Opinion: Albanese’s transformation complete thanks to the big 0

Forget policies and platforms, the Labor Party have sought to turn Anthony Albanese from the invisible man to the man of the people with this simple switch, writes Mike O’Connor.

Those considering a last minute tilt at the federal election should note that their chances of success will be significantly enhanced in they change their surnames to more easily accommodate the letter “O”.

Forget policies and platforms. Just go for The Big O, a philosophy embraced by the Labor Party faithful who have fallen in behind a newcomer to the political stage who answers to Albo.

Until a few weeks ago, Albo-man was an unknown. His predecessor Anthony Albanese had been wandering the corridors of federal parliament since 1996, a shadowy figure and one whom in terms of presence could easily have been said to have risen without trace.

How, then, to add colour to Albanese the Invisible Man’s palette of uniform greyness? Makeovers are one thing but what was needed was not so much a touch-up but a rebirth.

Then someone, whom we must hope does not go unrewarded, was struck by the lightning bolt of inspiration. “Go The Big O” they cried and so it was that in the deep recesses of the Labor Party bunker Albo-man was born, emerging into the bright light of dawn to lead the Labor Party out of the wilderness and into the Promised Land.

When the stone to the bunker was rolled back and Albo-man appeared, the demise and subsequent resurrection of the man once known as Albanese was complete.

Rather than Anthony Albanese, the class warrior from the Socialist Left who boasted of loving nothing more than fighting “Tories”, we had Albo from the Bowlo, an affably likeable fellow who absolutely must be true-blue, dinky-di, fair dinkum because his name now ended in The Big O.

(A Tory, if you were wondering, is anyone who has made a lot of money but who is not a highly paid trade union executive or an extravagantly remunerated member of the CFMEU.)

There would be no idle chat about death duties, attacks on “the big end of town” or changes to superannuation rules.

Here, truly, was a man of the people, a second coming greeted with cries of “Hosanna” by his disciples for blessed is he who in politics can pretend he has no past.

The Leader of the Australian Labor Party Anthony Albanese. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Jeremy Piper

This, of course, was his predecessor Bill Shorten’s problem for he was cursed with a name to which The Big O did not easily attach. “Shorto” just didn’t cut it and “Billo” would never do so poor old Bill, a man who jogged so bravely for the cameras but with all the co-ordination of a three-legged rhino, was doomed to fail.

It is a sad reflection on how political strategists regard the intellectual acuity of the electorate when they seek to propel a man into the highest office in the land by truncating his name, adding an O and parading him as a newborn, one who has left his previous pronouncements behind with his discarded vowels and consonants.

This is one reason I won’t be running in next month’s election for while possessed of a surname blessed with an absolute abundance of O’s, fate decreed that they be in the wrong place. An “O’ConnorO” I fear, would never find favour with the masses.

Another reason is that I am a racist for I recall that many years ago, to my eternal shame, I described a person of my acquaintance as “a Pommie prick”.

In my defence, he was a Pom and he was undeniably a prick so I can use truth as my defence. I may also have once made an unkind reference to a New Zealander, combining the term Kiwi with a particularly harsh expletive and one richly deserved but I’m sure that if I ever ran for public office, my opponents would uncover these sinful transgressions and I would be hounded into exile by social media’s keyboard harpies.

ScoMo, after all, has denied an unproven allegation that 15 years ago he warned against endorsing a person with “a Lebanese background”, a claim he and the Lebanese community deny but one which regardless has seen him vilified as a racist for such is now the vituperative nature of our politics.

We will see, in the weeks ahead, the depths to which people who would claim the high ground and aspire to lead the nation will go in their attempts to destroy an opponent’s character and moral standing.

Some election campaigns end up in the gutter. This one started there so we will see where it ends but the sewer would seem to be a good bet.