2010-08-02

This article belongs to And That's the Way It Is column.


After two weeks of electioneering, there are signs of desperation within the Australian Labor Party after the Australian public appears to begin to see through the ALP's cheap and nasty tactics which began by the various factions within the party, and coup leader Gillard in particular, deposing Kevin Rudd as Prime Minister and by doing so in a particularly nasty fashion, so raising serious voter doubts and indeed more than a few ‘second thoughts' about electing Gillard and her co-coup plotters as Australia's Government on 21 August.

Gillard appears to be side-stepping the many major failures of the Rudd Government during which she, Gillard, was the Deputy Prime Minister. Not one mention for instance about the fact that because of her decisions and that of others within the Government in relation to the ‘home-insulation scheme' four people are now dead and well over 200 houses and other premises have been destroyed by fire. She has also failed to mention that she essentially caved in to Australia's three major foreign-owned mining companies to the tune of billions of dollars while at the same time totally ignoring a substantial number of Australian mining companies. Gillard also failed to explain the fact that she and her co-coup plotters, some of whom were not even elected as Members of Parliament, plotted the overthrow of Kevin Rudd for months while, at the same time, telling the Australian public that she was not interested in replacing Rudd. In other words, Gillard repeatedly told the Australian public one thing while doing the complete opposite.

On the other side of the political spectrum, Tony Abbott, also known in Australia as the ‘Mad Monk' appears to be giving the Australian voting public the opportunity to step back to the John Howard era which must be more than a frightening thought. Abbott and the Liberal/National coalition have, thus far, come up with nothing new regurgitating plenty of the old Howard policies which were so convincingly defeated during the 2007 elections.

The third political force, for want of a better description, the Greens, appear to consist of a bunch of waffling wishful thinkers with policies, if that is what they are, that have absolutely no hope of ever coming into being as they totally lack substance as well as credibility.

In total, given the fact that the current major two parties are total duds and that the third party within the Australian political landscape also has nothing to offer the Australian public, time might have come for Australians to start thinking about starting a somewhat more progressive and creative political party, a party that gets things done without constantly giving Australian voters a load of bullshit.

I have not as yet seen such a major part emerging but I think that eventually there will be one, hopefully.

And on that note and like it or not.

My name is Henk Luf.
And That's The Way It Is.