Malcolm Turnbull's memoirs are a bookend to the long Baby-Boomer hegemony in Australian politics. For decades, the Boomer generation have enjoyed Australia’s golden years, enjoying advantages in wealth accumulation and war avoidance that no prior Australian generation has had.
Malcolm’s memoirs are, also, the final, or at least one can hope it is the final, shot to be fired in the dismal long decade of Australian politics, from the defeat of John Howard and the election of Kevin Rudd in November 2007 to the fall of Malcolm himself in August 2018.
Australia’s Depression & War generations endured hardships & built for a future prosperity they could never themselves enjoy.
Our Boomers, successively, avoided Vietnam, indulged themselves, and, on taking power, deregulated & privatised whatever public goods they could.
Our Boomers, successively, avoided Vietnam, indulged themselves, and, on taking power, deregulated & privatised whatever public goods they could.
Malcolm's & fellow Boomers won the intergenerational war - we are now still enduring their long victory lap. Succeeding generations would be paid less, live more insecure lives, and be burdened with costs and denied opportunities that Boomers enjoyed to an unprecedented degree.
In Malcolm’s case, his own worst tendencies – as a very wealthy Boomer, who literally acquired & got to do it all, including hold the Prime Ministership – only to then turn around & complain about how hard done by he has been, are, in many ways, a fitting end to this Boomer era.
Moreover, given that every Liberal leader since John Gorton has departed Canberra as an embittered mess, Malcolm’s writing of his memoirs to 'get square' with his treacherous former colleagues is, really, Malcolm positioning himself in the mainstream of former Liberal leaders.
In their own ways, Kevin Rudd, Julia Gillard, Tony Abbott, and Malcolm Turnbull, were able people, who could have made more significant contributions to Australia, if…they had not been who they were. That this dishonourable decade ends in this whimpering way is, really, fitting.
The loss of our last really conservative Prime Minister, Malcolm Fraser, to Bob Hawke ushered in the Hawke-Keating-Howard liberalisation era of Australian economy & society. There is probably a room for a work on Australian politics called, "From Malcolm's End To Malcolm's End".
