In which the reptiles take Pravda down under fully tabloid ...

Tragic.

The reptiles have finally jumped the shark and nuked the tabloid fridge, with an effort which makes the average front page of the Terror seem like a Warholian work of art … and after turning off all the folk at airport terminals looking for a free tree-killer read, they replicated the folly in the digital lizard Oz …

The poor old bouffant one was assigned the duty of writing the government's official reply to comrade Bill, with Dame Groan chipping in, glowering out at the world like some mad aunt who'd resented being dragged down from the attic.

The problem, it goes without saying, lies with the cartoon, which contains the sort of glib caricature and crude drafting that became part of the Leakian legend …

You can't begin to sound serious with that sort of obvious politicking.

It's so low rent, so naked and obvious and so misguided that the pond feared for the reptile business plan …because the ploy felt so desperate.

The pond has no time for comrade Bill, but didn't the reptiles understand anything about Robin Hood? He's meant to be a folk hero, you useless doofuses … why even our very own Rusty played the noble thief, and while it was a useless movie, at least Ridley Scott understood Robin was ostensibly the hero (why pick Rusty then?), and assigned the task of playing the villain to assorted rich barons and the Sheriff of Nottingham …

It fair ruined the start to the pond's Friday, it did, so in a petulant fit of the sulks, the pond reverted to the savvy Savva of yesterday … she was sure to be full of saucy doubts and fears, and be inclined to much brooding ...

Well yes, it was spinful, there was no actual surplus and that helps explain why the reptiles led with that wretched cartoon this day.

The pond understands that the onerous duties of Pravda down under reporters never end, but robbing the rich isn't a patch on robbing the surplus …

But enough of the budget. The pond is in ABTB, anything but the budget, mode. The poodle has left in tears, things fall apart, the centre will not hold, chaos is unleashed, and the surplus is but a butterfly dreaming …

Ah never mind the backflip and the spinning on a dime …

...speaking of climate scare campaigns, which reptile let this one through, an import from the "agencies"?

The "agencies"? Apparently they haven't swallowed the reptile kool aid, but there's a lazy acquirer of stories at the lizard Oz who's treading on dangerous climate denialist ground … there's filler, and then there's heresy ...

And in turn that reminded the pond of a disappearing Louisiana, a nicely observed story by Elizabeth Kolbert for The New Yorker, luckily outside the paywall for the moment, lengthy but actually worth the read - unlike anything the reptiles produce - and inter alia, building to this …(spoiler alert):

...McPhee included “Atchafalaya” in his book “The Control of Nature,” published in 1989. Since then, a lot has happened to complicate the meaning of “control,” not to mention “nature.” Choose just about any metric you want and it tells the same story. Through activities like farming, mining, and clear-cutting, people have directly transformed more than half the ice-free land on Earth—some twenty-seven million square miles—and we’ve indirectly altered half of what remains. As with the Mississippi, we have dammed or leveed most of the world’s major rivers. Our fertilizer plants and legume crops fix more nitrogen than all terrestrial ecosystems combined, and our planes, cars, and power stations emit about a hundred times more carbon dioxide than volcanoes. We now routinely cause earthquakes. (A particularly damaging human-induced quake that shook Pawnee, Oklahoma, on the morning of September 3, 2016, was felt all the way in Des Moines.) In terms of sheer biomass, the numbers are stark-staring: today, people outweigh wild mammals by a ratio of more than eight to one. Add in the weight of our domesticated animals—mostly cows and pigs—and that ratio climbs to twenty-three to one. “In fact,” as a recent paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences observed, “humans and livestock outweigh all vertebrates combined, with the exception of fish.” We have become the major driver of extinction and also, probably, of speciation. In the age of man, there is nowhere to go—and this includes the deepest trenches of the oceans and the middle of the Antarctic ice sheet—that does not already bear our Friday-like footprints. 
Atmospheric warming, ocean warming, ocean acidification, sea-level rise, deglaciation, desertification, eutrophication—these are just some of the byproducts of our species’ success. Such is the pace of what is blandly labelled “global change” that there are only a handful of comparable examples in Earth’s history, the most recent being the asteroid impact that ended the reign of the dinosaurs, sixty-six million years ago. Humans are producing no-analogue climates, no-analogue ecosystems, a whole no-analogue future. At this point, it might be prudent to scale back our commitments and reduce our impacts. But there are so many of us—nearly eight billion—and we are stepped in so far, return seems impracticable.  
And so we face a no-analogue predicament. If there is to be an answer to the problem of control, it’s going to be more control. Only now what’s to be managed is not a nature that exists—or is imagined to exist—apart from the human. Instead, the new effort begins with a planet remade, and spirals back on itself—not so much the control of nature as the control of (the control of) nature. A Mississippi that’s been harnessed, straightened, regularized, and shackled can still exert a godlike force; it’s no longer exactly a river, though. It’s hard to say who, these days, occupies Mt. Olympus, if anyone.

