Gerard Henderson, Malcolm Turnbull, and prattling Polonius scores again ...

(Above: a Donnie Darko vinyl wall decal. Well you try finding an image relevant to the somnambulistic, somnolescent, sleep inducing, trance like ramblings of Gerard Henderson).

In these troubled times, with satanism rampant in Canberra and likely the cause of all the opposition woes, who are you going to turn to?

A rock of stability, a solid ship made of stout oak, a man of firm convictions blessed with a tough talking tongue ...

Why of course it's Gerard Henderson, and here's the official starting price results for this week, as embedded in Given the climate, Turnbull's the right man for the job.

First mention of John Howard in the column: third para

Number of mentions of John Howard in the column: seven

A strong week, and here's hoping even now you're taking your winnings to the pub to celebrate by having an argument about who's the right man to lead the Liberals.

But only if you're a journalist. Because as usual it's all the fault of the media, and the media's obsessions, and of course in particular the journalist at the ABC (if you can call those pinko pervert swine journalists at all).

This week as well, our prattling Polonius comes up with so many platitudinous observations that it might be worth organizing a side bet on the most obviously banal insight on offer. If you wanted to fill up a story about the Liberal party leadership, could you do any better than these monumentally tedious re-statements of recent events?

Second, Howard - despite his promises to the contrary - failed to ensure an orderly leadership succession to Costello.

Third, Costello - who was by far the best equipped politician to lead today's Liberals - decided to pack up his files and depart politics.

Fourth, Henderson - the bleeding obvious.

As for point one? Well Henderson's given the game away, left the field, ceded the penalty try and anointed Chairman Rudd the winner in the next grand final:

The only matter of genuine debate turns on the timing of the election, the ALP's margin of victory and how long its success will last.

Well that's all done and dusted then, nothing more to say, except that the media will keep yabbering on:

In spite of this, much of the media is obsessed with the Liberal Party and its leadership. On Insiders last Sunday, the conservative commentator Andrew Bolt maintained that "the Liberals are cactus". In The Sun-Herald that day, the columnist Paul Davey decided to give the Liberals some advice and declared: "Enough! It's time the Federal Opposition got behind a new leader."

At this point, I got the usual dizziness - or is it the sense of falling down the rabbit hole once again - that comes with reading Henderson. Because in the preceding paragraph hadn't Henderson just announced that the Liberals are cactus, and then he spends the rest of the column announcing "Enough! It's time the Federal Opposition got behind their current leader."

Wriggle how you will, the sense of ennui and tedium as Henderson once again goes through the various candidates to announce a shocking and revelatory discovery ... Turnbull is the right man for the moment. However long that moment might be.

The depths of this SWOT analysis can be deduced from this typical par:

Turnbull's self-assurance - which was evident when he headed the Australian Republican Movement and remains evident today - is a weakness. But it can also be a strength. In the difficult environment at present there is something to be said for the Opposition having a leader who does not need to be loved. The only other Liberal who meets this test is Abbott - and he has indicated that he is not interested in the leadership in the short term.

Yep, you read in Henderson first. Self-assurance in a politician is a weakness, which presumably means that a lack of self-assurance is a strength.

Inevitably even Henderson tires of the tedious business of offering up such profound insights, and returns to his true love. Kicking the heads of recalcitrant journalists and pundits, especially of the academic kind:

On The 7.30 Report last Tuesday, Turnbull followed up one of presenter Kerry O'Brien's interruptions by commenting: "Have you stopped asking the question or giving a speech? Can I answer now?" On the same program on Thursday, O'Brien actually responded to a rhetorical question posed by Abbott and advocated a means of breaking the stalemate over the emissions trading scheme. Unlike Howard, Turnbull and Abbott are prepared to publicly take on journalists where appropriate.

Now you might find this arcane, exotic, preposterous or paranoid, but never mind, it's just Henderson buzzing about the ABC bee in his bonnet, and in particular his fear and loathing of the carrot top Kerry O'Brien (switch off the telly, take a walk, think of other things, why doesn't that cloud up there look like a camel, why I think it does, no on second thoughts more like a weasel, or perhaps a whale, yes very much like a whale).

But back to the rabbit hole. Having pronounced the Opposition Cactus for this and another term of government, Henderson takes umbrage, finds high dungeon in other doomsayers, particularly of the academic kind:

- As with the Liberals during the Hawke-Keating government - and as with Labor during Howard's ascendancy - predictions about the Opposition's long-term decline are likely to be exaggerated. In 1993 the academic Judith Brett wrote that "the Liberal Party in the 1990s seems doomed". Within a few years some commentators were declaring that it was Labor which was doomed.

Well there's no doubt we'll all be rooned, but isn't there something strange about a commentator writing off a pundit for writing something that he himself has just written. To whit: Kevin Rudd will lead Labor to a second election victory some time in 2010.

So what's left?

In the short term the Liberals, under Turnbull's leadership, have little alternative but to advance good policy. There is much that can be said about small business including farmers, rising youth unemployment and the likely increase in power generation costs under a carbon reduction scheme that should appeal to the Opposition's core support base. That's about all that can be done until, in time, the electoral cycle turns. As it invariably does.

That's all that can be done in these troubled times!?

Oh wise Lord Polonius advise us further in these troubled times:

Yet here, Malcolm! aboard, aboard, for shame!
The wind sits in the shoulder of your sail,
And you are stay'd for. There; my blessing with thee!
And these few precepts in thy memory
See thou character. Give thy thoughts no tongue,
Nor any unproportioned thought his act.
Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar.
Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,
Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel;
But do not dull thy palm with entertainment
Of each new-hatch'd, unfledged comrade. Beware
Of entrance to a quarrel, but being in,
Bear't that the opposed may beware of thee.
Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice;
Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgment.

And so on and so forth and etcetera. And never mind Malcolm that you're going to be a loser, these things happen. Just remember it's all the media's fault ... and while I might be one of those doomsaying columnists clucking in the media, hanging around like a vulture, never mind, and beware the dangers of self-assurance because if to thine ownself you be true, then surely as night the day, no way can Birnam wood come to Dunsinan,e or you do over Chairman Rudd ...

With friends like these does poor Malcolm in the middle need any enemies?

By golly, I'm getting the hang of this prattling pontificating Polonius business. Now I just need someone to bore to death by stating the tediously obvious at alarming inordinate length.

Made it this far in the read did you? Well you'll certainly do ... take a look at this cloud, does it remind you of something? A camel, perhaps a weasel, even perhaps a whale? Or does it look like a Donnie Darko bunny to you?

Time then for a singalong:

All around me are familiar faces
Worn out places, Worn out faces
Bright and early for the daily races
Going nowhere, Going nowhere
Their tears are filling up their glasses
No expression, No expression
Hide my head I want to drown my sorrow
No tomorrow, No tomorrow

And I find it kind of funny, I find it kind of sad
These dreams in which I'm dying, Are the best I've ever had
I find it hard to tell you, I find it hard to take
When people run in circles it's a very very,
Mad World, Mad World