Finding Soho

Some thoughts on the just-concluded Australian federal election. On episode after episode of Q&A before the election, participants asked why the media's political coverage seemed more engrossed with personality than with policy. In fact, even in the first episode of Q&A after the election a member of the audience asked rhetorically why the minor parties elected to the Senate were expected to have any serious policy platforms when the major parties lacked the same. This was a motif that ran through a lot of the (center-left) media's coverage. Several newspaper commentators remarked in the course of the election campaign that the major parties had turned it into a presidential contest. It was claimed that personality had taken precedence over policy. Seen in conjunction with the general 'despondency' and 'lack of interest' that purportedly characterized voter sentiment, these imputations, though justified, confused me quite a bit. I found it hard to und