Yep, absolutely right John. Rudd will continue with just the same future-destroying doctrine.

I’ve already completely lost hope that we’ll get any significant readjustment of the rush-towards-the-cliff approach to the governance of our society.

You mention a few ways in which Rudd is imitating Howard where essential change is ….er…….essential.

But you haven’t the mentioned the really big one; sustainability and the continuous growth ethic. http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=7168#110021

*CHEEZY GRIN*.... yep.. its all over my face... why ?

aah.. because all the work so many people did.. the Unions... 'hate howard' days.. (not in those words).. "Get RID of 'Howard' rally's"

"Destroy the Coalition" rallies and public events...

"Lefty talk fests, book days-rip_into_Howard" stuff.....

"Kill the Konservatives" (not literally)

all..for what? :) MORE OF THE SAME.. but with... "minor tinkering"

John.. what did you expect? a tsunami of euphoric socialist utopia enveloping us in warmed and filled 'from each according to his ability to each according to his need'?

It seems to me that the nature of political parties is to 'say' what they need to, to get elected, even if that means pandering to interests they consider loathesome... but then, reality bites and they realize that most people really don't want too much radical change.

MINOR PARTIES.. are usually the ones yelling the loudest about this and that. Usually at some recognizable identity who symbolizes all they are against...like Auntie Pauline....

and in the end.. all a waste of time, .. for as King Solomon said many years ago:

8 All things are wearisome,
more than one can say.
The eye never has enough of seeing,
nor the ear its fill of hearing.

9 What has been will be again,
what has been done will be done again;
there is nothing new under the sun

Lets invite Solomon to make a few posts to OLO :)

I really don't think all that much of this piece.

For starters, there are two separate spheres - economic and social policy. My suspicion is that most Australians were reasonably agreeable to Howard's economic policy, until workchoices, though it was only the more extreme conservatives who supported his social positions on things such as private school funding and the rather brutal refugee policies that were out of step with the rest of the world.

In terms of social policies, I think many hard headed members of the political class regard this as largely irrelevant when weighed up against the economic imperatives, though I don't think this is justified. They're as important as each other, and Rudd's acceptance of global warming, coupled with the dismantling of the pacific solution and even just his willingness to have further engagement beyond the American and Japanese relationships, shows a significantly different approach on social and international issues.

This is not irrelevant, though these things don't even warrant a mention in Passant's piece.

Rudd has not been in power long, but he has already reversed many of the policies that were the most abrasive to centrists.

TurnRightThenLeft is perhaps mistaken to think “only the more extreme conservatives” supported Howard’s refugee policies. In the 2001 election the Australian electorate strongly and clearly indicated that it did not favor a humanitarian refugee program based on secondary movements of asylum seekers and people smuggling. The electorate indicated that it wanted refugee places to go to those most in need, not those having many thousands of dollars to travel around the world seeking their preferred destinations for asylum. The electorate’s position has perhaps not substantially changed that much over time on this issue.

Howards policies were aimed not at refugees per se but at secondary mover asylum seekers. Secondary movement asylum seekers are defined to be asylum seekers who move from a first country of de facto asylum, moving long distances around the world through countries with little interest in persecuting them, in order to settle in an affluent Western country. Almost all secondary movers arrived without identity papers / travel documents, destroying them to make the determination of their identities and verification of their stories of persecution and return to their countries of residence / origin a very time consuming, difficult and costly task.

Rudd’s policies mirror Howard’s in the preference of the turning back of boats carrying secondary movement asylum seekers. The Pacific Solution has been dismantled, however, secondary movement asylum seekers unable to be turned back (due to deliberate sabotage of their boats for example) will be processed on Christmas Island, and not on mainland Australia.

Thanks for the comments posters. The article had to be edited so some material was left out. That is what happens with space restrictions.

Ludwig makes a fair comment about not addressing sustainability, something I hope to come to in the near future in another article. I wonder whether the short-termism of the capitalist mode of production will see us destroy the planet and with it the very economic system so many support.

In any event I think Kyoto, like the apology, was a tokenistic response. I don't think it is an accident that the symbolism of change in the social sphere is used to hide the reality of HowRuddism in the economic sphere. Indeed I'd be prepared to say that in the social sphere there may well be some change rather than just the impression of change (although I have yet to see any). That itself helps disorient workers and ALP supporters when the government does attack wages and jobs.

I think the budget will for example be a disaster for public servants, with compulsory redundancies. They could even come up with a wage freeze for public servants. This is all on top of 3.5% "efficiency" dividend which will wreak havoc on administrators across the country.

Anyway, maybe I am jumping the gun here about the budget.

Back to reading about the social class base of Islamism which itself might make a good thread or article for OLO.

Franklin again on secondary movement of refugees. There never was any such thing happening but he spouts this everywhere he writes without ever giving us any evidence.

The fact that no refugees were denied protection gives the lie to this nonsense but still he goes on and on and on.

For the record, the only refugees who might be classified as secondary movers are those we fly here at great expense so we can get out of our obligations under the refugee convention.

For example. Sudanese refugees who have had the protection of another nation for as much as 17 years would legally be excluded under the refugee convention 1 part D because they already have protection.

A refugee who flees Afghanistan, stays in Pakistan for a time and cannot apply for refugee protection because they are not in the refugee protection framework, than comes to Australia is not a secondary mover and not liable for exclusion under 1D of the refugee convention.

I wish the Online opinion editors would have someone write a piece to refute the nonsense peddled by Franklin, whom I suspect is Ruddock or his kin.