By Steve Davies  

The normalisation and globalisation of moral disengagement

Earlier this year I created The Moral Disengagement Handbook. The handbook focusses on the Australian Government and the Australian Public Service.

Why did I focus on them? Because over the past decade Australians have lived through and witnessed an appalling decline in the behaviour and practices of politicians along with that of the government agencies whose decisions and actions effect the lives of every single Australian.

In 2023 people are very attuned to the fact that all is not well with politics and government. The trouble is that the major parties are not really listening to them. Let alone acknowledging that the problem is them – behaviours and practice – and its systemic.

The persistent sentiments that runs through people’s disquiet is that politicians and government will never change, they are out of touch, they don’t care about people, and they don’t listen. Numerous real-life examples have created and reinforced that sentiment.

These sentiments have not changed with the election of the Albanese Government. If anything those sentiments are stronger than ever. Hence, for example, the rise and rise of the Teal independents.

It may be argued that the Albanese Government inherited the situations that have given rise to these sentiments. While there is no doubt that the extremes of the Morrison Government (along with those of previous LNP Governments), plunged the decline in behaviours and practices to new depths that does not absolve the Albanese Government of responsibility.

Why do I say that? Because … As I pointed out in the handbook:

“Tragically, within the Australian Government the moral compasses of public servants and politicians have been switched off and, indeed, are expected to be switched off. As a result, great harm is done to people, society and the land we live on. To all of our institutions and democracy itself.

Here we are in 2023 and, even with the election of the Albanese Government, we see a government that is fearful of dealing with the fact that moral disengagement has been normalised in government and, to varying degrees, all of our institutions.”

Here we are in December 2023 and what are seeing from the Albanese Government just over halfway through its term of office? A continuing failure to directly address the moral disengagement that has been normalised in government and its institutions. The statement I made in the handbook still holds true today. Moreso.

“Despite the fact that Professor Bandura’s work offers practical solutions to deal with the problem the Albanese Government and the Australian Public Service persists with a tried and failed focus – Culture change and leadership. Over decades millions of dollars has been wasted on culture change programmes and leadership development in the Australian Public Service. They have failed dismally. It is the wrong solution for what is the actual problem – the normalisation of moral disengagement.

2023. The Albanese Government and the Australian Public Service continues to waste taxpayers’ money on tried, failed and wrong approaches despite the very real threats moral disengagement poses to the lives and future of the Australian people. To the health of the public service, government, society and democracy.”

The situation is even more urgent due to the dire need to ensure the behaviours, practices, policies and actions of government actually ensure the well-being of people, households and the community in the face of:

• Social inequality
• Climate change and catastrophe
• The continuing destructive impacts of the policies and actions of the Morrison Government
• Homelessness
• The loss of opportunity to younger generations now and into the future
• The severe distortion of our economy courtesy of the military industrial complex
• The continuing demise of democracy
• Especially our participation in the war and genocide being inflicted on the Palestinian people.

What we are seeing within individual Western nations, is a slide into a 21^st century dark age driven by the normalisation of moral disengagement.

The war and genocide being sponsored and inflicted on the Palestinian people by those nations is clear indication of the globalisation of moral disengagement in action.

If the governments of Western nations dealt with moral disengagement from within would they be participating in the globalisation of moral disengagement? Would they be sponsoring, directly enabling and sanitising the industrial scale slaughter of the Palestinian people?

Would they be going down the path of a Dark Age Within. A Dark Age Without?

And what can we all do, individually and together, to put a stop to the moral disengagement that is driving this comprehensive descent into darkness?

Restoring Moral Engagement in the Australian Government – Ending the silence that feeds bad government and harms people

We all know it. We all feel its the impact. Government is a big, complicated beast. Politicians seemingly never change. Many have lost sight of their real reason for being there – that is to represent their constituents and govern for all Australians.

The only time, it seems, they are interested in us is when elections come around and then many do whatever it takes to persuade us to vote for them. Increasingly, these persuasive tactics have taken on a dark and sinister form with the Liberal party now deploying Trumpian lies, and propaganda imported from the USA to scare and confuse people halting any progress to better future – think the No campaign.

Then there is the Australian Public Service. From the outside, they seem to blindly follow orders and are more concerned about protecting their own careers and political masters than serving the people. If people dare to complain they get stuck on a bureaucratic treadmill.

It’s always the same. The majority of politicians and bureaucrats at the top are in it for themselves. Despite all the money government has (our money), and all the technology it’s got worse.

The treatment of whistle blowers such as David McBride and Richard Boyle and The Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services Industry illustrate how bad things have got.

The Robodebt Royal Commission showed us all just how bad things are inside ‘the system’. People died.

Time after time the media ‘reports’ on the goings on in the Australian Government and the Australian Public Service. However are we really getting the true picture? For several years now the mainstream Australian media have not been pulling their weight when it comes to delivering independent journalism.

The major commercial media outlets and, sadly, the ABC have lost their moral compass resorting to presenting False Balance Reporting often spruiking lies and propaganda in the form of news. And it’s very obvious the Murdoch media is running a protection racket for Liberal Party and their vested interests. When the Fourth Estate has fallen prey to vested interests we know that democracy is in trouble.

The persecution of whistleblowers, the stifling freedom of information, rampant secrecy, the win at all costs misuse of the legal system along with rampant spin and denial. The Australian Government has it all. To this day.

No wonder things are a mess, and no wonder most public servants quickly learn to shut up. The threshold for being seen as a troublemaker is nigh on paranoid.

We could go on and on. Despite the good work of many, many good people an awful lot of ‘bad’ things continue to happen. The real question is what drives all the bad things. The answer is the insidious normalisation of moral disengagement. That’s the conversation The Australian Government is afraid to have.

We can have that conversation and, at the same time, hold politicians to account in a very specific way that cuts through all the clutter and denials.

Let’s gets down to it.

What is the status of the work on moral disengagement? Where did in come from?

Professor Albert Bandura (1925 – 2021). Albert “Al” Bandura, the David Starr Jordan Professor of Social Science in Psychology, Emeritus, in the School of Humanities and Sciences Internationally recognised as the most influential psychologist of the twentieth century.

For his extraordinary contributions Professor Bandura was presented with the National Medal of Science at the White House by President Obama on May 19, 2016.

Without Albert Bandura the understanding of the importance of social learning, social modelling, observational learning and how people come to accept and repeat behaviours would be a shadow of what it is today.

Fast track to 2016. The publication of Albert Bandura’s book “Moral disengagement: How people do harm and live with themselves” is a powerful legacy. A practical tool to empower people in Australia and elsewhere to remove and prevent moral disengagement. To restore the health of government, all our institutions and our democracy.

“… people in all walks of life behave harmfully and still maintain positive self-regard and live in peace with themselves. They do so by disengaging moral self-sanctions from their harmful practices. These psychosocial mechanisms of moral disengagement operate at both the individual and social system levels” (Albert Bandura).

The research that underpins moral disengagement is work renowned and rock solid. The specific mechanisms of moral disengagement identified by Professor Bandura are of immense practical use.

Using the mechanisms of moral disengagement?

As Professor Bandura states the “… mechanisms of moral disengagement operate at both the individual and social system levels”. The Australian Government, the Parliament, political parties and the Australian Public Service are intense social systems.

