I'm still too burned I won't believe he will lose until I see it. — StreetlightX
The relationship between tertiary education and voting has shifted, with higher levels of education increasingly correlating with voting for Labor or the Greens. The cost is the increasing alienation of the well-educated elites who once gave the Liberals their support.
For Morrison, words are just distracting noises that come out of a hole in his head. They are not connected to any logic or fact or principle. They are not constrained by anything he has said or done in the past, nor do they commit him to any future course of action. To expect otherwise is to make a categorical error. Morrison’s political career provides no grounds for believing that he will ever give a straight answer to any question, offer a cogent and consistent argument, explain himself in any way, or do anything he says he will do. He has never baulked at any hypocrisy, small or large. He speaks in order to make the very act of questioning him an exercise in futility, addressing no concrete reality beyond the immediate imperative to generate static. It is a form of anti-oratory: the rhetorical equivalent of avoiding an awkward conversation by starting up a leaf blower.
...Morrison is, according to Sheridan, ‘the prime minister for all Australians, for Australians of all faiths and none’. The only problem with this assertion is that it is demonstrably false in all but the most narrowly technical sense. Morrison has led what may well be the most indolent, nasty, bumbling, dishonest, cynical and corrupt federal government in Australian history. In his term as prime minister, he has failed to achieve a single lasting reform for the long-term betterment of Australian society. He failed even to propose one. He has proved himself, over and over again, to be an abuser of executive power, a substantive policy vacuum, and a legislator of surpassing ineptitude. His ideological stance is little better than a collection of antipathies pursued in a spirit of vindictiveness. He is as dogmatic as he is shallow. The keynotes of his time in office have been rampant cronyism, industrial scale rorting for partisan ends, the funnelling of vast sums of public money into the coffers of private vested interests, deliberate undermining of public institutions, and an evident distaste for the very thought that the federal government should use any of the vast resources at its disposal to help anyone who actually needs help.
On these points, Morrison has been absolutely consistent. The major catastrophes of bushfires, floods and the pandemic have done nothing to alter his basic stance. Faced with the spectacle of his fellow citizens in desperate need, Morrison has responded in ways that are belated, inadequate, grudging and skewed — every single time. The defining feature of his political career is that he always seeks to use his position of power to disadvantage and, in many cases, actively punish sections of the populace he regards with disfavour. These include but are not limited to academics and university students (those studying the humanities, in particular), public school students, aged-care residents, Indigenous Australians, women, people with disabilities, anyone who relies on the public health system, Muslims, the entire populations of Victoria and Western Australia, gay and transgender people, everyone who works in the arts sector, everyone who lives in a safe Labor seat, and everyone who understands that climate change is a serious problem. Hands down the most disgusting and shameful piece of maladministration in recent Australian history was the Robodebt debacle, which weaponised the federal bureaucracy against the citizens it was supposed to be serving, targeting the poorest and most vulnerable members of society. The scheme was a shakedown, carried out with such calculated menace that it drove a number of its victims to suicide. It was subsequently found to be illegal. Morrison was its chief instigator.
Australia needs to find a way of allowing real wages to grow at a faster rate than productivity, for a while — and, desirably, at the same time fostering a faster rate of growth in productivity — in order to facilitate not only faster and more sustainable economic growth, but also to restore our communal sense of prosperity.
But why blame Djokovic for this? — baker
You mistake me for someone who might care. — Banno
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