Scott Morrison really is the gift that keeps giving to the Labor Party. Like Donald Trump, after leading his troops to a crushing election defeat he simply can’t stay out of the spotlight. Albo may have made politics sensible and boring again, but our version of The Former Guy is determined to keep the entertainment flowing. All week the media has been expressing its stupefaction at the idea that Scummo, a man who has stuffed up every task he’s ever undertaken, decided he needed five extra jobs as well as Prime Minister, having himself secretly sworn in to the portfolios of Health, Treasurer, Finance, Home Affairs, and Industry, Science, Energy and Resources.
It’s astonishing he did this, and even more astonishing he didn’t tell the relevant ministers – including his good pal, Josh – that he was effectively ghosting their jobs. Albo has eloquently described these actions as “weird”. Others have called for a Royal Commission. The charmless Karen Andrews had a sudden conversion and called for Scummo to leave Parliament. Let’s hope she can devote the same volume of nastiness to her former leader as she has lavished on refugees.
Even though that eminence grise, John Howard, has come out in support of Scummo, I think he should pause to contemplate the Biblical phrase “the writing on the wall”. We might also consider whether John Howard deserves the exaggerated respect he seems to command nowadays. With the exception of the gun buyback, his virtues were never conspicuous when in office.
So what does this reveal about Scummo’s much-analysed personality? For a start, it confirms his extreme narcissism, which saw him believe he was the only one who could be relied upon to steer the ship of state through a crisis. He didn’t tell anybody about his new portfolios because he didn’t need to, knowing that it was all for the best and the ministers would naturally fall in line behind his genius if they found out. He is the complete control freak and paranoid who embraces secrecy in all things and doesn’t trust anyone except maybe Jesus and Jenny. His colleagues could not be described as his friends. He is a compulsive micromanager and a career incompetent.
All of this feels completely absurd when we realise this is the same man who kept telling us, over and over: “That’s not my job”, when asked to accept responsibility for some debacle that he did little to alleviate. Mike Cannon-Brookes posted a tweet this week that mashed together all these “not my job” moments with the relevant crises.
The ‘minister for everything’ saga shows the degree to which Scummo was living in a parallel universe in which he ruled Australia as a wise, benevolent autocrat, blessed by the Lord, beloved of his subjects. All he had to do was say that a problem was resolved, and magically it was! – timing his revelation for maximum electoral advantage. There was no need to commit actual resources to any issue. He’ll be taking this supreme self-confidence with him into the next party room meeting, and shortly after that into the search for new employment. Having shown us all what he’s capable of, I imagine the job offers must already be pouring in.
On a more sober note, this week’s art column looks at Sidney Nolan’s Auschwitz paintings – a virtually unknown body of work that left the mercurial artist “shaken to his core”, to invoke the name of the exhibition at the Sydney Jewish Museum. Taken indivdually these works are spontaneous and a little scrappy, but the theme and the obvious impact it had on Nolan, make them compelling viewing. Will we ever be done with the Holocaust? Probably not. The way the world is shaping up today, there are countless, pressing reasons for remembering this historical atrocity.
The movie being reviewed is Good Luck to You, Leo Grande, which I approached with a certain scepticism, and left feeling won over. The story-line, about an aging widow looking for at least one good sexual experience before it’s too late, seemed to invite sentimentality and wokeness. Instead, the intelligence of the script and the quality of Emma Thompson and Daryl McCormack’s performances, made this a quality night at the pictures.It’s pleasing to think here are a few good actors out there. We just happened to have a bad one as our Prime Minister for the past three years.