The mechanisms can be used to judge and provide feedback on the behaviours and practices of politicians and officials within government (individual level).

The mechanisms also provide a reliable means of identifying the behaviours and practices that drive every harmful, corrupt, abusive, inhuman statement, decision, policy, process or action imaginable (social system level).

Consequently, we can all use the mechanisms to judge the moral health of the Australian Government in a precise and cohesive way. This is important as it prevents politicians and official from portraying complaints as isolated instances.

The mechanisms of moral disengagement

Advantageous comparison

Making something appear better or less harmful than it is by pointing to something far worse.

Attribution of blame

Blaming the victims or targets that have been harmed by immoral behaviours and practices for bringing it on themselves.

Dehumanization

Portraying people who will be harmed by behaviours and practices as less than human. As case numbers in a system or process.

Diffusion of responsibility

Minimising personal responsibility for any harm caused to people by claiming they are only responsible for a small part of the process.

Displacement of responsibility

Superficially acknowledging the harm caused to people by behaviours and practices, while claiming it’s the result of decisions made at a higher level.

Disregard, distortion, and denial of consequences

Ignoring, minimising and denying the harm (including evidence of harm), caused to people.

Euphemistic language

Using sanitised language and jargon to mask the hurt and harm caused to people.

Moral justification

Claiming behaviours and practices that cause harm to people serve a higher social and moral purpose.

Tips

Start by briefly describing the issue you are concerned about. Is it an individual or system level issue? Or both.

Is your issue about:

• A particular public service agency
• A number of public service agencies
• The Australian Public Service as a whole
• A government minister
• A particular policy or programme
• A particular administrative process
• The behaviours and practices of public servants
• The behaviours and practices of politicians
• The management of staff within a public service agency

Highlight the mechanisms of moral disengagement you have experienced or observed.

It is likely that you have experienced or observed a large number of or all of the mechanisms/behaviours. Consider the intensity with which you have experienced them.

If you have experienced one or very few of the mechanisms/behaviours also consider the intensity with which you have experienced them.

End by pointing out the harm being done, and deaths being caused.

By Steve Davies  

• Introduction

• Understanding Moral Disengagement

• Moral Disengagement in Government

• The Impact on Policy

• The Human Cost

• The Challenge

• Judging Moral Disengagement

• Resources

Introduction

Moral disengagement is a huge problem in the Australian Government and its public service. To this day major political parties remain silent on this issue. Labor, Liberal and the Greens are all silent despite the facts and the science.

Moral disengagement is the process by which individuals or groups distance themselves from their own moral standards, allowing them to engage in behaviour that they would otherwise find unacceptable. 

The phenomenon of moral disengagement fuels corrupting and abusive behaviours and practices in government. It causes harm to individuals and society as a whole. It is a serious issue that demands attention and action.

Understanding Moral Disengagement

Moral disengagement is a psychological and social mechanism that allows individuals to justify unethical behaviour without feeling guilty or responsible for the consequences of their actions. It is enables people to engage in harmful behaviours without feeling any sense of responsibility.

There are several mechanisms of moral disengagement. For example, using euphemistic language to describe actions, making them seem less harmful than they actually are. Using displacement of responsibility, blaming others for their actions rather than taking responsibility themselves. Minimising the harm caused by actions, arguing that the benefits outweigh the costs.

Moral Disengagement in Government

When moral disengagement becomes the norm, especially among people with power and status, it infects entire institutions. 

In Australia media report after media report, enquiry after enquiry showed how morally disengaged the Morrison Government was.

Robodebt, the behaviour towards women within the parliament, conflicts of interest, the abuse of whistleblowers and throwing millions of dollars at consultancy companies. The list goes on and on.

Moral disengagement has been normalised in the Australian Government and its public service. It does not magically go away with the election of a new government.

Open public conversation and government transparency are key steps towards eradicating moral disengagement.

The Impact on Policy

We must act decisively to put a stop to the dangerous practice of normalising moral disengagement in the Australian government. Steps need to be taken to help people to recognise and confront situations where individuals and political factions detach themselves from the moral consequences of their choices and conduct.

By actively screening moral disengagement from all policies and processes, we can ensure that ethical considerations are baked into government.

Imagine the potential of a morally engaged government with a populace of good individuals who do not turn a blind eye to wrongdoing. The key to unlocking this potential lies in breaking the silence and removing harmful practices. It’s time for good people to take a stand and make their voices heard.

The Human Cost

Moral disengagement can have devastating consequences for individuals, their families, public servants and wider society. Australia’s Royal Commission into the Robodebt Scheme graphically illustrated that in forensic detail.

Robodebt was a scheme that automatically assessed and raised debts against welfare recipients. The data was wrong yet the government proceeded.

This inflicted misery on welfare recipients and resulted in deaths. All inflicted on and industrial scale.

The silence maintained by most public servants and the blind obedience of senior officials are reminiscent of historical atrocities. This behavioural similarity is striking and shouldn’t be taken lightly.

The Royal Commission’s findings displayed the truth that moral disengagement was deeply normalised in the Australian Government. Alarming as it is, the current government has not taken any initiative to address this deeply ingrained concern.

The Challenge

Normalised moral disengagement has severe implications for the community’s wellbeing and the health of government and its public service.

The behavioural mechanisms and practices of moral disengagement are learned and normalised. This perpetuates belief that change is impossible.

Australians have seen and experienced the harm caused by moral disengagement in their government’s policies, behaviours and practices.

It is easily costing the Australian community billions of dollars.

It is essential to take action to eliminate moral disengagement and prevent any future normalisation in government and its public service.

Judging Moral Disengagement

The 8 mechanisms of moral disengagement are a powerful lens for judging behaviours and practices of government. The mechanisms are:

• • 1. Advantageous comparison
    2. Attribution of blame
    3. Dehumanisation
    4. Diffusion of responsibility
    5. Displacement of responsibility
    6. Disregard, distortion, and denial of harm
    7. Euphemistic language
    8. Moral justification

The mechanisms are the behaviours and practices used to stigmatise, distort, deny and mask harmful and abusive behaviours and practices. They are endemic in the Australian Government.

Resources

I suggest people view these videos in this order:

Professor Albert Bandura (1925-2021).

Moral disengagement – “an informed public can actually neutralise a lot of this stuff. 

Dr. Peter Senge

“… bureaucracy development to the extent it is dehumanised… so in many ways we’ve worked to drive out the empathy, the intuition, the artistry.”

Professor Shoshana Zuboff “Wonderland. Herding people. Behaviour modification. The age of conquest.”

By Steve Davies  

Why it matters: During the 2022 elections the Labor Party promised to create a National Integrity Commission and reform public sector whistle blower laws.

Despite those promises the newly elected Labor Government is allowing the prosecution against Australian Taxation Office whistle blower, Mr Richard Boyle, to continue.

They are doing so using the very laws (Public Interest Disclosure Act), they vowed to reform. This is illogical. Worse still, it is driven by the moral the disengagement that has infected government and causes great harm. All funded with our taxes.

Look deeper: For decades Australia’s Federal Government had no whistle blower laws. Major political parties saw no need for it. Neither did the Australian Public Service.

