Readers Write: You tell us your views and your comments

“Count the number of derogatory references that have been made about Family First in The Australian and ask if it is time an opportunity was given for a slight balancing of the scales before the election? A conspiracy? No way. But I do think it is another example of lazy, cheap shot journalism. I think it is lazy journalism to follow the leaders around like sheep - being told what and where to go every day by a political party and not getting the real stories out there in the community.

Why? It will make the party leaders nervous because you are not bowing down to every spin they put on issues of the day, so you do what you are told. When I read your sarcastic labelling of Family First as right wing, extreme right wing, church backed, AOG backed, I do have to ask, "What IS your problem?"

Why should people who happen to choose to have a go, use their own resources to be part of the democratic process have to crawl under a rock because elements of the southern media are bleating hysterically?”

Mimi Zilliacus, a student of history and politics at the University of New South Wales is despondent about the election result. A far cry from the exhilaration she experienced at Sydney’s recent “Rally against the Lies of the Howard Government”.

“I don't know anyone who voted for Howard,” she writes. “And herein lies the point, we need to find a way to educate the masses, those people who didn't go to the rally, and don't go to any rallies. The cab drivers, labourers, and ordinary Australians…

“I need to do something, but…I feel powerless. There has to be something that I can do. Got any ideas? Australia is supposed to be a democracy but democracy doesn't work without a well-informed public. I want help to come up with a way to educate the public, and especially those people who see "left" as being a bad thing.”