Trump factor looms as Canada and Australia go to the polls

postal-vote-freedom
Postal vote clears the air

It is pure coincidence that Canada is holding a national election on April 28, a week ahead of Australia’s Federal poll. These elections come as US President Trump continues to dismantle the framework of America’s hard-fought democracy. The resistance from Canada thus far has been manifest. Australia, well, not so much.

As Trump rolls out his plan to arbitrarily gut the US public service, shut down dissent, deport ‘undesirables’ and wage war through economic sanctions, his actions have had an alarming effect on the mood of voters in the aforementioned countries.

Polls in Canada and Australia clearly show the US leader’s plan to turn the United States into an autocracy is affecting politics here and abroad. Canada’s deeply unpopular Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, resigned in January, acutely aware that despite a near ten-year reign, his chances of being re-elected were slim. Trudeau’s Liberal party (centre-left) was  without a leader until Mark Carney, a political naif,  a former central banker and businessman, was elected leader of the Liberal Party and consequently appointed as Prime Minister. Prime Minister Carney then called a snap election, at a time when Canada was deeply troubled by a cost of living crisis and a housing affordability scenario very much in parallel with Australia.

Carney and his Conservative opponent Pierre Poilievre have two things in common. They agree that the country is struggling with the cost of living crisis and housing shortages. They are, so far, united in their vocal opposition to economically damaging tariffs imposed by President Trump. They have also unilaterally rejected Trump’s notion of annexing Canada (his dream of the 51st state). Grassroots opposition to the US in takeover mode led to a national slogan, “Elbows Up”. This is an ice hockey reference which means defend yourself or fight back (imagine a defending player slamming his opponent into the rink wall at speed).

Canada’s tactics on Trump’s tariffs and resulting publicity has had a major effect on  election polls, which had previously shown as much as a 25-point lead by Poilievre’s Conservative Party. This has now been reversed, according to some polls, into a 6 point lead to the Liberals.

Early voting started this week, at a time when Carney’s Liberal Party maintained a lead in voting intentions. The latest opinion polls showed over 43% of Canadians would likely vote for the Liberals compared with 38% favouring the Conservative Party (CBC poll tracker).

Political commentators in Canada and elsewhere conclude that the ‘Trump factor’ is having a dramatic effect on the election campaign. The ordinary voter, it seems, does not relish the idea of ending up with a strong leader whose rhetoric sounds too much like Donald Trump. We are seeing this happen in Australia too, with Conservative leader Perter Dutton and his Liberal (right) party cohort slipping in the polls. Late last year Mr Dutton seemed to be aligning himself to the US strong man, but that rhetoric has since been toned down.

The Guardian observed that of the five political parties represented in Canada’s parliament before the election was called, there are two main choices for Prime Minister- Liberal leader Mark Carney and Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre. Such is the level of concern over Canada’s economic security and sovereignty, opposition voices such as the left wing New Democratic party have struggled to stay relevant.

The BBC’s analysis of the contest agrees – third place parties are struggling for survival. Unlike its counterparts in Australia and Europe, Canada’s Green Party is fighting to remain politically visible. The Green Party was recently disqualified from a televised debate for running too few candidates.

Polls suggest that the bulk of Canadians are opting to support either the Conservatives or the Liberals. The once influential New Democrats is polling at 8.5% (translating to just five seats out of 343). ND currently hold 24 seats. The separatist party, Bloc Québécois, stands to lose at least a dozen seats in Quebec.

Despite his lack of experience, Carney is steering his party to the centre, a tactic designed to draw swinging Conservatives to the Liberal fold.

Is this relevant to Australia as we head into the May 3 Federal election? Elbows Up: the key issues troubling voters are identical.

Housing affordability (and availability) and mortgage stress continue to bedevil working families both here in Australia and Canada.

My research assistant Al (I use him sparingly) turned this up:

“Housing affordability in Canada is a significant and growing concern, with rising home prices and limited supply contributing to a shortage of affordable housing options, particularly for renters and first-time homebuyers. A major factor is the high house-price-to-income ratio, meaning homes are disproportionately expensive relative to average household incomes.”

