Now for your consideration, let the compiling of of the craziest commentariat scribblers in the land begin...

(Above: David Rowe captures a mood, and more Rowe here)

The pond has been pivoting for weeks now, ever since Silicon Valley decided to send up MBA-speak (and in the usual way, you can see Jared pivot for Pied Piper on YouTube here).

The pond loves the abuse of language, and traces back the enthusiasm to an Oxford don who loved Old English.

She had studied with Tolkien - oh she could talk for hours about the tree hugger - and she affected a hearty disdain for all the effete Latinate ponciness that had come after the Anglo-Saxons.

She loved her hard consonants and despised vowels, and she also liked to épater le bourgeois, though being one herself. Naturally she despised anyone who would use such a French decadent poet phrase.

The pond has no doubt she would have loved the AFR front page invention of fukt, because of its eloquent consonantal edge. It's innate truth and wisdom. What more to say than it's fukt?

Thus trained and armed, the pond knew exactly how to cope with Julie Bishop and the wondrous story Julie Bishop avoids referring to East Jerusalem as 'disputed' or 'occupied'.

Well actually it was Tony Abbott, but the hapless Bishop had to front the story:

Speaking on his US trip, the prime minister, Tony Abbott said: “There has been no change in policy – absolutely no change in policy. “There's been a terminological clarification. We absolutely refuse to refer to occupied East Jerusalem. 
That was what the argument between Senator Brandis and the Greens was all about, but there has been no change in policy – simply a terminological clarification.”

A terminological clarification!

It's impossible not to love.

And better still it's a terminological clarification arising from terminological ineptitude, and quite possibly a terminological panic on the part of George Brandis.

Of course the pond suspects the Oxford don wouldn't have been quite so forgiving. She would have most likely said that Tony Abbott was fukt and so was George Brandis, how fukt is he, though perhaps she might have forgiven Bishop for attempting this sort of torture and abuse of the language:

In an interview on Sky television on Tuesday, Bishop, who, as foreign affairs minister, is due to meet ambassadors from 18 Arab nations on Thursday to hear their concerns, was asked about the change, which the prime minister has described as a “terminological clarification”. 
Bishop repeatedly refused to use the term “occupied” during the interview, saying: “I am not getting into that debate. I call it East Jerusalem, you can’t force me to call it something … if that is a geographic name that is its name.” 
She insisted there had been no change to policy and that the former Labor government, including former foreign minister Bob Carr had “often described it as East Jerusalem, he didn’t refer to it as occupied, capital O proper noun occupied, East Jerusalem, he referred to it as East Jerusalem, so what we have said is what I thought was a non-contentious statement, the geographic location of East Jerusalem is precisely that, East Jerusalem.”

Wondrous, amazing stuff, all the more so because it has arisen from a Brandis own goal. Talk about fukt.

Now if you love your German you have the word 'dummkopfs', but really dunderheads, dunces, blockheads, boneheads, numbskulls, dropkicks, layabouts, and useless tools will serve just as nicely ...

How bizarre is it? Well for the first time in yonks, perhaps forever, the pond is forced to link to a piece by Bob "let's ruin Sydney while we can and while I study the American civil war" Carr and Gareth "have I got a beard for you vivacious young lady" Evans, and Australia hinders progress in Middle East peace process.

All this as an entree. Oh it's a blessed mid-week Wednesday.

So what else is news?

Well the reptiles are in excellent form today. They picked up a piece by Sinclair Davidson, headed Cherry-picking stats an uncertain science, behind the paywall because you have to pay for anything that appears elsewhere on the internet for free in Murdoch la la land - yes at the very bottom you get to read This article first appeared on the blog Catallaxy Files, and yes there it is at that crazy, gun loving site, for free, here.

That's about the first time the pond has linked to the crazies at Catallaxy, but hey, it's free, and how that must stick in the Chairman's craw.

But back to the Davidson piece. Why is it such a comical header for such a comical footnote?

Well you see it talks of the uncertain science of cherry-picking and the reptiles didn't feel the need to trot out the news that Davidson is a heavy hitter for the IPA, a senior fellow no less, one of the fellows and chasps.

Yes, here he is, fighting the good fight, from a comfortable academic position, ie heavily subsidised by the Australian taxpayer, while moonlighting for an organisation which routinely refuses to disclose its funding by big tobacco.

Oh come on you say, it's jolly unfair to abuse someone for being an academic attached firmly to the taxpayer's teat - let's not ask how much RMIT scores from the taxpayer - so here's an offer and a promise. The moment that Chris Mitchell instructs the reptiles to give up this form of abuse of the ABC and academics, for the crime of noting emperor Mitchell hasn't got a stitch of rational clothes, but surely loves his paranoid rabid ideological rags, then the pond will do the same ...

Or perhaps the IPA could tell us just how much big and small tobacco contributes to the kitty, and then we could stop talking about cherry-picking ...

