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I have noticed about the very powerful that they find it unpalatable to admit that any of their power could be attributable to dirty tricks and good fortune...
BTW, since I will not be at the Press Parliamentary Party this year I doubt that much misbehaviour such as singing, dancing and drinking ... will take place. Sadly, even Peter Anderson, the best singing voice ever inside the Bear Pit, no longer invades the place. However, I gather that the omnipresent ghost of Bill McKell might file a report with Crikey.com about the risque sound and video clips in due course:
It's several decades since the riotous and debauched NSW press gallery Christmas parties but, it seems, you can't be too careful.
On the eve of next Wednesday's 36th annual press party, Parliament's presiding officers, Speaker John Aquilina and upper house president Meredith Burgmann, laid down some onerous rules.
They are spelt out in a letter to gallery president Alex Mitchell, who writes for The Sun-Herald, from the Clerk of the Legislative Assembly, Russell Grove.
Mitchell must be present at all times during the function; be responsible for the conduct of guests; assist with the co-ordination and movement of guests and be "responsible for any fees incurred by the Parliament as [sic] result of the function being conducted".
Naturally, I will be ready to throw out ... any MP, minister or House official who misbehaves or becomes overtaxed with neck oil

Eye on Politics & Law Lords: Safety risk stops rail apartments
As Sydney grapples with how to accommodate its future population, a report to RailCorp has warned that building residential apartments over railway lines is inherently problematic, could pose safety risks and inhibit growth of the rail network.
The Hurstville Super Centre does not meet Railcorp standards in a number of respects, including support piers, transfer beams, clearance, centre-line clearance, column and pier stability, structural integrity, vibration and noise isolation and fire life safety
• Hillish Village on the Edge of the Forest [ ]
• · As an empire grows, 1300 firefighters wait for boots; [Pouring funds into marginal seats in the run-up to an election has a long history Roll out the barrels ]
• · · Citizens Stripped of Protection
• · · · Be the Bismarck and Kaiser of this world Act the Angel, Be the Brute
• · · · · Lot of water passed under the bridge since I went to kommunist school at Tatra Mountains while Lauren went to kapitalist Tara Skirting the issue
• · · · · · Speaking of personal and national history, a spectre is haunting Australia . . . and its name is Keith Windschuttle! Ach, Windschuttle’s source for the view that the Tasmanians could not light fire is the 1966 publication Friendly Mission. Presumably Windschuttle did not bother to check if any
subsequent work had been done on this topic. Had he done so, he would have discovered a 1973 paper by German anthropologist Gisela Volger that argues the percussion method was used, an admission by Plomley in his 1993 book The General that in all likelihood he himself was mistaken on this point...
In 1838, when Lancelot Threlkeld gave his evidence to the NSW Legislative Council's Committee on the Aborigines Question, he said of the proposed Protectorate:
I am of opinion, that it would be much more beneficial, if an establishment could be formed on the Morava River principle.
Don't look back in anger: historian ; [The Bolshevik success in the Civil War was the more effective cause, which means that the Tsarist officers who served under Trotsky bear more of the liability for creating the Communist regime of the USSR than the German officers who are usually blamed for secretly transporting Lenin back to St. Petersburg. Hence there is not a direct line of responsibility from 1914–18 to the Cold War. In other words, the First World War did not dominate the twentieth century to anything like the extent usually claimed. Indeed, were someone to now compile a list of the decisive battles of history, he might not include the First World War in it at all. If only historians did not make things up all the time]