In which the pond goes in search of bonus reptiles, and ends up starting with Jensenism and Polonius ...

 

The pond hasn't thought about Jensenism (or Pellism for that matter) for many a long year, and yet suddenly there was a rush of fragrant memories that came tumbling into the noggin, discovered as the pond went looking for a bonus for its Sunday meditation.

How could the pond resist bumping up a leading Jensenist to top of the page, with talk of lads gone fishing?

Alas, the pond then discovered that the intermittent archive was feeling out of sorts, and so it was impossible to save the rest. 

How could the pond leave the Jensenism in mid-stream without showing another young lad?

There was a homily that followed after that last snap...

But perhaps the boys themselves have sorted it out. Fishing isn’t organised. It isn’t run by adults. It isn’t even very competitive, as far as I can see. There are no grades, no likes, no followers. There’s no pretence. You either catch a fish or you don’t. And if you don’t, so what?
There’s something wonderfully honest about that.
Perhaps this little revival of boys fishing is telling us something hopeful that we shouldn’t miss. Left to themselves, absent the adult panic, boys can figure it out.
I wonder if that’s also why we are beginning to see young men drift back towards church. At its best, the church offers many of the same things that fishing does: not entertainment but purpose; not instant gratification but patient formation; not isolation but togtherness; not endless choice but a demanding way of life.
Perhaps the instincts that make for good fishermen are not so different from the instincts that make for men of faith (and women too). Both require patience, humility, teachability, perseverance and hope. And maybe those instincts were never lost. We simply forgot to believe they were there.
Michael P. Jensen is a writer and the rector of St Mark’s Darling Point, Sydney.

Bizarrely, a hot link attached to "absent the adult panic" led straight back to the very same piece of Jensenism.

Sadly there was no indication that Michael P. had written anything else for the reptiles, but the pond does encourage the reptiles to repeat the dose, even if the angry Sydney Anglicans seem to have lost a little of their bite. 

Such stupefying banality is the sort of soporific the pond needs when confronted by the challenge of getting out of bed on a Sunday.

Dissidents might murmur at the way the pond favoured Jensenism over Polonius's prattle, but rest easy, this lad never goes fishing. He prefers hunting green elephants ...

The header: Green elephant in the room: political focus on the wrong minor party; Journalists hold the Coalition to a standard rarely applied to Labor when it comes to minor party alliances.

The caption for the stunningly meaningful and insightful snap that sets Polonius on his journey: The unintended consequence of One Nation’s apparent success could be a return to a Labor government, in Victoria and nationally, on the back of Greens preferences. Picture: NewsWire/ David Crosling

Polonius offered his standard 4 minute read, and the pond immediately knew what the problem was.

Polonius, often inclined to indulge his obsession, had been watching the ABC yet again, early in the morning, and it had set off his bile juices and compounded his jaundice...

In earlier times the cry “What about the workers?” could be heard in the labour movement across the land. A more relevant question today is: “What about the Greens?”
It’s understandable why Labor Party leaders at federal and state levels claim, because of the increase in support for Pauline Hanson’s One Nation party, the Coalition can form government only if it is in coalition with One Nation. But is it true?
Last Wednesday Sally Sara interviewed opposition frontbencher Dan Tehan, one of the better performers in the Liberal Party-Nationals Coalition, on ABC Radio National Breakfast. The Coalition has been in operation at the federal level, with only a few breaks, for a century.
The program ran an audio of Ben Carroll, the new Labor Party Premier in Victoria, stating opinion “polling says Victoria is on track for Australia’s first Liberal-One Nation government”. He did not mention the Nationals.

Naturally the reptiles followed up with a snap of Dan "the man": Senior Liberal frontbencher Dan Tehan. Picture: NewsWire / Martin Ollman

That vile ABC hussy sent Polonius spiralling out of control ...

Sara threw the first question to Tehan: “In your view would it be better to have a Coalition slash One Nation government or another Labor government in Victoria?” This question followed Carroll’s claim that “a Liberal-One Nation government will cut … services Victorians rely on”.
Tehan responded: “Look that’s just Labor Party spin”, and said Labor had been “cutting services in Victoria”.
But Sara returned to her original point about whether “it would be better to have a Coalition government in coalition with One Nation than to have another Labor government”. Tehan stuck to his point that the Coalition’s aim was to attain a majority of seats in its own right.
Sara implied that one or the other was the only possible outcome of the Victorian election in November. But this is not the case. The most recent Newspoll for Victoria, published in these pages on Tuesday, has the Coalition at 31 per cent, Labor at 28 per cent, One Nation at 19 per cent, the Greens at 13 per cent and others at 9 per cent.

Where would the reptiles - and its hive mind readers - be without a reminder of where their allegiances lie ... Opposition Leader Angus Taylor, Victorian Liberal Party state president Brian Loughnane and Victorian Opposition Leader Jess Wilson.

Polonius dared to dream a One Nation dreaming ...

If the Coalition won more seats than Labor without attaining an absolute majority it could possibly govern with the support of One Nation and/or some independents. That’s called a minority government. This would not require any formal link with One Nation MPs, only a guarantee to support a Coalition government by passing supply and not supporting votes of no confidence.
It’s the same with Labor. If Labor did not win enough seats to govern in its own right, it too might get support from Greens or independent candidates if they happened to win seats.
In other words, a Coalition government, led by Jess Wilson, comprising Liberals and Nationals would not need a formal alliance with One Nation to govern. No surprise that Labor is running the opposite line, but journalists should know better.
The states show how this can work. In Tasmania, the Liberal Party holds 14 out of 35 seats and Labor holds 10 seats. The crossbench consists of five Greens, five independents and one Shooters, Fishers and Farmers MP. The Liberal Party has enough guarantees of confidence and supply that it can govern in its own right.

You see? It would be an alliance, but an informal alliance, not a formal alliance, and that makes all the difference. Just look at Tasmania for how tremendously effective it can be ... Jane Howlett resigns as Tasmania's Racing Minister amid questioning over publicly funded legal bill

And then there's Minnsie (Minnsy?), busy bulldozing public housing ... NSW Labor Leader Chris Minns. Picture: NewsWire/Monique Harmer

Everybody's doing it, but it's just not fair the way they look at it. They need a set of patented, unique Polonial glasses ...

It is sometimes overlooked that the Chris Minns-led Labor government in NSW does not hold a majority in the Legislative Assembly. It has 46 out of 93 seats, one short of a majority. There are nine independents and three Greens on the crossbench. One independent serves as Speaker.
There is a difference between a formal capital-C Coalition government between the Liberals and Nationals and a small-C coalition government that would bring together two parties with significantly different policies. Neither the Coalition nor Labor like this.
The likes of Sara who ask a Coalition frontbencher about whether it would form a coalition government with One Nation seldom raise a similar questions with Labor leaders about the Greens.
It would be reasonable for journalists to ask Minns if he would go into government with Greens MPs who happened to win seats to form a minority government after the election. The answer almost certainly would be similar to Tehan’s response to Sara.
Namely, that Labor intends to govern in its own right but would form a minority administration. Labor MPs dislike the Greens much more than some Coalition MPs dislike One Nation. No Labor MP in NSW would be likely to advocate a coalition with the Greens. Yet the question is relevant for a journalist to ask, if only to avoid being accused of double standards.
Nor are the opposition’s leaders – the Liberal Party’s Angus Taylor and the Nationals’ Matt Canavan – likely to concede that they would form a coalition with One Nation.

Sheesh, just at the moment the pond thought it had spotted a rebrand, the old brand surfaced yet again, courtesy simplistic Sharri ...Veteran Broadcaster Ray Hadley says Opposition Leader Angus Taylor needs to “stop bagging” One Nation Leader Pauline Hanson. Mr Hadley told Sky News host Sharri Markson that all Angus Taylor is “promoting her” every time he talks about One Nation. “If you want to beat Labor, there’s a Coalition to be formed.”

And after all that, Polonius dissolved into his usual state of uncertainty, a blank void of unlikies, suggestions and possibilities ...

In any event, the next federal election is not scheduled until May 2028. Anthony Albanese is unlikely to call an early election. For starters, there is no reason to do so. Moreover, Albanese is a cautious politician disinclined to take unnecessary risks. Then there are his parliamentary colleagues. It’s unlikely that all Labor MPs will hold their seats at the next election. Most of those in marginal seats will want to hang on to their positions for as long as possible.

The latest national News24 Pulse/YouGov poll, conducted between July 21 and July 28, has Labor at a primary vote of 28 per cent with One Nation at 25 per cent, the Coalition at 22 per cent and the Greens at 13 per cent.
This suggests the Taylor-led Coalition is narrowing the gap between it and the Hanson-led One Nation. As mentioned in these pages not long ago, the essential task of the Coalition is to get ahead of One Nation. Then it could benefit from One Nation preferences – provided they go to the Coalition at the same high rate as Greens preferences go to Labor.
This is possible but far from certain since some One Nation supporters are former Labor voters. Which leads to the tentative conclusion that the unintended consequence of One Nation’s apparent success could be a return to a Labor government on the back of Greens preferences. Both in Victoria and nationally.

