Well, that was one weird weekend. I can’t recall one like it. Media misbehaviour, Mark Latham pretending to be in the profession he despises most, Laurie Oakes criticising his own network … and we even ended up with a debate.

It seemed like we were given a glimpse of something very, very ugly by the media, so ugly even journalists recoiled from it.

The hulking presence of Latham in the media room at yesterday’s Liberal Party launch sparked plenty of anger from Gallery journalists, and for once it was hard to fault them for it, except to note that Latham was masquerading not merely as a journalist but as a decent human being, and failing miserably at both. A plainly unhappy Laurie Oakes summed it up best in one of the more remarkable moments in broadcast journalism in recent years, describing it both as embarrassing and damaging to his own network.

Nine executives could do worse than listen when a grown-up is talking.

The employment by Nine of Latham — who was suddenly and conveniently missing from the venue when the Liberal launch kicked off — showed a media organisation failing to take a federal election seriously. It was apt for this weekend, given the disgraceful performance of the media contingent accompanying the prime minister on Saturday afternoon, when an important policy announcement on seniors and aged care funding was completely ignored in favour of drivel relating to Kevin Rudd and Latham.

After that effort, which sent Twitter into meltdown, yesterday’s press conference by Julia Gillard in Darwin saw a massive improvement, with journalists actually focussing on policy detail.

But the media aren’t the only ones guilty of not taking the election seriously.

Elections should above all be a contest of ideas. But ideas have been few and far between in the 2010 campaign, and most have been, in short, rubbish. For every proposal to give principals greater budgetary control in their schools, there have been high speed rail studies, knife crime crackdowns and handouts to Family Tax Benefit A recipients. Both parties have made a virtue of turning their backs on key reforms they have long championed and which, as recently as a couple of months ago, party leaders insisted remained critical.

Yesterday’s Liberal Party launch was bereft of policy of any note. There is no reason to expect Labor will be any better. The only real content on offer from a major party at this point is Labor’s ongoing lesson in how to completely bugger up a big lead.

There’s a powerful sense that we are being let down by both our major parties and our most powerful media, that they are failing to step up to their responsibilities in the most important event in Australian public life.

If journalists, media executives and the major party politicians aren’t taking this election seriously, how on earth can they expect voters to? How can they legitimately expect voters to even pay attention?

All of us in the media and politics might reflect on that once the dust has settled in a fortnight.