(Above: B. A. Santamaria. Spiritual leader of the Liberal party, Tony Abbott and Barnaby Joyce. Quick, rush off to Archbishop Pell's funeral oration here, to learn more, or drop in here for a review of his selected letters, as launched by Tony Abbott).
Hooray for Gerard Henderson.
"He's certainly picking up on a lot of our ideas," said Mr Thies. "I found him very receptive."
"We've also got a lot of supporters in western Queensland and they run into Barnaby all the time -- I'm sure they give him our material and talk to him about it," said Mr Isherwood.
"There's nothing direct with Barnaby, but indirectly, we all run in the same paddock."
The last years of Santamaria's life were dominated by two great concerns: the restoration of authority in the Catholic Church and the creation of a political party that people of traditional Australian values could readily vote for other than under threat of fine. In a 1982 letter to Peter Coleman, he complained about the "modernist revolt against the authority of the Church as a whole and the papacy in particular".
In a 1992 letter to Philip Ayres, he said that the roots of a new political party "rest within the Nationals, what are broadly regarded as the social conservatives among the Liberals … and the DLP factor which still exists … within … Labor". I'm not sure, given his constitutional pessimism, that he would have taken the accession of Pope Benedict and the ascendancy of Cardinal Pell here in Australia as vindication, but it is.
It hasn't meant the end of altar girls or the revival of plain-chant in ordinary parish churches (as he wished), but it has meant markedly less equivocation and half-heartedness about Catholic beliefs and their relevance for the wider world.
In the meantime, though, the DLP is alive and well and living inside the Howard Government, and Labor's SDA (Shop Distributive and Allied Employees' Association) caucus has a leader who should at least give them a fair hearing. The times may not have suited his more dire predictions, but they have been kinder to his values.
Sheesh. More than Tony?
I was lucky to know B.A. Santamaria for the last 22 years of his life, to have attended diligently to his writing and speaking over that time and to have been the beneficiary of the occasional private lunch and long phone call.
I am honoured to have been asked to help launch these memoirs, as there are many whom he knew better and loved more. Perfectionist that he was, I'm fairly sure that I would have been a disappointment to him. Still, hardly a day passes without recalling his example and its challenge to do more, better.
No, really, his problem isn't language, or a sense of irony, or even what he uses to wipe his bum. That just makes him a real dude, in the manner of a big Lebowski. So attention should be paid, room must be made:
The National Party is never likely to again dominate the Coalition. However, there should be room for Joyce's economic and social philosophy and his message is likely to have some appeal to regional and rural Australia. Hence the Nationals' advertising campaign some six months out from the election.
Hooray for Gerard Henderson.
Just when it looked like Barners was going to disappear from public view, or at least settle down to some quiet pillow chewing time, the stolid prattling Polonius manages to trot out a stern defence in stentorian tones in Laugh at your peril: Joyce is not a joke.
In a remarkable bout of revisionism, Henderson devotes an entire column to slaying Barnaby Joyce's flippant enemies, those fearsome dragons of mirth, and celebrating him and the National Party's role on the political stage.
Primly, the pert apologist points out that Joyce was born in Tamworth, brought up in nearby Danglemah, sent to a Jesuit college in Riverview, and studied commerce at the University of New England, before heading off to St George in Queensland.
Now gentle reader it is a remarkable coincidence that I too was born in the centre of the Universe known as Tamworth, and indeed once mingled with the fine lads who went on to make up a remarkable generation of rural scientists and agricultural economists. Talk about beer vomitus from sundry acts of emesis and groping paws. No wonder the University of New England is regularly hailed as an inland Harvard. Apart from the odd dalliance with bankruptcy, they have Judith Wright to point to as an inspiration.
The agitated Henderson gets upset at Andrew Fraser's Barnaby Joyce voices a far Right platform, which linked Barners to Lyndon LaRouche's Citizens Electorial Council, noting that Fraser's evidence for a physical link is that Barners had been placed on the CEC's mailing list.
Never mind any spiritual connection. Andrews actually took some time to talk to a few CEC types:
The party's former candidate in Blair, Dick Thies, a retired builder and farmer from the Darling Downs, spoke to Senator Joyce at a meeting against climate change in Roma in October.
"He's certainly picking up on a lot of our ideas," said Mr Thies. "I found him very receptive."
And this:
"We've also got a lot of supporters in western Queensland and they run into Barnaby all the time -- I'm sure they give him our material and talk to him about it," said Mr Isherwood.
"There's nothing direct with Barnaby, but indirectly, we all run in the same paddock."
That'd be the back paddock, which is unfortunately short of a few sheep at the moment.
And then Henderson is appalled by the comical approach of Guy Rundle saying that Joyce hailed from "deep rural Queensland" when indeed the correct term is the "deep north", in much the same way as those in the United States talk of the "deep south".
Proving that he has a splendid sense of humour, Henderson then goes on to rail at Mungo MacCallum:
... MacCallum asserted that Joyce believes "the world is run by an international conspiracy of Jewish bankers, or possibly Masonic bankers, or possibly Martian bankers". At least Rundle rejected the assertion that Barnaby Joyce is anti-Semitic.
Amazingly Henderson fails to note that Barners, as well as not being anti-Masonic and anti-Semitic, is definitively not anti-Martian.
