Is it just me or does KRudd like those metaphors about summits?
/Kevinista rhetorical question
Meanwhile, back here down in the foothills, the press got a list of the summit participants this morning from Glyn Davis, but those of us who are outside the magic media circles can’t find the full list on the official website yet. My grumble isn’t just about media management (though the selective reporting from the meejah highlighting Hugh Jackman and Claudia Karvan as participants is going to work against the message Davis and Rudd want out there), but also about the supposed participatory and inclusive nature of the thing. Are those of us not summiteering left hanging while the great and good wait for their moment in the sun in tomorrow’s papers?
Beyond this particular bitch, there was a broader opportunity to use the techniques of e-democracy to widen and broaden the scope of this thing. It’s been missed. That’s disappointing.
Update: The full participant list is now online at New Matilda.
“though the selective reporting from the meejah highlighting Hugh Jackman and Claudia Karvan as participants is going to work against the message Davis and Rudd want out there)”
To say nothing of the participation of Greg Sheridan, Gerard Henderson and Miranda Devine…..
On the upside, they may have broken the record for the number of Professors you can get into one venue at the same time and a couple of attendees may well fit the PM’s “not the usual suspects” criteria.
Actually some of the names I recognise are Professors hiding behind the titles “Mr” or “Ms”…
Here’s the list:
[link]
Who wants to play count the bloggers?
Joshua Gans
Andrew Leigh
Andrew Norton
Alison Croggon
Marieke Hardy
any more?
Nick Gruen.
What doea it matter how amny blogers ther are?
Claudia Karvan and Hugh Jackman are both in the arts tribe and both apropriate for that. Of course the media highlights well-known names.
It doesn’t particularly matter how many bloggers. Except that what I’m trying to allude to in the post is that use of media like blogs could have broadened out the possibility of participation - as in the posts from Joshua Gans and Elliott Bledsoe (for the Youth Summit).
[link]
There were any number of ways the nets could have been used to make this thing really inclusive. Hasn’t happened.
As to Jackman and Karvan, I agree, but they’ll get the “glitterati” story which they won’t want. That was my point.
Professor John Quiggin
Kim and All:
The Nuisance Period for “The Professor Show” is almost over, thank goodness, so everybody will soon be able to get down to considering what policies will deliver us a better future instead of fretting about who scored an invitation.
e-Democracy? Well, like it or not, I’ve had my own Counter Summit blog just sitting there for many days now. At least there are some of us who aren’t apathetic about the possibilities of e-Democracy.
What about everybody on the OTHER side of the Digital Divide? Are they merely sub-humans who don’t deserve to hold opinions or to come up with brilliant ideas? They might have been catered for in the Local Summits …. but there are relatively few electorates where Local Summits are taking place …. and that is bloody slack!!.
Hugh Jackman is Working (Actor) Family personified. He won a Tony for being “The Boy from Oz” and he sung Advance Australia Fair at the 1999 NRL Grand Final. He shared an SCG VIP box with Kevin Rudd at the Oz/India Test in January, he’s never been arrested for throwing a mobile at a hotel receptionist and he has never been married to Tom Cruise. An obvious Arts shoo-in
Yes I look forward to Karvan’s address “I luve ‘Straya? ‘Cause anywhere else in the world you haveta have talent? To be an actor? If I was English I’d be a waitress? Give us more funding for films no-one wants to see? And pay a lot more novelists to write books no-one wants to read? Aussie Aussie Aussie Oy Oy Oy!!!
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‘Straya where we import everything there is in American culture except, y’know, the good stuff.
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Welcome to the Jabberfest of the Chosen Kilo: It’s part of Kevvie’s fresh ideas. He was watching Oprah and reckons gee that’s a good way ta get a bit a kulcha up ya’s.
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Not that we don’t have talented people here. We do. How’s that song go:
“Hugh Jackman is Working (Actor) Family personified.”
He’s also… y’know…
Hawt.
The whole thing is hilarious. It’s like when senior management goes away to Coffs Harbour or Healesville or somewhere for a ‘retreat’, in the expectation they’ll come up with brilliant insights into the future direction of the business. Except that senior management sometimes has a remote chance of making something actually happen as a result, which is more than this cast of thousands will.
And what’s the point of inviting bloggers and academics and columnists? Like Miranda or Gerard or Robert Manne or Phillip Adams or any one of a few hundred others is going to say something they haven’t said already. At tedious length in some cases but often with considerably greater evidentiary support and careful reasoning than will be the case when they’re fighting for the microphone in this Cecil B DeMille production.
Hilarious.
My biggest complaint is the inclusion of some of the media “Usual suspects”.
Phillip Adams, Henderson???? FFS what “new” ideas will they bring they havent had the chance to print in the last 20 years?
And although probably not intended the overwhelming majority of attendees are Vic/ACT based.
And the Male/Female bit on the list is just cringeworthy.
Geez, if you can’t figure out why they’re inviting
filthintellectuals like Henderson and Divine, you’re not quite as smart as Kevin.Hint: It’s not about the outcome, or at least not only about the outcome.
Miranda Devine is IN; Janet Albrechtson is OUT.
What sort of Jesuitical reasoning leads to this outcome?
adrian
I realise its to give an impression of “balance” by having a few profile names up there, but its still a pretty weak brew to place as “new voices”.
No, I think it’s a bit more subtle than that. A bit, but not much.
Spiros: Divide and conquer?:-)
Another hint: There is no outcome. This whole thing is one big brain fart.
Speaking of the usual suspects, the man who will never ever go away, Barry Jones, is on the list dkgd0w0gpcg-v=sgyuo8t75srtiuryyoiguy Sorry, I fell asleep and my head hit the keyboard, just thinking about him.
It’s a predictable piece of new era symbolism. A new day dawns, great minds engage, a 21st vision emerges, fresh national breezes blow, wrap up is 5pm Sunday. Business as usual on Monday morning.
Rudd was ill-advised to overbill this as some sort of epochal, “not the usual suspects,” ground-breaking event that would set the national policy agenda.
It could work as a Great and Good, Big Ideas Day Out/launch the new government kind of thing - providing no-one takes it too seriously. And it should have been by invitation. The open slather nomination thing will have created 7,000 sets of resentful dashed hopes, left wondering why Rhys Muldoon (Rhys Muldoon?!) got up when they didn’t.
I reckon this thing could do for Kevin what Costello’s report on the future (whatever he actually called it) did for Cossie. He quoted it forevermore whenever he did something a bit different even if the report actually said the opposite.
They’re gonna make a camel. 458 ‘femmes’ (or thereabouts), but don’t quote me on that.
Reading some of those lists, it’s hard to stay awake
But there’s an assumption that these people aren’t at least talking to their peers, and I’m sure that many are. I know that’s not exactly democaracy, but, hey was the purpose of this ever going to be about democracy?
“Yes I look forward to Karvan’s address “I luve ‘Straya? ‘Cause anywhere else in the world you haveta have talent? To be an actor? If I was English I’d be a waitress? Give us more funding for films no-one wants to see?”
Actually, the series she co-produces ‘Love My Way’ rates extremely highly and sells well into overseas territories. In commercial terms, it’s very successful. But don’t let a few facts get in the way of your argument, Adrien.
Ken Lovell [12]:
Brilliant! Bloody brilliant!
Geoff Honnor [20]:
IMHO, Rudd was not ill-advised to have have such a Summit …. but he was very foolish indeed in allowing the Dead-Hands-Of-The-Past to arrange it, to run it and to make sure challenging or innovative ideas don’t disturb the equilibrium of comfort. Making sure that only those with money could attend was a folly that is already coming back to bite the Rudd government.
Kim and All:
A teacher with political experience, Joan Kirner, is there. Good. But where is the pioneer political blogger and expert on unpopular and neglected social issues policies, Andrew Bartlett? Not so good.
So Australia is becoming a leading creator of empty, futile gestures. Aaah, Kruddtopia, what a place - and this empty gabfest symbolises it. Has there ever been such a collection of the like minded in living memory?
