A public apology to the ABC ...

The pond is deeply, abjectly sorry.

It means no harm playing with the reptiles in the herpetarium. Sure, where the pond sees a certain weird, surreal beauty, others just see dirty, horrid creatures likely to bite off a finger.

Yes, they run riot at times. Yes, they have no care for facts, or balance, or fairness. The pond suspects they nurse a grievance and a persecution complex bred into them from the time the meteor took out their ancient relatives.

No, they don't like to correct things, or apologise, or do any of that un-reptile girlie stuff … they think leaving a little guano in the living room is just a way of marking out the territory.

It's hard to tell who's the naughtiest reptile. Some might argue for Polonius, some for the Caterist, but whatever, the pond feels caught out, as if imitating Michaelia Cash flapping her mouth like a fish without gills, and turned into a meme on the spot …

And so to the correction.

The pond has every suspicion that the Caterist will be too proud and too haughty to acknowledge an error, being inclined to the Humpty Dumpty … but the pond regurgitated his stuff without thinking, without chastising and without close marking …

Oh how mortifying ...

Oh you naughty, naughty Caterist… bad reptile.

Go to the corner, put on the cap, and no tax dollars for you this week … 

And while we're at it, the pond is aware that blogger is banned in China, and consequently the pond has very few Chinese visitors … the last lot of data showed more visitors from Brazil than from an invisible China.

But just in case, and to make sure the pond is truly, properly banned, a few words …

'Ten thousand years’ (万岁) 
'Xi Zedong’ (习泽东) 
‘Shameless’ (不要脸) 
‘Lifelong’ (终身) 
'Personality cult’ (个人崇拜) 
'Emigrate' (移民) 
‘Immortality’ (长生不老) 
Yuan Shikai, a Qing dynasty warlord

George Orwell, and for good luck, Orwellian

1984

Animal Farm

And anything with "N" in it, as in …

… beware the Knights of Nih, who are nigh, dressed in outrageous neckties sure to nullify any impending nirvana…

For all this, the pond thanks the Graudian, furiously scribbling China bans letter N (briefly) …

Now if we could only ban the cultists haranguing the Chinese-laden buses that pull up outside the Sydney fish markets, what a win-win for all ...

Finally, as a peace offering, a cartoon showing a teacher everyone would love to have … especially those naughty, naughty Caterists …bad reptile!

In which the pond signs up for some Dame Slap fortress schooling ...

The lure of the Donald continues apace, but it's the pond's duty to tend to the reptiles resident in fortress Oz, always on the look out for threats … and who better to have as an armed-to-the-teeth teacher than Dame Slap?

Oh she's at the top of the heap, and she's been blessed with a Lobbecke cartoon … say no more, it's time to enter the classroom and learn more about the vile, filthy pinko pervert commie socialist greenies that threaten doom for all …

What follows is a sublime example of Dame Slap at her very best …

Around this point the pond's brain began to hurt, as it usually does when reading Dame Slap.

Is this the very same Dame that slipped out onto the streets of New York at night wearing a MAGA cap and ready to celebrate the elevation of the Donald?

Is this how a straight-talking Donald makes sense?

The Donald a straight-talking straight-shooter?

Is it any wonder that Rowson is getting more surreal by the day?

As always, the pond suggests dropping in on the Graudian cartoon section here on a regular basis … it's all that's needed to keep in touch with an island state gradually slipping into irrelevance, incapable even of working out what to do with the Irish border and with the Europeans determined to extract a little pleasure from the process ...

Ah dear, there we go again, talking about boons for the rich and hits for the low-income taxpayer, while at the very same time celebrating Uber …

… while Uber goes about its business of transferring current obligations, such as superannuation, and other parts of conventional pay packets, off into the future, there to be paid by taxpayers and the government should anyone in old age want some kind of pension or means of living …

Don't look at the pond, it'll be dead by then, and in the meantime the bill for the whole gig economy, the Deliveroos and the Ubers and all the rest of them will finally come home to roost, as the young 'uns finally realise that everyone finally does get old, and either you've got some money tucked away somewhere, leftovers from your generous Uber or Deliveroo stipend ... or an obliging government that remembers what a welfare state was like …

... or it's out on the street for you … and if Dame Slap has anything to say about it, you'll be out on the street, while she Ubers around in grand style …

As for the British economy, the pond turned to that notoriously leftist news organisation Reuters, for an update here …

Britain was the weakest Group of Seven economy over the course of 2017 in terms of overall growth, and there are other ways that the vote to leave the European Union has left its mark too.

Hmm, a bit like the splendid temperatures in the Arctic, speaking of that devious UN plot to introduce world government by Xmas ...

Oh dear, it must be time for a Bell, who can also be found in abundance at the Graudian archive ...

But really we all know what this is ultimately about.

It's just been an elaborate feather dance, with the real point to warn us all of the dangers of Comrade Bill, and the risk of that notorious condition - "Zinger fallout" - likely to occur on Mad as Hell tonight ...

Come the revolution?

That'll likely come when young members of the gig economy go looking for their pensions.

