Didn't cover much of it here due to extended break from blogging, but this piece from The Guardian, published in August, sums up the Australian Coup to the 2010 Federal Election period perfectly :

Here was a Labor government which had breasted the world financial crisis better than almost any other developed state. Here was an administration facing up to the realities of Australia's environmental situation, the constraints represented by the country's limited water supplies and agricultural land, and its vulnerability to fire, flood, drought and other hazards made worse by global warming. Here was a leadership with plans to impose more realistic taxes on the extractive industries that control the nation's most important assets. Here was a government, in other words, ready to discard the myth of "Big Australia", of a nation that could be pumped up to super-size by immigration and the breakneck exploitation of its mineral resources, and settle for a more modest vision of the future. And this reining-in carried with it the possibility of attending more effectively to the social inequality that had been increasing in Australia in recent years.

In all this it had the broad backing of most of the electorate. So how did this translate into a performance at the polls so dismal that the Australian Labor party is either headed for opposition, or, if it stays in power, will have only a tiny majority provided by a handful of independent MPs and one Green? The answer is a cautionary tale involving the power of Australia's mining and energy industries, the loss of nerve in the face of that power by two Labor leaders in succession, and the determination of the leader of the opposition Liberal National party.

The Rest Is Here

The Australian, July 14 :

Americans who are attending the annual conference (with Kevin Rudd) are curious.

They wonder how it happened that an Australian leader who appeared so popular and so comfortable on the world stage only 12 months ago could be tossed out so quickly -- even before he had faced an election.

Yes, what an absolute mystery it is.

The Australian, June 26 :




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Wreckage

From this :



And this :



To this :



And this :



Homer Simpson :

"When will people learn? Democracy doesn't work."


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How The Media Welcomed Julia Gillard, Prime Minister

A round-up of graphics from local and international online news sites announcing the results of the Australian Coup.

ABC News Online :



7News online :



CNN :



Daily Telegraph :



News.com.au :



Herald Sun :


News.com.au :

New York Times :




Sydney Morning Herald online :



And two particular favourites to close. The Illawara Mercury :



And Al Jazeera :



The Murdoch media decides it's okay, now the coup is over, to call it a coup :




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Peter Hartcher :

Kevin Rudd’s polling numbers were no worse than John Howard’s had been at the same point in the electoral cycle on several occasions before he went on to win.

Howard managed to rally his party, campaign and win. Rudd has not been given the same opportunity.

Rudd’s poll support fell brutally in April and May, but had stabilised. Two polls this week, a Newspoll and an Essential Media survey, put Labor ahead by 52 per cent to 48 on the election-deciding two-party share of the vote.

As the former national secretary of the Labor Party, Bob McMullan, told a caucus meeting on Tuesday, no government sitting on these polls numbers this close to an election had lost.

And no opposition leader as unpopular as Tony Abbott at this point in the cycle had gone on to win.

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Call It What It Is, A Coup

By Darryl Mason

Did it really only take the mere rumour that prime minister Kevin Rudd was considering a super-profits tax, like he was planning for Australia's richest miners, to be imposed on all of Australia's most profitable corporations, for the coup to commence?

It began, as most major news stories do these days, with a Twitter update. ABC News on Twitter announced before the 7pm news that prime minister Kevin Rudd was fighting a coup :


This news was retweeted (republished) minutes later by ABC managing director Mark Scott to around 30,000 followers, including every journalist, business leader, investor, news junkie in Australia who realises Twitter is where news breaks first now :


ABC political reporter Chris Uhlmann pumped the news out to thousands more on Twitter :


It was no longer conservative media and Liberal Party-allied media fantasy. Their dream of a Julia Gillard prime ministership had come true, many months early, and the Rudd government was tearing itself apart.

Minutes later, ABC News Online published this story :



The original brief ABC News Online story, posted shortly after 7pm Wednesday (now swallowed up and changed through updates) :

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's leadership is under siege tonight from some of the Labor Party's most influential factional warlords.

The ABC has learned that powerful party figures have been secretly canvassing numbers for a move to dump the Prime Minister and replace him with his deputy, Julia Gillard.

It appears she has rebuffed the advances, but it is a measure of the disquiet which has been building in the party since Mr Rudd's approval ratings began their precipitous slide in April.

Ministers and party members have been lining up all week to voice their support for Mr Rudd but behind the scenes, party leaders have been contemplating a leadership change.

Although Mr Rudd looks likely to survive the challenge, news of the attempted coup will undoubtedly weaken him.

It is understood that the only thing holding the Prime Minister up is that his deputy refuses to join in a bid to bring him down.

The essential word "coup" appears to be missing from later stories, all other news sites and nearly all late night TV and radio reports.

A few hours after ABC News Online broke the story, prime minister Kevin Rudd faced a press conference to announce a leadership vote Thursday morning at 9am. He seemed mildly stunned, but firm, and railed against the right factions of the Australian Labor Party, all but shouting that he wouldn't let the Labor right wing take over the government; the same right factions who had almost effortlessly plunged the Australian government into utter chaos, with days of stock market uncertainty to follow.

Frontbenchers of the Rudd government were seen sitting in their Parliament House offices, watching news of the coup unfolding around them on the TV, mouthing words that simplify out as "What The Fuck?"

By 11pm, Julia Gillard was a bigger discussion subject on Twitter than even the World Cup, which is fucking remarkable :



Kevin Rudd's name briefly climbed into the Twitter Trending Topics list, but not for long.

Newspaper front pages aren't online yet, to round up for this, however bizarre, truly historic event in Australian politics and Australian democracy. But the pre-midnight graphics of Australian online news sites clearly spelled out the (perhaps only brief) federal government disaster unfolding. None with more fever than the Murdoch media, who have been all but hysterically demanding Julia Gillard replace Kevin Rudd as prime minister for months.

Adelaide Now :



News.com. au :



The Australian Financial Review :



ABC News :


The Australian :



In fact The Australian was so excited they invented a new word to mark this historic occasion :



The Sydney Morning Herald :



NineMSN :



The Age :



The Herald Sun :



The Daily Telegraph :



How dare Kevin Rudd be "defiant"? Who does he think he is? The democratically elected prime minister of Australia?

The face of our new prime minister, Julia Gillard, as she exited Parliament House last night, after what some media reported as a solid two hours of yelling and raging "discussion" in the prime minister's office :


(screengrab from graphic on The Australian)

If Julia Gillard wins the Labor Party vote to replace Kevin Rudd, she has to call an election. Immediately. As all new leaders of any state or federal government should and must, but rarely, do when they rise to peak power through internal wranglings and not by the vote of the public.

Democracy demands it.

Remember?

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Fair Shake Of The Coup Bottle

One of the final messages from @KevinRuddPM on Twitter :



It should have read : This is still a democracy.

In Australia, coups don't require military assistance. So far.


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