Malcolm Turnbull’s New Logo Is Missing One Important Thing. At several press conferences in the two-day-old Australian Federal election campaign, Prime Minister Turnbull sported a new logo:
There are three important “tells” here:
- No mention of his party, the “Liberal Party.”
- Prominent mention of “Turnbull.” He is promoting himself rather than his party.
- The usual Liberal colors of red and dark blue are absent.
It’s as if Turnbull would rather not be associated with the Liberal Party, which is full of yucky people like Tony Abbott, “delcons”, and climate skeptics, of whom his friends at the ABC rather disapprove.
The Labor Party, on the other hand, is placing “Labor” prominently on most all of their election material, which declares confidence in its brand and its ideas.
In my experience when a major party in Australia mutes its name in its advertising, it usually goes on to lose.
UPDATE: Alan Kohler opines:
Australia, on the other hand, is choosing between two broadly similar offerings. There is no Donald Trump, Jeremy Corbyn or Marine Le Pen in the mix, or Austria’s Norbert Hofer. Just two sensible, middle-of-the-road blokes who wouldn’t look too out of place in each other’s party.
Kohler points out that the policy differences between the parties on the main topics like negative gearing, tax rates, and levels of spending are all fairly small and will make little real difference. They differ significantly on super, but Kohler suggests that Labor wish they had thought of the Liberal idea on that. Even the immigration and refugee policies are almost identical this time around (thought they were before the 2007 election too).
[I]t looks like in this election we have a choice between basically sane, competent people leading parties with broadly similar economic and social plans.
