Rudd's republic a work in progress
KEVIN Rudd's brand of brash diplomacy - speaking out on Tibet while in Beijing, telling Pakistan publicly to lift its game in Afghanistan before telling President Pervez Musharraf privately - extended last week to putting the Queen in her place.
A few hours before seeing her at Windsor Castle, he declared himself to be "a lifelong republican" and added: "I expect that in the course of the year ahead, you will have an accelerating public debate about the republic and I welcome that. We will be looking carefully at the way in which that debate unfolds."
Even Australian monarchists did not stir themselves to suggest that it was discourteous of Rudd to canvass the sacking of the Queen just before going to see her. They just don't seem willing to defend their monarch any more. As for Her Majesty, she is a realist. She also had business to transact with Rudd, accepting his recommendation to appoint Quentin Bryce as our next governor-general. It was a nice juxtaposition: one minute Rudd was encouraging a new debate on the republic; the next he was asking the Queen to do her duty under the Australian Constitution.
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