Bet it generates loads of ‘new thinking’. Hmm. My irony meter just melted …..
I knew I was going to find the Krudd years entertaining. I just did not think it would be this entertaining this quickly. From most of the posts above, I am not alone in thinking this event a complete waste of time, another empty gesture from someone who just may be the emptiest little man to infest the PM’s office.
MarkL
Canberra
“Speaking of the usual suspects, the man who will never ever go away, Barry Jones”
Yes, and shoehorned into a rather questionable category, like Phillip Adams who scores under ‘Future of Australian governance’. The Right in 2020 may have its own albatross necklaces, dating back to the Howardian Age, but for fek’s sake why don’t PA and BJ have the grace to recognise that they should have said ‘No, thank you’. Aaaaghh!
Having got that off me chest, I still see lots of potential for interesting results.
MarkL, get out of Canberra; irony meters don’t work there. Inter alia.
Anita [26]:
Fair crack of the whip, regardless of his political affiliation, Barry Jones has always looked forwards and outwards - that’s more than can be said for most politicians. He does deserve a guernsey for this Professor Show.
MarkL [25]:
As the old Chinese saying goes: Long Tou She Wei [ = the head of a dragon but the tail of a snake ]. The concept of such a Summit had great potential - pity about the implementation. Sad, really sad but that is how things are done in Australia these days …. and why greatness will keep eluding us.
Gotta agree with Ken at #12 - it’ll be a battle for the mikes, lots of ideological carts being pushed from all directions, nothing new under the sun. Kev will pick and choose as he pleases.
OTOH there is a diversity of voices on hand, so it’s an opportunity for the media to highlight (should they choose to do so) some ideas which don’t get much air-time. For example, Prof Q recently wrote a post about disbanding the Navy… Seriously! The talkfest could become a bit like these LP blog threads, where a very minor issue takes on a life of it’s own…?
Or it could be like a football game where some youngster gets his big chance and becomes an overnight sensation. We could certainly do with a whole generation of new “voices of the real Australian public”.
BTW: Hugh Jackman is a close personal friend of the Murdochs. Wendi Deng likes to hang out with Hugh and Nicole Kidman. Just saying…
I note ,one or two plagiarises in the mob,or how you spell the word.ABC and Andrew Denton are there,thieves to their back teeth,and,I am not talking Jewish Conspiracy,just thieving bastards.And I am so board with these type people,that they are by their behaviour shaming all of us.No-one that I know amongst the names is there,one I admire a bit,Rosemary Stanton,often working with the C.S.I.R.O. on dietary matters,knows more than she churns out.And Ken Lovell is wrong,when certain people visit Coffs Harbour way,they sometimes do find ideas,from Camp Creative ,Bellingen etc.There is even a book title that was lifted off a letter I sent to The Dorrigo Gazette…called the Potato Factory,and in that letter I was actually suggesting something akin to producing spuds and by products,if memory cells are in operation.No-one from a Potato growing background on it I would say..in the UNO Year of The Potato.I ll even hazard another guess some of my output even on Australian Blogs and not by the mentioned,will have a change of clothes a hairdo and dark sunglasses,but I will still recognise it as mine.Stay alert for others not on list for feeling the same weary process going on with them.Any chances someone here can convert their names to numbers and see if we cannot win Tattslotto..you’re are mad if you dont!
I think its a good idea, but it seems conceptually flawed. 100 people working on one topic are supposed to come up with a consensus on a 12 year direction for Australia in two days?
Assuming that they work for 12 hours a day that equates to about 14 minutes of speech per person. It just won’t work. They should have broken it up into seperate conferences for each topic and allowed them to re-convene several times before reaching their ultimate conclusions. That would have given people time to digest proprosals and just as importantly given ideas time to be presented before the Australian public before they were finally adopted. The purpose of the conference is supposed to be to acheive a consensus about Australia’s future direction but the way its designed it can only possibly acheive a consensus of Australia’s elite, not the entire country and its doubtful it can even do that. There might be alot of good ideas presented which will be interesting, but not an actual useful consensus that I think Rudd is after.
