Jew World Order

Greg Callaghan speaks with Prime Minister Julia Gillard (Amanda Bishop) about Tim Mathieson’s charm and her record-low poll ratings.

Julia Gillard, aka Amanda Bishop: “People’s waistlines are personal.” Picture: Guy Bailey
Source: The Australian

PRIME Minister Julia Gillard, aka Amanda Bishop, on gay marriage, living with a divorcee and her sexual tension with Tony Abbott.

Greg Callaghan: As our nation’s first female PM you rode a wave of goodwill to begin with. Now you’re Ms 24 per cent. What happened?
Julia Gillard: You say that like it’s a bad thing? A leader has to lead and change is always met with resistance… quite a lot of resistance in my case.

Has Australia’s First Bloke, your partner Tim Mathieson, added any of his own decorating touches to The Lodge?
Oh yes. He’s put up some Vidal (“Veye-dl”) Sassoon posters from his old salon. He particularly loves the 1982 vintage ones. He’s obviously a big fan of the blowdry from that era too, the “up before then back” variety. He assures me it’s coming back in.

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What physically attracted you to Tim in the first instance?
I see where you’re going with this: my on-air comment about his fluffy knees. But it’s really what’s above the knees that helps things along for me. I won’t elaborate on that one, people’s waistlines are personal.

From this new show on ABC1, At Home With Julia, it looks like you wear the pants at home too…
Don’t be fooled by that. I do get around in a pair of trackies or a dressing gown. I put on something for special occasions, like when we’re doing OK in the polls. Admittedly, we’ve been through a separate-legged, fleecy-lined patch recently.

More than 60 per cent of Australians support same-sex marriage and a float at the 2011 Mardi Gras posed the reasonable question, “If Liza Minnelli can marry two gay men, why can’t I?”
That’s a trick question. You left out the repeat [the Prime Minister breaks into song] “why, oh why, can’t I?” And it wasn’t Liza Minnelli, but her mother, Judi Dench, who sang that song.

Why are you opposed to gay marriage? It can’t be for religious reasons – you’re an atheist…
This isn’t only a religious question. It’s a moral issue. As a single woman living in a de facto relationship in the taxpayer’s Lodge with a 50-year-old divorcee male hairdresser, it’s just not something I can ethically support.

In February, radio host Alan Jones chewed you out for being 10 minutes late for his interview and then called you Ju-Liar over the carbon tax. If you could have 10 minutes alone with Mr Jones in a padded room, what would you do?
I know that running the country comes a distant second to the vital work that Alan does. But I don’t know that I’d need a padded room – I could supply the padding. Actually, I’m not sure I could do anything with Alan in a room, or he’d want to do anything with me in a room. Perhaps a dark room might get him across the line with me. But it would have to be a total blackout.

In his book Sideshow, Lindsay Tanner wrote that politics had become an entertainment show driven by soundbites and slogans…
Well, I think that sums up the Opposition pretty perfectly…

Did you have a falling out with Lindsay, by the way? No sooner had you completed your first Question Time as Prime Minister than he announced he wouldn’t be contesting the election…
I did have a couple of quiet words with Lindsay after Question Time. I can’t confirm what they were. But I can tell you the second word was “off”.

You’re a strong advocate for the national broadband network. Are you a wired woman?
Oh yes, I’m very wired. I use my iPop to make calls on my way to work, I never go to a meeting without my ePad and I never watch a movie unless it’s on Blue Roy. I’ve obviously needed to bone up on broadband in preparation of the NBN, so that I can be absolutely clear with the Australian people.

Bonus Questions: You’re wearing your red power jacket today and Tony Abbott is often seen in his fire-engine-red sluggos. Many of us see a certain sexual frisson between you…
Tony and I do recognise our sexual possibilities. He understands he has to remain three feet away from me at all times – at least that’s what the court order says. Anything else I’m not at liberty to discuss.

What was it like working 9 to 9 for Kevin Rudd? Was he the psycho slave driver he’s been made out to be?
I was 100 per cent behind Kevin. Until I wasn’t.

Did you visit Kevin Rudd when he was in hospital recently for heart surgery?
Yes. I took him in liver pate and snuck him in a little hip flask…

We know you love your footy and you’ve been a Western Bulldogs fan for most of your life. Were you upset when the Dogs got rid of Jason Akermanis last year? We ask because in happier times you exchanged text messages.
“Bulldogs bite and bulldogs growl” [The Prime Minister breaks into song again]. I think it was the right decision. When you have an upstanding citizen like Barry Hall in the Bulldogs, Aker was bringing down the tone. You have to make to make rough and tough but ultimately positive decisions for the long term.

I have some disappointing news for you, Prime Minister. Aker was on Fox Sports recently and declared, “Defending the Dogs is as predictable as poor government policy on carbon tax.” What do you say to that?
There is nothing predictable about the government’s carbon tax policy. Its reception gets worse and worse every day. Aker has just got his wires crossed.

Paul Keating has had a musical. So why not Julia: the Musical? We hear the comic impersonator Amanda Bishop is interested in playing you.
Oh no! Not her. She’s awful. Who does she think she is? There’s absolutely nothing worse than actors playing parliamentarians to thinly disguise their own unwanted ideas. My money would be on Hugh Jackman.

But he’s a man.
And your point is?

– Greg Callaghan