Harry Clarke » politics

A winner-takes-all-society will fail

hc — Thu, 20 Oct 2011 08:07:57 +0000

Joe Stiglitz makes the sensible point that the “1%” society America has become cannot be sustainably successful. The prosperity of the 1% depends on the prosperity of the 99%. Gross inequality is also economically inefficient and distorts a country’s politics.

Quote “It’s no use pretending that what has obviously happened has not in fact happened. The upper 1 percent of Americans are now taking in nearly a quarter of the nation’s income every year. In terms of wealth rather than income, the top 1 percent control 40 percent. Their lot in life has improved considerably. Twenty-five years ago, the corresponding figures were 12 percent and 33 percent. One response might be to celebrate the ingenuity and drive that brought good fortune to these people, and to contend that a rising tide lifts all boats. That response would be misguided. While the top 1 percent have seen their incomes rise 18 percent over the past decade, those in the middle have actually seen their incomes fall. For men with only high-school degrees, the decline has been precipitous—12 percent in the last quarter-century alone. All the growth in recent decades—and more—has gone to those at the top. In terms of income equality”.

Now well known facts but the inequality threat to the survival of capitalism is crystallising into a definite focus for dissent. It will impact on Australia.

Tasering abuse

hc — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 14:09:46 +0000

I am stunned by this taser assault on a harmless aboriginal man by 4 psychpathic cops while 5 others stood around and watched. Those watching included police supervisors. Two of the barbarians who committed this crimes were given minor fines while the rest apparently received no penalty. The lot should have been sacked and given hefty jail sentences. At least now they should be publicly named and shamed.

If ordinary citizens had behaved in this way they would be severely punished. Why the double standards with respect to people who are supposed to be enforcing the law not breaking it? If anything should not police officers be held to higher not lower standards?

And can you pick 9 officers by chance in a particular station who have these sorts of attitudes? Or are these attitudes characteristic of the police force? The real problem with taser use in the police force is that these weapons end up be used in a criminally irresponsible way by low brow thugs who wear police uniforms.

Rudd is finished & good riddance I think

hc — Sun, 13 Jun 2010 13:54:00 +0000

The inept Kevin Rudd has no future as Prime Minister of Australia – he will be displaced and fairly soon. He is an arch hypocrite and wind-bag who has been revealled as such on countless occasions and who is now trying to demonstrate that he has backbone by backing a ludicrous tax on the resources sector that will damage Australia’s resource sector and our international credibility as a place to invest. The tax is a confiscation of equity in existing Australian resource projects and a deterrant to develop new projects. It will not prevail as all logic dictates against it – the few economists who backed it should be ashamed of themselves – a miracle $9b annual transfer that has no disincentive effects - how pathetic as these gurus put politics ahead of logic. As the contradictions on the impossible Rudd position tighten there will be increasing pressure on Julia Gillard to challenge Rudd as the incompetent Labor politicians begin to worry that they may lose their opportunity to continue to pig-out at the public trough. I think Gillard would be an improvement on Rudd – almost any replacement would be – but she is a populist, ignorant Laborite who will damage Australia. Lindsay Tanner is a better choice but he won’t be given the gong.

Am I pre-maturely celebrating a Tony Abbott win? Not at all. On the basis of his recent populist hysteria he is worse than Rudd though it may be at heart he is simply a conniving political being who will say anything to gain power and then reverse his positions to suit more credible logic. The Greens – well I’ll probably vote for them but what a bunch of clots they were in rejecting the ETS in the Senate. Bob Brown’s critique of the Afghanistan involvement after the two Aussie soldiers were killed sickened me.

Australian politics is in a desparate state. Time for a new party or movement. I hope the disasterous Rudd is displaced but fear his immediate replacement and fear the Coalition alternative to a Labor Government.

Update: I inadvertently deleted some comments on this – I deleted the post inadvertently but could restore that but not the comments. The results of the NSW Penrith byelection confiirm my views. Rudd (and of course the NSW Government) is finished.

The American right – conservatism &/or fanaticism?

hc — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 22:54:21 +0000

I have been following the increasingly strident claims of the American conservative movement primarily through my interest in climate change denialism, a component of their agenda. More important parts of this agenda focus on the Obama health plan, on the bailouts to various groups in the economy as a consequence of the GFC and to what seems to be an obsessive hatred of President Obama.

I found this account by Michael Tomasky of the rise of a right-wing US protest movement, brimming with hatred and with racist undertones, illuminating. The discussion deals with the new Tea Party Protest movement that sees America collapsing into socialism or communism. It is backed by numerous well-funded conservative organisations and numerous media organisations such as the FOX News Channel with Glenn Beck, Michelle Makin and Rick Santelli. The movement is almost entirely white. Some of the concern reflects genuine fears about the increasing role of government and the loss of individual liberty. Much of it, however, is directed to the “parasite in Chief’, Barack Obama. The movement will become more important if the US economy weakens.