But I could be completely wrong.
On another note there will be local summits held in various places throughout the country in the lead up where us mere plebs can participate.
See here for details
I wish there was a parallel process to the summit for the elites where ordinary people could have their say. There is an excellent model for doing this. The ANU already runs regular Deliberative Democracy conferences which are similar in concept to the 2020 Summit. The difference is that the invitees are chosen randomly just like in phone polls.
Swio makes a good point. OTOH this model of 100 people working towards consensus (without ever achieving it) is nothing new to anyone in government.
In these days of information overload and compromised media, I have often wondered how any head of state is able to stay abreast of new developments and make rational, informed decisions on a whole swathe of topics while simultaneously attending ceremonies, doing interviews, having a life, etc.
The fact is that they don’t - they rely on others to digest all this information and then advise them. The White House is the perfect example: Bush fronts the cameras between vacations while Cheney’s goons burrow through the information and come up with the “decision options”.
Kev won’t need “consensus” from any of these forums. He’ll do what he likes and his information gatherers will hand him quotes from anything at 2020 which supports his agenda. If he wants, 2020 will give him an opportunity to move away from some of those “me too” Howardist positions, on the basis that “the Australian public have spoken” and they want something different.
Phillip Travers [30]:
Thanks for mentioning plagerism.
That was one of the reasons I slammed the brakes on my own blog for the time being; [brakes off and accelerator flat to the floor at a time of my choosing].
Sharing ideas and information is great; just look at Wikipedia and Linux for example.
Rewarding recidivist plagerizers is not so great though.
“Is it just me or does KRudd like those metaphors about summits?…”
Kimmy, it’s probably just you.
#28 Graham, agree.
Honestly implemented as a genuine effort, this would have a balanced mix of political views, be based on demonstrable (and verifiable) papers, and be structured as an oversight committee of perhaps half a dozen, with a bunch of working groups. They’d have a year to complete the first tranche of work.
Their aim would be to inform policy decisions.
There is none of this whatsoever.
Instead, we have a media circus stacked with all the usual suspects, who have said all they have to say for donkey’s years. It’s an exercise in ‘hail-to-the-chief’ groupthink.
For this, funding to pensioners, the ADF and carers is being slashed? Is Krudd the new Whitlam? Because this looks like a circus designed solely to get Krudd on the front page for a week solid. This is great cover for the razor gang, as CSIRO just found out.
MarkL
Canberra
What a hilarious roll-call of the nation’s left-wing knob-jockeys.
At least they’ll all be in one place now. Mwahahahaha.
Funding to pensioners and carers is being slashed MarkL? Jeez, do you have any, like, evidence for that or does it just make you happy to believe it?
Craig Mc if you classify Miranda Devine, Gerard Henderson, Nick Greiner, Andrew Norton, Kerry Stokes, Fred Hilmer etc etc as ‘left-wing knob-jockeys’, you live in a dark and dangerous right wing cave that I hope I never visit. Did you bother to actually read the list before commenting?
Yes, it’s not a good list.
Where are the brain-dead, the self-deluded and the pop-gun snipers?
Ken: yep. Token right-wingers only. And frankly everyone on that list has ideas as fresh as last week’s piss.
I remember a lot last year about having to climb a mountain to win the election.
While I broadly support the idea of a deliberative process that doesnt reflect the stunted John Who-ite notion of leadership as “taking immediate uninformed action based on pre-exisiting views, just to appear tuff n shit”, I do wonder what such intellectual luminaries as actress Claudia Karvan will have to offer.
I spose she might have views on the yarts.
I love Claudia. Quite the fan boy.
But, never fear, Lefty E, health is in good hands.
[link]
Mind you, not picking on her in particular. There also footy player James Hird (isn’t he AFL or summit); and obviously, the nation cant wait for James Packer’s exciting proposals for online gambling.
Crossed!
One dud (if she is, I don’t know her) participant will not sink the show, LE.
Packer’s got ideas for “Future Directions for the Australian Economy” apparently.