For Australia, Al produced this:

Housing affordability in Australia has deteriorated significantly, reaching its worst level on record due to rising home prices and high mortgage rates. A median-income household in 2023-2024 could afford only 14% of homes, marking a sharp decline from 43% three years prior. Low-income households are particularly affected, with families earning $50,000 per year able to afford only 3% of homes. 

In Australia we can blame successive governments for refusing to even tinker with negative gearing (a tax shelter for those purchasing a home or homes as an investment, rather as a place for them to live). The last figure I saw (circa 2021), had 2.24 million Australians owning 3.25 million investment properties.

It was revealed recently that Perth is the most unaffordable housing market in Australia, with renters paying 30.6% of income on rent. At this level, that puts 42% of low income renters under stress.

It’s the sort of headline Québécois folk might read about Vancouver, way over there on the west coast, which routinely grabs ‘most expensive place to live’ headlines.

Opposition leader Poilievre has promised to cut regulations, diminish the role and size of government to facilitate homebuilding. Carney, meanwhile, is encouraging Canadians to accept government as having a key role in any mass home building effort.

The Guardian described Poilievre as a ‘brash populist and seasoned parliamentary “attack dog” who gives a voice to those who feel ignored by political elites. The Tory leader promised supporters he will crack down on crime, toughening sentences for the worst offenders. Did you read that Mr Crisafulli? Seconding that, Mr Dutton?

Canada’s parliamentary elections are held across 343 districts. Like the UK and Australia, the party with the most seats typically forms government. Trudeau’s Liberals, failing to win 172 seats in 2021, struck a supply deal with the New Democratic party. That’s not going to work this time.

In Australia, it seems we may end up with minority government, much like Trudeau’s coalition. The cashed-up Teals are ready to have another go and this election features independent candidates who may push incumbents to the brink. Keep an eye on Groom (Suzie Holt) and Dickson (where Labor candidate Ali France and independent Ellie Smith have been vigorously campaigning in Peter Dutton’s seat).

Just so you know, Dickson is the most marginal seat in Queensland, with Mr Dutton on a majority of just 1.7%. Labor has been pouring money into Ali France’s campaign and sent top level MPs to campaign alongside her, including Penny Wong, Tanya Plibersek, Chris Bowen and Katy Gallagher. Dutton has accused Labor of ‘carpet-bombing’ his electorate to attract donors. If you have an abiding curiosity about this contest alone, you’ll find political journalist Karen Middleton’s take on it thorough and impartial (well, I thought so). She did remind me that sitting MPs John Howard and Tony Abbott lost their seats at Federal elections, so yes, it can and does happen.

 

The Goodwills Trio at The BUg, New Farm April 1

The-bUG-April-1
The Goodwills Trio: Helen Rowe, Laurel Wilson, Bob Wilson

We are one of two guest acts performing at The BUg, Brisbane’s weekly acoustic music gig at New Farm Bowls Club on Tuesday April 1.

Music starts at 7.30 with blackboard acts, followed by The Goodwills Trio. The second act is Scarlet Gypsy. Admission is $15, the venue is licensed and meals are available.

This popular weekly music club hosts a variety of local acts ranging from solo singer-songwriters to folk/country bands and Celtic and world music. Popular bands who have performed at The BUg include Murphy’s Pigs and gypsy jazz ensemble Cigany Weaver.

New Farm Bowls Club is at 969 Brunswick Street, New Farm.

.

A Doomsday Report (and a song) for 2025

Skye Doomsday Report 2025
Isle of Skye, present day, photo by James Fagan.

You may have been expecting fireworks, first-footing, haggis and other Celtic fare in my first Digression for a while, but no, it’s a Doomsday analysis.

I don’t mean Doomsday as in the Marvel comic character; look instead at the Doomsday Clock, a harbinger of global catastrophe. The world’s atomic scientists have adjusted the time of the clock (founded by Albert Einstein in 1945), 17 times since 1947. The members of the Science and Security Board, deeply worried about the deteriorating state of the world, set the Doomsday Clock at two minutes to midnight in 2019 and at 100 seconds to midnight in 2022. The best we could do was 17 minutes to midnight (in 1991).

