If one thing has characterised this election it’s the bun fights over who stole whose policy.

If I was smarter, I would have seen it coming.

One thing I noticed about Rudd early on, when he was Shadow Foreign Affairs Minister was the number of times he said virtually the same things as Alexander Downer.  It lead me to the gentle reassurance that if this man ever became PM (which was obvious from the outset of his career).

But even now, in the midst of the campaign, there are so many policies which have been announced which are almost undifferentiated between the two parties.  Especially when it comes to the federal government budget.

A little while ago I read (most of) Howard’s Brutopia (http://www.smh.com.au/pdf/ruddbrutopia.pdf).  Which reminded me that Rudd was not a disenfranchised conservative, who joined the Labor party to stand out.  He was in fact right at home with all the other socialists who he has chosen to be his colleagues.  And whilst I can fault his criticism of Howard as being a proponent of the free market over other family values (our current federal government is anything but “big L” Liberal and has done very little to make the market freer), the biggest point of contention is that I can not agree with his criticism that neo-liberalism, materialism and consumerism is laying waste to traditional conservative institutions such as the family, community, church and country.  In fact I would say they are not opposite sides of one coin, but two very different currencies all together.  [Just to continue on the rant I’m trying not to go on, what could be better for any institution than the freedom to choose and practice what you think is right and best?]

What we must all remember is that what separates these two people who both aspire to be our Prime Minister, is ideology.

Whilst both leaders are tending toward the popular and have a range of influences in their own parties which will potentially tend to normalise what is enacted, they will have their own biases and preferences based on their ideology.  To me the question comes down to, do we want socialism, and the diminishment of property rights or do we liberalism with it’s freedom and choice for all?  At the end of the day, these are ideals which we, sadly, won’t see, but they will pave the way for the decisions that are made by our government.

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