Only Tony Abbott can fix what Malcolm Turnbull broke in the Liberal Party (Australia)

Herald Sun (Melbourne) ^ | 4th July 2016 | Andrew Bolt

[naturalman1975]

TONY Abbott must return as leader of the shattered Liberals after Saturday’s election disaster.

.....

True, Abbott ideally needs months more to repair the image that a smart-arse media tore to shreds, feeding off his sometimes dumb mistakes. But who else but Abbott could hope to fix what Turnbull has just smashed?

This election result has been a near-total catastrophe for the Liberals, who have been left without a mandate, platform, unity, honour or real power after letting Turnbull hijack their party last year.

Turnbull, a man of the ABC Left, then ditched the Liberals’ base, Liberal principles and even the Liberals’ party colours to campaign on virtually nothing but a fantasy tax cut for business.

.....

Why did he treat the Liberals’ base as trash, smashing it with a huge tax grab on superannuation, repeatedly snubbing Abbott and talking up almost every social cause of the Left, from same-sex marriage to global warming?

.....

Why did he call the colonial settlement of Australia an “invasion”, hold an Iftar dinner with known Muslim hate-preachers during the election campaign or tell (now Senator-elect) Pauline Hanson she was not a “welcome presence” in Parliament?

.....

True, Abbott is not the perfect answer. His public image is bad and many journalists have banked their reputation on painting him as an idiot. Still, he’s acknowledged his mistakes and time is making him seem better already. Almost every member of a focus group shown on Sky News last week praised Abbott as a man of conviction, as opposed to Turnbull’s flim flam.

.....

Few could now heal the party as Abbott could. Note the muted applause for Turnbull at recent party conferences and, in contrast, the cheers for Abbott.

And if he’s still not your candidate to lead the battered Liberals, tell me who is?

[naturalman1975]

Remember in Australia, the Liberal Party is the name of the main conservative party - at least it was before Malcolm Turnbull was in charge and at its base, in its roots, it still is.

[headstamp 2]

Can you give us a quick run through on what the political situation looks like now?

[Nextrush]

Politics in Australia as in Prime Minister or Opposition Leader has been a revolving door in recent years, how long can Abbott last if he comes back?

They dumped Abbott for Turnbull hoping to win the election, which is in doubt at this point.

[naturalman1975]

Simply put, we had an election on Saturday. Like the US, our legislature has two chambers (named in the same way) a House of Representatives and a Senate. The Prime Minister is the leader of the party or coalition that controls the House of Representatives. Laws need to be passed by both houses. We went into this election with a comfortable conservative (Liberal/National Coalition) majority in the House. We still don't have the final count, but it's looks like it's going to be a near dead heat with both the Coalition and the Labor Party holding about the same number of seats and independents and minor party candidates having the balance of power. We might hold on in that case with the support of those independents/minors - or Labor may take over government with their support. Even if we do hold on, it will likely be by a razor thin margin.

And our situation in the Senate (where we were already in the minority and they blocking a lot of things) has got even worse.

At the 2013 election, we elected a true conservative government lead by a true conservative Prime Minister (Tony Abbott). Unfortunately, largely due to a hostile media environment, he became very unpopular, and eventually about a year ago in a panic, his party voted to replace him with the centrist Malcolm Turnbull who was seen as more popular. If Turnbull had done well in this election, that might have seemed defensible in the end - but he's failed. Even if he's managed to hang on by the skin of his teeth, this just isn't good enough.

[headstamp 2]

Thank you for taking the time to write that great information.

[NRx]

I am a huge fan of Mr. Abbott, who is indeed a true conservative (with some differences from the American flavor owing to Anglo-Australian history culture etc.). He is staunchly pro-life, deeply opposed to the invasion of his country by illegal immigrants, and he is an unabashed monarchist in a country where the political left is deeply infected with small (r) republicanism.

[montag813]

We all predicted this when they allowed the jackass NWO globlist Turnbull to seize power.

[naturalman1975]

To give you numbers, this is what the House looks like now.

150 seats - so 76 is a majority.

Labor (socialists) - look like they have 67.

Liberal/National Coalition (conservatives) - look like they have 68.

Greens (even more socialist than Labor) - 1.

Nick Xenophon Team (basically left wing) - 1.

Independents - 3.

10 seats remain in doubt. The Coalition would need to win 9 of those to have a majority. That isn't impossible, but it's unlikely.

