The location choice for yesterday’s Family First campaign launch has been explained.

Senator Fielding launched Family First’s campaign from an abandoned petrol station at Lower Templestowe yesterday to emphasise the party’s key election policy of a 10-cent cut in petrol taxes.

(I still fail to see the connection between an abandoned service station and the cost of petrol tax, but anyway…)

Fielding reckons that the Pentecostal Church party’s policy of a 10c per litre reduction in petrol tax to ease the “burden” on families would cost $2.8 billion.

In a completely unrelated statement, Steve Fielding called The Greens “economically reckless.”

A few days ago, inspired by Iain Hall (aren’t we all?), I wondered if the opposite of the “latte left” was the “Nescafe right.” Dave from Albury, in comments, has expanded on this line of thought and argues a very convincing case:

Most Liberal party supporters are from the Starbuck’s Starboard, it tastes like shit but they suck it up because it came from the USA. The Nats on the other hand are the International Roast Right - cheap, nasty and the drinkers simply don’t know any better.

Family First is like ordering an espresso from a roadhouse between Adelaide and Echuca - no matter how shiny the machine looks it produces a brew that is undrinkable and very, very, very, bitter.

The Democrats are the Muffin Break Cappucino - bland, tasteless and no-one’s really interested.

The Greens are fair trade organic peabury - you might feel good about ordering it, but you suspect that the reality won’t be as good as the hype.

The ALP left is an afogato - it seems like a good idea but it’s really impractical. The ALP right is a ristretto - blunt and bitter, should be dispatched quickly to reduce the number of witnesses. Anyone else left in the ALP is a latte with two sugars - doesn’t really stand for anything, but it’s trendier than drinking tea.

ps/- I wonder what kind of coffee Timmeh Blair (who continues to engage in righty groupthink) drinks?

Kruddy’s a smart guy. You can tell because, firstly, he wears glasses and, secondly, he’s obviously watched episode eight of Lachlan Connor, Independent and done a PMI on ignoring environmental concerns when formulating Tasmanian logging policy.

Pluses
Will likely win back the two Tasmanian seats lost to the Libs at the last election that are crucial for victory at the ‘07 election.

Minuses
Will disenfranchise a lesser proportion of predominantly mainland voters in safe Labor seats, causing them to vote Green and preference Labor.

Interestings
Watching Peter Garrett squirm as he struggles to suppress his actual opinions and adopt those imposed upon him by the Party.

I think it’s disgraceful that on a “listening tour” the alternative prime minister (and leader of the major Party I dislike least) flat-out refuses to listen to one side of the argument when considering an issue as important as this. I respect his political nous but can’t respect the means to the end.

Here’s the thing. I will probably vote for the ALP my whole life. So anyone out there who is volunteering in a local ALP member’s office and is responsible for keeping a finger on the pulse of the blogging community, you don’t have to read past here. Your vote is safe with me.

Or I should say - your preference vote. I have taken to giving my primary vote for the Greens or Democrats in the last few elections and preferencing ALP as my version of a protest within the ranks.

Here are some of the things that piss me right off about the Federal ALP and which I do not expect to change:
1. The factions.
It is unbelievable but appears true that the ALP factions would rather lose election after election than sort their shit out.

2. The dominance of beery and outspoken older blokes.
Where are your bright and feisty women in party leadership positions? Hurray for Julia Gillard but surely there are others? If New Zealand has had a female PM for almost ten years than we must be about another ten years off, I guess.

3. The snail pace of realising that climate change might be used as a real vote winner
You could really hit those middle Australians for all their worth - get them in the fear joint, hit them with the risk to their future livelihood, the jobs of their children - whatever it takes, but use it.

4. Kevin Rudd.
He just makes my skin crawl. I can’t explain it, but I know I am not alone.

The absence of actual policy
Whilst my skin was crawling, I heard Rudd say something about providing ‘a real alternative government,’ not just shadowing Howard. I hope he does what he says. I have to say though, the moment he was quoted as being in the business of ‘nation-building’ my automatic nervous system switched off my attention gland.

