The media’s sole aim appears to be grasping at straws to weave a story; the more sensationalistic it is, the better. For most journalists nowadays the most important objective is to firstly promote their name so as they can later sell a book or two, and then only secondly market the media platform they work for. Reporting true facts hardly comes into the equation.

Most media writers and commentators nowadays seem to fit comfortably on the centre Left and extreme Left of politics and those few journalists not on the Left seem to preach from extreme rightist platforms meaning that no longer is balanced reporting commonplace. Indeed, there are hardly any real conservatives practising balanced reporting remaining anywhere in Australia.

MOULD

It has also become the norm for talk-show hosts to speak over anyone they are interviewing so as to put their point of view without allowing any other opinion to be expressed.

In mentioning this, I am not digressing from the main theme but explaining how journalists are able to mould public opinion their way, and that way is usually of the Left. Most politicians and their staffers digest news dished out by the media and formulate their opinions from what they have read or heard often regardless of true facts.

The only claim to conservative journalism comes from The Australian newspaper and Sky News. However, although writers and commentators are Right of centre or even extreme Right, that does not mean that they are truly conservative for the very simple fact that a true conservative cannot be conservative on some issues and radical on others.

For instance, I have been interviewed on a great number of occasions by supposed “conservative” commentators, but instead of conducting a proper interview to find out the answer to questions for their readers, listeners or viewers, they attack and pour scorn. Whenever I accept an interview, I often feel like a lamb to the slaughter.

We find the same problem in politics. The Liberal Party, as established under Sir Robert Menzies, was formed as the dominant conservative party in Australia. Its place has always been on the centre-right.

At the time of the first national parliament of Australia following federation in 1901, there were a number of non-Labor political parties including the protectionists, who could be equated to the Whigs in the British parliament and free traders who were more Tory in outlook.

In 1931 these parties came together as the United Australia Party which, although winning four federal elections within the next decade, generally in coalition with the Country Party, was dissolved in 1945 and the new Liberal Party of Australia took its place.

SOCIALISTIC

Sir Robert Menzies and his team had always viewed the new party as a conservative party in all but name. The name “Liberal” was chosen to engender a greater support from minor factions who were necessary if the new party was ever to be formed. However, the Liberal Party of Australia should never be confused with the socialistic Liberal Democrats in the United Kingdom or the leftist liberalism of the Democratic Party in the United States of America.

In many ways, the name “Liberal” can be said to be a misnomer and it should always have rightfully been named “the Conservative Party of Australia”.

The Oxford Dictionary description of “conservative” is “a person tending to conserve” and “adverse to rapid change”. A conservative party is described as “that which is disposed to maintain existing institutions and promote individual enterprise” and that is what the Liberal Party was founded to be and always was until possibly the late 1970s when republicanism took a small foothold.

Of course, whilst there have always been republicans in Australia, no one really took any notice of them. Even when Rupert Murdoch tried to promote a republic in the late 1950s, it took four more decades and a fanatically militant prime minister for the idea to grow roots and even then the Australian people decisively rejected it at the 1999 referendum despite Murdoch’s newspapers sponsoring and championing an Australian republic to the fullest.

Being a republican became a trendy thing to be mainly because the media said it was so.

However, an Australian conservative who at the same time is an Australian republican, is in fact an oxymoron made up of contradictory or incongruous elements. This is because an Australian republican seeks to tear down a system that works whereas a true conservative would always seek to maintain existing institutions.

An Australian republican is therefore a radical and anything but a conservative. The accepted definition of a “radical” is “believing or expressing the belief that there should be great or extreme social or political change”.

DISGRACE

This means, of course, that all those so called “conservative” members of the parliaments together with the right-wing media who are republicans, are really radical and in no way can they be classified as conservative whatever tag they may give themselves. It is time that this was realised and that these people were outed for what they actually are.

It is a disgrace that a number of sitting members of the Liberal Party in the Australian parliaments have rejected what they term the “old fashioned” ideals of Menzies preferring instead to adopt liberal socialism which includes republicanism all under the guise of the “modern Liberal”, which is basically Marxist in philosophy. Just because they may embrace the social and economic liberalism of the Left does not make them Liberals in the Australian political sense.

This is not to say that conservatism and liberalism in its original format are not intertwined. John Locke (1632–1704) is widely recognised as the father of modern liberalism. In his Two Treatises of Government, he declared that men are by nature free and equal and have inherent rights, such as the right to life, liberty, and property which are, of course, fundamentals of Magna Carta as laid down over four hundred years previously in 1215.

Locke wrote that government exists by the consent of the people in order to protect the rights of the people and promote the public good, all of which true conservatives will, or rather should, fight to preserve.

The thinking of the “modern” Liberal is actually quite the opposite to the original philosophy of Locke’s liberalism. It is more aligned to Marxism which should have no place whatsoever in the Liberal Party of Australia.

The “modern” Liberal is also an activist republican in nature. This is in spite of those in the federal parliament having sworn or affirmed to be faithful and bear true allegiance to the Queen.

Malcolm Fraser was the politician who, for the sake of gaining government blocked supply to the Whitlam Labor government. He was warned that he would damage the monarchy should he proceed but this did not deter him and his actions destroyed the life of the then Governor-General and to false accusations being levied against the Queen for interference.

SELF-ANNIHILATION

It also caused the Labor Party to adopt a republic as a policy thereby forever undermining confidence in the Australian constitution. In 1999 Fraser joined with his previous opponent, Gough Whitlam to support a republic.

The current political leadership of republicans in the Australian parliament comes not so much from the Labor Party, as one might expect, but from the Liberals, although a Labor senator is a joint chairman.

All parliamentary members of the Australian Labor Party must support a republic and have no freedom to do otherwise. If any Labor politician let it be known that he or she was sympathetic to the monarchy, it would be akin to self-annihilation.

This is because the Labor Party had included a republic in its party platform in 1981 and this was endorsed at its 1991 Conference.

Unlike the old “traditional Labor”, the Labor Party has become resolutely radical in its policies under the pseudonym “New Labor”. Whilst it is only when they adopt a more conservative platform, as Kevin Rudd did in 2007, are they are able to gain office – yet they tend to move to the socialist Left when in government regardless of the colour of their temporary election platform.

The Liberal Party itself continually modifies the integrity of its conservative ideology to appeal to “swinging voters” in its endeavours to be voted into government. It is regrettable that one of the principles it has dropped is support for the system of constitutional monarchy, something its creator, Sir Robert Menzies, would have found contemptible. 

Swinging voters used to comprise around 10 per cent at each election but nowadays the swings can be far more volatile. The problem with changing policy to cater to winning a few votes completely shatters the fundamental ideological basis of the party.

PHILOSOPHY

Of course, politicians will say that it is far better to be in power and implement policies rather than be in opposition. Nowadays, expensive polls are conducted to determine what policies will be more likely to generate support, whether those policies are in accord with the philosophy of the party or not.

Similarly, but not so prevalent, the same applies to the Labor Party.

Rather than preselect conservatives who are staunch to the philosophy of the Party, we see individuals being selected who would probably fit more comfortably into a socialist party but who are chosen because the powers that be think they will win. These individuals enter the parliament and group together with the specific purpose of completely changing the direction of the Party and of government whenever it is in power.

It has been said for decades that the Liberal Party is a “broad church” but nowadays it is probably so broad that there is little room for the original ideological integrity of the Party as established by Sir Robert Menzies. Whereas Sir Robert was always pragmatic in his approach – obviously politics is about running government – he never betrayed the conservative roots of the Liberal Party.