In which the pond enters the age of lead with the Bro, the Killer and "Ned", who didn't all walk into a pub together ...

 

This is the pond's penultimate post for the year, though rather than thinking of silver, the pond should probably think of an age of lead.

What with the Clarkson carry on and the cat fight between Boebert and MTG, the entertainment component has fallen off a cliff into a pile of excrement.

The pond had done its required reading, but sad to say, the scene at the lizard Oz was dismal, with the reptiles naturally compelled and horrified by the appointment of former chairman Rudd, having thought they'd long ago got rid of the pesky varmint ... and yet there he was shaking hands with a Bush at the top of the digital page ...

The pond did an inward groan, not at the ruddy pun,  nor even the 'secret sweetheart deal',  what with the Dominator and Albo being such sweethearts, but at the sight of "Ned". 

Not a natter to ruin the penultimate post, but when the pond looked down below the fold at the comments section, things got even worse ...

Dame Slap still blathering about the Voice? Again? Yes, yet again! So much anal retentive, obsessive compulsive behaviour ...

That earned Slap a red card yet again, and for the rest, there was yet more Kev, with the minor Milner staying loyal, as toads are wont to do, brother Stewie offering a gamble for the ages, and the Killer hedging his bets ...

The pond looked a little further and found a recycled bit of Gerard Baker which hadn't aged well ...

Maoists? Jack Dorsey is a Maoist? Parag Agrawal a Maoist?

It's reassuring to be reminded that enormous stupidity and idle abuse remains the reptile go to mode ...

As for the culture wars, they seem to have come at a cost, which Baker was probably happy about because it was nothing to do with him, though at one time the pond could remember when the reptiles most cared about profits. 

Not so, it seems, these days ... per Fortune ... per Yahoo ...

‘Time to end this nightmare’: Analyst Dan Ives says Elon Musk will likely step down from Twitter as company is on track to lose roughly $4 billion.

A broad bear market has taken the S&P 500 down over 20% this year, with high-growth tech stocks faring the worst as central banks worldwide raise interest rates to fight inflation.
Elon Musk’s Tesla is the perfect example. The EV giant’s shares have dropped more than 62% in 2022 amid fears that demand for vehicles may wane as rising interest rates dampen global economic growth.And Tesla has been dealing with another “overhang” over the past year as well—Musk’s decision to buy Twitter for $44 billion and sell roughly $40 billion of Tesla stock.
Wedbush tech analyst Dan Ives believes the acquisition was the “most overpaid” in the history of the tech space, and he argues Musk is using Tesla to fund what could be $4 billion per year of “red ink” at Twitter.

Showing how to blow a fortune is a contribution to public discourse?

So that's what the reptiles call a bout of festive euphoria and blather about a manger, where Tesla stock owners might well end up ...

And then there was the obligatory Xian Xmas offering, though the war on Xmas this year has been astonishingly feeble.

This time the Xian decided to trade off on the universe, perhaps expecting to find heaven and hell somewhere near Jupiter's moons ...

It was all too tiresome and tedious, and so, jumping to the biblical chase, the pond could only be bothered with a closing gobbet, wherein the canny Xian didn't bother with much of the bible, but led with Tolkien ...

Desperate and truly pathetic stuff ... a universe unimagined at the time the bible was written, and a dose of Gamgee? 

Is that the best the Xians could do, with a bit of the Old Testament - that ancient font of bigotry and darkness - flung in at the very end, after a bit of Peter Jackson?

There was nothing for it but to turn to Killer ...

A correspondent had drawn the pond's attention to a Killer tweet, so the pond had hoped for some fireworks of a Killer kind ...

It was a false twit dawn ...

Why on earth was the Killer being so cautious in the matter of the Ruddster? It's very un-Killer like, and the reptiles seized on the chance to run a click-bait video ...

At least Killer has stayed loyal to the mango Mussolini, and Ron DeSanctimonious, and no doubt will applaud if the GOP manage to hand Vlad the Terrible a victory, as a way of incentivising Xi in relation to Taiwan ...

But still the pond couldn't understand why Killer was being so circumspect. Was there no upside?

Killer had to turn to a ranting Prof to deliver the Ruddster a broadside, all 32 guns blazing way back in 2016? 

Feeble stuff, as feeble as a Xian rabbiting on about Lord of the Rings at Xmas time ... and so the pond turned to the bromancer for a final word on the matter ... only to discover he was just as dismal ...

It was so ambivalent that the reptiles decided to stuff in a couple of click bait videos, as a kind of seafood extender ...

And after that interminable yammering, it was time for a conclusion as tepid as the water into which you might dunk a Tolkien character's elbow ...

Unlikely to be boring? Is that the best the reptiles can do? No wonder the pond turned to the immortal Rowe for a little leavening humour ...

After that, there was nothing for it but a slide into stupefaction, long before the Xmas drinks get passed around ...

Sheesh, not more blather about Gough. Poor old "Ned", trapped in senility and the endless desire to repeat himself, and yet even the pond couldn't help noticing that a year had gone by ...

Dear sweet long absent lord, already swept from the pond's mind, yet still ancient, antique "Ned" is carrying on about the Gough years like some ancient mariner stopping one of three aged readers still in the "Ned" demographic and able to afford the shekels the chairman demands for these trips down memory lane...

Oh the good old days, and the pond does miss them ... the entire SovCit crew ...

Well if "Ned" can blather on about Gough, why can't the pond remember the great days when all was good?

The pond understand's "Ned's" desire to seek refuge in the distant past ... better than looking back just a little bit in time ...

Was that only December 2021? How time flies, and so the pond finally comes to a final "Ned" gobbet ... a Jeremiah preaching bullfrogs and jeremiads and yearning for an apocalypse ...

One thing's certain. If Albanese is prudent, he will ignore the tedious yammerings of a boring old fart, who should long ago have been pensioned off, rather than offering his pompous, portentous musings on aged events ...

The pond would like to have ended with a fresh Pope, but in lieu, this ancient memory of Xmas's past will have to do ...

And here's a Wilcox, about all that needs to be said on the matter that still obsesses Dame Slap ...