What can we satirise when John is gone?

It was often said in the lead-up to this year's election that many of those voting for the first time knew no other Prime Minister than John Howard. And even though I was 19 when the Howard government was elected in 1996, I have much the same sensation. I simply can't remember a time when the words "the Prime Minister" referred to someone other than the Hon J.W. Howard, and it's going to be quite an adjustment.

Those of us who work for The Chaser also face a seismic shift in the political landscape. The new territory is still far from familiar. When we started our tiny newspaper in 1999, the Howard government had already been re-elected for the first time a few months earlier. So we simply aren't used to having any other primary target, and it was with surprisingly mixed emotions that I have watched him power-walk off the national stage this week. It will take a long time to adjust to the idea that tracking down the Prime Minister with a silly stunt won't be as easy as simply rocking up to the Kirribilli foreshore before dawn. Kevin Rudd has proven far more inaccessible – I know, who'd have thought he'd tightly control the media? – so it's probably lucky we're finishing making television for the year.
As the outgoing PM departs, we should take a moment to remember that John Howard gave so much to so many, primarily in the advertising industry. But his rule was also a bountiful period for satirists, and this was in part due to his remarkable consistency. The man simply does not change, and in the end this was his undoing – when he tried to appear in touch with issues such as climate change, the electorate simply didn't believe him. But the predictability of Howard, which led to him being trusted as a safe pair of hands at the last two elections, meant that the same jokes that served satirists at the beginning of his government still worked in 2007. The refusal to say sorry, the hatred of unions, the doting regard for George Bush and the Queen, the dorky cricket fandom, the Wallaby tracksuits and above all those glorious, bountiful eyebrows were as constant and immovable as Rudd's hair. And if you don't believe me, check out Casey Bennetto's brilliant Keating The Musical – the anti-Howard jibes seem as fresh in late 2007 as when they were when written nearly three years ago.
Howard was the grandmaster of repetition, beating the electorate about the head with his carefully qualified phrases until we yielded in submission. Who else could win an election with a statement as awkwardly legalistic as "We decide who comes into this country and the circumstances in which they come"? And he could kill the most awkward of leadership tensions with the phrase "I'll stay as long as my colleagues want me to, and it's in the best interests of the party", whose brilliant use was exhaustively categorised by Crikey. And then, most ironically for Peter Costello in hindsight, the suggestion that he would become PM "if I go under a bus ... " Well, it was a public conveyance that got him in the end, and it took both of them out. Nevertheless, in his pomp, Howard's love of playing difficult deliveries with the same straight verbal bat was an absolute gift to satirists.
Now he is gone. So where to now for Australia's satirists? I must confess to having had concerns during previous elections. Kim Beazley provided some fodder for satire, particularly given his inability to use words that the average Australian could actually understand, but the end result was so dull that there was no joy, and little humour, in it. Surely under him, satire would have withered and died as everyone lost interest in politics completely. On the other hand, Mark Latham was a brilliant source of jokes about uncontrollable violence, but other than his fixation with teaching kiddies to read and fierce class hatred of private schools, we saw little that could be properly satirised before he flamed out.
But in electing Rudd, voters have anointed a prime minister who is, on the evidence to date, even more of a gift to satire than John Howard was. Having spoken to friends "right around this country of ours", as Rudd likes to put it, since the win, I know that I am not the only one to have been significantly underwhelmed by our new leader from the very moment he claimed victory. Rather than Howard's trusty "My fellow Australians", the incoming PM chose to start his speech with "OK guys", sounding much like a head prefect unsuccessfully trying to be on the same level as his underlings. And then the rest of the speech became mired in bureaucratese.
There are no memorable words from his speech at all. No "sweetest victory of them all" or "one for the true believers". Instead we had talk of "forging a consensus", of a "mission statement" and "an agenda for work". "We have a job of work to do," he intoned by way of conclusion. The former bureaucrat didn't sound prime ministerial; he sounded Yes Prime Ministerial. Bob Hawke should be urgently called in for training, because this is the first Labor leader in history who doesn't sound convincing when he says the word "mate".
And the cliche count was preposterous. "Without family we are nothing," apparently. "My local community is the rock upon which all other things are built," he told us. We heard repeatedly of a "new page", "sacred trust", "blood, sweat and tears" and "this great nation of ours, Australia". It left me wondering what his marriage proposal to Therese was like. "Therese, this underemployed diplomat who can speak Chinese's heart needs new leadership with fresh ideas. And you know what? I want to put my single life out the back door and establish a working family with you."
Rudd needs a new speechwriter urgently, and he needs to read Don Watson's Death Sentence, in which Keating's former speechwriter explains how cliches and management-speak are leaching meaning from our language. Because, on Saturday night, Rudd made John Howard seem like an inspiring orator.
Rudd's campaign was based on providing all the things the nation liked about Howard, and then a few extras. He will clearly do the same for those who write about politics for a living. In Rudd, Australians have chosen a PM whose unbreakable addiction to management-speak and glib soundbites will deliver great things – perhaps not for working families, but definitely for working satirists.

A dispatch from the booths

It's a cold, rainy morning in Sydney, so much so that when I saw the queue shivering at my local polling booth, I nearly turned away. Compulsory voting claims another victim. While I was waiting for an eternity to exercise my democratic right, I got a chance to check what messages the parties are trying to push on polling day.

After reading this briefing on the messages the campaigns are trying to ram down your throat, you'll be safe to keep your eyes firmly closed or even put a paper bag over your head so none of the annoying volunteers can bother you as you walk into your booth

Climate Change Coalition: If a photo of a confused-looking Dr Karl wearing a Hawaiian shirt is enough to convince you to elect him to the Senate, you may find one or two hiding at the outer reaches of your booth. Except that Dr Karl isn't even first on the ticket - it's Patrice Newell, Phillip Adams' wife, using his profile to try and get in to the Senate. As we all know, Dr Karl understands almost everything, but I fear he may not quite have understood just how slim his chances were before resigning his ABC job.

Democrats: A noble ambition, but a slogan to fire up the troops. And of course there are lots of ways of bringing back balance to the Senate - voting Labor for one. The original slogan tapped into most Australians' feelings about politics, namely that those involved are "bastards" who need to be "kept honest". This worthy yet limp approach perfectly encapsulates Lyn Allison's slow, steady hand steering the party into the ground. And would you believe, they didn't have anyone handing out how-to-vote cards at my booth for some time?
Eventually one lone Democrat showed up as I was leaving. He was wearing a fetching orange "Lyn to Win" t-shirt. I was surprised by this, since Lyn Allison is from Victoria. But then I realised the genius of the Democrats' plan. The NSW candidate is Lyn Shumack. That spelling is almost as rare as a Dems supporter these days, so to find someone who ticks both boxes is a remarkable campaign coup. At first I was hailing the brilliant strategy which would deliver the Dems a purely Lyn-based recovery. But then I realised it's probably because that they can only afford one set of t-shirts.

Family First: It'll surprise no one when I tell you that in Darlinghurst, they didn't bother campaigning. It seems the rights of gay families aren't among those being put first. I'll update this when I've actually seen some of their supporters elsewhere in Sydney.

Greens: They're got lots of pictures of Bob Brown everywhere. Which seems strange, since he isn't running in NSW, and unlike the Lower House where your vote does actually help elect the leader, those voting Green today aren't giving Bob Brown anything more than friends. Still, no one's heard of anyone else from the Greens, and their campaign staff are wearing spunky green t-shirts, and they want to do something or other about the environment, which is as much as anyone voting green ever knows about their party's plans.

Labor: Kevin07 t-shirts are everywhere - a clever bit of branding, except that they've been around for a few months now and are sooo August. And "Kevin" isn't exactly Prime Ministerial, compared to the serene gaze of John Howard that has appeared everywhere on election day since I was a toddler; or at least it seems that way. I was in Wentworth this morning, and was surprised to see that not only has George Newhouse's team got the election date right, but they've managed to deliver the appropriate how-to-vote cards in the right places. The first signs of competence yet from the Newhouse campaign.
The election day poster is the same one we've seen all campaign of Rudd in an open-necked shirt, smiling beatifically against rolling hills on that day he briefly returned to the country he so successfully left behind. The slogan is "new leadership". Which is something Julia Gillard will be endorsing if Rudd loses.

Liberals:Not a lot of posters of John Howard to be seen at my booth. Instead they've opted for huge signs, bigger than anyone else's. They warn that when Labor gets in "they'll just change it all", on the basis that when Peter Garrett had his "short, jocular conversation", he was actually formulating policy. And really, if you were a Labor candidate at the left-wing end of the spectrum, is there anyone you'd rather trust with the masterplan for three years of office than Steve Price? The problem with these signs is that a lot of voters will be delighted at the idea of everything changing, and be only too happy to vote Labor. And since they're in traditional Labor red, they look like an official policy. This could backfire badly.

The poster features images of Garrett, Gillard and Swan with question marks on their faces. I was confused by this - where was Rudd? Then I realised everyone knows what he stands for - continuity with Howard. Peter Costello's more of a question-mark than Rudd nowadays.

Nationals: Sorry, I live too far into the inner-city for them even to bother campaigning here, but I'll update this page once I've had a chance.

Unions: The Coalition has been presenting the ALP as a coalition between Labor and the unions, calling it "Union-Labor" wherever possible. Of course that's not actually true. The unions have far more power than, say, the Nationals. But you'll see evidence of a campaigning coalition at the booths, with separate ACTU campaigners and signs from Labors, in cheerful orange. They've continued the "Your rights at work, worth fighting and voting for" theme, oblivious to the problem that it also covers bosses' new rights at work, which they'll certainly be voting for. They should probably just have come out and said "Screw WorkChoices". Still, it's good to see the union movement still actually has people in it - there have been grave doubts about that lately. Presumably all the people handing out just want a favoured passage to the Labor frontbench.

