Ludwig

"What chance would Rudd have had if he had stood up boldly for the things that really matter?"

I actually think he would have had a good chance if he'd done it properly. He's articulate and personable and people are looking for a leadership that is different to Howard's. If he'd struck out on a bold course and really sold a definite plan for combating climate change and bringing back some fairness into the economy I think people would have gone for it, especially if he'd had a team behind him strongly enunciating the same message.

Of course the vested interests would have gone into overdrive and brought out every dirty trick to discredit him, but I still believe he might have pulled it off. Unfortunately, it's one of those things we'll never know.

We have to remember it's the people who vote, not corporations. In fact voting is the one and only time where people power should be able to outdo corporate power. The main problem of course is we have a corporately controlled media dictating the campaign direction.

I still feel though that Rudd would never have it in him to strike out on such a course anyway. I don't think the real Rudd is much different to the real Howard.

Howard is simply pathetic.

K.rudd is simply a pathetic COWARD.

Voters get the government they deserve.

Vote 1... the K.rudd.

Bronwyn

Yes if Rudd had had his heart in it, he possibly could have gone down a strongly different path that would have appealed to a winning majority, and beaten the massed vested-interest forces that would have mounted against him. Possibly.

But I doubt that even if he did have a strong conviction to strive for sustainability and tackle peak oil head-on, he would have gone down that path anyway, because he would have seen the huge difficulties that it would have generated for his campaign.

Anyway, if he’d shown any such convictions, he would never have been elected leader of the Labor party, would he!

“I don't think the real Rudd is much different to the real Howard.”

That’s the bottom line.

Stop giving this guy oxygen - he is an idiot.

Having got that off my chest I will turn my attention to the matter at hand.

There is not now nor has there ever been all that much to separate the major political groupngs in Australia - the myth of me tooism is born out of a culture of relative consensus that characterises the Australian psyche - only in the past decade has there been a drift to more extreme expression of racial intolerance and general mean spiritedness - and it is that more than anything else that is driving the polls

Each of the parties has flirted with a degree of socialism - Black Jack McEwen was a agrarian socialist with great influence, there are still remnants of that today - Keating embraced globalism with more enthusiasm than his conservative predecessors - and Hawke deliiverd brakes of wages growth and over saw the progressive reduction in tarrifs

- there have been few if any "politcial visionaries" with great new ideas - some might elevate Whitlam to that status - but most of his initiatives have been wound back or undone - and much by his own party.

The pendulum of political policy ( or the PPP as sneekee likes to call it - feel free to use it in general conversation )swings through a very small arc here - so it is of no surprise that Rudd mirrors Howard and indeed vice versa.

Australia is a very conservative nation - the conservative commentariat would have you believe that the barbarian left controls every social agenda you can name - but in spite of their dire warnings at the end of the day we remain a conservative bunch - and are destined to do so for a while - dont expcet a revolution anytime soon.

Ludwig,
I love your reference to the bottom line, It's why we exist. We exist to assist the informed public, proving that you can wipe away the Election Woes, and whats more you can do it with a smile. Cutting the crap is easy with us .
We will change forever the myth that nothing can be changed, except by removing the incumbent Government at election time. Why wait until an election , you can register your disapproval of a governments actions but indulging a few of your own. Its great for morale . And great for frustration. Join us at www.allonaroll.com Have fun . Politicians exist to serve us, not us serve them
Cheers

Mirko, you see a conflict between a morally-based society and economic growth (“If Rudd can urge the nation to move towards such morally uplifting ends, even if it means a small reduction in our economic well-being, …”). I don’t think that there is a contradiction, a country with a stronger moral base and greater harmony is likely to prosper.

You comment that “the community does not know the man well enough to make an informed assessment,” and Palimpest comments that “What's missing this time is a real feel for Rudd the man.”
Kevin recruited me to the Queensland Office of Cabinet and 1991, and is now my Federal MP (while our former OoC colleague Anna Bligh is my State MP and Premier). In my experience, Kevin is a control freak. He kept a barrier around himself; he had occasional staff meetings, ostensibly for broad-ranging discussion, but his approach completely shut out the opportunity for constructive criticism or other comments. I worked with Goss and several ministers, and I found that Kevin applied the same attitude to most ministers – he called the shots, and ministers knew that without Kevin onside, they had no hope. Whether he can exert such control at Federal level is dubious.

On the positive side, Kevin’s intelligent and often supported good public interest policies. But he also gets bees in his bonnet, e.g. his push for national teaching of Chinese and Japanese in schools (stitched up with his NSW equivalent) led to many children wasting time on a trivial introduction to two very complex languages. Kevin’s argument that we needed fluency in these languages to do business was nonsense – the years spent to master those languages would be better spent developing business skills – and we have done wonderfully well in our business dealings with Japan and China.

Kevin’s campaign literature in 04 showed him explaining the ALP’s tax policy to two “battlers.” The “battlers” were two long-term party members and Queensland public servants who got rapidly promoted (in one case middle management to department head) when Beattie became Premier.

Howard? Should have done better.