It’s hard to see that this will not end badly. The Prime Minister’s particular gift for not only getting it wrong but getting everything adjacent to it wrong as well (as when she said the government had lost its way and then kept every member of that errant government in the same cabinet post and called an early election so we could punish her for keeping in their present positions all those dumb fucks who had lost their way) was evidenced this time in her running from Aborigines as if they were assassins on Australia Day and sacking Hodges for saying that Abbott was with her, co-compering a famous public occasion, and then, after that, saying he did nothing wrong, the young fool, but let that be a lesson to him, the young fool, for giving out explosive information of that kind, to wit, where Abbott was speaking on Australia Day; and then not re-employing him after having copiously established his innocence of any crime under any law of any land in any century since early Sumerian times.
And for losing her shoe, of course, and not going back for it.
Did she believe she would be killed by a black man with a knife or a pistol if she went back for her shoe? Could she have been that wrong?
I know it all happened pretty swiftly and the shaven-headed blusterers in charge of her protection were briefly running the show and enjoying, no doubt, the melodrama and the world fame. But this was Australia Day for fuck’s sake and you have to get a few things right if you’re Prime Minister and not make it look like the first hours of the Aboriginal Spring.
You have to unify your nation on Australia Day, unify it, I would say, and not flee from it shoeless with your head under the armpit of a wild-eyed paranoid walloper. Images count. Images count. There is no such photo of Thatcher emerging from the bombed ruins of the Brighton Hotel. She came out looking composed; and dignified; and resolute; and unfazed; and determined to carry on; as you do. She knew that if she had not been on the toilet when the explosion occurred she would have come out dead on a stretcher, like the others. But she looked calm and dignified and brave. A leader. You have to do that. You really do. The tribe expects it of you.
You really do have to do that.
A young friend of mine just rang and he says the atmosphere in Parliament House is like that of ‘a morgue after a massacre’ and he thinks there’ll be an election soon.
For what it’s worth, and I’m often startlingly right about these things (I got Abbott’s leadership numbers right for instance and was the only pundit that picked him to win against Hockey and Turnbull), and less often dead wrong (I thought Gordon Brown would survive as Prime Minister), my prediction is there’ll be no election, and there’ll be a new Prime Minister by Thursday fortnight, February 16, after Gillard compliantly stands down saying she wants to spend more time with her hairdresser, and there’s a lot of evidence she should.
And it won’t be Rudd but a compromise-unity candidate like Swan or Crean or Smith, or the one who though apparently more divisive looks like he might just win an election, Shorten; or Albo; or Plibersek, maybe. Or Jason Clare.
We’ll know soon enough, alas.
And so it goes.
Name:
And if you are right, Bob, my guess is that the throatiest chuckle will be heard emanating from the beautiful red brick and white columned mansion in Washington, once the home of General George Patton, and now the residence of the Australian Ambassador to the United States. You really ought to try for an invitation to visit him before he’s kicked out by Abbott–it’s a great house.
No, Beazley’s not vengeful. He’s the most public-spirited, great hearted and unambitious leader I have known. He cared little for his own adventure, and much for the nation.
A easy solution would be to put him Melham’s or McLelland’s vacated seat and make him Prime Minister by Mayday.
That would work.
Let’s make the phone call.
You won’t be surprised to read that I disagree.
This storm in a teacup will run its course soon enough; it’s simply a matter of something more tasty arriving for the hounds of the media to chase.
You think she handled it well, do you.
What gave you that idea?
It appeared to me that she was ‘handled’ by the security detail. They overreacted to a possibly dangerous situation; but that is undeniably better than injury or death resulting to Abbott or to the PM.
If you mean sacking Hodges, neither of us know enough about the details of the matter; Gillard and her senior staff did, eventually.
Bob, is it time to fire up the Volvo and head to the front?
It seems like a frenzy is building, to be resolved, one way or another, in short order.
Can’t see your compromise-unity candidates getting up. It might be what the Party thinks internally workable, but it just wont play in the electorate.
Rudd or bust, or maybe Rudd and bust.
Comrade, anyone who is Prime Minister is in with a chance, except Rudd, who failed as Prime Minister, and Gillard, who failed as Prime Minister. Anyone who gets up will be immediately 50-50 or better, and can win from there.
Are you saying Gillard will survive?
What are you saying?
No Bob, Gillard wont survive.
I accept your premise of failed PM in so far as it provides a ready source of criticism for the Opposition, but that would last all of five minutes; just as the Gillard honeymoon did from entirely the opposite pole.
Then it’s all about what happens and how quickly a simple narrative can be applied to sum up the new (or recycled)leader.
