Rita Panahi: Elite’s crazy comments illustrate Covid lunacy

Just when you thought they couldn’t say anything sillier, these three moments from the political elite show Covid lunacy is still running rampant.

As Victoria officially ends Lockdown Five and enters another period of “Lockdown Lite’’, let’s ponder three profoundly stupid moments from the political elite in the past three days.

1. Prime Minister Scott Morrison saying on Sunday that vaccines are “not a substitute for lockdowns” and only lockdowns will end lockdowns. Just when you thought the PM couldn’t say anything sillier than the vaccine rollout is “not a race” he comes out with this absurdity. Morrison must be clear and consistent in communicating that vaccines will free the nation from lockdown lunacy, and soon.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Gary Ramage

2. Therese Rein floating a conspiracy theory about AstraZeneca is unhelpful at the best of times but particularly when there is so much vaccine hesitancy in the community. The former first lady tweeted: “The 50 million doses of AstraZeneca for Australia are being manufactured by biopharmaceutical company CSL. Which senators and MPs and donors of the federal coalition have shares in CSL?” For the record, while the Pfizer vaccine is sold for a profit, the AZ vaccine is sold at cost and CSL’s share price has barely moved since the vaccine was launched.

3. Premier Daniel Andrews saying he “didn’t know” why anti-lockdown protesters were protesting? Really, Premier, you have no clue? The Premier seemed befuddled when a journalist pointed out that many were protesting against him.

What was as disturbing as Andrews’ cluelessness was his minion, Labor MP Sonja Terpstra, trying to engineer a pile-on against the reporter. Terpstra took to Twitter demanding to know who the female journalist was and scolding them for the factual comment. She then shared the name of the journalist who no doubt is getting trolled by the “Dan cult’’ cultivated by the Premier’s well-resourced social media team.

DOUBLE STANDARDS

Some sage advice for anyone wanting to protest: There’s no quicker way to put the public off-side than to throw projectiles at police or police horses.

And, here’s a tip for the police: there is no quicker way to undermine public confidence in law enforcement than to engage in two tier policing. It’s curious how the media and political class who fell over themselves to justify the BLM marches during the pandemic cannot comprehend why people whose livelihoods, liberties and quality of life has been destroyed would protest against lockdowns.

Read the column in full here.

Rita Panahi is a Herald Sun columnist

IN SHORT

Laurel Hubbard, formerly Gavin, was an elite male weightlifter who now identifies as female and will represent New Zealand at the Tokyo Games in the women’s weightlifting. Men and women are different and pretending otherwise only disadvantages female competitors.