A column about the Ruddslide

Fresh ideas. New Leadership. Working families. Economic conservative. Education revolution. When it comes to this election, to use Kevin Rudd’s favourite start to any sentence, these are the buzzwords that will finally get boost Labor back into office after eleven years in the wilderness. Rudd knows that his pitch is electoral dynamite, and that’s why he mentions his buzzwords constantly, and that’s why he’s going to become Prime Minister on Saturday.

It may not be quite that easy, of course. Labor still has to win 16 seats, which mightn’t be quite as easy as it seems when you read the polls. Perhaps by the time you read this, John Howard will have found the magical Rudd-killing bullet that has eluded him for so long. Perhaps there’s another sex scandal like the Scores one out there, but less laughably innocent. Perhaps the highly sophisticated computer programme inside Kevin Rudd’s head will crash under the pressure. Or perhaps, just perhaps, people will start to like Peter Costello.

Okay, so that won’t happen. But I never would have assumed that the result would seem so assured just days before the election. Everyone assumed that the previously infallible homing-beacon instincts of John Howard would have focussed in on the precise argument he needed to make to – well, if not defeat Kevin Rudd’s challenge, then at least make it a real contest. But if you believe the polls, it’s absolutely game over. As ugly as both the idea and the word used to express it may be, we are on the verge of a ‘Ruddslide’.

Unfortunately, dear readers of The Glebe, none of your lower-house votes will make a jot of difference, since this newspaper’s catchment area votes for left-wing parties so staunchly that even Mark Latham got your support. But you can rejoice in the knowledge that for the first time in quite a while, the rest of Australia agrees with you as well. Note that I can’t say ‘agrees with us’, you understand, because due to my work with the ABC, I am of course entirely neutral in this election. I just want the winner on the day to be democracy.

So what kind of Australia can we expect under Kevin Rudd? Well, one very much like John Howard’s. Or so we’ve been led to believe by Labor’s extraordinarily disciplined campaign, which has doggedly removed every point of difference between the parties that has any chance of proving electorally damaging for Kevin Rudd. Principle has taken second place – Rudd is all about politics, and cleverly so. His focus groups have found that calling “Mr Howard” a “clever politician” goes down well – but that he’s delivered the message makes him the one who’s been the really clever politician in this campaign.

Where previously John Howard has successfully portrayed himself as more in touch with the public’s values, this time the electorate cares about issues that are traditionally Labor ones – things like education, industrial relations, the environment and, perhaps most importantly, a less economically tough approach to government as interest rates rise. In this context, the public simply isn’t interested in scare campaigns about the unions or even cash handouts. It wants to feel reassured, and that’s exactly what Kevin Rudd’s soothingly nerdy persona provides.

One of the many failed scare campaigns that the Coalition has tried involves Peter Garrett saying that Labor would just change everything after the election – the infamous “short and jocular” conversation with Steve Price. Well, let’s hope Labor does change everything after the election, because otherwise, based on the policies they’ve put forward so far, it will scarcely have been worth voting them in. As John Howard himself knows from 1996, you rarely win office by promoting radical change. You win it by portraying the government as out of touch – his slogan against Keating was “for all of us”, which amazingly allowed the ALP to be portrayed as the party of the elites. So Rudd has been stressing continuity while showing that he has a better understanding of where “working families” are at.

But Labor will overturn many things that lefties love to hate – WorkChoices, of course, but also long-term bugbears like abolishing full-fee degrees and ratifying Kyoto. Having run to the centre to win the election, we can expect to see Rudd moving a little further to the left, just as Howard eventually returned to his ideological roots. But he’ll learn from his predecessor, and not go far enough to scare anyone. Labor had to create its own conservative, battler-courting version of John Howard to defeat the Coalition’s one, and once he’s in, he’ll probably prove even harder to dislodge.

Ten ways John Howard can win

With only eight days to go, John Howard still can't even up those pesky polls. He needs, as Kevin Rudd would put it in around 600 consecutive sound bites, "fresh ideas" to retain office, or his long innings will very shortly come to an end. Here are ten easy options the PM might consider using to win back voters.
(Note; if the Coalition actually uses any of these ideas to pull off an unlikely win next Saturday, the price for licensing my intellectual property will be an ambassadorship to somewhere with lots of sunny tropical islands. That's how it works, isn't it?)

1) Sack Tony Abbott
After a gaffe-filled campaign, Abbott has now embarrassed the Government by conceding that workers had lost some protection, and that where there were problems the best solution was for the employee to simply find a new job. Well, Tony's been performing very badly, and it's time he was moving on. With one swoop of his pen, John Howard can make voters grateful that it's now so easy to sack people.
2) Promise not to retire
The uncertainty of the Prime Minister's departure is a major plus for Labor. He's sought to clarify this by saying he could leave in 18 months. But he'd be more in line with what voters were thinking if he promised not to hand power to Peter Costello for at least 18 years.
3) Cash handouts
The PM has handed out more than $50 billion so far this election, but his message of largesse still isn't really cutting through. He should take a leaf out of the FM radio playbook, and simply send out street teams to distribute cold, hard cash. Icy cold cans of Coke wouldn't go astray either.
4) Stop hugging everyone
It's good to see that the PM has belatedly discovered his emotional side, but the hugging is getting more than a little freaky. His YouTube video with cerebral palsy sufferer Daniel Clark had more hugs in it than an episode of Oprah. John Howard's like the great-uncle we only see at Christmas - sure, we're happy to receive handouts from him, but we definitely don't want him to touch us.
5) Ratify Kyoto
Malcolm Turnbull was right - the Coalition's refusal to do this is only hurting itself, and exemplifies the worst of John Howard's stubbornness. At this point, the only thing Kyoto actually means for the Government is providing a convenient symbol of its inaction on climate change, because although we've all heard endlessly what Kyoto means, no one actually understands what it involves. Australia's going to meet its targets anyway, and the only person who would be put out by it is George Bush, who can hardly help Howard any more. We don't care about signing up China and other polluters, we care about token statements that make us feel less guilty about the environment without having to really do anything. Ratifying Kyoto is the national equivalent of buying a Prius.
6) Take on the Reserve Bank
Every time it raises interest rates, the central bank has been warning the Government not to spend so much. The Government insists that its spending isn't driving inflation. So why not put it to the test by promising to compensate every single mortgage holder for any extra repayments they have to make because of interest rates? Better still, why not give them double so that a rate rise means we all pay less, not more? Then we'll really see if profligate government spending is linked to interest rates.
7) Give regional grants to every seat
The latest big story is that the auditors have found considerable bias towards Coalition seats in the distribution of funds under the Regional Partnerships Programme. It's being reported as something of a scandal, but it isn't hard for John Howard to fix it up by simply matching the funding everywhere it wasn't applied. All he needs to do is acknowledge that in fact every seat in Australia is part of some region or another, and therefore deserving of more cash. Urban regions are actually just as "regional" as the bush, if you think about it. Australians are outraged when irresponsible cash handouts are applied unfairly in favour of others, but delighted when they come to us.
8) No more walks
Several moments in the campaign have given the impression that John Howard is presiding over a circus, most of them involving Tony Abbott. But when he goes on his fabled morning walks, John Howard actually is presiding over a menagerie of bizarrely-dressed activists, cantankerous old people and The Chaser. Maybe it's time he bought a treadmill.
9) Silence Alexander Downer, in both languages
The Foreign Minister is embarrassing enough when he speaks English, let alone trying his hand at French. His clumsy attempt to do so when compared to Kevin Rudd's remarkably accomplished - yet nevertheless quite glib - Mandarin illustrates why the Government is so far behind in this campaign. As with Amanda Vanstone, it might be time to send Downer off to become ambassador, somewhere he can speak the language. So not Paris. Or anywhere else, come to think of it.
10) Give the people what they want - Rudd
Rudd's tried to give the people a slightly newer version of Howard, and that's worked a treat. So why doesn't Howard deliver them a more experienced version of Rudd? The Opposition Leader's hair looks plastic already, so Howard could quite convincingly adopt a toupee. And it's not like the PM would have to dramatically rewrite his policies.
Photo: Andrew Meares

The children's toy drug scourge

I'm glad that the world has finally woken up to the narcotic properties of children's toys. The manufacturers of Bindeez beads say "with a little spray of water join them together to create works of art". But we now know that as well as art, you also create a substance that is similar to the date-rape drug known as liquid ecstasy, fantasy or GHB. Meaning that the kids who were given them may end up a great deal happier than their parents intended.

