Stuart Muckton writes:Apparently third highest watched show in ABC history, most watched comedy show for ABC on record. A sign of public mood, given how the Chaser so effecitly proved that the police state measures were not aimed at protecting world leaders, but clearly at the general population.The core issue is the demographics and what it means for a section of that viewer share to celebrate the Chaser's disdain for APEC, Howard's and the whole cop and anti-terrorism deal.
Tie that in with the spectacular achievement of the two main protests -- Wednesday and Saturday last week -- and you have to note a change in the wind. The envelope has been advanced a tad.
This is a particular political (and satirical!) occurrence that is occurring in the lead up to the most significant election held in Australia for about 25 years. After a period when as a consequence of the 2003 Iraq mobes failure to prosper and the 2004 electoral results in the US and here -- there has been very little breakout allowed -- leastways any that has not then be constrained by the ALP or the ACTU under cover of protecting Labor from the left.
So this last week has been a major time for our side of the fence and its consequences are still unravelling. Just ask Johnny Howard!
People may even be getting cocky!..Maybe even [egads!] confident and much less demoralised than they have been for the past five years.
There may be a whiff of inspiration in the wind -- but an inspiration that is not dependent on Kevin Rudd.
I don't know which stakeholders were the keenest in the Stop Bush Coalition -- but it appears to me that the most politically mature thing to do would be to build on that coalescence and commit to a joint perspective for the time ahead.
Maybe that's too hopeful? [He says with a cynical smirk.]
OK. Perhaps then it's best to note that we have broken out of the electoral logjam and consensus that rules Australian politics even on the left by noting it is never an either/or situation.
The tragedy is, in my estimation, that there seems to be an unwillingness to consider these events and credit them with their true significance. We need to note that while there may be sterile & rhetorical jockeying to see who rules in parliament, the streets are another matter all together and our problem is that there is a disjunction between the street and what may be our electoral aspirations.
Nonetheless, the dead hand that has been bearing down on us for over a century -- that of the ALP -- has weakened enough such that, aside form the trade union sphere (of no small consequence I grant you), the ALP and ALP governance no longer can sabotage so freely as it has in days of yore.
Is this then a turning point? A symbol of a change in our fortunes that will be played out and explored with greater verve once --and if of course -- Labor wins federal government?