The first laws, (Public Interest Disclosure Act) were passed in 2013 by the Gillard Labor Government.

The ultra-conservative Liberal Government of Tony Abbott was elected later that year. The Liberals remained in power until 2022. They hollowed out open government and freedom of information. The creation of a positive culture of public interest disclosures (whistle blowing), was snuffed out at birth.

Labor’s Attorney General, Mark Dreyfus, recently dropped the prosecution of lawyer Bernard Colleary for allegedly releasing classified information about alleged spying operations in East Timer.

In contrast, he is refusing to drop charges against Tax Office whistle blower Richard Boyle. Mr Boyle’s alleged crime? Blowing the whistle on unethical debt recovery practices in the Australian Taxation Office.

Mr Boyle has been subjected to hostile treatment since 2016 when he first raised issues within the Taxation Office concerning the aggressive and unethical use of garnishee powers against small business owners.

The typical pattern is that when public servants such as Mr Boyle raise serious issues, they are heavily managed and documented. As they pursue matters through due process, they experience more hostility. This gets worse when matters enter the legal battlefield.

The problem: Government agencies own the rigged whistle blowing battlefield from the start. Whistle blowers, at even a low level, are in a shooting gallery. All paid for by taxpayers.

The big questions: Why is the newly elected Labor Government choosing to go down a path that contradicts its election promises?

Why do otherwise good politicians and officials sanction behaviours and practices that cause harm to people and corrupt government organisations?

The Attorney General, Mark Dreyfus has stated:

“The Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions (CDPP) takes decisions about the commencement of prosecutions independently of government,” … and the Attorney-General’s powers under section 71 were “reserved for very unusual and exceptional circumstances.”

The content of those two statements made by the Attorney General raises questions concerning the specific (and insidious), mechanisms of *moral disengagement:

The CDPP making decisions independently of government seems logical. However, in practice it is enabling the “diffusion of responsibility”.

The second statement also “displaces responsibility” by asserting that the “powers under section 71 were reserved for unusual circumstances.”

However, follow up reviews found that Mr Boyle’s allegations were valid and ATO investigations into his disclosures superficial. This shows that the situation is anything but usual.

In the light of the Labor Government’s election promises the Attorney General’s decision makes no sense. On that basis alone legal action against all whistle blowers should cease. It’s time for government to reflect deeply on the mechanisms of moral disengagement.

Taking action: What’s missing in all of this is a lens through which to understand and judge the behaviours, practices and actions of politicians and public servants. Such a lens is needed to keep government, our society and lives healthy.

The Morrison Government and COVOD-19 are tragic and dramatic proof that we all need a lens to help us cut thorough the politics, spin, denials and deception.

Moral disengagement was mentioned earlier. That term and the two mechanisms mentioned come from the lifelong work of the world-renowned Professor Albert Bandura (1925 – 2021).

His work spans two centuries and his book Moral Disengagement – How People Do Harm and Live with Themselves pulls together a lifetime of research, learning and teaching.

The mechanisms of moral disengagement provide a powerful lens for us to use to assess and judge the behaviours, practices and actions of politician public servants.

They provide a means to help us all judge the policies and services they provide to us. The very direction they seek to take our nation.

More than that using the mechanisms of moral disengagement provides a common foundation that we can use to talks and judge together.

At the moment the stories of the public, public servants and whistle blowers are isolated, untold and rarely listened to. They can be ignored, twisted or picked off one by one.

We all know there is a lot wrong. Politicians and public servants? They are all trapped in systems and institutions that are infected with moral disengagement.

Too many are a part of the problem. Too many forget that silence means consent.

More reading:

Senator Rex Patrick – Richard Boyle Sequence.

Stanford psychology professor Albert Bandura has died.

We begin the countdown to our Top 5 most viewed articles in 2021. Number 5 goes to Steve Davies for this article from February 2020, which narrowly missed out last year coming in at Number 6.

Hardly a week goes by on Twitter where I don’t seen this article being tweeted and its popularity continues to grow.

Pentecostalism – The decline, infiltration and fall of Australian Democracy

There is a strong sentiment that there’s something not right with the Morrison Government. There is also a sentiment something is not right with Prime Minister Morrison’s leadership.

These sentiments and concerns have gradually increased since Morrison’s “miracle” election win in 2019. Broadly speaking, that increase is due to the aggressive and arrogant manner in which this government has pursued its agenda.

As important as they are, set aside the many policy issues for the moment and you are left scratching your head. What is driving this government to behave so aggressively and arrogantly after an election win?

All of these questions, sentiments, views and concerns have increased further due to the reactions of this Prime Minister and that of his government to Australia’s bushfire disasters and its ongoing denial of the global climate crisis.

There have been recurring questions and reports in both the mainstream media and social media concerning Morrison’s religion – Pentecostalism. Some of these reports highlight the secrecy of the Pentacostalism.

“ … it is also a characteristic of Pentecostalism itself. Little more than a century old, this highly distinctive expression of Christianity has flourished in the spiritual marketplace by selling a feel-good message to seekers while keeping the full truth for trusted true believers.”

However, there is actually quite a lot of information that lifts the veil on the nature of Pentecostalism. In particular, the ideas and strategies that drive its ‘influence’ in the world of politics and government.

The conclusion I have come to is that serious questions need to be asked of the Prime Minister and his government.

We, the people, need to demand transparency from government on these issues. Religious influence is one thing. Dominance another.

The conversation that we must have

It is well known that the Christian Right seeks to shape government and society. The question is to what extent is the Australian Government is in the grip of dominionism and Pentecostalism? Arguably you can see this influence in this government’s stance on climate change, social welfare, employment policies, religious freedom and education.

Morrison has made no secret of his religious beliefs and affiliations – Pentacostalism. In addition, there have been questions about the influence of his religion in the press, social media and the wider community. Questions about his religious beliefs and affiliations have been further amplified by his response, as Prime Minister, to the bushfires that have ravaged Australia since September 2019.

What I am writing here is not an attack on the religious freedom of politicians as private citizens. The information I am presenting concerns dominionist strategies associated with the Pentecostalist movement and Christian Right. Strategies intended to shape and dominate governments and societies.

The strategies in question are known as the Seven Mountains Mandate. The Seven mountains mandate has a long history. It is a dominionist strategy for transforming nations and with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

The advocates of this strategy have taken to using the term sphere’s of influence rather than mountains. They are doing so to soften the language. Why? To slide under the radar. To minimise resistance.

The marketing and communication is very clever. However, at the end of it the agenda is the same. To conquer the seven mountains to transform nations in the image of a particular brand of Christianity.

These strategies and their underpinnings raise serious questions concerning the infiltration of Australia’s system of government – the policies it sets and, indeed, its behaviour. Seeking to influence is one thing, seeking to dominate another.

The ideology of dominionism remains a divisive issue within the broader the fundamentalist movement itself. It has been reported that attempts have been made to recast dominionism as a benign influence (to soften the language), in order to deceive people. There is more detailed information in this Church Watch Central article; Is your church part of Houston’s NARpostolic Australian ‘Christian Churches’ (ACC) network?

