juliar wrote on Jul 12^th, 2019 at 1:43pm:


Hardly.  People more concerned with how to put bread on the table under a Coalition government, not dreaming about what happens if ALP got in.  Reality check for them - Coalition is not on their side.

Now something to rally the Lefties. The Decline and Fall of the Labor Party. When will Labor and the Greenies unite into the new GARBO Party ?



Labor Now A Party Of Capitulation And Parliamentary Irrelevance
By Ben Eltham on      July 10, 2019 Australian Politics


Opposition leader, Anthony Albanese. (IMAGE: Nic MacBean, Flickr)

These are dark days for the Australian left, writes Ben Eltham.

Anyone who thinks that elections don’t matter would do well to observe the smoking ruins of Australian social democracy this week, in the wake of Scott Morrison’s tax cuts.

As the Coalitions staggering $158 billion tax cut sailed through the Parliament last week , we caught a glimpse of a newer, stranger and grimmer Australia, a nation even more divided and unequal than we feared.

Seven weeks ago, Australia seemed headed towards a Shorten Labor government. The ALP had an ambitious policy agenda to make Australia fairer and more equal, winding back tax subsidies to the rich and investing heavily in health and education. Labor’s vision wasn’t exactly democratic socialism, but it was certainly a cautious step towards repairing the damage wrought by three decades of neoliberalism.

Less than two months and a surprise election victory later, Scott Morrison’s Coalition has just delivered one of the largest upward redistributions in modern Australian history.

What do the tax cuts mean? In the short term, voters get a handy tax rebate that will stimulate the ailing domestic economy. In the longer term, the passage of the massive tax bill heralds a new era of flat taxes in this country, pointing the way to a level of inequality that will make the discontents and resentments of the 2019 election look like kindergarten spats.

The tax cuts voted through this week will flatten Australia’s tax system in ways that few voters understand, but which will slowly and inexorably grind away what’s left of Australia’s communal life. Tens of billions of dollars of tax cuts will be handed to the wealthiest in our society. A ticking time bomb has also been set to detonate underneath the federal budget in 2024. If the Coalition is still in power, it will use it to slash Commonwealth spending to social services, ripping the guts out of education and Medicare, and further rending Australia’s threadbare social safety net.

The rich will get richer – much richer. They will use the extra disposable income to buy bigger houses, better holidays, and more expensive private schooling for their pampered children. For the well-to-do, times will be good. They will enjoy the last decades of a dying planet happily ensconced in a golden cage of conspicuous consumption.

Read the FULL story of the end of Labor here

https://newmatilda.com/2019/07/10/labor-now-a-party-of-capitulation-and-parliame...