Good luck with the war ... especially if you've got a futtock for a fearless leader ...

The pond was so irritated by the devious, dissembling, often outright lying Tony Abbott's attempt to deny the use of the word "war" in relation to the military action, which is to say war, currently underway in Iraq and Syria, that naturally it was curious as to how the practitioners of the ancient art of headline writing would treat Abbott's folly.

As you'd expect of the war mongers in Murdoch tabloids, hungering for War these many months, they didn't worry about the verbal gymnastics, and knew they'd scored months of reliable lead story material.

The Saturday Terror was clear cut, Australia is flying into WAR, but some of the other tabloids couldn't resist the "W" word either:

Yes there it was, in little break outs, war on savages and war against Islamic State, though they're not supposed to be calling it a state. But at least the thoughtful dearies also adopted Abbott slogans, like death cult and disrupt and degrade, perhaps as a sop to Abbott for their daring use of the "W" word.

Or it could be that the Murdoch war mongers aren't content with the level or kind of war they've already got? As usual, it was the reptiles at the Oz that set that pace:

Yes, already 'boots on the ground' was the cry, with "Terror war" front and centre. Strange, how could we win the war on terror if we refuse to go to war?

The digital edition - no link, it would only lead to a begging letter from the paupers of the press - was equally clear cut:

So it begins, and after the first couple of excursions with boots on the ground have been such a smashing success.

Perhaps even more interesting is the way the Fairfaxians fell into line with Abbott's request not to mention the "W" word:

All clear to bomb? Ready to strike? Sssh, no "W" here ... here no "W" ...

It's war, you cackling geese. 

The HUNsters also followed this line, but they dressed it up in proper tabloid style:

No doubt this is an arcane reference to Jonathan Swift's witty remark:

Laws are like cobwebs, which may catch small flies, but let wasps and hornets break through.

Though perhaps with Abbott it should say:

Lies about terminology and the use of the "W" word are like cobwebs, which may catch small flies, but let wasps and hornets break through.

And out of all that, and the declaration of the "W" word, what did the pond walk away with?

Well without doubt the stupidest thing by an actor said in quite some time, and the long absent lord knows, actors are inclined to say profoundly stupid things at the best of times. Go on Rusty, take it away:

"We've often said a strong South Sydney club means not just more football players or sportspeople but more doctors, lawyers and artists will rise from our fan base of kids as they grow because they have been given the true example that hard work and belief does in fact have its rewards." (much more blather here, with forced video)

There will be more artists because professional gladiators are going to bash heads and set up dementia for future years this long weekend? And the Sydney Fairfaxians put this above news that Australia was heading off to war?

Stupid people say stupid things, and here they are this long weekend, reported with enthusiasm by stupid people ... and worse, in a time of war ...

Meanwhile,  for its sins, the pond has been researching the state of the war, and naturally the very last place it would head is to a Murdoch rag like the reptiles at the Oz sound the 'boots on the ground' drum as they yearn for yet another generation lost in the mire and fog of war ...

First port of call was a piece by Dexter Filkins for The New Yorker, about the story of the Kurds in the whole sorry saga, and luckily his lengthy piece,  The Fight of their Lives, is right at the moment outside the paywall.

Now to misquote Muhammad Ali, the pond has got nothing against no Kurd. They were stiffed by the British - they can join the pond's tribe on that alone - and they seem vaguely secular and just interested in a good materialistic existence, and where's the harm in a decent big screen TV?

But what a sorry tale it is, and how a few incisive remarks explain just why America has routinely fucked up its attempts to pick sides in the conflict:

Since 2003, when the U.S. destroyed the Iraqi state and began spending billions of dollars trying to build a new one, the Kurds have been their most steadfast ally. When American forces departed, in 2011, not a single U.S. soldier had lost his life in Kurdish territory. As the rest of Iraq imploded, only the Kurdish region realized the dream that President George W. Bush had set forth when he ordered the attack: it is pro-Western, largely democratic, largely secular, and economically prosperous. President Obama recently told the Times that the Kurdish government is “functional the way we would like to see.” 
Still, the Administration, bound to a policy it calls One Iraq, is quietly working to thwart the Kurds’ aspirations. American officials are warning companies that buying Kurdish oil may have dire legal consequences, and the warnings have been effective: the Kurdish regional government is nearly bankrupt. And yet, as the peshmerga work to force ISIS out of Kurdish territory, they have been supported by American jets and drones, and by American Special Forces on the ground. In August, President Obama ordered covert shipments of arms to the Kurds. By the end of the month, Kurdish forces had taken back much of the territory that they had lost to ISIS, and were preparing operations to reclaim the rest. 

Yes, the Americans are that dumb. They want the Kurds to fight for Iraq, and indeed the Kurds represent the best set of boots on the ground, despite recent defeats, and despite their clear reluctance to do more than defend their own turf, yet the United States has conspired with the Iraqi government to virtually bankrupt them, and even to prevent countries like Turkey helping them out with oil revenue, even though ISIS has been smuggling oil into Turkey and other neighbouring countries:

