Turnbull and the Establishment versus Abbott and Trump. Maurice Newman is a rare grown-up in the Australian political firmament.

To overthrow Abbott, left-wing elites hyped Turnbull as the acceptable Liberal. … Now, just six months in, their candidate isn’t living up to expectations.

[Australia’s] extraordinary prosperity is also built on that [American] creed. It embraces equality before the law, equality of opportunity, freedom of speech and association, self-reliance, limited government, free-market economics, and decentralised and devolved public authority. During the past 50 years here, as in America, that creed has been subverted and declared outdated by the Left.

Public servants, judges, military chiefs, church leaders, teachers, academics, journalists, union bosses and even captains of industry have progressively adopted a soft liberal position and provided momentum for more rapid social change.

 

The Overton window is the range of views considered politically acceptable in the current climate of public opinion, which a politician can recommend without being considered too extreme to gain or keep public office.

Outside the Overton window lie shocking, upsetting and dangerously radical ideas. Across time, social pressure shifts the window and today’s revolutionaries become tomorrow’s moderates. The Left’s conditioning has been so complete that today we mostly fear radicals on the Right.

The left control the public debate by defining the Overton window through media control. Trump, by successfully challenging political correctness, is the first person to enlarge and shift the Overton window to the right in decades.

Newman concludes:

Reversing an accelerating trend will be extremely hard. Abbott couldn’t do it and now we watch Trump’s campaign to restore many of the values that made America great being ruthlessly attacked by the controlling elites.

Where classical liberalism advocates civil liberties and political freedom under the rule of law, socialism consolidates the government’s master-servant power over the people, using force against the unwilling.

After 50 years the people are noticing this role reversal. They feel powerless. The major parties are philosophically aligned. Voters can choose between Tweedledum and Tweedledee.