The SASB will reveal the 2025 Doomsday Clock time in Washington, DC on January 28, 2025. In so doing, the team will consider multiple global threats, including; the proliferation of nuclear weapons, disruptive technologies like artificial intelligence, the Russia-Ukraine war, Israel-Hamas war, Israel-Hezbollah conflict, bio-threats and the continued climate crisis.

Bob & Winne’s curtailed honeymoon

The world is in as parlous a state as it was when my parents – Bob and Winnie, journeyed to Scotland’s fabled west coast Isle of Skye for a honeymoon in early September,1939. The honeymoon was cut short by British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain’s declaration of war against Germany.

Dad’s skills as a baker and cook were at the top of a list of ‘must haves’ for the British government of the day. He was elevated from Reserve status to regular army duties in double time. Private Wilson to you.

Perhaps I exaggerate by making comparisons about Adolf Hitler’s invasion of Poland in 1939 and today’s conflict-ridden world. Or not.

I spent a couple of heatwave days locked in the home studio (it faces west), finishing a Doomsday song for Generation Beta. If you didn’t know, babies born between 2025 and 2039 are Gen Beta. Whatever they want to call them, this next generation (and Alpha that came before them), will probably grow up with a grudge against their parents’ generation and the ones that came before. From their perspective, we pillaged the planet, mostly for material gain. As a result of damage done over 200+ years, climate change has run amok.

If you want some insights from Gen Alpha, this (lengthy) opinion piece in The Guardian does not hold back.

The majority (97%) of actively publishing climate scientists still agree that humans are causing climate change. I got that stat from my research assistant Al (well, AI looks like Al, doesn’t it?).

Digressing just a little, did you know that the saxophone parts on Paul Simon’s hit You Can Call Me Al were programmed on guitar synthesisers by Rob Mounsey.

My pal AI also tells me that 99% of peer-reviewed literature on climate change says it is human-induced.

Yet in 2020, Australia was ranked third in the world on a table of climate denier countries (topped by the US at 12%)

A University of Canberra survey conducted in 2020, not long after the Black Summer bushfires, found that Australian news consumers were far more likely to believe climate change was “not at all” serious.

The Conversation’s report on the survey of 2131 people found that 15% don’t pay attention to climate change news.

Of the 40 countries in the survey, Australia’s 8% of “deniers” was more than double the global average.

A recent Pew Research Center survey on global threats found that whether you believe climate change is a major threat depends on your political views.

Scepticism rules in the US, where 85% of voters who lean to the left thought climate change to be very serious; on the right of politics, only 22% agreed.

As I wrote this, Doomsday arrived early for some residential suburbs in Los Angeles, burnt to the ground by unseasonal and out of control wild fires.

In Australia, 91% of those who place themselves on the left side of the political spectrum say climate change is a major threat, compared with only 47% among those on the right. In the share market world this would be called ‘talking to your book’. That is, politicians acknowledge climate change as a threat, yet appease business interests by backing new coal mining and oil and gas projects.

Despite those trends, at least 10 countries in the Pew Report have changed their tune dramatically in recent years as floods, cyclones and other climate change events have crippled towns and cities.

President 47 And The Doomsday Clock

As President 47 prepares to take over the Oval Office, we all wonder just what will replace former President Biden’s policy of backing Israel’s armed offensive against Arab nations.

The most worrying sign of the Middle East conflict escalating is the mass importation of cannon fodder. This derogatory term describes troops regarded as expendable. It was most used to describe Australian and New Zealand innocents abroad during WWI. They were sent to the front line to fight in trenches, where survival was rare and dysentery more common.

The Russian-Ukraine war, which dates from 2014 but got more serious in 2022, took on a different hue in late 2024.

