Ghostbuster Turnbull sprays Rudd and Abbott but, to be fair, they’re neither lipids nor limpets

Leaked recording of Malcolm Turnbull addressing young leaders in New York on Friday, Nine News:

When you stop being prime minister, that’s it. There is no way I would be hanging around like lipid Kevin Rudd or Tony Abbott. Seriously, these people are like miserable, miserable ghosts.

Nine political editor Chris Uhlmann tweets an update:

Important correction to the text of the speech by @TurnbullMalcolm in New York from someone in the room. He said Rudd and Abbott were “hanging around like LIMPET” (which is a tenacious sea snail) not LIPID (which is a molecule and makes no sense).

Always a wag. @Aussie_Oliver:

I don’t know Chris — a ‘molecule that makes no sense’ seems like a pretty good definition for Tony Abbott.

And there’s @chrispydog:

Cholesterol=lipid=clogs up the arteries.

But ex-Sunday Times journo @TurnbullMalcolm party-poops from NYC:

I hate to spoil a good lipid or limpet (or lipidinous limpet) story — but the ­adjective mistaken for, variously, an indissoluble fat or a tenacious sea slug is “embittered”. I guess an iPhone at 50 paces is not an ideal recording device!

@CUhlmann replies:

Eureka! And it sounds like the iPhone was hidden in their trousers, #auspol.

Greg Turnbull, no relation to Malcolm but a one-time adviser to another ex-PM, chimes in on Twitter:

In Parliament one time Paul Keating said somebody had a heart like a caraway seed. In the Hansard draft it said ‘heart like a railway seat’.

Tony Abbott, September 15, 2015 (the day Turnbull overthrew him as PM):

My pledge today is to make this change as easy as I can … there will be no wrecking, no undermining, no sniping.

The ghost of Abbott haunts Turnbull on ABC radio on August 20 this year:

What we want to know is, where are this Prime Minister’s convictions. We always thought that he was convicted on climate change issues. I think he probably still is. And it was a conversion of convenience this morning.

The unembittered ghost of ex-PM Turnbull haunts rival Peter Dutton in a tweet from NYC on September 12:

The point I have made to @ScottMorrisonMP and other colleagues is that given the uncertainty around Peter Dutton’s eligibility (to sit in parliament), acknowledged by the Solicitor General, he should be referred to the High Court, as Barnaby was, to clarify the matter.

On September 27, the ghost of Rudd responds to Turnbull’s claim that ABC “standards have deteriorated”:

No Malcolm. It’s your standards that deteriorated. By applying political pressure to the ABC as Prime Minister on staffing decisions.

Rudd on Twitter last night:

“ Dear Malcolm. A quick reality check on “miserable ghosts”: 1st, having told the world you’ve left politics behind, you seem to be in the media every day talking about it. 2nd, in case you didn’t notice, I left parliament for NYC 5 years ago. Why not come over for a cuppa?

The ghost of PM Turnbull on Friday:

I’m not going to become a Trappist monk — but my days of being involved in partisan politics are over.

In Ray Parker Junior’s wise words:

If there’s something strange in your neighbourhood

Who you gonna call? (Ghostbusters)