Seldom has an Australian politician received the kind of accolades accorded to Queensland Premier Anna Bligh after the disastrous floods that engulfed her state.
Columns / Mungo MacCallum
Commentary from long-time political journalist Mungo Maccallum.
For Gillard and Abbott, it’s storm clouds at 20 paces
For the first couple of weeks of 2011 the big story has been the weather — it well and truly pushed politics off the front pages.
Mungo: Chris Mitchell and The Oz … it just ain’t cricket
The Australian again has become a haven for sceptics, deniers and downright nutters.
Mungo: WikiLeaks principle critical, but contents … oh well
Julian Assange may not merit a Nobel prize, but he sure as hell doesn’t deserve to be persecuted either. If we are serious about defending democracy, he is not our enemy but our new best friend.
Nuclear debate will end, not with a bang but a phut
It must be the silly season. The old arguments are all back on the agenda, and none of them is more thoroughly worn than the one about Australia going nuclear.
Gillard’s welcome show of strength on Telstra
It was a fitting climax to Labor’s tumultuous parliamentary year. Julia Gillard finally brought off a big win with the passage of the Telstra legislation, but hostile commentators were still able to spin it as a defeat.
Government can’t have a bob each way on boat people
The Liberal Party’s cadaver in waiting, Phillip Ruddock, described last week’s High Court decision on the rights of asylum seekers as “diabolical.” The misuse of the word was so grotesque as to suggest that the former Immigration Minister and Attorney-General’s use of it might have itself been satanic inspiration.
For Gillard, banks a perfect opportunity to get on with it
Julia Gillard is there to govern and must be seen to be doing so. To be — how should one put it? — moving forward. Banks may be providing her a perfect opportunity to do so.
Markets continue recent good form
The S&P 500 was up for the fifth straight day and up 3.6% in the week for its fifth straight weekly gain.
Mungo: cue applause for Greens on Afghanistan … but what have we learned?
The debate on Afghanistan was long overdue and the Greens are to be congratulated for forcing it upon a reluctant Government. But it must be said that we have learned very little from it to date.
Two virility symbols and a saint … lucky country indeed
Judging from the shambling swagger he affects these days (part-Western gunslinger, part-silverback gorilla) Tony Abbott is brimming with confidence.
Gillard’s safe but her ability to legislate isn’t
Julia Gillard can afford to be reasonably satisfied with the first week of the rest of her government. But the crossbenchers are ready and eager to exploit their temporary power bases, particularly on climate change and the war in Afghanistan.
Mungo: pig drama, an anagram of paradigm, seems appropriate
Tony Abbot has now made it clear that his lust for power is absolute; he will stop at nothing.
Mungo: all bets are off for PM, Abbott still locked in the past
Everything is up for grabs once more, and as far as Julia Gillard is concerned, she is starting pretty much with a blank sheet.
Mungo: hey innumerates, look at the scoreboard
When the two-party preferred vote is finalised, Labor will be comfortably ahead on that too. By Abbott’s own reckoning, this gives Gillard more legitimacy than Howard had in 1998.
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Mungo: embrace of consensus, peace, love and brown rice sheer hypocrisy
There have been many losers in the 2010 election, but none more to be pitied than those who relied on News Limited for their political information.
‘Australia’ rejects the system, and Labor is to blame
There is a superstition among many political commentators that the nation has some sort of collective mind; that when the voters go to the polls there is a psychic bond which determines the overall result. It’s rubbish, as Saturday showed.
The Wimp v the Wuss
Never has the Prime Ministership of Australia been contested by such a pair of abject, craven, weak-kneed, whey-faced, chicken-hearted, lily-livered, jelly-bellied milksops. And what a lead up to the so-called Great Debate: The Wimp versus The Wuss, says Mungo MacCallum.
Mungo: it appears we’re voting on personality rather than policy
First, Julia Gillard has to be elected, and to do that she has to give us reasons to vote for her. What exactly (or even approximately) is the election actually about? Most voters are confused.
Mungo: Timor solution a stuffed-up version of whatever it takes
Timor Leste is a horribly cynical choice, and still would be even if the negotiations had been sensibly handled and the government and populace had shown themselves willing.
Mungo: The fix is in, thanks to Gillard’s populist adhockery
Gillard is offering not leadership but populism, not vision but adhockery, not policy but fixes: whatever it takes. She has had her boost in the polls, and that, for the moment, is all that really matters.
Rudd and Abbbot a case of double disillusion
It will take a mighty effort indeed in his second term if Kevin Rudd is ever to recapture that first rapture of the heady Kevin07 days. And Tony Abbott will need to mature considerably if he is to be given a second chance.
It’s time, Kevin, to pull your finger out
If Rudd was also some kind of a loose cannon, what was the point of keeping him? Rudd might be a bit of a letdown, but the alternative is still unconvincing.
A politician is an arse upon which everything has sat except a man
The government is in diabolical trouble. No one gets Rudd’s mining tax and Tony Abbott is now a possibility of becoming PM. Whoever you vote for, a politician always gets in, so why bother?