Church Watch is essentially a religious research group:

“Founded by pastors, elders and members from various denominations around Australia (now with pastoral contributors from around the world), CWC investigates and publishes news on controversies, reports on scandals, resources on discernment and tools to identify cults and sects.”

They state:

“We wish to be factual as we can on Church Watch Central. If there is any information on ChurchWatch Central that you think is not accurate, please contact us at c3churchwatch@hotmail.com. All constructive criticism will be appreciated.”

There has always been tension over the separation of church and state in Australia. In view of the activities of what is broadly coated the Christian Right and the dominionist ideology we need to revisit that issue in 2020 with a particular focus on the degree of infiltration and the influence of the Seven Mountains Mandate on government policy making.

Decline

Between 2010 and 2018 public trust in Australia’s democracy, its institutions and leaders has more than halved. Research undertaken by the Museum of Australian Democracy predicts that:

“By 2025 if nothing is done and current trends continue, fewer than 10 per cent of Australians will trust their politicians and political institutions — resulting in ineffective and illegitimate government, and declining social and economic wellbeing”.

The decline in trust was sparked by conflicts within the Rudd Government. Those conflicts became public and resulted in the removal of the Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and the installation of Julia Gillard as Prime Minister.

The Liberal Party under Tony Abbott exploited those divisions to win office in 2013. The tactics used by the Liberal Party to gain power emboldened them to aggressively pursue a policy agenda that did not match the promises it made during the election. That resulted in a further decline in public trust.

Due to the falling popularity of the government Tony Abbott was removed from the Prime Ministership. He was replaced by Malcolm Turnbull. Prime Minister Turnbull attempted to shift and soften policy directions. Contrary to expectations within the Liberal Party Turnbull barely won the election. Hence, the seeds of conflict festered and grew within the Turnbull Government.

Conflicts between the extreme right and moderate wings of the Liberal Party resulted in two leadership spills. The eventual result of these leadership spills was the installation of Scott Morrison as Prime Minister on 18 August 2018. Scott Morrison called an election for May 2019 and won with a wafer thin majority.

The Morrison Government has continued with a policy agenda driven by its extreme right. Public disquiet with its policies and approach has grown. The Morrison Government’s weak approach to climate change, coupled with its reaction to the bushfires that have devastated large areas of Australia and have outraged Australians and the world.

Public trust is still at an all time low. The tipping point alluded to by the Museum of Australian Democracy in its December 2018 report Trust and Democracy in Australia remains.

Indeed, we are arguably past the tipping point due to the arrogance shown by the Morrison Government since the last election. An arrogance underlined by the horrific impacts of the bushfires, the government’s refusal to accept the science of climate change and listen to the public.

The gulf between the government and the community is clear – Australia found to be much less divided on need to tackle climate change than US.

Infiltration

The community and media are scratching their heads over the reaction of the Prime Minister and his Government to climate change and the bushfires. This is on top of disquiet over policies as diverse as those associated with financial institutions, Newstart, Aged Care, health and more. Increasingly the  sentiment is that we do not have a normal government.

There are also deep concerns over the behaviour of government politicians and, to this day, concerns about the influence of Pentecostalism within the Morrison Government. Concerns about dominionism and the Seven Mountains mandate have been raised some media reports.

An excellent 2011 report by Chrys Stevenson; Is the Australian Christian Lobby dominionist? states:

“They say when the United States sneezes, the rest of the world catches a cold. And so it is with dominionism. Now an international movement, dominionism is thriving in Australia.

From local parents and citizens associations to regional councils, from our previously secular state schools to state government departments and even within Parliament House, Canberra, this particular clique of evangelical Christian extremists is working quietly but assiduously to tear down the division between church and state, subvert secularism and reclaim this nation for Jesus.

But, is there sufficient evidence to suggest that the Australian Christian Lobby (ACL) is at the forefront of this ideological holy war? In order to achieve their aim, dominionists plan to infiltrate, influence and eventually take over seven key spheres of society: business, government (including the military and the law), media, arts and entertainment, education, the family and religion.”

The Seven Mountains Mandate is essentially a Christian Right strategy of political and cultural infiltration and conquest.

The mandate has a long history and is also a means of unifying and growing the Christian Right. Some say, of dominating Christianity itself. The Christian right and neo-conservative politics increasingly work hand in glove. The mandate is a strategic theocratic weapon.

The convergence of interests between the Christian Right and neo-conservatives was reflected in the election of Donald Trump and, indeed, in the election of Scott Morrison.

“The parallels between Donald Trump’s unexpected triumph and Scott Morrison’s “miracle” election win are remarkable. A week on, it’s increasingly apparent this was a Trump-like victory.”

This convergence is so strong that after Scott Morrison’s election victory:

“Some of Australia’s most extreme Christian-right parties have withdrawn from politics, claiming the election of Prime Minister Scott Morrison had rendered them redundant.”

In Australia, as in America, it is evident that:

“Dominionism, like the Christian Right itself, has come a long way from obscure beginnings. What is remarkable today is that the nature of this driving ideology of the Christian Right remains obscure to most of society, most of the time. Dominionism’s proponents and their allies know it takes time to infuse their ideas into the constituencies most likely to be receptive. They also know it is likely—and rightly—to alarm many others.

It is time to ring the alarm bells over the influence of dominionism in Australia and the very real threat it poses to our system of government, democracy and society.

Fall

In a very real sense Australian democracy has already fallen. Public trust in our institutions has collapsed. We have a government that simply does not listen.

We have a government under the influence of a religious ideology that advocates the establishment of a theocracy. Capturing the Government Mountain through “Archangels” is one of the keys to that.

We have a government whose behaviour and actions suggest that it has adopted the strategies and intent of the Seven Mountain Mandate. One indication of that is the Religious Freedom Bill.

One thing is certainly clear in all of this. This government needs to come clean on the influence of this religious ideology on its behaviour, policies and actions.

I will be writing more about these matters in the very near future.

By Steve Davies  

“The time is well overdue for serious parliamentary and public discussion of the morality of the actions and behaviour of the Scott Morrison Government. In particular its impact on people, the integrity of government and the Australian Public Service.

It is impossible to consider whether actions, decisions and behaviour are moral without considering moral evil.

The key aspects of the actions, decisions and behaviour I have listed in this piece are markers of moral evil.

To varying degrees both major political parties have brought us to this point. It is critical that we have this difficult conversation given the capacity of technology to amplify moral evil and cause great harm to individuals, our society and our democracy” (Steve Davies).

Part 1 – Evil

Social media and the mainstream media are littered with reports concerning the behaviour and policies of the Coalition Government. This has been the case since the election of the Abbott Government in 2013. Community concern ran so deep and was so vocal that within two years Tony Abbott was removed as leader.

He was replaced with the more politically correct and amicable Malcolm Turnbull. It was anticipated that a Turnbull would ensure electoral victory. It did not quite work out that way.

“Malcolm Turnbull’s audacious double dissolution gamble looked to have backfired spectacularly on Saturday night as voters walked away from the first-term Coalition government in droves, raising the chances of another hung parliament and turmoil in Coalition ranks.” (Australian federal election 2016: Voters walk away from Malcolm Turnbull, results on knife’s edge. Sydney Morning Herald, 3 July 2016).