Then having slayed the so-called, alleged humorists, smirking into their lattes as they sip their chardonnays somewhere near Ultimo, it's on to the positives. Barners lists the St Vincent de Paul Society as a hobby, as any good Catholic should, and Australian Catholics aren't anti-semitic (or even anti-Martian), and if anything, Barners is under the wonderful influence of B. A. Santamaria and the National Civil Council. Oops, think that's a typo, it's the National Civic Council, but we catch Hendo's drift. And what concerned B. A. Santamaria?
In the famous Melbourne University debate about the Spanish Civil War, he declared: "When the bullets of the atheists struck the statue of Christ outside the cathedral in Madrid, for some that was just steel striking brass. But for me, those bullets were piecing the heart of Christ the King."
He could engender a thrill in the heart that was part patriotism, part Christian idealism and part "fighting the good fight".
Oops, sorry, that's not Barners, that's Tony Abbott delivering an address at the launch of Santamaria's letters at the State Library of Victoria on January 30th, 2007, as faithfully reproduced by News Weekly here.
And after the DLP fell on hard times, what then? Tell us Tony:
The last years of Santamaria's life were dominated by two great concerns: the restoration of authority in the Catholic Church and the creation of a political party that people of traditional Australian values could readily vote for other than under threat of fine. In a 1982 letter to Peter Coleman, he complained about the "modernist revolt against the authority of the Church as a whole and the papacy in particular".
In a 1992 letter to Philip Ayres, he said that the roots of a new political party "rest within the Nationals, what are broadly regarded as the social conservatives among the Liberals … and the DLP factor which still exists … within … Labor". I'm not sure, given his constitutional pessimism, that he would have taken the accession of Pope Benedict and the ascendancy of Cardinal Pell here in Australia as vindication, but it is.
It hasn't meant the end of altar girls or the revival of plain-chant in ordinary parish churches (as he wished), but it has meant markedly less equivocation and half-heartedness about Catholic beliefs and their relevance for the wider world.
Altar girls! How preposterous. And the Pellists as vindication!
In the meantime, though, the DLP is alive and well and living inside the Howard Government, and Labor's SDA (Shop Distributive and Allied Employees' Association) caucus has a leader who should at least give them a fair hearing. The times may not have suited his more dire predictions, but they have been kinder to his values.
Oh dear, I got so captivated by Tony and B. A., and Tony's fine solo stand in Q&A last night - did they hear loon ponders rail at the format of six gibbering panelists? - that we're drifted, Rourke's Drift style - from Hendo and Barners.
Joyce is his own man. But he does reflect certain Santamaria positions, much more so than Tony Abbott.
Sheesh. More than Tony?
I was lucky to know B.A. Santamaria for the last 22 years of his life, to have attended diligently to his writing and speaking over that time and to have been the beneficiary of the occasional private lunch and long phone call.
I am honoured to have been asked to help launch these memoirs, as there are many whom he knew better and loved more. Perfectionist that he was, I'm fairly sure that I would have been a disappointment to him. Still, hardly a day passes without recalling his example and its challenge to do more, better.
Guess that makes Barners one of the inner core, perhaps even one of twelve or so key disciples. Now spot the difference between Barners and Tony on policy matters:
Joyce is no fan of free enterprise or globalisation and believes in a degree of protectionism. He is a patriot and has a genuine concern about the communist regime in China. What's more, Joyce has empathy for the down and out, and expresses traditional Catholic views on such issues as abortion.
Yes! Barners is more Catholic than Tony Abbott! Except when it comes to protectionism, when he's an agrarian socialist. Which naturally leads to a concern about communism.
But Hendo, that eternally prattling Polonius, does insist that there is a modest downside to Barners:
He does not appear to be able to say "no" to a media appearance and is yet to constrain his language when a microphone is present. Yet his problem is not language or occasional bad taste but a lack of policy depth and a tendency to exaggerate. And he has been in national politics for only five years.
The National Party is never likely to again dominate the Coalition. However, there should be room for Joyce's economic and social philosophy and his message is likely to have some appeal to regional and rural Australia. Hence the Nationals' advertising campaign some six months out from the election.
Meantime, I think Hendo deserves a special prattling award, for failing to note once in his piece that Barners was given the royal order of the sideways shuffle boot by Tony Abbott for too many egregious outbursts, beyond what even Abbott could tolerate, perhaps finally sensing that Barners was a threshing machine constantly in search of wheat, but unable to tell the grain from the chaff (we speak in those kinds of metaphors, we solid citizens of Tamworth).
And don't get me wrong, we love Barners here at the pond. There should always be room at the inn for Barners, and his solid, real, rural folksy presence, hey true blue, so that comedians everywhere can rejoyce and have plenty of material for a slow night at an alt country show in St Kilda. Go you St Kilda cowgirls.
Any goose that keeps on giving golden eggs is revered on the farm.
Why I can't think of a better way to spend a few hours at work than to do a search of Crikey, and spend a few hours reviewing Joyce's golden moments, here.
May he keep on giving, so that Tamworth and UNE will be renowned and revered throughout the known universe, and Gerard Henderson can keep waffling and prattling, and Tamworth can, in due course, become the capital of the grand new state of New England, before eventually becoming the federal capital of this fair land (as Canberra is only full of bureaucrats and politicians and reports only suitable for the dunny or swatting flies or killing redbacks).
Barners, cobber, mate, dinkum didgeridoo, jolly jumbuck, just like the Marrickville mauler, we loves ya. Truly rooly. We owe it all to you ...
(Below: an illustration of a loveable jumbuck being given a dinkum cuddle. Work hard for that patch, Scouters).
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