Scottie from marketing forgot to study history
Scott Morrison makes many – too many – mistakes, but his biggest one is presenting the Coalition government as a one-man band – SCOTT MORRISON – occasionally accompanied by another Minister to speak on the main topic.
Whatever the PM learned in school and at university, it did not include the important bits of history – or of economics.
Nor did he grasp the idea that learning is a life-long process, and change means that knowledge requires to be continuously updated and ideas adjusted to cope with novel situations.
Ideology, of course, is a stumbling block, because it necessarily forces a blinkered view of life.
Much is being made at the moment of the similarities between Australia’s financial situation at the end of WWII and now.
Mention is also made of how long recovery took.
I am not sure whether Morrison is aware of how much he does not know, or whether he has the ability to make realistic attempts to bridge the gaps in his knowledge, or, at the very least, turn for help to people who know a lot more about economics than he does.
The present situation is a brand new paradigm as a whole, but reference to past events can provide clues to guide the way through the current nightmare of the COVID-19 pandemic and economic collapse.
Building up a massive deficit is the least of our worries. Keeping people alive, housed and fed is the priority, with provision of jobs to follow over time.
And rather than being the first thought in Morrison’s mind in planning for recovery, the fate of the people who have lost jobs seems to be pushed well behind the fate of businesses. And as for his treatment of those in the gig economy and the arts – words fail me!
We are in an unprecedented (there’s that word again!) state which could lead to total disaster.
We have the pandemic.
We have parts of the country which are a long way from recovering from the last disastrous bush fire season.
We have a country, the USA, which used to be respected as the major world power, in a worse state of chaos than Australia.
We have China, the rising contender as world leader, on which our economy has become seriously dependent, becoming distinctly unfriendly.
We have effectively closed our borders to the rest of the world because of the pandemic, while we struggle once more to recover stability in Victoria and maybe NSW.
Finally, and importantly – but not to Morrison – we have urgent need for action on climate change, which is not going to be helped by a policy which insists that we can use gas to transition to renewables – as if the gas market would cooperate in a plan from which it will need to be removed again!
To be an effective leader is to get out front and set an example.
The second wave has arisen because leadership has not shown a model of caring for the members of our society – particularly those on the fringes.
If I do not follow the rules of social distancing, hand hygiene, avoiding gathering in large groups and, when necessary, wearing a face mask, the risk I take has three elements:
1. I might contract COVID-19 and recover, not necessarily totally;
2. I might contract COVID-19 and die;
3. I might contract COVID-19, with or without symptoms and pass it on to others.
The worst outcome here is the third, because I would be harming people who might otherwise remain unaffected.
If we have leaders who do not care about us, it is hard to persuade our fellow citizens that they need to care about other people, at least as much as they care about themselves!
So many rumours circulate without any effective efforts to correct them – like only older people are at risk of dying.
WRONG.
Children are not affected.
WRONG.
We can eliminate COVID-19.
WRONG.
We may or may not develop a vaccine, but, as flu has shown. that does not guarantee that, if vaccinated, we will not contract the infection.
I don’t know about you, but when I hear Scott Morrison responding to questions – yes, he does sometimes answer rather than brush the question aside! – there seems to be a whiny note of irritation and defensiveness in his voice, as if he resents being expected to explain to us poor nobodies.
When I think back through history of some of the leaders who have left a legacy of respect, I reflect how unfortunate we are to be in the present quandary, with people in charge who do not have the capacity to lead in an effective way.
I end as always – this is my 2020 New Year Resolution:
“I will do everything in my power to enable Australia to be restored to responsible government.”
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22 comments
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Phil Pryor -
ajogrady -
Kerri -
Matters Not -
Neil -
RosemaryJ36 -
Matters Not -
Jack Cade -
Patricia -
RosemaryJ36 -
Phil -
Roswell -
Phil -
Greeny -
Jack Cade -
Greeny -
Jack Cade -
Matters Not -
Greeny -
Matters Not -
Keith -
Kerri
Return to home pageA politician has many opinions and principles, and if you don’t like them, well, he’ll (usually) get up another set to suit the price, whether money, ambition, donors, expediency, career moves. Do not ask for sense, only for a statement. Do not ask for truth only an appearance. No ethics or morals must interfere with superficiality, exaggeration, even downright lies. And, anyone drenched in a self rewarding superstition is never to be trusted in public life, rather like a virus. Morrison is a political perverted pox.