It’s for the reasons above that I am not a member of the ALP and never will be. I have card carrying members for friends who I wish would run for seats but I know they value their quality of life too much for that (damn you for your lack of total self-sacrifice - and you know who you are).

The take home message from this is not new - these same things piss off thousands of my dissatisfied, left-leaning compatriots. I am not going to suggest anything for the ALP to change because the ALP refuses to change any of these things in any active way. Instead I will enjoy observing the ALP as it is inexorably forced to change, as the Greens grow into a real left wing threat and my and others’ currently empty primary vote starts to mean something more than protest.

So The Greens were an abysmal failure on Saturday, according to the mainstream and fringe media. Abysmal failure because they failed to live up to the hype created by those same media outlets and because their vote “plateaued” at a “pathetic” 10%.

Four points:

1) The Greens have won, according to whichever estimate you choose to believe, two, three or four seats in the upper house. A gain of two, three or four respectively. They have gone from being a minor party with no Parliamentary representation to a Party with potentially equal upper house representation to the Nationals. By the next election The Greens will have significant Parliamentary experience with all the benefits that come with Parliamentary offices and staff, along with a swathe of experienced candidates with voting records and legislative histories.

2) Although the vote is still too close to call The Greens have come within a bee’s dick of snatching the lower house seat of Melbourne from the ALP. If it wasn’t for the mother-of-all-scare campaigns run by the ALP in the dying days of the election there is every chance Richard Di Natale would’ve drunk champagne by now.

3) The Greens received double the Nationals’ first preference votes and nearly triple the extreme Family First’s. If it weren’t for the National’s highly concentrated vote resulting in eight lower house seats The Greens would be the undisputed third force in Victorian politics.

4) No other Party has ever had to deal with such a concerted and sustained fear campaign run by a major media outlet.

I think The Greens should be proud of their result over the weekend and feel safe in the knowledge that it provides an excellent platform for improvement in 2010.

Forgetting to ask themselves “what would Jesus do?”, Family First operatives have unethically flooded the radio talkback airwaves this morning in a last minute attempt to discredit The Greens.

At a few minutes past 9am on Jon Faine’s ABC774 program, caller Michelle spoke practically verbatim from this (PDF) Family First press release. She started by saying (I’m paraphrasing) “John, I’m disillusioned with the major parties and I was thinking about voting Green until I heard their candidate say something that I found really offensive to families.” She then read aloud the three-year-old quote from Greg Barber contained within the press release before crapping on about about how this anti-suburbs attitude is anti-family. Her speech was littered with the word “family” which was always emphasised. My suspicions about Michelle’s Family First connections were confirmed when she concluded her call by reading out the last paragraph of the press release almost word-for-word.

I can’t wait until my post-election blog on Sunday morning when I can crow about Family First being rejected wholesale by the electorate. I can see the headline now: Family First rejected by families.

The Public Transport Users Association has released a report card that grades Parties’ public transport promises ahead of Saturday’s election.

Democrats A-
Family First F
The Greens A
ALP D
Liberals C+
Nationals C
People Power C

However, if these A-E gradings are based on current Victorian school report criteria (also known as The Nelson Method) then the Libs and the Nats are doing just fine, the Dems and the Greens are ahead of the pack, and the ALP needs to try harder. There’s no ‘F’ grade possible in Victoria but joke Parties deserve joke grades.

If, as is more likely, the grades are based upon the traditional A-E system and you care about public transport then you know what to do on Saturday.

Family First press release (PDF):

MEDIA RELEASE
19 November 2006

EXTREME GREENS REGARD ORDINARY FAMILIES WITH CONTEMPT

The extreme Greens insult ordinary Victorian families while FAMILY FIRST proudly represents them - the families of the outer suburbs and regional and country Victoria.

