Back to the trenches, and through a series of amazing encounters with broken cement plugs, the pond changes the course of history forever ...

(Above: Trotsky as a child on the 20 Kopeck stamp, except it wasn't Trotsky himself, it was his son, but even so, please be assured this stamp, through a set of amazing circumstances and bungles and David Penberthy, changed the course of history forever).

Now where where we?

Well over the weekend we came up with a positively wizard idea, and came up with a letter addressed to James Murdoch, which proposed that we had some potentially damaging information in relation to News Corp., and as we understood that he never asked any questions about million dollar payouts or the cheques he was signing, perhaps he'd be ever so kind, and sign the enclosed cheque for a million smackeroos made out in favour of loon pond.

Sadly we never sent the letter - after all, it's possible that, instead of nodding off or suffering memory lapses, the younger Murdoch now pays attention in meetings, and might even read emails. He might have even discovered the potentially embarrassing information in the pond's possession related to the way senior News Corp executives were seemingly completely unaware of how their various businesses operated ...

Meanwhile, an astonishing revelation also came from David Penberthy over the weekend, in Trotting out nonsense at an inquiry into nothing.

Apparently Penbo attempted to sell Direct Action in Adelaide (now available for your delight online here) and in the piece he comes out as a teenage Trotskyist. Okay, fair enough, teenagers are silly, and scratch a rabid socialist and you'll likely find a rabid capitalism and Murdoch lackey ripe for the grooming, but then Penberthy really jumps the shark.

First he alleges that the current Sunday newspapers are a delight to read, ignoring their real utility as vital components in papier-mâché for school students (yes, you too can win an environmental schools sculpture prize by starting off pulping Murdoch rags to a cloggy stickiness), and then in the usual way of Murdoch hacks attacking anyone for thinking about the media, or even inquiring into the media, he rounds off with this:

The people who gave evidence to this committee are welcome to start their own paper. It is, as they say, a free country.

Yes indeed and the people who punch on at The Punch are welcome to be silly young Trots who maintain their silliness in everything they write to this very day. It is as they say, a free and remarkably stupid country. Was it only a few days ago that we ran this excerpt from First Dog?

If another Murdoch lacky suggests someone should start up a newspaper, the pond will go out and jump a shark. If that's the best argument Penbo can come up with, he should revert to being a follower of Trotsky. At least most of the canny Trots I know realise you're better off with government bonds than putting money into a newspaper in this digital age ...

Meanwhile, the pond's concern for The Punch continues, if all it's got is Penbo writing drivel. Once upon a time, Sophie Mirabella was a mainstay - who else would publish her thoughts for free? - but today she turns up behind the paywall at The Australian.

They want someone, anyone, to pay for the thoughts of Sophie Mirabella? Simply amazing ... the pond is beyond telling them they're dreaming, because this way lies nightmares.

Meanwhile, it wouldn't be Monday without Paul 'Field Marshall Grumpy' Sheehan explaining yet again how Europe's situation is all the fault of the public sector. To astute Sheehan followers, there's really not much point reading past the header Europe shows how a fat public sector consumes an economy.

They could write the entire column in their sleep, and Sheehan manages to show what it's like to read a somnambulist having a go at automatic writing.

It's a vital skill when writing a column of this kind to show that you're dimly aware there might be other causes, and then dismiss them with a sneer:

Whatever excesses greedy corporate executives, gouging banks and casino capitalism have added to the mix, it is obese government that pushed Europe into financial crisis.

Yes, it's all the fault of fat cat bureaucrats, the very same fat cat bureaucrats now tasked with the job of saving the banking sector.

And of course what was Europe's fate yesterday will be Australia's fate tomorrow, all thanks to the Labor government, and the size of government, and never mind the excesses of greedy corporate executives, casino miners and gouging banks.

For simple minded fatuities and follies, repeating the same old mantras like a Buddhist monk wanting to produce a trance, or a whirling Dervish wanting to conjure up a dervish in a whirl, you really can't go past Sheehan on a Monday.