From the beginning, Kurdish leaders have said that the constitution gives them the right to unilaterally explore and drill for oil. That interpretation, which they have been acting on for a decade, has become a fait accompli: the Kurds now have much of the wherewithal to run an independent oil industry. 
Still, Kurdish leaders did not foresee just how hard self-sufficiency would be. With no money coming from Baghdad, and little coming from the sale of oil, the government has been largely unable to pay its fifty thousand civil servants for most of this year. The local economy, which imports nearly all its consumer products, has come to a halt. At times, the lines outside gas stations have stretched for miles. The economic slowdown has reminded every Kurdish official—and every citizen—how vulnerable their landlocked state is. “We believe in our right of self-determination,” Fuad Hussein, Barzani’s chief of staff, said. “But, at the same time, politics is about reality. It’s not only about what you desire—it’s about what you can get.” 
Ashti Hawrami, the minister of natural resources for the Kurdish region, told me that he hoped to increase Kurdistan’s output of oil to a half million barrels a day by the end of the year, and to a million barrels a day by the end of 2015. That, he said, would help the Kurds ride out the difficulties imposed by the central government. But his optimism has not blunted his distrust of his counterparts in Baghdad. “Why are they fighting with me?” he said. “Cutting my budget, and keeping the oil in the ground, and damaging the oil fields? Just to punish me.” 
The government in Baghdad has threatened to sue anyone who buys Kurdish oil, and it has taken at least one case to the International Court of Arbitration, in Paris. More important, officials in Turkey, through which the vital pipeline flows, have indicated that they will require the Kurdish government to distribute oil revenues—which are held in a Turkish state bank—according to the provisions of the Iraqi constitution. That means that the Kurds can expect to receive only seventeen per cent of the money from the sale of their own oil. 
The Obama Administration says that it is neutral in its policy toward Kurdish oil. But analysts say that the U.S. government warnings about buying Kurdish oil have chilled the market. “When the United States says don’t buy Kurdish oil, no one’s going to buy it,” Nat Kern, the editor of a newsletter on the international oil industry, told me. The Kurds say that they have dispatched sixteen tankers filled with oil from the Turkish port of Ceyhan. According to industry experts, they have delivered only two directly to buyers—one in Croatia, and one in Israel, which is a longtime supporter of the Kurds. The others have taken a circuitous route. Some have handed off their cargo to other ships in mid-passage; the rest are still at sea, sailing with their beacons turned off, so that they are difficult to track.

Filkins has a lot more to say in his analysis, but the bottom line is that American - and Australian - policy is so incoherent and confused that we still call the PKK and the Kurdish Peshmerga forces terrorists, determined as they are to split from Iraq and form a Kurdish state, while hoping against hope that the very same forces will help defeat the barking mad fundies aiming at a new Caliphate ...

Now this isn't news - Ruth Pollard wrote for the Fairfaxians Is Australia arming 'terrorist' PKK fighters in the middle of last month (with forced video at end of link) - but it is particularly cogent when contemplating the incoherent strategy outlined by Tony Abbott.

Essentially it sounds as if he doesn't have a clue what he's aiming for, and all he can do is talk in terms of negatives (though what would you expect of a man who's carved a career out of nattering nabob negativity?).

Here's the reptiles citing Abbott (no link, it only leads to a begging letter):

The Prime Minister acknowledged that the risk of civilian casualties could never be eliminated in a mission he said was likely to last months, rather than weeks.
He defined success as when Islamic State was “in retreat, not in advance”. 
“We will know that we are succeeding when the Iraqi government is restoring a modicum of control over its own cities and towns,” he said. 
 Mr Abbott said the aim was not to build liberal pluralism in Iraq. 
“We’re not trying to create a shining city on a hill,” he said. “We are simply acting as part of the US-led coalition in support of the legitimate elected government of Iraq.” 
Mr Abbott conceded it was very difficult to eliminate an ideology.

What, no mention of the Kurds? Well here's the AFR's report of that very same set of interviews:

Under repeated questioning during a series of television and radio interviews on Monday morning, Mr Abbott said the Australian government would use the Iraqi government’s ability to look after its own people as the test of victory. 
“If the Iraqi government, the Kurdish regional government are able to maintain reasonable control over their substantial towns and reasonable protection for their own people, that will be a success,” Mr Abbott said. 
 “We’re not trying to create a liberal pluralist democracy, we’re not trying to create a shining city on the hill.” 
Mr Abbott said he was confident that given the right support, the Iraqi army could rebuild its capacity to fight back against Islamic State. 
“This is a new Iraqi government which has pledged to be much more inclusive and unifying that the one they replaced. There is a new confidence that this Iraqi government will have the backing to do the job it needs to do.”

Uh huh. We're not trying to do this, and we're not trying to do that, but at least this time the Kurds cop a mention, along with blather about new confidence in the new Iraqi government.

Uh huh. This very morning the experts are out and about wondering why it's taken so long for the Iraqi government to get its act together and invite the Australian government to go to war ...

And what war is that? Did someone mention the Kurds?

Cue Filkins:

Peter Galbraith, the longtime diplomat and advocate of the Kurds, also served in East Timor and Croatia, regions that surmounted enormous difficulties to become separate states. He believes that once a people decide on independence almost nothing will dissuade them. “The desire to become independent is part of the consciousness of every Kurd,” Galbraith said. “They really feel like they are fighting and dying for something.” 
In late July, as the Muslim month of fasting gave way to the celebration of Eid al-Fitr, Barzani travelled to the front lines to exhort his troops. In a series of stops, he told them that the peshmerga were making history, building the future for a Kurdish nation. All the money in the world was nothing compared with one drop of a peshmerga fighter’s blood, he said. But the men who sacrificed themselves would be fighting for their people’s freedom. One scorching afternoon, he addressed soldiers at a base on the eastern bank of the Tigris, where fortifications manned by ISIS militants loomed across the river. At a lectern draped with a Kurdish flag, Barzani apologized for the heat and urged the fighters to hold on a little longer. “Be patient,” he said. “Our day is near.”

Good luck with the war ...

What's that you say?

They couldn't even organise a decent war on the burqa, without retreating in some confusion?

And how's that war on the home front going?

Well as Phillip Coorey notes in the AFR this morning, in 'Burqa' ban and backflip have cost Abbott goodwill (currently outside the paywall) security at Parliament House has recently turned to farce:

Throughout this whole episode, the only MP who voiced concern was the ever-vigilant NSW Liberal senator Bill Heffernan, who brought an imitation pipe-bomb into the building to expose the folly. There was, however, a deafening silence throughout this entire period from Cory Bernardi, George Christensen and Jacqui Lambie, all of whom have reignited a crusade against the “burqa”, by which is presumably meant the niqab, in the wake of the Islamic State terror threat both at home and abroad. That they never raised a peep when thousands of unscreened people poured in to the building daily only furthers the suspicion that security is not their concern as they seek to conflate the “burqa” with terrorism as part of what Malcolm Turnbull called “a coded attack, coded attack on Muslims”. Put aside the fact that no one can remember someone wearing a “burqa” inside Parliament. 

