November 27, 2003
SIMON THE UNLOVED
It’s happening again:
Simon Crean's support as Labor Party leader is bleeding away, with several of his key backers in the June leadership ballot shifting their support to alternative candidates.
None of whom are any better. The Bob Carr rumours will probably re-commence next week. Hey, why not recruit this guy?
UPDATE. Kate in comments refers to Kevin “good to be with you, Kerry” Rudd. It’s funny because it’s true.
Posted by Tim Blair at November 27, 2003 11:21 AM
I suspect that by now that lemon sucking expression on Howard's face has changed to a different flavour.
What else is labour going to give him for christmas? Are they going to be in the running for the Australian comedy awards as well? What about Margo? What does she think about all this? Will someone please think about Margo...... Tim do something!!!
Posted by: Rob at November 27, 2003 at 12:30 PM"SIMON Crean's support as Labor Party leader is bleeding away, with several of his key backers in the June leadership ballot shifting their support to alternative candidates."
Oh, no, no no. They've got it wrong. His appeal is simply becoming more...selective.
Richard.
Kevin (good to be with you Kerry) Rudd for the leadership? You've got to be joking.
Posted by: Kate at November 27, 2003 at 01:40 PMUntil I could actually be bothered finding out what Labors policies are, I'm quite happy to let Simon stay on.
Mind you, Mark Latham has been making some good comments about the economy lately, and I reckon he's shaping up to be a good party leader.
Mrk Latham is a joke. Not a very funny joke, I grant you, but still a joke.
Posted by: Toryhere at November 27, 2003 at 02:01 PMWhy complain? Simon Crean is the best thing to happen to the Liberals.
Posted by: donnyc at November 27, 2003 at 02:12 PMAnybody who beats up cab drivers can't be all bad and obviously has leadership potential . He could go a few rounds in the ring with Tony Abbott.
Posted by: Freddyboy at November 27, 2003 at 02:15 PMJust so long as he doesn't go a few rounds in the ring with Bob Brown.
Posted by: Habib at November 27, 2003 at 02:30 PMHe could go a few rounds in the ring with Tony Abbott.
Put boxing ring in the middle of the House of Reps, let Mark and Tony go a few rounds.
It would improve the ratings of Question Time.
Posted by: Peggy Sue at November 27, 2003 at 02:35 PMWord up- Simple Simon is making an announcement about his future this afternoon; looks like it's off to the backbench for Crean.
Posted by: Habib at November 27, 2003 at 03:04 PMCrean had the impossible job, you have to feel sorry for him, imagine having to lead that bunch of backstabbers and loonies through domestic and international crises. Being whiny didn't help though, not that Beazley was any better with his high-pitched drone interspersed with the fat guy huffing and puffing.
Posted by: ilibcc at November 27, 2003 at 03:14 PMBugger that. Type in "good to be with you" and "Rudd". He says it to everybody! It's a really creepy phrase.
Posted by: Gabor at November 27, 2003 at 03:16 PMI'm a Liberal who enjoys the sight of Labor in the dumps, but I honestly feel sorry for Crean.
The knives were out from day 1. I'm pointing the finger at that fat waste of space Beazley.
Posted by: FirstIraqThenChirac at November 27, 2003 at 03:21 PMCrean'll be like the Cheshire Cat - only the whine will be left hanging in space, loing after the body has disappeared.
Posted by: sleasybeazley at November 27, 2003 at 03:32 PMBugger that. Type in "good to be with you" and "Rudd". He says it to everybody! It's a really creepy phrase.
So, Gabor, how does that make you feel about our creepy prime minister?
www.australianpolitics.com/news/2000/00-07-26.shtml
sievx.com/articles/psdp/20010817HowardInterview.html
http://nationalsecurity.ag.gov.au/www/rwpattach.nsf/viewasattachmentPersonal/6381449D479D5504CA256B50000EFF94/$file/PM%20HOFM%20Hobart%20211.doc
http://www.pm.gov.au/news/interviews/Interview309.html
Or maybe our Treasurer:
www.treasurer.gov.au/tsr/content/ transcripts/2003/048.asp
www.treasurer.gov.au/tsr/content/ transcripts/2002/077.asp
Enough!
