The Gravy Train Express

The election is over. After 9 very long years, the Coalition has at last, mercifully, been removed. As many have noted, there's a general feeling of a nation breathing a sigh of relief. But while the most corrupt, inept, and malicious government in living memory is gone, the damage goes deep, and relief will very quickly need to give way to resolve, and action - on climate, ICAC, the social safety net, health, education, and even the restoration of a functional bureaucracy and state, a vast amount of work will need to be done. And the old donors haven't gone away - public pressure will need to remain high. There's a lot of damning detail to be shared about the dirty campaigning and old-media hysteria which surrounded this election. There was a worrying, frenzied tone to it this time - the use of smear and disinfo tactics imported from the US and UK was extensive. But covering all that is for another day. For now, here's a quick flashback to a telling episode that came f...

  On Thursday morning, Scott Morrison did the rounds of the media... excluding the ABC. He then revealed he'd agreed to two more televised debates - to be hosted by Nine and Seven, the friendly neighbourhood Costello/Stokes outlets. In the past, the National Press Club has been the debate venue, and Labor has declared their interest in continuing that tradition. (Last election, the Liberals insisted on it.) The moderator at the Press Club is usually the president - and the president right now happens to be the ABC's Laura Tingle. Morrison hasn't directly responded to the invitation, but said today that three debates made "a good number", and "I've already done one". (For anyone who missed it, that was on Rupert's Sky.) The ABC has issued a separate invite for May 9, with their Sky-import, the not-overly-taxing David Speers as host. The Morrison camp has so far ignored that offer. (With Albanese only due out of Covid iso on Friday, and Labor's...

On Thursday, April 14, the Fin Review ran both an opinion piece and an article based around Ipsos focus-group work which the Fin said showed undecided voters were leaning toward Scott Morrison. The paper described that voter-group's feeling as "better the devil you know". The Guardian's economics correspondent, Peter Hannam, noticed that no numbers were mentioned. When he contacted Ipsos to check, it turned out that two groups of voters had participated, with each group consisting of... five people. Yes - the work was indicative of the leanings of fully ten individuals. The journalist responsible for hyping this junk was Phil Coorey, who in recent years has been the AFR's contact-of-choice for leaks and briefings from the Prime Minister's Office, and who memorably penned the fawning "Woman Who Saved Australia" profile of Gladys Berejiklian just 5 months before her exit under a corruption cloud. The AFR was once a Fairfax publication. Then Malcolm T...

 Flashback - article written in March, 2021. In 2018, Scott Morrison described his squabbling band of gaffe-prone grifters as a "Muppet Show". On taking the Prime Ministership, he assured breakfast television that "the curtain's come down on that Muppet Show - and an absolute new curtain has lifted up!" The unintentional implication that the nation was about to witness the launch of Scotty's All-New Muppet Show was reinforced by his next miscalculated response: Presenter: "How do you unite a bunch of Muppets?" Morrison: "Well, I'm doing exactly that in terms of my colleagues." In the two and a half years since, the volume of corruption and ineptitude has become so great as to make the compilation of a complete list near-impossible. But just to refresh, here's some of the show's notable lowlights: Robodebt theft, deaths & $1.2 billion settlement; $100 million Sports Rorts plus Gaetjen's whitewash; slashing funding to t...

"Thank you, Mr Speaker. This is coal! Don't be afraid, don't be scared, won't hurt you, it's coal! " That's Scott Morrison in parliament in 2017, brandishing a chunk of lacquered coal, given to him by his beloved organ-grinder, The Minerals Council. In his speech, Morrison went on to praise the "prosperity" delivered by his pet rock, and to dismiss attempts to enact science-based climate-policy as simply "pathological...coal-a-phobia". Seated behind him, Barnaby Joyce laughed with the joy of a particularly thick-headed child as he fondled the prop. One month after this performance, Lismore flooded. At that point it was the most destructive flood the town had ever had. In 2008 the Garnaut Climate Change Review examined the scientific studies outlining climate impacts on Australia, and concluded in part that without concerted action the nation would be facing longer and more intense fire seasons - by 2020. Right on time in 2019/20, an es...

A huge stretch of the Qld and NSW coast is flood-devastated. Scott Morrison gives a special address announcing... ten billion dollars for a nuclear submarine base. Deputy Barnaby declares we could never have anticipated the flooding - despite repeated, detailed warnings from all the relevant experts. Morrison's hand-picked head of the National Recovery and Resilience Agency, vintage Liberal Party seat-warmer Shane Stone, complains about how expensive it'll be to fix the flood damage - and actually says out loud that it's the fault of victims for "(living) among the gum trees". Australia continues to have no climate policy, and to expand fossil-fuel projects. This is a government laughing in the public's face. Their contempt is absolute.

  On Friday the 18th, the Morrison government rejected the recommendation of the bipartisan parliamentary committee enquiring into homelessness, that Australia should develop a 10-year national plan. The government's written response refused any new funding (including for provision of accommodation to women and children facing domestic violence), described homelessness as a matter for the states, and only agreed to fully support two of the 35 recommendations in the committee report. The following Monday, the government confirmed it would continue funding the hiring of private eyes by Services Australia, as part of its welfare "crackdown". (In 2019, with the post-election rush-of-blood-to-the-head, Services Australia was the agency created by Scott Morrison to replace and clean out the Department of Human Services.) Investigators are given the power to follow, photograph, film and bug recipients of social assistance, despite previous audits and department stats confirming ...

Scott Morrison, Saturday January 29, while clasping an unlucky koala in front of assembled cameras: "We love to throw our arms around koalas. And they love to throw their bear arms around us when we get to have a cuddle. What this is about is continuing to throw our arms around our koala population". Continuing? In the last 20 years, Koala numbers have halved in Queensland & dropped 60% in NSW. Land-clearing, drought, and fire mean koalas are currently on track for extinction by 2050. The $50 million announced by the Prime Minister yesterday - should it ever eventuate - is earmarked for monitoring, research, and habitat restoration. The latter is near-pointless without climate action, and the previous two will confirm we need climate action. There are no mysteries as to why koalas are dying. Australia's climate, farming, and "development" policies are killing them. Setting aside the accounting tricks, carbon emissions in Australia have risen 7% since 2005. S...

Written Wednesday, January 12, 2022: On Monday, the government told Australia's ragged parents that there was no shortage of vaccines for kids. This, despite tight restrictions being placed on the number of child-doses allowed to GPs, and vax appointments being cancelled all over the country. The slippery fine print was that supply-chain failures arising from Covid-spread meant the shots existed - they just weren't being distributed. (Although another report said we were indeed still awaiting some overseas shipments - but either way, that's a shortage.) Over and over again in his Monday presser, the PM said the country just had to "push through" and "ride the wave", as though that meant something other than just getting used to the sick and the dead. He vowed to ensure small-to-medium business wouldn't have to test its staff, on the basis of there being "no exposure sites anymore". (This, he said, was thanks in part to his 4-hour redefiniti...