Scott Morrison believes that success is the ability to go from one total failure to another total failure with no loss of enthusiasm or any sign of a guilty conscience or any shame.
Rosemary I question your assertions over this virus?
New Zealand has indeed eliminated the virus from within their borders. Every recent case in NZ has been from an overseas traveller and has remained quarantined. New Zealand has not had a case of community transmission in the last month.
WE could eliminate this virus from within our community and whilst it would still leave us potentially vulnerable to infection via overseas arrivals with proper quarantine procedures, it would allow us the freedom to move safely within our own borders. For those of us who are immunocompromised this would mean a return to normality and an escape from our caged lifestyle.
The main reason you can have “the flu” vaccine and still get “the flu” is that “the flu” is not one disease. Your vaccination covers whatever strains are in communities at the time of its manufacture. “The flu” you catch after your vaccine is not “the flu” or one of the many “flues” you were vaccinated for. “The flu” mutates thousands of times every year in every country.
COVID19 is a distinct virus that whilst it does mutate does not greatly alter its prime characteristics as a virus. The small mutations allow for genomic tracing that can establish the origins of a cluster but overall it still exhibits characteristics similar enough for it to be identified as COVID19.
There will be a vaccine for COVID19 but it will take time as given this disease is far more deadly and contagious than “the flu” and the need for a vaccine is more urgent than “the flu” vaccine and given this virus has exhibited so many and varied symptoms it is taking longer than most people are comfortable with to make a vaccine that is safe and effective.
If you cast your mind back to the proclamations of doctors such as the US’s Anthony Fauci, their initial prediction for a vaccine was some time nest year.
I enjoy your writings Rosemary but I will challenge you on this one.
Kerri – re flues. Think you will find that ‘flues’ are defined as – ducts, pipes, or openings for conveying exhaust gases from fireplaces, furnaces, water heaters, boilers etc.
According to my Dictionary, the plural of ‘flu’ (an abbreviation of influenza) is ‘flus’ (unlikely as it may seem). Or is ‘flues’ now accepted in medical circles?
As for:
Maybe not? As I understand it, COVID-19 is a new ‘corona’ virus as are MERS and SARS (both now ‘old’ corona viruses) and to date no vaccine exists for those (corona) viruses as well. Granted with Covid-19 extraordinary efforts are being made but there is no guarantee of success. Or am I wrong? Just askin …
Scromo is one of the most disgusting incompetent human specimens we’ve seen in geological time.
Kerri – in theory we just might be able to eliminate the virus, but indications to date are that it is highly unlikely that we will. And we have not at any stage closed our borders or quarantined effectively to the extent that New Zealand has done. And as long as people can be infected but asymptomatic, eliminating the virus remains problematic.
As MN says, there is no certainty of a vaccine and we cannot keep our borders closed forever.
With the current government’s anxiety to snap back, elimination becomes even more problematic.
Finally – our national leader is not Jacinda Ardern.
She cares about people.
ScoMo cares about proving he can manage the economy.
RosemaryJ36 – I think that even with an effective vaccine, complete elimination of COVID-19 will still face the hurdle of those who see vaccines in general as some type of incredible plot driven by Bill Gates, George Soros et al and therefore will refuse to be vaccinated regardless of the consequences.
Sad! Perhaps we may have to consider ‘isolating’ those who can be seen as ‘selfish’ broadly defined. And it may come to that – life or death decision(s).
Rosemary J36
If a vaccine IS developed, and the virus is absolutely eliminated, you can bet your life Fort Detrick will store a couple of phials of its alongside their Smallpox (for use against uppity Sioux or Cheyenne) and anthrax (for use against anybody some sick tuck in the CIA doesn’t like).
By the way – am I alone in being tempted to build a spoonerism around that Trumpist with the tempting given name TUCKER? He is a Fruly ugly Tucker
“I am not sure whether Morrison is aware of how much he does not know, or whether he has the ability to make realistic attempts to bridge the gaps in his knowledge, or, at the very least, turn for help to people who know a lot more about economics than he does”
Morrison is a psychopathic narcissist. He does not have to listen to others, even those who have experience in the areas in which he does not, and that is all scientists, medicos and a goodly proportion of the populace, he does not have to learn because he knows everything.
Expecting any other than we get from Morrison is like trying to put out an erupting volcano with a thimble full of water. Will not happen.
