When too much RWFWittery is not enough
“I have a leadership style which I believe they appreciate, which is why people very strongly are expressing their support to me.” (Mr 25%, Spud Dutton).
“There go my people. I must find out where they are going so I can lead them.” (Alexandre Auguste Ledru-Rollin). I’m not sure why this came to mind.
* * * * *
How to succinctly describe Australia’s worst ever Prime Minister? A miasma, an effluvium, a whiff of eau de low tide… a funk that clings to clothes and hair long after his departure? The unlamented ScoMo’s™ awfulness was so all-encompassing that no one pejorative was sufficient to capture the spectrum of his deficiencies. Scotty From Marketing, Scummo, Smirk & Mirrors, Scooter, Sooty, Skiddy, Liar from the Shire, Diddley Scott, the Great Schmo, Scurry, Shirko and more were all wryly derived from his own facile marketing contrivance and thrown back in his face as a “no way, get fucked, fuck off” chorus from the sentients in the crowd.
Phone in hand as he scrolls through Seek while languishing on a nose-bleed seat on the backbenches, his calls going unreturned, he’ll be struggling to reconcile his current status as unburied landfill with his self-image as God’s emissary. But really, who gives a fuck? Now he’s nothing more than a phantasm representing Tory decline into neo-fascist bigotry and wretchedness; a benchmark for whether they can go subterranean in their search for the ultimate in nasty. Turns out Scooter was no outlier; he was a symptom. Enter Bubba and Squeak – a lumpen tuber with the head and attitude of a copper’s truncheon with the befuddled Suss as the Lib’s no.2 slot showcasing her sad loser pique, her misplaced ambition and a lack of self-awareness that, in comparison, promotes Liz Truss to icon of perspicacity.
“Conservative, Dutton-supporting MPs said that Ley had been taking soundings from the backbench for weeks, but they rubbished the prospect of the Liberal moderate becoming the party’s leader.” (James Massola, SMH, 31/3/23).
If you’re the Tories’ Leader Of The Opposition yet also Labor’s best weapon, when your own party hides you away from electors in favour of defrosting the cadaverous John Winston Howard to waddle the streets quacking at startled passers-by, when you’re a hard-right head-kicker in a party abandoned by once conservative, heirloom electorates as the entire country rejects your antediluvian, divisive manifesto then a prudent politician would indulge in some considered introspection. Such sissy reflections are not for our potato-headed hard man Herr Shickltuber – he’s doubling down on the nasty (“I yam what I yam”).
Spud has marked his territory – Abbottesque blanket negativity, culture wars, fear and division, accusing opponents of that for which they themselves are guilty and that old Tory favourite of nurturing resentment by demonising those least able to fight back – cultivating suspicion of the gay folks, blatant transphobia and not so much dog-whistling their racism as broadcasting it by loudspeaker from the back of a truck.
People in outer suburban areas were “very worked up” about trans rights claims Spud, the Libs lost Aston because Labor was mean to them, there’s no need for him or the Coalition to change their brand, they just have to wait for electors to come to their senses. All very amusing given that in a party of roadside dumpers, shrunken intellects, onanists, P76ers, pelvic thrusters, doggers, Trumpers, pimps, Nut Bush lip synchers and shout absconders he’s the best the unelectable Tories have to offer.
What is not amusing is Spud’s response to the proposed referendum for an Indigenous Voice To Parliament. Just as Donald Trump gave permission for the worst of American society to be open and proud about how stupid and ugly, they really were Spud’s “No” campaign has given permission for the racists to be openly racist – albeit clothed in the pretense that they actually give a fuck about the welfare of our Indigenous fellow citizens.
The referendum will be a pivotal moment in our history – an opportunity to capture a mutual generosity of spirit, to give a voice to the longest surviving culture on the planet, for Aboriginal Australians to no longer be marginalised in their own unceded land. It’s a time for empathy and good will, for inclusiveness, and for leaders to show themselves. And it’s only that very last bit that applies to the loathsome Dutton.
His dishonest framing of “the Canberra Voice” or “Albanese’s Voice”, the dishonesty of claimed Voice interference in everything from the Reserve Bank to tying up the High Court in endless litigation, never ending calls for “more details”, a fantastical Aboriginal veto on ANZAC day. The whole No case rests on misinformation, deceit and lies.
Alice Springs revealed Dutton’s true, vile character. Recent images of street crime has been represented as a new phenomenon, except it is evidence of institutionalised, generational failure – failure that Spud cared not one whit for when he was in power. However, exploiting child sexual abuse to paint a picture of undeserving Blacks to score opportunistic political points for his “No” campaign is a new low for a bloke who has form when it comes to demonising those of a darkish hue.
Dutton is as stupid as he is odious. If the “Yes” vote succeeds in the referendum he’s toast – a minor footnote in political history. If “No” prevails his reputation as a naysayer and wrecker will challenge that of Tony Sluggos Abbott but with racist overtones.
But he will never take Scooter’s crown as our worst ever only because he will never be PM.
References
The gravedigger. Rachel Withers, The Monthly.
‘Dog act’: NT police minister reacts angrily to Peter Dutton’s claims of Alice Springs child sexual abuse. Peter Dutton’s claims that “young Indigenous kids are being sexually assaulted on a regular basis” in Alice Springs. Lorena Allam Indigenous affairs editor, The Guardian.
This article was originally published on Grumpy Geezer.
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