Posted by: Mork at November 27, 2003 at 03:34 PMPlease don't leave Simme. You are doing such a good job. And now that we've got Carmen the Forgetful in as el Presidente things are going to be so so much better.
Posted by: Razor at November 27, 2003 at 04:27 PMmove along! nothing to see here ppl! according to the SMH the liberal party is torn apart over the new ruddock/asio bill. LOL! bye simon!
Posted by: roscoe at November 27, 2003 at 06:33 PMmove along! nothing to see here ppl! according to the SMH the liberal party is torn apart over the new ruddock/asio bill. LOL! bye simon!
Posted by: roscoe at November 27, 2003 at 06:33 PMmove along! nothing to see here ppl! according to the SMH the liberal party is torn apart over the new ruddock/asio bill. LOL! bye simon!
Posted by: roscoe at November 27, 2003 at 06:33 PMmove along! nothing to see here ppl! according to the SMH the liberal party is torn apart over the new ruddock/asio bill. LOL! bye simon!
Posted by: roscoe at November 27, 2003 at 06:33 PMmove along! nothing to see here ppl! according to the SMH the liberal party is torn apart over the new ruddock/asio bill. LOL! bye simon!
Posted by: roscoe at November 27, 2003 at 06:33 PMmove along! nothing to see here ppl! according to the SMH the liberal party is torn apart over the new ruddock/asio bill. LOL! bye simon!
Posted by: roscoe at November 27, 2003 at 06:34 PMi did that on purpose! it's good to be with you tim!
Posted by: roscoe at November 27, 2003 at 06:38 PMGuys, my sister works as a parlimentary aide in the house of reps and she says Crean is definately gone. (so is Macklin) Currently Rudd is the favorite to replace. Apparently Beazley's not in the running (or so i heard.)
Posted by: Quentin George at November 27, 2003 at 08:13 PMI'm trying very hard, but I just can't imagine Kim Beazley running
Posted by: Jim Flair at November 27, 2003 at 10:08 PMJust think of the Hindenburg with legs.
I hope it is Kevin Rudd- he's even less popular than Simple Simon- a smug, pompous former bureaucrat with pretentions of intellegence and rumoured God-bothering; at this rate the Democrats or the Greens will be Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition after the next election.
Tee Hee.
You're too hard, Habib! I reckon Rudd is a pretty smart guy. He could make a half-way decent Minister if he wasn't tied down with a party where crazed left-wing lunatics have way too much say.
He has become a pain in the arse over the last two years with his continuing efforts to "differentiate" Labor from the Howard Government - all part of his campaign to raise his public profile. A lot of his criticisms have been just fucking peurile.
If it was really just up to him or Kim Beazley, we wouldn't have to worry about, say, preserving the Australia-US alliance. But the ALP itself can't be trusted on important stuff like this at this point in our history.
Posted by: Bob Bunnett at November 28, 2003 at 12:01 AMTB asserts of the alternative Labor Party leaders that:
None of whom are any better [than Crean].
So far as public opinion is concerned (which is the critical criteria for leadership choice in a democracy) the evidence points in the opposite direction.
Any one, a generic Labor leader, would be better than Crean:
Among all voters, almost a quarter said they would change their vote if Mr Crean was replaced as Labor leader, with the majority of those - 61 per cent - indicating a switch to Labor.
Presumably, this quartile of voters is indicative the sentiment of the swinging-median voter bloc. There are about 15 government-held seats within a 5% swing of the ALP. If preferences for a non-Crean-led ALP are running 60-40 the ALP's way, then the ALP would be able to pick up close to 2/3 ie ~10 of the marginal seats, which would give Labor victory (ie Howard's "Eight seats is all that stands betweenus and electoral oblivion,").
Beazley is the most popular alternative amongst Labor voters:
A Herald-ACNielsen poll, published yesterday, showed that Mr Beazley had five times more support than Mr Crean among Labor voters - 54per cent to 11 per cent
However, it appears that Bob Carr would be the most popular ALP leader amongst all voters:
A new poll suggests New South Wales Premier Bob Carr would be a more popular federal Labor leader than current Opposition leader Simon Crean.