Now there's a climate scare, and funnily enough, it doesn't involve a crude cartoon about comrade Bill, it involves a disappearing Louisiana … and so to the final savvy Savva gobbet ...

Poor old reptiles … even the Kudelka of the day could afford a joke about the bake-off …

And so, reluctantly, to the official government response to comrade Bill's budget speech … as provided by the bouffant one …

Dear sweet long absent lord, that's not the tone that the pond expected from a dutiful Pravda down under scribbler. There's far too much talk of comrade Bill's archery skills, and perhaps that's why the bouffant one felt the need to cut it short. No long ramble, nattering "Ned" style from him … just do it, and get off the stage quickly, exeunt far right ...

The bottom line? There's a serious mis-match between the bouffant one and that wretched, tone-lowering cartoon, which suggests there's something wrong with the larrikin attitude to Robin Hood …

And so to a story about the reptiles' chief love, which the reptiles have been pushing for a couple of days as an EXCLUSIVE …

They never give up, these the black knights of coal … take it away lesser Kelly and cohort …

So the savvy Savva was right. They do want to mount a climate science scare campaign from their bunkers in the deep north …

By the way, hasn't Rowe been strange lately?

 

More strangeness here, because there's no chance you'll see a Rowe cartoon top of the page in the lizard Oz …

Now back to the cold, clammy coal fear ...

And so, just when loyalty, strength, staying true is required …

… what do we get, but fudging and hesitation, saucy doubts and fears, and perhaps a realisation that coal isn't such a big seller outside the deep north?

What a pretty mess, what a wicked pickle the reptiles and their love of coal has produced for the coal-ition …

It sets the tone for the Pope of the day, with more infallibility to hand here …

And in honour of Dame Slap yesterday, here's a joke for Brexiteers …

In which the pond catches up with Moorice and Barners ...

Surely, the savvy Savva is out and about today, agonising over the way the Libs can't paper over the chaos, dysfunction and instability, and the bromancer is at it again, lashing out at our national shame, those wretched late-arriving subs, and Barners is on hand to bemoan electricity prices, as if the current federal government had nothing to do with much of anything …

And yet the pond, being deeply perverse, felt the call of the day-old siren song of Moorice ...

How could the pond let pass the siren song of Moorice?

This is the one song everyone
would like to learn: the song
that is irresistible:

the song that forces men
to leap overboard in squadrons
even though they see the beached skulls

the song nobody knows
because anyone who has heard it
is dead, and the others can't remember.

Please allow the pond to leap into the company of the world's greatest climate scientist and the most eminent historian this country has produced …

Indeed, indeed. This wretched academic might think the campaign in the Dardanelles was a completely botched and bungled affair and a wretched waste of human life. It was of course a complete victory, with Johnny Turk driven back to Ankara, his tail between his legs, and the war shortened by a good few years, thanks to the strategic vision of Churchill. (And Churchill managed a second marvellous strategic outcome at the start of the second world war with his visionary work in Norway).

Okay, that's burst the bubble of that ragamuffin ersatz historian peddling fake news, and put him back in his box, and now it's time for a little more history, Moorice style …

Ah, good old Moorice. Who else could take that tired old coinage "Orwellian qualities" and make it sound as fresh as a daisy, and drag in talk of the politicisation of universities, seemingly unaware that perhaps the Ramsay centre might perhaps involve a little politicisation?

Who else could mention "Orwellian qualities" and celebrate a place called the "Australian Consensus Centre", because we can never get enough bullshit verbiage?

Who else could maintain the rage about climate science and cheer on the denialists?

Who else could love Western Civilisation the way Moorice does, with a love as deep and complete as his love for beautiful coal? 

We know what his love means. We must beware the Islamic and possibly the Mongol hordes, and turn them back lest all be lost, and the gatling jams and the red square broken.

Shall I tell you the secret
and if I do, will you get me
out of this bird suit?

I don't enjoy it here
squatting on this island
looking picturesque and mythical

with these two feathery maniacs,
I don't enjoy singing
this trio, fatal and valuable.

Actually there's only one feathery maniac, and here's his last gobbet … and it begins with a most important line ...

Captain Cook a discoverer? The pond can hear the quivering indignation of cardigan-wearing academics, wretches intent on finding meaning in the English language.

But follow the logic. Most dictionaries define a "discoverer" as the "first person to find or explore a place", and who could argue with that?

But, the pond can hear the petulant pedants wail, there were people in country who had already found and explored the place.

Clearly these pedants know nothing of history. Who could argue that Cook wasn't a discoverer?

Oh sure there might have been a few indolent pesky difficult black people hanging about in country, but everyone knows that the rule of terra nullius applied: "land that is legally deemed to be unoccupied or uninhabited".

