Category Archives: Liberal

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Berlin 1989: It was no accident that, once the Berlin Wall had come down, the freedoms available in the west of the continent were grabbed with both hands by the formerly communist nations in the east. Photograph: Lionel Cironneau/AP.

Sometimes a landscapes contours dissolve into the detail. This is happening now amid the fracturing of the wests liberal order. Brexit, Donald Trump, angry nationalism and populist politics - all are closely reported and rudely debated. Lost to the cacophony is clear sight of just how much is at stake.

For all its blemishes, the post-1945 settlement ushered in a remarkable period of relative peace and prosperity. We can all list the mistakes - whether hubris in Washington, corrupt politicians in Europe or greedy bankers everywhere. But for the most part, the story has been one of rising living standards and a spreading politics of generosity.

Freedom has advanced in step with the absence of war between the great powers. We too easily forget that there is nothing inevitable about peace or the march of democracy.

We might have noticed also the synergy between a rules-based world order and flourishing open societies. What unites peace abroad with democracy at home is the rule of law. Substitute arbitrary power and states fall to war and societies slide towards authoritarianism. That is why we should shiver when Mr Trump, the president of the worlds most powerful democracy, casually challenges the right of US judges to uphold basic freedoms and disdains international co-operation in favour of America-first nationalism.

The system established after 1945 was built on US power. But it endured and, after the end of the cold war, expanded because US leadership was embedded in multilateral rules and institutions. Everyone had a stake. Washington sometimes over-reached - in Vietnam or with the invasion of Iraq. By historys standards, however, the Pax Americana was essentially benign, resting as much on the force of example as military might.

In Europe, a legacy of war between states was replaced by a system that recognised their interdependence. There are lots of things wrong with the EU, but nothing at all when set against what came before. Compare the peace and prosperity of the second half of the 20th century with the barbarism of the first. It was no accident that, once the Berlin Wall had come down, the freedoms available in the west of the continent were grabbed with both hands by the formerly communist nations in the east.

This order, of course, was the creation of the west. The redistribution of power within the global system was always going to impose stresses. Nations such as China have been among the biggest beneficiaries of the US-led open trading system. But Beijing was never going to sign up to liberal democracy or forever abide by rules and institutions of exclusively western design. The challenge was whether the system could be revised to accommodate the aspirations of rising states and contain the resentments of a declining Russia.

What was not predicted was that the rich democracies would turn against their own creation, and the question would become whether they could manage the insurrections within. The textbooks tell us that at moments of global transition established powers such as the US defend the status quo, while rising states such as China seek to upend it.

History has been turned on its head. With Mr Trump, the US has joined the ranks of revisionist powers, threatening to surrender US global leadership in the cause of economic nationalism. Britain has done something similar by repudiating the EU. Germany and Japan are almost alone in seeking to hold on to the old multilateral order.

The charge sheet against western elites is by now familiar enough. Globalisation was rigged in favour of the one per cent. Politicians, mesmerised by markets, conspired in the theft. The incomes of the majority stagnated even as they carried the burden of post-crash austerity. Bankers who should be in jail are still pocketing bonuses. Unchecked migration has heaped cultural dislocation on to the economic insecurities wrought by technological change.

These grievances cannot be brushed aside. Mr Trumps xenophobia, the vote for Brexit in the UK and rising populism across Europe have been fed by the complacency of a political establishment in thrall to unfettered capitalism. Winning back public confidence requires mainstream politicians to deploy the tools of government - taxation, education and welfare policies, and yes, redistribution - to balance the excesses of globalisation.

No one should pretend, though, that the populists have the answer. Protectionism impoverishes everyone. Demonising Muslims will not make anyone safer. Locking out Mexicans or, for that matter, Polish plumbers, will not raise the living standards of workers in the US or Britain. Closed societies are meaner, poorer and more repressive. Rising nationalism most typically provides a backdrop to wars.

Memories are short. In Britain, the Brexit vote has stirred a fashion for rose-tinted spectacles. The 1950s were tough, the story goes, but communities stuck together. There were jobs and opportunities for the white working classes.