The rest, as they say, is history. In what has been characterised as a coup Scott Morrison replaced Malcom Turnbull as leader and the Coalition and was returned to government in the 2019 federal election.

In short order the Morrison Government returned to the radical neo-liberal policies and autocratic behaviour that were the hallmark of the Abbott Government.

Unsurprisingly, it did not take long for severe community concern to re-emerge over the behaviour of the Morrison Government and the impact of its policies.

Fast track to today and what we are seeing with the Morrison Government is the continued:

1. implementation of policies, practices and technologies that demonise and abuse welfare recipients and disadvantaged Australians.
2. implementation of policies and practices that increase social and economic inequality.
3. abuse, via administrative and legal means, of whistle-blowers whose information exposes government corruption.
4. abuse, via administrative and legal means, of citizens and taxpayers whose information exposes wrongdoing and maladministration.
5. demands for blind compliance within government agencies at the expense of ethical and moral conduct.
6. failure to implement a National Integrity Commission to ensure the ethical conduct of politics and public administration.
7. development and operation of oversight mechanisms that render redress, justice, fairness and transparency impossible for ordinary citizens.
8. weaponisation of technology and data which robs citizens and officials of moral agency and freedom of rights.
9. stifling and distorting the public dialogue essential to democracy and good government via propaganda and censorship.
10. trauma and psychological harm inflicted on people and damage caused to society through the normalisation of moral disengagement across government. The treatment of refugees is a graphic illustration of this.

It suits the Morrison government and its apologists to look at the actions I have listed though the lens of individual ‘cases’. That tactic falls apart since the actions listed are systemic and touch the lives of every Australian.

The deeper significance of these actions is that they are markers of the normalisation of moral evil within the Morrison Government.

Pointedly, the question of the impact of moral evil has been raised by people of faith in relation to a new evil: the COVID-19 pandemic:

“But potentially deadly viruses, like other natural disasters, can also be greatly exacerbated by the moral evil of bad human decisions and actions. For example, human beings can cause or contribute to pandemics by irresponsible actions like the following: wet markets (animal meat placed in highly unsanitary conditions), risky or negligent laboratory practices, biological warfare, government unpreparedness, failure to share critical medical technology, etc. Natural evil in the world never seems to stand alone. Moral evil often makes things much worse.” (Coronavirus Pandemic & the Problem of Evil by Kenneth R. Samples, April 21, 2020).

Definition of moral evil: Moral evil is the result of any morally negative event caused by the intentional action or inaction of an agent such as a person or organisation

What accrues from all of this that we should all question the behaviour and actions of the Morrison Government, or for that matter and other governments, through the lens of moral evil. It’s also logical and prudent that we do so considering the espoused values and beliefs of the Prime Minister and some of his colleagues.

It may very well be that the Prime Minister and his colleagues assert that their beliefs are their business. However, it is particularly important we do question them due to the impact of government on our society, democracy, and lives.

After all, how do we judge whether actions and decisions are morally good without considering moral evil? In many ways, this is illustrated by the Morrison Government’s behaviour in relation to COVID-19.

One only has to look at the constant sniping of the Morrison Government against the actions of the Victorian Government. In particular, against the Premier of Victoria Dan Andrews see this.

Throughout the Morrison Government have railed against the recent lock down in Victoria. The tension behind this appears to be the Morrison Government’s preference for what they call a “scalable proportional response,” snapping back and ‘living with’ COVID-19.

As reported in the Sydney Morning Herald on 28 March 2020:

“A group of experts convened by the Group of Eight prestige Australian universities at the request of Chief Medical Officer Brendan Murphy a fortnight ago were asked to give the government their view of the severity of social distancing measures that should be adopted. The overwhelming majority in the group urged a strategy of “go now, go hard and go smart.”

But “go now, go hard” did not find favour in Canberra. As Deputy Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly later explained, what was at issue was “essentially two schools of thought”. One was go hard, go fast, while the other was what he called a “scalable proportional response.” (Has Australia’s coronavirus response been too slow off the mark? Sydney Morning Herald, 28 March 2020).

The difference in the two approaches was highlighted by Bill Bowtell AO, Adjunct Professor UNSW Strategic Health Policy Consultant especially related to global health and development, HIV/Aids prevention and public health in a tweet on 28 October 2020.

Re-opening of Melbourne only possible because of great determination of Victorian people and setting of strategic goal of zero local transmissions by @DanielAndrewsMP Imperative this goal remains into 2021. The best way to live with #covid19 is to live without it. Well done!

— Bill Bowtell AO (@billbowtell) October 28, 2020

Bill’s statement; “The best way to live with #covid19 is to live without it” sums up the moral evil inherent in Morrison Government sniping and position. That is, the so-called scalable and proportional response sews the seeds of illness and death and, with that, social and economic decline.

One only has to look at the success of our neighbours in New Zealand to see that and, of course, of the success of the people of Victoria.

Coming soon:

Part 2 – Demons

Part 3 – Demagogues

By Steve Davies

“…the mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favoured few booted and spurred, ready to ride them…” Thomas Jefferson.

“It’s not just a health crisis, it’s an economic crisis.” Dominic Francis Perrottet, a gangly colt by Gordon Gecko out of Margaret Thatcher in party apparatchik’s blue tie saddle-cloth, a heavily tipped favourite, but up in class, easily beats his lunchtime jogging pal, Planning Minister, pious Anglican and fellow anti-abortionist, Rob Stokes to the winning post in NSW’s forty-sixth premier stakes.

It’s a rigged ballot, after much horse-trading, yet a novelty in a party which hasn’t voted for a leader since 2002. NSW prefers, like La Cosa Nostra, to keep its succession planning simple.

Gladys is a no-show. Is she in witness protection already? Scuttlebutt from “senior Liberals” is that she’ll be parachuted into a safe federal Liberal seat. If ICAC doesn’t send her to jail.

Federal Liberals and Nationals unite behind the terminally compromised ex-Premier, if only to show their hostility to the very idea of the ICAC and air their continued contempt for accountability. As thick as thieves, the saying goes.

Also continuing is Ms Berejiklian’s salary – not her $407,980 as premier but a handy $14000 a month pocket money – as is her ex-deputy’s, the self-styled John “Pork” Barilaro, as you’d expect from two pillars of selfless dedication to the greater good.

Neither has formally resigned yet. Nor has Andrew Constance. Nor need they, until by-elections, costing around a million dollars are held.

To the delight of his corporate owners, bankers and investors, Perrottet immediately pushes the economic panic button. Thanks to our unique media oligopoly, everyone knows that being locked down causes horrendous losses while “opening up” is the one true path to eternal prosperity. But austerity budgeting will do nothing for employment.

Since May, there are 244,000 fewer people in work in NSW while a further 217,000 people report working zero hours last month due to “economic or other reasons.”

To the horror of the PM’s handlers, saddled with an absolute dud in the leadership stakes, aka the PM for NSW, Perrottet, The Premier for Australia, in Laura Tingle’s call, goes rogue; decrees that he’ll abolish caps on overseas arrivals and dispense with tedious quarantine requirements. It’s refreshingly assertive, attention-seeking and an homage to the Ruby Princess. What could possibly go wrong?

