Never seen anything like it, says Labor Senator Doug Cameron. AAP

PRIME Minister Julia Gillard says she feels misunderstood by the media and has given a colourful account of her cabinet colleagues.

In a frank and personal interview on ABC radio in Brisbane, Ms Gillard said fairness and a "love of country and a love of family" were at the core of her personal values.

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However, she said she often felt misunderstood, particularly when it came to the modern-day media cycle.

"I think there is a lot in this time of change in the media industry that pushes the cycle towards more schlock, more horror," she said.

"That means you need more and more drama or you can't sustain it, so even the simplest things get puffed up in a way that is really pretty absurd."

Ms Gillard gave the example of her cabinet reshuffle earlier this year involving the retirement of senior ministers Chris Evans and Nicola Roxon.

"I thought the media reaction to that was absurd," she said.

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"Two wonderfully competent ministers who have decided to go and do something else with their lives seamlessly replaced by two fantastically competent ministers and this is written as crisis. Excuse me?

"That was complete silliness."

Asked who was the stand-out intellectual in her cabinet, the prime minister gave a glowing assessment of some of her ministers.

"It depends what you mean by intellectual," she said.

If you wanted to go "the well-read, understanding of the artistic world, understanding of the world in general", you would go for Bob Carr or Simon Crean, she said.

If you wanted to go for "a mastery of the law", you would say Mark Dreyfus.

If you wanted to go "in touch with working people it would be Wayne Swan, Jenny Macklin, Bill Shorten.

"The list goes on," Ms Gillard said.

Offering an insight into the closed-door cabinet process, the prime minister said she had a strict rule for meetings.

"I specifically say to my cabinet colleagues I don't expect people to come in and just automatically agree with each other.

"What I do expect is for them to give the best of themselves and to operate what I call a positive climate."

Asked about the booming social media forum Twitter, Ms Gillard said some "vile things" were posted and there were some issues which were "too serious and too weighty" to be dealt with by it.

"But it's a fantastic way of engaging people," she said.