The problem with Kevin Rudd
As some of you will be aware, here in Australia we are currently in the midst of an extremely boring election campaign. Boring because our two campaigners are all-but-identical, and because the campaign is a calculated attempt to ensure that nothing is at stake. My friend Scott Stephens – who pulls no punches, as you might have noticed – has a column in today’s Eureka Street on the Leader of the Opposition: Kevin Rudd’s Political Cowardice.
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On the basis of the campaign so far I think my view of Kevin Rudd will be much lower by its end, than it was at the start. Very well.
But if Paul Keating is the model and arbiter of courage, then it's not clear to me that cowardice is a sin. Don't get me wrong: I voted for the guy, was gutted when he lost, and have been missing the vision ever since. But neither recklessness nor hubris were virtues last time I checked, and nor is an utter refusal to accept a share of blame for events in which one was a driving force.
Politics is the art of the possible. If the possibilities seem sadly contracted now, the previous generation of leadership must shoulder it's portion of the blame.
As for holding dominical warnings over Mr Rudd: I am holding my fire until he gains office and I see what concern he shows for the widow, the orphan, the asylum seeker, and the casualties of our society.
Regarding his media strategy: let him who is without sin in this matter cast the first stone.
from a professed bonhoefferian I have been expecting bigger and better things. His essay in the 2006 Oct The Monthly "Faith in Politics" was exciting to say the least.
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