Sophie Mirabella, and the great big scorched earth camelcide urged on by feral Liberal camel killers ...

(Above: now there's a solution to the feral camel problem, and too heavy reliance on the motor vehicle for transport needs).

It was inevitable that the great minds of the land, and so loon pond, would turn at some point to thinking about the great big new feral camel cull.

First there was the outrage of Akker Dakker in Camel gas and other warmist nonsense:

The insanity all of those who have been engaged in running the great global warming scam is summed up by the decision to recognise belches and farts from domestic camels, and not those emitted by the feral camel population, when calculating a nation’s carbon footprint.

No wonder the Kyoto Protocol didn’t pass the sniff test and April 1 is still nearly two months away.

Because Australia’s estimated one million feral camels, which emit the carbon equivalent of 300,000 cars, aren’t included in the Kyoto count Climate Minister Penny Wong has rejected a camel cull.

So much for the humungous claim she and Prime Minister Kevin Rudd made that human-induced climate change is the greatest moral challenge of our time.

If they believed such rubbish they’d have the SAS crisscrossing the interior in armed choppers speeding our herds of feral camels to their maker.

The SAS? In armed choppers? Crisscrossing the interior? Oh won't someone think of the poor camels.

Really, if there was one thing that might lay bare the way the commentariat columnist can plumb the depths of shallowness and superficial meretricious symbolism, the feral camel crisis is surely it.

Oops, sorry, I see that the the tremendously incisive Sophie Mirabella stole that line in Hollowmen and shallow decisions, in a column no doubt scribbled for free - Chairman Rupert's minions get no pay for their Punching on - and illustrated with a YouTube clip of Kevin Rudd on the ABC's Q&A.

Because Chairman Rupert's minions just love intellectual property rights, and have no problem providing a direct link to the actual full program, available at the ABC site here.

What's that? There's no link, and in terms of intellectual musings, you get what you paid the mindless Mirabella?

... despite all the exposure of the Q & A grilling, there was another decision this week which really laid bare the extent to which Labor has plumbed the depths of shallowness and symbolism.

Oh yes, if you want someone as thick as a brick and as determined to drown herself in the shallow end of the pool of symbolism, you can't do better than Mirabella.

Here's Mirabella channeling Akker Dakker, the ectoplasm pouring out of her nostrils:

I am talking about Climate Change Minister Penny Wong’s rejection of a feral camel cull, simply because it won’t earn her brownie points in the Kyoto tally.

Yes, because only domestic and not feral camels are included when calculating a nation’s carbon footprint, then these carbon-producing monsters are free to continue to emit unchecked.

And emit they do. Apparently, culling Australia’s 1 million feral camel population would be equivalent to taking some 300,000 cars of our roads.

Sounds simple, doesn't it. Just kill all the camels and the world will be saved from global warming. But of course this kind of serendipitous stupidity isn't what the argument's about at all.

If Labor were serious about the environment and reducing carbon, surely a cull would be a sensible proposal? If it’s really about environmental outcomes, then why would they reject such a practical step out of hand?

Because it’s all about symbolism. If it doesn’t earn us Kyoto-credit, it’s not done. Forget about whether it will benefit the environment.

Of course when you bother to take a look at the actual history of camel culling, you begin to get a different picture.

Remember back in August last year when Erin Burnett ravaged Chairman Rudd on CNBC?

(Burnett) donned her gravest expression yesterday to attack Kevin Rudd over federal cabinet's decision to spend $19 million culling a million feral camels wandering the Simpson, Gibson and Tanami deserts. "There is a serial killer in Australia and we are going to put a picture up so we can see who it is," Burnett told her audience. A photo of Rudd was shown. "That would be the Prime Minister of Australia, Kevin Rudd. OK, well, do you know what he is doing? He has launched air strikes -- air strikes -- against camels in the outback." Burnett had a child's toy camel sitting in front of her. The man in charge of the cull, Environment Minister Peter Garrett, should thank Rudd for taking the heat. Burnett's sidekick during the segment, commentator Jim Cramer -- who's no stranger to hyperbole -- said: "That's genocide. Camelcide." (here).

