In which prattling Polonius washes hands, and bathes the feet of the Pellists, and the pond turns to the church of Python ...

Ah, it's the good old "fail to prove" defence, and it's all the fault of the media ...

Well it wouldn't be a proper weekend without examination of the output of the Catholic Boys' Daily and above all the thoughts of its very own prattling Polonius, this time prattling on behalf of the Pellists, because that's what Polonius does best ...

Of course Polonius is just the latest in a conga line of Murdochians keen to keep the whore of Babylon in good shape ...the HUNsters were also at it (no prizes for guessing who the prattler's bolting to keep up with) ...

But while Polonius is late on the scene, surely he is never wrong ...

Yes, wickedness everywhere in the media, the innocent tarnished, and yet they have the very best defence of all ...

Oh sorry, how did that get in? Wrong religion, wrong log line. It should have been "sees no problem, hears no concerns, speaks fluent Vatican."

Never mind, it's back to the prattler smoting mightily all those fiends who dare to work outside the reptile bunker and who refuse their daily sip of the kool aid ...

Hmm, there's a hint of nervousness developing in Polonius, what with the need to revert to 2006 and the talk of the fallibility of memory ... and never mind that the pond, with its very fallible memory, has a very clear and unaltered recollection of certain potent events in its childhood ... yes, the pond can still recall a number of physical assaults by nuns as if they happened a moment ago, so unfair and vicious did they seem at the time ... and yet they were nothing, these sears in the memory, compared to what some unfortunate children suffered at the hands of upstanding clerics, defended, sheltered, and moved around from place to place in a morbid avoiding the issue dance ...

But setting aside any saucy doubts and fears, or the very notion that the Pellists might have shown more compassion and concern for their children in their care - ruined molested lives the result - this is where Polonius delivers his master stroke.

You see, if the Victorian police did nothing, what could the church and its leaders possibly do? Well if the onion muncher can call on the good Samaritan yarn as a role model for him, then surely it's only fair for Polonius to adopt the Pilate gambit ...

Now, having washed the paws, let us see how Polonius bathes and washes the feet of the Pellists ...

You see, the Victorian police did nothing?!

So what on earth could honourable, decent thoroughly Christian Catholics do in the circumstances? 

Act as if they were Christian and had a moral conscience? Deplore the indecency and the assaults and vigorously act on the matters drawn to their attention, punish the villains, cast them out, and  compensate, sooth and heal the victims?

What impossible thoughts are these ...

Better to throw up a wall of obfuscations and indifference, blame the victims, offer denials, deploy legalisms, haul in a bank of lawyers funded by a tithing church, and trot out any half-baked excuse by way of refusing to admit what happened, such that only a Royal Commission would reveal the true and astonishing depths of the sordidness and depravity ...

Well at least it explains why the pond only follows one true church, the church of the Python ...

... even if it earns Pilate's and prattling Polonius's stern disapproval ...

In which the pond starts with the bromancer's 'crisis for our civilisation' and ends up with a free taco at Taco Bell ...

Well there's an easy troll to ignore.

The very last thing anybody needs to do is read, or even worse, pay for the pleasure of reading a parochial dog botherer having yet another tedious go at the ABC...

But that bromancer "crisis for our civilisation" is such a splendid hook. Who could possibly have helped produce such a bromancer headline?

It reminded the pond of the latest conspiracy theory it's heard that's doing the rounds.

The GOP gets the Donald into power, then arranges for his assassination - apparently Ted Cruze's dad is still available for the job - and then they blame the killing on left liberal elites and so a hard right fundamentalist Christian crazy gets the top job but he presents well, as he ruins the United States - and ends any notion that it's still a home for liberals and democracy - and Ted Cruze is drafted in as the new VP and all's well ...

A fundamentalist Christian theocracy is born and the great crusade about the Islamics begins as a prelude to the rapture ...

Faced with those high hopes, we'd be mad not to unify ....

Oh right ... it's madness day at reptile central ...

        

Poor Mark Day ... never the first clue ... and him such a faithful and loyal lickspittle to the formerly twittering chairman ...

But actually it's panic in bromancer country day, and the bizarre and bitter presidential campaign has left the bromancer bewildered and confused ...

Yes, the bromancer's sublime response to the global crisis in western civilisation is to endorse Trump's analysis of the US situation, though with the rider that some of his remedies might be a tad suspect.

Even as the four horsepersons of the apocalypse gather for the final ride, the bromancer feels the need to pander to the "legitimate grievance" industry, as opposed to spending the time telling the whiners and the moaners to harden the fuck up, in the way that liberals are supposed to harden up ...

