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Happy Birthday Snooze

Well wow. Just wow! What an extraordinary weekend. It still feels a little unreal. In fact so unreal that I keep remembering all over again, like a goldfish with a two second memory. And it's wonderful. I go about my business, doing this and that and then something bubbles to the surface: VSU; Kyoto; Andrew Bolt; Kevin Andrews; Work Choices; Phillip Ruddock; AWB; Alexander Downer; Teh History Wars !1!!; Caroline Overington, Piers Ackerman and Dennis Shanahan; and the little devious prick himself, John Winston. Oh the wonderousness. I remember that they're gone, or silenced, or humiliated and a little beam of sunshine peeps into my life. Sure it's uncharitable. I'm quite content to admit I'm not being particularly gracious. But quite frankly, fuck that. We've put up with it for eleven and a half LONG years. And with EVERY ONE of the conservatives' four consecutive victories, we of "The Left" have had to stay silent and absorb the gloating, a...

I have ceased to enjoy it. Yesterday's polls spooked me. Now I just want it over and done with. My ballot paper now nestles among it's friends in a ballot box at the North Fitzroy Primary School waiting patiently for the moment it cascades onto a table in the closed polling centre to be placed on a pile. 1 for the good guys. Standing in the line waiting to vote we were surrounded by people of all shapes and sizes and all political bents. Snooze and I shared a laugh at the ludicrously type-cast Liberal staffers - girlfriend and boyfriend we hypothesised, both in their early twenties. She dressed in short shorts, blonde perky ponytail, big gold-adorned sunglasses and fake tan. He in iron-free tan chinos (FFS!), navy polo shirt (collar up) and the obligatory boat shoes. The bechilded couple in front of us clutched two how-to-vote leaphlets: one for the Liberals, one for the Greens. Only in North Fitzroy. As we stood there quietly in the sunshine, I was overcome with a sense...

This is actually fun. I am actually enjoying myself. However, for those of you not wishing to be complacent, take a walk down memory lane courtesy of Antony Green and the ABC Election website. Nothing will make you pull your head in faster than watching "highlights" from the last four election campaigns. In other news, Jackie Kelly, are you for serious ?! CHRIS UHLMANN : Was your husband involved in the distribution of this pamphlet? JACKIE KELLY : Well, I've read the alleged pamphlet and when I first read it I had to laugh because I think everyone who reads it has their first instinct is to laugh, pretty much everyone who's read chuckles in terms of the parody it does make of various things that have happened during the campaign. So my view is that it's a bit of Chaser-style prank that an ALP goon squad, which I understand was is led by some unionists, have chased down and hunted down and tried to intimidate and I understand there was even a fight, so yes, I t...

Alright kids, here we go. Five sleeps to go and the Psephos are going to town. Things are looking good. Very very good. For those of my readers who remain unconvinced and keep muttering about marginals and the like, feast your eyes on this... Possum's Big Prediction (Anthony Green in disguise?) So how good is [my] model using previous elections? In 1998, the model predicted an ALP TPP of 50.82 whereas the actual result was 50.91 In 2001 the model predicted an ALP TPP of 49.15 whereas the actual result was 49.07. In 2004 the model predicted an ALP TPP of 47.23 whereas the actual result was 47.20. So what is the forecast for the election? An ALP two party preferred result of 55.15% And again. The message is clear - the game is over. That is what makes it so dangerous. The polls are consistent, the fantasy of “Liberal strategists” being able to hide under the petticoat of fictitious marginal seat polling because “they’re closer than the national polls suggest” now looks like the faç...

There are many things I like about Possums Pollytics , but probably the most impressive is the fact that he not only clearly knows what he's talking about, but that his predicitions seem to be uncannily accurate. Have a look at this post about today's Newspoll . Honestly, if you're not regularly reading this blog during the election, then you should take a good hard look at yourself.

From this morning's AM . Chris Uhlmann interviewing Andrew Robb, Vocational Education Minister. CHRIS UHLMANN : This argument on experience, this argument on experience, saying you can't replace experience with inexperience is a self-annihilating argument. If you argue that then you would never change governments, would you? ANDREW ROBB : But people need to look long and hard at, you know, at what the circumstances, the economic circumstances are that are there. Labor is promising to scrap our industrial relation laws which will only remove the checks and balances on inflation and risk an interest rate break-out. Now, when, the thing is, when you look behind Labor's slogans, when you peek behind Labor's, there is nothing there. Nothing but what they've copied from us. The rest of it, they have not done the policy work, they have not made a case for taking over government. And people do face a choice in an election. Governments do change, but, but when they change t...

From today's Crikey . Click to embiggen.

Here you go, a Friday present. EVERYONE loves a cat video!! Off to see the Sydney-siders for the weekend. Won't THAT be fun.