Breadline wages and slum housing, hotel signs declaring no dogs, no blacks, no Irish and cabinet ministers who denounced homosexuality as a contagious perversion as dangerous as heroin addiction go unmentioned. Opportunity? University was for a privileged five per cent.

The danger with nostalgia is that it can blind you to progress.

Financial Times Service

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Why the liberal world order is worth saving - Irish Times

Vancouver Sun

BC Liberal staffer hired by government, but still did work for party Vancouver Sun VICTORIA The B.C. government hired a Liberal party staffer into a supposedly non-partisan communications post, only to allow her to return to party organizing less than a month into the job. Kirsten Hamilton was hired in January as an events ... Premier backs away from allegation that NDP hacked BC Liberal websiteTimes Colonist Christy Clark accuses NDP of hacking Liberal party website, without proofThe Globe and Mail all 39 news articles »

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BC Liberal staffer hired by government, but still did work for party - Vancouver Sun

NESN.com

Trevor Bauer Takes Issue With 'Liberal-Slanted' Anti-Donald Trump Articles NESN.com You probably remember Bauer from the disgusting finger wound he suffered during a drone accident while the Indians made their run in the 2016 Major League Baseball postseason. But he was back in the news for something entirely different Thursday. and more »

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Trevor Bauer Takes Issue With 'Liberal-Slanted' Anti-Donald Trump Articles - NESN.com

Washington Times

Tim Scott reads racist tweets by 'liberal left' over support for Jeff Sessions Washington Times You see what I'm surprised by, just a smidgen, is that the liberal left that speaks and desires the rest of us to be tolerant do not want to be tolerant of anyone that disagrees with where they are coming from, the senator continued. So the ... Sen. Tim Scott: Liberal Left Activists 'Do not Want To Be Tolerant'Breitbart News 'Disgrace to the Black Race': Sen. Tim Scott Illustrates How Liberals Show ToleranceCNSNews.com SC's Scott takes aim at intolerant liberals in Senate speechThe State The Australian all 2,680 news articles »

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Tim Scott reads racist tweets by 'liberal left' over support for Jeff Sessions - Washington Times

Donald Trumps victory in the U.S. presidential elections was taken by many as another nail in the coffin of liberalism, and could also have an impact on the 10 Most Liberal Companies In The US. The upcoming elections in a number of European states like Germany, France, and the Netherlands, which are being preceded by strong results for right-wing parties in polls, isnt likely to make things better. In this way, it looks like the liberal story is coming to an end, or is already dead, as many headlines stated in the last couple of years.

And even though conservatives can rejoice over their victories in political and social spheres, one segment where liberalism isnt dead yet and is unlikely to ever be eradicated completely is in business. For better or worse, there will always be companies which follow the ideas of liberty and equality, will support projects aimed towards improving such ideals, and will stand up against governments attempts to alienate certain rights. However, there will also be companies that will be more conservative and each group will appeal more to people that are closer to their respective ideologies.

Political divisions often dominate Americans lives, but are particularly noticeable during an election year. Last year, after having published the Fortune 500 list, Fortune contracted SurveyMonkey to conduct a poll in order to identify which companies Americans like and dislike and whether they identify themselves as liberals, conservatives, or moderate. The results showed some interesting differences. For example, conservatives were more likely to shop at Wal-Mart, while liberals considered it to be one of the worst companies for America. On the other hand, liberals like Target, while conservatives would like to see it shut down. Liberals named Alphabet as the company they would most like to work for, while conservatives, unsurprisingly, like ExxonMobil. However, there were also a number of similarities, with both liberals and conservatives naming Amazon, Walt Disney, Apple, Microsoft, Johnson & Johnson, and Alphabet among companies they like, which is also expected since these companies generally score well in consumer confidence polls.

