While counting is still underway, it can be said at this point that we have Albanese and Labor back in for another term. As is so often the case, actual numbers are still a bit unclear at this stage, especially with so many pre-poll votes yet to be counted. But a majority Labor government is now a certainty.
The government of course is formed in the 150-seat House of Representatives. For the past three years Labor has been the ruling party, with 77 seats, the Coalition had 53, and crossbenchers numbered 19 (with a few vacancies). The election was called just a few hours after the polls closed, at least in the eastern states. It is a Labor landslide.
At this very early period, consider the ominous numbers: Labor, 77 seats; Coalition, just 33! Yes, it is still early in the night. But the Libs needed to gain at least ten seats to simply stay in contention. Instead they are going backwards. And even the Liberal Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has managed to lose his seat!
Whither the Liberal Party?
Millions of conservatives and Christians are not necessarily surprised, but they are greatly disappointed. The weakness of Dutton has to be a big part of all this. This was his election to lose. Refusing to stand on issues like the madness of Net Zero (‘I am not a scientist,’ he said when asked about climate change) was one clear example.
And his refusal to run with a clear winner such as resisting the radical trans agenda is another case in point. He told journalists it is not an issue here – good grief. He had so many chances to show how the Libs are different from Labor, and how they are a party of solid conservative conviction, but he refused to do it. He had nothing to excite voters who are tired of Labor.
So once again, a weak and spineless Liberal Party is the real issue here. This has been true in most Australian states for far too long, and it is also a massive problem on the federal level. This election was a real drubbing for them. As to the future of the federal Liberals, it almost has to implode. It really seems to have no future now.
There are too many divisions within it, few strong and principled leaders, and far too few conservatives and Christians. Some other Liberal now has to take Dutton’s place. But who? Who could do it that still has principle, conviction, and some boldness? Andrew Hastie maybe? Alex Antic perhaps, if he could be moved to the House? Sadly there just are not many real worthwhile choices out there.
I have to go along with the strong but accurate words of former federal LNP member for Queensland, George Christensen:
They’ve blown it. Again. After another gutless, rudderless campaign, the Liberals and Nationals have been rightly thrashed at the ballot box—and let me be clear, they deserved it. Not because the other side had a better vision. Not because the mainstream media was fair or balanced. But because the Coalition stands for nothing anymore. Nothing except clinging to seats and appeasing people who hate them anyway.
Let’s call it out. The Liberal Party isn’t a movement. It’s a bland, beige shell—a party of clichés and cowardice. You could slap half their policies on a Greens flyer and no one would bat an eye. “Opportunity.” “Aspiration.” “Middle Australia.” Empty words. Words every party recites to fool the disengaged masses. The Nationals? Even worse. A club of seat-savers who’ve confused pork-barrelling for principle.
And political commentator Stephen Chavura put it this way:
Blind Freddy could see that the Liberals were just hoping to slide into leadership by being as uncontroversial as possible. Whenever Dutton sensed a little bit of serious media pushback, he backed down. He could have offered a robust criticism of immigration, linking it to housing. He wouldn’t. He couldn’t stand his ground on the indoctrination of school kids. He couldn’t robustly promote mining while pursuing nuclear. I could go on. The Liberals have no idea who they are. They have no idea what Australia is. They are terrified of the media and enthralled by media advisors. The best thing that can happen is that a lot of the worst people in the party will leave like rats abandoning a sinking ship. Then the task is to fill it with people who love this country. That’s a project for the next 3-6 years. Look, this is probably the best thing to happen for the long run. As long as Liberal gets elected it will never change. Australia needs to go through a lot of pain before it wakes up; before the Liberal Party can change.
The only hope for conservatives and Christians lies in the Upper House. As tends to be the case, with the Lower House results so often disappointing, we need to look at what transpires in the Senate. But we will not know all those results for a while yet. In the previous 76-seat Senate, there had been 25 Labor seats, 30 Coalition, and 21 crossbenchers. Groups like Family First and others have a chance to perhaps get some candidates in there, but again, actual numbers will not be known perhaps for a week or more.
