party of hope

I reckon Judith Brett’s Quarterly Essay is optimistic for Labor because it highlights, to me, how little substance there actually is to either party and therefore how easily Labor might reinvent itself. The parties have changed their images many times. In recent times, as an example, Howard has stolen ‘reform’ from Labor, the original ‘party of hope and reform’. Of course, he had to tweak it a little: the Liberals are now the party of fear and reform.
Recently Alan Ramsey wrote about how adman John Singleton has been complaining about the lack of difference between the major parties. I get the impression people assume this is Labor’s fault, but as Brett demonstrates, it’s actually Howard who has been busily blurring the boundaries since he took office; if Keating pushed the Liberals to the right, Howard has surely been pushing leftwards from his base camp in the middle. He has attempted to appear more progressive on a number of issues, for example indigenous issues and multiculturalism.
Howard's recent stance on multiculturalism is interesting. John Howard’s original dismissal of it always came across to me as a fear of difference. As a Whitlam-era import to Australia, I grew up innocently thinking multiculturalism itself was an important shared value in a young country made up of settlers, migrants and indigenous people. So I hada rude awakening when I found out that Howard couldn't comprehend that difference could be a central value, actually a critical part of the Australian identity, as much as being "laconic" or "self-reliant" or "unpretentious", or whatever.
Anyway, no wonder it’s hard for us to perceive a difference between the parties when so much depends on a given party leader. For example, Brett writes:

"It seems to me that it is not obvious, except in hindsight, that the new social movements should have attached themselves to the Labor Party. A Liberal Party led by Don Chipp would have offered them a congenial home."

And not only is it about the vagaries of personality and style of individual leaders, the parties are also always being repositioned in relation to each other and to the social context and the ‘changing electorate’. For instance, an anxious global climate perfectly suits Howards’ style of leadership. Brett is at pains to emphasise the continuity and traditional roots of John Howard’s behavior in the job, but in the end, you can’t help feeling that politics just boils down to who has the better marketing skills.
I wonder what Howard offers us that he regards as uniquely Liberal. Howard’s philosophy kind of boils down to something like, ‘You, your home, and your country’. So Howard wants to force Labor into its traditional negative position on those things, when there’s no reason Labor can’t equally own them. The real point of difference between the parties is in the Liberals’ denial of social contexts and the existence of groups or classes.
Howard sells the Liberals as being about the free individual. But none of us is really free; our lives are embedded in contexts. Brett explains how Howard’s view is that being Australian requires affiliation only to family and nation, nothing else. On the other hand, Labor accepts the existence of "large historical forces shaping national destiny" and the resulting "circumstances that limit the individual". The Liberals just seem to be in denial about this.
Class is an established point of difference between the parties. Historically the worker's party, Labor is damned by the Liberals as being the party of the part, the section, the group, the collective, the union. In contrast the Liberals reckon they govern for all of us. But the Libs have their class and eat it too, as Brett shows (I love the bit about Menzies’ second eye). It’s good to be reminded that the Liberal Party traditionally regarded the Labor Party as made up of "workers [who] were not fit to govern" because of their lack of education.
There are other differences between the parties that can be made salient again. As I said the other day I think Howard’s Industrial Relations reform is a boon to Labor. Suddenly we know what Labor stands for again. Post-Latham, running with Beazley, Labor's probably still up shit creek, but a least now they’ve got a paddle.
Incidentally, it seemed a limitation of Brett’s essay (though maybe she expands on it in her books, which I'd like to read one day) that the qualitatitve research included at the end didn't juxtapose four Liberal voters with four Labor voters. Maybe something could be learnt from hearing why people vote Labor, too. I can’t help thinking that the popularity of John Howard is blown out of proportion in the mainstream media. The difference between winning and losing government doesn’t come down to many votes. We don’t all love the guy.
I also would've liked to know more from Brett about why people vote differently at State and Federal level. There’s got to be lessons in that for Labor marketing.
Well, I’ll come back to Brett another time as I do have some other comments but the baby has just woken. The essay certainly gave me a lot of food for thought.

rebel without applause

He's made such a tragic figure out of himself, hasn't he? Loner Latham. Pretty sad for someone who once seemed to have so much potential. I guess politics and pancreatitis make strange, and painful, bedfellows.

