Howard & Bush win in Australia
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| Mon, 10-11-2004 - 4:53pm |
BUSH WINS AGAIN
http://nypost.com/postopinion/opedcolumnists/31578.htm
October 11, 2004 -- AUSTRALIAN elections are almost never im portant outside Aus tralia. If the Labor Party replaces the conservative Coalition parties in power, or vice versa, the outsider generally regards this as Tweedledum replacing Tweedledee. All Aussie governments look pretty good by the (admittedly low) standards of international life.
Saturday's vote was an exception: Prime Minister John Howard, a strong ally of America in general, was committed to supporting the United States in the Afghan and Iraq wars. Labor's leader, Mark Latham, had committed his party to bring home most Aussie troops in Iraq by Christmas.
If Labor had won, the world would have seen the result as a dramatic erosion of international support for George Bush's Iraq intervention — much more important than the Spanish elections (which threw out a Bush ally in favor of a left-wing government that immediately withdrew Spanish troops).
Australia has been a faithful U.S. ally in every American war since 1917 without needing (in John Kerry's words) to be either "coerced or bribed." At risk was a splintering of the English-speaking alliance (America, Australia and Great Britain) that has been the moral and military core of the war on terrorism.
A Howard defeat would have been a setback for the Anglosphere, a disaster for the United States and a catastrophe for George W. Bush (and Tony Blair). And it would have been celebrated as such — make no mistake — by France, Germany, Middle Eastern despots, the United Nations, and the massed NGOs (non-governmental organizations) of the "international community."
But Howard won. Indeed, he won a landslide of sweeping proportions — something rare by the standards of the cautious Aussie electorate. After three terms in office — when the usual sentiment of voters is "Time for A Change" — Howard actually increased his majority to an unassailable 30 seats. He gained control of the Senate — the first time since 1981 that the Coalition has controlled both Houses.
The initial impact of this landslide will be felt in Australia itself. As The Australian's Paul Kelly points out, the scale of the victory will enable Howard to carry out his ambitious reform agenda — including industrial-relations reform and income-tax cuts.
Howard wants to "lock Australia into the entrepreneurial culture" that will take the Australian economy closer to the American one and light years away from the subsidized, unionized and tariff-protected economy of the Lucky Country's postwar years. He persuaded Aussies (including many former Labor voters) to give up these comfort blankets in order to be able to compete effectively in a world of "Asian Tigers" and globalization.
But there are lessons in Howard's victory for other political leaders in America and elsewhere (in addition to the obvious one of fighting an election against the background of a long economic boom).
First, Howard saw that the class basis of politics is changing — and that this gives conservatives a real chance to make inroads into the traditional blue-collar vote.
In this election, Labor was divided between its working-class bedrock supporters and its new middle-class reformists with concerns over the environment, human rights, asylum seekers and Iraq. Latham chose to back the reformists on issues like timber logging. Howard saw his chance and wooed the workers — winning Labor districts where logging was an issue and generally winning blue-collar votes across the board.
Bush could do the same if he were to campaign against extreme environmentalist and other policies that hurt blue-collar workers. So far, however, he has avoided contentious issues.
Second, Howard destroyed the fringe anti-immigration party, One Nation, and won over its voters by adopting a moderate and responsible version of their policies on immigration and multiculturalism. In particular, he made it clear that Australia would not be morally blackmailed into accepting bogus "asylum seekers" by international pressure; Australia would decide who could enter the country — and on what terms.
Throughout the advanced world, parties like One Nation flourish because political elites allow unchecked immigration. President Bush's invites the rise of such a party in America. But Howard's toughness cut One Nation's support from 8 percent in the previous election to barely 1 percent.
Above all, Howard demonstrates the virtue of political courage — especially on Bush and the Iraq War. He refused to be bullied by either the "chattering classes" of the Australian media or their international equivalents. He never wavered on his involvement in the Iraq war and he expressed warm personal support for George W. Bush. Not all of these beliefs were shared by most Australians. But the great majority respected Howard for sticking to them. And they chose a leader who would show courage rather than truckle to them.
The result for America and the world is reassuring. Australia will continue to be led by a courageous and far-sighted friend of America. He will be a leader in the movement towards a more efficient and prosperous global economy, a leader in the resistance towards rule by unaccountable transnational elites in the U.N. and NGOs and a leader in the fight against Islamist terrorism.
Al Qaeda has received a serious setback, Kofi Annan a rebuke, France and Germany a disappointment — and the media elites a slap in the face so stinging that outside Australia Howard's victory has been a non-story.
Not for the first time, America owes the Australian people a hearty vote of thanks. Something on the lines of "Good on ya, Cobber. Have an ice-cold tube of Fosters on us."
Or, these days, "a nicely chilled Sauvignon Blanc from the Margaret River."
John O'Sullivan, a former Post editorial-page editor, is now editor of The National Interest
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<<Good thing the Australian people saw through Kerry's sister's rantings >>
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Hooray Australians! May Americans do the same.
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