Menzies practised what he preached. When novice backbencher and subsequently Democrat leader Don Chipp decided to give notice that he would cross the floor over some government bill, Menzies replied, “If you feel that way, my boy, you must follow your conscience”. This freedom is at the very heart of representative democracy. As Burke explained, we choose our representatives for their judgment. Any restriction is contrary to the “whole order and tenor of our constitution”.

Craig Kelly has been ordered not to repeat scientifically endorsed views on medicines or vaccinations, a Sydney TV host even ordering him to “be quiet”.

EVIDENCE

Following the US mainstream media, no longer adhering to the adage that “comment is free but facts are sacred”, journalists will too often insert some adjective like “baseless” about something which a responsible media once reported with curiosity and without condemnation, such as the fact that banned medicines may still enjoy reputable scientific support or that allegations of electoral fraud are supported by mountains of evidence. Such journalists will also readily dismiss comment by reference to some non-existent standard such as “the” science.

Rather than limiting themselves to desk-based reporting, such journalists could visit a court room. There they would often see expert witnesses called by both sides.

They would come to understand that scientific truth is determined neither by majority nor even consensus, as demonstrated when Australian scientists won the Nobel Prize for showing that some gastric ulcers can be caused by a virus, Helicobacter pylori.

In the case of Craig Kelly, where the mainstream media have smelt blood, the Prime Minister unwisely surrendered just as he did over the National Anthem. Unsurprisingly, Kelly’s pre-selection is now an issue.

On that surely it is time that our normally manipulated pre-selections be replaced by primaries where registered Labor, Liberal, etc, supporters in the relevant electorate or State actually decide who their candidates shall be.

Probably the strongest reason why there is a bi-partisan move to replace Craig Kelly, as there was with Trump, is that he embarrasses the politicians and their elite allies over the litany of burdens they impose on the people for which they will never have to answer.

Central to this is their endorsement not only of the increasingly discredited theory of man-made global warming but also both the Paris solution and the claim that the successors to the assorted dictators, thugs and dissembling politicians will deliver on their promises decades hence.

OUTRAGEOUS

Independent research suggests that at best this will barely reduce the temperature in 2100, saving about two per cent GDP at a cost of between 16 to 32 per cent of GDP. I doubt whether most politicians believe all this. If they did, they would not have “carbon” footprints many times those of ordinary people, unless of course they are outrageous hypocrites.

Why then have they, as Alan Jones and Terry McCrann warned years ago, signed a national suicide note? What they and other elites want is for Craig Kelly and a few colleagues to stop reminding Australians of this. But ordinary Australians are not stupid. Only ten per cent of airline travellers buy “carbon” credits, probably those elites who don’t themselves pay for their tickets.

As with their refusal to harvest water, as with their immigration programme designed to satisfy the fiction that the GDP is rising while wages are stable or falling, as with an education programme delivering declining standards, the politicians are running our great country into the ground. Hence their determination to throw anyone who exposes this out of parliament.

Meanwhile in America, Speaker Pelosi followed the answer given by the high priests when Pilate invited them to explain their case, “If he were not a malefactor, we would not have delivered him up unto thee”. There was need neither for evidence nor due process. The voice of Pelosi was sufficient. The so-called Senate trial is undoubtedly unconstitutional for any one of several grounds most of which have been mentioned in prior columns.

One arises out of reliance on Trump’s free speech-protected assertion that the 2020 election was fraudulent.

On that Time magazine has now confirmed the existence of a “conspiracy” among a “well-funded cabal” of “powerful people” working together behind the scenes to “influence perceptions”, “change rules and laws”, “steer media coverage” and “control the flow of information”.