Things were going so well for Tony Abbott — Labor’s polling was in the dumps, people were finally beginning to talk about him as a viable contender for the nation’s top job… and then he went on The 7:30 Report and had this exchange with Kerry O’Brien:
TONY ABBOTT: Well, again Kerry, I know politicians are gonna be judged on everything they say, but sometimes, in the heat of discussion, you go a little bit further than you would if it was an absolutely calm, considered, prepared, scripted remark, which is one of the reasons why the statements that need to be taken absolutely as gospel truth is those carefully prepared scripted remarks.
KERRY O’BRIEN: So every time you make a statement, we have to ask you whether it’s carefully prepared and scripted or whether it’s just something on the fly? No, seriously; this is a very serious question.
TONY ABBOTT: But all of us, Kerry, all of us when we’re in the heat of verbal combat, so to speak, will sometimes say things that go a little bit further.
The ALP vultures immediately started circling, labeling him “phoney Tony” and launching an attack ad within the day:
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uS2V7S7Iv-Y[/youtube]
So is the Mad Monk Parliament’s resident Pinocchio? Or are all politicians just a pack of liars, and this is just more of his characteristic “plain talking”?
In yesterday’s Crikey Daily Mail, Bernard Keane’s said that the “all politicians lie” theme is just a distraction, and the issue isn’t so much that Abbott admitted to lying, it was that he was so easily cornered and quartered by a routine media interview:
What would Abbott be like representing Australia in international negotiations? What would he be like dealing with business? It’s not only the media that subjects political leaders to pressure.
The rest of the nation’s pundits haven’t foregone the opportunity to lay in the boot, too. Here’s how they see it today:
The Australian
Editorial: Time for Tony Abbott to get his story straight
It is simply not good enough for the alternative prime minister to admit he is so ill-disciplined that the voters can only rely on what he puts in writing, because his spoken word is not always his bond.
Samantha Maiden: Abbott’s political harakiri
… the Liberal leader appears to have found the line between political chastity and promiscuity an irresistible one.
Dennis Shanahan: Labor lets loose its dogs of war
Labor ran the dual risk of appearing too eager and too febrile in their Abbott attacks
Mirko Bagaric: Honesty not always the best policy position
We should be less embarrassed about lying and ditch the delusion that dishonesty is always bad.
Sydney Morning Herald
Editorial: The truth and Tony Abbott
Abbott wants the public to let him open the door to Orwell’s Ministry of Truth, where past statements can be finessed to suit the politics of the moment.
Lenore Taylor: Even the honest ones find it hard to lie straight in bed
Is it any wonder the latest Nielsen poll shows about 40 per cent of voters think neither leader is trustworthy?
Jacob Saulwick: Tony in good company in the erroneous rogues’ gallery
The novelty of Tony Abbott is not that he exaggerates or stretches the truth – but that he admits to it.
The Age
Shaun Carney: Casualty of verbal combat
Abbott did not make a gaffe on the 7.30 Report.
Courier Mail
Dennis Atkins: Difficult to know where Abbott stands after ‘lies’ concession
The messy business that Abbott let loose with his interview on The 7.30 Report is not doing the Liberal leader, or any politician, any good.
Daily Telegraph
Malcolm Farr: Tony Forked-Tongue or Up-Front Abbott?
Much of the electorate will be amused by this latest confession, but many Liberal supporters will be furious.
Sue Dunlevey: A big black hole in Abbott’s credibility
… Abbott destroyed his credibility
Herald Sun
Phillip Hudson: Fibbing is fair dinkum?
Abbott might have given Labor an almighty free kick, but the match is not over
Andrew Bolt: Gospel gaffe will take toll
It’s Shakespearean: Abbott is both the Liberals’ best hope and their greatest danger.
ABC
Jonathan Green: Moment of truth gives the game away
Modern politics, like a piece of impromptu theatre, involves a suspension of disbelief. Tony as good as told us last night.
Elsewhere…
Dominic Knight: Tony Abbott, pants on fire!
Yesterday, he exposed himself not as a habitual liar, as someone who makes policy on the run, and as a result, contradicts himself
Isn’t the point not so much about truth as about Abbott’s lack of competence when he’s on his hind legs. In an arena where words mean so much, you at least need to be able to say what you mean to say if not then you’re just some bloke in the pub having a spray. Not so much dishonest as just don’t know what you’re talking about.
BK has put his finger on it
the issue is not that he admitted to lying, but that he went completely to pieces under a line of questioning from Kerry O’Brien that could best be described as a light tickling.
The Labour front bench will be licking their lips at the prospect of hammering Abbott in the House over the next few months before the election, in the hope that he will make a few more stammering gaffes. They have already done for Nelson and Turnbull, more accomplished Parliamentarians, and now know that they only need keep Abbott off-balance and making policy on the hoof . They also know that Abbott has nowhere to hide, because he will not dare let Barnaby, Sloppy Joe, or Mesma into the firing line.
No comment seen here yet about Malcolm Turnbull’s sudden reappearance into the limelight with a column in Fairfax National Times and a sudden change of heart about the ETS. Is Turnbull realigning himself with the ‘climate change is crap’ brigade in the party room in order to win back the leadership?
It may take a little while for the Liberal Party, and much of the media, to realise this but Abbott’s statements about his lying habits makes it impossible for them to win the next election. Not difficult, not unlikely, but outright impossible.
Many commentators are vacillating about what the electoral impact will be and coming up with far-fetched guesses about what voters might think. They are wasting our time because not only does he admit that he lies but he also says that it is excusable. Admitting to lying is one thing, absolving yourself of responsibility for it, now and in the future, is quite another. It is the ‘excusable’ part that has totally destroyed him politically.
I can’t wait to see the lines from Rudd and his honest mates, but something tells me the Libs won’t come to a gun fight with a slingshot.
I have a feeling we’ll get a list of lies, mistruthes and misleads, maybe in alphabetical order, or maybe from the top down, that have all occurred in the past 3 years of this useless government.
I could name 5 right now that Rudd knew he would never, ever deliver yet convinced the public he was here to help.
He’s a fraud and a conman.
At least Barnaby Joyce grasps what Tony Abbott doesn’t despite aiming his message at the wrong target. “What you say to your lover isn’t usually what you’d say to your check-out chick” (or some similar analogy). In other words Barnaby’s point was that Abbott should be discerning and prudent which is exactly what Tony isn’t. Abbott’s confession was honest – that he can’t be held responsible for what he says, its accuracy or its meaning because he’s easily distracted and goes off track. Since when do we endorse poliltical leaders who can only function reliably if they’re strapped in and monitored closely?