Folks might recall the contest we held in conjunction with Overland for the best two word definition of Ruddism. The prize is a free sub to their estimable mag. We ended up asking Jeff Sparrow to judge the entries – since it’s he who kindly offered the prize – and he’s released a shortlist. Winner to be announced soon!
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I never understand why these things have to always be negative. Must be a carry over from the wedging sledging Howard era.
I dunno, I always appreciate a bit of verbal sudoku. Good on Overland for trying out the witty!
The responses tell you all you need to know about so many of my comrades on the Left. Same old bitchy, fashionable, herd-like automatic cynicism. Tories don’t bag their own side to anything like the degree we do. If the Libs ever return to power, it will be partly as a result of the work done by the Left to demoralise its own side.
You would think that someone who slayed the most dangerous ideological enemy the Left ever had in this country, John Howard – and saved the union movement from certain destruction in the process – would get the odd comment of praise from his own side. Or you’d think that a PM who, despite the disappointment on ETS targets, is doing twice as much on climate change as his predecessor did would get the odd tick. What’s been the most important symbolic act so far? Apologising to the stolen generations – I much prefer that to putting kids in detention centres.
Rudd’s response to the global economic crisis has probably been one of the most impressive and rapid of any government in the world. And unlike the likes of Bob Carr, he’s stopped apologising for being on the Left side of politics and come out proudly and says he’s a social democrat.
Ruddism is better than I thought it would be in 2007.
Oooh, I maked the shortlist!
What “Liberals Stole My Shoe!” said @3. Spot on!
what joe2 and LSMS said.
Agreed Joe2 in seconding “Liberals Stole My Shoe”. I said it was a bitchy thread, but after chiding decided to suspend my judgement until LP’s selection. Some of the short list are very clever, but often cutting. Why does the left do this to itself? You have a good government, a very popular PM and a talented hardworking front bench team hanging together and we stand on the sidelines and make bitchy clever comments about a really popular leader. You might as well be joining the “toxic bore” brigade led by the Mad Monk. People out there like Rudd, they can understand him and find him sincere, even if he is not a barrel of laughs in the house of reps. He is also a damn sight more intelligent than most of us, with a seemingly benign nature. I refer you to Elizabeth Murdoch who responded to a question about him as PM -”He’s a thoroughly nice man……and not many of them are!” Appreciate him. Give credit it’s due! Think of the alternative!
Correction – “Give credit where it’s due!” Sorry! Carried away. So pleased to read that most of the response so far is one of dismay about negativity. Thanks to Thomas Paine for taking the lead.
Does anyone have a take on the relationship between current climate politics and Rudd/Labor’s current electoral popularity? Yesterday’s Australian gave Labor a 16% lead over the Coalition, and Rudd personally a 44% lead over Turnbull. I think this is largely about economic management, and then perhaps secondarily about leadership discord within the Coalition. But Labor’s climate policy is remarkably unpopular; at least, I can’t think of anyone outside of the government who’s standing up and saying they think the CPRS has indeed found the right balance. So how is this affecting the popularity ratings – is it even a factor? A slight negative for Labor, overcome by the other positives? Or might there even be a slight positive gain to be found in the sheer stubbornness with which Wong and Rudd insist that they are sticking with the existing scheme design? On the grounds that it is politically advantageous to look like you have a plan and know what you’re doing.
Better than a slap around the face, I’ll give you that much.
I’m nice, do I get to be Prime Minister?
George Darroch at 10 – I understood Elisabeth Murdoch to mean that as well as being PM he’s also a decent human being, unlike other PMs she’d met, of whom there would have been plenty. I quoted her because I think people in general see him that way too, quite apart from all the extraordinary attributes he has which have got him where he is, notwithstanding his lack of “charisma.” And no, George, you don’t qualify to be PM. Your comment suggests you may not be nice anyway and the job requires a lot more than delivering facile one liners! Yours is probably the “automatic cynicism” LSMS at 3 refers to and which I too despair of after more than sixty years of looking to the Left for the governments needed to create a society I’d be happy to live in and ultimately leave for my children.