Tag Archive for 'Howardia'

The reception and implementation of the National History Curriculum

Published
by
Mark
2 weeks, 3 days ago
in Culture, Education, History, Howardia and Politics
. 26 Comments

A while back, Kevin Rudd proclaimed the history wars over. He may have been right, at least insofar as the combatants left on the field are looking decidely ghostly; witness the non-event of the launch of Keith Windschuttle’s latest tome. Yesterday’s grapeshot over the history curriculum will, likely, not be followed up by another offensive – the Coalition, and the usual suspects, will move on to criticising the government’s health announcements.

Yet the influence of the Howard-era battles remains – and its most significant legacy might be the fact that history is embedded in the national curriculum at all. This is a major shift from its folding into SOSE (Studies of Society and Environment) at P-10 levels in many states.

In an interesting piece for Crikey today, Tony Taylor looks at the reception and implementation of the history curriculum: Continue reading ‘The reception and implementation of the National History Curriculum’

Turnbull on Prince William, Australian identity and the Republic

Published
by
Mark
1 month, 3 weeks ago
in Australiana, Nationalism and Politics
. 46 Comments

Intriguing to see that Malcolm Turnbull is about the only Australian political figure who’s put Prince William’s visit into some sort of political context. Writing in The Times, the erstwhile Liberal leader puts his finger on a conception of Australian identity which is truly Republican:

A key element in Australia’s success has been that we do not define our nationhood by reference to a common religion, ethnicity or race. Our culture has always been very open to new ideas.

That’s in stark contrast to both Tony Abbott’s mishmash of Howardian themes and dire mutterings about “values”, and the apparent propensity of the current crop of Australian Labor leaders to avoid the question altogether, preferring to make sure they’re in frame for a right Royal photo-op. Turnbull’s articulation of an inclusive Australian identity will no doubt make an interesting contrast to the anticipated mawkish patriotic themes our ‘Fair Shake of The Sauce Bottle’ PM provides for our edification sometime or other over the next few days.

Even the devil sometimes speaks true? Rudd, Labor and the 2010 election

Published
by
Mark
2 months, 3 weeks ago
in Climate change, Federal Elections, Government, Health, Howardia, Industrial Relations, Policy and Politics
. 50 Comments

We have it on good authority, that of St Thomas Aquinas, that demons and evil spirits can sometimes speak the truth. Now, I’m not saying that Janet Albrechtsen falls into either of those categories, but for once I was interested to read something she wrote:

It is disappointing if this is now the politics of Rudd’s prime ministership. Despite Rudd’s tendency to conflate issues as moral challenges, he appears to view every political decision through one prism: inflict no pain and it’s all gain for him. … Here, in a nutshell, is Rudd’s political nirvana. He can continue a prime ministership based on rhetorical flourishes and symbolism without inflicting any pain on voters.

Much of Albrechtsen’s analysis is inflected with the spleen one would expect (and the illusion that to introduce WorkChoices is to do good), but I suspect she has something of a point. I’ve been critical myself of Rudd’s ‘big tent’ strategy – the accumulation of political capital for its own sake. As I’ve also commented, the Labor Party, in the face of Abbott’s leadership, is likely to downplay climate change as an issue. In an election year, the theme will move to an accentuation of the argument that Abbott and his frontbench waxworks represent a return to Howardism; but a nastier, more brutish version. And don’t be misled, they’ve hardly even begun to fight on this front. In many respects, the smart political move is to let Abbott prepare his own noose, as his negatives are already very much defined in the public mind.

But any election theme that Abbott represents the past requires painting Rudd as representing a brighter future. I’m not so certain Labor can just run on its record – a la the first term Hawke government, which got a nasty surprise in the 1984 election. Continue reading ‘Even the devil sometimes speaks true? Rudd, Labor and the 2010 election’

“Ghosts go along with us to the end…”

Published
by
Mark
5 months ago
in Howardia and Polls
. 41 Comments

So, what happens if the Opposition, and their media echo chambers, tried every Howardian trick in the book, and nothing worked?

Possum explains the significance of the latest polling numbers:

With the phone poll average in the sidebar now showing 109 seats going to Labor were the latest round of phone polls repeated at an election, there must be some pretty nervous Coalition marginal and not so marginal seat holders.