The pond hopes they'll remember to thank Dame Slap, enamoured as she is with Uber and Hayek … and no doubt,  with a passing tip of the hat to Ayn Rand, happy to bank a little welfare in retirement while she could …

Of course in the US, plans continue to cull the herd so that retirement won't be a problem for many, as Rowe noted in his cartoon here ...

And as the Kushner catches the Kelly security clearance kiss of doom, here's another one for MAGA cap wearers ...

In which the reptiles deliver a new shepherd for the agrarian socialist sheep ...

 

The lure of the Donald is strong, and the pond is willing to line up for that Seth Meyer movie any day - what an incredibly brave man he is - but the pond was distracted when it noticed a disturbing tendency amongst the reptiles on domestic matters …

Oh please Troy don't be coy, tell us what you really think. 

Now some pushback came from the usual source, a man with all the gravitas, wit and vision of an angry old man frequently prone to shouting at clouds …

But the real pushback was given a heavy push by the reptiles …

Oh no, Barners only a few days gone, his ashes still warm, and they send in an assassin to revile Caesar and praise Brutus?

And even worse, one with a Messiah tendency, and a way of looking at agrarian socialists as if they're a flock of sheep in need of an ideal shepherd?

Uh huh, already they're poking and prodding at the ashes, so that the new leader might be glorified and placed in an exalted position somewhere near god …a god unfairly treated and much maligned, just a humble dweller in an eastern suburbs mansion …

Come, let us all worship and adore the new shepherd ...

An heroic shot of the new fearless leader, and talk of Australians being sick of the Barners style of leadership, and his role in the political soap opera of Canberra - drain the swamp, drain the swamp - and newly factionalised Nationals divided by personality, populism and ambition … and with Barners off to the backbench to brood … and this is the way to start the new regime, with the cat knocking the urn off the mantelpiece and pissing in the ashes?

There's no way back from that start. You don't go kicking around the old guard unless the new guard senses an ongoing threat and future peril, and wants the ashes back in a lead-lined casket …

But first let the flowers be flung, the orations begun, the new leadership hailed ...

A Coalitionist? A constructive and seamless partnership, unlike that dreadful Barners chappie?

The pond couldn't resist flinging in a Pope cartoon a little early, at the risk that people might rush off for more Pope here, and miss the final few lines from this blessed Mitchell (not the major) ...

You see, the clue that paranoia's afoot in the Nats came with that immortal line:

It is a secondary concern that the Nationals' leader be a household name.

Put it another way:

It is a secondary concern that the Nationals' leader is a nonentity, a  person of no account, a cipher, a nothing, an unimportant person, a small fry, a lightweight, a generic no name brand on the bottom supermarket shelf ...

What better way to get brand recognition than to stir the pot, give Barners a kicking, and call the new hero a circuit breaker?

Now the pond knew all this was extremely significant stuff because the reptiles gave it their full and proper attention.

In the usual reptile way, it wasn't enough that this Mitchell came out to stir the waters and frighten the possums, and bless the sheep with a new shepherd, the reptiles had to shout it all over again from the rooftops with an EXCLUSIVE …

Hmm, how to start off the piece? 

Well we've already done the glorifying photo of the glorious new shepherd, ready to tend his flock of sheep. 

How about a classic shot of a sweaty Barners, pulling a funny face in the inimitable way only a Barners could manage … what a loon, how was he ever a leader? Always trying to score a spot on the pond banner, what a try-hard Tamworth dropkick, ready go downmarket Armidale ...

Oh dear they're not finished with Barners, they're still piling on …

What a tragedy it is, and with the pond with a fresh supply of Donald cartoons sitting on the shelf and going to waste.

Oh heck one won't hurt …

As for the rest, the punch line comes right at the end ...

He didn't rule anything in, but he didn't rule anything out?

The beast might rise again and slouch once more towards Canberra and disturb the new shepherd as he tends his flock?

Kill the beast …hail the new shepherd … sheep, line up here … oh and kill the Barners beast … and for that, how about we import a man with exceptional courage and a willingness to perform incredible feats of bravery?

In which the pond refuses to pay the Price ...

The pond always hesitates to do a third reptile leg in a day, but received an indignant communication from a reader angry that the pond ignores Fairfax these days …

But really what's the point? With the magic water man long gone, the magic has gone from Fairfax.

The correspondent attached a screen grab of a story … which will need to be clicked on to enlarge …

The foolish correspondent seems to have entirely missed the point.

Mendacity and trolling of the Danny Price "If you're against Adani's mine, you're against fighting poverty" kind is all in a day's work for the lizards of Oz …

If the pond wants to chant "dinkum Ozzie clean coal, oi, oi, oi," and marvel at expert climate scientists explaining how climate science is a gigantic Chinese hoax (and/or an attempt by the UN to establish a world government by Xmas), why would it go to Fairfax for such naked and blatantly conflicted nonsense as that being peddled by Danny Price?

The Fairfaxians are so inept at this sort of nonsense they can't even dig up someone worth a decent price …let alone a full piece of mockery ...

