In which the pond must settle for a gung ho bromancer and a dissonant, discordant groaning ...

 

Tuesday is the day that the pond has come to dread, because there'll always be a deep and dire groaning emanating from the reptile well, and yet the Groaner has her enthusiasts and devotees, and a super time is had by all.

The reptiles could rustle up sweet bugger all else as a distraction, and even turning to a recent new favourite for signs of life, Petronella of the UK Terror, offered no relief ...

There was the sight of the bromancer engaging in hand to hand mortal combat with the French clock man, and it had to serve as a make-do, though some might wonder why the pond only paid attention to the bromancer's side of the fence. But that's the way it goes in reptile la la land ...

Hang on, hang on, Chairman Rupert and his minions have made it clear that they accept, ethically. morally and ideologically, the right of big powers to invade smaller neighbours ...

That clip is here, and if the pond might borrow from the accompanying story, only three days old ...

Fox News anchor Tucker Carlson attacked the Joe Biden administration while parroting Russian propaganda on the eve of the one-year anniversary of Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.

Calling the peninsula the “Russian port of Crimea”, the host suggested the US government’s goal has changed to taking the port back from Moscow.

“The world is laughing, the adults are laughing. and in this country it's a measure of our media’s total corruption that no one ever asks anyone in the Biden administration what the United States is hoping to accomplish in Ukraine,” he said.

“Now, the original answer was, well, to push Russia back to where it was a year ago before it invaded Ukraine and that seemed like a reasonable and measurable objective. The public seemed behind that.

“Then, without fanfare or even official notice, the goal changed and became taking the Russian port of Crimea just because it would be nice to have that. Always, wanted it. Why not take it now.”

Carlson, earlier in January, had called suggestions of Ukraine retaking Crimea “truly crazy”, while calling the peninsula “Russian Crimea”.

Moscow illegally annexed the contested land in 2014 and, over the past year amid the war, Kyiv has remained adamant on taking back the peninsula on the northern coast of the Black Sea and said it was crucial for Ukraine’s victory.

The New York Times reported last month that the Joe Biden administration was paying attention to Ukraine’s demands about possibly striking Russian assets in Crimea after it initially refused to provide Kyiv weapons to target the region.

The White House insists Crimea belongs to Ukraine.

“We have said throughout the war that Crimea is Ukraine, and Ukraine has the right to defend themselves and their sovereign territory in their internationally recognized borders,” Adrienne Watson, a spokesperson for the National Security Council, was quoted as saying by The Times.

Meanwhile, Carlson continued to rue that Washington’s goal has shifted to “overthrowing Putin and putting American tanks in Red Square because, sure, we could manage Russia once we overthrow the dictator”.

And so on and so forth, and there's some fun reading to be had in reading Fox News Rejects Ad From Progressive Group Highlighting Stars’ Damning Texts...

You might think that sort of carry on would temper the bromancer's righteous indignation, what with him being kissing cousin to Tuckyo, but never stand in the way of a warrior bromancer intent on a Powerpoint listicle...

It's an awkward situation for the pond, because it has no time for the CCP or Xi in particular, and yet it has no time for the bromancer, who is, it should be noted, working for a foreign corporation and notorious foreign agitator ...

Best perhaps to just plough on, because then it gets really strange, with the bromancer valiantly defending the sort of expensive kit he routinely decried in days of yore ...

But, billy goat bromancer butt, you should register as a foreign agent, because you work for a foreign corporation which peddles all kinds of isolationist deviancy abroad ...

You don't have to look far, you just have to head off to the horse's mouth ...

...Donald Trump understood this very clearly: "Russia will never be our closest ally," he said. "But if Russia ever becomes China’s ally, we’re in deep trouble." The combination of natural resources, military and economic power — and sheer population — would make the Russian-Chinese alliance the most powerful force in the world. The United States would soon be dethroned, we’d be taking orders. As Trump put it, there is no reason to make Russia our enemy and there are many reasons not to.

It was a sound case, but official Washington ignored him. Their response, shouted in unison: "Shut up Putin stooge." And then they set about trying to provoke a war with Russia. Now they have succeeded. 

But the war we are fighting in Ukraine is not against Russia alone, but also against Russia’s newest ally, the People’s Republic of China. What Donald Trump predicted has happened, and in the worst way. If the war in Ukraine continues, we will lose no matter how it ends. The world order is being reshuffled as we watch, and by the time it’s over, the U.S. will no longer be at the top of the deck. That is very obvious to the rest of the world.

