‘It is understood Mr Dutton thought he was sending the text to Mr Briggs, but instead sent it to Maiden, who had been highly critical of the ex-minister in a column published on Sunday.

“It’s what one bloke thought he was saying to another bloke,” Mr Joyce said.’

Well, there you have it. And what one bloke says to another bloke should never be the subject of our concern.

Remember how after Peter Slipper’s sexist texts were revealed how the Liberals defended him on the grounds that it was just a text between two blokes.

As Julie Bishop said:

“I believe Mr Slipper’s position is untenable,” she told ABC radio.

“He has made deeply offensive remarks about women, including women in the parliament.”

Well, Simon Birmingham:

“Frankly Peter Slipper clearly has no place in the Speaker’s chair any more.”

Ok, Tony Abbott:

“This Speaker is a creature of the PM. He would not be Speaker if not for the PM. We are increasingly aware of his attitude towards women.”

All right, so they’re being a little hypocritical, although I’m sure they’d argue that what Peter Slipper did was far worse than simply calling a woman names. After all, Slipper was sexually harassing James Ashby by threatening to spank him. To which Ashby made it clear that it was harassment by suggesting that he (Ashby) might like it. Ok, that wasn’t the worst of Slipper’s texts but it was one that made the harassment case a little harder to pursue.

But I’m not writing to defend Slipper or to point out the contradictions in the different responses to the texts.

No, I was just wondering if you noticed the suggestion that things like pap smears are going to rise in price after July 1st. *

Interesting that this wasn’t the front page news. Instead we’re more concerned about Dutton’s stupidity. It’s not that Dutton’s incompetence isn’t important. It’s well-documented and as I said elsewhere, he performs the very important function of making the rest of the front bench look vaguely competent by comparison – a role made even more important by the absence of Joe Hockey and Christopher Pyne’s self-imposed vow of silence. (Eric Abetz – even though relegated to the bench – has still played a role because Turnbull’s decision to dump him makes it look like Turnbull is on the right track.)

Ah, Turnbull a man who has all the right policies, but just doesn’t see any need to implement them now he’s Prime Minister.

Turnbull – I got rid of Tony Abbott!

People – Yay! So what are you going to do now? Introduce same sex marriage legislation.

Turnbull – No, we have a timetable for that which everyone’s agreed to so I don’t want to make it political.

People – Ok, fair enough. Well, what about climate change?

Turnbill – We have a really, really awesom direct action policy and we’re going to go to Paris and tell everyone that we’d much rather that climate change doesn’t happen.

People – Right, well, what about saving the Great Barrier Reef from potential damage.

Turnbull – Greg Hunt is a fine Environment Minister and I”m sure that he’s on that.

People – What about those kids in detention centres?

Turnbull – We’re committed to getting them out as soon as possible, but as you can appreciate by the time that happens, many of them will have turned eighteen and will therefore no longer be minors.

People – Cuts to support for victims of domestic violence?

Turnbull – I intend to make all my Cabinet wear white ribbons, even the ones who beat their wives. And we’re going to run even more commercials about it.

People – Yeah, but what about the cuts?

Turnbull – They’re needed to pay for the commercials.

People – Mm, cuts to Medicare?

Turnbull – We’re determined to make Medicare even stronger by making the sick people pay for everything.

People – So what’s actually changed?

Turnbull – I’ve stopped using three word slogans and I don’t answer everything with “We stopped the boats!”

People – Mm…

Turnbull – And I got rid of Tony Abbott!

People – Yay! Three cheers for Malcolm.

So, Mr. Turnbull condemns the leaking of the photo, but says that there’s no point in an investigation because such investigations rarely lead to anything. Or as Sir Humphrey said, “And never set up an enquiry unless you know in advance what its findings will be.”

Yep, as Barnaby Joyce told us,

“If you invite me out for a drink, you want me to speak frankly and freely rather than ring up 13 media advisers and get encrypted babble.”

I take that to mean that Barnaby believes that, unless one is having a drink with a Mr Turnbull and other members of his government, all you’ll be getting is “encrypted babble”.

For once, I suspect that Mr Joyce could be right!

P.S. I tried to post a link to a different article. but the link for some reason would work as a hyperlink where I first placed it. You can try it here.