In which Hedley Thomas gets the fear of Clive ... while the rest of the world get the fear of Sophie and Mal ...

(Above: more excellent Popery here).

The pond is jaded and bored.

Even the usual excellent Popery only provided a hollow, Treasure of Sierra Madre sort of laugh, echoing across the wasteland of ADSL2. Does anyone remember Stars Wars after George's last three leaden efforts?

Oh sure there was a glimmer, a flicker of light with the news that Abbott would stand down if he lost, but that's only a cheap thrill for sublime optimists ...

On another front, there has been some most excellent news in relation to Sophie Mirabella, who is in the thick of it.

Even the reptiles at the lizard Oz have been forced to note Indi row 'dire' for Mirabella. (behind the paywall because they want to keep the news within the castle).

Crikey also ran with Mirabella scrambling as polling puts Indi on knife edge.

Because Mirabella is a nasty piece of work, the campaign has turned nasty, as also noted by Crikey, with the DLP spreading sicko posters featuring a young blonde girl, with barely repressed nasty homophobia at the heart of the copy. (see Tips and rumours, may be paywall affected, but the pond doesn't like to run images that prove the nasties know how to nasty).

The pond much preferred this excellent coverage by the excellent Mr. Denmore:

(screen cap only, no links, but you can find Mr Denmore on Twitter here, and at the top of his page there's a link to his blog).

The smelegraph? Now that's a serious contender to displace the Daily Terror nick ...

Meanwhile, over at The Monthly, there's an air of hysteria settling in, with the offer to punters of a game of election night bingo (you can see it and cop a pdf here)

But enough of the serious issues and the sombre coverage, the pond is devoted to loons, and this morning a certain kind of issue has risen to a head (no, not that kind of head you deviant perverted reader, keep your thoughts to yourself).

And it's all thanks to Hedley Thomas, reportedly and reputedly once upon a time a journalist, until he got a Clive Palmer bee in his bonnet. 

Here's the wider front page digital perspective:

Now a keen eye would have moved past all the talk of Tony Abbott being wonderful and Labor doomed - commentary couched as news in the usual reptilian way - to focus on Hedley's effort:

Yes it's a digital double whammy, and what's even more amusing and bizarre is the header Why we need to worry about the real Clive. (behind the paywall because you have to pay to be worried).

The trouble is, the pond feels absolutely no need to worry about the real Clive, or the surreal Clive or the unreal Clive ... or come to that, any other form of Queensland madness ...

Of course the sting is in the tail of that splash, under the header Magnate sues Brough over Ashby denials. (behind the paywall because legal actions are expensive)

Yes, Clive is taking on the rough Brough:

Mr Palmer yesterday filed a defamation lawsuit claiming the former Howard government minister had caused him distress and embarrassment and damaged his reputation by publicly refuting Mr Palmer's allegations last month that he had sought funding for Mr Slipper's former staffer, James Ashby, to launch a sexual harassment case against his then boss.

But that's just a worry, or perhaps an irritation for the rough Brough - oh what frabjous joy if he lost - and no doubt the same applies to the lizard Oz:

Earlier this year Mr Palmer also issued defamation proceedings against the publisher of The Australian.

So it's the use of the "we" that set the pond off.

Back in the day the reptiles at the lizard Oz were right up Clive, and so was the LNP in Queensland - why the rough Brough enjoyed a lunch with him, and nobody sneezed when Palmer donated $200k to the LNP in five instalments in 2011/2012, and set Campbell Newman off like a pocket rocket.

Back then Clive was just an eccentric uncle with deep pockets, and the lizards were cheering on his talk of standing against Wayne Swan in Lilley.

Also back in the day, Clive was the poster boy for the campaign against the mining tax, standing side by side with Gina Rinehart.

Never mind that they sounded barking mad even then - they were on the right side, part of the same team - though Laurie Oakes revealed what an odd couple they made when emails from Queensland Liberal MP George Christensen leaked:

She and Queensland mining magnate Clive Palmer are the "go to" billionaires for coalition politicians and conservative causes. Palmer is the Coalition's biggest donor. He bankrolls the Liberal National Party in Queensland, on occasion even making his private jets available for party purposes. The two billionaires subscribe to similar conspiracy theories. Palmer made headlines a few months ago with the bizarre claim that the Rockefeller Foundation was being used by the CIA to channel funds into Australia to attack our mining industry. 
In her reply to Christensen's email, Rinehart said: "This reminds me of my father's concerns years ago when the same Rockefeller Foundation funds were used in long-running campaigns to mess up the USA mining industry. These USA funds are now to be used against Australia and I feel a more sustained program will be needed to counter." (here)

Yes, those were the days to be worried about Clive, when the Bolter, the reptiles at the lizard Oz, and the rest of the Murdochian crew led a long, relentless campaign against the mining tax, still resonating even now ...

