Election 2004 | Day 40 | Final Roundup

$1.20 Coalition, $4.00 Labor. It was at $1.25 to $3.75 during the day, but has since gone back to that.

And now for polls.

All the papers have been shrieking that the Liberals are in front (note that I have never, ever heard of a Galaxy poll being mentioned before in this campaign). AC Neilson says 54/46. Newspoll has them on 50/50. Contrary to the stories that are saying Howard will win easily, this is still anyone's game. The sky hasn't fallen just yet.

The Sky News poll tonight said 47% of people would give their second preference to Family First. This is in no way a proper poll (you do it via remote control and can go as many times as you want), but makes me wonder what the fuck the demographic of Foxtel Digital subscribers are.

Medicare Gold
Treasury says it's underfunded by $725m, due to higher hospital administrative costs than expected.

"Even if they are correct, Labor could meet its commitment to deliver free hospital care to the elderly because it is ahead on other policy costings," she (Julia Gillard) said.

She also says the department's analysis falls far short of the $4 billion price tag which Prime Minister John Howard tried to put on it.

"There's been wild claims in the last week about the costs and sustainability of Medicare Gold," Ms Gillard said.

"Mr Howard said as recently as yesterday that it was $4 billion underfunded.

"That's not true and Mr Howard can't answer the simple point that across Labor's policies we can fully fund all of them and deliver a bigger budget surplus than the Howard Government," she said.

The most disappointing find of the day (because of the timing and lack of people there to cover it) comes from Margo Kingston, who has been hanging around the National Press Club all night.

Update 9.06pm, October 8: The press gallery is basically empty except for me and the SMH's COS Gabrielle Hooton when the Department of Finance wanders in to 'box' its latest costings assessments. They're about the government's new policies, and they show that the Coalition has underfunded some of ITS promises. Perfect timing.

Gah! Too late for newspapers to run. But would they run it anyway? Hrm hrm.

Argh
This just makes me want to punch him.

"To those Australians who are listening to this program who haven't made up their mind, this is not a time to experiment with the theory of kick him but he'll still be in office. Please don't do that because if you kick hard enough and enough of you kick, I won't be in office."

- Howard

THAT'S THE POINT YOU IDIOT.

Greens
They could become a third major party in the future. I'm sure I speculated on this a few weeks ago, but can't remember.

Full Circle
Howard ended the campaign as he started it, cynically speaking about trust.

"It is a question of who do you better trust to manage Australia, both economically and Australia's national security and defence, and nothing has happened during the election campaign to shake my belief that is the central issue in this campaign."

Latham finished it in his original primary school (where he first started handing out HTV's for the ALP) , having a press conference in his old classroom.

"It's where I started my activism, my service for the Labor party and to be back here today as the parliamentary leader makes me proud, honoured and privileged."

The Rest...
The Age has a roundup of the entire election, if you've only just tuned in now.

The AEC site has a section where you can get stats on how many people screwed up their voting papers last election. Interesting!

Navel Gazing
Unless there's some ongoing scandal over/after the election, or I somehow figure out how to do this full-time, Completely Biased will either end or get scaled back heaps.

Forgotten News
Now to tie up loose ends (or leave them loose yet bring them to the front of your mind):

Tony Windsor (guy offered diplomatic posting to stand down) - There has been absolutely no news whatsoever reported about him after September 28th. I can't find anything.

Ralph Hahnheuser (guy running for Senate that went on a hunger strike for the past three weeks) - No idea what happened to him either. Once again, no news past September 28th.

Stuff I Wish I'd Done

• I was going to rewrite the National's interest rate calculator, and adjust it for actual values from reality instead of Andoworld, but never got around to finishing it. No point now.
• Creatively insulted Piers Akerman/Andrew Bolt heaps more. They're utter fuckwits that don't deserve to be recognised within the industry at all, let alone have positions above the guy that scrubs the toilets at News Ltd. Is being a shitstick all you need to do to get a decent position in the media?
• Tim Blair too. His blog is crap, he can't write jokes for shit, acts like a smug fuckstain, omits facts that differs from what he's trying to push, and reminds me of Beavis & Butthead sitting on a couch going "hur hur hur, Latham sucks or something, hur hur hur," with no actual decent reasoning.
• Started the Ando Zone earlier. The majority of times he made a goose of himself was in the start of the campaign, so it feels like I just left it too late. Could've developed a cult following, and gotten a TV show with celebrity endorsements.
• Pimped this blog more. Didn't want to feel like I was spamming though. Oh well.

Finally...
This is your chance to make a difference, and all it requires is numbering boxes properly. Make it count.

My gut feeling is good (well my lower intestines are a different story altogether at the moment, but that's related to dinner) about tomorrow, despite nearly every media outlet in Australia siding themselves with the Coalition. I'm just hoping my gut is accurate.

Fingers crossed tomorrow is a good night.