rickeyre.com

I am starting to think that the Intertubes are not going to have the impact on this Federal Election that the major parties may have been hoping for. Nonetheless, it's good for having a squizz at the TV ads without having to anywhere the Dreaded Commercial Television.

Top of the bill tonight, the Liberal Party's latest Truthful Scrutiny Ad. It's a cheap shot, but nonetheless it's one of the most incisive election ads I've ever seen, as much as anything for its simplicity. It just happens to be based upon a false premise.

Secondly, an excerpt from Bob Brown's address to the National Press Club on Wednesday (full transcript in PDF here).

And finally, a Dead Man Powerwalking verbally abuses a giant rabbit.

Lindsay, covering the Penrith-St Marys district of outer western Sydney, was one of the Liberals' most unexpected scalps in 1996 when Jackie Kelly toppled Ross Free. Kelly has said "enough" after eleven years and one of her staffers, Karen Chijoff, is aspiring to succeed her.

North-western Tasmania, including Devonport, Burnie, Smithton and King Island. Home of the Mersey Hospital, that most blatant of pork barrels that JWH announced on the Intertubes before even discussing it with the state government, and condemned by many as bad, populist, policy. Here is one of Bud Abbott's defences of the takeover.

I'm not going to make any apologies for spruiking the Greens' candidates for the Senate all over Australia, not just in New South Wales. Scott Ludlam, top of the Greens senate ticket in WA, has made a half-hour animated video called "Climate of Hope". It's on Youtube in three parts, and I'll slip it in as an extra election Youtube selection for today.

Political debates really serve little purpose. They do, sometimes, distort the vote depending on who performs best. It all started with Kennedy v Nixon, which arguably won the 1960 Presidential election for JFK (though some would credit Mayor Daley of Chicago and his team of vote-riggers). But look at America now. The "presidential" debates have gotten way out of control. We've had squllions of debates with squillions of Republican and Democrat hopefuls this year, the year before the presidential election.

So we are told that 70% of the Rudd inner cabinet would be former union officials.

Well d'oh! Even if the stats were true, and not blatantly distorted, it is the Australian Labor Party.

But then I guess the other side think that political parties only have a name to look pretty. Otherwise you would have liberals in the Liberal Party.

What you do have in the Liberal Party is a lot of lawyers. Solicitors, barristers, corporate lawyers, small-time suburban solicitors (guess who that is), QCs, you name it.

Four videos today. Saeed Khan is the Greens candidate for my local electorate of Grayndler, he did a video in August as part of the kick-off of his election campaign. On, then, to the Leaders: Rudd switching off a video of a Liberal ad saying "oh come on Howard", followed by Howard switching off a video of Rudd switching off a video of a Liberal ad and saying "grow up" to Rudd.

As at 17 October 2007.

Grayndler - I'm a fan of Anthony Albanese as I have previously documented on this blog, indeed it was one of my entries that led to his photo appearing on the Times Online cricket blog last year. Having said that, it is likely that I will vote for Saeed Khan of the Greens and give Albanese second preference.

All of my blog entries on the 2007 Federal Election can now be reached directly from www.rickeyre.com/blog/auselection2007. Please note the Y2K compliance :-)

The URL for the RSS feed is www.rickeyre.com/blog/taxonomy/term/734/0/feed.

I'll be adding a series of position statements on my voting intentions, recommendations and policy analyses in the coming weeks - complete with variations noted if I should change my mind!

According to the Newspoll published in today's The Australian, 49% of respondents said that the Coalition (Liberal/Nats, not The Willing) would best handle national security, while 26% said the Labor Party. (And 25% either uncommitted, or with another choice.)

I really can't understand for the life of me how anyone could argue that the Libs have demonstrated competence in handling national security.

Consider their record: