Bored already with herpetology studies even though it's only just past half way in January?
Once read Ross Douthat, and thought he was a complete dick?
Here, have a treat:
Ross Douthat’s usual contrarian approach, in his recent book Believe, leads to a curiously impotent, watered-down account of religious experience. (*archive link)
Robert P. Baird
When the hard copy dropped in the pond's letterbox a few days ago, the pond was smitten with joy and rushed to have a chortle.
A sample:
Some people, clearly, admire this arch performance. (The New Left Review recently called him “the most consistently original mind writing about American politics in the pages of the New York Times.”) I can’t pretend I’m one of them. Douthat’s punditry has long struck me as glib and sententious, and it particularly rankles when you notice how many of his arguments borrow the look-what-you-made-me-do rhetoric of domestic abusers and playground bullies. Whether his subject is immigration, or abortion, or gay marriage, or trans rights, or free speech, or the broad rollback of civil rights taking place under the cover of the “anti-DEI” backlash, Douthat likes nothing more than telling his liberal readers that conservative extremism is in fact all their fault.
I also loathe his politics, which have to count at this late and dispiriting date as functionally pro-fascist. Though he has dutifully registered objections to Donald Trump’s moral character, and was once a Never Trumper, in more recent years Douthat has regularly used his column to run cover for Trump’s assault on American democracy. (Seventy years ago his mentor William F. Buckley performed a similar two-step in defense of Joe McCarthy.) In 2024, in a rare burst of uncamouflaged awe, Douthat described Trump as “a man of destiny…a figure touched by the gods of fortune in a way that transcends the normal rules of politics.” More typical, however, was a column he wrote in April in which he lamented the depredations of Trump 2.0 not for substantive economic, legal, or ethical reasons but because their “tough-guy excess” threatened the political stability of the MAGA coalition. A few weeks later, in an interview with J.D. Vance, Douthat raised a plausibly Times-coded concern that the administration’s inhumane and illegal deportation policies were “ripe for war-on-terror-style abuses.” Yet as soon as Vance showed the first hint of struggling with the question, Douthat reassured him with a comment that laid bare, however briefly, his deeper motivations. “Let me be perfectly honest,” he told the vice-president. “I’m not interested in having you trapped here.”
Feel this is a tad old?
Well yes, the wretched tome came out long ago and was given a smack down in The Economist:
Ross Douthat believes everyone should believe. Readers may have doubts (*archive link)
But do not worry about them. Because Ross Douthat, a columnist at the New York Times and Catholic convert, has also thought about the problem of evil, and he is not that bothered by it. He thinks it is “ridiculous” to dismiss ancient religions over some “moral intuition” about whether suffering should exist. So that’s fine then. Don’t bother with Augustine. Put away Aquinas. Just read Mr Douthat.
Mr Douthat does not stop there. He tackles other problems that have hitherto been considered thorny and briskly answers them, such as: the question of who made the universe (God, he thinks); who created the laws of physics (God again); and why things behave in a weird way at the quantum level (you’ve guessed it).
And again:
This Christian book often teeters on the unchristian in tone. Mr Douthat refers sardonically to the “brilliant arguments” of atheists; accuses the (meticulously polite) Richard Dawkins of “crow[ing]” and puts ideas with which he disagrees in Slightly Snarky Capitals—so you read about “Official Knowledge” and the kind of “Serious Modern Person Who Doesn’t Believe in Magical Nonsense”. Which may give you a Serious Urge to Throw This Book Across the Room.
The pond isn't sure Mr Dawkins could be called meticulously polite, what with him sometimes being a bully and a browbeater (especially if you happen to be trans).
And the pond will have to wait until some mug throws his Douthat at a street library before tossing it across the room.
But it's pleasant to think about future possibilities.
The point of this Tootle: well, students of reptile ways have to pace themselves.
Sometimes it's good to enjoy the ravaging of a columnist resident at the both siderist, fellow travelling NY Times before putting nose back on grindstone, especially as this day all the pond has to offer is basically a set of intermittent archive links.
Students of the lizard Oz will already know that when it's TGIF, it's also Our Henry day, and the pond wanted to open with something to balance his rant about Islamic fundamentalism.
Yes, the bucket repair man was at it again ...
The mad mullahs prepared to drown Iran in blood
History shows that in Iran, repression has proved recurrent, endurance more so. In that balance lies the irreducible force of Iran’s constitutional tradition.
By Henry Ergas
Picking on the mad Mullahs is easy game, and the pond despatched Our Henry to the intermittent archive, pausing only to note that the pompous pedant was in typical ancient reference form:
The constitutionalists’ victory owed much to contingent factors, both in 1906 itself and in the defeat of a counter-revolution that erupted in 1908. Yet even before that challenge materialised, the constitutional project had encountered a structural constraint. The ulama (the Shia clergy), which had supported the 1906 mobilisation, insisted that legislative authority be limited by conformity with Islamic law.
The compromise adopted in 1907 reflected that insistence. It qualified the constitution’s protection of freedom of expression by excluding allegedly anti-Islamic speech and publications and created a supervisory body of ulama empowered to invalidate statutes deemed religiously impermissible.
Strangely, while Our Henry could go back to 1906, the pompous bigot completely failed to mention the role the CIA played in the country's ill-fated history, nor any of the other wretched foreign interventions - the Poms were particularly good at mucking things up - but that's to be expected from the one eyed hate preaching wonder.
"Nattering" Ned also returned to celebrate the RC, what with it giving the reptiles easy copy for a good year ...
A knockout blow from an Olympian. Pivotal speeches. An unprecedented campaign by grieving families, sport legends, business leaders and ordinary Australians shattered resistance to a royal commission after the Bondi massacre.
By Paul Kelly
Count the pond out "Neddie", because the notion that the reptile jihad was conducted by a dinkum bunch of sweeties is too risible for words.
Besides, "Ned" was out of touch, what with there being a new jihad to hand, celebrated by Sarah and the bouffant one ...
Albanese’s ‘perfect’ storm on hate-speech laws
Anthony Albanese’s hate speech and guns bill in danger as Coalition and Greens say no
Labor’s signature antisemitism legislation faces collapse as the Greens demand sweeping changes and Coalition opposition hardens, leaving Jewish community leaders fearing political failure.
By Sarah Ison
As a result of Anthony Albanese’s political games on his antisemitism bill, Labor faces the possibility of not getting any legislation passed at all or drastically modifying it to get it passed.
By Dennis Shanahan
Killer Creighton of the IPA was on hand to celebrate the new jihad (do keep up "Ned") ...
Labor’s hate speech bill risks criminalising opinion, chilling debate and jailing Australians for imagined offence. Rushed after Bondi, it threatens free association and turns democracy into tyranny
Get 'em coming, get 'em going, it's the reptile way ... and never a word about the unelected tyranny of the lizards of Oz ...
Meanwhile the Writers' Week debacle continued apace, with the reptile devotion to cancel culture staying strong...
Hedders was out and about ...
Free speech does not mean unleashing the vile haters
My encounter with Louise Adler was the moment I knew Adelaide Writers Week was not for me
The boycott of Adelaide Writers Week isn’t a brave stand for free speech. It’s ideological tribalism that excuses antisemitism, mistakes absolutism for courage, and leaves Jewish Australians less safe.
The pond's encounter with Hedders' first words was the moment the pond knew his rant was not for it.
Nor was this rant ...
The 180 writers who stood with Abdel-Fattah should understand Abdel-Fattah is now their figurehead. They march as one.
It was just one way that the reptile hive mind decided to go all in on defending a decidedly stupid Labor state premier determined to remain strong in his stupidity ...
