“Performative symbolism” is an apt description of the Morrison government
I don’t often agree with Greg Sheridan but when he described Scott Morrison’s announcement that Australia was sending weapons to Ukraine as “performative symbolism,” he was right on the money.
We transferred a few million dollars to the people who do have weapons – a token gesture that Morrison wants acknowledged by the Ukrainian President in an address to our parliament. After all, he addressed other countries, why not take time out from the war to thank us too.
Morrison and Dutton want a khaki election. They want us to concentrate on a war in Europe and threats of Chinese invasion via Antarctica and Russian Space Wars.
But as they furiously point over there, Australia reels from the cumulative onslaught of drought, fire, flood, heatwave, cyclone, storm surge and new diseases.
Nothing underlines the “performative symbolism” of the Morrison government more than their pretence at taking action on climate change.
In response to criticism from the UN secretary general, government MPs were quick to show their true colours.
Matt Canavan said the UN should “read the room” and accused it of being “asleep” as “Europe has got itself into an absolute vulnerable mess because they failed to develop their own fossil fuels.”
“It is clear now that what we need to do is restore natural resource production to the free world … For the UN here – they are not only so hopeless on Ukraine … Now they’re actively undermining our peace and security, and we should totally ignore them.”
Paul Fletcher told ABC News Breakfast the “chattering classes of the UN can say what they want” while Australia was “delivering outcomes” like a 20% emissions reduction since 2005. That was a “better performance” than the US, Canada, and New Zealand, Fletcher said.
That claim requires so much cherry-picking that it is beyond credible.
Excluding LULUCF or changing the starting year to 1990, when the data begins, puts Australia well behind the pack. The claim also doesn’t acknowledge the effect of the pandemic and compares recent data from Australia to pre-pandemic data from other countries.
Comparable emissions reduction data from 2005 to 2019:
- The UK: -34 per cent
- France: -19 per cent
- Germany: -20 per cent
- Italy: -32 per cent
- Australia: -15 per cent
Pep Canadell, chief research scientist at the CSIRO Climate Science Centre and the executive director of the Global Carbon Project, told Fact Check the sudden drop of around 5 per cent between 2019 and 2020 was the result of “a pandemic problem that has nothing to do with structural changes of energy, or economic system.”
The government has told us that they are committed to a fossil-fuel led recovery in Australia and continued expansion of mines and exports and support for the industry.
Any pretence otherwise is, as Mr Sheridan put it, performative symbolism.
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Return to home pageKaye
The last possible date for an election appears to be 21 May so with Easter and ANZAC Weekends it seems that the only available dates are :
election 21 May 2022 must be called by 18 April 2022
election 14 May 2022 ” ” 11 April 2022
election 7 May 2022 ” ” 4 April 2022
Morrison would probably prefer later but the only way he could delay the vote would be a national emergency : Spudley Dutton is doing his best to bait the Chinese but they are not playing ball – threatening to send our new submarines into the South China Sea in 2040 or perhaps a bit later doesn’t seem like a viable threat.
The Budget will be handed down on Tuesday 29 March and the government are going to want whatever momentum they can get from budget handouts to be still in voter’s minds when they vote. So, 7 May seems a logical date.
What do you think ?
Albo said the 14th. ScoMo wouldn’t like him to be right. In this silly world, who knows.
I am not sure anyone is really listening to the drip feed of a few million here, there and everywhere anymore. There are bigger issues. Like finding staff for aged and chilld care, and teachers and nurses – all leaving in droves.
Caught between obeying Washington, and the folk who elected him, Scummo will never disappoint. He will come down with what is best for USA.
So anything to prolong this conflict will play into the hands of those selling wheat, or Oil, or gas, and some commodities. At the same time it becomes an A+ site to test weapons mainly coming for US. But of course if they come from China, then guess who becomes the bad boys then.
This is all sad for those that choose to stay in this no mans land.
One atavistic piece of foolishness of our national election system provides the Prime Minister of the time, a front foot in declaring when an election will be. As in most of developed democracies, and indeed as it the case with our Australian state elections, national elections should be scheduled well in advance, and independently of the political whims of Prime Ministers.
