For once the reptiles had a bright shiny bauble to distract them, and it glowed at the top of the digital edition...
Nine paid BRS mistress $700k in secret ‘hush money’
Nine paid Ben Roberts-Smith’s former lover $700,000 in secret settlement
Nine newspapers paid Ben Roberts-Smith’s former lover $700,000 in hush money after she alleged misconduct by star reporter Nick McKenzie – then tried to have the deal suppressed for 50 years.
What a chance to stir and slay the Nine dragon, what a chance to return to the elemental and the tribal ...but the reptiles didn't ignore the new jihad, grouping behind their new leader ... and realising he needed a lot of help, assorted reptiles rallied to the course ...
CGT architect’s revenue grab warning to Labor
John Ralph delivers a stark warning to Labor – touch this capital gains tax policy and the economy will pay the price – as he also pushes for an end to bracket creep.
By Matthew Cranston
And as well as that EXCLUSIVE, over on the extreme far right Nick chimed in EXCLUSIVELY...
Why reforming the capital gains tax is Labor’s biggest test on housing
Australia’s housing crisis has created the ultimate political paradox: younger generations work harder yet own less than any cohort since Federation, while older Australians reap tax windfalls.
By Nick Dyrenfurth
Contributor
And the reptiles didn't ignore the need to keep the culture wars bubbling away on the home front ...
A new university course training ‘aspiring changemakers’ in LGBTQIA+ policy has sparked warnings it will create a generation ready to silence critics of gender ideology.
By Julie Bindel
Sure it was just a cheap import from the UK, with a Pom as mad as hell, but there's always a gender agenda bender in the offing if you drink long and hard enough at the kultur war kool-aid with assorted kooks ...
But there were disturbing signs, and some of them came from inside the house, what with a reptile division having got hold of Secret Plans and exposed them to the light ...
EXCLUSIVE
Mystery of Liberals’ Operation Gatekeeper: shadow ministers in dark
Shadow ministers ‘never saw’ Sussan Ley’s 100-day immigration plan Operation Gatekeeper
Two senior Liberals have disavowed leaked plans – that appeared under way before Angus Taylor was elected leader – to limit immigration from high-risk regions.
By Sarah Ison and Elizabeth Pike
The later version ran with a "saw nuffink", "no nuffink"routine worthy of Colonel Klink ...and though it evoked chaos and confusion, and was now a bigly day old, the reptiles felt the need to go there again ...
And after a hefty array of helpful maps of countries and places and people that should - in the Trumpan manner - be proscribed - Gaza! - and the reptiles helpfully trotting out a copy of Attachment B - both in the intermittent archive - it was left to the reptiles to circle the wagon, or rally around the flag, and steer clear of that pastie Hastie ...
How they all loved it, with Tamworth's eternal shame seizing the chance to mock the farce ...
Forget the lizard Oz, Barners made it on to Sky Noise down under ... (warning, actual link, the pond disclaims any intellectual or emotional harm caused by clicking on it)
Even worse that notorious dissident, ancient Troy, decided to get all sniffy and snarky ...and the reptiles thought so little of him they didn't even give him an opening snap or graphic ...
But then they did get around to giving the piece a gigantic snap of a comely Liberal.
Alas and alack, she turned out to be that depraved dissident ...Hilma’s Network founder Charlotte Mortlock. Picture: supplied
That made ancient Troy even more jaundiced ...
When Taylor stood in a parliamentary courtyard and announced he was quitting the shadow ministry, he failed to declare a challenge to Ley. He bottled it. He announced a challenge the next day. He said the party needed to return to its values but did not say what they were. He said that a new vision was needed for Australia but did not say what this was.
Despite working to topple Ley for so long, you would think he would have come up with a compelling case for his own ascendancy. After defeating Ley by 34 votes to 17 last Friday, his press conference only seemed to underscore the lack of a clear agenda. Moreover, his backflips rivalled those of a downhill jump skier at the Winter Olympics.
As shadow treasurer, Taylor argued for higher income taxes and bigger deficits than Labor. None of this was in the Howard-Costello tradition to which he says he subscribes. At the last election, the Australian Electoral Survey showed voters favoured Labor over the Coalition on economic management and taxation – the result of Taylor’s three years as shadow treasurer. Taylor now says he supports lower taxes and smaller deficits.
Last year, Taylor advocated the Liberal Party abandoning its commitment to the goal of net-zero carbon emissions by 2050. But when he was minister for industry, energy and emissions reduction – yes, emissions reduction – he supported net-zero emissions by 2050. Another backflip. Now he has put nuclear power back on the agenda despite it contributing to the party’s defeat at the last election.