It’s a heaven-sent opportunity for comic relief, even if it is egg on face. Libertarian autocrat, King Dom is a whirlwind of free will, divine right or hidebound arrogance – no-one’s quite sure – especially the state’s increasingly casualised, precariat, its baggage handlers and an underclass of overworked, underpaid and contract staff whose lives are consumed over getting enough hours to get by.

A world away, on The Drum, ABC’s leisure class salon, no-one’s booking OS holidays. Yet.

The ACTU says one in three jobs are casual or contract or labour hire and gig workers. Federal government gurus such as the very Christian Porter counter that it’s one in four.

In fact, the ACTU understates the case given our Uber-army of self-employed workers. The true figure is closer to 37% of the workforce or about five million workers.

Denied paid leave, casual employees generally have no guaranteed hours of work, work irregular hours and can have their employment ended without notice, says the Fair Work Ombudsman. But the federal government rejects, out of hand, any suggestion it revive Job Keeper. Or any Dom keeper.

Perrottet’s already lost a shouting match with the PM on the topic in July. Now, Morrison must slap-down the uppity Premier for Australia again. He must lasso the bolter fast.

“The Premier understands that is a decision for the Commonwealth government not for the state government and when we believe that is a decision to make, we will make it in that time,” Morrison issues a pointed, but ineffectual rebuke.

It will be a different story should infection gallop away again, as it has elsewhere in the world, as a result of prematurely easing restrictions. Or importing new mutations.

Already there is a massive miscalculation baked into the Federal Plan or Roadmap, a Clayton’s plan Morrison imposes on premiers and waves in front of the camera. Vaccination rates are never uniform across any state. Perrottet’s grand gesture spells disaster for regional NSW, especially for the state’s rural aboriginal communities.

Rick Morton reports in The Saturday Paper that the Covid-19 infection rate for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people is two and three times higher than that of non-Indigenous Australians. He cites leaked federal government confidential briefing papers.

The death rate amongst First Nations’ peoples aged 40-60, given low vaccination rates and the prevalence of early onset chronic diseases, is three times that of non-indigenous people.

Now, as the two most populous states, NSW and Victoria, begin to ease restrictions, the woefully low vaccination rates among First Peoples generally and especially in some communities pose a real threat to the lives and wellbeing of those for whom the priority vaccination effort has been anything but urgent.

So much for the PM’s assurances that his pet unicorn, “federal cabinet” and its National Plan would give top priority to the vaccination of our most vulnerable.

A few hours after the Premier for Australia usurps him, the PM for NSW, who spends all week in “coward’s castle”, Kirribilli, letting the Nationals hijack the carbon agenda, emerges to peg back Perrottet, claiming opening up applies only to returning Australian citizens (the same group he promised to have back home last Christmas).

King Dom has another go. He walks back his travel thing a tad. He puts regional freedoms on hold a month or two because of low vaccination rates.

Not to be outdone, Saturday, Morrison announces he’s giving everyone the freedom to buzz off overseas and back. Permanent residents, only, of course.

In just one week, despite his bluster, Perrottet’s sounding as weak and indecisive as the dithering Berejiklian. And every bit as shifty. Neither gives a fig about any duty of care towards anyone.

By Saturday, Perrottet is at it again. All international travellers will be welcome in NSW.

He’ll decide who comes into NSW… besides the state urgently needs a shed load of cheap migrant labour.

Morrison’s utterly gazumped by the young upstart. Never has a PM’s authority been defied so brazenly. Nor his impotence exposed so publicly. Dominic Francis Perrottet knows that Scotty’s all piss and wind. And that he has Sydney business behind him.

Moreover, his pernicious, economic crisis, tabloid scare, helps the state’s latest Great Helmsman to divert from the inconvenient truth of his own controversial role in Treasury.

Perrottet was in the wheelhouse in Captain Gladys ship of fools’ inglorious retreat from Delta, a textbook case in turning crisis into catastrophe. A headless chook ought to be NSW emblem. Or a barbed wire canoe. We’re already all up shit creek as far as national public health is concerned.

Perrottet’s choice peddles a deadly deception. People gasp their lungs out in intubation in a hospital system gutted by gung-ho post-modern neoliberals who’ve defunded public health and privatised just about everything left worth selling. But the Perrottets of this world insist it’s your own fault or a lifestyle choice if you’re sick or must live in overcrowded poverty in a Western Sydney ghetto.

“Privatize everything. Abolish help for the weak, the solitary, the sick and the unemployed. Abolish all aid for everyone except the banks. Don’t look after the poor; let the elderly die. Reduce the wages of the poor but reduce the taxes of the rich. Make everyone work until they are ninety. Only teach mathematics to traders, reading to big property-owners and history to on-duty ideologues.” And the execution of these commands will in fact ruin the life of millions of people,” writes Alain Badiou in Capitalism Today, (2012, 13).

It could be a page from Dom’s secret diary. It certainly fits federal Coalition “policy”.

Not only is the state not coping, but its health system itself needs intensive care after botched neoliberal surgery. The pattern is the same across the nation. All states are infected with the deadly neoliberal virus. Expect ever greater unmet demand, fewer hospital beds, overcrowded emergency departments and longer waits for elective surgery. Our public health system puts at risk the lives of all Australians reports The AMA in its recent analysis, Public Hospitals: Cycles of Crisis.

The crisis was full-blown well before Covid. As for the crisis induced by the Berejiklian government’s failure to respond, the former premier insists she acted on “the medical advice,” yet three months pass before Michael West Media investigative journalist, Callum Foote even gets a reply from her office. Foote simply wants to know what the medical advice was. The Premier’s office can’t tell him.

Incredibly, three months later, Foote receives an email from Kerry Chant dated early June, three weeks before the lockdown on June 23. But that email is not about public health advice in NSW. It’s about lockdown restrictions in Victoria. ICAC could turn its attention to what seems to be a desperate bluff. NSW’s response is dictated by the top end of town’s business interests. Gladys’ mantra about “the medical advice” is a pathetic attempt to evade accountability.

Perrottet’s glib diagnosis of economic crisis gaslights a state so wracked by existential crises, its vital signs are faint. News of a fourth resignation doesn’t help. Rats.

Nor does the new premier’s opposition to laws requiring priests to disclose to police confessions of child abuse. He believes that canon law trumps any state legislation.

Bringing schools back a week earlier without any consultation has teachers’ unions furious. But it does get everybody’s attention. It’s the new realpolitik which holds that a even wilful blunder can pay dividends in generating publicity for a newbie leader.

But is it just to keep himself in the news all week, that Perrottet, announces that NSW will abolish quarantine from 1 November? It’s a calculated act of contempt for Scott Morrison and federal authority over borders that he represents. And more.

Perrottet adds another, crisis to the disaster area that is NSW State politics, a state in crisis in an age of crisis; economic, political, environmental and social. And engineered.

“Crisis, rather than being accidental or episodic – as is too often assumed – has been a regular feature of state practice in the neoliberal austerity regimes of contemporary capitalism,” writes Canadian academic, poet and activist Jeff Shanks, echoing Naomi Wolf’s Shock Doctrine and Anthony Lowenstein’s Disaster Capitalism.

Thursday, Melanie Gibbons becomes the fourth rat to desert a sinking Liberal ship, leaving Perrottet a four-by-election popularity contest crisis.

