Tag Archives: Daniel Andrews

Daniel Andrews may be the most clueless political leader in Australian history

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There really is no getting away from how dumb Daniel Andrews is, with this the latest: Dan Andrews rips into Scott Morrison as the Prime Minister calls for end to hated Covid isolation rules: ‘I’m in the business of taking advice from the experts’.

Everyone in politics has “experts” to draw upon. We elect our leaders for their judgment; we elect them in the hope they will be able to make sensible decisions based on the advice they are given. The PM is trying to emphasise that the lockdowns and closed borders are based on decisions made by the premiers, and if things were up to him, many of the restrictions now in place would be lifted. Andrews has thus helped the PM get his message across. It is Andrews who is responsible for having implemented the world’s longest lockdown, and for keeping the present restrictions in place.

As for taking advice, it has been clear from the start that it is Andrews who has made all the major decisions in Victoria, and that the only serious consultation he does is with those who do the polling. That is what we have had to put up with since the start. But if he has not had a variety of opinions offered by the “experts” he is surrounded by, Victoria really is an idiocracy from the very top all the way down. But that is not how it worked out. The people who do the polling have told him that the majority of voters in Victoria prefer the lockdowns and that is what we have had, and will continue to have until voter sentiment changes.

There he is, a political leader, Premier of the State, but still doesn’t know what the job he has actually is. It is to make decisions based on all of the options that others propose.

That he has been singularly inept in the decisions he has made is just how it is. He will leave Victoria a bankrupt mess, wrecking the world’s most liveable city in the process. And there is no doubt that the mess is directly attributable to the string of phenomenally bad decisions Daniel Andrews has made while Premier.

It’s always for political reasons

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This is from The Spectator online:

Xin Du asks if the Daniel Andrews government in Victoria is keeping children masked for political, rather than medical reasons…

Masking children is idiotic but you may be sure Andrews has focus-grouped this to the fullest extent possible. Of course, it’s not for medical reasons. In politics it is always for political reasons. It’s embarrassing to read such inane things from a source where I expect them to know better.

“Put the arguments aside…”

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I appreciate that The Oz puts a range of views on its editorial page so that there is usually something for everyone, but I have to say that the superficiality and phenomenal ignorance of Ms Katrina Grace Kelly does try the nerves. It was her first four words that captured just how dull what she wrote was:

Put the arguments aside over whether it was wrong or right, and focus on what is significant – namely, the emotions that were expressed. On Australia Day eve, when in the presence of Scott Morrison, Grace Tame was visibly discomfited. Tame presented as angry and disgusted with the Prime Minister. These were personal feelings but, in their display, Tame conveyed the public mood of a large cohort.

If you “put the arguments aside” there is nothing left other than empty emotion. I realise Australian of the Year has tended to become Victim of the Year, but how astonishing is all of this. Anyway, I will go direct to the comments since this is obviously not a place into which I should venture. The first half dozen classified under “Most Liked”.

I quote: On Australia Day eve, when in the presence of Scott Morrison, Grace Tame was visibly discomfited. Tame presented as angry and disgusted with the Prime Minister. These were personal feelings but, in their display, Tame conveyed the public mood of a large cohort. Newsflash: Tame has done no such thing. She’s conveyed the mood of Leftist ideologues who never liked, will never like and will never, ever vote for Scott Morrison. Moreover, Tame doesn’t not speak for me. 

Seriously! has anyone actually travelled to regional Vic or even the CBD? Whole streets of boarded up shops. Victoria is a ghost town. Most of them now unfortunately have migrated to Qld.  Please don’t tell me they blame Morrison for any of the dismantling of Victoria. Speak to any sensible, normal person in Victoria and Daniel Andrews is despised.

Meanwhile in Qld, Anna is delighted about the Labor voting Victorians pouring into her state, many with her beliefs, of high debt and crook hospital systems are acceptable, ( until, of course, it affects them) as the Gold and Sunshine Coasts reel under the invasion of Southerners waving wads of money to get them to move, and pressure from Real Estate agents to move on, that is until they realise unless they downsize, there is nowhere to go, and not many want to move to the beachless, public service town of Brisbane. Qld. won the election for The Libs last time, and are likely to lose it for him this time, as their Premier “saved” them, and most would vote her back in tomorrow. Our country is coming to its nemesis as to which way to go, to follow the US on its path to semi destruction, to honour wokeness, or stay a strong country holding onto the beliefs of Democracy.  It’s your call.

So Dan Andrews locks down and ruins Victoria, and Scomo gets the blame? Give it a rest.

OMG! Down south suffering from the longest lockdown in the world by DA! No problems in Victoria caused by DA! ScoMo  is the one and only to blame for everything from the sun coming up in the morning to the stars coming out at night!

