The gift of Porter

When an opponent leaves themselves more wide open than the gob of a shark, it would be churlish to ignore it.

Kate Ellis, Richard Marles and Bill Shorten in parliament yesterday. Picture Gary Ramage

When an opponent insists on leaving themselves more wide open than the gob of a peckish whale shark, it would be churlish to ignore it. For example, Social Services Minister Christian Porter, who yesterday persisted in finding awkward moments to get stuck on repeat. Exhibit A: “And I sat down and thought can I think, can I think …” A Laborite loudly answered, “No, you can’t.” Exhibit B: “Now we don’t pretend, we don’t pretend …” On cue from the Labor benches: “To know what you’re doing.” Still, the bloke does not want for good manners. After question time, Jenny Macklin rose, flipped the switch to “full hector” and gave him a pineappling that went on for an unrelenting, decibel-rich 10 or so minutes. But when it was over, Porter quietly thanked her for her contribution and started focusing on points of harmony. (No such gentility from the Nationals’ Darren Chester who, how shall we put it, played the yang to Porter’s yin and went off.)

Then there was Waz

Yesterday, we offered an observation on the parliamentary speaking style of Territories Minister Paul Fletcher. We may have alluded to a certain, mesmerising featurelessness. We may have made a comparison to the disorientation felt by invading German troops when crossing the vast, flat Russian steppe. Anyway, we can only imagine Deputy Prime Minister Warren Truss read this and thought, “I’ll show those whippersnappers.” Truss, as you will be aware, normally speaks in a slow flood of caramel that’s so soothing, anyone within earshot is well advised to avoid operating heavy machinery for several hours afterwards. But yesterday, he gave a performance we can only describe as Truss Plus. As he went on, there fell a hush so complete you could have heard a pin fall unconscious. (We’d like to think Kate Ellis, Richard Marles and Bill Shorten were captured here by our colleague Gary Ramage during the middle of the Truss event.)

Mr Happy and Tony

It was an understatement of some calibre in the Coalition’s joint partyroom meeting when Julie Bishop talked of Malcolm Turnbull’s “optimistic and upbeat style”. The human ecstasy pill that is our PM continued his joyggernaut in question time, once again proffering the opinion there has “never been a better time to be an Australian”. One of the few conspicuously not listening was backbencher Tony Abbott who, to be fair, could probably nominate a couple of better times. He chatted with his neighbour Dan Tehan instead.

Cop it three ways

When Bill Shorten, Jenny Macklin and Chris Bowen held a joint press conference to denounce cuts to family tax benefits, there was nothing so binary as good cop/bad cop. Standing in the opposition caucus room, Shorten held the sadness of the nation in his eyes, even his eyebrows arranged into a pair of forlorn frowns. Macklin came with more of an edge of rage in her voice, like she was planning to hunt down everyone responsible and, at a pinch, burn their houses. But it was Bowen who brought a glint of hard-headed malice, the picture of a man ready to go that one step further than Macklin and torch their crops, slaughter their herds and arrest all their relatives. Or until he suddenly remembered the benefit of being reasonable and suddenly he was the shadow treasurer again.

Crime and punishment

An announcement yesterday from Peter Dutton: “We won’t tolerate destruction of commonwealth property and those people that have undertaken that behaviour will face the full force of the law.” When this proved to not pertain to a certain marble table trashed in a certain former prime minister’s office, there was relief. Not widespread, but intensely felt.

Katter’s quiet riot

Not only was Bob Katter praised by Agriculture Minister Barnaby Joyce in question time yesterday for asking a “proper question”, his office put out a release headed thus: “Katter-tonic rage at Northern Australia Funds directed at foreign corporates.” Catatonic is an interesting choice of word to make a play on.

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