The Greens and NXT are most likely to support Labor - so Labor's real current number could be counted as 69, rather than 68. 71 with one of the independents far more likely to support Labor than the coalition. Likewise, the Coalition can probably rely on one of the three independents, so you could count their number as 69. But they'd still need to win 8 of the 10 in doubt seats. If they won seven - they could try to get the third independent.

These are likely numbers, not yet certified. Postal votes remain to be counted (which is why 10 seats are still in doubt).

[goldstategop]

When you ditch principles for electability, you lose.

Turnbull ran to the Left, told the Liberal base to go take a hike and stood for nothing conservative.

That’s why he lost.

[Lisbon1940]

Also in Australia up is down and down is under.

[MadMax, the Grinning Reaper]

Why does anyone want to fix a liberal/Marxist cesspole known as the Liberal Party?

Perhaps a nice show of media bias?

[Oztrich Boy]

You are Not. Even. Wrong.

[Fred Nerks]

See 2#

Remember in Australia, the Liberal Party is the name of the main conservative party - at least it was before Malcolm Turnbull was in charge and at its base, in its roots, it still is.

[MadMax, the Grinning Reaper]

I’ll take out the “Marxist” part but the so-called conservatives have been very timid in their policies and not much different from the leftists. It’s not like they had a Margaret Thatcher is their leader in, how many years?

The Australian Left is definitely Marxist and I remember when the woman was their leader. She sounded like Hillary Clinton on steroids.

[Impy]

So, IIRC, Abbott was supposedly ousted cause he would have lost the next election and this other dude was gonna win it. And it turns out this dude Turnbull’s campaign was a bizarre joke and he blows the election?! Damn.

I have a question for you N-man, why is it that so many minor parties’s in Australia have someone’s name in their official title? Nick Xenophon Team, Katter’s Australian Party, Derryn Hinch’s Justice Party, Pauline Hanson’s One Nation, Jacqui Lambie Network. It seems like an odd quirk to me.

Some freepers like to attack the US Senate’s election system and want to go back to having Senators elected by a small group of politicians instead of the people.

UK House of Lords, illegitimate, just a waste of money now that it’s powerless.

Canadian Senate, a joke.

Australian Senate, unusual election system enables tiny weird parties and gives them the balance of power.

I’ll take the US Senate any day.

[naturalman1975]

So, IIRC, Abbott was supposedly ousted cause he would have lost the next election and this other dude was gonna win it. And it turns out this dude Turnbull’s campaign was a bizarre joke and he blows the election?! Damn.

Yes, that's pretty much the size of it.

I have a question for you N-man, why is it that so many minor parties’s in Australia have someone’s name in their official title? Nick Xenophon Team, Katter’s Australian Party, Derryn Hinch’s Justice Party, Pauline Hanson’s One Nation, Jacqui Lambie Network. It seems like an odd quirk to me.

In most of the cases you describe, it's because the person in question was originally elected as an independent and has been successful enough in presenting their policies that the idea of a party around them began to make sense - but they are identified by their names so keeping their name in the title is important in terms of people knowing who they are. That's true of Hanson, Xenophon, Katter and Lambie. Bob Katter didn't originally want to do that - he wanted to name his party 'The Australian Party' but the Australian Electoral Commission would not allow that name on the grounds of it being too generic, so he put his name on it. Derryn Hinch is a different category - he's a major media personality and has been for decades and name recognition is really important to him - he's often called 'the human headline' in Australia.

Australian Senate, unusual election system enables tiny weird parties and gives them the balance of power.

I think most people in Australia would agree that the Senate is now dysfunctional, but nobody so far has been able to come up with a better system that will get through the Senate - it needs to vote to reform itself and the Senators, having been elected, like it the way it is.

[Impy]

- it needs to vote to reform itself and the Senators, having been elected, like it the way it is.

I hear that, unfortunate. You'd think the major party Senators would be able to make a deal.

Thanks for the info.

[Oztrich Boy]

>So, IIRC, Abbott was supposedly ousted cause he would have lost the next election and this other dude was gonna win it. And it turns out this dude Turnbull’s campaign was a bizarre joke and he blows the election?! Damn.

Malcolm Turnbull is the man who broke the Liberal Party's heart.

[odds]

“I think most people in Australia would agree that the Senate is now dysfunctional,”

I can’t speak for “most people” in Australia.

But I do think both Liberal and Labor parties are “dysfunctional”, in Australia. And, too alike, in so many policies.

Maybe a reason some voters went Independent. Let the two dysfunctional parties sort it out.

And, no mistake about it, both major parties, within themselves, in Australia, have been Dysfunctional for several years.