Tom Valcanis
Life-long politics tragic, digital marketer and writer. Articles in the Age/SMH, the Big Issue, the Spectator, and editor of alt-lifestyle mag Hysteria from 2016–2020. An advocate for free speech, free markets, and small government.
In Warner Bros classic Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies shorts, director Chuck Jones wrote nine rules governing how the hapless Wile E Coyote and his nemesis, the Road Runner, would interact. These were gospel, gracing the wall of their famed production studio, the “Termite Terrace”.
One rule was that the Road Runner could not harm the Coyote except by going “beep beep”, for example. Another was “No outside force can harm the coyote – only his own ineptitude or the failure of ACME products.”
The third rule is that “The coyote could stop any time – if he were not a fanatic.”
Under that is a quote by George Santayana – “A fanatic is one who redoubles his effort when he has forgotten his aim.”
A common refrain in today’s culture is this “You couldn’t make this stuff up.” Often, it’s applied to government incompetence or bizarre, nonsensical policy.
Let’s turn our attention to the People’s Republic of Victoria, where the Allan regime has installed 45 “machete amnesty bins” across the state to combat rising crime involving edged weapons.
If you complain, you are just a cooker anti-vaxxer Murdoch-loving knuckle-dragging moron who hates Palestinian babies.
Something had to be done: In the year to March 2022, Victoria recorded 470,022 total offences: it’s now risen to 627,268 (March 2025.) Assaults have climbed 11.9 per cent since last year.
So of course, the solution is… this big box, that criminals will absolutely 100 per cent use to rid themselves of their primary crime-enabling tool.
Like many people online, I too thought “you can’t make this stuff up” when it was unveiled. The writers of political satires The Thick of It or Utopia would likely think such notions would strain audience credibility.
Politics is downstream from culture. If the flunkeys and hangers-on inside government departments are arts graduates from prestigious universities (and they definitely are) they also believe they’re shaping society at the stroke of a pen. It’s not poetry but their BS that’s the real unacknowledged legislator of the world.
If there were rules for writing government policy these days, what would they be? What strings would be attached to every idiotic move and moronic play our overlords seem to trot out with such irritating frequency?
The first rule is appear as if you’re doing something. Our Dear Leader must assemble the press gallery every day to announce a policy announcement that will take place at an announcement later on in the announcement schedule. The issue is definitely important enough to warrant an announcement. It’s just like how Instagram activism works. All those black squares cured racism, Russia backed out of Ukraine thanks to those Yellow and Blue squares, and wearing a keffiyeh with latte in hand has also granted Palestinian statehood. Look mum, I’m helping!
When the policy is announced, it’s enacted with the most inept, ill-conceived methods available – though the policy has to appear novel and progressive – not something that’s been tried and true like say, bail reform or decreasing police tolerance for petty crimes, like how Rudy Giuliani cleaned up New York City in the ’90s by tending to graffiti and broken windows. If you clean up the small stuff, serious crimes decrease in kind. Nah, let’s just ban the knives. Somehow.
This leads to the next rule, in which the leader is never wrong, even when contradicted by extraordinary evidence to the contrary. Premier, why should people wear a mask if there’s no one for miles around? That’s an esoteric question, you Murdoch puppet. I am Science Incarnate and the Single Source of Truth. Shut up and shovel down your government-subsidised Uber Eats slop.
One rule was that the Road Runner could not harm the Coyote except by going “beep beep”.
Also, any policy that our boffins come up with can’t be stupid because they went to university, which means common sense and reality can be safely ignored. I saw a progressive vegan feminist play in which gravity was too misogynistic to exist, therefore I don’t have to deal with it. Twenty per cent HECS debt reduction? Because our ‘skills’ are ‘useless’ in the ‘real world’? What the hell are you talking about?
Please also remember that the democratic process is only a means to gain power, and a rather inefficient one at that. Can’t we just ban everyone who disagrees? Lock them up? Make them provide some sort of digital ID so we can track everything they do online? Let’s blame it on disinformation and social media or something. Even though disinformation has existed as long as we’ve had language. We’re thinking of the children! This will definitely work to silence dissent because it aligns with all the previous rules.
There you have it, everyone: the perfect script for a country in managed decline. Politicians that are convinced that the government must do something, as long as it increases their own power at the expense of the freedom and liberty of the general public. If you complain, you are just a cooker anti-vaxxer Murdoch-loving knuckle dragging moron who hates Palestinian babies.
Of course, these people could stop the charade at any time – if they weren’t fanatics, that is.
This article was originally published by Liberty Itch.
