Julia Gillard makes a rare appearance at number two as she continues her long fight to rid the world of the evil forces of militant unionism started so long ago in the Dollar Sweets case … oh sorry … got a bit confused there. A few hundred school gyms helped her up the list as well.

As punters rush out to get the paperback to put alongside their numbered hardback edition, Australia’s longest serving Treasurer has ended the 18 month tease and left the field to his dear friend from Point Piper, who worked hard to restrain his glee, meanwhile getting perhaps the most tepid public farewell from a longstanding political colleague ever seen from his other dear friend from Wollstonecraft. Love lingers long.

The new chums in the ministry quickly bow out of the list to be replaced by the immediate historical discourse of Tony Abbott, the intervention issues of Jenny Macklin and Martin Ferguson doing some of the PR biff work with the unions.

A fair bit of volume but not many strong opinions either way on the departure of Peter Costello, perhaps reflecting his entire political career, meanwhile despite having the best week of his entire political career, Malcolm Turnbull continues to mainly sail under the radar on talkback.

Rank Politician Talkback
1 Kevin Rudd 497
2 Peter Costello 336
3 Nathan Rees 187
4 Wayne Swan 87
5 Malcolm Turnbull 70

The family continue to offer free scripts to the producers of Underbelly.

Press Radio Television Internet Total INDEX
Des Moran 113 403 396 111 5,061 256

There’s more on the Media Monitors website.