Read my lips: A class in political double-speak

State Treasurer Cameron Dick announced no new taxes before promptly imposing new taxes. But he was only speaking to those Queenslanders who didn’t operate businesses, of course, writes Mike O’Connor.

Harry Houdini would have been amused and former US president George Bush Sr, while possibly miffed at the lack of acknowledgment, would surely have approved.

It was Bush who back in 1988 when campaigning for the presidency announced: “Read my lips: no new taxes”, a catchphrase which became a cornerstone of his campaign.

He won the election and less than a year later raised taxes leading television host David Letterman to observe that his assurance to the American people should be changed to: “Read my lips: I was lying.”

State Treasurer Cameron Dick announced no new taxes and in the finest traditions of president Bush, promptly imposed new taxes.

Unlike Bush, however, he wasn’t speaking to all the electorate when he made this promise. Heavens, no. He was only speaking to those Queenslanders who didn’t operate businesses. The distinction would have been lost on lipreaders who absolutely heard him say that there would be no new taxes. Those who did not require the services of a lipreader were equally confused, wondering how no new taxes actually meant new taxes but not for everyone. Business people wondered if they had misheard.

Queensland Treasurer Cameron Dick. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Tertius Pickard

Lipreaders throughout the state were suddenly besieged with inquiries. When the Treasurer’s lips had moved, had they said “no new taxes” or had they said “a few new taxes” or perhaps “no new axes”?

The optimists among them agreed that it must have been a reference to the national parks budget whose rangers would now have to make it through the year with no new axes or had he said “no new saxes”, bad news for the state’s Symphony Orchestra?

It turned out that it was all pretty straightforward because while he had said what he said it wasn’t really what he had said because ordinary Queenslanders knew what he had said and also understood what he hadn’t said which he didn’t need to say because we all knew what he had said when he hadn’t said it.

There were those dim-witted souls, however, who still struggled to fully comprehend what he said when he hadn’t said it so having already emulated president George “Read My Lips” Bush, Treasurer Dick then attempted to channel escapologist Harry Houdini by appearing on television and wriggling out of the rhetorical chains in which he had become entangled.

It was like watching a man trying to wrestle a 20m python, for the more he struggled, the worse it became, every utterance coiling itself around him and slowly but inexorably crushing the life out of what was left of his credibility, the ordeal lasting for several excruciating minutes.

Politicians, of course, maintain that they are merely misunderstood and in not saying what he’d said because people knew what he hadn’t said, Treasurer Dick was in good company.

Former US president Bill Clinton had the lipreaders wondering if they’d missed something when he said “I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Ms. Lewinsky”.

He later explained that what he said but hadn’t actually said was that he had engaged in an “improper physical relationship”. Those thinking of using a read-my-lips strategy in denying allegations of infidelity should be aware that the US House of Representatives had a quick word to the lipreaders, charged Clinton with perjury and impeached him.

Julia Gillard’s read-my-lips moment came when during the 2010 election campaign she announced “there will be no carbon tax under the government I lead”.

Apparently she thought that we knew that what she hadn’t said was that while there wouldn’t be a carbon tax there would be a carbon pricing scheme. Lipreaders weren’t impressed and the result was a hung parliament.

Bob Hawke was similarly loose with the language when he announced that under his government “no Australian child will live in poverty” by 1990. The countless thousands of Australian children currently living in poverty are advised that they have hopelessly missed this politically decreed deadline and to lift their act.

The great sadness is that the political process has become so debased that no one is particularly surprised when our elected leaders make statements which we know to be self-serving and demonstrably untrue. The simple truth is that if you didn’t say what you said, you are unfit for office.

Footnote: Entries for the Idiot of the Year contest have closed six monthsearly with judges unanimously declaringGreens leader Adam Bandt the winner.