“This conservative protest movement… has three powerful forces supporting it: bottomless amounts of corporate money; an ideologically dedicated press, radio, and cable television apparatus eager to tout its existence; and elected officials who are willing to embrace it publicly and whose votes in support of the movement’s positions can be absolutely relied upon”.

The conjunction of the GFC, the long-term decline in US power and the need for the US to undertake comprehensive reforms in relation to the way its financial and environmental policies operate creates the potential for long-term conflict.

John Della Bosca

hc — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 23:19:58 +0000

I have zero affection (or respect) for the Labor Party in NSW but, for the life of me, I cannot understand the hysterical puritanism that has driven the resignation of John Della Bosca from its state government ministry. Nor do I understand the more recent sentiments suggesting he might be ‘rehabilitated’ and reinstated into the ministry.

My limited understanding of the facts suggests that Della Bosca had an affair with an attractive 26 year old female and this woman went to the press and dobbed him in. This should be as irrelevant politically as the information that President Clinton got a blowjob from Monica Lewinsky. In both cases the press should have ignored the affair and concentrated on the real issues of politics. Sexual liasons are private matters and there is no law against having them whether or not you are married.

We live in such a sexualised culture and yet there is a streak of sexual puritanism that persists particularly in the sensationalist media. You notice the same type of society-wide hypocrisy in the US.

Many people enjoy gossiping about ‘who is having it off with who’ and I see no great problems with that. But forcing a man from his job because he was lucky enough to enter into a mutually happy liason with a young attractive woman is a throwback to the sexual puritanism of the 1950s. Society has moved on and good riddance to the foolish sexual mores of the past.

On a happier and more humorous note, Peter Ruehl in today’s AFR (subscription required) makes the pointed obsevation that Della Bosca should have adhered to two lessons: (i) Don’t have affairs with people who will run to the tabloids if things don’t work out and; (ii) if you are going to have an extra marital affair don’t be married to Belinda Neal! I heartily concur on both counts but emphasise that it is the tabloids who behaved disgracefully here not Della Bosca.

Attacking Turnbull

hc — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 11:36:41 +0000

The pursuit of Malcolm Turnbull should now cease. It is clear that Godwin Grech – a formerly respected public servant who ran the OzCar policy for Labor – provided a false email to Turnbull that was the basis of Turnbull’s attack on Swan and Rudd and which therefore distorted this attack. The Labor Party is a perennially corrupt institution that has displayed its corrupt practices in Victoria, NSW, Western Australia and now most recently (again) in Queensland – shocking corruption that even its cheers squads find difficult to defend. Its former members include bribe-takers, suppliers of juveniles into prostitution and child-molesters – some are now serving lengthy jail terms and more will undoubtedly follow. These people are the worst of Australia’s political low-life. Selfish, greedy and dishonest people who use the pretence of caring for ‘working Australians’ as a cover for self-aggrandisement and their despicable lack of common morality.

Turnbull was justified, though as it turned out wrong, in assuming the worst about the dummy duo of Swan and Rudd. He has agreed that he was misled. Labor should cut the continued cry-baby politicking and get on with the business of trying, in its own inept way, to govern.

NSW, a basketcase?

hc — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 00:39:01 +0000

Well almost certainly not but this report is disturbing. For a decade NSW has been declining relative to the rest of Australia. The poorly-performing Labor Governments of Bob Carr, Morris Iemma and now Nathan Rees have been a factor in this decline.

Since the Sydney Olympics growth, business investment, home building, wages and jobs in NSW have performed poorly relative to the rest of Australia. The whole country will soon officially be declared to be in recession but NSW is doing particularly badly. It now contributes less than 32% of national product compared to 34.5% at the time of the Olympics. The population share in NSW has shrunk.

The slump in business investment is dramatic with just 23 cents of every dollar spent occurring in NSW compared to 35 cents in 2000.

NSW is home to one-third of Australians but only 15% of new building approvals are occurring there.

NSW’s unemployment rate is among the highest in the country and the wage premium paid to NSW workers in 2005 was $3500. Now it is just $500.

The poorly performing NSW is a drag on the national economy.

Good poll news for Coalition

hc — Mon, 18 May 2009 06:57:33 +0000

The Herald /Neilson poll shows promising news for the Coalition.

The Coalition is – as it should be – making significant inroads against Rudd and Labor. A 5% swing to The Coalition since March and back to the narrow margin of the 2007 poll. Labor leads the Coalition by 53% to 47%, down from the 58-42 gap in the previous poll. The Coalition made up 9 points in the crucial primary vote. Labor’s primary vote fell 3 points to 44% while support for the Coalition rose 6 to 43%.

This is despite general satisfaction with the budget. Six out 10 were unhappy with the decision to raise the retirement age to 67.

