• It’s normal for political parties to undergo a cycle of hypocrisy as they move into and out of office on issues like election debates, of which prime ministers always want less and opposition leaders more. It’s altogether less normal for the parties to do so in the space of little over a week. It’s barely nine days since Julia Gillard was waving away the need for more debates and Tony Abbott was whining about it. Now each has adopted the position of the other. A little hypocrisy goes a long way in politics.
  • One of the reasons for the snarky reaction of the press gallery yesterday to ‘the real Julia Gillard’ is that it is, in short, a rejection of the national media’s role as primary interpreters of what is good and bad in politics. With journalists and editors unable to focus on policy for more than five seconds, or actively running vendettas against her, Gillard looks like taking a cue from both John Howard and, to a lesser extent Kevin Rudd, and shifting more attention to softer media like FM radio and tabloid TV. This will enable her to reach much bigger audiences than newspapers or specialist political broadcast media ever manage. But it always prompts bitching from the gallery about ‘dumbing down’ — something of which, of course, they’re never guilty.
  • Getting rid of the baleful influence of NSW Labor on her campaign style might turn out to be a smart play by Gillard, but it’ll only be of any use if she goes all the way and removes the likes of Mark Arbib and Karl Bitar from the government’s policy process as well. That’s where the real damage has been done.
  • Strangely missing from the media coverage of the Coalition’s looming changes to its PPL scheme is the word ‘backflip’. This has only come about because of Labor’s one campaign success — its conversion of the PPL levy into a ‘Coles and Woolies tax’ forced the Coalition into announcing a company tax cut and a reduction in the levy. That doesn’t change the fact that the Coalition scheme is still middle-class welfare, outrageously handing high-income earners huge amounts of taxpayers’ money.
  • Terrible pity that Gillard’s proposal for what is in effect a pilot scheme for empowering principals has been announced during an election campaign — and one Labor looks destined to lose. It is that rare thing from this government — high-quality policy — and is a natural follow-on from the MySchools website, the next step in allowing the education sector to function more responsively and effectively. Maybe if we can get the teachers’ unions to come out against climate action, cuts in middle-class welfare and putting asylum seekers in perspective, Gillard will muscle up on those issues.