Labor Now Has A Rudder

I am happy that Kevin Rudd has acquired the leadership of the Labor Party.  For too long, the Howard Government has gone on without being held to account principally because the opposition has been hopelessly out pointed and the leadership has been weak.  Beazley and Crean before him were both fairly spineless and lacked the mongrel and the out and out balls to lay it on the line against Howard.  With Rudd, I don’t think he’s a “mongrel” like a Latham but he is a person who is articulate and intelligent and will leave you in no doubt what his point of view is.  I think this is the leader that Labor has been looking for.

But Julia Gillard as deputy?  I don’t know… she doesn’t seem to be a big speaker and I have hardly heard her say anything let alone anything of substance.  At least the hopelessly inept Jenny Macklin didn’t even bother to contest the deputy role as she was truly awful.

So now, hopefully the Labor Party can quickly get its act together and start to make alternative policy rather than indulging Howard on divisive political name calling and getting into “credibility wars”.  Simply put, Labor should present alternative approaches on the Iraq War, Industrial Relations, Taxes and Social Services.  Maybe open up and spend this farking huge budget surplus and stop spending money on military campaigns – how much has Timor, Afghanistan, Iraq and the like cost us in true dollars?