But what’s fascinating is how few Americans seem to understand what's happening or its consequences. But how would they know? No one in American politics or media will tell them the truth. Since the first hours after the invasion, Americans have been fed a steady diet of increasingly absurd lies about Ukraine. Google and Facebook have joined with the Biden administration to censor any factual information that contradicts the official storyline. It’s dystopian. 

Please allow the pond to turn the question around. How often has the bromancer criticised Faux News, or his boss Chairman Rupert, or come to think of it, his kissing cousin, Tuckyo Rose?

The pond has read a lot of bromancer in its time - the long absent lord's punishment for atheists perhaps - and can't recollect a single time ...

Never mind, back to the war with the French clock lover, with the bromancer asking all sorts of questions, but with nary a thought for the quislings, appeasers and lickspittle lackeys in the chairman's ranks ...

The mirror? Why not just indulge in a feast of Faux Noise cable viewing?

Alongside the feud came news that subs were no longer the way to go ...

Killer drones! Immediately the bromancer dropped all talk of subs, he was on the case for killer drones ...

It all sounds very intertubes and thingy, though the pond does occasionally wonder why all those Ruski missiles have failed to quell Ukraine, even as they carry on like a bunch of V-2s from WWII days, randomly splattering on civilians yet failing to kill the spirit of plucky Ukrainians, and why the Ukrainians keep asking the west for modern tanks and modern aircraft - FFS, just give them some - but the bromancer is a way better armchair warrior than the pond could ever be, so forget all that talk about killer subs, it's on with killer drones ...

As for the navy? A few missiles should do the trick, say by 2050 or so ...

And now it's time for the pond to move on to the groaning for a super time, though in an idle moment, the pond did dream of James O'Keefe persuading the Groaner to take on Doris Day's role in Calamity Jane, and what a fine pair of musical theatre performers they'd make, and then John Oliver could do a brutal skit featuring the best of O'Keefe and the Groaner ... and at that point, the pond must have woken up a tad early to be greeted by the real horror ...

Here the pond should note that it's completely, utterly and comprehensively bored by the reptiles' and their super obsession, which this day turned to class warfare at the top of the digital and tree killer editions ...

 

Is this the best the reptiles have got? Do they really think that talk of class warfare will hide which side they're on?

You only have to persist with the groaning to get a clue ...

Some might wonder why the pond persists with Dame Groan and her truly bizarre talk of bizarre stuff, but what other choice does the pond have?

Look at the line up this morning as the clock struck the dawn witching hour of six, and whatever reptiles were going to make it on to this day's menu were lining up in the comments section ...

Three lizard Oz editorialists blathering, two bromancers wanking and an ancient Troy standing firm in a pear tree, completely oblivious to the rats in the chairman's ranks ...

If the pond wanted a sense of what was going down in the real world, it'd be better off with a cartoon by the infallible Pope ...

There was of course that other reptile obsession, the voice ...

No veto? There's a disappointment, how are they going to completely ruin the country?

So it was back to the Groaner, groaning away ...

Indeed, indeed, the pond has always thought about setting up a trust, or perhaps do its banking in the Cayman Islands, or perhaps best of all, have faith in the Swiss financial system, as the Swiss bank account man once did ... but it's on with the notion of making the super system voluntary, the thing most yearned for by the murmuration of murmuring reptiles, though casually tossed into the mix by the groaner as an aside in her final groaning sentence...

The best thing to be said for this super fuss is that the immortal Rowe also is having a super time ...

In which the pond has a super time with the Caterist, the Killer and the Major (who didn't walk into a bar together, but shared space in the lizard Oz this day) ...

 

Before beginning the proceedings, the pond would like to pay tribute to a correspondent''s link to Pearls and Irritations, and another correspondent's link to the crisis in Trove funding, also noted in The Conversation.

In another life, far removed from the reptiles, the pond uses Trove on an almost daily basis, and hopes that what's happening is a funding stakes game of bluff poker, because otherwise the pond is going to turn almost reptilian in its attitude to the federal government and the NLA.

And a correspondent contributed a most excellent joke via The Shovel: The Voice is a "vanity project", says MP who added an extra S to her name, to which might be added This wasn't just vanity, but numerology, which makes a lot more sense. 

There was more, as usual from the pond's correspondents, but the pond must move on to the usual Monday reptile business, only to be astonished by this brazen parade in a reptile rotating fickle finger of fame device ...

What reptile thought that was a good idea? And there was the reptile graphics department in top Lego form offering those hideous solar panels and baleful windmills generating nightmares for the beefy boofhead with an office in Goulburn. 

Did some reptile think a bit of window dressing would be a good idea, a way of suggesting the reptiles were hip and down wit it? Would keeping the company of green power players turn the reptiles just a teeny weeny bit greenie?

