prompt some 'debate'.

It would be good if you could bring a little light into your closed-off world, and think, for at least a 'moment', about your gleeful cackling over the Coalition win.

You encourage an ever closer relationship between the ALP 'policies' and the Coalition 'policies'.

Why not just join forces with your new friends in the Coalition, and stop pretending?

After all, your rank-and-file chums vote for the Liberals behind your back don't they?

Shorten would do really well in the new Liberal-ALP Party, and be able to take on Turnbull to become our next PM.

As for 'policies', none of us would be able to tell the difference.

AGIR:

Thanks so much for the link. I shall pass it onto my son (worth a try at least). Yes, I am a Christian, but I'm not sure what that's got to do with anything. After all, Greens Christine Milne's, rhetoric on climate change reflects her Catholic background. She's said that climate change "goes to the heart of questions of justice, equity, and the survival of human kind and the ecosystems on which all life depends."

You have to be kidding, Boaz.

A two hour lecture on "The Outworking of the New Sexual Agenda in Society and a Biblical Response"?

Why do you not simply précis the key points for us, rather than invite us to listen to an unknown speaker, on a dry-as-dust topic, over a period of time where we could actually be doing something useful. Like dyeing the hair in our ears.

As far as the defeat of Labour in Victoria is concerned, it wasn't actually much of anything, was it. Almost a repetition of the Federal scene, where the electorate simply couldn't pick the difference between two sets of equally unattractive politicians.

It will be the same in NSW next March. We will go to the polling booth to deliver the whack to a sleaze-ridden, incompetent and venal government, no doubt only to find ourselves saddled with a different bunch that is equally sleaze-ridden, incompetent and venal.

The most positive outcome of all this is that we will have an enhanced power vacuum at Federal level for a while, which will mean that very little actually gets legislated. Given the pathetic bumbling of all concerned, this can only be a Good Thing.

Aha Pericles, so you too dye your ear 'ole 'air, eh wot?

I think that is where AGIR goes wrong.

He's wasting his time with Bible College drones with dodgy academic letters from dodgy colleges as he searches for The Truth everywhere but where it exists.

If you want less legislation though, it is important to vote strategically in NSW to keep the two gorilla's on equal seats with a Green rump forcing them into compromises all the time.

I see General Jimbo from the ACL has a list of Rob Hull legislation that 'simply must go' now his drones are in government:
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/opinion/voters-are-looking-for-leaders-with-courage/story-e6frg6zo-1225962956881

Jimbo sounds more like that crazy-haired woman from Alaska every time he opens his gob. He'd only be happy if Pastor Nahlia was the premier.

The Blue Cross, not a bad post, none of the sometimes seen waviness in yours.
Let us get down to it, your post insulted me.
The question is did you intend to or just not understand me?
See I lived in the 23 years in opposition years for my ALP.
Yes DLP/Catholic right fear and lies helped keep us out of government.
We however while confronted with media , press mainly against us, did as much to keep our selves in opposition as all of the above.
Whitlam took a hidden virus in to power with him, the great man had some great fools under him, with yesterdays ideas.
Vic was best of the east coast I am afraid the new leader may do a good job, but in NSW after the train wreck they have very little going for them.
If you and I are going to continue to talk read my post history if you can not see my support is not without needing the best from my team you ,not me will be seen as not understanding and mate, one eyed?
Sorry a statement I can not respect, different than yours but that is my right.
You are a green I take it?

Insult you? No, not at all intended, I just respond directly to you because I see you as a very direct person, who writes what you think, so I assume you appreciate that approach.

You are quite right about the ALPs desire to remain in opposition for long periods of time, as when Keating lost and Beazley and crew carried on without changing a single policy setting for years, then raising a pair of total duds, Latham and Rudd, to the top position, and the same happens in states of course.

Whitlam was just another right winger, but he appeared to be a communist to many because Australia was such a backwater at the time. I know that for sure because I came here during the Whitlam years and saw someone who could have been a Liberal in the UK, but never a socialist.

His fame, mostly unearned, continues but this is really because he actually was, and remains, a highly intelligent politician which is in stark contrast to all those around and about today.

Also, because the middle-aged who were politicised during the Whitlam era have retained a cultish regard instead of reassessing the reality after the fact.

My assessment of those years, as I lived in many states, is that South Australia was the most advanced state, under Dunstan, coupled with the work of a liberal-ish predecessor from the conservatives prior to Dunstan.

Yes, I see you are monocular, but also expect greater things from the ALP. You will always be left hoping for more I fear. It's very much what-you-see-is-what-you-get with the ALP.

I did indeed sign up to the Greens, after many years in the ALP. Unlike you with the ALP, I have no hopes the Greens will be a glorious saviour political grouping. I just joined out of sheer desperation, and to assist with funding to get a Green Senator up in Qld.