I read today in cathnews.com, that newly re-elected Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is now claiming that his government is a symbol for what he is calling “progressive patriotism”.

I will now quote some phrases from the cathnews article and comment how these words relate to the reality of Anthony Albanese and the Australian Labor Party in government.

“Albanese begins second term with a new slogan.” Albanese and his party, the ALP, are much better at sloganising than they are at governing.

“Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is pledging to strengthen Australia with a second-term agenda that eases division …….” Albanese won the recent election with a brilliantly effective but viciously unfair negative campaign against his conservative opponent, former police detective, Peter Dutton.

“Mr Albanese introduced the idea of “progressive patriotism” as a new catchcry for his plans to build on Labor reforms in housing, Medicare and childcare to help grow the economy.” Previous Labor “reforms” under Paul Keating in housing have been a key factor in pushing up the price of buying a home for young people and enriching speculators. Labor spending on medicare and childcare will not strengthen the economy if the spending creates unsustainable debt. Creating such debt is not the act of a patriot. Trying to call it patriotism is the act of a liar.

“We spoke about doing things the Australian way, not looking towards any other method or ideology from overseas.” Despite a very important and ancient aboriginal heritage and many important ethnic minorities, Australia is primarily an advanced nation in The Western World closely aligned to both the United States and the United Kingdom. This heritage is a huge part of what Australia is now and will continue to be for some time to come. As a much better Labor Prime Minister, John Curtin, said in 1941: “Australia looks to America”. The Australian way is a delicate balance between what is local and unique and the glories of being a part of western civilisation. But Socialist Left Leader Albanese does in practice have far too much Marxist ideology for my liking in how he and his party colleagues govern. As the above picture shows the PM cannot relax when face to face in America with ideas from a Republican leader like Speaker Mike Johnson.

“At a time where there’s conflict in the world, where people are often divided on the basis of race or religion, here in Australia, we can be a microcosm for the world ……. we’re enriched by our diversity …….. we have respect for people of different faith ……. we try to bring people together ……. we don’t bring turmoil overseas (sic) and play out that conflict here ……. This is a project, if you like, that’s not just about strengthening Australia, but also being a symbol for the globe in how humanity can move forward.” Anthony Albanese tried to get the Australian people to allow race to be a factor in representation to parliament through his divisive Voice referendum. The police force and injustice system of Albanese’s Socialist Left Labor colleague, former Premier of the state of Victoria, Daniel Andrews, was responsible for the judicial persecution and false imprisonment of Cardinal George Pell. People like Anthony Albanese make a living out of dividing people on the basis of race and religion. That moves nobody forward in any decent way. Being progressive is meant to be about good changes helping people but far too often the reality of people like Albanese being progressive is actually regressive and hurtful to those they claim to serve.

After these thoughts, my conclusion is to modify the above title of this post to become:

“WTF IS A ‘PROGRESSIVE PATRIOT’ IF WE ARE SUPPOSED TO BELIEVE THAT ANTHONY ALBANESE IS WORTHY OF THE NAME?”

Geoff Fox, May 15, 2025, Melbourne, Australia