All the fun of the fair and the Pellists and copper ...

(Above: David Rowe sets the tone for the day, and more Rowe fun here).

The pond was exceptionally pleased at the news ...

You can Graudian the story at New national security laws to include offence of inciting genocide, and the moment the new law hits the books, the first thing the pond is going to do is launch an action against god ...

Now the pond is aware that Billy Connnolly was once The Man Who Sued God, but surely this is prima facie evidence which should see god sent down for a long, long time ...

7 And the Lord said unto Noah, Come thou and all thy house into the ark; for thee have I seen righteous before me in this generation. Of every clean beast thou shalt take to thee by sevens, the male and his female: and of beasts that are not clean by two, the male and his female. Of fowls also of the air by sevens, the male and the female; to keep seed alive upon the face of all the earth. For yet seven days, and I will cause it to rain upon the earth forty days and forty nights; and every living substance that I have made will I destroy from off the face of the earth.

Every living substance! Premeditated, planned and then executed. Bold as brass, and as cheeky and as brazen as all get out.

By golly, that's ambitious, multiple species genocides. And once She's nailed for her wide-ranging crimes, then all who preach Her genocidal word can take the fall too - a long, long sojourn in the clink for their inciting ways, and thanks to shared heritages, we can lock up not just angry Sydney Anglicans, but all kinds of Christians, Jews and Islamics who recognise the old testament story of Noah (yes, the Rusty Crowe man appears in Qur'anic verses, you can Greg Hunt it here).

With that good news story out of the way, the pond settled down to some quality time with the reptiles.

Sadly, some stories were obvious enough - the pond always suspected it was Putin's lackeys what did it, and the more they protest and obfuscate and deny, the stronger the suspicion (please send all alternative conspiracy theories to 4Chan) - but when it came to the rest of the Oz output, the pond was dismayed to discover that it could have written all the stories in its sleep.

There was the spin of the political stories:

And then there was the matter of terror:

Ah, the ABC, the font of terrorism. And what sort of honesty do the reptiles have to offer?

Terror denialism? That'd be from the rag that has routinely deplored the use of the term "climate denialism"?

Actually the reptiles aren't capable of honesty or insight when it comes to terror, so keen have they been to whip up hysteria, fear and loathing, nor has anyone produced any evidence that putting fourteen year olds in the hands of the plods is going to produce a miraculous transformation. The new laws would have done diddly squat in the recent Parramatta murder, and if implemented widely, control orders are much more likely to be counter-productive than effective ...

But if you point out the bleeding obvious - as Andrew Wilkie has been doing this morning - suddenly you're off in the strange world of "terror denialism", as opposed to wondering if anyone in the federal parliament (or the NSW state circus) has the first clue about how to engage with a troubled community.

Meanwhile, the "us" and "them" mentality keeps turning up on the pages of the lizard Oz:

Yes, because our political conversation should focus strictly on the absurdities of the Islamic religion,  and conflate them with barking mad fundamentalists, and fail to mention the absurdities of all the rest ... and meanwhile we should cultivate a growing unease and make as a part of the political conversation the thought that maybe there should be a blanket ban on Islamics migrating to Australia ... because that will really help to settle things down ...

Well if Young isn't calling for a blanket ban on Islamics, what does he want? A growing sense of unease, fear and loathing ...

So much stupidity in such a little time that the pond gave it all away, and turned to another bunch of fundamentalists, an old pond favourite we haven't heard much from for such a long time ... the expensive frock-loving Pellists ...

The pond was wondering when the Pellists would make their Roman move, and sure enough their despair at child molestation within the church has seen the Pellists go on the march ...

Oh sorry, the pond got that completely wrong.

It was actually a tendency to bring the church somewhere remotely into the twentieth century that got the Pellists on the move ...

Amazing really, that grown men should sit around fearing the smog of Satan, but that's probably what enforced chastity will do for you when it comes to contemplating the practicalities of marriage and divorce.

And so the church, thanks to the Pellists, will probably prove incapable of the slightest reform ...

Naturally that thought put the pond in a good mood for the rest of the day.

And speaking of a capacity for futurist reform, the pond would just like to close on this Delimiter story, "Welcome to the 1940s": Labor lampoons NBN Co for deploying new copper.

Yep, they're rolling out new copper. But the pond has a bone to pick with Labor. The first copper telephone wires rolled out back in 1878 (you can wiki the telephone line here).

That story should have been headed "Welcome to Queen Victoria's times".

