The Midwit Shallowness of Anthony Albanese

Last year, a few days before the federal election which would make Anthony Albanese Australia’s Prime Minister, there was a brief moment that most people have almost certainly forgotten by now, if they even noticed it at the time. Albo was attending a business lunch in Perth, and after delivering some remarks, he was asked by journalist Lanai Scarr: win or lose, could he describe what he wants his legacy to be in three or fewer words? Albo paused a moment, and then, with that characteristic emotional frog in his throat, said: “acting on climate”.

At first glance this is pretty anodyne stuff for the leader of a centre-Left party in a Western democratic country. It is an essential requirement for someone in Albo’s position to speak the words on climate change at every opportunity.

But I remember finding it deeply strange. So much so that it’s been knocking around in my head for the year since he said it.

Here’s why. Anthony Albanese had, at the time, been in Parliament…