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Flat White

Labor are the masters of their own demise

Labor’s energy policy has recast Labor from the ‘catch-all’ party of Keating to the ‘upset-all’ party of Albanese

17 January 2024

2:00 AM

17 January 2024

2:00 AM

The Albanese government’s dictatorial policy of renewables at all costs was always going to bring about its demise. Following the defeat of the divisive Voice to Parliament Referendum, the Prime Minister has been labelled a ‘beta male’, defined as a ‘submissive, feeble-minded, and weak man’. With Labor’s planned republic referendum now hopefully shelved until their defeat at the next election, renewables policy is one area where we can expect rapid desperation from the Prime Minister to create some sort of legacy in the short time he has left.

It was unusual to hear a Prime Minister refer to himself as a ‘conviction politician’. Being a conviction politician, much like being charismatic, is a moniker others give you, not one you give yourself. Albanese would have been better off remaining a ‘consensus politician who would govern from the centre’. Instead, land grabs for solar factories and wind farms – not to mention ‘water grabs’ for offshore wind – have upset Australians ranging from farmers to surfers in Labor’s ill-thought-out energy plans.

Labor’s energy policy has recast Labor from the ‘catch-all’ party of Keating to the ‘upset-all’ party of Albanese.

The Green-Left movement has become comfortable telling people where to live, what to eat, how to cook, what to drive, what to think, when they can use their air conditioners, to get used to renting from the government forever, and why it is so important based on ideas imported from countries where most of the people would probably rather live in Australia. It is all part of leftist philosophy.

In socialist thought, the idea of contradiction explains the driving forces of societal evolution. To explain, the bourgeoisie supports their self-righteous and superior position where societal changes can only occur through external events, such as wars. Socialists, however, see society as evolving through internal events resulting from ‘contradictoriness’ in various forms, such as the division we are currently experiencing. Eventually, the contradiction is resolved when we arrive at a new form of social organisation (before starting over again). Many conservative commentators refer to this as the ‘left’s long march through the institutions’, a phrase originally coined by the left.

To understand what is happening in our energy sector, if we adopt a socialist analysis, we must then examine the ‘particularity of contradiction’, or the contradictions within the sector that are driving its evolution. But rather than leading to a Green-Left conclusion, the analysis helps us see through the myths of Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen’s narrative that is dividing the country.


If external events do not dictate institutional change, then ‘climate change’ cannot be an external event that is driving our energy policy. This is clear – if reducing carbon emissions is the driver, then nuclear energy should be a major part of our energy policy. Instead, we are pursuing onshore wind and solar which is destroying valuable agricultural land, and offshore wind which is butting up against another contradiction – environmental policy – based on ideology.

And it seems that destroying the environment to save the environment, amid Woke ideology and other attempts to undo Australians’ pride in their history and culture and the liberties we have long defended, is now contradicting the left.

Minister for the Environment Tanya Plibersek’s welcome call to protect wetlands at the proposed offshore wind terminal site of Port Hastings in Victoria reveals the Green-Left’s approach to conservation as nothing less than political correctness gone mad.

The sense of morality in energy policy that has become a misguided attempt at leaving a legacy reminds me of Colonel Nicholson in the movie The Bridge on the River Kwai. Nicholson helps the enemy build a bridge to show off British engineering prowess. Meanwhile, William Holden’s character, ‘Lieutenant’ Shears (who faked being an officer to avoid manual labour as a prisoner of war), escapes and later participates in a commando operation to destroy the bridge. Nicholson sees the wires and informs the enemy commander, but when he sees Shears killed he is awakened to his misplaced loyalties and exclaims, ‘What have I done?’

Like Shears, Plibersek has redeemed her role. Colonel Nicholson also redeemed himself by, while dying, stumbling over to fall on the plunger and blow up the bridge. Bowen may also ask, ‘What have I done? Regrettably, there will be no redemption and it will take a new government to blow up the energy mess we have gotten ourselves into. It didn’t have to be this way.

Liberal democracy is about compromise. We debate political issues to arrive at a solution that everyone can live with. It’s often not the best solution, but it is less divisive, and it works.

Australians typically reach a point where they say enough is enough. The recent poll showing that the Albanese government’s energy policy is on the nose indicates that that time is now.

I was having a beer with my good friend and neighbour Darlene this afternoon. We found common ground over declining representation of Australian citizens’ interests by politicians and how we hoped the stupidity of contemporary energy policy would not lead to their inevitable and obviously stupid end in our lifetime. It’s hardly the optimistic future promised by the previously positive vibes extolled by our Prime Minister.

The reality is that this Labor government loves to tell people what to do. Not because of any particular loyalty like a parent might exercise care and guidance toward a child, but the kind that hides behind the socialist idea that parents are a construct of capitalism that perpetuates the capitalist economic system. Never mind the social, political, and economic benefits that have resulted from capitalism that have not been replicated in any other economic system.

But don’t take my word for it. Ask Darlene. Salt of the earth. Hardworking rouseabout and stalwart of the community she is, her voice is the voice of ANZACs that made this country great. These are the people who will decide the next election, not green-left inner-city elites.

Labor’s energy policy is not only contradicting Australian values of personal and political liberty but contradicting the tradition of the Labor Party itself. Indeed, energy policy ‘destroying the environment to save the environment’ is such a foreign concept that now even the Labor Party is ‘rejecting the premise’.

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