The pond was vastly relieved to see that the Caterist was also out and about and this time the feeble graphics department got it right, with hideous threatening Satanic windmills as the right way to start off the quarry flood water whisperer's piece ...

Meanwhile, speaking of Bowen, on that other reptile planet ...

The pond would have none of that sort of nonsense. It was time to step and return to listening to the deepest fears of the quarry flood waters whisperer, and his Satanic windmill nightmares ...

Meanwhile on another reptile planet, there was idle blather about a higher purpose ...

Back to the government cash in the paw man for talk about lower purposes ...

Ah, the man from Kirribilli talking of the idle rich on the north shore, but did any of them have a dinkum decent defamation payment to sort out?

The pond couldn't help but notice that the graphics department had resorted to a canary yellow snap with an unflattering look as a way to break up the quarry flood water whisperer's piece, and luckily on another reptile planet, there was help to hand with fashion advice ...

And with all that, there was just one gobbet to go from the professional climate science denialist, living high on the hog with a never-ending supply of federal government grants ...

Ah the reptiles had just the right contribution to add to help the Caterist with that final outburst ...

And so to see what else, or who else, was out and about this day ...

What a huge relief. The reptiles seem to have given up vocalising about the voice for the moment, but that meant that a super time could be had by all, not least simplistic 'here no conflict of interest' Simon ...

Tempting as time with simple Simon saying is, how could the pond resist Killer sorting it all out in a super way?

The one thing that the pond knows from its American friends is that you don't want to be old and poor in the United States, not with the GOP breathing down the neck. 

For a bit of comedy, correspondents might like to duck away from the Killer to read in the New Daily from back in 2020 ... US fund manager wants Australian-style super as solution to America’s widening inequality.

Well they would run that, wouldn't they, confirming Killer's worst fears, and barely leaving time for the pond to recycle a New Yorker joke ...

Back to Killer for another quick problem-solving gobbet ...

Meanwhile on another planet back in that ancient 2020 report in pdf form ... a dire threat of socialism on the prowl...

...If we are to avoid continued political risk and disharmony which create serious risks to the sustainability of the capitalist system, we need to find a way for those left behind to participate to a greater extent in capitalism, broadly defined. This is an important problem that must be addressed, and it is incumbent upon all of us, particularly those of us who are the greatest beneficiaries of the system, to find a potential solution.

Despite its faults, we are strongly of the view that, while far from perfect, capitalism is by far the best system for maximizing the size of the economic pie. One of the principal problems with capitalism, particularly as it has functioned over the last several decades, however, is that wage growth has not kept pace with long-term wealth creation, which has disproportionately favored the wealthy and the upper middle class. This likely can be attributed to the higher after-tax returns generated by investment assets compared with wage growth over the same period. Without funds to invest for retirement – particularly after the housing crash destroyed many Americans’ only other source of long-term wealth creation – one has almost no hope to build wealth for retirement, or to give the next generation a head’s start. In sum, the American Dream has become a disappointment or worse for too many.

If capitalism continues to leave behind most Americans as the growth in wages has not come close to the more tax-efficient compound growth that has been achieved by investing in the stock market, more and more Americans will seek changes, potentially radical ones, to the current system, or seek an alternative system. Like those who rent rather than own their homes and thereby have no love lost for their landlords, Americans that have no ownership in the success of capitalism, and who are suffering economically, are more motivated to turn toward Socialism or other alternatives.

One potential solution to the wealth inequality problem is to create a way for those with no investment assets to participate in the success of capitalism. We need a program that makes every American an owner of the compounding growth in value of corporate America. Compounded returns over time are indeed one of the great wonders of the world, and every day we wait to address this issue, the problem looms larger.

There are a number of potential solutions to this problem. Among them, the government could establish and fund investment accounts for every child born in America. The funds could be invested in zero-cost equity index funds, be prohibited from withdrawal until retirement, and could compound tax free for 65 years. At historical rates of equity returns of 8% per annum, a $6,750 at birth retirement account - which would cost $26 billion annually based on the average number of children born in the U.S. each year - would provide retirement assets of more than $1 million at age 65.

Dream on bigly.

The pond offers it only as an alternative to the spectacle of Killer kitted out in rose-coloured spectacles ...

Once again the pond is no match for the splendid visual offerings of the lizard Oz's graphics department, with that wonderful snap of an aged Australian indulging in a green slushy ... though it did remind the pond to ask whatever happened to that serve of Oreo on a Monday?

Okay, it's no match for the lizard Oz graphics department, and anyway Killer is now winding down ...