SA Premier Peter Malinauskas would not join the Adelaide Festival’s about-turn on anti-Israel activist Randa
Peter Malinauskas refuses to join the Adelaide Festival in apologising to Randa Abdel-Fattah
Abdel-Fattah, declaring that others could change their position but ‘I certainly don’t need to change mine’.
By Elizabeth Pike and Sarah Ison
Meanwhile, the pond had made the mistake of reading Haaretz again ...
Where Are the Israeli Jews? The Lonely Protest of Arab Citizens Against a Horrific Murder Rate
As of January 11, 14 Arab Palestinian citizens had been murdered in Israel since the new year; two were killed by Israeli security forces; the rest were the victims of crime. Arabs in Israel are beside themselves with grief, anger, and a sense of abandonment. On Sunday, Arab community leaders called for a demonstration outside the Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office in Jerusalem...
...Nothing has worked. In the first year of the current government, the number of Arab victims more than doubled, from 116 in 2022 to 245 in 2023. The first 11 days of 2026 saw Arab citizens murdered at approximately twice the rate of 2025, which was already at a peak - roughly one every day and a half. In 2025, the civil society group Abraham Initiatives reported 252 Arab victims, out of a total of 305 murder victims in Israel, according to the Israel Police.
Never mind, how disappointed the bromancer must be as TACO King Donald struck one more time...
Trump told attack on Iran wouldn’t guarantee regime’s collapse
Advisers told the President they’d need more military firepower in the Middle East to launch a large-scale strike, protect US forces in the region and allies like Israel should Iran retaliate.
By Alexander Ward and Lara Seligman
Still the WSJ mob left the bromancer with a little hope ...
US and Middle Eastern officials said Mr Trump might be stalling for time as military assets move toward the Middle East. One Qatari official said the US might need five to seven days to prepare a full offensive. Last June, the president said he was open to a two-week negotiation with Iran over its nuclear program despite already approving an attack plan.
Speaking of King Donald, there was this aside in the Beast the other day ...RFK Jr. Caught in Cringeworthy Trump Moment at White House (*archive link)
Despite this unusual diet, Trump claimed that drinking milk had helped him “ace” three cognitive tests, which are typically used as a screening tool for dementia.
“I’ve taken a lot of them,” Trump said on Wednesday. “I’ve aced every one of them because I drink milk.”
Medical experts have expressed concern that the tests, which the president has repeatedly bragged about acing, are being used for monitoring rather than detection.
Speaking to The Daily Beast Podcast’s Joanna Coles, Dr. John Gartner said, “You could maybe justify giving someone the MoCA once, just on their age, just as part of a physical. If you’re giving it to him three times, that means you’re not assessing dementia. That means you’re monitoring dementia.”
Yawn. That's what the pond does every day, monitor reptile dementia ...
And for a little light relief ...
Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Hosts Deranged ‘Furry’ Marie Antoinette Party
Furries live! Shades of Kubrick's worst movie ...
Some days the pond feels the world is like a Rowe cartoon, such is the inescapable presence of the tangerine tyrant ...
All up, the pond feels that's as exhausting and as exhaustive an archival coverage of the lizard Oz this day as the pond could muster, but perforce the pond is obligated to present at least one reptile in detail, and this day the pond selected Jimbo from the deep north.
Come on down Jimbo ... prof of toad law, explain why law ain't worth a spit on a griddle in the Tamworth sun ...
The header: Why I don’t give a toss about ‘International law’; We don’t take treaties as seriously as the Americans do — and for good reason. As appeals to international law multiply, it’s worth questioning how democratic, legitimate and enforceable it really is.
The caption for the snap: A demonstrator holds pictures of ousted Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores during a rally to support them in Caracas on January 6. Picture: AFP
Worried about Russia's sociopathic behaviour conducting a vicious war on Ukraine?
Concerned that King Donald might snatch Greenland and break up NATO?
Fretting that Xi might seize the chance to bung on a do with Taiwan?
Nervous about other tin pot dictators wanting to follow king size dictator Donald?
Fear not, anxious nervous nellies.
Settle back, let Jimbo of the deep north soothe your fears.
Jimbo took a full four five minutes to go full Stephen Miller, to go rogue, to go the might is right route, and don't you go carrying on about dem useless laws and dat pathetic UN and world courts and ...
Many legal academics and lawyers, and even retired judges, like to trot out appeals to these norms as though they definitively settle all disagreement. But how many readers have a sense of just what it is that is being referred to by the phrase “international law”? Because I doubt many people realise just how thoroughly democratically deficient this body of rules called “international law” really is. I am a sceptic about the democratic legitimacy and indeed quite often the worth of international law. I’ve written about my doubts in law reviews. Let me give readers a sense of what’s in play.
First off, there are treaties and conventions. These can be between two or more countries. Here’s the thing, however. In Britain, Canada, New Zealand and Australia, treaties are entered into under the prerogative power (or, more prosaically, under pure executive government power). In theory, Anthony Albanese can wake up tomorrow and sign us up to something if his cabinet agrees. The elected legislature does not have a veto or initiating role, though sometimes a bit of ancillary input. So compared to statutes and domestic law, these treaties have only an indirect and enervated democratic status. We certainly don’t take treaties seriously the way the Americans do, where any treaty a president wants to sign up to requires two-thirds of the 100-person Senate to vote to ratify that decision.
In the British Westminster world that includes Australia, the trade-off for not taking treaties seriously enough to require the elected legislature to have the last word is that these instruments do not become part of our domestic law. You cannot cite them in court as a direct source of law. They have to be incorporated into a statute. Sure, there has been a trend of judges pointing to treaties to help interpret penumbral or otherwise ambiguous laws, especially in administrative law. I am not a big fan of that as it verges on judicial activism. Still, it’s comparatively minor stuff.
The reptiles interrupted with another snap: A man works in front of a house displaying a poster of deposed Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and the country’s late leader Hugo Chavez in Havana. Picture: AFP
Then Jimbo of the deep north got back to the hard work of being a wild-eyed lawless rogue:
Then think about the International Court of Justice. Countries you wouldn’t be caught dead taking moral advice from get judges on this court. The person selected is supposed to be independent of his or her government. But does anyone believe that as regards China or Pakistan or Russia?
Then there are the human rights-type treaties and conventions of the post-World War II era. No longer is international law simply the law between states. It now has a component that affects the individual. That is great as regards people in North Korea or Somalia. Of course, international law is better than the domestic law of thuggish dictatorships and military juntas. But then those governments don’t pay an iota of attention to international law. My claim, which many share, is that international law human rights standards are simply not as good, not as democratic and not as worthy of support as those of the domestic law of established longtime democracies. How rights should apply to situations is highly debatable and I don’t really care what some rapporteur or UN-appointed person thinks about some rights-related issue. I care about the voters in my country.
Yearly there are more Human Right Council resolutions condemning Israel for breaching rights than there are against all other countries on Earth combined. The UN purports to think that the worst place on Earth to be a woman is Israel. It’s risible.
Then there is this, a point Oxford legal philosopher HLA Hart made back in the early 1960s. Domestic law is easy to enforce in any functioning country because individuals are more or less equal in terms of strength, power, etc. This is simply not true of states. The most powerful countries can never, ever, be made to comply if they do not wish to comply. That is the Hobbesian fact of the world we live in. And many of those powerful countries (think China, Russia) are non-democracies.
So these norms are better than nothing but they do not represent some moral ideal. Australian domestic laws are better, and anyone pretending international law ought to be treated as a higher source of law is bonkers, Nor are international laws part of our domestic system unless legislated to be so. But then my highly sceptical view is very much a minority one in the legal academy. And probably among the lawyerly caste more generally. We saw something similar a few years back when it came to who supported the voice. Remember?
James Allan, is professor of law, University of Queensland.
