Thread by @davrosz

I think the economy is in terrible shape. Sure, ask Albanese about what the RBA cash rate is - and as a former banker, I can assure you it is largely ignored by the banks - but what about asking Morrison what the inflation rate is?
The CPI usually ticks along at between 2 and 3%.

At present, the annualised cost price index increase is 5.17%. It's high!
Meanwhile, wage growth averages around 2%. (Not for people like Morrison or the CEOs, though. Corporate profits are booming.
It means we are all, on average, 3% poorer every year under this Government.

Which adds an added sense of irony to the Coalitions "won't be easy under Albanese" pitch. The real value of our money is diminishing by 3% every year under the Coalition, wages are stagnant, and more and more people are in insecure jobs all the time. Housing prices are absurd.

But, I am a qualified accountant and a former investment banker (finance analyst). I grasp this shit almost unconsciously. But how many other journalists understand this stuff? I'd say very few. So instead they're asking Albo about dot points on pg47 of the ALP policy manifesto.

It angers me, because the nonsense these underqualified hair products with a body attached ask and repeat and focus on, relentlessly, aggressively, inevitably becomes what the average person picks up as their pointer towards who is the better bet. Who they should vote for.

It's called the Fourth Estate, because historically democracy has been seen as having four intrinsic elements.
First Estate: the executive; Second Estate: the legislature; Third Estate: the judiciary; Fourth Estate: the media.
Media is vital to keep the other estates honest.

To cut to the chase, on what I've seen - and I have been in the Press Gallery - Australia's political journalists are mostly too young and inexperienced, and more have done nothing much else but wave a microphone in people's faces and develop a grandiose sense of self-importance.

When you have a weak Fourth Estate or one that has become subverted by one or all the others - as Australia's has - democracy suffers. This is why voters have become increasingly disenchanted with it here. Politics, as it's reported, is tribal, adversarial and seen as irrelevant.

How to strengthen our 4th Estate and thus our democracy? Some ideas.
1. Deconcentrate media ownership.
2. Bring in an ACMA-type authority to regulate all the media, not just broadcasting.
3. Make media a profession you can only enter with some other credentials, like medicine.

Only by a Fourth Estate staffed by people who know the larger context before they ask questions and do their hair swirly piece-to-cameras, can we hope to have a public informed enough to make considered decisions as they approach the ballot box.
Otherwise, it's not a democracy.

That's pretty much it.
I'll just add, I retired at 40 and start @independentaus in 2010.
After 11 years without earning an income, but giving lots of other people some, I've tapped out my savings.
The smart thing for me to do would be to close down IA. Or sell it to Murdoch.

But I don't want to do that. I think @independentaus is one of the few parts of our 4th Estate that does indeed inform.
I'm proud of it. It's a work of art IMHO. I'm sure no-one else sees it that way.
If you want IA to stay and to keep employing journos, writers and editors...

Consider donating just 5 bucks to IA right now.
If every one of my 37,000 or so Twitter followers did that, or even a fraction of them, well, I wouldn't need to humble myself before you all, asking for help.
I do it because Australia needs IA more than me.
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Thank you so much for hearing me out.
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