Opinion:
Bill Shorten’s Medicare scare campaign makes him the most brazen liar of 2016
Mike O’Connor, The Courier-Mail
June 24, 2016 12:00am
IT IS said there are three kinds of lies – lies, damned lies and statistics. To this, surely, can be added a fourth – political lies.
The political lie can be distinguished by the volume at which it is delivered, the belief being that a lie shouted is more believable than one delivered sotto voce.
It can also be identified by its size, political wisdom dictating that if you are going to tell a lie, it is much better to tell a really big one than one of more modest proportions.
The political lie will almost always be an orphan for once it has served its purpose, this being to deceive and mislead, it is disowned.
Its author moves on, the lie discarded in favour of new untruths.
Students of the political lie have been enthralled this week by Opposition Leader Bill Shorten, who turned in a truly Olympian performance.
Medicare, he shrieked, would be privatised under a Turnbull government.
Students of the political lie have been enthralled this week by Opposition Leader Bill Shorten, who turned in a truly Olympian performance.
It won’t be, as he well knows, but Labor Party research has shown that lying and telling people that it would be might frighten them into voting for Labor.
One lie, of course, will never do so lies are laid upon lies and further lies laid upon them, building a wall of obfuscation.
The cost of all medical care will go up. It won’t, but that’s irrelevant. Bulk billing will disappear. No one will be able to afford to go to the doctor.
We’ll all die horrible, lingering deaths because having crawled all the way to the doctor’s surgery, it is discovered we can’t afford to be treated.
We then crawl outside and expire in the gutter.
If in the course of your daily toil, you encountered someone who habitually lied, it is likely that you would go to some lengths to avoid their company.
Would you place your trust in a person whom you knew to be a liar?
Of course you wouldn’t, for lying, surely, reveals a flawed character, a lack of any sense of morality and a person who is prepared to pedal untruths to advance their cause.
A person who knowingly lies can have little regard for right or wrong. Right is what suits their purpose. Wrong is anything that does not.
If you lie in a court of law and are found out, then you will be charged with perjury and face a jail sentence.
If you are a politician and lie, however, then that is acceptable because lying is what politicians do.
They appear to believe that the standards of behaviour which apply to those people they would seek to represent do not apply to them.
They have their own rules, an unwritten code which decrees that lying is fine if it helps you get elected.
Bill Shorten is not alone but for the moment, he holds the title of the Most Brazen Liar of the 2016 election campaign.
As we sat watching the 6pm television news a few nights ago, my wife turned to me and said: “How can they get away with telling such blatant lies?”
I had no answer but in the end, I suppose, it’s because we let them.
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