Revolting people.

Today, Tony Abbott's "People's revolt" descended on Parliament House to let the Prime Minister know how angry they were about her carbon tax. Backed by prominent acadacademic Angry Anderson and other eminent intellectuals such as Barnaby Joyce and Sophistry Mirabella, it truly was a rally to withdraw sanity. I'd like to know how many of the protestors didn't have a southern cross tattoo.

Now there is more than one way to skin a cat, and more than one way to attack a policy. Misogyny is not one of them. 

Tony Abbott, Eric Abetz and Barnaby Joyce all addressed the angry mob in front of sexist placards. The crowd shaking their fists chanting "Tony, Tony, Tony" with all the hate and enthusiasm of a Nuremburg rally. (Eric Abetz was not born there)

The crowd was mainly composed of angry old white people, supplemented by younger angry white people whom collectively I like to call the 'white wing'.  Maybe they've eaten too many Angry Angus' prepared by workers who stole their jobs. I wish Malcolm or Joe would steal Tony's job. (Note the two were conspicuously absent).

I say this because only angry white people under the influence of people like Alan Jones could conflate the issue of pricing carbon with immigration. "Illegals stay, Ozzies pay" read one of the placards. "Stop the boats and stop Labor's waste" read another. (You can find them here http://blogs.abc.net.au/drumroll/) 

My personal favourite was "Juliar, Bob Browns BITCH". (Note that is verbatim, the person in question doesn't understand the use of apostrophes) Alan Jones would be proud of the phrase he coined being used by his listeners to such devastating effect. Alan was a notable absentee, apparently he couldn't find a mandate. 

It truly was one of the funniest fringe festivals I've ever seen, even more so because of the appearance of Pauline Hanson (She has forgiven Tony for organising the slush fund and stealing her constituents). She turned up just to add some gravitas to the racist contingent. 

It truly was "grassroots activism" as Cory Bernardi would call it. Pre-printed signs and t-shirts and even a plane writing "no tax" in the sky as people stood on the astro-turf. 

Perhaps they used the money left over from the 'Stop the Levy' campaign to pay for these things.

Now what are these people so angry about? Redistribution of wealth? A broken promise? Or the boatpeople's revolt on Christmas Island? 

Harvesting this manufactured and largely uninformed rage is what Tony Abbott and his band of demagogues are relying on. 

However amongst the herd, there are people with legitimate policy questions relating to the carbon tax. These people could do worse than distance themselves from the kooks that undermine their concerns and galvanize the cynicism about the motives of the COALition.