All sensible people thought that the panic caused by the usual shonky models was well over the top; now even the less sensible are starting to see it. But, that's the way it always is - when it's too late. However, the UN's predictions on how many people will people die, and how many will be plunged into penury are most likely to be just as rubbery as the China virus 'models' and those for climate change, a subject that is being dragged up again as the China virus loses it's fear value.

"The government does not have a good track record of providing an answer to this question." Governments don't have a good track record on anything, most of the problems they can't fix being ones they themselves caused in the first place. Mr. Shieh's comment on 'central planning' and his comparison with the Soviets is right on the mark. And people should realise that that's the situation we are heading for, if all the Leftist lunatics excited yabber about a 'new normal' is anything to go on. Anthony Albanese is promoting the current mess as a "once in a lifetime opportunity" to wreck the economy permanently along communistic lines.

This author has presented us with a very realistic warning of what is to come if the majority of Australians don't start sitting up and listening. As he says, " …. the government’s interests are rarely aligned with those of the people".

I hope we hear a lot more from Edmund Shieh.

Comparing Albanese to the Soviet Union; what an idiot.

if it is ok for Trump to call for manufacturing to return to the US, albeit not much has, then no reason why Labor (or coalition) cannot do the same.

How can one be supposedly great, and the other a communist.

Where is the evidence that a 2020 Albanese wants to to make Australia like the Soviet Union?

Come on, provide the evidence given your big mouth ttbn.

Articles like this beckon the Michigan LIBERTARIAN protester reaction http://youtu.be/zXXFf0Q2bcU

"We are mainly white, male, under 50.

We bring Guns to solve complex problems.

We don't care how many die - as they're mainly poor, older, black and somebody else."

J.P.
You can believe what you like about whatever you like? Even a flat earth, if that rocks your boat? And doesn't need to be correct in any sense of the word.

Joe.
No, I don't think you were too sarcastic. Just a little more clear-sighted and less ideologically driven like a few other (flat earther) posters?

Pete.
Hear, hear and well said with the usual cut through commentary!
Alan B.

Ttbn,

Panic ? What don't you understand about eighty thousand deaths under one, admittedly incompetent administration - and less than a hundred under another ?

No, not panic - Trump may get round to doing that if it ever dawns on him what he has been responsible for - not panic, but responsible and timely prevention, preventative action.

Because of Morrison's cool-headed program, we will be in and out of a crisis in barely a few months, with minimal casualties - fewer than annual flu deaths, as we keep getting reminded - while the largest economy and most prosperous society in the world will get deeper into a morass which it barely recognises YET - and will take far, far longer to get out of.

This could ruin America for a decade (which is why many of us are deeply concerned) and thrust China forward as the world's only super power.

But you can sit back and contemplate that without fear and concern, that's up to you.

But this timely article might jolt you vaguely towards reality:

http://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/03/thing-determines-how-well-countries-respond-coronavirus/609025/

Joe