Menzies House

On a Queensland House of Review

March 24, 2012 was a historic day in Queensland's history, writes Michael Smyth

Not only due to the utter devastation for the ALP, but also due to its ushering in of "conservative" rule in this state; a sign that the Right in Queensland has shaken off the spectre of Joh.

Before the apologists of Joh get outraged by such a statement, I want to clarify what I mean.

Joh did some good things for Queensland, but his government was ultimately undone by the shortcomings of some of its members.

Anzac Day hijacked by Poilitical Correctness

Allan has hit the nail on the head with this article. It is our ever controlling leaders and bureaucrats that seek ways to cause complaint. Nearly all immigrants couldn't care less what Australians celebrate. Why do they hate Australians so? GC.Ed.

According to a report by the Department of Veterans Affairs, ANZAC Day commemorations are a risk to multiculturalism and a source of “unexpected negative complications.”  The report that says of the ANZAC commemorations, “Commemorating our military history in a multicultural society is something of a double-edged sword.  While the 100th anniversary commemorations are thought to provide some opportunity for creating a greater sense of unity, it is also recognized as a potential area of divisiveness.”

How very true, and the division it is creating is between an arrogant interfering bureaucracy and the Veterans who march in remembrance of all Australians who didn’t come home and for those Australians who would like to commemorate ANZAC Day on the former battlefields of WWI.

The Government squandered $370,000 so that Veteran’s Affairs Bureaucrats could finance a number of ‘Focus Groups’ to develop still more political correctness and tell us that ANZAC Day commemorations were “unpopular with younger people” and offend recent Islamic immigrants.   Someone forgot to tell the focus groups about the increasing numbers of young people that are attending dawn services and other ANZAC Day commemorations around Australia, at Gallipoli and other memorial sites on the battlefields of WWI and recent immigrants are offended by everything Australian.

Weekend homework

We all need a hero.

Re Menzies House post yesterday under:  “Barbecue time—test your Aussieness.” It was about an innovative burger launched in Sydney called, “Kangemu” a mixture of kangaroo and emu. Lively comment, however, turned to matters of flags, Cronulla riots, police, and Ned Kelly. Nothing really about our Coat of Arms emblem served up on a bun.

Coincidentally, on the same day, distant kin of Ned Kelly gathered to bury what are thought by the family to be Ned’s remains, or some of them at least. This was picked up by Australian and international media. Most of it less than complimentary of Kelly, as a British police profiler decided after analysing Ned’s “Jerilderie Letter” dictated by him to Joe Byrne in 1879. The profiler determined Kelly as “psychotic and Dangerous.”

Perhaps the profiler was swayed after reading that Ned’s dislike for a neighbour was such that he sent the bloke’s wife a set of Bull’s testicles to highlight her husband’s lack of “manhood”.

The Jerilderie letter is lengthy. It does reveal much about rural life in the mid eighteen hundreds and how various hatreds, especially how one of law and order flourished. Read the letter and offer your analysis as comment. No comments about “kangemu” burgers please! GC.Ed.

It begins, including errors:

Dear Sir,

I wish to acquaint you with some of the occurrences of the present past and future. In or about the spring of 1870 the ground was very soft a hawker named Mr Gould got his waggon bogged between Greta and my mother's house on the eleven mile creek, the ground was that rotten it would bog a duck in places so Mr. Gould had abandon his waggon for fear of loosing his horses in the spewy ground.

Entire letter: http://www.ironoutlaw.com/html/jerilderie_01.html

A Lesson from History

The perception of being obstructionist can critically damage a political party, writes Senator Cory Bernardi.

It is expected that this week’s United States mid-term elections will see a massive swing to the Republican Party.

Some pundits predict the Democrats will lose 55 seats which would hand control of the House of Representatives (and likely the Senate) to the Republican Party.

This would mirror the result of the 1946 elections when President Truman was written off as a spent force by many in the Democratic Party. History records that despite the initial political damage, Truman went on to win the Presidential election just two years later and actually reclaimed a majority in both the House of Representatives and the Senate.

The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Sixties

Ben-Peter Terpstra introduces Menzies House readers to an alternative take on the history of the 60s. 

Social upheaval? Free love? Peaceful protests? Hmmm…really? In The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Sixties, playwright Jonathan Leaf advances the position that the 1960s was a relatively conservative decade.

And his arguments deserve our time. Or as William Kristol, editor of the Weekly Standard writes, “Has any decade been more mythologized than the 1960s? I doubt it.”

Libertarian and Conservative Controversies: Revisiting the Traditionalist v Individualist Debates

Conservatives and libertarians can learn from revisiting past debates, writes Will Church.

Much can be learned from revisiting past debates. This being most pertinent when parallels can be drawn with current debate. In my time as a member of the youth wing of the Australian Liberal Party I’ve been both spectator and participant in many debates taking place at the fault line of the party’s conservative/classical-liberal divide.

Greens that are too Yellow to admit they’re really Reds!

Andy Semple profiles a few historical leaders in a contemporary context.

Below are just a few. I’m sure you can name others.

Kevin Rudd - who wants to introduce Cap & Trade aka CPRS and is willing to push the progressive agenda farther than Whitlam’s.

Malcolm Turnbull - any “Liberal” willing to support Kevin Rudd’s Cap & Trade scheme.

Al Gore - who stands to profit the most from worldwide Cap & Trade schemes.

Barack Obama - a president who seems to be willing to push the progressive agenda farther than former presidents, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson & the Father of “Progressivism” Theodore Roosevelt.

Is Hayek a Conservative?

Will Church considers Hayek's true political persuasion.

I’ve often pondered this question and consider it important for those in right-wing politics for three reasons. Firstly, I believe that Hayek is a conservative thinker.  Secondly, considerable confusion persists as to the philosophical heritage of our party. Many insist it’s ‘a progressive party’ and conservatives are imposters. These people tend to locate Hayek within the liberal political tradition, perhaps not realising the obvious philosophical similarities between Hayek and conservatives like Burke and Oakeshott. Thirdly, while I accept that people can never agree, disagreement might be partially mitigated by an appreciation of how aspects of classical-liberalism and conservatism philosophically cohere.