There was the Major perched in his favourite far right spot at the top of the digital edition early this morning ...
... and naturally the pond saluted, but it turned out that the Major had Major doubts, which made the pond think of him as Major Major, but that would be a shamelessly borrowed joke: “Major Major had been born too late and too mediocre. Some men are born mediocre, some men achieve mediocrity, and some men have mediocrity thrust upon them. With Major Major it had been all three. Even among men lacking all distinction he inevitably stood out as a man lacking more distinction than all the rest, and people who met him were always impressed by how unimpressive he was."
There were other topics this morning - a Keating troll and the lesser member of the Kelly gang drumming up consternation about not being able to teach creationism and a young Earth, but the pond stayed firm. On with the mediocrity of a Major crisis:
Ah, so it's a full company, all the News Corp's peak loons are present and correct. Please, do carry on Major, and some saucy doubts and fears would be great fun ...
As a pond correspondent noted, it would have been a big help if Ted (what strength it takes for the pond not to talk of its old Teddy Bear) had actually offered straight answers to the questions, but Teds were always designed to be floppy at the joints (sadly in an operation to remove its appendix, the pond's Ted came to grief).
Never mind, after the next gobbet, the Major will reveal what the reptile rage machine is actually all about this time ...
Strange how SMRs seem to have disappeared from the reptile discussions, to be replaced with talk of what an authoritarian regime can managed, but then out of the mouth of the babe came a Major revelation. It's really about the wedge, it's nothing more than a wedge, and just like the nuke subs vanishing over the horizon, nuking the country to save the planet will also likely disappear, but as a wedge, it's peachy keen ...
Yep, it's the perfect wedge ... anything to avoid taking action ...
Down below the pond had to report a Major disappointment ...
The pond would like to spend time with the craven Craven, doing his Dame Groan impression, but he's no match for the Caterist and the Lynch mob, though the reptiles didn't help by stretching out their thin material with sets of huge snaps ...
The Caterist theme was eco-anxiety, on the basis that the planet was in spiffing shape and vulgar youff just needed some tuff love ...
We have, of course, been here many times before. As a blog noted
here with some sketchy quotes, it's an old and reliable theme ...
They [Young People] have exalted notions, because they have not been humbled by life or learned its necessary limitations; moreover, their hopeful disposition makes them think themselves equal to great things -- and that means having exalted notions. They would always rather do noble deeds than useful ones: Their lives are regulated more by moral feeling than by reasoning -- all their mistakes are in the direction of doing things excessively and vehemently. They overdo everything -- they love too much, hate too much, and the same with everything else. (Aristotle)
It feels positively indecent to put the Caterist in the company of Aristotle, but needs must ...
At this point the reptiles began the set of huge snaps, a distraction the pond is always whining about ...
The pond is aware that the Caterist is also in the company of Plato, as noted in a Reverend in a pdf
here...
I would like to begin today with a quotation from a famous author: "What is happening to our young people? They disrespect their elders, they disobey their parents. They ignore the laws. They riot in the streets inflamed with wild notions. Their morals are decaying. What is to become of them?" These words were written more than 2,300 years ago, by Plato, the Greek philosopher.
The pond would like to note the real point of the Caterist exercise. It's to ignore, downplay, and avoid discussing climate science and instead blame the victims, vulgar youffs concerned that this is the only planet they've got and the chance of living on Mars with uncle Elon is a slim one ...
What to do? Tuff love of course, but in the meantime ...
"The world is passing through troublous times. The young people of today think of nothing but themselves. They have no reverence for parents or old age. They are impatient of all restraint. They talk as if they knew everything, and what passes for wisdom with us is foolishness with them. As for the girls, they are forward, immodest and unladylike in speech, behavior and dress." (From a sermon preached by Peter the Hermit in A.D. 1274)
Harden the fug up young 'uns, the Caterist is full of grit and resilience, a strength he earned during the Blitz and surviving the loss of the crispy bacon they had before the war ...
On and on the Caterist went, channeling the ancients...
"I see no hope for the future of our people if they are dependent on frivolous youth of today, for certainly all youth are reckless beyond words... When I was young, we were taught to be discreet and respectful of elders, but the present youth are exceedingly wise [disrespectful] and impatient of restraint". (Hesiod, 8th century BC)
As weather patterns get more extreme and oceans get warmer, sea levels rise due to thermal expansion and weather patterns get more extreme, boosting coastal erosion. This climate crisis is now on the doorstep of Salisbury beach homeowners, as they suffer the consequences of rising sea levels, stronger winds and severe storms in recent months, including two in January.
“It was devastating,” Saab said about the recent storms. “Water went from the ocean into people’s living rooms and kitchens. Patios were destroyed. And at least one home was deemed uninhabitable.”
