As we know, this week John Key was awarded the title of Honorary Companion in the Order of Australia.
Sorry ... actually, that should be Sir John Key, although if you say it fast, spookily it comes out as "Shonky".
But the former Merrill Lynch whizkid is understandably baffled as to the origin of a sudden unsavoury odour. Many will tell him, free of charge, he's just scored the political equivalent of the Ancient Mariner being awarded the dead albatross.
This conspicuous act is akin to Tony Abbott harbouring some long-standing grudge against Phil the Greek -- sorry, the Duke of Edinburgh -- and going out of his way to award him a knighthood.
The rust-encrusted duke was already dripping with just about every gong in the book by virtue of being hooked up to his good lady Lillibet, so for the budgie smuggler to bestow him a mere piddling knighthood was equivalent to awarding Gordon Ramsay a Wolf Cub Order of Merit Second Class in Toasted Cheese Sandwich Making.
Despite all the on-camera faux bonhomie, Malcolm Turnbull obviously similarly carries a festering, deeply toxic resentment of Sir John.
Perhaps it's because Jonky got his foot in the door first in the knighthood stakes. Perhaps it's because -- to give him his full title -- Shonky has already split for the hills into a Pike River and Todd Barclay-free zone, and poor Malcolm is left with the 5am starts and still having to deal with the press corps piranha. Either way, Malcolm wants revenge.
So poor John has had to front up and publicly swallow one very big, hairy and malodorous rat. How so? Because in recent years Australia has gone from the Lucky Country to the Lurgy Country.
Aussie Gong Show: John Key is made an Honorary Companion in the Order of Australia by Australia Prime Minister Malcolm Campbell at a ceremony in Sydney. Photo/file
Offshore concentration camps for would-be refugees, race relations that condemn its indigenous people to the status of sixth-class outcasts, environmental pillaging that is steering world heritage icons such as the Great Barrier Reef to the scrapheap -- not to mention serious kicks-in-the-guts to hard-working Kiwis who have paid taxes for donkeys' years over the ditch only to be denied citizenship or any payback when times toughen up. The list goes on and on.
Given our Anzac cuzzies' new mantle of pariah state, to be awarded its top gong brings to mind the cliche trotted out for the drawn Lions/All Blacks rugby series -- that it was "a bit like kissing your sister".
Except in John's case, being awarded the Oz gong was more like being French-kissed by a seriously deranged and diseased satanic stepsister.
Just to rub things in, previous recipients of the order were of the ilk of Nelson Mandela, Mother Theresa and Burmese stateswoman Aung San Suu Kyi.
Now, as we know, Jonky publicly admitted to having a very serious case of amnesia as regards the anti-apartheid movement. He couldn't recall, in what should have been his radical student days, whether he was for, against, or even aware such a thing as apartheid existed.
It seems he was too enamoured of his girlfriend-at-the-time, Bronagh, and too busy crunching the numbers for his accounting degree. But regarding Nelson Mandela's heroic freedom fight, he just couldn't account for his lack of accountability.
With regard to Mother Theresa, if John was oblivious to pressing issues in Sharpeville, you could bet your bippy Calcutta slums weren't exactly front and centre on his radar either.
Let's face it, our ostensible Anzac cousins have become an embarrassment. Individually, there are still plenty of genuine top-drawer ockers, but collectively and politically they've turned turtle and are noisomely decomposing in the high noon of a Noosa summer.
Johnnie. Jonky. Sir John. Shonky ... whatever. Give it back -- it's a tainted bauble of office.
Best concentrate on getting your Wolf Cub Order of Merit Second Class in Toasted Cheese Making -- now that's a real McCoy qualification to be proud of. If you'd had it 40-odd years ago, you could have made yourself useful helping feed those marching up Molesworth St chanting "Amandla!"