Uh huh. So how did the fearless leader, our brave general in the war on two fronts respond?

But their concerns and the hysteria they generated hijacked the debate this week to the extent that in the space of 24 hours,Tony Abbott lost control of the message framing the latest war against terrorism. 
Bernardi has been jumping ugly on Islam for years, but Abbott’s refusal on Wednesday to show backbone and unambiguously stare down the maverick Senator and others in his ranks was failure of leadership. 
Rather than shut down the issue as the needless and stupid distraction it had become, Abbott, as one of his senior colleagues noted, tried “to play both sides’’ of the issue. 
He expressed a personal distaste for the burqa while at the same time said it was not up to the government to dictate what people did and did not wear. 
He would have been better off copying his Attorney-General George Brandis, or Foreign Minister Julie Bishop, both of whom saw no need to blow the dog whistle. 

Uh huh. A flip flopping fool:

On the same day this week when Bronwyn Bishop and Parry issued their inflammatory edict, Bernardi and colleague Dean Smith poured fuel on the fire by rekindling the 18c issue, using a private members bill. 
The police, MPs, ministers and terrorism experts will all tell you the entire exercise about the “burqa” has been counter-productive. All it has done is increase the terror threat. Amid growing reports of Muslims – especially women – being abused on public transport and elsewhere, authorities fear the hysteria whipped up by the “burqa” banners will hamper intelligence gathering within Islamic communities and push already volatile young men into the arms of radicals. 
“Our concern is young men, very juvenile in their outlook, [and] often very insecure,” Professor Greg Barton, director of the global terrorism research centre at Monash University, told The Australian Financial Review. 
“If they have an experience where their mother, their sister or family member was treated badly, that only contributed to their anger and sense of alienation,” he said. 
And the “first line of defence” against domestic terrorism was intelligence, and Bernardi and his ilk were risking that as well. “There’s no way we’ll get human intelligence right without community support.’’ 
Liberal senator and parliamentary secretary for social services Concetta Fierravanti-Wells spends a lot of time in Western Sydney cultivating relations with the Islamic community. She was there again on Friday and said Barton was spot on in terms of the threat the “burqa” banners posed to intelligence gathering and radicalisation. “The Muslim community is vitally important in terms of intelligence, she said. “Intelligence is the lifeblood in the framework of our new terror legislation. This is about terrorism, this is not about what people wear.’’

Good luck with the wars, domestic and foreign, the wars on terror and the war on the Kurdish terrorists, especially when you've got a futtocking flip flopper as your fearless leader.

Gentlemen, this is the war room, you can't fight in here.

Take it away First Dog, and more First Dog here.

It's an act of war, stupid ...

(here, forced video at end of link)

The thing that used to get George Orwell going, the thing that Orwell used to think of as truly Orwellian, was the abuse of words, and the refusal to use words simply and honestly, as the English language allows ...

In his rant about this, here, he actually mentions the cunning ways of armchair warriors:

Pretentious diction. Words like phenomenon, element, individual (as noun), objective, categorical, effective, virtual, basic, primary, promote, constitute, exhibit, exploit, utilize, eliminate, liquidate, are used to dress up a simple statement and give an air of scientific impartiality to biased judgements. Adjectives like epoch-making, epic, historic, unforgettable, triumphant, age-old, inevitable, inexorable, veritable, are used to dignify the sordid process of international politics, while writing that aims at glorifying war usually takes on an archaic color, its characteristic words being: realm, throne, chariot, mailed fist, trident, sword, shield, buckler, banner, jackboot, clarion ...

These days he'd have to update that list with things like humanitarian mission, or a deployment, or combat operations against an insurgency, or operational activities, or just a mission, or other mumbo jumbo, as a way of conflating and confusing the notion of Australia going to war ...

Here's the reptiles swallowing the kool aid, and just letting it trickle down their throats:

It would be a dangerous mission but it was not strictly true to say Australia was at war, the Prime Minister said.
“I know that you’d love to have that headline, but it’s not strictly accurate,” he told reporters. 
“Yes, we are engaged in combat operations. But these are combat operations against an insurgency in support of the legitimate government of Iraq. 
“We’re not trying to build liberal pluralism in Iraq, we’re not trying to create a shining city on a hill.” 
Mr Abbott said “only Iraq can defeat ISIL, but Iraq shouldn’t be alone”.

Uh huh.

Yet the definition of war is simple and straightforward enough, and inclusive. Here's the first dictionary definition out of the gate:

1. a. A state of open, armed, often prolonged conflict carried on between nations, states, or parties. 
b. The period of such conflict. 
c. The techniques and procedures of war; military science.

Parties, armed conflict. Deal done ...

Now just because it's a number of nations going to support another nation in a war against a third party or parties, or that Abbott can't actually articulate what the war is for, except to stand alongside the Iraq government, doesn't change the definition or the act.

How about some variations? Does that leave room for some weasel word wriggling/

1. (Military) open armed conflict between two or more parties, nations, or states.
1. armed conflict between nations or factions within a nation; warfare. (more and the source of the word here)

It's simple enough, and Abbott is such a mindless 'three word slogan' inept politician, he still manages to trip over the stupidity of his own rhetoric:

"ISIL has effectively declared war on the world," Mr Abbott said on October 3. "The world is responding."

Yes, if they've declared war on the world, and the world responds by declaring war on ISIL, then that means Australia is embarking on a war.

In the usual way, the ABC's fact check decided "It's war, not 'a mission': Abbott incorrect on Iraq, but the pond isn't inclined to such niceties.

Abbott, in his usual humbug way, is simply talking bullshit ...

