Political Corrections

with Mungo MacCallum

Writing on the wall for Latham's lunacy

A diary is supposed to be a very personal thing; a confidential document in which are recorded private thoughts, musings and self-doubts.

Seen in that light Mark Latham's diaries are probably no better and no worse than those of many other public figures, especially if the other figures are politicians. Latham's contempt for many of his colleagues is far from unique - Clyde Cameron, for instance, memorably savaged Gough Whitlam in the single published volume of his own diaries (he claimed, improbably, that the rest were stolen by ASIO).

What is unusual is Latham's decision to air his grievances so soon after his retirement, and in such a manner as to do maximum damage to his party. For this he will not be forgiven.

It is not just the paranoia and the intemperance that are embarrassing - although the stuff about Kim Beazley's treachery and indecency is simply fantastic, and the bitterness towards Gough Whitlam, his political mentor, and Paul Keating, his political hero, is rather pathetic. It is the revelation that the party fell for a confidence trick: Latham truly was the wolf in sheep's clothing that his detractors had always feared.

Latham posed as a modern Laborite, a social democrat in the Fabian mould, a reformer looking to discard the shibboleths of the past and position his party squarely in the 21st century. His best-known work was, after all, titled Civilising Global Capital. He fooled a lot of people, including me.

But underneath the intellectual hid another, more primitive Latham; an unreconstructed class warrior still immersed in the long forgotten battles of the 1930s. The awful irony is now revealed: while Latham was rightly deriding John Howard as a man trapped in the Menzies era, his own ideological base came from at least a generation earlier.

Actually, the real Latham stood up before the publication of the diaries, at his office dinner speech on the night before the last election, when it was clear to Labor insiders - including himself - that he was going to lose. He said then that his real fight had always been with four establishment groups: the business establishment, the foreign policy establishment, the media establishment and the elite school establishment.

Well, hang on a minute. In the times in which we are living capitalism, the American alliance, media conglomerates and non-government schools are all irrevocably locked into Australian society. Latham might wish that they weren't, as many of us do, but you have to face reality.

It is worthy and legitimate to talk about civilising these immovable objects but to talk about fighting them, extirpating them, is beyond quixotic; it is politically deranged. If Latham wants to play the role of a revolutionary, well bully for him, but he belongs in the Socialist Workers Party or some other Trotskyite fringe group, not in the ALP.

The modern Labor Party has many faults, and Latham's diatribe contains some valid criticisms. But its prospects for government in 2007 would hardly be improved if it embraced the principles of the radical 19th century left, which is apparently where Latham would secretly (until now) like to take it.

And of course, even for Latham, the establishment has its uses - especially the establishment media dominated by the Murdoch press, which is where Latham chose to publish his manifesto, to maximise both his own profit and the damage he can do to his erstwhile party. Hypocrisy? Cynical opportunism? Or perhaps just a bit more double-think.

It's easy to dismiss Latham as around the twist. But if this be madness, yet there's method in it.

There was no madness, just cold deliberation, in the seemingly irrational deportation of American peace activist Scott Parkin.

Parkin, holding a valid visa and having spent an incident-free period in Australia involved in non-violent protests against the war policies of the coalition of the willing, was grabbed by a goon squad from the Immigration Department after refusing a so-called voluntary interview with ASIO.

He was then told his visa had been cancelled because he had been re-assessed as a security risk and sent home under guard, but not before being presented with an extortionate bill for the privilege. And of course, he and his lawyers, and for that matter everyone else, were given no explanation or justification for this authoritarian treatment.

However, a clue might lie in the fact that it was the same week the government introduced its own new authoritarian legislation to Parliament. Parkin was a convenient scapegoat to demonstrate John Howard's toughness on terrorism; he was also a useful kite to fly, to see if the media, the public and most importantly the emerging moderates in the Liberal Party room would cop yet another assault on civil liberties.

Howard denies that we are now a quasi-police state, but admits the new laws will severely limit personal freedom. The justification for the latest increase in the powers of the police, both uniformed and secret, is supposedly the London bombings; as many experts have pointed out, the relevance is dubious and the urgency unwarranted - even ASIO admits there has been no increase in the security risk to Australia.

So why is Howard doing it? The answer is the one given by tyrants throughout the ages: because he can. Scott Parkin may have been the first victim of the Howard dictatorship, but he won't be the last.

And last week brought yet more proof (if any was needed) of the non-existence of a just, interventionist God: Carol Page is dead and Phillip Ruddock is still alive - well, sort of.