The same correspondent provided a link to Buzzfeed, outraged that Malware now has the NBN's 100 mbps speed,, a plan he claimed no one would have a need for … and the humble taxpayer is paying for Malware's pleasure …

"But the question is do households need to have – will they value, will they have any use for very high speeds of 100 megabits per second and higher and it’s difficult to identify the applications that would need that," he said on ABC's 7.30 program in 2013. "Remember, to stream a high definition video, a high definition video requires six megabits per second so you’ve got to have a lot of them going simultaneously to get to 100[Mbps]" 

Uh huh. Suddenly Malware's a mega movie buff ...

Opposition leader Bill Shorten told the Labor caucus that whole suburbs of Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane were having to make do with one quarter of this speed on the "second rate copper network". "Mr Turnbull says that Australian businesses and families don't need a first rate NBN, but he's happy to use taxpayer money to look after his own suburb and make sure they do."

That's more like it, a zinger from comrade Bill and more evidence of Malware's routine capacity for malfeasance …

Meanwhile, the pond must regrettably insist that the only reason to attend Fairfax is to give the magical Pope a hit here …

And here, have a few old Pope cartoons in memory of Adani … ah memories, and now so many gone ...

In which the pond finds something on its boots … genuine Caterist mud … or is that manure?

These days the pond's heart keeps sinking into the mud even before it begins to grapple with its reptile addiction …

It's a long, hard slog to get to the joy of a Rowe cartoon at the end of the daily journey.

As soon as the name "Emma Alberici" popped up, the pond knew the painful truth of that lizard Oz splash, "Alberici analysis backlash has life of its own."

Haven't the reptiles got anything better to do? Must they spend endless hours gnawing at the same old bone, desperate for a bit of juice?

Well there's no more tedious a fart arriving late on the scene than a Caterist, and sure enough …

… because, you know, the Caterists are full of authority and relevance … though at least he didn't try on the Major Mitchell routine about degrees and speaking Italian, given our Nick's own degree ...

It's not just the lizard Oz that's been obsessed, the reptiles at the AFR have also been carrying on, and so the pond decided it would approach the Caterist sideways, via a detour through assorted AFR correspondence … (no hot links, screen cap only)

Uh huh … please, another one ...

Oh dear… another sceptic. Are there any more?

Sorry Kaz, we're still in an automate, fewer people, less cost, more dividends phase … and while the pond appreciates that Henry Ford moment, it wasn't quite that clear-cut.

Is there another letter in the AFR house?

Oh dear, speaking of people living in glass houses and throwing stones, what was it the pond started talking about?

Being kind of absent-minded, and always unlucky, like many a punk, the pond clean forgot what it was going to go on about …

Ah, that's right, how silly of the pond, it almost forgot it was Caterist day … what a blessed relief a loss of memory can be ...

What a relief, it's not about Alberici, still caught in the reptile wars …

… it's actually about Netflix, and what sensible people would pay for content ...

Uh huh. Did anyone at News Corp check all this?

You see, the only thing keeping Foxtel in business is live sport, with both it and FTA paying more than the ABC could manage, explaining why the ABC vacated that field, and the only thing keeping the tree killer newspapers alive is the cross-subsidy from Fox and other successful elements of News Corp business, and the biggest threat of all to the old model is Netflix and other streaming services …

As the Caterists seem fixated on the price of content, please allow the pond a moment to go shopping … first at Netflix, and then at Foxtel ...

  

  

Say what? $111 a month for 12 months, usually $137 a month?

Who could afford these ridiculous prices?

What allows them to fork over such a generous stipend to the Murdochians? Is somebody shovelling taxpayer money down their throat?

Oh right, say no more.

Of course the pond cherry picked the Foxtel plans, just for fun, and in much the same way that the Caterist routinely rabbits on with sublime lack of authority about matters irrelevant …

Other barely profitable online publications?

Steady, this is dangerous turf, here ...

But that was then, when we were arguing about not so much that the lizard Oz routinely made a loss, but the size of the loss … Chris Mitchell admits The Australian has not been profitable since 2008 …

As for Goldman Sachs, the Caterist defending them is a bit like the Donald explaining how he was going to clean out the swamp …

Ah yes, the good old days of swamp draining, before Mr Donald went to Washington with Goldman Sachs ..

On the campaign trail, Trump unfailingly tarred Clinton as compromised by, and enmeshed with, Wall Street and its mega banks. Goldman Sachs had “total control” of her; she was in thrall to a “global power structure that is responsible for the economic decisions that have robbed our working class, stripped our country of its wealth and put that money into the pockets of a handful of large corporations and political entities”. (Graudian here)

Well we were talking about glass houses, anyone got any more Caterist stones?

A centre of national unity?

What, like Pravda, or perhaps Russia Today?

The Orwellian group think that on any other given day the reptiles would rail against?

What a stupid, silly man he is, and boring as well … and what a long hard slog it was to get to the Rowe, and truth to tell, sensible folk would have just headed off here a long time ago, but for what it's worth, and as the pond's only salvation …