Three Weeks Shouting at The TV

Pushing close to a fortnight of procrastination I find myself forced, once more, to dive into the non-sensical quagmire of Australian Politics. It will long be a subject of debate amongst academics as to why I seek solace from writer’s block by watching the 24-hour news feed in order to shout at the TV. That is their remit and I will leave it to them to discuss my self-imposed torture regime at their leisure.

But I have begun to follow tangents much earlier in my spiel than usual. I attribute it to my (and the general Australian publics) disenchantment in the Australian Government specifically and the Australian Parliament more broadly.

There are many more reasons on this second sitting week of Parliament for the year, as to why the voting public have none to bugger all faith in most politicians of all stripes than before they rose last year following little more than a month of sitting days.

When this first session of Parliament for 2020 rests for a week, they will have sat for almost half the time they sat for all of 2019. Citizens with any other “full-time” job would be sacked for absenteeism of such magnitude.

Not turning up to work when you can’t be stuffed is a well-respected Australian tradition and the practice doesn’t appear to be abating in the general population. That our elected officials chose to lead the way is admirable but turning around and bagging out a few kids for skipping school because they want a planet that will be habitable for their potential broods is hypocritical.

No one really expected that the bloke who didn’t even think he could win the election last year to the point he called his victory a “miracle”, would nick off to Hawaii while rainforests that hadn’t burned in living memory cloaked Brisbane and Sydney in micro-particle full smoke because he had “promised” his daughters.

He was so focused on this alleged “promise” that he forgot The Oath he took after stabbing former PM Turnbull, to serve Australia.

To the dismay of his country and the bewilderment of the world, Scott Morrison decided the most appropriate course of action was to remain ensconced in the US Military run resort to which he had fled while his office scrambled to deny he had even left the country.

It is probably going to be recorded as the greatest Prime Ministerial fail since Harold Holt decided to go for a swim.

That he was Missing In Action on the fiftieth anniversary of Harry’s final dip was not lost to anyone with more than a passing interest in Politics, which is interesting only insofar as neither Scotty from Marketing or anyone from his office failed to realise how quickly it would be leapt upon by commentators.

As would his failed and much maligned Tourism Australia campaign featuring the slogan “Where The Bloody Hell Are You?” It was a gift that critics of Scotty From Marketing eagerly accepted and utilised with glee.

By the time he slunk back to face up to his failure, Canberra and Melbourne had been added to the top ten list of cities with the worst air quality in the world, so he figured the best thing to do was shift blame. First, the daggy dad tried blaming rich white girl privilege and a feeble excuse about all Australians taking holidays.

This from a bloke whose greatest achievements of 2019 (aside from only working for a month) included committing to drown his “Pacific Family” (who broadly offered assistance as Australia burned while Morrison sipped Mai Tai’s); pissing his pants after running water bottles for a sportsball team in Fiji, supplicating himself to the racist rapist in the White House and being ridiculed on the world stage following his speech to the UN on Australia’s inaction regarding Climate Change.

Instead of addressing the reason as to why Australia is experiencing more severe droughts and longer fire seasons, he instead tried to blame (in no particular order) State Governments, The Greens, The RFS (or CFA, or the acronym they use in your State) for not conducting Hazard Reduction Burns… And Arsonists.

His excuses have been rebuffed, rebuked and ridiculed publicly by the experts, from scientists to volunteer firefighters. More than twenty former emergency chiefs, as well as First Australians have criticised the Morrison Government’s response to what can only be described as a National Emergency. Police data shows that while many fires were caused by human action, most of those were not deliberately lit.

Realising that “Thoughts and Prayers” wasn’t quite cutting it in The Electorate, Scotty decided to put on his Politician in The Bush Uniform and tour the firegrounds in order to commit common assault by forcing people to shake his hand when they clearly didn’t want to. His departure from Cobargo will long be remembered as a seminal moment, not only in Morrison’s political career, but as a victory for free speech.

As the footage of his interactions went viral, he scarpered off to Kangaroo Island to try pretending he cared once more, only to forget that two locals had died defending their property and suggest that their sacrifice was less than that of registered firies.

Then the PM doubled down on his denial that Australia is the largest emitter of CO2 per capita in the world, stubbornly sticking to his narrative that we only emit a little over one percent.

By failing to acknowledge that the fossil fuels we export to be burned overseas contribute to Australia’s emissions globally is nothing short of negligence on a criminal scale. Scott Morrison, does not believe in the “Laws of Man”, he believes in cherry picked verses from a book apparently written by a bunch of blokes who spoke to sky fairies or followed an unemployed carpenter around Palestine before making up a load of fibs in order to turn a profit as an organised religion.

