My apologies to readers who a) don't live in New South Wales or b) do live in NSW but, like most of us, don't give a fuck about the State Government. But it's hard to ignore the fact that there's an election at the end of the week. And were I to ignore it, I'd be derelict in my duties of rampantly poking fun at the hapless collection of goo-stains that inhabit the hallowed halls of parliament in Australia's Premier State^TM. So... here goes.

Aside from a smattering of hideous commercials (including a series that feature Liberal Party member and Opposition Leader Peter Debnam with his mouth gaping open like the entrance to the Lane Cove Tunnel - just beautiful...) there's been three-eighths of five-eighths of fuck all coverage of the upcoming election.

Of course, Morris Iemma and Peter Debnam have been out kissing hands and shaking babies in shopping malls all over the state. It stands to reason - in between taking miniscule sips of recycled piss to ‘prove it's safe and doesn't at all contain viruses like Hepatitis oh no... ho ho ho... (are you sure?)' and banging on about solving the water crisis, the lack of policy statements from both sides speaks volumes. Oh, they're all promising to spend massive sums of money on fixing shit up, but let's be honest here - no amount of money will fix the state's schools, hospitals will always be overrun by hypochondriacs.

But the ads we've seen so far have been very, very odd. On one side, we have Morris Iemma attacking Debnam's lack of experience, and the suggestion that Sailor Pete has all the business acumen of a squeegee-toting derelict at the lights – on a rainy day. According to Labor, Debnam was a director of a prawn farm that went broke. (When I first heard the ad, I was in the other room with a tap running, and heard the statement as ‘Porn Farm'. Much hilarity ensued. The end.)

On the other side, we've heard very little about Iemma, with the Opposition choosing the interesting tactic of playing the balls, and not the man. To wit: picking on three of the government's serial under-performers (who, coincidentally, are all from an Italian background. RACISM! RACISM! Etc) rather than targeting the Premier. A bold tactic? No... not really. Although I won't be sad when Tripodi's last day in office rolls round. Between allegedly sexually assaulting people in his office and allegedly stitching up land deals for his cronies, his ‘career' in politics hasn't exactly been a beacon for Young People Of Today to follow. Unless they want to be rapists and slumlords.

But at the end of the day, the explanation as to why the spending on this election from both sides of the policy plunge has been so small is simple: Labor's gonna shit it in. In fact, I'll go out on a limb here and say that Morris Iemma could, very easily, migrate to New Zealand and still win it. With an increased majority. In fact... Morris Iemma could turn up in the middle of Macquarie St, dressed in a bear suit and armed with a high-powered rifle (as is his constitutional right in the United States: the Fourth amendment clearly states that US Citizens have the right to Keep and Arm Bears. I think) AND STILL he would poll better than Debnam.

Iemma could die tomorrow and still win.

Never mind that he's as suspect as a four-cent-piece. And never mind the fact that he looks like he's had a stroke. And never mind that he was a Minister in an increasingly shoddy government that took the genius of Bob Carr (hur hur hur) to realise when it was time to abandon ship.

The man's got WINNER written all over him at the moment. But it's only because of the shithouse Opposition that he's got any chance at all.

I mean, really... Debnam's last public statement for the weekend saw him standing behind a bare lectern, thumping the tub about something or other (I tuned out. My boredom threshold is getting lower and lower every day, and the more he talks, the less I remember). He was flanked by Fatty O'Barrel, who really should never have shaved his beard - the deforestation of his jowls mean that he's lost any hope of ever recapturing the under-fives, who used to support him him en masse because of his incredible resemblance to Humphrey B Bear. But no... he's shaved (and started wearing pants) and thus lost all credibility.

Weirdly, Labor's gone for sweeping changes to its line-up before the election, drafting in a bunch of well-known identities to help boost its electoral chances. It's like a hideous reality show - "I'm a Celebrity, Vote Me In There". Make the bad man stop. Etc etc.

Meh. It's all pretty pointless - the NSW state election (indeed, any state election) is only marginally more interesting than local government elections (yet, strangely, I care more about making sure my garbage is collected than seeing any of the rubbish the state looks after. Hospitals? Yeah - they're always gonna be there. I may have to wait two hours to get my fingers stitched back on, but I know it'll happen... god bless our health system.

The real show is on at the end of the year - the Grand Final (or Grand Mal - I'm not sure which of these titles to give it) of elections will be on us. And you can bet your bottom dollar that I'll give a shit about that one.

So I guess this coming weekend for the residents of New South Wales is little more than voting practice. We all know who's going to win, we know why they're going to win and we know when they're going to win. In fact, the only thing that separates the populace of NSW from the hierarchy controlling Zimbabwe is that we don't know by how much the ALP will win. Doesn't that make you feel glad you live in a democracy?

Next Week: Morris Iemma's Tips on Shedding Unwanted Kilos from Your "Front Bench"

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