The pond's pledges are worth as much as a Tony Abbott pledge, no less but certainly no more ...

Inspired by the fearless leader, the pond decided on its own set of pledges:

Oh dear. So quickly broken.

How about another pledge?

Which reminds the pond of the funniest video! You can watch it at The Graudian here, or here it is at YouTube (ads attached):




Oh where are the ladies, we've lost all the lady members, we've lost all the females, oh they're probably doing female business hah hah hah hah hah ...

Oh wait, there's one:

Phew, that's a relief.

Oh dear LOL, another pledge bites the dust. Never mind, let's keep those pledges flowing:

Why only the other day the pond was reading Greg Hunt - rhyme the name in your head how you will, the pond is always ready to abandon feminist principles when dire emergencies arise - promising pie in the sky, as you can read here:

Coal will be used for decades and decades more … but what I do think will change is the emissions from it and that is the critical thing,” he told Sky news, describing “highly prospective” technology being developed by Csiro. 

“What I think will happen is this … we will be able to use coal and gas in a dramatically more efficient way, with dramatically lower emissions … that will happen over the coming decade as we make real progress, including cleaning up our brown coal power stations, with drying gasification and capturing, not for storage … but capture and reuse,” Hunt said.

That would be the CSIRO (well it is The Graudian), which of late has been flung into turmoil by the very same government.

CSIRO braces for budget cut of up to $150 million (with forced ad)

Inevitably there's already been idle chatter about young and sensible scientists packing up and heading overseas.

And why wouldn't you?

As for the pie in the sky that Hunt's peddling, presumably he got it from wiki... and skipped a few chapters here.

Meanwhile?

Meanwhile, the Minerals Council of Australia has launched a website, called Australians for Coal, which extols the financial benefits brought by coal, which it calls “indispensible to modern life”. (here)

How lucky they are to have the likes of Greg Hunt as a foundation member. Did he tip them off to the typo, and now we understand that coal is "indispensable to modern life"?

The pond sometimes wonders how people like Hunt and Malcolm Turnbull lie straight in bed at night, but presumably they can do it because of all the intellectual contortions and distortions they go through as part of their daily business carrying out the instructions of the head luddite, and never mind the blatant contradictions, hypocrisies and stupidities involved.

Crooked men walking a crooked mile ...

Meanwhile, the craven lickspittle apologists are in fine form today.

There's the Bolter, all indignant and apoplectic, as usual, about the ABC, in Mark Scott apologises to Chris Kenny. Admits it's too late.

Quoth the Bolter:

How long does a simple review of a grotesque insult take? It took me no more than an instant to know the ABC had crossed a line. How come it took Scott six months and “internal ... review processes”? One thing is already clear: the ABC’s Audience and Consumer Affairs doesn’t know s..t from sawdust and should be sacked. How many other dodgy decisions has it made to protect the ABC?

Uh huh.

Meanwhile, on another planet, Jules Morrow tweeted this image here:

So how does the Daily Terror deal with it?

Yes, it makes it even ruder, by making Scott have sex with an anonymous hamster, rather than a warm and human and identifiable hamster, and by covering up a bit that in the original is fully clothed.

The only thing that's too rude is the stupidity of the editor who allowed this sort of Carry On Benny Hill humour to get into the act.

In the lexicon of News Corp, it's a grotesque insult, and you'd expect the Bolter to be outraged, and spend month after month abusing the Daily Terror's editor, and the rest of News Corp, demanding apologies while campaigning on behalf of Scott for the grievous personal and professional injury he's suffered at the hands of the Terror. Like this:

How long does a simple review of a grotesque insult take? It took me no more than an instant to know the Daily Terror had crossed a line. How come I didn't respond immediately? 

One thing is already clear: me and the Murdoch press wouldn't know shit from sawdust and the whole lot of us should be sacked. How many other dodgy editorial decisions have we made to further our hideous desire to destroy the ABC lock, stock and barrel? And to lower the tone of debate in the mainstream media to the level of Faux noise?

