There is no doubt that Australia has the worst vaccine rollout underway in the developed world. Bar none. It is the slowest, most troubled, and worst handled. Via Goldman:
Note that Japan is now much faster than Australia.
I am locked down today for the sixth time directly as a result of this failure and Morrison’s other screw-up, failing to centralise quaratine in the bush.
Yet, Samantha Maiden today commits some serious chart crime in extrapolating this to politics:
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One of the great truisms in Australian politics is that sooner or later, the mob works you out.
The problem for Prime Minister Scott Morrison in the latest Newspoll is that it suggests the mob has worked him out, and the trend is not his friend.
Voter dissatisfaction with his leadership is rising amid the bungled vaccine rollout.
Sadly for Maiden, the chart is completely wrong. Newspoll’s “better PM” measure has deteriorated for Morrison but only a bit to 53-32. I assume the colours are just back to front.
The real mystery of Australian politics today is why nobody is blaming the Morrison Government for the vaccine and quarantine debacles. Take your pick:
We love closed borders.
We love property booms no matter what else it costs.
We love Scott Morrison.
We are a cowering and terrified people.
We hate needles.
All of Australia hates Victoria.
Conservative times render politics moot.
Anthony Albanese and Labor are so repulsive that not even the greatest policy failure in modern Australian history makes either attractive.
David Llewellyn-Smith is Chief Strategist at the MB Fund and MB Super. David is the founding publisher and editor of MacroBusiness and was the founding publisher and global economy editor of The Diplomat, the Asia Pacific’s leading geo-politics and economics portal.
He is also a former gold trader and economic commentator at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, the ABC and Business Spectator. He is the co-author of The Great Crash of 2008 with Ross Garnaut and was the editor of the second Garnaut Climate Change Review.
