THE SENATE IS THE ONLY WAY WE CAN STOP THE ROT

By Kevin Glancy – November 2018

As the Liberal party continues to stand for nothing, there are other tastier conservative choices and regardless of the vagaries of our biased, two-party preferred election system, if you’re a conservative you should try them. If Labor wins the next federal election as it appears it will, it’s only in the Senate where their lunacy can be held at bay or at least restricted.

I’m sure many are frustrated by the Senate’s obstructive ways and the lack of justification as to why many Senators actually hold Senate positions. Tasmania has 12 Senators in the 76 available and it certainly does not warrant that many. The paltry number of votes that give most Senators that power is undoubtedly an abuse of democracy. But these are desperate times and our only hope is in the Senate. It’s the only way in through a manipulated two-party preferred voting system. But it will only succeed if a clutch of genuine conservatives hold the balance of power in the Senate after the next federal election.

The Liberal party has already shown that they are not prepared to fight for Australian conservative values and do not deserve much consideration. The argument that by punishing the Liberals at polling booths you let Labor in carries weight but voting for the marginally better of two evils will not stop the rot. The Liberals have had long enough to establish their conservative credentials and they have failed miserably.

To avoid Labor, the best strategy for a conservative is to ensure that even if they vote Liberal in the lower house that they use their white ballot paper vote to ensure that genuine minor conservative parties gain control of the Senate.  I would favour the Australian Conservatives, they are the sensible option.

The Australian Conservatives deserve our conservative support

There’s no mistaking Senator Cory Bernardi’s genuine conservative credentials or his resolve. Understandably dissatisfied with the left-leaning direction of his then Liberal party he departed in 2016 to stand as an independent Senator. If a politician was only interested in the easy money, Bernardi’s move is a definite contradiction.

He’d always been loyal to the party of his choice and the split clearly suggests that he was motivated by conscience and integrity. It could have ended his political career and there would have been many who had hoped it would.

At the time he obviously had bigger plans and concerned about the socialist course that Australia was on, he then formed the Australian Conservatives.

He makes no bones about his election strategy and he continues to proceed with caution. Senator Bernardi is boxing clever and needs to; he understands the need for party discipline.  He’s aware of how difficult it is to find 150 good candidates to contest seats for the House of Representatives. Sensibly, he’s concentrating on finding good candidates for the Senate. A smart move but candidate selection in any event, is always a risky business.

Cory Bernardi is wise to travel slowly in choosing his people. One of the problems for conservative parties are ‘loose cannons’.  Candidates and members who shoot off at the mouth without thinking. What they have to say is not necessarily wrong but unlike those on the left, the media will pounce on the slightest suspect word said by a conservative that can be taken out of context and use it to label someone as racist, extremist, homophobe etc. The result? The party’s election chances are damaged and the candidate’s campaign is over before it starts.

Pauline Hanson has a history of bad candidate selection and it has robbed her and her party of meaningful success. Undoubtedly, she is the most courageous politician in Australia but also pursues non-relevant issues like vaccination amongst others. I can appreciate her passion but politics is a hard and unfair game and contentious minor issues should be ignored. They are just fodder for the dominant left-wing media, a means by which they can pull you down.

Positioning a party is like banging a nail home and there’s no time for distractions or mixed messages. A minor party must pick say, five core policies and air them over and over again to ram that nail home.

There’s multiple conservative policy choices. Pulling out of the Paris climate change lunacy; reducing unsustainable immigration; regaining freedom of speech and opinion; curing problems caused by drought with rain harvesting infrastructure and pipelines.

There’s secondary but still important cultural issues like; religious freedom and identity politics; selling or correcting the biased ABC and shutting down the freedom eroding, Human Rights Commission. There are many issues that will resonate not just with conservatives but with any voter who has a degree of intelligence and common sense.

It’s not easy to get the message out. Minor parties, particularly conservative ones do not have the luxury of media attention. The trouble is that conservatives only get that attention when they’re controversial in the eyes of the media.

Creating controversy is not necessarily a bad thing in attracting publicity but you can be provocative without fuelling the cries of racist etc. Use facts to support your case and your policy stance will connect, whether it’s about unsustainable immigration and climate change or the reality of renewable subsidies forcing the rise in electricity prices.

Pointing out hypocrisy and double standards can also be provocative and attract media attention and there’s a daily dose of contradictions by those on the left. But it pays to align those with key policy positions as you continue to bang the nail home and create a vote-worthy profile. Highlighting double standards also show where you stand in the bigger picture.

Importantly, when a candidate speaks to the media, he or she must express what they have to say carefully. To learn to speak in terms of twenty-second meaningful grabs because the media is rarely interested in context and will avoid the meat in your sandwich and choose the lettuce.

Senator Cory Bernardi knows his way around the corridors of parliament house, is articulate and is equipped with a good dose of common sense. It’s just what Australia needs along with the strength to resist the scourge of socialism flushing individual freedom and with it the hopes for our country down the drain.

The only way that his party, the Australian Conservatives can do that, is with our help in voting for their candidates for the Senate at the next federal election.

I urge you to do so, check them out here; www.conservatives.org.au