Australia General Discussion 4.0: It ain’t easy under Albanese

[Cassius]

You’re not a modern Labor PM if you don’t end up falling out with your own faction (Rudd, Gillard, arguably Hawke towards the end, Whitlam). Even Keating did a great crossing of the desert from the very right wing of the NSW right to being… very much not as PM.

[(no subject)]

Whitlam rightly purged Bill Hartley and co. because he knew they made Labor unelectable in Victoria.

[(no subject)]

Friends of Israel in other countries, and particularly those of us in the Labor Party, will need to spend the next few years making a clear distinction between the policies and actions of Netanyahu and his ministers, which must be condemned where necessary, and the fundamental issue of Israel’s right to exist as a legitimate, sovereign, democratic state, and to defend itself against those who seek to destroy it – which includes various western NGOs such as Amnesty as well as Iran, Hamas, Hezbollah and other more obvious enemies.
I will certainly condemn any actions by Netanyahu’s government which infringe on the human and civil rights of Israeli citizens, including Israeli Arabs. I will continue to support the creation of a Palestinian state, although I think that is a very remote prospect given that the Palestinian leadership still lives in a fantasyland of “resistance,” and sees getting the UN to condemn Israel every second week as a substitute for direct negotiations with Israel.
Equally, however, I will condemn moves to isolate, boycott or delegitimise Israel, and I will continue to expose the fabricated narrative of “Palestinian dispossession” where and when that seems necessary. I will also oppose moves for Australia to recognise the “State of Palestine”, both on the grounds that no such state in reality exists, and on the grounds that this is just another piece of political theatre designed to avoid direct negotiations, which is the only way a state of Palestine can ever be made a reality.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

And Albanese is from the Left, while Shorten is Right. Do these factions even matter beyond "this is what i vaguely believed when i joined the party in uni or from the union, now it's just my mates"?

They absolutely matter (and have clear ideological divides) it’s just that to become leader involves a great deal of extremely conspicuous compromise with the other faction and falling out with your own faction in the process. And the formulation of policy is (somehow?) still very independent from leadership scuffles.

Additionally after the history of split after split the ALP is a little paranoid about public disunity over policy. They much prefer to work it out in smoke filled rooms and Chinese restaurants, then have a public battle over the leadership.
(The NSW Liberals incidentally do the complete reverse. Leadership and Preselection scuffles are extremely secretive, but we’ve got no qualms to splash the front pages with ideological disputes about literally everything)

[CumbrianLefty]

Whitlam rightly purged Bill Hartley and co. because he knew they made Labor unelectable in Victoria.

Hartley actually started off as a Coalition supporter in his youth

[(no subject)]

Whitlam rightly purged Bill Hartley and co. because he knew they made Labor unelectable in Victoria.

Hartley actually started off as a Coalition supporter in his youth

Whitlam purged the left junta in Victoria after they re-elected Henry Bolte by sabotaging Clyde Holding and releasing their own separate policy platform during the 1969 state election.

[TheTide]

And Albanese is from the Left, while Shorten is Right. Do these factions even matter beyond "this is what i vaguely believed when i joined the party in uni or from the union, now it's just my mates"?

Eighteen years, Mark Latham (officially, I think, part of the Right) was a Labor leader with a fairly lefty image (in terms of being anti-war and environmentalist).

These days, (without even getting into his party affiliation) his typical tweets seem to be, well, those such as this.

https://twitter.com/RealMarkLatham/status/1610126832090886146?s=20&t=1f5dp4S...

[CumbrianLefty]

What has happened to Latham is genuinely extraordinary.

Did bitterness and resentment over not becoming PM simply drive him mad?

[(no subject)]

Always a nutter. As with Rudd, those who knew him before he reached the big time tried to warn us.

[JimJamUK]

What has happened to Latham is genuinely extraordinary.

Did bitterness and resentment over not becoming PM simply drive him mad?

Would be genuinely interested in any of our Australian (or otherwise knowledgeable) posters explaining the Latham journey, because from the outside it’s just looks utterly bizarre.