Gibbons quits her marginal, Western Sydney seat of Holsworthy, to have a crack at federal politics in Hughes – seat of Craig Kelly, climate science denier, anti-vaxxer and Covid quack – the arse end of Clive Palmer’s UAP panto horse; a pseudo-party set up to peddle anti-Labor lies. Help the pro-mining federal coalition buy another election.

But there’s more. UAP now has 65,000 members, which Kelly reckons makes it the largest political party. It’s free to join via a simple online form. The politically comprised AEC says it’s all legit. Meanwhile UAP is joined by an extremist group.

Monday brings news that UAP will turbo-charge its toxic disinformation as Reignite Democracy Australia’s (RDA) top firebrand, Monica Smit, who has Liberal links, is to “join” the UAP.

How good is RDA’s call that all Commonwealth Health Officers be prosecuted for crimes against humanity? Vaccines are deadly? Contact tracing is unconstitutional?

Smit is a rabid conspiracy theorist who says her movement began “in response to the Victorian government’s catastrophic handling of the Covid Pandemic.”

Reignite Democracy Australia (RDA) boasts 80,510 subscribers, a thousand paid up members and an extensive online presence in an algorithm based digital echo chamber in which the deluded and irrational collude in paranoid fantasy, insidiously promoting the growth of outrageous lies, disinformation and bias.

RDA-UAP political interference suits the Morrison government’s agenda and is boosted hugely by Palmer’s funding. Clive’s spent almost $1m already, bankrolling Kelly’s election ads on YouTube. Google’s political transparency report shows that the UAP has spent $878,250 since November 2020, twenty times its nearest rival; over sixty per cent of the total political advertising spend.

The hard right, dry white, Dominic Perrottet’s ascension to Premier is, like Scott Morrison’s, a miracle given Dom’s tendency to treat the state treasury as a hedge fund and his role in the iCare scandal. The Liberals’ Pravda, The Australian, aka Catholic Boys’ Daily, reports Dom’s got the top job only after a deal to make his party deputy, Stuart Ayres, a St Dominic’s College Old Boy and Marise Payne’s man bag. Veteran Liberal powerbroker, lobbyist Michael Photios works the phones.

Fellow “committed Catholic”, the highly ambitious, green energy advocate, Matt Kean becomes treasurer. Ayres’ “Western Sydney profile” seals the deal, and leaves moderates out in the cold.

The superbly named Paul Toole gets the Nationals’ leader’s baton when pork-Barilaro does a Gladys and quits before ICAC can separate him from his superannuation. This makes Toole the new token deputy Premier, largely a walk-on role. Expect to see a lot of images of Paul Toole scowling in the background while Perrottet makes it up as he goes along. It’s the federal coalition in miniature. But with more political deaths onstage than the last scene of a Shakespearean tragedy.

Perrottet steps booted and spurred over three rivals, an Olympic standard pile-up- even for the perilously thin ice skating of contemporary Liberal politics. Imagine Steven Bradbury morphing into a predatory, bespectacled, giant stick insect.

Too Kafkaesque? Perrottet’s economic crisis diagnosis is woefully deficient and wilfully misleading. Imagine if this were a Labor government. NSW Leadership Crisis would be all over the news. Or what passes for news in our benighted island paradise, a fully owned subsidiary of News Corp with its retinue of fawning hacks, flacks and Morrison government stenographers.

Instead, Leigh Sales goes in soft on Ita’s ABC 7:30 midweek, letting Perrottet get away with murder.

“I think … Leigh, in relation to the workers compensation scheme in New South Wales. I think, as I have said very clearly in relation to that scheme, the reform was the right thing to do when I was finance minister. The scheme is in a much better place than it was before.”

Some things Perrottet would have done differently? Create an iCare without racking up four billion dollars in debt while underpaying 52000 workers $80 million?

Some subsequently perish. Others just have their lives ruined. But three key iCare executives get a total of $1.2 million payouts. Labor calls for an end to iCare executive bonuses after eight executives share $8 million in salaries and bonuses over two years.

Miraculously, a branch-stacking scandal in Victoria monopolises media attention while Perrottet’s Freedom Day lets you have a beer while you get your hair cut or your nails done, or all three, simultaneously, provided you are fully vaccinated.

These freedoms leave no-one any time at all to heed a terminally, politically compromised Federal Treasury, which confesses Monday, that it blew $40 billion on JobKeeper subsidies to businesses who did not qualify; did not lose a third of their turnover – and not $27 billion as previously reported. No-one cares?

Undaunted, Deputy PM Barnaby Joyce appears on ABC to spruik a further $100 million of corruption in The Building Better Regions fund (BBR) whilst BBR is being audited by the Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) over whether funding was consistent with the Commonwealth’s grant rules. Talk about contempt for accountability.

The Nationals, a critically endangered political subspecies, who represent five per cent of a gerrymandered electorate, rush to top up the scheme; blow their bags about how much control they have over the purse strings. Brag about a colour-coded spreadsheet.

How good is colour-coding? Such a boon to our innumerate ruling classes. “Get the money out the door” is a Coalition mantra. Shame is dead, buried and cremated. It’s the Morrison government’s biggest achievement.

God forbid that we exercise due diligence, even-handed justice or duty of care in federal expenditure. Any ideal of a democratic commonwealth is corrupted; mired in the stampede to buy votes.

Above all, the celebrity cult sucks the oxygen out of our politics. Hacks rush to gush over how many children the premier has sired. His Catholicism. How he’s only 39.

It’s a hot mess of irrelevancies which displace the cardinal question of the day; how in Dog’s name did Perrottet get the gig?

Is it his scandalous fiscal incompetence, or his Wolf of Wall Street stunt such as punting public funds on stocks, shares, junk bonds, anything bar the 7:30 at the Dapto Dogs, which equips him for the role of NSW premier?

Or like Morrison, has his God spoken to him out of a photograph of an eagle or a parrot or the hindquarters of a bandy-legged budgie smuggler? The suppository of all wisdom?

Such is the bizarre, supernaturalism and magical realism at the heart of our polity: a Trumpian adulation of celebrity leaders who betray us with their venality, their narcissism and their gobsmacking incompetence, while they bleed us dry.

Rivals, Berejiklian and Barilaro flee the ICAC, a body booed by Murdoch hacks, while Andrew Constance is lured out of the comp by shonky Morrison’ promise of a safe federal seat in Gilmore.

Constance. So promising a name, so quickly waylaid by the whiff of a chaffbag of cash.

Perrottet proclaims himself “first family premier of NSW”, an award he selflessly gives himself in his inaugural speech. Hugely cheered by Dom’s posturing, doubtless, are families suffering because injured or sick workers were underpaid in the state’s iCare workers’ compensation scheme scandal.

iCare nearly collapses under Perrottet’s mismanagement, making a $4bn loss.

Taking on the unions to cut public servants’ pay, or freezing nurses’ wages, similarly, is always a family friendly career move. As is not consulting teachers’ representatives.

A dry, right, family guy Perrottet seeks to distract us from the elephant in the room, his own fiscal incompetence and the sudden, rapid, decapitation of his government.

