The Intellectual & Moral Cowardice of Malcolm Turnbull

I notice that the Sydney Morning Herald columnist Elizabeth Farrelly has been seduced by M'Lord Turnbull.

He's "intelligent," she says. He can talk to us as though we're "functioning adults." Hence, she ventures to predict, he's going to be Australia's "longest-serving prime minister since Menzies. Possibly ever." (Malcolm is here for the long haul, 26/11/15)

Talk about easily pleased.

Now I get where she's coming from.

M'Lord Turnbull's not Tony Abbott. He lacks the simian gait. He doesn't wink, and his ears don't stick out.  But can't she see it's substance, not style, we need?

Frankly, I don't give a rats whether he's intelligent (whatever that means) or has a way with words. All I ask of a leader - or a columnist, or anyone else for that matter - is intellectual and moral courage.

So how do we test for that? Simple. As the Singaporean writer and thinker Kishore Mahbubani once observed:

"There is always a litmus test to assess a person's intellectual and moral courage. In the West... this litmus test is provided by the issue of Palestine."

I'm afraid M'Lord Turnbull has been failing the Palestine test all his life.

In fact, he's just failed it 5 times in a row, as our most recent voting pattern on Palestine in the UN General Assembly indicates:

Committee on the the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian people (A/70/L 10): "Requests the Committee to continue to exert all efforts to promote the realization of the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people, including their right to self determination, to support the achievement without delay of an end to the Israeli occupation that began in 1967 and of the two-State solution on the basis of the pre-1967 borders..." 102 in favor, 8 against (Israel, United States, Australia, Canada, Federated States of Micronesia, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Palau), and 57 abstentions

Division for Palestinian Rights of the Secretariat (A/70/L 11): "Considers that, by providing substantive support to the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People in the implementation of its mandate, the Division for Palestinian Rights of the Secretariat continues to make a most useful and constructive contribution to raising international awareness of the question of Palestine..." 99 in favor,  8 against (Israel, United States, Australia, Canada, Federated States of Micronesia, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Palau), and 59 abstentions

Special information programme on the question of Palestine of the Department of Public Information of the secretariat (A/70/L 12): "Considers that the special information programme on the question of Palestine of the Department is very useful in raising the awareness of the international community concerning the question of Palestine..." 155 in favor, 7 against (Israel, United States, Canada, Federated States of Micronesia, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Palau), and 7 abstentions (Australia, Cameroon, Honduras, Papua & New Guinea, Paraguay, South Sudan, Tonga)

Peaceful settlement of the question of Palestine (A/70/L 13): "Expressing grave concern about the extremely detrimental impact of Israeli settlement policies, decisions and activities in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, including on the contiguity, integrity and viability of the Territory..." 155 in favor, 7 against (Israel, United States, Australia, Canada, Federated States of Micronesia, Marshall Islands, Palau), and 7 abstentions (Cameroon, Honduras, Nauru, Paraguay, South Sudan, Togo, Tonga)

Jerusalem (A/70/L 14): "Reiterates its determination that any actions taken by Israel, the Occupying Power, to impose its laws, jurisdiction and administration on the Holy City of Jerusalem are illegal and therefore null and void and have no validity whatsoever, and calls upon Israel to immediately cease all such illegal and unilateral measures." 153 in favor, 7 against (Israel, United States, Canada, Federated States of Micronesia, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Palau), and 8 abstentions (Australia, Cameroon, Panama, Papua & new Guinea, Paraguay, South Sudan, Toga, Tonga)

Deeds, not words, Elizabeth.