JULIA GILLARD’S STRAIGHT UP FRONT TALK FROM DOWN UNDER
http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article/565797/201103111841/A-Gift-From-Canberra.htm
The American Spirit: With the Obama administration last week sending appallingly mixed signals on both the economy and foreign policy, Washington needed to hear a certain trumpet. It came, of all places, from Down Under.
More accurately, the bracing blast came from the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives, but not from an NPR-created caricature of a newly elected Tea Partyer. Instead, it came in a speech to that body delivered firmly by the Laborite prime minister of Australia.
“As I stand before you in this, the cradle of democracy,” the auburn-haired Aussie encouraged the assembled congressmen and senators, “I see a nation that has changed the world and known remarkable days.
“I firmly believe you are the same people who amazed me when I was a small girl by landing on the moon. On that great day, I believed Americans could do anything. I believe that still. You can do anything today.”
Julia Gillard is only months into leading the massive, English-speaking anchor of the South Pacific, having wrested the prime-ministership from the hapless Kevin Rudd. But her voice sounds remarkably — critics would say suspiciously — like Rudd’s conservative predecessor John Howard.
Since 9/11, and as the U.S. took on military obligations in Afghanistan and Iraq, Howard, next only to Britain’s Tony Blair, stood up as America’s sturdiest ally.
All that seemed to dampen when Rudd, in 2007, ushered the long-serving Howard out of Canberra. The Laborite leader benefited from 15 years of economic growth, only to tumble — as he tried to push more socialistic measures — into the next year’s global downturn.
Challenging Rudd’s leadership, Gillard deftly took control of both her party and the government. Last year she won a second term on her own.
Though still pushing government-heavy initiatives in education and climate change, Gillard has expropriated Howard’s more hard-line policies on foreign policy and immigration. She created a welcome stir by sternly warning Muslims not even to think about replacing Anglo with Shariah law.
On Capitol Hill Wednesday, as she pledged an unbreakable commitment to the 60-year-old ANZUS Treaty, Gillard ended her speech invoking the memory of our 40th president:
“This year you have marked the centenary of President Reagan’s birth. He remains a great symbol of American optimism. The only greater symbol of American optimism is America itself. The eyes of the world are still upon you. Your city on a hill cannot be hidden.”
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