"The Liberal Party is in turmoil tonight following the resignation of six front benchers, including Tony Abbott and Senator Nick Minchin, after they refused to back Opposition Leader Malcolm Turnbull's position on the controversial emissions trading scheme. Liberal frontbenchers Sophie Mirabella, Senator Eric Abetz, Tony Smith and Stephen Parry have also quit their positions over the ETS, leaving Malcolm Turnbull's future as leader in doubt. In a press conference tonight Mr Turnbull said he respected his colleagues' decision but the issue was now one of integrity and it would be irresponsible for the party to not take action on climate change."
Yesterday Mr Turnbull survived a leadership challenge from Kevin Andrews MP but other Liberal MPs may yet challenge their leader if polls continue to point to a landslide defeat.
Malcolm Turnbull, the Australian Liberal Party leader since September last year when he ousted Brendan Nelson, is likely to face a leadership challenge of his own in the next 24 hours. Mr Turnbull has caused fury and division within his party after forcing the party to support the Labour government's amended emissions trading scheme - amended by Turnbull. Pasted below are some key commentaries:
Sydney Morning Herrald: "Malcolm Turnbull's leadership has been taken to the brink after his decision to put his job on the line over climate change backfired when he was rolled by the backbench. In extraordinary scenes last night, Mr Turnbull declared he wanted to cut a deal with Labor on the emissions tradings scheme and if anybody was opposed, they should move a motion and challenge him."
The Australian: "Malcolm Turnbull last night threatened to quit the Liberal leadership if his party did not back his assessment that a majority of the Coalition supported an emissions trading scheme deal he had struck with the Rudd government. The Liberal leader laid down his "my way or the highway" ultimatum and closed the partyroom meeting after anti-ETS Coalition MPs, led by Senate leader Nick Minchin, refused to accept his calculation that the meeting had supported the ETS deal. "I am the leader, I have made the call," Mr Turnbull said at a news conference later. "If people are unhappy with the leader they can take whatever steps they deem to be appropriate.""
The Age: "Mr Turnbull told a news conference last night: ''The Opposition has today saved tens of thousands of Australian jobs, protected vital industries and secured energy supplies by forcing significant substantial improvements to the Rudd Government's emissions trading scsheme''. He said the deal showed the Opposition was sincere in its commitment on climate change."
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Australian Prime Minister remains hugely popular in the latest polls. Kevin Rudd enjoys a 63% to 22% advantage over Mr Turnbull in terms of preferred Prime Minister rankings.
I am currently in Washington DC for the fourth annual gathering of organisations and thinkers from the English-speaking world - all broadly of the centre right - that are interested in developing new solutions to the problems of poverty. The gathering was launched by Iain Duncan Smith in 2005.
This year, about thirty people from a dozen organisations and five countries are here. Britain's Centre for Social Justice, America's Heritage Foundation,
President George W Bush's new Institute (which has already raised more than $200m), Canada's Institute for Marriage and Family, New Zealand's Maxim
Institute and Australia's Kevin Andrews MP are some of the key contributors. A new website has been launched by the Heritage Foundation's Jennifer Marshall - RestoringSocialJustice.com - to track what we are all doing. It's early days for the website but over time we hope it will grow into a useful resource for all conservative people interested in tackling social problems that have defeated the Left. It will record policy thinking, profile key thinkers and case study effective programmes.
Readers of the ToryDiary will know that I am seized with the enormous potential of compassionate conservatism and during this conference my excitement reached new heights. Deeper and deeper friendships are being formed by people who have given their lives to philanthropy, school reform, family policy, tackling crime and understanding welfare systems. An international movement is being built and the RSJ website will be its online home.
Sarah Palin's memoir, Going Rogue, is selling like hot cakes but the American fascination with the former Governor of Alaska is unlikely to see her become a contender for the nation's highest office.
Sarah Palin, talking to Oprah Winfrey, says she is not considering a presidential bid in 2012 (not yet, anyway): "“I’m concentrating on 2010,” when there will be midterm elections. Has she thought about running? “It’s not on my radar screen right now,” she said. Then again, she probably wouldn’t tell Oprah if she were, right? “No, I wouldn’t,” Ms. Palin acknowledged." [New York Times].
