Saturday’s MDFF referred to Paul Daley’s scathing response to the unreconstructed Tony Abbott’s  job application in relation to the already filled position of Minister of Indigenous Affairs.  Among myriad factors making Abbott totally unsuitable for the job was Abbotts claim that basically nothing of interest or importance happened before 1788.  

Our Dispatcher has some thoughts on the matter:

Paul Daley’s article . . .  has 515 comments, so I decided to not bother adding a comment of my own as it would drown in the sea of comments  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DOkBbGn0Mpk  (Neil Murray’s ‘Ocean of Regret’). I then proceeded to write a comment on pcbycp ( a smaller more discerning audience)  only to have it disappear at the stroke of the keyboard.

Tony, the Minister for First Australians. Fact 1# No paternalism here.

It included the following from a 2013 Musical Dispatch:

To wrap up his Closing the Gap Statement reply, Tony Abbott said that should he become the next Australian PM, he would spend a whole week on an Aboriginal Community each year of his leadership. I have been unable to work out if this was a promise or a threat.

Almost three years ago he visited Alice Springs. This is what I wrote in a Dispatch back then:

Fact 2#. No paternalism here.

“As reported by Dan Moss in the Centralian Advocate, Mr. Abbott paid a visitation upon an Alice Springs ‘town camp’ with an entourage of politicians and journalists (17 people in all). I have been told that this visit was unannounced and uninvited. They descended on and filmed an unfortunate amputee sitting in ‘third world conditions’ (I saw it on the ABC TV News). TA gave him a spiel and asked him: “I’m here to help- what can I do?”

The fellow said he’d like some firewood! He didn’t mention a ‘Closing of the Gap’ or a decent house, or a ‘real job’, none of that, just firewood!  Dan Moss wrote: “Did Abbott go fetch firewood? No. He and the stage hands moved on to the next poor bugger to run the same spiel”

Fact 3#. No paternalism here.

…….When our 9 year old grand-daughter overheard us talking about this she chimed in “He’ll have to get his own firewood….. by hopping”….

I was flummoxed by the suggestion (surely they jest) of elevating Mr. Rabbit to the Ministry, and found Paul Daley’s article to neatly mirror my reaction, and balm to the soul.

Fact 4# No paternalism here. Perhaps an ‘awkward’ interlude

I can’t say the same for some of the comments.

Frank