Mirko you really don't like Rudd, do ya? Neither do I!

I would much rather Rudd pumping money into the lower echelons of the economy to keep it turning over than [Turnbull/Costello] slashing government spending so the government doesn't go into deficit thus plunging the economy into a deep slowdown, of severe recession or depression magnitude.

Smirko is pretty second-rate when it comes to analysis, not to mention history.

First he tells us that:

"The worst we can say is that Kevin Rudd is displaying a level of breathtaking cynicism the likes of which Australian political life has not seen for many a year." For many a year.

His very next sentence?

"The only thing that comes close is the way that the Liberal Party used concerns about terrorism and boat people in 2001 to craft a governing narrative built around the politics of "strong on national security". Comes close eh? I would have thought locking up asylum seekers and their children and milking security fears for political motives was a tad more cynical than writing an essay in a struggling journal.

'Cynical' seems to be Smirko's magic word. According to him, Lindsay Tanner has a big dose of it. Then he would have us accpet that "the government is spending on the poor because economists cynically inform us that they have a greater propensity to spend transfer payments". Economists, no less. Cynics.

Smirko's penultimate sentence?

"The Rudd essay is a political tract designed to fashion a narrative where hitherto none has existed and to opportunistically establish mastery over his political opponents in much the same fashion that Howard was able to achieve following September 11, 2001.

To fashion a narrative where hitherto none has existed? Hitherto none has existed? In much the same fashion as Howard? The likes of which hasn't been seen for many a year? Are you getting confused? Smirko certainly is.

This is the same Smirko who told us the beginning that John Howard and the Liberal Party "used concerns about terrorism and boat people in 2001 to craft a governing narrative...". So the cynicsm is recurrent?

When it comes to cynicism in Australian politics - and writing about it - there are many competitors and a long history.

Surely OLO can find someone a little more competent to analyse Rudd's latest essay?

"The Rudd essay is a political tract designed to fashion a narrative where hitherto none has existed and to opportunistically establish mastery over his political opponents in much the same fashion that Howard was able to achieve following September 11, 2001."

But Marko, have you actually read the essay? Not much evidence of that.

Sledging doth not an analysis make.

Bille and Spikey, the author is Marko Beljac, just in case you were getting him mixed up with Mirko Bagaric. Susan P - ed

He wrote this year 8 indoctrinate essay; - whilst slouching around, ravaging for food and shelter in his 10 thousand dollar a week Holiday house? - You got to love socialism- especially when you are on top of the pyramid.
He has a point with urgent Government reform though.
Here is an Idea- Sack the blooming Lot- State and Federal- and all the useless idiot parasites gravy train’s . Trough snorting looters and all the Ideological psychopath witchdoctors.
There you have it , Australia will recover from the Ruddster in a matter of month

Funny stuff All-! :)

Marko is right, Rudd Labor undertook a deliberate rehabilitation of Keatings reputation to take ownership of the good times and present the ALP as responsible economic managers.

They claimed the significant reforms of the financial sector as the work of the Keating/Hawke years. And they were.

It is worthwhile pointing out Rudds polemic contains not just a new or expanded philosophical line but also a cynical political theme.

Mr Rudd won the election on work choices and then works his staff half to death. I wonder if he includes his successful wife Theresa in on his rants about evil capitalism. Nothing more needs to be said.

Kevin rudd is pathetic.Firstly he panics everyone saying how bad things will get ,then tries to pass a $42 billion stimulus package putting us all in more debt.The money is not coming from the Govt,it it is the tax payer that must pay the principal plus interest in the future.

The RBA borrows from the World Central Banks or the IMF and this makes us slaves to them.The central banks generate the money in cyberspace devaluing our currencies and charge us interest on a depreciating currency.

We should sack the central banks/IMF and let the RBA generate their own cash.

Popular pulp fiction.

How about a new word to describe this?

Neo-ruddite or gero-ruddite maybe even gero-laborism.

Every time our fearless leader appears on TV he looks like a store mannequin, at least Howard added animation to his lying.

To tell you the truth if we have a leader who is more interested in proving he is an intellectual, than proving he is a leader and has common sense. It would seem he is too busy trying to make his mark for the history books, rather than being our elected leader.

And letting history take care of itself.

Socio-contrapulism

JamesH,

"...at least Howard added animation to his lying." You must be referring to Frankie H?

Ha!
liberal fanboy shows just how hypocritical they are.
"breathtakingly cynical" describes Liberal philosophy perfectly.

Howard was asleep at the economic wheel, having preferred to engage in culture wars and propping up last centuries industries. He had a golden opportunity to invest in the future, but instead plumped up his asset values, his family businesses and his mates industries.

He sat and watched the credit crisis come for 2-3 years and did nothing. He did nothing for infrastructure, he did nothing for foreign relations, he stopped many decades of real-world improvement in health, education, equality dead in its tracks and sent us on a regressive path.

Rudd may not be perfect (who is), but to call him "breathtakingly cynical" coming out of the Howard years is just silly.
Fanboys shouldn't try and write "analysis" of documents they haven't read yet!

James H “Neo-ruddite or gero-ruddite maybe even gero-laborism.”

May I suggest “Kruddonomics”

And note something Margaret Thatcher said

"Socialists have always spent much of their time seeking new titles for their beliefs, because the old versions so quickly become outdated and discredited."

because, according to rumours to the chief advisor for the innovatively bankrupt

Kruddonomics is merely the 2008 run-out model of the 1991 version of

“Keatingomics”,

A system which defines the fiscal agenda to be one of ensuring the power of government is assured through the numbing of the electorate, with faux-horror crisis, to the point they are so stupefied, impoverished and bereft of personal options, they are therefore sufficiently malliable to follow the duck call of a socialists band of duck hunters, up to the guns and oblivion.

It is a particularly destructive system and requires a cyclical reversal of strategies (called change to coalition) to rebuild the confidence and life style of the populus, before a sufficient number of wallies decide to retry the "socialist" path....

but only because they are all too young to remember the last recession

SusanP,

I can't speak for Billie of course, but for me there was no case of mistaken identity. I hear the sub-text, however.

Col Rouge,

I can see why Kevin 07 doesn't appeal after your love affair with the Iron Maiden. No whips and spurs with gentle Kev.

I hear that repeating your self and the Iron Maiden's anecdotes is a sign of geriatric slippage. At least you're too young to remember the last recession.

The complete nitwit and his fans.

Debating(?) ar article that has yet to be published. Just brilliant.

No chance of waiting to see whatever it says huh? Nope, just charge in, get yer dumb old flags out, left and right, and wave them at each other from behind your keyboards.

What a pathetic gathering of fools. The author leads by a long way. Next he'll be critisicing things he has predicted from reading Revelations. Or has he started already? I predict that he has. My predictions are safe. I look back to see what to predict.

My understanding of the tipping point for this financial crisis.

The foundation was laid with a grand housing plan, in the US for low income earners (socialism) this was exploited by the capitalists to increase their wealth,

Now if the low income earners did not have the interest rates they were paying for their housing loans, raised. This would not have happened.

Now capitalists greed built a stack of cards which came tumbling down, rather spectacularly.

I notice the the Labor party is made up of socialist-capitalists.

In the past neither have the Labor or Liberal parties been good for public services. One would expect State Labor parties to pay for public services first before doing deals for their mates.

So maybe we have a neo-socio-capitalist Labor.

Although the foundations were laid sometime earlier, the real crash was brought on by the now-discredited policies of Alan Greenspan and how they were adopted internationally.

His strategy was to generate ever-increasing corporate profits by putting downward pressure on real wages and outsourcing, and then flooding the world with cheap credit so consumers could borrow to fill the gap. Despite criticism is seemed to work initially but could never be sustained indefinitely.

Add in the housing bubble plus further deregulating the fractional banking system plus rampant consumer greed and everybody dug their own economic graves. Every dollar deposited now supports thirty dollars of debt and because of the international banking system, everybody is affected.

Anybody who warned about the coming crisis was denounced and labelled some sort of socialist.

When times were "good" it was indeed the "neo-liberals" who claimed credit but now it's failed, they are pointing the finger at everybody but themselves. They were the ones who have been running this market for many years now.

So if Rudd was so completely wrong, who was really to blame? Those Chardonnay-sipping socialists? The greenies? The greedy consumers?

RobbyH posted on Thursday, 5 February 2009 3:59:17 PM:

“The complete nitwit and his fans. Debating(?) ar article that has yet to be published. Just brilliant.”

Er, Robby, “The Monthly” was published on Wednesday 4 February and subscribers had their copies before that.

Now what was that you said about “a pathetic gathering of fools”?

Hi JamesH,

It's nice to see writing from someone who has at least looked to the causes of the crisis. I have read variously that Barack Obama single-handedly engineered the whole catastrophe (which, it must be said, was carried out with perfect timing to get him elected); alternatively it is an Arab plot. Finally, someone who has looked at plausible reasons!

The only thing I would add is that many of the low income earners should be held to account as well. While banks funded loans that would never be repaid, the low income earners took out loans that they knew they would never repay. The phenomenon of 'jingle mail' - people walking out on their McMansions and sending the keys to the bank - is a disgrace to both parties. Banks cannot recover the debt without selling their newly-acquired houses; people cannot afford to buy the banks' houses; debts are called in and banks go broke; economy takes a beating.

In essence, the nature of individualistic capitalism is to build up capital for ourselves. Three years of interest-only repayments is a small price to pay for three years in a nice house - and who looks to the future with prospects like that? Hopefully, after this debacle, the answer to the last question is 'everyone'. But I doubt it.

Otokonoko

there is a saying I rather like.

In your twenties, if you are not a socialist, you dont have a heart.
In your fourties, if you are not a capitalist, you dont have a brain.

So basically some very smart but perhaps morally corrupt people packaged the risk and sold it on to corporate greed as a sound investment.

Had the sub prime mortagages continued, it would have gotten larger and larger, until a crisis point was reached.

I find I am cynical, for example our goverment bailing out car salesmen. This like crooks bailing out other crooks.