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The light on the hill, the lamp on the desk & the fist in the glove: Mark Latham has taken the fight to the coalition, but Labor's enthusiasm for authoritarian social policy cannot go unchallenged.

Article Excerpt
It would take the most doctrinaire socialist not to feel a surge of joy at the recent transformation of Australian politics created by the election of Mark Latham to the leadership of the ALP. In a matter of weeks the polarities of power have been reversed and a new agenda has been established. It is the Opposition that is setting the terms of debate and the Government that is responding. Throwing out the old "small target' strategy, Latham has suddenly made visible a whole new social and political landscape. For the past three years, the Howard Government has successfully lowered the expectations of what Australian society could be, or how life could be improved. Paradoxically, despite Latham's frequent rhetorical celebrations of the market, his initiatives in the first months of leadership have quashed the notion that it will satisfy all human needs, and the notion that the state can have a constructive role to play in people's lives is less likely to be successfully howled down by the right-wing commentariat. In the process, the political magic of John Howard has been revealed as fairy dust. Perpetually on the back foot and in a responsive mode, he sounds querulous and plaintive.

On a range of issues--the lack of affordable dental care, for example--Latham has moved the issue from one of cost-benefit analysis to that of being an essential feature of a decent society and its absence a shame and a disgrace. The idea that the "small target' strategy could be a long-term one for Labor has always been obviously wrong; Labor parties have no reason to exist if they do not have an agenda for change. The transfer of the 'small target' strategy from the Coalition to Labor was one of the myriad unintended and unreflected-upon consequences of the further professionalisaton of politics and the triumph of 'spin'. And leaving aside some of his policies for the moment, Latham is an inspiring leader to many--not least because he is the...

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