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The secret climate election we didn’t know we had

The only way climate elections are won is by keeping it a secret or telling lies. Today we wake up to find out it was a climate election. Who knew?

There was not one word, barely, about climate change in the public square in Australia the last six weeks, yet today suddenly it was “a Green-slide” and a climate election post hoc. But the whole reason the Greeny-Teals did well was because no one talked about climate change.

No one asked how expensive it might be to alter the planet’s weather a hundred years from now? Should we fund hospitals now, or slow cyclones in 2100, ya’reckon?

Whenever it was a climate election in the last 12 years, the skeptical side won.

And the more skeptical they were, the bigger the win was. Tony Abbott won a landslide 90 seats by crushing the Climate Gods. It was a Climate Election and the voters said “No”. To win in 2010 Julia Gillard had to lie “there will be no Carbon Tax”, and do 17 days of wheeling and dealing to barely scrape through. In 2016 Turnbull was barely a skeptic and barely won — losing 14 seats in the process. In 2019 Morrison pulled off the Miracle Win by asking Bill Shorten hard questions about the costs of climate action, which Bill called dumb and a “charlatan’s argument”. That election was called a Climate Election they bragged, and believers were shocked to lose. But this time, there was no policy debate. There was no “let them eat cake” moment. No out-of-touch Bob Brown tour of the coal zones of Queensland. The climate bomb ticked quietly and no one said “boo”. No one, at least that the media couldn’t ignore. Vale! Craig Kelly.

The only climate battles were strategic quiet shots in the inner city Teal Seats between the Gucci wives and the Liberals who said “me too.” None of this played out in public and won the Liberals a single vote in battler-land.

Thus the Liberals ran chicken down the left lane on the freeway — in the same direction as the climate bully bandwagon — because they thought that the media wouldn’t hit them as hard, and it was true — but that didn’t help at all. It’s in the hate-filled fantasy rants of ideology when the winning “Deplorable” moments occur. The smug, lefty zeal looks ugly to the public, but it was never exposed. The punters didn’t get reminded of the elitist disdain for their electricity bills. Extremists didn’t glue themselves to footpaths or dance naked in the street shrieking. This was not an ugly, vitriolic election; it was a nothing campaign. But that just left a pinless vacuum the green fantasy balloon grew to fill.

The whole climate facade is built on feel-good branding and fashion, and the Libs just joined the advertising — as Matt Canavan says – we effectively legitimized the green agenda when we signed up for Net Zero.

Matt Canavan is a gem.

The Nationals though, in the party room that signed up to NetZero didn’t deserve to keep their seats. And if the media interviewed the minor parties in the country, they probably wouldn’t have.

We’re in an Information War. Shore up your lines of communication. Find a way!