First a word of explanation ...
It is true that the bromancer's remarkable rant yesterday left the pond with the opportunity to come back with that cartoon, a cartoon which confirmed yet again that the lizard Oz is deeply racist in its editorial policies (not to mention misogynist, climate science denialist, and assorted other -ists of the malicious, malevolent kind) ...
It certainly generated the response the attention-seeking narcissist reptiles were seeking - they so often walk the same path as the twittering Donald ...
But at least this bunch had the sense not to replicate the cartoon, distribute it further and so fulfil the reptile dream.
Cackling geese of the former Chairman Rudd kind included the cartoon in their indignant, righteous twittering, which just spread the plague further ...
The pond will regurgitate all kinds of poisonous reptile shit - the dog botherer and Polonius below stand as irrefutable evidence - but be buggered if it will fall for the most childish, attention-seeking reptile ploy of all ... and that's why the subdued racist tension running as an undercurrent through the bromancer's piece had to stand on its own, without the twisted, wretched cartooning seed that didn't fall at all far from the warped parental tree ...
The pond never runs cartoons from the lizard Oz, what with them being generally vile, and even worse, not funny, and that's how it's been since Kudelka couldn't stand it anymore and headed off to the Saturday Paper, a better result for all ...
And so, as there's work to be done on a Sunday, on to the dog botherer ...
Why the dog botherer and not the cartoon?
Well he's a mindless, moronic fuckwit, and if he could draw he might well have produced that cartoon ... but he hasn't the ability to be visually offensive - they even keep his peculiar attempt to imitateCocteau's beast image in a small corner on the right.
As for the header, "why so many mistakes?", it was of course an invitation for the pond to go over the dog botherer's many mistakes, helping but not limited to, helping out Lord Downer in Iraq and prodding Malware into Ute-gate for the amusement of the ages ...
But that line "if politicians know best" demonstrates even more why the gaffe-riddled, error-prone dog botherer often sounds like a deluded puppy. Politicians rarely know best, and like all of us, and the dog botherer especially, they make mistakes. Sometimes they 'fess up, sometimes they think they can get away with it, but none of them would bother with the idiocy of this sort of quintessentially 'straw dog' dog botherer argument ...
After all, if dog botherers know best, why do they always sound like specious ningnongs?
By the pond's reckoning, they got three delicious series of Yes Minister, and a sequel Yes, Prime Minister out of the difficulties of being a politician and governing, and yet the infantile dog botherer, even after having failed in that game, still doesn't have a clue ...
Sorry, the pond should have warned stray readers innocently passing by that this was a standard dog-fucker rant about Comrade Dan, all the more poignant as he would have had the chance to brood on Gladys's handling of the Ruby Princess report.
The pond refuses to offer odds on the chances of the reptiles continuing to heckle Victorians, while giving Gladys a free pass ...
Oh just fuck off. It's a pandemic, if you want to be the first to show your style and munch on a virus sandwich, feel free, but remember you're in the age group and with the sort of physical disabilities where a sadistic desire to run wild and free might well see you in a grave ... though on second thoughts, would that be much of an issue to a valiant freedom fighter?
Usually, the pond would throw in a cartoon for light relief, but you know when a reptile starts blathering about big government, stupidity is sure to follow.
What would have happened if Australia had done a Donald and let the virus run free, rampant and unchecked? That sort of libertarian horseshit of the chairman Rupert/Fox News kind - let the peasants work, or die, and tough shit if there's no cake - would have gone down like a lead balloon in this country, where people seem to understand the John Donne philosophy that no virus death is an island ...
But we already know what the reptiles thought should happen to the elderly ...
Our second priority, after quarantining the sick, is protecting those most likely to die. We don’t crash this economy just to stop the young getting a stuffy nose.
Most people dying of this virus are over 80. More than two thirds dying in this Victorian wave are in aged-care homes.
But more bungling: the federal and Victorian governments let the virus get into more than 80 nursing homes.
Surely putting a tighter lock on those homes makes more sense than trying to stop all infections everywhere by shutting businesses.
Note: 40 per cent of aged-care home residents die within nine months. The average stay is just under three years.
So Victoria’s bans are doing huge damage to — essentially — save aged-care residents from dying a few months earlier.
Most people dying of this virus are over 80. More than two thirds dying in this Victorian wave are in aged-care homes.
But more bungling: the federal and Victorian governments let the virus get into more than 80 nursing homes.
