Australians, finally able to rejoice at the demise of the hated Howard government, can count themselves lucky that the Queensland Labor Government's undemocratic local government amalgamations program enacted at the behest of the Property Council of Australia did not fatally undermine Federal Labor's election campaign.

The fiscal management for which Treasurer Costello has been lauded is not the same as economic management. As economic managers, Howard and Costello would not even earn a grade of 'pass'. (Read original article on Online Opinion or read copy on this site.)

Today’s reports of Kevin Rudd’s own family decrying his silence on the proposed Mary River dam are sentiments shared by many Queenslanders, who deserve to know what Labor’s position on the dam is before voting on Saturday, said the Greens today.

According to Independent candidate for Calare Gavin Priestley the recent announcement of technical staff redundancies in Telstra highlights a lack of service control created by the Coalition Government’s sale of Telstra. Original article is from the Nyngan Observer.

In the last days of the 2007 election campaign, John Howard continues to peddle the Big Lie that his Government is safeguarding Australia's defence needs. In fact, his Government has undermined the "self containtment" policy established painstakingly by Australian governments prior to the Second World War in favour of always buying overpriced and often inferior American equipment.

Also published on Opinion on 21 November 2007 and on Margo Kingston's webdiary.

Greens lead Senate candidate Larissa Waters joined building workers on a Brisbane building site this morning and pledged to abolish all of the government's WorkChoices laws and the controversial Australian Building and Construction Commission.

Nationals Senator Ron Boswell’s record of Senate inactivity could be the reason for his stated concern about losing his seat to Greens lead Senate candidate Larissa Waters.

Greens leader Bob Brown has attacked environmental scientist Dr Tim Flannery's for endorsement of Malcolm Turnbull.

The poor standards of the Coalition on Government advertising, exposed again in the annual report of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet for the year ending June 30 2007 according to Australian Democrats Senator Andrew Murray.

John Howard's promise that no-one will "be in any way adversely affected by" changes Industrial Relations legislation if he is re-elected, already made once before and broken once before, is scrutinised.

In his article "Latham: Beware the Polls and The Swinging Voter" in the AFR of 17 November former Labor leader Mark Latham praises John Howard's economic management, in general finds surprisingly little fault with his government and labels the union movement's "Rights at Work" campaign a "scare campaign"

The Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) "slammed the Howard Government's use of a key regional grants program, citing many examples of financial mismanagement and apparent pork-barrelling." [The Australian, 15 November]

Both the Prime Minister and Kevin Rudd are only paying lip service to the real needs of our education system according to Cate Molloy, who is standing for the Federal seat of Wide Bay as an independent.

Mark Wooden, leading Australian economist, clarified the role of AWAs beyond any shadow of a doubt. Wooden affirmed that employers enthusiastically embraced AWAs "because they could legally reduce pay and conditions." [Fairness test killing AWAs, PM warned,The Australian, 12 November]

AWAs arrive faster than they're processed, and increasingly, they fail the fairness test. 6 September, there was a backlog of 110,000 AWAs awaiting vetting; 9 November - the backlog was 142,000.

If I understand correctly, the Howard Government paid "hundreds of Canberra public servants [to] prepare seat-by-seat 'cheat sheets'" intending to use those cheat sheets to "plan its political advertising." "Thousands of hours ... at taxpayers' expense ... " [Canberra Times, 10 November]

Queensland Democrat Senator Andrew Bartlett called for greater protections such as the public right to appeal against the lawfulness of decisions that directly affect them.

"Costello, who knowingly made/makes false assertions about Labor front benchers; obstinately refusing to accept objective evidence; arrogantly, rudely shouting over the interviewer; arguing that there's no big difference between 70% and 60%."

Orange City Council has reaped the benefit of the government's desperate pork barrelling in this phoney election campaign with $10M to complete the Orange Bypass' northern distributor, according to Peter Andren Member for Calare.

As of 6 September, merely 10% of AWAs lodged were vetted for fairness (about 12,700 of 123,000). After four months and (supposedly) 600 additional inspectors, there's a backlog of about 110,000 AWAs to vet, with about new 30,000 AWAs submitted monthly. Some assert it will take 10 months to work-off this backlog.

The Greens today slammed Prime Minister Howard and the Queensland Labor government for their paltry commitments to renewable energy targets.

The Australian Labor Party, the world's oldest political political party still in existence, is a contradictory organisation. With its record in Government, at the Federal and state levels, and in opposition, led by Kevin Rudd, with an ever-diminishing number of policy positions which distinguish it from the ruling Howard Liberal Government, it is all too easy for critics to the left of Labor to dismiss it as no better than the Liberal Party as indeed the Greens, the Democrats and some parties of the far left have maintained either implicitly or explicitly

Like every thinking compassionate person in this country I desperately want to see the end of both Howard and Costello, but I am dismayed to have learnt that the Federal Labor Party is, yet again, poised to pour millions of their hard-earned advertising dollars in an attempt to, once again, focus voter attention on the Liberal Party leadership succession issue ...

If the leaders of the "Friends of Noosa" coalition had learnt anything from recent history, they would understand that their "Dump Labor" campaign, aimed at the Federal Labor Party, which has opposed forced amalgamations from the outset and has fully supported John Howard's legislation to allow Queenslanders to express their views on this issue at the ballot box, will have almost the precise opposite effect to that intended.

The myth of the Howard Government's superior ability to manage the Australian economy may prove in this election as in the last to be the Archilles heel of an otherwise damning case against Howard.

Five myths of superior economic competence, which has been flogged by the conservative Australian Coalition from the time it first assumed office are demolished by John Hermann of Economic Reform Australia.

In his speech Faulkner gave the hard facts and numbers behind the Howard Government's use of taxpayers' money to promote itself and its Industrial Relations legislation - legislation, which has changed the very fabric of our society, but which had not even put to electors during the 2004 elections.

The Coalition Government has exposed its hypocrisy on council amalgamations with its current attack on the Queensland Government according to Independent Member for Calare, Peter Andren.

John Howard, the same man who privatised Telstra against the wishes of 70% of Australians and even more strenuous opposition from rural Australia, and who sold out the interests of beef and pork producers in signing the Australia US Free Trade Agreement in 2005 has emerged, in the past week, as the unlikely saviour of Queensland democracy.

Also published as "Dictatorial conduct" on Online Opinion on 12 Aug 07.