Why it was almost as bland and as soporific as a burst of Jensenism, or watching the ABC ...

If Polonius had to feature simpleton Sharri, why not the full deal?

At this point, the pond went looking for that bonus, and became terribly distressed ...

Following on from the bromancer's assault yesterday on the conduct of the war on Iran by mad King Donald and minions of the Pete Kegsbreath kind, it seemed his fellow reptiles were just as down on other mad king schemes.

Stewie was in a real stew ...

Endless hurdles ahead in fragile plan to disarm Hamas
Hamas agrees to disarm but major obstacles lie ahead
For the first time Hamas has agreed to a plan to lay down its arms – but the devil is in the detail of a plan riddled with obstacles.
By Cameron Stewart
Chief International Correspondent

A teaser trailer should suffice for this treasonous attitude ...

Outrageous. As if the pond hadn't seen it clearly set down in print...

There, done and dusted, a rolled gold proclamation, sorted and solved. When has anything the mad King so ordered not come to pass?

Who are these provincial bums to question His Majesty or the thinking of state regime media, aka the Emeritus Chairman's Faux Noise.

And yet, outrageously, the pond must report that Jennings of the fifth form was in the same camp as Stewie, and he was pulling the same stewed prune face ...

‘I want to believe’: Why Trump’s disarmament agreement with Hamas will fail
It is more believable the US is hiding aliens than Hamas will lay down its weapons in favour of peace and property develop­ment.
By Peter Jennings

Why are all the reptiles so down on mad King Donald?

Could it be that maybe Benji wasn't too keen on peace before those elections, what with being on a war footing a handy way to rustle up a few more votes?

Could it be that Benji might shaft mad King Donald yet again?

After all, it was Benji who facilitated Hamas as an alternative power base, a way of ensuring that factions would be riven and there'd never be a Palestinian state, not that any of that much troubled Jennings of the fifth form ...

Of course, it's all the fault of Hamas, because Benji would do anything to help out the mad King.

After that extended detour, the pond kept looking for a bonus that might appeal, but came up short.

The pond has always found snappy Tom to be Dame Groan lite ... never willing to go to the heart of the apocalyptic chaos that will surely erupt before Xmas...

RBA and Fed wait, but inflation beast has not been killed. Who is to blame?
Most Australians blame the RBA for causing inflation. But the central bank says most believe the cure for inflation is actually making it worse. And that confusion makes its job harder.
By Tom Dusevic
Columnist

Even the uncredited collage below the header looked very low rent ...

Enough already with these teaser trailers!

Why had the Angelic one let down the pond when she was badly needed?

The pond decided on a desperate strategy.

It was time to turn to the lizard Oz editorialist for a summary of the key issues the reptiles had confronted this weekend ...

There was simplistic Sharri and the Fauci matter ...

Roll that last line trippingly around on the tongue ...

His failure to do so will leave citizens in the US and around the world more hostile to health authorities, including in the event of future crises. Many citizens, for good reason, became more sceptical as the Covid crisis unfolded. Their reluctance to trust health authorities in future could bring its own problems.

Say what? Their reluctance to trust health authorities in future

This in the age of Robert Kennedy and mad King Donald?

And then there was the Lloydie matter, that nuking of the country, not to mention the planet, in order to save the planet from the ravings of a climate science cult ...

Say what? The lizard Oz editorialist felt the need to start that last sentence with an "If"?

If you can fill the unforgiving nuke

    With sixty seconds’ worth of energy run,   

Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,   

    And—which is more—you’ll be a reptile, my son!

Dare to dream ... and talk of that climate science cult, that hoax, will melt in the noonday sun.

And lastly there was the fertilizer matter, which had been a weekend lizard Oz EXCLUSIVE ...

Yet again there was no mention of the masterminds behind all this fuss.

Yet again the reptiles had failed to understand the wisdom of tariffs, or the need for the mad King to make out like a crypto bandit, or the need for the US government to forcibly acquire shares in corporations ... or arrange for chips to be shipped forthwith to the middle east, so that they might be forwarded on post haste to China, facilitated by appropriate crypto deals.

Yet again they failed to understand how their kissing cousins in regime state media had opened them up to suspicion and derision ... what with the Faux Noise approved war still surprisingly resilient and going swimmingly well ...

And so to the usual weekly debrief ...