Richard Farmer’s chunky bits
Anyone will do. If you can be described as a “Labor figure”, anyone will do to help put leadership back on the news agenda. Yesterday morning a former WA state member and failed federal candidate Alannah MacTiernan filled the bill. By afternoon it was the turn of that party giant Kon Vatskalis from the Northern Territory to declare that Julia Gillard should depart. Later today I expect my brother’s neighbour’s mother’s friend, who once voted Labor but isn’t planning to this time, to get her 30 minutes of fame.
Such an interview would have given a bit of substance to last night’s 7.30 program on the ABC. Alas, we had to make do with the recycled MacTiernan as justification for the Mission Impossible storyline.
Still, it all made for a worthy winner of the Daily Leadership Beat-Up Award, as it was a report totally without substance. Just a pity that Newspoll came along showing an improvement for Labor and dampening the momentum. But not to worry. There are many more fortnights to go to keep the story bubbling along.
A leadership-free zone. Such a killjoy was Newspoll that this morning’s front pages were a virtual leadership-free zone. In the tabloids only the Adelaide Advertiser could find the enthusiasm even to have a pointer to a “Labor MPs in crisis talks” story tucked away inside. The Australian naturally enough made a welter of the poll results — well, it does pay for the survey — but not much excitement about its “Glimmer of hope” headline.
Obama loses election. Malik Obama, President Barack Obama’s older half-brother, suffered a crushing loss in his bid to become governor of Siaya at the recent Kenyan elections.
Not a clever tactic. Among the younger generation of my family there is considerable sympathy for the plight of Schapelle Corby, and I expect that Labor has detected something similar on a broader scale. Hence the seemingly strange decision of Foreign Minister Bob Carr to make the impossible-to-keep promise that if Corby is released from a Bali jail Australia will guarantee she conforms to whatever parole conditions are imposed. If nothing else, the promise is good politics. Not so clever is the decision of the federal opposition to question the wisdom of doing whatever is necessary to help the woman.
Greens forgetting about the trees. Preserving trees and allowing wild rivers to flow free were the foundations of the success of Green parties in Australia. It was not noble words about ecological sustainability, participatory democracy, peace and non-violence and social justice that lured voters from the established parties. Pretty pictures of the Franklin River and ugly ones of clear-felled forests are what did the trick. Today’s Greens forget that at their peril.
Perhaps forgetting that is what happened at the weekend to the WA Greens. Their policies were a tree-free zone. Instead we had thousands of words like this mumbo jumbo:
“The Greens (WA) are committed to creating an ecologically sustainable future, integrating social, economic and ecological imperatives into public policy through transparent democratic processes.
“This approach means harmonising human work and enterprise with natural systems and social justice. It affirms the intrinsic value of the nonhuman world and acknowledges the interdependence between people and their environments.”
News and views noted along the way.
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Categories: POLITICS, Richard Farmer’s chunky bits
The WA Greens “mumbo jumbo” quote was, literally, the only “chunky bit” apart from the Obama one that I didn’t have to read at least twice.
by Ben Green on Mar 12, 2013 at 2:25 pm
It’s nothing short of a mystery why, in the past year, our Foreign Minister makes extra effort to protect young female Australians in distress but is cavalier in regard to Julian Assange.
Assange has not been either charged, or found quilty of, any crime. Unlike Corby who is actually serving a prison sentence.
Frankly, having young Australians behind bars as a result of drug trafficking should be sending an effective message to others who might be tempted. Releasing them early does not send the right message.
by zut alors on Mar 12, 2013 at 4:35 pm
Zut, haven’t you ever played “Uncle Sam Says”?
by klewso on Mar 12, 2013 at 6:09 pm