Was thinking about the post-election post I made and how it sounded like I don't mind the Liberals. But the fact is, I do. And somehow I'm not surprised they've all got the knives out for J-Ho for not retiring soon enough or whatever else. And saying Work Choices should be dumped - why not a hint of that just a wee bit earlier?

Part of me would love to see Tony Abbott as the new leader of the Libs, simply because it'd be like an extra gift that just keeps on giving to the Labor party - perhaps even somehow Lathamesque.

I'm glad to see the Liberals out of power. As with every political party, there was the good. But there was also the bad. And I think there was a lot of the bad displayed in the final years. The arrogance, the dog whistling and wedge politics, treatment of refugees and the vulnerable in our society, etc. Enough people had gotten fed up with this all, and although the economy is strong enough, perhaps people are moving back thinking governments need to involve ethics somewhere. Or something like that. Or even just to have a "fresh" government. Or perhaps it's just because enough "battlers" were impacted by Work Choices and not enough by all the pork being thrown around.

Although there are still a lot of Howard Huggers out there (as demonstrated by some of the letters to editors in newspapers around the country that tell us we know not what we have wrought, followed, presumably, by "I'm going to my room!" and a full hour's worth of sulking).

But contrary to the warnings of what would happen if we voted Labor, the world hasn't ended, interest rates haven't suddenly shot up to 30%, we've not all been packed off to the gulags or anything like that. No-one would be silly enough to suggest the election of Rudd signifies some variety of glorious new dawn for Australia, really - it's politics and they're all politicians in the end. But hopefully it'll help to restore some of the balance that has been lacking in Australian politics.

I guess in some respects, I don't see myself as being committed to voting for any particular party for life or something (that said, I love my Greens). But I'll vote for whichever one will hopefully be doing the right thing for the country in terms of policies and practice, as idealistic and naive as that sounds. Governments need to change on a fairly regular basis because of the whole power corrupting thing. Change is needed for balance, and in some ways, is kind of part of the flow of things.