Day 36, and the pond kicks off with some "independent" thinking by fabulous thinker Troy ...

So much to admire this day,  and moving on from the admirable Rowe - and more Rowe here - the pond, in view of today's impending announcement, couldn't resist the magical Mirabella, thanks to the reptiles of Oz:

But that's just the apéritif for a spectacular display by Troy ...

Now the pond rarely pays any attention to Bramston, but at the end of his piece, he so spectacularly disappears up his fundament - or at least the fundament of the reptiles of Oz and Chairman Rupert - that the pond was almost reduced to tears marvelling at the feat and the sight.

And this on the day when there are tough competitors for attention, such as wild-eyed, arm-breaking Mark Latham, and the taxpayer-rorting Caterists.

For the first part of Troy's work, the pond couldn't actually work out why Bramston had bothered to write the piece, apart from the usual sour grapes and resentment at Fairfax's continuing existence.

It's no news that Fairax - and Syme for that matter - were conservative, pitched to Woollahra and to Toorak. It seems this came as some kind of latter-day revelation to Troy, or that Troy, in his condescending way, thinks only he has some kind of memory of the past ...

Now all this is as may be, but then comes the spectacular display of kool aid drinking.

First there's a bit more on the Fairfaxians, and the whitewashing, and then an extraordinary feat of exemplary whitewashing by Troy himself ...

Shocked to learn that Fairfax was conservative? The rag that stuck by Paul "magic water" Sheehan through thick, at least until it got too thin even for them? Shocked that this very day they're running a piece by Peter "send in the hounds" Reith?

Only as shocked as watching Troy drink the whitewashed bath water ...

But it was worth sticking with it, just to read the kool aid swigging, reptile loving Bramston celebrate the lizard Oz as an anti-establishment paper, supporting both sides of politics and displaying "independent" thinking ...

It's just as well that Troy deployed inverted commas in that sentence The Herald can't point to the same record of "independent" thinking over a much longer period time.

Apart from the illiteracy embedded in the sentence, the pond immediately understood what Troy was saying.

"Yes, we've been lickspittle lackeys to the thoughts of Chairman Rupert and we've carried out his orders fearlessly and diligently, and that's why we can proudly point to a record of 'independent' thinking over a much longer period of time ... and that's why in recalling the lizard Oz's relatively short history, we can provide a view of the lizard Oz from the present that is fundamentally at odds with the newspaper's past, its independence having disappeared with the sacking of Adrian Deamer by Murdoch for daring to criticise the Springbok tour of Australia ... because apartheid wasn't so bad, don't ya know ..."

Perhaps Troy should stray outside the tent a little more ...

There was the sacking of Adrian Deamer in 1971, despite the fact that he was one of the masthead’s most successful editors and probably rescued it from early closure. Deamer later claimed he was let go because Murdoch disliked the political flavour of the paper under his editorship – too bleeding heart – and he was insufficiently acquiescent. Then there was the political campaigning against Gough Whitlam in 1975 that saw journalists go on strike because their copy was being altered.

And from then on the rag has been a self-censoring servile servant of the Chairman... well at least until the latter days, when they discovered that the IPA had thoughtfully constructed an agenda for them to follow ...one the Chairman just loved to pieces ...

Indeed, later in that piece, after brooding about the dog botherer, came this thought:

Most Australians don’t even know that there is a culture war and wouldn’t care much if they did. The Australian is not addressing these people. Nor are those who only react to its agenda. 
Its narcissistic tendencies are, I think, the key to why we spend too much time thinking about the Australian. Narcissists are very powerful and energetic personalities, adept at involving those around them in their drama and feeding their need for attention. They exercise a strong gravitational pull, all in the defence of the huge yet fragile ego.

Narcissism? Yes, that about accurately sums up the tone and tenor of Troy's piece.

But m'lud, the pond has an excuse for indulging the narcissists.

There's simply nowhere else - not even amongst the Terrorists on a good day - that fine examples of delusionalism of the Troy Bramston kind are put on parade, their comedy stylings a guarantee of belly laughs, or at least a good giggle ...

Still, at least the pond can now look forward to a fearless editorial by the reptiles urging the people to kick Malware out, not least because of his wretched copper-based NBN, and vote for anyone else ... because the reptiles are deeply in the grip of "independent" thinking.

And if you believe that's coming, why not have another swig of Troy's kool aid? Think of the energy from the bonus teeth- and mind-rotting sugar ...

Never mind, at least the hard copy tree killer edition remains useful in outside dunnies for hardy Tamworth folk, and the digital edition, courtesy stylings like Troy's, provide blank spaces so that the Rowe cartoons won't look like they've been crowded too close together on the pond ...