Oh dear. Camelcide. Well surely that makes Mirabella a fellow lickspittle genocidist camelcidist of the first water?

And then of course came the reaction of the British and other Europeans (oh I just love calling the British Europeans) to a much smaller cull of feral camels last December. You can read about it in Brits outraged by Australian camel cull. Here's a few of the loon comments published on a Times Online story about the cull:

Many comments state that Australia is not worthy of G20 status, while others claim Australians have a chip on their shoulder.

"Please tell all your friends that Australia is the worst nation on earth and they should stay away," William Burt wrote.

"Yet further evidence, if any were needed, that Australia is a third world country with a standard of living markedly below even the worst in Europe," John Spurway said.

One person from Germany wrote to Mr Knight last week, saying he was "outraged and shocked" by the government's plan.

"So 6000 innocent, gentle creatures have to die for only 350 humans?" he wrote.

"To me, these creatures have the same right to live under God's sun and drink his water as any other, including the human species."

Sure, a bunch of loons - just like the ones that run the cat lover shop down the road - but a loony army to be reckoned with.

Even in Australia, this small cull led to breast beating and hand wringing, as you can read in Camel cull sparks emotive debate. Not least because a photo of a camel opening a door - the cunning ferals posing a threat to humans - turned out to be a snap of a pet, and the NT government's alarm at the way Docker River was under siege by 6,000 marauding camels turned out to be more likely a modest 600 - thereby conforming to the rule that if there's a way to stuff something up the NT government will manage it:

The marksman responsible for killing the 3,000 camels, Kim Schwartzkopff, went on ABC Local Radio in Alice Springs and responded to the concerns.

He gave an informative interview about how the cull would be done and how it would be humane, but it was too much information for the Government and he was subsequently gagged.

The Central Land Council is coordinating the cull with $50,000 from the Government, yet during the cull this week it banned the media from covering the aerial shooting in Docker River.

It stopped any filming of the helicopter being used in the cull even while the chopper was on the ground.

The Land Council is also refusing to confirm whether the cull has begun.

Then of course there were those - from the camel meat industry - who considered the cull a huge waste, wanted it to be the last, and wanted to start carving up the camels for Muslim eaters.

Perhaps the opposition should be calling for a 'camel meat eating' day to encourage the business?

Then of course we come to the current nonsense about how killing one million feral camels would be the equivalent of taking 300,000 cars off the road, as enunciated by opposition agriculture spokesman John Cobb. (here) Such symmetry in the figures, such impracticality in making the dream come true.

Which makes you wonder why Cobb didn't also mount a campaign for everyone to go vegetarian, and for the federal government to ban the burger, seeing as how cattle produce the same ton of carbon the camels are alleged to belch into the air. Rather than say encourage the eating and farming (and thereby the control) of feral camels, or even encouraging the export trade, as only 25,000 a year are currently exported, mainly to the middle east.

By the time the story hit The Australian, in Feral camels clear in Penny Wong's carbon count, not to mention Feed feral camels to crocodiles and kill plague, says Aboriginal leader, we now knew we were in the land of the perfect Northern Territory story - feral camels and killer crocodiles. Oh show me some snaps of a croc and a crack camel shooter with a big gun, and call a broadsheet a tabloid and celebrate the perfect storm of an NT News front page! Kill all the camels. And kill all the crocs!

Of course Penny Wong and Greg Hunt joined in the absurd dance, with The Australian turning on a bravura accounting performance:

A camel emits 0.97 of a carbon-equivalent tonne per year. According to the Carbon Reduction Institute, an average 1.8-litre car running on petrol and travelling 20,000km per year emits about 3.5 tonnes of carbon emissions annually. On that ratio - which is backed by the Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries - if 300,000 cars were taken off the road Australia's emissions would be slashed by an average of 1.05 million tonnes a year.

