Let’s not abandon them to die at seaAnother boat has sunk, leaving desperate asylum seekers to drown in their attempts to get a better life. Amongst all the tough talking and negotiations with Indonesia, we mustn’t forget ourselves as a civilised nation, writes Tony Kevin.
Rudd government
Don’t kid yourself Kev, it’s not just the refugees
Yesterday’s damning Newspoll result wasn’t just because of the government’s “tough but humane” rhetoric on asylum seekers. What about all the other stuff ups by the Rudd government like climate change, Timor Sea oil spill and supporting a corrupt Afghan government?
Is Rudd’s honeymoon over?
Everyone today has an opinion or three on whether the latest Newspoll is the 47th end of the Rudd honeymoon or a polling outlier. The most likely answer is probably a bit of both.
Hartcher: Is Swan the anti-Keating?
Wayne Swan is acting a lot more modest over the Australian economy’s GFC rebound than Paul “the recession we had to have” Keating, writes Peter Hartcher. But it’s thanks to Keating and Peter Costello that we avoided further trouble
Is it time for Australia to become a republic?
It’s ten years since the republic referendum failed and it’s time to restart the debate, says George Williams. Let’s have an initial popular vote to establish we do want a republic, then vote again for the type of republic we want.
Guy Rundle: A Costello on each knee, Rudd plays for laughs
What if Rudd’s appointment of Peter Costello to the Future Fund was a little too clever? What does he do if Costello takes the piss: finding safe harbour aboard the ship of state, he refuses to leave, despite continuing to denounce the government by means of messages in bottles?
“Tough but humane” will never cut it as a bumper sticker
“Closing the Gap”, “Education Revolution”, “Building Australia” — Kevin Rudd loves condensing his policies into neat little slogans. But asylum seekers are far too complex an issue to ever be summed up in a three-word sound-bite, says Lyndal Curtis.
Question Time fun: See Kevin run. See Kevin hide.
The pursuit of the Prime Minister over the Oceanic Viking made, inter alia, for a rather more interesting Question Time yesterday than we’ve had in some months.
Asylum policies hang in the balance
The “tough and humane” mantra of the Federal Government on asylum seekers could end up tipping very heavily towards just one of those words, says Andrew Bartlett — the question is: which one?
Shanahan: Coalition misses the boat
Kevin Rudd has his hands on the wheel of the boat people issue and he’s aptly steering it to his political power, writes Dennis Shanahan. Will immigration become the new economic management upper hand of Labor?
Rundle: The asylum seeker debate isn’t over. It hasn’t even begun.
The left hasn’t won the asylum seeker debate — yet — but there have been some small victories, says Guy Rundle: for a start, the government is speaking of refugees as fellow human beings, not child-chucking martians.
The CPRS: what the Liberals want
So Malcolm Turnbull has convinced the Coalition to push amendments on the Government’s CPRS. But what is it that the Liberals want?
Not even fear mongering can save the Opposition
Many in the Opposition are pushing an anti-ETS line, but it’s hard to run a scare campaign when you’re not in power. A time will come when voters don’t view Kevin Rudd as Father Christmas, but not for awhile, writes Peter Brent.
Boat people: driven by Rudd or war?
Has the Rudd Government’s bleeding heart softness encouraged refugees to head to our shores? Or are external factors at play?
Crikey Clarifier: Has Rudd really made it easier for refugees?
How has Australia’s refugee processing system changed recently? And are those changes really significant enough to have invited a “surge” of boat people to our shores?
What happened to the NT intervention?
It’s been over two years since the NT intervention barged into indigenous communities with racist practises that wouldn’t be acceptable in non-indigenous Australia, says Alistair Nicholson.
Political snippets: No government this morning
With all the media focus on the Opposition at the moment, the government are staying very very quiet. Plus, the sneaking humorous world of sub editors.
Kelly: Coalition assure Rudd’s power for many years to come
PM Kevin Rudd should give a hearty thank you to the Opposition, because thanks to Malcolm Turnbull and disagreements over climate change, they are about to hand Labor another two terms on a plate, writes Paul Kelly.
Kohler: Rudd’s dividing and conquering, not leading, on ETS and Telstra
Kevin Rudd and his ministers seem to think they are all just playing a political computer game, in which the aim is to kill as many bad guys as possible. But broadband and emissions trading are both nation-changing issues.
How Kevin Rudd saved 200,000 Australian jobs
The OECD has released a glowing report for the Federal Government’s stimulus package, estimating the economy will benefit for another decade and up to 200,000 jobs have been saved from the axe.
Telstra decision is just good policy
There’s an element of politics in Communications Minister Stephen Conroy’s decision to break Telstra up. But it’s also good policy that finally corrects the huge mistake Bob Hawke and Kim Beazley made.
School signs, spin and other half-smart Ruddy capers
The Government’s proclivity for spin and half-smart political strategy is re-emerging, with its signs-in-front-of-schools plan and attempts to sell award modernisation.
Interconnected online services remain a government pipedream
The government’s online services are in a total mess, says Simon Bush, with no central portal, no leadership and far too much empty rhetoric.
Guy Rundle: McClelland’s new terror bill is soft totalitarian nonsense
Robert McClelland’s new terror bill is based on the notion that people are simply psychological crash-test dummies, rather than robust and resilient citizens in a free society.
Getting the best bang out of our stimulus bucks
The Rudd government’s stimulus is working better than forecast, says George Megalogenis — but they can do even better by tweaking what remains of the stimulus.
