Well, Crikey, I dunno. Where are the Insights from this tactical screed? It's not totally accurate, for a start. Whilst the focus was of course on the lower house, both Herald's ACNielsen poll and a small one commissioned by News (Galaxy) forecast the result well. ACNielsen even over-estimated the win.
But I was expecting this result after reading Hugh Mackay's article a week or so before. Here is a man whose mind we know but who also learns the mind of the community through his own empirical methods. He forecast in sadness against his hopes. Would we agree that policies that are "too complex" need to be simplified in order to be sold to the electorate, instead of being matched to the need? Or that a campaigns should deliberately swing further towards negativity? Clearly *people* need to change for the better - not campaigns for the worse - if this is the thinking. Alan Ramsay in yesterday's Herald certainly thought so. He wore his heart on his sleeve. No heart in this analysis below. No questions about ourselves as a people. One worrying propect identified, though (amongst many): the idea that Packer may get carte blanche for a takeover of Fairfax. I got all my mateiral above from the Sydney Morning Herald. It may not be a perfect paper, but it offers more than the web-based journalism I've encountered so far. It even managed to have a piece on Aboriginal health - that great neglected issue that our UCA was pushing - just before the election. "Campaign" strategy for me henceforth will be on getting people on subcriptions like the Herald - and talking. Or at least getting them to watch my 15 minutes compulsory TV each week - ABC's Media Watch (Mondays, 9:15 pm). It would include Insights mailing list too, as long as there are insights to share. David -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of John Maynard Sent: Monday, 11 October 2004 09:07 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Sadly, That's Politics http://www.crikey.com.au/politics/2004/10/10-0006.html Crikey's Sunday election post-mortem By The Crikey Team Here are some of the election items sent to subscribers on Sunday after the dust had settled from John Howard's spectacular triumph. Will Howard go the full Fightback! agenda? No-one picked it. ... So why did Labor do so badly? There will be a torrent of analysis this week and we'd love to hear your views to boss @crikey.com.au and might even work up a survey on the issue. To kick things off, here are seven government positives and Labor negatives: ... 1. Labor failed to prove its economic credentials and Latham should have talked more about economic management and reform. 2. Labor's advertising and campaigning was too positive, even though Howard was constantly called dishonest. 3. The Labor policies were too complex, came too late and created too many losers. ... Crikey's man in the Press Gallery, Hugo Kelly, writes: To the winner the spoils, and the next three years will see John Howard control both houses of Parliament - the Senate either directly or via the religious fundamentalists at Family First. There can be no complaint from Labor. The people have spoken and the verdict delivered. For Mark Latham and his party, the hard work of serious Opposition begins today. ... Former Labor hack Hugo Kelly writes: ... Ted Horton take a bow and bring back Singo An advertising expert writes: Simon Canning was right on Friday in The Australian when he singled out the Liberal's advertising was much much better than Labor's. Even though the interest rate campaign was misinformation it hit the nerve of a public who really don't have much interest or a grasp of economics. Intelligent people I know were fooled. ... Singo is the man. They've got about two years to ponder it. ... Copyright � 1999 - 2004 Crikey Media Pty Ltd. All rights reserved http://www.crikey.com.au/politics/2004/10/10-0006.html ------------------------------------------------------------------- John Maynard ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) PO Box 600, Cowes VIC 3922 Australia ------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------------ - You are subscribed to the mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] - To unsubscribe, email [EMAIL PROTECTED] and put in the message body 'unsubscribe insights-l' (ell, not one (1)) See: http://nsw.uca.org.au/insights-l-information.htm ------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------------ - You are subscribed to the mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] - To unsubscribe, email [EMAIL PROTECTED] and put in the message body 'unsubscribe insights-l' (ell, not one (1)) See: http://nsw.uca.org.au/insights-l-information.htm ------------------------------------------------------
