Wot?

I have to agree with Belly twice in one day? What is OLO coming to?

While I am pleased with the removal of Victorian Labor, and anticipate their rout in NSW and QSL shortly, this is actually good news for Julia Gillard, as she will not have state labor poisoning the federal vote.

Whilst the coalition and the greens are politically at opposite ends of the spectrum, the reality is that Labor and the Greens are actually in direct competition for votes, and that in gutting the greens, the coalition is doing more for Labor than itself.

Labor should wake up and stop preferencing the greens in the senate as the greens are starting to strip away their old labor voters. Having the greens in the senate does more damage to labor than the coalition in the long term.

Belly,
Seems i have been a bit misleading in my posts. You are correct in saying that labor has copped some good beatings and that they need renewal across the state ranks. Being in NSW it is always difficult to gauge what is really going on in other states. It seemed all was well in QLD until they decided to sell off public assets to fix some damage caused by the GFC. I just don't get the problem, Howard did this and we all voted him back in so is it wrong when labor does it? I am sure i will hear from my cousin soon, he sits in the Vic upper house. The reasoning will be interesting. I would have thought that the base issues for the vic's was how long that government had been there and that they really never liked Brumby anyway. As for SA don't know have no contact with their politics.
My point was more that with labor on the nose all around the country, why is it that the conservatives can not secure a clear and defining victory. In Tas and federal people swung to the greens rather than hand the lib's victory, SA got back just and again one seat is no resounding victory in Vic. It would seem we have a problem all round, no one trusts the main parties anymore.
I have voted for the greens in the past for the senate because i do not believe it to be in the national interest to have either the government or the opposition controlling the senate. We need only look at what happened in the last term of the Howard gov. Unfortunately the only party alternative left is the greens. I am awaiting now to see whether they can operate as the balance as the democrats did for many years or whether the next election will be the end of them.

Nairbe it is my view many who are green supporters are the way I see deep blue.
Refugees from an ALP that no longer exists.
And never will again every day you find some one willing to lament the ALP surge to the right, The very thing that bought them to government again, no thought is given to one thing.
Voters live in that part of the political paddock.
My party got lost,hearing just how bad Rudd was,just how weak some who failed to act earlier, I think this Castor oil is a needed wake up.
We can not on one hand say we dislike independents having too much say.
Then contribute to the problem by putting greens in a balance of the senate.
Remember please, more people do not want a green in any house than want to vote for them.
Both party's have true conservationists in them, both do not hide a radical agenda under a save the planet front.
Nairbe we need not worry, Labor will be better for this defeat, Bill Shorten is on the rise.

Belly...precisely who, in either major party, leaving out the Nationals who have no idea what they believe, beyond everything for themselves, is the least bit environmentally aware?

And just how much 'castor oil' are you prepared to drink?

By the way, an independent is not the same as a Green. For a start, all the so-called independents are from the rightwing, mainly the National Party.

And the radically inane agenda is on full display within the Coalition and the ALP, at all levels of government.

I will agree however, that Shorten is probably going to dislodge Gillard, whereupon we will all no doubt discover that he too is a born-again nitwit with Baptist roots, and not a single policy objective beyond The Lodge, like all the rest of 'em.

Nairbe in a post you said one seat is not a landslide.
Sorry it is 13 or 14 in fact a task that looked far away.
TBC you persist in telling me I am fixed and focused only on my thoughts.
In a way the best evidence I could want that you in fact are guilty of that.
But at least here in print, you again show why greens are getting support.
The unattractive and wrong belief they are a conservation party.
They are a radical minority always and forever.
This mornings news includes Labor members wanting Nuclear power true conservation greens will say no.

Belly, every vote that goes to the Greens seems to be a crushing blow to the lib/lab camp. I just don't get it. Sure they have some ridicules policy but it is hardly hidden it is all on show on their web site. The whole socialist revolution theory.... well come now who is being paranoid about socialism a union official? My point was that i do not trust the senate to be majority held by either major party. For that matter i don't have any trust in either major party. They both lie and deceive the electorate to achieve agenda's they are never honest about. So to allow some bunch of crazies a few seats is a small cost to ensure compromise.
I am not fussed on the current state of the house but it is probably the best reflection of the distrust the electorate has of government. We were deceived in to going to war and tricked into hateful policy on asylum seekers, then labor after promising to resolve both have done nothing but hold on to power.
The behaviour of the current liberal leader is of the most appalling standard, demonstrating that they have little to offer bar more of the ultra conservative paranoid rubbish Howard fed the country for 11 years. So tell me, why are we sitting in a vacuum of meaningful policy where everyone seems scared to do anything of substance bar maybe the NBN despite the cost which will blow out. My biggest issue is that the detractors are the one's that will make hugh profit from it when next in government.