I don't wish adversity on anybody, but often times, it's through adversity that we grow as people. I don't think there are too many people who can say, "When I was four, I wanted to do this, and I went to this grade school, this junior high, this senior high, this university, then Yale or Harvard, or even Oxford (yes, I know Bill Clinton was able to avoid serving in the Vietnam War by doing a second degree at Oxford) and everything has just fallen into place.

One of the most emotionally immature people I have had to live under was former Australian International and Domestic Embarrassment in Chief and Washington Speakers Bureau member, tony abbott. He attended university in Australia, and then Oxford, then returned to Australia to study to be a priest, and after three years, the principal of the seminary called him in and said, "You need to think about whether the priesthood is really for you. Take a year and spend it in a church to see what a priest really does, and then you decide." He opted not to continue, and after some time as a journalist and with Australians for a Constitutional Monarchy, he won the seat of Warringah in a by-election, in 1994. He was a terrible Health Minister and allowed his personal views to influence his decisions. To be a cabinet minister, you have to be a bit like a court judge. You may not like the look of the defendant, you may not agree with the defendant's political views or whatever, but a judge has to advise the jury in their summing up, according to the law. If the judge directs the jury to find the defendant guilty, it is on a point of law, not the judge's personal opinions. As Health Minister, you cannot allow your personal views to influence your stance on access to medical abortion drugs. In a Hung Parliament, you have to accept that the crossbench may not support you to be leader of the country. You even have to accept that your party may not want you to be leader anymore. But you don't destabilize and destroy your opponent for your own gain out of your own desire to be in power.

I haven't had the easiest path in life, but I've had some opportunities that I'm truly grateful for. When I was 18, I met a woman and thought that she'd be the be all and end all. She wasn't. She even talked of me going to Japan and doing things. Three years later, I had the opportunity to go to Japan all expenses paid, and that was a heck of a lot better than if I'd arrived in Japan on a tourist visa and was stopped at customs and they'd told me I didn't have enough money and sent me back to Australia with a three-year exclusion period!