“Lost” or leaked?

A briefcase was discovered in the Sydney airport Qantas Club lounge a few nights ago. Inside were a series of half-completed newspaper opinion pieces. Initial investigations suggest these are the work of a regular contributor to one of Australia’s leading newspapers. Here is one of them, though they were all much of a muchness.

Tony Abbott had a good election campaign, sure. But the forces of unrest in his own party are circling. He’s not a popular man (with me, at any rate) and so we can expect that as this Gillard government comes to grips with its earlier failures – and by the way, let me make this incredibly early prediction right now that Julia Gillard will lead Labor to a victory at the next election that will dwarf the size of any of Bob Hawke’s or Paul Keating’s or John Howard’s or Kevin Rudd’s wins, so that I’ll be able to make the call on television on election night that Labor won within seconds of the polls closing. That would let me break my record at the last election.

But where was I? Ah yes, Tony Abbott.  The man has no knowledge of economics. Certainly he’s not in the same league as Kevin Rudd who knew that you can just throw money at people to dig holes, dump more money in the hole, fill in the dirt, and then pay different people to dig it out. Real Keynesian insights had Mr. Rudd. That’s why his stimulus worked so well. He did it with roofs instead of holes, but same thing, right?

Same goes for Julia Gillard. Not only is she a woman, and by God I think that’s important because it sends a message to, well, my daughters that, well, you know, short people can make it in politics too, but she really knows her economics as well. Way, way, way better than Tony Abbott.  You don’t fight your way up through the far left side of Labor politics without an in-depth understanding of what makes a free market economy tick now do you?

That’s why she’ll go down in history as such a great reformer. As for Tony Abbott, have I mentioned that his own party is seriously considering dumping him as leader? And as for the man’s political instincts, well, he’s a Neanderthal. And I say that because I clearly don’t agree with his views.

Take refugee policy. Now I happen to have superior moral antennae to anyone who thinks Australia needs to have a strong deterrent policy. You see I disagree with that. And I should know because I’m a journalist. And on that basis, and on that basis alone, I think Tony Abbott’s policy is morally outrageous, disgraceful and beyond the Pale. And it will no doubt be a factor in encouraging some of his colleagues in the Coalition to dump him as leader because those colleagues don’t care in the least that most Australians agree with Tony Abbott on the issue of refugees.

Which takes me to another key fact, which is that Labor is much more credible on deficit reduction than Tony Abbott and the Coalition.  I see no reason at all to doubt we can spend 40 or 50 billion dollars on a broadband network and still balance the books, without a whopping big new tax on mining, or carbon, or anything really. And anyway, what matters is getting to surplus, not decreasing the size of government.

Abbott really is such a nube. I think I’m going to try to make sure that every second column I write takes a dig at the man. A backhanded compliment here, an out-and-out jibe there, a bit of sewing the seeds of doubt about his leadership there. And why? Because at heart I’m a conservative. No really. I really, really do have right of centre instincts. It’s just that Tony Abbott is so far outside the mainstream, whatever 50 percent of Australian voters might think.

So that’s the goal. To bore readers to death by ensuring that a high percentage of my newspaper writing is about the failings of one Tony Abbott. That way every time anyone sees one of my columns coming he or she will know what to expect.  And after a while that will bore the reader near on to death.

You see boring is the new black. Julia knows that even if Tony does not. But that’s not surprising because Julia is also nicer to her colleagues. Mr. Rudd will back me up on that. Oh, and have I mentioned that Tony Abbott will soon be rolled by his own party?

It goes without saying, or should do at any rate, that the above parody was wholly made up by me. It wasn’t found in any Qantas Club.  That said, having unpicked the satire any remaining resemblances to any real life political commentators, supposed or purely imaginary, will no doubt depend largely on the beholding eye the reader brings to the task.

Still, as Jimmy Choo is wont to say, “If the shoe fits ….”.

James Allan, Garrick Professor of Law, University of Queensland