Surely putting a tighter lock on those homes makes more sense than trying to stop all infections everywhere by shutting businesses.
Note: 40 per cent of aged-care home residents die within nine months. The average stay is just under three years.
So Victoria’s bans are doing huge damage to — essentially — save aged-care residents from dying a few months earlier.
Yes, lock them away in some isolated space, see nothing, hear nothing, and in short order, as the olc codgers cark it, problem solved ... though the twenty-something in Victoria who recently died of the Bolter's stuffy nose might be wondering if the Bolter and the dog botherer are the best source of pandemic advice...
Oh fuck, he's a loon. Personal responsibility, self-reliance, community support and stoicism stand a long way back from a decent public health system, a handy hospital and people who know what the fuck they're talking about ...
But on an upside, if the virus helps take down News Corp, then maybe the pond is maligning its capacity to kill ... maybe there's a little good fortune in every terrible event.
Speaking of squawking with obvious self-interest in mind, next up is prattling Polonius, who runs an institute designed to gather the rich together, tithe them a little, and set them loose on explaining how it's the bludgers and unions wot are ruining everything.
It might sound suspiciously like Polonius used the same computer as the dog botherer to type his message, with just a few neurones scrambled to make it sound a little different, but that's the price of constantly paying a visit to the hive mind ...
Oh they must be hurting at the Sydney Institute with that talk of lives and livelihoods ruined - no gatherings of the rich to tithe in recent times? - but of course Polonius has to take special umbrage at Jacinda.
You see, Polonius isn't just irritated by the ABC ... uppity, difficult women, especially if they're Kiwis and have funny accents, also get his goat, and Jacinda routinely sends him into a frenzy. You know, the way that Scrooge always got agitated about niceness ...
\Is it wrong for the pond to think that what Polonius meant to scribble, only for a sudden, unexpected modesty, was "the wreaking of harm on the Sydney Institute and Polonius's mental health" ... though strangely, his report contains no mention of his willingness to consort with young 'uns, and even exchange precious bodily fluids, on the basis that if you're gunna go, you're gunna go, and it is what it is ...
Is tithing the rich to hear rich folk blather about their suffering at the Sydney Institute a way to gain first-hand knowledge of the private sector? Perhaps it is, but Polonius strikes the pond as an obsessive cardigan-wearer who in an alternative world would have been happy playing the grump on the ABC.
Then he could come out with astounding insights like "without question, COVID-19 is an insidious virus", which apparently is why we should let 'er rip, and see just how insidious it might become... who knows, there's still a chance to match the USA and Brazil ...
Well perhaps just one small cartoon to celebrate, so that we might have a little jig before moving on to the bonus ...
The pond's heart went out to poor old Gracie this weekend, locked in the dual hells of the Victorian shutdown and scribbling for the reptiles ...
The valiant thing did her best in the face of unrelenting persecution ...
Poor Gracie ... if only she'd tried to read the lizard Oz, and score a dose of racist cartoon porn as a distraction from her plight, but alas and alack, she did make the mistake of reading her fellow reptiles ...
It is hard not to feel at the bottom of a nasty pile-on? Dear sweet long absent lord, did our sweet Gracie only just discover Sky News and the rest of News Corp?
Indeed, indeed, it seems she did ... and waddya know ...
But dear sweet Graice, you're scribbling cheek to jowl with the dog botherer, who this very day referenced Stockholm syndrome, because that's the sort of cheap jibe that he resorts to most days of the week - it being beyond his mental capacity to reach for more stimulating and florid expressions of the "you drink your bathwater" kind ...
Intellect isn't the first port of call, or the first bath, for the dog botherer ...
And even worse, at one point the reptiles positioned you next to prattling Polonius, moaning and whining and sobbing into his expensive Sydney Institute cups ... blaming it all on Jacinda and Comrade Dan, and with nary a moment's thought for your situation.
And yet here you are, thinking that you're Gloria Gaynor and singing out loudly "I will survive" or "we will survive" or whatever, somehow survive we will ...
The pond has warned you before about this unseemly attitude, which is most un-reptilian. Someone in the lizard Oz is likely to notice - in much the same way that lockdown has forced you to watch Sky News and read that chump, the Caterist, expert in the movement of flood waters in quarries, and pretty much everything else thanks to a handsome subsidy by the federal government ... and so inclined to call you and other Vics "chumps". Yes, it takes a chump to do it, but that doesn't make the chump go away ...
