Not for me to say

WHILE springing a visit on Victorian Premier Denis Napthine, Tony Abbott was asked about Nova Peris.

WHILE springing a visit on Victorian Premier Denis Napthine, Tony Abbott was asked about Nova Peris:

Journo: “Malcolm Turnbull’s raised concerns about the reporting. Do you think those concerns are valid?”

Abbott: “ ... As a former journalist, the last thing I want to do is to start pontificating on media standards. Perhaps you people can have your own debate amongst yourselves on media standards.”

Journo: “Do you think Turnbull’s pontificating on media standards?”

Abbott: “You people can have your own debate about this one.”

Data deflection

FOLLOWING Malcolm Turnbull’s quoting of Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa’s novel The Leopard to explain the need for data retention, yesterday’s Strewth suggested a longer, bleaker and very different quote for him to use instead, including this bit: “... he had found himself comparing this ghastly journey with his own life”. And here’s Turnbull on a panel talking data retention yesterday: “... as James Jeffrey noted in The Australian today, I quoted from The Leopard …” Five stars.

Memory lane

TWO blasts from the past yesterday. There was Bill Shorten courageously making use of “boondoggle”, a word most strongly associated here with Kim Beazley, a Labor leader famous for the eloquence of his speeches in defeat. And former Howard government minister Jackie “Outside the tent now” Kelly called her former colleagues “lying, lying toads”, a pleasing echo of “lying rodent”, the description of John Howard both attributed to and denied by George Brandis.

The nickname game

GOOD times at Flight Centre’s annual general meeting, thanks to founder and chief executive Graham Turner, aka “Skroo”, who in jolly fashion introduced new chairman Gary Smith to shareholders: “We call him the Gaza Strip. Death and destruction follows him everywhere. The shareprice has dropped 13 per cent since he took over.” Said Smith, “Skroo’s the only one who calls me that. It’s a nickname which hasn’t stuck, thank goodness.” Then he talked about getting the shareprice back up.

Not plain packaging

ONE of the smaller stars at Anzac Albany this weekend will be the gold cigarette case Mustafa Ataturk gave to then PM Stanley Bruce — long after Gallipoli — for his help in treaty negotiations over the Bosphorus. Former deputy PM Tim Fischer, who came across it while researching his new book on John Monash, describes it to Strewth as “an exquisite piece of post-Anzac iconography”. Bruce used it daily until he died.

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