The year is 2054.
Life isn’t too bad here. I’m 70, about to retire and looking forward to moving to Abbottville.
Nice place by the way – named after Tony Abbott who was the Prime Minister of Australia from 2013 until 2019.
Sneaky bloke got Manly re-named just before Malcolm Turnbull rolled him as leader before the 2019 election.
Ah, Malcolm. He’s 99 this year and still angry he never became Prime Minister.
Almost as angry as me when Penrith lost the 2047 Grand Final to the Eels. I still hate little Mickey Hayne for that final try.
One of these days we’ll win the Phil Gould Cup again, it’s only a matter of time until we re-live the glory days when we won six grand finals straight from 2015 onwards.
Talking of footy, how good are the Blues going? 40 straight series wins, and two games at Laurie Daley Stadium this year – I’m sure we’re going to make it 41.
Anyway, here we are about to face the 2054 Federal Election and I just don’t know who to vote for.
This idea about free health care just seems absurd. I seem to remember back in the day, we had something similar. You could just walk into a doctor, show this thing called a ‘Medicare card’ and walk back out again.
You paid in the long run but it felt like it was free, so it seemed to be a winner.
Personally I’m okay with the $110 fee to see the doctor and I don’t really notice it come out of my account when my good old Doc pops up on my computer screen for our Skype session.
My kids think I’ve lost my marbles when I tell them you used to just rock up at the doctor’s without having to hand over any cash.
Anyway, so here we are going to an election, with the Budget in surplus (that’s something we haven’t seen since Clive Palmer was PM!) and they want to ruin it by providing this healthcare system where you don’t hand over any cash.
Seems like we’re going back to the old days where people just thought you got everything for nothing. What’s next, giving people money just for having a baby or something like that?
Actually, that wouldn’t be the silliest thing we’ve ever done – remember that Tree Bonus we had in the 30’s where we paid people for every tree they planted? Bloody Greens.
If there’s one thing I’ve learned in my 70 years on this planet it’s that history only tells us the real story. We can whinge and moan all we like right now about what our politicians do and don’t do, but it’s only when we’ve come out the other end that we really know the truth.
I can tell you that back in 2014, nobody could have ever imagined that there would be a statue of Joe Hockey outside of Parliament House (we’re all still trying to figure out why he has the cigar in his mouth – does anyone remember that story? We lost so much news history in the great Internet crash of ‘28).
Certainly nobody would have predicted David Bradbury’s comeback to be Prime Minister from 2019 to 2025.
Heck, back then we were obsessed with ‘selfies’ and Facebook. Yes, Facebook. Remember that? I think you can still logon and see your profile if you remember your password.
We laughed and scoffed at previous generations without realising ours was perhaps the worst offender yet.
My point to you all, whenever you may be reading this, is that no matter what your country may be going through at the moment, no matter what the big talking point is, you’ll always come out the other side – with a much better perspective.
Just ask King William – he survived that great Royal scandal in ‘36 after all!
