Richard Farmer’s chunky bits

Moving the market. Given the headlines I suppose it was no surprise but the market moved decisively against Labor this morning. On the Crikey Election Indicator the probability of the government being returned was down to a tiny 8.3% by 11am.

Newspoll again seems to have more impact on journalists than Crikey‘s own Essential, but being part of the dominant Murdoch stable probably guarantees that even the lower Essential figure for Labor published yesterday was bad enough. Over at Fairfax they made a good spoiling attempt at taking some of the edge off The Oz with that ever-reliable standby of internal Labor Party polling predicting a disaster in Queensland. Not wanting to miss out, the tabloids have polls of their own for some marginal seats in Victoria that did not seem to me to justify the “wipeout” and “death rattle” headlines.

Here is the pattern for the year:

A fascinating political possibility. The chance of it happening is probably remote, but it would be fascinating to watch a prime ministerial Tony Abbott dealing with a balance-of-power-holding senator Pauline Hanson come 1 July next year. “I am not a vengeful person and I will work with anyone,” is the official line of the redheaded candidate when asked about the Opposition Leader’s actions back in 1998 in setting up a fund to underwrite a legal bid to deregister One Nation. I have not yet seen an Abbott promise of reconciliation.

A quote for the day

“Economics is a highly sophisticated field of thought that is superb at explaining to policymakers precisely why the choices they made in the past were wrong. About the future, not so much.”

— US Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke

Children are cheaper. Perhaps I should stop my smirking at those continuing photo opportunities with  children because at least when used as props they don’t cost us taxpayers anything. Unlike the preparations whereby the Defence Department spent $284,000 to transport equipment like a Seahawk helicopter and two F/A-18 Super Hornet jets to the launch of the Defence white paper last month at Canberra’s Defence Establishment Fairbairn.

News and views noted along the way.

• Oliver Pritchett: we have an oil dipping crisis on our hands — “It just occurred to me… I rather welcome the Eurocrats’ intervention in the matter of dipping bowls. … Don’t you think that a dipping bowl is really an unnecessary bit of spraunce?”
• Ed Davey attacks papers who report ‘destructive’ climate sceptics — “Newspapers are wrong to give a ‘platform’ for campaigners and groups that question whether climate change is caused by human activity, Ed Davey, the energy secretary, will say.”
• Rindfleischetikettierungsüberwachungsaufgabenübertragun — “Germany’s longest word, a 63-letter long title of a law regulating the testing of beef, has officially ceased to exist.”
• Unmarried Chinese mothers to be fined — “Plans to fine women who have children out of wedlock have caused outrage in the central Chinese city of Wuhan.”