Master and Fearmonger

The scariest thing about Dan Andrews was how meekly Victorians surrendered

If the boffins in the Wuhan lab engineered Covid-19 to suit a particular kind of leader, Dan Andrews would have been the politician they had in mind.

The retiring Premier of Victoria played the politics of fear with panache, locking down the state's 6.5 million citizens until their noses bled and waited for them to thank him.

To describe Andrews as Teflon-coated is to overstate the durability of thermoplastic polymer-layered pans. It also understates Andrews’ mastery of his craft, for he is beyond doubt the most skilful Australian political operator of the modern age.

His decision to step down comes ten months after he won a second successive landslide win, claiming 56 of the 88 lower house seats against a demoralised and dishevelled conservative opposition.

Andrews’s transition from chief minister in the Westminster tradition to Dictator Dan was straight out of the autocrat playbook. Alfred Hitchcock could have learned a thing or two by tuning into Andrews’ daily press conferences. “I know this is scary," he said announcing the state's first lockdown, "but if we don't slow this thing down, we'll have people waiting in line for machines to help them breath."