Or some such thing. The Terror's effort comes under the header The ABC's ham(ster) fisted apology to The Australian's Chris Kenny.

But the image was also on view, in cut down form on the front digital page:

That's tipping off the world to an image, that in the world of Chris Kenny, was deemed hurtful and injurious and worthy of a court case.

Meanwhile, the Bolter was explaining in sombre words today how Even Holocaust denial should be debated into silence, not legislated.

The Bolter starts off by quoting the Caterists, out and about doing their usual stroll into the land of stupidity in Diary changes agenda (behind the paywall, because Caterists should never be allowed to roam free).

Inter alia, the Bolter then proposes a far-fetched example, whereby Jews opposing Palestinians claiming a right of return to Israel would run a very real risk of falling foul of exactly the law that caught me.  

Never mind the far-fetched stupidity of this. Never mind the St Sebastian martyr pose the Bolter routinely adopts when talking about me, me, me, and my case, mine, mine, mine, and the suffering, suffering, suffering ...

No, let's just run with the notion that even holocaust denial should be debated into silence....

... while a joke about Chris Kenny has been seen as the end of western civilisation as we know it, and a reason to cut ABC funding, yet the Daily Terror, a ratbag publication, can publish essentially the same joke and the same image and the same idea, as if the change of animal and a few Photoshop tweaks make it okay ..., but this time about Mark Scott ...

Scott knows that all he can do is suck it up, and meanwhile, there's not a squeak about the hypocrisy and double standards rampant in the Murdoch empire, as the lickspittle apologists go about explaining how the government is doing the very best for free speech by changing an act of parliament to suit the Bolter's wounded pride and vanity ...

Which is why the pond can tarry only for a moment with the Caterists, with Nick Cater concluding grandly:

It is not speech but totalitarian suppres­sion that makes atrocities possible. The Holocaust started in silence and continued in silence.

The stench, the nausea, is almost too much for the pond to bear. Did the Caterists mean to say?

It is not speech, or comedy, or jokes, but totalitarian suppression by right wing commentators taking legal action that makes comedy impossible. The Murdochians started in outraged vocal anger and then ended up in silence ... or worse, in half-baked imitation, shamelessly reprinting a comedian's joke and tweaking it, without any regard whatsoever to the integrity of the work ...

Which brings us to the pond's final noble pledge:

But, but, but, you say, being as billy goat, the pond has broken every single pledge on this page at the very same time, on the very same day as making them ...

And what about the news that the Abbott government is finally going to set Badgery's Creek running?

It's on everybody's lips this morning, at least in old Sydney town, long the centre of the known universe, with Paris and New York minor outposts of civilisation ...

Shouldn't the pond be grateful that while doing its best to help fuck up the entire planet, Abbott and company are going to do a bit of urban planning, as long advocated by the pond?

Well yes, but no. You see, crazed right wing ratbags lie and cheat their way into power, and then toss the odd bit of cake, or perhaps a bone, off the table to the ravening dogs sitting with doleful eyes, waiting for a treat ...

While going about grander acts of theft, such as proposing that field and factory and heavy duty workers keep on toting those bales and lifting that steel until they turn seventy.

They will, of course, end up on a cheaper form of the dole - new start for sixty nine year olds - or kicked out of their houses, because of the luck of the draw of their settling, new members of the lumpenproletariat, discarded and ignored, Boxers of the new age, off to the knackery*.

So there's the difference. Why should a humble amateur give Tony Abbott and his acolytes a break when they're professional, paid liars, who merrily break promises and create mayhem?

