Gerard Henderson, alternative history, and how a mining tax is just like bank nationalisation ...

(Above: a few cartoons to get the week under way. For interpretation and activities, why not head off to the discovering democracy unit here? Class, is there room for Mr Henderson? Someone let him sit in the back row.)

It's time for an alternate, bizarro, 'what if' history lesson as the perfect way to wend the way back into a short working week, and who better as guide than the esteemed historian Gerard Henderson, as he scribbles High-handed intransigence can sink even a new PM.

It's a routine saw that every Commonwealth government has been elected to a second term since the Scullin government crashed out at the height of the depression. Even the Whitlam government notched up a second win.

But if you're Gerard Henderson, with a wink of the eye, a click of the fingers, a clashing of the heels, and a hey presto, or perhaps an Ali Baba-ish open sesame, all that can be transformed before your very eyes, and suddenly you're in Kansas with him in high heels:

True. But this overlooks the fact that Gough Whitlam's Labor government would have lost an election at the end of its scheduled three-year term. It was saved this fate because the Coalition threatened to block supply in the Senate and Whitlam used this tactic as an excuse to call an early election. Labor won in May 1974 but lost comprehensively in December 1975 - three years after it was first elected.

Yep, when you have a crystal ball, all becomes clear. Governments which might have won could certainly have lost, and those that win can be adjudged to have certainly lost. Because a win in May 1974, confirming the rule that governments tend to win a second term can be over-ruled by the intuitive certainty that they would have lost in a phantom election to follow.

Try this at home folks, and you can imagine Australia defeating Italy and going on to win the World Cup. Sure it's a little hard in the current environment, but remember a win is only a guide to a certain loss.

Is there any wonder that after reading the spin of the commentariat, there's always a feeling of falling down the rabbit hole with Alice. No need even for caterpillars and mushrooms. Henderson even has the cheek to open his opus thus:

Contrary to the prevailing cliche, history does not repeat itself - either as tragedy or farce. However, at times historical comparisons are useful and precedent plays a part in all democratic societies.

But what of alternative history and fanciful airs and interpretations? What role science fiction in history?

After that, it's a gathering around the campfire so that the kiddies can be told of the demonic engine driver Ben Chifley and his fiendish desire to nationalise the banks. It's a tale told by the elders of the conservative horde with lip-smacking relish. Of course it's all worked out tremendously well since, and we like to think of the bonuses paid to the employees of Goldman Sachs as a wonderful tribute to the way they've handled the world economy.

We keed, we keed, the whole point of Henderson in bringing up the nationalisation of banks is to run a parallel book on Chairman Rudd's taxing of the mining industry.

You see, taxing an industry is exactly the same as nationalising it, and full of the same risks, thereby proving that history as a precedent is extraordinarily useful to commentariat commentators:

Chifley's bank nationalisation legislation was aimed at the well-off executives who ran the private banks. It sparked the expected response from what Labor liked to call the ''top end of town''. But the decision was counterproductive in that it also threatened all private sector bank employees, including relatively lowly paid tellers and clerks. Menzies' appeal to what he called "the forgotten people" - meaning the middle class - had not worked in 1946. But, thanks to Chifley, Menzies' message certainly cut through in the December 1949 election.

Oh dear, alarums should be sounding for Chairman Rudd, as he simply doesn't understand that a super tax is the same as nationalisation, as he sends in the government apparatchiks to take control of the mining industry, snatching it away from bereft billionaires.

After Labor's defeat, Chifley conceded to his friend Frank Green that he had moved too fast on banking and that this had led to Labor's defeat. He had an opportunity to back off after the defeat of the legislation in the High Court, but ploughed on.

Labor should start as the favourite to win the 2010 election since it has the benefit of being an incumbent government presiding over a relatively strong economy. However, the precedents of 1975 and 1949 should be cause for sobering reflection.

Yep, the precedents that bring pissed as parrots Aussie drunks to moments of sobering reflection - rugby league footballers everywhere calling for a minute's silence so they can ponder racism.

Ain't it grand that in Henderson's fictional 'what if' world, the Whitlam government's first victory doesn't count, and in the second handsome precedent, that bank nationalisation is the same as a tax on mining.

