By Michelle Grattan
To the ears of many Australians, even those very pro-American, Julia Gillard's congressional speech would have sounded cloying. Her line about thinking, when she was a seven-year-old girl watching the US moon landing, that America ''can do anything'' and her declaration that she still believes this, would have appeared rather too much like gushing.
And her choking up when she reprised the sentiments late in her address seemed rather strange. She was not speaking on any occasion of national tragedy. The teary reaction of some of her congressional listeners added to an excess of emotional hype that would leave a good many Australians bemused. This is a vital relationship with deep ties between two peoples. But that's not a reason to get the hankies out when one leader speaks in the other country's parliament.
Illustration: Dyson
But for the Americans, Gillard struck just the right note. The speech was distinctly crafty, in a very modern sense. Those helping her draft it had a keen eye on what plays in America, where politicians' speeches are often more syrupy and sentimental than those of their Australian counterparts.
Read the addresses given by Robert Menzies (1950), Bob Hawke (1988) and John Howard (2002), the only other Australians to address the US Congress, and they are more restrained. There are some common themes - such as shared values, the importance of the friendship between the two countries and strong praise for American virtues - while some subjects have gone out of fashion: Menzies lauded Australia's immigration program to boost a too-small population, a marked contrast to the way Australian leaders see things these days.
Howard and Gillard were sharp about US farm bills, and Hawke was very tough about its trade policies. Hawke and Gillard both pushed the need for economic reform. ''I know you are practising politicians and so am I. I understand constituency interests. I know that the adjustment process is not easy. But it must be done,'' Hawke said more than two decades ago.
Gillard echoed him this week, telling Congress: ''Like you, I am the leader in a democracy. I know reform is never easy. But I know reform is right.''
Even Howard's speech, delivered less than a year after September 11, 2001, and substituting for one he'd been due to make on September 12, did not go over the top in its tone to the extent that Gillard's did.
Bruce Wolpe, a former Fairfax corporate executive who is now a senior Democratic aide in the US, sees a big difference in political culture between America and Australia - and Gillard played squarely, unashamedly and successfully to this culture.
Wolpe, who was sitting with Republicans at the back of the chamber during Gillard's address, said the references to the alliance, security, Afghanistan and September 11 really resonated with them. Then he looked over to the Democrats, with whom her references to the dignity of work, climate change and education struck a chord.
Gillard told a moving story about the bonding between an Australian fireman and the son of a New York fireman killed when going in after the September 11 terrorist attacks. The two men were sitting in the public gallery during Gillard's speech and when she acknowledged them, the audience swung around to applaud the pair in what was a dramatic moment.
Wolpe says Ronald Reagan - to whom Gillard paid tribute - was the first modern president to put people in the gallery so he could illustrate his wider messages through their stories.
For Wolpe, the whole speech could be described as a ''Ronald Reagan moment. It just worked. She did it as well as he did. In 29 minutes, she bought another 10 years of solid alliance with the US. It was an absolute connection to the American psyche.'' But he said, ''The overtones of the emotional connection might cause some Australians to be a little uneasy.''
In sharp contrast, Hugh White, Australian National University professor and a former senior Defence Department official, rated the address as ''a piece of policy-free puff''.
''I suppose she wanted the Americans to like her, but she decided not to say anything serious to them,'' White says.
He singles out her treatment of China, where Gillard's message to the US was that it shouldn't be fearful of that country's economic rise because the international economy was not a zero-sum game.
White says: ''She focused on the economic relationship, where it's not a zero-sum game. But the strategic relationship is a zero-sum game, and that's the core question facing America - how to deal with China's strategic rise.'' He says that for Gillard to treat the China question in this narrow way was ''either very coy or very ignorant. Certainly it's evasive. It avoids the core strategic question between us and the US, about how we should respond to China. America's instinct was to push back hard against China's challenge. Australia's interests require a measure of accommodation.''
All this raises some further questions about Gillard. How come she could wow the Americans, but at home seems to have become a poorer communicator than previously? And is her congressional performance a revival of her political flair that will be admired by her Labor colleagues, or will it reinforce doubts about her policy substance and even her political identity?
The images back home out of her appearance in the US House of Representatives chamber were compelling. But they add to confusion about the ''real Julia''. How could someone who once came from the left of Labor be seen to outdo Menzies, Hawke and Howard in her rhetorical genuflecting to the US?
Michelle Grattan is Age political editor.
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