Andrew West has hit the nail on the head with this article in the SMH. Well all apart from the bit where he alludes to Joe Tripodi looking good in a suit.

Mass political party no more - just a haven for careerists ANDREW WEST
June 21, 2010

ANALYSIS

JOHN ROBERTSON is one of the smartest strategists in Labor politics - an authentic, self-educated blue-collar man with the wits to understand the thinking of the electorate. He was the author of the grassroots ''Your Rights At Work'' campaign that was instrumental in toppling the Howard government.

So he was either delusional or disingenuous yesterday when he said the unprecedented 25 per cent-plus swing away from Labor in the heartland seat of Penrith was largely because of voter anger with the former MP, Karyn Paluzzano, who quit after lying to the Independent Commission Against Corruption.

Deep down, surely he and the tiny handful of wise operatives that remain know that the rejection of the Keneally government reflects a widespread fury at the culture of corruption that pervades NSW Labor.

It is not always a criminal corruption. It is more an ethical corruption.

A recent newspaper column posited that NSW is being run by the same people who took over Young Labor in the early 1990s, only now, instead of squabbling over jobs in ministerial and union offices, they sit at the cabinet table. It was a clever, if incomplete, observation.

NSW Labor is defined by a mentality of entitlement and grievance - and has been for almost 40 years. Back in the late 1960s and 1970s, a coterie of Young Labor operatives, including Paul Keating, Bob Carr and Graham Richardson, sat around and divided up the world.

They believed because they craved seats in Parliament, and plotted a way there, they were entitled to such perks. The problem they struck is that people whose ambition outstripped their talent have followed.

This culture reached its apogee at the 2003 election, when the Fairfield MP Joe Tripodi and his then ally Eric Roozendaal, now treasurer but formerly the party's general secretary, assisted a cast of mates, relatives or relatives of mates into safe Labor seats.

Aside from the premier, the candidates included Tripodi's sister-in-law, Anglea D'Amore, Tanya Gadiel and Paluzzano. Already in Parliament were Tripodi's former fiance, Reba Meagher, and right-wing allies Matt Brown and Cherie Burton.

They, and their sponsors in the Labor machine, decided if you could prove yourself in the superficial arts of political organisation, such as screeching platitudes from a script at party conferences and looking good in a suit, you possessed the qualities necessary for a seat in Parliament.

Few could claim the confidence of a majority of their branch members or demonstrate deep roots in the communities they would represent. (Meagher arrived in western Sydney from the Sutherland Shire via the North Shore, and drove a BMW around her low-income electorate.)

Most tellingly, none came to Parliament having distinguished themselves in a profession, trade or career. And that is the problem with modern Labor. It has ceased to be a mass political party, with members who are also active in community groups. It has become a haven for careerists, where idealists are sniggered at as ''losers''. But who are the losers now?