Oh just harden up, the Caterist has no time for your eco-anxieties ...
At this point the reptiles inserted a snap designed to terrify everyone,
including Don Lemon ...
Luckily that snap of Uncle Elon terrified the Caterist too, and so he finally got around to his suggestion of tuff love (and never mind the planet, the planet can just go hang)...
Yep, there's your answer to climate science in a nutshell, or perhaps in a nut ...
And so, simply because he's there, on to the bonus of the Lynch mob, again littered with distracting snaps ...
Each time the pond takes a stroll with the Lynch mob, all it can think about are the students running up mountains of HECS debt to get his pearls of wisdom, when they might just read the pond recycling the Lynch mob ...
Peak woke?
Sorry, it's a ritual for the pond ...
The reptiles also began their own visual interruptions, including a snap of a forlorn Brexit party the pond was tempted to run full size ...
British consumers have been told that the price of some of their favourite red wines could increase by more than 40p next year after the government ignored pleas from the wine industry to abandon complex post-Brexit tax changes.
The chief executive of Majestic Wine, John Colley, said the new alcohol duty system, which comes into effect in February 2025, would increase the number of tax bands for wine from one to 30, and cost businesses huge sums of money to administer.
The chief executive of the Wine Society, Steve Finlan, said the plan was “ludicrous, expensive and probably unworkable”.
Sorry, the pond didn't mean to Farage the conversation, back to the Lynch mob ...
Oh dear, Ireland has always been a troubled island, always full of the troubles, and yet again it becomes clear why ... but then the Lynch mob jumps the shark and nukes the fridge by inviting Dame Slap into the conversation ...
Sorry, the pond has a proud tradition and it must be maintained ...
Phew, the tradition is taking a bit of a hammering this day ... and what a relief that the pond foreshadowed Brexit and had already covered climate catastrophism with the Caterist ...
Climate change remains subject to intense political debate? Well that's one way to discuss climate science, though when the pond last checked, actual climate scientists were debating
just how Faraged the planet was ...
The impacts on corals and other forms of marine life are incalculable. Australia’s Great Barrier Reef is suffering its fifth mass bleaching event in eight years. Meteorologists warn that high surface temperatures may also presage a longer and more active hurricane season.
Raúl Cordero, a climate professor at the University of Groningen and the University of Santiago, said the growing possibility of a cooling La Niña between June and August could bring respite from the global heat, but this would only be temporary: “All recent temperature records will likely be broken sooner rather than later. The situation will continue to deteriorate until we halt the burning of fossil fuels.”
Never mind, pay your HECS fees to sit at the feet of the Lynch mob and you get a free snap of Maggie ...
After that attempt at a visual troll, the Lynch mob seemed to run out of steam, and wimped out with a short final gobbet ...
Ah, the mango Mussolini.
As proposed by Luckovich, the pond offers its disgust, hatred, joy at the prof's wife's unattractiveness and a desire to destroy the prof ...
Hi Dorothy,
ReplyDelete“So, too, is confirmation bias, an unconscious preference to interpret information in a way that confirms pre-existing hypotheses and discounts evidence to the contrary.”
Priceless advice from the amateur hydrologist.
The problem really is that 'confirmation bias' is an case by case thing: one way or another, some people can reject the bias in a particular instance, but that will have no effect on the rule of bias in most/all other cases.
DeleteLynch: "The state's Governor, Ron Desantis, failed to turn his anti-woke crusade into a viable presidential campaign". Actually, DeSantis failed to turn anything of his into anything much at all. The place where woke goes to die ? Sure, Ron, sure.
ReplyDeleteHave you marked a young person down today for a mistake you think they've made? If not, do your bit now to improve their eco-mental instability!
ReplyDeleteThis will do wonders for their eco-mental instability.
Deletehttps://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2024-03-18/wa-summer-heat-broke-records-but-media-downplayed-climate-change/103572922?utm_campaign=abc_news_web&utm_content=link&utm_medium=content_shared&utm_source=abc_news_web
Paul Keating has given the Lizard Oz a right bollocking over its coverage of his meeting with the Chinese Foreign Minister; it’s detailed over at the Graudian’s political blog. It’s classic Keating venom and he rips into not just this particular story but the organisation as a whole.
ReplyDeleteSo according to the Lynch mob, the results of national plebiscites and referendums show that populations overwhelmingly reject progressive - sorry, “woke” - proposals. Except that as he admits, that’s not always the case. So did he get most of the way through the article, realise his central premise was flawed and just decide “Bugger it - can’t be bothered starting again and in any case, who’s going to bother reading this crap with a critical eye anyway?”.