That's the trouble when you get a man who can't go beyond simple three word mantras like "murderous death cult", and who hasn't got the simple integrity to acknowledge and admit what's actually happening ...

At least if you're going to bomb the shit out of others, for what might or might not be justifiable reasons, be honest in your use of the English language ...

Oh look, and there's a couple of fearless leaders off to war, and more Moir here.

Meanwhile, as Abbott, Bronnie and the reptiles drone on ...

So after months, years, of demonising, slavering, slobbering, salivating coverage of Islamics, the Murdochians finally managed to produce the knee-jerk response that the mindless Tony Abbott, stuck in a medieval Catholic world of transubstantiation, was always likely to produce ...

And for his pains, what sort of coverage did he cop from the Mad magazine of the deep north?

Why, a front cover demonising Bronnie ... where's the fairness in that?

Well at least they spared her a Photoshop, but with those clothes, who needed to exaggerate? Here's an idea for the deep north reptiles to try out some time ...

The trouble was, the burqa/burka/berserka/oh never mind fuss brought out the schizophrenia inherit in Murdoch la la land.

The reptiles at the lizard Oz tried to have it both ways - an EXCLUSIVE reminding the world that terror was just around the corner, and not just in the commentary and editorial writers terrorising their readers, and a washing of hands in the particular matter of the clothing:

Yes, it was left to the budgie smuggler man to urge a re-think on the hysteria he'd encouraged the day before, dog whistling to high heaven, and leaving hapless Bronnie hanging out to dry ...

There it was, in the digital edition, cheek by jowel:

It's usually the sort of logic you'd find in a movie sociopath:

There was shock and consternation ...

... as twitter erupted, and there was uproar in the land, featuring the most unlikely allies ...

Hurtful memes sprang up like agitated mushrooms exposed to the light:

(and more Wilcox here)

And so the bigot wilted in the sun, and the statesman intervened in a statesmanlike manner, and the quislings and fellow travellers were immensely gratified:

An excellent call? As excellent as Peta Credlin?

Yes Tim Wilson's link herded stray readers, like a gang of cats, to the Fairfaxians and Tony Abbott to kill off Parliament house burqa ban (forced video at end of link), and never mind that it was the futtock himself who set the whole furore in motion, and never mind that the speaker and the Parliament are supposed to have a measure of independence, because it's an institution, not the plaything of the PM, though that sort of logic jumped right out the window when Abbott appointed Bronnie to do his hatchet work and kick out a couple of hundred MPs of the wrong stripe, and what Wilson calls an excellent call others might call an embarrassment of a kind routinely produced by Bronnie with Abbott's full support ...

In an embarrassing back-down for the government, Fairfax Media has learnt Mr Abbott will ask Ms Bishop and Senator Pary to reconsider the proposal after an extraordinary backlash. 
Before the revised security rules were announced, Foreign Minister Julie Bishop and Attorney-General George Brandis both appeared to distance themselves from comments the Prime Minister made about the garment being confronting.

So that's the way politics is now conducted: dog whistling and fear mongering and testing the waters and distraction, always distraction, and then a retraction, and a hanging out to dry, and suddenly Abbott's being praised by Wilson for making an excellent call?

Maybe it's not so much the art of cat herding, as of sheep herding ...

Meanwhile, having spent months lathering up a fear of the different and the other, the reptiles at the lizard Oz felt the need to pen an editorial, Burka debate a sideshow to serious security issues.

After noting the pointlessness of the security matter - once checked by security, what security benefit sending a demon to sit behind glass in the schoolkids area? - the reptiles offered a consoling word to the jihadist fundies:

Shrieking headlines would be counter-productive in what needs to be a courteous, sensible discussion. 

Shrieking headlines? Oh hush your Murdochian tabloid hypocritical hearts ... where's Greg Sheridan when he's needed to defend the shrieking Daily Terrorists?

But the question is not beyond debate. The Australian believes Liberal senator Cory Bernardi, Nationals MP George Christensen and Palmer United Party senator Jacqui Lambie went too far calling for the burka to be banned from Parliament House. But they are entitled to express their opinions. 
Many Australians agreed with Mr Abbott when he said he found the burka confronting. It is highly favoured in fundamentalist regimes. And the idea of women shrouding themselves entirely simply because they are women seems discriminatory, especially in our society. 

Uh huh. It was only then came the grudging admission ...

These are not reasons to ban it, however. 
 France’s burka ban three years ago was divisive and has isolated some women at home. Personal choice matters, which is why most Catholic women rebelled 50 years ago against wearing head coverings at mass. That said, feminists are curiously quiet about the burka, sharia law and other issues affecting Muslim women. 

Ah that old saw. It's the fault of the feminists, because they haven't managed to overthrow the patriarchy, despite the reptiles at the lizard Oz routinely publishing on the front page leading thoughts by leading feminists ...

There has been, and no doubt will continue to be, ongoing and often noisy debate about the burka, sharia law and issues affecting Muslim women, not least by Muslim women, though their attempts in countries like Saudi Arabia - beloved ally of George B. Bush and with heaps of oil - are frequently stymied by the gang of chauvinists running the country ...

What gets the pond is the way ratbag right wingers like Abbott and the reptiles can suddenly pose as being deeply concerned about women and the rights of women and take on a feminist air at the failings of feminists to be truly feminist ...

When we know their real form ...

Yes there's a real fucking feminist going about his fucking feminist business furthering the fucking business of fucking feminists  ...

