Elections in Australia went well!

As y'all know, the elections in Australia went very well (i.e. Kevin Rudd and the Labor party won). What we all wonder know is what other center-left parties can learn from the campaign.

E.J. Dionne has already written an article about it, in which he underlines the need to win the decisive swing-voters, while mobilizing you base at the same time. I agree with his analysis:

”While Rudd's centrism wooed swing voters, new political energies were unleashed through innovative organizing efforts on the left. The unions' "Your Rights At Work" campaign mobilized especially the middle- and working-class neighborhoods where Howard had done well in the past. A Web-based group called "Get Up!" organized young progressives.

The efforts paid off. Kristina Keneally, a minister in the Labor state government in New South Wales, said that in Howard's own district of Bennelong, "some polling places had over 50 volunteers between Labor, Get Up and Your Rights at Work." Rudd has to keep his core promises to the unions and his pledges of economic sobriety to middle-of-the-road voters -- and not disappoint either.”

You can read the whole article here.