And a bit of perspective is what Agriculture Minister, Tony Burke, who has a talent for getting under Turnbull's skin, gave us in question time this week.

On Tuesday, Mr Burke reminded Mr Turnbull of his decision, in the final days of his stint as environment minister, to approve a $2 million grant of federal money to the Australian Rain Corporation.

More than that, actually - the decision was to approve the $2 million and bump it up to $10 million, despite the experimental nature of the science involved and the disconcerting fact that much of the grant application's supporting literature was in Russian. "And who did he do it for?" Mr Burke asked with a flourish.

"One of his neighbours, who was an executive of the Australian Rain Corporation, the same neighbour who was a member of the election fund-raising committee known as the Wentworth Forum, with membership set at $5000 just to get into the room."

Much fun was then had by Mr Burke on the science of cloud seeding, which he resumed on Wednesday with a delicious and much-interrupted reading of an old Reuters report about Russian attempts at rain-making.

"Russian air force planes dropped a 25 kilogram sack of cement on a suburban Moscow home last week while seeding clouds ..." Mr Burke gurgled.

At this point, Mr Turnbull could stand no more.

"Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. This is a joke that the minister is talking about. The technology that he is attacking does not involve cloud seeding. You are a moron!" (The last comment being directed at the Agriculture Minister.)

So that's what Mr Turnbull disputes about the story?

Not the favours for a mate, not the Liberal connections of the beneficiary, not the arbitrary boosting of a $2 million grant to $10 million - but the question of whether bags of cement were to be involved?

"Last Friday afternoon, the leader of the Opposition offered his own definition of 'corruption'," Mr Burke concluded.

"He offered his own definition of what it was when you use taxpayers' resources to seek advantage for one of their mates ... Under that test, was the [rain-making] payment against departmental advice? Yes. Was it for a mate? Yes. Was it for a donor? Yes. Did somebody end up receiving that money? Yes.

"Every box is ticked, according to the Leader of the Opposition's own definition of corruption."

It does make Mr Turnbull's outrage over Wayne Swan's phone call to John Grant look kind of overdone, doesn't it?

Even the most casual scan of the Coalition's years in government will yield further context.

What about the Howard Government's 2003 decision to ramp up excise on foreign ethanol imports?

That had huge benefits for the Australian ethanol industry, dominated by Mr Howard's friend and substantial Liberal Party donor, Dick Honan, with whom Mr Howard initially denied having discussed the decision - later, he was forced to admit that he had.

Or what about the time the government bailed out the workers of a company run by the then PM's brother, Stan Howard?

These matters are never simple, but there was more meat on the above-mentioned bones than you'll find on the starved frame of this so-called ute scandal.

But the Liberals can't stop. Probably because if they did stop, they'd notice just how thin the ice is underfoot.

For sheer unbridled cheek, though, you can't go past Philip Ruddock, whose last memorable knock was as attorney general in a government which elected to deport Mohamed Haneef in 2007 regardless of his guilt or innocence of charges that he assisted a terrorist organisation.

On Wednesday, Mr Ruddock rose in question time and inquired, in those memorable papery tones, of the current Attorney General whether there had been any "improper release of information" from the Australian Federal Police investigation concerning Mr Grech.

"What is the role of the presumption of innocence in relation to Mr Grech?"

One does not like to find oneself drawn into the Prime Minister's complicated verbal universe, but sauce bottles do spring immediately to mind.

http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/utes-dead-cats-and-cloud-seeding-20090626-czs6.html?page=-1