Christopher Pyne has clearly been pondering the fate of Sodom.

In Genesis 18, you will recall, Abraham asks God if, in immolating Sodom, he doesn’t mind destroying the righteous with the wicked. God says, What righteous? What are you talking about? Abraham says, well, if there are fifty righteous men in Sodom will you spare it? God says yes. Too right. Abraham gulps, and asks if there are twenty, will you spare it? Absolutely, God says. My oath. Abraham haggles him down to one, and there still isn’t any. And Sodom burns, in what seems now a rehearsal of 9/11.

And so it went last night on Sky News with Richo pleading with Pyne to spare Gonski. And Christopher, Godlike, said he would not spare it, nay, not even for O’Farrell, nor yet for O’Farrell plus the Labor states, nor by Yahweh would he spare it, even for seven out of the eight states and territories. He would spare Gonski only if every state signed on. And if they did not, the disabled and Aboriginal and language-challenged hobbled and crippled children could burn in Hell for all he cared. He would not spare them. Not a one of them.

In thus impersonating the God of Israel, Christopher may have exceeded his mandate. Richo was baffled when told in arch and fearsome tones no contract would be honoured and O’Farrell must take his punishment like a man.

It may be that Christopher has become insane.

O’Farrell, thus thwarted, may feel like the visiting angel in Sodom whom the Sodomites wished to anally penetrate, and Lot, a good host, protected by offering the surging crowd his daughters in place of that heavenly arse, and he may not like the sensation. And he may soon seek his revenge.

And we will see what we shall see.

Pyne & The Sodom Factor

meanwhile ….

over at the credibility gap ….

NSW Education Minister Adrian Piccoli has returned fire at his federal Coalition colleagues over education funding, warning schools in this state would be worse off under Tony Abbott's policy and defending his own government's decision to sign up to the Gonski deal.

He also urged other states to sign up for Labor's funding offer.

Federal opposition education spokesman Christopher Pyne sparked a war of words with the NSW Coalition government this week by declaring his colleagues had been ''conned'' into signing up to ''a very bad deal''.

It came a week after Opposition Leader Abbott said an elected Coalition federal government would not honour the deal signed by NSW unless a national agreement was reached.

But in a strong rebuke of his federal colleagues four months before the federal election, Mr Piccoli said the present funding model was broken and the new needs-based model offered more money and fairer distribution for both the government and non-government sectors.

''The status quo would see NSW worse off, and what essentially the federal Coalition is saying is the status quo,'' he said.

The claims made by Mr Piccoli rely on the federal Coalition maintaining present funding and extending additional national partnerships funding by only one year. Mr Pyne said in a letter this week the Coalition would work on a new deal with all states. Mr Piccoli said he did not want to have a ''blue'' with Mr Pyne but said he felt compelled to assert schools would be better off under the deal his government had signed.

''[The federal Coalition] will do what they think they need to do, but what I need to do is have the facts out there as to why NSW signed up for it,'' he said. ''I hope other states embrace it and I would hope the federal opposition embraces it too, because it's a good deal for schools.''

The NSW deal promises to invest an additional $5 billion over six years, two-thirds of which is federal funding.

Mr Pyne has disputed the actual levels of extra funding under the reform and argued that the government's proposed annual increases were ''less generous than the current model''.

On Tuesday, Mr Pyne said the government had ''deceptively'' claimed indexation under the current regime would remain flat at 3 per cent when in reality it would fluctuate and be closer to 6 per cent. ''This assumption clearly abandons the 'standard budgetary practice' of projecting indexation levels using the average, which is the 5.6 per cent from [the midyear budget update],'' he said.

But Mr Piccoli said it was ''wrong'' to suggest indexation, which is determined by average government school recurrent costs under the present model, would be that high, backing one of Prime Minister Julia Gillard's arguments for change.

The existing measure is linked to movements in funding of public schools by state governments. Mr Piccoli said teachers' wages growth had slowed and efficiencies had been made in state education budgets.

The NSW deal sets out indexation rates of 4.7 by the federal government and 3 per cent by the state government from 2016.

Mr Pyne refused to back away from his claims.

''It is unsurprising that Mr Piccoli would defend his decision to sign up to Labor's school funding plan,'' Mr Pyne said on Friday night.

Piccoli Fires Back In Coalition Bust-up Over Education