A Sirens’ Song for the Easily Impressed

I was passing a Woolworths supermarket a few weeks ago. My local federal member, Trent Zimmerman (North Sydney – Joe Hockey’s old seat), was meeting and greeting. I said, ‘Hello, Trent’, in the informal way we conduct ourselves these days. We briefly chatted. I said that I wasn’t with him on climate and did not intend to put him first on my ballot paper. However, I said I would preference him because I was fearful of a Climate 200 activist getting in. He grinned and said, so I’m better than the alternative, or something to that effect.

I had a similar exchange, albeit by email, a little over five years ago (tempus fugit) after I’d written a post for Quadrant Online (“The Listing Liberals”) prompted by a pamphlet he’d put out. I was very critical of its content and sent him a copy of my post. He replied, apropos of his pamphlet, “Well at least you read it.”

Why mention these two interactions? Well, they both earned him brownie points in my estimation. He…