So, let me see if I have this straight:

Alex Downer and Trump adviser, George Papadopoulos, meet in a London bar where, according to George, he doesn’t tell Alex that the Russians have damaging material on Hillary Clinton. Then Downer passes on the information that he didn’t receive to George. This led to the Mueller investigation, because there was an announcement by the FBI that they were still investigating Hillary’s emails in the days preceding the 2016 election. This action was evidence that the FBI were part of a global conspiracy to prevent the election of Donald Trump, even though the release of the material actually harmed Clinton…

Now before some of you start jumping up and down and telling me what terrible human beings the Clintons are, I want to make it clear that I have no wish to defend any American presidential candidate, I’m just trying to establish the facts here. Yes, you can tell me how “House Of Cards” is based on the Clintons and not some BBC show from twenty years ago and how they ran a pizza parlour which they disguised as a pedophile ring. Whatever! The Clintons are not the issue here. We have another global conspiracy to stop the election of Donald Trump for reasons I’ve yet to quite understand.

Anyway, according to the current narrative being pushed by Papadopoulos and the other Trumpsters, Alex wasn’t told about the damaging information that the Russians had on Hillary but Downer reported this non-existent information. The investigation into the investigation would like to delve more deeply into this because according to George – the man who pleaded guilty to making false statements to the FBI – Downer recorded their conversation. If there’s one thing worse than a diplomat passing on information they were given after a couple of drinks, then it’s one who records and passes on information that they weren’t given. The Australian government is only too happy to help… We’re not releasing the transcripts of anything written but we’re happy to release Alexander.

Yes, it’s all a bit John Le Carre rather than James Bond. Whatever, Scottie says that there’s nothing wrong with helping an ally with an investigation. Pity, the Ukraine isn’t an ally, I guess.

Then again, Scottie is very helpful these days. When it was discovered that one of the councils being given drought relief was actually experiencing a bumper season, our PM told us that he made no apology for being generous… which would be fine, were it not for the fact that the councils to which he was so generous didn’t seem to be in any Labor electorates. I’m mildly surprised that the metropolitan electorate of Chisholm wasn’t given drought relief, not because it’s a marginal electorate, but because city people have to pay higher food prices thanks to the drought…

And then there’s the NDIS which is so generous that it had more money than people needed. How else do you explain the $4.5 billion in unspent funds this financial year? Incompetence in its administration? Ridiculous. The Coalition is in charge! An obsession with returning the Budget to surplus no matter who suffers? You cynic! As if the government would do such a thing.

Of course, generosity has its limits and you certainly can’t go increasing money to those on NewStart. No, as Minister for Family and Social Services told us, that would just lead to more money going to drug dealers and pubs.

I don’t know what she’s got against pubs. Or drug dealers, for that matter. I mean, the economy needs a boost from somewhere and it’s certainly not going to get one from increases in the NDIS or the dole. If it has to come from some hotel owner or ice dealer buying a new car or adding to his bling, then it’s better than slipping into recession. Besides, can’t the Liberals remember that when Labor suggested putting a limit on pokie machine losses, they banded together with the clubs and pubs and told us how this would lead to massive job losses. Yet now, we can’t have an increase in unemployment benefits because it would help the pubs.

It seems just a few days ago that the Liberals were telling us how good they’ve been at creating jobs. I suppose if you use the word “creating” in the sense of a making up a thing that’s not really there, then one would have to agree.