OPINION & ANALYSIS ONLINE COMMENT Struggling to keep theherald.com.au Thomson saga THE government has accused the Opposition Leader, Tony Abbott, of breaching the Crimes light on hill burning Act by suggesting Craig Thomson’s well-being would be best served if the MP resigned from Parliament. The story, on the Herald’s website yesterday, Phillip attracted plenty of comment. O’Neill It is apparent that the Coalition has only one policy to offer Australia: “THE long-term future of the play the man/woman. Australian Labor Party is now at Chookman stake. Continuance of present trends will reduce the greatest political I call for all of them to be sacked. party this country has known into a Let’s start again. Clean slate. sectional rump.” judgedredd This was not said last week. It was said by Gough Whitlam before the For both sides: stop with this 1966 federal election, where Labor stupid, grubby, dirty politics and would suffer its seventh successive get on with your jobs. Remember defeat since 1949. you bunch of clowns are our I stumbled across the quote last employees. week in Graham Freudenberg’s tale N/Flyer of Gough Whitlam’s political career. A Certain Grandeur was released in The quote ‘‘but wait there’s more" 1977, the year Gough Whitlam seems to fit this federal retired as Labor’s leader. government. Freudenberg was Whitlam’s speech Spike writer. The two shared a love of language and knew its power. I don’t feel any sympathy for him. Gough Whitlam became Show him the door and if the piper opposition leader after the 1966 loss played right all the rest could and set about reforming his party follow. The Labor party, who I once and its policies, and then he took held in high regard, has done its them to the people, unsuccessfully dash with me. in 1969, but then in victory in 1972. GARGANTUANS: Gough Whitlam, second from left, with the late Frank Crean, Sir John Kerr and Jim Cairns in 1974. So over it However, Whitlam’s government was forced to an early poll in 1974 government and restore the global media corporation the world Vince Gair and Joh Bjelke-Petersen, Our Prime Minister has shown an when the Liberal-Country Party conservatives as leaders of the nation. has seen. and Albert Field, all key players in amazing amount of resilience Coalition threatened to block the Of course, Whitlam’s cabinet Among the surviving ministers are the circumstances that stripped leading a minority government government’s budget in the Senate. colleagues gave his opponents good Bill Hayden, Kep Enderby and Tom Whitlam’s government of legitimacy. against every dirty trick in the book But Labor was again victorious with reasons to attack the quality of his Uren, who celebrates his 91st Khemlani is also long dead. by a negative alternative with no 51.7 per cent of the House of government. And the loans affair, a birthday today. And Junie Morosi, A Certain Grandeur reminds us of policies and no ideas. The Representatives vote on a two-party naive attempt to borrow a vast sum Jim Cairns’s principal private the two great struggles that Thomson saga is overblown as basis. Yet the Coalition still refused of money via Tirath Khemlani, an secretary, and lover, lives on. dominate the history of the he’ll have his day in court. to recognise Labor’s right to form a unlikely agent of the newly wealthy But the dead are many, including Australian Labor Party. One is the Stevo106 government. Famously, Coalition Middle East oil states, gave Fraser Kim Beazley (snr), Fred Daly, Jim struggle for internal unity and leader Billy Snedden said: “We were the extraordinary and McClelland, Newcastle’s Charlie purpose so Labor can win elections. Is this just the tip of the iceberg of not defeated. We just didn’t win reprehensible circumstance. Jones, Lance Barnard, Jim Cairns, The other is the struggle for titanic proportions? enough seats to form a government.” Four decades on, the merits of the Clyde Cameron, Rex Connor, Lionel legitimacy: the fight with the Kurt Snedden was asserting the born- Whitlam years are mythologised or Murphy, Frank Crean and the boy conservative parties, the media and to-rule mentality of many in not, depending on your view. But no from Redfern, Jim Cope. It is a roll powerful business interests over the Innocent until proven guilty in a Australia’s conservative parties longer are the passionate debates of call of men and their dreams, some right to govern. court of law, or have I lost the plot? throughout history. those years re-joined. fulfilled – like an end to conscription My memory was that Labor was Let the government have a go and Labor was pummelled by the Yet nostalgia kicked in as I read and the withdrawal from Vietnam; a routed at the election that followed stop your bloody whining. Tony, Coalition throughout 