Moderate Republicans are said to be unhappy at Sarah Palin's re-emergence: "Moderate Republicans—yes, they are not yet extinct, though most are in hiding—scoff at Sarah Palin and wish she would go away. But she's not going away. This week she's going on-air with Barbara Walters and Oprah Winfrey to flog her new book, Going Rogue: An American Life, and to promote her brand of in-your-face, power-to-the-people conservatism." [Newsweek].
For the Republican Portillistas at NewMajority.com, Palin has celebrity but not credibility.
Loved by most Republicans and hated by most Democrats: "Ms. Palin remains highly popular among Republicans (69% favorable). But the Democrats' striking antipathy to the former governor—she has a 72% unfavorable rating among them—drives down her overall approval." [Matthew Continetti].
Independents are divided but could they be won over if she demonstrated substance on policy?: "In last month's Gallup poll, Ms. Palin had a 48% unfavorable and 41% favorable rating among independents. Not good, but not insurmountable. Flip those percentages, and they could be serving moose burgers in the White House in 2013. What drives independents' uncertainty is their feeling that Ms. Palin isn't up to the job." [Matthew Continetti].
The consensus is that she's unlikely to run: "Republicans have just edged ahead of Democrats in the polls and Mr Obama is suddenly looking as if he might be just a one-term President. But Mrs Palin is unlikely to become the candidate who can oust the man Oprah anointed as "the One"." [Toby Harnden].
For many she'll be a hero of movement conservatives but never anything else: “Palin will forever be a cult hero among conservatives, but I think it is unlikely she will ever hold public office again. In fact, I have concluded that she will never even run. In 20 years she will have earned a spot on the mountain with Buckley, Goldwater, and Limbaugh, but I don’t see her on a ballot again.” [A consultant quoted by Jim Geraghty].
All across America, including against Florida Governor Charlie Crist, conservative candidates are standing against more centrist Republican candidates as part of the anti-'RINO' phenomenon that took off in New York. 'RINO' equalling Republican In Name Only.
Rand Paul, son of libertarian Ron Paul, is the poster boy for this insurgent movement as he seeks to win the Republican nomination to be US Senate candidate for Kentucky.
This Wall Street Journal video overviews the Republican establishment's concerns that this will cause division in the party and that the conservative candidates favoured by grassroots Republicans will be easier for Democrats to beat than more moderate candidates.
In the video below Rand Paul explains why he opposes government bailout of car manufacturers:
The CDU/CSU-FDP coalition is enjoying something of a honeymoon after Angela Merkel successfully formed a new post-election coalition with the reformist FDP. The Social Democrats are down to 21% - half of their support in 1998.
The Irish government of Fianna Fáil's Brian Cowen is trailing Fine Gael by 35% to 25%.
The Czech ODS - Tory allies in the European Parliament - are slightly behind the Social Democrats (32% to 29%). The Czech election will take place next June.
The Tories' allies in Poland - the Law and Justice Party - are 48% to 28% behind Donald Tusk’s Civic Platform.
Geert Wilders' Freedom Party is currently leading public opinion in the Netherlands.
Sweden's centre right government led by Fredrik Reinfeldt is trailing the Social Democrats by 30% to 34%. Elections are due next September.
Click here for a PDF of the full ComRes briefing and here for ConInternational's previous snapshot summary. If you would like to subscribe to ComRes' European Opinion Briefing please email andrew@comres.eu.com.
A number of special elections were held in America last night; one year after Obama was elected America's 44th President.
The Democrats will want to say that last night's setbacks for their party were not a reflection on Barack Obama and it is true that most voters told pollsters that the President was not a big factor in their decision. However, it is also true that the magic that he sprinkled on American politics has gone. He stumped for the embattled Democratic Governor of New Jersey, Jon Corzine, five times during the campaign, twice as recently as Sunday. The President recorded ads for Corzine and Corzine used Obama constantly in his own ads. None of this was enough to save the Democrat from voter anger about taxes and general economic distress. The Republican Chris Christie won the Governorship by 49% to 45%. Jennifer Rubin writes:
"The White House will have a hard time saying this one doesn’t matter. Obama won the state by 14%. The Republicans in a only a year won the state back."
