In which the pond takes its usual Tuesday look at the government cash-loving, planet-hating Caterists ...

Before moving on to the usual - Caterists celebrating dinkum Oz coal, coal, coal for the world, in much the same way this day as headlines are celebrating soaring temperatures - the pond would like to take a walk down memory lane, and brood on the subject of sin ...

The pond had a stern upbringing. A sin was a sin, no matter how small the sin. Oh sure there were venial sins and mortal sins - watch out masturbators and users of naughty words - but thanks to dropping the weekly paycheck into a brown envelope on shakedown tithing mass day and a word with the interceder in the confessional box, any form of sin could be fixed...

It often led the pond to the tempting, sinful thought that if forgiveness could be so easily bought and fixed, why not just keep on sinning? After all, the bigger the sin, the more grand and enjoyable the forgiveness ... in the Catholic way ...

But still, a sin was a sin, and it required acknowledgment and some attempt at redemption. It was no good saying that little Janey had sworn like a trooper or advised of the pleasure to be had touching a certain spot, she too was a sinner, and to follow a sinner in sinning was a sin ...

There was no way of getting out of a sin by saying others had sinned. We were all sinners, thanks to that bloody woman, but that was just the start of the sin empire business ...

Now it just so happens all these thoughts came flooding back recently when reading a Fairfaxian piece about the Caterists ...

By golly, that shifty, furtive face should be on a blog banner somewhere ... 

But as for little-known? Little known Department of Finance grant payments?

Perhaps little-known in the lofty world of Fairfax, but the pond has routinely been featuring the Caterists with their paw in the till and making off with the government lolly ... like this ...

That's just the short-form one for 2014. The pond has also routinely featured the long-form ones for 2015 and 2016 and looks forward with anticipation to the 2017 bout of Caterists absconding with government lolly, cash clutched tightly in paw...

But how did sin get into it?

There, you see it?

... Menzies executive director Nick Cater says the payments pale in comparison ....

You see, if others sin, why then the Caterists may sin with impunity, because theirs is a much lesser sin ...

Never mind that stealing from the taxpayer, bludging like a welfare fraud, and then hypocritically denouncing other welfare bludgers, makes a mockery of everything the hypocrite writes ... 

If others can get on the cash in the paw bandwagon, why then that makes it fine for the Caterists to make out like bandits ... and to suggest ways, say your average Indian billionaire, might also get on the government grant bandwagon ...

Of course the old 'mote in the eye' metaphor would have worked nicely, but now it's time to turn to the daily Caterist reading, and discover the fine produce arising from the Department of Finance cash in the paw support ...

How did you guess it would be dinkum coal, coal, coal for the world ... and by the way let's throw a billion dollar subsidy at Adani?

You see how it works? Who could argue against a humble billion dollar rail subsidy when your humble Caterist thief makes off with a humble couple of hundred thou or so? And who could argue against a couple of hundred thou when what's really needed is a handsome billion or so?

Seldom has a grant-bludger and welfarist fraud and government cash thief pandered so nicely to big coal ... seldom has a Caterist conducted a column so cynically and with so little regard for the planet, suggesting that saving the planet is a stupid and idle activity ... no doubt because with a decent-sized government grant, the Caterists can set up shop on Mars, or at least in a moon base ...

Yes, planet-wrecker is a much more noble and honourable profession ... and the next time you see some namby-pamby Xian rabbiting on about killing and the commandments, remember to snigger and sneer and mock him as a "human saver."

And there, at the end of that gobbet, note the outrage and the indignation about a humble US$7000 a month, when the Caterists themselves are into the federal government at a rate that makes that sum look insignificant.

But that's the point about the Caterists and envy, and wanting to get in on the rackets ....

And at that point the pond drifts back down memory lane to the notion of a sin being a sin, or at least a very large mote in the Caterist eye, when we probably should be finishing off the last Caterist gobbet ...

A cash in the paw grant thieving welfarist mocking others for being moss-munchers?

Well that's the way it goes in Caterist cuckoo land ... though it does bring the pond to another matter attracting anxiety in reptile la la land this day ...

Debt soaring, yet we can splash money on the Caterists and Indian billionaires, while supplicants beg for $25 million to help fix the dire situation of the poor in relation to their teeth?

Debt soaring, yet we can splash cash - grants, nothing ever coming back - on blathering, insulting Caterists?

Well good old sexist, swearing Henry had something to say on that ...

Did the Caterists spot it in all that typically turgid set of Shavianisms? (The rest of them here).

Take care of the pence and the pounds will take care of themselves ...

Put it another way ...

Piss pence against the wall on the Caterists and next thing you know you'll be pissing pounds against the wall on Indian billionaires taking care of themselves ...

Never mind, that's how it goes with venial and mortal sins. 

There are little ones, and then there are much bigger ones, and they take on the smell of benzine ... or hypocrisy ...