The resurrected Rudd would have to come with an explicit statement of contrition from the Party: we got it wrong, we’re fixing it.
Shorten and Smith, the two most visible alternatives, would suffer from that same brand of illegitimacy that Gillard has. That is, they somehow gamed the process.
If fair winds and great talents had their back, and the knives of the fallen remained in their sheaths, they may prevail. But I fear the odds.
Sorry to interrupt the wake, but Gillard still has plenty of shots in the locker. Parliament resumes shortly, and we shall see what we shall see.
Perhaps Abbott, Mirabella, Pyne and co will spend a bit more time cooling their heels outside the chamber if they try to play up.
It is time for the Labor Party to take the long stick to Abbott’s parliamentary tactics, and Slipper as Speaker may be just the man to make it stick.
Watch and learn.
What shots? What locker?
Specify.
Specify.
That would be telling. Rupert’s media will probably have a version available as soon as they assimilate the results of their hacking efforts. I won’t help by ‘specifying’ here.
As someone with some security training i was puzzled to see our PM used like a battering ram in the face of a relatively harmless crowd. Hilarious really, and immediately reported in the Teheran Times.
PS Bob, your website doesn’t match your stature as a Seinor Elder (Journalism). Visit my site and contact me
I have no doubt Beazley is as decent as you say. He certainly seems to be very well liked where is.
Beazley still thinks turning away the TAMPA was right and proper and the party under Gillard still think it is right and proper to flog refugees to Malaysia.
A question on notice was released yesterday which highlights the dangerous stupidity of Rudd and Gillard around Sri Lankan refugees.
In late 2008 and early 2009 three boats with Sri Lankans arrived 94 passengers,68 of them were forced home and arrested.
On 28 June 2009 193 Sri Lankans arrived on one vessel and the cry went up to stop them, make them stay home, they are not refugees.
In September Rudd called Indonesia to illegally stop 255 Tamils who then spent 6 months in hell in Merak, most of them are now here and refugees.
In October he had Tamils rescued by the Oceanic Viking and broke the law by having them sent illegally to Indonesia to jail, ASIO have now decided that 3 babies are a risk to us all and they must spend all their lives in jail.
Now along comes Gillard and says “if you are Sri Lankan and pay a ‘smuggler” you will end up doing your dough and being flogged off the Malaysia – now here is the punchline.
Of the 1104 refugees from Sri Lanka who came after the three boats in the beginning only 14 have been sent home.
And not one of them paid a ‘smuggler’, they sailed themselves.
And you ask “what about the 193″? Good question because they are all still here as permanent residents because they were all refugees amazingly having just fled the killing fields that BBC brought us vision of and the UN have reported on a number of times.
As for the Hodges and the non-riot – the worst part was the automatic assumption of all the media, except Jack Waterford who was there, that because there were some aborigines there must have been a riot.
Even though the only violence was from the rent a cops.
But then those rent a cops bravely popped all the red balloons at Baxter during another “riot”.
Funny how these wallopers hate human rights isn’t it?
Don’t forget these are the same cops who fitted up Dr Haneef and shot at refugees on Christmas Island.
No, he didn’t. He voted against it. He made Labor vote against it. He made Labor vote against it. He said to me at the time, ‘We’ll lose the election because of this, but we have no choice. It’s the right thing to do.’
Go fuck yourself, Marilyn.
Get it right.
Thank you for saying that, Bob. Much appreciated.
I listened to the filibustre tried on by Bolkus and Schacht, then they voted to push people off to Nauru and allowed the TAMPA mob to be towed away.
I walked around the streets of Norwood crying.
So do not tell me to fuck off.
He also has told David Marr since that it was the right thing to do, even though he voted down the first bill he voted for the second.
So don’t tell me to fuck off about facts ever again.
I am not a partisan party hack, I think both parties are appalling.
Which bill did he vote against? Which bill did he vote for? Was there an element of mercy in the one he voted for? Or not?
Give details.
Bob, can you elaborate on what the factional breakdown (Left, Right, etc.) might possibly be in such a leadership spill from your inside knowledge?
A very good post Bob. You are also correct. All leaders must look dignified and calm in the face of an impending crisis no matter how frightened they feel. That is the price you pay. Gillard’s security over-reacted and ran off with her like a rag doll swept in a storm. She had nothing to fear, yet lost her composure and her dignity and our respect. We saw a glimpse of the real Julia in those photos of her stunned frightened face, shoeless and undignified, looking like a victim rather than the leader of a Nation. Of course I hope she hangs in there until the inevitable happens. I hope you are also correct and her party do not reward Rudd. It would be too much to bear for no Nation deserves to be Rudded twice.
How’s the weather at Menzies House?