A review of the last half century by former US Secretary of Labor Robert Reich

I came across a video yesterday by former US Secretary of Labor Robert Reich giving his thoughts on the political changes of the last half century, and what has to be done to undo the damage that has been done. As always, I found the presentation engaging and thought provoking, and, for all that its US-centric, I consider it well worth a look and a think.

A lot of the general trends apply to my nation (Australia) as well - the growth of the evil of neoliberalism in particular.

However, there are a few other major items of damage that can be blamed on the evil and despicable John Howard, including: 

• enshrining racism and xenophobia - as I wrote here:
  "The debate and ranting in reaction to this legislation have, however, hardened the once shallow fault lines that Howard identified and then incised deeply into the bedrock of Australian society."
  
• start of the trend towards harshly abusing refugees aka "asylum seekers" (although the initial problem started under the ALP; see here, here, here [on the fundamental misconception], here, here, and here - and more recently, just as our racist "White Australia" policy contributed to South Africa's apartheid, so too now does our policy of punitive abuse threaten to drag other parts of the world down [see here and here]) and a more widespread contempt towards and disregard of international law, beginning with the "Tampa affair" (see here, here, here, here, and here) and continuing with the deceit and outright lies of the "children overboard" scandal (see here, here, here [the comments about the "backfire model" are particularly worth considering], and here); and
  
• perverting ordinary, everyday Australians into neoliberals who want to be rich IPOCs. As I've written elsewhere,
  "a home is for living in, not feeling, becoming or being rich or a “better” class than others"
  However, as the fictional character US President Josiah Bartlet says, in the Season 3 episode (no. 3) “Ways and Means” of the TV series “The West Wing” (at 40 min 29 sec):
  "It doesn't matter if most voters don’t benefit. They all believe that someday they will. That’s the problem with the American dream. It makes everyone concerned for the day they're gonna be rich."
  That's poison infected Australia's soul largely through the evil of John Howard, and his attempts to, in effect, buy votes.
  

I see racist Howard is still refusing to accept that the apology by PM Kevin Rudd had to be given - and, incidentally, it is the response of the Rudd Government (see here, here, here, here, and, for good measure, here) that prevented the GFC being as much of a catastrophe here as it was elsewhere.

PS - see also https://theconversation.com/cabinet-papers-2001-how-securitisation-became-a-mindset-to-dominate-australian-politics-for-a-generation-172056.