Morrison with the backing of the Murdoch media, and much of all other media outlets, has convinced himself that he is the saviour of, if not the world, like is hero Trump thinks he is, but of Australia and its people.
Nothing could be further from the truth. We think that we dodged a bullet when Dutton was not chosen to lead the liberal party, the truth is that we just got a different bullet but one of the same calibre but with a demeanour that appealed to the bogans and uneducated of the populace, whereas Dutton basically pissed most people off.
Does no one in the government actually understand the future costs the government is creating?
For young people to be encouraged to draw down on superannuation is irresponsible, because the later cost in terms of Age Pension. demands will be enormous.
Those who only partially recover from COVID-19 appear likely to require considerable and expensive health care in consequence.
Pushing to re-open the economy prematurely is insane. Something along the lines of the UBI would be much simpler, with changes to taxation laws which prevent any benefit to those who definitely do not need a government hand-out.
Top priority should be construction of social housing, providing homes and jobs!
Of course, if the government really cared about people who already have little or nothing, none of these suggestions would be necessary!
The governments only plan is to get reelected, no more no less. Anyone thinking anyone in the Morrison government cares about people, has obviously been asleep since he has been PM. Tories only care about money and how much they can make without doing anything. It’s their stock in trade.
When has an LNP government, or opposition for that matter, ever looked further ahead than the next election?
” When has an LNP government, or opposition for that matter, ever looked further ahead than the next election?”
They haven’t and that’s why most of them are abject failures, going from one crisis to the next. No change there and no change likely in my lifetime what’s left of it.
@Matters Not “those who…will refuse to be vaccinated regardless of the consequences”, sounds like me 🙂
Already China, Argentina and India require those who travel by rail or air show proof of vaccination so it wouldn’t be a surprise to see the same manipulative, herding agenda play out here.
Re Bill Gates, aka Mr Eugenics 2020, Overseer of the Decade of Vaccines, Mr $5-profit-for-every-$1-invested in vaccines, The Bill: Retired British doctor Vernon Coleman in a recent post ‘Your Government Wants You Dead’ said this in regard to the Bill and his eugenic program: “Why have things changed so much? It’s partly money. And it’s partly eugenics – Bill Gates’s pet project.”
Greeny
Why is requiring proof that you are not infected by or a carrier of a killer virus a ‘herding agenda’? That is the most fatuous comment ever made on this site – and I’ve made a few.
I’ll bet you had measles, whooping cough, scarlet fever and polio vaccines when you were younger.
If not, do you know what measles can do? Do you know what ‘post-polio syndrome is?
Are you Taliban?
Jack, ‘killer virus’, like the strains of influenza virus that killed over 1000 people in Aus and 650,000 people worldwide last year? People have died from viruses every year since 1918. The CDC described covid as slightly more deadly than seasonal flu.
Today narcissism is endemic and the average person believes they should not die from a virus? Car accidents, cancer, chronic respiratory conditions etc also kill people. Should we lockdown the economy until everything that causes death is eliminated, is that an option? Peanuts had a security blanket, now we have the MSM promise of a vaccine somewhere over the rainbow.
You are right, I had some vaccines and was almost hospitalized twice. Lucky for me I didn’t enter the allopathic chemical fix downspiral. Back then there were no safety tests for vaccines – just like now. Today, control groups are given ‘placebos’ that contain mercury and/or aluminium adjuvants so both groups get the same portions of neuro-toxins.
There is a saying ‘an apple a day keeps the doctor away’. Imagine if we added mercury, aluminium, formaldehyde and attentuated viruses (up to 11 now in some multi-valent compounds) to an apple, would be a sign of progress in the arena of health?
The ‘herding agenda’ refers to the way govts around the world are making it impractical to live without taking vaccines. Already children at most day-care & schools and hospital & aged care workers require proof of vaccination to attend. If the future unwritten decree is ‘Vaccinate or Starve’ (once your savings run out and you can’t find another job) – what kind of choice is that? And if you think the future receipt of job-keeper/job-seeker will not be dependent on having been vaccinated, think it through.
No vaccine has ever been safety tested and recording of adverse reactions are in general tracked for 1 to 3 weeks.
The USA Vaccine Court has paid out some $4B in recent year, list of injuries here:
https://www.hrsa.gov/sites/default/files/hrsa/vaccine-compensation/vaccine-injury-table.pdf
Measles – most cases are now vaccine-related strains, not wild measles. See the work of Dr Andrew Wakefield.
