Morgan has taken political polling to new heights.
According to the results, Labor voters just love soap operas — Passions, Days of our Lives, and the Young and the Restless. They also watch Insiders, Lateline and SBS News.
Coalition voters watch Dancing with the Stars, McLeod’s Daughters, travel and gardening shows, crime and drama shows, Business Sunday and National Nine News.
I am speechless!
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Yesterday, the Senate’s Legal and Constitutional Legislation Committee handed down its 300 page report on the Provisions of the Anti-Terrorism Bill (No. 2) 2005 (ATB2). In a fairly gutsy move from the Coalition senators, the committee made 52 bipartisan recommendations; most recommended changes to the government’s proposed anti-terrorism laws. On reading the report, the recommendations seemed eminently sensible.
ATB2 is based on an agreement between the Commonwealth, State and Territory Governments adopted at the Council of Australian Government’s (COAG) Terrorism Summit held in Canberra on 27 September 2005. Under the COAG Agreement, Premiers and Chief Ministers agreed to introduce complementary legislation for the purpose of introducing preventative detention for a period of up to 14 days and search powers. Key features of the Bill include:
Many of the committee’s recommendations go to ensuring people under control orders and preventative detention have adequate protections and appeal mechanisms. Other recommendations dealt with the new powers for ASIO. But for my money, the chapter on sedition and advocacy was the one to read. In summary the committee agreed with the repeal of the current sedition provisions in sections 24A to 24E the Crimes Act, but could not see a reason to replace those provisions as proposed.
5.167 The committee received an overwhelming amount of evidence in relation to the sedition provisions in Schedule 7 of the Bill. With the exception of the evidence from the Department and the AFP, this evidence indicated strong opposition to the sedition offences from all sectors of the community.
5.168 The committee agrees with many of the concerns raised in relation to the sedition provisions. The committee recognises that Schedule 7 is an attempt to update and modernise the existing offences of sedition already contained in the Crimes Act. However, the committee agrees with the evidence received that the removal of Schedule 7 from this Bill, pending the review foreshadowed by the Attorney-General, would not weaken Australia’s anti-terrorist capacity given the nature of the existing law in this area. In particular, the committee is not convinced of an urgent need for the provisions in light of existing laws such as the offence of treason (in section 80.1 of the Criminal Code) and the crime of incitement (in section 11.4 of the Criminal Code).
5.169 The committee acknowledges concerns about the potential impact of the sedition provisions on freedom of speech in Australia. Despite the Department’s various reassurances on this issue during the committee’s inquiry, the committee is troubled by evidence of the potential for ’self-censorship’ by a community cautious of the potential breadth of the provisions. The committee also notes the extensive expert legal evidence to this inquiry raising serious concerns about the provisions, including the clarity of various aspects, such as the fault elements and defences.
5.170 The committee acknowledges that the Attorney-General has committed to reviewing the sedition (and advocacy) provisions of the Bill next year. In that light, the committee agrees with the evidence received that it is inappropriate to enact legislation which is considered to be in need of review.
5.171 The committee therefore recommends that Schedule 7 be removed from the Bill in its entirety, pending a full and independent review.
The other big amendment suggested by the committee was a five-year sunset clause for the new anti-terrorism provisions, rather than the ten-year sunset clause agreed by COAG. The committee argued that there was no precedent for a ten-year sunset clause.
Reading the entrails of the Pittwater by-election is difficult — even thought the message has been delivered with all the subtlety of a sledgehammer. A twenty-five-plus per cent swing against the opposition to an independent and the loss of its third safest seat is some message for the Liberal party to digest. The Poll Bludger has been unable to find parallels.
As with most election losses, the spinmeisters are out in force to ensure their side of the story is put and put effectively. No one in politics wants to carry the can for an election loss.
The line from the newly ascendant Christian right is that John Brogden is to blame. Milne reports that the right is blaming Brogden for not publicly endorsing the non-local Liberal candidate, Paul Nicolaou, in the face of a popular local mayor and ultimate winner, Alex McTaggart.
Frankly, I find it hard to imagine the kind of endorsement that would have wound back the six percentage points necessary for the Liberals to win Pittwater. As for the implication — “it is not our fault for picking a non-local candidate; it is Brogden’s fault for not endorsing that candidate” — what can I say? It was naive and perhaps unreasonable for the right to expect the man it had defeated and humiliated so publicly would then jump to its tune and endorse his replacement. Revenge is, after all, a dish best served cold. (And anyway, Brogden’s face did appear on Nicolaou’s how-to-vote cards).
From the moderates’ perspective, the right took the electorate for granted and lost it. First the right brought Brogden down with a whispering campaign. Then it selected a non-local candidate. Ultimately, the electorate said “no” to the socially conservative (some would say extremist) ideology of the Christian right and its hegemony within the New South Wales Liberal party.
