24-06-2010, 12:06 PM
Mark Stapleton Wrote:The media isn't avoiding mentioning the proposed mining tax as the reason for Rudd's downfall. On the contrary, they've been talking about it ad nauseum.
That isn't what got him knifed. The mining tax wasn't unpopular with the people--it was unpopular with mining magnates and wealthy stockholders. John Howard's proposed GST in 1998 was much more unpopular than the proposed mining tax, and he didn't get punted.
The GST was a tax on the people, and a reduction in tax for business, for the most part. The mining tax is a tax on profits. That entails the prodding of a whole different beast.
They mention the mining tax as part of the mix of reasons for his demise, but I still think it alone was the necessary and sufficient reason for his exit. Or, if you like, it was the only straw capable of breaking that particular camel’s back.
Quote:No, there's a much less visible reason for his removal--see post #1.
I’m open to being convinced otherwise, but I think Rudd fell so perfectly in line with the wishes of the neo-liberal ruling class (up until the talk of a mining tax), that he’d have had to declare war on Israel (e.g. persistently insist that they start treating the Palestinians better, or something), to motivate the Jewish players to have him ousted. The Jewish community doesn’t want the Australian voting public to know that they have the vast majority of Oz parliamentarians under their influence, and if circumstances prevent them from being seen as a beacon of all things good, they will happily embrace news that paints themselves as weak outsiders. Rudd expelling an Israeli operative, months after the incident, weeks after Britain had done the same thing, was a very weak response. Weak, yet “harsh”, and “harsh” was the effect Rudd was trying to project...after, I’m sure, he’d made half a dozen phone calls to members of the Jewish community apologising for the necessary face-saving measure he was about to take.