Source — AITW Ep109 — Balloons; FM's UK Speech; France 2+2; DM on Sovereignty¶

Episode Metadata¶

Field	Value
Episode number	109
Title	Ep. 109: Balloons; FM's UK speech; France 2+2; DM on sovereignty
Publication date	2023-02-11
Recording date	Friday, 10 February 2023
Guests	None (Allan and Darren only)
Allan present	Yes
Format	News episode: Chinese surveillance balloon; Penny Wong's King's College London speech; France-Australia 2+2; Marles on sovereignty and AUKUS; Pat Conroy on DFAT. Reading segment at close.

Summary¶

Two significant biographical fragments emerge. First, Allan names his wife for the first time in the corpus: "at the urging of Catherine, my wife, whose taste in reading on the whole couldn't be more different from mine." She recommended Annie Ernaux's The Years — a book about which Allan is genuinely astonished ("how the hell is she doing this?"). The disclosure is incidental but precise: Catherine's reading tastes diverge substantially from his, and yet he follows her recommendation and is transformed by it.

Second, responding to the media hysteria over Wong's King's College London speech, Allan deploys a personal credential: "I'm a veteran of the Paul Keating Lizard of Oz tour of the United Kingdom in 1993, when manic tabloid journos, outraged by his Republican sentiments... chased us through the streets of London like in the movies." This confirms he was in Keating's personal entourage during the notorious 1993 UK visit. The Keating comparison is also analytical — it is used to calibrate the scale of the reaction to Wong's remarks, which Allan dismisses as "nonsense on stilts."

The episode also contains a characteristic piece of wry commentary: on Marles' claim that "Australia's frontline is diplomacy," Allan says he "can't remember an Australian defence minister talking about diplomacy as the frontline before" — and then immediately adds: "I just hope the necessary support for the frontline troops turns up in the budget." The metaphor is extended just far enough to make the point.

Key Quotations¶

"The Paul Keating Lizard of Oz tour" — the 1993 UK visit¶

"I'm a veteran of the Paul Keating Lizard of Oz tour of the United Kingdom in 1993, when manic tabloid journos, outraged by his Republican sentiments and his placing his hand on the Queen's back while guiding her around the opening of Parliament House a year earlier, chased us through the streets of London like in the movies. So I yield to no one in my respect for the capacity of the British tabloids to make Mount Everest out of a molehill."

— [00:16:02.300 --> 00:18:10.300]

"Chased us through the streets of London" — he was there. This confirms his presence in Keating's entourage during the 1993 UK tour, consistent with his role as International Advisor in the PMO. The anecdote is deployed not for nostalgia but as a calibration tool: he has personal experience of British tabloid hysteria at its most extreme, and against that benchmark, the reaction to Wong's measured remarks about colonial history is "nonsense on stilts." "I yield to no one in my respect for the capacity of the British tabloids to make Mount Everest out of a molehill" is one of the most elegant ironic formulations in the corpus.

"At the urging of Catherine, my wife"¶

"I have another stranger recommendation. The Nobel Prize for Literature last year was won by the French writer Annie Ernaux, whose work I didn't know at all. But at the urging of Catherine, my wife, whose taste in reading on the whole couldn't be more different from mine... You keep — or at least I kept — pausing as I was reading it to ask, how the hell is she doing this? It's really just a remarkable technique."

— [00:34:20.720 --> 00:36:18.300]

The first naming of Allan's wife in the corpus: Catherine. The parenthetical characterisation — "whose taste in reading on the whole couldn't be more different from mine" — is both affectionate and precise: their reading lives diverge, but her recommendation reached him, and it changed his reading week. The reaction — "how the hell is she doing this?" — is genuine literary astonishment, the response of a voracious reader encountering a technique he has not seen before. That a book recommended by Catherine, against his own grain, produced this response is itself a fragment worth preserving.

"Nonsense on stilts"¶

"I was startled to read that Penny Wong, who is usually so much more polite and controlled than Paul Keating, had savagely attacked British colonialism in the heart of London. As usual, I thought it would be useful to actually read the speech, which I did... Can you imagine a more outrageous attack on the former colonial power? Well, of course you can. The reaction was just nonsense on stilts."

— [00:16:02.300 --> 00:18:10.300]

The structure of the argument is characteristic: he names what he was told, reports that he read the primary source, quotes the supposedly incendiary language, and then delivers the verdict. The irony — "can you imagine a more outrageous attack?" — is calibrated. "Nonsense on stilts" is the Benthamite phrase deployed for maximum philosophical deflation of journalistic excess. The comparison of Wong ("usually so much more polite and controlled than Paul Keating") is also a precise characterisation of two different styles of Australian political leadership.