How easy is it to defame the reputation of the University of Queensland? Quicker than a Lynch mob does in the University of Melbourne ...
Some mug student might be forking over hard cash for an MILaw, or wasting time at Public International Law, and be reading this sort of drivel ...
This program is designed for both lawyers and non-lawyers wishing to focus their studies on international law. In an increasingly internationalised world, international law shapes almost all forms of international interaction, from business, to trade, to diplomacy, and in war. People already working or hoping to work in a variety of internationally focused fields, such as business, policy, government, and the NGO sector would benefit from a clear understanding of the structure of the international laws that shape the international system, and how to work within those laws. The Master of International Law has four compulsory courses: one introducing public international law, and a series of three courses that focus on international law in action, and the nexus between international law and domestic law. Students then choose from a range of elective courses to suit personal growth and interest.
And as for remembering?
The pond remembers Jimbo's real inspiration:
The Consequences of Trump’s Assault on International Law
Oona A. Hathaway and Scott J. Shapiro (Foreign Affairs, free first time read):
Inter alia ...
NO MORE RULES
But what may be in store could be even worse. In the short term, the world faces deep instability; leaders may sometimes invoke the postwar rules but may also increasingly ignore them, depending on what is convenient. This is a recipe for unrelenting conflict, as states would be in doubt about what the rules are and therefore unsure of how to avoid provoking violence. Until a clear set of rules takes hold, the world will be a profoundly dangerous place.
A longer-term possibility is a world in which states are no longer prohibited from resorting to force and at least one superpower acts as if there are no rules at all. In this world, not only would the rules be unpredictable, they would depend entirely on the impulses of whoever happens to command the most coercive power at a given moment.
What is worrying is that the Trump administration seems to be ushering in such a world. The day after the United States kidnapped Maduro and his wife in Venezuela, the senior Trump aide Stephen Miller explained the administration’s thinking in an interview with the CNN host Jake Tapper. “We live in a world, in the real world, Jake, that is governed by strength, that is governed by force, that is governed by power,” Miller said. “These are the iron laws of the world since the beginning of time.” Neither Miller nor anyone else in the administration offered any real legal justification for launching a military assault on Venezuela—an operation that killed at least 75 people. There has been no legal justification, either, for the plan Trump announced on social media to seize “between 30 and 50 MILLION Barrels” of Venezuelan oil. Instead, the State Department shared an image of the U.S. president emblazoned with the words “This is OUR Hemisphere,” and Trump styled himself in a Truth Social post as the “Acting President of Venezuela.” Now, the administration has begun to turn its sights on Greenland. A White House statement issued days after the capture of Maduro claims that the United States “needs” Greenland and that acquiring the territory is a “national security priority.”
What is so troubling about the Trump administration’s words and actions is not just that the administration is breaking the law. And it is: the intervention in Venezuela clearly violates the UN Charter’s prohibition on the use of force. But more than that, U.S. officials have discarded the idea of legal constraints altogether. The only constraint, Trump said in an interview with The New York Times last week, is his “own morality.” There is no real argument to defend the government’s behavior. No pretense. No attempt to persuade. When a policy is announced in an online post, without explanation or justification, one has the unsettling sense that its makers see no need to bother cloaking it with a lie. A system of rules can survive some hypocrisy, but nihilism will bring it down.
At the same time, the Trump administration is acting as though the threat or use of force alone can grant it legal entitlements. Gunboat diplomacy, roundly renounced when war was outlawed, has returned. The United States is using oil blockades, coercive seizures, and military threats to extract political and economic concessions from other countries. This is an attempt to assert that power alone creates rights, regardless of reason.
A world in which the powerful no longer feel the need to justify themselves is not merely unjust. It is barbaric: operations to kill, steal, and destroy are severed from any claim of right. That world does not have a legal order at all. It has only force, guided by one man’s whims.
