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Updated June 30, 2017 14:38:11

Liberals in Victoria claim the party's religious right is stacking branches with Mormons and Catholic groups in a drive to pre-select more conservative candidates.

It comes amid a heated debate in the New South Wales division over whether to adopt a Victorian-style "plebiscite" model to empower branch members.

Currently, candidates in NSW are chosen by a mix of branch representatives and party officials, a system critics claim is run by "factional warlords".

The Victorian model, introduced in 2008, allows party members of two years standing to vote in Lower House pre-selections in their electorates.

Sources have told the ABC the Victorian system is more open and democratic and has seen talented MPs including Josh Frydenberg, Kelly O'Dwyer and Dan Tehan win pre-selection.

Others claim it has also encouraged rampant branch-stacking.

Members of the party's executive have been accused of "actively recruiting" Mormons and conservative Catholics to branches across Victoria, which some fear could eventually lead to more conservative candidates winning pre-selection.

While the Liberals prides themselves on being a broad church, the ABC has been told the recruits are often motivated by "single issues" like same-sex marriage or euthanasia.

There are concerns this is distorting the values of the Liberal Party, which is shifting towards the right, but others argue it is part of a broad recruitment drive aimed at arresting a serious decline in membership numbers.

Victorian State Executive member Marcus Baastian said the party has been targeting business groups, young professionals and different cultural groups as well as religious organisations.

He hit back at claims the party was "swinging to the right", saying the accusation was designed to undermine efforts to modernise the state division.

"Recruitment in Victoria has delivered fantastic results in lowering our average age, increasing our party membership and ensuring we have campaigners on the ground in our marginal seats to help out candidates at election time," he told the ABC.

The battle over plebiscite pre-selections in NSW will come to a head at next month's "futures convention" where delegates will debate Tony Abbott's push to adopt a plebiscite or "one member, one vote" model.

Mr Bastiaan, who is considered a controversial figure in the party, is firmly behind Mr Abbott's push and has told the NSW division its duty was "to be relevant, forward footed and ensure it is a membership organisation that respects the very people who vote for it".

In a video to members attending a pre-convention event in Sydney tomorrow, he warned: "Without a strong New South Wales, we cannot win and hold Government."

Those pushing for change in NSW point to the Liberal's dwindling membership and narrow support base, arguing that giving people a say will revive the party.

But, for many, this is also a battle for control between a divided right faction and a dominant left.

The NSW State Council last year rejected Mr Abbott's motion to change the preselection process and voted in favour of a one put by Mr Turnbull and NSW Premier Mike Baird to debate the issue and broader party reforms at this year's futures convention.

Anyone will be able to attend and some party members have told the ABC they fear it will be ambushed by Mr Abbott's hard-right loyalists whose ultimate goal is to damage Malcolm Turnbull.

The Prime Minister supports plebiscites in principle, but the left faction to which he is aligned has been campaigning against it, fearing it could open the door to branch stacking in the state.

According to Mr Abbott, change to the NSW Liberal Party is "unstoppable" and most now concede that is the case.

"Nobody wants to leave that conference with the same system we have now"," a NSW Liberal source said.

"There has got to be change."

Topics: liberals, government-and-politics, federal---state-issues, federal-government, political-parties, community-and-society, religion-and-beliefs, australia, nsw, vic

First posted June 30, 2017 14:29:49

Original post:
Victorian Liberals claim right faction stacking branches with Mormons and Catholics - ABC Online

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As someone who voted for Barack Obama twice, supported the Affordable Care Act, and could be persuaded to vote for the right kind of single-payer system, I've found the entire health-care debate over the past several months deeply depressing. That's no doubt why my first instinct was to cheer when reading a recent rant against the right from an editor at The Huffington Post.

The transparently titled opinion column, "I Don't Know How to Explain to You That You Should Care About Other People," is a perfect expression of our political moment in its utter exasperation at those on the other side of a policy debate, but even more so in how it casts these partisan opponents as moral monsters with whom communication, let alone persuasion, is simply impossible.

I admit that it does often feel that way these days, especially when it comes to the House and Senate bills to remake the nation's health-care system, since so much of the discussion has been conducted by Republicans in undeniable bad faith with bills primarily designed to cut or eliminate taxes dishonestly described by leaders in Congress, as well as the president, as efforts to make health care more affordable. (The tax cuts ensure that health care would in fact become much less affordable for millions of people.)

