Sophie Mirabella and that sanitation in the streets problem ...

(Above: Sophie Mirabella's the short one in the middle, part of the unholy trinity, so to speak, a kind of triptych cryptic ecliptic apocalyptic vision of hell on earth, with the holy kerosene ghost on the left, and on the right the king of the antipodean tea party).

A thought bubble inspired by Sophie Mirabella's Protestors occupied with glib, childish, pointless fantasy:

They boldly claim “we are the 99 per cent” - it’s their official catchcry - so unless you consider yourself among the uber rich and powerful, these folks are your new voice. So they’ll be speaking for you when they wave their glib and nebulous placards declaring “people not profits” and “be the solution”. (I am not making these up – this is the print-ready poster artwork available on their website.)

Yes, instead of glib and nebulous placards, what we need is the kind of incisive, deeply intellectual, philosophical placard you can find at a Mirabella supported rally.

Oh yes, that's more like it. (No, the pond isn't making that sign up).

Whenever attending a rally, call Sophie Mirabella for your placard needs. And then remember to position yourself right below a sign full of richly semiotic significance.

Ditch the bitch witch who flung us in the ditch, the kitsch glitch snitch witch who drove us into a twitch ... (if you happen to like verse right up there with Eliot ...)

Yes, there she is again, in the middle of the triptych, surrounded by those richly resonant signs.

Now you might suggest to Mirabella that ...

The real bottom line is that “Ditch the witch” is not a policy. It’s not going to create one job, it’s not going to provide the funds needed to build hospitals or schools, and despite the hokey sentiment it’s not going to build local communities.

It is just a catchcry. So is “stick the tax up your ass” and “Bob Brown's bitch”. Easily said, easily read on a placard. But not a blueprint for any meaningful reform.

But then you'd be sounding just like a smug, righteous, sanctimonious Mirabella:

The real bottom line is that “Greed is over” is not a policy. It’s not going to create one job, it’s not going to provide the funds needed to build hospitals or schools, and despite the hokey sentiment it’s not going to build local communities.

It is just a catchcry. So is “be the solution” and “people not profits”. Easily said, easily read on a placard. But not a blueprint for any meaningful reform.

Yes, here's how to hold up a placard that's a blueprint for meaningful reform, while staring up at your adored leader with eyes full of ferocious yearning love for his rightness and his truth and his justice:


Trust Mirabella to call it as it is:

And that’s where this “occupation movement” falls down. It’s called reality.

Yep, and to deal with reality, you need advanced post-modernist placards which deal with reality in a way that only Mirabella can understand:

And remember it's all a conspiracy. Reality always involves a conspiracy:

Not surprisingly the organiser of the “Occupy Melbourne” event is a former Greens candidate. The Greens tend to have a bit of a problem with reality, as an examination of their policy manifesto reveals.

As opposed to Mirabella, who has a complete problem with memory and with attending the carbon tax rally and standing under really stupid signs.

Interestingly, the Greens were faring much better with the Australian public when their unrealistic catchcry policy platform was just a wishful glint in Bob Brown’s eye.

Uh huh. That'd be as opposed to the splendidly realistic catchcry policy platform enunciated by the followers of Sophie Mirabella, in relation to Bob Brown's bitch.

Now they’re Labor’s partner in Government, people are less comfortable with some of the reality-defying concepts the Greens hold dear.

But perhaps not as uncomfortable with the reality-defying notion that Sophie Mirabella is just a short step away from power, and if things come to pass, she might well transform from shadow minister of Innovation, Industry and Science to an actual minister of Innovation, Industry and Science.

At that point, it might just be simpler to hire a few luddites to go around the countryside wrecking science laboratories ... and as for innovation, well we can ditch that bitch witch concept quicker than you can call innovation a bitch of a notion.

Innovation? Isn't that the destruction of fibre to the home, and creating a brand new stitching pattern in needlework instead? A hemstitch or a topstitch so dull and tepid and full of rhetorical bile, it'll take a long time to unstitch or unhitch ...

Never mind. I’m sure this Saturday’s “occupation” will give those professional protesters and Greens voters a chance to voice their anger at some nebulous, greedy “machine” rather than hold to account the Government they helped elect.