Thus, under the present arrangements an unscrupulous character such as Morrison, and his patron, the New York-based media emperor who happens regards Australia as his special ideological bailiwick, are free to use the election date as a political plaything.
When the risible Fletcher claims “we” have reduced emissions by 20% since 2005, he forgets to mention that most, if not all of that reduction from Howard’s 2005 emissions peak was achieved by 2013 and under Rudd and Gillard. The LNP can’t claim to have achieved any meaningful reduction in emissions as a result of its “climate action” policies since it gained office under “a great big tax” Flabbot. In fact, even its own net-zero by 2050 modelling shows that we won’t achieve net-zero and the modelling is based on a=n assumed carbon-price. Apparently, Labor’s “carbon price was a “great big tax on everything”, but the LNP’s assumed carbon price isn’t “a great big tax on everything”.
Spot on Regional Elder and, of course, until an election is called Morrison can continue to travel and campaign on the public purse without needing to call on the Liberal Party to cough up.
That always gets me !
Matt king Coal should read the room with his
glasses on next time, as over 65% of voters regard climate change as a major issue
great article as usual, Kaye Lee
i AM REMINDED THAT THE 1983 NATIONAL DROUGHT BROKE THE DAY AFTER the Bob Hawke LABOR government won the 1983 election.
Could this run of drought, bushfires, pandemics and floods be somebody trying to tell Australian voters that ”something is rotten in the state of Australia” and that ”the fish rots from the head”??
I am still going for a split election, half senate first. As he desperately clings to power. HOR can be then in September. Transactional politician at work.
I really hope that Labor, if they win, gets rid of this Reichspud travesty Defence Space Command because the thought of him madly fiddling with himself while wearing his plastic raincoat as he watches big muscly troops standing on top of a mountain and throwing rocks at satellites passing overhead is…ugh…
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-03-22/cph-space-commander-warns-australia-lags-in-space-capabilities/100930234
Scummo’s increasing lunacy is spreading to the rest of the LNP faster than you can say, “Want a donation?”
What a bunch of whiny pathetic bitches! Seems the complaint came from one prince/princess precious who is more than likely a LNP sheep. The mayor, a certain Philip Ruddock, would also find it offensive. If it was a Labor sticker would it also receive the same treatment?
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/liberal-led-council-threatens-not-to-collect-bins-with-anti-morrison-stickers-20220322-p5a6tr.html
I live not far from Launceston with a friend and we have the same two stickers on our bins and have yet to hear a complaint.
Paul Fletcher, he of the HMAS Endeavour gaffe, Matt ‘Coalface’ Canavan; really, these people are nobodies dressed up as importants. Their ignorance and arrogance on full throttle display, per the ‘chattering classes’ and ‘read the room’ jibes & insults directed at this significant global body, the UN. What they fail to comprehend is that their utterances expose them for the naked fools that they are. What’s the expression again: ‘Better to be silent and thought a fool than to comment and confirm the suspicion?’
It reminds me of a conference I attended in the mid-90s when this bloke sat down next to and without ado proffered me his business card – Minister for Agriculture (Federal) – I’d never heard of him before, or since, but he said, presumptuously, ‘You’ll hear from me again’. Another nobody. The LNP seems to be a waiting room full of these jumped-up egoistic nobodies trying desperately to be important, significant; but lacking in insight and any capacity for reflective thought on how their behaviour affects the broader community.
I note that today’s SMH reported that NSW Planning Minister Anthony Roberts scrapped a policy directive from his predecessor two weeks after it came into effect that ordered consideration of flood, fire risks before building, a decision that would have put planning for climate change at the heart of building decisions.
A mere few weeks after the disastrous north coast floods.
They just don’t care, and don’t even pretend to care, these LNP apparatchiks. Middle finger firmly raised, and parliamentary pension forever on their minds as they slurp at the trough.
GL:
I also have those stickers on my bins. No complaints, no problems with collections, just a few appreciative winks from passers by when I put the bins out.
It gives me a little hope.
Just as important as knowing the election date is the date the election will be called. Will it be a long campaign, or a short one?
One could argue that Morrison has been in election mode for almost three years.