Thank the long absent lord the polls and David Rowe feel the same way, and more Rowe here:

* Oh you knew an Animal Farm reading was to hand, and the rest of this prescient novel, which compares Tony Abbott to Napoleon the pig, and which is available in full at Project Gutenberg here:

About half the animals on the farm rushed out to the knoll where the windmill stood. There lay Boxer, between the shafts of the cart, his neck stretched out, unable even to raise his head. His eyes were glazed, his sides matted with sweat. A thin stream of blood had trickled out of his mouth. Clover dropped to her knees at his side. 
"Boxer!" she cried, "how are you?" 
"It is my lung," said Boxer in a weak voice. "It does not matter. I think you will be able to finish the windmill without me. There is a pretty good store of stone accumulated. I had only another month to go in any case. To tell you the truth, I had been looking forward to my retirement. And perhaps, as Benjamin is growing old too, they will let him retire at the same time and be a companion to me." 
"We must get help at once," said Clover. "Run, somebody, and tell Squealer what has happened." 
All the other animals immediately raced back to the farmhouse to give Squealer the news. Only Clover remained, and Benjamin who lay down at Boxer's side, and, without speaking, kept the flies off him with his long tail. After about a quarter of an hour Squealer appeared, full of sympathy and concern. He said that Comrade Napoleon had learned with the very deepest distress of this misfortune to one of the most loyal workers on the farm, and was already making arrangements to send Boxer to be treated in the hospital at Willingdon. The animals felt a little uneasy at this. Except for Mollie and Snowball, no other animal had ever left the farm, and they did not like to think of their sick comrade in the hands of human beings. However, Squealer easily convinced them that the veterinary surgeon in Willingdon could treat Boxer's case more satisfactorily than could be done on the farm. And about half an hour later, when Boxer had somewhat recovered, he was with difficulty got on to his feet, and managed to limp back to his stall, where Clover and Benjamin had prepared a good bed of straw for him. 
For the next two days Boxer remained in his stall. The pigs had sent out a large bottle of pink medicine which they had found in the medicine chest in the bathroom, and Clover administered it to Boxer twice a day after meals. In the evenings she lay in his stall and talked to him, while Benjamin kept the flies off him. Boxer professed not to be sorry for what had happened. If he made a good recovery, he might expect to live another three years, and he looked forward to the peaceful days that he would spend in the corner of the big pasture. It would be the first time that he had had leisure to study and improve his mind. He intended, he said, to devote the rest of his life to learning the remaining twenty-two letters of the alphabet. 
However, Benjamin and Clover could only be with Boxer after working hours, and it was in the middle of the day when the van came to take him away. The animals were all at work weeding turnips under the supervision of a pig, when they were astonished to see Benjamin come galloping from the direction of the farm buildings, braying at the top of his voice. It was the first time that they had ever seen Benjamin excited--indeed, it was the first time that anyone had ever seen him gallop. "Quick, quick!" he shouted. "Come at once! They're taking Boxer away!" Without waiting for orders from the pig, the animals broke off work and raced back to the farm buildings. Sure enough, there in the yard was a large closed van, drawn by two horses, with lettering on its side and a sly-looking man in a low-crowned bowler hat sitting on the driver's seat. And Boxer's stall was empty. 
The animals crowded round the van. "Good-bye, Boxer!" they chorused, "good-bye!" 
"Fools! Fools!" shouted Benjamin, prancing round them and stamping the earth with his small hoofs. "Fools! Do you not see what is written on the side of that van?" That gave the animals pause, and there was a hush. Muriel began to spell out the words. But Benjamin pushed her aside and in the midst of a deadly silence he read: "'Alfred Simmonds, Horse Slaughterer and Glue Boiler, Willingdon. Dealer in Hides and Bone-Meal. Kennels Supplied.' Do you not understand what that means? They are taking Boxer to the knacker's!" 
