Since the recent election there's a lot of commentary saying the Liberal party needs to reconsider its policies and re-align with its core values which, when enumerated sound very centrist.

I just watched ABC's q&a, there was a few interesting points. There was a strong consensus that Trump style culture wars are toxic in Australian politics, and that it's unlikely future candidates would take that route.

I don't want to gloat infront of the seppos, but I think what's happening during this aftermath is very salient for all of those "both sides are bad" Americans.

In October last year there seemed to be a lot of users saying that they didn't want to reward the dems with their vote, and that the only way to communicate with the party was to withhold their vote.

I think what's happening right now in Australia demonstrates the importance of voting.

Labor might not be left enough for you personally, but each time the libs are defeated they need to move to the left to be viable, and Labor will have to move further left to differentiate themselves. That is to say, the spectrum of acceptable opinions is moving to the left in an observable manner, right now.

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[–] shirro@aussie.zone 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

I couldn't say for sure if the window has really moved or if this is a temporary shift caused by a poor Liberal campaign that didn't address peoples real concerns about cost of living. I think there are still a lot of people who don't like the Labor party or what they represent. I don't know if the Liberals failed to address the needs of the center or just completely ignored reality. The damage to the Liberal party will probably persist for some time though because they are probably going to need at least one more election to rebuild the parliamentary party before they can mount a credible campaign for government.

The Libs do appear to be wiped out in some cities - almost unelectable in their current forn in both state and federal politics. The sensible thing would be to go where the votes are. John Howard did that very successfully. If they need to move to the center to win then they need members and supporters who will back them in that move and they have pushed out a lot of moderates so it might be a struggle.