In which all the reptiles offer are Saturday space fillers emanating from "Ned" and the bro ...

 

The pond went to sleep last night knowing that religious leaders were revolting, courtesy of a story in the far right perch in the lizard Oz by the bouffant one,  the lesser member of the Kelly gang, and Natasha, possibly not the one who gave Rocky and Bullwinkle a hard time...oh yes and renewables...

Even worse, the venerable Meade had warned the pond that apparently the thoughts of bubble headed boobies, aka stars of soaps, were the new game in town ...

The rightwing media has found a new local hero in the form of former Neighbours soapie star and pop singer Holly Valance, who lives in the UK with her billionaire property developer husband, Nick Candy.

Candy, Holly?

Dear sweet candy-filled long absent lord, surely no reptile at the lizard Oz would go there, and take a dive into the soaps, and naturally the pond got it completely wrong, because there in the highly desired perch at the far right of the lizard Oz sat Dame Slap, decking her halls with Holly ...

Dear sweet long absent lord, not just Neighbours but Spice Girls and the woke. 

Still, on the upside the renewables yarn had been bumped down a notch and "Ned" had moved on to burbling about nothing, in the manner of the greatest reptile bloviator of all ...

A look down the fold confirmed the pond was in trouble, what with the Price is wrong coming out in favour of genocide ...

What a dismal line-up, and knowing the pond would need something for its Sunday meditation, it turned back to "Ned" for some space-filling and time-wasting.

The pond notes that correspondents have noted that the reptiles seem determined of late to produce terminal boredom or at at least a state of existential ennui, and "Ned's" effort was a classic example, an interminable fuss about nothing much ...

Of course the venerable Meade had explored the only interesting question about all this in her Friday piece Trump’s ‘nasty’ jibe and Sky’s Paul Whittaker – was it all part of News Corp’s war of revenge on Kevin Rudd?

Sky News Australia launched a torrent of negative headlines this week about Australia’s ambassador to the US, Kevin Rudd, which left some wondering whether it was one of the Murdoch empire’s more blatant attempts to smear an enemy.

The acres of bad press for the former PM came after an interview screened on rightwing UK channel GB News and back home on Sky.

In response to questioning by Brexit cheerleader Nigel Farage, Donald Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, called Rudd “nasty” and claimed he “won’t be there long” as Australian ambassador to the US.

Cue days of negative headlines saying Rudd, who has been critical of Trump in the past, cannot last in the key Washington post.

No matter that it remains unclear Trump even knew who Rudd was.

Farage prefaced his question by disclosing it came from “our good friends at Sky News Australia”.

Hours later 2GB’s Ben Fordham reported that the Rudd question was written by Paul Whittaker, the chief executive of Sky News Australia and chair of the editorial board of The Australian.

Whittaker, according to Fordham, was invited by the GB News boss, Angelos Frangopoulos, Whittaker’s predecessor at Sky, to craft a question.

And why would Whittaker care about Trump’s opinion on an ex-PM?

Fordham revealed his take on the motive behind the question: “[Rudd’s] war on News Corp has come back to bite him on the bum,” he told listeners. “When he was pushing for a royal commission into Rupert Murdoch’s influence it was always going to end badly because when politicians go to war with the media, they look a little bit like footy players whining about the referee.”

A little more than three years ago Rudd’s petition calling for a royal commission into the Murdoch media reached a historic high of almost half a million signatures.

The ex-Labor leader said Murdoch had become “a cancer – an arrogant cancer on our democracy”.

Whittaker has been approached for comment.

No need for a Whittaker comment, and that's why the pond went with "Ned", just so it could promote the venerable Meade. 

It certainly wasn't for the snaps in the lizard Oz ...

The snaps were used to hide the way that the reptiles now offered "Ned" in short bursts, perhaps as a way of attempting to relieve the sense of ennui, and the feeling of a brewing storm in teacup ...

At least the pond now knows that former chairman Rudd was engulfed in the retributive politics of News Corp and that "Ned" is an even bigger fool than he routinely manages in his scribbling...

Apparently when the onion muncher makes his many appearances in the lizard Oz and other News Corp media, it's just business as usual, but when Chairman Rudd gets set up by News Corp, it's something exceptionally alarming, and deserves the "Ned" treatment, with full Neddification ...

It was unsurprising? Yet again, see the venerable Meade above ... and as the firestorm, that actually happened in the Murdochracy ...

The pond has already noted the keen Keane in Crikey, Media pearl-clutching over Trump's Rudd comments shows real historical amnesia (paywall), so it's on to one of his links, James Curran in the AFR, Trump's attack on Rudd a total beat-up, Ambassador Russ is not the first to face the snarl of Trump's contempt, nor will he be the last (possible paywall)...inter alia ...

That sound you hear is the tinkling rattle of disturbed chandeliers in the gilded halls of global diplomacy.

Donald Trump is not even president. But he can sure still traumatise allied temperaments.

As during his presidency, panic buttons are being hit and gloomy prognostications about the future of the US-Australia alliance delivered. Some commentaries breathlessly suggest Canberra’s standing in the US capital is now imperilled.

Ambassador Rudd is not the first to face the snarl of Trump’s contempt, nor will he be the last.

Britain’s top envoy to Washington during Trump’s presidency, Kim Darroch, resigned after a leak from one of his confidential dispatches to London. His crime? He labelled the Trump administration “inept”.

Darroch “was caught in a whirlwind because he did his job,”  said the Lowy Institute’s Daniel Flitton.

Rudd is also not the first to be reminded of comments made about US politics before elevation to positions of diplomatic prominence. Recall the brouhaha when former NSW Labor premier Bob Carr was appointed foreign minister by the Gillard government in 2012. Almost overnight, some of Carr’s blog posts critical of US foreign policy were hastily shuffled off into the ether of cyberspace.

