Kevin “Oh-lonesome-me” Andrews How must veteran Liberal Kevin Andrews feel after being rolled for preselection in his seat of Menzies? Having watched Scott Morrison intervene to save Craig sodding Kelly in Hughes, when it came to Andrews it appears Morrison left him largely to his own devices.
So now we’ve lost the father of the house, it’s a good time look back at some of his greatest hits.
Andrews was of course near the heart of the appalling Mohamed Haneef saga, and his enduring influence is demonstrated by attempting to politically weaponise anti-African sentiment in a doomed election year a full decade before Johnny-come-latelys like Matthew Guy and Peter Dutton jumped on board.
Andrews’ views on marriage has provided ample entertainment. There was his interesting point during the marriage equality debate that his “affectionate relationships” with his “cycling mates” wasn’t marriage (which, in isolation, I suppose we’d have to agree with). Then there were his deeply unloved relationship counselling vouchers.
But perhaps Crikey‘s most bizarre encounter with Andrews came not with him, but with his wife Margaret, in the form of an extremely tetchy (or very civil, depending on whose account you favour) exchange of ideas with our then-correspondent Benjamin Law.
Tortuous takes The presence of another “censorious left-wing mob justice is destroying society” column in The Australian‘s opinion section is a development so predictable that at this stage one assumes it’s the product of a keyboard shortcut. But the author of this one — Mirko Bagaric, dean of law at Swinburne University — does invite extra attention. At one point he argues:
It is appropriate to challenge forcefully and criticise their views but it is modern-day barbarism to insist that suffering should be inflicted on them for expressing beliefs that do not breach any legal standards.
Bagaric has a lot of thoughts on the inflicting of suffering. In 2005 he argued that unlike taking back someone’s award based on their views, torture is sometimes justifiable.
Stop the presses On Sunday night parts of Western Australia went into a snap lockdown after a guard in a quarantine hotel tested positive to the highly contagious UK COVID strain.
If a lockdown after one case seems excessive, the worry is that he has a second job as a ride share driver. So in a development you could see coming from space, yet again the culprit in making the virus worse for Australia is insecure work.
Parliament minus the sandgropers The snap lockdown has meant WA MPs from both sides of the aisle have been directed to stay away from parliament, disrupting the first sitting day of the year. But could this be an opportunity to get a coupla things done?
Perhaps some GST reforms? A mining tax (although it’s hardly just WA acting as a barrier to that, we’ll grant you)? Hell, while we’re dreaming, perhaps the eastern states could band together to somehow force Western Australia to take up daylight saving (famously it’s far more amenable to secession than changing the clocks by an hour), or finally sever WA’s vestigial and pointless employment law system?
My enemy’s enemy In the latest salvo in the war between Google and Australia’s media, the Oz reports that Microsoft is “eager” to fill the void if Google exits Australia. Well that ought to sort everything out — a tech giant with a long history of ruthless anti-competitive behaviour replacing Google.
It is hardly surprising that Morrison made little apparent attempt to save Andrews (in contrast to his support for Craig Kelly in 2019). Andrews’s seat is south of the Murray, and too far from the Sutherland Shire for Morrison to even acknowledge its existence.
Does this mean that Labor now has a majority in Parliament?
First day of the lockdown. I should have suspected it happening when I cycled to my gym in a small shopping centre yesterday at 1 pm and noticed that the parking lot was full, unusual for any day.
I found out at the end of my session. I was going shopping anyway, but there were long queues to get into the Coles.
i took the dog for a walk this morning, and compliance with the mask requirement seems very good. Even a woman watering her lawn was wearing a mask.
I expect we’ll get this mini-outbreak under control very quickly.
“force Western Australia to take up daylight saving”
Before I moved to WA I’d have agreed completely. But a few years experience of the climate here has convinced me daylight saving is bad. The afternoons and evenings are far too bloody hot during summer. The last thing anyone needs is more of it by getting out of work an hour earlier than you would without DST. And in the mornings with DST you have to go to work when you might have had a tolerable hour of daylight before it gets seriously hot again. Leave the bloody clocks alone!
Kevin Andrews was a proud member of the righteously right wing dodos of the Liberal Party. Perhaps the equally obtuse Erica Betz (Eric Abetz) would like to withdraw from Tasmanian politics and give Australia a holiday?
Secession is way more preferable to daylight saving!!!!!!!!
Absolutely. WA voted for secession in 1933 (by a two to one margin) so perhaps it’s about time we saw some action.
It is a sticky slope once you start seceding. The next step might be the north-west of WA seceding as the Billionaire State – taking all the iron ore revenue with it.
I understand one of the issues with earlier secession execrcises in WA was the fear that the goldfields that had a majority of uppitty former eastern staters working there would in turn secede.