Russia imported 10,000 troops from North Korea, a secretive state from which no verification of facts is ever offered. Sources including NPR, the BBC and the Washington Post say the troops sent to the front have limited training and experience in front-line warfare. Al Jazeera reported in late December that 1,000 North Korean troops had been killed and 2,000+ soldiers injured on the Kursk front line.

But what does all this have to do with us folks Down Under? Quite a lot, as we are allied to the US and by extension, Israel’s retaliatory war against Hamas/Gaza. Prime Minister Albanese and Foreign Minister Penny Wong have walked back their too-early pro-Israel statements, but the damage is done.

Fair to say we would become a fancied takeover target in any world war or Doomsday scenario. Just as the late John Marsden imagined it in Tomorrow When the War Began, Indonesia (or China or India), would have no trouble invading Australia using barges and four-wheel drive landing craft.

Despite the US establishing a large Marine presence in northern Australia, our capacity to retaliate against mass invasion is questionable, nuclear submarines notwithstanding.

Not that it will come to that – nuclear warheads and the dodgy people at the top will bring any escalation to a rapid end. In the meantime, more ordinary people will be flushed out of their homes and businesses to continue life as refugees and asylum seekers.

Sad to say, Australia’s new laws relating to those who come by boat leaves no room at all for a future here.

As Kasey Chambers once sang: “If you’re not pissed off at the world then you’re just not paying attention.” (from the song Ignorance and the album Barricades and Brick Walls).

Kasey wrote the tune in 2001 and 24 years later keeps on rolling out new music and blunt opinions. My editor recommended Kasey’s 2024 biography “Just Don’t Be a Dickhead”. The publisher has asterisked the title, even though 9 out of 10 streaming dramas freely use far more offensive words.

If this Digressions essay and the accompanying song carry any hope at all, it might be that Kasey’s book title become a universal cry for fair and reasonable discourse, at all levels.

Take five then have a listen to a song on the same topic.

(link from Bandcamp)

A personal story about hearing loss

dog-with-hearing-loss
Only people without hearing loss could ever use this means of communication.

Here is a story  about hearing loss from the early days of Friday on My Mind, January 16, 2013. Nothing much has changed in 12 years except to give those new to hearing aids a heads up – they need replacing at least every five years. My hearing loss took a bit of a dip in 2020 but that proved to be due to a physical ailment. Nevertheless I forked out a few grand for a new pair of hearing aids in 2023 and yes, they have a charging station. We still need the debate about a simple piece of technology that has just one function yet costs four times more than a laptop or tablet which can deliver, well, anything.

By Bob Wilson

This story begins with a famous pangram (a phrase using all letters of the alphabet) – The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog. We’ll get back to that later.

When I went to the bedside cabinet drawer on Monday to change my hearing aid batteries, I had just two left (they last about 7 days). Next day I rang my service provider who said they would post some to me, as per the terms of their 12-month contract. Australians dispose of approximately 156 million lithium hearing aid batteries per year. That is a serious amount of lithium in the landfill. Some hearing aid manufacturers now sell rechargeable hearing aid pods (the batteries last for a year). It’s about bloody time.

It started off being wryly amusing. For years I thought Jimi Hendrix was singing, “S’cuse me while I kiss this guy”, (now the name of a website which chronicles mis-heard lyrics). Is Billy Joel really singing, “You made the rice, I made the gravy”? Does the line in Toto’s Africa sound like “There’s nothing that a hundred men on Mars could ever do?” Or Canada’s national anthem – “Oh, Canada, we stand on cars and freeze?”

After five years of asking people to repeat what they said and seeking refuge in my favourite three words – “What?’ “Pardon” or “Mm,” I had my hearing tested.

Six months into the quixotic world of hearing devices, I have mixed feelings; good days and bad days and also much for which to be thankful. Gone are the days when I thought my wife said “Hearty Elephant” when she actually meant “hardly relevant”. I could go on, but you hard of hearing blokes out there know about which I speak.

If you are losing the high frequencies (and we all do as we age), if it gets too bad you won’t discern between words like ‘list’ and ‘fist’, you will turn the TV up louder than your partner will like and you’ll avoid going out to places where people gather.

