Oz election thread #3 - Rudd's Labour

"And that is the great difference between our side of politics and leadership.

"Because we believe that government’s role is to enable each and every Australian to do their best.

"Labor believes government knows best. We are not so vain as Mr Rudd."

“I know what it’s like to be very short of money,” the 53-year-old said.

“I know what it’s like to live in rented flats. I know what it’s like to grow up with a single parent, with no support other than a devoted and loyal father.

“I know Australians are doing it tough.”

I'd also be interested in your assessment of Labor's position on industrial relations" "Forward With Fairness".

Dear Squatters,

For those who've come across the seas
We've boundless plains to share ...

There are many Australians who were shamed by the Howard Government's treatment of refugees, asylum seekers and illegal immigrants. It was not so much that people desperate enough to travel half the world at great personal peril and in hardship were welcomed with mandatory detention, or that their prisons were located in some of the most god-foresaken corners of the continent ... what galled many above all that was the way in which the policy was implemented cynically for political advantage.

There's a double edge to that of course: for a government to turn the detention of men, women and children to a vote winner it must first tap something latent and obnoxious in the public subconscious. Let's hope that something is changing there in the Australian soul.

But perhaps not. Today we learn that the Australian Government, never mind that its popularly elected face has changed, is seeking to recover money from former detainees. More than $7 million is outstanding. What is this money for? It is the bill for their mandatory detention. It's enough to make you stitch your lips.

eeeyew.

So are we gonna get out of the estates of the ones who sent back to political persecution, fatally?

Can the children warped by years in those camps sue us?

Given that we were condemned by the UN for violations of human rights, and violated treaties we had endorsed...could we be tried internationally?

Mind you, for all that I think Amanda has abhorrent views, I think she is honestly abhorrent.

Mind you, for all that I think Amanda has abhorrent views, I think she is honestly abhorrent.

Dear Squatters,

Australia’s mainstream political class has handled the issue of climate change disastrously.

The Howard years were an extended period of denial, even as the evidence mounted, the public called for action and the scientific consensus developed to the point where only corrupted researchers, climate flatearthers and right-wing bloggers seriously argued against it. Throughout it, a timid Opposition made much of its commitment to Kyoto, but spoke little about taking seriously the challenge of an overheating planet. Only the Greens consistently argued for action.

The consequences of this failure are evident in the profoundly pessimistic nature of the Garnaut Review, which essentially gives away icons like the Great Barrier Reef because it’s too late to prevent significant warming and too hard to forge an effective international agreement.

In spite of this, our two major political parties continue to argue the toss over whether to start in 2010 or 2011, who to exempt and how much compensation should be doled out to our biggest polluters -- including motorists.

Based on the small-minded response of Labor and the Coalition to date, Garnaut’s pessimism looks well-founded.