As you say, fear seems to have played a large part in it. Fear of higher interest rates under Labor. This wasn't uniform, but it was in the so-called "mortgage-belt" outer suburbs of the big metropolitan areas of Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth. Which is where the marginal electorates are. These voters, the working class families buying houses in the suburbs are the people portrayed in the 'Kath and Kim' TV series.
These people are clinging to their hold on the Australian Dream of home ownership. House prices have skyrocketed under the Howard's government, putting the Dream out of the financial reach of the next generation. But the Battlers don't give up so easily and the exceptionally low interest rates have allowed many people to hang on, by working two jobs, overtime, sacrificing. Just hang on.
And of course there was the illusion of windfall profits to existing home owners as property prices double and treble. But for those who have just recently bought into the Dream, there is also the fear that a slight increase in interest rates could be disaster. The market has stalled, any increase in interest rates would send the market reeling, many wouldn't be able to keep up repayments and of course if that happens then market prices would drop like a stone and they would be bankrupted.
All other issues are secondary to the thousands of "aspirational" families in the "mortgage Belt", tenuously clinging to their dream of upward mobility via home ownership.
The Howard government is of course largely responsible for the mess. Generous negative gearing tax concessions for property investors have been responsible for fueling the residential property boom. As prices soared, investment property seemed a sure bet, sucking in thousands more people to try to get in on the windfall profits.
Even owner occupiers could participate in the illusion that they were making a windfall profit, as the market value of their own house doubled, trebled or more. Though they would need to sell the house and move to rented housing, or move to the sticks, where prices were much lower and jobs were scarce, to actually realise the profit.
The fear of higher interest rates is well founded but, tragically, Howard is in no position to keep his promise to keep interest rates low. The 12 year economic upturn in Australia, financed by record private borrowings and ever increasing balance of payment deficits, can't be sustained indefinitely. Its only a matter of time before the piper demands to be paid.
But Howard will probably retire soon, so it will be everyone else's problem. The Labor Party will then be called on to perform its historical role under capitalism, that of slashing social benefits and tightening the belt of the working class which is its traditional base. Only a labor government can successfully implement radical attacks on the living standards of the working class, because only they have the trust of the working class and the links to the unions which are necessary to ensure that the cuts will not be fought tooth and nail by organised labour, the only element which would have a hope of resisting.
There will be no budget surpluses to finance Labor's social programmes by then, quite the opposite. So Her Majesty's loyal opposition will knuckle down to the job it knows so well, ensuring that the property sharks and other mad profiteers are largely insulated from the consequences of their drunken profit spree, while the working class will be urged to work harder for the common good.
Bill Bartlett Bracknell Tas
At 3:52 PM -0700 9/10/04, Mike Ballard wrote:
>Looks like John(rodent liar) Howard won the
>(s)election down here in Australia. That means that
>Aussie troops will not be pulled out of Iraq before
>Christmas. There aren't that many there, but the
>power of the symbolic might have tipped a few more
>votes away from your Shrub. It also means that Labor's
>plan to shore up "bulk billing" won't happen i.e. that
>medical care will continue down the road of
>privatization from an entitlement. The majority of the
>people have endorsed image and ideology over their own
>class interests. Fear played a big role too as a lot
>of people appear to have bought the image broadcast to
>them by the conservatives that they'd suffer higher
>interest rates if Labor won.
>
>Watch out America!
>
>
>Best,
>Mike B)
>
>
>Sunday October 10, 05:43 AM AAP
>
>Coalition swings to victory
>
>
>A 1.82 per cent swing has delivered the coalition 52
>per cent of the two-party preferred vote and an
>increased majority in parliament.
>
>Labor lost votes in every state, only picking up
>statewide swings in the ACT and the Northern
>Territory.
>
>
>In Queensland, where Labor hoped to pick up seats from
>the coalition, there was a 2.11 swing to the
>coalition, giving them 57 per cent of the two-party
>preferred vote.
>
>The Liberals looked likely to gain the new seat of
>Bonner, contested by former Keating government
>minister Con Sciacca, and possibly Labor frontbencher
>Craig Emerson's seat of Rankin.
>
>In South Australia, also a key to Labor's hopes of
>winning power, the coalition picked up an extra 0.18
>per cent of the vote, winning 54 per cent of the
>two-party preferred vote, with 46 per cent for Labor.
>
>Labor looked likely to win Adelaide and Hindmarsh from
>the Liberals but to lose frontbencher David Cox's seat
>of Wakefield.
>
>The Liberal-held seats of Kingston and Makin were too
>close to call.