As to why I think more of the Labor/Greens/Teals axis of evil will continue to destroy this country, I have already laid out that case a few weeks ago, so I won’t repeat myself here. See this piece for details on that: https://billmuehlenberg.com/2025/04/15/on-another-federal-election/
And despite the results tonight, well done to all the Christians and conservatives who either ran for office or worked to help others in their election bid. Thank you guys for all your hard work.
You win some, you lose some
The Christian knows that ultimately it will not be politics that saves us. We understand that no political party or politician has what we really need to fix what really ails us. We know that only one person has that ability: Jesus Christ. But we also know that politics is important, and some governments can be much worse than others. Some policies are much more damaging, and even anti-Christian, than others.
So election outcomes do matter. But anyone who has been around for a while knows that we win some and we lose some. Just yesterday there were big wins for Nigel Farage and Reform UK. Last November we witnessed a massive win for Trump and the renewal of America.
But earlier in the week we also saw a fourth term of the ruling socialists in Canada transpire. And here we have Albo still in power. So Christians and conservatives are seeing some wins here and there, but we are also seeing some losses. Either way, we need to keep on keeping on. We need to keep working, keep praying, and keep seeking to be salt and light in a needy and broken world.
Spiritual takeaway
Many considerations of a biblical and spiritual nature can be raised here. One thought that many believers have when we get a result like this is that God might well be judging us as a nation. That is always possible. Indeed, long ago John Calvin said this very thing in various places.
A few months after I penned that piece, I discussed further this concept of ‘getting the government we deserve’. I said this in part:
The saying, “Every nation gets the government it deserves” has been tossed around quite a bit of late. On some social media sites you see it attributed to John Calvin. It seems however that it actually came some two hundred years later, being first said by the French writer and philosopher Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821). This aphorism may well have some elements of truth to it, and I want to explore it further both in biblical and theological terms, as well as in political terms. https://billmuehlenberg.com/2016/02/23/on-getting-the-government-we-deserve/
The thoughts I presented there I still run with today. We do not always know what God is up to when we get results like this. We do have some basic biblical principles that we can depend upon, such as these:
Psalm 33:12 Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord, the people he chose for his inheritance.
Proverbs 11:10-11 When the righteous prosper, the city rejoices; when the wicked perish, there are shouts of joy. Through the blessing of the upright a city is exalted, but by the mouth of the wicked it is destroyed.
Proverbs 14:34 Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a disgrace to any people.
Proverbs 29:2 When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice: but when the wicked rule, the people mourn.
In a fallen world true righteousness and justice will never prevail, and even if good and godly rulers get in, it may be just for a short period of time. The issue is for God’s people to persevere and not get their hopes up or down based on the circumstances we face.
The secular left will now be further emboldened to push its radical agendas, including their anti-Christian agendas. Things will get worse for at least the next three years. We will have to prepare for further unrighteousness, wickedness and ungodliness ruling the land.
But still, we do not despair. A slight adaptation of Habakkuk 3:17-18 might be in order here:
Though the Albanese government be re-elected,
and he retains his seat,
Though the fig tree should not blossom,
nor fruit be on the vines,
the produce of the olive fail
and the fields yield no food,
the flock be cut off from the fold
and there be no herd in the stalls,
yet I will rejoice in the Lord;
I will take joy in the God of my salvation.
Final word
Earlier today I penned another article. I deliberately did it knowing that tonight I might not get a positive election outcome. I knew I needed to keep in mind the broader view of things – especially the spiritual. So I thought of quoting from some helpful Christian and conservative thinkers who could nicely fit the bill here.
I settled on the American political philosopher Daniel J. Mahoney. He has penned a number of important works, so I picked out two of them and simply quoted from them. They encouraged me along the way, and they might do the same for you. See that piece here: https://billmuehlenberg.com/2025/05/03/introducing-daniel-j-mahoney/
The closing lines of that article were these:
An unwanted election result can help turn a melancholic like myself into even more of a melancholic, so I at least need to remind myself of the bigger view on things. Seeing that the spiritual ultimately transcends the merely political, there is always hope. Works by someone like Mahoney are a part of the intellectual and spiritual medicine that I am in need of. You might find him and his works to be good medicine as well.
