Have you noticed that our political class, and the media which helps shape its discourse, is fixated on 'doubling down'?
2016 was a bumper year for the political double down: everyone seemed to lock into a stubborn defence of a favourite prejudice or frustrated demand.
Sydney Morning Herald journalist Mark Kenny witnessed a dramatic manifestation of the cult of repetition on 26 November: 'Mr Abbott was seen to double down on his recent indirect messaging to Mr Turnbull about a possible return to the frontbench.'
A combined 'double down with indirect messaging' manoeuvre: perhaps a uniquely Abbott adaptation, insisting on attention to his frustrated ambition, heedless of its impact on the Turnbull government, and reducing political discourse to a focus on personal resentment.
Doubling down — otherwise known as repeating yourself — is the public language of aggressive redundancy, drowning out alternative voices and ideas.
Mark Thompson might see doubling down as a further debasement of political language, which he argues in his recent book, Enough Said, has lost its power to persuade.
New York Times CEO Thompson argues that in the face of intensifying political conflict, economic disorder and technological change, political language in western democracies has become a blather of evasive spin and crude dogmatism.
In Australia, the absence of either an ethical or credible policy can be overcome by doubling down. The media will dutifully record an obstinate stand with a 'double down' marker. The evidence suggests politicians are comfortable with a DD badge.
"Doubling down is the diminished language of a political culture locked in its own prejudices and unable to articulate ideas to shape a better future."
On 21 November the ABC reported that Immigration Minister Peter Dutton 'doubled down' on his insistence that the Fraser government's immigration policies opened the door to Lebanese Muslim criminals and terrorists.
Having been attacked by Labor for an initial swipe at Fraser's recklessness, Dutton reiterated the claim in Parliament, and added that: 'The advice I have is that out of the last 33 people who have been charged with terrorist-related offences in this country, 22 of those people are from second and third generation Lebanese-Muslim background.' Dutton suggested a prolonged period of 'sleeper' terrorism, passed from one generation to the next until finally being unleashed nearly 40 years later.
Consideration of complexity — the force of recent circumstance, the role of western nations in destabilising the Middle East in the Iraq war, the susceptibility of the young to new discourses and technologies that facilitate radicalisation — is set aside in favour of vilifying an entire community for nurturing a nest of brooding malcontents. Dutton's double down echoed across the media.
Labor has also embraced redundancy. During the 2016 federal election Opposition leader Bill Shorten criticised Malcolm Turnbull for having 'doubled down' on ruling out privatising the Medicare payment system. Shorten found Turnbull's denials insincere.
Unable to sustain his 'Mediscare' privatisation claim by rational construct, Shorten resorted to prejudice: 'I just don't believe him.' Labor doubled down on Mediscare in the last weeks of the election campaign, and was almost rewarded with government.
Treasurer Scott Morrison joined the election repetition challenge, urging a double down 'on trade, investment and innovation, entrepreneurialism, on the ways we collaborate to improve the financial architecture and share data to facilitate the new digital economies'.
Recycling digital economy clichés was too much for Bernard Keane, Crikey politics editor: 'Morrison's suggestion that we merely double down on globalisation suggests a profound disengagement from the political challenge posed by the resurgence of economic populism.'
Morrison's enthusiasm for doubling down on simplified neo-liberalism has persisted since the election. He insists that economic policy can be reduced to implementing Abbott era spending cuts and reducing company tax.
Forget about chronic problems of low wages, sluggish growth in full-time work, or younger generations permanently priced out of the housing market: asked how the government would address such issues in an ABC 7.30 interview on 23 November, Morrison doggedly stuck to repeating a formula of cutting spending and company tax.
Morrison's double down resists the need for flexibility, or a breakthrough to a more creative policy response. Or perhaps Morrison can't imagine an adaptable politics, or find the words to express it.
The impact of doubling down is intensified by the speed of transmission.
Thompson argues that the internet has not fulfilled a promise of providing space for compelling and well-researched journalism. The online media is a 'digital sweatshop' driven by the demands of relentless deadlines and an algorithm-induced repetition of slogans and bullet points: high churn doubling down, inserting lazy code that obviates the need for analysis.
An accelerating news cycle suits politicians, thriving on the blunt force of simplified repetition. Doubling down is the diminished language of a political culture locked in its own prejudices and unable to articulate ideas to shape a better future.
Dr Mark Hearn is a lecturer in the Department of Modern History, Politics and International Relations, Macquarie University.