Victorian Greens leader Greg Barber, who was raised in Glen Waverley, now insults the suburb he grew up in, saying in an article: “It’s not the end of the world, but you can see it from there.” (The Age, July 31, 2003)

The way the Greens see it, families in the outer suburbs – like Caroline Springs and Werribee, Melton and Fawkner, Thomastown and Epping, Frankston and Dandenong, Cranbourne and Mordialloc, Mitcham and Lilydale, Knox and Croydon, Ringwood and Ferntree Gully - are second-class citizens.

The extreme Greens do not understand ordinary Victorian families and do not care about them. They look down on them. In fact, the extreme Greens think living in the suburbs is a joke.

FAMILY FIRST wants to give a sense of hope and opportunity to these families yet the Greens message is they’ll never make it. The Greens are completely out of touch with the lives of ordinary Victorian families.

Raising a family is hard work and families need all the help and support they can get – not insults from the extreme Greens.

FAMILY FIRST promotes policies that will really help families, such as removing pokies, cheaper petrol, more doctors and police, improving our schools, supporting carers, helping families be more environmentally responsible and building new roads and new dams.

GrodsCorp press release:

EXTREME FAMILY FIRST REGARD ORDINARY FAMILIES WITH CONTEMPT

The extreme Family First insults ordinary Victorian families while The Greens acknowledge and represent all of them - the many types of families found in all corners of this state, not just the inner suburbs of Melbourne.

The extreme Family First believes that a family can only grow from “heterosexual relationships between men and women” who enjoy a “stable and loving relationship and are faithful to each other.” So bad luck if you’re in a loving homosexual relationship, or a loving de facto relationship, or having a few marital problems that you’re working through. And bad luck even if you’re a single parent because the extreme Family First demands that a child must have “both a mother and a father” before they are in a family.

The extreme Family First do not understand Victorian families that don’t fit their narrow world-view and do not care about them. They look down on them. In fact, the extreme Family First, believing that they are doing God’s work, think these families are living in sin and are heathens.

The Greens want to give a sense of hope and opportunity to all families yet the extreme Family First message is they’ll never make it. The extreme Family First are completely out of touch with the lives of ordinary Victorian families.

Raising a family is hard work and families need all the help and support they can get – not insults from the extreme Family First.

The Greens promote policies that will really help families, such as removing pokies, more doctors and police, improving our schools, supporting carers, and helping families be more environmentally responsible. The extreme Family First, in their narrow world-view and policy making from the hip pocket, want to price petrol below market cost and commit blindly to building more roads and dams.

As this is my first State election living in the seat of Brunswick I set out to learn a little more about the lower house candidates I will have to choose from on Saturday. My primary and preference votes are all but decided but I was curious to see if any of the candidates added (or subtracted) any value from the Party they represent.

ALP: Carlo Carli MP
His campaign mailout arrived in my letterbox this morning betraying his fear of a Greens win by emphasising (in a seemingly random use of bold and underline) the danger of “protest votes.” Apparently the Greens can only “carp around the edges” because they’re not in government, while the Liberals will cut jobs in hospitals, schools and police stations to pay for their “extravagant campaign promises.” Amusingly, the letter says “Labor has action plans* on sustainable planning, transport, energy and water.” Presumably the asterisk is supposed to lead the reader to said action plans but there’s not a single corresponding asterisk to be found anywhere on the letter.

Carlo has a half-decent blog with an amateur-hour YouTube broadcast to attract the yoof vote. He has some respectable tertiary qualifications to back up his policies about transport and planning.

The Greens: Cyndi Dawes
Cyndi’s official web page tells us that she has a background in education and the union movement and that these areas remain her passion. I heard Cyndi on ABC774 with Jon Faine a couple of weeks back talking about a gambling venue rort she had uncovered where money earmarked for community needs was sneakily pumped back into pokie venues by their operators. She came across well.

It would be interesting to meet her at a campaign stall and have a chat to learn more about her ideas.

Liberal: Vince Arborea
Vince works as a building inspector and surveyor and has worked for local councils and the private sector. He lectures on these subjects along with drafting and construction. There is little other information about Vince on his official web page apart from a declaration of his support for the Liberal plan to build more technical colleges and information about his membership of the Veneto club.

