Hmmm, another cunning plan from Joseph

Joseph Muscat is going all out to prove the point that the Labour Party depends for its survival and success on the votes of those who haven’t yet learned how to think.

Not content with the unthinking adults, he has now trained his sights on sixth-formers and school-leavers. Trying to liven up an August weekend while driving some attention his way – after all, he’s not likely to get it while sunning himself in a bikini at Ghadira – he announced that people here should be given the right to vote at the age of 16.

You can see where he’s coming from. It’s dawned on him that his chances of success with the grown-ups have been severely reduced now that Anglu, Toni, Jason, Alex and the rest are shackled to his ankles. So he has had to resort to desperate measures and train his sights on the kids. Like every drug pusher, cigarette manufacturer or promoter of alcopops, he knows that the best way to get somebody hooked on a very bad habit is at that crucial age when they know nothing but think they know it all.

Having peaked already – a very bad case of political premature ejaculation, if you like – he has given up on trying to impress the rest of us and is gunning for the most impressionable instead (“Be a rebel, vote for Joseph”). Unlike me, he probably doesn’t know many 16-year-olds, and hasn’t a clue what they’d make of him. Take it from me, Joseph dear. To somebody just out of school, a man in his mid to late 30s is old, very old. I was 37 when my son and his friends were 16, so unlike Joseph I know what I’m talking about here.

Quite frankly, I don’t know what he’s worried about. If he works on 16-year-olds for the next three years, they’ll all be old enough to vote for him by 2013. But then let’s not forget that his secretary-general hadn’t a clue how many first-time voters there were in the last election, so they probably haven’t worked this one out between them yet. Perhaps the SEE-EEE-OH will explain.