Thursday, February 03, 2011

News Corp, and ssssh, don't mention climate change, it only alarms the climate scientists employed by News Corp ...

(Above: The Daily Terror and The Australian show the cardigan wearers and the latte sippers how it's done).

Here at the pond we've decided bold, imaginative, firm-handed action is required, and that's why we're announcing an appeal for funds to oppose the appeals for funding to oppose the government levy.

It's all in a good cause, no receipts will be issued, no tax breaks are offered, and we expect it to be treated with the same cynicism as any political slush fund. Give generously, and help out, purely in the spirit of giving. In the manner of Christian giving, Tony Abbott style giving ...

And our next initiative is likely to be a giant levy on big business to help the children, or the parents of children, because the children and the parents are always in, or on, our minds ... (and for more, Abbott donations call on levy lashed as selfish).

Meanwhile, don't mention the role of government in mitigating recent acts of god in Queensland. We don't like to think of the government as having a role to play, not when it can be blamed or privatised. You see, the Queensland government caused the Brisbane flooding, by way of its management of Wivenhoe dam, as you'll discover if you read Bligh leaves the dam too full, and little master sir echo Andrew Bolt Is Anna Bligh refusing to learn the lesson of the Brisbane floods?

The dolt cunningly phrases it as a question, followed by a lavish quote, but then comes down on the side of righteousness.

Meanwhile, don't mention climate change in the context of cyclones amongst the News Limited commentariat. It only gets them excited ...

The Cut and Paste section of the rag today provides snippets proving that ABC presenters and Fairfax contributors have gone in search of a climate change connection, as lavishly detailed in Scientists and commentators make heavy weather of the Queensland cyclone.

The snippets must have been prepared a little too late to include the lavish News Corp coverage of Ross Garnaut, which you might find in We risk deep subversion of climate effort: Ross Garnaut, or There's good news and bad news, or Science suggests worse to come, or Worst disasters to come: professor, or 'Expect more extreme cyclones', or Worse, wilder weather warning in the Daily Terror.

By golly, those ABC presenters and Fairfax contributors have a lot to learn when it comes to transmitting the thoughts of Ross Garnaut.

Meanwhile, how goes the level of denialism in News Corp commentariat columnists?

Well it proceeds swimmingly well, led naturally by that top climate scientist, and expert in everything else, Piers Akerman as he explains some totally startling scientific facts in A total inability to read wind of change:

Those who choose to live and work in tropical Australia, be it Queensland, WA or the Northern Territory, well know what comes with the turf.

Cyclones, floods, crocodiles, poisonous snakes, lethal jellyfish. This is the sort of wild stuff that sends shivers up tourists’ spines and sells books for Bill Bryson.

It is not new however. None of the creepy-crawlies or the smashed homes can be attributed to climate change.

What a tremendous rebuttal of those thousands of ill-informed climate scientists who asserted that poisonous snakes and lethal jellyfish were the devilish work of science change ...

And it turns out that Akker Dakker is something of a Gaia believer, or a neop paganist or perhaps a Wiccan:

All those who shamelessly predicted without qualification that Yasi would be the worst natural disaster to hit Australia have been proved wrong.

It is as if mother nature herself, having shown how ruthless she can be during the recent floods, has shown how capricious she also is, and how foolish are those hubristic humans who dare to predict what she will do next.

Yes just like a bloody woman, ruthless and capricious, and making fools of men, but there you go, what else can you expect of women, or mother nature.

Now that's as expert a scientific study and insight as you can expect from News Corp, and a truly hubristic columnist, but if you want more deep insights into those who worship the mother goddess, why not head off to her wiki here, or perhaps join the Greens ...

Akker Dakker in the Greens? Well if he keeps talking about mother nature like this, we'll have to measure him up for a koala suit ...

Anyway, you see, while some Queenslanders might think they've partially dodged a bullet, according to the gospel of Akker Dakker, the cyclone's impact was relatively mild, not because of sensible precautions by government and citizenry, or because the cyclone took a turn away from major towns, but because there's not been that many cyclones - numbers are falling - and the cyclones that do occur usually turn out to be pretty small beer, for all the alarmist hysteria of Bligh and the Queensland government:

It was not to be another disaster movie, however. Without detracting from the experience of those who endured Yasi, particularly those in Cardwell and Tully, it is now apparent that the category five event rapidly degraded into a category four after hitting the coast early yesterday and then weakened to a category three, then category two.

Bligh was yesterday saying that people would have been in the “path of danger” if they had not listened to the warnings as she continued in her new-found role as the national weather girl.

Yes, without detracting from Akker Dakker's painful experience of the actual cyclone, there's nothing like sitting on your fat pompous arse making pronouncements many miles from where a category 5 cyclone has done its work, as a way of showing the finest traditions of a News Corp armchair warrior expert doing his business...

Meanwhile, if you can stand it, there's more expert denialism at the dolt's lair, under the header Dear Professor Garnaut: we've seen it before, so stop acting so shocked, but remember, a hit only eggs him on as he goes through his full three ring circus act of rampant denialism, which proves that we've seen it all before, it's the same as it ever was ...

And naturally that other little sir echo and gadfly Tim Blair joins in with Politics of Fear:

Arts graduate and climate advisor Ross Garnault uses Cyclone Yasi to hone his new pantomime villain act:
He said: “If we are seeing an intensification of weather events now, you ain’t seen nothing yet.”


Actually that joke about an arts graduate isn't much of a smear for the blathering Blair. Here's how to do a smear:

Former editor of Truth and Sports Illustrated and expert climate scientist Tim Blair yawned in the face of a one in a century cyclone. We've seen it all before, he moped, while planning for his new role as the pantomine dame, having been told that he's no longer of an age befitting principal boy or girl (and for more on pantomine, head to its wiki here).

Yes, that's the way to start a story involving dignified rebuttals and careful considerations.

All in all, a top notch, measured, considered performance from the cabal of commentariat News Corp columnists, excellent coverage and insights into the state of climate change science, and now Queenslanders can go back to blaming the long absent god for all those jelly fish and poisonous snakes, and not to worry about any future cyclones in the current season ...

She'll be hunky dory, thanks to mother nature and Akker Dakker ...

And now for a new fun Cut and Paste parlour game. Select your most beloved News Corp commentariat commentator, and see which pantomine character below most evokes their scribbles. There's hours of fun for all the family in this, but if there's too much fun, remember we have the power to invoke the fun levy ...

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