In which, thanks to gorgeous George and the dog botherer, the pond explores the grotesque art of caricature ...

The tragedy of the man who lost the y'artz somewhere along the line, but it does bring up the noble art of caricature ... and as always at this point the pond turns to the dictionary for guidance.

car·i·ca·ture (kăr′ĭ-kə-cho͝or′, -chər) n. 1. a. A representation, especially pictorial or literary, in which the subject's distinctive features or peculiarities are deliberately exaggerated to produce a comic or grotesque effect. b. The art of creating such representations. 
2. A grotesque imitation or misrepresentation: The trial was a caricature of justice; Chris Kenny is a caricature of a journalist; George Brandis is a caricature of a politician tr.v. car·i·ca·tured, car·i·ca·tur·ing, car·i·ca·tures To represent or imitate in an exaggerated, distorted manner, with the proviso that it is impossible to caricature Kenny and Brandis because a caricature of a caricature is too post-modern and referential to be possible or wise. (French, from Italian caricatura, from caricare, to load, exaggerate, from Late Latin carricāre, from Latin carrus, a Gallic type of wagon or a croweater form of empty delusional vessel).

Yes, it's dog botherer day, but before we get there, the pond just has time to celebrate Adam Creighton, as foolish, dumb and silly a reptile as to grace twitter in recent days in a way designed to reveal that he's a twitterer of the first water:

You see, calling people leftards and making a joke that trots out old gay lesbian black midget whale routines is sedate and calm, but the real breathtaking stupidity, having copped flak for it, is to complain, in a breathtaking way, about the level of stupidity and rudeness on twitter among supposedly educated people ...

What a breathtaking fool, completely unaware, it would seem, of his twittering folly.  A real thinker ...

And before we get to the dog botherer - it's called the slow tease - let's just pause to acknowledge the wild excitement in reptile la la land at the news some of the dead wood has at long last been cleared out, years too late but better late than never. Talk about a cornucopia of ecstasy:

Why it's like the wonders of the ages, this coming, this transformation, though naturally the y'artz is in mourning at the loss of classical perfection:

But this at last brings us to the dog botherer, who is apparently having trouble adjusting, and so must cast around and discover someone, some organisation to blame, other than the blind stupidity of those that backed the wrong dog in the race:

Ah, the brutal dumping ... yep, the poor dog botherer is still licking his wounds, and like any hurt, wounded cur on the wrong side of history, he must lash out and bark wildly at the world, and so to the first eruption:

Indeed, indeed, how shocking they didn't invite the dog botherer on, what a grotesque traducement to ignore his profound and completely unbiassed insights, and how astonishing to discover that the ABC has a mean-spirited triumphalism, which seemingly has infested the dog botherer's fellow reptiles this very day.

Damn you ABC, damn you and Barrie Cassidy and his program that thrashes the Bolter and makes Kenny's TV appearances seem like a pimple on a cosmic fart, damn you to a purgatorial afterlife working for Chairman Rupert ...

Of course, others - without the slightest shred of Kenny's deep political nous - might think having Arthur on to sell them a brand new water supply, or perhaps a used car he got from Artie, what with him having been one of the key plotters, was a bit of a coup and an insight into the new political lines being trotted out, but what would anyone know up against Kenny's Creighton-like capacity to sniff out infinite stupidity ...

But perhaps we should forgive him, because the poor lad is still deep in trauma, still keening and wailing at the loss:

So hard to let go ...

The pond noted it with an old and treasured dog, which loved certain scruffy toys and a blanket which stank to high heaven and was saturated in dog hairs and sweat ...

Oh indeed, most astute diplomacy to redeem all that treasonous work by the ABC, or more likely what the pond has come to call Abbott derangement syndrome, arising from a deranged attachment to Abbott, a syndrome which surely should have disappeared into the ether along with the disgraced, humiliated and discarded man ...

Somehow, when captive to the Abbott derangement syndrome, it's all the fault of the ABC, and the dog botherer is deeply afflicted ...

The truth here is brutal. The dog botherer is barking mad, and an obsessive of the most peculiar kind to boot, and his grandiloquent notion that he speaks for Australia and Australians with "Sure isn't ours" is surely the sign of a man in the grip of a delusional Napoleonic mania of a grand, and likely inoperable kind ...

One thing's for certain. Kenny sure isn't the pond's ...

Or perhaps we're mistaken, and what we're observing is just a yearning for exquisite beauty, now lost forever to the dimming tides of history and nostalgia?

Ah, the noble art of caricature. Almost as good as the special pleading of that caricaturist of reality known as the dog-bothering Chris Kenny ...

And now for the determined followers of the reptiles who will trudge through anything to get to a Rowe cartoon, the pond must note that the Oz editorialist also seems to be in the grip of the mean-spirited triumphalism that infests the ABC:

What's that you say, accuse jolly Joe of sour grapes? Perhaps even a dummy spit of the first water?

How did that ABC intern get to write the Oz editorial?

But at least, like any decent dog botherer, the Oz editorialist spares a moment to berate twitter and celebrate Kev's distinguished departure, and sound a note of caution:

Yes, indeed, because things went so swimmingly well with Indonesia under Tony.

The dog botherer swears it's so, and while that might be in an alternate universe, who knows but that some day we might all inhabit the weird bizarro world in which the dog botherer dwells ...

And so to that belated Rowe, and much more fine Rowe here, as recent events have produced a positive flood of Via Dolorosa wonders ... and the pond won't have Erica and Kev to kick around anymore, and strangely all that produces is a vast sigh of relief and a sense of release ...