Last week was a depressing week in Australian politics but it was also clarifying

Thoughts arising from Dutton's nuclear fallout

In a zone of insecurity…the tribes were mustering.

—Evelyn Waugh

The circus that greeted Peter Dutton’s announcement of his nuclear fantasy dominated #ozpol last week, and the reception he received reminded us of the underlying battle that defines politics in this era.

As the solstice slipped by at the end of last week, we saw more clearly than usual that the cleavages in our political system continue to find expression within the growing divergence between, on the one side, the main legacy parties, and on the other, the independents and minor parties.

That is to say, in our emerging “three-party” system, Labor and the LNP are more and more likely to agree on key areas of policy to protect their traditional dominance, while the real engine of governance shifts to the crossbench.¹²

It goes deeper than that, to be honest, because we are also being swept along by international forces that are realigning the world order in complex and not very reassuring ways. All of that is happening in the …