So we must keep going. We must pray more, work more, and trust God more. He is indeed still on the throne, and one day all wrongs will be righted, and his will shall be done on earth as it is in heaven. Jesus told us to pray for that. That we must do.
12 Replies to “On the Australian Federal Election”
Dangerous, destructive, deceitful and deadly days ahead from a 40 year communist network leader.
Afraid so Judith.
One successful method to win elections is to hand out free stuff (AKA, other people’s money).
The inevitable consequence of this is to devalue the currency and drive up inflation.
Politicians do not have to worry, as by then, they will be retired and on their inflation-compensated, super-annuations.
———-
Research > Fiat money
“The problems we face today are there because the people who “work” for a living are outnumbered by those who “vote” for a living”.
Karl Marx wrote that whenever capitalists accept the right of propertyless men to vote, private property is in theory abolished.
Suffrage Debate, N.Y. Constitutional Convention of 1821
Chancellor James Kent
The tendency of universal suffrage, is to jeopardize the rights of property, and the principles of liberty. There is a constant tendency in human society, and the history of every age proves it; there is a tendency in the poor to covet and to share the plunder of the rich; in the debtor to relax or avoid the obligation of contracts; in the majority to tyrannize over the minority, and trample down their rights; in the indolent and the profligate, to cast the whole burthens of society upon the industrious and the virtuous; and there is a tendency in ambitious and wicked men, to inflame these combustible materials.
Thou shalt not covet; thou shalt not steal; are divine injunctions induced by this miserable depravity of our nature.
The notion that every man that works a day on the road, or serves an idle hour in the militia, is entitled as of right to an equal participation in the whole power of the government, is most unreasonable, and has no foundation in justice.
the individual who contributes only one cent to the common stock, ought not to have the same power and influence in directing the property concerns of the partnership, as he who contributes his thousands. He will not have the same inducements to care, and diligence, and fidelity. His inducements and his temptation would be to divide the whole capital…
Democracy’s Road to Tyranny by Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn
Slouching Toward Servitude
Tocqueville did not tell us just how the gradual change toward totalitarian servitude can come about. But 150 years ago he could not exactly foresee that the parliamentary scene would produce two main types of parties: the Santa Claus parties, predominantly on the Left, and the Tighten-Your-Belt parties, more or less on the Right. The Santa Claus parties, with presents for the many, normally take from some people to give to others: they operate with largesses, to use the term of John Adams. Socialism, whether national or international, will act in the name of “distributive justice,” as well as “social justice” and “progress,” and thus gain popularity. You don’t, after all, shoot Santa Claus. As a result, these parties normally win elections, and politicians who use their slogans are effective vote-getters.
The Tighten-Your-Belt parties, if they unexpectedly gain power, generally act more wisely, but they rarely have the courage to undo the policies of the Santa parties. The voting masses, who frequently favor the Santa parties, would retract their support if the Tighten-Your-Belt parties were to act radically and consistently. Profligates are usually more popular than misers. In fact, the Santa Claus parties are rarely utterly defeated, but they sometimes defeat themselves by featuring hopeless candidates or causing political turmoil or economic disaster.
A politicized Saint Nicholas is a grim taskmaster. Gifts cannot be distributed without bureaucratic regulation, registration, and regimentation of the entire country. Countless strings are attached to the gifts received from “above.” The State interferes in all domains of human existence—education, health, transportation, communication, entertainment, food, commerce, industry, farming, building, employment, inheritance, social life, birth, and death.
There are two aspects to this large-scale interference: statism and egalitarianism, yet they are intrinsically connected since to regiment society perfectly, you must reduce people to an identical level. Thus, a “classless society” becomes the real aim, and every kind of discrimination must come to an end. But, discrimination is intrinsic to a free life, because freedom of will and choice is a characteristic of man and his personality.
egalitarian democracy remains adamant in its totalitarian policy. The popular pastime of modern democracies of punishing the diligent and thrifty, while rewarding the lazy, improvident, and unthrifty, is cultivated via the State, fulfilling a demo-egalitarian program based on a demo-totalitarian ideology.
Democratic tyranny, evolving on the sly as a slow and subtle corruption leading to total State control, is thus the third and by no means rarest road to the most modern form of slavery.
