Regular Features

Weekend reflections (Rudd edition)

John Quiggin24 Comments

It’s time once again for weekend reflections. I’d be interested in views on how the Rudd government has performed in its first couple of months. My short answer: Very well, all things considered. Anyway, feel free to write at greater length than for a standard comment thread. As always, civilised discussion and no coarse language.

24 thoughts on “Weekend reflections (Rudd edition)”

  1. To tell the truth, they don’t seem to done much so far. I guess parliament is yet to sit. There have been hopeful signs in cleaning up the dirtier parts of Howard’s refugee, “terrorist”, alliances and wars policy.

    On the other had, I suspect Rudd and Labour in general have no real idea of the massive coming world emergency and how to position Australia to (maybe) survive it. I doubt the they’ll grasp the real nettles like major CO2 reduction, removing the massive subsidies for fossil fuels, commencing a national renewables energy policy, changing our cities from car dependent to mass transit serviced… to name a few.

    But then again maybe they are right to do (next to) nothing. After all , the window of opportunity is probably already closed. It was the years the world lost between the first Limits to Growth warning (early 1970s) and 2000 that really doomed us. Too late now.

  2. Ikonoclast might be ready to throw in the towel. I’m sure that Rudd and his ministers are not. Change is on the agenda but we always knew they would be cautious. The perceptions of the Whitlam government as doing too much too soon, whether accurate or not, still haunt the ALP. Gough’s needs-based education revolution took condiderable time to develop through the Carmel Commission processes and an obstructionist Senate.

    The apology is a great start to the parliamentary session.

    Watch this space!

  4. I must second Gerard on the Don Bradman question. On ABC AM early this week the Minister was saying it was gone. By the evening news Rudd was saying (essentially) that the Don Bradman question was sacred.

    As a form of genuflecting to something meaningless it reminds one of the “way of the gourd” and “the way of the sandal” from Life of Brian. It is just ludicrous.

  6. Garrett has used a Friday late pm press release to annnounce that approval has been given to Gunns to clear land destined for it’s pulp mill.
    OK so there are a number of further approvals needed before it all goes ahead but this sort of press management isn’t a good look for Rudd.

  7. The Rudd govt have done well so far, if they could maintain their minimalist approach over the entire term I might vote for them next time.

  8. One aspect of the Rudd Government so far that I applaud is that they have no engaged in a purge of top office holders of the Public Service. We will see how that develops. The accountability of ministerial staff is something that might be introduced, as a reminder that Parliament should be sovereign, although it is not wholly unproblematic in a bi-cameral system that tests the meaning of democracy.

    Secondly, the “Sorry Statement”, it now seems to me, is not about symbolism and compensation, but an affirmation and recognition that justice is fundamental, and that wrongs done to Aboriginal people were wrong then, and wrong now.

    I do not expect the techniques of government to change overnight, but some actions of government can have a symbolic resonance with what I take to be the aspirations and expectations of most Australians. I, for one, welcome the differentiation, at least in these matters, from the Howard years.

    And another means of product differentiation, might well be to have a citizenship test that was relevant to that knowledge required of citizenship.Such a suggestion presupposes that democratic citizenship in a democracy should be taken seriously rather than be derisory. Hence we get stupid questions about cricket, which act as dummy variables for cultural understanding. Cricket is a form of entertainment and distraction, albeit not as violent as the circuses of the Roman Empire.

  9. Was Donald Bradman a famous (a) tennis player, (b) cricketer, (c) rock’n’roll drummer, (d) explorer?

    What a joke. Nothing highlights the tragicomic absurdity of the test as this idiotic question. How pathetically desperate for national heroes can we get? To put such a ridiculous, irrelevent question on the citizenship test belittles the nation itself.

  11. Happy with Rudd on two counts:-

    1. He is not backing away from the promised tax cuts.
    2. He has made a big deal about the need to cut government spending.

    Not happy that he seems to be in favour of running endless surpluses. He should be cutting taxes even further, especially given that tax revenues are running so strong.

    Time will tell.

