Shaun Micallef's Mad As Hell

We're back just in time to analyse the date currently known as "January 26" , Bernardi's unplayed playlist, Turnbull on boats and in boats, and the slippery nature of micro party senate seat replacements.

Franz Kafka and H.P Lovecraft team up to solve a small-town murder. Kafka is convinced the culprit is the banal inhumanity that lives in the heart of all relationships, but Lovecraft believes it's a giant octopus.

Tonight what is in the public interest and what is the public merely interested in? Adam apologises, Jim causes a stir, Jacqui gets miffed, Denis stays quiet, Malcolm slips out early and Barnaby doesn't.

With Shaun away golfing with Angela Merkel, leadership of the show tonight falls to the Manager of Mad As Business, Darius Horsham*, who gets his humanoid hands into Malcolm's sex ban, Elon's big battery, and, of course, Barnaby. *Not true

On the show tonight (at least before it's pulled down for breaching ABC editorial and food safety standards) are our stories on the silencing of Abbott, Bernardi's tsking, Clive Palmer's big comeback announcement, the Queen's not coming back for the Commonwealth Games, and Barnaby, Barnaby, Barnaby.

After being bullied in Senate Estimates we had no choice but to retaliate with tonight's show, wherein we weigh Julie Bishop's travel claims, X-Ray Cash's and Carr's estimates outbursts, and rifle through Bill Shorten's donations.

Tonight, before we are driven out of the business by cheap foreign satire trying to get around the US irony tariff, we arrange a meeting with Kim Jon Un, defend Tony Abbott's right to be indefensible, and commiserate with Xi Jinping for losing his end of term holiday.

Celebrate the return of good old fashioned shiny new intergenerational class warfare with a full frontal attack on everything: we welcome political refugee Peter Dutton, drive an armoured car off the lot, make a withdrawal from the banking commission, and find out who's lucky enough to be Australia's preferred opposition leader.

Tonight's show is packed full of material targeted specifically to you based on your leaked Facebook data: hot gossip about the company tax cut, scandalous images of stagnant wage growth, and an in depth exposé of the Prime Minister's selfie technique.

We're working late in the lab tonight as our ghoulish experiments hint at a way to restore life to the dead meat-slabs of history. Will Tony Abbott's leadership again stalk the earth? Will the Cold War stand defrosting or will it have gone all soggy and weird in the upright freezer? And is it all too late for our cricketers after sponsors pull the plug?

The balloons are wall mounted and mouth-horns held firmly between lips to celebrate the arrival of the 30th Newspoll. Will Abbott pollie pedal in and crash the party? Is that the Monash Forum break dancing in the corner? Will Di Natale convert attendees to his big ideas? And who's that at the door? Peter Costello?

With the Royal Commission banging on our door over questionable donut related financial advice given by Tosh Greenslade's financial reporter character, Mad As takes a parting swipe at Greg Hunt's right to free speech, Morrison's Santa qualifications, Di-Natale's pot plan and Pauline's military manoeuvring PLUS all the hottest goss out of CHOGM.