But exactly what sort of difference a large-scale camel cull would make to our carbon footprint remains in dispute. Senator Wong's office claims a camel cull would be the equivalent of taking just 500 cars off the road. But that is 1/600th of the 300,000-car assessment given by the opposition, which has vowed to cull the mammoth herd.

Because the point of this arcana was not to do with culling, or the environmental benefits of culling, or of the practicality of killing off a million or more beasts, but having a bash at the way the Kyoto Protocol counts emissions, with only emissions from domestic beasts counted.

So Wong's office could claim that the figure was more like 500 cars, in much the same way as emissions from bushfires or drought don't count, because they are not something directly under government control. A piece of sophistry too far. So suddenly the talk can revolve around the absurdity of the UN carbon accounting system.

Rather than the absurdity that the nation would suddenly kill off all the camels.

And so working your way down the logical food chain to the lowest of the low bottom feeders, you come to Mirabella:

So much for Rudd’s “greatest moral challenge of our time”. Apparently we only need to be “moral” if the world is watching us and if we get recognition for our actions.

Well for all the stomping about, as the Liberals proclaim themselves the most fearless vampire camel killer cullers on earth, the camels actually grew abundant on the Howard government's watch.

Want to bet - after the first air head bimbo on American television accuses them of camelcide - how brave they'll stay?

Oh yes, why am I reminded of a bully held back by a safety fence as they shout how all they want to do is kill all the camels, racing out to get a few deft kicks at greenies before returning to hide behind the fence:

Perhaps even more telling has been the deafening silence from dark-green environmental activists and organisations that continually lecture about the evil of cars and for whom the removal of 300,000 cars from Australian roads would be the ultimate dream-come-true.

We are talking about the exact same environmental outcome here guys, where are your voices of outrage?

Well here's my voice of outrage you gherkin. Talk is cheap, and your shots are even cheaper. Talk of total eradication of feral camels for benefit of climate change, as opposed to a fragile outback environment, makes it almost impossible to have a debate without the spectre of Godwin's Law looming large.

Talk of practical solutions to the feral camel problem becomes almost impossible when it's twisted into the knot of climate change abuse, Kyoto anomalies, and talk of moral crusades.

Where are your calls for action? OK, I’d settle for even just a small press release pointing out the environmental hypocrisy of Labor’s decision to turn a blind eye to a carbon emitting problem that’s within their realm to fix.

Nothing. Not a peep.

Would you settle for the hypocrisy of a small press release about the stupidity of a climate denialist party trying to turn a feral population into a carbon emitting problem, when getting a camel industry going might be a more sensible and practical solution. Because as with rabbits, the chance of removing all camels, is just another lebensraum dream (sorry, I couldn't help it).

And for the record I love a well done camel curry.

Come on all you dark green warriors out there – if it really is about environmental outcomes, you can’t allow such blatantly hollow political decisions to go unchecked.

It’s clear from Rudd’s Q & A experience that young Australians are beginning to call-out such hypocrisy and expose the absurdity of shallow political decisions like this. They’re wary of empty rhetoric and sceptical of broken promises.

And they sure as hell know that environmental decisions should be made based on practical outcomes – not whether or not they allow the Government to score political brownie-points on international protocols.

Oh you pious sanctimonious political brownie-point scoring gherkin. Your time will come, and then we'll see about the scorched earth crusade that will see feral camels wiped from the earth, to the howls of Americans and Europeans, and the finger wagging from the Japanese, tortured by us about whaling ...

Meanwhile, if you want to help a struggling industry, eat some camel today. Followed by a dash of kangaroo. And don't forget a bit of savoury Mirabella flavoured tripe.

(Below: Erin Burnett, coming at ya Mirabella, if you dare harm a hair on the head of those cute little feral camels. Ah they're so cute, won't someone think of the camels).