How I voted 2010

I voted in Bennelong, using the following thought processes to complete my ballot paper:

• First, who did I hate? Communists, fascists, racists-who-don't-want-to-appear-racist? One Nation fitted that bill so they got no. 11.
• No communists, so the next on my list was the climate septics, polluting the political atmosphere with nonsense so that any proposal for cleaner industry or a functioning economy in an environment under pressure gets pooh-poohed. That fool got number 10.
• There were twoo lots of Christian zealots, Family First and the Fred Nile Failure Squad. I can't remember which got 8 and 9, but that's where I put them.
• By this time I was all negatived out. I was determined to make the majors wait for my vote. So, who's nice? No Democrats ran in Bennelong. The Carers' Alliance were nice, and much overlooked. I have been impressed by the activism of mental health advocates in this campaign so I put them at no. 1.
• I liked Building Australia, so I put them at no. 2.
• I would have put the Greens higher up had I not lived in NSW, where the party is run by communists who are all either either mugs, control freaks or both. I put them at 7.
• Having dealt with everyone I hated, the challenge now was to deal with those who I regarded as stupid rather than actually noxious, so the libertarians (Terje Petersen and the Sex Party) went at 5 and 6 (wish I had the foresight to put them at sixes and sevens).
• This left the majors. I voted for a future where some sort of innovation would be possible and where simple facts about the economy, the environment and refugees were recognised rather than trampled by desperadoes hankering for offices they lost, and who still don't fully appreciate why they lost them. I voted for Maxine McKew (Labor) ahead of John Alexander (Liberal).
• McKew's campaign was non-existent even before her laryngitis. It is an indictment on Labor and on McKew and Hogg that they ran such a non-campaign.
• Alexander deserves credit for putting in the hard yards in the campaign - a bit like Francesca Schiavone's victory at this year's French Open against the better player, alliterative, more fancied but rattled Samantha Stosur. Had McKew matched him she'd be back in. However, if race-based campaigns and demonising asylum-seekers was the political gold that the Liberals and others seem to believe, you can be sure Labor would have done it first: imagine if the Liberal candidate for Bennelong had been portrayed as John Al-Iksandar, playing to that louche image of the man with the all-year suntan. It would have been grossly unfair but it would have served the buggers right. As an MP, Alexander is unlikely to have any real idea of the steady and often unrewarding grind associated with helping constituents, and he'd make bugger-all contribution to policy debates (except, perhaps, sport - and that would consist of telling young fat people to get off their backsides and go play some tennis).

We'll see what happens.