>
>In NSW, the coalition gained an extra 0.77 per cent of
>the statewide vote, giving it 52 per cent, compared to
>48 per cent for Labor.
>
>Labor lost the previously safe seat of Greenway.
>
>In Victoria, there was a 2.77 per cent swing to the
>coalition, giving the government 51 per cent of the
>vote and Labor 49 per cent.
>
>In Tasmania, where voters in rural areas were expected
>to punish Labor for its forestry policy, there was a
>3.74 swing to the coalition, giving them 46 per cent
>of the vote, compared to 54 for Labor.
>
>Labor lost the seats of Bass and Braddon.
>
>In Western Australia there was a 3.56 per cent swing
>to the coalition, giving them 55 per cent of the
>two-party preferred seat vote and the seats of Hasluck
>and Stirling.
>
>In the Northern Territory there was a 2.31 per cent
>swing to Labor, giving them 53 per cent of the vote,
>compared to 46 per cent for the coalition.
>
>In the solidly pro-Labor ACT, the Liberals lost 0.62
>per cent of the vote, leaving them with just 38 per
>cent of the two-party preferred vote, with 62 per cent
>for the ALP.
>
>
>********
>AAP
>
>Greens see-saw back to parliament
>
>
>The Australian Greens have lost their only lower house
>seat, but looked set to boost their numbers in the
>Senate.
>
>Greens MP Michael Organ was resoundingly beaten in the
>NSW coastal seat of Cunningham by Labor's Sharon Bird.
>ADVERTISEMENT
>
>With nearly 80 per cent of the vote counted, Ms Bird
>clinched the seat with 40.2 per cent of primary votes,
>double that of Mr Organ.
>
>Mr Organ, who surprisingly won the Wollongong-based
>seat from Labor in a 2002 by-election, described the
>outcome as a double blow - he lost his seat and
>Liberal Prime Minister John Howard was back in power.
>
>"We've basically held our vote from the by-election so
>we're pleased about that but we don't have the
>preferences working in our favour this time," he told
>AAP.
>
>Ms Bird, a 41-year-old former TAFE teacher, was
>pleased to have won back support for Labor from voters
>who had voted against the party in the 2002
>by-election.
>
>"I'm very excited about all this," she said.
>
>"I just want to get on with the job."
>
>The picture was brighter for the Greens in the upper
>house, with party leader Bob Brown claiming a Senate
>seat victory for former Tasmanian MP and high-profile
>conservationist Christine Milne.
>
>"She will win the fourth or fifth Senate seat in
>Tasmania," Senator Brown told ABC TV.
>
>Ms Milne was on 12.94 per cent, slightly short of a
>full quota, as voting continued.
>
>The Greens remain hopeful of picking up another Senate
>seat in Western Australia.
>
>But while the Senate gains were welcomed by the
>Greens, the party failed to achieve Senator Brown's
>target of reaping one million votes this election.
>
>The Greens enjoyed a national swing of 2.12 per cent
>of first preference votes after increasing their vote
>in all states and territories.
>
>The Greens appeared to have gained ground lost by the
>Australian Democrats, which suffered a national swing
>of 4.24 per cent against them.
>
>The party's strongest performance was in Tasmania,
>where it enjoyed nearly 10 per cent of the primary
>vote.
>
>Senator Brown said the Greens' primary vote across the
>country was extraordinarily good.
>
>"Right across the country the Greens are polling above
>our last vote, which itself was a record vote," he
>said.
>
>Fellow Greens Senator Kerry Nettle said while it was
>disappointing the party lost its only lower house
>seat, the Greens enjoyed strong support across the
>country, especially in Mr Howard's seat of Bennelong.
>
>Whistleblower and Greens candidate Andrew Wilkie
>managed to grab 16.56 per cent of the primary vote in
>Bennelong.
>
>"I think we have got votes from everywhere and I think
>when you look at somewhere like Bennelong where the
>Greens got 16.5 per cent ... well that's coming from
>everywhere that level of support," Senator Nettle told
>AAP.
>
>"I think there's a message in that for the Labor Party
>about their failure to address the Iraq war as one of
>the key issues during the election campaign."
>
>=====
>"In the shadow of its own incomplete
>emancipation the bourgeois consciousness
>must fear to be annulled by a more
>advanced consciousness; not being the
>whole freedom, it senses that it can
>produce only a caricature of freedom--
>hence its theoretical expansion of its
>autonomy into a system similar to its
>own coercive mechanisms."
>
>Adorno, NEGATIVE DIALECTICS
>
>http://profiles.yahoo.com/swillsqueal
>
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