In which the pond wonders what glory there is left in Cory ...

To say the pond is disappointed with Cory is an understatement.

There were the grand old days, with 50,000 signing up for his conservative movement and Cory fever about to sweep the country like cholera, or at least dengue fever.

What's it come to?

Tory scribbling about Cory, and the main interest for the pond the way that all the regional Murdochian mastheads are now packaged like rice crisps around the land ...

The HUN?

What a shame, what a tragedy ...

The 'Tiser reduced to servicing the mighty V and the Terrorists?

Croweaters in despair ...and for what?

So Tory can compare Cory speaking ...to a muppet dribbling?

Yes, the pond gets it. There's a HUN rendezvous, and a Terrorist one, and one for croweaters, and eerily, they all manage to look and sound just the same ...

But once there were giants that walked the political landscape, with hopes and dreams and human desires to repair everything ... and sort the world out like some super-duper Tory down under  ...

How Dame Slap held her tremulous breath in hope ...

It was a glory time for Cory, no notion of the gory time that would see him devolve into a regional politician, spurned by other regional politicians who couldn't believe their luck at the way the draw came out ...

Now all that's left to him is regional condescension and parochialism:

"For those of us who have been around politics for a long time, we can understand the consequences and implications of significant decisions like this," the Senator explained. "We got our head around it quickly but it is much more difficult for those who are new to the political environment."

There's not much to get the old noggin around.

The dropkick loser is taking on Nick X, and will be lucky to retain his own seat, let alone drag another Senator across the line.

Why sit in silence listening to Cory blather on as the fearless leader of a party of two,  as opposed to having a little fun on the cross bench?

Already the mocking has begun ... with Tory dishing it out to Cory like he's some sort of non-story ...

Room to grow, and soon there will be spring and summer, and then the leaves will yellow and drop in the fall and things will turn desultory near the end of the allegory ...

Yet once there were hopes and dreams that Cory would be the repository of Tory hopes ... see how Dame Slap saw the future celebrate Cory's broad church, before it turned out to be a small bunch of barking mad Xian fundamentalists ...

That was scribbled less than a year ago, and what's the best Cory has come up with?

An alliance with a bunch of fundamentalists who score the odd seat now and then, and put them in the hands of ratbags and bankrupts ...

Oh sure Tory does her best to put a gloss on the story ...

But blathering on about Aloysius and Snufflepagus shows just how hard it is to spin this bit of nonsense into anything meaningful ...

Cue the reptiles a few days ago sinking in the boot (behind the paywall, googling text required):

Mr Bernardi disputed claims by senior minister Christopher Pyne that the merger proved Australian Conservatives and Family First couldn’t survive alone, saying Mr Pyne’s analysis was “self serving”. “If there was no threat to Christopher Pyne he wouldn’t be making any comment,” he said. “These sort of trouble makers, or power brokers, as they like to style themselves, in the Liberal Party, they are responsible for the...disillusionment by the public, “People like Christopher Pyne don’t stand for anything and they are worried that a coalition government doesn’t stand for anything”.

Sure, Cory did his best to liven things up by having a go at the poodle ...

When asked whether he would consider merging with One Nation, Mr Bernardi said it wasn’t an immediate goal. “I will work cooperatively and positively with anyone,” he said.

No you won't you goose, you stormed away from your colleagues, and ended up with a bunch of loser dropkick fruit loops as your chosen new companions ... you don't have the first clue about working cooperatively and positively with anyone, unless they hail the fast-fading glory of Cory ...

Sure there were some who crawled out of the woodwork to deplore Tory's hoary inventory of hope ...

But the hard hats at the lizard of Oz had already written their derogatory admonitory story ...

Yep, two loser dropkicks get together to salvage what they can, and next thing you know Tory is scribbling a story about muppets not having much of a clue ...

Well the pond is now seriously reviewing its association with, and promotion of Cory. 

Let's face it, each day the pond has to associate with reptile losers and dropkicks. Having a total loser dropkick on the masthead, who thinks the party of Bob Day is a step up, is too rich even for the pond ...there has to be a smidgin of memento mori as things head down the lavatory ...

As usual, the final decisive word must go to a cartoonist, thanks to David Rowe, and more excellent Rowe here, where all stray cats and dogs are welcome...