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Politics by other means.

Article Excerpt
Aside from taming his eyebrows, John Howard's personal image has remained relatively static over his tenure as Prime Minister. Howard has, however, worked and moulded almost all political images of the last eleven years to his own ends. If the political image can be taken as a combative component in the construction of common sense, then deft use of the images in our media-saturated social life is politics by other means.

At present and in the coming months, however, the government is facing a series of political images that have in the past been used successfully but now may be slipping the leash.

Drunk on Gallipoli

One of the results of the Howard Government's long-run process of populist image-making is the swelling numbers of people attending the Anzac Day dawn service at Gallipoli. Last year 12 000 were there for the ceremony. But this year the expected 15 000 'pilgrims' will have to pass through security checks at which drunks will be barred, 'large backpacks' prohibited and alcohol confiscated. This follows the 2005 Anzac Day that got out of control: drinking, boisterous celebration, Bee Gees songs.

Gallipoli in April has become part of the itinerary of the global stream of young backpackers: not so much the sombre commemoration of the bloody birth of a nation, as a celebration of personal...

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