The pond lives and breathes for irony, and whenever the bromancer hits the keyboard, the pond goes into irony overload ...

Back before he fell into twitter silence, the chairman was calling the troops home ...

And so to the bromancer sharing the grievances ...

Oh sheesh, more blather from a comfortably well off journalist, published from a bunker in inner city Surry Hills, working for the man and mentioning "elites" in every second line.

It's about this time that the pond goes into irony overload ... and yet there's way more to come ...

So it's back with the 'cooling it' bromancer ... who needs to close ranks and learn to fight the real enemy. Perhaps that is best done by drawing false equivalences ... and more railing against the 'leets ...

Actually the question that's never asked by the reptiles is this: is it better to get your information and cultural values from Fox News, or is it better to have none at all?

As for Vegas, the pond has been there a number of times, even got hitched in the joint, but for fuck's sake, how stupid can the bromancer manage to sound?

Even your average dumb fuck recognises that there's Vegas, there's Hollywood, and if you get a hangover in Vegas, it stays there with the boxer and the tiger, and people can chew all kinds of cultural gum and still walk away with a shred of intelligence and a deep pleasure in what New York has to offer ...

Yes, there's a larger sense in which the bromancer's column represents civilisational failure. It's the complete incapacity to recognise pluralities and the pleasures in difference.

It's riddled with false equivalences, and it honours the culture of grievances, in its own way, with its blather about elites and the failures of allies (if only Australia had failed George W.), as if the rhetoric of Republicans, amplified by Chairman Rupert - for whom the bromancer is a lickspittle lackey - didn't have something to do with the flames ...

I mean, fuck, somehow if you're a liberal, you can't enjoy a night in Vegas watching rampant atheist libertarian Trump show loon Penn doing magic tricks with Teller?

As usual, the pond has to turn to a refreshing cartoon for a proper insight ...

That's better and more papal wisdom here - no doubt it was wise and proper for Pope not to scribble Sean Hannity's name on that petrol bomb - and now it's back to the bromancer for a final gobbet ...

Somehow it's all the fault of liberals?

As opposed to the likes of Paul Ryan and reptile in chief and Ted "his dad killed JFK" Cruze lining up behind the Donald?

Well if you're like the bromancer - so befuddled by Catholicism that his best bro is an onion muncher - if you start from there, you'll never get to here from there ...

Somewhere in that litany of grievances it's possible to get the sense that the bromancer might favour Clinton winning, but the pond came away with "Trump has a point" and "Trump has ... policy themes that have won enormous support" ... and each "embodies a legitimate US grievance" ... and better still, Trump doesn't bother offering judicial impartiality ...

The bromancer is so locked down in the fog of bigotry and prejudice and LGBTQI jokes that he doesn't have the first clue about how he and his US kissing cousin reptiles have facilitated and enabled the rise of a perpetual bankrupt to the status of POTUS candidate ...A Trump Tower Goes Bust in Canada ...

Never mind, the chairman and his former buddy Roger, and the FBI-informed Giuliani and before his bridge troubles laid him low, the burger-carrying Christie have wrought their magic ...

And now all the bromancer can scribble is that Trump has a point? And if he loses, we might all need a musket? Which isn't a gun ...

What a prime, irony-laden futtock and lover of onion munchers he is.

Still, there's always an upside, as the bromancer himself notes, and it's great for anyone with liberal inclinations. There's been a boom in comedy styling exports to the world ... and it can only get better if it gets entirely worse ...

The Chairman and his faithful Fox minions have helped lay America low ... and now we all get to live with the mess ...

In which the pond enjoys the onion muncher on the move as the Crowe flies ...

The reptiles have a problem, and any problem the reptiles have is also a problem for the pond ...

There's no point asking tricky questions like "why?" because it is what it is and it will be what it will be ... an ongoing part of the onion muncher's legacy. This legacy must be stepped around gingerly, and with due and proper focus on the enemy.

David Crowe's effort early this way was exemplary in this way, spending an inordinate amount of time on an irrelevance, namely former Chairman Rudd ...

It's tremendously well played though it could all have been put in a Fairfax cartoon ...

And up to the break, with its valiant defence of onion muncher policies, it entirely ignored the real elephant in the room, still strutting about in the actual political game being played by those who have some ongoing relevance ...

It's that noble bird, the former cock o' the walk rooster chairman who refused to accept his status as a feather duster, and instead has turned himself into a human headline dynamo ...