These are the sort of people that populate the Australian Parliament generally, but the Liberal and National Parties in particular. One only need watch former Deputy Prime Minister and Member for New England Joyce’s video he released while allegedly off his tits on booze/cocaine/ketamine, perhaps a combination of any or all On the other hand it could simply be explained away as being overwhelmed by the appearance of Baby Yoda in The Heavens. As a Nation, Australia must thank Huw Parkinson for removing the filter and showing us the truth.

While the Minister for Marital Affairs ranted about feeding livestock and shouted into his phone about how Baby Yoda was going to save us all, a billion odd native animals were busy burning, thousands of homes and other properties were being destroyed and people were being killed.

Aside from Darren Chester, The Coalition, to an individual, failed their electorates in not responding to the bushfires. When McCormack realised he was Acting PM and decided he should front the cameras, he didn’t have any clue as to how he should act. But when Morrison got back, Mick Mack got a masterclass in how not to handle a National Emergency, so he’ll be well prepared the next time Scotty decides to shirk his responsibilities.

If he still has his job that is. Barney’s failed tilt at the Nats Leadership will not be the end of this, McCormack is on borrowed time and I’m willing to say the same is probably true for Morrison. While I’d like to see the sacking of both, a very real possibility if that happens, is a Dutton/Joyce Government.

Let that sink in for a moment.

A former Queensland cop and a bloke who gets hopped up on goofballs could be running the country. If there wasn’t a chance of it of becoming a reality, someone could have written a great comedy about it and we would all laugh at how impossible it would be for that to ever come to pass.

The reality Australia finds in front of it, is one of denial and inaction from the highest levels of Government and this will only be worsened if Spud and The Beetroot get the captaincy. For a developed nation to be discussing whether an inept happy clapper and an incompetent faceless man make a better Prime Ministerial couple than a bloke who is only a heartbeat away from becoming a card-carrying member of The Nazi Party and another who campaigns on “Family Values” while cheating on his family beggars belief.

Unless the Governor-General sacks the lot of them, we will be stuck with this rabble until 2022 and until the crossbench decides to grow a spine by refusing Supply and Confidence in The Government, he doesn’t really have a precedent to do so. Granted it will take a couple of Coalition MPs to cross the floor but given the unforeseen rise of Llew O’Brien (who was quickly dubbed “Who O’Brien” before disappearing from public discourse) and the half dozen Nats who crossed the floor to elect him as Deputy Speaker following a Labor nomination shows how shaky the ground Morrison and McCormack are standing on.

If a handful of “Radical” Nationals and “Moderate” Liberals, (hilarious, I know how weird that sounds) cross to vote with Labor, we could once more experience the joys of a double dissolution.

As these combined possibilities become more probable, the pressure mounts on Labor to present as a credible alternative Government and while Albo’s response to the bushfires was one which Scott Morrison should aspire to, his inability to capitalise on his favourable press coverage to hammer the Government on any issue he wanted resulted in a pile of sweet nothing.

While the bushfires abated, the scandals returned. Not satisfied with Angus Taylor’s corruption that was exposed last year, The Coalition were caught out pork barrelling marginal seats with sports grants. Not once, but twice and now we discover they did the same with an infrastructure fund. Bridget McKenzie fell on her sword and Barney lived up to his namesake by having a tiff with McCormack. Canavan quit Cabinet as Gladys Liu disappeared from public view.

Amongst all of this, Zali Steggall decided to introduce a Climate Change Bill that will more likely fail to pass and Adam Bandt became Parliamentary Leader of The Greens. Bob Katter ranted about something and Pauline Hanson blamed a woman for her husband immolating her and their children. Jacqui Lambie has forgotten that she was once an unemployed single mother and has decided to support the Indue card while Andrew Wilkie showed George Christensen there was more outside of Australia’s borders than brothels in Manila.

That Mr Wilkie has allied with Christensen shows how desperate Julian Assange’s plight really is and begs the question - Where are all the Free-Speech advocates in Government when a citizen is being persecuted by two of our historically strongest allies for publishing facts? Even Alan Jones has got on board with the Free Assange movement, but the Government is silent on the issue. As an Australian Citizen I am increasingly concerned by the prolonged imprisonment of Assange, but I am more concerned about our Government’s inaction regarding the persecution of a compatriot. Given that I have admitted publicly to acts punishable by death in certain countries that I still intend on travelling to, I am proper screwed, and I don’t have a public profile like Assange. Possibly because I procrastinate too much.

This has now taken me three weeks to write. I’ve had other shit going on and Parliament has sat and risen once more since I began. I’ve done nothing on The Book, but I’ve paid the rent and am now broke again. Maybe I’ll just go out to the International Arrivals Gate and hug anyone who coughs or is wearing a face mask…

HH