“By the time they had trawled through Turnbull’s past, the Opposition Leader was portrayed, under the privilege of Parliament, as a treacherous, bullying, smearing, opportunistic, justice-poisoning, forest-stripping, tax-avoiding, profiteering, cat-abusing loser.

I had thought all this was being warehoused for the next election. But no, they want him dead now.”

Paul Sheehan comments on the circling of the hyenas in Parliament, where Malcolm Turnbull looks distinctly like a dead man walking after Utegate. The illustration accompanying the article, in which Turnbull is rendered as a dying zebra being ripped to shreds, is especially entertaining:

“I would say that Australia definitely is different [from] the US. In many ways it was like stepping back in time.”

Former Telstra CEO Sol Trujillo’s parting shot to the country that never liked him, in an interview with the BBC. Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s response to Trujillo’s departure was one word: “Adios”. Rudd has now been accused of being racist in referring mockingly to Trujillo’s Mexican ancestry.

“There were these two wogs fighting. The fatter wog said to the skinnier wog: `Oi bro, you slept with my cousin’. And the other one said: ‘Nah man, I didn’t for shit, eh’ and the other one goes: ‘I will call on my fully sick boys, eh’. And then pulled out a gun and went chk-chk boom!”

Clare Werbeloff utters the immortal words that launched her to fame. For the moment. “Chk chk boom” can be spotted on T-shirts, coffee mugs and beer mugs as well as a YouTube dance video.

As it turns out, Werbeloff didn’t even witness the event in question, proving that it is possible to achieve celebrity without any substance whatsoever.

“This particular allegation by Turnbull is absolutely ridiculous and absolutely false and designed.”

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd resents Malcolm Turnbull’s allegation that he had a frothy over the lack of a hairdryer while visiting troops in Afghanistan.

“Twenty-five years ago, maybe, when nouveaux riches and poor lived side by side and the shops were an interesting mix of secondhand book and furniture stores, greengrocers and oddments such as the chocolate factory. Now it is full of pretentious tossers shopping at overpriced clothes boutiques. And even they are packing up as the global financial crisis bites.”

Jim Gentles of Coogee disputes the assertion by another SMH reader that Paddington is Sydney’s most desirable suburb.

“As Australians we know it is not appropriate to be upset by white-collar crime. It is simply the mark of a keen entrepreneurial mind, a little over-eager in the pursuit, by any means, of the wealth that is the sacred right of any true-blue Aussie,” snorts Moya Connors of Valla Beach.

Elizabeth Goodsall of Wahroonga argues:

“Can the rags of Richard Pratt’s tax-deductible philanthropy really cover the nakedness of his dishonesty? A self-confessed thief, he greatly enriched himself by stealing from every person in Australia. His status as a Companion in the Order of Australia should never be restored.”

Peter Wertheim, on the other hand, defends Pratt, arguing, “What a miserable lot some Herald readers are (Letters, April 30). They excoriate the late Richard Pratt for “ripping off the public over an extended period” and liken him to “a common criminal who made money by snatching old ladies’ handbags”. This is the tall poppy syndrome at its most graceless.”

“YOUR Newspoll survey shows that Kevin Rudd’s popularity has been apparently unaffected by a shameful display of inexcusable behaviour towards an RAAF cabin attendant, even though his bad temper and filthy little mouth are legendary. Have our standards and complacency sunk to such an all-time dismal low that we are now prepared not only to tolerate this type of bad behaviour but then reward it while excusing it on the grounds that he’s only human?

Do the feminist warriors who infest the Labor Party, our education system and saturate our media condone this deplorable bully-boy display on one of their own, from our Prime Minister, no less? Apparently so. Weak as a fizzy drink the lot of them. No wonder our kids are running amuck with bad behaviour when this is the example set by those supposed to present a moral compass for society.”

Ralph Walton, Belmont, Qld, letter to The Australian.

“ONE cannot help being amused by Bill Leak. When all is said and done on Kevin Rudd, the reality is that he makes Mark Latham look like Mother Teresa.”

Colin Gourley of Doncaster, Vic, one of a number of responses to a controversial cartoon by Bill Leak.

“There you go again bashing our state’s poor elite private schools (“Big pay day for top private schools in cash handout”, April 6).

One look at my local elite private school and you would see that its art gallery was built years ago (it looks like it was thrown together by the ancient Greeks).

And it must have only about 10 cricket nets. How is it to produce the next generation of lawyers and merchant bankers with such limitations?”

Adam Williams Summer Hill, letter to the Sydney Morning Herald.

“They are just completely irresponsible and reckless. I think they would rather see the country fail than see the Rudd Government succeed.”

Treasurer Wayne Swan hits out at the Opposition’s threat to block aspects of the budget if they are unhappy with allocations, during an interview on the ABC.