Raven Paradox

After a little more research using the official Reserve Bank of Australia’s website and also the Australian Prime Ministers website, I discovered some interesting facts about Howard’s years as treasurer.

Fact – he was treasurer from the 19th of November 1977 until the 11th of March, 1983

Fact – during his time as treasurer, interest rates peaked at 22%

Fact – the average interest rate during his tenure was 12.66%

Fact – he left Labor with interest rates of 13.95% when Fraser’s government lost office in 1983

Fact – when he became treasurer, interest rates were 10.25%. when he left office as treasurer, they were 13.95% – 3.7% higher.

Fact – during Labor’s tenure in government (12th March, 1983 – 11th March, 1996), the average interest rate was 12.22%

Fact – Labor left Howard’s government with 90 day interest rates of 7.51%

Fact – Labor reduced interest rates by 6.44%

On the balance of it, it would appear that Howard’s claim of interest rates always being higher under Labor is, well, quite untrue.

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John Howard has been consistent.

He has consistently been a master at playing upon the fear of the electorate.

Most of the time, the fears and prejudices he has evoked from within the dark recesses of the minds of the populace have been ill conceived – but they have worked – they have kept him in power.

The sad thing is that it hasn’t just been the ignorant or uneducated who have fallen for the seductive speeches of the master of wedge politics – at some point, almost everyone has fallen for it, I know that I have, sadly it seems that the educated and affluent have fallen for it regularly. Some examples of the fears that he has played upon regularly are:

• Interest rates
• Refugees
• National security
• Economic prosperity
• Industrial relations/Unions

Look at the above five items, they are all issues that might be used emotively, that might be used to cause fear because they are all related to our sense of personal security.

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