As everywhere from NAZI Germany to communist China show, control of the media means control of the people.
There are two minor positives. We are in no position to go to war with China and with them controlling us through economic and political means, there is reason for them to.
Also clearly as the election demonstrates, our bureaucrats are clearly firmly esconsed in socialism and Marxism which means they will work like a well oiled machine with Labor. It’s just unfortunate that the well oiled machine is going to lead us down the toilet.
We have definitely painted ourselves into a corner and without God’s help and massive cleverness there is no easy escape and with every major party being anti-God, that is unlikely.
I can’t really work out why the inner cities are so easily manipulated. Perhaps it is to do with previous large migration plus the Marxist overthrow of the education system. I’m not sure what they think Labor will provide but the LP is definitely on the nose with them.
There are some obvious crunches coming. We cannot sustain massive immigration without massive infrastructure build and that is not remotely happening and neither can we afford it.
The Labor energy policy is an economic and environmental nightmare. The environment will be ruined and people will die from it.
Labor has mitigated the adverse effects of their policies with handouts, employing more public servants etc., but of course this approach is not sustainable.
Eventually, if we want our freedom, we will likely have to fight for it but with our major allies of the UK and USA also undermined by their own atheistic, socialists policies, they are no longer in a position to help us particularly.
The other crunches are more spiritual but will have great effect. Without God there will be increased mental and physical health issues, for example.
The Liberal/National Party is mostly atheist and is close to useless anyway and because the bureaucracy is so socialist, even if they gained power, the government simply becomes dysfunctional.
Unfortunately the Australian people have put us on a road to loss of freedom and a massively powerful, one-world government which is hugely difficult to escape but they have not realised they have done it. Our historically created AAA economic rating will keep us going in the short term, however.
The thousand or so years of Roman rule were the legs of solid iron and we are definitely living in the time of mixed clay and iron. It cannot stand.
Thanks guys. I offer further election reflections in this brand-new piece:
Thanks for your article Bill. I found it helpful. I agree with you. Many have spoken of the danger of the Libs becoming Labor-lite. You have too without using this term. It has been a pox on party around various states. Victoria and NSWs are good examples. I had a very good politics teacher in year 12. He used to say: “Governments lose elections rather than opposition win them.” There seems to be a significant a level of truth in this. Although the overwhelming majority of the population incredibly blind to how cleverly crafted our nightly free-to-air TV news and current affairs presentations have been in support the Federal Labor government and Greens. (Although encouragingly the Greens vote is down). But Albanese in his first term of office enjoyed one of the longest honey-moon periods in Australian media history. Just before the election, I became aware that there was potential for greater good to come out of a Liberal loss rather than a win. A Liberal defeat may provide us with an opportunity for a real opposition to form. If Liberals had won we would be locked into what many are calling rule by the duopoly; by Labor and Labor-lite. Dutton’s personal loss adds to a clean slate. (Few of us who think Labor is capable of redemption). But Bill your call to prayer is important. May the Lord in His mercy grant us friends to pray with about this. May we find the grace to press in. May the Lord raise the right conservative leaders up in our nation. Leaders who are prepared to do the hard yards because the consequences you raise in your article – quoting Calvin – are likely to be very much greater a little while down the track; we appear to be hastening toward a 2 Thessalonians 2 scenario.
Australians can take action by Petitioning the Court of Disputed Returns to demand the Labour Party & Greens Party be (sitting Senators & re-elected & newly elected candidates) be Disqualified immediately from holding office for violating Section 44 (i) & (ii)!
During Covid – the last three years of the Albanese Government, there has been mass immigration to deliberately dilute the vote of Australians!
Then there were quite a number of extra-ordinary Citizenship Ceremonies where Liberal / National MP’s were either not invited or sent invitations too late for them to attend …….???????
Thanks Bill for your thoughtful article. You raised a good reminder that ultimately our hope is in God as sovereign. I think there are many questions still to be considered. Questions such as: How much did Aussies want stability and a continuity of Government in these uncertain times? How much did the Trump factor drive people away from conservative politics? And it seems trivial but how many voters were influenced more by personality than policies? I mean Albo had a nice smile and some hair!