Um, there were lockdowns in Victoria that meant people from outside the state couldn’t go to Victoria, which the writer just seems to conveniently forget. As for Grace Tame, she acted like a petulant ungracious child. Supporting her behaviour demonstrates your own misunderstanding of the respect that should shown to our PM, especially when holding an important civic office such as Australian of the Year. Finally, we have all had a gut full of Australians of the Year parading themselves around as if they run the place, just as Tame has done. She was a very poor choice.I find it infuriating to constantly read media reports of a state minister or premier blaming the federal government for the failure of their own policies. It is worse when the journalists covering the story never point out the blame is misplaced.

I find it infuriating to constantly read media reports of a state minister or premier blaming the federal government for the failure of their own policies. It is worse when the journalists covering the story never point out the blame is misplaced.I find it infuriating to constantly read media reports of a state minister or premier blaming the federal government for the failure of their own policies. It is worse when the journalists covering the story never point out the blame is misplaced. Then there are opinion pieces like this attempting to reinforce the blame shift. Morrison and his government had no say over the lockdowns in any state. It is the same with aged care, the federal government supply the funds but the states are the ones who (mis)spend it. Use an article like this as exhibit one of why the public distrust all politicians equally as much as main stream media

Lots more just like these.

We are governed by totalitarians with the battleground worldwide and not just in Melbourne

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This is the background which I was sent a few days ago. The video was released yesterday – one hour and forty-one minutes in length. This is what you are being prevented from seeing.

As you may be aware, Battleground Melbourne, a feature-length documentary is out in a few days and is free to watch! I think they accumulated over 100 terabytes of data for this one. 

Topher has been making videos for quite a long time but this will be his finest. 

Here’s Topher’s latest post:

This is the Full Trailer for Battleground Melbourne, a documentary which tells the story of the fall of the World’s Most Liveable City through the eyes of those who risked everything to save it.

Melbourne was voted the World’s Most Liveable City 7 times… now Melbourne is the most locked down city, and has spent the last 2 years being rocked by anti-government protests and unprecedented levels of police violence in return.

Battleground Melbourne tells the story of these protests, the people, the events, the courage, the violence, the hope… through the eyes of the people who were there.

Who are they really? Are they really as bad and evil as the media and politicians claim? Why did they keep going even as police were arresting, assaulting, and shooting them?

You’ve heard the politician’s side of the story, you’ve heard the media’s version of events… now see it through our eyes.

Above is what you get if you now try to watch the full video which was released yesterday and them immediately suppressed. Below is the trailer which you can still watch as I post it here, but I wouldn’t count on it lasting very long.

Basically, it is the story how Melbourne went from being the World’s Most Liveable City to an ash heap and dump under Daniel Andrews and his mates. Still, they remain odds-on favourites to win the next election so who is there to blame for any of it?

There is absolutely nothing to thank Daniel Andrews for

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If there has ever been a more repulsive political leader in Australia than Daniel Andrews I cannot think who it was. The notion that the leader of a government through its incompetence has led to hundreds of deaths and the longest lockdown in the world is owed any gratitude is a notion so grotesque that only a socialist party could even have conceived of it.

And even now we are still in lockdown although some, but only some of the worst excesses have been lifted. The premier is a bungling idiot. He has done nothing that he can point towards with an ounce of pride. His stupidity has led to the deaths of many many individuals who would be alive today were it not for his personal involvement in the lockdown.

Daniel Andrews is, moreover, such an evil presence that he actually thinks he has been a positive influence on the outcomes we have endured in Victoria. Look at the other states, you stupid fool and tell me what you have achieved in Victoria. For others, in the grip of the Melbourne Syndrome, there are those who are grateful for still being alive in the midst of a viral epidemic that had virtually no possibility of killing them.

I, on the other hand, think of Andrews as a monster who has been responsible for the deaths of hundreds of people, responsible for the destruction of millions of dollars of value across the state and for a lockdown that will drain the resources available to Victorians for a generation.

And it is still not over and Andrews has still not resigned. He must live inside the tightest most secure echo chamber ever constructed if all he can hear is the praise from deluded idiots for what he has done. Step outside, you buffoon, and hear what the rest of us think.

Josh Frydenberg has said it well, and he has said it in response to a Labor Party motion in the Federal Parliament to thank Dan Andrews for what he has done. How out of touch with reality can these people be! Repulsive remains the only word that captures the essence of Andrews and the sooner he leaves the political stage the better it will be. If you “Stand with Dan”, you are a pretty stupid person yourself.