1975, led by the roll call of the Whitlam ministers national health insurance scheme; Whitlam’s sacking. But Freudenberg this is Australia not the American Snedden’s replacement, Malcolm in Freudenberg’s book, enough to free university education; federal records that Labor’s national Bible Belt and also the 21st Fraser. The attack had the backing make me check Wikipedia to see who schools funding; sewerage in primary vote in the 1975 election was century in case you missed it. of big business and the big was still alive. Gough is, of course, but Australia’s growing suburbs; a 43 per cent . The latest Fairfax Just a thought newspapers, especially those run by he is frail, as we saw recently at the radical overhaul of family law; the Nielsen poll has the Labor Rupert Murdoch. Murdoch would funeral of his wife, Margaret. reform of the public service; and the government of Julia Gillard at just You are dead right, Tony. learn from this campaign that his Malcolm Fraser lives on, too, and in guarantee of one-vote one-value. 28 per cent . draco newspapers could give him massive a fortnight will deliver the Gough But the list of names also reminds Labor’s struggles continue. personal and political power. Whitlam Oration to the Whitlam us of the bungles and mishaps when Freudenberg describes how Fraser Institute in Sydney, an extraordinary inexperienced and fanciful men were hunted and hounded Labor that year sign that wounds heal. Graham jolted into the real world of running ONLINE poll in search of the “extraordinary and Freudenberg will sit in the audience. an increasingly complex Australia. Professor Phillip O’Neill is director reprehensible circumstance”, the Rupert Murdoch also survives, The list of the dead also includes of the Urban Research Centre, excuse to bring down the Labor still head of the most powerful John Kerr and Garfield Barwick, and University of Western Sydney. TODAY’S QUESTION Should parents be prosecuted for allowing It’s the deed, not the pit bull breed, that kills under-age drinking at parties? YESTERDAY’S RESULT Laws targeting a dog receiving a number of complaints University, Linda Watson, has been Australia should crack down on Would it be best if Craig about their behaviour cause researching the effectiveness of backyard breeders and the pet stores Thomson left Parliament? breed don’t work, writes concern. The council said it did not breed-specific legislation and that profit from them. , better for him and have enough evidence to declare the argues that similar legislation Adoption from shelters and the YES 70.6% Mel Williamson. dogs as dangerous. around the world has been proven a implementation of foster programs everybody else. Proponents of breed-specific failure in several academic studies. should be encouraged. NO, there is no need and IN 2010 some of the leading external legislation argue that pit bull breeds The Netherlands abolished their Dogs may then be screened for it would just play into the causes of death in Australia are genetically engineered to be breed-specific legislation in 2008. behavioural issues and desexed Opposition’s hands. included transport accidents (1503 savage. They reason that any dog Breed-specific legislation is also prior to adoption. 29.4% deaths), accidental falls (1648 with pit bull genes should be being repealed in the US, Canada Free basic courses provided by deaths), accidental poisoning (864 declared dangerous; but the and the UK. Ms Watson noted that councils in dog behaviour and TOTAL VOTES 514 deaths) and assault (217 deaths). Australian Veterinary Association since 1979, a pit bull cross had been training would support Australian Death by dog didn’t rate a insists that we should judge the responsible for only two of the 33 dog owners in their responsibility as VOTE NOW mention. However, in 2011 little deed, not the breed. dog attacks in Australia which have dog handlers, helping them to Ayen Chol was killed by a pit bull I believe a Queensland case resulted in a human fatality. manage and correct behavioural terrier cross and suddenly pit bull involving Tango, an American Instead of toughening unworkable issues before they presented a tion ... breeds were on Australia’s most- Staffordshire Terrier, highlights legislation which kills innocent pets danger to the community. conversa wanted list. another major flaw of breed-specific and wastes taxpayer dollars, the Dog attacks don’t occur because of the JOIN The recent attack on Natalie legislation, which is the difficulty in government should get serious genetics; they occur because a Southam at Lake Macquarie has proving beyond doubt that a dog is a about preventing dog attacks. human failed to prevent them. theherald.com.auththehehere aalld.d.ccoom.m aua again prompted calls to toughen pit bull.