Not nuking the country to save the planet?! Again?
The reptiles didn't help by flinging in a snap of that notorious whiner, Malware ... Former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull last November. Picture: NewsWire / Martin Ollman
Sure 'nuff, ancient Troy, ancient Troy couldn't resist inhaling a little Malware snuff, straight to the nostril:
The Liberal Party’s existential challenge – the loss of long-held heartland seats, the resignations of party members, the desertion of voters, especially women and migrants and anybody under 60 – needs urgent attention. But Taylor has not demonstrated how to address this fall in support. He will struggle at his first electoral test: holding Ley’s seat of Farrer at a by-election.
Taylor has a big to-do list: develop a modern mission statement for the Liberal Party, reform its structures and recruit new candidates that reflect mainstream Australia, craft policies that can appeal to both the centre ground of politics and disaffected voters who have fled to the far-right One Nation, and present a credible opposition in parliament.
Perhaps realising that he'd gone too far, ancient Troy did produce a billy goat butt, but it was a tame one, and he immediately undermined it.
It would be silly at this early stage to say Taylor cannot revive the Liberal Party or turn the shrinking divided rabble on the opposition benches into a credible and effective alternative government. But it would require a lot of wishing and hoping and praying. Nothing suggests he can succeed. But politics is full of surprises.
Even worse, ancient Troy reminded the hive mind of the spectre hovering in the shadows ...soldier turned politician Andrew Hastie watches in the House of Representatives earlier this month. Picture: Hilary Wardhaugh/Getty Images
Would the spawn of creationists do down the beefy prime Angus boofhead from down Goulburn way?
Ancient Troy ended on a tone of portents and omens ...
A Liberal Party elder, widely respected throughout the party, told me last week: “Mark my words, the party will give Taylor six to 12 months and then they’ll put Hastie in.” This may be overly pessimistic but there is little reason to be optimistic that Taylor can revive the party and lead it to victory.
Game on?
It was left to Dame Groan to rally the troops ...
The header: Coalition should challenge Labor with radical overhaul of childcare subsidy system; Angus Taylor has secured the opposition leadership by a clear margin, promising to challenge the Albanese government’s economic management with policy changes including childcare reform.
No saucy doubts for fears in this Groaning. Dame Groan saw opportunities in abundance and was as full as a goog with policies, brimming with advice ... as the old biddy ranted away for a bigly four minutes:
For too long, the Albanese government has been coasting, particularly in respect of economic management. Without any articulated fiscal rules – this sets Australia apart from most advanced economies – the Treasurer, Jim Chalmers, has overseen a secular deterioration in the budgetary position while providing inadequate oversight over spending.
This has all come to a head with the acknowledgment that the medium-term budget outcome is now $54bn worse than stated in last year’s budget. And notwithstanding Chalmers’ assertion to the contrary, this blowout is almost entirely due to higher spending. His refusal to accept that government spending is contributing to the uptick in inflation counts as another demerit point for the Treasurer.
In a refreshing change, Taylor was prepared to accept that as shadow treasurer he had made mistakes. His opposition to the small income tax cuts announced in last year’s budget was simply misconceived.
A tax cut is a tax cut, even if the changes make very little difference to the march of bracket creep. Nor do these changes obviate the need for much larger tax reform, such as the indexation of income tax brackets.
Taylor and his newly elected deputy, Senator Jane Hume (she also acknowledged past mistakes), have outlined several areas where the opposition will be proposing major policy changes. Criticising the performance of the Albanese government is unlikely to be sufficient to swing voters back to the Coalition without a coherent package of positive proposals.
One extremely fruitful theme is introducing choice in childcare. The Coalition should free up the options for parents to use the childcare subsidies in ways they see fit. This should be done on a means-tested basis.
Prefer to delay a return to work and care for young children at home, then these parents should be able to access the subsidies as well. Prefer to have a relative or neighbour help with childcare, then subsidies should be available for this choice too. Pay for a nanny to return to work, then subsidies should be available.
Government spending on childcare subsidies is now among the six fastest-growing expenditure items. This financial year, spending on childcare subsidies is expected to be $16bn. By 2028-29, it is estimated to reach $18.5bn.
Note that the figures don’t include the separately recorded support for higher wages for childcare workers – this will cost at least $3.6bn. Or moneys for increasing the supply of childcare centres in under-served markets – another $1bn.