Rudd’s approval rating has fallen 10 points to 64% while his disapproval rose 10 points to 32%. Mr Turnbull’s approval rating stayed steady at 43%, as did his disapproval rating of 47%.

Rudd still leads his rival as preferred PM but by 9 points less than 2 months ago. Rudd’s preferred PM rating fell 5 points to 64%. Mr Turnbull’s rose 4 points to 28%.

The Coalition will get more votes highlighting debt and deficit issues. There are votes in emphasising the Rudd-Swan team buffoonery. So far these issues have not driven polls. The normally sensible Brian at LP gets it wrong when the switch is attributed to a ‘big lie’ regarding debt and the deficit in the budget – on the contrary the budget was well-received. The Labor cheer squad who wriggled around with comments on the uncomfortable poll trends missed this point too.

The tragedy of it all overwhelms me.

Budget 2009 – response by Turnbull

hc — Thu, 14 May 2009 11:03:26 +0000

Malcolm Turnbull’s budget response was very political. The main practical point was to emphasise retaining the health insurance subsidy and substitute a 3 cent extra tax per cigarette to raise the same income. This is probably sensible in my view but small potatoes. Otherwise the attack was primarily on the size of the $57 billion deficit and the implied debt which he claims will blow out to close to $300b once Labor’s Ruddbank, Broadband and other proposals are included in official debt forecasts.

Turnbull’s point that Rudd’s debt as a fraction of GDP compared to other c0untries was low because the Coalition had wiped-out public debt in Australia was sound. It is a dramatic turn around.

The response of Labor supporters (and standard Keynesians) will be that the debt is necessary to limit the extent to which the economy will falter now and the Coalition will respond that too much is being spent and being spent on projects with a low rate of return such as the Broadband effort.

I don’t know who is correct here – the right sort of stimulus package will necessarily be a stab in the dark – but Labor needs to be positive in its interpretations and the Coalition, if it wishes to regain office, to be cautionary. The future course of politics – unless there is a short-term double dissolution of parliament is clearly ‘hope’ versus ‘fear’. I doubt there will be a double dissolution of parliament – the government can do this if the alcopops legislation is defeated a second time but suspect the double dissolution won’t occur.

I thought Turnbull performed well. He can be a future Prime Minister if the Treasury’s optimistic forecasts turn out to be false and if he sticks to his guns of attacking Labor over debt and deficits. I think Labor’s popularity will now decline in the polls as people start to take seriously the fears expressed by the Coalition.

Rudd on climate change

hc — Wed, 06 May 2009 05:55:08 +0000

Kevin Rudd has further delayed the start of the emissions trading scheme to 2011 (after the next election), reduced the initial price of carbon to be charged from $20 per tonne to $10 per tonne (that is now about equivalent to a massive 2.4 cent per litre charge on unleaded petrol) and increased assistance to heavy industry (steel and aluminium previously would get 90% of their permits free – now they will get 95% of their permits free for the first 5 years – or really 1+5 years – of the scheme). The only a bonus is agreement to cut emissions by 25% by 2020 if all other nations agree to do the same in Copenhagen this year.

It is a major backflip for a man who said, last December, in the face of the full obvious force of the financial crisis, that there was no case for delay. But it is by no means an astonishing backflip. I think Rudd’s mouth runs ahead of his brain most of the time but, on climate change, he simply cannot be trusted at all.

Rudd has caved into business who were faced with the prospects of tiny cost increases and their immediate response was not gratitude but – ‘not enough we want even more concessions’. They will use the extra time not to adjust to the new scheme but to prepare a campaign to thwart any scheme (AFR, Tuesday, p.2). Rudd has also tried to play some really low level politics with Malcolm Turnbull. The stupid issue here is that Turnbull can now push for further delays in adopting any scheme to ‘fine tune’ the details.

Kevin Rudd went into the election mee-tooing John Howard on all issues other than climate change and the prized Labor scheme to increase unemployment by abolishing WorkChoices. He has reneged on the first distinctive policy but not on his second which should help to drive unemployment towards 9%. His profligate fiscal policies will be largely ineffective in offsetting impacts of an external terms of trade shock that we can do little about but will leave us with mountains of debt, huge tax bills and a devalued currency.

Rudd is using the financial crisis to enact policies that will reduce the gains we have achieved in labour markets and which which will help imperil our environmental future. Given the ambiguity of the Liberals on this issue – they should be pushing hard to achieve sensible climatic change policies – I will think seriously about voting for the idiot Greens (woeful economics, sound environmental policies) in the next election. It is one way I can indicate my total disgust with both major political parties in Australia because of their lack of principle on the climate change issue.

The Greens at least lack the hypocrisy of the Labor cheer squad who insist that the feeble conditional 25% increased cut more than compensates for the policy negatives. They are hypocrites who see climate change not as an urgent policy priority but as politics. Very unimpressed.