A cry of horror burst from all the animals. At this moment the man on the box whipped up his horses and the van moved out of the yard at a smart trot. All the animals followed, crying out at the tops of their voices. Clover forced her way to the front. The van began to gather speed. Clover tried to stir her stout limbs to a gallop, and achieved a canter. "Boxer!" she cried. "Boxer! Boxer! Boxer!" And just at this moment, as though he had heard the uproar outside, Boxer's face, with the white stripe down his nose, appeared at the small window at the back of the van. 
"Boxer!" cried Clover in a terrible voice. "Boxer! Get out! Get out quickly! They're taking you to your death!" 
All the animals took up the cry of "Get out, Boxer, get out!" But the van was already gathering speed and drawing away from them. It was uncertain whether Boxer had understood what Clover had said. But a moment later his face disappeared from the window and there was the sound of a tremendous drumming of hoofs inside the van. He was trying to kick his way out. The time had been when a few kicks from Boxer's hoofs would have smashed the van to matchwood. But alas! his strength had left him; and in a few moments the sound of drumming hoofs grew fainter and died away. In desperation the animals began appealing to the two horses which drew the van to stop. "Comrades, comrades!" they shouted. "Don't take your own brother to his death!" But the stupid brutes, too ignorant to realise what was happening, merely set back their ears and quickened their pace. Boxer's face did not reappear at the window. Too late, someone thought of racing ahead and shutting the five-barred gate; but in another moment the van was through it and rapidly disappearing down the road. Boxer was never seen again. 
Three days later it was announced that he had died in the hospital at Willingdon, in spite of receiving every attention a horse could have. Squealer came to announce the news to the others. He had, he said, been present during Boxer's last hours. 
"It was the most affecting sight I have ever seen!" said Squealer, lifting his trotter and wiping away a tear. "I was at his bedside at the very last. And at the end, almost too weak to speak, he whispered in my ear that his sole sorrow was to have passed on before the windmill was finished. 'Forward, comrades!' he whispered. 'Forward in the name of the Rebellion. Long live Animal Farm! Long live Comrade Napoleon! Napoleon is always right.' Those were his very last words, comrades." 
Here Squealer's demeanour suddenly changed. He fell silent for a moment, and his little eyes darted suspicious glances from side to side before he proceeded. 
It had come to his knowledge, he said, that a foolish and wicked rumour had been circulated at the time of Boxer's removal. Some of the animals had noticed that the van which took Boxer away was marked "Horse Slaughterer," and had actually jumped to the conclusion that Boxer was being sent to the knacker's. It was almost unbelievable, said Squealer, that any animal could be so stupid. Surely, he cried indignantly, whisking his tail and skipping from side to side, surely they knew their beloved Leader, Comrade Napoleon, better than that? But the explanation was really very simple. The van had previously been the property of the knacker, and had been bought by the veterinary surgeon, who had not yet painted the old name out. That was how the mistake had arisen. 
The animals were enormously relieved to hear this. And when Squealer went on to give further graphic details of Boxer's death-bed, the admirable care he had received, and the expensive medicines for which Napoleon had paid without a thought as to the cost, their last doubts disappeared and the sorrow that they felt for their comrade's death was tempered by the thought that at least he had died happy. Napoleon himself appeared at the meeting on the following Sunday morning and pronounced a short oration in Boxer's honour. It had not been possible, he said, to bring back their lamented comrade's remains for interment on the farm, but he had ordered a large wreath to be made from the laurels in the farmhouse garden and sent down to be placed on Boxer's grave. And in a few days' time the pigs intended to hold a memorial banquet in Boxer's honour. Napoleon ended his speech with a reminder of Boxer's two favourite maxims, "I will work harder" and "Comrade Napoleon is always right"--maxims, he said, which every animal would do well to adopt as his own. 
On the day appointed for the banquet, a grocer's van drove up from Willingdon and delivered a large wooden crate at the farmhouse. That night there was the sound of uproarious singing, which was followed by what sounded like a violent quarrel and ended at about eleven o'clock with a tremendous crash of glass. No one stirred in the farmhouse before noon on the following day, and the word went round that from somewhere or other the pigs had acquired the money to buy themselves another case of whisky.