In which the pond gets more science from a packet of Kettle Chilli chips than from a reading of the lizard Oz ...

(Above: and more Popery here).

The memes and tweets have been running hot ever since the news was announced, though the Murdochian press has been eerily quiet on the matter.

There were oodles of richly comic routines along the lines of ...

It was only the Graudian who could afford to set that hare running ...

Of course if you clicked on Do you pay more tax than Australia's biggest companies?, it turned out you didn't have to pay much in the way of tax to pay more than 37.88% of Australia's companies.

There were many ironies to the game, perhaps top of the list all the pathetic bleating about the onerous impact that the company tax rate had on business, but the pond was vastly relieved to see that its favourite reptiles were also included in the game:

Great stuff reptiles, and the pond promises to take seriously every word you write about the onerous burden of the company tax rate and the unfairness of it all, and the need for a fair deal ...

What else?

Well the pond knows that Leigh Sales has some supporters, but last night became a contest of the unendurables. 

The pond has no time for Bill Shorten, actually less than no time, the man is as depressing as all get out, and shortly the pond will be spending time amongst a bunch of Shortenistas in a way guaranteed to ruin Xmas and tarnish the New Year, but what to make of this?

Fuck, it was just a fucking joke, and a feeble zinger at that, in the patented feeble Shorten zinger style. We all know what it was aimed at, class resentment, but why the po-faced harping?

Now we can't mock the rich, the truffle snorters in the eastern suburbs who fucked over and screwed up broadband in the country, or perhaps even the ones that get away with zero tax?

It takes a lot to generate even a shred of sympathy in the pond for the tedious bore known as Shorten - the man who will never be PM - but the humourless Sales easily wins the pond's award for the worst television interviewer of the year. Did naughty Bill make a cheap truffles joke about her favourite PM? The one she swoons over whenever he appears and smirks at her? Malswy walsy palsy ...

Now since the pond never watches commercial television or morning breakfast shows, the contest for worst television interviewer of the year is an unfair race, but what to say about a truffle joke greeted with pursed lips and frowning severity and all puritan seriousness?

A fucking truffle joke?

Enough. It's time for some real comedy, and some tremendous comedy stylings are at hand thanks to the reptiles of Oz, as they are on a daily tax-free basis, thanks be unto the Chairman ...

Come on down Matthew Canavan, who might pass for a brain surgeon if he didn't happen to be a rocket scientist:

Now others might want to have a go at the science on display, but the pond just wants to enjoy the wondrous conflation of witches and climate science, and the tremendously heart felt plea for public funding for denialists, because you know, the Koch brothers and the Heartland Institute simply aren't enough ...

Speaking of the military, that just happened to remind the pond of an excellent reader link, to The Fight of our Time:

As Navy officials told Kerry in an informal briefing aboard the San Antonio, the base was highly vulnerable to sea-level rise. Already, roads connecting the base to the city of Norfolk, Virginia, flood during major rainstorms. At high tide, water surges over the sea walls, threatening key infrastructure and inundating buildings. Kerry, dressed in a sharp blue suit and pink-orange tie, asked the officers about the life expectancy of the base. "Twenty to 50 years," Capt. J. Pat Rios told him. 
There was a slight but perceptible pause among the naval officers and State Department officials on the bridge. It was an extraordinary moment in the annals of American military history: A U.S. naval captain had just told the secretary of state that this strategically important base, home to six aircraft carriers and key to operations in Europe and the Middle East, would be essentially inoperable in as little as 20 years. Yes, they could shore up the sea walls for a while. Yes, they could raise roads. But without the massive influx of billions of dollars to fortify and elevate the city of Norfolk, as well as the roads and railroads that connect it to the surrounding region, the base was doomed. 

Oh dear, please, enough already with that red team analysis.

Let's get back to the real scientist scribbling furiously in the lizard Oz:

Wonderful, wonderful stuff. It takes a remarkable mind to talk of inane arguments and the rigours of science, and then trot out a comparison to pundits agreeing on the power of witchcraft in the 16th century.

Better yet, the notion of funding red teams who take a different view, even if that different view happens to be incorrect, because being stupendously and stupidly wrong would challenge the zeitgeist the way Matthew Canavan does ...

Luckily, Canavan produced a eureka moment in the pond, and led it to a remarkable scientific conclusion. 

There is definitely something in the water that they drink in Queensland, and it isn't fluoride ...

And now the pond joins Laura Tingle in a new year's wish ...

And if he could just take Canavan on his caravan as it wends its way off to the sunset, the scientific world would be richer for it, though the comedy world would mourn the loss of two great talents ...