Whenever Paul Keating provides one of his frequent uninvited cantankerous contributions to the public debate, Australians should recognise the debt of gratitude owed to John Howard for removing, 28 years ago in a landslide election victory, Prime Minister Keating’s hands from the levers of political power. Doing so also excised what had remained, under his egocentric rule, of those behavioural constraints normally imposed by the responsibilities of office.