In which the pond offers an onion and a skinny mocha to Dame Slap, and cops a raw prawn argument in return ...

Being in the grip of a "come to Satan" moment - google it, the meaning of the phrase is perfectly clear, though no doubt it will keep the media navel gazing for the rest of the week - the pond just had to plunge back into the witch broth known as Dame Slap's column for the reptiles at the Oz.

Yes, yes, it's an old meme, but the pond just wanted to boast that it was meme ready and meme aware.

Now it will be fondly remembered by many that Dame Slap was the amongst the first to follow the lead provided by that laddish Lordy, Lordy, the Lordly Monckton, and note the way that the UN was using climate science to establish a world government - a conspiracy elaborated on subsequently by Maurice Newman. (The pond has taken to wearing its foil hat every day as a result).

Oh okay, the pond just wanted to remind stray readers that on a clear day, Dame Slap is inclined to go barking mad and howl at the moon.

But hey, the UN world government conspiracy turns out to have been just an Entrée (no stray American reader, an entree means a bloody Entrée, you stupid goose, not the main meal).

Could anyone else on the planet manage this for an opening par?

Though deranged Abbott-haters will never manage it, the Prime Minister deserves praise for his handling of the same-sex marriage debate. Whatever Tony Abbott’s personal views about gay marriage, he knows democratic principles matter more. When same-sex marriage is recognised in this country, it will happen because of principle, not politics.

Roll that one around on the tongue the way jaffa lovers once rolled them down the aisles: Abbott deserves praise for his handling the same-sex marriage debate.

What, by opposing it, squelching it, squashing it, ignoring it, and only belatedly and grudgingly being herded to the point where he might allow a conscience vote, but only then by weight of numbers and the sense that maybe Opus Dei is on a loser regarding the issue?

And if you point out any of this, you're a deranged Abbott hater?

And so says the pond, Connie! But don't expect any thanks, not from a deluded hater of the first water.

Never mind, the pond would like to provide students with a guide to Straight and Crooked Thinking (thank you Robert H. Thouless), because remember the end of year is closer than you think, and the gobbets you might be examining at the moment probably don't give you a clear enough guide to the art of sophistry and horseshit.

So how does Dame Slap arrive at praise for Tony - gays make me nervous - Abbott's handling of the gay marriage matter.

Let us peruse the runes and the entrails and the offal:

Yes, after all that nonsense about Abbott, and claiming religion had nothing to do with his attitudes and behaviour - at which point you have to ask why bother having a religion or a set of religious beliefs - Dame Slap settles on the real game, which is to abuse the Labor party.

As if the party which includes that ratbag Joe de Bruyn wasn't itself inept and conflicted on the matter. It wasn't the pond who said it, it was Gough Whitlam who noted that Joe de Bruyn is a Dutchman who hates dykes. Glory be, Joe even has his own Facebook page, Sack Joe de Bruyn NOW ...

But soft gentle students, the pond got distracted. Let us continue with the Dame Slap reading:

You see, you see. You bag former chairperson Rudd - my, my, isn't he sounding weird and very pursed lip and anal in those trailers for the ABC's spilling of Labor blood - for not supporting the Greens, and then you skip, with a lah de dah, like a vinegar flogging skipping girl, right past Tony Abbott and what he did.

So when Rudd has a curious contrasting conversion, you don't contrast it with Abbott, who's never had any conversion, except to his come to Jesus self, you contrast it with an unmarried atheist.

And what's unmarried got to do with it? Well at least Dame Slap stopped short of mentioning the failure to breed. Stay tuned, it'll turn up in due course ...

You see, you just keep on rabbiting on about Labor, because curiously, you can't manage to track Abbott's fierce opposition to gay marriage from day one.

Well now you should be prepared for the relentless barrage, the coup de grace of bigoted column writing, as Dame Slap drives ahead to a glorious consummation:

Uh huh. And so it all comes out.

There's no reason to rush. Ireland's a different country, they do things differently there.

And the Liberals, with Abbott to the fore, have spent the past decade pandering to their bigots and ultra-conservatives, most notably Abbott himself, and turning them is going to be a bit like turning the Titanic, and when it does come to the vote, it must be principled, rather than politically opportunistic, and therefore must not leave any egg on Abbott's smirking face, though truth to tell, he has been such a relentless opponent, that no matter how much Dame Slap and the rest of the spin-doctors spin it, he will have egg on his face should it ever come to pass, and he will be revealed yet again as the laggard, luddite, backward fundamentalist Catholic that deep in his Pellist heart he remains ...

Well there's a lot more work on that front to be done by the spin doctors as momentum grows, and gay marriage will for the rest of the year offer the same spectacle as Abbott ignoring climate science and delivering a second unfair budget and wanting to use citizenship as a fascist cudgel, as if somehow Australia can wash its paws of its citizens and do a British in reverse, by shipping its convicts to hulks abroad. Only a ten pound Pom could think that's an admirable solution to dealing with lawbreakers.

Sorry, gentle students, the pond got distracted again.

All the best with your studies and your exams, and here's what you might have noted it if you had any capacity for balance and actual observation of political realities:

It goes without saying that the Labor party has been resolutely useless on this matter until Bill had his sudden conversion, and no doubt he saw a political advantage in the conversion. As if politicians never thought about political advantage (bit didn't that shock the DLP element in the pond's extended family of bilious lovers).

But to pretend that somehow this turns Tony Abbott into some kind of heroic leader on the matter surely wins the horseshit award for the week, possibly the month, and perhaps for the year.

There's spin, and then there's Dame Slap getting a call to Jesus. Only it seems Tony Abbott is Jesus.

What say you David Rowe? Sock it to us, and remember more Rowe is here.

Go on Dame Slap, eat the onion and drink the skinny mocha. You've given everybody else the raw prawn, so fair's only fair ...