Several children have ended up in comas after swallowing the beads - which makes me wonder what kind of parent buys young children beads as a present in the first place? Surely the danger is considerable even when they don't contain narcotics. So it's not surprising that the toys have been recalled the world over. We can assume that the US DEA is preparing a counterproductive helicopter gunship raid on the Melbourne headquarters even as we speak, as Moose Enterprises becomes the latest target in the War On Drugs.
It's not all bad news, though. They were the Toy Of The Year, and you can presume that a lot of parents have a few packs stashed away, and are now celebrating the motza they'll make thanks to the dramatic increase in Bindeez's street price. I expect skanky-looking guys are already pushing kiddie playtime beads up in Roslyn Street. You can't even buy them on eBay anymore, so they must be really dodgy.
I'm prepared to admit there's a difference of degree, since not all children's toys literally transform into toxic substances when you merely add water. But surely all popular children's toys can technically be classed as dangerous drugs. Take Pokémon for instance. They were highly addictive, had detrimental lifestyle effects and addled the brain, encouraging users to squeak "Pika, Pikachu!" in a high-pitched voice. In other words, the effects were identical to many party drugs.
During the heyday of this inexplicably popular toy, kids themselves were being recruited as pushers by the manufacturer, Nintendo, which encouraged our children swapping Pokémon cards freely in the playground. And, like many drugs, they were inappropriately glamorised in the movies; or at least in Pokémon The Movie. Children in the midst of severe Pokémon addiction imagined themselves as the trainers of an imaginary magical menagerie, which is an effect also reported by many LSD users.
In hindsight, many of the toys of my youth posed drug-like dangers aspects as well. Is there any wonder that our nation is suffering from an obesity crisis when so many Australians played with Cabbage Patch Kids as children? After supposedly appearing in the cabbage patch - leading, incidentally, many kids to be severely misguided about the reproductive process - they literally did nothing except sit there and look chubby. Appropriately, given their origins, they were literally vegetables. Like the pot smokers their owners went on to become, they sat lifelessly in their cabbage patchism, greening out in keeping with their logo. Even the story behind them creates severe nausea - although to be fair it probably won't put anyone in a coma.
The childhood toy whose appeal I find most difficult to fathom, though, is He-Man. I'm proud to say that I never much rated him, which probably accounts for my highly un-He-Mannish appearance to this day. But I remember many of my primary school friends were obsessed with Him. Now, his battles against Skeletor may be perceived as a metaphor for combating anorexia, and I think that's admirable. But his absurdly muscular appearance was almost as damaging for the male body image as Barbie surely is for girls. If you can't achieve a He-Man like appearance through exercise - and really, who can? - there's one easy way to get there, and that's anabolic steroids. We don't all look like Dolph Lundgren, who portrayed him in the 1987 classic Masters Of The Universe (and has a chemical engineering degree from Sydney Uni, strangely!). And I wonder how many kids who grew up idolising muscle-bound action figures ended up injecting themselves with the chemical equivalent of the Power Of Greyskull(TM) to look like He-Man themselves?
There is a strong argument for banning pretty much all children's toys. They're addictive, highly expensive and ultimately harmful. As many drug users will tell you, once hooked on something like Bob the Builder or My Little Pony, it can become a vicious cycle. The only escape is simply to grow up, and hope that you don't succumb to the next craze. As I found in my youth, even Lego can be dangerously addictive - although the manufacturers figured out how to bond their pieces together without using GHB.
So I am considering simply not buying toys for my own offspring - not just because they are dangerous, but also because I am cheap. My children, when I have them someday, will be given miscellaneous lumps of wood and perhaps the odd pebble or two, and told to use their imaginations. And that is perhaps the greatest gift I could give to them, and also my bank balance. In the end, I figure it's safer to encourage the kind of fantasy that doesn't come in liquid form.

Rudd and Howard: spot the difference

In a bid to avoid the sort of wedge campaigns that have been used against it in previous years, Labor has simply echoed many of the Coalition's policies, or made minor modifications. So are there any differences between John Howard and Kevin Rudd? After extensive examinations I could find only 10.

1. Education revolution: While both are avowed conservatives, Rudd thinks "revolution" sounds cool.
2. Age: Howard is a 68-year-old grandfather, whereas 50-year-old Rudd merely acts like he's 68.
3. Unions: Though neither man is a great friend of trade unions, Rudd is a great friend to trade unionists – his front bench is full of them. Howard has done a great deal in his career to frustrate unions in an effort to increase flexibility and reduce workers' pay. Rudd, however, has left this task to his wife.

4. Language skills: The Labor leader will most likely develop a close relationship with Chinese President Hu Jintao, based on Rudd's ability to speak his language, Mandarin. Howard's closest relationship, with US President George Bush, has blossomed despite Bush being barely competent in English.
5. Environment: Both men are being undermined by their multi-millionaire Sydneysider environment ministers. However, Howard's has hair.
6. Housing affordability: Rudd has talked a lot about housing affordability during this campaign in an attempt to reach ordinary Australians. He and his wife have recent insight into the issue, having decided not to bid $5 million for a beach house. Howard's major concern in this area, however, is how much money he has to throw to voters so he can avert his own housing crisis and stay in Kirribilli.
7. Peter Costello: Obviously neither man likes the Treasurer nor would dream of having him over for dinner, but Howard is stuck with him as the anointed successor for another three weeks.
8. Interest rates: Howard says that the interest rates rises are not his fault, but that rates will always be lower under the Coalition than Labor. Rudd says that the rate rises are entirely Howard's fault, but that he isn't going to be able to control them. So both leaders say that interest rates are largely beyond their control, and yet that the other one cannot be trusted. And the difference? Only that this worked for Howard last time, and won't this time.
9. Scare campaigns: The Coalition has run a negative campaign, warning the public that, if Labor wins, unions will run rampant over the entire country, there will be a "financial tsunami" and life as we know it will effectively end. Whereas Rudd disapproves of scare campaigns, tut-tutting that "Mr Howard always claims that the sky will fall in". Instead he has focused on positive, visionary campaign messages, such as how Costello would extend WorkChoices and the Coalition would build nuclear power plants.
10. The polls: Three weeks out, opinion polls still have the two leaders far further apart than they are on any one issue. This may well be the only area where the two leaders are ultimately all that different.

A column about Björk

Every time I try to book tickets online, I grit my teeth and remember how ironic it is that the internet was supposed to make our lives more convenient. Because whenever Sydney decides en masse that a certain event is must-see, then good luck getting tickets. It happened for the Ashes Test last summer, to the irritation of those who loyally go every year and couldn't get in because of the influx of the trendies. And it happened, to my huge irritation, with the Big Day Out this year.

I know, you'd think that the organisers would have been falling over themselves to give me freebies to ensure good coverage in the pages of The Glebe. But no. And when I tried to slum it by booking them online, I couldn't. And I was furious, especially since I'd probably missed out to a Hilltop Hoods fan. (Yes, apparently they have them – and yes, I'm as shocked as you are.) All I can say is that I was disappointed and angered, and that the only way the BDO can possibly make it up to me is free tickets, and my own hospitality tent.

Even worse was the process for Splendour in the Grass, that hippyish festival they have up in Byron in the middle of winter, which had a little animation of a virtual ticket queue. After an hour, virtual me neared the front, only to find that it had sold out. I was left wishing there was some way I could have taken the easy option and sat out in the freezing cold overnight, like we used to do as teenagers. At least in those days you knew that if you queued for long enough, you'd get a ticket. Now, there are no guarantees. The internet isn't designed for massive spikes of traffic like when tickets go onsale, and there are tens of thousands of people simultaneously clicking 'refresh'. It may have originally been designed for the US military in wartime, but no soldiers have the dedication of an army of emaciated Goths trying to get to a music festival.

So I wasn't confident when I tried to book tickets to Björk’s gig at the Sydney Festival. There were only 5000 tickets for one of the most famous ‘alternative’ performers in the world singing in the forecourt of the Opera House on what will in all probability be a blissful, idyllic summer night, and people have been talking about it for months. Tickets went onsale at 9am on a Friday, and I logged onto Ticketek at what my computer assured me was the dot of 9. No dice. Sure, it said tickets were available, tantalising me, but when it actually went off to have a look, it blithely suggested that the event must have sold out. As at literally 9:01am.

I was astounded. Björk’s last two or three albums have been widely perceived as unlistenable twaddle, and the first few weren’t exactly accessible unless you have a partiality to the sound of Icelandic- accented yowling cats. Which, as it happens, I do.

Still, the Sydney Festival site had said the Opera House had tickets as well, so I tried there. The site was so busy that it wouldn't even let me in. I kept trying, and trying, and by 9.45, it seemed everyone else had given up and I breezed through the booking in no time. Everyone with any sense had obviously abandoned hope, and my foolish persistence paid off. Finally, a crashing ticket website had actually worked in my favour.

The real problem, though, is this city's mob mentality when it comes to big summer events. Sure, Tropfest's fun, even if most of the movies aren't – but do we all have to go? And as for Field Day, the New Year's Day dance party, you can't tell me everyone in the Domain is actually enjoying the music. Half of them are in such a state of chemical bliss that we could bundle them into Parliament House next door and they'd still be grooving along, with idiotic grins on their faces, to the phat beats in their heads. Which would make way for those of us who might actually have a chance of dancing in time with the beat.

I always get the impression that most Sydneysiders spends January rushing from event to event, terrified that they'll miss the must-see event of the summer. People, you need to relax. Maybe you should try staying home, and having a lovely backyard barbie? Why not put your feet up, eh? Specifically on days when I want to get tickets.

Ten ways to entertain yourself during the campaign

Well, we're only a week and a half into the election campaign, and I'm already bored to tears. I have to follow this stuff intimately for work, unfortunately. If, like me, you don't have the capacity to simply switch off the television like most Australians, why not adopt one of my patented methods of entertaining yourself during Campaign 2007?