Let’s be fair, Lefty E. It might not just be online gambling. It might also be private equity deals with the Murdoch brood.
All in the national interest, Mark.
Claudia’s a major spunk and a great actress, I agree. And as I said, I’m broadly in favour. Its just interesting to see the talent pool spiced up by otherwise irrelevant celebs!
Ms Anna Rose
I’ve got a sneaking suspicion Rudd read The ‘Wisdom of Crowds’ on one of his flights to China last year and decided he’d organise some crowds of his own.
Fine I’d like to add: total inability to comprehend anything except in the most literal minded fashion to my criticisms of Australian Kucha Industries. I don’t mean to pick on Ms Karvan in particular. She’s not particularly bad. She’s just not particularly good. But y’see it’s called a ‘provocational operation’. And what does it provoke?
No. Cate Blanchett is a great actor. Al Pacino is a great actor. Claudia Karvan is ordinary.
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Ordinary.
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And so is 99% of the bullshit that passes for cultural production in this country Fine.
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But I’m sure the Jabberfest of the Chosen Kilo’ll fix that right up. Not.
And how come you’re such a goddam friggin’ expert, Adrien?
Oh sorry, thta’s rght, you’re not.
The usual high standard of wit and intellect we’ve all come to expect from you Adrian. The standard response to the criticism of the Oz Kulcha Industries is to defend it as if one were defending a handicapped friend from a clot of bigoted bullies. That’s telling.
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We see no reason to defend underperforming atheletes in that fashion. Why? Because we aren’t pathologically insecure about our capacities to excel in sports. In culture? Another matter entirely. As individuals we aren’t mediocre. But collectively we are. The standard response to this is either denialism usually accompanied by that most laughable of retorts - you’re not qualified to say that. You have to be an ‘expert’ to make a judgment about taste do you old bean?
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The other one is to host a Jabberfest in which the inevitable “let’s restructure the funding” bollocks gets paraded…
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How ’bout this. NO. NOT GOOD ENOUGH.
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I’ll say this for myself. I can compose a verse to fit a tune and when pointing out to someone that their verse doesn’t fit the tune I make sure that’s actually the case before blasting away. I have at the very least a modicum of skill you’veso far failed to demonstrate so perhaps you might practise the secular theology you encourage me to adhere to and stand at the sidelines in acknowledgement of your own deficiencies.
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Or compose an intelligent retort even.
“It might also be private equity deals with the Murdoch brood.”
Well, Lachlan is going to be there as well, so there’s ample opportunity.
A bit of networking with some of the captains of industry who will be in attendance, perhaps?
I wonder what Prof. Fred Hilmer will be contributing - great ideas on how to sack journos and cut costs, scuttle the chance to establish an internet biz, write a tedious autobiography?
Speaking of networking, anyone planning to go to the Saturday night drinkies and hide behind a pot plant with a camera for the binge drinking expose? Oh hang on, that’s only teh yoof, not the best and the brightest.
God you’re a bore sometimes, Adrien. I aint defending anything, just questioning your seemingly monumental ego.
I’m still waiting on that intelligent retort Adrian. Having an opinion and expressing it well does not make me an egotist.
Get a room, please!
Adrien, I’ve noted on a another thread that you’re passionate about facts. I thought I’d offer you a couple of fact. But it seems when you don’t like the facts, it’s just being literal-minded. On the other hand, you seem to think if you put a word in bold, or capitals, that makes it a fact. Sigh!
Everyone:
Let’s be fair. Some of the usual culprits might actually come up with worthwhile ideas [original, second-hand or plagarized] that could give us a better future.
Fine - I’m not in my studio at the minute or I’d fetch out one of my favourite Emerson quotes about the banality of consistency.
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But you’re right it was not only unfair to pick on Ms Karvan it was also a bad example. I withdraw my specific comment about her, tho’ I haven’t been much impressed by anything she’s been in since High Tide in which she was outstanding. Fair enough?
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And I’m also sorry for picking on you re literal mindedness but as a general assessment of the Oz Kulcha Industries I stand firm.
