Teflon Modi And The "Infallible" John Howard - A Chin Up To Indian Liberals

What do Indian PM Narendra Modi and former Australian PM John Howard have in common? A lot. Not just their apparent invulnerability, but also their unapparent vulnerability.

A recent poll by the India Today group shows that 74% of Indians believe that Prime Minister Narendra Modi's performance is "good or outstanding".

Only 6% of survey respondents see Modi's performance as poor

A number of other Indians are simply incredulous at these results. As journalist Aakar Patel tweeted while referencing this poll, 

We are in the 37th month of sequential decline in GDP growth. This is our fourth year of decline. Indians were poorer in 2018 than they were in 2013, and that was before this 37 month decline began. This is Govt data. Modi era has set us back 10 years.

Of course, as the comments following Patel's tweet show, many people simply don't believe these survey results. They consider India Today to be part of the "sold media" whose function today is to subtly push the government narrative onto an unsuspecting populace.

In the absence of evidence to support that accusation, let us assume the survey results to be genuine and accurate.

Harking back to Aakar Patel's points, just how does Modi manage to retain his stratospheric levels of popularity in the face of such a dismal performance over the past 7 years? Some of my liberal friends were despondent at these survey results. If the Indian people were willing to give high marks to a government that had clearly failed to deliver, what did that mean? The implication to them was very clear, i.e., that the majority of Indians had bought into the Hindutva ideology and were in fact expressing their satisfaction with the progress of Modi's majoritarian agenda, with no regard to the economic hardship they have had to endure. Some of these friends were despondently resigning themselves to three or even four terms of a Modi government, and the seemingly inevitable prospect of India becoming a theocratic Hindu state with a permanently fascist polity.

Having lived in Australia since 1998, I recollected a parallel from Australian politics, and I put together this piece to provide them some cheer.

Former Australian PM John Howard won four consecutive 3-year terms (in 1996, 1998, 2001, and 2004) before losing in 2007, when he even lost his own seat.

What suddenly happened in 2007?

Nothing happened. That's what was so surprising. Howard was an extremely successful prime minister and a sure-footed politician who always seemed to sense the public mood, and invariably did things that gained popular approval.

In 1996, shortly after his first victory, the Port Arthur massacre took place - Australia's worst mass shooting tragedy. Howard reacted with alacrity, banning all automatic weapons and implementing a buyback program. That made him very popular. (In the US, this would have contravened the Second Amendment.)

This was also the term when Pauline Hanson, then a newly elected independent MP, made her maiden speech, a sensational diatribe against Aboriginal people, Asians, and immigrants in general. She suddenly gained popularity with a section of the electorate that was feeling threatened by Asian migration. Most other politicians condemned her speech, but John Howard stayed completely silent. He in fact very quietly started implementing aspects of her demands in immigration policy, and stole the wind from her sails. He swung the racist vote to his party without saying anything! This is exactly like Modi's strategy of staying silent and pointedly not condemning extreme and bigoted statements by others.

Howard won again in 1998, but with a reduced majority. He took a big risk when he pushed through the GST in 2000, which was unpopular at the time, but which turned out to be visionary and, in retrospect, one of Australia's great success stories (One flat rate of 10% on all goods and services, period). Just before the 2001 election, he famously refused entry to The Tampa, a Norwegian ship that had rescued boat people from a capsized vessel. Once again, that act appealed to the immigration hardliners and he won his third election. This is again like Modi and his Balakot operation just before the 2019 election.

Howard's third term saw the 2001 WTC attacks, and he joined Bush and Blair in sending troops to Iraq, which became very unpopular later. He was at his weakest before the 2004 election, but he got a major reprieve because Labor's leader at the time (Mark Latham) put off many people. Latham was a known goon and a hothead who had once broken a cabbie's arm during an altercation. Howard won his fourth term in 2004 because of the TINA factor. This is exactly like how people see no alternative to Modi because Indian opposition parties are such a disaster.

Mind you, Howard's stewardship of the economy during his four terms was beyond reproach. Not only did he run surplus budgets, he also paid off the national debt. During his tenure, Australia built up a huge surplus called the Future Fund (which came in very useful for Kevin Rudd in 2008-2009 when he had to provide a Keynesian stimulus after the GFC). Also, under John Howard and his Treasurer Peter Costello, Australia neatly avoided the recessions that hit the rest of the world, first during the Asian currency crisis in 1997-98 and then during the Tech crash of 2001.

It's good to have a surplus like that as a buffer for the future. Well, the future is here. -- Kevin Rudd, unlocking the Future Fund to provide a stimulus package in 2008

Impeccable economic management credentials. Expertise in dog-whistling hardline right-wing messages without actually saying anything that people could point at.

Yet John Howard lost in 2007. How? Why?

Analysts have been searching for reasons, and they usually come up with three. The first two are very weak, IMO.

1. He tried to tinker with labour legislation with a new policy called WorkChoices, which reduced employee rights, but he backpedalled on it after facing opposition.

2. There was a feeling that Australia needed to do something urgently on climate change, which Howard (as a conservative) did not think was important.

3. There was a sudden and inexplicable "shift in the wind", with people just feeling that he had overstayed his welcome and it was time for a change.

In fact, Kevin Rudd followed a very clever policy of not differing much from Howard except on climate change. He portrayed himself as an economic conservative too, so on paper, there was really not much to choose between the two opponents. Rudd deliberately made it hard for Howard to attack him on policy, since he mirrored Howard on all his policies. He just happened not to be John Howard. He banked on voters' weariness with Howard. And it paid off.

Howard did not just lose the 2007 election. He lost his own seat. He was only the second sitting Australian PM to lose his own seat.

Such a dramatic and swift fall, and for no apparent reason. Howard did everything right, and even his critics had to grudgingly admit that he was one of Australia's best economic managers. Ultimately, the wind just shifted and, in the words of a columnist, "John Howard was yesterday's man".

Modi is not going to rule forever, even if it seems that way. One day, for no reason at all, the wind will shift, and that will be that.