I think I have a new guru, none other than former NSW Labor treasurer Michael Costa. Now that he has retired from parliament he is free to speak his mind. His latest is a free market attack on Kevin Rudd:
Rudd's comments remind me of the ideological nonsense I used to hear at ACTU meetings from left-wing trade union officials in the '90s. Bob Hawke and Paul Keating were repeatedly attacked by the political Left for their neo-liberal policies of global integration and deregulation. Doug Cameron, now a Labor senator, gave a speech to the Tasmanian Fabian Society in 2005 in which he attacked, among others, the Labor Right for being neo-liberal. It's an example of the ideological typecasting the political Left habitually uses. Anything that doesn't conform to their world view of greater government intervention is described as neo-liberal. This epithet is a favourite of the anti-globalisation crowd. Indeed, there is nothing more old Labor than protectionism and industry subsidies.
I thought he was on the right side when I learnt he had a portrait of Ronald Reagan in his office. Sadly his mental health problems probably held him back politically.
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