Upton Sinclair: "It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it."
Life throws us moral quandaries, and Oakeshott and Windsor (O&W) are certainly in the middle of one now. I can not speculate re Katter because I can not imagine what penguins slip around that man's brain and also because I have a history with him which I can not go into right now but in summary involved a heated argument and physical contact at about 3am at a hot dog stand in Canberra about fifteen years ago.
But I will be very interested to see how O&W go. In essence they have to decide between their jobs and their consciences. If they support Gillard they will almost certainly be thrown from Parliament at the next election. If they support Abbott they will need to convince themselves in some way that he is not the whacko nutjob they both know he is. They have been waiting two weeks for the Liberal party to convince their consciences that it would be ok to support Abbott, and for two weeks the Liberals have fluffed the opportunity.
The constituents of their seats are as anti-Labor as Adam Bandt's Melbourne constituents are anti-Liberal. If you can for a second imagine what would happen to the Green vote at the next election if Bandt had supported the Liberals, then you must understand that the same rapid evaporation of support will follow for O&W if they support Labor.
The problem is O&W are more politically engaged than their constituents. While they obviously understand they have a duty to represent the views of their electorates, they concurrently realise better than their constituents what a fruitloop Abbott really is. The most morally smooth way out for them would be if they could be convinced (or even just find an excuse to justify the belief that) Abbott is not going to be such an absolute baboon in office and that therefore O&W, as rational, experienced, non-fruitloop human beings could possibly countenance supporting him. Unfortunately for them the Liberals have not been able to provide the necessary lubricant to make this intellectual and moral transition viable for a thinking person.
And this is sharp in the souls of O&W because they must be imagining the counter-scenario. If they support Gillard they will be deluged with blame for every Labor pinko policy that comes out. And be sure of this - someone in their electorates will call every Labor policy pinko-commie rubbish. And also be sure of this - that being called something is often the same as being something in politics. The facts don't matter. What does matter is the being-together-with-a-common-enemy. In their electorates the common enemy is Labor. If the independents support Labor, they are joining the common enemy.
The National Party would have a field day. They would heap curse and blame upon the independents who have stolen their votes. They would seek to rebuild legitimacy by doing this. It would be very ugly indeed, but providing the electorate with a figure of hate upon which they can heap the blame for everything the government says and does will not be a tactic that fails to draw support in their seats. O&W, of all people, know this already.
The Coalition knows it has lost the intellectual argument over who would be better to run the country. That's why they have switched to their red-baiting tactics today. It is an appeal directly to the constituents of O&W, and a very clear reminder to O&W that they will lose their seats if they support Labor.
It is also by default an admission that when the conservatives present their arguments in detail to people who have the time and intelligence to understand and judge their arguments, their arguments fail dismally. All they can do now is pander to the base prejudices of the constituents and by that appeal to the base instinct of O&W for political survival, and hope that trumps any conclusions O&W may have come to through rational thinking.
Lastly, there is the Parliament itself. Eventually Julia will almost certainly ask Quentin for permission to try to form a government. On the floor the conservatives will then put up a motion of no confidence. The independents will then be put solidly on the spot to support one or the other. If they support Julia they will be signing their own political death warrants. If they support Tony they will be betraying their own consciences.
That will be an interesting moment.
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