Michael McGuire: Politicians are taking us to rock bottom

Abandoning facts in order to mount cheap arguments is a move right out of the Donald Trump playbook, and it’s a dreadful trend our own leaders have decided to follow, writes Michael McGuire.

Britain has been having one of those arguments that makes you realise the depths to which political debate has sunk.

And this is not about Brexit, that long, slow eulogy to a nation, although there may be elements of it mixed in. No, this one is about Winston Churchill.

Somehow the vast, complex story of one of the history’s most fascinating and substantial characters has been reduced to two words: was Churchill a “hero” or was he a “villain”?

It started last week when Labour’s shadow chancellor John McDonnell was asked whether Churchill was hero or villain. McDonnell’s reply was “Tonypandy. Villain.’’

Tonypandy is a town in South Wales and a place where Churchill as home secretary in 1910 sent in 200 police from London and the Lancashire Fusiliers to quell a riot that erupted after the police tried to cross a picket line.

One miner was killed and 580 people were injured. Although, the extent of Churchill’s involvement has always been a matter of debate.

Reducing a man as complex as Winston Churchill to a simple label of hero or villain is wrong and stupid.

The reaction was predictable enough. Outrage. Former Conservative Party foreign secretary Boris Johnson said McDonnell should be “utterly ashamed”.

“Winston Churchill saved this country and the whole of Europe from a barbaric fascist and racist tyranny and our debt to him is incalculable,’’ Johnson tweeted. And many others lined up behind him.

On the other side, Churchill’s complicity in the Bengali famine which killed four million was brought up. An Australian may be tempted to point to Gallipoli.

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The point is not that any of this outweighs his vital leadership on World War II and the defeat of the Nazis, but that reducing people or complex arguments to sound bites or single word descriptions is wrong and stupid.

Deputy PM Michael McCormack did all he could to avoid telling the truth on Sky News last week about the Government’s plans. Picture: Mick Tsikas/AAP

This tendency to frame every debate in terms of black and white has been obviously at play in the past week as Scott Morrison attempts to demonise some relatively minor relaxation to the rules regarding health care for seriously ill people on Manus and Nauru.

In his transparent attempts to whip up fear and loathing, Morrison is warning Australia is about to be invaded by rapists and murderers. More or less copying the Donald Trump playbook.

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But the unavoidable consequence of painting every issue as either black or white is that you have to abandon facts and truth to substantiate your argument.

So, we had deputy PM Michael McCormack doing all he could to avoid telling the truth on Sky News last week about who would be able to be transferred. The sad truth is we haven’t reached the bottom.

The Liberals, and Labor as well, are going to keep digging all the way to election day.

Michael McGuire is a senior writer for the Adelaide Advertiser.

@mcguiremi