“Albo proclaims India’s Narendra Modi as a paragon of ‘democracy’ while knowing full well that he uses his Hindu religion to bolster his support and oppress his opposition in the Sikh and Muslim communities,” writes “The Gadfly” columnist ROBERT MACKLIN. 

MY usually mild-mannered medical specialist was ropable. 

Another medico had let his heart rule his head and altered the small list of medications in my chronic obstructive pulmonary disease regime.

“There is no evidence,” he growled, “none, anywhere in the world, that supports that change.”

It was not, I have to say, a major alteration; merely an extra couple of puffs a day on one of the two regular inhalations designed to keep the lungs in reasonable shape. But the specialist’s response struck home the importance that the medical professionals place on the scientific method. And that begins and ends with evidence.

While Prime Minister Anthony Albanese can decry the idea that the ACT government’s takeover of the Calvary Catholic public hospital has nothing to do with religion, the evidence is against him. 

In this, he is a perfect example of a highly intelligent individual whose early religious exposure created a kind of double vision – one eye perfectly perceptive, the other providing a distorted emotional context, mostly through religious fables that pretend to answer the big questions of how and why we live and die.

The same Albo declines to “swear to God” and instead “affirms” his response to the governor-general when becoming PM. 

Yet he’ll tie his reason in knots rather than condemn the Calvary religionists on grounds that their “faith” has no place in the scientific world of medicine (let alone the right to die in dignity at a time of one’s choosing).

The same Albo proclaims India’s Narendra Modi as a paragon of “democracy” while knowing full well that he uses his Hindu religion to bolster his support and oppress his opposition in the Sikh and Muslim communities. 

He excuses Modi’s trade and commerce with Russia in the war against Ukraine, while ignoring Xi Jinping’s attempts to broker talks between the combatants. 

It’s almost as though he accepts Modi as an autocrat in the making, but at least he’s “our” autocrat, because somehow the religious component trumps China’s Communist ideology.

This is a very common dilemma, fortunately becoming less so in Australia with each passing decade, as the percentage of “no religion” rises with each census. 

The pattern is oddly evident in the recent parade of Liberal Party prime ministers, from the fanatical Tony Abbott to the laughable convert Malcolm Turnbull, who screwed up everything he touched, from the republic to the NBN to the instant rejection of the Voice and the chaos of climate change. His one great hope for redemption was Snowy II until a great big machine got bogged. And bogged it remains while the Multi-Ministered Morrison topped them all and sent the “no religion” figures hurtling skywards.

The Catholic church itself is making a powerful contribution to its own demise as its priestly acolytes cut a swathe of sexual abuse through the innocents in their care. But even the weekly reporting of yet another paedophile facing criminal justice hasn’t yet brought the community on to the streets protesting the schools that openly indoctrinate the young minds with the double vision that scrambles the Albanese perception.

On the contrary, we actually boast of our religious “tolerance” and perhaps with good reason. Banning the various cults and creeds would only raise their ire and attract supporters of free speech across the board. 

However, the first step must surely be to remove the religionist’s tax-free status so we all run the race of life down lanes of equal length. That way we’d all have the same access to the puffers that science decides we need to reach a dignified finish line.

My mild-mannered specialist, for one, would be greatly relieved.

robert@robertmacklin.com