Labor’s left feint is cover for the right
Posted by John, October 12th, 2014 - under Labor Left, Labor Party, Labor right.
It is now looking pretty clear that some sections of the
Parliamentary Labor Party Left are distancing themselves from the Bill
and Tony comedy duo. I wouldn’t be surprised if this tactic is part of
the right’s attempt to win back disaffected supporters and voters. Let
the left have a little leeway, not too much, but enough to attract
support for a new Labor that will be in fact just like old Labor –
neoliberal economically and reactionary socially.
We can see this strategy more generally in the vacuous photos of
Labor leader Bill Shorten and other Party luminaries with signs
condemning racism and bigotry.
Yet Labor, both left and right, supports the very policies stirring
up Islamophobia right now and when in government did nothing to fight
racism, hatred and bigotry. Its support for the Northern Territory
Intervention, its demonising of refugees and locking them up in offshore
and onshore concentration camps, its warmongering, all add to racism,
hatred and bigotry.
The decision to cut a little bit of slack to the Left is another attempt to put lipstick on the Labor pig.
Yesterday it was the turn of former leadership contender, the man
with 60% membership support, Anthony Albanese. According to Katharine
Murphy in the Guardian Australia:
Anthony Albanese has signalled Labor has gone too far in
supporting the Abbott government’s national security agenda,
particularly the new “draconian” restrictions on press freedom which
would see journalists jailed for between five and 10 years.
But not to worry. Albanese makes clear in the same article he is a
true blue warmonger supporting the latest senseless western intervention
in Iraq, an intervention that will only in the long term increase the
power and appeal of fundamentalists like ISIS.
This comes on top of Melissa Parke voicing her opposition to the
national security laws in Parliament and abstaining (so I have been
told) on the vote.
A few weeks ago Parke and former speaker Anna Burke addressed a
Canberra Refugee Action Committee meeting to argue refugee policy must
change.
It is good to see this sudden bout of conscience from sections of
the group formerly known as the Left in the ALP. It reflects I think the
concern within the membership and that section of society horrified by
the bipartisan Labor and Liberal onshore and offshore concentration
camps and dismayed with yet another Labor supported war and the attacks
on our rapidly dwindling rights that entails.
However we need to be clear. Albanese, Parke and Burke not only
support the racist, misogynist, warmongering ALP; they are integral to
its racism, its sexism and its war mongering, not to mention its
‘caring’ neoliberalism.
Their opposition provides left cover for the dominant right wing. It
gives false hope to left wing Labor members. It might even win back a
few voters from the Greens.
Our task has to be to point out this reality and to talk to those
with illusions in Labor not to repeat the same errors of the past.
Let these champions of freedom and refugees actually join the
campaigns and mobilise ALP members and supporters. Why do you think they
don’t?
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