What else?

Well a kindly reader drew attention to this epic effort by Timmeh Bleagh:

The pond's omitted the nominations - why defame and abuse people like a Timmeh Bleagh does? - but it did occur to the pond that there was room for another most excellent competition.

Who is Australia's craziest, most fuckwitted right wing member of the lunar commentariat out there in Murdoch la la and IPA and Catallaxy land?

But let's not bring bats into it. What's wrong with bats?

But you can mention frights. Like the fright of seeing someone flash a Graudian:

Naturally Bleagh himself, if only through his frightbat competition - let he who has no fruit bats in the garden throw the first stone - is first out of the gate as a nomination - you can't get more fuck-witted and determindedly stupid than Bleagh.

But you might find contenders with additional qualities, as a daily tour of the lizard Oz will confirm.

The pond considers that Dame Slap deserves a place in the parade of finalists, because week in, week out, she delivers top quality material, and not just when she took 'Lord' Christopher Monckton at his word about climate science being an excuse for the UN to mount a push for a world government ...

Now you might wonder why the pond has nominated Albrechtsen when all she's got to offer today is this:

If you can be bothered getting behind the paywall to read The essence of good judgment, it's a bog standard outing, a most frabjous, some would say almost uxorious celebration of the learned judge Murray Gleeson and a smackdown - yet again for the interminable nth time - of Justice Kirby, this time for being a hero judge.

So why the comedy and the nomination? Well Dame Slap serves up Gleeson, with elephant stamp of approval:

A month after Kirby’s “I Dream” speech, Gleeson politely slapped down the judicial activists on the courts and in our law schools: “Although some judges speak confidently of community values as though they know what they are, they may be attributing their personal values to the public for rhetorical purposes.” 
 “The judiciary”, he said, “is a passive institution and judges should not set out to influence wider community values.”

And she opened with this:

If a judge’s name is well-known outside the law, it’s safe to assume they have probably stepped outside their proper judicial function into the adrenalin pumping political arena. Many in the media love nothing more than a self-appointed hero judge.

And yet there's not one mention of Campbell Newman, and Carmody and the circus unfolding in the deep north.

Why even the Jesuits could point out the bleeding obvious, or at least Frank Brennan could at Eureka Street, in Law disorder in Campbell Newman's Queensland:

Unlike Bathurst, Carmody is not your usual prospective appointee as chief justice. Except for his close relationship with the Attorney-General and his expressed coincidence of viewpoint with government about law and order issues, there is no way that he would be in the mix for consideration. 
Despite some of the more shrill observations by his critics (and he has many in the legal profession), this closeness and coincidence of views would not necessarily rule him out of consideration if he had the requisite prudence, experience and learning in the law. But he does not. 
He took to the airwaves to defend himself and his appointment. This is unheard of in the Australian system. But worse, he revealed on air that not one of the 26 serving Supreme Court judges had congratulated him, and that he would have to knock on the door of each of them to determine if they were friend or foe. 
Imagine a new chairman of a major corporation like BHP Billiton announcing to the public that he had not been congratulated by any serving board member and that he would now have to take soundings, presumably building alliances and dividing his board into camps. The shareholders would demand he walk, doubting his prudence and that of those who nominated him.

Indeed. Imagine a member of the reptile commentariat at the lizard Oz daring to criticise Campbell Newman, as opposed to kicking that very old and battered can, Justice Kirby, down the road one more time. Poor Gleeson. Imagine having to deal with praise from Dame Slap ...

Never mind, for adeptly practising the art of omission, elision and avoidance, Planet Janet deserves a moment revolving in the sun ...

And finally where would the world be without the epic climate science of the Bolter?

How grateful Melbourne and HUN - and thanks to the intertubes - world readers must be for these constant updates on climate science, and they're so scientific, the research is quite wondrous, extensive and detailed:

(no hot links, screen cap only)

The man's a scientific genius, aided and abetted by a wonderful reader research network.

Now don't you go asking how these warm water fish ended up so far south being caught in a cold snap.

Is it possible to be so stupid you cannot begin to comprehend your stupidity?

Sure thing ...

And in other news, the pond reports that mosquitoes continue to haunt the pond's bedroom - an unheard-of phenomenon considering that the winter solstice will this year take place on June 22nd, a mere four days away.

Talk about some top notch scientific observation and research by the pond.

To celebrate the science, the pond is considering a Bacchanalian rite and dancing under the solstice moon in thin cotton summer gear ...

But what to do about the catering?

(and more cartoons from the New Yorker 9 June 2014 edition here)

By golly, it looks like it's going to be another sunny day in Sydney.

What's that? No, we're not going to provide a terminological clarification of the meaning of "sunny".

What else?

Well NSW has had its budget delivered, and in the usual way, words fail the pond, so here's one for any stray Sydney readers, courtesy of Cathy Wilcox and more Wilcox here ...