Liberal leadership may have taken a fatal hit but Perrottet’s kept his powder and his Thatcherite economics as dry as they were in his maiden speech.

“I strongly support the principles of free markets. I oppose plans for more social engineering, more welfare handouts and the continual obsession with our rights at the expense of our responsibilities,” Perrottet declared in 2011.

It’s vacuous, hypocritical, cringeworthy, neoliberal cant. Did an IPA hack write it for him? All parties are social engineers as The AIMN’s John Lord so capably shows.

As state treasurer, Perrottet helped former Premier Gladys Berejiklian ensure that Sydney’s elite Northern Beaches received four times the amount of lockdown support from fellow social engineer, Morrison a defender of the rights of the kleptocracy to help themselves to funds diverted from the poor and needy or unvaccinated battlers on the Death Star Victoria.

Middle-class welfare, the genteel euphemism for tipping buckets of money stolen from workers into bosses’ Cayman Island accounts is the class act of our economic theatre for the last fifty years. The myth of trickle-down makes the reverse Robin Hoods of Coalition economics public heroes. At least in their own echo-chambers.

Workers starve as billions of dollars are gifted by Frydenberg and his government’s subsidies to fossil fuel corporations and private insurance shysters. Naturally, one of Perrottet’s first moves is to announce a “package” of funding and other measures to help the struggling business classes.

Perrottet is perfect successor to Gladys in a state which is run by business for business.

Dom’s cranking up the economic crisis because he’s just shunted Chief Health Officer Kerry Chant off-stage in the state’s daily Covid Punch n Judy Show with its ritual case tally, fatalities and finger-wagging. Saturday there’s no show at all. Bugger the medical advice, King Dom’s in charge now.

We’ll miss passive-aggressive Gladys’ ineffectual pleading. Imploring people to follow the medical advice which she never divulged because it never existed. And the way she could still bag Victoria. Her outbursts of petulance when journos expected answers.

On ABC Insiders, recently, a sage says shooting the medico messenger is part of a general return to elected representatives. It’s a revealing comment from an embedded press, given the extent to which those self-same representatives, including our federal Health Minister, just love to hide behind “the medical advice” until there’s a political point in ignoring public health experts. Now it seems to be open slather.

The myth of an economic crisis caused solely by lockdown; of liberty curtailed by dictatorial Labor premiers out to sabotage a nation’s economic well-being is one many lunatic absurdities created by a Murdoch-led media which endanger public health.

Yet it sells well – at least with the hired help who turn up outside the CFMEU, who keep building workers safe, before blocking the Westgate Bridge, scene of one of the worst industrial accidents in the history of construction, an industry notorious for injury and shoddy work practices which ruin or cost workers’ their lives.

Urging states to open before restrictions have done their work is madness. Yet Perrottet is a more than eager accomplice. He’s in competition with his let ‘er rip PM, the latest avatar of Scott Morrison, ever a work in progress.

Goodbye dullsville; hello Gladesville. Make way for an up-beat, corporate, kleptocratic patsy, who like his predecessor has all the libertarian rhetoric about granting freedoms off pat while acting like a petty tyrant, arbitrarily bringing Freedom Day forward for his own political gain. We’ll know in a week at what cost. If we can trust the data.

Dom is head of a state that now becomes even more about cheering on its celebrity premier than any social contract, political covenant or civil society. Suffer mere voters who may yet cherish quaint hopes of democratic representation. Or responsibility. King Dom has a bent for autocracy, secrecy and golden parachutes.

With Perrottet at the helm, Icare, NSW’s WorkCover 2.0 almost collapsed. It underpaid 52,000 sick and injured workers, eighty million dollars in claims benefits, as it racked up four billion dollars in debt. Yet it was immensely successful in looking after its executives. Executives collected four million in salaries and bonuses in 2018-19 alone, a parliamentary inquiry was told.

Another $1.2 million helped ease the pain of termination, icare announced, this February, when interim CEO Don Ferguson would depart the government-owned insurer in six months’ time, while group executives Rob Craig and Sara Kahlau were to go sooner.

But look over there! Dom promises more freedoms. By Monday, 11 October he tweaks Gladys’ hopelessly nanny-state plans to let shops and hairdressers reopen to the fully vaccinated and apply a five kilometres-from-home travel limit.

“Hey, hey it’s Perrottet” firms as favourite in the stakes for the title of the new, occasional Covid NSW infotainment which dumps “the medical advice” in favour of appeasing corporate greed.

Our medium, singular, given all outlets sing from the same hymnal, choruses that new King Dom’s a “devout” Roman Catholic with a six-pack of kids. Dom, a Castle Hill Quiverfull denies he’s a member of Opus Dei, but in the immortal words of Mandy Rice-Davies, “Well, he would, wouldn’t he?”

If he were a member of a secret cult, his superiors would, presumably, insist that he not advertise the fact, John Carmody notes drily. But Perrottet makes his allegiances crystal clear.

Fear not. Dominic’s faith will not affect his politics or his religion; the uber-neoliberal flogging of every public asset he can get his hands on, poles and wires, roads, even the Public Titles Office.

It’s not his family Dom’s talking about. Perottet’s tickled pink to be elected NSW’s new Godfather at The Liberal Mafia’s Macquarie Street palace after self-professed – self-deceiving – “goody-two-shoes” Gladys goes under a bus, bequeathing Dom her Fiefdom of Little Mateship and HQ of The Jolly Bagman as Operation Spicer discovered, where developers make donations to The Free Enterprise Foundation, a Canberra slush fund, which are then washed back into state politics.

Bugger the law. On with the party is the Liberal anthem, fostered by Pepsodent Kid Mike Baird, whose career dipped when, in 2014, ICAC found a swag of Liberal MPs “acted with the intention of evading laws under the Election Funding, Expenditure and Disclosures Act.”

For ten, the party was over. Not all left politics entirely, some took refuge on the cross benches.

Dom’s not giving too much away when becomes clear that even the Press Gallery knows Morrison called the former NSW treasurer a “fuckwit”.

Others claim he was told to go away. The latest NSW Premier, a gawky, asthenic, bespectacled, geek who lost a mozza on his iCare scam, for which he may yet face the ICAC, is no dear friend of the PM. Not because he’s failed spectacularly already but because he’s a rival and he’s pushy and he’s shrewd. He intimidates the PM.

But Perottet’s not going to break Omertà, the code of silence binding Liberals.

Politicians are like diapers. They should both be changed regularly. And for the same reason. As for the Liberal Party of NSW, its MPs must also contend with Engadine Macca’s syndrome, where our PM involuntarily soils himself over a Rugby League Grand Final in 1997 and must then go on Sydney’s KIIS FM, three years later, to clear up the matter.

Doubtless, Gladys is similarly indisposed on hearing that ICAC is on her case. Perrottet has every reason to expect a call also. In the meantime, he’s humiliated Morrison publicly, with his defiance of the PM’s authority over borders. It bodes not well for either.

Ultimately, the rise of Perrottet is another chapter in the rise of a ruling elite, to whom Morrison does not wholly belong, an elite that exists to promote its own and to serve the interest of its wealthy corporate sponsors. Despite much distraction over the NSW’s new premier, it is not his religion but his dry, right politics that merit our full attention.