This is taken from Nick Cater’s article in today’s Oz: Victoria: From a state of emergency to a state of tyranny. Daniel Andrew’s level of incompetence is astonishing, but the high regard so many still have for this utterly stupid buffoon is more astonishing still. Here is the story as told by Nick.
The Andrews government serves as a living example of why governments that rule by fiat are more prone to failure than those forced to run the gauntlet of parliament. Decision-making is restricted to a handful of individuals who lack perfect knowledge and are vulnerable to groupthink. Contrary facts, discordant data and alternative strategies are suppressed. Since all power emanates from the emperor, no one in his inner circle is game to tell him he has no clothes. Increased power leads to an excess of hubris. Any reserves of humility the leader might have had are depleted as the god complex begins to set in.
From the start of the outbreak, there were many who tried to argue for a different strategy, one a lot less like that employed in China and more in keeping with the principles of individual liberty and personal responsibility that have served us well. The alternative approach advocated focusing protection on the elderly and vulnerable instead of pretending the risks were equally shared. There was strong evidence in March 2020 that the World Health Organisation’s estimate of a 3 per cent fatality rate was wildly overstated. It was also known the risk of death for the elderly was substantial, but the risk for the young was statistically insignificant.
Yet instead of putting all available resources into protecting the few, most governments were fixated with the false indicator of the incidence of Covid-19 in the general population. Kids with almost no risk of becoming seriously ill were kept home from school and barred from playgrounds to stop infection spreading to the elderly.
The strategy failed. The notorious hotel quarantine bungle that led to Melbourne’s outbreak in the winter of 2020 was a minor hiccup compared with what happened afterwards in Victorian nursing homes. The government followed flawed advice that Covid-positive residents should be treated in their nursing homes, supposedly to prevent hospitals being overwhelmed.
By early July, it was apparent that scores of residents were dying in nursing homes who might have survived if they had been treated in hospital. Since nursing homes lacked the experience and equipment to abide by the highest protocols of quarantine, the virus rapidly spread to other residents.
Nursing homes were screaming for ambulances, but Andrews’ bureaucracy was slow to react. In mid-July, chief health officer Brett Sutton said the official strategy was to keep the virus out of aged-care homes by screening healthcare workers who entered, rather than removing sick residents: “I don’t think moving residents out who are infected is always the control measure that is required.”
Belatedly, the policy was changed, but by then the coronavirus wave was passing and the damage was done. In 2020, 678 nursing home residents died, all but 19 in Victoria. In 2020, three out of four Covid deaths were nursing home residents. So far this year, with the new policy in place, the figure is one in 50.
The core to understanding Victorian policy is to understand that it is entirely the will of Andrews who is a particularly stupid man. I would also add that he seems to have taken all of his policies from Andrew Cuomo, who was at the time the Governor of New York. Putting elderly covid patients back into nursing homes was a particularly deadly killer. But for those who have not died, they are grateful to be alive and think it is in some way because of Andrews they have been spared.
The sheeple of Victoria voted ALP.
The winning ALP party had him as premier.
Democracy. Same sort of thing has happened since Classical Athens.
He’ll be harder to shift than a tonne of runny manure.
People’s Republik of Amnesia will reinstall this BEM. (Bat Eared Mong)
Hope Emperor McClown reads this … nah…
Did they now? It was unanimous you say?
According to the Victorian Electoral Commission, the 2018 election saw Labor get 42.86% primary votes. – https://www.vec.vic.gov.au/results/state-election-results/2018-state-election
The only reason Labor got into power was because of preferences and deals with the Greens. The Liberals didn’t do well at all, but that still means that 57.14% of the population did not vote Labor.
Exactly right Bemused. We are here now because of preferential voting.
The 3 morons in Victoria are only there due to it. Bugger all people voted for them but they are calling the shots.
First past the post please.
I assume that Emperor Mcclown is the one we refer to as
St Mark McShitstain??
Steve, can you imagine Jeff Kennett moping around letting Dictator Dan get away with what he is getting away with?
All this hand-wringing over Andrews suggests you’ve missed the obvious; he does what he does because he can. Nobody is stopping him, the Victorian Liberals least of all. He laughs at them with good reason.
Pommy: There’s a case for preferential voting, but not COMPULSORY preferential voting, which demands every box be ticked.
Voters should never be obliged to make a mark, any mark, against parties and candidates they loathe.
Whilst I totally agree that Andrews has an inflated view of his competence as any sort of leader, I think that the ignominy of the cruel deaths of the elderly in aged care homes should be shared with NSW authorities well.