1) Heckle John Howard: He may be down in the polls, but our indefatigable PM is still power walking every morning, giving joggers the perfect opportunity to give John Howard a piece of their mind. If Kevin Rudd becomes PM, he won't do anything as spontaneous and non-media managed as walking through a public place every morning, so take advantage while Howard is still around. Democracy has never been so direct.
2) Play the Kevin Rudd drinking game: It's easy! Every time Kevin07's speaking and his dextrous tongue darts out to wet those silvery lips of his, you have to wet your own lips with a sip of your drink. Be thankful there are no more 90-minute debates, or you'd be drunker than a night out at Scores with Col Allan. Note the optional, quite gross rule: like the infamous YouTube video, the loser in the game has to pick their ear and eat it.
3) Marvel at the Steve Fielding video blog: All the parties are trying to embrace Web 2.0, and Steve Fielding has done his bit with a range of fascinating videos. Although I don't know that forcing your family to appear in your embarrassing clips necessarily counts as putting them first, you can watch enthralled as Steve's daughter wins Best & Fairest for her soccer club, and his son wins a swimming race. Yep, as the videos prove, Fielding really is a fair dinkum ordinary Australia. With emphasis on the ordinary.
4) Bet on the election: Aussies love to gamble even when it isn't good for them, and the election's a much simpler field than the Melbourne Cup. Rudd's miles ahead - is it an easy profit, or does John Howard represent the chance to win a motza? The good news is that anything you wager you'll get back in tax cuts.
5) Remember Paul Keating: This campaign could desperately use a bit less spin and a bit more Keatingesque wit. Kevin Rudd has never, in his entire political career, said anything as entertaining as these quotes, more's the pity. He's also the only person who's really taken on the Liberals over the unions. Then again, Mark Latham was a dab hand with the insults, and look where it got him.
6) Recalculate your mortgage repayments: This isn't exactly fun, but it'll certainly wake you up a bit if the latest glib Kmail has put you to sleep. When you've worked out how exactly much a 0.25 per cent rise will hurt you, why not calculate the impact of the 0.5 per cent and 0.75 per cent that will inevitably follow as the cash handouts from both parties drive up inflation?
7) Find embarrassing Peter Garrett lyrics: This is one of the Coalition's favourite pastimes. Pull out those old Oil LPs and find the lyric that is most at odds with the new, meek, spin-controlled Garrett. For me, given Labor's recent awkwardness over the US alliance, it's hard to go past "US forces give the nod, it's a setback for your country".
8) Play "Where's Ally?": Every day, why not skim the newspapers and see if you can find any mention of Democrats leader Lynn Allison? Caution - while every page of the Where's Wally? books features Wally somewhere, most pages of the newspaper do not.
9) Sing along with Pauline Hanson: Pauline's never been only about the race-baiting - she's also big on the flag-draping. So why not enjoy her song The Australian Way Of Life here? Recorded with boyfriend Chris Callaghan, it's a little clunkier than I am, you are, we are Australian. But it definitely owes a certain intellectual debt to fellow guitar-wieldin' politician Bob Roberts.
10) Start a worm farm: Pay tribute to the most interesting story of the campaign so far (which isn't saying much) by raising some controversial worms of your own. You can order everything you need from WormMan's worm farm store. Then settle the question once and for all by seeing whether the Liberal Party, National Press Club or ABC tries to stop you.

A column about the Federal election

Finally, after nearly a year since Kevin Rudd was elected and it all began in earnest, we have an end date for the seemingly interminable campaigning: 24 November. On that night, the cycle will begin again, either with the same old leadership or Labor’s new old leader, who offers almost identical policies but has a much snazzier website.

I’ve been looking forward to this election since Rudd’s arrival. Sure, I’m a politics nerd – heck, I found some interest even in the Beazley contests. But Rudd is a real contender, finally Howard’s match when it comes to sheer political professionalism. He rarely puts a foot, or even a hair, wrong. Watching him on the 7.30 Report the other night, I was struck by his remarkable capacity to string soundbites and talking points together so seamlessly that they almost sound like actual human conversation. He never ums or ahs – in sharp distinction to John Howard – and if he’s interrupted midway through a sentence, he simply takes a moment and then starts off where he was, delivering the perfect soundbite in such a way that it will clip nicely into the evening news.

In short, if an evil genius were to design a political robot, it would probably look a lot like Kevin Rudd. Okay, so perhaps not physically – very few people would choose to outfit themselves quite so prissily. But in terms of its almost flawless message discipline, it could do worse than derive its programming directly from Rudd’s own neurones.

Even Rudd’s policies could have been designed by computer. And the program is simple. Take the Government’s positions, test them with focus groups and tweak the formula ever so slightly so that they’ll like them just that little bit more than Howard’s version. And, crucially, still deliver nearly everything that the original policy that appealed to Coalition voters. Kevin07 is very much a subtle evolution, not revolution – whatever he may have chosen to term his education policy.

His tax plan, which was just released as I was finishing this column, is the perfect example. Rudd will deliver nearly all of the enormous tax cuts Howard announced at the start of the campaign, but hold a little back from the very top income earners – who probably weren’t going to vote for him anyway. He’ll use that $3 billion or so to give families a tax credit for investment on education, and to reduce waiting times for elective surgery.

See what he did? He knows that most voters are into health and education, as long as they don’t have to pay for it with high taxes. So he slightly skews Howard’s package to invest a small amount in these areas, so he can claim he’s more in touch with working families than the Coalition. Another of Rudd’s favourite soundbites that we’ve been hearing since he was elected last December is that Howard is a “clever politician”. But when it comes to tricky political calculations, Rudd’s evidently no slouch either.

And that, ultimately, is what’s starting to infuriate me in 2007, a mere week into the campaign. It’s all tinkering at the margins. Neither party has any real ideas to make our society better, or fairer, or nicer. They just want to push our buttons so we’ll elect them. Principle has long gone from the Labor Party, except when it comes to delivering for the unions that fund and staff it. And John Howard achieved his wildest political dreams a year ago, and hasn’t had anything new to say since. Well, except on reconciliation. So he hasn’t had anything credible and new to say since.

I’m left harking back to the days when there were radical differences between the parties, and bold ideas. Sure, there were some disasters. But look at something like Medicare, which is so popular that neither party dare touch it. No-one would even attempt to create something like that now. All they’d do is offer the status quo, or the status quo packaged with trendy buzzwords and a little Web 2.0 pizzazz. And sure, this reflects that Australia is an affluent place for most of us. But not all of us. But you’ll never hear about that during this campaign. Not while there are $34 billion in tax cuts to distribute to people who already have it all. Sorry, or $31 billion if we vote Labor. An enormous difference.

When John Howard was elected in 1996, his slogan was “For All Of Us”. Of course, that isn’t how it panned out. But back in the day, politicians used to at least pretend they wanted to help life’s unfortunates. Not any more. Now, the Coalition is Going For Growth, and Labor is following closely behind them. But it doesn’t say much for our society that our grandest aspiration is a little more for ourselves.

Election 2007: the wrap-up

It is with great pleasure that I present my analysis of where the 2007 federal election was won. Lesser commentators will reserve their post-mortems for November 25, or perhaps election night itself if they type quickly. But let the record show that on October 18, more than five weeks away from polling day, I was the first with the comprehensive analysis that explained not only why the result happened, but what it was in the first place.

Against all the odds, the Coalition has won the 2007 federal election with a net loss of only one seat – Bennelong, where the Prime Minister succumbed to Labor challenger Maxine McKew. Though many expected him to retire in this scenario, the Prime Minister has instead argued that the rest of the Australian electorate wants him to stay even if the voters of Bennelong do not. He will therefore seek to move to a safer seat as soon as a by-election has been organised.
Howard intends to take over the Victorian seat of Higgins, currently held by the man who has in fact already been dubbed Prime Minister-elect by most commentators, Peter Costello, who will be asked by his colleagues to retire. Howard congratulated Costello on a magnificent career. "I want to thank Peter, if not for his loyalty, for never having had the guts to act on his disloyalty," he said. "I realise it's tough for him to be made to retire just before finally becoming prime minister, but I promised voters I'd make the tough decisions in 2001, and I'm not going to stay in this job until I'm eighty by being a nice guy."
Costello is understood to be gutted by the decision, but accepts that, as ever, when it comes to both voters and his party room, he simply doesn't have the numbers. He will now retire from politics and assist his brother Tim with his charitable projects, in an effort to understand why his sibling is so much more widely respected. Costello is eager to put something back into a country that gave him so much – and yet still not enough.
In the aftermath of a famous victory like this one, everyone will want to take credit. And while Pauline Hanson's role in policy development must be acknowledged, it is yet again the Coalition's advertising guru, Ted Horton, who has delivered. This media Svengali, who voices many of the scariest attack ads himself, may simply have replicated the strategy that won the 2001 and 2004 elections, right down to the same use of L-plates, but as the Prime Minister has always maintained, experience is more important than creativity.
Of the many scare campaigns, it is perhaps that about unions which hit Labor hardest. Having come from the Party's other great recruiting ground, the bureaucracy, Kevin Rudd was loath that 70 per cent of his front bench were unionists. But he ultimately accepted that to reform Labor's recruiting processes to reflect merit rather than branch-stacking ability would take decades, and gave up. And where voters had initially been frightened that WorkChoices would make them lose their jobs, the Coalition's advertising convinced them that groups of workers voluntarily coming together to demand a certain level of minimum conditions was a far more terrifying prospect.
Howard's catchy slogan, "Go For Growth" also galvanised his prized mortgage-belt battlers who had previously been too busy worrying about their monthly repayments to pay heed to macroeconomic notions like growth rates. Now, thanks to the campaign, it suddenly seems that economic chatter is everywhere, leaving climate change forgotten as trendy inner-city dinner parties shifted to discuss the burning issues of the day, like the current account deficit and the consumer price index.
The scare campaign about wall-to-wall Labor governments also hit home, as voters realised that a party they were happy to repeatedly re-elect at state level couldn't possibly be trusted Federally.
Ultimately Howard and Costello's firm hands on the economy have once again won the day, and although it can be argued that they are the merely the beneficiaries of underlying structural reforms initiated by Hawke and Keating, an unprecedented resources boom and the fluctuations of the global economy, it is not an argument voters have been interested in hearing. The strength of Howard's economic credentials was bolstered midway through the campaign, when he had the AFP arrest Governor Glenn Stevens and the entire Reserve Bank Board on its way to a meeting at which is was widely predicted interest rates would be jacked up because of the inflationary impact of the Coalition's promised tax cuts. Such a decision, Howard argued, would have irrevocably damaged the Australian way of life – most particularly, his own – and was more than sufficient under the recent anti-terrorist legislation for them all to be imprisoned indefinitely without charge.
Against this ferocious Coalition attack, which none of his strategists could possibly have predicted unless they'd looked back at any of the previous three election campaigns, Rudd simply wilted. He had thought he'd win over the electorate with what he termed "fresh 'n' funky ideas" about climate change and education revolutions, but his decision to give all his policy speeches in Mandarin to showcase his "fine Beijing accent" ultimately backfired.
Rudd has been left licking his wounds, but is expected to remain unchallenged as leader thanks to his decision to appoint someone virtually unelectable as his deputy, yet another idea he copied from John Howard.
Once again in Australian politics, very little has changed – the inevitable result of economic good times that left the electorate feeling benevolent towards its government. And while previous elections have been marked by genuine concerns that the Coalition might decimate the education system, or skew industrial relations in favour of bosses, or introduce draconian security laws, this campaign was conducted in the knowledge that it's all been done already.
So congratulations to John Howard, Prime Minister for another three years despite his pro more. Labor is left once more in the wilderness, knowing that if they are to ever beat the Coalition in a federal election, all they have to fear is fear itself.

