Good Riddance to John Howard!
Well, it’s hard to believe, but finally the destructive force of the Howard government has come to an end!
And it’s poetic justice that, as well as being Australia’s second longest serving prime minister, Howard’s also the second one to lose his seat while still in power. It couldn’t have happened to a nicer person! Now he can crawl back under whatever rock it was that he came out from in the first place.
The only disappointment was that that smug and petulant shoolboy, the aptly name Downer, managed to keep his seat. But maybe it will be worth it to see a bit of the smugness knocked off his face from now on!
I’m not sure if Mal Brough deserved to lose his seat or not – i’ve never been able to quite work him out – but i suspect that, being Queensland, part of the reason he was voted out may have been because he was seen in some sections of the community as being a “black-lover”! After all, Queensland is the state whose laws the South Africans based apartheid on.
There’s been a lot of fuss about “me too-ism” in this election, but nobody’s mentioned the “me-ism” that the Howard government has promoted and based its policies on for the last 11 years.
And Howard and his thugs have made a big deal out of government debt and the desirability of having a budget surplus. A lot of Australians seem to have been sucked in by this nonsense, but practically every adult in this country has hocked their future to buy fancy houses, flash cars and widescreen televisions – and are consequently up to their own armpits in debt.
Why it’s ok for them to get a loan, but not for the government, i’ve got no idea. But i’m certain the vast majority of succesful businesspeople in this country have made at least part of their fortune by investing borrowed money. That’s how capitalism works.
And a government that has a budget surplus is clearly not providing the essential services and infrastructure investment that they should be. So long as it’s properly managed, governments borrowing money to invest in infrastructure – which will ultimately save a lot of money – is not at all a bad thing. Not providing the infrastructure is a much greater evil.
Anyway, that’s my political rant over now – for a very long time, i reckon!
By the way, for the mystified poms reading this, John Howard was Australia’s Margaret Thatcher – only worse, because he had her mistakes to learn from.
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