I’m fairly sure I’ve said it before, but for anyone who had more interesting things to read that day, I’ll say it again. I’m a right wing (small L) liberal. I don’t like the govern-by-committee, let’s mouth-platitudes-at-the-vocal-minorities-without-actually-doing-anything-to-help-them, suspicious-of-small-business-and-overawed-by-big-business, all-my-friends-are-teachers-or-public-servants smugness of the left. It makes me itchy and cross.

The ALP work best in opposition. They can stand up for the people who are supposed to be their constituency and act as a brake on the right-wing collusion with the big end of town. You can’t govern from the moral high ground, but it is a good place to monitor the actions of those who are.

Back in the early days of Howard, this wasn’t so much a problem. 10 years ago he had rock solid economic credentials, sensible ideas about how much the government should stay the hell out of most of our lives and managed Australia’s minnow in an ocean position in global affairs with enough gravitas that outsiders would occasionally give a shit about our presence in the world. That’s pretty much all I ask of a Prime Minister.

Then Tampa happened. And Pauline Hanson. And Iraq. And the Pacific Solution. And Work Choices. And climate change. And billions of dollars of vote-buying middle class welfare. Somewhere in all of that he lost me.

Rudd was not a good alternative, but I figured that the coalition needed to be smacked around a little. I hoped that he wouldn’t do too much damage in one, maybe two terms, while the Liberal party cleaned house and got their shit together, then they could come back and run the country properly while the rest of us got on with our lives.

Ok, so maybe it was a little bit of wishful thinking, but really, who saw Tony Abbott coming?

It’s not just his racist redneck policies I object to, it’s his complete absence of economic ability and naughty-child- trying-to-get-out-of-trouble reactions to criticism or complicated questions. His lack of clear thinking and broad understanding of policy make him dangerous as an alternative prime minister.

But, in a two party system, what do you do when both parties are equally unacceptable?

Voting for one of the independents can be risky. They don’t have the resources or the profile to get really well known before they are voted in and, while you could end up with someone of Xenophon’s calibre, you could also end up with a Steve Fielding or Brian Harradine (shudder).

So, what to do in the next election?

I think the only option is to go Greens. It’s risky, the Greens would have no idea what to do with real power if they got it, they’d end up dropping it on its head and giving it an acquired brain injury.

However, if both the major parties lose enough votes to the Greens they will hopefully work out that the middle ground they’re both fighting for has moved. Howard’s battlers are heading off to aged care homes and the marginal seats are employing new migrants and worrying about global warming. Fewer and fewer of them are interested in the reactionary bullshit being served up by the two major parties. A federal election is the only chance we have to smack them around the ears with that unpalatable fact, so pick up your two-by-four and make sure you hit ‘em where it hurts.

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