It's a GST more or Lees

John Howard has been threatening and promising it for so long it has finally happened. Australian voters are facing the political reality of a double disillusion.

This is not a knee-jerk reaction to the abysmal performance of Australia's highly paid politicians.

Talkback radio has been allowed to set the political agenda for so long voters have become disillusioned with the back-stabbing, sniping, mud slinging and dummy spitting now passing for political debate.

Australian politicians, using their hand crafted 30 second sound bites to maintain the right to supplement their meagre wage by investing in outside business interests, have added to this chronic depression. Voters now realise politicians have no interest in politics at all.

The Australian Democrats attempted to fill a political vacuum by promising to "keep the bastards honest". Cheryl Kernot has since vanished into Labor's ample bosom while the Liberal Party have sprinkled Meg Lees and her merry band of tree-hugging Senators onto the fairy bread of the GST.

Australians are suffering the lingering effects of the depression we had to have. A depression generating billions of dollars for multinational pharmaceutical companies.

Help, however is at hand from an unlikely source.

Richard Ackland, host of Media Watch, a weekly television program dedicated to exposing bad grammar in journalism, ensuring local community newsletters their 15 minutes of shame, has uncovered the real reason.

Researching for an upcoming episode, about television news readers and an unscrupulous Sydney hair transplant surgeon, Media Watch uncovered documents revealing John Laws has been paid to say nice things about Banks.

Knowing this would titillate ABC viewers Media Watch decided to run the story.

Records obtained by Media Watch, under the Freedom of Information act, reveal that pharmaceutical, tobacco and alcohol companies have secretly been paying Australian politicians millions of dollars to depress voters. This practice has been going on, unreported, for years.

"It is no secret unhappy people smoke and drink more," said Richard Ackland. "Australian politicians, are paid by drug companies to foster a climate of industrial unrest and political uncertainty".

"Documents which we have obtained show the GST is just another ploy to create economic unease. Pharmaceutical companies have paid millions to the Liberal Party and the Democrats to pass legislation designed to boost sales of Prozac around the country".

Many individual politicians are also receiving money. Peter Reith, for instance, has received millions of dollars for the tension he created with his waterfront dispute.

This was not even his own policy. Media Watch will reveal that the whole waterfront industrial reform campaign was instigated and overseen by a junior copywriter employed by an advertising agency working for the alcohol industry.

Market research showed that unemployed people drank more. In order to boost alcohol consumption they approached the Government with the proposal.

Treasurer Peter Costello, is also being paid a retainer by the Australian Brewers Association. Researchers noticed that every time Australians saw him smirking across television screens alcohol sales went through the roof.

Meg Lees, who organised a GST deal with the government received a handsome commission from the makers of Prozac for the excellent job she did. In one week of hastily conceived GST discussions, this former school mistress did more to boost the sales of anti-depressant drugs then the recent Kosovo crisis.

The Australian Democrats are also receiving funding from coffee companies, who are thrilled at the amount of latte drinking the Democrats have encouraged in cafes around Australia.

Richard Ackland admits he has now opened up a can of worms. The Government is threatening to cut ABC funding unless they drop the program.

Media Watch are determined to cash in on their new found fame. "We haven't even looked at how the gambling industry is influencing government policy," said Richard Ackland.

No politician wanted to be interviewed. Government Ministers are under strict orders not to reveal anything to the press.

Victorian Premier Jeff Kennett, however, refused to be muzzled. "We are not bound by any code of ethics," he said. "We are not journalists. We are entertainers, I am confident that Australians well see this for what it is. A shabby attempt by the press to hound politicians, and a further indication of the blatant, political bias of the ABC".

Australian voters still reeling from the shock of realising no one will "keep the bastards honest", now have to deal with the fact that no one can keep the bastards out of power!

Well known Australian entrepreneur, Dick Smith, was enraged to learn Australians are spending so much money buying overseas drugs. He has vowed to market a totally Australian owned version of Prozac. It will be called ProAnzac.