The recurring highlight of the federal government soap opera these past few weeks has been watching the “big swinging dicks” sticking their, um, necks out just a little too far for what’s turned out to be an increasingly sceptical public conversation in both social and traditional media.
The government’s pitch has been driven by fumbled nostalgic appeals to 20th century white picket fence identity politics, already more sentimental than real when it seemed to work so well for the Howard government a couple of decades ago.
From the “drums of war” with China, through the legal over-reach of defamation to smother the ABC’s Me Too reporting, and on to the ban on Australian citizens returning from India, the government is struggling to find its footing on what it would have thought were safe culture war battlefields.
Public opinion is leaving them behind. The government’s attempt to gin up a lovely war has been damped down — from Hugh White in The Saturday Paper, who called it “one of the biggest failures of statecraft in Australia’s history”, to Paul Kelly in The Australian, who cautioned against cancelling the lease on the Darwin port. “The biggest mistake people can make,” Kelly writes, “is to think the China relationship cannot get worse”.
Meanwhile, the government’s ban on Indian Australians coming home was called out across the media. For News Corp’s Andrew Bolt it was a “mean and irrational” act which “stinks of racism”. For Guardian Australia‘s Katharine Murphy, appearing on Insiders, it was “morally repugnant”.
The government plays these cards because of the near-universal confidence among the political elite (both party and media) of the enduring power of Howard-era dog-whistling — “we’ll decide who comes to this country” — aimed at “real Australians”. It’s a settler populism performatively reflected in Morrison’s daggy-dad-from-the-Shire shtick.
It’s an assessment trapped somewhere in 2001, where the MV Tampa remains floating off the Western Australian coast. All Morrison needs to do is get his whistle into the right key.
The political class may still look a lot like 2001. But Australia? Not so much. We’re more diverse, more urban, more educated. Politics lags behind demographics. Sure, there’s still a group identifying with the politics of “little Australia”, and a media which feeds its fears (it’s the News Corp business strategy, after all). But year after year it’s harder to build a durable political majority off it.
George Megalogenis (a leading media sceptic on the politics of “little Australia”) has been highlighting the big shift in the country’s make up. As of 2013, half of all Australians are either born overseas or have at least one parent born overseas. The result, he wrote in the Nine mastheads this weekend, is that “the race card just doesn’t stack up in Australia”.
At the same time, generation after generation of Australians are becoming educated. Over 55? You probably didn’t finish high school. Under 50? You almost certainly did — and probably have some post-school training and education to go with it.
According to Morrison at the now infamous Australian Christian Churches conference, these seismic shifts — mixed in with the impact of international travel and the globalising force of a transnational social media — are “corroding and desensitising our country and our society”. The diversifying identity of modern Australia, he seemed to warn, “is going to take our young people”.
Structurally, the off-the-cuff speech is a dog’s breakfast, but it reveals a Morrison filled with an existential dread that Australians are losing their connection to a particular vision of the Australia; the “one and free” he reflected in his New Year’s Eve rewrite of the national anthem.
“And we’ve gotta pray about it and we’ve gotta call it out. And we’ve got to raise up the spiritual weapons against this,” he exhorted the faithful.
This “last days” dread underpins the government’s adoption of a tactical hand-me-down from Trump. If the dog-whistle doesn’t work, pull out the trumpet. Talk more, talk louder.
As the audiences decline, they have to be made more fearful with claims made more extreme, and so we end up with Australians stranded in India and the country’s leadership seemingly embracing the threat of a nuclear war.
Morrison, or SmoCo as I prefer to think of him, courtesy of his ill-timed, poorly executed Hawaiian holiday, has the superpower of poor judgement. I’ve already mentioned one, here’s some others:
– supporting Angus ‘the document doctor’ Taylor
– inviting his paedophile protecting pastor to the WH dinner
– covering up said invite and trying to make it a national security issue
– sports rorts – with his office fingerprints all over it
– letting Mckenzie stay on for too long
– dead-hand handshakes
– calling out the military, but not telling anyone
– failing to act on Porter
– failing to meet Higgins until way too late
– failing to take serious action to protect the women who have to work in the toxic sludge that is federal parliament
– laying hands on people and praying for them uninvited
– attacks on China that were ill-judged, badly timed, poorly framed
– sucking up to Trump who now sits caring not one iota about Australia or its future
– failing to support the Brereton report and Angus Campbell in response to Australian war crimes
– appointing Dutton to Defence …
Lest we forget…
Don’t worry: he got Holy Ghost power.