That parallel, powerful unelected government of Australia sadly doesn't include Chairman Rupert and his reptile flock, though how they yearn to run the show ...

And so to the Major, also having a super time. This offering is a tad excessive, an indulgence a bit like someone with 401(k) in hand not having to fret about the stockmarket or other distractions intended only for the idle rich, but how could the pond ignore the Major?

Ah, the inimitable Major, always in the third person, "this newspaper was told", and even more bizarrely quoting that bloody socialist in the SMH ...

Clearly the Major was on a roll ...

The Major quoting the Killer, who perhaps would love to quote the Major, and yet there in the tree killer edition came the alarming news that a small change to only 36,000 people would produce an economic catastrophe that would make armageddon seem like a tea party ...

We'll all be rooned, or at least overcooked, like a lobster in the pot ...

The pond had to bypass the sight of the reptiles pumping up the Dominator's chances, and get on with the Major, alert to those bloody industry super funds ...

And that's why the pond stays with the Major. Who else could advise the pond that compound interest is into swinging? Now stay tuned for Bernie telling "this masthead" ...

The pond has had a super time with the Major, but now there's just time for a last short withdrawal ...

The pond will leave others to feast on the Major's thinking, and will turn to super cartoon from the immortal Rowe for a closer ... though perhaps he should have substituted contented reptiles for fat cats doing a Lidia ...

In which, confronted by prattling Polonius and nattering "Ned" on a meditative Sunday, the pond once again opted for a cartoon-led recovery ...

 

The pond makes no apology for holding over this infallible Pope and starting the day with a super cartoon, because it's eventually going to turn into a super day with super "Ned", and there needed to be a super start to the proceedings ...

The pond is doing its best to ignore the reptiles on the matter of super and the voice, but frankly the tremendous work by prattling Polonius can only go so far ...

There will at some point come a bleat about not a single conservative voice being present, and the pond will realise that once again some wretch has refused to invite Polonius to the feast as chief conservative voice of a generation ... will they never learn? Will the ABC never do the right thing and give him his own show? Will literary festivals always forsake the chance to advertise a gig featuring "prattling Polonius in full prattle, and some others" ...?

Will they never understand that Polonius is the only real contestant in any real contests of real ideas, albeit in an alternative reality?

More than a decade? Such modestly. The pond seems to recall Polonius blathering on for what feels like at least a half century about the ABC and there not being one conservative on the list ...

What a gigantic pedantic bore he was and still is, and always will be, and even his corrections have the nitpicking tone of a bore incapable of admitting an error ...

The pond has been running this for years, and yet as an evocation of the Polonial modus operandi, it never gets old ...

So here's how the tiresome pedant deals with the problem of not having spotted Mandy in the line-up ...

As Polonius now gets his information from the full to overflowing intertubes, and as he invited the pond and others to do a web search, the pond did one, and came across this, relating to another event ...

The war of words began a few days before the Georgetown event, when Jonathan Greenblatt, the liberal head of the ADL, shared a dossier accusing El-Kurd of antisemitism based on a selection of his tweets and past writing. Most of the accusations were based on social media posts from El-Kurd loudly chastising Israel and Zionism.

One item from the ADL dossier, however, has become the centerpiece of the campaign against the writer: a line from a poem he wrote that is now being alleged to echo a medieval antisemitic trope known as the “blood libel,” an accusation originated in medieval Europe that Jews consumed the blood of non-Jews for ritual purposes.

The passage in question came from El-Kurd’s book of poetry published last year, “Rifqa.” In one of the poems, El-Kurd, who denies the charges of antisemitism, wrote, “They harvest organs of the martyred, feed their warriors our own.”

The line includes one of the few footnotes in the volume of poetry, directing the reader to a decade-old news story in which the Israeli government admitted to harvesting organs from bodies of Palestinians, as well as some Israelis, without their families’ consent in the 1990s.

El-Kurd denied that the line from the poem had anything to do with the “blood libel” trope, saying in an interview that until very recently he had not been familiar with it. “When I wrote this poem, I was like 14 or 15 years old,” El-Kurd said. “I literally only understood what blood libel was like two months ago. I’d never in my life even heard of this concept.”

The allegation of antisemitism against El-Kurd based on the poem is the only one that has gained traction. That his accusers are relying on a relatively obscure accusation — a distant echo of an antisemitic trope from the European Middle Ages — as the main ammunition against El-Kurd is raising questions among advocates for Palestinian rights about the responsibilities of Israel’s critics to have an almost-scholarly grasp of antisemitism and its history.

