The Budget was announced this week, and not only was it one of the most political ever, it was also one of the most expensive job applications in history for the federal Treasurer, Josh Frydenberg, who is clearly angling for the leadership of the Liberal Party after the next election, win or lose.
Is this a good Budget? Budgets should be all about the community and the economy but, once again, the media has focused on whether the Budget will be enough to get the Coalition government re-elected or not, which seems to totally miss the point of national finances.
And is this government incompetent, or is its mismanagement – inaction on climate change, bushfires, flooding, vaccination rollout – a deliberate strategy by design? Many people have suggested it’s impossible for a government to be so incompetent, and the Morrison government is following in the footsteps of the Bush administration in the United States: deliberate incompetence and recklessness that opens up the pathway for an obscene ideology that brings in all the spivs, charlatans, and private operators. Everything is against the public interest and in favour of the chosen few.
We’ve had yet another once-in-3500 years weather event in Lismore and northern New South Wales. And, once again, government has acted slowly and its response has been too late. This is an issue that is going to feature in the background of the federal election campaign, once it is announced.
Labor preselections always seem to attract controversy, especially when a white male economist from an affluent area is parachuted into a diverse multicultural western Sydney seat. Should parties insert high quality candidates into winnable seats, or choose the local who works the branches for many years, and ends up doing nothing once they become the MP?
This, of course, is an issue. But nothing compared to the criticism being thrown at Scott Morrison by his own side of politics. Senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells has, effectively, been dumped by the Liberal Party and her final speech in the Senate shared her opinion of Morrison as a bully who is unfit to be Prime Minister and lacks a moral compass.
There’s no come back for Morrison. Fierravanti-Wells is leaving politics but it appears there might be quite a few of her Liberal Party colleagues following her at the next election, whenever it is held.
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