Look back at the tactics of the Opposition over the last few months where every card from the Howard era was played. Rising Interest Rates…. tick. Labor’s debt…. tick. Boat People….. tick.

It’s like that episode of the Simpsons where Lisa tests the difference in learning capability between a hamster and Bart. Sure the cupcake is electrified, sure every time he tries to grab it he gets shocked – after a few tries even a hamster would learn – but Bart keeps grabbing away time and time again, hoping that this time he won’t be zapped. Hoping this time it will be different.

When you change governments you change the country – as Keating said, but the national zeitgeist also changes with it and pulling these old cards out from the Oppo benches is a roadmap to failure.

Meanwhile, Essential Research finds 66% of respondents rating the Rudd government’s performance in handling the Global Financial Crisis as good or excellent. But over at The Australian, they’re banging on about the Liberal leadership, and declaiming:

…debt and deficit are now a concern of most Australians…

Oh. Really?

Elsewhere: Bernard Keane.

Legacy wars

Published
by
Mark
6 months ago
in Books, Writers & Writing, Economics, History, Howardia, Industrial Relations, Media and Politics
. 30 Comments

It was the political debate of last week, and we missed it. But that’s ok – so did most of the rest of the population, I would imagine. The columns of The Australian were full of the ‘legacy wars’ – arising out of Kevin Rudd’s speech at the launch of Paul Kelly’s new book. Rudd argued that – contrary to Kelly’s thesis of a similarity between John Howard and Paul Keating as ‘patriots’ working to modernise Australia along a similar path – that the Howard government had left little in the way of a nation building legacy. This promptly prompted rantings about his hypocrisy (because he’d argued that the history wars were done with when launching Thomas Kenneally’s book), claims that conservative dissent was being repressed, and … well, Rudd appears to have learnt the trick of making the punditariat and the Liberal frontbench rant on cue. Useful politically, that one.

It also probably contributed to the demand – within the Liberal party – to ’stand for something’, which is apparently code for ‘defending the Howard legacy’. This theme inspired Turnbull to get ahead of the pack and raise the tattered banner of individual work contracts. Not so useful politically, that one.

Those interested in the merits of this debate, as opposed to the sound and fury, might find Mungo McCallum’s contribution interesting:

It’s all Kevin Rudd’s fault. Here we are, nearly two years out of the Howard years and happily consigning them to well-deserved oblivion.

And then Rudd has to mention the war; and of course John Howard and Peter Costello lurch out of the political cemetery to boast about the size and quality of their tombstones and pretend they are not really dead after all, and Malcolm Turnbull feels that he has to join in and defend the two people in the world he most wants to forget. Such is the level of discussion in contemporary Australia.

And the hero of the narrative is…

Published
by
Kim
1 year, 7 months ago
in Media and Politics
. 18 Comments

As a bit of a follow up to the post on PJK’s various bomb throwing exercises (that – as you may recall – was the business he said he was in many years ago), I wanted to note two things.

The first is the lamentable habit Rudd has retained of retail politics Howard style. So we get grabs on the tv news every night of what Rudd thinks about x y and z – many of which have zip to do with the job of being PM. Let’s not forget the excuse for bringing the Beazer down – mixing Rove McManus and Karl Rove up. Perhaps the twenty something whiz kids Inside Kevin08 have a better grasp of pop culture, but would you really trust KRudd to comment on the political pop culture story of the week – Paris Hilton? Maybe the dude got where he is today in part because he was on breakfast telly and FM radio all the time, but isn’t there some truth to what Keating says about not just the dignity of the office but also trivialising the Prime Ministerial voice? When the Orstrayan public becomes less enamoured of Kevvy than we are at the moment, could it be that we’ll be as uninterested in what he has to say about economic policy as what he thinks of the last cricket result or all those many many many artistic and intertube-ish threats to teh kiddies? (Which probably – incidentally – needlessly alienates part of his support base without really gaining him much…)

Secondly, there’s a very sensible piece by Bernard Keane in today’s Crikey on the narrative thing. It repays reading in full but there’s one bit I wanted to highlight.

Continue reading ‘And the hero of the narrative is…’