Dangerous, destructive, deceitful and deadly days ahead from a 40 year communist network leader.
Afraid so Judith.
One successful method to win elections is to hand out free stuff (AKA, other people’s money).
The inevitable consequence of this is to devalue the currency and drive up inflation.
Politicians do not have to worry, as by then, they will be retired and on their inflation-compensated, super-annuations.
———-
Research > Fiat money
“The problems we face today are there because the people who “work” for a living are outnumbered by those who “vote” for a living”.
Karl Marx wrote that whenever capitalists accept the right of propertyless men to vote, private property is in theory abolished.
Suffrage Debate, N.Y. Constitutional Convention of 1821
Chancellor James Kent
The tendency of universal suffrage, is to jeopardize the rights of property, and the principles of liberty. There is a constant tendency in human society, and the history of every age proves it; there is a tendency in the poor to covet and to share the plunder of the rich; in the debtor to relax or avoid the obligation of contracts; in the majority to tyrannize over the minority, and trample down their rights; in the indolent and the profligate, to cast the whole burthens of society upon the industrious and the virtuous; and there is a tendency in ambitious and wicked men, to inflame these combustible materials.
Thou shalt not covet; thou shalt not steal; are divine injunctions induced by this miserable depravity of our nature.
The notion that every man that works a day on the road, or serves an idle hour in the militia, is entitled as of right to an equal participation in the whole power of the government, is most unreasonable, and has no foundation in justice.
the individual who contributes only one cent to the common stock, ought not to have the same power and influence in directing the property concerns of the partnership, as he who contributes his thousands. He will not have the same inducements to care, and diligence, and fidelity. His inducements and his temptation would be to divide the whole capital…
Democracy’s Road to Tyranny by Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn
Slouching Toward Servitude
Tocqueville did not tell us just how the gradual change toward totalitarian servitude can come about. But 150 years ago he could not exactly foresee that the parliamentary scene would produce two main types of parties: the Santa Claus parties, predominantly on the Left, and the Tighten-Your-Belt parties, more or less on the Right. The Santa Claus parties, with presents for the many, normally take from some people to give to others: they operate with largesses, to use the term of John Adams. Socialism, whether national or international, will act in the name of “distributive justice,” as well as “social justice” and “progress,” and thus gain popularity. You don’t, after all, shoot Santa Claus. As a result, these parties normally win elections, and politicians who use their slogans are effective vote-getters.
The Tighten-Your-Belt parties, if they unexpectedly gain power, generally act more wisely, but they rarely have the courage to undo the policies of the Santa parties. The voting masses, who frequently favor the Santa parties, would retract their support if the Tighten-Your-Belt parties were to act radically and consistently. Profligates are usually more popular than misers. In fact, the Santa Claus parties are rarely utterly defeated, but they sometimes defeat themselves by featuring hopeless candidates or causing political turmoil or economic disaster.
A politicized Saint Nicholas is a grim taskmaster. Gifts cannot be distributed without bureaucratic regulation, registration, and regimentation of the entire country. Countless strings are attached to the gifts received from “above.” The State interferes in all domains of human existence—education, health, transportation, communication, entertainment, food, commerce, industry, farming, building, employment, inheritance, social life, birth, and death.
There are two aspects to this large-scale interference: statism and egalitarianism, yet they are intrinsically connected since to regiment society perfectly, you must reduce people to an identical level. Thus, a “classless society” becomes the real aim, and every kind of discrimination must come to an end. But, discrimination is intrinsic to a free life, because freedom of will and choice is a characteristic of man and his personality.
egalitarian democracy remains adamant in its totalitarian policy. The popular pastime of modern democracies of punishing the diligent and thrifty, while rewarding the lazy, improvident, and unthrifty, is cultivated via the State, fulfilling a demo-egalitarian program based on a demo-totalitarian ideology.
Democratic tyranny, evolving on the sly as a slow and subtle corruption leading to total State control, is thus the third and by no means rarest road to the most modern form of slavery.
As everywhere from NAZI Germany to communist China show, control of the media means control of the people.
There are two minor positives. We are in no position to go to war with China and with them controlling us through economic and political means, there is reason for them to.