But for sheer audacity in news analysis, it's impossible to go past Phillip Coorey and his effort in Disaster in the Gulf of Mexico brings an oil strike for Gillard. (forced video at other end of link).

Who else could lead with such an epically meaningless opening par?

As fate would have it, a disaster deep beneath the sea and thousands of kilometres away has almost certainly changed the course of Australian political history.

Almost certainly! Emphatically likely! Problematically possible! Butterflies! Amazon!

But do go on Mr Coorey, explain your reasoning, and why cargo cultists welcoming DC3s and US Presidents have got it right:

Following a chain of cost-cutting and bungling, it was essentially the failure of a cement plug at the bottom of the sea that caused the BP oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico to explode on April 20 last year, killing 11 men and creating a rupture that resulted in about 4.9 million barrels of oil being spewed into the ocean.

It took months to cap the well and, as we now know, the environmental catastrophe was the reason Barack Obama cancelled his visit to Australia that was scheduled for June.

But now he's coming to Australia, and as a result, the course of political history in Australia will be changed forever.

Sure he was also scheduled to visit in March, but on that occasion the failure of a cement plug (perhaps involving cost-cutting and bungling) in the healthcare reforms meant Obama stayed home, and so as a result, the course of Australian history was changed utterly and forever.

You see, by failing to visit the first time Obama allowed the knocking off of former Chairman Rudd to proceed, and quite possibly it will now stop current Chairperson Julia Gillard being knocked off.

Is there nothing an American president can't do, except herd that unruly bunch of cats known as the United States of America?

Funnily enough each time Coorey attempts to lather up the significance of Obama's visit, he proceeds to undercut it, mentioning how even as George Bush snr was packing his bags for a tour down under, Bob Hawke was sent packing, and how the second visit of George W. didn't prevent John Howard from being sent packing, there being no eternal US presidential dead cat bounce ...

So we finally reach this line:

Obama is more popular here than at home and Gillard, who has enjoyed a small uptick in fortunes of late, should benefit from his visit, even if just ephemerally.

Yep, all that razzle dazzle rhetoric about cement plugs and changing the course of Australian political history turns up to be a bit of ephemera, celebrated and buried like a Mafia boss's feet in a bucket of concrete.

Somehow an enhanced military presence in Darwin is going to get the Greens in a rage, and differentiate the Labor product, and there'll be harmony because Dr. No will become Dr. Yes, and no one will manage an ironic Midnight Oil quote. Almost certainly!

By the end of the piece, I could feel a few more IQ points draining out the collander as Coorey strained for significance and something to say about the presidential visit, and the result is a feeling that Obama's visit has forever utterly changed the course of Australian political correspondent reporting and punditry ... from the silly to the ridiculously silly, and all thanks to a chain of cost-cutting and bungling that saw the BP oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico explode, killing people, and creating a rupture that resulted in at least 4.9 million barrels of verbal waste and oxymoronic sludge spewing into the ether ...

Now here's that quote you've been waiting for, and we'll do it at length because we like it so well:

US forces give the nod
It's a setback for your country
Bombs and trenches all in rows
Bombs and threats still ask for more

Divided world the CIA
Say who control the issue
You leave us with no time to talk
You can write your own assessment

Sing me songs of no denying
Seems to me too many trying
Waiting for the next big thing

Will you know it when you see it
High risk children dogs of war
Now market movements call the shots
Business deals in parking lots
Waiting for the meat of tomorrow

Everyone is too stoned to start emission
People too scared to go to prison
We're unable to make decisions
Political party line don't cross that floor
L. Ron Hubbard can't save your life
Super boy takes a plutonium wife
In the shadow of ban the bomb we live

Etc and etc. It's quite possible to say, as fate would have it, that the album 10 to 1, the result of a gangly man spewing musical lyrics into the ocean of AM radio, almost certainly changed the course of Australian political history forever ...

But whether for ill or good, who can say? Perhaps only Phillip Coorey ...

(Below: and so, with a bit of sophistry, we move from David Penberthy as a hapless Trot turned member of the Murdoch beehive, to Peter Garrett being held high, hanging out with puppets, and yearning to reveal his inner self).