Moving forward or going forward?

Jim Hart writes: Re. “Julia might be ‘going forward’, but East Timor is standing firm” (yesterday, item 2) Julia, I think I need some clarification if I have to sit through this election campaign with you. First up, what’s the message — are we moving forward or going forward? I thought you said we are moving but then I heard we are going. If you must recycle a number plate motto as your campaign rhetoric at least do it with some consistency.

And either way, how can you talk about forward when you are rushing back to the Howard years with your gunboat approach to the boat arrivals? If some of your marginal constituents are deluded about a supposed threat to their way of life then how about moving them forward into reality instead of pandering to their backwardness.

Then there’s the rear-vision reminiscences about your old school tie, not to mention your hard-working parents (hell, why not call them battlers?) and how they wouldn’t like to see anyone get “special privileges”. Some privilege. It all sounds pretty un-forward to me, like whistling up the good old Aussie dog in the manger — the one who would rather say no to 100 deserving people in case one got a bit more.

Finally, Julia, there you go launching the latest hagiography of Bob Hawke, your role-model PM. You studied him well because in the next breath you borrow one of Bob’s great lines from the ’80s when you announce that no Aussie child will go without a school uniform. Bob snuggled up to Alan Bond; you do it with miners. How very forward of you.

It took at least a year before Kevin’s glitter started to look a bit tarnished, but for you Julia I reckon it’s a month, tops. I’m really not ready to see Tony Abbott as PM but if you keep pissing off voters like me you could be sitting across from a Liberal-Green coalition before winter’s out.

Clairvoyant calamari

Justin Templer writes: Re. comments (yesterday). Sam Varghese writes that you are triumphalist, deluded, gullible and unprofessional in your coverage of Paul the clairvoyant calamari, the World Cup winner-predicting octopus.  He’s probably correct, but it is difficult to agree with his suggestion that Paul might know who killed JFK — there were no octoped sightings on the grassy knoll.

Kevin tells us the election date …

Robert from the Adelaide Hills writes: The federal election WILL be in August.

My koala Kevin (named after the drink, not Rudd) hangs out up my gum tree with three limbs. I have labelled these limbs AUGT, SEPT and OCTY (short for a German friend) and for the past four days Kev– as I like to cooee to him — has always climbed the AUG limb and stayed there.

So you heard it first from Kev: an August federal election.