Former Australian ambassador to the US Dennis Richardson offers a counterpunch to the dire assessments resulting from Nigel Farage’s interview with Trump.

“It is very clear that Kevin Rudd is doing an outstanding job in Washington”, he tells this column. “Not only with the Biden administration, but on both sides of the aisle and, more broadly, politically.

“It is equally clear from Trump’s response to Farage that Rudd has not been on his mind at all. Indeed, Trump responded in typical fashion to what could have been a question about anyone who’s ever been critical of him. Further, it is also clear that the question was deliberately designed to elicit a negative response.”

In what remains still a long road to November’s US election, Richardson views Trump’s comments as giving “no cause for concern at this point”.

Should Trump prevail in November, there will be questions asked about what kind of access Rudd will have to the administration. Still, the Albanese government has quickly swung in behind their man in Washington.

But if Biden’s team has needed large doses of reassurance about the Albanese government’s commitment to AUKUS, then Trump, assuming he commits to the project, will likely need more. Especially when he is made aware of its impact on the US’s own submarine battle fleet capacity.

Well yes, of all the things the orange Jesus might produce as a freakout, the fate of Chairman Rudd is in the trivia category, but nobody beats the pompous, portentous, unbearably tedious "Ned" at doing a beat-up ...

"Ned" and News Corp are completely culpable in this storm in a teacup, and the pond's penance is to endure another lengthy "Ned" gobbet, as ponderous and pompous as it is tedious ...

Meanwhile, the onion muncher can roam the world or sit down with Viktor or carry on like a pork chop, Tony Abbott doubles down on praise for Hungary's far-right PM Viktor Orbán or Tony Abbott joins forces with ultra-right Hungarian think tank, and the reptiles wouldn't say boo to that goose ...

On the upside, this is "Ned's" last gobbet ...

It's all just noise, and the confection that started the brew was News Corp, simply so their pundits could have something to scribble about ...

What a relief to turn to a 'toon ...

And so to the bromancer for the bonus, and the pond only does this because the pond always offers up the bromancer, even when it's not the news, and when the pond is not the slightest bit interested in his scribbling.

Here the bromancer offers his take on the tangerine tyrant, which is only interesting because of the amount of pandering offered to the mandarin-coloured moron ... though the pond will concede that the mango Mussolini did build a fabulous wall, and even more remarkable, got Mexico to pay for it, right down to the last dime due on Monday, US time ...

The pond is only in this for the moment when it becomes clear that Xians are revolting, it certainly isn't in it for the lizard Oz snaps ...

The pond used to mock the reptile graphics, but how it years for them to return ...

Speaking of working migrants, the pond is reminded of a few lines in John Crace's extended piece 'Is this how I die?' John Crace on his terrifying heart attack.

Having enjoyed the services of the RPA during a heart attack, the pond knows how Crace felt, and wishes him the very best, but it was this bit that resonated too:

It’s been one hell of a shock. On the day of my heart attack, I wrote in the Saturday diary that I was a lucky man. I feel that even more so now, restored to health by the love of not just family and friends, but strangers, too. How easily the outcome could have been different. The NHS can be frustrating – try getting your shoulder fixed – but when the chips were down, it was there for me.

St George’s is magnificent in its chaos. But it shouldn’t have to be in chaos. There is no point celebrating its successes if we don’t value it enough to give it the resources it needs. And then the staff. Over four days, I must have been in close contact with at least 50 members of staff. All but five or so were black, Asian or from other European countries. The NHS would fall apart without immigration. Something for Rishi Sunak to bear in mind if he ever happens to get chest pains on his Peloton. 

The pond wouldn't call RPA chaotic, but on the pond's next visit, early in April, it knows it will be tended by an Asian expert in feet ... and so it goes ...

Meanwhile, back with the bro ...

Of course the bro is scribbling this to avoid mentioning the great titillation, Trump claims he has $500 million in cash, undercutting lawyers' claims on bond money ...

Amazing what you can find when you dig through the sofa ...

Now back to the pandering bromancer ...

The tactic is a familiar one ...

And so to the section where the pond was reminded yet again that Xians are revolting ...

Awkward. Did the pond hear in the distance a cock crowing thrice? Or perhaps a doubting bro? Some amendment, some caveat, some ferreting through to find a little looseness in the clause.

At the least that pesky bible verbiage will have to produce a gigantic billy goat butt, of the kind managed by those who advocate the death penalty while weeping for frozen embryos ...

"The activist class".

Apparently the bro doesn't count himself or his fellow reptiles as activists, but the good news for the activist bromancer actively promoting the immunity of kings came in that keen Keane piece...

Trump’s vague remarks got local journalists very animated, with The Australian’s unfortunate Adam Creighton declaring it was “a major problem for Australia” and that Anthony Albanese’s choice of Rudd as ambassador was “reckless”. One Nine hack declared Rudd was “[damaging] Australia’s most important security alliance” and that he “will imperil Australia’s standing in Washington and make it harder to convince Trump to hand over America’s precious nuclear-powered submarines”.

Hilariously, that would actually be one of the few positive outcomes from a second Trump term, enabling Australia to free itself from the absurd AUKUS debacle we’ve locked ourselves into, and taking pressure off the US nuclear submarine production process.

Ah, the subs, the subs ... but then the pond is forgetting that under the bro's latest watch, we're now all Houthis ready for his war with China by Xmas using drone power or perhaps panzerfausts ...

And so we leave the bromancer yearning for the man child orange Jesus, the wannabe dictator, or perhaps a completely immune king, and so the pond can end with an immortal Rowe celebrating the way a Xi and Putin lover will stop the boats ... even as they promised a ride so smooth you could hear the clock on the dashboard ticking ...