NTM Photography/Shutterstock.com

With the White House being ruled by an egotisticalnarcissist who attacks everything and everyone that doesnt align with his positions, and the consequent increase of conservatives confidence that things will go their way, it is likely that the political and cultural division in the U.S will dominate its society for years. Trumps recent attacks on individual companies and businesses responses to his actions will put in the spotlight the idea of liberal and conservative companies, which is likely to affect their performance. In the end, companies will try to accommodate both camps and try to keep everyone happy.

With this in mind, we have compiled a list of the 10 Most Liberal Companies In The US, based partially on the results of SurveyMonkeys poll conducted for Fortune and partially on the segments that these companies are engaged in, their actions, theircorporate social responsibility(dont miss our list of the10 MostSocially Responsible Companies in The US), and the views of their top management.

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10 Most Liberal Companies In The US - Insider Monkey

Justice Harold Burton recalled from a 1957 meeting with President Eisenhower that the president said his two biggest mistakes were sitting on the Supreme Court: Justices Earl Warren and William Brennan. Both were Republicans.

Warren was the governor of California who participated in the detention of Japanese Americans during World War II. Brennan was appointed to New Jersey Supreme Court by Republican Governor Alfred Driscoll. Brennan was not a liberal on New Jerseys highest court.

The first point is that once on the Supreme Court, justices can go on their own path. The second point is that judges with slim records, like Judge Gorsuch, are not easy to predict.

Liberal Signs

Gorsuch lives in the ultra-liberal college town of Boulder, Colorado. He also teaches at the University of Colorados law school, also a progressive bastion, and is supported in his quest for the Supreme Court by most of the faculty and students there.

Gorsuch is also a member of the St. Johns Episcopal Church in Boulder. The Episcopal Church has embraced very liberal positions on a variety of issues, including performing same-sex commitment ceremonies since the 1980s and eventually same-sex marriages. At church, he often hears a very liberal point of view.

Mike Orr, a spokesman for the Episcopal Church in Colorado, described Gorsuchs church, as a congregation that does a lot of social justice and advocacy. He said, Its a healthy and vibrant congregation. Its very diverse in its congregants as well as its ministry.

The first word that St. Johns uses to describe itself on its website and Facebook page is inclusive, and the church is led by a female rector. On its website, the church encourages members to write letters to Congress asking that they combat climate change.

Cases and Decisions

Judge Gorsuch sided with an Albuquerque middle schooler who was strip-searched by his school, dissenting while his colleagues ruled that the school, police officer and other employees were immune from lawsuits. Judge Gorsuch cited in a brief, colorful dissent, Oliver Twist, in which a judge admonishes Mr. Micawber that the law thinks a man should control his wife. In the novel, Micawber responds: If the law thinks that, then the law is a ass, a idiot.

Gorsuch concluded:

Often enough the law can be a ass a idiot, Charles Dickens, Oliver Twist 520 (Dodd, Mead & Co. 1941) (1838) and there is little we judges can do about it, for it is (or should be) emphatically our job to apply, not rewrite, the law enacted by the peoples representatives. Indeed, a judge who likes every result he reaches is very likely a bad judge, reaching for results he prefers rather than those the law compels.

So it is I admire my colleagues today, for no doubt they reach a result they dislike but believe the law demands and in that I see the best of our profession and much to admire. Its only that, in this particular case, I dont believe the law happens to be quite as much of a ass as they do. I respectfully dissent.

Judge Gorsuchs opinion in this case was published six months ago. He does not sound very conservative in this dissent.

Judge Gorsuch wrote an opinion upholding a Colorado clean energy program against a challenge alleging it would hurt coal producers from out of state. Colorado law requires electricity generators to ensure that 20 percent of the electricity they sell to Colorado consumers comes from renewable sources. Gorsuch upheld the liberal legislation of the Colorado legislature that was challenged by the Energy and Environment Legal Institute, a conservative, anti-environment organization.

Liberal or Libertarian?

Judge Gorsuch does not fit the mold of a rock-ribbed conservative. He is a smart, free-thinking, literary, independent who will be a good, and unpredictable justice. In some cases he will be liberal, some libertarian and in others conservative. But he is a fair man with a good sense of justice, just what we need on the Supreme Court.

