Good press, bad press it is all good for Rudd as this simply highlights he is thinking of helping those who need help. I didn’t think Hartchers piece was all that bad apart from implying that there was not much difference between Howard and Rudd in relation to position they were working from.

Typical neocon argument – ‘if you don’t know everything then you don’t know anything’

Thank you for providing the link to Peter Hartcher’s opinion piece. I thought his key point was, in fact, complimentary to Rudd; that is, Rudd appears to have a pragmatic approach to the practice of politics and that happens to be similar to other recently departed politicians like Blair and Howard, who won a few elections in their time.The Prime Minister ‘is working in the …centre ground, where there are no longer any ideological absolutes but only questions of degree’. Tony Johnson and Geraldine Doogue may not ‘get it’ but there is no reason why the rest of us cannot.

I am not sure there is reason for your complaint about the newspaper article. Is it the headline and the comparison with the Hawke pledge in 1987 which you say is ‘totally misleading and inaccurate’? I thought you said on a previous thread that you welcome reasonable scrutiny of those in government. Do you say this article fails that standard of reasonableness, and if so, why?

As to Rudd’s idea, it is certainly worthy of proper consideration and that must include some more thought about mode of implementation, a timetable for it to happen and how it is to be funded (including detail of taxpayer funding). I would also like to hear the views of (politically uncommitted) parents/carers with infant children or those planning families in the near future.

It’s [a href="http://blogs.theaustralian.news.com.au/dennisshanahan/index.php/theaustralian/comments/threat_of_bloody_battle_is_liberal_leaders_best_chance/"]here[/a]

Peter Hartcher warns Rudd his Prime Ministership is in danger from trying to plase all the people all the time. Oh, and he’s not much different to Howard. This is all in the context of Rudd’s Sydney Institute speech the other day.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/peter-hartcher/australia-in-for-a-rudd-awakening/2008/04/17/1208025377389.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap2

I guess Hartcher’s pondering why we changed.

I’m wondering why Rudd bothered to attend.

Hartcher seems to have learned nothing since he wrote up Howard’s culture war speech at the quadrant dinner in 2006, thus:

Labor, long a bystander to Howard’s victorious parade down the avenue of cultural conquest, has sought to enter the fray.

“Avenue of cultural conquest,” fer cryin’ out loud?

Ah… for the good old days when leftists infected the wards of our hospitals and haunted the corridors of our schools. When, according to Hartcher, Tony Abbott ranked the cultures wars highly:

“I have always regarded that fighting the good fight in the culture war to be the most important contribution one can make in public life,” Abbott said yesterday.

when there was,

“…a proliferation of Government ministers fighting the culture wars. Abbott has always been a warrior, together with the commander, Howard himself, and his other lieutenants: Alexander Downer, Peter Costello and Nick Minchin.

…
Together, the reform agenda for schools and universities will make Bishop one of the country’s most important cultural warriors.

Another rising star of the Howard Government, Andrew Robb, the parliamentary secretary for immigration and former federal director of the Liberal Party, has also become a warrior with his discussion paper on citizenship.

The mild-mannered Mal Brough has brought the warrior’s chariot to the Aboriginal Affairs portfolio.

Even the maladroit Joe Hockey, in a bumbling sort of way, sought to join the war this week by attacking the lack of work ethic among the unemployed.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/howards-warriors-sweep-all-before-them/2006/10/13/1160246325222.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap2

Howard? Costello? Abbott? Downer? Minchin? Bishop? Robb? Brough? Hockey? That sounds like some “proliferation”… but can someone please remind me who these people were?

The Victorian branch seems particularly prone to preselecting Mayors who have had -up until then – no declared party affiliations.

I’m not sure what the infatuation is.

I am sure that drafting non party members is a bad strategy.

It rarely gains you any points electorally and their lack of knowledge about the party’s inner workings, campaigning and politics in general creates its own series of problems.

If the person does get elected, they’re so busy learning all these things that it’s hard for them to carry out their real job – you can’t afford that if you’re representing a marginal seat.

Plus, the ideological commitment to Labor ideals held by a candidate who joined the party five seconds before they were elected is necessarily suspect.

Much as I dislike the notion, they’d have been better parachuting someone in if they were so short of political talent down there (and they’re not – Gippsland has some very active members).

He may work out brilliantly, and I wish him all the best (and he’s certainly one up on a basketball coach) but there’s a good reason why the ALP has a rule – honoured though it maybe more in the breach than in the observance – that you need to have been a member for at least two years before seeking preselection.