There was no one here. Nil, nada, nothingness ...

Some say that this was overturned by Mabo, but the pond is with Moorice.

The most important feature of Western Civilisation is the ability to degrade, ignore and render invisible people of a different colour to the noble white folk who rightly rule the world … bringing wisdom and insight with traditional eighteenth century thinking - though some might think that Moorice's understanding of things possibly stopped around the time of Elizabeth I, a game of bowls and teaching the Spaniards a lesson, wot, wot, before somehow those devious continentals managed to wangle their way into Western Civilisation …

I will tell the secret to you,
to you, only to you.
Come closer. This song

is a cry for help: Help me!
Only you, only you can,
you are unique

at last. Alas
it is a boring song
but it works every time.

Fair's fair, and the pond thanks Margaret Atwood for the Siren Song that wove its way through Moorice's melody as a kind of counterpoint, but any hint that Moorice produced a boring song should be stoutly resisted, because it works every time for the readers of the lizard Oz - just look at all the newspapers littering airport lounges all over the country and left in racks, though offered for free, to see how people love their Moorice …

And now to catch up with the strange sight of a modern politician kindly sending his message behind a paywall, and thereby limiting his message to thousands rather than millions …

As with Moorice, the pond can never walk past a Barners, especially when Barners starts off by ignoring the way that dinkum clean true blue Oz coal has copped the odd subsidy over time …

Each year, the Australian government spends billions of dollars of your money on programs that encourage more coal, gas and oil to be extracted and burned. Market Forces estimates that tax-based fossil fuel subsidies cost almost $12 billion a year federally. This figure includes subsidies that support both the production and use of fossil fuels. But tax-based subsidies aren’t the only government financial backing for fossil fuels. Direct handouts and contributions to the industry are doled out at both federal and state levels. On top of this, public money is used to finance fossil fuels through our national export credit agency EFIC, as well as our involvement with international financial institutions. (here)

But this is a trivial, minor matter. More importantly, it should be remembered while reading Barners that the federal coalition has been in government since the 18th September 2013, and what do we have to show for it?

Well we have plenty of climate science denialism, much love of clean dinkum Oz coal, riven politics, and high electricity prices. What to do about it? Do a Barners, and scribble furiously, as if in opposition for the past six years ...

Why are the Liberal and National parties so blind to this national disgrace? Why is Barners so blind to the way he was once the deputy PM, and this was what he offered the poor and the humble pensioner?

Ah, the leaden monkey that sits on the back of the pond, held up by a leaden monkey scribbling furiously for the 'leet who have no need for airport giveaways and can afford to waste their money on a subscription to the lizard Oz to find out what their luddite MP is thinking ...

The Nationals are incapable of fighting for common sense?

Well that explains the climate denialism, but can anyone explain the curiously stilted English our Barners always deploys, with talk of "proscribed" and "privation" and "anathema", and riveting sentences, such as "What truce is there if their standard of living is being placed beyond their capacity to pay for it?"

Why it's almost as tortured as a lump of coal.

Of course the pond blames the federal government for the entire mess, but wonders if perhaps someday Barners might remember he's actually been in the federal government for some six years, rigorously denying climate science, while comprehensively fucking up energy policies …

Only in Australia, the pond would have once said, but now to a Brexit bonus.

Yesterday the pond recoiled from getting too close to the reptiles, and so missed out on Dame Slap explaining Brexit …

Though the good Dame is already out of date, with a tied vote, Bercow siding with the 'no' mob, and May still talking with Corbyn, why not finish the day's offering off with a whiff of Dame Slap? It'll surely fix what ails ya, even if if does three fifths of fuck all for the mess the Brexiteers have produced … and there's sure to be railing at the 'leets, from the reptile home in Surry Hills, where the best baristas in the world are standing by to serve them a morning coffee ...

In that spirit, perhaps a restorative Pope before proceeding, with more miracle cures here?

And so to a country worse off than this, and perhaps not helped by Dame Slap's nostrums …

The pond has to note from the get go that the idea that Dame Slap's talk of making sense made no sense at all to the pond, but it voted to stay the course with Dame Slap, certain that she would deliver for the hapless Poms ...

Indeed, indeed, and hasn't the Donald worked out well for the country, a wondrous achievement by our MAGA-hat wearing warrior …

Steady. The pond would never mock Dame Slap for her bigotry and self-contented stupidity …in much the same way that the lizard Oz would never run a column written by an anonymous clown parading as "The Mocker" … why, that would suggest all the newspapers littering airport terminals might be suffering from some kind of terminal blight or other disease …

And so to an abundance of conspiracy theories, and everybody except Dame Slap getting it wrong ...

Oh okay, it's got nothing to do with the Poms, but here's another …

Well it does feature a wall, and Dame Slap is all for walls and border troubles and the north feuding with the south ...