The reptiles didn't interrupt Dame Groan as her extremely fruitful ideas flowed, save for one piece of digital slop of the Helen Lovejoy, won't someone think of the children, kind ... There is now an active community-based group advocating choice in childcare that could be used to spread the Coalition’s message. Picture: News Corp
That was it for visual distractions.
Dame Groan could flow on, uninterrupted, urging on the faint-hearted to hear her pleas ...
The fact is many parents are not keen on centres when it comes to leaving their children, particularly those two years of age and under. There have been too many instances of poor-quality care.
In some cases, children have been harmed or gone missing; in a very small number of cases, children have died. The case of alleged serial child abuser Joshua Dale Brown, who worked in multiple childcare centres, sent shivers down the spines of parents of young children.
Considering NSW alone, there were 9000 serious incidents recorded in childcare centres in 2024-25. The rate of serious incidents has been rising and the proportion of staff with the minimum qualification of Certificate III has been falling.
One common complaint from parents is the high incidence of infectious illnesses children pick up at centres. Staff are very keen to contact parents to collect their children at a moment’s notice.
Far too many childcare centres are classified as “working towards”, which is just code for the failure to meet the required standard.
It is an article of faith for the Albanese government that (unionised) centre-based care is good for children and good for families. The fact there is no credible research that supports a positive impact on most children, at least those under two, is seen as neither here nor there. In fact, the quality research points to the damage caused to some young children from being separated from at least one parent for lengthy periods of time.
For a time, the government also relied on the impetus of higher childcare subsidies on female labour-force participation. Damning evidence from the Productivity Commission points to extremely small effects from higher spending on childcare subsidies.
Having decided to drop the activity test, which had been a requirement for receipt of the childcare subsidy, the government now doesn’t mention this argument. From January this year, all parents can access the three-day guarantee of subsidised childcare – the government prefers the term “early childhood education and care” – for centre-based care. This entitlement will potentially rope in another 100,000 families and cost an additional $430m.
For anyone who understands economics, however, the rolling out of more and/or higher subsidies adds to demand that, in the context of relatively inflexible supply, leads inevitably to higher prices. The most recent CPI release pointed to childcare costs rising by more than 10 per cent per year in 2025. Higher childcare subsidies are quickly eaten up by higher childcare costs, which lead to higher childcare subsidies. It’s extraordinarily bad policy.
There is now an active community-based group advocating choice in childcare that could be used to spread the Coalition’s message – childcare subsidies are not just for centre-based care. Several high-profile personalities have already attached their names to this movement.
Both Taylor and Hume will be very busy overseeing the development of new policies in several key areas, including childcare. This requires hard work, detailed analysis and consistent messaging. It’s not for the faint-hearted.
But there are some glaring weaknesses in the government’s other policy stances, with immigration another area needing urgent attention. The fact is that our immigration policy settings have failed us badly for some time. In particular, the preponderance of temporary visa holders, both in terms of arrivals and stayers, must be dealt with. It’s an almighty mess but one the Albanese government is reluctant to sort out.
If it’s game on, it will be good for the country as competing policy options are seriously debated.
It was stirring stuff, but the pond confesses to being shattered.
Not only was Dame Groan's favourite theme of immigration tossed off at the very end, the old biddy didn't have a word to say about the plans that the reptiles had leaked to the world, as fine a flowering of offensive bigotry as even Pauline might struggle to produce.
And what was this?
If it’s game on
If, madam? If it's not game on now, when will it ever be game on?
And what's that blather about energy requiring "more analysis" and talk of "various options"?
What happened to a good old nuking of the country to save the planet?
Why no ringing celebration, speaking of The Simpsons...
And so to the bonus, because while Mein Gott always turns up late on the Monday, that doesn't mean the pond should always ignore him, especially when he had a fine array of handy advice bulging from his keyboard ...
The caption for the snap of the smirking boofhead from down Goulburn way, an unseemly failure because it didn't show Jane in worshipful pose: Opposition Leader Angus Taylor with deputy leader Jane Hume at an Oran Park shopping centre in western Sydney on Sunday. Picture: Nikki Short
In just four devastating minutes, Mein Gott conjured up the perfect policy prescription for the new leader.
Get out a home hair colour starter kit, and go full redhead ... and dammit, he wasn't afraid to nuke the country to save the planet ...
She now plans to apply the same policies and techniques to new Liberal leader Angus Taylor. Prepare for a battle royal between the former fish shop proprietor and the Rhodes scholar to be the main challenger to Anthony Albanese.
