At the heart of the Liberal problem

With the historic by-election loss on the weekend, Malcolm Turnbull gets to go all "ha ha, told you so":

Turnbull, a moderate who has strongly criticised the growing conservative focus of the party since his departure, told Guardian Australia on Sunday that “the problem is that they have to move back to the centre”.

“It is hard to see how that can be done with a leader who is so indelibly associated with the right of the party and whose support base in the Murdoch media is calling for the Liberal party to move further to the right.”

But, as I have complained before, Turnbull chose not to read the riot act on climate change to his party when he was leader, so I find it a bit rich for him to be complaining about any subsequent leader not doing likewise.  

I mean, the problem with this key policy area, for the Coalition, is arguably not so much their "official" position, but the continual internal erosion of the sincerity of that position by climate change deniers who are tolerated by the party.  For example:

 And this from their media supporters:

And this:

 

Matthew Stratton's article ends on this note:

The future, like the past of the Liberal Party, is conservative. The constant moderate Liberal fear-mongering over our 1.2 per cent of global carbon emissions; and the recent turn to reshape the Liberal Party from selecting our brightest and most capable candidates with MPs, Premiers, and Prime Ministers declaring it’s not what you have in your heart, but what you have between your legs.

This decade's long game of trying to straddle the barbed wire fence on climate change, with one foot in the "it's a urgent serious problem" camp and the other on the "don't be ridiculous, it's no problem at all, you've all been conned by scientists who can't be trusted" side may have worked for a time, but if you ask me, the bushfire emergencies under Morrison are what killed it off once and for all, and the success of the Teal candidates is strong evidence of that.

So in my humble opinion, unless the Liberals confront the formal schism that is needed (in the form of a demand that elected party members who don't believe it is a real science problem must leave the party), the Liberals are stuck in a losing position.   

Update:  And who could forget this (former) shining light of the Liberal Party, who tweets today: