In which Polonius's obsession with the ABC leads the pond to do an obsessive cut and paste by way of balance ...

 

It's grim times for old favourites at the lizard Oz. The last the pond heard from the bromancer was his report on his gassing, Lloydie seems to have taken a month off to save the Amazon, and this weekend there was no sign of nattering "Ned", though some might see that as a vast relief rather than a cause for concern.

Sure, as an alternative, there's Marina Hyde, but this week she's sounding grim - a rotten building housing a rotten culture while the country rots - and Jonathan Freedland couldn't see the black humour in Nige pronouncing Brexit a failure, bleakly scribbling about new toxins. Couldn't he at least have found a place to say he was making plans for Nigel in British steel?

One reptile who can be relied on to keep endlessly chattering away is prattling Polonius, and here the pond must confess to being suckered into a read of the report wherein Polonius likes dress up as a dog, as rich a furry fantasy life as the pond has found. Not that there's anything wrong with furries, it's more that Polonius doesn't seem to realise he's a furry and possibly hasn't even arranged for a water bowl and a litter tray at the Sydney Institute.

Never mind, it was this that caught the pond's eye, and it was astonishing because it suggested Polonius might briefly have forgotten to rage at the ABC, with the red bandana man taking over piñata duties ...

It seemed unlikely angle, and it turned out that Polonius's obsessive hatred for the red bandana man led him to jump to conclusions ... because this was his sole evidence ...

Reading the holy text was vague, and much like the bible, open to sundry interpretations. 

At no point did the bandana man mention Lucas Heights, but reading the text, you might just as easily determine that he was aware of Lucas Heights being right next to his backyard, and was one of those wretched Nimby types who would be reluctant to welcome an SMR in his neighbourhood.

Yet from this tenuous bundle of straw, Polonius wove a story of the bandana man's ignorance. The pond refused to bare it ...

It shows how obsessive compulsives tend to leap to conclusions, and that trait was on display again today, but with Polonius returning to his reliable bête noire, the cardigan wearers at the ABC ...

There was clear evidence of Russian interference in the 2016 election, if only by the presence of Paul Manafort on the mango Mussolini's campaign ...

As for the Durham report, everybody the pond has consulted, including Steve Bannon, has deemed it a dud of the first water.

There was also David Frum in The Atlantic, possible paywall, with A Sinister Flop Special Counsel John Durham served up not an investigation, but an excuse for future partisan abuses.

The pond felt an irrepressible urge to do a cut and paste of the Burroughs kind, while being careful not to shoot at apple on head ...

Then there was Charlie Savage in the NY Times ... After Years of Political Hype, the Durham Inquiry Failed to Deliver, A dysfunctional investigation led by a Trump-era special counsel illustrates a dilemma about prosecutorial independence and accountability in politically sensitive matters. (likely paywall)

Put it in a more succinct way ...

So why did Polonius hare off down this barren path?

The answer as always is his fear and loathing, and his obsessive compulsive fascination with the ABC ...

precisely the same sort of weird jumping to conclusions as he did with the bandana man, with blind rage and bullishly red eyes fogging his glasses ...

The trouble with turning to the Durham report to give the ABC a sound thrashing and a stern beating is that it was a wet lettuce.

Per Frum ...

Well yes, per Charlie Savage, another gobbet ...

Put it another, more succinct, way ...

At this point the reptiles decided that Polonius needed a little visual aid and a distraction, so they inserted a huuuge snap of a demonic ABC figure intended to arouse fear and loathing in the aging lizard Oz demographic, so naturally the pond cut it down to size ...

With the space saved, the pond could include another Frum gobbet ...

And another gobbet from Charlie Savage ...

Put it in a more succinct way ...

Then the reptiles doubled down with a huuuge snap of James Clapper ... back to back with that aforementioned satanic ABC figure ... (apparently Satan favours cardigans) ...

The pond didn't mind cutting it down to size. It created more space for gobbets from Frum ...

... and from Charlie Savage ...

By this time the pond was really wishing for a succinct summary of the report ...

But was Polonius paying attention? Nope, his weird obsession with the ABC had led him down the garden path ... into the thickets of the far American right ...

By this point, Frum had run out of steam ...

Well yes, and Polonius was rationalising away, while Charlie Savage was still going strong ... by giving the contemptible Barr a kicking ...

By this time, the fire in the Polonial belly had subsided, but he still managed to demand a correction, though on the weight of evidence and on the alternative analysis cut and pasted up against his blather, he should have been the one apologising and correcting...

Uh huh, but how is it that cartoonists can ask more penetrating questions than a furry looking for his litter tray at the Sydney Institute? Or perhaps a cow anxious to drop a cow pat ...

Well in good faith the pond should finish the NY Times savaging, with this the penultimate gobbet ...

Then there was a final savaging, and a final irony ...

As Mr. Horowitz uncovered and criticized, the F.B.I. later cited the Steele dossier in wiretap applications, despite learning a reason to doubt its credibility. But Trump supporters often go further, falsely claiming that the F.B.I. opened the entire Russia investigation based on the dossier.

Mr. Durham’s report appeared to nod to that false claim, saying that “information received from politically affiliated persons and entities” in part had “triggered” the inquiry. Yet elsewhere, his report acknowledged that the officials who opened the investigation in July 2016 had not yet seen the dossier, and it was prompted by the Australian diplomat’s tip. He also conceded that there was “no question the F.B.I. had an affirmative obligation to closely examine” that lead.

Tom Fitton, a Trump ally and the leader of the conservative group Judicial Watch, expressed disappointment in the Durham investigation in a statement this week, while insisting that there had been a “conspiracy by Obama, Biden, Clinton and their Deep State allies.”

“Durham let down the American people with few and failed prosecutions,” Mr. Fitton declared. “Never in American history has so much government corruption faced so little accountability.”

But Aitan Goelman, a lawyer for Mr. Strzok, said that while the special counsel accused the F.B.I. of “confirmation bias,” it was Mr. Durham who spent four years trying to find support for a preformed belief about the Russia investigation.

“In fact, it is Mr. Durham’s investigation that was politically motivated, a direct consequence of former President Trump’s weaponization of the Department of Justice, an effort that unanimous juries in each of Mr. Durham’s trials soundly rejected,” he said.

Adam Goldman contributed reporting.

In all Polonius's huffing and puffing, not a mention that it was Alexander Downer wot done it? Was this conclusive evidence that cross-dressing had ruined the country?

Not that the pond has trouble with men wearing high heels with florid leopard patterns, though it might be wise to avoid Taliban territory in the US deep south ...

And so to the pond's one regret ...

No, the pond doesn't regret not covering the Angelic one. True to form, she dismissed the refusal of Catholic medical services to deal with abortion, and so this was about as much as the pond could bear to quote, featuring as it did a man in a frock ... which apparently in Florida is a capital offence ... while at the pond the offence is not to celebrate frock lovers everywhere ...

Well she would say all that, and ritually raise the spectre of comrade Dan as a bonus, as reptiles are wont to do ...

No, the pond's regret was that Polonius's relentless obsession with the ABC meant there was little space to deal with some other classic moments going down at the moment in the United States ... and so a few cartoons had to suffice ...