Oppositions need presidential endorsement but, alas, it can't always be a world leader

Alastair Campbell details in his diary Blair's meeting with president of the US Bill Clinton just prior to his election:

APRIL 9. Jonathan called to ask what we wanted Mike McCurry, Clinton's press secretary, to say. I said our media would judge things on the length of the meeting and the way he was treated. April 12: It was time to go but Clinton kept talking, more talking and eventually he got up and carried on talking. Mike said he would say it was a 40-minute meeting. He had been a terrific help. I got a certain satisfaction knowing this time, because the White House had been so helpful, there was no way [the press] could write this as anything but a success.

Opposition Leader Tony Abbott meets Nauru's President Marcus Stephen, in The Weekend Australian on Saturday:

THE Opposition Leader met President Marcus Stephen in Brisbane today and said the centre, set up as part of the Howard government's Pacific solution but closed by Labor, could be reopened immediately. Mr Abbott defended his decision to meet with Mr Stephen, even though he had not been elected as prime minister.

Julia Gillard on ABC1's Insiders program yesterday:

IF I had to make a choice again between supporting Australian jobs, keeping 200,000 in the workforce, keeping them in their homes and their families from being shattered by the kind of devastation that comes with unemployment, I'd make that decision again.

The PM last Thursday in Townsville:

PEOPLE know we made the right judgement calls to support jobs. Yes, not everything went according to plan, but we supported jobs, and look at the contrast with countries overseas: six million jobs lost in the United States, 450,000 jobs created here.

The Australian's inspirational page one headline on Friday:

PARIAH to messiah: he's back

Tony Abbott on Saturday:

JUST six weeks ago Kevin Rudd was so toxic to Labor's cause that he had to be politically assassinated.

Now it seems Julia Gillard is so toxic to Labor's cause that the pariah has become the messiah and Kevin Rudd has to rescue the Prime Minister.

Will the real Brad Orgill stand up? The BER taskforce head talks to Sophie McCarthy:

McCARTHY: If you could choose a mentor from anywhere in the world, who would you choose?

Orgill: I think I would choose Arundhati Roy, author of The God of Small Things.

McCarthy:Why?

Orgill: I think her perspective on life, post-colonialism and her appreciation of things that I'm interested in but don't have as good a perspective on as she does.

Will the real Arundhati Roy stand up? Roy in January 2005:

THE Iraqi resistance is fighting on the front lines of the battle against empire. And therefore that battle is our battle. Before we prescribe how a pristine Iraqi resistance must conduct a secular, feminist, democratic, non-violent battle, we should shore up our end of the resistance by forcing the US government and its allies to withdraw from Iraq.

Fran Kelly with Malcolm Fraser on Radio National's Breakfast program on Friday:

KELLY: In your view, is the Coalition ready for government?

Fraser : No.

Kelly forgets to ask whether the government is fit to govern. Fraser on ABC1's Q&A, May 24:

THE administrative failures [of the Rudd government] are as great, if not greater, than the administrative failures in Gough Whitlam's government. Whether it is delivering houses to indigenous people, or whether it is putting insulation in roofs, or building classrooms for schools, government schools costing several times what it costs private schools, or other things they've sought to administer.

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