Re: Australian Politics Chatter Thread
Slidey said:
Post-war recovery and Cold War count as part of general war-time to me. I love Chifley, and he was an epic PM, but he still had completely different conditions to Howard, and was in power when the world was much, much different to today. It's silly to compare.
Howard isn't the best PM we've had. But Australians under Howard enjoyed a great quality of life; probably the best in the country's history. You don't need to like Howard to accept the later proposition.
Well, yes. However, as you say, it's silly to compare. Is Australia better now than it was 100 years ago, when tuberculosis was common, penicillin not yet discovered and anyone not an Anglo-Celtic male was a second rate citizen? Obviously. Therefore, the question to argue (and what Rudd was saying in his speech that you commented on that prompted the argument) is are Australians best fulfilling their potential now? And I would argue, in that sense, no. Australia is not better relative to the rest of the world as it has been in the past.
I accept this isn't how I articulated my previous argument, but it's how I took the statement (and Howard's "working Australians have never been better off" statement). As you say, it's silly to compare Australia with the technology of the world now vs Australia with the technology of the world then without taking the wider context into account.
It's silly to bring up Worker's rights since they only really became an issue at the very end of his tenure and were quickly torn to shreds by the Australian public (remaining, for the most part, theoretical and untested, thankfully).
Howard began doing so from his very first term, with individual contracts. Look at the situation on the wharves. Howard always ideologically opposed unionism, and over his twelve years set out to massively weaken them. It was only that in his final term, wherein he had the Senate to do whatever he pleased, that he really went too far too quickly for the Australian public. But no, Howard was the greatest enemy the working classes ever had.
I'm not commending Howard for it; I'm simply observing that Howard wasn't some demon who fucked up Australia, and certainly improvement in technology and health continued unabated under Howard.
But even then, Howard's support of the big business moguls has hindered his allowance of major advancements that had been progressed during the Keating years. For example, Australia was the leading nation in solar power research in 1996, but today has fallen well outside the top ten. There's that story of the fellow who couldn't get government funding in producing solar cells, so went to China, where he's now one of that country's richest men.
Don't get me started. I seriously question the validity of claims that Australia is racist, but that's been done to death in other threads around here. Anyway, I never mentioned foreign perception of Australia, I mentioned foreign relations of Australia; they're actually two fairly different things.
I don't necessarily believe Australia is racist, but there's no question there are racists in Australia. And Howard played to them and set out policy to exploit those feelings of xenophobia in the community to rally behind him. Each Prime Minister post Menzies furthered Australia's move to a more racially tolerant nation, but Howard stopped such progress and turned back the clock.
I recall reading an interview with Malcolm Fraser, who claimed the reason he appointed Howard as Treasurer following Phillip Lynch's resignation is that he felt Howard would be of least threat to his leadership - that Australians would never accept such a picket fence racist as Prime Minister, and therefore Fraser's position as leader would be, to a point, safe.
Oh is it just? Could you please provide a little evidence?
I'm willing to accept, once you provide some evidence, that the income gap is showing a widening trend. But under Howard the income gap was kept remarkably small for the majority of his tenure. I fully expect it to start to widen a bit, as well as other economic problems to occur now that Rudd is in power. Do I blame Rudd? No, it's natural economic variation; neither Rudd nor Howard can control the American economy for instance.
I don't have the source on hand, and am a bit too tired and tipsy to do a thorough search. But, in my understanding (and please by all means show me wrong), the income gap expanded to a rather large extent under Howard. I won't argue that it had been doing so under Hawke and Keating also, but, from what I know, it increased dramatically under Howard.
Absolutely false. The educational quality disparity w.r.t. income is no worse than the norm for OECD and I doubt any worse than it has been in the past in Australia. What's with making stuff up just so you can rag on Howard?
As above, I'm not really up to finding the source at this moment, but again, I recall reading it (something like our impoverished are in the bottom two OECD nations in the world? I think). On both of these points I'm happy to be shown to be wrong, if I have my facts muddled.
Also, just because this is the best place to put it (and is an opportunity to rag on Howard with something that's absolute fact), Howard's increasing the cost of university courses, and introduction of full-fee paying university places, was disgraceful.
Yeah, because instead of the government giving them wadloads of cash for luxury and hedonism, it gives them enough to live on and support themselves with while seeking employment or education. That's a good thing; it's a safety net that encourages independence, something which Howard introduced.
Howard introduced welfare payments?
I am not just referring to unemployment payments, but likewise to the senior's pension (which increased well below the rate of inflation, under Howard) and others of that ilk. Anecdotally, I have a friend whose mother is a rather ill diabetic, whose father is absent and has a younger 13 year old brother. She is her mother's carer, but the payments are so low that she is unable to live anywhere off the state's allowance bar a housing commission place. Because her mother doesn't want the son to grow up in such a neighborhood, my friend has taken on a cash in hand night-time job, so as to keep them in a half-decent household.
While no doubt such stories existed pre-Howard, I think he's done so little to appease the situation, and the prevalence of such have only grown. The sign of a nation's greatness is how it treats its least fortunate people. Howard could not give a shit about them.
Please do. Please explain how Howard screwed up Australia?
Howard's ideological dislike for anything not outside of his view of a perfect Australian society was treated with disdain. The working class, the poor, non-Europeans, homosexuals, non-Christians - he had little time for these people. Howard's agenda was to better those in strong social/economic positions in this country. To achieve this, he exploited the fears of the people of his country so as to disunite them and remain in power, governing for those at the top. Howard may not have screwed up Australia to the extent that, for example, Honorius fucked up Rome, if that's the argument you're trying to make. However, Australia is a lesser nation because of him.
In what way was he the worst PM? Is it because he was part of the Liberal party and your delicate left-wing sensibilities can't stand the idea of a right-wing PM doing some good?
Not at all. Fraser was a part of the Liberal Party, and he was okay (likewise Gorton and, to go back to Commonwealth Liberals, Deakin). It's that he was a reactionary, an economic rationalist and, in short, a right cunt.