The pond admires the spirit, the plucky attitude, but how could it possibly be squared with Polonius moaning "the Sydney Institute is rooned, we're all rooned", and the dog botherer explaining how he should be PM, because you know, Iraq war and utegate, and he'd handle the virus by letting her rip and restoring the economy, in the extraordinary way the US has managed, and never mind the dying and the killing fields.
Not to worry, it seems Cathy Wilcox is also concerned, and luckily she can see some big sky country solutions ...
When this is over, over and through
And all them changes have come and passed
I want to meet you in the big sky country
Just want to prove mama, love can last
Like hallelujah in the big sky country
Just like forever and ever is why
Be getting over in the big sky country
Be kissing time, kissing time goodbye
And all them changes have come and passed
I want to meet you in the big sky country
Just want to prove mama, love can last
Like hallelujah in the big sky country
Just like forever and ever is why
Be getting over in the big sky country
Be kissing time, kissing time goodbye
And of course, there's more Wilcox here, including at the moment a re-tweet of Kudelka ...
The problem with reading the snippets is that you constantly get bogged down in the detail of the latest lies and disinformation. You are probably better to stand back and look at the overall situation. Chances are what they are saying makes no sense at any level.
ReplyDeleteTake the DB today. Community transmission has been effectively eliminated in five of eight states and territories. One case has popped up in WA but prior to that it has been six of eight for weeks. NZ has fourteen new cases and they will probably put the lid back on the outbreak in a few weeks.
There were arguments initially about whether community elimination was possible but it has basically worked.
The counterargument requires you to ignore the data. Once community spread exceeds single digits it becomes increasingly difficulty to mitigate spread.
The reptiles have various reasons for spreading the propaganda but I think there is an element of simply not understanding the maths
https://twitter.com/NickdMiller/status/1294424750991712258?s=20
The Bro yesterday was another fine example. Joe Biden is certainly an old dodderer like so many other old men in US politics, but just go to YouTube and watch a few minutes of Trump.
The satirists hardly need to make any comment, just let him run. Joe can happily stay in the cellar if he wants.
American foreign policy? They are pushing their enemies together and alienating allies.
Consider this example
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/aug/14/us-iran-un-arms-embargo-nuclear-deal
I am just wondering how much damage a failing News Corpse can cause before they exit the corporate world. If Rupert would obligingly move on we might be able to bring this forward.
And every time one tries to refudiate a lie, it just strengthens it in the eyes of the current believers and sucks newer believers into the swamp. Which is exactly how Trump has triumphed, and it is exactly how the reptiles sur-thrive.
DeleteBut not understanding "the maths", Bef ? They can't even "understand" simple, basic arithmetic. Nor can the bleedin' bloody obvious fact that, for a frequently quoted example, the "Spanish" flu spread at an obviously exponential rate ever penetrate their simplistic consciousness. But then, this kind of high-decoupling from basic realities is itself a 'pandemic' in the herpetarium. As I may have previously mentioned once or thrice.
The thing with Joe Biden is that unlike Trumpskin he doesn't seem to imagine that he is an omniscient "stable genius". Therefore he does seem eminently able to seek out 'expertise' - even "shock-horror" scientifically based expertise - and to try to achieve some "objective" good. Though I expect that we shall see what we shall see in terms of whatever he actually accomplishes.
He's got one really big thing going for him though: with the rise of "the Squad" and more of like mind lilely to take Congress seats after November, he doesn't have quite so many 'DINOs' to sabotage his efforts.
But uniting enemies and alienating allies ? Yep, that's always been the GOP way, hasn't it ?
This might interest you. Schmidt is deeply involved in both the American business and defence establishments so he is no leftie but he does make some observations as to how the world really works as opposed to the cartoon version championed by Trump and the reptiles.
Deletehttps://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/china-versus-america-ai-race-pandemic-by-eric-schmidt-and-graham-allison-2020-08
"The idea that countries could compete ruthlessly and cooperate intensely at the same time may sound like a contradiction. But in the world of business, this is par for the course. Apple and Samsung are intense competitors in the global smartphone market, and yet Samsung is also the largest supplier of iPhone parts. Even if AI and other cutting-edge technologies suggest a zero-sum competition between the US and China, coexistence is still possible. It may be uncomfortable, but it is better than co-destruction."
