The author attempts to outline some supposed 'victories' of the current Labor Government under a veil of humour. I think. Were all deliriously happy how the lot of the very,very, very, few intersex and transgender people who exist in this country has been improved, at least symbolically. We can't wait to pay more money for the Carbon Tax. Its just enriched our lives no end. We are eagerly anticipating her attack the Superannuation system to pay for her hair brained schemes. Yes, its been just great, thanks.

I am laughing too. Mainly at the absolute corrupt incompetency of the Government which welded on Labor supporters like the author are unable to see.

BTW Abbott may be unpopular but nowhere near as unpopular as Julia.

If this were a speech it would have been given because the speaker likes the sound of his own voice. I don't know if you can like the look of your own prose, but I suppose anything is possible, if you are narcissistic enough.

As it turns out, it is nothing more than a bit of bumph, to make sure every one knows he has studied Japanese theater, & tell every one he is too blind to see past some group think ideology, beloved by ivory tower lefty academics

Can any historians do arithmetic?

Parliament under Gillard is getting things done.
??
Gary Wotherspoon,
I'm afraid I don't get it. What's getting done ? When will it translate into some sort of benefit to us ? I can see quite a decline in services & mentality & infrastructure development but I can't say I see things getting done.

I have seen on OLO many well thought out and presented articles. This is not one of them. In fact I haven't seen such a poorly written, self indulgent piece of flatulence for some time.

Garry, if you are an academic why write like a mentally challenged 10 yr old?

The fat lady may not have sung, but she is clearly warming up the vocal chords backstage.
When there was a light on Ben chiefly's hill, I believe neither fiscal conservative Kevin or economic dry Simon, would have been in the labour Party. These patent impostors, would have been invited to join Menzie's libs, where they would have found a much more natural fit?
Julia should not have tried to spare Kevin, even if his was emotionally fragile; and simply come out and told us the real reason why Kevin simply HAD TO BE REPLACED, even when PM!
Her patently misplaced loyalty to her former leader has hurt her enormously!
Kevin 07-11, apparently remains a workaholic, and is reportedly a hugely disliked power hungry control freak?
When he was replaced, with Julia, it was with unanimous support of the political Labour party.
Kevin did what Kevin does, and tested his support?
When he could find little or none he refused to challenge, just as he squibbed a double dissolution, to get the moral imperative of the century, climate change, dealt with by parliament.
He might not have leaked and irreparably damaged brand Labour in the process, but someone in his support group clearly did?
A true Leader, even a highly unpopular one, retains the courage of conviction; and indeed, party loyalty!
Something that seems missing in Kevin an or, members of his support group?
The Labour party needs some time in the political wilderness, in order to divest itself of some of the filth currently clinging to it.
It needs to find and re-establish the core values that once made it a great party, rather than a pale shadow of an increasingly ultra-conservative coalition?
And it needs time to democratise the party from within, and return to past practise of recruiting members from the general rank and file, rather than straight from uni, with a head full of untried intellectual concepts? Or, straight from the union leadership, with generally narrow perspective/values, or patent and dismal lack of personal admin skills or business acumen?
Rhrosty.

I am not a " welded on" Labor supporter but I have to agree with the "getting things done" theme of this article. Last week we got the disability scheme passed into legislation, after forty years of waiting. It would never have happened under Liberal because it was just never a priority. I know that it has bipartisan support now but it took the social conscience of a few good Labor people to get it up. It will impact on millions of Australians, present and future, and will translate into more votes than you may expect. While you were watching a leadership challenge last week, we were watching a life changing event. Don't underestimate it - its political ramifications may be as great as its social ones.

Rhosty, Gillard did nothing at all to protect Rudd, not a thing.

How you can still blame him when it is clear she is the incompetent bungler is beyond me.

