After all the attempts by Labor to attack John Howard’s credibility and to scare the electorate off over the thought of a Costello lead government the people finally had their chance to put the ledger straight.
In what many of us in the blogsphere had already predicted, John Winston Howard was re-elected for a fourth term with a majority. Labor didn’t enhance their prospects either by signing up with the radical Greens and Bob Brown, which inevitably lost senate seats for Labor.
I quoted in earlier posts that it didn’t behove Labor to have someone so opposed to Christian or family values as Bob Brown in their midst or to name call these very people [Family First] leading up to our biggest Christian festival, Christmas. Family First may now hold the balance of power in the Senate and at the same time put Bob Brown back in his bottle.
Labor ran possibly the dirtiest campaign in our political history and it backfired; yet they still just don’t get it. All we heard from the likes of Crean, Beazely and McMullan were moans over a fear campaign based on a lie, interest rates. Unfortunately for Labor, people know it was a legitimate claim for the coalition to make as historical evidence proved them right. But interest rates alone didn’t win the election.
Labor were hell bent on removing choice, choice of education, choice of health, choice of employment, choice on childcare and the list went on. Add to that, people had to envisage the likes of Latham and Bob Brown having to negotiate with the US after both had called George Bush the “world’s most dangerous man” and “the worlds biggest terrorist”. Pretty dumb politically one would think!
Mark Latham in all probability ended any hope of it being close when he aggressively grabbed the PM’s hand outside the broadcast booth at a Sydney radio station and then looked like he was about to head butt the PM. It was a gutless act and extremely poor politics to try and physically intimidate the PM for all of Australia to see. Latham is just a thug!
The Labor states didn’t help either with many voters realizing that the hospital crisis is actually the fault of the state Labor governments as is the public schools.
For Labor, their political future looks abysmal. Who on their front bench has the capacity to grab the electorate’s attention and instill confidence in them?
Surely Labor must now concede that Kim Beazely and Simon Crean aren’t doing Labor any favors, nor are Wayne Swann, Bob McMullan, Jenny Macklin or Craig Emerson. It’s simply a useless lineup of non-performers.
Will Peter Garrett push his case for the Labor top spot?
One thing is for sure; Labor now has to gain a swing of close to 5% in the next election to have a hope and that is an impossibility, considering they needed only a 2.2% swing on Saturday.
The entire smear mongering by Labor and its dirt units [johnhowardlies.com] didn’t even scratch the surface, the people just viewed it with the contempt and cynicism it deserved. All the media assistance and bias that Latham enjoyed has also backfired, the 43 signatories, the 54 “eminent” doctors, the actor’s lead by Philip Noyce, Scruffy, Brian Deegan, they all got told by the majority that they were fools. Democracy worked no matter how hard those mentioned tried to exploit it.
The result itself, a landslide, would also dismiss the theory that people don’t trust the PM, I would have to say he could rightly claim that he is indeed considered a trustworthy man and leader after the weekends results.
Latham was so desperate in the last day of the election that he tried to infer that Howard was a racist over comments he made in the mid 80′s. He just doesn’t get it.
I have no doubt that most people just don’t like Latham. Many can’t come to grips with his violent past and his treatment of his first wife Gabrielle Gwyther. Nor can they stomach his foul mouth and vicious remarks, e.g. Skanky Ho. Latham could benefit from the wisdom of a boxing analogy, “keep it clean and keep the hits above the belt”.
Australia is not ready for a Mark Latham styled leader and probably never will be. Labor will have to address their selection criteria within 3 years and if they hurl up Peter Garrett then they better get ready for a long time in opposition.

Humphrey B Bear has a better chance.