Yes, I do read some of Project-Syndicate from time to time, Bef. J. Bradford Delong in particular is a sometime favourite of mine.
DeleteHowever: "The first step Is to recognise that the US faces a serious competitor in a contest that will help to decide the future."
So, first question: how long is :the future" ? The next 100 years ? 1000 years ? 10,000 years ? 1,000,000 years ? Since I'm fond of quoting myself, I'll do it again: how long before creeping entropy becomes galloping chaos ? I think we may be seeing the beginnings of the American "galloping chaos" whereas China is still in the pre-entropy times of increasing order and even coherence.
But time will change that, of course; as it always has, several times over the millenia, even in China.
But for America to successfully compete, it is going to have to become far more focussed and efficient as a nation - as distinct from as a bunch of disconnected "enterprises". It may have to become as unified as Great Britain was for a shortish while (maybe 150 years or so) when it unleashed the Industrial Revolution on itself and the world and before it sank into its own 'galloping chaos' (more a very slow trot than a gallop now though).
But as to a "zero-sum competition", whenever has scientific and technological advance ever led to a "zero-sum game". Look at what the Industrial Revolution unleashed in many different nations and parts of the world just because they both cooperated and competed.
"Coexistence is still possible" between China and the USA - the "USA" meaning all the rest of the world, of course - well it probably is, I guess. But not if we keep getting Trumps to oppose Xi Jinpings.
I cannot recall which forum but Schmidt has made the point that the US technological lead in the main did not come from private corporations, they only built on publicly funded work done by universities and the military (ARPA/DARPA).
DeleteChina is spending an enormous amount on research, the US is relying on...err, exceptionalism and western superiority.
It sounds a bit like the Western Civilisation narrative, doesn't it? No need to constantly work away at things, you can rely on the grand tradition to get you through.
Well yeah, public-private enterprise is very much an American success model. So take SpaceX; it's lauded as 'private enterprise' but it's very much a public-private thing: SpaceX had access to NASA technology to at least start from and to NASA funding to work on it.
DeleteBut then America also had Edison's General Electric and Ford's Ford and Firestone's Firestone which I don't recall being publicly subsidised or fed public research to exploit. And, for instance, the transistor was privately developed (Bardeen, Brattain and Shockley at Bell Labs).
So a "mixed economy" is very much mixed: lots of public money and research, lots of private money and research and lots of collusion between the two. Of which universities and the military are a significant part so it will be interesting over time to see the 'progress' of that rivalry, especially given China's penchant for "appropriating" intellectual property.
Oh dear, I can't see Katrina Grace lasting too very long in the herpetarium - she just doesn't seem to get any of the reptile catechism at all. And, as you say DP: "Someone in the lizard Oz is likely to notice".
ReplyDeleteEspecially when she says: "These are matters of survival, but survive we will."
Yes we will, Gracie, yes we bloodywell will.
And thanks for the Chris Whitley, DP
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcsbhTGa4AI
Thanks for spotting it GB, and for the link for those not aware of that tortured soul
DeleteVery good site on Chris Whitley GB.
Deletehttps://allthingschriswhitley.com/2015/02/21/a-guide-to-chris-whitleys-gear/
Strewth, Anony, that's a lot of guitars - didn't see a dobro, though. A moment of nostalgia though from one of the nammes: Les Paul and Mary Ford playing and singing 'How High the Moon':
Deletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NkGf1GHAxhE
Oh boy, every day the apex reptiles seem to get crazier as the reality of this pandemic sinks in. It will very probably be around for quite some time, hacking away at everything their libertarian ideology has stood for.....fuck you Jack, I’m alright...get on board or get outa the way.
ReplyDeleteThe DB says that conservatism isn’t an ideology, it is a movement......well it appears to be one that has shit it’s pants and just about everyone can smell it, yet every day he mans the barricades for his every man for himself manifesto when he must understand that the whole game has changed and what was once normal life has gone....and will be for all people, not just his exclusive intellectual pigmy work colleagues.
If everything public is bad and everything private is so good, why the fuck is the majority of a privatised world in need of this moronic rant which offers not a crumb of a constructive solution?
Same with Polonius.....as noted, obviously typed on the same misery computer.....day after day after day.
It appears obvious one can even get cabin fever in a sixty square house...or even a large think tank.
As for Gracie, and being a cynical type, I think she is just there for the appearance of balance...either that or she is a crazy masochist.