Some time ago Marieke Hardy had a few words to say about all this, and it strangely involved the burka:

As a downtrodden, continuously oppressed woman of a certain age I am always grateful when stronger, more eloquent masculine types sweep in to fight battles on my behalf... Perhaps some of you were unaware of the Reverend Fred Nile's unfailing commitment to feminism and the rights of the fairer sex, writing him off as a homophobic, poisonous stiff better suited to making a red-faced ass of himself on Mardi Gras before a crowd of bemused homosexualists. Shame on you, you small-minded, judgemental curs. Why, only last week Nile revealed his latest arresting and forward-thinking hobby - campaigning tirelessly to rid the streets of the burka, claiming loudly that it "oppresses women" and that we delicate types deserve better. Couldn't you just eat him up with a spoon? 
"The wearing of the burka is a form of oppression which has no place in the 21st century," Nile said manfully, possibly dressed in a posing pouch and simultaneously punching a crocodile in the snout. He added that concealment of a person's face - male or female - for any purpose, including discrimination against women, should be banned. 
Oh sure, he also mumbled about various other reasons like "terrorism and anarchism" and implied rather heavily that hidden beneath most Muslim robes is a bloodthirsty towelhead with a lust for revenge, but at the heart of his argument - surely - is a love for all things femme. A fearmongering bigot? Nile? Why, some of his best friends are suicide bombers. He just wants our Allah-worshipping sisters to strut their empowered stuff. Presumably while he shrieks "YOU GO GIRL!" and snaps his fingers encouragingly from the sidelines.
Tony Abbott, too, is a man who loves nothing more than assisting beleaguered damsels. If there's a distressed hymen somewhere out there in the country I'm fairly certain some kind of pubis-related bat signal is sent skywards causing him to slide down a pole and get into his Vagina Mobile and zoom into Gotham City to save the day. (and the rest here)

Hardy didn't mention the strutting, posing righteous feminist Murdoch press, but she'll no doubt be relieved to know that Abbott has intervened, and is now trying to run the parliamentary building with the same confusion and chaos with which he's running the country ... while hanging the presiding officer and Bronnie out to dry.

Uh huh. So it's all Bronnie's fault, is it?

So what about Peta Credlin?

Uh huh. If you were inclined to paranoid conspiracy theories, and had read Peta Credlin backs burqa ban in Federal Parliament, you'd see Abbott's office at the centre of this little storm ...

Meanwhile, what a lovely distraction it's been as the real business of ruining the country goes on ... remind us, Mr. Rowe ...

(Below: and more Rowe here. By golly, he's caught the likeness and he's got him dressed in just the right gear)

But before the pond heads off to the weekend, what else have the reptiles got to offer?

You know, something innovative and different and really insightful and useful and no doubt able to provide a weekend of deep thinking ...

Oh for fuck's sake, always the same shit, day in day out and now, if the pond provides a link, always leading to a begging letter from the paupers of the press.

Well bugger that for a joke.

The blinkered reptiles will never change their spots, or their scales, and they'll never bloody learn as they continue their slide into irrelevance ...

Meanwhile, there are serious questions being asked, but as usual, while the reptiles and Abbott do comedy, it's the comedians who do genuine insights and insightful discussions of serious issues.

Yes Virginia, in the real world, there are matters of life and death being discussed, and though it's now a few days old, here's hoping everyone has John Oliver in their calendar, and have checked out his bit on drones at YouTube here.

Now there's a cat who won't be herded and who makes the Murdochians look as medieval as their mindless master dog whistling up his burqa mayhem ...

For lovers of the abuse of language, this one was a beauty:

In which the pond flees the deep north only to be confronted by the deep big Mal and the even deeper budgie smuggler ...

So the Currish Snail is at it again, substituting Photoshop for insight and political analysis.

Is there something in the water in the deep north? Well it can't be the fluoride polluting the precious bodily fluids ...

Are they in a fierce war to become the worst tabloid in Australia, even worse than the Daily Terror or the NT Nausea? So where's the croc in the Photoshop?

Every day the pond contemplates the level of political commentary, and its presentation, in the Murdoch tabloids, and it feels like being swept back in a time warp:

When you read the actual story, if anyone can be bothered, and lordy it's a big bother, there's actually nothing of substance:

It's an easy smear, with the header saying it all, Outlaw bikies aiming to ride with Clive Palmer's Senate inquiry into the Newman Government.

Talk to a few bikies and never mind what the actual inquiry might achieve and whether it will even land, and then come up with this simple storyline:

Both Mr Palmer and Senator Lazarus have emerged as heroes of the violent motorcycle gangs that police have spent years battling to bring under control, with bikies thanking Mr Palmer for his honest, accountable approach.

It's an easy enough tactic:

Both Mr Palmer and Senator Lazarus have emerged as heroes of Hitler and the violent SS gang that the Weimar republic police have spent years battling to bring under control ...

Now the pond has always thought of Palmer as a buffoon, but he's a cunning buffoon, and only mad north by north west, and he once worked for Joh Bjelke-Petersen, and that strutting bantam Campbell Newman is a direct descendant, in word and deed and legislative action of Joh, and where oh where were the media in this long and sorry history?

Why being fed like the chooks they were and are, and Greg Stolz wins the 'chook of the week' award for this shameless beat up ...

And it wasn't without fierce competition within the Currish Snail.

An honourable mention has to go to wretched, hapless Renee Viellaris, for faithfully reproducing Erica's bizarre predictions in Senator Eric Abetz says Senate inquiry into Newman Government will hurt economy.

Now it's to be expected that Erica would make wild-eyed accusations, verging on paranoid hysteria, but the real skill is to present the rhetoric with a straight face:

“If this deal ... sticks, then PUP has actually delivered a cruel blow to future economic growth and job creation in Australia,” Senator Abetz said. 
 “(Opposition Leader) Bill Shorten needs to either reverse Labor’s decision to support the outrageous and unconstitutional inquiry into the Queensland Government or explain to the 70,000 unemployed Australians who will have their prospects of employment trashed by this grubby deal why Labor has deserted them. 
 “The deal will also wipe out more than $160 billion of cumulative real GDP revenue gains (out to 2025) from the states and territories.”

Yes, yes, and the sky will fall down, and Chicken Little will be crushed by the falling clouds.

Well played Renee, and wear your "junior headless chook of the week" award with pride.

It just goes to show the dangers of holding inquiries. 

Does this explain why Australia is stuffed?