Now Hedley wants us to get agitated ...

Contrary to the flim-flam and spin, Clive Frederick Palmer is not a professor, not an adviser to the G20, not a mining magnate, not a legal guru and not an advocate for freedom of speech. He's probably not a billionaire. And he's a trillion-to-one chance of becoming prime minister on Saturday. 
 If the latest polls are correct, however, there is one disturbing prospect: the Gold Coast property tycoon, a man with a history of peddling fantasies that often morph into a unique version of "reality", could see his party in control of the sixth Senate seat in Queensland - and possibly even Australia's balance of power. 
Palmer, who cut his political teeth as an electoral mouthpiece a quarter-century ago for a bent premier, Joh Bjelke-Petersen, when the rottenness of the ruling National Party and its top police was on the brink of being properly exposed, must now be pinching himself.

As if there's no hint of a smell surrounding the rough Brough ...

But Hedders old mate, old chum, Clive is the man the reptiles at the lizard Oz celebrated and facilitated, up until the big split, and even now, there's not a peep nor a boo from the reptiles about the sordid world of what is known in other circles as Ashbygate.

Poor old Hedders has been given the job of sounding the alarums and ringing the bells about how Clive isn't a successful businessman, and isn't a mining magnate, and yells at hapless Chinese people, and so on and so forth, and at such length that you really have to worry about Hedder's obsessive compulsive interest in Clive.

And then comes the spectre, the ultimate horror:

Is it delusional to tell the Australian public that it is viable to produce a balanced budget that will include big cuts in income tax for every Australian, rich or poor, the abolishment of fringe benefits tax, the mining tax and the carbon tax, while at the same time asserting an intention to massively increase all age pensions and boost spending on infrastructure, schools and hospitals, with health spending to be increased by no less than $80bn? 

Abolishment? But do go on:

If the answers are yes, contemplate the prospect of Palmer's insight, logic and capability being deployed via his candidate, Glenn "The Brick With Eyes" Lazarus, in the Senate. Many voters say "at least Clive is entertaining". Buffoons are entertaining. An entertaining buffoon is close to achieving great political power.

If only Hedders could get as worked up about Sophie "nasty" Mirabella, or the rough Brough ...

Of course the relentless Murdochian crusade against Labor in Queensland can also take a lot of the credit. 

But when you read a different story in the AFR, Could Clive Palmer really be a force in the Senate?, they see it working for good old Tony:

Former rugby league player Glenn Lazarus has an outside chance of winning a Queensland Senate seat for Clive Palmer’s new party, and Labor is clinging to its eight seats in the Sunshine state and will struggle to pick up more. 
 If the former Brisbane Broncos prop is elected, Opposition Leader Tony Abbott will be a step closer to being able to abolish the carbon tax without relying on the agreement of Labor or the Greens.

You see Hedders, Tony can still get a chance to fuck over climate science and the planet, surely amongst the dearest wishes of the Bolter and the reptiles at the lizard Oz.

There's another view at The Conversation, here:

Palmer is a passionate opponent of the carbon tax so one would expect a PUP senator to vote enthusiastically for its repeal. But Palmer says “not necessarily – if [the repeal] didn’t go far enough. Our policy is to provide refunds to consumers” for the higher electricity prices they have suffered. And he’s no fan of Abbott’s paid parental leave scheme. But he adds that PUP would exercise what Senate power it had “responsibly”. 
Abbott would much prefer a PUP to a Green. But it sounds as though a PUP could still be a bit of a handful.

Yep, the Murdochians have gone a long way to helping fuck the NBN, helping fuck climate science, helping fuck the mining tax, and helping fuck almost everything else along the way these last few years, and now they want me to worry about Clive? 

Or a footballer, arising from the thugby league world celebrated by the Smellegraph and the Courier Snail on a daily basis?

In your dreams, Hedders old chum, in your dreams ...

You and your chums have helped fuck the country. You demonised the Labor party and you demonised the Greens, such that now the Liberal party thinks it's witty to show garbage bins and blowflies buzzing and cockies, and this very day, the crazed Courier Snail is still encouraging a blitzkreig by maddened, enraged Queenslanders...

So you can worry about Clive and any mess arising from an untrained PUP in the house ... why it'll just be more of the chaos you've honoured and celebrated in the shape of Dr No ...

Even if Sophie Mirabella and the rough Brough make it, the pond is determined to keep calm and carry on ...

(Below: the good old days, more Nicholson here)