  12. “democratic citizenship in a democracy”

    you didn’t quite catch on to ‘newspeak’, i take it.

    the people of california are democratic citizens of a democratic state. ozzies are sheep in a comfortable paddock.

  13. Rudd’s between a rock and a hard place on the tax cuts and the bad news from the Reserve on their past incompetence and hence the spending cuts. It’s OK now to wedge the Opposition on the sorry thing, but it will come back to bite him with the inevitable calls for practical compensation. He’s safe as houses dragging his feet on real CO2 cuts because the Opposition can’t and won’t complain on that issue. On foreign affairs he’s made a rod for his own back, pulling out of Iraq as it turns the corner, whilst staying the course in Afghanistan going downhill fast with waning NATO support
    http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,23152083-5005962,00.html

  14. Overall I think Rudd has done well so far, although prior to the opening of parliament is not a great indication of what is to come.

    The major exception however is Garrett. As mentioned above he has not only facilitated the disastrous Pulp Mill, by doing it after 5pm on a Friday he’s shown he’s keen to shut down public awareness of such an important issue. Combined with his blundering on the dredging of Port Phillip Bay he is looking very much like the minister against the environment. His one pro-environmental move is on the very minor issue or plastic shopping bags – a tiny proportion of the waste problem.

    All this really does demonstrate the fallacy of the notion that talented outsiders can change the ALP. Hopefully it will be a warning to others.

  15. Rudd seems to be merely following the populist wants more closely than Howard (e.g. climate change), but unwilling to make tough decisions (e.g. tax-cuts are sacrosanct when the RBA wants to lower consumer demand).

    So far, the only real leadership seems to be in things that don’t impact the public conciousness (e.g. ungagging NGOs).

    I’d suggest a good diagnostic for the quality of the new government is how quickly Rudd rolls back the political donations disclosure changes that Howard introduced.

  16. Perhaps for the moment we should defer to the wise Mandarins across the sea who in the intro of the translated version of Kevvy’s biography gush leftily-

    “This book will fully interpret the legendary life of Lu Kewen. How he was born in a poor family in 1957, how he stepped into the palace of success through endeavour and effort, how he fought in the political waves and stepped proudly through the tide.”

  17. Sounds like China’s version of the coming of the Fifth Imam, Le Kewen Maohommed. Get in the popcorn for the movie folks. Now if he can just manage to part the waters of the Murray Darling put me down for a slice of the action with the sequel…

  18. Al,

    I may be redundant, but I do not think it quite newspeak. Newspeak would be “democit” or politburo, or some such construction that obliterates the original words. Redundancy is a thought crime, but at a lower level. It is more transparent.

    Thanks for the close reading. Since we are being picky here, I don’t get your comparison of California with Australia – and I am sorry I asked.

  19. observa, we in the English speaking world take English speaking leaders from non-English speaking countries for granted. For the Chinese it is a very novel first! they tend to idolize successful politicians in general, and love rags-to-riches stories.

    (Vlad Putin is many Chinese ladies’ idea of a red-hot sex symbol).

  20. Yeah I got the gist of that and it was after all a bit of front flap spin, albeit a bit of Great Leader retro stuff. As for loving rags to riches stories we used to worship them too, until too many heathens began to take that bit about resting on the Sabbath a bit too literally.

  21. I find the Bradman question offensive and embarrassing. But then people are also required to swear allegiance to some English grandma (though at least she actually is part of the constitutional set up).

  24. So far it is cautious times but a few positives
    Iraq 6/10
    afghanistan 0/10
    China difficult to tell but I heard we are pulling out of the “lets ring them in” war games ie the gang of four (US, Japan & India) is not the three amigos. in this case tentativley give a 9.5/10 but there is obviously a lot of stuff we do not know

    I loved his homeless stance. 9/10 for the idea. have to wait to score on implementation.

    Economic matters its early days. Bare pass at this stage
    On environemnt i agree garret is getting a 2/10. diappointing

    Whales id 7/10 (or maybe higher

    Bali was a Kevin PR coup but verdict of effect still open

Leave a comment