In the first chapter of Uncle Dynamite (1948), by P.G. Wodehouse, Frederick Altamont Cornwallis Twistleton, the fifth Earl of Ickenham, explains to his nephew, Pongo, the essential features of a well invented fib:
Simple, which is always good. Impossible to disprove, which is better.
Craig Thomson MHR, however, in his strained, mendacious, deliberately misleading “explanation” in the House of Representatives yesterday, failed to keep his account simple and, though some details would assuredly be considered credible by partisan, gullible dupes, far too many were fancifully over-complicated, which is always bad, and too easily disproved, which is worse.
Mr. Thomson ought to have followed the advice which I companionably sent him. I suggested that he choose one of two defences beloved of soapies, viz: (a) that he had suffered from amnesia, brought on by concussion, and could as yet remember nothing from early 1984 until he awoke in a strange bed in April, this year; or (b) that he has an evil twin brother, Bunbury, who has been the bane of blameless Craig’s existence since that bounder learned to forge his brother’s signature expertly, and to mimic his voice and mannerisms exactly, in the reprehensibly hedonistic pursuit of depraved pleasure at an irreproachable brother’s expense.
Thomson will soon be proven to be a pornerastic cheat, a thief and a dreadful liar, and he will have to be forced from Parliament. Sadly, it will take longer to force the removal of the present, incompetent and corrupt Government.
UPDATE I: What Thomson said in his maiden speech (from Hansard):
The support I received from the entire
union movement but in particular from Unions New South Wales, the TWU,
the CFMEU mining division, the PSA, and of course my own union, the
Health Services Union, was phenomenal. Michael Williamson, the HSU
national president, was a marvel in relation to the long-term support he
provided to me. I would also like to acknowledge the support and
friendship of my former state branch secretaries, but in particular,
along with Michael, I would like to acknowledge Dan Hill, from Western
Australia, Lloyd Williams, from Victoria and Chris Brown, from Tasmania.
What Thomson said yesterday (from Hansard):
[T]he Fair Work report’s allegations are largely based
on allegations—I repeat, allegations—made by two people: Kathy Jackson
and Michael Williamson. […]
Later on, some years later, Michael Williamson
said in front of a few witnesses, ‘This is the way we deal with people
in the Health Services Union when we have problems.’ So we have the
threat and, post facto, we have an admission.
For [Katrina] Hart and her equally appalled colleagues, Thomson’s melange of conspiracy theories, “cloned” phones, score-settling and accusations did nothing to rebut the damning findings from Fair Work Australia that he had spent $500,000 of HSU members’ money on prostitutes, ATM cash withdrawals, fine dining and election expenses when he was the union’s national secretary (which Thomson denies).
“That’s it, we’re out,” HSU members told Hart, as soon as Thomson finished. […]
“A lot of them walked off in disgust,” says Hart.
“A lot said it was crap, it was staged, he didn’t address anything that was real. It was always somebody else’s fault. Who wrote that speech for him? Who coached him?”
Hart, who also is an unpaid union official, president of the Randwick campus general sub-branch, and a supporter of whistle-blower Kathy Jackson, had managed to stop members quitting—until then.
But for the hospital workers she represents—cleaners, kitchen staff, porters, surgical dressers, clerks, the quintessential working poor—Thomson’s address was the final straw […].
UPDATE IV (24 May): listen to 2GB’s Ray Hadley and Grant Williams, Executive Producer of ACA, discuss the forthcoming interview with a former prostitute who has revelations to make anent Craig Thomson.
UPDATE V (30 May): see Piers Akermann’s “Gillard endorses Thomson cover-up”, wherein he concludes:
Gillard told Caucus and Parliament the campaign against Thomson had descended in to one of “vicious and personal attack”.
Not so, but there is a crying demand for justice and that is just what Gillard does not want.
She thinks the nation is not interested in union rip-offs, she is wrong.
We deserve better than this.
UPDATE VI (3 June): see, at Kangaroo Court of Australia, “Slater and Gordon Lawyers Nail Craig Thomson for Fraud. The Real Smoking Gun!”
UPDATE VII (7 June): a former prostitute whom ACA located has retracted her allegations—perhaps because of political pressure, perhaps from belated probity; accordingly, idiots in the media this morning are opining that Thomson, the pornerastic peculator, is (by fallacious reasoning) innocent and has a presumption of innocence. That’s rubbish. The presumption of innocence is a legal rule concerning the burden of proof in criminal trials. It exists only within the context of a criminal trial, and need prevent none of us (within the constraints of defamation laws and the like, of course) from identifying proven liars as liars. Thomson lied, and continues to lie, and misled Parliament. I notice that the Government and its credulous apologists, in their various, serial, hysterical claims, have no problem with their denying various members of the Opposition a presumption of innocence.
