Anthony Albanese has over-estimated himself his whole political life
Two years ago I stood before a cheering crowd at the Canterbury-Hurlstone Park RSL Club in Sydney, where I claimed victory for Labor. “I’ve been underestimated my whole life,” I triumphantly proclaimed.
That was true. But reflecting on my government’s many failings during the last two years, particularly the rising cost of living and the inability to protect this country from both external and internal threats, I’ve reluctantly reached a conclusion. And that is I’ve over-estimated myself for my whole political life.
I promised on election night that I would seek “common purpose and promote unity” and “not fear and division”. For good measure I also added: “It is what I have sought to do throughout my political life”. But the truth is I have long revelled in conflict, division, and petty sniping. That is my nature.I have presented many faces to the public, a practice otherwise known as telling the audience what they want to hear. Two months before the 2022 election, I gave an interview to The Daily Telegraph, claiming Labor was “the party of mainstream Australia”. I made a big show of distancing myself from the Greens, saying I was pro-business and would implement economically “realistic” policies.
That was a façade. I knew it was a façade. You knew it was a façade. Only ten years before I had, as a cabinet minister in the Gillard government, tearfully lamented that the upheaval in Labor’s leadership was distracting me from my core business of class warfare.
“I like fighting Tories,” I said. “It’s what I do.”
That was one of the rare occasions the public got to see an upfront Anthony Albanese.
I was a teenager when I embraced far-left politics, and I’ve never relinquished the ideology of envy and antagonism. I define myself not by what I’m for but what I’m against.
As for my love of fighting, that needs qualifying. I’m big on shrill denunciations while pointing the finger at the other side. I’ll posture for the camera and yell exhortations like “smash her”, when a member of the Opposition speaks. It’s all theatre, though. In short, I’m a piss and wind warrior.“I won’t run and hide from responsibility,” I said in a pre-election speech. “I won’t go missing when the going gets tough.” It’s just my ticker that will go missing, I should have added. They were just a couple of the many promises and assurances I have given over the last few years, all of which were about as believable as a bedtime fairy tale.
I told the Australian public on the eve of the election: “Labor will be every bit as strong in defending Australian values against any push by China or any nation trying to undermine them”. So what did I do when a Chinese warship deliberately used its sonar to injure our naval divers? I kept that under wraps until I finished my pre-departure press conference at San Francisco, so the media couldn’t ask me if I’d raised this incident with President Xi Jinping during our APEC summit meeting.
I’m forever telling everyone that my government is “keeping Australians safe,” yet I refuse to call out the growing number of Islamic extremists in this country. I’m paralysed by the thought of losing safe Labor seats in Western Sydney. Every aspect of our foreign policy concerning the Middle East is assessed according to that narrow consideration.
My government even refused a modest request by the US to send a warship into the Red Sea as part of a global effort to protect shipping lanes from Houthi rebel attacks. Do you know who praised us for that decision? China’s state-owned media, that’s who. “It is sensible for Australia to continue distancing itself from the US”, said the Global Times. That says it all.
I know that Jews throughout the Western world, including those in Australia, increasingly fear for their safety. One reason for that here is my government offers only token support for them, because we are more worried about offending Muslim voters.
Take for example my reaction to the disgraceful protests outside the Sydney Opera House just days after the horrific atrocities of October 7. Asked at a press conference about that ugly demonstration, I resorted to false equivalence. “I’m concerned about the rise of anti-Semitism,” I said. “I’m concerned as well about Islamophobia, which has impacted in this country as well,” I added.
To put that in context, many of Western Sydney’s Middle Eastern residents had only hours before taken to the streets to celebrate the biggest mass murder of Jewish civilians since the Holocaust, and there I was waving the anti-Islamophobia finger...
As for my commitment to protecting Australia’s borders, that’s also a farce. As of April, three boatloads of illegal maritime arrivals had reached the mainland. Fear not, I said, our commitment to maintaining Operation Sovereign Borders has not changed.
Just like I insisted repeatedly that we would honour our promise to implement the Morrison government’s Stage 3 tax cuts. “My word is my bond,” I would say. “Our position has not changed.” And I continued these reassurances and denials right up until the moment I announced we had reneged on our commitment. So much for my election campaign launch declaration when I said: “I can promise you I’ll always tell it straight.”
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