The worst premier in Australian history

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Daniel Andrews is good at wasting money on over-priced infrastructure projects. He had already bankrupted the State even before the Chinese Flu came along. But here is the psychology of what then occurred. Although he is quite stupid, he thinks of himself as a genius. And what he has found out is that his stupidity is now recognised by all, other than the dwindling number of our fellow citizens caught up in the toxic virus of the Melbourne Syndrome. And along with his low grade intelligence, he has a ridiculously high level of self-regard. As a result, the incessant level of bungling has led to his refusing to admit that even a single one of his decisions has been at the centre of the problems in dealing with Covid. Look at this from The Oz today:

Josh Frydenberg, the nation’s most senior Victorian federal minister, has pleaded with Daniel ­Andrews to free Victorians from “devastating’’ coronavirus restrictions, warning that businesses are losing hope and the state now has 40 per cent of the nation’s effective unemployed.

The Treasurer sparked a bitter political row with the Victorian Premier on Monday when he ­accused Mr Andrews of “callous indifference” towards economic hardship in the state after restrictions on many businesses were ­extended for two weeks.

A dismissive Mr Andrews hit back, accusing Mr Frydenberg of playing politics when Victorians wanted their families kept safe so the state could reopen safely.

More psychology here, this time a bit of projection when he accuses The Treasurer of “playing politics”.

Face it, he’s a political moron and even worse economic manager. But he has had some psychological wire tripped and he is now going to show us how it is done properly.

He was elected because he promised to get rid of rail crossings and even he found it too expensive and hasn’t done it. Now he is in charge of dealing with the Covid where we once again discover how massively out of his depth he is.

And there is this which has just cropped up. I wonder who Mr Stupid will blame: Hotel quarantine guests at risk of HIV and other viruses after testing blunder.More than 200 people who were in Victoria’s hotel quarantine program are being urged to get tested for HIV and other viruses after a testing mix-up.`State health authorities have announced that 243 people are being advised to undergo testing for Hepatitis B and C and HIV after it was revealed that single-use blood glucose testing kits were used multiple times.

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Dan really has to go. Worst Premier in Australian history.

There has never been a government with such a high approval-to-incompetence ratio

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Guess who that is? And guess what it’s about. The first two minutes should make you sick. Do not watch too much more since it will be bad for your health. Much more dangerous than CV-1984.

So this is where we are with Mr Stupid: Andrews threatens border closures over Kiwi arrivals. There has never been a government with such a high approval-to-incompetence ratio. Bumbling fools comes nowhere near covering it. Twenty-one years of almost continuous Labor Party management have brought community expectations for their governments to the lowest level in history.

Mr Andrews said he had previously told the federal government Victoria was not part of the travel bubble and blamed federal authorities for the arrivals, saying he did not know they were coming and they should have been stopped before they boarded flights to Melbourne. NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian made it clear her government would not prevent passengers travelling to Victoria, with a spokeswoman saying the issue was a matter for the southern state. Victoria’s borders are not closed to NSW…. Victorian authorities spent much of yesterday trying to track down the travellers, with Mr Andrews conceding the state’s health department had no power to stop passengers, detain them or force them into quarantine if they had arrived from interstate, rather than overseas.

They arrive from places where there are no cases of the Corona Virus, so what’s the problem? And if you want more evidence just how incompetent these people are, try this although there is much much more:

A spokeswoman for the federal Department of Health confirmed Victoria’s chief health officer Brett Sutton was present at a meeting on October 12 when the matter of onwards travel of New Zealanders from Sydney to Melbourne was discussed. Mr Tudge also tweeted that Professor Sutton “did not raise any concerns” in the discussions. It also emerged Mr Andrews’ own department had given one of the arrivals from NZ the green light two weeks ago to travel onward to Victoria although the advice, from the Department of Premier and Cabinet, was issued before Mr Andrews had officially declared his state was not joining the travel bubble. The Age has also seen an email from the Premier’s Department, sent on October 12 in response to a query about travel from NZ via Sydney, that clearly advised that Victoria’s borders were open and that the traveller was free to arrive in the southern state.

I can only think Dan is still there because the rest of his cabinet has joined Michael O’Brien (the unknown leader of the Liberal Party) in not wanting to become Premier until the present Victorian mess is limited to the level of “Ongoing Catastrophe” from its present level of “Major Calamity”.

A $30m contract for three months’ work

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This is what Daniel Andrews was dealing with. From Peta Credlin: Too much we’re not being told about Victoria’s hotel quarantine fiasco. And while who made the decision is important (here’s the answer, it was Dan), more important to me is why he chose some local mates over the ADF.

The Premier’s chief of staff was the first person Eccles briefed on the national cabinet decision to introduce hotel quarantine. Jobs Department head Simon Phemister then put the process in train that led to the engagement of Unified Security, a company not on the list of preferred tenderers, but that somehow won the lion’s share of the work — a $30m contract for three months’ work…. How could Phemister have set up the private security contracts without knowing how this had come to be authorised? What public servants would spend $30m without being clear about the authority for it?

So many questions, so few answers.

The Melbourne Syndrome in pictures

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It would be much funnier if it weren’t actually true.

