In which the pond is forced to fail the urbane Urban for not having a clue ...

And so to the latest in the reptile crusade, as the ANU and Schmidt discover what it's like to be on the receiving end of the fearless crusaders, forensically examining every thought crime and calling on the IPA to pass judgement …

When they get in this sort of mood, the reptiles go barking mad and howl at the moon in a relentless way that suggests monomaniacal delusion …

Usually the pond would suggest a couple of alternative photos to the one that the reptiles keep peddling of the hapless Schmidt …

 

But your fancy toff dress and your fancy awards count for naught against crusading reptiles, so since the subject for the moment seems to be 'freedom', the pond thought instead it might mention the fun of seeing Jacqui Lambie take down the smarmy, dissembling, pathetic Julia Overington …

The pond usually doesn't catch The Drum, but it stayed long enough to see the smack down celebrated on Twitter here …

Oh there was all sorts of fun to be found in the comments section, which naturally the pond only observed for sociological reasons …

At this point, the pond feels compelled to ignore the quisling, lickspittle, forelock-tugging, supine reptiles with their can't talk of 'freedom' to link to the Graudian, and ABC ban: News Corp rejects media boycott of Nauru forum …

What makes the story funny is the way that the pond favourite, the cawing Crowe, who fled the joys of daily slurps of the News Corp kool-aid for refuge at Fairfax is the current president of the press gallery …

There was much talk of 'freedom', but not from the fellow-travelling reptiles ...

When the ABC was banned, the gallery decided to fall in behind the public broadcaster because it believed the prohibition set a dangerous precedent. “What other Australian media might be banned from a similar group by another government in future?” said Crowe, who is the chief political correspondent for the Age and the Sydney Morning Herald. “We stand for a free press not a banned one.” The executive editor of the Age and the Sydney Morning Herald, James Chessell, said: “The Age and Herald support the decision made by the parliamentary press gallery. Any attempt to restrict press freedom is an affront to all newsrooms.”

Indeed, indeed, and the sooner China gets around to banning News Corp from a gig, the sweeter the cries of poetic justice will be ...

Overington tried to have it both ways, pretending the ban was deplorable, while at the same time explaining how the reptiles saw no problem going along with the deplorable … in much the same way as that spineless jellyback, old Malware, danced to his fiefdom's tune, again reported in The Graudian, under Malcolm Turnbull says Nauru's ban on ABC journalists 'regrettable' …

Up Tamworth way, the no neck thugby leaguers would have used simpler terms to evoke Malware, "gutless wonder" probably being nearer the top of the pack …

The ABC ban has been condemned by the Federal Parliamentary Press Gallery committee as an “outrageous restriction on press freedom”, while the Vanuatu Daily Post said it would no longer cover the event. “We were offered a spot. We will not be accepting,” its media director, Dan McGarry, tweeted. “All of us or none of us.”

All of us or none of us, allowing of course for gutless wonders and lickspittle sycophants blathering on in their crusades about 'freedom' not being one of us …

One final link, to explain just why the gutless wonders and the lickspittles are so supine, and that's to Tony Walker in The Conversation here…

Yes, that's how pathetic it is, how sordid and wretched, and yet the mealy-mouthed reptiles keep banging on like loose dunny doors flapping in a Tamworth breeze about 'freedom'…

Well with the mood now right, it's time to revert back to that urbane dunny door, the crusading Urban, and yes, oh delicious irony of ironies, she's banging on about 'freedom' …

Is that the best the reptiles have got?

Blathering about the question of commitment to academic freedom and autonomy, when they themselves fall at the first 'freedom' hurdle?

As for the stupidity of the answer to that quiz, the legality of the possibility of a treaty is simply not a question, and it is entirely specious of the reptiles to suggest it is widely contested.

The Treaty of Waitangi (Māori: Te Tiriti o Waitangi) - Greg Hunters here - is not widely contested, and   there are seats reserved for Māori in parliament. The pond isn't endorsing it or proposing it as a solution, it's simply noting that there are entirely solid precedents.

Of course the United States indulged in all kinds and manners of treaties with its indigenous populations, and generally ignored, subverted, tore up or overturned most of the promises made therein …

And what truly terrifies the reptiles and politicians is not the legality, but the potential consequences, as noted in The Conversation here …

….reflecting indigenous groups in a constitution in anything other than a shallow, formulaic way is to recognise their social and cultural traditions. This carries political and potentially redistributive consequences. In Canada, the recognition of aboriginal rights was the constitutional foundation for the eventual creation of a separate Nunavut province with extensive self-government in 1999. Opponents of symbolic recognition in constitutions – whether in Australia or elsewhere – hence sometimes see it as the thin edge of the wedge. One argument is that the Australian Constitution has worked so well precisely because its basic function is procedural, rather than “national” or identity-based. Yet this argument provokes the rejoinder: the constitution has worked well for whom? Equality before the law in itself is often of little benefit to groups seeking to rectify decades of active marginalisation in all other areas of cultural, economic and political life. This is because they lack the economic and political resources to translate legal equality into socioeconomic equality. Constitutional recognition is certainly the thin edge of a wedge, but it is not one Australians should be afraid of. Rather, it should form the basis for a renewed conversation about how Australia can – to paraphrase the Expert Panel – recognise, respect and secure the advancement of Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders.

And that's the rub, 'freedom' as opposed to paternalistic indulgence from bureaucrats and politicians in Canberra …

Well there's a survey at the aph here, which notes in passing plenty of legal precedents …

...In Australia, as in Sweden, indigenous people do not enjoy any constitutional or treaty recognition, unlike in New Zealand, Canada and the United States where treaties have been signed, or in Norway where an outline of the state's responsibilities with respect to the Sami has recently been inserted into the constitution. Australia also has a poor history of indigenous representation in Federal Parliament, unlike New Zealand where seats are reserved for indigenous people, or Canada where the geography has been used (as it could in Australia) to create some low population electorates which virtually guarantee the election of an indigenous representative. Australia, like Sweden and Norway, has however, put in place mechanisms for electing representatives to a national indigenous body. The Australian body, in addition to the political role played by its counterparts in Scandinavia, also performs the administrative functions of a department. This model can be contrasted with the Canadian model of highly influential informal bodies and increasingly decentralised administration.

The pond urges the urbane Urban to sit the test again, and perhaps then not scribble so blithely about "widely contested" ...

But where did the crusading reptiles, with too much free time on hand for their crusading, pick up the
'widely contested' idea?

Why the IPA of course, which is all for 'freedom', except when it comes to discovering the people and institutions that kick money into its coffers, as the tobacco industry did for so many years, to ensure that its customers might have the 'freedom' to die from excruciating tobacco-related and caused illnesses ...

Fair dinkum, the crusading reptiles are great at their monomaniacal campaigns, but the pond must fault the urbane Urban on this story … at no point did she manage to drag in climate science denialism, or the 'freedom' to love dinkum clean Oz coal, oi, oi, oi … and yet she had her chance …

Might the pond humbly suggest ...

Mr Howard and Mr Abbott have both expressed opposition to a treaty, which in many ways is very similar to the climate science tokenism that has seen decent clean Australian coal ignored and electricity prices rise … and whoever signed Australia up to the Paris agreement should be shot on sight.

And now as the onion muncher has been mentioned yet again, why not end with a Rowe cartoon featuring the bold, brave, fearless freedom fighter, wrecker, underminer and sniper, with more Rowe here, and thank the long absent lord he's returned from the wilderness to do his thing …no, not the onion muncher, Rowe making the onion muncher look silly again ...

And if you head off to Rowe, you'll find a link to a Rob Rogers cartoon, here, which is well worth the look …