Lexi, no joy but please do not put your faith in voters.
I knew last night was to be as it is.
And spin played little part in it.
I live for the ALP.
And my union.
Because fundamentally they care.
Both know we exist in a whole world, our success will be found in our understanding, change and reform, MUST become part of our every day existance.
I am in it up to my chin!
But change so far, is only a word, one my party is not yet fair dinkum about.
Blame those who bought this about last night, QLD Labor.
But too, stop kidding your self, Gillard has one skill, no other is seen in public,she is good at keeping her team behind her.
And no use at all, in keeping the voters even informed,a switch exists, it flicks to off, people stop listening, as she starts to speak.
Only Tony Abbott,keeps her a float, for now.
Only Abbott gives Labor any chance, in Canberra.
Throw mud and some sticks.
Throw a Prime Minister out mid term,one such as QLDS loved Rudd, and its Labor blood in the streets.
Bill Shorten will lead the ALP not far in our future.
He,one day will be as popular as Rudd, he is as competent.
But first he must unite my party and convince the foolish we are far better than the manufactured headlines.
We, you and I must never stop supporting the best government Labor,but demanding that change too.
And if we try to turn a massive rejection in to a soft landing?
We too become spin doctors as is the case with a few here, let us not do that.

Labor came down hard in QLD, congratulations to CN, probably the worst thing is an out of balance parliament.
Lets hope he uses his new found powers to the good. He says he has the first 100 days worked out, i wonder if the rest of his side no about it.

It was also clear that one of the factors that increased the hurt for Labor was the nature of the campaign they ran. A very negative one without evidence to back it up. At the end they shifted to a "We'll probably loose but don't give them to much power" mesaage. After all the preceding spin and lies I suspect that message was lost.

I'm personally very pleased with the outcome but wondering if either side will learn from this. Voters are sick and tired of gevernments that talk about reshaping states andcountries but which seem to mostly make out lives harder. We are sick of the lies, sick of the spin, sick of the unfounded dirt throwing and directorships for party faithful.

Will the LNP be much better? I don't know, I hope so but only time will tell. They have a tough job ahead forming a good government with so many first termers but at the same time having so many new people might let them avoid some of the old entrenched political behaviours.

My hope is that the thrashing Qld Labor took last night is a powerful lesson to politicians else where, that those wanting to keep their seats might decide to work a lot harder to ensure good government trumps party values.

R0bert

In defeat, Labor figures still raving on about need to uphold its values.

I think the electorate see through rhetoric, and expects a solid policy mix based on existing policy realities which any smart party needs to adapt to and offer change that can appeal.

Carbon tax alone looks like one of biggest miscalculations ever, along with other factors.

I just hope that reform by LNP done in fair way, while addressing its legitimate concerns such as spending and boosting eco activity and so on.

A bit of irony about woman and politics. Labor has tried to promote woman into positions of leadership and ultimately into office, with all things being equal that must be a good thing. The only proviso is you do not promote simply based on gender, otherwise you disregard the potential of 50% of the population, and you may end up with the best of the worst choices. Do not know Anna Bligh or Julia Gillard by that was the case with Kristina Keneally in NSW, you could even end up with an Amanda Vanstone, fortunately this one never actually made it into office as the One Nation leader Pauline Hanson. That's not to say there are not some outstanding women in politics such as Christine Milne, Sarah Hanson-Young, Rachel Siewert, Penny Wright, Larissa Waters and my personal pick from an outstanding group of individuals Lee Rhiannon, To be fair there are also some very good men in parliament at the federal level,Richard Di Natale, Scott Ludlum, Adam Bandt and of course that great statesman of Australian politics Dr Bob brown.
The irony is in the 50's and 60's it was the women's vote that kept 'Pig Iron' Bob Menzies in power, 'Pig Iron' believed a woman's place was bare foot, pregnant, and in the kitchen. Takes all kinds.

Brisbane train station was a very busy place last night.

There was the early departure of the 8:15 pm ALP special, containing the entire ALP contingent of about seven MP’s. They were accompanied by zero Greens MP’s who had successfully managed to drive their support base to something less than zero. The departure board showed this train’s destination was “political oblivion” and all passengers appear to have one way tickets.

Shortly after this the first of the media trains left. The CH7, 9 and 10 train was packed with excided TV journo’s discussing the second installment of the $275m in taxpayer’s money for license fee rebates announced by Gillard last week. They are excited about their new business model, “cash for comment”. This trains destination was shown as “The ALP’s Pocket”.

The Canberra Press Gallery departed with much talk about the great ALP victory. The singing was led by Laurie Oakes with Kumbya as they returned to their home base of “Journalisms La La land” in Canberra.

The ABC train left last with the rail attendant complaining that all passengers we occupying only the seats on the left. They all refuted the attendant’s assertion with a series of 1,000 word essays.

The ABC’s representative, Kerry O’Brien, a man never lost for words was asked for his assessment of the election to which he replied. “Well….er, this is er….., It seems as though…er…., What you need to… er… understand…., I think….er…., Well perhaps…er. Asked if he would like a seat he looked at all the empty seats to the right of the carriage and said he would rather stand!

Julia Gillard was interviewed this morning and said that Queensland voters had sent a very strong message, particularly about cost of living and the CO2 Tax. She said it was their democratic right to have their voices heard, at least until she could get her MeeeeJaa Review Board in place.

There are also reports of ALP galahs flying around in small flocks squawking, “State issues, squawk! State issues, only state issues, squawk, squawk!”