But hearing loss is not just a problem for older people. The Ipod generation and those who frequent dance clubs and rock concerts are at high risk of damaging their hearing. There’s a lot of difference between the 50 to 60 dB level of normal conversation and the 140 dB pumped out by some of the world’s big stadium bands.

Phillip Adams is one of the few mainstream writers who confessed in public to needing hearing aids. Adams canvassed themes with which I had become entirely familiar, through five years of denial and hogging the TV remote.

“I developed a preference for foreign films with subtitles,” Adams wrote in The Australian Magazine, December 2012, adding that he rather enjoyed the self-censorship which came with deafness “..allowing me to ignore a bombardment of banal conversation or unattractive views”.

BHA (Before Hearing Aids), we’d be watching the splendid US spy thriller Homeland (with subtitles) which might read “birds chirping” or “dog barking in distance”. I could not hear those sorts of noises at all. AHA (after Hearing Aids), as the audiologist warned me, flushing the toilet evoked memories of a trip to Niagara Falls in 2010. I no longer heard faint chirping in the Bottle Brush tree next to our front veranda – I could hear and identify honeyeaters, wrens, whip birds, cat birds as well as the sound of frogs and the creek gently running at the bottom of our block, 100m away.

They say it can take your brain a year to adjust to being able to hear high frequencies again. The audiologist patiently heard the problems I reported when playing guitar or whistling. I complained it sounded like an effects pedal and there was feedback and other unpleasant sounds. After some tweaking of compression and other frequencies, these problems diminished. Now I am finding the handiest thing about these devices is the volume button. I turn it down if people’s voices sound brassy and loud up close and up when, say, listening to a speaker in an auditorium. Oh and the wonderful music programme button – four-part harmonies and fiddle/mandolin solos never sounded so sweet.

The amazing thing, considering the estimated 1.45 million Australian who have hearing aids, is why there is so little dissent about the disproportionate cost. Even mid-range hearing aids can set you back $3,000 each and if your hearing loss is serious or your job depends on hearing every word, you’ll be in double that figure in no time. Meanwhile, you can go to a computer shop and walk out with the latest Mac laptop for less than $2,000 and enough computer power to run an international online business. Or you can use a smart phone’s GPS, telecommunications suite, camera, video, skype, email, internet access and hundreds of apps for no money at all. Just sign here and pay your bill every month.

While hearing aids fall into the category of a big ticket retail item, it pays to shop around. There are sales-oriented hearing clinics out there which will lure you in with a free assessment and then push you fairly hard to sign a contract.

I got assessed by a couple of private clinics then went with the Federal Government’s voucher system (for the over-65s), opting to pay for a “top-up”. My mid-range, programmable hearing aids (I have two) cost me $3,400 and the government paid the rest.

Choice magazine surveyed 525 people to find the main reason people get hearing aids is to overcome social disconnection and isolation. But half of the people interviewed had problems with their hearing aids and one is six were dissatisfied, so it is no simple fix.

Choice said people also shop around online, citing a member who was quoted $12,000 for a pair of top-end hearing aids and ended up buying online from a UK retailer for about $4,250. The retailer programmed the hearing aids according to his audiogram. The member later found a local clinic to service his aids for $100 to $200 per appointment.

There can be warranty issues taking this approach, but increasingly, older Australians are starting to add hearing aids to the list when they go to Thailand or the Philippines for dental work or knee replacements.

Whatever the options, I can say I’d rather have my hearing aids, imperfections and all, than go back to the muddy pond that was once my hearing.

Meanwhile, for those of you who do not (yet) suffer hearing loss, consider this. Occupational health and safety advocates nonprofitrisk.org says the permissible top limit for noise exposure over an eight-hour period is 90 decibels.  If you don’t know what that means, here’s a short list:

  • 80 decibels: city traffic, manual machine, tools;
  • 90 decibels: lawn mower, motorcycle, tractor;
  • 100 decibels: woodworking shop, factory machinery;
  • 110 decibels: chainsaw, leaf blower;
  • 120 decibels: ambulance siren, heavy machinery, jet plane on runway;
  • 130 decibels: jackhammer, power drill.

