If Dallas read my opinion piece he or she would know that I see the Rudd budget as deflationary not stimulatory.
Look at Table 2 Page 10-9 of Budget Papers no. 1. http://www.budget.gov.au/2008-09/content/bp1/html/bp1_bst10-03.htm

You will see that government tax revenue as a % of GDP rose under Howard from 22.3% in 1995/6 to 24.7% in 2007/8. Under Rudd, taxation revenue is projected to fall from 24.7% of GDP to 23.9% in 2011-12. Government spending will fluctuate but basically resume the downward trend that we saw under Howard in his first two terms but not the last two. Don't believe this rubbish about the Rudd Government being a high spending, high taxing government.

When you consider that the Swan budget is likely to be quite deflationary – reducing domestic demand by 1/4 to 1/2 per cent – and that this will happen at a time when unemployment is likely to rise by up to 1 percentage point, I consider this very “brave’ and the Government deserves praise for its courage.

Perhaps the economic circumstances over the next two years will demand a more stimulatory budget but that's not what we got.

Fortunately the Rudd Government has left itself an opening to draw on the three investment funds (capital and income) from 2009-10 if the unemployment figures turn ugly. This flexibility is good not bad

Unemployment figures are a joke, they in no way reflect true unemployment [or under employment]

Working as little as 2 hours a week is classed as FULL employment [thanks to the howard-esq style of unemployment measure] I dont want to talk into a debate because every govt does it , the numbers simply arnt to be relied upon.

Ok they may go up [but i doudt it , any real movement in unemployment can see them cut off the dole at whim['creating' 30,000 'jobs'using the 'fall' in numbers] or like they did in the 90.'s they can be moved into other statistical classifications [ie become trainee's ,or pensioners ,or sickness benifits,[or the neo public service]

There is really no end to the creative accounting we can do with to those reacting to good or bad numbers ,
i personally favour training them in new teqnoligal needed specialities [that at the end of their training sees the best in the course set up into their own small buisness [running out of the very training center they were taught in ],that in better times repays the cost of their setup ,like turning hemp into bio fuel [locally]

ie use the new infastructure fund to set up really new [NEW] buisness models to train the untrained or under employed ,we then become shareholders in a NEW buisness
[we all know a dollar today will buy less tomorrow, so funds are a great way to lose value.that thus becomes some funds managers new bonus

On this string "socialism" and "the market" have been loosely used.

I understand socialism to mean government ownership of the means of production as in the USSR. The Australian Labor Party is no more for government ownership of the means of production than the Liberal Party. Labor is connected to the trade union movement which is a feature of capitalism - not socialism. Under Lenin and the other Marxist dictators there were and are no free trade unions. Trade unions did not have a right to strike or collectively bargain but were reduced to transmitters of the party line to the workers. Regardless of whether Labor or the Liberals are in government Australia is not socialist.

I understand the market to mean what Adam Smith described in 'The Wealth of Nations', and market theory is based on that model. Freely operating supply and demand rest upon three assumptions:

1. No producer is large enough to affect the market by itself.
2. No consumer is large enough to affect the market by itself.
3. Commodities are essentially indistinguishable. (One barrel of oil or load of wheat is much the same as another barrel of oil or load of wheat.)

The first assumption is generally not true since much production issues from large corporate entities which have a great deal of power to flood or withhold goods from the market and so manipulate price.
The second assumption is generally not true since many purchasers are themselves large entities such as Coles-Myer and the government which have a great deal of power to affect demand and so manipulate price.
The third assumption is generally not true since manufactured commodities can differ widely in capabilities so the consumer cannot readily compare one product with another.

The market as envisioned by Adam Smith exists in farmer's markets, opal miners in Cooper Pedy and a few other places. However, these instances only apply to a small segment of the Australian economy.

On this string the words "socialism" and "the market". have been used to express various ideological predilections and have contributed little or nothing to understanding.

Green labor State Government regulated land supply (Urban Consolidation/Constraint) is directly proportional to housing price and therefore choice.

Lots of people chose to get in on the renovation/investment property craze, collectively bidding up the price of housing/rent as they aspired to be ever richer and more affluent.

A small handfull of people doing this would not have been harmfull but too many people wanted for too much materially, putting affordable housing out of reach in the process.

The Howard government left Australia

the highest inflation since the early 1990s,

interest rates among the highest in the developed world,

record levels of debt in the economy,

housing the most unaffordable ever,

historically low levels of household savings
http://tinyurl.com/65yuwq

record foreign debt,

record Current Account deficit,

slowing growth,

investment in Higher Education in reverse,

one of the most draconian workplace systems in the western world, aimed at putting downward pressure on pay conditions and jobs security.

They managed to 'achieve' all this while governing during the most remarkable period of global prosperity in a generation, and a once-in-a-lifteime mining boom.

What do the Liberal 'achieve' on the economy -without- those benefits? We need look no further back than the results of Howard as Treasurer, 1977-1983:

BUDGET DEFICIT
Before Howard $3.2 billion
After Howard $4.3 billion

INFLATION
Before Howard 8 per cent
After Howard 11 per cent

GROWTH RATE
Before Howard 1.6 per cent
After Howard negative 0.4 per cent

UNEMPLOYMENT
Before Howard 6.3 per cent
After Howard 10.2 per cent

The Canberra Times, 9 April 2007

http://canberra.yourguide.com.au/news/opinion/opinion/howards-record-as-treasurer-questioned/573574.html