Promises, Promises: Abbott’s Survival Modus Operandi

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Today’s Guest Author is Aguirre (see – told you I’d get a thread-starter out of you one of these days . . . ). As we at The Pub know, Aguirre is a fine analyst of politics and – as importantly – policies. In my opinion (and that of at least one other, Your Royal Leonine Majesty) his ability to get to the heart of the matter is better than almost every mainstream journalist, and the equal of the best of the fifth estate. Thank you again, Aguirre, for permission to republish.

Well, we all know Abbott’s MO is to survive the next thing, whether it be an interview, a party room meeting, a presser or a session of Parliament. He’s happy to sacrifice all future credibility anything one of his colleagues might have said, any promise he might have made, even the workability of his own party, just as long as he survives that next thing. He’s made promises to WA that shaft Tasmania, and then gone straight to Tasmania to make promises that shaft WA, just so he could survive each of those particular speeches. He’s gone on TV and actually called himself a liar, simply because there was no other way out of that line of questioning, and then pretty much gone straight out into the community and said “Trust me.” He did an NPC speech a couple of years ago where he came out with all sorts of wonderful policy promises, his ‘new direction’ or whatever it was, and we watched him back away from all of them within a half hour of questions. Just because there was no other way out. If he needs his wife an daughters to act as a buffer against curly questioning, no worries, out they trot. Just as long as he gets through the next hour, the next meeting, the next day, the next interview.

So the next thing is the spill. You can bet he’ll go around to each of the backbenchers, individually, and promise them whatever it is they want from him, hand on heart. They’ll be different promises to each backbencher, and the promises will all contradict each other. A lot of them won’t believe him, but given he’ll have some support already, and given there could be three of four candidates and Bishop and Turnbull might split their votes, he probably only needs to con 15-20 of the backbench. He’d be thinking he could win a three-way contest. Just. But just is enough.

Maybe he’ll tell some of them he’s confident he has the numbers, and there’ll be retribution for those who don’t back him. Maybe he’ll tell others they’re close to a ministry position so just hang in there. Maybe he’ll tell others he’s begging them for the stability of the party, don’t change horses mid-stream. Whatever pushes their buttons.

473 thoughts on “Promises, Promises: Abbott’s Survival Modus Operandi”

  1. Here is the full text of Tony Abbott:

    As you know, two of my colleagues have called for a leadership spill of the two senior positions in our party. They’ve called for a spill of my position as leader and they’ve called for a spill of Julie Bishop’s position as deputy.

    The first point to make is that they are perfectly entitled to call for this, but the next point to make is that they are asking the partyroom to vote out the people that the electorate voted in, in September 2013.

    I want to make this very simple point. We are not the Labor Party. We are not the Labor Party and we are not going to repeat the chaos and the instability of the Labor years, so I have spoken to deputy leader Julie Bishop and we will stand together in urging the partyroom to defeat this particular motion and in so doing, and in defeating this motion, to vote in favour of the stability and the team that the people voted for at the election.

    We have a strong plan. It’s the strong plan that I enunciated at the Press Club this week and we are determined to get on with it, and we will.

  3. Monday’s Newspoll will be pivotal. They will be out in the field now. Likely to be a Turnbull question re preferred PM, and Bishop. If it’s a disaster, it will swing party room votes to support the spill. If its business as usual, Tony may have bought himself time. But it won’t last. He’ll be gone by years end.

  4. Barrie Cassidy – the nobody ‘insider’ who thinks he’s the oracle of good analysis. And Uhlmann, who spent so much time stroking the abbott’s feet, now tells us the abbott has come to this due to his pre-election rhetoric which he and the rest of the stupid msm ignored and refused to call him out on.

  5. Former Lib pollie Ross Cameron discussing Tones’ prime ministership says “It’s Over !” .Oh oh, has Tones verballed Julie Bishop ? Gilbert told by a contact very close to Bish that they “would be shocked” if JB went with a joint ticket with Tones on Tuesday.

  6. God is GREAT!!…seriously…Karma is great!!..and there’s the best to come!!…Oh, Oh, Oh,…thank GOD for the LNP….But there’s more!…what are the Nationals going to do??…Truss! Truss!…bring on Truss…we want Truss, we want Truss!!…or Barnaby…jeeezus!..there’s a whole marquis of comedy yet to play this gig!
    BRING IT ON!!

  7. Thanks for the text of the announcement, Ducky. From watching Sky (and they’re handling this really badly, never seen such jumping at shadows), I would say that Bishop has given Abbott one reassurance, but is probably going around privately urging MPs to go for a spill. She’d definitely be canvassing opinion and keeping her options open.

    Watching Frydenberg right now. There’s obviously some serious delusion amongst the Liberals. They talk about avoiding a crisis, not allowing themselves to be destabilised. They can’t see that it’s happened, they’re already inside it. They don’t understand that calls to change the leader from their own party, particularly in a situation where that leader is shit scared of a spill because he’s going to lose it – they are the leadership crisis. Surviving from here doesn’t make anything go away.

    I’m certain that Bishop is now being verballed. Both Frydenberg and Cormann have now specifically tied Bishop’s name to Abbott in any reference to leadership. Neither of them have spoken to her – they were asked and they said no. It’s pretty clear what’s going on. Public campaign to force her into line.

  8. Cormannator trying to beat CanDo’s highest score for most use of the word “strong”

  9. I would think Simpkins and Randall, both ultra-right-wing nutjobs, would favour Morrison as leader over Jules or Turnbull. Simpkins said today Morrison was his preference, then Bishop, but Morrison says he’s not in the running……..

    You just can’t believe a word any of them say.

  10. Little Troy forgot to add Krudd to this list, but he’s right.

  17. Abetz, Andrews,Cormann,Hockey,Pyne are being wheeled out to support the glorious leader. They have no choice. Neither does Bishop.What else could they say? We don’t support the leader. It’s the Ministers who remain publically mute that are the key. People like McFarlane, Robb, Ley,Morrison. Even if they are asked they will not break Cabinet ranks. It’s an old tactic, but a failed one.

  19. Hello Minister (insert name) this is Tony Abbott. If you value your job get out there and sprout the stuff I just emailed you.

  21. It could just be my PC (Flash Player won’t work for some reason) but I am a bit confused why the ABC is live streaming ABC24 on you tube. I can’t open the official ABC24 News site yet there is no problem with this one.

    It’s the first time that I have been aware that the likes of the ABC can live stream on you tube?

    Are they doing this to save money? They took 4 days to put up Insiders on their web site and it seems to be a “short cut” version.

    Might be pay-back to Abbott & Hockey for cutting their budget! 😉

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