AND THIS FROM TODAY’S FINANCIAL REVIEW: Mask crackdown mad, health experts warn. Their headline, with this text:

Asked why he would require Victorians to wear masks when there is no health purpose, Mr Andrews dismissed the question. “That’s an esoteric debate, isn’t it? Maybe there will be a time when we have the luxury of having those sorts of debates.”

Maybe there will be a time! “Mad” is just the word.

And indeed, Andrew Bolt now specifically asks

Has Daniel Andrews gone mad?

I cannot tell if this is just hyperbolic exaggeration or is meant literally. To me, it could be either, but what if it’s literally true? I keep coming back to The Caine Mutiny and Captain Queeg. The Caine is a US battleship during the war in the Pacific. Captain Queeg is its captain who has gone insane. The leader of the mutiny is Maryk.

Maryk keeps a secret log of Queeg’s eccentric behavior…. Soon afterward, the Caine is caught in a typhoon, an ordeal that sinks three destroyers. At the height of the storm, Queeg’s paralysis of action convinces Maryk that he must relieve the captain of command to prevent the loss of the ship. Willie, as Officer of the Deck, supports the decision. Maryk turns Caine into the wind and rides out the storm.

Fundamentally incorrect government statements

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This seems very direct.

Lying is native to politics. If you did not realise it before watching the inquiry into Victorian Labor’s disastrous COVID-19 quarantine scheme, you will now. The Victorian government led by Daniel Andrews is so mired in lies that truth is a distant memory….

We heard the lie by omission, the half-truth, blame-shifting, obfuscation, red herrings, selective memory and collective amnesia. The Premier claims not to know who made the decision to hire private security staff to guard people in hotel quarantine. Labor ministers have followed suit, though most peppered their feigned ignorance with a generous serving of selective amnesia….

On August 8, the Premier told a parliamentary committee: “I think it is fundamentally incorrect to assert that there was (sic) hundreds of ADF staff on offer and somehow someone said no. That’s not, in my judgment, accurate.” However, Sky News and others reported that Prime Minister Scott Morrison personally wrote letters to the Victorian Premier urging him to accept the help of Australian Defence Force personnel in July as the number of COVID cases surged in Victoria. It was reported that the PM sent letters to Andrews on July 4, 6 and 11. In the final correspondence, the PM offered about 1000 defence personnel to work alongside Victoria Police to ensure the virus was contained, affected suburbs were locked down and contact tracing was undertaken….

When Defence Minister Linda Reynolds noted the Victorian government had rejected commonwealth offers of ADF help with hotel quarantine, the Premier framed it as playing politics. He supported the alternative version of events authored by Emergency Management Commissioner Andrew Crisp, who said he neither sought nor was offered ADF assistance with hotel quarantine in meetings on March 27-28. However, Defence records showed that from late March the offer stood. The Victorian government authorities rejected at least half a dozen offers of assistance.

And then there is this from Maurice Neuman: Nostalgia won’t protect Snowy white elephant.

Paul Broad, the chief executive officer of Snowy Hydro, has provided a solid rebuttal (The Snowy 2.0 project will pay its way) to an open letter (On every count, Snowy 2.0 is a disaster in the making), published on this page on September 18. The letter’s 37 authors cannot be easily dismissed. All have relevant expertise in energy markets, engineering and the environment.

That said, Broad is adamant that Snowy 2.0 is “underpinned by a strong business case”. He alleges that “critics have run with every falsehood under the sun” and that most arguments are “flimsy” and not warranting a response….

The project’s announcement bears many of the hallmarks of the National Broadband Network, which was a dream brought to life on the back of a drinks coaster. As predicted, it is a technological and commercial white elephant.

While there were no drinks coasters, former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull’s Snowy Hydro 2.0 announcement in 2017 was widely viewed as a cynically timed thought bubble. Like the NBN, it had no business case but was still acclaimed as an “electricity game-changer”. Turnbull boasted, “it will increase the generation of the Snowy Hydro scheme by 50 per cent, adding 2000 megawatts of renewable energy to the national electricity market”. He made no reference to cost. However, Broad later told a Senate estimates hearing that a “very rough, top-level estimate”, was $2bn.

Rough it was. Two years later, a construction contract was let for $5.1bn….

All in all, and without allowing for cost overruns, the final investment for the entire project could well sit at about $14bn or, seven times the original indicative figure….

Whatever the reality, Australians are getting the impression that Snowy Hydro 2.0 is yet another “trust me” project where the business case has been written to reflect the announcement. It will take time for the truth to be known but, sadly, history is not on the government’s side.

The sad part is that we still live in a kind of fantasy theoretical economic environment in which government waste is believed to be good for the economy. It may well be good for those on the receiving end of all this money, but for the rest of us, it is a straightforward loss that keeps us much poorer than we would otherwise have been.