|
September 9, 2013
Tony Abbott won a decisive political victory. Greens and Labor will no longer hold a blocking majority in the 76-seat Senate after July 2014.
Australia is now "open for business." Big Business cheers the rout of the ALP and says the return of confidence for it and consumers will now surge. Commentators take Abbott at his word that his Coalition government both understands the limits of power as well as its potential, and that it will be a good government that governs for all Australians.
David Rowe
The junk yard dog, the bomb thrower, the ideological warrior who inflamed the tribal hatred with mass deceptions, the wrecker, is really a position player; a natural conservative--that is a compassionate, measured one focused squarely on economic growth and national prosperity.
What kind of economic growth and what kind of prosperity though? Well, for starters, we know that being “open for business” is certainly not the case for large-scale renewables. The Coalition’s vow that it is open for business – and its promise to cut green tape is pitched almost entirely to the mining industry.
The AFR editorial says it is pro-business interpretation of economic growth and prosperity:
it is crucial that Mr Abbott now clearly sets the direction and tone in his government’s first 100 days through his planned commission of audit, by setting a credible path back to budget surplus, acting to cut red and green tape and advancing the tax review and the Productivity Commission’s review of the Fair Work Act. This would clarify the Abbott agenda and cement expectations within the Coalition, across the new legislature and throughout the land.
Abbott's rhetorical reference to Robert Menzies's desire for a country of "lifters, not leaners" suggests a winding back of the nanny state and the restoration of personal responsibility. Does the Coalition's deregulation zeal imply small government?
The Australian, which claims that is tied to no party, to no state, and has no chains of any kind, thunders away in its editorial:
Despite [thee fall of the Greens' vote of almost a third to 8.4 per cent.]he Greens' support appears to have firmed in some inner-city suburbs, particularly in Victoria. The absolutism that drives it remains a potent and dangerous political force, as Adam Bandt's victory in the seat of Melbourne demonstrates. The cultural pull it exerts cannot but damage Labor. It is impossible to image a Labor platform that will appeal to working families in middle Australia while appeasing the absolutist tendencies of the Greens.
The Greens need to be banished from power in the Senate because they are the enemy within a democracy: the few who sabotage the interests of the many who undermine stable and effective government.
|
So the new Senate consists of a ragtag group of rev-heads and gun, bible and sports loving senators. Right wing populists who floated in on the conservative tide.