As the sad clowns continue to juggle for an increasingly inattentive audience, TPA’s Alasdair McClintock starts to regret signing up for this caper. How many politicians feel the same?
*****
The Grind
In a moment of wild inspiration I decided to do eight weeks of analysis on this upcoming election. Normally I forget these moments and don’t see it through. They come to me after six beers and disappear in a fog of whiskey twenty minutes later, but this time I was sober and made the foolish promise to TPA editor, Dave Edwards, that I would actually do it.
I don’t think even he thought I would deliver, yet here we are, just over halfway there and I’m still pegging away, like an old prostitute with a strap-on, in the hope there are still a few weirdos out there who are into it.
Yet much like the politicians campaigning, I’m five weeks in and I’ve run out of fresh ideas. I’ve talked about a few obvious issues, skipped over heaps more, and now I find myself on a loop. Repeating slogans. Groping babies. Kissing journalists. The grind.
Myself, Malcolm, Bill et al. are now just punching the clock and trying to make our 500 metaphorical burritos a day, so we can go home and actually watch Netflix and chill. No sexual intercourse, we’re far too tired for that.
I get the feeling the whole country has fallen into the same malaise. Are any swinging voters going to change their vote over the next few weeks? I doubt it. They may as well hold the election tomorrow and be done with it. The only swinging going on now is in forty-something house parties out in Pennant Hills. A liberal stronghold represented by Philip Ruddock. Do they get to keep the Party Whip?
At least this isn’t America. Those bastards have been clamouring for months just to decide who gets to run for President. Campaigning, itself, seems to be a viable industry over there. You want to get rich in the United States? Start a balloon and streamer company. You only need three colours. Red, white and blue. Ironically, also the colours of Russia.
But while they fight over the lesser of two evils, we fight over the lesser of two dotards. Whatever spark there ever was in Australian politics, is long dead. Buried under a slew of white career politicians who have absolutely no idea what it is like to live in the real world and interact with normal people.
If they did, they would realise that Australia doesn’t want another rigid cardboard cut-out that tiptoes around every sensitive issue. That doesn’t mean we want a Trump, Abbott or Katter either. We just want a normal person.
Is that too much to fucking ask?
By Alasdair McClintock
Twitter: @AWJP83
Read Week One – The Leaders here
Read Week Two – The Major Parties here
Read Week Three – The Big Issues here
Read Week Four – “Economics, Dear Watson” here