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Major breaking news at the Age; apparently Kevin Rudd is not a socialist. Further shocking details here.
It’s not that he rejects it. He just can’t spell it.
Posted by richard mcenroe on 2006 12 13 at 09:47 PM • permalinkThat article does a good service in reminding us that the current platform of the ALP calls for “the democratic socialisation of industry, production, distribution and exchange…” It’s eerie to read something like that anywhere other than in the pages of a history book. Funny how the ALP never emphasize that part of their platform during election campaigns, or anytime, for that matter.
How bizarre. The headline says “Rudd rejects socialism” but then the rest of the article talks about Rudd’s policies - all of which are socialist in nature.
Posted by Art Vandelay on 2006 12 13 at 10:08 PM • permalinkMr Rudd said: “It’s very hard. It’s really hard.”
I hope I am not quoting him out of context.
Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2006 12 13 at 10:09 PM • permalinkInfidel Tiger… well, if he’s going to steal Bush’s material there may be hope for him…
Posted by richard mcenroe on 2006 12 13 at 10:11 PM • permalinkJust so long as he is not a socio-political entity.
Posted by Margos Maid on 2006 12 13 at 10:17 PM • permalinkOne sentence of KRuddy’s condescending tone as on RN Breakfast with Fran Kelly should be enough to turn off the punters.
How long til the Spillard attacks from the rear?
Test match about to begin… cricket thread imminent.
Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2006 12 13 at 10:24 PM • permalink#8, Allan, you can guarantee the right to bear arms wont be included in an ALP backed Bill of Rights, however, things like “the right to grow up in a sustainable, multicultural utopia where all public transport is free” will.
The ACT bill of rights is a great example.
Posted by Art Vandelay on 2006 12 13 at 10:27 PM • permalinkBonmot - Not yet, but then again, we’re batting.
Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2006 12 13 at 10:32 PM • permalinkEveryone - Shhhhhh! The cricket’s on. All eyes and ears on the WACA.
Posted by Stop Continental Drift! on 2006 12 13 at 10:44 PM • permalinkHe rejects socialism, yet embraces “equality, solidarity and sustainability.” That bird is looking. waddling, and quacking very much like a duck. Unless, of course, it is a plastic turkey…
Posted by AlburyShifton on 2006 12 13 at 10:49 PM • permalinkPolicies so far:
No child shall live without cutlery.
Express lanes to all bridges.
A dental plan for the lower class man.
Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2006 12 13 at 10:51 PM • permalinkKevin Rudd becomes John Howard
From The Australian: Kevin Rudd on abandoning multiculturalism - “Learning English and getting a job will be the cornerstones of Labor’s new approach to multiculturalism, which will emphasise integrating into Australian society over celebrating cultural diversity”.
On Australia getting out of Iraq - “Mr Rudd added that no withdrawal would take place without first consulting the US”.
Well do tell Einstein. Or as Homer would say, “Doh!”. Like, John Howard is not consulting with the US over a withdrawal strategy? I mean, does Rudd think we’re that stupid?
What Kevin Rudd is doing is taking Howard’s policies, warming them over a bit then trying to pass them off as his own - like some great revelatory change of direction for Labor.
Do you reckon the punters are that blind - that they can’t see Coalition policy tarted up and spruiked as Labor’s own work? We look forward over the next few months to the other Howard policies that Kevin Rudd will try to pinch - however, I’m not so sure John Howard will allow him to get away with it.
Obviously Rudd has made a fundamental decision. To beat John Howard he must become John Howard. Are the punters silly enough to swallow it - that is the question.
Reject socialism? Bollocks. The ALP’s constitution has, since 1949, called for (and still calls for) the—
...democratic socialisation of industry, production, distribution and exchange to the extent necessary to eliminate exploitation and other anti-social features in these fields.
Posted by walterplinge on 2006 12 13 at 11:45 PM • permalinkThe The Age home page:
Kevin Rudd rejects “an arcane 19th-century doctrine”.Where does that leave all the other socialists at The Age, The SMH, The ABC, the university’s etc etc.
Arcane 19th century people like Phil Adams and cretins like Mike Carlton, Terry Lane, Adele Horin, Alan Ramsay, Malcolm Fraser….
Looks like Big Kev (I’m excited!) has cut them adrift. Phatty’s next column should make interesting reading since he is such a dewey eyed Krudd booster.
What about the ALP’s policy on the right to use illegal drugs???? link here
Posted by surfmaster on 2006 12 13 at 11:57 PM • permalinkI don’t know why you guys didn’t see this coming. He’s following the example of David Cameron, leader of the UK Conservative Party, who’s no longer a conservative and has turned greenie liberal, while Blair (no, not our Blair-Tony Blair) is doing the opposite. There seems to be something in the air…
Posted by ElectronPower on 2006 12 14 at 01:22 AM • permalink#26
Phatty’s next column should make interesting reading since he is such a dewey eyed Krudd booster.
