In which Ukker Dukker churtles at the kuwus ... or some such garbled dismantling of the special relationship with the fush and chuppers ...

It's all been jolly good fun ... and perhaps Pope has the best of it (and more Pope here) ...

Rowe also lined up for another shot (and more Rowe here).

And we all know the impression that the Shortenistas wanted to leave behind ...

Thankfully one of the benefits of the pond being dedicated to the right wing commentariat is that it doesn't have to spend much time at all contemplating the enormous tactical and strategic stupidity of Bill Shorten or Sam the man.

It can safely leave that to better minds, as with Lenore Taylor and her piece Labor's shadow boxing with Turnbull distracts from real transparency fight, which covers inter alia the incredible incompetence of the Labor party in the recent matter of Senate proceedings ...

Will the Labor party ever realise that they've got a dud on their hands in Shorten?

Probably not, but thankfully that's not the pond's beat, though it is possible to marvel at this insouciant piece of cheek:

Remember, young Fauntleroy, show absolutely no shame, remember nothing of your past, and hope that you don't get caught up in an ICAC inquiry, and foreswear any knowledge of Swiss bank accounts, and sssh, no mention of the Offset Alpine fire, and instead be as bold as brass, and you too can lecture the Earl and the world on how leaders should clean up their acts ... 

Oh, but it helps to hand out pegs so everyone can put them on their noses, or on their lips to stop their snorting at the marvel and the wonder of it all ...

The reptile beat also lets the pond off the hook for not paying any meaningful attention to the second outing of The Verdict. They tried to tidy the wretched thing up, but it was like watching an undertaker apply lipstick to a corpse - it's hard to see how a show could make a come-back from a first outing which saw ratings of 522,000 viewers, taken to the cleaners by the likes of Ten's Gogglebox with 559,000.

The numbers will be out today, but who cares. The decision to go with a panel of dead weights, losers and tossers ensues a continuity of stupidity, with Mark "you're an animal" Latham, and Anne "you'll be sent to the naughty corner" Henderson at the head of the infants class, though the obligatory boofhead footballer did his valiant best to match them in their dropkick boofheadedness ... talk about a man with a capacity to show off his screw-loose torpedo punt ...

The more they try to produce discipline in and cull insights from, this rude crowd of rowdy ruffians, the more the show loses its one guaranteed selling point ... watching a train wreck unfold.

They should have tried a different format than Beauty and the Beast, with Footy Club voting finale ... and allowed themselves a little more flexibility in the matter of panellists. Latham is no longer a novelty, he's just a very peculiar man, and in seeking to fossick out the truth behind Latham's bizarre twittering, all Karl confirmed is that one of the featured panellists is a very strange, mumbling and dissembling man ...

No, the pond is better off sticking to the tried and trusted world of the reliably weird ... the reptiles in Murdoch la la land ...

It being Friday, what better fun than to see Akker Dakker showing his sublime diplomatic skills with the Kiwis?

Now the pond has spoken sharply to the reptiles before about putting up a paywall at a front door, and leaving the back door of the blogs unlocked, so that anyone might stroll in and view what seems so prized and valuable at the front door, but turns out to be completely valueless and a waste of precious time at the rear end (talk about an ass's arse).

It turns out that the addle-brained Akker Dakker, pompous preening owl of the remove, has zero by way of diplomatic skills, though the pond was startled to realise that it might have been expecting some ... which says more about the delusions of the pond than the reality of the fat owl of the remove ...

Now forget the window dressing of the factoids in relation to the Ark Royal. That's just the senile ramblings of an old goat wandering down memory lane, filled with the delusion that he must inform a young readership, as if Akker Dakker has a readership with an average angry white male age of less than 79.

No, the real point is Akker Dakker's fond quoting of Nifty Wran and his anecdotal abuse of the useless piggy, in a way which seems completely at odds with the point that Akker Dakker was seeking to make earlier piece about the kiwi rage all being the business of ratbag civil rights lawyers.

In reality, while there are human rights involved, there are also simple and expedient and practical matters concerning relationships with other countries. It's all very well to deport criminals, but what, for example, if it's a criminal that turned up in Australia when 27 days old. What happens when you send such a criminal back to a country where they don't speak the language?

Well there are any number of examples - such as the SBS story here - and in the end it's attempt, for petty purposes, to break the old rule which is akin to the golden shopkeeper's rule, "you break it, you bought it."

In this case that can be varied to, "you brought them up, you live with the result of your work".

The notion that you can simply ship recalcitrants back to country of origin with no questions asked and no political fall-out and believe no one will notice the casual cruelties and stupidities involved in such a simplistic policy is one of the greater follies of the 'laura norder' crowd, and the current federal government ...

While the lawyers are in there criticising, it is the mutton Dutton that has cranked up the pace of this policy, and in the process managed to get the kiwis alienated and agitated.

It might have helped Akker Dakker to have read the debriefing here, which explains that it was all thanks to that fine member of Amnesty, the crud Ruddock, cranking up the machine, and well within the lifetime of the Ark Royal:

Australia’s system of mandatory deportation became even tougher in 1998 when Phillip Ruddock got amendments to the Migration Act through parliament called the ‘Strengthening of Provisions relating to Character and Conduct’. These amendments gave the Immigration Minister and Department greater powers to deport people by cancelling their visas on grounds of criminal record, criminal association or being a threat to national security — known together as the character test. Since these amendments were promulgated in 1999, immigration ministers and officials have used their new powers aggressively as part of the Coalition government’s determination to be tough on border control, crime and terrorism. They have used the character test to cancel hundreds of visas, turning the individuals concerned into unlawful non-citizens who must be detained and deported. Two categories of people have been hit particularly hard.

Well you can read more at the link, but it's enough to say that somehow this government thinks it can export its problems, without let or hindrance, and without diplomatic, social and personal consequences ....

It's come to a pretty pass when the likes of Harold Holt sounds more compassionate and intelligent and aware of the consequences than Akker Dakker and the current federal government ... but it's part of the island fortress mentality that's been cultivated in recent years ...

Well Donne had a poem about it:

No man is an Iland, intire of itselfe; every man, or even every woman
is a peece of the Continent, a part of the maine; 
even if a Clod as thick as Akker Dakker bee washed away by the Sea, 
the Dinkum land of dummies is the lesse, as well as if a Promontorie were, as 
well as if a Manor of thy friends or of thine 
owne were; any mans or even womans easy deportation diminishes me, 
because I am involved in Mankinde or even Womankinde; 
And therefore never send to know for whom 
the bell tolls; It tolls for thee.

Oh well, if it tolls for Akker Dakker or The Verdict, perhaps the pond could make an exception.

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

And hasn't the ghost of the eminent one lingered on like Banquo?

So many noble artists toiling away unrecognised on the full to overflowing intertubes ...