The Republican victory was even bigger in Virginia. The so-called purple swing state of Virginia has been trending to the Democrats for a number of years and it was one of Obama's biggest prizes last year. But the Republican candidate for Governor won a landslide victory yesterday. Bob McDonnell "steamrolled" his Democrat opponent by 59% to 41%. The GOP won all three Virginia-wide offices up for election. McDonnell made a promise not to raise taxes but to use efficiency savings to afford improvements to transport and schools. He also campaigned heavily against President Obama's proposed cap on greenhouse emissions (while backing more green jobs) and against plans to aid unionisation of Virginia's economy. As RealClearPolitics noted, however, McDonnell was a conservative who downplayed social issues, was relentlessly optimistic and asked Sarah Palin to stay out of the campaign. Ramesh Ponnuru offers one other lesson:
"One of the lessons he draws is that Republican candidates have to "finish the sentence." Instead of just saying that we have to keep taxes and spending low, and thus pleasing conservatives, he said, McDonnell explain how these policies would create jobs and "plug the hole in [the budget]." Too many Republican candidates, he says, forget to do that."
Exactly. Conservatives need to show how conservative themes have practical benefits.
The most disappointing result for conservatives and Republicans comes from New York state where a Democrat won after the Republican vote was split. ConInternational discussed this fascinating contest on Saturday. Conservatives will blame the party establishment for the defeat, saying that they were wrong to foist such a liberal candidate on them. Republican centrists will say that the tactics of insurgent grassroots conservatives have resulted in a Democrat winning a usually very safe Republican seat.
Mike Bloomberg was re-elected New York City's Mayor but his opponent ran him surprisingly close (51% to 46%). The New York Times attributes the closeness of the race to "his maneuver to undo the city’s term limits law and his extravagant campaign spending". Bloomberg out-spent his opponent by ten-to-one!
It looks like voters in the moderate state of Maine have narrowly overturned a law that legalised same-sex marriage.
The latest Canadian opinion polls suggest that Stephen Harper's minority Conservative government enjoys a solid lead over the opposition parties. Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff's attempt to force an early election look doomed to failure - and his own position as his party's leader is now in jeopardy - with a clear majority of Canadians opposing another vote. Canada elected a second minority Conservative government just one year ago. The largely left-wing opposition parties attempted to remove Stephen Harper almost immediately but he is proving to be the great survivor of Canadian politics.
Writing for the National Post, however, George Jonas regrets that Mr Harper has never moved beyond "pussyfoot conservatism". The article is now more than a month old but Jonas says right-wing leaders that govern with confidence are rare things - particularly in a left-leaning nation like Canada:
"Would a majority make [Stephen Harper] govern more like a true blue Tory, perhaps even a Tory with a libertarian tinge? Would he champion ideas and policies of the kind he championed once as head of the National Citizens Coalition? Would he try to stem the tide of the regulatory state? Would he buck interventionist trends in business, environment, education and free speech? Would he reform, or even abolish, human rights commissions? Nix the gun registry? Help cool the globe without freezing the economy? Make sure "universal" in healthcare doesn't translate into "universally unavailable"?
What would it take for a Conservative government to feel sufficiently mandated to pursue conservative policies? Would a majority do it? I doubt it -- not if past performance is an indication...
Some centre-right leaders in the United Kingdom and the United States haven't been as vulnerable to the syndrome of pussyfoot-conservatism as Canada's centre-right leaders. But even the least wobbly, Margaret Thatcher, say, and Ronald Reagan, weren't entirely impervious to it. With all their self-confidence and charisma, Thatcher and Reagan never radiated that cocksure, hubristic aura of self-righteous intellectual and moral conceit that's the hallmark of centre-left leaders from Pierre Elliott Trudeau to Barack Obama.
Simply put, the centre-left feels entitled to govern; the centre-right doesn't."
