Fat cats on parade ... (and don't forget to bring a decent Cuban cigar) ...

So the Sunday Terror is on hand with yet another risible EXCLUSIVE, a leak about how the heroic battling PM is going to savage his own income while kicking the shit out of the disabled - well we all know that the disabled are a shifty bunch, hanging around in their wheelchairs when they could be out and about making a living as professional footballers ...

It seems we must wipe from our minds the scandal of Liberal MPs using their expense accounts to junket off to their colleagues' weddings, because hey, every social occasion is politics ...

Oh yes, those were the days, as you can remember by strolling down memory lane here, or AFP called on to look into Tony Abbott, George Brandis wedding cost claims. 

And so on and so forth, because there were plenty more examples of fingers dipped in the till.

What's interesting about this smokescreen, this aluminium chaff, offered up today by the lickspittle fellow travellers at the Sunday Terrorist is the way it follows hard on the heels of that immortal sight of puffing Joe and his Terminator hench man, and the way that exotic sight sent Twitter into a melt down:

There were some dupes and stooges who infested the comments section of the stories about the indiscretion, wondering why there was outrage at two men having a harmless smoke (well harmless to everyone except themselves in their infinite, self-indulgent stupidity).

The answer of course is that they're FAT CATS.

That's the flip side of the Sunday Terror's headline. You see the story clearly identifies Tony Abbott as a FAT CAT, along with all the other federal politician FAT CATS.

Prime Minister Tony Abbott has ordered a pay freeze for himself, federal politicians and the nation’s top public servants. 

The edict is understood to have the backing of the independent Remuneration Tribunal, which tomorrow is expected to announce it will agree to Mr Abbott’s request. (here)

Eek, here, there, everywhere a FAT CAT.

Look, there's the FAT CAT, smirking, right next to the headline:

Look at him, smirking like he's just had a bowl of cream and a slice of wedding cake (and how thoughtful of the Sunday Tasmanian to identify the head FAT CAT while forgetting that the story was allegedly a Sunday Terror exclusive. Still, no one in Sydney knows anything about Tasmania, not when there's some King Island cheese to help fatten the cat).

So rather than create, in the pond's mind at least, the image of everybody sharing the pain and uniting to do the hard yards and take the ball up the middle and all the other guff boring MAMILS trot out in a testosterone crisis, the pond was immediately reminded that Abbott was a FAT CAT with a sordid expense account past.

Even Samantha Maiden, in the very same Terror, couldn't resist a trot down memory lane to when the Ruddster introduced a freeze - which mysteriously managed to get itself unfrozen - and Abbott memorably said on Lateline:

TONY ABBOTT, OPPOSITION FRONTBENCHER: Well, I think it's a bit of a populist stunt. It's the easiest trick in the book to slag off politicians. (here)

Yes the lemon shrieked that day, and the pips were sore:

Abbott was forced to increase the mortgage on the family home to $700,000, a ­financial decision that he joked about in an unedited moment that made some of his colleagues wince. 
“What’s it called? Mortgage stress? The advent of the Rudd Government has caused serious mortgage stress for a section of the Australian community, i.e. former Howard government ministers!” he said. “You don’t just lose power in inverted commas, you certainly lose income as well, and if you are reliant on your parliamentary salary for your daily living, obviously it makes a big difference.”  (Maiden, here)

Uh huh. So now Abbott is repeating the Ruddster's populist stunt. And apparently he thinks it will fool the mug punters, since it's such a clever former Chairman Rudd trick.

Maiden made the point that's so obvious to everyone except cigar smokers:

That’s another reason why Joe Hockey and Finance Minister Mathias Cormann’s afternoon indulgence, smoking cigars in public view around Parliament House, is so incredibly dumb. It’s such a bad look when the pair of them are banging on about ending the age of entitlement, while chugging back a fat Cuban cigar. 
Especially when they were expressly warned by colleagues that sooner or later someone was going to film them doing it.

It's like the schoolgirls in the toilet in Puberty Blues, puffing away, wanting in some twisted, perverted way to be caught by the prowling teacher so that their naughtiness and rebelliousness could be established for all to see.

So what happened to that Ruddster freeze?

Long gone, and unlike the flowers, not a long time in passing.

You can, if you like, check out parliamentary remuneration and entitlements by heading off to the proper page, here (have you thought about a good birching in the snow, Percy Grainger style, as a viable alternative?)

But the simple minded pond prefers a simple graphic:

And that's why gibberish about freezing the FAT CATS is so much pandering and nonsense, and such a nakedly self-serving and blatant populist stunt.

You see, the FAT CATS copped a generous payrise back in July 2012, and what a hearty whack it was, and then the headline ran Tony Abbott defends increase in MP salary ...

Back then, The Hon Tony 'Have I Got a New Surprise and a New Tax for you today' Abbott was working hard for the man ... to get rid of surprises and new taxes:

Tony Abbott says he justifies his increasing MP salary by working as hard as possible to try to scrap the carbon tax. 
The Opposition Leader would not be drawn on whether MP salary increases should face public hearings, as suggested by Independent Senator Nick Xenophon, saying he was comfortable with what he was paid. 
“I never forget that the taxpayers of Australia pay my salary,” Mr Abbott said. “I think that the average Australian, those people who work hard and struggle to meet their bills at the end of the week or month, they want politicians to make their burdens easier, not heavier. 
“That’s my job, to reduce the burdens faced by the Australian people, and that’s why I’m so determined to get rid of this carbon tax. “That’s how I justify my salary, by working for the benefit of the Australian people every day.”

Yes disabled bludgers get down in that coal mine, and yes students take that fourth job, and yes hapless sick poor people, get that cash in the paw ready for your visit to the doctor. And so on and so forth. But forget about climate science and the world likely to go to hell in a handbasket. Let's all pull together to ignore that.

Speaking of convenient charts, back in July 2013 James Glenday provided a handy compare and contrast here:

And the Sunday Terror provided this update:

Now the pond doesn't mind politicians getting a decent salary. 

There's got to be some reward for fucking up the country and copping the resulting abuse, and if it's a reasonable sum, there should be less excuse for the rorting that's currently on view in New South Wales. Well that's the theory, the greed for a harbour view makes it a relatively useless theory.

But that said, does Abbott and his merry band of cigar puffers and expenses rorters really think his empty gesture will work with the punters each time they fork over cash to doctor or emergency ward?

It's an entirely meaningless, shallow and empty gesture.

Abbott would be better off accepting his fate as a politician the majority of Australians fear, loath, despise, or just plain dislike.

Which just leaves time for a few LOL fat cats - got to keep those clicks turning over in these desperate times:

By golly even the LOL cats can manage a good likeness to jolly Joe.

And then there was this cartoon. 

Scratch out America, substitute Australia and away you go. Joe Hockey probably supplied the cigar: