Hi Elanor. Am I still allowed to write on this thing? At least, in non-diary form? I guess as we're both, like, students again, it would make sense to start having opinions on things and stuff. But it's been such a long time. The workforce has made me complacent, crushed my spirit, and made me happy with things like twitter, $19 bottles of red wine, and expensive scented candles.

So anyway, I feel the need to express an increasing unease about what's been going on of late. As everything's already been said by everyone on every other medium, this will either sound redundant or over-wrought, but basically I have a real fear that by the end of the year Tony Abbot will rule the country. And then I will have to leave.

I mean, I assume that even horrible bigoted Australians still think he's a bit nuts and not to be trusted with the nation. And even the most conservative types want to preserve their right to have secret abortions, and secret bottom drawer porn. But what scares me is that even people like me, who were always slightly uneasy with Rudd but willing to put up with him in order to make the country ever so slightly better, are disgusted in him. It was a very low bar we set. But actually, maybe that's not so alarming since we'll never vote Coalition, which means he doesn't need to earn our vote, and can focus his energies on trying to solidify the middle ground and alienating everyone in the process... but still. We didn't expect much and it's still turned to shit. Anyway, unease expressed.

On the flip side, the Liberals are hilarious at the moment -- maybe it's because Kerry O'Brien seems so invigorated and terrifying lately (Joe Hockey looked petrified on the 7.30 Report last night, as if he was expecting vivisection). They're acting like a pack of slimy, squabbling young libs (which they were I guess) spinning any kind of shit to win an argument. And I'm not being partisan here. That's just the way it is, which makes me even more uneasy: when they're so obviously lying, why can't Rudd argue the point. Everything's just trapped in this routine of spin being combated with more spin, with no one actually pointing out when stuff isn't actually true, or might be true, but also might be a reasonable non-evil response to things that are highly complex. Anyway, rambling. All of this has been said before, so I may as well go back to twitter.

I also have an opinion on this, which is similarly awful and hilarious.