People Power: Christian Astourian
Christian maintains an extensive website with an amazing amount of detail about his values, ideas and vision. With a focus on health and education, both generally and for the disabled, he goes into a reasonable amount of detail about the reform he intends to fight for. The site suggests passion, intellect and drive. I feel that I have a better insight into Christian’s personality than any of the other candidates.

Family First: James McDonald
With only five days until the poll, I will let a screen grab of James’ web page tell the story.

James is blue, large and dresses in Times New Roman suits.

I can’t help but notice the similarity in the level of detail provided by Family First about their candidates, their policy, and their church affiliation.

Socialist Alliance: ?
Couldn’t even find the candidate’s name.

The verdict
The only change in my voting intentions after putting on my Google Detective hat this afternoon is that I will now preference People Power much higher than planned. The Party’s policy platform and grab-bag of principles has failed to move me so far but Christian Astourian strikes me as a worthy candidate.

The only real conundrum I now face is who do I preference last: Family First or the Socialist Alliance?

UPDATE 21/11: Vanessa Hearman from the Socialist Alliance has left a comment with details about the Brunswick candidate — her!

In the last ten days there’s been so much to blog about but I’ve been locked in a battle between my final university submission due on Tuesday and the new kitten, Napoleon, who is determined to use my keyboard as his personal highway. Let’s do some GrodsNibbles.

1) Lachlan Connor, Independent
We successfully shot six more episodes of LCI: Preston (as Billybob has started to call it) last Saturday, managing to rope in Greeny and a very hesitant mate of J,The’s to fill new roles. J,The’s mate was concerned that he had never acted before and would look a fool. We simply showed him the first six episodes and he felt much better. Because of this uni work the new episodes won’t be edited until next Wednesday (with a massive hangover, I’d wager) so episode seven, due Tuesday, will be delayed a day or two. Tony T. of After Grog Blog will be well pleased with episode seven. Head over and peruse his blog to find out why.

2) Climate change and Howard’s hot air
It’s been interesting to watch the Howard Government desperately scrambling to change their line on global warming over the last couple of weeks. Times like these are a reminder that maybe John Howard’s not such the smooth political operator he’s often painted to be, caught once again in a half-snooze somewhere between public opinion, his personal, outdated ideology, and secret dreams of quiet afternoons at the retirement home in front of the telly with a blankey and a warm malted milk. Unfortunately, I despair that the overwhelming majority of Australians who say they are in favour of moving to renewable energy sources will have a sudden change of heart when threatened with higher energy prices.

3) Victoria Decides ‘07
God, I hate it when the media calls elections “[insert region] Decides ‘[insert year]“. Anyway, the Victorian election is shaping up to be an absolute fizzer in the lower house with the only real question being what minor change will be made to Bracksy’s majority. Ted Baillieu is about as interesting and engaging as… well… something that is really, really uninteresting and unengaging. There was a brilliant story, I think in the paper the other day, where Ted jumped on a train to get to a policy announcement and apologised to some passengers for the media intrusion. A lady said to him, “That’s okay, we’re just trying to figure out who you are.”

Priceless.

The upper house will be interesting to watch with a wide open race for the minor parties and control. I fiercely desire any outcome except for anything to do with Family First. If Steve Fielding’s band of sneaky, duplicitous morons take balance of power I’m moving to Adelaide. At least I can vote for Kate Ellis there.

I love elections and usually get nerdlingerly excited about them but this one mostly makes me want to go back to writing my honours for the 12th hour in a row.

4) $90 million for school chaplains
Attention: Kim Beazley. Your job is to provide voters with an alternative to the government. There is so much wrong with this policy that I thought even a bumbling fool such as yourself couldn’t screw it up. At least you could’ve waited a couple of minutes after Howard announced it to give it your unconditional support. Extra big Christmas card from John and Janette this year, Kimbo.