A week may be
a long time in politics, but so is thirteen minutes when you’re up against Ali
Moore, the ABC’s sharpest interviewer. With an amused twinkle in her eye, Ali
slowly grilled Wayne Swan to reveal that underneath his shiny new
cloak of “The
World’s Greatest Finance Minister” lies… not very much at all.
“I believe there is a serious situation in the global economy,” Wayne informed
startled viewers, before enlightening us that he personally sees his main role
as “getting on with making sure that we strengthen the global economy.” Whew!
“Can you give us some detail?” Ms. Moore repeatedly begged, struggling
in the face of a tsunami of bureaucratic jargon along the lines of “All of
these things are part of the architecture of a comprehensive response” and “a
sizeable facility to assist a European financial stability facility.” Until Wayne
finally confessed: “it's entirely a matter for the European ministers to talk
about what they intend to do.” And, er… that’s it.
As for
genuine insights into the global debt crisis, Australia’s IMF role, cabinet
leaks, the effects of onshore processing on the surplus and the legalities of
the carbon tax – all raised by the determined Ms. Moore - Swan failed to
deliver anything other than pre-rehearsed spin and obfuscation.
To the point
where the interview tipped into satire: “I couldn't give you
an update on that, but there will be an update on that in the normal processes
through the mid-year review at the end of the year. That's the appropriate time
to provide the update.”
By the end, our world-famous Treasurer was left floundering that: “I
don’t know if those reports were accurate or not,” “I'm not ruling anything in
or out,” and “I'm not going to speculate about what may or may not happen.”
Even the amiable Ali struggled to keep smiling.
No comments:
Post a Comment