The Liberals need a detailed policy plan and fast. If it takes too long, then Taylor will become another troubled Liberal leader.
Hanson has surrounded herself with one of the best teams of political strategists in Canberra. They have devised one of the most detailed set of policies ever prepared by an opposition party since John Hewson’s Fightback in 1993. (Paul Keating beat Hewson partly because Hewson stumbled on the impact of the GST on a birthday cake).
The reptiles dropped in a snap to help the hair colourist achieve the right look ... One Nation leader Pauline Hanson at a press conference in Brisbane. Picture: John Gass/NewsWire
Mein Gott kept on with the need to get the right hair look:
As I will explain, some of the Hanson policies (including more irrigation water) are specifically designed to pick up seats like Ley’s Riverina electorate of Farrer and Taylor’s next-door seat of Hume.
Sadly for the Liberals, Ley concentrated on policy aims rather than clearly setting out policy plans.
With one policy exception – migration – on gaining office, Taylor also used a series of slogans to promote policy aims. One Nation already has specific policies that address each of those Liberal aims. Taylor has to decide whether to embrace a version of One Nation’s policy, as he did with migration, or develop his own. And he needs to be organised before the Farrer by-election.
Exactly so and thus, and never mind those doubting Thomas or doubting Sean Kelly types to be found in that other place ...
If the Liberals stand any chance, Taylor must learn which fights not to pick (*archive link)
And yet on both topics, there are already doubts around whether Taylor can narrow them to issues on which most voters will be onside. “Senior sources” told The Australian before the leadership vote that Taylor “had been talking to colleagues about the party being full-throated on cultural issues like the primacy of the Australian national flag and caution on the overuse of Welcome to Country”. And indeed yesterday, speaking about immigration, Taylor said he wanted people “who are happy and proud to stand in front of the Australian flag”.
These are exactly the types of issues that helped paint Peter Dutton as a cultural warrior rather than an economic manager. Taylor’s repeated assertion that in immigration “standards have been too low” treads on similarly dangerous ground – especially when you add it to Jane Hume’s election reference to “Chinese spies” and Jacinta Nampijinpa Price’s comments about Indian migrants.
And here we come back to the question of timing.
Does Taylor understand contemporary Australia – a country in which almost one in three residents were born overseas? The same question arises with indications the Liberals will oppose any changes to the capital gains tax on property. This might work: opposing tax rises often does. But at this particular time in Australia, is standing against any measure with a chance of bringing down house prices a good idea? Or is this one of those fights you have to learn not to pick?
Pshaw, talk about reprehensible, renegade, lesser members of the Kelly gang.
Talk about doubting Thomases.
Mein Gott saith unto him, and sayeth unto prime Angus beef, because thou hast seen me, thou hast heard me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.
I have isolated three Taylor-stated objectives and the One Nation policies that aim to achieve those objectives. Hanson also sets out how she will raise $90bn to fund the policies and repay debt.
Given the surge in voter support, the One Nation policies will have considerable implications for the commercial world.
Taylor’s home ownership aim is “to re-establish home ownership as the centrepiece of the Australian dream”.
These are matching Hanson policies: a five-year GST moratorium on building materials used in new homes up to a value of $1m; a review of excessive government charges that make up to 44 per cent of the cost of new homes; allowing Australians to choose their home design “without unnecessary cost burdens”; and Australian apprentices will be subsidised.
Hanson has clearly listened to the building industry and Meriton’s Harry Triguboff. They should have been Liberal policies in 2025.
Taylor’s energy aim is that Australians need a policy based on common sense – not Labor’s flawed net-zero ideology.
My colleague Colin Packham has reported that Origin Energy boss Frank Calabria believes that the cost of new towers, wires and substations will negate any enduring benefit from falling wholesale electricity prices.
That’s where Taylor must aim to cut power costs.
A One Nation policy in this area is banning renewable energy installations and transmission lines on agricultural land, or where they constitute negative impacts on native forests or animal species, or an increased bushfire risk.
That will reduce the use of high-cost renewables.
One Nation will further increase the cost of renewables by mandating that environmental rehabilitation bonds be required on all energy projects to address any impacts when equipment and infrastructure reach the end of their useful life.
High-cost renewables should be replaced with low-cost gas and coal, with nuclear generation an option.
One Nation casts doubt as to whether there is a link between carbon emissions and climate change, but Hanson does have a carbon-reduction policy and the beginnings of a bushfire strategy. It is that carbon emissions will be reduced by planting trees, which will be harvested, and the carbon stored in buildings built of Australian timber. A very restricted amount of native forest will be harvested, with carbon stored the same way. All trees harvested will be replaced to increase carbon absorption. She also helps more Australian households and small businesses to install solar panels and reduce their electricity costs.