Man-child, 30, seeks to join Entourage

I know I've joined the fad a little later than some (as my brother keeps reminding me), but I've become a huge fan of Entourage, the HBO show about the young Hollywood star and his three homies from New York who are kickin' it in LA. And while I've been enjoying the antics of Vinnie, Drama, Turtle and E – so much so, in fact, that from now on I am going to insist on being known on the streets as 'D' – I can't help asking one thing. Can I join somebody's entourage already?

And where better to star than Vinnie Chase himself? The show's star-within-the-show, Adrian Grenier, has been in Sydney to promote it, and I thought it was a perfect opportunity for some Entourage-style star tailgating. Because the way romance works in the show is very simple, and very effective. In essence, Vince is so hot and so famous that he constantly gets action, and his three hangers-on get to enjoy second through fourth dibs. Well, I share both E's corny sentimentality with the ladies and Johnny Drama's crippling neuroses, and look kind of like a cross between Drama and Turtle (particularly in terms of dodgy facial hair), so I figured it might work just as well if I hung with the real Adrian Grenier, who is almost as famous offscreen as he is on it.
Unfortunately I haven't succeeded in casually running into Grenier while I was here. Perhaps he isn't famous enough to get into the celebrity hangs I now have access to as a blogger for smh.com.au? Pity – if his publicist had gotten in touch with mine, I could have taken him to Jackson's On George and stuff. It could have been sweet.
(Actually, I don't have a publicist – I just give them my mum's number and she passes on the messages. Don't tell Grenier's people, though.)
I tick all the boxes when it comes to joining Grenier's onscreen entourage. Well, except for the lack of street smarts from back when I grew up in Queens. But otherwise, I'm ideal. I'm in my early 30s, spend way too much time playing video games and don't have a proper job. I don't seem to be able to form lasting bonds with women, but have lots of close male friends dating back to high school who are my primary support network. What more could any major film star want from a shameless hanger-on?
Vinnie and co always seem to go to the top parties, and although I'm woefully behind on that score, I did somehow get into my old fave De Nom the other day. And apparently Paris Hilton drank there briefly on New Year's Eve. So I guess that pretty much makes me a Hollywood A-lister.
And that's not all – like Drama, I once appeared briefly in a television series. Although unlike him, I haven't managed to claw my way back to the top of the heap. Fingers crossed I run into Eddie Burns, eh?
(Sorry if you haven't followed that subplot yet, but get with the program, people. And I mean the actual program, which is screening on Foxtel now. It's hilarious – superagent Ari Gold in particular.)
In short, Entourage is a wonderful warts-and-all portrait of a bunch of man-children, not unlike myself. But although they're probably a dime a dozen in LA, I've found that in Sydney, we man-children seem to be in short supply. And it's left me painfully short of cats to roll with, frankly. Rather than settling down and taking on adult responsibilities, I want to be jumping into my Lincoln convertible and cruising down Sunset with my peeps, and it just isn't possible – and not only because I don't currently have a car.
The vast majority of my male friends are in stable, successful relationships – many are even married nowadays. And sure, they say they'll hang with me like the old days, but compared to a night of snuggling with their better halves indoors, they always seem to choose the latter. (And to be honest, I don't blame them.) And the swinging singles like me are left twiddling their thumbs when we could be living the high life. Because it's important to have a posse when you go out to bars. No one likes sitting by themselves in the corner. But if you travel in a pack, when you can't manage to meet any interesting women, you can pretend you're having just as much fun with da boys.
The four of them even live together, generally in some swanky mansion or deluxe condo. Which would be perfect, because I share another of the gang's little neuroses in that I don't much like to be alone. I'd even be willing to be the gimp who cooks the breakfasts in return for a setup like that. But I know hardly any thirty-somethings who are living in share houses, other than myself who has a paltry one flatmate. What's the big rush to grow up in this town, anyway?
Maybe it is a Sydney thing. We like to think we're party HQ, but I'm not so sure. (Not that I'd recognise party HQ if I saw it, to be fair. And if I did, my name wouldn't be on the door.) This is a bit of a socially conservative town, where people don't sleep around like Vinnie and his buddies. It's not considered cool to have six people on the go at the same time in Sydney, but in NYC and Hollywood, that's considered restrained.
I like to think that in LA, though, my new showbiz pals and I would be kings of the hill. At least if one of them was a major Hollywood movie star. Still, Heath Ledger is, so it can't be that hard for some Aussie friend of mine, can it?
But back to my main man. I just Googled Grenier, and it seems he did go to De Nom the other night. I must have just missed him. Apparently he got to know this member of the bar staff. And not just that – it seems he's still in town. Darn it, Grenier, I so could have rolled with you, dawg. I'd even drive you around like Turtle does, if you get me one of those free Maseratis. Get my digits and call me, okay?

A column about summer

As you know, this column is highly influential in world affairs. Rarely a major incident occurs on the world stage without my counsel proving in some way decisive. Many have likened me to Henry Kissenger, while some have even dubbed me The Glebe’s own Nelson Mandela. And while of course I’m flattered by such comparisons, I’m just doing my job.

Even as you read this, Aung San Suu Kyi, General Than Shwe and thousands of imprisoned monks are all waiting for my considered deliberations on the situation in Myanmar. And I’d like to devote my full attention to that particular flashpoint, given its urgency. But I’m afraid I simply can’t apply the healing balm of my wisdom to that troubled region today, for one simple reason – this afternoon, the weather is nothing short of spectacular today.

Oh okay, I suppose I can spare them a paragraph before I get back to contemplating the loveliness of Sydney in the springtime. General, it’s high time you gave Aung a go, okay? It’s polite to share. And lay off the monks, it’s making you look bad. Not to mention Australian Federal Police, who trained your thugs. There. Now, where was I?

I’ve travelled through many other towns in my time (we UN peace envoys do tend to get about a bit) and they simply aren’t as good. Especially not Melbourne, and I do wish they’d stop going on about it.

For us Sydneysiders, it’s genuinely hard to care about the bad things that are happening in the world over summer. Take for example Kevin Andrews’ latest hideous decision to restrict migration from Africa. He justified it with a hideous list of generalisations about how Africans are poorly educated, join gangs and (shock horror) won’t integrate.

And that, apparently, is enough to deny genuine refugees – whose lives, let’s not forget, are in danger if they stay in their own countries – the chance to come and live in this earthly paradise of ours, and share the wonderful lifestyle we have enjoyed since the British essentially stole the entire continent. Frenzied leftists have often dubbed the Howard Government racist, but this seems like the most indisputable instance yet.

And yet, I can’t really find it in my heart to care all that much about it. As I wrote at about this time last year about global warming, it’s hard to get passionate about important causes in warm weather. I know I should be taking to the street, shouting angry slogans and making a genuine effort to smash something – probably the state. But what I most feel like doing is going for a swim. I’m sure the water’s lovely. Sure, I also think that Africans should be allowed to enjoy it alongside me, but that’s not going to stop me shutting the computer down and taking a dip.

And this, perhaps, is why John Howard keeps putting off the election. That, and the desperate hope that Kevin Rudd will suddenly develop pancreatitis or shatter some cabbie’s ulna. All of John Howard’s wins have been in the heat – in March, October or November. When we go to the polls on an idyllic day, it’s easy to see the appeal of the status quo.

If anyone out there is planning to foment revolution – and there surely aren’t many cells of communist revolutionaries out there, but I’d be willing to bet that any in existence are probably somewhere within the Inner West – I suggest they wait until midwinter. Because I’ll be happy to storm the barricades in June or July, especially if there’s any chance of guillotining Kevin Andrews, whose tenure as Immigration Minister is making Amanda Vanstone look competent and Phillip Ruddock seem caring. But right now, I’m busy thinking about what cocktail I’ll be ordering this evening. A mojito, I think. And while I’d love to share the Sydney summer with some Sudanese refugees and persecuted Burmese dissidents – in particular Aung San Suu Kyi, who seems like a bit of a spunk for a woman in her early 60s – the weather has turned warm, and it’s high time I put down the lethal weapon of political influence I call my laptop and went out to enjoy some of it.

Telstra: making it easier for Labor

John Howard should be careful what he wishes for. He pushed so hard for so many years for Telstra to be privatised and independent, and vowed to turn Australia into a "nation of shareholders" by encouraging mum-and-dad investors to snap up a slice of the national telco. Well, there are 1.6 million Telstra shareholders (I am not among them), and guess what? That's a substantial voting bloc. And Sol Trujillo knows this. Which is why his company is trying to mobilise them in marginal electorates to try and get the Government to give Telstra an even more dominant market position. Sorry, I mean, let Telstra bring better broadband to all Australians.

