Heartwarming developments
Posted on February 8th, 2005, under Politics
1. Amanda Vanstone sums up the Howard Government’s success in one pithy phrase:
‘What’s in the public interest and what the public are interested in are two different things.’
2. NSW Police demonstrate ongoing sensitivity by publicising the address of Mamdouh Habib’s new home.
On February 8th, 2005 at 11:42 am, Jean said:
Pithy indeed. Interestingly, also sums up the arguments of the bitter left on the cultural studies discussion list re the Ikea set after the election.
Ah, contempt for the masses - a powerful uniting force.
On February 8th, 2005 at 1:01 pm, Glen said:
Fuck yeah, that comment is gold. I am so using that in my thesis. What a slip in the hegemochine!Awesome.
On various labor-left blogs I have read discussion about the reinstallation of Big Kim. They all seem to be worried about getting elected and gaining power. I stand by my comments of a while ago about Kim being a poor simulacra of Howard for the exact same reason why Howard is such a poor leader, but such an excellent politician. To point out the freakin obvious, they both mobilise interest to their own devices. At least Latham attempted to mobilise the public in such a way that didn’t attempt to tap into hegemonic ‘interests’, well not all the time.
I have been thinking about this disjunction between ‘interests’ in relation to the recent panics in NSW about P-plater drivers and the like. In whose interest is it to allow P-platers to even drive? (’P-Platers’ being a sneaky - vera vera sneaky - discursive trick to frame ‘youth’ in road safety debates.) The discursive space of the p-plater debates signals the leading edge of a number of conservative-machines. Simple example, notice how P-platers are discoursed as failing to incorporate themselves into the governmental system of automobility, instead of the system of automobility (and all the neo-liberal ‘performance’, ‘flexible labour’, etc pressures that feed into it) failing young people by killing them?
I know this is my baby, so sorry for the ’self-interest’, but it has become apparent to me how important the disciplinising process of ‘getting a license’ is for the new regimes of capital. It is no coincidence this is happening at the same time as public transport is getting buried in NSW. Can you imagine what would happen if someone simply said, “People under 25 should not drive, ever.” Whose ‘freedom’ would be invoked? I think if you ran with the ‘freedom’ line, you would end up sounding like Dubya.