Yes, it's former Chairman, onion muncher in chief, and PM in waiting, a legend at least in his own lunchtime, and an exemplary generator of an unseemly amount of headlines on wide-ranging international tours as befits a senior statesman and fearless leader ...

Note how, having been so fearless in despatching the former Chairman Rudd to the boundary like a Cub home run, the Crowe gingerly, on tippy toe, eventually gets around to murmuring a few thoughts about the onion muncher ...

Splendid stuff, and that mention of lifelong socialist George Orwell always brings a round of applause at the pond.

Now for those who blinked at the wrong time, and missed the bit about the onion muncher - worrying about Gough Orwell matters, perhaps - you need to go back and read the last four pars, wherein the onion muncher is given a terribly polite warning about "virtue".

It's a bit like warning Godzilla or King Kong of the dangers of too much stomping on the ground.

The onion muncher is in full campaign mode, with substitute fielder (surrogate for Americans) Catherine McGregor as his Chris Christie, always willing to carry the drinks and the burgers.

The pond dares to think that if it bunged on a barbie and enough possums turned up, the onion muncher might be persuaded to make a speech...

Look how he turns up anywhere to make a speech or three ...

Tony Abbott as the pond probably doesn't know him? What, as a fundamentalist tyke of the usual bigoted kind? If the pond might cut to the chase ...

Delusional, Tennysonian, and a smile more persuasive than a frown?

After the wave of nausea had passed, the pond remembered another little story which had been flung out by Crikey as part of its plan to attract passers-by ...

The good Samaritan! Sweet long absent Jesus ...

And with that onion munching hypocrisy under the belt, it was time to turn the gaze to the US election and marvel at recent events ... celebrated by this Huff Post front page ...

It's already gone into the digital void, but in turn set the pond up for this Rowe cartoon, and more most excellent Rowe here ...

In which the pond breathes a little of Dame Groan's air and comes away with a coughing and spluttering fit ...

The pond only started with a tweet because it knows how much the twitterati and social media and all that newfangled stuff really, truly irritates the reptiles ...

In the usual way, the pond would have started with the beguiling Dame Groan splash, and its poignant juxtaposition to a story about saving the reef ...

Now these days, some of the reptiles - not all - tiptoe around their past denialism, the obfuscations of Liberal policies which set in motion both at a federal and Victorian state level the predictable outcome for a tired, dirty, useless old power station ...the sorry story has generated a long wiki posting at a wiki here, no doubt frequented by Greg Hunt in walri-hunting mode, which leads off by noting that the station was listed as the least efficient power station in the OECD in a WWF 2005 report...

Plans should have been put in place long ago to replace the plant with a reliable and more emissions friendly modern plant, but that's the peculiar place you get to, when signing agreements in Paris while doing the ostrich routine at home ...

And there's the first really big whopper. Hazelwood began being built in 1964, and has had various fixes applied over the years since ...but it's been on its last legs for years and anyone with half a brain would know that spending another $400 million on fix-ups on a brown coal polluting monstrosity would be sending good money after bad.

The reptiles reached the dire point of quoting an actual CFMEU official in a 28th October 2016 story about the then likely closure ...

Well yes, it's bit like the electricals on the pond's old Neeesun ...when you've got to tear the car apart to fix it, you have to be a dedicated cultist to bother.

In the short second gobbet, Dame Slap begins to get a glimmer of what should have happened ... but first there's the usual tedious RET carry-on, of the Jolly Joe, onion munching kind ...

The real tragedy is that the reptiles encouraged their political overlords to imagine that they could just cruise along and not make preparations for changing needs in a timely and efficient fashion ... because climate denialism  ... and  because climate science a UN conspiracy aimed at establishing a world government.

The real tragedy is that the reptiles and their political pawns saw no reason to follow an obvious path to a lower emission electricity system until the obvious happened, and then suddenly Dame Groan has the cheek to talk about deeply flawed policy ...

The barking mad reptiles are complicit in all this, and as usual, it's a cartoonist that provides a succinct explanation in a way Dame Groan could never manage (and more papal infallibility here).

And so to the piquant juxtaposition of that reef story. Now it occurred to the pond that stories about the reef dying, or dead, have been rampant of late ... google the words and there's a flood of stories ...

So this piece in the reptile rag is just one in a long list of stories, and a defensive one at that, as Queensland and the tourist industry begin to reel from the endless bad news ...

Right there, from the get go, the delusionalism kicks in. 

What is this talk of "big, bold and urgent" actions? 