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Please also note I use different kinds of rhetoric. There’s my non-fiction (fact-loving) rhetoric and there’s me being glib and snarky. The bit you quoted (starting this off) was in the latter category. Reality is not so specifically pertinent here. (Another problem with Oz Kulcha).
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Now if you’d care to tell me that Australian Cultural industry types are not literal minded, banality ridden worshippers of the excessively ordinary I’m all ears.
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Or perhaps we should restructure the funding. There’re too many writer-directors don’t you know. Who do these people think they are? Artists?
Use tags then Adrien, if you find your audience is failing you.
“Now if you’d care to tell me that Australian Cultural industry types are not literal minded, banality ridden worshippers of the excessively ordinary I’m all ears.”
Adrien, what do you want me to say? Everyone’s literal-minded blah, blah, blah… No-one’s literal-minded blah, blah, blah… Of course, all the thousands of people who work in the ‘Kulcha Industries’ are all the same. They’re universally brilliant. They’re universally terrible. It’s a set of ridiculous propositions and you know it.
And whatever I say you’ll have the wonderful fall-back position of , “But of course you work in the ‘Kulcha Industries’. Therefore you’re in no position to comment on them”. What’s the point of the conversation. Adrien?
Besides, it’s all a bit off topic for this thread.
I think I’ll finish my glass of wine and watch some bad television. What’s on tonight anyway?
Whenever I hear the whinge “cultural industry” I reach for my pistol.
Nasty….
I reserve the pistol for “unappreciated”
Everyone;
Check out what’s happening at Ozideas [link]
and don’t forget to sign the petition.
Why do you expect e-democracy from a system that is clearly and explicitly designed to keep people away from decision making?
The only answer is an overthrow of this capitalist structure and the institution of a true workers democracy. This democracy would extend mass control of political decisions into the economic sphere where most of the important decisions (eg. what to produce and how) are currently made by rich people with profits on their mind.
Fine - I don’t intend to say ‘you work in the Culture Industries and therefore you’re in no position to comment on them’. That would be silly. Also I have not made any generalisations about individuals just commented on the aggregate and I’ve made this very clear.
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The thing is you simply aren’t allowed to criticize it from within so we have a spectacle where the discourse in magazines like Inside Film is little distinguishable from a gov/film apparatus press release. In fact I had a look at IF a month or so back and the editor and some gov/film suit whose name and rank escapes me were still crapping on about the Dalton Report’s ‘brilliant’ answer to why our scripts suck: too many writer-directors. Fascinating. This is eight fucking years after this ‘well-researched’ piece of tripe was presented at an AFC conference and there still going on about this irrellevency which they cherry-picked a handful of facts to make pertinent.
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But the standard response is either to ignore criticism, hail it down with a chorus barrage or relegate it to some political arena where those uttering criticisms are somehow philistines. And it’s not off-topic. The Jabberfest of the Chosen Kilo’s s’possedly discussing the Farts but whatever. The result will be this. The present situation will continue with the same mediocre results and the outstanding talents will simply fly to LA as soon as they graduate.
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Juan - It’as been tried dude and the result was not democracy. It was a tyranny in which you had to work much harder for much less. But good luck selling the paper.
Anita @ [29]
Hear, hear!!
Well said. When BJ was Minister for Science, an awfully big supernova went off bang!! in a nearby galaxy - one of our little companion galaxies - in 1987 I think it was. I had the pleasure of hearing Minister Jones in Parl’t explaining to the empty benches, that according to Einstein’s theory, the supernova “hadn’t yet exploded”.
PIFFLE!! Where the fek did he think the bloody light the astronomers were observing had fekking come from??? and travelled for many years across space to get here. Fekallbloodymighty and he poses as a Great Intellect on “The Einstein Factor”! He should be struck off, the man’s a dill.
Signed: Bert Einstein, Natimuk
And as for bloodyphillipbloodyadams with his smug superiority and his hysterical newspaper columns (example from a coupla years back: “Howard is going to lock up all the dissidents such as PA and throw the keys away”) Well, why didn’t you just lock up PA, Mr Howard?? An opportunity missed.