Businesses generally don't deign to descend into the muck of politicking like this, presumably reasoning that they need good relationships with lawmakers. So to see Telstra getting its hands dirty is a bizarre spectacle. How will a Telstra-style campaign look? Is it going to find some way of charging its supporters a fee for the privilege? Are we going to see thousands of blue-clad technicians turning up at polling booths to briefly hand out how-to-vote cards at some unspecified time between 7am and 12pm?
Helen Coonan has tried to stop this potentially damaging development by asking the board to hose Sol down. She says voters will punish Telstra for its campaign rather than being convinced by it – a massive assertion, although I suspect the Coalition has been looking at who the electorate is in the mood to lash out at with particular care lately.
As has been noted, the irony is delicious. Because this is what Howard's beloved private companies, those supposedly more efficient bastions of a truly free society, do. If they come up against a barrier, they ruthlessly liquidate it, to the greatest extent allowed by law (or even beyond it, on some occasions). So why shouldn't Telstra make its shareholders aware of their own financial interests, and get them to vote with their hip pockets? That's how the Coalition won the last election with their "keeping interest rates low" furphy – why shouldn't Telstra be allowed to argue that the Government is keeping Telstra's share price low as well? They're just making their case to the market. The Government should be applauding their democratic initiative. Especially since, unlike the Coalition, Telstra pays for all its political mailouts.
And Telstra is making its case via the ever-so transparent online spin headquarters, "Now We Are Talking". Reading this page, you'd imagine that Telstra was some sort of benevolent society, desperate to usher ordinary Australians into a glorious future of fast internet connections, if only the evil government wasn't determined to keep us at dialup speeds.
While Labor candidates like George Newhouse in Wentworth have been lapping Telstra's support up, I can't help wonder whether the telco's endorsement might backfire on Rudd. Personally I would take great pleasure in voting against whatever Telstra supported, thinking that I'd probably get a better deal if its competitors were better able to compete. Nevertheless, if every shareholder votes Labor, Rudd will have probably, on balance, have been gifted a substantial windfall.
Senator Coonan, nevertheless, is right that Telstra should be split up, although it's far too late for her to make the point now. To have the same company owning a network that it resells to companies who are forced to compete against its retail division is clearly an ideal recipe for uncompetitive practices, and Telstra's pinged for this by the ACCC regularly. But Helen Coonan's belated interest in this idea smacks more of political revenge than sensible regulation. When the Government was still the majority owner, it could presumably have split the company and simply given existing shareholders stock in each of the new offshoots. Now, it will face an almighty legal battle.
Nevertheless, the move is surely likely to lead to lower prices. As a big consumer of telecommunications services (in other words, an internet-addicted nerd), I constantly compare its plans against competitors – for landlines, for ADSL and cable internet, for mobile data (that is getting your laptop on the internet when it's out and about) and, most importantly, for my mobile phone bill. And every single time, Telstra is not only far more expensive, but wants to lock me into lengthy contracts with hefty termination payments. I often wonder whether Telstra's main source of revenues is in fact consumer ignorance. For every hardcore technophile like me who shops around, there must be five people who just get everything from Telstra because it's easy, and pay dearly for it. That's one heck of a competitive advantage, deriving purely from incumbency.
And the Coalition chose to keep Telstra as such a behemoth. (Although, as Malcolm Maiden points out, Labor corporatised it, it's the Coalition that made it independent.) John Howard is the one who sold it off without creating a genuinely level playing field. So what we're seeing is a bit like watching Dr Frankenstein being savaged by his own monster. That is, a bit gory, but wonderfully entertaining.
Most amusing of all is that Telstra is encouraging its shareholders to call talkback. Of course, the telco is no stranger to trying to influence opinion via AM radio, and John Laws got into hot regulatory water only last week for neglecting to mention his deal with the company when making no less than 20 positive comments about the privatisation – including during an interview with the PM. Now John Howard's favourite medium is being used against him.
I had the bizarre fortune to see Sol Trujillo at a nightclub on Saturday night. (If it wasn't him, it sure looked more like him than a colleague of mine does) It was 2.30am, and he was dancing up a storm, apparently not bothered by anything. Helen Coonan and John Howard are probably not nearly as relaxed at the prospect of Telstra mixing it out on the political floor.

Shane Warne: still the wrong 'un

Shane Keith Warne is the most successful bowler in the history of cricket, with an astonishing 708 Test wickets. But while Muttiah Muralitharan is closing in on his record, Warne's place in the annals of sporting legend remains assured. Because no other sportsman can touch his record when it comes to scandals.

The great man is still playing for Hampshire, of course. And still playing around, of course. And as with the vintage Warney scandals of yore, this latest instance is magnificently foolish. It doesn't quite plumb the moronic depths of following his mother's advice to take a diuretic so he'd look slimmer in front of the cameras, but replying to his ex-wife with a text message intended for his new paramour was truly special.
Warne now says he didn't cheat on Simone, and that they split in August. He is reported as rather bitterly calling it her "latest paid factually incorrect interview with New Idea". I'm not sure who to believe – Warney has strayed so many times before, but then again, so has New Idea.
Still, he doesn't deny accidentally sending the text message to Simone, just that they weren't together at the time. If his story is correct, she seems to be the one lacking class on this occasion, telling all to New Idea before the kids even knew. But that shouldn't take away from the sheer brilliance of Warne's apparent slip of the text message. Sending an ex a message meant for your current flame is about as bad an SMS gaffe as you can get.
Honestly, if you were Shane Warne, would you trust yourself to even send mobile phone text messages at all after getting caught out so many times before? With the nurse, and that exotic dancer, the South African woman, and, , and, and, and presumably an endless number of others.
I'm not entirely sure whether Shane Warne is a sex addict, or merely a text addict. But his latest salacious cellphone saga should be a cautionary tale for us all. Mobile phones are deadly. Everyone always assumes that they're 100% private, but of course they aren't. Your own handset isn't, let alone the person you think you're texting. I've heard so many stories of jealous partners going through their messages. Really, why people don't delete "special" messages when they arrive is beyond me, and you can password-lock your phone. But still, people don't. And still, people get caught.
Alternatively – and here's a way-out suggestion – there's always fidelity. Just a thought.
It's not just mobiles, of course, although those relatively simple devices seem to have Warney constantly flummoxed. Privacy is easily compromised with most of our oh-so-convenient modern communications devices. Many of my friends spend all day tapping away on Gmail and use the built-in chat client to swap gossip, but it's incredibly easy to leave the computer logged in. And thanks to Google's excellent search capabilities, a passer-by (or your girl/boyfriend) can easily index every bitchy little comment you've made about them. It's a recipe for disaster.
Similarly, instant messaging clients like MSN and Skype tend to automatically log themselves in, and keep a record of every conversation. This stuff can be lethal. Not only can your colleagues, flatmates, lovers or anyone else find them, but probably the CIA is monitoring them all as well. Try to avoid using phrases like "jihad", "rain fire" and "infidel scum", even in jest.
I've come up with some easy ways around these problems, though. There's a handy off-the-record chat function in Gmail which prevents either party from saving the chats... or if it really freaks you out, I suggest adopting my solution, which is the diametrical opposite to Warney's approach. If you simply have an incredibly boring personal life, there will be no salacious messages for anyone to find.
It gets worse, though, as Paris Hilton found when someone hacked her mobile phone. With computers and cameras increasingly having built-in cameras now, the chances for major inadvertent embarrassment are greater than ever. I'm astonished that we haven't been inundated with more footage of Warney unwittingly exercising his flipper.
I don't feel the least bit sorry for him, of course, because it's now abundantly clear that there is simply no scandal that can make him give away his mobile phone. I assume we'll still be reading about him sending lewd holo-messages in years to come, when his cricket career is a distant memory, and all the kids are only interested in the Ten10 form of the game.
As for Simone, surely nothing can be less surprising than the news that Shane might have been entertaining other lady friends, especially if he was actually single at the time. As those perpetually unfunny cricket banners used to quip, surely she'd been adequately Warned.
And so should we all be. Because just as the onfield career of one S.K. Warne showed the sublime potential of legspin bowling to a new generation, his off-field antics have amply demonstrated that a text message conversation can be even more incriminating than a chat about the weather with a subcontinental bookmaker.

A column about music videos

I have reached the age when I no longer understand popular music. I have always been a huge music fan, and am still buying CDs and trawling the internet obsessively to find new artists, but I have finally reached the point of total disconnection from the charts I used to collect from the record shops each week as a teenager.

A quick trawl through this week’s list only confirms this. The #1 song is Sean Kingston’s ‘Beautiful Girls’. Not only have I never heard the track, but I’ve never even heard of Kingston. There’s a new Kanye West song at #4 that I know – not only because I like West, but also because Daft Punk, who he samples, is more from my era. Further down the list, there are artists I’ve heard of, like P!nk (whose spelling seems to be more pretentious these days), the Foo Fighters and Ben Lee, but I don’t know any of their new songs. I could hum the songs by Avril Lavigne (I can’t believe that awful ‘Girlfriend’ is still in the charts – or even that it ever was), Sneaky Sound System, Justin Timberlake and Silverchair, but honestly, that’s about it. For a 30-year-old, that’s a truly pathetic effort.

This all came to a head recently in a creative meeting for the tv show I work on (The Chaser). One of the team pitched a sketch based on parodying what he said was one of the year’s biggest dance songs, a little ditty called ‘Destination Calabria’ by Alex Gaudino which is currently at #14 on the ARIA chart. And it would be fair to say that of the other five members of the team, not a single one of us had heard of it.