So if you’ll recall the pangram we cited in the first paragraph. If you’ve got moderate hearing loss, Australian Hearing says this is what you will hear:

__e _i_ brown _o_ jum_ed over _e _azy dog.

Scary isn’t it!

Friday on My Mind was a weekly column by Bob Wilson, published by Bob & Laurel Wilson Consulting Pty Ltd. You can now catch up on occasional post-2023 Digressions or troll the archives on this website.

 

 

 

A new home for Friday on My Mind/Digressions

Bob and Nibbler putting the polish on the last FOMM from our Maleny home, circa 2019.

Nobody said it was going to be easy but in December 2024 I merged the content of our two websites into one, which means fans of The Goodwills and my long-running blog, Friday on My Mind, end up here.

I stopped writing the weekly essay just over a year ago, promising to produce occasional rants called Digressions. They have been few in number so far but I can feel one coming on.

The nine-year archive of Friday on My Mind can be found in the right hand side panel under the historic photo of me posing in the doorway of a stone cottage in Culloden, Scotland. I was born there, so claim birthright.

From now, all Goodwills posts and Digressions columns will appear on this website. If you are less interested in the music you can confine yourself to the right hand column. As warned, the Home page contains a constant stream of writing from today back to 2014, when I started the blog. It is more efficient to browse through the topics or search by key word (try Trump or Abbott).

The Goodwills website goes back further – to 1999 when the Internet was in its infancy and we had no idea what we were doing. That is why the original website name was hacked and pinched by a porn Queen. Ironic, eh.  It happened to Kristina Olsen too but she gets lots of laughs from the story when performing live.

The original bobwords website will soon disappear, as will the rather large invoice to maintain two websites. Just a word about the mailing lists. Of neccessity they have all been condensed into one (large) mailing list. It is a simple matter to unsubscribe and your contacts details will disappear from the database forever. You can always subscribe again. I’m working on that too, but Ukraine wasn’t built in a day, eh.

I’d say Happy New Year but given the tone of my next Digression and a new song (coming soon), let’s just say Good Luck.

Karen and Murray Law and The Goodwills

Karen-Law-The-Goodwills
After setting up sound gear, playing guitar and singing then packing it all away, Murray Law (left) took this lovely selfie of Mum and the Goodwills Trio.

As our songwriter friend Karen Law, co-host of two successful concerts on the Southern Downs in November said: “Let’s do it again sometime.”

The concerts at Eukey Hall on November 23 and St Mark’s Hall in Warwick on November 24 were well-attended and the audiences fulsome in their praise.  We even had to put out extra chairs.

Karen is already planning some concerts with us for next year.

Karen was launching her latest CD, Lifeline, accompanied on electric and acoustic guitar and vocals by her son Murray. Her sets were mostly drawn from this album but she also included Sweet in the Morning, my favourite song about her home town of Nambour.

We were joined yet again by fiddler and harmony singer Helen Rowe who also stepped up to play fiddle on one of Karen’s songs. Our only problem was, what to leave out. With a back catalogue of more than 100 published songs it’s a hard task preparing a set for a new audience. Yes, we should have done Underneath the Story Bridge. Next time.

If you missed our Southern Downs concerts, the best way to experience the music is to explore our respective pages at Bandcamp. This is an online shop for independent musicians. You can listen to songs at least three times before Bandcamp will ask you for money. There are singles and albums here. If you want to buy direct from the source, look up our websites. You know what to do. – Bob Wilson December 3, 2024

Karen Law Bandcamp

Karen Law Website

The Goodwills website

The Goodwills Bandcamp

 

 

 

Harris Biden Her Time

(Official White House Photo by Adam Schultz) Wikimedia creative commons

Perhaps it is the circles in which I travel, but of late it seemed to me every person who thinks deeply about life had one thing to say about the USA: How is it, in a country of 336 million people, that Joe Biden and Donald Trump are the only candidates for president? * (There’s also a Kennedy offspring, whose name escapes me, who plans to run. Ed)

This rhetorical question became academic after President Biden’s selfless decision in June to step aside and not contest the November election. Maybe nobody else noticed, but Biden flagged this about a day before it was revealed he had Covid (again). “If a doctor tells me to, I will step down.”

