Two for twenty-two

And so another state election comes and goes. Bracks returns. A Brackslide, as I heard coined. Which is not entirely appropriate as the Brackslide came when he beat Kennett; now he's just riding on the back of a poorly performing and completely impotent opposing party.

I don't like the ALP in either federal or state flavours. However, while I have good reason to dislike federal Labor, what's the impetus behind my steely glare towards state Labor? - beside the obvious things. And, after all, Bracks seems a charismatic enough guy to kind of push them over the line of being acceptable, right?

It wasn't until I received a letter requesting support on election day from my local member that I was able to really clarify why I despise state Labor as I do federal.

It turns out that it was under my nose the whole time. The issue is fundamental to state as it is to federal: they are without genuine leadership.

Carlo Carli writes to me proud as punch about Labor's movement on climate change, indigenous issues, securing water for our state, public transport and just about everything I have an interest in. His joy at being able to point out examples of Labor action on these items was not only obvious, but completely over the top.

The problem is, Carlo, you've only done it because public awareness on these issues, and their accompanying disgruntlement, has reached critical mass. To pretend you give a fuck about the climate, or indigenous issues is just plain old-fashioned disingenuousness: you care because votes balance on these issues now.

And so we come back to leadership.

Leaders recognise issues before everyone else, or at least at or around the same time as it becomes an issue for those individuals that are affected. Everyday, common, garden variety politicians only pick up on issues when the newspapers have run them front page for a year.

Both Bracks and Beazley follow this course of watch and see, and wait and wait some more. It's why they're both disappointing and useless respectively.

Beazley is just plain average, so he can't really help himself. Bracks on the other hand, though, is a disappointment because he could be so much more. He is devastatingly popular and he could use that mandate to become a genuine forger of progress at a national level. But he doesn't. He doesn't because he is not a true leader - a leader willing to take a risk on something that could be even marginally risky. He really would rather get back to business at Spring Street; steady as she goes, continuing to obfuscate the path of FoI requests and making excuses for shoddy-as-fuck ministers.

Lost opportunities. Nothing new to Labor, really, but a point of heartache for those of us that want change and realise it can probably only come from a major party.

It's nice to dream that the message from voters this election is that we're done with Liberal thinking and ready for a change. But we know this not to be true after a decade of Howard and a dominating Labor at a state level for most of that time.

The simple truth is that Howard is better at reading and manipulating the community than anyone in the Labor party. This is his brand of leadership and it only works because there is a vacuum of real leadership on the other side. The fact that Howard's ability to lead in this fashion is revered by the press and sections of the community disgusts me to the point of wanting to hand in my passport. What bothers me more, though, is that the ALP have accepted Howard's omnipotence and now don't even bother to get out of bed in the morning and try reverse-engineering him.

But never fear, Bracks is here.

Well it's better than Brackslide.