The pond enjoyed Bernard Keane's analysis of the sordid inquiry fever in Crikey, Should Labor have backed Clive's War on Campbell? (paywall affected):

What revenge, one wonders, is the Coalition plotting against Labor for its support for Clive Palmer’s war on Campbell Newman — oops, sorry, the inquiry into Certain Aspects of Queensland Government Administration? 
Launch a couple of partisan royal commissions, perhaps? Try to humiliate the former prime minister, Julia Gillard, by dragging her into the witness box to answer vague and unsubstantiated allegations of wrongdoing 20 years ago? Conduct yet another inquiry into the Home Insulation Program after the multiple inquiries that have already been conducted? 
Maybe they could get Trevor Morling to have another crack at Centenary House.

Uh huh, and meanwhile the pond understands that these assorted inquiries have wiped billions off the real GDP revenue gains, and will cost at least 70,000 jobs, and that's before we even begin to contemplate the sums pissed against the wall on lawyers ...

Inter alia, Keane concluded that Labor should play at the level of the Abbott government:

As Crikey explained a few years ago (more Keane - paywall affected), game theory suggests the only sensible approach by Labor is to match the Coalition, low blow for low blow. Continuing to play within the rules as though you have a cooperative opponent is a mug’s game when they refuse to adhere to the rules that benefit both of you. The only way to force an opponent to return to mutually beneficial rules is to punish them for breaking them.

There's one problem with this - nobody's managed to find Bill Shorten's actual genuine certified spine - but a bigger problem is whether the Murdoch media needs to get down on the side of one of the gutter players, with Photoshopped nonsense, and an infinite capacity to sound like a mindless parrot reciting - or is that regurgitating like an owl with a pellet? - the nonsense spouted by the Ericas of the world ...

The end result is that the Currish Snail currently looks like a propaganda rag of the lowest Mad magazine ratbag kind, a throwback to the Joh era ... and isn't there enough of that already doing the rounds?

Oh dear. Why does he always open his mouth like a catfish?

Meanwhile, that hopeless futtock, Malcolm Turnbull, destroyer of community television, and wrecker of genuine broadband in Australia, has found himself in yet another pickle.

It was the reptiles that set the hare loose in Federal cabinet considers plan to split up and sell off NBN - sorry no link, that would lead to a begging letter from the paupers of the press - by revealing what everyone has known for a long time ...

The planned fate for the full to overflowing intertubes is to sell off the pipes and make it the private sector's problem and haven't Telstra and Optus done so wonderfully well over the years ...

Oh just choke on the irony.

Why is it an own goal for the fatuous eastern suburbs fop?

A newly released, Coalition-commissioned analysis recommends that NBN Co be split up and its transit, satellite and fixed-wireless network — along with the obligation to subsidise unprofitable bush areas — sold off.

Yep, they commissioned the report, and now they're running helter skelter ... and then the pompous prat put his foot in it by flying a verbal kite:

“Disaggregation of NBN Co’s business units after the network is complete cannot be ruled out,” Mr Turnbull said. He added a warning that breaking up NBN Co at this time would distract its management and delay the provision of high-speed broadband to all ­Australians.

But nobody paid attention to the warning, and everybody picked up on the disaggregation angle, hardly surprising given the way Medibank private is going ...

So now the foolish fop has to run around explaining that he didn't want to distract the management, in the process doing as fine a bit of distracting business as could be imagined ...

How stupid does it get?

The report said splitting up NBN Co would reduce financial risks to taxpayers and improve the chance of an efficient and timely network rollout. 
“It would prevent assets consumers have paid for (including the copper in HFC areas) from being prematurely scrapped, instead harnessing those assets for the benefit of end users,” it said. 
If parts of the NBN were ­divested, it would be possible for Telstra or Optus to step in as buyers and compete on an infrastructure level with NBN Co.

Oi vey (that's for any stray Dover Heights or St Kilda east reader), they're still going on about the joys of copper, because HFC is useless?

Well they're both bloody useless in Camperdown ...

But what really got the pond going was the sort of accompanying rhetorical nonsense, about trusting the government to ensure a level playing field:

The report recommends any potential buyers of NBN Co’s ­assets be subject to stringent regulatory imposts, including the structural separation of the retail and wholesale arms to prevent new owners from favouring their own operations. 
Should the government reject the breakup of the NBN’s networks, the report said the company should be subject to greater and more onerous regulation to promote infrastructure-based competition. 
In line with the recently released Harper review of competition policy, the Vertigan panel recommended replacing the competition regulator with a newly created industry regulator to oversee the pricing of access to telecommunications networks.

Stringent regulatory imposts?

Like the ones in the delivery of electricity and gas?

Trust big Mal to sort it out?

He couldn't organise a crowd sourced chook raffle using Skype ... what with the way the connection keeps dropping out ...

In all of this, one of the key underlying problems is the subsidy to the bush, delivered to the agrarian socialists by the Labor party - god knows why, there were no political gains in it for them - which now torments the hard-headed economic rationalists ...

Meanwhile, almost on a daily basis, big Mal manages to outrage the pond, which is a pretty big achievement seeing, as a blog, it's the duty of the pond to match the Murdochians in excessive daily outrage and paranoid hysteria ...

Here's big Mal in The Conversation's Turnbull leaves door open to break up NBN Co, (no begging reptile letter at end of link), talking about the same report:

“Breaking up NBN Co would distract its management and delay the provision of high-speed broadband to all Australians,” Mr Turnbull said in a statement.

Stop right there. Just stop it, you wanker. Cease and desist. Or go blind, for all the pond cares ...

You see, we have our "high-speed" network already. It's the HFC draped off the power poles that big Mal has deemed to be good enough for the rest of the pond's life. And it's aging, useless, and wretched ...

So what's proposed will happen to that?

The panel also recommended the hybrid fibre-coaxial (HFC) network, crucial to the Abbott government’s multi-technology mix NBN plan, be owned and managed by an organisation other than NBN Co.

