At the end of my last post I suggested I needed more words to explain my proposition that Labor could win the next election. I did so because I felt l would be overwhelmed by anti-Albanese comments.
True to form, the anti-Albanese’s (mainly Facebook) were at it wanting a character full of sarcastic rebukes and aggressive remonstration. Even if it were Tanya Plibersek. I do not doubt that Albo has that in him; I have seen it when Albo was his party’s attack dog during Question Time. But when people are sick to death of shouty debate, it will not shape a believable candidate when looking for someone they can trust to oppose Scott Morrison.
Albo has all the characteristics of a politician who has given long service to his electorate, party, and country. He has held several portfolios and has served as deputy Prime Minister.
However, his main attribute is that he has a clean slate without scandals: Nothing on which Morrison (or the media) can pin a controversy. In other words, he is more trustworthy than Morrison. And that, of course, also applies when words like decency, transparency, lying, honesty, morality and fairness are used to describe a political candidate.
Who would you trust?
With Albanese, we have a man who can, when necessary, raise the tone of a debate while appealing to people’s better instincts.
Conversely, in Morrison, we have a Prime Minister who refuses to answer questions about his knowledge of one of his best friends’ involvement in the conspiracy theory QAnon. It is the “why” he won’t answer that annoys people. If there is nothing in it, why not answer?
And it’s a little early, but Morrison could always employ the Liberal’s favourite scare campaign saying that the boats will start again if the Biloela family is granted asylum. There isn’t one iota of evidence that this is so, yet the Coalition sticks to its hard-line policy. It will lead to the floodgates opening again, they might say. And after all these years, raising this issue against a child’s illness is despicable and fills one with disgust.
Immigration Minister Alex Hawke has the final say, but it was like taking a step back in time listening to him last Thursday. The words remain the same, as does the manner in which they are conveyed.
But of course:
“… the pedlars of verbal dishonesty are the most vigorous defenders of lying because it gives their vitriolic nonsense legitimacy. They use our countries gift of free speech to influence those in the community who are susceptible or like-minded.”
But alas, I have drifted from the points I wanted to add to my last piece. I wanted to strengthen my view that there were enough issues so damaging to the Government that Labor would make it look vulgar in an election campaign: Problems that amount to gross incompetency and negligence are as numerous as mice in a cornfield.
For example, at the G7 conference, the emissions reductions promised by the US, UK and EU doubled those proposed by the Morrison government. They also promised more policies before Cop26 in Scotland.
By comparison, Australia, in the eyes of the world, looks foolish and uncommitted. Despite acknowledging that the world is moving to a new energy economy, Scott Morrison has yet to address how Australia fits into it.
Australians now clearly see the need for us to be part of this new world. A world in which we lead the technologies race and the will to make it happen. Yet the conservative attitude that has so blinkered their thinking since Labor first proposed a carbon tax continues to take us down the wrong path and will not get us there in the future.
COVID-19 and the Royal Commission into Aged Care have highlighted the Morrison Government’s horrifying attitude to aged care in our country. So much so that I found (as an 80-year-old) this source for my research upsetting:
“Homer Simpson could have seen the catastrophe in aged care coming with COVID-19 because it was there in your face,” said Professor Joseph Ibrahim, head of the Health Law and Ageing Research Unit at Monash University.
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When a political party deliberately withholds information that the voter needs to make an informed, balanced and reasoned assessment of how it is being governed. It is lying by omission. It is also equivalent to the manipulation of our democracy.
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The Government’s outright incompetency has:
… cost 909 deaths from COVID-19, more than two-thirds of them (685) people in aged care facilities. Sadly, this is a disgrace, and the blame sits securely at the Government’s feet.
Yet another stone to throw at the Morrison government is the Coalition’s failure to produce a policy on the oversight of corruption or even a national security review. To find the answer to why a national ICAC has been left to decay at the grave of crime, you only have to read a list of the Coalition’s blunders, scandals and corrupt activities.
To formulate such a list – a complete one guaranteed to shock those who value their vote – will require a few more days. The more I dug, the deeper the scandals became. So can you please wait in anticipation?
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Governments who demand the people’s trust need to govern transparently to acquire it.
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I contend that the Abbott/Turnbull/Morrison governments are the most incompetent, corrupt and unempathetic governments in my lifetime. The cabinet is full of narcissistic males who have a low opinion of women and a lessor one of the citizens they serve. And an awful lot of academic achievers who wouldn’t know shit from clay, as the saying goes.
This being so, then why are they still in power? Many of the activities, as mentioned earlier, should have required ministerial resignation. Still, principles and responsibilities seem to have been thrown out the window by this Government which has grown worse in this last term. Yes, they are ripe for defeat, and deserve to be.
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My thought for the day
The real enemy of neoconservative politics in Australia is not Labor or indeed democratic socialism. It is simply what Australians affectionally call. A fair go.
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