[morgieb]

What has happened to Latham is genuinely extraordinary.

Did bitterness and resentment over not becoming PM simply drive him mad?

Would be genuinely interested in any of our Australian (or otherwise knowledgeable) posters explaining the Latham journey, because from the outside it’s just looks utterly bizarre.

Trust me, it's just as bizarre from the inside.

[GoTfan]

What has happened to Latham is genuinely extraordinary.

Did bitterness and resentment over not becoming PM simply drive him mad?

Would be genuinely interested in any of our Australian (or otherwise knowledgeable) posters explaining the Latham journey, because from the outside it’s just looks utterly bizarre.

It's a political metamorphosis that one can only reach through, I suspect, constant grifting. After 2004, we wanted nothing more to do with him, so he had to look for another way back to relevance, ergo, he becomes a Hansonbot.

I don't even think he even believes what he's saying.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

What has happened to Latham is genuinely extraordinary.

Did bitterness and resentment over not becoming PM simply drive him mad?

Most famously, two years before taking the leadership he crashtackled a cab driver.

It was two and a half years ago that Mark Latham, on the night of Gough Whitlam's 85th birthday, crash-tackled a Sydney taxi driver in a dispute over a fare.

The cabbie, Bachir Mustapha, 35, said yesterday: "I don't bear him any grudge . . . He looks a family man, a sport man, and he may produce a good government; the only payback I can take is not to vote for Labor. I vote Labor in state, I vote Liberal in federal."

According to Mr Mustapha's version of events, he picked up Mr Latham in the city, invited him to share his cab with another passenger to Balmain and negotiated a tip to take him home after that drop-off.

Mr Latham, with alcohol on his breath, had fallen asleep and woke to accuse the cabbie of taking a long route. Mr Mustapha ordered him out and, when he did not get his fare, ran after the MP and snatched his satchel. Mr Latham then tackled him.

In hindsight, Mr Mustapha says, the satchel probably contained valuables, if not money, and concedes his actions may have been provocative. Nevertheless, he says, he was only defending his livelihood. "If he was a nasty man he would have punched me on the ground. He didn't."

He added: "It's over. I'm happy for him, happy for Labor."

His wife, Jovana, is less forgiving. She says her husband, whose arm was broken, has not worked a day since. "God will forgive him," she says of Mr Latham.

Mr Latham did not flinch when asked about the case in his news conference yesterday. "Every now and then there is a bit of strife as you get home. My property was stolen. I recovered it."

[AustralianSwingVoter]

What has happened to Latham is genuinely extraordinary.

Did bitterness and resentment over not becoming PM simply drive him mad?

Would be genuinely interested in any of our Australian (or otherwise knowledgeable) posters explaining the Latham journey, because from the outside it’s just looks utterly bizarre.

I'm a hater. Part of the tribalness of politics is to really dislike the other side with intensity. And the more I see of them the more I hate them. I hate their negativity. I hate their narrowness. I hate the way, for instance, John Howard tries to appeal to suburban values when I know that he hasn't got any real answers to the problems and challenges we face. I hate the phoniness of that.

Start with this mentality to politics. Then apply it to the people who knifed you after you lost an election.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

(He did actually lose his left testicle to cancer the year he lost the leadership)

[Silent Hunter]

(He did actually lose his left testicle to cancer the year he lost the leadership)

Nigel Farage also lost a testicle to cancer in his 20s.

[GoTfan]

I still stand by my belief that he doesn't believe what he's saying.

[Secretary of State Liberal Hack]

I still stand by my belief that he doesn't believe what he's saying.

Why would a former labour leader pretend to be a far-right nutcase ?

[AustralianSwingVoter]

A useful few paragraphs from an old Monthly essay:

The thread holding Latham to the left was always thin. In his maiden speech to federal parliament in 1994, Latham explained his understanding of his party. “Ultimately, Labor’s hopes for a more equal and just society rely on a certain judgement about human values: the belief that whilst people will always defend their own interests they also care enough about the society in which they live to advance the interests of others.”

