• Another day, another set of terrible housing data. The number of dwelling commitments was down 0.8% in trend terms; value of dwelling commitments down 0.3% in trend terms; number of dwelling constructions down 3.8%. At least the issue was raised at yesterday’s debate between Wayne Swan and Joe Hockey. Swan said Labor had begun to address the issue through COAG; Hockey blamed it all on the government “crowding out” of business borrowing, a claim that has repeatedly been discredited, including by the RBA. With a choice between the glacial process of COAG and a childish scare campaign, there’s no evidence either side understands we have a slowly-unfolding crisis right before our eyes.
  • So, now we know. Hockey yesterday said that under the Coalition the budget would have gone into deficit, and they would have had a stimulus package. This from the bloke who originally claimed the government’s stimulus package wouldn’t work, then claimed it worked better than predicted, then said government borrowing to fund the packages was stifling economic growth, while also claiming the packages were causing inflation. How many different positions does that make from Hockey?
  • Most observers called yesterday’s debate a draw, or that Hockey edged it. I reckon Hockey can claim a win — he certainly presents much better than Swan even when his content is rubbish. And while Swan has grown into a confident and effective Treasurer whose handling of the GCF was outstanding, one must occasionally wonder whether a lot of Labor’s problems in recent months have been because they lacked a Treasurer with the cut-through communication ability of Keating or Costello to sell some basic messages — like that the government saved hundreds of thousands of jobs, or that our debt is trivial, or that unconstrained mining booms are damaging to the rest of the economy.
  • Julia Gillard, meanwhile, produced her second high-quality policy of the campaign, and oddly enough it was on her home turf of education. Her presentation yesterday on the government’s overall approach to education, what it had done while in office, what it had announced during the campaign and how it now proposed to reward schools and teachers, was a rare example of this government offering a simple, clear and engaging narrative and showing how its election policies fit into it. That education unions immediately jacked up would have been all the better from the government’s point of view.
  • After the education announcement and a polished performance on Q&A — mercifully free of the more obvious party plants that the ABC usually allows in — Gillard had a much better day yesterday. But Tony Abbott is persisting with his low-risk frontrunner strategy. A policy-lite campaign launch is one thing but the Abbott campaign gives the impression they want to coast to the 21st. It was a bad idea for Labor three weeks ago and it’s a bad idea for the Liberals now. Worse, if it goes wrong they’ll have little time to reverse course.
  • Memo to all candidates: the term ‘smear campaign’ refers to attempts to use irrelevant claims about one’s personal life, whether true or false, to damage one’s public standing. The term does not extend to pointing out that in the past you said something you now wish you hadn’t. That’s simply good politics by your opponents. So, for example, claiming that Gillard’s childlessness prevents her from being able to lead effectively is a smear. Repeatedly sending anonymous claims about the Abbott and Gillard families to Crikey is a smear campaign. Pointing out that LNP candidate George Christensen once said ”the truth is that women are bloody stupid”, or that Abbott has repeatedly contradicted himself, is not.
  • While we might find Mark Latham’s antics either outrageous or amusing, after last night’s interview one must consider whether he is unwell, and whether the media are knowingly exploiting his ill-health.