Now any teacher of history would mark down a student for maintaining this strange set of precedents as a sensible guide to current events, but Henderson has no shame:

Any government can lose three years after a big victory - John Howard went close to suffering this fate in 1998. Moreover, Kevin Rudd has to be careful that he does not "do a Chifley" with his resources super profits tax by uniting both wealthy mining executives and entrepreneurs with miners, contractors, and medium and small businesses that benefit from a booming mining industry.

Banks = mining = QED "do a Chifley" = Chairman Rudd does a Chifley = Chairman Rudd is Gough Whitlam = Chifley + Whitlam = Chairman Rudd = your worst nightmare.

But you see here's the rub. The desire to nationalise the banks was part of a time when elements in the Labor party were genuinely socialist, and coming after the second world war (not a precedent or a repeat of the first world war, we hasten to add, firm in our Hendersonian understanding), and they embarked on bank nationalisation with too little thought and too little understanding of the way the economy would function in a post-war environment.

During the war, Australia had become as socialist and government-controlled as it ever would at any time, with rationing in place, and the organisation of every aspect of society in a way that would turn the whole towards the war effort.

Talk about historical circumstances and precedents. In the current affluent situation in Australia, there is simply no parallel between bank nationalisation and the mining tax, except a simple minded one, and the obvious one, that the implementation has been flawed. But then Rudd expected to have a barney, he just thought he'd do better in the barney.

Back to Henderson:

There is a case that successful mining companies should pay more tax. Rudd's error has been to impose a new tax on mining without adequate consultation with the industry and without properly communicating the decision to the electorate.

Now imagine Henderson writing this back in the fifties, since alternative history is all the go:

There is a case that the banks should be nationalised. Mr. Chifley's error has been to attempt to nationalise the banks without adequate consultation with the industry and without properly communicating the decision to the electorate.

Yeah sure. In your dreams, and in your alternative history world, old chum.

Well it wouldn't be a good start to the week if our pompous Polonius didn't deliver a statement of the bleeding obvious:

Obviously there are vested interests in this controversy - from the Minerals Council of Australia on one side to the weekend's intervention of the Australia Council of Social Service and the ACTU on the other.

Do tell, old chum. Vested interests? You mean the billionaires are antsy? What fun to read Mike Carlton on the plight of the hapless billionaires (here):

''One must have a heart of stone to read the death of little Nell without laughing,'' said Oscar Wilde of Charles Dickens's most tragic heroine. I feel much the same as I watch the mining magnates wringing their hands, rending their garments and uttering up their piteous cries about the horrors of the resources super profits tax. They were the picture of abject misery when the Prime Minister visited Perth on Wednesday.

Poor Gina Rinehart could barely speak. ''Axe the tax!'' she croaked, double chins wobbling furiously.

A funnier writer than Henderson, but I digress. You see, and this is the tragic Freudian implications of Henderson's entire column, his dreaming and his desire, is that he just wants to foretell the end of Chairman Rudd, and he'll lure someone, anyone, and any historical precedent he dig up, disinter, scrounge around and find, and enlist it into the cause:

But voices have also been heard criticising the Rudd government's approach from Labor supporters and commentators who are not unfriendly to social democratic governments. Last week the Trade Minister, Simon Crean, acknowledged that there should have been more consultation with the mining industry. And the likes of Vince Fitzgerald and Geoff Carmody have criticised the structure of the resources tax.

The precedents of 1949 and 1975 indicate that poorly structured policy plus stubbornness can lead to a quick desertion of Labor voters to the Coalition. It's worth remembering that Menzies and Malcolm Fraser were not all that popular when they defeated Chifley and Whitlam respectively.

You see! Even the wretched mad monk can do it, he can win, even if he has all the popularity of a black snake in an outside dunny.

Well we're not big fans of Chairman Rudd - mentioning Senator Conroy around the house can produce a sound boxing of the ears - but we are big fans of Australian history. And this kind of drivel, dressed up as history, when it's really speculative desire urging on a coalition victory, must stop.

Cease and desist Mr Henderson. Look up the difference between an actual second electoral victory, and skipping ahead to a third loss, and the difference between nationalisation and a mining tax.

Write your propaganda if you will, but don't wreck the past for inquiring sensitive young historically inclined minds, should the nation have any left to inquire ...

(Below: and now for a few more cartoons of an historical kind).