NSW public should never forget the Anglicare debacle which saw so many frail old people die in the home with negligible medical attention & without seeing their loved ones for the last time. No ambulances came for them. It was cruelty on a huge scale. Nor was there any outcry in the press. PETA Credlin was one of the very few to draw attention to the lack of humanity.
Personally, I think that NSW Health didn’t think that Nepean Hospital could cope. But that is simply no excuse for lack of medical help. I still cannot believe it happened. Same for the Victorian experience.
A pox on them all for their incompetence & cruelty.
Absolutely correct in every particular.
What has been demonstrated here and state of emergency powers under the guise of public health should never ever ever been legislated.
Which some of us have been saying since last year when the first ‘extension’ was granted.
Like Texas said, much of the problem is the weak pathetic excuse for an opposition. The Vic Libs agreed with Dan on almost everything, what differences there were, were very small. Labors been in power for around 20 years, interrupted only by a few years of weak left leaning liberals led by the egregious Ted Ballieu and the almost as bad Napthine. Even if Dan loses the next election things won’t change much, in fact I reckon the Libs wouldn’t even repeal Dans latest power grab, the temptation for so much power will overwhelm what little sense they have. We’re doomed.
“Whilst I totally agree that
Andrews hasall politicians an inflated view of his competence as any sort of leader”The tactic Andrews uses to considerable effect is to blame the Feds for every crook result. Deaths of the elderly in nursing homes ? It was the Feds !
His minions ringing talkback in the mornings and it goes over so well because there is absolutely no opposing view to be heard.
It’s not just that Andrews believes in his own competence that’s just a normal trait of sociopaths.
Daniel Andrews has turned Melbourne into the anus of Australia. I hope never to see it again.
VIC – the place to flee.
I love Diktator Dan
Long will he lead Victoria into the glorious future.
“I love Diktator Dan
Long will he lead Victoria into the glorious future.”
I hope and believe this is sarcasm.
Might be Brett Sutton playing with his slug.
Andrews who is a particularly stupid man.
Americans who listen to him speak are astounded at his stupidity and lack of regard for Freedom and Liberty.
Calling a successful opponent ‘stupid’ may be personally gratifying, but it not only denies reality, it avoids dealing with the problem at hand.
I’m not claiming that Dickhead is a Rhodes Scholar, but he is undoubtedly a very successful politician. Cunning as a shithouse rat is the comparison that comes to mind, and shithouse rats should never be underestimated.
The problem, as others have said, is that there is no other rat from any environment who has the skills and the inclination to take him on. Victoria reminds me of the ultra-blue States in the US – no matter how awful the Democrat governments are, they keep getting elected. It takes a shatterer of icons like Trump to break through and begin the process of change. Kennett was a bit like that in his heyday.
As I have said before, Victoria has a very different political tradition to NSW, which is much more pragmatic and business oriented, and even a tad libertarian.
I can’t see a lot of change for Victorians in the forseeable, unfortunately.
Not “Free Victoria” but “Flee Victoria” should be the meme – we’ve had friends whose adult family is now moving back to NSW — last COVID test for their grandchildren
Daniel Andrews has spent millions being coached by a firm
Called Qdos that trains clients in impression management, media manipulation and and how to avoid accountability. Early in the first Covid lockdown, listening to his pressers I listened to his language ,the visuals and has I had been trained in my profession , a CBT therapist with decades of listening to clients I picked up all the techniques he used . I wrote a piece called Wooed with Weasel Words that not only screwed Victorians but left us well and truly f####ed . However many still love him . A bit like Gladys and Daryl so let’s hope like Gladys they get a rude awakening . Unfortunately it is going to be as painful for Victorians as it is for Gladys but hopefully just as Daryl falls to ICAC sword so will Daniel to IBAC
Liberty Quote.
“Americans who listen to him speak are astounded at his stupidity and lack of regard for Freedom and Liberty.”
Clearly NOT Angelinos nor New Yorkers – Neusome and Cuomo are worse in these regards.
They’d still have won if it was first past the post.
Whichever way you dice it, a majority of Victorians wanted Andrews as Premier over the alternative.
Recent multi-source polling suggests not much has changed since.
I saw a couple of American guys on their online show, who presented clips of Andrews, and they were absolutely gobsmacked by him, and even compared him with Hitler and Nazis.
And that was even before Dictator Dan’s latest legislation which would give him untrammeled power.
Morrison isn’t a great deal better.
He is the jerk, who when queried about it replied, “free speech doesn’t create one job”, as though jobs had any relevance to free speech.
Part of the reason I now utterly despise the PM.