Only his most one-eyed supporters could think Howard is an "honourable patriotic great man". History will judge him harshly on all counts.
Honourable: he is on record of taking "spin-doctoring", "core and non-core promises", "credible deniability" and outright lies to new heights in Australian politics.
Patriotic: his allegiance, as demonstrated by his "deputy sheriff" comment, is to the USA. Sadly, with shallow and meaningless poses like flag poles in schools and hand-on-heart for playing of the national anthem, he is mistaken for patriotic. Moreover, his disgraceful workplace reforms is designed to emulate the miserable workplace conditions in the USA: one weeks annual leave, no leave loading, no long service leave, no security of tenure, no penalty rates. Like the USA, he wants Australia to have a working class beneath the poverty level. His love is for the USA, not Australia. That is, until Australia is indistinguishable from any other US state.
Great: as Ian Chappel famously expressed "I never would have thought that I could be ashamed of being an Australian". Howard's pathetic and disgraceful treatment of refugees contrasts with Winston Churchills comment that "the treatment of refugees is the measure of a civilization". By that test, Australia, under Howard, has become a bloody mean-spirited place. Howard is a little man, not even a pimple on the arse of a real Statesman.