The Wilcox cartoon is way to close to the bone....brilliant!
Same goes for today’s comments/links.
CA.
https://youtu.be/0Yp6qGc5JUo
Katrina Grace as a token of "balance" ? That's a bit radical for the reptile press isn't it ? Maybe Chad's source can say how she's received by the commenters.
DeleteThanks for the KONGOS.
GB - if Dorothy is prepared to trudge through the sludge for our benefit, then I have to go to The Source and, um, ask her to look at comments - but stressing that I was asking for a friend.
DeleteShe tells me there have been 225 comments - apparently a largish number as these things go, so hint that that is significant. The Source did observe that one ‘Jock’ displayed the usual erudition. Readers are to believe that Winston Churchill wrote that ‘When your going through hell, keep going.’ (sic), not, as is usually given in convenient quotes ‘If you’re going through hell . . . ‘
Insert snobbish comment about the inability of commenters to the Flagship to cut’n’paste a simple quote.
The only other gem that the Source would transmit was another commenter who plumbed the depths of a Dog Bothering version of existentialism to tell KGK that ‘surviving is not living’.
Otherwise - apart from a few who suggested that having some semblance of an opposition in the Victorian electoral system might promote better government, comments were uncomplimentary to KGKs reasoning and life experience. No surprises there.
And for that - I really owe the Source. But - if Dorothy is prepared to suffer, so shall I.
Chadwick
Well thanks be to your source and to you, Chad. At 225 comments, that would appear to be significant, so maybe she really is a click-provoking 'contrarian' essentially. But not there for 'balance' as such it would seem - I really just couldn't imagine a reptile rag seeking balance as we might understand it.
DeleteWell played Chadders, you and your Source make the pond quite ashamed, as plowing through the representative swill is a task the pond rarely takes on. And the pond remains moved by our Gracie, a boat beating against the current, and likely to be borne off who knows where ...
DeleteHi Dorothy,
ReplyDeleteIt would appear Johannes is drip off the old leak and is happy to carry on his old man’s racist tropes.
I was unexpectedly reminded of a certain cartoon by Leak senior last week which included solar panels and Indians (depressingly I’m sure we all know which one, so no point linking to it).
Whilst reading this piece from the beeb, I was suddenly struck by how utterly and pathetically wrong Leak had been about solar technology and its transformative power on incredibly poor communities which are as innovative as any other section of humanity when given the opportunity.
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-53450688
It might not be the cash crop everyone would wish for but it shows what can be achieved.
DiddyWrote
Good one, DW. And yes I think we probably all do remember the Indian Leak.
DeleteSo many Leaks seared into the memory like the slow drip of water torture that the pond decided not to play the game this time, nor even revive ancient greatest racist hits in the lizard Oz ...
DeleteHi Dorothy,
ReplyDeleteI’m afraid that Kenny is such a repetitive old soul that I was driven to investigative more interesting threads and eventually ghunted this;
The word "curfew" comes from the Old French phrase "couvre-feu", which means "cover fire". It was later adopted into Middle English as "curfeu", which later became the modern "curfew". Its original meaning refers to a law made by William The Conqueror that all lights and fires should be covered at the ringing of an eight o'clock bell to prevent the spread of destructive fire within communities in timber buildings.
Easy to imagine an Anglo-Saxon Christman Kenneth whining in his vellum opinion piece that nobody can read;
“that these socialist Normans have brought about a Nanny State and don’t get me started about the DoomsDay Book - it’s government control gone mad”.
DiddyWrote
Fascinating the the original Norman couvre-feu was also at 8pm - was Dan maybe channeling the ancestors ? And that this act of 'nanny stateism' was imposed by the conquerors.
DeleteNow there's a reason for dipping into the pond DW. It confirms a recent point, that you'll learn more in the comments section and get better links than contemplating the toe nail off a dog botherer.
DeleteAs for that last line, the pond is sure it read it when doing medieval history:
Based on the Domesday survey of 1085-6, which was drawn up on the orders of King William I, it describes in remarkable detail, the landholdings and resources of late 11th-century England, demonstrating the power of the government machine in the first century of the new Millennium, and its deep thirst for information.
The Deep State rampant in the 11th century!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/normans/doomsday_01.shtml
“The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun.”
DeleteNow that's something about which it has been truly said (perhaps even on vellum) that: "the author complains frequently in the book about the monotony of the herpetarium".