“I’m far more familiar with the history of antisemitism and the history of prejudice against Jewish people than I am about the history of prejudices against many, many other peoples because that is what is necessary to engage on this subject in the United States,” said Yousef Munayyer, a nonresident senior fellow at the Arab Center Washington. “At the same time, people who make arguments in favor of Israeli policies never seem to be subjected to the same minefield related to sensitivities over Palestinian history and suffering. That clear double standard is one the ADL seems dedicated to reinforcing.”

Uh huh, perhaps the pond should stick to cooking, or perhaps Polonius should, because this is how it came out courtesy of his intertubes research ...

There is one delusion at work... that any festival stacked with types approved by Polonius would produce genuine insight or genuine debate, as opposed to the standard DLP clusterfuck that has been going down for well over half a century ...

Speaking of gigantic bores, the pond must now turn to nattering "Ned", and in this case, it's not a matter of a pleasure delayed, as tedium that can no longer be avoided, but on the bright side, it's Sunday, and the bed and a sleep-in remain a viable alternative ... and there's that cartoon-led recovery to offer as many distractions as the pond can muster ...

The pond only decided to go with "Ned's" natter because of that rare sign of life in the reptile graphics department, though the egg joke looked a little cracked up against the infallible Pope's chooks.

The pond could just as easily have led with simplistic "no conflict of interest here" Simon turning to the man who lost his seat as well as government as a way of celebrating the reptile war on super moves ...

Yeah nah ... and the pond has already had its fill of simpleton Sharri, thanks to the venerable Meade's News Corp rolls out the Sharri publicity caravan, which was way more than the pond needed to know. Nausea and upchuck is never far away as a dangerous side effect for intrepid reptile readers.

Never mind, with "Ned" doing his own super moves, what an excuse for a cartoon-led recovery.

No need to pay attention to "Ned's" fear mongering about super, just as the pond did its best to ignore his fear mongering about the voice.

Sure it's going to mean time with "Ned" is going to stretch, but then time with "Ned" has always been a stretch, with the pond's favourite metaphor of climbing Everest much used and abused, as was the image of Sisyphus pushing "Ned's" never ending shit up a never ending hill ...

At least the pond will have better illustrations, because Jimbo's the feature in the next gobbet ...

It goes without saying that it isn't the Liberals that have laid down the foundations for their retaliation. That's the job of the reptiles, which is why they've been blathering on endlessly about the endless suffering of the rich ...

Is it because they've become exhausted mining the notion of the "woke"?

Okay, okay, the pond will have to take this slowly. 

There are only so many cartoons to hand, and jokes about the NY Times as the mainstream muddler might get in the way of the joke known as muddler "Ned" ...

Meanwhile, on another planet ...

Oh heck, the pond still has some left-over woke cartoons. Perhaps just a short burst of "Ned" as an interstitial?

Yes, save your super so you can spend it now, and then when the spending is done, you can always go on to the pension, and that'll fix everything ...

Hang on, hang on, the pond was going to ignore "Ned's" super advice, and carry on about being fully woke ...

Well they're better than the reptile illustrations.

The one of the mutton Dutton that follows reminds the pond that in every snap he looks like he's just swallowed a blow fly and is doing his best to pretend it never happened ...

Sorry, sorry, what "Ned" meant to type was "the lizard Oz and all loyal reptiles will build a political campaign",  but there are more woke jokes to go ...

That one reminded the pond of another joke doing the rounds ...

A quick tech joke ...

And then it's back to a penultimate serve of "Ned" ...

What a bore he is, with his sharp twists and his warnings about the need to be careful. 

The portentous, pompous old windbag these days doesn't even bother to hide the way he's now in full campaign mode.

As for the threats dressed as insights? Just more idle windbaggery and humbug...

The reptiles have already labeled Albo as the PM of broken promises ... that was his destiny the day he took office ... and that's the way it is this weekend, and every weekend to follow in the lizard Oz ...

Meanwhile, on another planet ...

Are cartoons about a war criminal better than reading "Ned"? 

Well they all fit into the bigger picture, what with "Ned" being kissing cousin to Faux Noise, and all the lies they tell ... such that even a few rabid ratbags have had enough ...

Lick spittle, treasonous, supine lackeys fellow travelling with Super villains, or villains being villain-ish about super, it's all much of a muchness, and so to the final gobbet of "Ned", doing what a "Ned" must do, while the pond did what it had to do just to get through the portentous, pompous serve of verbal sludge ...

And so to a final flurry of cartoons, and lo, Marge has become a genre unto herself ... the salvation of cartoonists throughout the United States, and a fitting note on which to end this Sunday meditation ...