My, there's a rash of Gillard-bashing articles today, aren't there?

What they and many of the comments they've elicited tell me is that many supposedly educated Australians are woefully ignorant of the political system in which they are compulsory participants.

Under the Westminster system Prime Ministers have never been directly elected. They are the parliamentary leaders, selected by their party cohorts, of the political party that can demonstrate to the Governor-General that they can form a viable government.

The Australian electorate didn't vote for Rudd to be PM - the ALP Caucus did. And they voted him out, quite correctly, when he lost their confidence.

If you don't like the Westminster System, agitate to replace it with a democracy :)

OK,

So Gillard is a ruthless politician who seized the moment. That's what ALL successful politicians do.

And I should care because.....?

On election day you look at the merchandise on offer and make your pick. Thus is it ever.

....and Rudd was the idiot who put his hand up as being responsible for the really dumb-ass Big Australia policy.

No sooner did he make the boast then there were cries of "Incoming...duck", but it was too late for that.

"If people don't know what you're doing, they don't know what you're doing wrong." - Yes, Minister

It seems all of our elected representatives from the last 15 years get a caning for not standing up to Howard or Rudd.

There will be others but as read that I thought of publicly voiced dissent during the Howard era - most notably over the treatment of refugee's by several coalition members. Petro Georgiou is the name that comes to mind and a piece I found in Crikey (sorry Graham) http://www.crikey.com.au/2010/06/03/petro-georgiou-regression-has-become-the-order-of-the-day/ touches on issues of dissent. I had the impression that Howard had lost some battles within the party room on other issues but don't recall what. I heard Costello express a differing opinion over some issues to that espoused by Howard - perhaps in the context of improving his own image but still public dissent with the leaders position.

I think that some elected politicians do far better than they are given credit for in this piece and my own view is that Howard may have handled dissent better then appears to be implied in the article (but not as well as I'd like). I'd not be at all suprised if others know of cases where Labor politicians have been willing to voice their dissent from Rudd's views.

R0bert

I might as well throw this one in to the mix:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/06/29/2939797.htm

I thought it was a good article containing some notable points.

"It’s also a case of women to the rescue again. When all else fails, wheel in the woman."

Followed by

"The ruthlessness, the brutality, and the cowardice we’ve seen over the last few days leave a very bad taste and a very bad smell"

So Julia Gillard is the innocent heroine fighting against "the ruthlessness, the brutality, and the cowardice"

PLEASE!

Spare the crap.