Spoiled for Joyce … Porter in a storm … is Tasmania going red? (No, the other red)

Your Joyce Which of the government’s recent indications that it wasn’t taking this “governing” or “politics” business all that seriously got you the most riled up in the past few weeks? The return of Bridget “sports rorts” McKenzie to cabinet at the expense of Darren Chester? The nakedly political rorting of the Urban Congestion Fund, which made sports rorts look like a peanuts? The fact that it was pushed to the back of many news reports by the government’s vaccine rollout — a rollout which continues to suggest a policy decided using darts and a blindfold?

Or maybe it was the appointment of mask dodger Barnaby Joyce, a man facing unresolved allegations of sexual harassment, to the cabinet taskforce on the status of women. If so, you can at least make your feelings known. There is a petition demanding his removal which is, at time of writing, about 400 signatures short of its 25,000 target.

Porter in the storm As we wrote last month Christian Porter is walking the tightrope of attempting to keep a low profile outside his seat while desperately scrambling for attention within it. As such the industry minister is continuing to spend a lot of money on Facebook advertising — $6394 in the past seven days alone. The campaign predictably features plenty of ads regarding the redistribution of his division of Pearce and generic “I care about local issues” rhetoric.

The commies return You’d think it would be impossible to have a factional split in one faction of the Tasmanian Labor Party, but apparently it’s happening. New Labor leader David O’Byrne is being slated by News Corp for employing Grahame McCulloch — a one-time NTEU leader, and also a one-time member of the Communist Party of Australia (CPA). And now a photo of O’Byrne in a T–shirt saying “Communism: It’s Good!” or something.

A communist leading Tasmania? The horror! Except for the last time a communist led Tasmania. That was premier Jim Bacon, a former Builders Labourers Federation official and member of the pro-China CPA until its dissolution in 1991. Bacon left Melbourne and rose to the top in the Apple Isle. News Corp never had much of a problem with him since his Maoism made him anti-green, pro-forestry and a friend of the gambling industry (because … it’s complicated). Compared with Bacon, the actual CPA was a bunch of dangerous moderates. Still, we await the inevitable “holding an AK-47 while on holiday” shot of O’Byrne any day now. Hasta la victoria a Tasmania siempre!

Entsch by Entsch Member for Leichhardt Warren Entsch has long been a vocal supporter of the LGBTIQ community. So one would expect him to oppose the purported Religious Freedom Bill — yet another attempt to open a front in the culture war on LGBTIQ issues. But he made it clear during an interview with JoyFM on Saturday just how firm his stance is:

I don’t see it as a religious discrimination bill. I see it as a Christian bill of rights. I didn’t waste 19 years of my political life removing discrimination from elements of our community just to sit back and let them discriminate again. I will not do it, and I will cross the floor.