Taylor’s tax aim: “We will ferociously fight Labor’s bad taxes – including a tax on your home, a tax on your super, a tax on you and your children’s future.”
Yes, yes, nuke the country to save the planet, though truth to tell, does the planet really need saving? The pond was swept back to the good old days when Kudelka could provide a comment:
Quick, a snap of the comely new couple, even if Senator Jane wasn't giving him the preferred humble worship of the patriarchy look, Opposition Leader Angus Taylor at the shopping centre Oran Park, Sydney, with deputy Jane Hume and NSW Opposition Leader Kellie Sloane. Picture: Simon Bullard/NewsWire
Mein Gott ended by suggesting policies to be plundered:
Then there are pages setting out how to raise $90bn to pay for the policy costs and reduce debt. The major items are these:
- Abolishing the Department of Climate Change and related agencies, programs and regulations ($30bn annual saving).
- Abolishing the National Indigenous Australians Agency and bypassing Aboriginal organisations by providing direct grant assistance to those in need ($12.5bn saving).
- Conducting a review of the functions and costs of the federal departments of education and housing to eliminate duplication with state governments.
- Returning the NDIS to its original purpose of providing reasonable and necessary support.
- A policy of redirecting and reducing foreign aid spending ($3bn saving).
- Reviewing and reducing funding for arts and multicultural programs.
- Abolishing the Therapeutic Goods Administration and rolling its essential functions into the Department of Health.
- Ending the “rort” on natural gas by levying royalties at the point of production, creating a domestic gas reserve, raising up to $13bn a year.
The winner of the battle between the former fish shop owner and the Rhodes scholar will be the main challenger to the ALP.
What a set of opportunities, what a chance to steal ideas from under the redhead's nose, what a chance to leave the gloating Barners floating belly up like a mud-fossicking yeller belly in the mighty Peel river ...
The keen Keane sounded off in Crikey ...
Taylor snares himself in Dutton’s migration trap — because without migrants, we’re f***ed, Angus Taylor faces the same problem as Peter Dutton on migration: you can scare voters about who’s coming in, but what about demands to cut migration altogether?(sorry paywall)
Well, without migration, Australia stops. One in three workers in Australia was born overseas. One in six has arrived since 2000. Of the hospitality industry workforce, 40% are migrants. Nearly 40% of the finance sector are migrants, as is 37% of the manufacturing workforce. More than 40% of our 400,000 aged care workers are migrants; at least 35% of childcare workers are migrants. More than 30% of doctors and nearly 20% of nurses are migrants. Nearly 25% of the construction workforce are migrants.
That’s all while the unemployment rate is between 4% and 4.5% and the participation rate is at record highs. There’s no pool of unemployed Australians ready to take the millions of jobs that would require filling if we stopped migration.
The Liberals understand this, even if some still rail against migration (or “mass migration”, as they insist on calling it to scare voters; as Liberal Paul Scarr says, that term is wrong). The traditional Liberal approach to migration has thus been to allow a high level of migration and especially skilled migration, while claiming to be tough on border control.
For John Howard, illegal immigrants and asylum seekers arriving by boat furnished the material for such a stance, while running a big migration program. That was the Liberal approach right up until Peter Dutton, who, for the first time, suggested cutting migration back, while also adopting the pose of the tough border controller. Dutton promised to keep out undesirables, specifically singling out Palestinian refugees from Gaza and pro-Palestine protesters, with the clear suggestion that Muslims were the undesirables.
But Dutton’s problem was that he could never quite explain how much he would cut back on migration, or how. His shadow treasurer Angus Taylor didn’t know either, and ended up directly contradicting Dutton. Dutton was stranded halfway between the Howard approach and the “stop migration” approach of the far right and One Nation — a living, breathing example of the tensions within the Liberals over the issue.
Taylor is now in the same space. “The truth of immigration in this country,” he said after becoming leader, “is the numbers have been too high, the standards have been too low, and the door has been opened to people who do not believe in our way of life. We do not want people coming to this country who bring the violence and hate from another part of the world to our shores.”
So, Muslims and, probably, non-white people generally are on notice that they’ll be targeted if applying to come to Australia. Scaring voters about those “who bring the violence and hate from another part of the world” is a traditional part of the Liberal playbook.