Morrison, or SmoCo, ……..has the superpower of poor judgement.
Great description of him. He really is so appalling that I cannot bear to watch and listen to him on the tv news (I never bother with him at other times).
A long and disturbing list, unfortunately I’m sure it is not even remotely finished…
Not even close.
“the enduring power of Howard-era dog-whistling — “we’ll decide who comes to this country” — aimed at “real Australians”.”
The critical mistake the Morrison gang made when it played the same card now was slamming the door on Australians, not some bunch of foreigners. And even more importantly, making it a criminal offence with extreme penalties if these Australians try to come home.
That’s new. And it’s not fair dinkum at all. Even Andrew Bolt noticed.
Think Bolt was also keeping an eye on the ‘east suburban doctors’ wives’ in Melbourne where many formerly safe Lib seats are not that safe anymore…. in NewsCorp’s interest to remind Morrison.
As Talleyrand said of the restored Bourbon Monarchy, They have learned nothing and they have forgotten nothing
Regarding the lease on the Port Of Darwin no one not even a Government unilaterally just break a legal agreement
More to the point what idiots signed off on the deal in the first place & to what advantage to Australia
BTW Richard Totally agree with your post
There was no advantage to Australia whatsoever. There was considerable advantage to a few Australians –
Deal done by CLP- the NT’s version of the LNP with LNP approval of course.
Sort of, but the NT is a territory and required federal approval. Who was the Treasurer at the time? Apparently a guy called Morrison.
As I said- with LNP approval- & that as you correctly say, was Morrison.
Interestingly it was Howard’s hand picked candidate parachuted in from outside the NT who was chief minister then & guess who offered him a job the moment he left politics? Gina Rhinehart. Mmmmm…. IPA, LNP & CLP finger prints all over it.
“All Morrison needs to do is to get his (dog) whistle into the right key”
In fact, he needs to get it into the right orifice, although he may not enjoy the taste, after where it’s been.
The mass immigration of the last couple of decades, solely in order to prop up the GDP figures, has resulted in the loony right being outnumbered. It’s like a polar bear at sea on a melting ice floe. It has that sinking feeling. An imminent lack of support is becoming apparent. Or so I hope.
‘The mass immigration of the last couple of decades, solely in order to prop up the GDP figures’
Further, this suggests that Australians have no interest in wealth, prosperity, high levels of personal debt, health of the economy, being consumerist and materialistic; suggesting it’s all the fault of those bloody ‘immigrants’ who force this upon real Australians?
Isn’t that a dog whistle messaged often in media, denigrates (undefined and anonymous) ‘immigrants’ as economic units or robots causing mischief in Oz e.g. ‘population growth’?
Misrepresents modern global but temporary mobility, i.e. movements of people caught in the NOM net overseas migration, e.g. int’l students described as ‘immigrants’, suggesting permanent, but they are not. More so, they are ‘net financial contributors’ via ‘temporary churn over’ which supports budgets (with increasing numbers of ageing citizens paying no/little tax and growing numbers of pensioners), an indirectly the economy.
Australia’s permanent migration under an annual cap (not unlimited as suggested by many) is actually declining as a proportion of the estimated population (swelled and frothed up by temp churn over on top); less than post WWII boom.
This is set against the coming mother lode of demographic change during the next generation, the oldies and most of the baby boomer bubble passes through…… the ‘big die off’.
Even the latter is an existential threat for rusted on WASPs etc. to be followed by a more diverse society and electorates.
It’s a half an argument Drew. They are only net contributors to the economy because those studies only counted the benefits. Real wage stagnation for the rest of the populace, lack of training up local people for jobs that are ‘lightly skilled’ and a good doorway to a real career, a lazy business sector that doesn’t see any role for itself in providing jobs for people who are here, a much higher unemployment rate than is good for our economy. All those, not considered in those ‘net contributors’ studies.
And student visas are a pathway to permanent residency and naturalisation. It’s the golden ticket, in fact.
Politely suggest that you are presenting old tropes and ignoring budgets; there has never been compelling evidence that ‘immigration’ causes unemployment or impairment of income.
However, it’s a trope like the ‘trickle down’ effect that has no grounding in research, but weaponised by the LNP, NewsCorp/media and IPA (the latter actually support temporary immigration under the guise of libertarian ideology, but not permanency nor citizenship allowing voting……).
Further, student visas are a pathway for those eligible for skills migration, who can then lodge an application, but only accepted under the cap….. not open ended’ hardly a ‘golden ticket’ if in the twilight zone…..