Colonel Emmo

WHEN Peter "Star quality" Dutton opted yesterday to draw parallels between Trade Minister Craig Emerson and Muammar Gaddafi, it got our mind racing, and not just because of yesterday's Jana-Wendt-in-Tripoli item.

WHEN Peter "Star quality" Dutton opted yesterday to draw parallels between Trade Minister Craig Emerson and Muammar Gaddafi, it got our mind racing, and not just because of yesterday's Jana-Wendt-in-Tripoli item.

Could Emmo cut it as a dictator? Would he draw inspiration from Gaddafi's distinctive sartorial style? And if so, would a Colonel Emmo opt for the military uniform, the techno Bedouin look, or the more fearless and, dare we say it, somewhat draggy kaftan look? Rather than send us packing, as would many people in their right minds, Emmo's office gave the matter some consideration. "Whatever garb he chose, it would have to flatter and not flatten his hair; anything involving too much headgear would not be a good look. Craig obviously is a stylish chap - bit of a metrosexual - but not so flamboyant as to dress in drag. But he is also a pacifist, so military is not his thing. However, given the battle going on in parliament at the moment, perhaps he should don the fatigues." It's a start.

Beating a retreat

ALAN "The shouting clock" Jones may be anger's poster boy de jour, but we mustn't overlook former NSW premier Bob Carr. Sure he's urbane, but he can turn it on, as demonstrated in this heirloom of a letter last July to The Australian Financial Review (which Strewth will trot out at every opportunity, so help us God): "Just as well Australia has tough gun laws. Without them I would have been in The Australian Financial Review office to take my revenge." This could explain the nervousness of our colleague Tom Dusevic, whom Carr has taken to task on his blog under the pointed headline "Tom Dusevic Grovels to Libs". Carr begins: "His two-page article in The Weekend Australian reads like a job application for a chief of staff in a NSW Coalition government." Sure, Dusevic hasn't always been complimentary about the former premier (for example, "Carr's 10 years of dodging and weaving, spinning and winning, hurt NSW beyond measure"). But we're not sure how that job application is going to pan out, given some of Dusevic's musings about NSW opposition leader Barry O'Farrell and his crew: "The do nothing, say anything, O'Farrell opposition offers little hope" (November 2008); "The debacles over the privatisation of energy assets . . . should also disqualify O'Farrell's Liberals from credibility or making big promises" (September 2009); "the alternative government of NSW Liberal leader O'Farrell is so insipid" (December 2009); "the partisan bastardry of Liberal Barry O'Farrell, premier-in-waiting" (January 2011). But just in case you're looking, Mr Carr, we don't have a clue where Tom is just now.

Off with her head!

LABOR senator Dana Wortley was sitting next to Liberal senator Cory Bernardi on the flight from Adelaide to Canberra on Sunday. Wortley tells Strewth Bernardi was "nicely dressed" in a dark suit and gold, crown-shaped cufflinks. When a flight attendant admired the cufflinks, Bernardi said he was given them after defending the role of the Queen at the constitutional convention. Which queen, queried the hostie. Answered Bernardi, the Queen of Australia. Wortley says at this stage, the hostie asked, "Who? Julia?" We're confident the ever illuminating Bernardi set her straight on this one.

Out of time

OUR eye snagged on an ad in The Australian Financial Review yesterday: a plug for the paper's travel special, Feelgood New Zealand. Tastefully, it was at least a few pages away from any earthquake stories.

Big black hole

THERE was a tough headline in South Australia's online newspaper Indaily yesterday - "Truth time, SA: We're not perfect" - underneath which a rightly concerned Susan Mitchell ponders: "Where is the energy, the dissent, the intellectual, table-thumping exchange of ideas of the past? Are we happy to put all our eggs in the mining basket and become the nation's next quarry? Perhaps leaders like Don Dunstan and Tom Playford only happen once in a century." Perhaps not: Dunstan was premier twice, first from 1967-1968, then from 1970-1979.

No need to get loud

A SMALL but hopefully helpful Strewth tip for the hardworking members of our federal parliament (where, incidentally, some visitors were admitted yesterday with passes mysteriously stamped "February 29"), not least Wayne Swan, Tony Abbott and Joe Hockey: the acoustics in the House of Reps seem pretty good, and there are microphones at the despatch box to faithfully convey your dulcet tones to all ears in the house and beyond. So, for the love of all that is good, PLEASE STOP SHOUTING; Strewth is suffering industrial deafness after yesterday's question time. Christopher Pyne set a good example when, at a more regular volume, he uttered the day's most memorable sentence (not counting anything on the BBC): "I've been asked to withdraw Pinocchio and Lady Macbeth in the past." Not a superfluous decibel, and yet what was his reward? A huffy Speaker Harry Jenkins ordering him to "try to sit there quietly". (Which, by the way wouldn't help Strewth one jot.)

James Jeffrey