Also clearly as the election demonstrates, our bureaucrats are clearly firmly esconsed in socialism and Marxism which means they will work like a well oiled machine with Labor. It’s just unfortunate that the well oiled machine is going to lead us down the toilet.
We have definitely painted ourselves into a corner and without God’s help and massive cleverness there is no easy escape and with every major party being anti-God, that is unlikely.
I can’t really work out why the inner cities are so easily manipulated. Perhaps it is to do with previous large migration plus the Marxist overthrow of the education system. I’m not sure what they think Labor will provide but the LP is definitely on the nose with them.
There are some obvious crunches coming. We cannot sustain massive immigration without massive infrastructure build and that is not remotely happening and neither can we afford it.
The Labor energy policy is an economic and environmental nightmare. The environment will be ruined and people will die from it.
Labor has mitigated the adverse effects of their policies with handouts, employing more public servants etc., but of course this approach is not sustainable.
Eventually, if we want our freedom, we will likely have to fight for it but with our major allies of the UK and USA also undermined by their own atheistic, socialists policies, they are no longer in a position to help us particularly.
The other crunches are more spiritual but will have great effect. Without God there will be increased mental and physical health issues, for example.
The Liberal/National Party is mostly atheist and is close to useless anyway and because the bureaucracy is so socialist, even if they gained power, the government simply becomes dysfunctional.
Unfortunately the Australian people have put us on a road to loss of freedom and a massively powerful, one-world government which is hugely difficult to escape but they have not realised they have done it. Our historically created AAA economic rating will keep us going in the short term, however.
The thousand or so years of Roman rule were the legs of solid iron and we are definitely living in the time of mixed clay and iron. It cannot stand.
Thanks guys. I offer further election reflections in this brand-new piece:
https://billmuehlenberg.com/2025/05/04/more-on-the-australian-election-results/
Thanks for your article Bill. I found it helpful. I agree with you. Many have spoken of the danger of the Libs becoming Labor-lite. You have too without using this term. It has been a pox on party around various states. Victoria and NSWs are good examples. I had a very good politics teacher in year 12. He used to say: “Governments lose elections rather than opposition win them.” There seems to be a significant a level of truth in this. Although the overwhelming majority of the population incredibly blind to how cleverly crafted our nightly free-to-air TV news and current affairs presentations have been in support the Federal Labor government and Greens. (Although encouragingly the Greens vote is down). But Albanese in his first term of office enjoyed one of the longest honey-moon periods in Australian media history. Just before the election, I became aware that there was potential for greater good to come out of a Liberal loss rather than a win. A Liberal defeat may provide us with an opportunity for a real opposition to form. If Liberals had won we would be locked into what many are calling rule by the duopoly; by Labor and Labor-lite. Dutton’s personal loss adds to a clean slate. (Few of us who think Labor is capable of redemption). But Bill your call to prayer is important. May the Lord in His mercy grant us friends to pray with about this. May we find the grace to press in. May the Lord raise the right conservative leaders up in our nation. Leaders who are prepared to do the hard yards because the consequences you raise in your article – quoting Calvin – are likely to be very much greater a little while down the track; we appear to be hastening toward a 2 Thessalonians 2 scenario.
Many thanks Christopher.
I just saw this online link: https://youtu.be/4S-KxekvSq4
Australians can take action by Petitioning the Court of Disputed Returns to demand the Labour Party & Greens Party be (sitting Senators & re-elected & newly elected candidates) be Disqualified immediately from holding office for violating Section 44 (i) & (ii)!
During Covid – the last three years of the Albanese Government, there has been mass immigration to deliberately dilute the vote of Australians!
Then there were quite a number of extra-ordinary Citizenship Ceremonies where Liberal / National MP’s were either not invited or sent invitations too late for them to attend …….???????
Thanks Bill for your thoughtful article. You raised a good reminder that ultimately our hope is in God as sovereign. I think there are many questions still to be considered. Questions such as: How much did Aussies want stability and a continuity of Government in these uncertain times? How much did the Trump factor drive people away from conservative politics? And it seems trivial but how many voters were influenced more by personality than policies? I mean Albo had a nice smile and some hair!