George and Charlotte’s angelic smiles can’t melt Paul Keating’s cold, republican heart
Paul Keating thinks leadership is what’s keeping us from becoming a republic. The former prime minister in The Australian, Monday:
A whole series of prime ministers have broken the nation’s heart on the republic … Australia is a diminished country, diminished by its own hand.
We would argue this woman is the biggest roadblock to the republic. Britain’s The Times, December 3 last year:
Meghan Markle will join the royal family for Christmas at Sandringham in yet another break with tradition for a woman who is the first mixed-race American divorcee to marry into the royal family.
As well as this woman. The Times, November 23 last year:
… the Duchess of Cambridge looked remarkably composed yesterday as she defied advice and drove over a rocky off-road course while pregnant.
Then there are these dudes. The Times, November 17 last year:
The Duke of Cambridge and his brother (Prince Harry) filmed cameo appearances as stormtroopers for the forthcoming Star Wars film, The Last Jedi …
Not to mention the wee bairns … AAP, July 23 last year:
The memory of “Granny Diana” is being kept alive for Prince George and Princess Charlotte by their father, who regularly talks to them about his mother.
Malcolm Turnbull wants to put the royals’ relationship with Australia to a vote. The Prime Minister at Bondi Beach, Monday:
I think the first thing you would need to do is have an honest, open discussion about how a president would be elected … maybe even a postal survey, given the success of the marriage postal survey …
Why the Prime Minister is starting the year talking about a republic of all things is anybody’s guess. The Australian’s editorial, yesterday:
Mr Turnbull is correct in saying there is no immediate appetite for Australia to become a republic. There are more important issues to tend to, not least boosting productivity and competitiveness …
Though this may be a good place to start. Keating speaking to The Australian’s Troy Bramston, Monday:
He has little or no policy ambition and commensurably little imagination, no system of prevailing beliefs … Was (his republicanism) just Malcolm being another chameleon, doing another chameleon act as he has on so many other things? You know, I was real but is Malcolm real?
Keating knows how to catch them. The former Labor prime minister speaking at an ALP fundraising event in NSW’s Blue Mountains, March 31, 2016:
Turnbull … fundamentally he is a cherry on top of a compost heap …
With a little bit of bait and a whole lot of patience … The former Labor prime minister on ABC radio, November 25, 2007:
Malcolm Turnbull is a bit like a big red bunger on cracker night. You light him up, there’s a bit of a fizz but then nothing. Nothing.
The big fish eventually will come to you. Turnbull responds to his predecessor on Bondi Beach, Monday:
Paul’s remarks today were, I thought, they were barely coherent … He seems to be critical of every prime minister and former prime minister apart from himself … it must be good for Paul to feel that he is without fault or blemish.