The state funded Judas routine of Cory Bernardi is a ghastly instance of what is making people sick about the major political parties.  He is spitting in the face of all of those who keep his party alive and who got him elected again to bludge off the rest of us for another six years.  He has been contemplating this treason for years while looking at the mirror.  Nothing has changed since the party got him elected again – except for one thing.  He was given a junket – a rort – to go to New York.  He there spoke to Kellyanne Conway, a leading attack dog prime time liar, and he there saw the end of western civilisation as we know it.  But Cory had an epiphany like that of his sponsor, Andrew Bolt. The second coming was at hand.

It is not surprising that a jerk like Bernardi should fall for a jerk like Trump.  They are both loudly brash, completely brainless, and deeply in love with themselves.  When you look at Trump, you find it hard to imagine any man being more in love with himself – until you see Bernardi. (Trump is at worst when signing orders and holding them up like a preening spoiled five year old child in kindergarten  Show & Tell.) And it is this self-love that makes each of them so brittle to criticism – and that’s a real problem, because they each have so much to criticise. And it is an even worse problem if you keep getting sacked for being a noisy dill.

The Australian had this to say today about our own nauseating egomaniac.

But one colleague is blunt — three-quarters of Bernardi’s motivation is “payback” against Turnbull.

He has never forgiven the Prime Minister for being dumped from the frontbench, and believes Turnbull is under the thumb of senior moderates in the party, including Pyne.

Others are brutal about Bernardi’s motivation, saying he is a “narcissistic egomaniac and a selfish bully” with “delusions of grandeur” that have been stoked by far-right commentators.

They point to comments from Bernardi’s wife, Sinead, who once quipped that their marriage was perfect because they’re “both in love with the same man”.

“Cory obviously has this huge belief in himself,” a source says.

“If you didn’t love a guy who was so in love with himself, you’d have a lot of trouble living with Cory.”

Those attributes show another trait that Bernardi has in common with Trump.  He cannot be a team player – how could a person so in love with himself think of anyone but himself?  Bernardi has not sought to hide his loathing of Turnbull and Pyne.  His attacks on both have been despicable.  The best that Trump and Bernardi can do is sound and light shows.  Trump wants a military parade and golf at Balmoral – and God bless the Speaker of the House of Commons for saying that Trump is not fit to address them; Bernardi started Party meetings with a communal rendering of the National Anthem.  Did they sing with their hands on their hearts, or did they just raise an arm in a salute?

But, sadly, Bernardi is in one respect even worse than Trump.  He claims to have God.  (Trump does, too, but that’s one of his sillier fibs.)  That makes me feel sorry for God.  In the name of heaven, how can a man who claims to follow the teaching of the son of a carpenter seek more freedom to insult and offend blackfellas on account of their race?  In a piece in the AFR this morning, Craig Emmerson referred to the damage done to the Liberal Party by the ‘religious right.’  I agree, but the damage is also in my view being suffered by religion.

It is therefore ironic that the intimation of betrayal should have downplayed news item that was second on the BBC about sexual abuse in the Roman Catholic Church – that also has the misfortune of hearing Bernardi call himself one of its acolytes.  Analysts say they were shocked to find that seven per cent of Catholic priests were alleged to have been involved in abuse. I think that figure sounds low for a body that denies marriage to its priests.  Yet Bernardi says God makes him deny marriage to others – even if as a result of its denial of marriage to its own, his church has discharged a swamp of evil all its own. You can see now why people’s aversion to politics is matched only by an aversion to religion – it is all very sad.

So, hasta la vista, Bernardi, you rat.  You are there on false pretences, bludging off us again.  As a keen student of the Book, you will know that Judas was decent enough to hand back the thirty pieces of silver, and that he then had the courtesy to hang himself.

Well, at least we were spared the kiss.