Tweet of the week: I am no fan of Margaret Thatcher but I thought this was brilliant. Link to Guardian article is here.

Of course the story that captured the media’s attention this week was the Speaker kicking my colleague Clare Curran out of parliament for wearing a highlanders jersey (original version).

At issue was the fact that this kind of thing has been accepted in the past when National MPs have done it.

Heather Roy reminds us that the issue of “appropriate business attire” for women MPs is not new.

I think this is the best suggestion I’ve seen:

Press Gallery Tweet of the Week: Must…Resist…Obvious…Jokes…About…NZ…Herald…

Tweet of the week: Is it wrong that I really really want to know more about this scam??

Press gallery Tweet of the week: The humble pun. Can’t beat it. <Awaiting endless posts from the grammar police telling me it isn’t actually a pun>

Compliment of the week: Excellent. I think Grant should get this embroidered on to a pillow.

Twit of the week: I hate picking on Heather because she is great on Twitter but these claims about costs are just rubbish given that Parliament would be sitting anyway.

And Grant points out the hypocrisy:

Bit of a slow tweet week what with it being recess. Come on colleagues – we need to lift our game next week!

Tweet of the week: I’m sure many people would be happy to pitch in.

Press Gallery tweet of the week: Definitely Idol.

And on the biggest event of the week on Twitter – don’t actually know what he’s saying but if I was going to express my feelings about the American Idol final in another language it would be something like this tweet – starting with “nonononono”, involving dramatic hand gestures and excessive almost violent punctuation (apologies to Carmel who has an aversion to exclamation marks.)

And just to show that MPs from across the political spectrum can put aside our differences and come together on the important issues:

Tweet of the Week: Jacinda captures Chippy’s entrepreneurial moment at Friday night Urgency fish and chips. And yes he did feel sick afterwards.

Press gallery Tweet of the Week: Worst. Idea. Ever.

And after the Budget the second biggest fizzer of the week had to be the promised imminent end of the world:

Hands down best explanation for why the rapture did not happen:

Tweet of the week: Following a hard hitting interview on BBC Hardtalk in the UK the PM was asked in Question time about some of the answers he’d given.  In not answering the question he managed to take evasiveness to a whole new level even for him…

Press Gallery Tweet of the Week: Vernon Small’s unauthorised spell check comes up with an amusing alternative when he types in ‘Te Tai Tokerau’…

(My personal favourite spellcheck is when the iPhone changes ‘Matthew Hooten’ to ‘Matthew Hootenanny”)

Twit of the Week: As if you needed another reason not to vote for these guys then this statement shows how stuck in the past they really are (even though they tend not to use this language anymore – Tau obviously didn’t get the Crosby-Textor memo).

And someone please explain to Alex that Aaron Gilmore invented Parliament (and gold stars) so he can sit wherever he wants!

Tweet of the week: I know the UK vote on electoral reform wasn’t the biggest story of the week by a long shot but I think it’s a very good point well made!

On to the big story of the week. On Monday Twitter was abuzz when President Obama called a late night (US time) press conference. As predicted Obama announced the death of Osama bin Laden (or “OBL” as he is now known). Jubilation followed in the streets of America although some were relieved for other reasons:

Then the inevitable Dems vs Reps battle over who should get credit:

Stephen Colbert – always manages to brilliantly send up the right’s arguments:

Nearly a week later the US media are exhausting EVERY possible angle:

And in the midst of it all Tau Henare reminds us of the more pressing issues here at home:

Twit of the week: <sigh>

Press gallery Tweet of the week: The Don reappears in the House on Tuesday to keep an eye on the team following his corporate takeover of ACT.

And from the “It’s kind of you to say so but we don’t really believe it” file – Heather teaches Sir Roger to tweet:

Not that we’ll ever know for sure because Sir Roger has regulated who can see his tweeting efforts:

So much for liberty and freedom…

With royal weddings, heated car seats, abuses of parliamentary urgency and further funding cuts for essential services going on you could be forgiven for not realising that another event of monumental significance is occurring today – the parliamentary press gallery AGM.

The competition promises to be tough and the battle lines have already been drawn.

Patrick Gower started the smear campaign invoking the image of dancing cossacks:

Claire Trevett made it clear she expects more than empty words from the candidates:

Out-going Treasurer Vernon Small goes a little bit Rod Blagojevich with the perks:

Then the inevitable media blackout:

Good luck to all the candidates. I look forward to watching the votes roll in.

Tweet of the week:

Twit of the week: Melissa Lee thanks a friend for a pirated CD the day before she railed against illegal file sharing – going so far as to liken it to assault.

Press gallery Tweet of the Week: The joys of being a government backbencher. I so know what he means…

And to finish off a couple more tweets from the very funny American comedian John Fugelsang who I suspect may become a regular feature…