Polio – why do you think Bill Gates and the WHO were banned from India and some African countries? Check the Corbett Report.
Am I a Taliban? No, I’m not even a Nazi. If you want to see Nazism in action follow the group-speak of technocrats, transhumanists and eugenicists who advise the Propaganda Unit, you can view their message on tv channels 1-10 each night.
If anyone wants to take a vaccine that’s their choice. To force another person to take part in an experiment using vaccines that have not been safety-tested is the kind of stuff that lead to the Nuremberg Trials.
Most of the anti-vaxxers’ would not be here to be anti-vaxxers were it not for measles, scarlet fever, smallpox, whooping cough, tuberculosis, polio etc vaccine/inoculations. I have had two friends die in the last 3 years from ‘post polio syndrome. They were not vaccinated in their childhood, got poliomyelitis, and apparently survived. BUT poliomyelitis sticks around, undetected, and in later life people who had it and were ‘unscathed’, start to have difficulty swallowing, breathing and walking. It destroys every aspect of your life.
You have every right to refuse a vaccine; what you do not have the right to do is infect everyone around you if your impregnable immune system gets impregnated. By all means refuse to be vaccinated, but isolate yourself, not for 14 days but forever, like a one-person plague village, like a Typhoid Mary. Because your pristine system could be a cocktail of unpleasantnesses itching to emigrate.
Re the work of Dr Andrew Wakefield (referenced above with approval)
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3136032/
No future in arguing with anti-vaxxers on social media. Usually they cite ‘evidence’ that’s been totally debunked. (See above). Besides they ‘know’! What with chem-trails …. Gates, Soros et al. Pick your windmill, lower your lance and way you go.
Jack, with an estimated 380 trillion viruses and bacteria in the human microbiome and covid mutating by the minute you think this whole exercise is about anything other than curtailing freedoms and achieving that through fear-porn coverage by MSM?
https://www.inverse.com/article/49747-what-is-the-human-virome
No way will I recommend children or adults for that matter be lined up to get poisoned.
You might be unaware the proposed mRNA vaccines have some dangers attached.
http://vaccinedangers.org/
Hi MN, will do so with pleasure.
Final citation.
A form of child abuse (albeit via omission) characterised by religious zeal!
Greeny
The collorallary of your comments is that people should not gain assistance from any Medical Practitioner. The antibiotics people are prescribed, blood pressure tablets, asthma medications, or serious opioid medications to ward off severe pain; are really only prescribed to poison people? That companies producing pharmaceuticals make huge profits is probably right. But, they are not setting out to maim or kill people.
Currently, a child born in the 25th week of pregnancy has a chance of living. Child mortality rates have improved through medical science over the last 100 years. Medical science has also ensured that people now have a chance of living longer. In the past, 65 was chosen as an age where people could retire, chosen on the basis of people did not live far past 65 it would appear.
You really need to provide better references, pseudo science and anecdotal comments are meaningless.
But then, the Earth is flat isn’t it? There is a conspiracy theory suggesting it is round. That is pretty well the status of your commentary.
Your comments anger me on the basis of having witnessed a young person under 20 dying through measal complications, quite horrendous.
Matters Not
Thank you for the spelling lesson.
The reason there is no vaccine for SARS or MERS is that those viruses, being less virulent, petered out before a vaccine was completed. Be a bit silly to keep focusing science on a virus that is no longer causing havoc.
Even Anthony Fauci debunks your claim that SARS and MERS vaccines are indicative of COVID19 vaccine viability.
A virus cannot live without a host. Part of the reason for the disappearance of the “Spanish Flu” was that it was way too efficient in killing it’s hosts as well as infecting new hosts. It basically ran out of organisms to infect.
The point of a vaccine is to protect those unable to survive COVID19 and to limit its spread.
At the moment that is a helluva lot of people.
As the virus is currently re-surging in many countries, suppression does not seem successful.
How many need to die?
In essence that is what it comes down to.
If you believe that suppression is the only alternative then you doom the world to the largest and most realistic game of lifeboat ever attempted.
Anyone who has had a pet knows that surreal moment when the vet comes back after examining Fluffy and says
“It’s going to cost (insert eye watering amount) to keep Fluffy alive. Do we go ahead?”
And you think “nah just kill Fluffy” “too expensive to keep him/her alive”
There are a lot of “Fluffies” out here!