A piece like this has to be satire: When Tony Abbott ate that raw onion it really got under my skin.

It’s been nine days since the Prime Minister travelled to a farm in Tasmania and ate an onion like it was an apple. . . .

It was when the farmer was – literally – showing the Prime Minister his onions that the odd thing happened. Mr Abbott seized one and took a lavish bite, skin and all.

Now: not being surprised by things that Tony Abbott does is becoming a national skill-set. But in the days since, I find that I cannot read or think about anything the government does without thinking of that moment, and wondering who eats raw onions, and why, and what it might possibly mean for the nation that the Prime Minister is one of them.

I know this sounds silly.

No, I wouldn’t say it sounds “silly”. I wouldn’t say that at all. I can’t quite find the word, just yet, but don’t you worry, it will come to me eventually. But “silly” is not the one that I am at the moment tossing up between