“From his whiskers to his tail, Andy knew that he, and he alone, would become the greatest ruler of his backwards village.” KEEPING UP THE ACT shares a fable. Fictional, of course.

ONCE UPON A TIME… there lived a crafty young wolf named Andy. 

From his whiskers to his tail, Andy knew that he, and he alone, would become the greatest ruler of his backwards village; a place where the locals couldn’t even tell a ristretto from an espresso, let alone spell either. 

Unfortunately for Andy, his mum had forbidden him from entering village politics until his room was tidy, and Andy never did anything in response to feedback from old people. 

Andy instead turned to the place where all the young wolves thrived – student politics. 

Here, those not focused on doing degrees could fight with others not focused on doing degrees to see who would run the union bar. And it was at the union bar, that Andy discovered the magic of thought bubbles! 

Andy learnt that a thought bubble attached to a promise and tied up in a slogan, was an alchemy that could bring tears to the eyes of even Voldemort, himself. 

And so it was that Andy set out to use these dark arts against voters. Donning monogrammed sheep’s clothing, Andy took to the streets to try out his new tricks. “Boy, oh boy!” he cried, “listen to all the things that I can do for you, villagers!” 

The villagers came running, and became enraptured as Andy told them tales of better health care, affordable housing, new footpaths and even surplus budgets. This was bloody fantastic, they thought, and channelled those thoughts on to ballot papers. 

To his great delight, Andy was voted Chief and could now rest on his laurels. 

Of course, elections still came every four years to annoy Andy. But Andy simply countered them with his catch cry of: “Boy, oh boy, listen to what I have in store for you guys, this time!” 

Sometimes, when the villagers weren’t buying it, Andy would need to throw in a stadium study or the promise of walk-in Band-Aid clinics. On other occasions, he might need to bamboozle them with voodoo logic such as: “The reasons our old promises didn’t work is because they quite clearly needed to be accompanied by these new promises. Only a fool would think otherwise.” 

Well, the villagers certainly didn’t want to be thought of as fools. 

But when villagers got particularly testy, Andy would resort to stronger forms of political necromancy, such as blame. “It’s not my fault,” Andy would say. “You need to blame it on the Feds, blame it on covid, blame it on the census, blame it on the sunshine, blame it on the moonlight, blame it on the boogie.” 

Then, one election, when Andy was out stomping the streets, a new voice cried out. It was Andy’s younger sister, Lizzy, out to spoil his fun! 

“Boy, oh boy,” teased Lizzy, “get a load of this sneaky old wolf and all of his broken promises. Vote for me and I’ll give you lots of shiny new promises.” 

Andy was furious. “You can’t cry that! Only I can cry promises in this village! Besides, it’s not responsible to make so many promises when our budget is totally up crap creek.” 

But Lizzy didn’t listen. “Boy, oh boy,” she cried again, “how would you guys like a stadium?”

Soon, Lizzy had attracted a large crowd. “We probably shouldn’t trust her,” said a wary villager, “but…” 

“Birdman Rally!” cried Andy, “groovy fridge magnets, free transport!” 

But the villagers weren’t listening.

“Another week of Floriade!” Andy’s arms began to move wildly as he gesticulated to the crowd: “You get an EV, you get an EV, everybody gets an EV!” But it was no use. After two decades of blustery promises, the villagers no longer believed the wily wolf. 

So, tail between his legs, Andy returned home to reflect on how he had broken the trust of the people he was meant to serve. 

Yeah, nah.

Andy kicked his cat and got straight on the phone to the feds. 

“Boy, oh boy, are you guys in trouble at next year’s election? How about you plonk me in a safe seat in Melbourne? Somewhere close to where all the cool cafes are, and I can be out lapping the laneways with promises aplenty. Whaddaya say, my dudes?” 

While audibly abrupt, the click that followed was deafening.