dreamer_easy | I actually had to hastily swallow a mouthful of coffee when I read this

Cheeky SMH columnist John Birmingham, suggesting that Tony Abbott's parade of gaffes are a deliberate distraction tactic:

"While many of the permanently appalled whom the ABC's Chris Uhlmann refers to as 'Twitter bedwetters' were busy soaking the doona over lifestyle choices, Abbott was able to scrape off the barnacle of his disastrous Medicare co-payment, and quietly reintroduce assistance for the car industry."

I'm not so sure about "Twitter bedwetters" (Uhlmann was excusing himself for saying Scott Morrison was "quite a nice guy" in person - of course he is, he's a successful politician), but the phrase "the permanently appalled" so painfully skewers that portion of the online social justice movement prone to shallow, noisy kneejerks instead of the harder work needed to actually change things. To be fair, we're all guilty of it from time to time. Maybe we should be less easily angered and more horribly suspicious.