The longer this so-called campaign rolls on the more apt a comment I heard on Radio National that described voting in this election as choosing between the impossible and the insufferable.

There's been plenty of talk but no debate. Talking past each of the parties but no engagement. Neither side is talking ideology or "big picture" about where they want to take Australia.

For me, it's a case of non of the above with the two big parties (neither deserves the term "major" parties).

Yes I know this is cynical. I despair that there is so little on offer from either big party that is inspiring. Both parties exude bitterness, small mindedness and nothing that inspires me that they may actually be able to run a chook raffle in a pub let alone a country.

In sadness
DKit

Jo, your spite-filled article discredits you and the LABOR party.

Obviously you thought that Abbott needed a lift so you poured bile all over LABOR while white-washing Gillard, the one who knifed Rudd.

Jo, vote for Palmer. He's more your type!

On the basis of my ABC radio and TV diet yesterday I'll be voting for Geoff Cousins, Tony Windsor and Tom Watson.

Rusted on Labour supporters are nearly as sour as Tony Windsor. They know they backed total duds and are now frothing at the mouth that the once 'unelectable' Tony has seen off Kevin, Julia and now Kevin. Instead of seeing how incompetent, broken and corrupt their own party has been they claim their is no one worthy to vote for. This despite Abbott likely to receive far more votes than Julia did before joining with the slimy independants and Greens who have done their best to turn our strong economy into a basket case.

Fancy complaining about the way Gillard was treated while running a despicable 4 year character assassination campaign against Tony Abbott - one of the most decent Members of Parliament.

Have none of you Labor supporters got any integrity?

Great question!
Find myself mostly agreeing with DKit.
Vision would include plans to actually roll out rapid rail rather than roll it out as a far distant future prospect with almost every election.
The Chinese Magnetron would probably be the most cost effective. The best place to start would be from Canberra to Sydney.
That would be the most profitable link and provide funds to gradually roll out the rest of the links to both Brisbane and Melbourne, and a few stops in between; meaning, it could be done off budget.
The current top speed of the magnetron is 900klms PH, and the projected safe top speed is around 1300klms PH.
Or if you will, Melbourne city central to Sydney central in under an hour! Ditto Brisbane> Sydney!
Vision would also include an inland canal, that would open up a vast and empty inland, and make it productive, as well as providing the most energy efficient, cost effective link, with Asian trading partners; via, very rapid turn-around, roll on roll off ferries and double decker, rapid rail freight links?
Plan to vote Katter in the lower house and the Palmer party in the Senate.
Plan to place the greens last, given they would likely oppose almost anything that would improve our economic performance and growth, all while paying lip service to our prospects of actually becoming a future food bowl for Asia.
Their real goal seems to be re-afforested farmland and all the irrigation dams destroyed; and therefore, our children reduced to a nation of spit lickle waiters and boot polishers? A recipe for a banana republic if ever there was one!
Rhrosty.

It is obvious whom we should vote for now.

Pauline

Vote for anyone but the Greens, Labor or the Liberal Party. Barnaby Joyce is the only one in the Nationals worth his salt.

Hi Jo,
No more lies and wishful thinking !

It only takes 10-15 minutes every 3 years ,to use the preferential system and number on the Senate ballot paper the 110 candidates below the line .
Not a big ask compared to having half one's face or testicles blown-off in Afghanistan.

By doing this , you can send the only message to the major parties, that they respect .

Every major problem we face from housing, university funding, child neglect, jails, environment, manufacturing collapse, casualization of the workforce, selling public assets, massive public/private borrowings, traffic chaos, growing poverty, social security blow-outs.....(.very happy to dialogue the back stories on all this)...is made catastrophically worse by one design blunder..................POPULATION GROWTH .

By preferencing the STABLE POPULATION PARTY first, then your major party second ( after that, just do the numbering because it won't matter ), we have a chance to turn the place around.

The positive message is that we have designed the mess in, so we can design it out .

Very best Jo ,

Ralph

Rudd and Labor have sunk into a mire of lies and deceipt. They have utterly destroyed thenselves. We are watching the death throes of labor. It is all so terribky sad.

Jo if you value your future you woukd abandon labor and their cohorts and vote Liberal.

Abbott a "decent member" of parliament?

Abbott's a morally & intellectually bankrupt throwback - a desperate, hysteria-mongering, habitually dishonest, arrogant megalomaniac.

Charging the taxpayer for all his "charity" stunts and posing for firefighter photo-ops during a bushfire and then going home as soon as the cameras leave doesn't sound very decent to me.

Neither does conspiring with media representatives and others to manufacture false allegations against others for a quick political gain.

Rudd's not much better but to claim that Abbott is somehow different is totally without foundation and as soon as he slips away from his media minders' tight leash, more will become apparent.

I'm with Wobbles and Jo
runner, and other Abbott fans, forget that Abbott would have done anything during the negotiating period in 2010 to form a governing coalition. Abbott's irresponsible attitude turned Oakeshott and Windsor toward Julia Gillard.

Abbott in government will show his true colours which are not attractive.

The measures Gillard put in place will (in history) show that she was one of the most competent people to have ever filled the PM position (provided Abbott and the extreme right don't get a chance to undo the measures before they become effective).

Anyone who has studied the efforts of Howard and Costello know that that pair made a mess of things. They made home owners feel wealthy at the expense of the homeowners children and grandchildren.

An understanding of the situation of a currency issuing government shows that such a government is nothing like a state government or a small business, or even an individual. Hockey and Robb either don't understand and are incompetent in economic matters or they know and are duplicitous.

While there is 13% underemployment the Federal Government should be creating work to built needed, beneficial, assets.

Actually Rudd was booted out because he didn't grovel enough to Israel. That is well documented in Wikileaks cables.

The really sad thing is that there shouldn't be a contest in the first place. Labor is useless so the only other alternative is the Coalition which has proven to be way above Labor so far as competence ids concerned.
The only reason why there is a contest is because the Lefties are diverting attention from the Coalition to Abbott as if that were some significant point which it is not. Abbott is PM material, Rudd has proven he is not. The Coalition has a proven track record whilst Labor has a proven record of failure.
If you want to totally ruin our future then vote Labor. If you want to get back to a reasonable situation then vote Coalition. It's as simple as that.