The rise to power of Australia’s "hairy-legged femocrat" should dismay the liberal left everywhere

The rise to power of Australia’s "hairy-legged femocrat" should dismay the liberal left everywhere: "

Kevin Rudd, the once wildly popular Australian PM, has been toppled by Julia Gillard, who becomes the country's first woman leader. Rudd, an environmental idealist, came up against the big mining corporations and lost - but were his Labor party right to ditch him?



But more significant than Gillard's rise, in many ways, has been the fall of a man whose anti-fat cat, green agenda had inspired many on the left. Yet neither Rudd's emissions trading scheme, nor his retro-active 40% super-tax on mining, nor many other of his cherished schemes ever saw the light of day. Should the left rue the departure of an idealist, or welcome the more pragmatic Gillard, learning to recognise that in a capitalistic system there are limits to how far you can go in antagonising capitalists.

Debates of the Day

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