Little wonder independents, undecideds and minor party voters are polling almost 30%. The election campaign between the major parties has descended from media infatuation with “gotchas” to a melange of fear-mongering tactics.
Here’s the tally for the past week: retiree tax, energy bills, mining tax, carbon tax, transgender, cashless debit cards, Medicare and temporary visas. And the scare campaigns du jour – as foreshadowed in News and Nine press this morning – are transgenders coming to get us and wages, unions and workers conditions.
Some of it is based on very little and most of it is based on nothing. Mind you, with wages flat for the past decade and workers stripped of penalty rates the damage has already been done for workers. Not to mention the LAMITO tax hikes which are coming.
Angus Taylor’s scare campaign over $560 household power bill hikes, as it transpires, is simply based on figures plucked out of the wind by Angus’s office. So now we are in ludicrous propaganda territory where they just make stuff up, the media runs it, then it’s debunked. All a complete farce which is likely to benefit minor parties and independents further.
Michael West established Michael West Media in 2016 to focus on journalism of high public interest, particularly the rising power of corporations over democracy. West was formerly a journalist and editor with Fairfax newspapers, a columnist for News Corp and even, once, a stockbroker.