My guess is that he’ll think it’s a master stroke of ingenuity. After all, we Howard voters are so stupid, we won’t be able to tell the fake from the genuine article. So if it takes a bit of chicanery and fraudulence to win power, Phil will be all for it. After all, it’s all in a good cause, isn’t it? /barf alert
Posted by AlburyShifton on 2006 12 14 at 02:06 AM • permalinkJulia Gillard on Labor jockeying:
there is always going to be debates about leadership, but there was a level of behaviour there about destabilization, about back grounding you know media stories. Whenever Simon looked like he was going to have a good day, the poison would come in the newspapers. There was a level of that which can’t be justified in the name of anything good even if you genuinely thought Simon Crean wasn’t the person to take us to the next election, you don’t have to behave like that. That is too much. And it brings its own corrosion when people behave like that. Because it’s a bit like the nuclear arms race, if one side’s doing it then the other side probably will as well. So if one side’s backgrounding a newspaper and creating negative stories it will bring a reprisal. And it’s a culture that you’ve got to get rid of and stop in order for people to treat each other any way near decently.Meanwhile our old Cretan friend has given Rudd his endorsement.
I disagree. First, there is no report of scrapping the socialist objective. Rudd is reported only as clarifying his position. Second, the idea that Beazley had sharpened the differences with the government that are now blurring strikes me as preposterous. The ALP’s striking public differences were IR, the war and climate change, and the position on these have not changed (moreover, and thankfully, new life has now been breathed into industry policy). The difference now is that people are actually listening to Kevin and Jules, not witnessing everything drown in a prolix bog, and the positions are being finessed in the process. Third, the roadshow is brilliant, supplying easy daily colour and movement as the media slope off into the silly season and everyone watches the cricket and goes to the beach. Fourth, Rudd’s critique of Hayek was crisp and well-targeted. Fifth, the idea that amateurs can lord advice on how to communicate political messages to someone like the Ruddster, who already has the highest voter recognition of any new ALP leader since Hawke, is fanciful. Often buried in these sorts of comments is an implicit assumption that he has to somehow say everything at once every time he speaks, all in a five-second grab. Critics on the left might be well advised to have a bex and a good lie down. The new leadership team is doing real fine.
Rudd’s chances would have taken a hit right there.
#22 Infidel Tiger
A dental plan for the lower class man.
I thought the working class had their teeth removed upon majority. Or are they debarked? I can’t remember.
Posted by flying pigs over mecca on 2006 12 14 at 04:20 AM • permalinkPriority#1. Economic prosperity. Priority#3, action on climate change.
It’ll take an Underpants Gnome to figure out priority 2.
Posted by AlburyShifton on 2006 12 14 at 06:51 AM • permalink#37
the working class have their brain removed upon majority. This is achieved by sending them bright-eyed and bushy-tailed to university and making them do a five year course they could have done half-pissed in six months carving all essays into solid rock with the sharp end of a dead jellyfish.
jus’ so ya know
I am not now, nor have I EVER been a member of the Communist Party…
Oh, sorry. Different time, different place.
Posted by Kyda Sylvester on 2006 12 14 at 01:22 PM • permalink#3
Lets see if Rudd has the balls to seek the removal of the socialist objective from the ALP constitution early next year. The last time there was any murmor about that the unions threatened to withdraw funding and it remained there.
Some other good reading out of the ALP constitution is its commitment to the Socialist International organisation of which it is a member. It has formal objectives like the growth of the welfare state, etc.Posted by Hank Reardon on 2006 12 14 at 02:40 PM • permalink#46
Lets see if Rudd has the balls to seek the removal of the socialist objective from the ALP constitution early next year. The last time there was any murmor about that the unions threatened to withdraw funding and it remained there.
Ho hum…Kevin Rudd backtracks on socialist label and from the story Kevin Rudd has junked a pledge to remove the word socialism from the Labor Party’s constitution just a day after denouncing it as an “arcane, 19th-century” doctrine.
My that didn’t last long now, did it? I wonder what’s next? I suspect we’ll see a lot of twisting and turning as the days roll by. Game on.
#47
KRuddy’s thin lick of new paint on ol’ Labor starting flake off already?
Like a cheap Xmas present: lucky to make it to the New Year.Would like to have been a fly on the wall when Garret gaffed over the Qld Traveston Crossing dam proposal:
“we’ll get back to you” appears to be their policy slogan.“Kevin Rudd is not a socialist.”
In much the same way that the Pope isn’t a Catholic.
Posted by Dave Surls on 2006 12 15 at 08:38 AM • permalink
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