Political Corrections

with Mungo MacCallum

A tough job, but someone's gotta do it

John Howard is now trying to tell us that when he pronounced himself Leader Forever, he didn't really mean forever; he just meant that he was staying until he was dragged from the job kicking and screaming.

This will be of little comfort to Peter Costello, who has repeatedly shown that he has no stomach for any serious dragging; he is in favour of an Orderly Transition, by which he means that Howard should hand him the job on a platter.

This, of course, was never and is never going to happen, but it is touching to see that our Treasurer has maintained his naivety after all these years. Perhaps he is also relying on the Tooth Fairy to restore all the money Howard has looted from his beloved budget surpluses.

Costello's line (or rather that of his supporters, who with almost comparable naivety still believe that sooner or later their man will show some sign of ticker) is that if Howard doesn't arrange for the handover by next March, by golly, then there'll be some action - like perhaps Costello can be persuaded to hold his breath until he goes blue in the face, or roll around on the carpet and scream and scream and scream until he is sick. So far the strategy has not developed much beyond that point.

Meanwhile Howard insists that both party and public still love him (after a while a leader gets a feel for these things) and that even to contemplate retirement so soon after the election would look almost like a broken promise, something which would be utterly unthinkable (except in the case of Medicare, along with whatever other campaign fantasies turn out to be unsustainable when the bills come in).

Nonetheless, the Costello forces are, at last, starting to think it; their numbers may still be small, but their patience is not inexhaustible. We are still a long way from the kind of open warfare which Howard used to wage when he was deputy to Andrew Peacock, but mutterings that Howard is starting to succumb to the kind of hubris that is affecting his political judgement can be heard in the background.

It's one thing to turn Gallipoli into his personal theme park, claim credit for 11 (no, make that 16) budgets, abrogate the party's long-standing commitment to state's rights and effectively usurp the role of head of state; every leader is entitled to the odd rush of blood to the head.

But igniting leadership speculation, especially on the eve of a controversial budget, is Not in the Best Interests of the Party. It's not a send off offence, at least not yet; but Howard has been shown his first yellow card.

The death of the extraordinary Al Grassby is a salutary reminder of how colourless, predictable and downright boring the modern Labor Party has become.

In recent weeks the party's internal critics have become more strident: a caucus run purely along factional lines, in which the only new faces are those ground out by the various party machines, has simply become too narrow and too incestuous to interest the public. Kim Beazley loyally defends his pedestrian front bench, but the fact is that no more than a handful of them have made a dent on their opponents and virtually none are known to the voters. Successive polls have made it clear that the majority are political holes in the air, and, given their background and personality (or lack of it), always will be.

In government, this would not matter so much, but in opposition, where the whole idea is to grab the public's attention and engage it both intellectually and emotionally, it's a disaster. No one would want a front bench composed entirely of purple-suited Al Grassbys. But a system in which he would not be considered is much worse. Indeed, one Labor historian has suggested that even the much-loved Ben Chifley would have missed out on pre-selection if the current factional warlords had been in charge.

If the Liberals have leadership problems, Labor's malaise extends right through the parliamentary party. There is no point in Beazley waffling about keeping the government accountable if his own troops are seen as unelectably grey.

The 30th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War has brought a predictable barrage of revisionism from the Right, who now maintain that not only was the cause just, but the result was not really a defeat - at least the years of carnage bought time for other pro-Western governments in the region to consolidate.

The sophistry is both obvious and absurd, but let us at least concentrate on two facts: the United States entered the war to prevent the holding of a democratic election over the whole country, which they feared their puppet friends in the South would lose, and Australia joined them purely to suck up to Washington. The rest was, and is, pure humbug.

It has been interesting to see the British Conservative campaign against Prime Minister Tony Blair, under the slogan: "He lied to take you into war - how can you believe a word he says?"

The irony is that the words are the brainchild of Australia's Linton Crosby, who masterminded John Howard's first three "trust me" campaigns. Advertisers, like lawyers, are of course hired guns; they are interested in results rather than honesty and sincerity. Even so, Crosby's ethical acrobatics are spectacular.

It is thus pleasing to report that the man can, at times, be frank: he once reassured his British employers that they needn't worry about their man being a bit on the beige side, because John Howard could win elections - "and he's as dull as batshit." At last, truth in advertising.