I find this analysis as self-serving as the last. Brogden was no saint. And the actions that led to his downfall, propositioning women and slurs against the wife of the former premier, would have been as distasteful with the electorate as any whispering campaign. Furthermore, the social conservativeness of local Federal member Bronwyn Bishop, has not been a tremendous liability for the Federal Liberal party in this seat. West noted that Bishop’s seat voted against the Republic referendum in 1999. The so-called doctor’s wives are not a big feature in Pittwater.
I have opted for a simpler explanation. Feuds within political parties are almost always damaging electorally, and almost always the fault of both sides of the dispute. In plain English: disunity is death. Ironically, the loss of Pittwater is likely to exacerbate factional differences within the Liberal party, at least for the short-term.
Having lost Pittwater, the Liberals have a huge challenge ahead. Antony Green noted that in New South Wales, strong and plausible independents have been a longstanding issue for the Coalition. Of the seven independents in the New South Wales parliament, six are from traditionally safe Coalition seats: Dubbo, Manly, Northern Tablelands, Pittwater, Port Macquarie and Tamworth. Furthermore, the trend appears to be that once an independent wins a safe Coalition seat they retain it at subsequent elections.
Green also argued that with seven independents, there is a chance the 2007 State election could see a hung parliament. While Green is technically correct, with the Liberals in disarray I think another Labor government more likely.
The world is full of sick puppies. In the past 24 hours I have had hundreds of search hits for nude images of Michelle Leslie. The top ten search terms for the last 24 hours are:
Top 10 searches in the past day:
michelle leslie nude (86)
michelle leslie pictures (29)
michelle leslie pics (24)
michelle leslie (19)
michelle leslie topless (12)
michele leslie (11)
michelle leslie photos (11)
michelle leslie nude photos (6)
“michelle leslie” nude (5)
leslie michelle, photos, australia (4)
This is a strange phenomenon. I guess it started with my blog or news feed pages - with the words ‘Michelle’, ‘Leslie’ and ‘nude’ falling randomly on the page. Now the published searches have become the target for subsequent searches. To add insult to injuty, my site comes up first on google when one searches for nude images of Michelle Leslie.
Sorry to disappoint, but I do not have any images of Michelle Leslie — nude or otherwise.
I am opposed to the death penalty, primarily because the judicial system makes mistakes. Australia’s best example of a judicial mistake is Lindy Chamberlain, who was convicted of murdering her nine week old child on circumstantial ‘expert’ evidence that was inconsistent with eyewitness accounts, the absence of blood on her own clothing, and the later discovery of the baby’s jacket.
In the United States the application of DNA technology to old cases has revealed a string of false convictions. For example, the Innocence Program has exonerated 163 wrongly convicted people through post-conviction DNA testing.
My contention is simple, if the judicial system cannot be relied upon to get it right 100 per cent of the time, if mistakes occur as they do, the state should not apply the ultimate (and irreversible) death penalty. The risk of applying the death penalty to the innocent is simply too high. It is better not to apply it at all.
In respect of Singapore and Indonesia I have added concerns. In my view, the application of the death penalty for medium level drug trafficking is disproportionate to the crime. Drugs are a scourge on society, and I can understand the desire of those governments to take a tough stance in their penalty regimes. But the death penalty is too tough.
A second concern is not just that the death penalty exists, but that in Singapore its application is mandatory. Singapore has a mandatory death sentence for the possession of 30 grams of heroin, 30 grams of cocaine, 500 grams cannabis, 200 grams of cannabis resin, and 250 grams of methamphetamine. At least in Indonesia the application of the death penalty for drug offences is discretionary.
These are not abstract issues. Ten Australians — Tuong Van Nguyen and at least some if not all of the Bali-9 — are likely to be executed for drugs offences; Nguyen as early as next Friday.
But nor are they issues that can be assessed on the merits of the death penalty alone. While I oppose the death penalty, I accept it is ultimately a matter for Singapore and Indonesia to determine for themselves — just as Australia has decided to abolish the death penalty. I understand that Singapore has achieved a relatively low use of illicit drugs through tough sanctions; and that this outcome has a high level of support in Singapore. While the outcomes in Indonesia are less clear, in part this reflects Indonesia’s lower levels of economic development.
And I accept that Australians in those countries must abide by the laws of those countries. There is little doubt that Nguyen and the Bali-9 were trafficking. There is no reason that Singapore or Indonesia should waive penalties for Australian convicts that would otherwise apply to Singaporean or Indonesian convicts. The law should apply in the same way to all regardless of their nationality. We would not accept the reverse situation in Australia, such that foreign nationals get a lighter sentence at their government’s intervention than Australian citizens receive. If Australia’s opposition to the death penalty is seen as tied to the cases of particular Australians, it will be seen as special pleading.
Finally, I have sympathy for the families of those to be executed. Doubtless they are and will experience substantial anguish. I cannot image how I would feel if it were my children in that position.