Joel D. Joseph is the author of Black Mondays: Worst Decisions of the Supreme Court (4th Edition, 2014), with a foreword by Justice Thurgood Marshall, and Inequality in America: 10 Causes and 10 Cures (2016). He earned his JD from Georgetown University.

The views of contributors are their own and not the views of The Hill.

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Is Gorsuch a secret liberal? Trump, GOP have reason to wonder. - The Hill (blog)

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, a conservative Republican, put forward a surprisingly liberal budget Wednesday that includes a huge boost in funding for schools, sizable tuition cuts for college students and increased tax breaks for the working poor.

The shift by the famously tightfisted governor designed to position him for a third term in 2018 also appeases his conservative base with more welfare reforms, elimination of the prevailing wage and nearly $600 million in tax cuts.

"This budget includes historic investments in our priorities," Walker told the Republican-controlled Legislature as he released the plan Wednesday. "We're putting more money into public education than ever before, making college even more affordable, caring for the truly needy, building a stronger infrastructure, rewarding work, and cutting taxes to the lowest point in decades."

Democrats, and even some Republicans who control the Legislature, called his $76 billion budget that increases spending 4.2 percent over two years unrealistic and designed to boost his approval rating before another run for office.

"It's a death-bed conversion because he's going to be up for re-election in two years," said Democratic Sen. Tim Carpenter, of Milwaukee.

Republican legislative leaders were slow to jump on board with seemingly popular increases in education spending, sharing the fear with Democrats that Walker wasn't being realistic.

"We have to be cautious," said Republican Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald. "We have to be sure that we're not doing something we're going to have to revisit two years from now, or god forbid, sooner than that."

And Republican Sen. Alberta Darling, co-chair of the Legislature's budget committee, said the level of spending Walker proposed was an issue for her.

"We need to dig in and see how much is responsible and what is sustainable," she said.

The budget would spend $649 million more on K-12 schools, but districts would have to show they are in compliance with a law requiring teachers to contribute a certain amount for health care and pension costs in order to get more money. He's calling for extending a University of Wisconsin tuition freeze for a fifth year, then cutting tuition by 5 percent for all resident undergraduate students.

His budget would also increase pay for state workers 2 percent each of the next two years, cut the two lowest income tax brackets to save a median income family of four about $70 a year and eliminate the state portion of the property tax.

The budget is Walker's first since his short-lived run for president and the final one before he would appear on the ballot for a third term in 2018. Walker is raising money and taking other steps to run again, but said he won't officially announce until after the budget is done.

The budget comes after Walker previously cut funding for K-12 schools and UW, and froze tuition the past four years, while also giving them new ways to control costs. Walker credited an improved economy as allowing him to propose spending more money on education and other areas he had previously targeted for cuts.

"Of course we're pleased that there is some reinvestment, rededication to our schools, our families, our roads," said state Sen. Janet Bewley, of Ashland. "We are trying to make up for lost time and it's going to be very, very difficult to catch up."

Some Republicans have joined with Democrats in urging Walker to consider raising taxes and fees to pay for ongoing highway projects and plug a nearly $1 billion transportation budget gap. Walker relied on $500 million in borrowing and other budget moves to keep ongoing major road projects on track, while possibly leading to delays of other pending work.

Republican Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, one of the leading advocates for considering transportation-related revenue increases, said he'd be willing to delay passage of the budget from late June into October if that's what it takes to find a long-term transportation solution.

"I think it's definitely possible that we are going to look at a gas tax," Vos said. "We are going to look at registration increases. We're going to look at tolling. It is not responsible for us to just continue to kick the can down the road and put more and more spending on the state's credit card."

Transportation, school funding and welfare reform will be the biggest areas where the Legislature works with Walker to find compromises, Fitzgerald said. At the same time, he said Republicans who have their largest majorities in the state Legislature in decades will be itching to make their own, unspecified "sweeping changes and more reforms."

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Wisconsin governor Scott Walker proposes surprisingly liberal budget - Chicago Tribune

Liberal groups sued President Trump on Wednesday over his "two-for-one" executive order issued last week that requires agencies to kill two existing regulations for every new rule they want to institute.

