Australian Federal Election 2022

[willedoo]

I forgot to add obnoxious.

[Bruce Tuncks]

I'm hostile to the greens because they won't consider nuclear power. Yes, there is a good argument that nuclear is more expensive than I thought, but the greens are against nuclear for religious type reasons which are nonsense.

They don't understand the concept of "least worst" and so I reckon they are idiots.

[old man emu]

8 minutes ago, Bruce Tuncks said:

I'm hostile to the greens because they won't consider nuclear power.

Nuclear power plants operate in 32 countries and generate about a tenth of the world's electricity.  Providing even one-quarter of our electricity through nuclear would substantially reduce carbon dioxide emissions and improve air quality. What's there argument against it?

 

The Australian Greens believe that:

1. The burden of Australia’s nuclear supply chain and proposed waste storage is disproportionately borne by First Nations peoples. It significantly and negatively impacts on their culture, connection to country, well-being, and their right to manage land, natural resources, and water. (Yet the First Nations peoples would benefit from clean air, less global warming and cheaper power costs. What if we simply put the waste back into the ground we dug the ore from?)

2. The world should be free of nuclear weapons and the nuclear fuel chain. (Fair enough, but if we don't join the nuclear fuel chain and just bury the used stuff, we wont add to weapons proliferation.)

3. There is a strong link between the mining and export of uranium and nuclear weapons proliferation. (Probably, but we can make laws to prohibit that.)

4. Nuclear weapons, nuclear accidents or attacks on reactors all pose unacceptable risks of catastrophic consequences for humans and the environment. There is no effective way to address nuclear disaster, therefore nuclear weapons should be eliminated and nuclear energy production should be phased out. (Incidents do happen, but the causes are most often traced back to staff making mistakes. We are learning from our mistakes and developing procedures to minimise them. Often that involves better design of waste storage.)

5. Future generations must not be burdened with dangerous levels of radioactive waste.(But it's OK to increase CO2 and particulate levels in the atmosphere.)

6. Nuclear power is not a safe, clean, timely, economic or practical solution to reducing global greenhouse gas emissions. (Neither is coal-fired. Hydro-electric water storages collapse. Geo-thermal, solar, wind and tidal are not likely to meet the demands of a electricity hungry society.) 

7. Australia's reliance on the United States nuclear weapons 'umbrella', which lends our bases, ports and infrastructure to the US nuclear war fighting apparatus, poses a significant threat to peace and disarmament. (So, do we  give equal opportunity to those regimes which aren't following the USA's foreign policies? What if we simply tell the warmongers to bugger off? Can we really trust the USA to come to our defence any more than Britain did when it had its back to the wall?)

[kgwilson]

Scomo was cynically called "Scotty from Marketing" from the beginning after his knifing of Turnbull. He had risen to his level of incompetence, first as the head of the NZ Tourist Board, falsely claiming he was responsible for one of the best marketing slogans ever, "100% Pure NZ" when he had absolutely nothing to do with it. He made the claim after he was fired. Then his disastrous & very short lived "Where the bloody hell are you" slogan as head of the Australian Tourist Board, from which he was quietly let go & concentrated on politics from that point.

 

He didn't fool any one who was informed or who wasn't a complete one eyed Liberal but managed to con the public for a while until it all began to unravel in full floodlight mode with the Hawaii holiday. A lot of the libs knew it but were caught like deer in the headlights & backed up his lies and deceit till they lost. Now they are all wide eyed & knowledgeable about what happened. The problem is can they find a cure for the cancer that has set in or will it slowly kill them off until some 2 headed phoenix arises from the ashes, one head to embrace the Teals & the other the ultra right. At the moment they seem to be heading down the path of the latter.

[Marty_d]

Was he responsible for "C U in the NT" as well?  It'd be very appropriate if that were the case.

 

2 hours ago, Bruce Tuncks said:

I'm hostile to the greens because they won't consider nuclear power.

The Greens have made some mistakes - for example not supporting Kevin Rudd's  ETS - but this isn't one of them.  It takes a very long time to commission new nuclear power plants, and all the problems with the fuel, plus cooling etc... then look at what happens when they go wrong.  Solar & wind farms, big batteries, pumped hydro will cover our energy needs and then some.  There's simply no need for nuclear in this country.

[pmccarthy]

No need because we have no substantial industry except mining.

[Old Koreelah]

Let’s hope that Australia is clever enough to develop our natural resource advantages before the world stops buying our coal and iron ore.

 

Our nation needs to rapidly transition to solar-power for our grid, transport and for processing and value-adding of our minerals.

 

Nobody can blockade us from the sun.

[spacesailor]

The big problem with nuclear plants, is the have to LIFT cooling water from below their need.