The pond just came off reading Dame Groan carrying on like a prime pork chop, mourning the death of a dirty brown coal power station, because ... climate change ... because that's a shot in the foot, rather than a step in the right direction ... if appropriate planning had been put in place by the likes of the onion muncher, jolly Joe and the Victorian state Liberal government which didn't want to know about alternative energy plans so long as brown coal could keep polluting away ...

Sorry, but the pond has given up. Too much reading of the reptiles has led to a profound sense of futility. 

Are these scribblers aware that the Donald, climate denialist supreme, is within a whisker of becoming president, and even if he falls short, his denialism will infest the United States for the next President's four year term, courtesy the creationist fundamentalist arm of the GOP?

Even the comments section contained a classic comment by a kool aid ingesting reptile reader ...

All is just fine?

Yes, even as the scribblers mount an urgent case, Bob the loon chips in with an indication of the reptile mindset.

All is just fine if you happen to be a barking mad reptile climate denialist, or a brown coal mourning Dame Groan, and the kool aid is double strength in the bunker's water cooler  ...

Well it's goodbye to a bit of all that ...

And these cartoons will also become redundant ...

In which the pond settles down for some quality Savva time ...

The pond was recently told an amusing anecdote about a netizen in leafy Avalon. 

He was overjoyed to have finally got the NBN, but then to his dismay, noticed he was getting slower speeds than his previous HFC connection to the world.

On complaining to the NBN - he knew a little about the world of tech - he was told he just had to wait a little while for the line to "settle down" ...

The netizen was bowled over by this tremendously helpful technical and impeccably scientific advice ...

Yes, broadband as children, marital bliss, a good night's sleep or perhaps a blue heeler, and that's why the pond thought that reptile editorial about "business as usual" was code for Malware fucking things up as usual ...

Never mind, what has the official reptile voice got to say on assorted Malware matters this day, what with Malware really having fixed the Senate as well as he fixed the broadband?

That'd be the Tony Abbott whose government fucked up the matter of Bob Day in the first place ...

It's a mark of reptile delusions that they continue to think that the onion muncher, if brought inside the tent, would toe the line, and everything would be sweetness and light, and a point of friction would be gone. 

The pond doesn't know how many times it will have to reference the scorpion and the frog, and former Chairman Rudd, and the outcome of many great other political vendettas (not least Hawke v Keating) for the reptiles to come to their rhetorical senses ...

But it helps explain why poor old Savva is in a disgruntled, savage mood this day ...

Yes, yes, perhaps it all just needs to settle down a little ...

Tragic. Fancy the government becoming the centre of stories about the government. 

And as for that illustration with the clover leaf ... why didn't they use a decent illustration or two from the recent cup?

Ah the 'leets at play ...

Oops, the 'leets took a tumble ...

Never mind, on we go, though it has to be said that the pond is shedding as many crocodile tears for Savva as it did when Sophie had to do a Chris Christie for her new Donald ... (does she go out for the burgers too?)

There's no reason to doubt the mutton Dutton?

Well that in a nutshell explains just how Malware has ended up where he is, and why Savva's handwringing makes such a piquant sight. 

But it's admirable how Savva keeps trying the fine art of distraction ... look, look, over there, over there ... but sadly, the onion muncher and his own Terrorist Chris Christie (travelling under the pseudonym McGregor) will out ...

Yes, yes, it will all settle down in due course ... but what tears there are in the meantime ...

It also gives the world a new definition of luck. The mutton Dutton and Malware are hopeless klutzes? Abbott is a ham-fisted blackmailing clown with astonishingly poor judgment? And that makes Shorten the luckiest politician in federal politics?

Don't get weird, as the aliens are wont to say ...

And now, for gluttons, but only gluttons in search of punishment, the pond must turn to 18C and the most recent reptile yammerings ... though the news is bad ...

Sexton has a lot to say - he has, after all a book to sell, but the pond would just like to present a delightful excerpt ...

Marvellous. It's puzzling that Jewish groups are worried about the freedom to speak hate speech ... and in the long term, they really have a strong interest in a revival of anti-semitic hate speech which might hurt, offend, and lead to broken bones rather than sticks and stones?

Still, Sexton came around to the correct line at the end, and no doubt will reap his reward with magnificent book sales ...

And so to Twitter, only because it irritates the reptiles so ...with this one presenting another view of the cup ...

And this one presenting a really deep riddle ...

Oh please, pick me, pick me, the pond knows the answer to that one. 

Why I support Donald Trump ... is bcause I'm an even bigger fuckwit and dickhead than he is, and lordy lordy you have to work hard to reach that sort of nirvana ... 

Now take that along to 18C and see how far you get ...