Election 2016: Why Bill Shorten is right about 'barking mad' Donald Trump

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This was published 7 years ago

Election 2016: Why Bill Shorten is right about 'barking mad' Donald Trump

By Daniel Flitton
Updated

If diplomacy is about careful language, remember "alliance" is spelt differently from "allegiance".

Australian and American politicians will disagree from time to time, and there is absolutely no reason to panic.

George Dubya once branded Mark Latham a "disaster", or at least Latham's promise when opposition leader in 2004 to bring Australia's troops home from Iraq.

The US President had only just endorsed his good mate John Howard as a "Man of Steel".

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump

More than a decade later we can have a rich debate about who made the right call.

Latham, in recognising early the invasion of Iraq was a catastrophic mistake?

Or Bush, in judging Latham's leadership of Labor as a catastrophic mistake?

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Which brings us to Bill Shorten and his character assessments of the sometimes "barking mad" Donald Trump. Malcolm Turnbull is right that foreign interventions are rarely popular, and it will be fascinating to see if barking Donald bites back. But the more important lesson is to recognise allies can disagree about priorities and remain close.

US President George W. Bush presents former Australian prime minister John Howard with Medal of Freedom during a ceremony at the White House in 2009.

US President George W. Bush presents former Australian prime minister John Howard with Medal of Freedom during a ceremony at the White House in 2009.Credit: Mark Wilson

Friends should be free to offer robust criticism and point out potential mistakes. And it is not really a partisan argument to worry that putting Trump in the Oval Office would be a mistake. Plenty of Republicans are deeply, deeply alarmed about just that very prospect.

As much as hardheads tell us the relationship with the US has strong bipartisan support, there will at times be an affinity with leaders from the same end of the political spectrum.

Republican presidential candidate, Donald Trump.

Republican presidential candidate, Donald Trump.Credit: AP

Howard and Bush, for example, or Kevin Rudd and Barack Obama.

Howard, curiously, once branded Obama to be the Osama bin Laden candidate of choice.

But this is a world of unprecedented connection. News and instant punditry saturates the world, there is every reason to expect politics will intrude on relationships.

Obama dragged US allies into the American election this week by declaring foreign leaders to be "rattled" by Trump's stunning rise to the Republican nomination.

Bill Shorten has merely given voice to that concern - as have others on the Liberal side of the fence.

When it suits their argument, leaders will invoke the old maxim that politics should cease at the water's edge.

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But a better way to conduct diplomacy is to be straightforward and honest - and speaking frankly, plenty of Australians worry about the World According to Donald Trump.

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