Turnbull needs to free his broken wagon from crazy train of zealots 

There was a common theme in responses to Crikey articles last Friday: Turnbull needs to get his head in the game. From his government’s push towards a “surveillance state”, to his direct responses to the exhausting Ramsay Centre saga, the PM is toeing the line of the extreme right wing.

Are those his true colours, or is he just yet to stand up to those within his own party?

On the agenda behind “foreign interference” laws

Gregory Bailey writes: An excellent summary of the situation. I think it confirms once more the true colours of Malcolm Turnbull. He is not at all the small L Liberal protector of individual freedoms he has long cultivated, and which for many years has entranced the MSM.

Instead he is the perfect conduit to a much more risk averse and controlling group of ministers who seek to make Australia a surveillance state, possibly leading to a situation where particular forms of now accepted public criticism will be banned. He is the illusion, they are the reality.

The haste in which the Attorney-General wishes to bring in the next security legislation is all part of this rightward movement and he has offered no good reason which this legislation should be introduced. It was only recently reported in The Age that his reason for haste was “to prevent any threats to the federal byelections due on July 28.”

What could these threats possibly be? They surely pale in comparison with the obvious influence of a certain US citizen whose media interests shape much of the electoral agenda here. And, finally, the average Aussie will not even be aware of these changes, nor be concerned about them.

Zut Alors writes: It’s correct to say Labor has lacked backbone re: the undermining of civil liberties. Meantime we are intellectually anaesthetised with debate about Barnaby Joyce.

Behold a lawyer’s fantasy, a grey area of vast proportion:
“… unless you can prove you believed the information would not ’cause harm to Australia’s interests’.”

On the unending Ramsay Centre mess

Mr Denmore writes: What exactly is Turnbull seeking to achieve by so tightly shackling his broken-down wagon to this crazy train of zealots and reactionaries? If, against the odds, he survives this onslaught there’ll be another and another. He cannot and should not appease this mob, but he capitulates every time. Why?

Realistically, the very best outcome for him is that he scrapes in for another term (and if he wins, it will be by the barest of margins and the mother-of-all Murdoch-led scare campaigns) — in which case he will remain the plaything of the unhinged right — like a gelded Vienna choirboy singing forlornly in front of the cracked mirror of his own sorry ego.

Hunt Ian writes: Well said, Bernard. Turnbull seems unable to lose his anti-Midas touch, and is seemingly bent on making a mess of relations between the government and our leading university, the ANU.

The issue is not directly that the Ramsey Centre wants to proclaim European Civilisation as the best thing after sliced bread. Certainly, they seem to have an ideological agenda, but the immediate issue is that they demand representation on the appointments committee, appointing staff to their program.

The university said “no” and they insisted so the ANU called off discussions. No public university in Australia would accept their demand. So tough. Of course, European civilisation now dominates the globe. A course that pretends this is the end of history should be left to the University of the IPA.

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