Clementine, the future belongs to you.

Provided you don't end up like Leigh and Hasbeen, it will be a good future.

Leigh, you could at least do me the respect of reading what I wrote, before asserting that I gave no opinion on the article (its there in black and white - I didnt like the article). I read your post after all. Given that this is called on line opinion, I dont see a problem with discussing the opinions of other posters - this is ultimately where most article discussions turn up. Incidently I used to often agree with your posts, but you have become quite bitter and nasty over the last 6 months or so (yvonne, he used to be quite reasonable, and willing to debate an issue). Making a comment about a generation that should have been smothered at birth is inviting attack, so if you dont like it, dont be inflammatory. And yes, like everyone else, I can lose my patience and get stuck into another poster - I'd find the critisism a lot easier to accept though if it didnt come from someone that was so prone to doing so himself.

TRTL, a good point about free services for all being voted out once the benefiting generation had finished with them! I hadnt thought along those lines - a very interesting point.

I think that Leigh has outdone even Col Rouge in the OLO Victor Meldrew Clone stakes. What a cantankerous old fuddy duddy. And runner's comment is beneath contempt.

Well said sneekepete, CG, yvonne and Mercurius.

Although I'm in my 50s, I found much that I liked in the wonderfully named Clementine's article. I've just spent a few days with my son and his friends, who've all just finished high school and are moving into adulthood. Their attitudes to politics are pretty much as related - in some ways very savvy, but in 'big picture' terms woefully naive and ignorant of reality.

But isn't that the status and role of the youner generation? To challenge and try and change things before inevitably becoming cynical and self-interested. That's what my generation did - we got us out of Vietnam and ultimately consigned the Cold War to history.

Now most of my 'boomer' cohorts are living enormously comfortable lives that directly and indirectly consume disproportionate amounts of food, resources, energy and land. I know this because I'm one of them and I consciously try to live comfortably without leaving an excessive 'footprint'.

Generation Y not only has to pay for our pensions, but they inherit from us a greatly diminished and threatened world in environmental terms. I hope there's lots of Clementines among them.

We baby boomers aren't young enough to know everything.

Inter-generational sniping aside, this article suddenly made me wonder if anyone knows who were the swinging voters who delivered the landslide last Saturday. Was it Gen Y (or Gen Why? as I prefer to call them), or older voters who can remember not only Hawke and Keating but previous Liberal governments which weren't consumed with spite and under which Australia enjoyed a reputation for decency and humanity, or was the swing across the board? Would be very interesting to know.

Countrygirl pretty much said it all pretty well for me, though I don't often see posts of Leigh's I can agree with.
It's more the constant hostility that's evident in posts that I feel the need to react to. I dare say I fall in his category of people supposedly limiting his free speech, but the truth is mate, nobody's stopping you from posting.

They're just holding you to account when you say things like 'generation Y should have been smothered at birth.'

How the hell are these people supposed to react to that Leigh? Judging by your earlier post, if that was said about you, you'd go into conniptions and say you're being victimised.
Feel free to express your opinion Leigh. Learn to deal with it when other people criticise. When your opinions are so negative on so many things, there's going to be plenty of criticism. This is when debating comes into play, though I note in earlier threads you say you don't want to debate, you just want to express your opinions.

Tough. There's nothing wrong with asking people to back their opinions. I know I'm happy to back what I say with reasons.

On the article: I tend to think Clementine is being a bit naive, and that Rudd was being rather patronising, especially in his media relations. If I'd heard 'working families' 'education revolution' 'housing crisis' or 'fair go' one more time I think I may have snapped.

She's right insofar as Howard didn't present a viable alternative, and many have been waiting for Howard to be removed, so the old fashioned insular conservatism doesn't get a look in.

Another article made the point that the Howard Haters aren't really the ones who decided the election however - which is true, if that were the case Latham would have won.
Truth is, Rudd was pretty much neutral, and is locked into most of Howard's economic policy anyway, so the exercise was more about people voting Howard out because he's disappointed them, while maintaining the status quo.