To all those people now breaking their necks to have Tony Abbott as PM, I wish you the best of luck, you must remember once a Catholic always a Catholic, he will rule by his beloved bible, he has no policies, is a staunch tMonachist, so the best of luck,

estelles is praising the passing of the disability insurance scheme. I wonder what she will say when it is inevitably removed, or at least watered down to less than 20% of the grandiose bit of posturing it is.

If it does translate into votes it will prove the average Ozzie is every bit as dumb as our Greek & Cypriot maters, who have ridden the welfare/handout train right into the cesspit. That they will be swimming around in it for a generation or more is their own damn greedy fault.

How anyone can consider it generous to ride the gravy train over a complete generation of your own neighbours I can't imagine, but that is what you're doing.

We are teetering on the edge of that cesspit now, & unaffordable gestures like the disability insurance scheme are just the thing to push us over that edge.

Great day for a swim, hope you enjoy the flavour.

Monachist, so the best of luck,
Ojnab,
Yes, with constituents like you he needs all the luck he can muster. What will you contribute to make this a better country & prevent it from turning into heap like the middle East ?
Can Abbott's team count on you & the likes of you being of help or hindrance ?
Will you be a decent citizen of Australia or will you just grab as much as you can. What's your idea of helping Australians to make things good again. You must remember once a hanger-on always a hanger-on. Just curious !

With your absurd, cockeyed views on illegal boat people, nothing would surprise me that's 'beyond you' MARILYN SHEPHERD ?

Here we have yet another academic boring us all with his eloquent oration on the many successes of the current Labour government ? Like preserving the integrity of our sovereign borders ? Maintaining our Defence capabilities, appropriate to our current regional threat assessment ? Reducing our massive debt ?

Yep, after Gough Whitlam I thought we'd never see anything more politically destructive again ? Enter Mr Rudd and Ms Gillard. My only question, which of the two does caucus despise the most ?

Marilyn, Nowhere in any post do I blame Kevin, for what we would have once called a nervous breakdown, or the fact that the country was, for all practical purposes, reportedly being run by juveniles in his office, just prior to his replacement.
Nor do I believe Julia was looking for his job?
Check the records of parliamentary journos, if only to discover, not one word of criticism was ever directed by a patently loyal Gillard at her Leader, prior to his replacement.
Aspiring, would be if they could be leaders, have quite a history of press leaks and promulgated critiques!
The fact that he was at the time very fragile emotionally, prevented Gillard from outlining the reasons for Kevin's loss of Leadership.
And she was not alone in considering his then emotional fragility, or possible demeaning loss of face.
Perhaps you are judging her on your own personal standards, or what you would have done if you were stood in her shoes?
Nonetheless, she and team labour knew he had to be replaced!
There was by all accounts, not a single dissenting vote?
Had she been a male and gone for the jugular, like Abbott did when replacing Turnbull, she would have simply fully backgrounded the press and let the chips fall where they may. And, we wouldn't even be having this conversation?
That said, I don't intend to vote for Gillard or labour, given the way they acquiesced to the coalition over asylum seeker policy.
And have now reinstalled Howard's Pacific solution.
As far as I'm concerned, real leaders never ever capitulate or lose the courage of their convictions, even if that then makes them deeply unpopular.
My asylum seeker sympathy is reserved for those refugees, who may well be second or third generation camp dwellers, live in the most appalling squalid conditions, and who simply don't have or can't find the resources, to pay criminals to smuggle them across borders, and or, all to often into harms way.
Take care, Rhrosty.

Estelles,
I had to read up on this & yes the scheme is something that shouldn't have taken all these years since big Goaf & be passed on literally the eve of an election called by a desperate Government. As good as the scheme is it is disgusting for a Government to use disability as an election ploy.
I might not have this view if they for example had introduced a scheme that provides Law & Order or decent Dental scheme etc a couple of years ago.

Gary, unless you can articulate any benfits to Australia and Australians from these ALP policies, I'm afraid we must conclude the the ones "Getting Done" are us.

Geez, I'd have thought in order to prove the conservatives wrong people like Gary would swamp us with evidence or are they just too modest to rub it in ?