But the instinct to cheer on the argument should be resisted.

The fact is that most intelligent and informed people on the right do not oppose progressive policies because they're stingy bastards who don't give a damn about their fellow citizens. It's true that this may describe some Republicans. There are probably a non-trivial number, especially those unduly influenced by the odious ideas of Ayn Rand, who do come close to viewing the poor as parasitic moochers. But many, many others the vast majority, in my experience do not take this position. They believe, instead, that progressive policies do more harm than good for the very people they're designed to help.

Consider the minimum wage. Many conservatives oppose raising it, especially as high as $15/hour, as some municipalities around the country have opted to do over the last few years. Do they take this position because they prefer lower-wage workers to struggle? No. They take this position because they understand basic principles of economics, which predict that raising costs for businesses that employ low-wage workers will lead them to make fewer hires, thereby hurting these workers overall. (A study released earlier this week seems to indicate that this is precisely what's been happening in Seattle since the city began incrementally raising its minimum wage.)

The same holds for the concerns that led the original neoconservatives to make various proposals for reforming crime and welfare during the 1970s and '80s proposals that powerfully influenced policymaking at the local and federal levels during the 1990s.

My point isn't to make a case for these policies (though I think many of them were defensible in the context of the time). The point is to recognize that the proposals were made with the intent of improving the lives of the poor, crime victims, and others, not with the intent of hurting them, or of giving the rich a post-spending-cut tax break. (While it's true that most of these conservatives supported tax cuts as well, those cuts, too, were justified as a spur to economic growth and job creation that would benefit everyone.)

It's certainly easier and more morally satisfying for those on the left to presume that the right is just motivated by rank selfishness. But it's no more true at an individual level than it is as the level of public policy debate.

Though there's been considerable dispute about studies purporting to show that conservatives are more generous than liberals when it comes to private charity, the most fair-minded critics don't claim the opposite that only people on the left care about the well-being of their fellow citizens. The critics claim, rather, that ideology is an insignificant variable in determining who gives to charity, and how much.

So much for having to explain to Republicans as a group why they "should care about other people."

Now, it may well be that Republicans are more inclined toward generosity when it comes to private charity than they are with regard to government programs. Is that foolish? Could conservatives do more social good if they supported tax hikes and policies devised and run by the federal government? That's an empirically testable proposition, the outcome of which just might change some minds on the right.

But only if liberals, progressives, and democratic socialists resist the temptation to flatter themselves and demonize their opponents and keep up the hard, unglamorous, sometimes infuriating work of trying to persuade.

View original post here:
Why can't self-satisfied liberals admit that conservatives care about people, too? - The Week Magazine

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., speaks during a Stop 'Trumpcare' rally in front of the Capitol in Washington, D.C. in May. Alex Wong/Getty Images hide caption

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., speaks during a Stop 'Trumpcare' rally in front of the Capitol in Washington, D.C. in May.

When Senate Republican leaders delayed the vote on their bill to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., was quick to not declare victory.

"We're not resting on any laurels, nor do we feel any sense yet of accomplishment," Schumer said at his weekly press conference, shortly after the surprise GOP decision to punt on a vote. "Other than we are making progress, because the American people are listening to our arguments."

The push to repeal key parts of the Affordable Care Act will succeed or fail based entirely on Republican votes. So arguing is the most that Democrats can do.

Perhaps it's enough. The bill's popularity has cratered as the debate has dragged on. An NPR-PBS Newshour-Marist poll out this week put its approval at 17 percent. As Republicans have scrambled to pull together the bare minimum of votes they need to pass their bill, Democrats have done something the GOP mastered over recent electoral cycles: Oppose a complicated legislative effort by focusing on how it could potentially disrupt voters' lives.

"Health care, in general, is a complicated policy, but for people to understand what this bill would do to them has been pretty simple," said Meghan Smith, a strategist at the public relations firm SKD Knickerbocker.

Smith is helping coordinate messaging for a number of progressive groups trying to block the repeal-and-replace effort. She said the groups are focusing on big-picture ideas, like projections the legislation would lead to higher health care costs for many Americans. The Congressional Budget Office's projection that an additional 22 million people would be uninsured if the Senate bill becomes law has been easy to communicate, as well.

