There’s been a definite change from some of the commentators with respect to our Prime Minister over the past couple of weeks. People who were criticising Scott Morrison just a few weeks ago are now comparing him to Hawke, Curtin and even Winston Churchill. Personally I find the comparison to Churchill the most apt but more on that later. First, let’s take a few moments to remind ourselves of all that’s praiseworthy in our leader.
- After the 2019 election, he admitted that there was no earthly reason for him to win by announcing that he believed in miracles.
- He delivered a budget surplus before it happened.
- He declared his ambition for Malcolm Turnbull when he could have easily talked about himself and his own ambition.
- He put his family before his job, taking his daughters to Hawaii even though this drew criticism from people who thought that he should be leading the country just because it was on fire.
- He compared himself to Moses which explains why the whole country has been lost without direction for a generation.
- He was very concerned about girls changing behind trees and in cars, citing that as the reason for giving grants to organisations that no longer existed or who had no female teams attached to them.
- He shows confidence in his underlings right up until the time that something goes wrong and it’s their fault.
- He’s not afraid to share his personal life, telling journalists that he’d spent a lot of time on his knees lately.
- He always keeps smiling, no matter how bad the news is.
Ok, there’s probably a whole lot I’m forgetting, but we need to talk about Covid-19 and not live in the past because, well, there’s a lot in the past that would just annoy the Coalition and wipe the smile off even ScoMoses’s face.
Some people have been critical of the effusive praise for Morrison, but they’re obviously not worth worrying about because they’re clearly anti-Morrison which is clear by the fact that they keep wanting to bring up the past. However, I would like such people to imagine the following scenario:
There is a factory worker which we’ll call Moe. He gets given the job of keeping people out of the factory. He announces that this has been causing a distraction, so he’ll keep them out but he won’t say how he’s doing it. In fact, he won’t give you any information about it. People are generally happy with this, so he’s given a promotion which is to look after the factory’s accounts. He announces that the accounts were in a mess, but he’s fixing them. He has a plan. This seems to satisfy some people but others want to know what the plan is and why he keeps wanting to shut down various parts of the factory. When someone suggests putting solar panels on the roof to keep energy costs down, Moe tells everyone that’ll be too expensive but he has a plan to keep energy costs down and thanks to his sound management the factory only owes twice as much debt as when the old boss was sacked. In spite of everything running so smoothly, there’s a bit of an outbreak of discontent and suggestions that there needs to a new boss. After a week of turmoil, Moe is installed as boss. A few months later, a fire breaks out in the factory and while people are fighting it, Moe goes on holiday, explaining that the fire brigade had been called and he’d planned the holiday before the fire broke out. Many people are appalled at this explanation, but when he returns he explains that he’ll give lots and lots of money to people affected by the fire. There is much shaking of the head and even more people are doubting Moe. It then comes to light that bribes were paid by one of Moe’s associates, but he insists that the bribes were nothing to do with him. Some people start to ask about the money that’s meant to be going to those affected by the fire, but it’s pointed out that these things take time because there’s a need to make sure that the money is going to the right place.
At this low point, a virus breaks out in the factory which threatens the life of many of the workers. At first, Moe says it’s nothing to worry about, before telling everyone that he’ll be at the firm’s football match. Then he has a rethink and says that nobody should be at the football, or anywhere with more than a handful of people. People start to die.
Moe shuts down the factory and says that he’ll pay the workers their wages in a month or so, and because of this, people say how great he is and how it takes a great boss to do something as difficult as shutting down the factory when you were allegedly just about to make a profit for the first time in over ten years.
Of course, credit where credit’s due. Although many would normally prefer cash, we now have a situation where lots of shops won’t take cash. Anyway, yes, I have to admit that not everything Morrison has done in the past two weeks has been wrong, and while I thought that comparisons to that wartime leader Winston Churchill were a little over the top, I’ve been forced to reconsider.
After all, Churchill did oversee the Gallipoli disaster and, in spite of this and a few other fiascos, managed to do a good job of inspiring Britain when they faced the threat of being defeated by Hitler. Yes, Churchill was such a very good wartime leader that it’s hard to understand why his Conservatives were defeated in 1945.
Maybe it was the fact that just because you do something right in a time of crisis, it doesn’t mean that people are prepared to trust you when things get back to normal.
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