The battle has been lost but the war will be won.
How do I know this? Yesterday’s sad and empathic defeat of the Voice has many sad ramifications but it does have two major upsides.
Firstly, we have witnessed the biggest own goal in Australian political history by Opposition Leader Peter Dutton. The Yes vote has been strong in inner-Sydney and inner-Melbourne; the Liberal Party will not regain seats lost in 2022 to the Teals, independents and Labor. Dutton will never be prime minister even if he lasts as Opposition leader to the next election.
Secondly, the result will have conned our nation’s pathetic mainstream media into thinking they still have an effective voice in shaping public opinion. The News Corp outlets in particular will rail hard in the months ahead, trying to lay all the blame for yesterday’s result on Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Labor.
Sadly, the Nine Entertainment Co.’s Australian Financial Review (well, that’s a given!) its Nine News network and its radio station shockjocks will not be far behind. As will all the other commercial TV networks. The Australian Broadcasting Corporation will probably follow their lead yet again. Thanks Ita! Any chance of leaving early? Like yesterday?
We will continue, through that collective media’s disgraceful rightwing bias and the absolute shredding of any pretence at real journalism, to see what I have termed for a long time the longest corporate suicide note in history.
Back to Dutton. He led the moronic “If you don’t know, vote No” chant from the get-go. What an absurd stance to take for anyone aspiring to national leadership. He was the figurehead of a campaign based on creating fear and division through endless lies. Dogwhistling to this nation’s sadly far too many racists and nutjobs was all pervasive in, and central to, that campaign.
Just take the roles of two former Liberal PMs. Tony Abbott led the charge that it was unfair to other Australians that our First Nations people were being offered something they weren’t. A moronic statement that made Pauline Hanson look almost balanced and fair until she opened her gob and said whites would have to pay to go to their local beach. John Howard chipped in with the total nonsense that Australian governments would have to implement anything our FTP wanted. Arrant unexplained nonsense from a man with a history of throwing the truth overboard.
Dutton must – and will – carry the blame for what the No campaign did. And, while statesmanlike and conviction politician Albanese will use diplomatic language and try not to offend those who voted No, I’m with prominent Yes campaigner Thomas Mayo who maintained the rage last night.
“But we have seen a disgusting No campaign, a campaign that has been dishonest, that has lied to the Australian people,” Mayo told the ABC TV coverage of the count.
This writer and The Bug stands with Mayo. We’ll be taking no prisoners in the weeks and months ahead. We’ll be telling a large swag of No voters that they were tricked. They may not like it but over time they might get to accept it.
And where has this tactic of Dutton’s left him? The Newspoll on the eve of the vote had Labor ahead 54-46 two party preferred. Labor’s primary vote is up two points to 36; the LNP down one to 35. Albanese leads as preferred PM 51 to 31. Dutton’s approval rating is minus 18 with approval down two to 35 and disapproval up three to 53. Albanese is neutral on a 36-36 scoreline. The Heralds’ Resolve Political Monitor earlier in the week had Labor on 37 primary and the LNP in near-lethal territory – 31 per cent.
Not bad for both Labor and Albanese considering a major plank of the disgusting dog-whistling was that Albanese was no longer doing his day job as he pandered to the interests of Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders. Did you all get the not-so-subliminal dog-whistling message there: Black-loving cunt!
Dutton has shown over past months that he is either too set in his ways or, to be unkind, just too fucking dumb to not realise that opening his gob and telling lies all the time like Scott Morrison did is not the best way forward. The Lodge does not await.
So, finally, on that subject, all of you Yes supporters out there weeping for this country’s trashed reputation for fairness, decency and a fair-go this morning, check out the vote tallies in the Teal seats of inner Sydney and Melbourne and the seats Labor also picked up from the Liberals in Melbourne last year. The Victorian capital, the once mighty jewel in the Liberal Party’s crown, is now dross. That gravelly sound you might hear in the background is Robert Menzies spinning in his grave.
Well done, Dutts!
And finally on the mainstream media. Rage against Albanese with all your faux-might, especially Newscorpse. Give it your best – and no doubt repeatedly – shot, Bolt, Morrow, Campbell, Albrechtsen, Credlin, Ackerman, Campion, Baxendale, etc, fucking, etc. Powder your shit-brown stained noses as you do the bidding of your new lord and master Lachlan Murdoch.
Shred any last remnants of journalistic integrity as you do. Kill yourself slowly in the process. Down the corporate boghole you’ll eventually all disappear and few will shed a tear as you go.
It’s sad in a way to watch the death of the craft of journalism I practiced for roughly a half century but there’s some consolation in the fact that it is still fun to watch its demise at the hands of these LNP publicists. I’ll never, ever, call them journalists.
Don Gordon-Brown
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