ReplyDeleteIt’s also worth noting that the Irish Constitution was written with an extremely reactionary Catholic focus and was actually submitted to the Vatican for approval - which it received. Its provisions regarding the position of women in society were widely criticised even at the time of its preparation and adoption in the late 1930s. Even though the recent reform proposals failed, they could hardly be dismissed as the result of modern “wokeness”.
DeleteOh c'mon Anony (the 1st), do you really think that any reptile could perform an act of thought that sophisticated ? No mate, they just write it (or dictate it to an AI voice interpreter nowadays) and then just forget it forever.
DeleteThe poor old Major - he seems genuinely perplexed that the massed talking heads of Murdoch Media aren’t sufficient to persuade the general public on some issues. Like the elderly L Ron Hubbard relying on the e-meter, he’s come to believe the bullshit that he’s been spouting for so long.
ReplyDeleteHe's "come to believe" his own bullshat ? Pish tush Anony, he's always believed it
Delete
ReplyDeleteKeating on The Broadsheet liars (in the guardian):
Keating: "The Australian [corpsenews] should be ‘contemptuously ignored’, Keating says ... "the same newspaper urges Australia to sell the Chinese ever more tonnages of iron ore, presumably so that China would have no trouble putting together the armaments of scale necessary to actually attack and damage us." ... "This is how mixed up The Australian’s editorial policy is and why it should be ignored. More than that, contemptuously ignored."
Contemptuously lying.
Can't we call them out as in they are major major shovellers of bullshit; "the lies, for the most part ignoble, now called The Australian Scribbler's propaganda..." (ibid., p. 106). But Socrates calls it a lie."
"At Book III 414 Socrates tells of the need for a "noble lie" to be believed in the city he and his companions are founding (in speech). Cornford calls it a "bold flight of invention" and adds the following note: "This phrase is commonly rendered 'noble lie', a self-contradictory expression no more applicable to Plato's harmless allegory than to a New Testament parable or the Pilgrim's Progress, and liable to suggest that he would countenance the lies, for the most part ignoble, now called propaganda..." (ibid., p. 106). But Socrates calls it a lie."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noble_lie
Cojones of lesser metals.
So, Pig Iron Albo you reckon Anony ? Naah mate, all we need is just a few missiles and drones and we'll sink that fleet before it's even halfway here.
DeleteExcept for their nuclear subs - we'll need a few torpedo drones to sink them. But hey, for the nation that gave the world the Jindivik (back in 1952) that's a doddle.
Not lying, just bad a case of complex
ReplyDelete"Superiority"
"This is a full posting of the short story by Arthur C. Clarke. It is titled “Superiority”. “Superiority” is a science fiction short story by Arthur C. Clarke, first published in 1951. It depicts an arms race, and shows how the side which is more technologically advanced can be defeated, despite its apparent superiority, because of its own organizational flaws and its willingness to discard old technology without having fully perfected the new.
Please enjoy.
https://metallicman.com/laoban4site/superiority-by-arthur-c-clarke-full-text/
Been around for a few years, that one, Anony. I can remember reading it back in the late 1950s (ie about 7 or 8 years after it first appeared).
DeleteBut what people don't quite grasp is that we have had a kind of 'superiority' in WWII when German weapons and devices were in many respects somewhat ahead of the Allies, even when America was dragged into action by those idiot Japanese.
Consider the planes of the Luftwaffe, the intercontinental rockets, the submarine fleet, the German tanks etc. All ahead of us, but still they lost - because any form of not immediately decisive technology will lose to strategic idiocy - like trying to invade Russia in the European winter. And not being able to take Leningrad even after slaughtering a minimum of 800,000 of the inhabitants and starving most of the rest.
"strategic idiocy" seems to be the moniker for our zeitgeist.
DeleteAccording to the Caterist - “We might encourage teachers to encourage shy kids to come out of their shells rather than offering the debilitating diagnosis of social anxiety disorder.“
ReplyDeleteI have an 11 year old grandson who, since early childhood, has experienced extreme social anxiety. He now manages to lead a perfectly normal, happy life at home, school and in other social environments. A lot of the credit for that rests with his school teachers, who early on recognised the issues with which my grandson was struggling, and put in a massive effort to assist him in recognising and dealing with them. We owe them a debt of gratitude that can never be repaid.
I’ve long recognised a lot of myself in my grandson- looking back on my own school days, I know that I faced a lot of the same issues. In those days, though, the general attitude was “toughen the fuck up, kid” - which appears to be the Caterist’s preferred approach. Back then even sympathetic teachers saw these issues as something to be put up with, rather than remedied. That’s a lot of the reason that I look back on much of my own school days as a period of misery, despite being reasonably bright and doing well academically.
I have no idea whether the Caterist has children. If he does, I hope that they haven’t been subjected to the half-arsed academic theories of their father.
Fuck you, Caterist.
Sen-say-shun-al comment!
ReplyDeleteI am applauding wildly here.