The use of having a water level ABOVE the reactor, would have saved ' Chernonoval ' from it,s meltdown.

Only one, to date has been built to this formula. 

spacesailor

 

[old man emu]

Spacey, what would you rather drive - a Model-T or a 2022-build car? While the general functioning of both vehicles is the same, there are 114 years of learning from experience between the two. Now apply that to nuclear power plants. The first commercial nuclear power plant was built in 1957. Now we have had 65 years' experience with them. It is inherent that modern plants are safer than the originals.

 

And what are we looking at here? The purpose of the nuclear reactor is to produce heat to turn turbines which are coupled to generators which produce electric current. Apart from the steam generation method, everything else in a power station and its associated electricity distribution system is the same. So, it could be feasible to decommission the steam generating system of a coal-fired plant and replace it with a nuclear one. I acknowledge that there would be some cooling problems to deal with, but they would not be insurmountable.

 

This morning they announced a big increase in the price of electricity as generating costs have risen by 100% in the past 12 months. I suspect that the cost increase has been due to the cost of coal, and maybe the costs of pollution reduction systems. 

[Yenn]

Not only electricity, but also gas prices are rising. I saw in todays paper that gas was $44 per whatever. A year or so ago Gladstone was exporting it to China and wherever at $8 per whatever ( giga joule maybe)

Businesses in Australia have been hit so hard that some are considering closing down, while no doubt China is still getting it cheap.

[old man emu]

2 hours ago, Yenn said:

usinesses in Australia have been hit so hard that some are considering closing down, while no doubt China is still getting it cheap.

Wasn't that Little Johnny's expert negotiating?

[Old Koreelah]

1 hour ago, old man emu said:

Wasn't that Little Johnny's expert negotiating?

I believe Howard signed a 25 year deal to sell Aussie gas linked to Singapore crude oil price. When oil prices unexpectedly fell, so did the price for our export customers, but Australian businesses couldn’t hope to buy our own gas that cheaply. I bet this did lots of damage to local industry.

Another short-sighted mistake, bur surely that 25 deal has now expired.

[onetrack]

But our fuel prices at the bowser are always linked to world oil prices, aren't they?? Talk about political idiocy in decision-making, at its best.

[Jerry_Atrick]

One of the responsibilities I have for my sins is running market risk projects, and ironicallly, yesterdaay, we were talking about the correlation of the crude price to the petrol price - and what an almost fallacy it is. The below chart is the 10 year brent crude spot price curve:

WTI will be much the same in terms of price and direction. Note, in 2014, the absolute price is the same as today, so there has been a small spike recently to almost $140/barrel, but is currently around $115.

 

Have you noticed how when the oil prices rise, the cost of petrol rises a couple of days  to a week later, but when the price falls, the "drift" of the price falling is much longer, and never returns to pre-oil price rise levels? So, when the price was around $110 on average/barrel, back in 2014, we were paying (over here), aboutr £1.35 - £1.40 a litre. Even when the price per barrel retreated, to average arouund $50-is/barrel, the lowest price at the pump was around 99p/litre. So, for a 50% drop in oil, eventually, the petrol price went down by c. 35% (I can't be bothered doing the exact math).

 

Price goes up again, and except for a brief period at $130-ish/barrel, we are around an average of $115/barrell. The price of petrol averages £1.70 and Deisel about £1.80 - after a 5% reduction in VAT (GST) applied to petrol (government are fining garages that don't pass on the discount).

 

OK - the price of distribution is up,  but looking at shipping futures contracts (which includes space on oil tankers, and fuel delivery trucks), the per-litre increase in costs in 10 years of low inflation was bugger all. I have only worked in commodities markets for a very short period, and didn't look at the trading or risk side of things - just regulatory reporting. But, between crude oil and the petrol pump are gasoil futures, and gasoline futures. And these more accurately reflect the pump price than crude oil. It tracks the crude oil sort of, but is less volatile.. which would imply why the petrol prices don't fluctuate as much at the pump (as well as greedy execs, too).

 

Here is the Gasoline futures historical price chart:

 

[Jerry_Atrick]

Back to the election...

 

Well, in the aftermath, Albo has at least made good on his desire to remove the high level of discourse in Aussie politics, critcising Plibersek for likening him to Voldermort: https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/politics/federal/shouldn-t-have-said-it-anthony-albanese-condemns-tanya-plibersek-for-comparing-peter-dutton-to-voldemort-20220526-p5aons.html?ref=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_source=rss_feed

 

Meanwhile, in an act of trying to save the election by being even more divisive and contravening convention: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-05-27/scott-morrison-instructed-border-force-election-day-boat/101101464

 

I had people in the office yesterday aske me my opinion on the Aussie election. My response was I was very proud of the Aussie electorate... Because while the Trumpian party, er LNP, suffered its worst loss ever, the ALP wasn't delivered an landslide victory as it presented itself as more or less visionless (since the "win", it bas been a bit different, I will admit). I was proud that the Aussies decided enough was enough, and treated both of the majors accordingly...