It's crucial? It's already owned by Optus (and Telstra). And it's singly and jointly useless.

So where's the fucking life support?

Finally the pond is disturbed to notice that Tony Abbott is disturbed.

It wasn't so long ago that he confessed to feeling threatened by gays and now he's threatened by clothes ...

Of course the pond is routinely threatened by anyone wearing religious insignia ... that's the lot of secular humanists consigned to hell by every crazed true believer of whatever faith is in the vicinity (you can imagine the shock the pond experienced to hear that US evangelicals deemed Jimmy Carter a secular humanist).

The way the pond gets around its fear of penguins is to count them ... within the space of a week the pond has sighted at least five penguins, in full regalia and as bold as brass. Perhaps it's something about the new Pope that has brought on this shameless ostentatious wearing of the cloth ...

All that said and done, what good did Tony Abbott think he was doing by confessing he's confronted by a form of attire?

As with others, the pond finds the sight of Tony Abbott - especially in his budgie smugglers, which pose a threat to national security - confronting, and, especially in the matter of the budgie smugglers, threatening ....

But the pond lives with it.

What's the real point of the god whistling and giving comfort to fundamentalists like Cory Bernardi and George Christensen and Peta Credlin and Jacqui Lambi?

Well it's to stir the pot along, and maintain the fear and keep the discussion in the safe turf of clothing, rather than contemplate real issues, such as domestic violence.

Yes right at the moment people are routinely dying at the hands of others in domestic settings, and all Abbott can talk about is feeling confronted and having anxiety attacks about the security system at cowards' castle.

It got to the point where the Fairfaxians felt the need to point out the differences in the confronting clothing, so Abbott could be confronted in knowledge rather than in abject ignorance (Tony Abbott expresses support for parliamentary burqa ban, but colleagues do not, forced video at end of link).

And so the country is reduced to a discussion of clothing choice, while Abbott goes about the business of waging an uncertain war with uncertain outcomes on pensioners and the budget ... oh that's right, and in the middle east too ...

Just don't expect any of that to turn up Photoshopped on a Murdoch tabloid near you anytime soon ...

Take it away, Tandberg and Rowe, and more Rowe here.

Tabloid terror, will it never end ...

The pond was wondering when there'd be payback for the series of shameless political inquiries and witch hunts launched by the Abbott government  as soon as it got into power.

That they were politically motivated became clear when Abbott and company decided to hang the union movement out to dry, but decided that the outrageous behaviour of Commonwealth Bank employees could remain in a dark, dank cupboard ... not to mention sundry other bits of behaviour at the big end of town well worth a Royal Commission ...

Well payback's a bitch, and it couldn't happen to a nicer feller ...

Campbell Newman himself hasn't been adverse to politicising and gaming the system - as with the reptiles celebrating Campbell Newman strikes back at Clive Palmer in court (yes, you even get the begging letter of doom on news stories, so no link to these paupers of the press).

That was about a defamation action launched by Palmer, which saw Newman launch this wonderful legalese:

Mr Newman’s document states that the public has a right to information “that might lead them to ask questions” and “be better informed about the means by which a party” Mr Palmer founded was “securing the allegiance of persons elected to representative bodies”. 
His Supreme Court reply to Mr Palmer’s defamation proceedings states that his remarks about the tycoon were reasonable and would assist the public in trying to determine how “Mr Palmer in his capacity as a businessman sought to influence government decision-making in relation to his business interests”. (you know how to google if you want the source)

Well indeed, and no doubt the PUPsters are busy stating that the public has a right to information that might lead them to ask questions about the follies of Campbell Newman, ranging from his shameless deep north desire to imitate Arizona in the matter of prison gear to his government's maltreatment of the environment, most notably the GBR, to his ongoing frolics with appointments to Queensland's legal system.

Yep, payback's a bitch, and what do you know, there was the great big internet filter man pointing out the hypocrisy of protesting political inquiries as the best excuse ever for another politicised inquiry.

Yep, paybacks a bitch, but how much more righteous and justifiably indignant Abbott and company could have sounded if they hadn't erected the model and set it running ... to the cheers and the plaudits of the festering, rabid reptiles ...

As for the Currish Wail and its photoshopped front page, it's clear that the honourable tradition of demeaning journalism remains strong in the deep Murdochian north.

It's as if the rag wanted to show it was an ideological rag, because you'd be hard pressed finding a similar sort of monkey business cover aimed at Tony Abbott and gang's set of political inquiries.

Unprecedented politically motivated inquiry?

What shower did they come down in?

It's a totally precedented politically motivated inquiry, and it couldn't happen to a nicer feller ...

Naturally the reptiles at the lizard Oz were front and centre with outraged indignation, and who better to lead the way than the bouffant one?

(sorry, no link because that would lead directly to a begging, pleading subscription demand from the paupers of the press)

Oh go shed crocodile tears about Abbott's attempt to destroy for all time a woman who wasn't even in power when he mounted his belated assault ... an assault on a woman to prove he wasn't really a misogynist ... now there's an irony.

As for Clive Palmer wanting to destroy Campbell Newman, does it get any funnier coming from a rag which has attempted for years, and routinely demonstrated its priority was, courtesy Hedley Thomas, to attack and destroy Clive Palmer. And slow work they've made of it ... because there the gadfly still is, prancing about ...

Meanwhile, as the Currish Snail continues its valiant attempts to reduce Australian journalism to the level of Mad magazine ...

... yep, and the graphic art is still at the same mindless, clichéd level. And while speaking of monkeys, there might be a few who remember these:

Talk of click bait - head off to The Shocking True Tale Of The Mad Genius Who Invented Sea-Monkeys to be shocked ...

Meanwhile, as the pond joins the Currish Snail in a valiant attempt to reduce Australian journalism to childishness, as sure as clockwork, and with a few scientists daring to point out that things might not be altogether well with the climate, what's the response of the feral reptiles at the Oz?