FYI Ronald Reagan said the same thing when pressed about his age and his health.

Not so much a promise but to keep the media guessing.

And the world’s media sent packs of journos, analysts and photographers to the US to provide a running commentary (interspersed with cunningly edited faux pas from the debate the Democrats would rather forget).

It was clear that Joe Biden’s 64-year career in politics was coming to an end, as the inevitable ageing process caught up with him. Let’s not forget President Biden’s steady hand as Barack Obama’s vice president from 2009 to 2017. But he was becoming frail, and something had to happen.

Collectively, we kept waiting for an Obama or Kennedy-like personality to emerge from the pack. There is Kamala Harris, a black, female Vice- President whose media profile was below the fold, as they say. Biden’s decision to endorse her as the Democrats candidate will change that exponentially. Regardless of reports that Harris has fumbled various tasks allotted to her,  she is a 59-year-old, well-credentialled lawyer who has been in the White House for nigh on four years. If Harris wins the election and becomes President, she will be 64 next time round and hopefully will have a younger deputy by her side.

But should this debate really be about age or disabilities?

Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) served as the 32nd president of the United States from 1933 until his death in 1945. He was not only the longest-serving US president, but he was also the only president to serve more than two terms. This was despite being confined to a wheelchair and relying on leg braces for mobility. Roosevelt developed polio aged 39 and spent the rest of his life running the US from a wheelchair.

Donald J Trump, who can walk unhindered, is a political naif compared to FDR.  Trump stands out for unpalatable precedents, including surviving a court challenge that pending criminal charges should disqualify him from running.

A scrum of judges, when asked should Donald Trump be granted immunity from prosecution, answered ‘some’. Or at least that was the word headline writers grabbed from a lengthy judgement. As some wag posted on social media when this was announced: ”So the American Revolution was for nothing”.

According to the official White House bio, Joe Biden, 46th President of the United States, ran for the White House on a platform which said he would “restore the Soul of America, rebuild the backbone of America – the middle class – and unite the country”.

Did he in fact do as he promised? Furthermore, as a rising 82-year-old, could he promise more of the same for a tenure which would have seen him celebrate his 86th birthday in office?

My research unearthed only one other candidate who led a major western country aged in his 80s. William Gladstone won a UK election in 1892 aged 82, resigning two years later. He was, however, PM on three other occasions (1868–74, 1880–85, 1886), all packed into a 60-year career in politics.

Point being, Donald Trump is no Gladstone.

Talk show hosts, comedians and lefty social media influencers pounce on any nonsensical utterance from Donald Trump. He’s an easy target but (a) he doesn’t care, (b) he can work a crowd), (c) he’s a salesman whose pitch attracts those who share his views and (d) he doesn’t care.

There was much conjecture about Biden’s mental acuity, not much of it from medicos, I might add.

Surely this was the main reason Democrats and ageist people alike wanted Biden to step down. They’d been calling it long before the debate debacle with Donald Trump.

There has also been similar speculation about the mental fitness of former president Trump, who comes to the campaign with a lot of baggage. This year Trump turned 78. If he wins the November election he will be 82 at the next election (though he recently told Christians to ‘vote now and you’ll never have to vote again’).

As with many things Trump says, that is open to interpretation.

The long (too long) televised debate left Joe Biden under the spotlight long enough for his emerging vagueness to become obvious. His faltering gait, especially when climbing up to the Presidential jet, a more than obvious sign of ageing (or underlying health condition).

In Biden’s defence, his long battle to overcome a stutter could explain his faltering speech patterns. Moreover, his decision to stand down indicates he is still capable of wise decision-making.

From a Down Under perspective, it is clear we don’t like old people running the country. The oldest person to be appointed Prime Minister of Australia was Sir John McEwan. He was 68 when appointed to a six-week caretaker role after the disappearance of sitting PM, Harold Holt.