Not only have we never heard of it, but our team – which is supposed to be an edgy comedy collective, with no barriers and all that kind of rubbish – has universally agreed that it is one of the worst songs we’ve ever heard, and that we’ll never understand kids these days, and other fogeyish statements. Not that we are completely ancient, mind you – we are in our early 30s, and by Triple J announcer standards, that makes us practically children.

And I’ll defend my negative position, frankly. It sound like 90s retro with what little was good about the dance music of that era stripped away from it. The producer has made millions, I assume, merely by splicing a dull Crystal Waters track, ‘Destination Unknown’, with a synthesised saxophone riff from a song called ‘Calabria’. It sounds like that Guru Josh song ‘Infinity’, only if he was demoted to Acolyte Josh.

The sketch was intended to parody the ridiculous explicitness of the video clip, which features raunchy close-ups of bikini-clad models and their saxophones. (At this point, I bet more than one reader is saying “Oh, that song” to themselves.) The close-ups go far beyond gratuitous, to the point where the viewers of FHM TV voted it the sexiest video clip ever. And hey, they’d know.

My ignorance of “what the kids are listening to” has plenty of upside, like my good fortune to have missed virtually all of the career of Akon. But it still concerns me. So I have vowed to make sure I watch the chart shows every month or so. Even though I genuinely fear that I’ll hate virtually everything on them. But it’ll be worth it. I need to know that when a 19-year-old says they really love what Fergie’s done lately, they’re not talking about another toe-sucking episode.

Of course, I won’t keep it up. My definition of “hot new music” will continue to be whatever the artists I liked when I was 20, like Beck, have done lately. I will make the odd, token effort to expand my horizons, like the peculiar day my father came home with an Usher CD. But for the most part, it’s already game over for my knowledge of new music. Or, as Alex Gaudino might put it by means of a shamelessly misappropriated sample, I’m on my way to ‘Destination Uninformed’.

A column about APEC #2

When you were a kid, and one of your parents’ bosses came over for dinner, it was always a nightmare. Mum and dad spent days sprucing the place up, and fussing over details like which was the best set of china, and whether the boss’ wife ate fish.

As for the children, our behaviour was expected to be impractically exemplary, and even the smallest of infractions attracted massive, and quite disproportionate, retaliation. Even leaving a toy on the kitchen table two days before the big event would be enough to get you sent to your room immediately.

And what’s more, you were distinctly unwelcome at your parents’ function. A brief appearance was mandatory, where you would politely greet the guests, but then you were to retire to your room and make absolutely no noise whatsoever. If you indulged in a little attention-seeking behaviour that made one of them come upstairs, painful retaliation was practically guaranteed.

Well, that’s what APEC was like. John Howard wanted to impress the big boys, so we all had to be on our best behaviour. The police were charged with ensuring that the public were not seen and not heard, and woe betide anyone who wanted to bang some pots and pans together – or perhaps squirt a little tomato sauce around – while we had company.

The security made the Olympic arrangements look like a Little Athletics meeting. And sure, when you have the leaders of the three most powerful countries in the world in town, and two of them have been directly targeted by terrorists over Iraq and Chechnya, you’re going to need some kind of security presence.

But it was a mistake to transform our city into a ghost town with all of the endless barricades and dour, tense police. It was a far cry from the party atmosphere of Sydney 2000, when our visitors would have actually felt welcome. And whereas the Olympics concluded with a wonderful fireworks display that gave everyone a chance to mark the end of a previous period of inconvenience, we were told in no uncertain terms not to come to the APEC ones. The Government even gave us a treat to bribe us to stay away, in the form of a public holiday.

I’m sure it was all very efficient, but if we were looking to give our guests a taste of Sydney, we failed. Because while the leaders may have broken bread at the Opera House, and sent their partners off to Icebergs for swanky drinkies, the city that the region’s leaders sped through in their heavily protected convoys wasn’t the city we know and love. The public were kept at arm’s length, not encouraged to come and say hello. It was the artificial Sydney of the Matrix trilogy, not the open, friendly place we see on New Year’s Eve. And it left a sour taste in the mouth.

And what was it all for, exactly? Photo opportunities with Driza-Bones, and a few scant political achievements. John Howard cited the “Sydney Declaration” on climate change as the greatest achievement, but all that meant is that while Kyoto’s name is now associated with efforts to control global warming, Sydney’s will be synonymous with token attempts to brush it under the carpet. Getting the leaders to commit to non-binding “aspirational” targets is about as useful as when your parents’ dinner guests used to ask you what you’d like to be when you grew up. It’s cute, but ultimately meaningless.

Oh, and Australia scored two pandas out of it. But for Adelaide Zoo. Come on – we had to put up with all of that hassle, and South Australia gets the cute bears?

When your parents’ bosses come to dinner, the real justification is that mum and dad will be able to suck up, and perhaps advance their careers. Well, John Howard dropped in the polls on the last day of the meeting, and it seems he’s about to be fired by his real bosses, the people APEC kept away. So his big show didn’t work even on that level.

It’s appropriate that APEC be held in Australia’s major city, and a bit of inconvenience is fine. But if the people who are supposed to be our representatives are so desperately keen to keep us all away from our own home town, then I’d rather ma and pa Howard had taken their guests out somewhere else instead of inviting them home for a meal.

Sydney's top 10 APEC sights

While you're here for the APEC summit, why not enjoy some sightseeing at some of Sydney's world-famous tourist attractions? This top 10 list has been updated to take account of the special conditions prevailing during the conference.

1. Sydney Harbour and the Opera House
Sydney's harbour is world famous, and its legendary Opera House is regularly named as one of the most beautiful buildings in the world. Unfortunately, during APEC, you may not visit the building, or approach it, or travel on the harbour, or even look at the harbour because of the security barriers around most of the major waterside vantage points. But postcards are readily available during your stay and, trust us, it's all very beautiful.
2. Taronga Zoo
All of the best animals have been moved to Garden Island for the private enjoyment of world leaders, but Taronga Zoo still boasts some state-of-the-art empty cages.
3. Great Wall Of Sydney
Scotland has Hadrian's Wall, China its Great Wall, and now Sydney has a massive wall around much of the city. Our Great Wall may not be visible from space (but then again nor is the Chinese one, despite the urban myth) but it's certainly an eyesore in most of the city. Like the Great Wall Of China, you can walk along sections of it. But unlike the Great Wall, if you do so, you will be arrested, or possibly shot.
4. Historic Parramatta
During the conference, NSW Police are running free courtesy buses to this historic centre, located by the picturesque Parramatta River. Under the special APEC legislation, those arrested in the APEC Zone will be transported to Parramatta for charging. Those planning on availing themselves of this convenient service should note that, because of the bars over the windows, views from the buses will be limited. Ditto the cells.
5. Wet 'n' Wild water cannon
Forget the Manly Waterworks. During APEC, water-time fun has come to the heart of the city! A quick blast from the police's high-powered water cannon will have you drenched in moments. Particularly recommended for visiting protesters who haven't washed in months.
6. The Running Of The Motorcades
In Pamplona, tourists run down cobbled streets in front of enraged bulls. But in Sydney this week, feral protesters will run in front of presidential motorcades in a pointless attempt to disrupt them. It's likely to be bloodier than any Running Of The Bulls.
7. Little Baghdad
Sydney is known for its many colourful ethnic neighbourhoods, which bring a taste of their home country to create a rich multicultural patchwork. During the meeting, Sydneysiders will have a chance to sample Baghdad's renowned Green Zone via the intense security of the APEC Zone, which will protect those inside from the indignity of any contact with ordinary people in the country they're visiting.
8. Street racing
Sydney's many hoons love speeding around the city's renowned street racing circuits, such as the Hickson Road area. During APEC, a single circuit can take hours thanks to the frequent traffic interruptions! You've never had a race that lasted this long.
9. Bondi Beach
The famous beach is also known for its high concentration of intoxicated tourists, especially on the Sunday of the conference when Janette Howard hosts her counterparts at Bondi Icebergs for an afternoon on the pink champagne.
10. Rifle range
It's one big gun fair for shooting aficionados during APEC, with some of the latest paramilitary equipment being deployed on rooftops around the city. And, during the meeting, Sydney is being converted into the world's largest sniper rifle range. Note that gun enthusiasts should not attempt to purchase any of the weapons on display, or attempt to trade any of their own firearms with those on official duty, lest they themselves are used for target practice.

Putting the 'e' in Joey

So, Andrew Johns – sorry, Andrew 'Joey' Johns – was busted with ecstacy. And at a party, what's more – not in a desperate attempt to enjoy watching a Newcastle Knights match, which would have been more understandable. No – his defence was that someone had put it in his pocket. It's amazing how often drugs seem to mysteriously appear when high-profile people are out partying. Don't tell me that Michelle Leslie's mysterious friend "Mia" has been up to her old tricks again?