 

[Marty_d]

Yeah, everyone else already calls him Voldemort, but she shouldn't have said it on radio.

 

Mind you, then Voldemort was being interviewed about it and said "I've got broad shoulders, water off a duck's back, I pay no attention to insults..."

Really?  Like you didn't actually SUE someone who insulted you on Twitter (only to lose on appeal)?

Also, this is the man who got caught on a hot mike joking about how Pacific Islanders were going to lose their homes due to climate change.  Bet they're real impressed that this idiot now leads the LNP.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-09-11/dutton-overheard-joking-about-sea-levels-in-pacific-islands/6768324

[willedoo]

2 hours ago, Jerry_Atrick said:

the ALP wasn't delivered an landslide victory as it presented itself as more or less visionless (since the "win", it has been a bit different, I will admit).

And there's the rub: bold agendas lose elections. These days, parties are better off going to the polls as a small target, and then working on the more daring stuff while in office. It can work if they bring the public along with them, and if it's good, well explained policy.

[spacesailor]

The party,s over . Names have changed !.

But

Everything is the same. Prices go up, & everybody blames the other one's. 

spacesailor

 

[facthunter]

It's CHANGED all right.  In Politics, IF you aren't THERE, you aren't anywhere. Nev

[old man emu]

2 hours ago, willedoo said:

These days, parties are better off going to the polls as a small target, and then working on the more daring stuff while in office.

You could call that the "Wedge Approach to Political Change". Mankind has been using wedges to break up monoliths for eons. But it makes sense not to rock the political boat too much as you get in. People know that each Party has different policies and agendas. If the people elect a Party with a different agenda, then there's that period  at the start when the people are sussing out the new Government. You shouldn't call it "The Honeymoon Period" because that implies something euphoric. I suggest that the best way to go is the "Test the Water" way. Test the feelings by doing something simple giving a quick result, then as the people become accepting of your Party, start attacking the bigger things.

 

Albo has been reported doing this twice. First he demonstrated that he was going to control the conduct of media sessions when he told the reporters that shouting wouldn't win them the chance to pose a question. Next he showed that he wasn't going let his Party play the personal attack game by chiding Plibersek for her likening Dutton to Voldemort simply on appearance. Maybe Albo is heeding Teddy Roosevelt's advice Too many people forget to say the last bit.

[kgwilson]

Reminds me of Marl Knopflers song "Don't Crash the Ambulance" which was about George HW Bush's advice to George W Bush when he took the US presidency. From the last verse below & of course the last line is definitely American. 

 

"We don't forget who put us here, jack
That's page one
We talk soft but carry a big stick
And pack the biggest gun"

[Jerry_Atrick]

A rendition of SFM's time  in power, I guess

 

[onetrack]

He makes a good egg-flipper, maybe that's really his true lifes calling. I wouldn't be in the least surprised to see him become a lay preacher, or go into some other major churchy job, where the ability to con people to join up with his group, and hand over their hard-earned on a regular basis, is a primary skill requirement.

[old man emu]

The next phase of this discussion will be watching where the deposed Libs get employed. Where will Josh Frydenberg end up? Will he simply have a gap year spanning three years and then stand again for the seat he lost? Will he take advantage of his insider knowledge gained as Minister for Energy and Resources and start working as the coal's face?

[onetrack]

One thing is for sure. If the Libs don't change their spots completely, and undergo a "Road to Damascus" conversion, so to speak, and continue to stick with the same faces that are associated with the Morrison era, then they will stay in the political wilderness for another 4 or 5 election cycles - barring Labor doing something idiotically stupid.

 

The Libs need to re-invent themselves, and produce a whole new lineup of ministers who have empathy with the "working classes", who recognise the signs of dissent amongst voters when they have policies that the voters disagree with, and who can change those policies rapidly - and be able to disassociate themselves from the corporate lobbyists, and the super-rich end of town.

 

The super-rich end of town has, for too long, had multiple advantages handed to them on a plate - tax reductions, investment breaks, massive grants, and just straight-out political favouritism, and quite likely, subtle political bribery.

They have continually gained mind-boggling wealth at the expense of the Average Joe and Josephine, and it's time the scales were rebalanced.

 

The problem as I see it, is that the Liberal Party apparatchiks who have gained unwarranted and unearned political and controlling powers, will not change things too soon or too rapidly, for fear of losing those powers. And that's where the root-and-branch pruning needs to commence.