November 24, 2007

Aussie PM John Howard comprehensively destroyed in the Australian elections - sweetest of all, a further personal message sent to the Bush-supporting anti-gay Howard by voters is the likelihood of his losing his own seat, which he has held since 1974. A sitting Australian PM has not been unseated this way since 1929. The new PM is Kevin Rudd, who some would say is just a younger, left-leaning version of John Howard who enjoys recycling, and the first Kevin to be Prime Minister of ... anywhere, I think.

posted by Hank Mabuse 17 years ago
  • Ding dong! Glad to see the back of him, meself.
  • I want to believe that this would be indicative of a global swing to the left, but it doesn't seem to me that is true. France took a turn to the right recently, if I am not mistaken, for example. How much of a force are global situations to the choices the voters of an individual country make? Has the environment as an issue made more countries go left? Has the war? Or does it just send some in different directions? I expect answers.
  • Re France, you are not mistaken. It's very rare that there's a gloabal swing in any one direction.
  • It's not indicative of a global swing to the left, but of a swing to the left in Australia.
  • "gloabal" being my perticuler argot for "worldwide" or maybe "global"
  • I just hope it doesn't swing into the sun! Congrats, Aussies! A happy day indeed.
  • Results for Bennelong - Howard's Seat. Bennelong at Wikipedia.
  • So unless he finds some pretty wild swing in the postal votes, he's lost his home seat.
  • Rudd's wiki article makes him sound pretty sensible- as in taking the temperature of the political situation before acting. Seems to me that could be good (as in bringing factions together) or not so good (as in not being a strong leader. Is there any indication which way he'll go?
  • Difficult to say. He shows encouragingly good character traits.
  • There used to be a decent but expensive restaurant in Paris called Bennelong, but last time I passed by it had turned into a gay bar. The menu was normally a funny kind of Aussie Nouvelle Cuisine*, but they had a veggie night on Sundays which I appreciated. *Like small piece of kanga steak with glazed mange-tout, butternut squash boules, and an arrangement of patates dauphinoise
  • Good riddance to John Howard - Glenn Greenwald. Captures a bit of just how loathesome Howard is.
  • Good news, Oz.
  • Rudd, so far, seems to have followed the sound political rule of, when your opponent is down and doing their best to keep shooting their own foot, stand well back and let them have at it. The Howard government overstayed its welcome with the electorate by, I would say, two elections. But the opposition under its previous leaders just looked too clownish to elect. A sitting PM doesn't lose (probably) his own seat unless they are really REALLY on the nose. And you don't get to that state over one election cycle. For a new leader it's astonishing how little we know about Rudd. (Not salty just Brackish one might say = obscure Aus Vic pun)
  • good to see the back of him.
  • Onya Kev! It's certainly going to be interesting to see how things go. There is more to politics than just the economy.
  • "Prime Minister Kevin" is growing on me. I look forward to seeing him fulfill his campaign promises in the coming months -- he should be ratifying the Kyoto Protocol in Bali, what, next month? Next step will be withdrawing Australian troops from Iraq. I think the surge of kiwis moving to Oz will grow over the next few months. We've talked briefly and hypothetically about moving to Adelaide, and this would certainly make it an easier decision -- Howard is a little gnome and I'm glad to see the back of him. I hope it's precursory (if that's a word) to Bush's equally embarrassing exit.
  • Costello going shows up the true motivations for so many Members of Parliament. I'd be *very* surprised if he serves out the full term and i'd love to see his voting record over the next 18 months, a large percentage of missed divisions would not be a shock. I'm glad they are gone, Australia has a host of problems that need to be addressed, foremost being addressing climate change and preparing the infrastructure to deal with it, as well as encouraging Australian companies, universities and other bodies doing the research and product design to take us into the 21st century as a leading nation in science and technology, not sending all our smart ideas and people off overseas never to be heard of again. The large number of climate change deniers in the Howard government was concomitantly laughable and nightmarish. Rudd will undoubtedly be fairly conservative but things can move forward where they need to much easily with him in the PM position instead of Howard or one of the other muppets in the Liberal Party.
  • What the rest of the world wants to know is if this new boy will dismantle the concentration Holiday Camps.
  • Tracicle! Adelaide? Really? Cos guess where I moved 18 months ago!
  • dj - I'd have to say that a large fraction of the Australians with the smarts to do, well, anything to do with R&D have probably already moved overseas or out of the R&D sector. The Howard govt did a TON of damage over the last 11 years and that's not easily remedied overnight. Or even over a couple of election cycles.
  • Tracicle! Adelaide? Really? Cos guess where I moved away screaming from 15 years ago!
  • Precursor. Yeah.
  • Polychrome and gomi, I loled. Yes, I figure that if we were going to move to Australia ever, at all, I'd like to try Adelaide. Not remotely interested in following the other kiwis to Sydney, Brisbane is too hot, Melbourne sounds cold and wet and too much like here anyway. I'm still thinking of moving to Italy and stalking my two favourite EuroMonkeys, though.
  • Paul Keating tells it like it is. In the Sydney Sun Herald last Sunday, John Howard nominated the putting asunder of political correctness and the celebration of our Anglo-Celtic past as the pinnacle of his social, indeed national, achievement. ... In a country of immigrants, such a view emanating from the prime minister is social poison. Damn straight.
  • Congratulations OzMonkeys and good on ya, Aussie voters!
  • Your two fav Euromonkeys just relocated to London though. If I move back to Australia it will probably be Melbourne - or somewhere obscure along the coast.
  • "Rudd, so far, seems to have followed the sound political rule of, when your opponent is down and doing their best to keep shooting their own foot, stand well back and let them have at it." Ah, so that's what the US Democrats have been doing! I feel much better.
  • In other news, Canadians are all thick and drunk.
  • Peter Garrett is now Australian Environment Minister. I can think of few I would trust more with this portfolio. At least in the ALP.