Satellites have shown how the emissions of methane from coal mines in the Bowen Basin are far greater than what the LNP government has been declaring. Any figures that look positive coming from the Federal government are highly dubious. Even if Fletcher’s figure of a 20% reduction in emissions was right, it is not enough by far. New coal mines and gas fields are being proposed which will produce further escaping emissions.
The LNP rescinded the Labor policy that had been working in reducing emissions. They also tried to discourage renewable energy by creating quotas for solar panels. Nonsense comments about electric vehicles were pushed at the last election by the LNP.
All we can expect from the LNP is spin.
https://www.theenergymix.com/2022/03/16/coal-mines-emit-more-methane-than-oil-and-gas-wells-with-more-new-projects-on-the-way/?fbclid=IwAR05PYsrl5npMLVceOk4eQzL-1CPc7dtjxdXNx19jymPchCT-ICfOL9GmFM
https://www.theenergymix.com/2022/03/16/coal-mines-emit-more-methane-than-oil-and-gas-wells-with-more-new-projects-on-the-way/?fbclid=IwAR05PYsrl5npMLVceOk4eQzL-1CPc7dtjxdXNx19jymPchCT-ICfOL9GmFM
The more Albo bites back the more that Scummo and The Rupert and other assorted sleazebags will continue to keep it on the boil and in the gutter. I think he should just not say anything further on the matter and try and deprive them of oxygen (which might be difficult because anaerobic bacteria don’t need it). As to Scummo calling him gutless, he should take that as a badge of honour from the Absolute Grand Master of Gutlessness and Cowardice, Scotty of the Scuttle and Run.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-03-23/anthony-albanese-kimberley-kitching-bullying-allegation-inquiry/100932006
How dare the Victorian supreme court go against Little Prince Precious Timmy the Turdulous. He will be going into a hold my breath until I turn purple and die petulant temper tantrum and stamping his little feet in rage.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/mar/23/independent-zoe-daniel-wins-court-battle-over-election-campaign-signs
GL: I’ve always thought the expensive kerfuffle caused by Tim Bloody Wilson in Goldstein was because he’d stuffed up his own arrangements for getting his publicity rubbish organised in time.
Vote 1: Zoe Daniel.
Put Liberals last.
Little Joshie didn’t like being questioned about his public purse $433,000+ pay packet (I’m also betting that with the wife’s “confidential” pay packet that they are skating along at $600k and more a year). All he could do is bullshit, bullshit, and yet more bullshit.
My favourite Friedeggburgerisms: ““I fill up my own car. I do some grocery shopping and I buy my own coffee.”” Wanker.
Does he ever go to the supermarket and worry about the price of vegetables?
“I understand that prices have been going up. And my focus right now is to address those cost of living pressures,’’ he said. Bucket time for throwing up in.
https://www.news.com.au/finance/economy/federal-budget/josh-frydenberg-avoids-awkward-salary-question-ahead-of-federal-budget/news-story/85bc0da68d4082fe50c5d781085bfd8f
GL,he’s nearly as repulsive as the dickhead whose job he wants.Redeeming features in the Liar’s rabble are nonexistent.Lower than a snake’s arse in a wheel rut.
I’m sure Houston is going to suffer after resigning, but the millions of dollars he’ll have stashed away in offshore banks will console him. He won’t have to live like the little people because dog has preordained that he would be a very rich man because he is just so wonderful. Anyway, the inhouse “independent review” will find him innocent.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-03-23/hillsong-church-founder-brian-houston-resigns/100932318
Bwahahahahaha…
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/mar/23/sales-of-anti-pm-stickers-surge-after-council-threatens-rubbish-services
GL,
Meanwhile, now-ex pastor Brian Houston (aka ‘the defendent’) is also currently still in the dock on criminal trial over allegations that he knowingly concealed serial sex-offences commited against children.
Although this additional fact is not being mentioned in most media reporting, I suspect it may have helped influence Hill$ong’s decision to encourage Houston to ‘resign his ministry’.
Ps, AFAIK, the PM has not yet made any comment on his moral/spiritual advisor resigning over misconduct whilst on criminal trial.