Through 2017, frustration at the standard of what passes for political debate in Australia, and a desire to comment on the issues of the day prompted much thought on the five-days-a-week morning walk around downtown Bowen.
The format was reasonably straightforward. It would take the form of a dialogue. One possibility was a variation on the John Clarke/Bruce Dawre interview, but that has already been done. And it has been done by people with far more satirical talent than Yours Truly.
Yes, Minister could have provided another avenue, but that would require some degree of familiarity with the internal workings of electoral offices and interactions with the public service. Another writer might be able to carry that off, but it seemed a long way outside The Author's experience.
There wa, however, an obvious alternative. Back in the early 1960s, the ABC used a variety of five- and ten-minute pieces to fill in the gaps at the end of content sourced from commercial networks overseas.
One of them was The Yarns of Billy Borker. Two regular characters would meet in a public bar. An interlocutor would pose an issue, and Billy Borker would respond with a yarn drawn from his supposedly extensive experience across the Wide Brown Land.
So that was a viable template.
Invent a politician. Land the character in a situation where a member of the public poses a topical question. Have the character respond.
Repeat as each new issue emerges.