There’s an often-misquoted moment in Robin Williams’ 2009 comedy special Weapons of Self-Destruction where Williams says, “If you want to know how your congressmen and senators are gonna vote … maybe they should be like NASCAR drivers. They should actually have to have jackets with the names of all the people who are sponsoring them. Wouldn’t that be cool?”
The answer from Australian politicians echoes Williams’ own: “Fuckin’-a! Yeah, baby!”
Last week, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese waxed lyrical about mining and the good megacorps who keep it chugging along while wearing a hi-vis Rio Tinto shirt with his own name embroidered on it. Like Matt Canavan and countless other bought men before him, Albanese looked like the world’s sorriest cosplayer, filming a solo cuck play video for his number one sugar daddy, the mining industry.
Ripples of outrage bubbled up online and across our largely indifferent media landscape, with some questioning whether it is sensible to be wearing the work shirt of a company responsible for blowing up a sacred site while pleading with the nation to respect Indigenous peoples in the upcoming referendum.
The naked shamefulness of it aside, the little game of dress-ups is about as surprising as former premier of WA Mark McGowan’s recent announcement that he’ll be working the pumps for BHP. Modern Labor works for the mining industry as something between a public relations firm and a security blanket, one assuring the other that nothing will be done to address their respective incompatibilities so long as the grift keeps churning and palms get greased.
Labor rusted-ons, so deep now in their ouroboros rectal explorations that you’d need the jaws of life to free them, are already framing Albo’s posturing as another brilliant gambit by the great radical centrist, a man who knows that true courage comes from one’s ability to cow and suckhole to the powerful. This is Albo sticking true to his working-class roots, going to bat for the downtrodden Ginas and Twiggies of this cruel world.
If it is anything, it may be Albanese and his government’s most honest act. For that reason and that reason alone, it is to be encouraged, applauded and, most importantly, cashed in on.
This should be the future of Australian politics: a branded outlet mall where the cap-teethed and wine-nosed door-to-door salesmen constituting our political class should be made to proudly bear the heraldry of the money men who put them in office. For too long we have treated political donations and lobbying in this country as some sort of mercurial, unknowable alchemy, worked by coked-up magi in the boardrooms of our nation’s Uruk-pits (consultancy firms). Imagine, instead, if our politicians did as Albo does and appeared as mascots for the profit-hoarding conglomerates around which they love to build their legislation.
Wouldn’t you prefer the drab charcoal greys and asphalt blacks of parliamentarian dress make way for the Warholian pop of some of our most believed megabrands? I can picture Tanya Plibersek bedecked in the dazzling red and yellow of Shell, Andrew Giles equipped in the intimidating garb of a Wilson Security guard, Don Farrell bounding into work as the Qantas Kangaroo, or Penny Wong getting stuck as the fin of her Lockheed Martin Javelin Missile snags on Barnaby Joyce’s inflatable goon bag powersuit (sponsored by Coolabah Wines).
Every week in Parliament could be like book week, only for people with the limited imagination of someone who dreams of a corner office at Woodside HQ someday soon.
Voting would be so much easier if the headshots of our local members on how-to-vote cards were replaced with the logos of the industries they represent. This way, the uninformed and ill-equipped can better decide between accelerated ecological collapse and accelerated ecological collapse with deregulated greyhound racing and the like.
Why try to hide it, after all? If you’re not ashamed to take their money, if you’re not ashamed to shape the nation’s future around these companies’ skyrocketing profits, then you shouldn’t be ashamed to waltz into the lower house with the Coles logo carved into your forehead, Inglourious Basterds style.
To that end: perhaps a literal branding will be the happy solution to this little dilemma. That way, they can pretend they didn’t ask for it, and we can spot them coming.
With the exception of Albo’s shining example, looking at our politicians now is a bit like walking into a Bunnings where the staff are dressed in their pyjamas. C’mon! We know who you work for! No need to be shy about it! Now put the goddamn apron on and ring me up, I’ve got some paint to drink.