It is easy to miss what is most interesting about this statement, because it so obviously echoes the sentiments of other Labor politicians in its commitment to equality and justice. But it is not a plain statement of belief. It is an analysis, one that is conditional: Labor believes X because it has made a judgement that Y is true.

After the 2004 election, Latham decided he had been wrong about Y. He puts this clearly in The Latham Diaries: “ had assumed that as [working people] climbed the economic ladder, they would still care about the community in which they lived, and take heed of the interests of others, especially the poor and disadvantaged. This was my misjudgement of modern society.”

Think, then, of the several devastations of that election loss. Personally, it would have been humiliating: Labor had not just lost an election that had once seemed in reach, it had gone backwards. In order to make himself electable, or acceptable to his party, or to keep his party together, Latham had suppressed some of his clearest beliefs. Finally, the basis of his belief in progressive politics had been shattered. A year later, broadcaster Andrew Denton said to Latham in an interview, “You’ve given people a lot of reason to feel cynical. You haven’t offered any way forward.” Latham answered, “No, well, I couldn’t find any …”

The surprise, after all of this, is that Latham did not immediately leave the ALP. To Denton, he said, “I still belong to the Labor Party and wouldn’t ever join any other organisation.” In 2013 he wrote a Quarterly Essay, offering Labor advice. He continued, he says, to help Labor at the local, state and federal level.

Going over this history, I can’t help but feel sad about what is coming. I think of something Michael Duffy wrote. At 15, Latham penned an article for his school magazine, attacking waste like the “lavish distribution of stencils and paper”. Soon after, he attacked the school again, but with the caveat that it was “truly a fine school”. Duffy’s assessment: “he was already revealing himself as a critic who at heart loved the institutions he attacked”.

He tells me it was crushing when Labor Party activists worked to get him disinvited from the fundraiser for a local MP in early 2017, particularly the fact that it happened in Western Sydney, “where I’ve lived for 55 years now, and for me it’s been my life, my politics, my existence …” When I thank him for his honesty on this, he says, “Well that’s how it felt. How would you think I’d feel? … Demoralising. Terrible. I still feel bad about it.”

[CumbrianLefty]

Now that is genuinely interesting. And of course he's not the only one from the left - and sometimes the hard left - to make this sort of political journey for those sorts of reasons.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

Now that is genuinely interesting. And of course he's not the only one from the left - and sometimes the hard left - to make this sort of political journey for those sorts of reasons.

Indeed, a very large share of One Nation voters have followed a similar path. Old fashioned (white male) Labourites in regional towns and working outer suburbs put off by a changing party and a different style of government (first with Keating, then with Rudd/Gillard/Rudd). Just look Pauline's hometown of Ipswich!

[(no subject)]

The actual *white* Australian working class doesn't support the centre-left today. Let alone, 19th century socialism. The *white* working class here in Oz *really* hate 20+ years of being told by the Australian left about how they are racists and xenophobes for not supporting unauthorised immigration by boat.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

The actual *white* Australian working class doesn't support the centre-left today. Let alone, 19th century socialism. The *white* working class here in Oz *really* hate 20+ years of being told by the Australian left about how they are racists and xenophobes for not supporting unauthorised immigration by boat.

Even though most of the white working class's grandparents came here on a boat in the 50s but that's apparently neither here nor there for you.

[(no subject)]

The actual *white* Australian working class doesn't support the centre-left today. Let alone, 19th century socialism. The *white* working class here in Oz *really* hate 20+ years of being told by the Australian left about how they are racists and xenophobes for not supporting unauthorised immigration by boat.

Even though most of the white working class's grandparents came here on a boat in the 50s but that's apparently neither here nor there for you.

They didn't - they were migrants taken from Displaced Persons camps, not refugees.

The 1954 Refugee Convention also doesn't say what the Hanson-Young types say it does either (not one country would have ratified it if it had).

[CumbrianLefty]

So are "migrants" better than "refugees", or what?