“Telstra’s High Court constitutional challenge to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission is a low-cost stunt to be used as a vehicle by its public policy windbag, Phil Burgess, to rerun his same tired old arguments,” opines the AFR’s Chanticleer column this morning. I guess that means John Durie’s not inviting Phil around for dinner any time soon.

Bartho in the Smage is much more pleasant about the matter, as usual, reckoning Telstra can still have a win without winning. But it’s definitely Durie’s Chanticleer that is more colourful. Try:

The breathtaking selective use of facts Burgess adopts to run his public policy debate is matched in sheer gall only by the fact that Telstra chairman Don McGauchie continues to support him and keep him on the payroll.

But even Chanticleer has to concede the The Castle against-the-odds possibility: “If the High Court eventually agrees with Burgess, he will be hailed justifiably as a hero – but the chances of this are small…”