"Australia's frontline is diplomacy" — and the budget¶

"I can't remember an Australian defence minister talking about diplomacy as the frontline before. I just hope the necessary support for the frontline troops turns up in the budget."

— [00:26:06.300 --> 00:29:16.300]

The first sentence is a genuine observation: Marles' language is unusual for a defence minister and worth registering. The second is the policy point delivered via the extended military metaphor — "frontline troops" — which allows him to say that DFAT is chronically under-resourced without saying it bluntly. It is the practitioner's advocacy for the diplomatic corps dressed as wit.

Biographical Fragments¶

New

Catherine named as Allan's wife — first naming in the corpus; reading tastes "couldn't be more different from mine"; recommended Annie Ernaux's The Years to him. (Ep109)
"Veteran of the Paul Keating Lizard of Oz tour, UK 1993" — was in Keating's entourage during the notorious UK tabloid incident; "chased us through the streets of London like in the movies." Confirms his presence in Keating's PMO entourage on overseas travel. (Ep109)
"How the hell is she doing this?" — genuine literary astonishment at Ernaux's technique; the response of a wide reader encountering a genuinely new formal achievement. (Ep109)

Reinforcing

Democracy as error-correction — "one of the great advantages of democracy is that it enables us to escape at low cost from the policy cul-de-sacs that all governments eventually are going to get themselves into." Used here on the France-Australia relationship post-submarines; consistent with the structural argument deployed across the corpus. (Ep109)
"Sovereignty is the word of the year 2021" — Darren credits Allan: "you were prescient, Allan." Allan: "this one's your victory to claim." The playful deferral is itself characteristic. (Ep109)
Practitioner's evasion of internal bureaucratic politics — "I don't think I want to get involved in this" on Conroy's DFAT remark; then delivers a balanced view that neither endorses nor dismisses. (Ep109)

Style and Method Evidence¶

"Nonsense on stilts": Benthamite phrase deployed for maximum philosophical deflation; one of the sharpest verdicts in the corpus.
"Chased us through the streets of London like in the movies": anecdote as calibration tool — personal experience of maximum British tabloid hysteria used to benchmark the current overreaction.
Extended military metaphor: "frontline... frontline troops... budget" — the metaphor extended just far enough to make the policy point without stating it directly.
"At the urging of Catherine, my wife": the wry parenthetical that discloses the recommendation came against the grain of his own reading preferences.
"I yield to no one in my respect for...": ironic capitulation formula that actually asserts superiority of knowledge.

Reading, Listening and Watching¶

Allan — Catherine Murphy / Anthony Albanese (Australian Politics podcast); Annie Ernaux, The Years

"I recommend it because it's such a relaxed chat between two people who clearly know each other well. And therefore, I got a much more revealing sense of the PM's personal approach to foreign and defence policy than you might get in a formal speech prepared by staff and officials."

— [00:34:20.720 --> 00:36:18.300]

"A deeply personal memoir of Ernaux's life from the Second World War to 2008, fused or sort of entangled like quantum particles with the social and political history of France and the world over that period... It's really just a remarkable technique. Bringing it back to the podcast, anyone with an interest in understanding France or Europe over the past 70 years will find insights in every page."

— [00:34:20.720 --> 00:36:18.300]

Two contrasting recommendations that both reflect his core method: the Murphy/Albanese podcast recommended because it captures the PM's personal voice outside the prepared-speech register — consistent with his theory of declaratory policy (primary sources always) and his interest in what people say when they are not performing; Ernaux recommended because of its technique of fusing personal memoir with macro-historical sweep — which is, it might be noted, something like the biographical-intellectual project of this very podcast. Catherine's role in the recommendation makes the Ernaux entry especially distinctive.

Open Questions¶

"Chased us through the streets of London like in the movies" — what exactly happened on the 1993 Keating UK tour? Does Allan describe it in more detail elsewhere in the corpus? Are there other episodes where he describes specific overseas travel with Keating?
Catherine — does she appear elsewhere in the corpus, named or unnamed? Are there other episodes where Allan mentions his wife's reading, tastes, or influence on him?
Annie Ernaux's The Years fuses personal memory with social history across seventy years. Does this technique — or Ernaux herself — appear again in the corpus?
"I can't remember an Australian defence minister talking about diplomacy as the frontline before" — does Allan ever describe in more detail what he thinks the right balance between defence spending and diplomatic investment should be?
"At low cost" — on democracy's ability to escape policy cul-de-sacs. Does Allan ever describe cases where democracy failed to provide this escape at low cost?