Among the many dubious gifts the digital age has endowed us with is an abundance of new ways of expressing old ideas. We have ‘selfies’, ‘default positions’, ‘command and control’, and ‘user experiences’, all borne of the internet. And supposedly new concepts such as ‘buzz’, ‘offline’ and ‘sexting’ that have increasingly found their way into common parlance. A particularly popular one is the notion of ‘rebooting’; the idea that at the push of a button you can simply wipe the slate clean and the machine will start itself up all over again, as good as new. All nasty problems disappear, and functionality returns to normal.But is it really that simple?

As the Abbott government struggled in the polls towards the end of 2014, and silly headlines dominated the pre-silly season, conservative commentators were quick to call for a ‘reboot’ of the government. This despite that same government’s impressive list of achievements; from the Prime Minister’s responses to the downing of both Malaysian airlines, his quasi-global leadership on aggressively responding to the rapid rise of Islamic State, a swag of free trade agreements and the successful hosting of the G20, the equally successful Peru climate change conference (see Julie Bishop’s Diary in this issue) and those other ‘small’ matters such as stopping the boats and scrapping the mining and carbon taxes.

With a surprising boldness and deftness that belied the ‘stop-start’ hesitancy of the previous fifteen months, Tony Abbott duly pressed the ‘reshuffle’ button just before Christmas. With gusto.

The genius of the reshuffle is that without rocking the Treasury portfolio it puts the undoubted talents of Scott Morrison to good use where they are needed; on our bloated and over-entitled welfarism. With Josh Frydenberg and Kelly O’Dwyer also putting their formidable shoulders to the financial wheel, there is now no excuse for Joe Hockey and Mathias Cormann not to win the hearts and minds of the public in the critical task – highlighted all those years ago by Mr Hockey himself – of ending the age of entitlement.

In terms of a reboot, the reshuffle has given the government the firepower it needs, where it needs it most, and should allow for an exciting and dynamic 2015 to follow. Certainly, the reboot should ensure that those pesky ‘barnacles’ that were troubling the Prime Minister are swept away. But there is plenty from the first fifteen months of this government that deserves to be ‘saved’. In its enthusiasm for its shiny new clothes, the government must not forget to continually boast of what is already an impressive track record.

Meanwhile, the PUP behave like a bunch of malevolent online ‘trolls’, whilst Labor are determined to occupy a space that most resembles another internet concept: virtual reality. A world in which boats magically stop themselves, money grows on trees and imagining what you want is as good as having it for real.

Ends in 4

As the Chinese believe, any number ending in four is bad news, given the similarity between the Chinese words for ‘four’ and ‘death’. And so it was with 2014; a year (as Elle Hardy points out in this issue) bookended by, among other ghastly events, two deaths that bizarrely rocked the world of cricket.

At the time of going to press, we pray that the other twinned tragedies, the grisly events of Martin Place and Cairns, are the final bad news of the year; but with the government’s warnings of further Islamist terrorism likely to occur, we all face the perpetual fear everytime we switch on the radio of being apprised of yet another appalling atrocity.

A nonsensical debate spilled out of the twittersphere and into the mainstream media as to whether self-declared Islamist Man Monis was a terrorist or a lunatic, when self-evidently the answer is both. It is becoming increasingly clear around the world – almost on a daily basis – that ‘nutters’ are drawn irrevocably towards the nihilist, hate-filled, neurotic doctrine of ‘oppression’ and victimhood that Islamism promotes. Arguably, you’re bonkers in the first place if you firmly believe that God wishes for you to run around kidnapping schoolgirls, decapitating policemen or driving your car into crowds of shoppers.

Depressingly, we must prepare ourselves for more such lunacy. A solid start would be if our judicial system actually bothered to lock these villains up when the police arrest them.

So here’s looking forward to 2015. Which, mercifully, ends in a 5.