Editorial:

Election tasks in Australia

Smearing and attacking personalities is stock-in-trade for 
capitalist politics. It is intended to divert attention from the 
real political questions facing society and lead voters into 
choosing between parties and candidates on the basis of 
relatively unimportant issues. It is also intended to cover up 
the real policies and consequences of the Howard Government's 
actions. The Australian people have been fed a diet of this sort 
of politics for the last few weeks as the election campaign hots 
up.

Desperate to win the election the Howard Government has pulled 
out all the stops in attacking Mark Latham. It is determined to 
continue its attacks on the working people and strengthen even 
further its "all the way with the USA" policies including the new 
US military bases and the US-Australia Free Trade Agreement.

The Bush administration joined the Howard Government in its 
attacks on the ALP. Their "coalition of the willing" is facing 
world-wide opposition and has suffered setbacks in Iraq and 
elsewhere. The withdrawal of Australian troops from Iraq, as 
promised by the ALP, would be a serious political blow to the US 
administration's agenda of war and occupation.

The comments of Bush, Powell and Armitage are clearly designed to 
influence the election outcome and as such constitute 
interference in Australia's domestic politics. Howard has 
attempted to pass them off as no more than the equivalent of 
comments by others regarding the US leaders. But coming, as they 
do, during the course of an election campaign and being made by 
the officials of a foreign government, they are a direct 
interference. They have the objective of obtaining the election 
of a parliament that will do anything that the US leaders want.

This is how the US leaders play their deadly game of world 
domination — although in many countries the interference is much 
more direct, including the use of assassinations, open military 
intervention and economic sabotage.

In their worldwide drive the US leaders have a 100 percent 
compliant sheriff in the Howard Government. The Howard Government 
is at one with US military plans for aggression in Asia and 
elsewhere. Both Bush and Howard are political and religious 
fundamentalists, completely dedicated to the preservation of the 
capitalist system with an ultra-conservative social outlook.

The defeat of the Bush and Howard Governments in the forthcoming 
elections would be a severe setback to their agendas even though 
the alternatives of Kerry in the US and Latham in Australia do 
not stand for significant change. However, such an outcome would 
represent a rejection by voters of the political course that the 
incumbents are following.

The political objectives for progressive Australians are similar 
to those that faced the people of Canada in their recent 
elections. A statement published by the Communist Party of Canada 
said that "the primary question was one of blunting the drive to 
the right by preventing a Tory victory, preventing either of the 
Big Business parties [winning] a working majority, and expanding 
the size and influence of other more democratic and progressive 
parties in Parliament.

"In this context, the outcome was a significant victory for the 
working class and the left and progressive forces in the country. 
The two parties of big business were hammered by voters, falling 
from 80 percent of the total popular vote in 2000 to 68 percent 
in 2004. The Conservatives lost over one million votes from the 
Alliance-Tory totals of four years ago, and the Liberals dropped 
300,000, mostly in Quebec. "On the other hand, the parties seen 
by voters as defenders of progressive positions made gains; the 
New Democratic Party gained about one million votes, the Bloc 
Quebecois about 300,000, and the Greens almost half a million."

This more or less sums up the tasks and possibilities in 
Australia. The only alternative to a Howard Government at present 
is a Latham-led ALP Government. And that would be a slap in the 
face for conservatism and war. But if that were all, it would be 
only a small step. A surge in votes for the Greens and other 
progressive, anti-war candidates would be an even better outcome. 
This is a real possibility but it will have to be worked for.