As outside groups have organized ad campaigns and activism efforts, Schumer and the rest of the Senate Democratic Caucus has been holding event after event in and around the Capitol. There's been a clear effort by lawmakers to bring their arguments down to a personal scale.

On Tuesday, most of the Democratic caucus stood on the Senate steps holding large posters of constituents who rely on the Affordable Care Act or Medicaid. As it wound down, Schumer spelled out the messaging strategy. "We ask you those of you from local papers and outlets, to talk to your senator about the person that they are holding up," he urged reporters covering the event.

As the debate has gone on, Democratic lawmakers keep returning to one main attack point. The Senate Republican-drafted bill, Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., said Thursday, provides "massive tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans. And to pay for that, we're taking away health care from millions and millions of Americans. It's as plain as that."

Democrat after Democrat has made similar arguments on the Senate floor and at various rallies and press conferences in recent days.

Booker orchestrated one of the Democrats' more viral moments on Monday a three-and-a-half-hour live video stream on the Capitol steps, focused on blasting the bill. The video initially began with Booker and Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga. Other lawmakers joined in, and, by the end, a large crowd of supporters was there, too.

"It was truly a special moment," Booker said. "It shows the spontaneous outpouring that people have, who feel very passionate about this issue."

Planned Parenthood and other organizations also organized a larger Capitol rally Thursday.

But the question is whether any of this matters. The bill's fate comes down to a dozen or so Republican senators lawmakers who likely don't have much support from the types of people who are showing up at Capitol rallies anyway.

That's why efforts by people like Stephanie Powell may be more important. Powell lives in Anchorage, Alaska, and every morning at around 8 o'clock, she calls the office of Sen. Lisa Murkowski, a Republican who represents the state. "I call her Anchorage office, her Juneau office, her Fairbanks office, her Washington office," Powell said.

Powell is progressive, but said she voted for Murkowski. "She's always been Alaska first," she said. But Powell and her family all rely on Medicaid, which she is quick to tell Murkowski's staffers when they pick up the phone. "They know more about my health history than maybe my own mother at this point, because I've been very up front about what this means to us."

The Senate is in recess for the next week. Which means Murkowski and other Republicans who are either on the fence or opposed to the legislation including Maine's Susan Collins, Nevada's Dean Heller, Ohio's Rob Portman, and West Virgina's Shelley Moore Capito will likely be hearing from a lot of people like Powell.

Read more here:
How Democrats Are Fighting The GOP Health Care Bill - NPR

The Democratic Party has reacted to its series of recent election losses by once again concluding that it needs a better economic message. As Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer said Sunday, Democrats need a strong, bold, sharp-edged and common-sense economic agenda. The only disagreement within the party is about how sharp-edged and left-wing that agenda should be. But it is increasingly clear that the problem for Democrats has little to do with economics and much more to do with a cluster of issues they would rather not revisit about culture, social mores and national identity.

The Democratic economic agenda is broadly popular with the public. More people prefer the partys views to those of Republicans on taxes, poverty reduction, health care, government benefits, and even climate change and energy policy. In one recent poll, 3 in 4 supported raising the minimum wage to $9. Seventy-two percent wanted to provide pre-K to all 4-year-olds in poor families. Eight in 10 favored expanding food stamps. It is noteworthy that each of these proposals found support from a majority of Republicans.

The Democracy Fund commissioned a comprehensive study of voters in the 2016 presidential election, and one scholar, Lee Drutman, set out his first key finding: The primary conflict structuring the two parties involves questions of national identity, race, and morality. Focusing on the people who voted for President Barack Obama in 2012 and then Donald Trump in 2016, Drutman found that they were remarkably close to the Democratic Party on economic issues. But they were far to the right on their attitudes toward immigrants, blacks and Muslims, and much more likely to feel people like me are on the decline.

The Public Religion Research Institute and the Atlantic also conducted an important study to analyze the most powerful predictors of whether a white working-class American would vote for Trump. The top predictor was if someone identified as a Republican, a reminder that party loyalty is very strong. But after that, the two best predictors were fears of cultural displacement and support for deporting undocumented immigrants. Those who felt their economic conditions were poor or fair were actually slightly more likely to vote for Hillary Clinton.