left field

Well, I think it's possible to put a positive spin on the ALP's leadership debate. Tim (whose comments still seem to be off) reckons the whole thing was phony as, but I think it was good phony. The Australian public knows exactly why Beazley is in again; we know he's the ALP leader of last resort, a puppet for unity. A big puppet with a big heart for the big brown land, sure. But a puppet.
And the defacto ballot we've just seen did one important thing--it showed the public that the ALP has a credible alternative stock of contenders. Yeah, credible, because the length of time they took before announcing their intentions not to run suggested they were in with a serious chance.
Just because in the end their colleagues indicated they think Julia Gillard and Kevin Rudd need more time to grow does not mean that they were wrong to flag their leadership aspirations at this time. And like Kate Lundy said on the 7:30 Report last night, there doesn't need to be a formal ballot, because there was obviously an informal one, and the message is clear: Beazley can't afford to sit on his would-be laurels, he has serious competition. Competition's a good thing, right? The party would seem like so much more of a big fat bore if not even one other Labor polly had put up their hand and said, "I'm interested, actually."
What was more interesting, and from a marketing POV more important, was how Rudd and Gillard handled it. Rudd was okay, though he did seem to stretch it out a bit too far, to the border of credibility. Gillard was better, though she has to watch that paranoia. I don't agree with Saint over at backpages that it was 'political suicide', but it definitely doesn't pay to appear paranoid. Just looks bad. Feel it, sure. She's probably justified, but unless you can prove it, zip it. Still, as Mark Bahnish said at backpages, at least she was honest. And I think she salvaged it well in the end, turning it into a call for "inclusion".
And what was also interesting was Beazley's response to Gillard's comment. He's already unsettled by her, isn't he? And he should be. Close your eyes for a minute. Gillard/Rudd 2007. You can see it, can't you? Gillard for modernity, Rudd for conservatism. Good mix. Rudd/Gillard is okay, but not as good because it's too conservative. Gillard/Tanner would be supermodernity, and I think that'd scare the Oz voters. As for the roosters...no chance, imho.
And yeah, Gillard should be Deputy, because Macklin seems to wear the CreanTM Cloak of Invisibility, but that would probably scare Beazley too much. Frankly I wish Gillard would do a no-nonsense, relatively painless, surgical excision of Beazley in about a year's time. But what she's just said about unity/stability/white-anting etc kinda rules it out, huh.
Anyway, the upshot for me is this: Gillard and Rudd have told us they're contenders and now they're going to have to show it. But the past few weeks have at least given them an incredible amount of profile.
And the party should take a leaf out of John Howard's book (just this once): turn a sow's ear into a silk purse. "Trust? We'll see about that." snarled the Rodent in 2004. So Labor: reframe the whole "disunity" thing into a positive. This is where Rudd was crazy to say the ALP was a 'god-awful shambles'. Mudd sticks. Labor would be better off dwelling on the positives. Start with Icarus Mark Latham--Chris is right, Latham needs to be sent off with dignity. It's embarrassing and feels cruel that he alone is being blamed for the loss and essentially ostracised for it. At his press conference, he was clearly a man in pain--physical, psychological, both.
And reframe the "disunity" thing. Unity for the sake of unity is pointless. Sticking with Beazley for the sake of unity is pointless. Disunity can also be seen as vital, healthy, exciting. They should all go read some Edward de Bono!
If Gillard and Rudd develop well over the coming year(s), then the ALP might be smart to swing behind them instead. If the public sees that it makes sense, they won't care so much if there's another leadership spill. They'll understand.
Gillard obviously has great potential, she's so firm, calm, sensible and rational (notwithstanding the moment of apparent paranoia). Her mission should also be to turn up the warmth factor. She can seem a bit too cool at times. That kitchen photo was the wrong direction.
And in reframing Labor, the party needs to constantly recap and summarise its achievements for voters with a short attention span. Turn the negatives into positives or at least explain/reframe them. And then market it as a party of modernity.
So say what you will about the 'turmoil' of the past few weeks, I reckon it was a good and necessary thing. You could even argue that in contrast, the Liberals seem really bland and boring, the way they all fall into line behind the Glorious Leader. Where someone like Costello has to make like he has no leadership ambitions that might interfere with the Glorious Leader's probable plans to become the longest-serving PM ever....
***
Anyway, we're off to the beach. God, it's good to be home.

leading man

Poor Mark. Well, with hindsight it's clear he just wasn't ready for the job, and wasn't the right choice for the job in the circumstances. I now regret having preferred him over Kim Beazley back when the leadership was up for grabs. We really should've let Beazley lose one more for us and then brought Latham in in time for the next election.
But with hindsight I also disagree with Adele Horin's recent claim that Latham's flaw was that he is a bully. I now think he was just out of his depth and nervous, which led to him acting strange and being withdrawn and projecting the wrong vibes, namely arrogance and coldness. That handshake wasn't aggro--it was overcompensation.
And it didn't help that Latham suffered a lot of negative publicity in relation to his personal life. I do think it was cruel and unacceptable for the media to indulge a bitter ex-wife in essentially portraying him as some kind of malignant narcissist. I think the biggest problem for Mark was this sense of coldness he emanated, of unhappiness even. Perhaps he was actually suffering chronic pain from his illness and was therefore just unable to project those qualities we had associated with him from his past behavior: vigour, energy, passion. Something was just missing.
So now Beazley's going to get another go. Fine--et's let Beazley lose another one for us. Can we please learn from the mistake we made with Latham and not ruin the Gillards and Rudds at this point? I have a lot of faith in Julia Gillard, but let's give her a chance to build a public support base. As for the criticism I keep reading that she'll never be leader because she's from the Left faction--that's just a crock. What does it mean? That Julia is never going to get a go just because she's from the Left? That no-one from the Left faction is ever going to get a go? It's a stupid argument. As for Kevin Rudd, I'm happy to have him as shadow foreign minister. He's intelligent, calm, compassionate and good-humored, as we frequently see on Channel Seven's Sunrise breakfast show. All qualities you want in a foreign minister. He might be a good leader one day, but I reckon Gillard would be better.
Anyway, poor Mark. It must have been such a humiliating and disappointing experience to have lost. And to have been ill--as he says, with a life-threatening illness--all along couldn't have been a lot of fun. Let's give him a break. He wasn't right for the job, sure, but he did an OK job. Let's not forget how even up til the end there was a sense he could win it. Let's not forget how he creamed John Howard in the debate (remember the worm?).
The biggest problem for having staked our chances on Latham was the geopolitical circumstances we live in. The War on Terror, the war in Iraq. At a time like that, the country understandably wanted security and economic certainty. That's not Latham's fault. With hindsight, Beazley would've been the better choice (though I still believe he would've lost it). Beazley had the relationship with the US. Beazley had the experience in Defence. So we ballsed it up. But let's go easy on Mark eh? You did OK, son.