The race with the greatest long-term implications is taking place in New York state, however. A solidly Republican district has a vacancy after Representative John McHugh was appointed by President Obama as Secretary of the Army. The Republican Party nominated Dede Scozzafava to take his place in Congress but her liberal views enraged ordinary conservative voters. The Wall Street Journal accurately painted her as a high taxing, union-supporting liberal.
The long-term implications are also fascinating. The Republican establishment has learnt that Republican voters cannot be taken for granted. In the age of the internet and with the support of talk radio an insurgent candidate can be much more than a protest vote. One day the same thing may happen in Britain.
Monday 2nd November update: The Wall Street Journal warns conservatives not to over-react to the news: "Democrats did themselves no favors by driving Joe Lieberman out of their party, and conservatives will do their cause no good by forcing GOP candidates in Illinois, California and Connecticut to sound like Tom DeLay. If conservatives now revolt against every GOP candidate who disagrees with them on trade, immigration or abortion, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid will keep their majorities for a very long time."
The Telegraph says so. He told a Czech newspaper: "The train carrying the treaty is going so fast and it's so far that it
can't be stopped or returned, no matter how much some of us would want
that."
Earlier in the week it had appeared - according to The Times - that Klaus would NOT sign.
If the Czech Republic does ratify the pressure on David Cameron will be enormous. William Hague has promised to annouce what "we will not let matters rest there" on the day that Lisbon is ratified (if it is).
The embattled Italian Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, has taken the time to declare his support for Tony Blair becoming European President through a letter published on the front page of a small circulation newspaper in Milan, Il Foglio (of which, according to The Times, his estranged wife is the largest stakeholder and one of his former government spokesmen the editor).
It reads:
“Tony Blair has got everything it needs to become the first president of the
European Council... He has everything it
needs to be designated to that role, as soon as it will be judicially and
politically possible... In agreement with many other heads of government,
and heads of state, and in co-ordination with the powers of the European
Parliament, my Government and I will work to ensure we do not lose a great
political legacy, made with courage, equilibrium and prudence without
uncertainty.”
That translated version is from The Times; Il Foglio's original in Italian is here.
The role of European Council President will not of course exist until such a time as the Lisbon Treaty is passed into law in the Czech Republic...
Despite all the speculation the Czech president sounds resigned with this latest quote (our emphasis): “The people of Britain should have been doing something really much earlier and not just now, too late, saying something and waiting for my decision.”
"With the EU piling on the pressure and threatening to strip the Czech Republic of its EU commissioner if the Lisbon treaty is not ratified, most observers feel that Mr Klaus will buckle. "He is confrontational but, in the end, he defends his own interests," says Jiri Pehe, a Czech political scientist and a former adviser to Mr Klaus's predecessor, Vaclav Havel. "That's why I think in the end he will sign."
The President of the Czech Republic, Vaclav Klaus, may face impeachment if he does not sign the Lisbon Treaty according to The Economist's Charlemagne.
"Well-informed types in Prague suggest the most effective pressure on him is the threat of being impeached for failing to perform his duties as president. Meanwhile, as first announced last week, a fresh legal challenge to Lisbon has been lodged by a group of senators close to Mr Klaus with the Czech Constitutional Court. The challenge seems doomed, but it could drag things out for a few more months. For some reason, the film Groundhog Day comes to mind."
If, as seems likely, Ireland accepts Lisbon on Friday, Klaus will be the last, best hope of stopping Lisbon being ratified before the Conservatives come (we hope) to power. We recently reported that David Cameron may have lobbied him to hold back from signing.
Over the next few months he may become the most hated leader in Europe by fellow EU politicians but a hero of all Eurosceptics.
Speaking to LBC earlier today David Cameron pledged that the Tories want to remain in the EU, want a referebdum on Lisbon but that "new circumstances will apply" if Lisbon is ratified (quoted by The Telegraph):
"If this treaty is still alive, if it is still being discussed and debated anywhere in Europe, then we will give you that referendum, we will name the date during the election campaign, we'll hold that referendum straight away and I will lead the campaign for a No. Now, if those circumstances change, if the Germans ratify, if the Poles ratify, if the Czechs ratify, if the Irish vote Yes to the treaty, then a new set of circumstances [apply], and I will address those at the time... I want us to be in the European Union. We are a trading nation, we should be co-operating with our allies and friends in Europe over things like the environment and crime, of course we should."
