Has anyone else noticed how boring our politicians have become?

I mean to say, they’re … where are you going?

No, no. Don’t run off!

It’s going to be funny, I promise.

For goodness sake, just mention politics and half of you start rummaging through the medicine cabinet looking for grandma’s sleeping tablets!

Did you honestly think I was going to offer an analysis of modern-day politicians, their policies and the impact on interest rates and foreign policy?

Fair dinkum! I thought you knew me better than that!

What I was saying before some of you sparked a stampede for the exits was that I’ve noticed how boring our politicians are now.

Don’t believe me? Have a look at Kevin Rudd and John Howard.

Apart from their policies, they’re so similar they could be brothers.

Impeccably dressed little men with perfect hair, perfect manners and well-rehearsed ad-lib lines.

It makes me want to commit Hari Kari with a teaspoon.

I’ll tell you a little secret I only just discovered – for a short time, the Ruddmeister was a boarder at the same Brisbane school as me.

Our paths never crossed because he was there a few years before me … and he hated every damn minute of it.

Apparently, he hated the fact he had to play sport every waking second; he hated the fact that getting the cane was a fact of life and, more than anything, he hated having to share a dormitory with 49 other swearing, burping farting, smelly teenage boys.

Fair dinkum! All the things that made boarding school great!

I don’t think Kev baby and I would have had much in common back then and we certainly wouldn’t have a lot to talk about over a few beers now.

And I know that little Johnny Howard and I would be about as compatible as a meat pie with a glass of chardonnay.

I met him a few years back at a social function and it was like having your back waxed by a pack of dwarfs – you have to pretend you’re enjoying it so you don’t hurt their feelings but it’s very, very painful and everyone involved wishes it was over.

Whatever happened to politicians with personality?

Back in the old days, Bob Hawke would have walked into the room, burped, scratched his crotch and proceeded to get drunk.

Paul Keating might have liked his fancy suits and expensive wine but at least he would have abused the waiter, called the other guests scumbags and maybe even put the hard word on a waitress.

Why do you think Mark Latham self-destructed?

He was bored out of his skull by Australian politics, wasn’t he?

Even old Kim Beazley was a bit of fun ... and boy could he eat.

I thought I could put food away but the big fella made me look like an amateur when I had morning tea with him and a group of other people back when he was Opposition Leader.

Kim and I went lamington-for-lamington for a while and as the cloud of dessicated coconut settled, we both suddenly realised there was only one left on the plate.

I saw him looking at it out of the corner of his eye while he continued with the small talk.

I wrestled with the moral dilemma.

Should I go with my instinct and grab the lamington while I could, thereby running the risk of getting into a physical confrontation with the man who could one day be prime minister (yeah, I know, but back then it was still possible).

Or should I sit back politely and run the risk of neither of us getting to the lamington before the waitress cleared the table?

As I pondered the problem, the little finger on my left hand must have twitched ever so slightly because suddenly the big bloke panicked and pounced.

He covered the space between himself and the plate like an Olympic hurdler, grabbed the last lamington and downed it before anyone knew what was happening.

As he returned to his seat, being careful not to step on the people he had knocked down in his haste, he gave me a grin that was victorious yet slightly sheepish.

“Don’t worry,” I said.

“There was no way in the world I was going to be caught between you and the last lamington.”

That’s the sort of in-your-face attitude I reckon Australian politics is lacking these days.