Say what? Oh cruel, unkindest cut of all, that Dame Slap should turn on Jacob and Boris … giants of the British stage, one as the sort of unctuous villain to be found in a Jane Austen novel, the other a clown who could defeat Charles Dickens and make Abel Magwitch sound like a sensible budget-balancing chap …

… though neither of them are remotely comparable to the rocket scientist the Dame worships …

And now back to the woulda, shoulda, coulda, and Dame Slap's classic "a pox on all their houses', with nary a hint of an actual solution in sight, but much mockery of the hapless Poms ...

Indeed, indeed, or even the first and last principle of mendacity and stupidity. Construct a meaningless referendum set up on monstrously stupid simplistic dualism, as fatuous and as silly as arguing over which end of the egg to cut, with the house divided between the big and little endians … because nobody knew what they were actually voting for …

In this carnival of deluded clowns, Dame Slap earns a special place in the Brexit Hall of Fame for a survey which fails to mention David Cameron and his role in the entire folly …

And yet not so long ago, and long a Brexiteer, Dame Slap was fully Boris …

Voters might also look dimly upon Cameron’s attacks against the Mayor of London, who, after much deliberation decided to support Brexit. Boris Johnson’s press conference was deferential to, even reverential of, Cameron. Yet Cameron’s response in the House of Commons was vitriolic, insulting and full of mockery. British people might wonder whether a Prime Minister who mocks Johnson, the six cabinet ministers and the 40 per cent of Tory MPs who want Britain to leave Europe, is also mocking the British people who support Brexit or haven’t yet made up their mind. (Google the text for a result).

After much deliberation? So that's what you call the contortions and brazen lies of a self-seeking narcissist too inept to score the leadership, but happy to do an onion muncher?

And so to a scarifying image which will haunt the pond for months. Don't blame the pond, blame Rowe, and if you want to blame him, he can be found here ...

In which a nauseated pond postpones a return ...

The pond had intended to start back today by sharing its thoughts on the lizard Oz's new website … but it doesn't matter how much you polish a turd, you end up with something looking like a lump of coal …and it doesn't matter how much you try to squeeze coal into a diamond, you need more heat and light than the reptiles have to offer …

The new, ostentatiously "clean" look is simply an acknowledgment that the reptiles, in a desperate attempt to bolster their failing business model, have gone low-rent tabloid … and in the process showed they didn't have much of a clue ...

And then came an almost overwhelming sense of nausea … prompted by this wretched effort, Leaked or perhaps dribbled, on to the full to overflowing Intertubes …

It was everywhere … and it was beyond satire or irony …

No doubt it was scattered like confetti at airports courtesy the tree-killer edition - though it's remarkable just how many lizard Oz rags remain available if you're catching a late flight. They can't even give it away for free, this mX of latter-day journalism:

The digital edition was even worse, but it should be recorded for a posterity that certainly won't care …

Win a trip to the Galapagos? Is that the only way out of this fawning, obsequious, servile, grovelling, ingratiating, unctuous, slavishly cringeworthy effort at turning the reptiles into abject toadies? Yes, they were all there, "Ned" nattering away, the dog botherer doing his best, petulant Peta blathering about "Liberal values" - you know, electoral bribery and token cash in the paw - and the pond simply couldn't summon the strength ...

On and on they rambled …

All this for a budget which actually isn't in surplus - that's still to come in the sweet bye and bye - and is, as noted, a shameless, naked attempt at bribery via a little cash in the paw? Where's the rage from Dame Groan at this sort of thing, why is the bouffant one joining in the victory lap?

And the reptiles still wanted passer-by's to share their thoughts on the new-look website? 

Well it certainly puts ad space above content, but then, given the content, perhaps the ads are now the selling point?

The pond looked at it all and shuddered. Perhaps by tomorrow the reptiles would return to their normal level of insanity, perhaps this fit of passion would pass, and then the pond could begin afresh … 

Make a new start, even if that meant not scoring a dime … though the pond suspected it might be like this right up to election day ...

In the meantime, others have noted the reptiles' cranking up of their uxorious love to eleven, while taking climate science denialism to an unimaginable twelve …

Is it fair and just to dump all the reptile watching on to Amanda Meade at the Graudian, here?

Desperate times call for desperate measures … just look at the rest of the herd …

 

Is that the best that they could do to sell the package? A prime cut, a punt, a crossroads and a roll of the dice?

Sure, it all comes from a noble historical tradition … with drawings and Photoshop, rather than a photo montage ...

But right now, all the pond can say is that it missed the infallible Pope, with more papal japery here …

And that's that, another day the pond has deferred its return, another day of peace and quiet away from the reptiles, and at last a day when the freebies littering the airport don't offer the tempting opportunity to stock up on supplies for the outdoor dunny ...