Uh huh. Global warming might be a problem, but it's not a real problem, and climate science isn't a problem at all because it's all in the fevered brain of the Bureau of Meteorology ...

No links, because why waste another nanosecond of life on climate denialists while being assaulted by a begging 'please subscribe' missive from the paupers of the press ...

It's just a matter of going cold turkey, and it's amazingly easy. The pond scored four tree killer papers from the airport yesterday - the AFR, The Age, the HUN and the Oz and was through them like a dose of Epsom Salts in a half hour ...

Meanwhile, as the reptiles at the lizard Oz indulge in yet another valiant attempt to reduce Australian journalism to scientific ludditism - next up, expert scientist Maurice Newman on the flaws in the theory of evolution - a few journalists have slowly begun to wake up to the implications of the national security act wending its way through parliament.

Too late.

You won't find the reptiles getting agitated - they're too busy lazing on the hot rock in the sun with denialists like Newman - but a few have worked out that if they reported a decent story on Australian security, they might be off to the clink for years.

That's the sort of style of an Egyptian government, and Suelette Dreyfus gets agitated in The Graudian with The Coalition's national security laws herald a new era in the Australian security state. There was plenty of other coverage too, such as Paul Farrell's National security laws 'strike at the heart of press freedom'.

But the reptiles lie doggo, more concerned about 18C, and the right to defame anyone within earshot, and the right of the holy crusaders to carry on their sundry jihads.

Yes, wouldn't you know it, instead of getting agitated about this dangerous threat to press freedom, there's Greg "bromance" Sheridan getting agitated about the ABC:

Oh for fuck's sake, there's the federal government stealing the rights of the hen house to report on serious matters, in lieu of jail time, and perhaps in Newman preferred pink, and there's Sheridan getting his knickers in a knot about a couple of fuckwitted Murdoch tabloid chooks getting caught out by the ABC.

No link to Sheridan - you'd only cop a begging note from the paupers of the press, and anyway, you can read the fuckwitted chooks attempting their own defence in The Daily Telegraph responds to Media Watch's latest attack.

Lordy lordy these chooks are worth the cover of a Mad magazine. Their first feint?

A Daily Telegraph spokesman said: “Once again the ABC is desperately struggling to find a stick to beat The Daily Telegraph while the ABC’s fellow travellers at Fairfax are responsible for an error that has seriously affected a young man’s life. It will be interesting to see how much of the program tonight that matter commands.”

Ah a pre-emptive fatuous strike designed to evoke the depths of fatuity the chooks can reach.

Fellow travellers? Is that Mao speak from the 1950s, you silly kool aid drinkers you ...

You see, it's not just about Fairfax fucking up. It's about the tabloid hysteria of the Murdochian jihadists fearing mongering in a foaming fit of distorted front page paranoia ... day after tedious bloody day, cranking up the Islamophobia.

How fudgy do the chooks get?

The Daily Telegraph stands by its prison riot story — which was gathered and updated as events unfolded.

This is code for getting the facts wrong on an updated basis. You see, it wasn't as the event unfolded, that was done and dusted, it was as the Terror tried to work out how to maximise its jihad, as its jihad unfolded, altering the 'facts' as it went along.

For sheer hokum, you can't do better than this closing line:

The Sunday Telegraph front page did inadvertently imply there were inmate ‘sweepers’ in Goulburn Supermax, but it stands by its report that ‘sweepers’ do exist in other NSW prisons.

Stupid headless chooks. The entire point of the story was how it related to Goulburn ... but like most bullies they can't take a deserved licking ...

You see talk of Fairfax fucking up - and the pond talked more than enough about that - is no excuse for the Terror being a disgrace to journalism ...

Truly, looking at the state of the Murdoch press, you might wonder why anybody would worry about freedom of the press, unless that's the freedom to be fuckwitted headless chooks ...

But it does matter all the same, because there are consequences ...

The evil within?

Well George Morgan has his own interpretation of the evil, as you can discover by reading Islamophobia feeds on our fear of an evil within, but for the pond, the Murdoch tabloids will do as exemplary examples of the evil within:

The wider function of the whole operation was to legitimise both the decision to send troops back to Iraq and to sell the counter- terrorist laws by which ASIO will be allowed to break in to your personal computer and meddle with its contents even if you haven't been involved in criminal acts. The intense circumstances of a moral panic are required to overcome the political misgivings about such attacks on freedom. So the press conference, in the wake of the police raids, assembled the full misere: Prime Minister, NSW Premier and heads of both NSW and Federal Police, each singing from the same portentous songbook: extraordinary attacks were planned and extraordinary measures were required. 
Despite subsequent attempts at multicultural reassurance – politicians calling on the public to respect the rights of Australians from Middle Eastern backgrounds – the dog whistle has well and truly been sounded. The knee-jerk Islamophobes, like Cory Bernardi and Jackie Lambie – gave voice to their prejudices. Pictures appeared in social media of racist slogans spray painted on the property of Muslim Australians, and there were reports of strangers pulling headscarfs from women's heads in public places. When a man walked into an Islamic school wielding a knife no news outlet reported this as a potential act of terror. It is worth remembering that the most shocking massacre of recent times in the west was committed by an Islamophobe, Anders Breivik in Norway, who considered himself to be a soldier in a global war.

And the Terror did its very best to feed the frenzy.

But what will be the end result, as the new security laws wend their way through parliament, and the enormous capacity of government to legally intrude on private lives is set in stone?

No doubt some journalist doing their job will end up in the clink, doing a Peter Greste down under ..

The odds it will be a Murdoch journalist?

Small ... the quislings know the benefits of fellow travelling ...

By golly, after that rant, the pond needs a Bex and a lie down, or better still, a little human flesh and a Steve Bell cartoon.

It's been a long time since the pond has paid homage to Bell, and more Bell here.

Don't feel threatened. We have our dinkum zombies down under, and they're as good as any Pommy political zombie ... and if you subscribe to a Murdoch rag, you can join the zombie army ...

Just remember, say no to guns ...