Thank the long absent lord that Jimbo of the deep north sent that mob packing. Just fancy that ...the notion that the prof from deep north is in any way interested in morality, not when there's a chance to suck on the morality of his nihilism...and we can all be guided by his toadish whims.
And now to wrap up, a note by Michael Bradley in Crikey ...
The argument the government is putting forward for excluding ‘advocating genocide’ from this bill’s list of hate crimes is nonsensical. (sorry, that's a paywall link)
The full piece runs to a four minute read, but this is what caught the pond's eye ...
The underpinning provision for this is a definition of the term “hate crime”. Before a group can be designated a “hate group”, the government has to be satisfied that it has been involved in or advocated conduct that constitutes a hate crime. That’s the threshold test for the whole regime.
The definition of “hate crime” is any of the offences in Subdivision C of Division 80 in the Criminal Code. These are all the crimes about threatening, urging or committing violence against groups — classic hate crimes — as well as the more questionable offences such as displaying prohibited symbols like the swastika or giving a Nazi salute.
Three of the specific Subdivision C offences are expressly excluded, meaning they are not “hate crimes” for the purposes of this new regime. Two of these make sense: urging violence against the constitution, and advocating terrorism, because neither is race-related.
The third exception is the Section 80.2D offence of “advocating genocide”. Yes — advocating genocide is not, under this new law, a hate crime. Now, I think we all know that genocide is the most race-adjacent crime of all crimes. So, why has it been excluded?
I’ve been told through back channels that the government’s answer to this question is “duh, read the explanatory memorandum”. That document says: “Hate crime conduct, while violent and offensive, generally falls short of terrorism, and is distinct from genocide. As such, advocating terrorism and advocating genocide should not be captured in this framework and are best criminalised through existing frameworks within the Criminal Code.”
Um, cool story, but also bullshit. Let’s be clear: all of the acts in the definition of a “hate crime” are already crimes within the Criminal Code. The point of the new hate crime concept is that it is the thing that defines a “hate group”. These groups are caught by the regime because they promote such crimes.
The argument put up for excluding advocating genocide from the list is nonsensical. It’s the mother of all hate crimes.
So we know the official explanation is rubbish. What, then, is the real reason for making the advocacy of genocide not part of the definition of who is or is not a proscribed hate group?
Israel and several of its government’s leaders are under indictment for genocide. Pro-Israel lobby groups have spent the past three years monstering anyone who dares whisper that the country might be perpetrating a genocide while staunchly defending every genocidal step the Israeli state takes. It would perhaps be in their interest to not risk being labelled a hate group on the basis of advocating genocide.
But who’s to say? Maybe it’s just poor drafting.
Who's to say? Maybe it's just poor drafting?
What a relief. There should be more bad drafting like this.
While the Zionists can continue their devotion to genocide, and rabbit on about the urgent need to exterminate the insects, on the upside, the pond can talk of the current Gaza genocide and not worry about the reptile thought police knocking on the door ...
And so to a final 'toon, a trip back in time to the good old days when everyone appreciated the appeal of sociopaths...
"The barbarism of the regime is no accident – it’s grounded in Islamic fundamentalism".
ReplyDeleteAnd one can say of various activities such as inquisitions and crusades and wars and suchlike that "the barbarism of these regimes is no accident because it's grounded in Judeo-Christian fundamentalism".
One just can't get any recognition at all of the universality of human grossness, stupidity and evil because there's nothing in the universe to stop us behaving in our various ways.
ReplyDelete"Concerned that King Donald might snatch Greenland and break up NATO?"
The indefatigable Ikonoclast, (thanks) chief commenter at JQ's blog (Ernestine, I hope you are well) posted his briefest comment- ever! It is a doozy. Jon Stewart re neighbours, Greenland and boat arrivals... and "oh, what would be call it?" re NATO... a classic. Short video and definitely worth a look.
Ikonoclast says:
January 15, 2026 at 2:54 pm
"Irony corner"
https://johnquiggin.com/2026/01/12/monday-message-board-710/#comment-267153