...The poll shows 60 per cent of voters would prefer. Mr Carr as Opposition leader, with just 25 per cent saying they would prefer Mr Crean.
But the ALP can take little cheer from Carr, as mighty John Howard is still the most popular leader in Australia:
The Herald-AC Nielsen poll in today's Sydney Morning Herald newspaper shows despite Mr Carr's popularity, he would still have difficulty beating Prime Minister John Howard.Posted by: Jack Strocchi at November 28, 2003 at 06:57 AM
Check out Phat Phil's column in The Australian two days ago - basically tipping Rudd as The Next Big Thing.
This is almost as good as his prediction a few weks ago of Australian Prime Minister Simon Crean welcoming United States President Wesley Clark to Australia in a couple of years time.
Posted by: steve at November 28, 2003 at 09:48 AMKevin Rudd looks like John Denver and he's a Bible-basher as well. Probably even sings like him too.
Posted by: freddyboy at November 28, 2003 at 09:56 AMBut he's not dead, which is all that matters for Labour.
Posted by: ilibcc at November 28, 2003 at 09:59 AMSelections from Kim Beazley speaking to Catherine McGrath on ABC's Lateline, on the eve of the election which he lost, November 2001:
'John Howard has gone into this election campaign with a retirement plan. And as the election campaign has proceeded, that has become patently obvious. He does not have the puff to govern for the next three years and he's declared himself as not having the puff to govern for the next three years. And he's going to put in Costello ...
'You and I, Cathy, are entitled to rely on an operational matter. We're not talking here about a 'policy debate', if you like, though there's a policy issue related to it. On this particular incident, we're talking about an operational matter, not the policy as a whole. And you and I are entitled to rely on the word of the Prime Minister and his ministers, and to move on ...
'So, I am perfectly satisfied with the way in which we have conducted the campaign on that. And I'm also perfectly satisfied that my job as a - as the person who would want to lead this nation, is to present to the Australian people the total picture of what I am about to do. And I believe that I have done that with some degree of success during this election campaign in extraordinarily difficult circumstances ...
'Now, let me tell you what we do. We canvass. And we canvass for ourselves. We don't canvass for other people. We canvass for ourselves and we have been canvassing for ourselves over the telephone during the course of the last couple of weeks. And so do our political opponents. On all the detail of that, on who does what and who is responsible for that, I'd be grateful if you'd ring the national secretary of the Labor Party, because that is the side of the campaign that he conducts. What I conduct is the policy side ... We are not campaigning for any independents full stop. We are campaigning for ourselves and we are campaigning in a proper and respectable manner, unlike the Liberals, who introduced into this nation the notion of push polling. We reject it as a completely illegitimate use of the airwaves, if you like, or people's telephones. When we - when we are campaigning for the Labor Party, we say we're here representing the Labor Party. Now, that is what we do, and that is - and all the advice I have is clear cut with that. But if you want to go to the detail of it, kindly ring the national secretary ...
'I would have thought at this late stage of the campaign what you would want to ask me questions about is what I intend to do about the education problems in this country; what I intend to do about fixing the horrendous problems now in our aged care system - a burgeoning crisis ...
'I would think that you, as a person who is prominent in the media, would want to question me about what I intend to do about what happens around the kitchen table of the average Australian family who rely desperately on a government focussed on their needs, to make absolutely certain they have the happiness in life that they're entitled to. And that's what I've been about in this election campaign. And I've punched through the fog.’
Keep punching, Kim. The only fog is in your fat head.
k. my tip is bomber beazlee for opposition leader. the labor tards will reckon they need someone up on national security.
Posted by: roscoe at November 28, 2003 at 05:47 PMSurely you mean "Simon the Unlikeable"?
It's not like the ALP is going to Get Smart.
I'm guessing that Rudd will become leader of the opposition:
Beazley's had his go, (the same could be said of Howard, but the period between recycling was much greater for Howard)
Latham? With the kind of statements he's made, the only country he's fit to be PM of is Malaysia.
Rudd is fairly decent.
Posted by: Andjam at November 29, 2003 at 12:51 AM