From Cut & Paste today:

Playing identity politics is easier than thinking. RMIT University’s Steve Kates, Catallaxy, yesterday:

What genuine problem has a party of the left actually solved anytime in the last forty years? Parties of the left never solve any actual problems, they only make existing problems worse and create new ones along the way … But the parties of the left are good at finding solutions for things that are not a problem at all … There are lots of such fake problems invented by the left and promoted through the media … to become controversial issues in immediate need of solution. Conservatives then have the choice of doing nothing since they think there is nothing to be done, and therefore end up hammered by the press and the left for not taking such problems seriously. Or they do take these up and legitimise the issue.

QED. Policy analyst Miriam Lyons, the ABC’s Q&A, Monday:

There was a time in Australian history where Irish Australians were extremely discriminated against.

Or … Q from Q&A:

My question is for Anthony Albanese. What do you say of recent criticism of the influence of Joe de Bruyn’s union, the SDA, over your party? How can we trust you when you say that you support marriage equality yet you have allowed a super union to bully you into stalling it for a significant amount of time?

Let alone this Q&A leap of logic:

Since the state of New York legalised gay marriage, it has brought $259 million to their economy. So I ask the panel this: if Tony Abbott is all for small business, then why doesn’t he agree with the 72 per cent of Australians who agree with legalising gay marriage and also bring these added funds to our kind of failing economy?

That kid will go places. Parliamentary secretary Scott Ryan, AM Agenda, Sky News, yesterday:

I didn’t watch Q&A. I find my weeks start better when I don’t watch it.