Imagine opening the morning papers to read the startling revelation that the government’s prime objectives are to decrease services to the poor by decreasing taxes for the rich.

Imagine the papers telling us that the government’s treatment of asylum seekers is cruel and inhumane, at the same time questioning whether the boats have really stopped. And that its disregard for services offered to victims of domestic violence is appalling.

Imagine them telling us that we were never going to be $550 a year better off once Labor’s ‘carbon tax’ was scrapped, and suggest that we were being lied to all along. Imagine if the Liberal Party’s hypocrisy and double standards were being called out.

Imagine being told something else we already know: that our Parliament is composed of some complete idiots, such as Tony Abbott, David Leyonhjelm or Cory Bernardi, and our media too has its fair share, with Andrew Bolt heading the list.

Imagine them telling us that climate change isn’t crap, but the government’s NBN is. And that the government are economic pygmies and that under them our democracy has taken a battering.

Imagine the papers telling us that the government – and the opposition for that matter – are out of touch with mainstream Australians and that both are bending over backwards to win the rednecks’ votes.

Imagine them telling us that Aboriginal Australians are treated like third world citizens. Imagine them telling us that people on welfare are also treated unfairly and poorly.

Imagine them supporting calls for the end of negative gearing and for the government to stop subsidising the mining companies. Imagine them telling us that ordinary Australians will be better off for it, as more money would be available for essential services.

Imagine, in summary, that the media starting talking like us here at The AIMN. Making the same fair and obvious demands that we do.

It’s never going to happen.

Imagine too, how good it would be to sit down and have a chin wag with people like Kaye Lee, Victoria Rollison, John Lord, John Kelly, Michael Taylor, Rossleigh or Jennifer Wilson, or for that matter any of the regular or guest authors here, as well as any number of the hundreds of great commenters that frequent The AIMN. It’d be awesome, in my opinion, but the opportunity is unlikely present itself.

We won’t see the papers talk some sense, and we probably won’t have the chance to sit down with the people that do talk it.

So what’s the next best thing?

Listening to Something Wonky . . . a podcast featuring two forthright and entertaining lefties; Dave Gaukroger and Jeremy Sear, who give us a weekly wrap on what’s been happening in politics, media, and current affairs. Here is their website.

Listening to Something Wonky is just like it would be having that chat with Kaye Lee, Victoria Rollison, John Lord, John Kelly, Michael Taylor, Rossleigh or Jennifer Wilson et al. And it’s great to know there are people out there like us, people who fill the integrity void left by our mainstream media. It’s hard-hitting honesty at its finest.

I’ve been listing to Something Wonky for over a year and not an episode goes by without me inspired to want to grab a segment to write about. I could have written dozens of them, but instead I thought I’ll unashamedly give Something Wonky a plug.

What can you expect to hear then? Just the same as what we discuss here as well as the ‘imaginings’ we want from our media.

Here’s just one example of their rationale: Some of our feral right-wing politicians have been putting the fear of God into us about Muslim asylum seekers since the Paris attacks, and the media has been giving them plenty, if not too much oxygen. “Terrorists are on the boats”, they scream in fear. But as the boys point out, why would a terrorist hop on a leaky boat when they know the only place they are likely to end up (if they don’t drown) is some hell hole on Nauru or Manus Island? It’s oh so obvious, but who in the mainstream media has bothered to point that out to us?

That’s the sort of logic that is delivered in spades by this podcast. One and a half hours of it a week. It’s the best thing I know to counter the right-wing shock jocks who get regular and undeserved exposure.

The AIMN has over four million visitors a year. Even if a small percentage of those tuned into Something Wonky each week then not only will the boys appreciate it, but more and more people will get the REAL news.

Download an episode via iTunes (or whatever you use) and take a listen. I’d be interested in your views.

For me Something Wonky is a must, just like the articles here on The AIMN.