These are embarrassing headlines for a man who admits he's a role model for kids, but hardly unusual. This year it seems more footballers have hit the headlines for drug incidents than for their play, especially out on the wild, wild West Coast.
Now, I'm not about to pass judgement on whether it was Joey's ecstacy, or he'd taken it, or anything like that. Call me a shameless libertine, but I'm not particularly bothered by the revelation that someone who has retired from a sport might care to indulge in – or at least be caught with – a recreational drug. I am led to believe people like them. Hence the market. Hence today's statistic that cocaine use – or at least prosecutions – are up 70%. In fact, the coke market's looking a lot healthier than the stock market. Talk about an 80s revival.
Casual drug use is commonplace, and it would be deeply hypocritical for many in the media to be up in arms about it. Almost as hypocritical, in fact, as if someone who's opposed gay marriage and hounded Bill Clinton over Monica Lewinsky pleaded guilty to soliciting gay sex in a public toilet.
The interesting question, though, is what we do about the supposed drug scourge. In Joey's case, it's been taken care of quickly, efficiently and sensibly. He got an official warning, a black mark, but no further consequences. That seems an extremely mature approach from the UK justice system. A slap on the wrist – and an embarrassing spectacle in the case of someone high-profile – and the promise of more severe consequences next time. He'll learn from it, and probably be more careful next time. And that's pretty much all that has to be said.
Far more serious than Joey's situation is the furore over Channel Seven's outing of players based on obtaining their medical records. The AFL has introduced a three-strikes policy that keeps positive tests for recreational (that is, non-performance-enhancing) initially confidential. It's controversial, but it shouldn't be. Warning the player is a far better approach than humiliating them. Young players are often thrust into a world of limitless hedonism by their celebrity and money, and can't always handle it. The AFL's approach lets them get the counselling they need to get past it.
I've been impressed to see to see how the players have reacted by snubbing Channel Seven. Obviously the network can't be trusted to look after players' welfare, or take the game's interests at heart, so it's only fair to punish them by other means.
And let's face it, if the AFL had banned every single player who had been linked to drugs this year, some clubs might not have been able to field teams.
The fact is that occasional drug use is extremely commonplace, and we need to adjust our attitudes. The AFL has led the way in dealing with the issue (and Johns' punishment has been similarly constructive) and the League should be supported, not undermined by irresponsible tabloid journalists with no regard for privacy or the well-being of those invoved. It is far more sensible to confidentially reprimand people and hope they'll learn their lesson than let loose the sniffer hounds whenever anyone's caught.
UPDATE: I wrote this yesterday, before it was revealed that Johns has, in fact, used ecstasy throughout his playing career. This will damage his reputation irretrievably. But it doesn't change my view about how best to deal with these situations.
Johns says that people at the club knew, which would tend to suggest there was a cover-up. Under the AFL system, where his privacy would have been guaranteed (Channel Seven notwithstanding), the problem could properly have been addressed, and he could have received the counselling he needed; discreetly and constructively.
Life must be difficult sometimes for high-profile sportsmen, and that's all the more reason for dealing with these issues primarily as a health issue, rather than as an opportunity for wowserism.
Johns on retirement day - photo Kitty Hill

The citizenship test's a trivial pursuit

I may have unfairly maligned Kevin Andrews. Sure, he's bungled the Haneef investigation, but the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship has been ever so industrious in the other side of his portfolio. Working together with the Prime Minister, who's long tried to codify Australianness despite the public knocking back that constitution preamble of his, Andrews has finally provided the definitive answer to the complex, loaded question of what it is to be an Australian with a handy booklet. Apparently being Australian is all about mateship and cricket. What a surprise from the Howard Government.

There's much more to the pamphlet than that, though. Thanks to its deliberately uncontroversial tone, much of it reads like a boring guidebook. Of course I don't have a problem with providing information to those arriving in Australia, or seeking to become Australian citizens. And it is true that citizenship involves rights and obligations, such as jury duty, and that the deal needs to be spelled out to those wishing to avail themselves of it.
What's more, to a new arrival (as opposed to those who've been here for years, and would be getting citizenship) some of the information would be genuinely useful, such as which level of government is responsible for what.
But to test people on this stuff, and only give them a passport if they get 60 per cent, is a silly notion, both symbolically and practically. Practically, the impact will be mere inconvenience. What will happen is that migration agents, or someone involved in the lucrative process of helping people settle here, will quickly cobble together a complete copy of the 200 questions and answers, and those taking the test will simply memorise them all, thus passing the test with flying colours. If people are willing to spend years and thousands of dollars getting citizenship, they'll be willing to cram for a test.
This process will also negate the more sinister aspect of the test, which is the attempt to test everyone's level of English. Personally, I don't believe English competence should be necessary for citizenship. Living in Australia without English skills is tough, and the incentives to learn are many - but for migrants in their 40s and 50s (over 60s are exempt) who might find it harder to learn, I really can't see why it's absolutely necessary for them to do so. Generally they will have younger, fluent relatives who can help them cope. If some migrants largely prefer to stay within their communities and converse in their own tongues, then good luck to them. People who aren't in a rush to integrate just don't bother me the way they seem to bother, say, callers to talkback radio. Anyone who's seen Australian expat communities will know that they aren't exactly distinguished by a rush to embrace a new culture and language.
By all means, the Government should offer free classes, and try to encourage everyone to learn English - it's inherently worthwhile - but requiring it seems excessive. A fiftysomething grandparent who arrives here on a family reunion visa should be allowed to become an Australian without having to prove they can answer multiple-choice questions about Phar Lap, especially when passing the test proves precisely nothing.
Does answering questions about mateship show you actually believe in it? Does choosing "Yes" when asked whether Australia believes in religious tolerance actually demonstrate a commitment to it? Of course not. You don't integrate people by lecturing them. Values are transmitted by community contact, not by government handouts.
The already infamous passage on the mystical reverence we have for mateship will be particularly ironic to those who've come as asylum seekers. Sure, "mates can be complete strangers", as the book puts it, but it so rarely works out that way.
The sample questions reveal just how banal and pointless the exercise is. They read like a particularly dull game of Trivial Pursuit. Honestly, who cares when our Federation happened, or what our floral emblem is? Knowing these factoids have absolutely no bearing on whether someone has integrated into our community, or can make a contribution to our society, or is committed to being Australian.
The whole process smacks of that particularly Howardian nationalism, which always seems to smack of trite self-congratulation tinged with insecurity. We are special, the book seems to plead. We are harmonious, aren't we? We love sport, and the ANZACs. That's really great. Weary Dunlop was a top bloke. "I am Australian" is an important national song. Yay. The brochure's as cringe-inducing as a Telstra ad, or the Bicentenary.
The project is an attempt at social engineering that would be sinister if it wasn't superficial. Of course our values are important, but this quiz simply does them a disservice. If we want new Australians to understand the importance of the "fair go", we should try giving them one instead of bullying them into reading about it. Really, it's just too ironic that Australia now intends to exclude people from joining it if they can't digest a pamphlet about how welcoming it is. As for Andrews, he should spend less time making migrants answer trivial questions about Simpson's donkey and more time answering important questions about our treatment of Mohamed Haneef.

A column about Wikipedia

I’ve been fascinated to read that John Howard’s ministerial staff have been caught modifying entries on Wikipedia, the internet encyclopedia that anyone can edit. They were caught out by a new site called Wikiscanner site, which found that on June 28, someone from the Prime Minister’s Department modified Peter Costello’s entry to remove a reference to his nickname, “Captain Smirk”, which was very surprising, and not just because this seems improper behaviour for a public servant. I’d have thought someone working for John Howard would have wanted to add insulting material to Costello’s Wikipedia entry, not delete it.

But that’s not the most shocking thing about this news. Given John Howard’s general level of technological literacy, I’m surprised anyone in his office has heard of Wikipedia at all.

Some of the modifications were more overtly political, such as the softening of claims that the mandatory detention regime helped Howard win the 2001 election. These are the moments when Wikipedia can uncomfortably resemble George Orwell’s Ministry of Truth, where the past is constantly being rewritten to suit the political purposes of the present. But fortunately, Wikipedia is truly democratic, and for every one government drone trying to spin their employers’ history, there are dozens of other committed users who can reverse the damage.

One of the best things about the encyclopedia is that it keeps a record of everything, so you can tell exactly what was done. At which point I should mention, in the interests of bipartisanship, that some of Morris Iemma’s ministerial staff have done the same thing, deleting the mention of an incident where he called the CEO of the Cross-City Tunnel a f***wit on a microphone which had accidentally been left on. I’m surprised his flunkies bothered to do this – surely the comment would only have endeared him to voters?

Now the comment is intact, with a reference to the attempt to delete it – which, of course, makes him look even worse.

More amusing, though, were some of the ways the staff found to waste time at work. One tried to diss the Sydney Roosters by claiming that they "base their pride on things such as stealing players from other clubs and calling them their own, and cheating the NRL salary cap.

Thanks to Wikiscanner, we can look forward to many an egomaniac being caught out modifying their biographies to present themselves in a more favourable light. And it’ll be fantastic entertainment. Can you imagine, for instance, how many times Kevin Rudd must have changed his page? Or Kyle Sandilands? Stay tuned for more amusing revelations.

Th I myself (cough, cough) have been affected by Wikipedia vandalism. Yes, I am in possession of perhaps the briefest and dullest entry of the 100,000+ on the site. Which might suggest to some that my fame isn’t exactly considerable. Whereas I choose to believe that my legions fans are so devoted that they’d rather consult a more reliable source.

The only interesting thing that has ever happened to my Wikipedia entry was on 16 May this year, though, when someone actually bothered to vandalise it. Here’s what they inserted:

His childhood was particularly difficult. Born in 1937, Dom was born genetically female. At the young age of 11, he decided that he wanted to be male, and so had his name changed via deed poll from "Dominique Samantha" to "Dominic Sebastian". He was ostracised from his peers, and never attended high school as a result. After many years (largely spent goat-herding in Mongolia), he underwent sex-change surgery in 1984.

Mongolian goat-herding! Yep, pretty wacky stuff. But in all honestly, I’ve never been so flattered as when someone took five minutes out of their day to vandalise my page. I had expected that no-one would even notice, but amazingly, some other Wikipedian had reversed the edit a mere four hours later. And I expect no-one but me has looked at the page since.

Which reminds me – I must make a few edits. If you by any chance visit the page and see mentions of my “hilariously devastating wit” and “remarkable sexual prowess”, let them be, would you? Go vandalise John Howard’s page instead.