GIVEN Mark Latham’s confessions to a growing calmness the longer he’s outside politics, we shouldn’t be surprised at his fresh assessment of The Latham Diaries, as shared on Sky News with Paul Murray yesterday: “I was struck by the intensity of it.”
WE’VE seen more books launched by Malcolm Turnbull than any other individual; perhaps we need to get out more.
AFTER a stint in the naughty corner, punchy Mark Latham can be excused for thinking he’s been rehabilitated.
IT was an unexpected delight to find John Pilger in Sydney’s Martin Place yesterday, addressing a boutique crowd deploring Western military involvement in Libya.
K. D. LANG wants to talk to our prime minister; something about Julia Gillard being openly atheist, living with partner Tim Mathieson in the Lodge, yet citing the Bible and a traditional upbringing as reasons to reject gay marriage doesn’t quite add up, especially to one of the world’s most high-profile lesbians.
ONCE upon a time, Australians in a procreative frame of mind could keep the voice of Peter Costello somewhere in the backs of their minds, exhorting couples to crank out three babies apiece: one for mum, one for dad, and one for the nation.
USING the most semi-diplomatic language available, 2CC Canberra broadcaster Mark Parton put this question to federal Trade Minister Craig Emerson yesterday: “Do you wish, with all respect to the former prime minister, do you wish that Paul Keating would shut the hell up?”
READERS with strong stomachs might have dwelled on photographer Ray Strange’s snap in yesterday’s paper of Julia Gillard and Bob Hawke making a decidedly half-hearted attempt at kissing.
WE know Barnaby Joyce has had the odd hiccup with billions and trillions in the past, but it’s nice to see him attending carefully to what is surely a deliberate running gag.
PREMIER-very-much-elect Barry O’Farrell was on his way to make his victory speech at western Sydney’s Parramatta Leagues Club when he realised one small, crucial detail was missing: his jacket.
JUST when you thought it was looking exciting enough in Queensland’s Liberal National Party, new “interim” leader Jeff Seeney has managed to lift things that crucial bit closer to the truly cutting edge.
YOU don’t need to go far to find the Greens pinned to anywhere on the extremist colour spectrum from red menace to brown shirt.
A SMALL sequel to that outsourced crack about Julia Gillard “looking like a poor man’s Tilda Swinton (Strewth, yesterday).
DOES Lycra lad Tony Abbott ever come off his bike? Not according to Cyclenation.com.au where old hell-on-wheels Tony comes in at No 3 on the top triathletes table.
IT’S a mystery why some people imagine Pauline “I have no intentions of selling my home to a Muslim” Hanson has issues with people of different faiths and race.
WITH more than 800,000 followers, WikiLeaks’ Twitter account was always going to be more than a match for The Monthly’s website.
FOR those who didn’t read this august organ’s letters page yesterday (shame!), NSW Premier Kristina Keneally responded to our colleague Imre Salusinszky’s Raymond Chandler-esque musings on the state election by channelling the noir master herself.
WHETHER it’s just jet lag or a more quotidian form of delirium afflicting us, we’ll never know, but the other night we had the most extraordinary dream in which the following happened: Julia Gillard had mastered the pronunciation of “negotiate”.
SENATOR Ian Macdonald, the federal opposition spokesman for northern and remote Australian, has had a gutful.
TRUTH may be the first casualty of war but it seems that the first victim of an election campaign, in Australia at least, is art.
Original URL: https://www.theaustralian.com.au/commentary/strewth/page/114