The NBN company has recently confirmed that it will, where necessary, deploy brand new copper cables in some areas to ensure that the Fibre to the Node network rollout mode preferred by the Coalition Government as part of its Multi-Technology mix will succeed. It will depend on the specific condition of the copper in each area as to whether the NBN company replaces some or all of the cables. In some cases, where the copper is badly corroded, fibre may be used instead. 
However, in a speech to the Australian Internet Governance forum last week, Labor backbencher Terri Butler — who has recently emerged as a supporter of Australia’s technology sector within the Parliament — noted comments that NBN company chief executive Bill Morrow made on the matter. “… recently NBN Co CEO Mr Bill Morrow also revealed that NBN Co plans to replace degraded copper with new copper in some cases,” said Butler. “He said: “… where the copper is insufficient, we have planned for that, we have budgeted for that, if we need to go in and retrofit that copper.” “Seriously. More copper? Welcome to the 1940s.”

Sorry Ms Butler, with the greatest respect, Welcome to Queen Victoria's times it must be ...

Speaking of which, it reminds the pond that a few years ago, Gizmodo dragged out a debate from Hansard which was beyond the valley of irony, conducted as it was in 1910:

James Mathews MP: Some time ago I met a gentleman who came here from the Old Country, who ridiculed the expensive practice of using copper wire where iron wire would do, the latter costing only [10.5 pence]. per lb., and the former [1.5 pence]. The price of iron wire does not fluctuate much, but that of copper fluctuates a good deal. The year before last it was about [11 pence] a lb.
Thomas Brown MP Copper is used for greater efficiency. 
James Mathews MP: The practical men in the Department, not the theorists, think that nothing is gained by using copper wire for short lines. Some of the iron wire lines have been in use for thirty years, and give as good results now as copper wire lines. Last year an iron wire line, put up when I was a boy, to connect the Age office with Mr. David Syme’s house on the Yarra, at Hawthorn, was still giving satisfactory results, although for a good part of its length it ran parallel with the railway line, and was exposed to the smoke of locomotives, which was prejudicial to its life. 
There is an iron wire line to Bacchus Marsh, and those who have spoken over it know that its conductivity is better than that of many copper wire lines. I do not say that copper wire should not be used for long-distance lines like that from Sydney to Melbourne, but for short city lines iron wire is sufficiently good, and is much cheaper. When the honorable member for Bendigo was Postmaster-General, the instruction was given that iron’ wire must be used where suitable. At the time there was not a great quantity of iron wire in stock, but when a new supply was obtained, the onus of determining whether iron wire or copper wire should be used was thrown on the line foreman, who naturally did not care to run any risk. Why should responsibility of this kind be thrown on men receiving only £156 a year? It would not be allowed in a business office. No doubt it is done to shield the official “heads, who, if anything goes wrong, can blame their subordinates. When there was an outcry against the increase in the telephone rates, many persons stated in letters to the newspapers that they did not object to paying rates which would make the service profitable, but objected to making good losses due to extravagant or incompetent management, and demanded that a better system should be provided. The PostmasterGeneral has shown that the auditors appointed by the last Government were of opinion that the rates should be increased, and the Postal Commission recommended an increase, so that the action of the Postmaster-General has justification, but, at the same time, the subscribers are right in demanding efficiency and economy of administration. 
For some time I was trying to get the conduit system extended. Two years ago, I stated in this Chamber that the officials are too fond of seeing their work in the air. In up-to-date towns overhead lines will soon be abolished. The conduit system is not so expensive as the tunnel system. Tunnels would be necessary in busy parts of the city, but conduits connected with them would be used for the suburbs. The ratio of the cost of having wires overhead to that of having them in conduits is about as one to six. but the Department would do nothing in the way of getting rid of the overhead lines until an agitation for their abolition commenced. It is a pity that the officials are not more ready to accept suggestions for improvements. (You can get the links here).

And they say history doesn't repeat itself, yet surely stupid politicians saying and doing stupid things must be counted as part of history ...

And so to the Twitterati because it irritates the reptiles so ...

Yes, yes, hypocrisy is rampant, and the police state proceeds apace, and Liberal spokespeople take to The Drum to assure the world that the age of privacy is dead, and where's the harm in that, but there's also time to enjoy the y'artz doing the rounds before someone from the government starts stalking you on the intertubes  ... (and never mind the typo)...

And this artwork had a singular surreal appeal ...