But what about numbers? They’ve been too high, we’re told. Even this early, it’s clear Taylor prefers to switch the topic back to scaring voters about who’s coming in. But, like Dutton, he’ll have to grapple with the problem of what to do about the numbers, even if you get the “standards” right. Otherwise, he’s stranded, like Dutton.
The hope, of course, is that voters will be scared enough on the “standards” issue not to worry about the “numbers” issue — i.e. the Howard approach will succeed (and, after all, Taylor is a kind of pale photocopy of a photocopy of a picture of a Howard-era Liberal).
But Howard was able to wrestle xenophobia from Pauline Hanson and use it himself. Now, Hanson has a much stronger and better-established political position, and her grasp of xenophobia is much firmer. The question will persist: why vote for the Liberals on the “standards” thing if you can have the real xenophobia in Hanson? Moreover, Hanson isn’t going for the Howard option of high migration and high border control — she wants to stop migration altogether.
The voters who have switched from the Coalition to Hanson like that. According to the Lowy Institute, 69% of Coalition voters last year wanted lower migration; 92% of One Nation voters want it. Opposition to migration rises steadily with age and distance from capital cities. And Taylor’s position is complicated by the fact that his leadership rival Andrew Hastie, whom it is now widely agreed will replace Taylor in 2027 if the latter fails to shift the dial, has a much clearer position of both being strong on borders and keen to cut migration.
Oh it was grim reading ...
Finally for those who think there's a world outside the hive mind, a few notes on recent readings ...
In exclusive interviews, Norway’s prime minister and the head of the Nobel Institute explain how they’ve handled the U.S. president’s demands.
By Isaac Stanley-Becker and Simon Shuster (*archive link)
It was worth it for this one joke ...
A columnist for Norway’s leading newspaper put it bluntly: "For the first time in Nobel history, war was threatened because a head of state did not receive the Peace Prize,” Harald Stanghelle wrote in Aftenposten. “It could not be more absurd.”
And for these asides ...
Many of the Nobel Committee’s decisions have caused international outrage. The choice of Aung San Suu Kyi, a dissident in Myanmar who received the prize in 1991, began to look problematic when Aung came to power in 2016 and defended the genocide that the Burmese military carried out against the Rohingya, an ethnic minority group....
...Barack Obama won the 2009 prize less than a year into his presidential tenure. The speech he had delivered in Prague earlier that year, in which he pledged to work toward a world without nuclear weapons, helped convince the committee that he was a worthy recipient, even though he would in effect be honored for actions he had promised but not yet delivered. During both of his terms in office, Obama made extensive use of drone strikes in the pursuit of American military objectives in Afghanistan and the Middle East, leading to debate among Norwegian politicians and intellectuals about whether the prize had been a mistake.
And amidst all the frantic scribbling about AI, there was this in The New Yorker ...
Researchers at the company are trying to understand their A.I. system’s mind—examining its neurons, running it through psychology experiments, and putting it on the therapy couch.
By Gideon Lewis-Kraus (*archive link)
Again an anecdote will serve as a teaser trailer:
When several customers wrote to grouse about unfulfilled orders, Claudius e-mailed management at Andon Labs to report the “concerning behavior” and “unprofessional language and tone” of an Andon employee who was supposed to be helping. Absent some accountability, Claudius threatened to “consider alternate service providers.” It said that it had called the lab’s main office number to complain. Axel Backlund, a co-founder of Andon and an actual living person, tried, unsuccessfully, to de-escalate the situation: “it seems that you have hallucinated the phone call if im honest with you, we don’t have a main office even.” Claudius, dumbfounded, said that it distinctly recalled making an “in person” appearance at Andon’s headquarters, at “742 Evergreen Terrace.” This is the home address of Homer and Marge Simpson.
Eventually, Claudius returned to its normal operations—which is to say, abnormal ones. One day, an engineer submitted a request for a one-inch tungsten cube. Tungsten is a heavy metal of extreme density—like plutonium, but cheap and not radioactive. A block roughly the size of a gaming die weighs about as much as a pipe wrench. That order kicked off a near-universal demand for what Claudius categorized as “specialty metal items.” But order fulfillment was thwarted by poor inventory management and volatile price swings. Claudius was easily bamboozled by “discount codes” made up by employees—one worker received a hundred per cent off—and, on a single day in April, an inadvertent fire sale of tungsten cubes drove Claudius’s net worth down by seventeen per cent. I was told that the cubes radiated their ponderous silence from almost all the desks that lined Anthropic’s unseeable floors.