The environmental and advocacy groups the Natural Resources Defense Council, Communication Workers of America and Public Citizen argue that the Trump order is unconstitutional, "irrational" and seeks to scuttle programs meant to protect the public.

"President Trump's order would deny Americans the basic protections they rightly expect," said Rhea Suh, president of the Natural Resources Defense Council. "New efforts to stop pollution don't automatically make old ones unnecessary."

Suh poked at Trump's lack of seriousness in addressing policy, saying "when you make policy by tweet, it yields irrational rules."

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The coalition argued in its lawsuit that any reduction of federal regulations would be inherently harmful, especially if the goal was to prevent overall spending from rising.

"It will be harder to limit pollution, protect consumers, safeguard our food supply, guard against financial abuses or to take any other action to limit corporate actions that impose costs on the public," the groups said in their complaint.

The deregulation order, also known as the regulation budget order, "imposes a false choice between clean air, clean water, safe food and other environmental safeguards."

The executive order includes a section saying: "It is essential to manage the costs associated with the governmental imposition of private expenditures required to comply with federal regulations. Toward that end, it is important that for every one new regulation issued, at least two prior regulations be identified for elimination, and that the cost of planned regulations be prudently managed and controlled through a budgeting process."

The groups filed suit in U.S. District Court in Washington.

Also from the Washington Examiner

"There is a bit of a concern on the trade issue," Mercedes Schlapp said.

02/09/17 12:17 AM

Sean Higgins contributed to this report

Top Story

Senate Democrats on Wednesday abandoned the all-night "talk-a-thons."

02/09/17 12:01 AM

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Liberal groups file lawsuit to block Trump's deregulation order - Washington Examiner

Stan Ivie likens Donald Trump to a Pied Piper, leading we mesmerized villagers into an alternative reality. Lets look at the reality of what I call Liberal Land.

In Liberal Land, so-called feminists march in protest, dressed like womens privates, screaming obscenities that would make sailors blush, allowing their children to carry vulgarity-laced signs.

Madonna announces she thinks about blowing up the White House. Ashley Judd likens Donald Trump to Adolf Hitler.

Another featured speaker Donna Hylton, convicted in 1985 of the murder of a New York real estate broker. Before he died, Hylton and others tortured the victim in ways so gruesome this newspaper would not print them. Their mantra abortion on demand. Great role models all.

No boys or girls in Liberal Land. Teachers refer to kids in gender-neutral terms such as purple penguins. Bruce Jenner becomes Caitlyn, the first man to be voted woman of the year.

If youre male, but feel female, its OK to use the womens restroom. The term expectant mother banned in Britain, because it might offend somebody.

Heroes are snubbed (Chris Kyle), thugs iconized (Michael Brown), victims dismissed (Kate Steinle), traitors excused (Bowe Bergdahl).

Patriotism is racist; individualism, taboo; globalism, supreme; national sovereignty, an abomination; killing the unborn, glorified.

Its open season on cops. Black on black murder, ignored. Block the freeway if you feel oppressed. Burning, looting and destroying other peoples property is condoned.

Denizens of Liberal Land hail themselves as pro-feminist, pro-gay/lesbian/transgender and defenders of children, yet laud Islam and Sharia law, which views women as property, supports female mutilation, pedophilia, child marriage, barbaric execution of dissidents, and the murder of gays tossing them alive from building tops.

In Liberal Land, you can marry anyone or anything you want. Same sex marriage is OK. If gender doesnt matter, neither does age. Soon, adults will be allowed to marry children. Marry your dog, your car, a rhinoceros. Whatever you want. Beware the horn.

Free speech? Tolerated so long as its liberal speech. Colleges, historically bastions of the open exchange of ideas, are now little more than dispensaries of liberal propaganda. Conservative speakers are banned from campuses, or forced to flee because of leftist riots.

Those who libs disagree with are given derogatory labels monikers such as racist, fascist, bigot, narrow-minded, misogynist, xenophobe, islamophobe, homophobe and, a Stan Ivie classic, mesmerized villagers.