Its worth considering how much the Democratic Party has changed over the past 25 years. Bill Clintons party was careful to come across as moderate on many social issues. It had a middle-of-the-road position on immigration and was cautiously progressive on subjects such as gay rights. The Democrats eventually moved boldly leftward in some of these areas, such as gay rights, out of an admirable sense of principle. On others, such as immigration, they did so largely to court a growing segment of Democratic voters, a process that Peter Beinart nicely explains in the most recent Atlantic issue. But in a broader sense, the Democratic Party moved left because it became a party dominated by urban, college-educated professionals, and its social and cultural views naturally mirrored this reality.

The partys defense of minorities and celebration of diversity are genuine and praiseworthy, but they have created great distance between itself and a wide swath of Middle America. This is a cultural gulf that cannot be bridged by advocating smarter policies on tax credits, retraining and early-childhood education. The Democrats need to talk about Americas national identity in a way that stresses the common elements that bind, not the particular ones that divide. Policies in these areas do matter. The party should take a position on immigration that is less absolutist and recognizes both the cultural and economic costs of large-scale immigration. On some of the issues surrounding sexual orientation, it can and should affirm its principles without compromise. But perhaps it is possible to show greater understanding for parts of the country that disagree. California recently enacted a travel ban that now prohibits state-funded travel to eight states with laws that in Californias view discriminate against LGBT people. Meanwhile, California has no problem paying for employees to travel to such havens of tolerance as China, Qatar and Russia.

The more I study this subject, the more I am convinced that people cast their vote mostly based on an emotional bond with a candidate, a sense that they get each other. Democrats have to recognize this. They should always stay true to their ideals, of course, but yet convey to a broad section of Americans rural, less-educated, older, whiter that they understand and respect their lives, their values and their worth. Its a much harder balancing act than one more push to raise the minimum wage. But this cultural realm is the crossroads of politics today.

Read more from Fareed Zakarias archive, follow him on Twitter or subscribe to his updates on Facebook.

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The Democrats' problem is not the economy, stupid - Washington Post

Things are getting so bad for the Republicans that theyre considering a last resort: bipartisanship.

Thats rightthe party that controls the White House, Senate and House might need some Democratic votes.

The immediate focus is the stalled Senate health care bill, which has a public approval rating of only 12 percent to 27 percent, depending on the poll. Nine GOP senators have expressed varying degrees of opposition to the bill. Conservatives dont like parts of it, moderates dont like parts of it, and even with President Trump cajoling lawmakers by phone and in person, the party cant seem to get to 50.

The New York Times says Mitch McConnell gave his senators a warning: Either Republicans come together, or he would have to work with Democrats to shore up the deteriorating health law.

Democrats are willing to negotiate, but their price is preserving most of ObamaCare with some changes. After seven years of Republican promises to repeal and replace the law, that sounds like a non-starterunless Trump and McConnell have no choice.

The larger problem is that the party that now runs Washington hasnt been able to push through a major piece of legislation. Theres been no progress on tax reform, which is tied in some ways to the tax reductions in the GOP health bill. Theres been no progress on an infrastructure program. Theres been no progress on constructing a border wall. And the GOP has to find the votes to approve a debt ceiling increase or face a government default.

Listen to the voices of Republican frustration, as reported by Politico:

Rep. Steve Womack: Wed better get our act together. Were better than this. Were not governing right now. Were stuck.

Rep. Tom Reed: The fact that were not getting to these issues health care, budget, tax reform is frustrating. We came here to move the needle.

The problem for Republicans is that they own these issues now. They are still trying to figure out how to be a governing party. The divisions within the party, and the gap between Trump and Republican lawmakers, has made each step agonizingly slow.

Gridlock in Washington can usually be blamed on the out-of-power party. And the Democrats have done their part to slow-walk just about everything, just as the GOP did during the Obama years.

But we are now faced with a Republican form of gridlock. And their success in 2018not to mention the presidents successwill rest on breaking it.

Howard Kurtz is a Fox News analyst and the host of "MediaBuzz" (Sundays 11 a.m.). He is the author of five books and is based in Washington. Follow him at @HowardKurtz. Click here for more information on Howard Kurtz.

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Could the Republicans rescue themselves by turning to ... Democrats? - Fox News