As the reptiles carry on about the voice and super, the pond turns to the bog dotherer, and the Bjorn-again one with a resigned shrug ...

 

Super and the voice. That's all the reptiles have got, and the pond is so very tired of it, and that's part of the reptile strategy - bore the readership and the pond into insensibility, and forward to victory.

They had a chance to vary it, with the mutton Dutton pleading for attention, but he was tucked away, though the reptiles will probably drag him out later in the day ...

Would the pond rather be reading a cartoon, perhaps one by the immortal Rowe?

Of course it would. A day late on the anniversary, but still the right sentiment, and so much shorter and to the point than the mutton Dutton.

When wanting a distraction, all that's left for the pond is to note certain reptile quirks, as in this outing late yesterday ...

The long absent lord knows how that dash crept into that word salad, but by the next day the reptiles had fixed it ...

And there you go - the readership so enfeebled, Paige was left to do a summary of the thinking of Pearson and Morris, and alongside that effort came "Ned" nattering about super... and despite the return of the lizard Oz graphics department, the pond decided to defer the horror of a super "Ned" until Sunday's sleep-in.

The commentary section was just as problematic ...

There was the original Pearson """ Morris epic, so kindly summarised by Paige, and across the way, an outburst by Gemma, who seems to think that bureaucratic indifference to the old is a Labor invention. So little does she know that the pond couldn't spare any time for her outburst, driven by personal grief. 

Meanwhile, the reptiles placed veteran black basher Gazza Johns alongside the Pearson """" Morris outing, just to make sure that any attempt to placate Noel was immediately displaced by an assault on the voice, and down below, there came Frank offering a word salad on the voice.

Ostensibly on the right side, only a Jesuit priest could scribble with a straight face about completing the Constitution, not changing it, and then propose a change to the constitution. 

The pond couldn't stand a full sermon, so cut to the chase...

A new section 127 of the Constitution could provide: “There shall be an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice with such structure and functions as the parliament deems necessary to facilitate consultation prior to the making of special laws with respect to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, and with such other functions as the parliament determines.”
This would be a way of completing the Constitution, not changing it, and would also be consistent with the Uluru Statement from the Heart. The voice could be given additional functions by legislation. Those additional functions could include representations to parliament on laws other than special laws with respect to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, as well as representations to government on laws and policies impacting on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. But these would not be constitutional functions of the voice. The voice’s structure and additional functions would be determined by legislation and could be varied from time to time by parliament.

Not helping Frank. A new section of the constitution, whatever it provides, is a way of changing it. 

It might also complete it, but truth to tell, you have a book to flog, don't you?

This is an edited extract from Frank Brennan’s An Indigenous Voice to Parliament: Considering a Constitutional Bridge, Garratt Publishing, published this week.

But what else could the pond have expected from the credentials outlined at the ACU?  Frank Brennan is a Jesuit priest and Rector of Newman College at the University of Melbourne.

The pond is reminded of something it learned long ago ... never argue with a Jesuit, because the resulting word salad will never produce light, though it might result in some heat ...

Meanwhile, speaking of a word salad in action ...

Thoroughly grumpy by now, the pond moved on to the usual weekend outburst by the dog botherer (though the pond could get used to calling him the bog ditherer)...

The strategic and survival instincts of mayflies? As the man hired by Malware,  and the man who helpfully helped produced Utegate, the dog botherer at least is living proof of what he scribbles.

Please allow a detour because the pond needs a little comedy just to keep going ... and an ancient Charlie Lewis is certain to provide a laugh about the beefy boofhead afraid of windmills, Malware and the bog dotherer, all in one go ...

Yes, that's better and frabjus joy, the beefy boofhead still continues apace ... as does the dog botherer.

Now back to the last DB Ginsbergian howl of pain, almost as long as the poem ...

Speaking of Petey boy. as the pond rarely does, the pond was on the way to a medical appointment near Parramatta road, and saw a forlorn book flapping in the breeze. 

The pond often goes out of its way to rescue a book, as book burnings, book bans and book re-writes send the pond into a frenzy, but unfortunately this was the tome ...

Ten bucks, and with gift wrapping? Tell 'em they're dreaming. 

Sadly Petey boy's effort, with a hack to help in the scribbling, had lost its dust jacket, and the pond decided to leave the tome flapping in the breeze, a marker showing its last reader had managed to only get to the half way mark before giving up and tossing it aside. 

There it sat, and there the pond left it, and it rained a little while later, and the pond realised that not all books could or should be saved, and death by drowning was probably as kind a way as any to put the book down ... not nearly as ugly or as unhappy as the way that kittens were consigned to chaff bags and tossed into the Peel ...

Sorry, sorry, wasn't the dog botherer rabbiting on about climate science or something, still doing his denialist thing?

Would the pond rather be reading a cartoon?

Of course the pond would, but best get on with it, before the DB's scribbling turns into the ancient must of a Petey boy outing ...

Be fair. The pond did promise a Ginsbergian howl, and the dog botherer has delivered, and the major problem is that he's still delivering ...

Would the pond rather be reading a cartoon?

Of course it would, but as usual the pond is stuck with the dog botherer on a Saturday ...

Here's the thing. You can bet a dollar to a dog botherer pound that the dog botherer has set himself up nicely, thanks to years of sucking on chairman Rupert's teat, which is why his blather about a black Swan event strikes the pond as so much self-serving horseshit ...

And there we go, back to the future, because if anyone knows how to burn political capital, it's the dog botherer ...

And with that done and dusted, the pond turned to the Bjorn-again one, still omnipresent at the lizard Oz ...

What might they engage in? A broader range of productive activities? You mean, productively scribbling bullshit in the Bjorn-again manner? 

Well he's got that right, there's productivity in all its knockdown glory, and as a result, likely the planet is doomed ...

Would the pond rather be reading a cartoon?

Well yes, but it's the pond's duty to watch the antics and the cavortings of the reptiles, and pretend they're amusing, and some days it's not an easy task ...

It's a cunning ply by the Bjorn-again one. Climate science is dismissed from class by the simple ploy of proposing that we can't do everything, and his previous blather about the need to fix climate science by spending oodles on research is now swept away by the need to spend oodles on research on just about everything except climate science.

It's a master class in obfuscation, reeling, writhing and distraction, and the great thing is that there'll be no need to worry about climate change ... there'll be tremendous crops able to grow strongly in the rising seas ...

The pond is sure that long time reptile addicts will love those faux statistics, with astounding social benefits put into $ terms and promises of astonishing benefits from sundry investments, up there with a spruiker for the very best kinds of crypto ...

And there you have it, a splendid demonstration of what happens when an aging con artist and snake oil salesman realises his old pitch has gone stale, and he needs a new hustle of he's going to keep fleecing the sheep at the carnival ...

Meanwhile, the pond will end where it started, with a portrait celebrating that dire anniversary ...