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To my friends on the occasion of an election defeat ...

Article Excerpt
When CNN's coverage was flapping aimlessly mid-evening, James Carville was clear: 'Can we just talk about Ohio. It's all that matters, Ohio, Ohio, Ohio!' Three hours later they finally realised he was right. Focus and judgement.

So it was in 1992 when Carville coined the immortal words: 'It's the economy, stupid!'

If only Labor could have had such simple clarity. We didn't. We've been too busy fighting among ourselves. The intelligentsia think the problem is the spin, polls and media management of the machine. The machine thinks the problem is the intelligentsia disconnecting us from ordinary voters. They're both wrong--it's the economy, stupid.

The problem is the punters don't trust us with the keys. They want to know we care and we can manage the economy. But what they've seen is disinterest from the intelligentsia and empty lip service from the machine. This has to change. Here are a few thoughts for each group:

To My Friends in the Intelligentsia ...

The only credible thing John Howard said in the campaign was: 'You can make all the promises you like, but if you can't manage the economy, they're not worth a hill of beans'. Our people evidently agreed with him. Even in 'safe' Labor seats like Calwell in northern Melbourne, we suffered large swings against us. In traditional working-class Broadmeadows it was 9 per cent. In faster growing Craigieburn South it was 12 per cent. It's been a 15 per cent swing there since the 1996 wipe-out. These aren't 'polling' numbers...

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