5.45pm: Dan Hamilton has just emailed in the exit poll:
2009 2005 CDU/CSU 33.5% (35.2%) SPD 23.5% (34.2%) FDP 14.5% (9.8%) Greens 10.0% (8.1%) Left Party 13.0% (8.7%) Others 5.5% (4.0%) I think it’s likely to be enough for the right. Germany has a threshold of 5% (or winning three constituency seats) so there should be enough parties under that to ensure that the CDU and FDP get (just) over 50% in terms of parliamentary representation. By my calculations, the full exit results the Merkel coalition on 48% and the lefties on 46.5%. Germany’s exit polls have historically been very accurate – Forschungsgruppe have been out by an (enviable) margin of 0.25% in the last three elections.
Noon: A jet-lagged Merkel held an eve-of-poll rally in East Berlin last night after returning from Pittsburgh. Concerns had been raised that her absence from the campaign for 72 hours had contributed to the CDU's slippage in the polls.Telegraph report.
10.30am: UKPollingReport reminds us that German polls "performed very poorly" last time - overstating the CDU lead by 6% to 8%.
This thread will be updated during the course of the day.
Both the Financial Times and The Economist hope that Angela Merkel will be able to break free of her 'grand coalition' with the left-leaning SPD after tomorrow's German elections. Latest opinion polls point to a race that is still too close to call. The CDU, when joined with the economically and socially liberal FDP, are one or two points within target of gaining a majority.
There are two principal reasons why the grand coalition should be replaced by a CDU-CSU-FDP coalition:
The grand coalition is bad for democracy The Financial Times: "All German governments are coalitions, ruling by consensus. But it would be bad for the country, and bad for the principal parties, if the CDU and SPD were forced once again into a “grand” coalition. It limits their room for manoeuvre. More importantly, it discourages democratic debate, and encourages the splintering of support towards more extreme minority parties."
The Economist made exactly the same conclusion one week earlier: "Yoking together Germany’s two Volksparteien in one government tends to stifle the coherent, mainstream opposition that is essential to the cut-and-thrust of policymaking in any democracy. Deprived of choice, disgruntled voters tend to drift towards extremism or apathy, thereby weakening the big parties even more. Indeed, there is a growing risk that, with five parties always likely to win seats in the German parliament, it may become all but impossible to have anything other than a grand coalition. What ought to be an emergency arrangement might turn into a permanent one. That would not be good for democracy."
An alliance with the FDP would build a more dynamic German economy The Economist believes that the FDP would be much better coalition partners for Frau Merkel: "The FDP is not only the most pro-business of the parties but also the most pro-American. It has also been the boldest in suggesting tax and welfare reforms. For all these reasons, if this newspaper had a vote in Germany’s election, it would cast it for the FDP, in the hope that it joins a coalition with Ms Merkel’s CDU."
Like Germany as a whole, Mrs Merkel has drifted leftwards since the last election. During the 2005 election a promise of radical tax reform saw an election-winning lead evaporate. "Next to Merkel, even a chameleon would blush," wrote Oliver Marc Hartwich. His evidence? This extraordinary quote from the German Chancellor: "Sometimes I'm a liberal, sometimes I'm a Christian socialist, sometimes I'm a conservative." She can be a campaigner for neoliberal reforms one day and a defender of the welfare state the next. She can campaign against climate change and then fight for the country’s car industry against new EU fuel efficiency rules. She can criticize the Pope in public and then speak about her deep Christian roots. Angela Merkel is everything to everyone - it only depends who she is talking to.
The Economist is correct to say that the FDP is by far the most economically liberal party but it is also true that the FDP has been moderating its position somewhat in recent times. The FDP leader Guido Westervelle (pictured) is most likely to become Foreign Minister. That is good for the Atlantic alliance but his energy is really needed in economic policy. German unemployment is predicted to hit 11% next year and the budget deficit will exceed $200bn.
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Posted below is a video from Channel 4 on Chancellor Merkel's campaigning style:
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