Kev’s first big boo boos

It had to happen. And it came when Kevin Rudd’s Labor government was little more than 80 days old.

That’s when the government made its first big mistakes. And one of Kev’s old mates, from Goss government days, Professor Glyn Davis, can be blamed for both of them.

Indeed, Mr Rudd, himself, has already come close to doing just that.

With substantially less than 20-20 foresight, Mr Rudd appointed just one woman, Cate Blanchette, to the steering committee for the 20-20 ideas Summit, that he will hold on April 19 and 20.

The absent minded Professor Davis, who will chair that committee, played a big part in that.

He is the chief organiser of the conference.

But what was he thinking?

And, what’s probably more important, what had Kevin Rudd’s staff been thinking, when they let him make that announcement?

Politically, there were two huge flaws in it.

One woman, on a committee of 11? That’s hardly fair representation.

Especially as that committee is to choose the team of 1,000 of Australia’s brightest and best, who will actually attend the Summit, on April 19 and 20, to give the government the benefit of their, presumably bright, ideas.

There’s a big problem with those dates, too.

It’s a fair bet that any fair pick of 1,000 of Australia’s brightest and best would include more than a few Jews.

They have had to get smart, to survive all the pogroms that history has thrown at members of their race.

Yet April 19 is an important day, on the Australian Jewish calender. It is the feast of the Passover, which celebrates the liberation of Jews from slavery, in ancient Egypt.

Yet nobody in Kev’s office thought of that, when the date for the Great Ideas’ Summit was set.

It’s a terrible pun. But we can’t resist the temptation. The Jews were passed over on the feast of the Passover.

They have been quite forgiving. One Jewish spokesman simply said his community was simply waiting to see what alternative arrangements would be made, to accommodate them.

Australian women, though, were not prepared to remain silent.