Never mind, who in their right minds would be able to name any aspect of the nebulous greed machine, be they politicians, bankers, Macquarie bank (paw thrust out in the hard times, millionaires' factory in the good times), greedy developers, greedy council workers, greedy CEOs and boards, and their upper management salaries and bonuses, and so on and so forth, and an observable, measurable, growing disparity in wealth in the United States, but also in Australia this past decade or so ...

But wait, we can't let you go away without a bonus condolence:

Of course, many families are doing it tough.

Oh yes, we feel for you, we weep for you.

Making ends meet is a challenge when the cost of living keeps rising and will it will continue to rise under Labor’s carbon tax.

Yep, a tax yet to be enacted is the cause of all the problems being experienced now. So the future always ends up causing damage to the present, damn you, peksy time travellers ...

There, there's nothing like condolences and a bonus typo to make you feel better, because times are tough and our comfortably well off hearts bleed for you.

Collectively politicians are poised to turn down the entirety of their upcoming pay rise, as we will shortly announce exclusively in the pond ... and if you believe that, yes, we do have a space for you down at the funny farm ...

Perhaps you even feel that the party of business and climate denialism really does give a flying fuck about you, at least once you've parted with your vote, and they really can get down to the business of a flexible work force and the pressing matter of individual contracts for check out chicks and burger flippers ...

Oh but wait, just one more moment, because we can't let you go away without a passing reference to sanitation problems:

But there’s a strange dichotomy about this movement. These “occupiers” want other people to earn less, while presumably they are supported by the Government or benevolent families so they can spend their days creating sanitation problems in the street rather than earning a living themselves.

Politics of envy? Politics of fear? Followed by politics of sanitation?

Yep, Sanitation.

Mirabella isn't talking about common or garden things like litter, and the odd dropped placard a council worker might have to pick up and throw in the bin.

She knows her English, so she's talking about sanitation, which is to say dealing with sewage, excreta, solid waste, waste matter, shit in the streets ...

So there you have it, just another day in the discourse you come to expect of an innovative, scientific shadow minister of the opposition, babbling on about protestors as shit in the streets ...

Well it's wonderfully consoling that she's going to be in the future a shit canner, a shit carter, a shit kicker of the first water. Unless you happen of course to be one of the lowly types who actually lives at the shittier fringes of society ...

Hypocrisy?

“They can call me all sorts of names but when the government turns its name calling on mainstream Australians and business leaders then I draw the line.” (No rally regret for Sophie Mirabella)

Name calling?

Who, moi?

Not really, because you must understand that it isn't name calling to deride glib, nebulous disaffected professional protestors, laughable, pointless, politically adolescent people, bludgers who create sanitation problems in the street. These people aren't part of mainstream Australia, they need to be flushed down the toilet by reality and Mirabella ...

You see, four legs are good, two legs are bad, some rallies are wonderful, some rallies are bad, some placards are childish, and some wonderfully adult, and some people are just excreta in the streets creating sanitation problems, and some people will listen to Sophie Mirabella and wonder what just happened to their brains and the neurones lost for ever ...

I am the very model of a modern innovative science minister
I've information vegetable, animal, sanitary, and mineral
I know the sewers of England, and I quote the fights historical
From Canberra carbon rallies to truckie carbon rallies, in order categorical

I'm very well acquainted, too, with matters mathematical
I understand equations, both the simple and quadratical
About binomial theorem I'm teeming with a lot o' news
With many cheerful facts about the sanitary square of the hypotenuse

With many cheerful facts about the sanitary square of the hypotenuse
With many cheerful facts about the sanitary square of the hypotenuse
With many cheerful facts about the sanitary square of the hypotepotenuse

I'm very good at integral and differential calculus
I know the scientific names of beings animalculous
In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral
I am the very model of a modern innovative science minister

In short, in matters vegetable, animal, sanitary and mineral
She is the very model of a modern innovative science minister (apologies to Gilbert and Sullivan).

(Below: remember folks, four legs good, and keep those witty signs coming. We suggest lie and liar repeated over and over again, perhaps with pants on fire if you like a good rhyme in the Eliot style, so witty, so elegant).