In the beginning there was MING. (on the left, not the silly bastard on the right.)
Dear reader, we find ourselves after a period of unexplained delay back on track with the true saga behind our current federal election.
Yes folks as the teals battle it out with the inner blues and reds we know that a much more Herculean task is afoot below the irradiated wastes of Maralinga. For there, hidden from the public more securely than a register of donations to both the major parties, the hope of ever seeing a federal ICAC or just the promise of a fresh, new, imaginative idea ever coming from the cobwebbed bowels of a Canberra focus group and dull policy documents a titanic struggle ensues for the real hearts and minds of what we refer to euphemistically as the “Quiet Australians’.
From the swamp came Harold!
And why are these Australians so quiet?
Harold was a REAL PERFORMER! He was the first to recognise the SHEILAH VOTE!
Cos they’re entombed, beneath layers of rock in a stygian cavern with Dutto and Sophie as their jailers. If they can get to a ballot box and make significant change it’ll be a miracle, cos las time we looked Maralinga was pretty much sewn up by Barnaby and the Nationals. But whilst there is Barnaby and the existence of ‘Barnaby-Speak’, there is also hope. So hold onto your corflutes, and hold your breath as we continue with the true account. The minute by breath-taking minute of how our heroes, all three of them and Australia’s noblest greatest most decorated soldier ever Benny-Boy Roberts Smith must find a way through the miasma of politics, vested interests and sinecurism…… Because, where there is still hope there is hilarity. Read on……
Then, along came JOHN! Johnny was our first PROPER post war labor P.M, even though he batted for the Liberals
The door clanged behind us and from within the dark stairwell we could just see steps, ancient, dust covered and undisturbed leading upwards. ‘This looks like it’, Benny gasped, and just to make sure, we watched in awe as Benny taped up the steel door that had clanged behind us and for good measure attached a string of rifle grenades, a trip wire, a claymore, several anti tank mines and a roman candle. ‘Whats the Roman candle for’? Ces asked. ‘Oh that’s just to distract them as they walk in, once it goes off the whole shebang’, he paused; ‘she blows, and that’s the last we’ll see of Sophie and Dutto’. He laughed somewhat too eagerly, he clearly enjoyed being on the job. ‘But what if it doesn’t work’? Ces asked with just a hint of incredulity.
Then came BILLY! Billy was not liked by anyone in Parliament. Still didn’t stop him from being P.M
‘Believe me mate it’ll bloody work’! And for emphasis he threw something long and shiny from his backpack. We clutched it, thinking it was an explosive device, a wad of torpex or bundle of cordite. To our surprise Benny had thrown us a prosthetic leg. ‘Hold the bloody leg and say after me, To the Fat Lady’s Arms and beyond, the bond, shall never be broken’!
We smiled awkwardly at Benny, what else could we do? Benny had two taped Kalashnikovs pointed at us. We uttered the solemn words, and Benny exalted, ‘Thats done then, give us back the fucken leg’.
‘But what’s it for’? sighed Ces.
‘It’s for good luck. Picked a pile of em up in Tarren Kwot, and they’re sort of like rabbits feet, they give you good luck, and’ , he smiled condescendingly, ‘they have other uses, Cmon!’
We barely had time to think of what other uses meant and just sidled up the steps. Ben had his night vis helmet goggles on and we just blindly stumbled forward, not caring for much other than the thrill of it ever happened of gaining the surface. Bit like finding yourselves after a policy desert in a federal election the day after. ‘The day after what’? Ces expired, ‘after the federal election’! replied Quent.
After Billy came GOUGH! Gough gave First Australians (portions)their land back, so that PRISONS could be more fully integrated in to the NT economy.
‘But’’, Ces exasperatedly sighed, ‘whatever happens in a federal election makes no bloody difference. Tudgey will still have a sinecure, Barnaby will be slotted onto a lifetime pension for fucking up the Murray Darling and a sensible climate debate. All the other hacks will be looked after and nothing ever changes. I dunno’? replied Terry, ‘Theres always some change.
What then’? blurted Ces. ‘Well, there’s a change in the mood, and who gets to buy toys for defence, and build prisons. There’s always a lot of change, and some parties just like to mix it up a bit. Yeah’, Ces replied caustically, ‘but is that real change or just window dressing’?
Terry took offence, ‘I was a window dresser at Myers in the fifties and the work we did kept the engine of commerce going though the post-war era. There’s so much more to window dressing than window dressing?
Post GOUGH? Tweedle-Dum and Tweedle-Dee. A safe policy bet and no threat of destabilising CHANGE!
‘Such as’? Ces asked dryly. ‘Well it’s the style, everyone wants a bit of style, it’s bit like Keating and his suits versus Scomo and his baseball caps’! Terry had made a point and it showed than in spite of the flim-flammery there was a prospect of real change.
But will change be enough? Will the climb from the gloom be their doom? Find out in the next sartorially challenging episode, ‘Two suits and your straight-jacketed’, or…. ‘is that couture you’re wearing or just haut couture’?