In which the pond reverts to prattling Polonius for its meditation on bizarre psychological conditions ...

More here, but what else? Well, surely ...

• Compulsive, obsessive reading of the reptiles
• Compulsive, obsessive watching of the ABC.

The pond will admit to the first, but the good thing about OCD is that it's containable and controllable. 

The pond, for example, has largely left the ABC alone for the last few months. It's clearly what they want - their programming indicates that they have no interest in encouraging people to stay indoors and watch television or listen to the radio. They should be outdoors enjoying the summer, or out fighting bush fires and fainting in the heat …

But what of prattling Polonius? Yes, this has been an elaborate way to introduce Polonius and his advanced case of OCD in relation to the ABC, which shows no signs of abating in the first months of 2020 …just check out the reptile splash for him, and his latest two outings ...

What is it like to develop an obsession about an organisation you hate and revile deep in your bones, in your churning bowels, yet such is the depth and extent of your fear and loathing, you must watch it all the time, to make sure that any fault can be detailed at length, and in obsessive detail?

Truly, it's not the pond's area for expertise. It's for people with training in the area to make a professional assessment, and here the pond must rule out Bettina Arndt. 

Lordy, lordy, did she cop a comprehensive smack down from New Matilda here, or what?

EXCLUSIVE: For many years, Bettina Arndt has been passed off by the Australian media as a “psychologist” and “clinical psychologist”. More recently, she’s been credited as “Dr Arndt” – in The Australian newspaper, and in federal parliament. But a long-running New Matilda investigation has discovered that Ms Arndt is not a doctor, has never obtained a PhD and nor, as it turns out, is she a psychologist or clinical psychologist.

Well there's more, much more at the link, and it helps explain why the lizard Oz still sticks with her be-medalled fraudulence, but that sort of epic fraudster certainly isn't going to be able to help the pond tackle Polonius's problem, as he prattles on endlessly about the ABC …

Of course the pond has regularly observed that the Sydney Institute itself lurks at 47 Phillips Street in the heart of the CBD, and Polonius himself has rarely given a sign that he's travelled any further west than Chippendale or Broadway, but I suppose when you spend all your time watching the ABC, you don't have time for much by way of international travel to lands as far west as Blacktown … (but by golly there's a good Afghani restaurant there, and when in Fairfield, please try to the lamb speciality of the house at the Al-Dhiaffah Al-Iraqi restaurant) …

Never mind, we're doing field work for a case study of an obsessive form of mania, so all the pond really needs to do is present the prattler's gobbets ...

Hmm, it hardly seems worth talking to the IPA, a notorious climate denialist coal-loving body, especially when they tout shameless lies, but it's a condition of Polonius's syndrome that he is happy to mock people like himself, and embrace the lies, and of course, he's already to hand with that much loved reptile figure of 1.3%. Sssh, don't mention the coal or gas exports … and the mere mention of it reminds the pond of its own serious need for psychiatric help, since the pond has mentioned all this as many times as Polonius has spent years, eyes glazed, in front of the TV screen, in a tormented, hellish condition…

An artist's impression of Polonius doing his ABC research.

But here's the thing. What would happen if the Polonial dog caught the ABC doing something he approved of? He wouldn't know what to do with it, it might well precipitate a nervous breakdown, so perforce the pond must encourage the ABC to keep on doing the things that keep Polonius fixated, and endlessly irritated … 

You have to ruin the mind to save the mind ...

Uh huh, no doubt reptile devotees will shortly see Polonius out the Al-Dhiaffah Al-Iraqi, mingling with the common folk, and listening to their concerns …

Meanwhile, shouldn't he be happy that the ABC routinely recirculates the reptiles' talking points, thereby giving them some air, a really handy service given the reptiles' pathetic circulation, minuscule in a country of 24.6 million (you have to use 'readership' rather than 'copies sold' to get it above the 300k mark Monday to Friday here).

And so to that other triptych from yesterday, and a little unfinished business by the pond ...

Now the pond has already covered the dog botherer, and refuses to indulge Bjorn, because the pond simply won't cop Bjorn's denialism, but as noted yesterday, the pond was entranced by Peter Jennings' call to arms, and by the headline announcing we're at war with nature, so it only seemed fair dibs to run the whole damn thing ...

A long-term rend for the continent to become hotter and dryer? Why that verges on heresy, but it's clear enough that if nature is going to bung on that sort of do, the only proper response is to take out nature …take Her out hard, like a Terminator sequel set to expire by dint of mindless repetition ...

The pond thought putting the nation on a war footing was a good fit for the Donald, what with his war on everything and everybody, and the proper response in his case, which was to revert to a revered monarchy …

So what we need is federal action on a war footing, perhaps with a federal monarchical system in control ...

Yes, but a few orders from the top should quickly bring people into line, and keep those volunteers volunteering for free …

The Donald has also shown the way with a special command force, and with some pretty nifty badges to back it up ...

Just the sort of thing we need, a SOC so we can sock it to nature …

Surely these are simple questions, involving simple answers …

But back to the war on nature …

And that's why in the end, the pond felt the need to mock Jennings. "… to reduce and mitigate disasters once they hit"?

Yes, but what about attempting to reduce and mitigate disasters before they hit? What about climate science? What about the lizard Oz, riddled with Bjorns and climate science denialists? What about the woods, as well as a military branch and assorted leaves?

It's just more distraction, more befuddlement, the sort of gung ho 'yes sir, no sir, three bags full sir' stuff that once was the bane of the pond's life, with everything treated with military precision, and yet not the first clue who or why we were out in the field, bunging on a do.

A war with nature? Completely clueless, and okay, Jennings might have not put that header on his piece, it might have been a useless sub, but it's a fair summary of where he then promptly headed, off pumping up the military, and with nary a thought about other matters ...

And so we come to the new line … it's a combat mission, we're combatting a threat, it's only going to get more severe, and we should flinch at spending money on what might be causing the threat, and do a bare minimum by way of alternative responses - alternative energy supplies, renewables, cutting back on coal and gas reliance, working with rather than against nature, urging other countries to match our tireless efforts - because fudging the figures, resilience and adaptation is the new normal, and everyone must do their duty …

Meanwhile, as the reptiles blather about China, Canada, New Zealand, India, Europe - anywhere but here - they fawn and pander to the climate denialist in chief … and all the pond can think is how tired it is of watching the same old storyline play out, as bad as the re-runs the ABC foisted on Polonius over the summer holydays …