Very interesting post this morning by Peter Brent at Mumble. Under the heading “Rhetorically Challenged”, he says:

During the Howard government’s first term 1996-8, it attracted the label “rhetorically challenged” several times, usually from disappointed supporters. (Coined by Michael Duffy?) You could say the same about this lot. … Lindsay Tanner alone seems able to get an economic/political message across without dumbing it down.

It’s a good point, but I’m not sure “rhetoric” is quite the right word here. To me, calling the Howard government “rhetorically challenged” calls up echoes of the stuff that Paul Keating was able to come up with – soaring and inspiring one minute, witty and incisive the next – but that Howard and his team couldn’t.

But I think Brent’s point is different, and probably more important: it’s about actually explaining things, trying to improve the level of understanding in your audience. Keating did that too, with varying degrees of success. But most of the time the Howard government didn’t make the effort. They seemed to make a conscious decision to keep things at a simplistic level; economic policy in particular became a matter of slogans, not explanation.

It looks to me as if the Rudd government has kept the same approach. That would fit with Rudd’s innate conservatism, his determination to be Howard-lite. But I could be wrong; maybe they’re trying to explain things, but just (with occasional exceptions) hopelessly incompetent at it.