In which somehow SSM and coal and nattering "Ned" and Dame Slap end up in a fine old cartoon lather ...

Fear is everywhere. Panic in the streets. SSM beasts stalk the streets, unnerving green creatures howl their bloodlust for clean energy ...

Fear, fear stalks the reptiles not just in their sturdy tree-killer editions, but in every digital page ...

The pond is frequently overwhelmed by the wealth of reptile fear on offer.

Look at yesterday's digital splash - saucy doubts and fears about batteries, and about SSM, and the need to reform the media so that Chairman Rupert will never have another bauble snatched away, as CBS has so cruelly attempted ...

And then today, just look at the parade of fearful, tear-stained obsessions ...

Coal, coal, coal, jihadis, batteries, SSM, all over again ...oh and a nice plug for Apple ...

Is it any wonder that with this wealth of fear material the pond should play it safe and go with old fear-mongering favourites?

Sure it'd be great if SSM had been settled without all the reptiles' saucy doubts and fears and sure the reptiles banging on about coal is tedious ... but it's hardly surprising. After all, if a man can think copper is the way forward for broadband, who wouldn't think carbon and coal is the future for the world ...

First a personal confession. The pond attempted to watch The Drum on their ABC last night, it being on the topic of SSM, and with nattering "Ned" on the panel... and gave up within a few minutes.

Is there a more solemn, tedious, po-faced, humourless, boring as batshit panellist around than nattering "Ned"? Like desiccated coconut, he manages to suck all water and juice and life from a conversation, and instead turns it into a mouldering husk, a hollow, empty shell ...

He's ponderous and portentous and gloomy and as grave as an undertaker's assistant, and the pond concluded that the only way that it could cope with a dose of "Ned" - way worse than cod liver oil though with similar consequences - was a couple of print gobbets ...

And perhaps a dose of "Ned" could also benefit from a cartoon fest ...

As usual, it was more of the same, talking up the no vote and the fundy Xians ...

Of course none of this covers what happens if they actually manage to catch this particular car. Chances are they won't know what to do with it, and nor will Malware ...

Yep, if Malware manages to fuck up SSM the same way he's fucked over broadband, stuffed the republic, and rogered the energy market and gone gaga over coal the same way he went into rhapsodies over copper, the momentum to drop the loser will crank up a gear ...

This is one of the benefits of a solid "no" vote that the hard right are no doubt eager to grasp, though they dress it up in the tosh of religious freedom, as if fundamentalist religious bigots will ever let go of their homophobia or have it repressed ... why that would be like taking guns away from a Republican ...

In essence, what "Ned" is saying is that the politicians can't be counted on enacting any of the bills already prepared as private member exercises which offer more than enough protections for fundamentalists to carry on with their homophobia and bigotry... a canny distraction from the real farce ...

Saucy doubts and fears is the name of the game, and when that button is pressed, the chance of people not bothering to express an opinion, or to offer a negative opinion in a meaningless and vastly expensive survey will be greatly enhanced ...

It's no skin off "Ned's" nose ... why should he care about one minority when it's the squawking Xians that have his ponderous, portentous love and attention ...

Need to know the reality? The reality according to a pompous, self-regarding, silly old bugger shouting at pink-tinged gay clouds?

The pond knew it was right to switch off The Drum, and must be cautious about further doses of nattering "Ned". Too much humbug, paranoia and saucy doubts and fear-mongering will likely result in a stroke ...

It was time to take in a Rowe cartoon like a whack of Anginine, just in case, with more heart-saving Rowe here ...

And by more than chance, that rich portrait of the anarchist radical socialists in the street with their petrol bombs provided the pond with a good way to segue, to throw from SSM to energy matters and the onion muncher and Dame Slap ...

You see, the onion muncher has been out and about at Fairfax and at the lizard Oz, with energy and coal the other prong whereby he can maintain his war against Malware ...

Now rather like "Ned" the pond has spent a lot of quality time with the onion muncher, still proudly at the top of the pond's banner, so it seemed best to revert to one of his surrogates on energy matters (to use a quaint American term). Come on down Dame Slap ...

It was everything the pond might have expected or hoped for. You see, Dame Slap opens by talking about the letter that's supposed to be coming, courtesy of Malware heavying the retailers.

As any watcher of Micallef would know, the joke is that the letter is only due before Christmas ... not next month or even next week ...

The urge to sample a cartoon before beginning was irresistible ...

Ah, that's better and with a zinger too ...

Now, apart from the high energy prices arising from the coal syndrome, what's not to like about all this.

Dame Slap sounds like some whining anarcho-syndicalist socialist moaning about vile big business and fat capitalist pigs ...

Naturally, like any good socialist, Dame Slap demands that government do something about it ... perhaps some kind of five year plan so we can all enjoy the benefits of coal ...

You see, it's all about climate science, because climate change doesn't exist and isn't happening, and everything would be fine if we just stuck with coal ... because, you know, copper for the NBN, and coal for the future ...

Now as further proof, and with no greater authority required, who better to reference than Matt Canavan, visiting citizen of another country?

Why the pond is glad you asked, because there's Malcolm Roberts, of course, and a horse is a horse of course, except when its Mister Mal ...

Yes, if we could just get all this useless irrelevant talk of climate science out of the way, how everyone would start loving coal again ...

Say what? Now Dame Slap wants us to start acting like Kerry Packer channeling Andy Vesey?

It was all too confusing for the pond, but it was determined to get in one last reptile flourish.

You see the reptiles have been very busy building up what they hope will result in violence in the streets ... could there be any better way to derail the "yes" vote than this?

They've been running the angle for awhile now, and Chip was in grand form this day ...

If it comes to pass, it will be a dream come true for the reptiles ... and another stick with which to give Malware a sound thrashing ...

Oh okay, the only reason the pond wanted to run it was that remarkable line about a Jewish neo-fascist being called "Trumpesque", in honour of an American neo-fascist, such is the rampant confusion of political labels these days, but thereby allowing the pond to sneak in a couple of Donald cartoons as a way to wrap up the cartoon fest ...