Our Newfound Father

By Pearl Bullivant on May 20, 2020 in Satire

Moshe Rabbenu up to his old tricks. Photo: Sue Narmy

While Australians were focussed solely on The Great Toilet Paper Shortage of 2020 (aka COVID-19), little did we know that the prime minister was covertly “committing Australia to God”. I am not against ScoMo making a personal commitment to God – he could commit himself to a giant fruit bat for all I care – but committing Australia to an entity that may not exist?! Sloppy and incompetent leadership in Pearl’s book. Little wonder the Liberal-National Party is so quick to commit Australia’s public assets and taxpayer funds to private entities without proper due diligence, entities that appear to deliver nothing to the public aside from political party donations.
My issue is that no one asked Pearl whether she wanted to be committed to God; I have been married three times and commitment is not my strong point. Surely a national commitment to Theocracy warrants public consultation? Where was the referendum or plebiscite on the matter? What about the mandatory focus group to gauge public opinion, along with a cosy chat with Alan Jones? How convenient that parliament has been suspended to avoid debate on where the ‘commitment’ would be better placed, i.e. the environment, education or the health system. And what of the opinions of Australia’s favoured children – Big Gina, the Murdochs, the Institute of Public Affairs? Why are they not having a hand in directing the commitment?
Pearl also requires clarification as to which God, and whose God. The religion of Jedi-ism is rather appealing to Pearl during these troubled times, so if God comes in the form of a resurrected Alec Guinness then I am all for it. The disturbing thing is that ScoMo’s commitment of Australia to God is based, at least in part, on what he feels is a ‘prophecy over our country’ in the Old Testament Book of Isaiah – “The Lord will… satisfy your needs in a sun scorched land”. Does this mean The Lord is also assisting sun scorched nations in Africa and the Middle East? Does Isaiah also refer to the worship of coal mining? Isaiah certainly mentions refugees but in a compassionate way, certainly not helpful to ScoMo’s stop-the-boats cause.
The prophet Isaiah is a favourite with evangelicals, a group the PM ‘claims’ to identify with. I use inverted commas here because my God-dar is as good as my Gaydar; I have worked with my fair share of marketing supremos and I doubt that Morrison truly believes the happy-clappy dogma he spouts. God is another convenient marketing tool in a long list of spin.
As much as I am disappointed with the PM committing Australia to God, I am equally disappointed with his need to consult a 740BC visionary on how to run the country. At least he could have gone all hipster and contemporary by embracing Marcus Aurelius or taken advantage of his daggy 1970s dad moniker by quoting Nostradamus or Pearl’s personal fave, ‘Chariots of the Gods’. In fact, I have arranged for my original 1968 publication to be couriered forthwith to our newfound Father of the Nation – ScoMoses.