Ill take the Pied Piper, thank you.

Kevin Jones

Annabella

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Liberal land - Richfield Reaper

It is hardly surprising that Malcolm Turnbull has followed up his personal attacks on Bill Shorten with more of the same.

The besieged Prime Minister was clearly buoyed by the positive response from colleagues and commentators in the aftermath. At this point in the cycle and with his own popularity in free-fall, that's a win-win.

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Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has taken his attack on Bill Shorten even further, with the Labor leader landing a few of his own blows. Courtesy ABC News 24.

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The One Nation leader and colleague Malcolm Robert express their admiration for the Russian president despite the downing of MH17.

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The South Australian government has hit back, blaming the national energy market operator for the blackout that affected 90,000 Adelaide homes and businesses.

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A man, whos name has been withheld for legal reasons, has been charged with the murder of three children from Bowraville in the early 90s, after being originally acquitted of the crime.

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When temperatures tipped 45 degrees in January 2013 we timed how long it took the heat to destroy an ice block.

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Australia's worst serial killers, David and Catherine Birnie may have killed more women than they were convicted for in 1986, suggests new series on Channel Seven, Murder Uncovered. Vision: Network Seven

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Veteran Liberal Senator Ian Macdonald is pushing to keep the Life Gold Pass that gives former parliamentarians taxpayer-funded business class travel for life.

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A simple hack for those of us lucky enough to have the NBN could give you some of the fastest internet in Australia. Video courtesy TechWiz Time.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has taken his attack on Bill Shorten even further, with the Labor leader landing a few of his own blows. Courtesy ABC News 24.

Spontaneous as the tirade had appeared, its objectivess were clear enough: to force Shorten back after the Labor leader has become increasingly bold in tagging the PM as "Mr Harbourside Mansion"; to reassure wavering pro-Turnbull MPs that their leader has the steel, the mongrel to hit back with interest; and, to silence persistent internal critics.

While it is undeniable that voters generally dislike such aggression in their leaders, and perhaps will particularly dislike it in Turnbull's case, this was more primal, its audience, more fundamentally tribal.

Expect Turnbull to elaborate this approach from here. Speaking to reporters on Thursday, he added to his dark picture of Shorten as a "simpering sycophant" to billionaires, a "parasite" and a hypocrite devoid of "any" integrity, by raising the character question.

The advent of "angry Malcolm" could not have come soon enough for his beleaguered troops. Something had to be done and for conservatives, this usually means channelling John Howard.

Parallels with Paul Keating's bruising parliamentary style, Peter Costello, and even Julia Gillard's (in)famous misogyny speech, were inevitable. But the more important parallel, looking forward, is with Howard.

Turnbull knows he cannot realistically hope to keep up that level of vitriol, and would not want to. But by hitting out so aggressively, he has done a couple of important things. One, he has signalled to his adversary that two can fight ugly, and that henceforth there will be personal consequences.

Two, he has begun the character assault on his rival. From here on in, Turnbull's approach will exploit doubts over Shorten's suitability for high office.

In politics as in advertising, the messages that cut through are the ones reinforcing an existing belief or prejudice. Fair or not, Howard nailed Kim Beazley's softness and rendered it negative with his claims that the big man might have lacked the ticker for national leadership.

Turnbull's line on Thursday morning? "Bill Shorten doesn't have the character to be prime minister of Australia. He does not have the integrity to be leader of the opposition, to be leader of the Labor Party."

Just as Labor is working off focus group feedback confirming the Mr Harbourside Mansion, millionaire tag on Turnbull, the government hopes to amplify a view of Shorten as beholden to corrupt unions, seduced by money and power, and insincere in championing the interests of working families.

Labor's is the easier task - especially as the harbourside mansion label was coined by a Liberal. But having finally bared his teeth, Turnbull at least feels he has found something solid on which to bite.

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'Angry Malcolm' channels John Howard to impress the Liberal tribes - The Sydney Morning Herald