The oldest person ever to serve as Prime Minister of Australia was Sir Robert Menzies, who left office one month and six days after his 71st birthday.According to www.australianpolitics.com, 9 of 31 Australian PMs took office aged in their 50s. McEwen, William McMahon and Malcolm Turnbull all took office in their 60s, but none were the result of an election. McEwen was a stop-gap PM after Holt disappeared; McMahon and Turnbull overthrew their predecessors.

The youngest PM lasted only four months. Chris Watson (ALP) took office at the age of 37. Of all our PMs since Federation, only 9 were younger than 50 when appointed.

Compare this with the USA, where 12 presidents got the keys to the Oval Office aged 60 or older, and four of them (Biden, Trump, Reagan and George Bush), were between 64 and 78 when sworn in.

From my perspective as an elder, the weeks and months of people urging Sleepy Joe to go revealed a clear bias against older people as no longer being capable of holding down serious jobs.

There is no official retirement age in Australia (apart from judges who must stand down at 70 and Catholic priests, who can work until they are 75). The Age Discrimination in Employment Act forbids employers from forcing their employees to retire.

Much of the desire to retire revolves around when you qualify for the age pension (in Australia this is now 67).

An ABC report in 2023 cited Census statistics that showed more than 65,000 Australians in their 70s worked full time (3% of that age group). The 2021 Census also revealed that 5,200 people aged in their 80s worked full-time. About double that number worked part-time.

Our cohort continues to slave away when they should have their feet up, primarily because of punitive social security and tax systems, and/or personal circumstances.

We’ll get our chance next year to pick the (relatively young) politician who promises to do most for the disadvantaged. It won’t happen of course, but we will hear lots of promises from Peter Dutton (55 in 2025) and Anthony Albanese (62).

Domestic events aside, the US election in November is the most crucial since Nixon faced impeachment. It means a lot to Australia to be able to work with a capable, cogent, energetic leader and Kamala Harris seems to fit the job description.

The US media appears to have allowed Harris a brief honeymoon but do not think it will stay like that. It won’t.

 

The Goodwills video collection

May 30, 2024

Bob’s been editing and updating our website video page. There’s quite a bit of ‘content’ on there now, including video slideshows accompanying the studio recordings. Some of these videos have had quite a lot of views. You can help this process by liking a video, subscribing to the channel and sharing links with people you think would enjoy our music.

In 2024 we will be doing more of this as (1) it is the most cost-effective way of keeping in touch and (b) motivates us to stop watching Married at First Sight (LOL).

Click on the link here

Caring for the Dispossessed

Bob and Laurel performing on the Bohemia Bar stage at the National Folk Festival in Canberra. Photo by Karina Red.

Our latest song is a fairly accurate description of contemporary life in Australia and its moral dilemmas. Bob was inspired to write this after finding an old black and white photo of his grandfather (a stonemason in Bob’s Scottish hometown). The Highland Clearances are mentioned here in the context of the plight of First Australians, homeless people and refugees.

We entered this in the 2024 Alistair Hulett Songs for Social Justice Award, the last time this award will be offered. Bob’s song, When Whitlam Took his Turn at the Wheel, was awarded the prize in 2022.

This year’s awardee is Paddy McHugh for an as-yet unreleased song about Lismore and its disastrous floods (A Hatchet in the Roof). Award coordinator Bob Fagan told the audience at a special National Folk Festival concert on March 30 that 200 songs for social justice had been written and offered to the judges in the 14 years the award has been held. After the concert (when eight of the awardees performed their songs), some audience members commented that some or all of these songs ought to be on a CD (or a download). We second that!

The 2024 concert in the Budawang included songs by Fred Smith, Penelope Swales, Snez, Miguele Heatmole, Tony Eardley, Tripple Effect, Karen Law and The Goodwills. There was also a rousing all-in version of Alistair’s famous song, “The Swaggies”, led by Murray Law and Fred Smith’s band.

To listen to and/or download, follow this link