Geoffrey, Peter and Dick, and a dash of Gerard because you can never have enough mind numbing ennui ....

(Above: Mark Knight's 17th August 2009 cartoon which you can find amongst the NMA's best cartoons of 2009 here. Amazing, only 2009, and already it's a nostalgia fest).

Here at the pond we've begun to apply the impeccable logic of brave, bold Nick Minchin to the issue of climate change, and anyone who might be inclined to comment on the arcane science. Naturally we do it in the Minchin way, without fear or favour or common sense ...

If you recall, with an airily dismissive wave of the hand, the mouthy Minchin munched on Ross Garnaut's qualifications:

"He's not a climate scientist. I don't think he has any authority whatsoever to speak on the climate". (here)

Well played for a solicitor turned party hack turned Senator, and an easy way to dismiss almost any participant in the debate - get thee gone Tim Blair and Andrew Bolt - as we discovered when we hied off to Quadrant to read The Intelligent Voter's Guide to Global Warming, as prepared by Geoffrey Lehmann, Peter Farrell and Dick Warburton.

Naturally we immediately applied the Minchinite principle of micturation and mastication, with a tendency towards verbal masturbation.

It turns out, if his wiki is to be believed, that Geoffrey Lehmann, of all things, identifies as a poet, and children's writer, though he has also worked as a tax lawyer and solicitor, and has degrees in arts and law. Yep, he clearly has no authority whatsoever to speak on climate.

Then there's Peter Farrell, who has a very impressive CV, which can be found here, as well as appended to the article, but sadly it seems to involve biomedical engineering, with bachelors and masters degrees in chemical engineering, not to mention a PhD in bioengineering and a DSc from UNSW for research related to dialysis and renal medicine. It seems a tad unfair - Farrell seems eminently qualified to have a layperson's educated opinion - but really, it has to be said that on the basis of his bald CV, Farell has absolutely no authority whatsoever to speak on the subject of climate change.

Which brings us to the third rascallion rascal, one Dick Warburton, a board room heavyweight to be found hovering around Westfield Retail Trust, the Board of Taxation, the Reserve Bank, Citigroup, the Smith Family, and at one time Du Pont Australia and New Zealand. Warburton, for his sins, has committed the ultimate thought crime, and been caught out supporting a carbon tax, on the ABC no less, in Business leader criticises ETS but wants carbon tax:

SUE LANNIN: You support a carbon tax. Why do you think that would be a better system than a carbon trading scheme?

DICK WARBURTON: Because the science is not settled, then I don't believe we should be going into a scheme which is virtually irreversible once it starts, because once it starts it will be almost impossible to unravel the financial derivatives, the rights particularly, therefore you better go to a scheme that can be changed if the science moves one way or the another, and the carbon tax would do that.

Secondly, the carbon tax is a much more transparent, is much more direct, is much more flexible type of system and with the completely compromised ETS I believe it's now turned out a better solution.

It almost goes without saying, but being followers of Nick Minchin, we'll repeat ourselves like blithering idiots, and roundly assert that this man clearly has no authority whatsoever to talk about the climate.

But apart from all this, how do we know that this unholy trinity don't know what they're talking about?

Well if you dig into their piece, you come to this transformative moment:

Man-made emissions are likely to cause a doubling of atmospheric carbon dioxide during this century and this increase will continue to have a warming effect on global temperatures. One of the disappointing distortions of the climate science debate is the claim that sceptics deny this relationship.

Now there's an alternative planet in an alternative universe.

This news will come as a shock to all those who dub themselves as sceptics and who deny any connection whatsoever between man-made emissions and a warming effect on global temperatures. Like Nick Minchin, who recently predicted we were heading for a cool snap, after a decade of coolishness ...

It seems, according to the trinity, that what all proper, decent sceptics argue about is the strength of the AGW effect:

What sceptics are sceptical about is the strength of this AGW effect. A strong AGW effect would be an increase in global average temperatures of 2.5 to 4 degrees or more, with potentially disruptive outcomes, such as a possible large rise in sea levels. A weak AGW effect would be an increase of 1 degree or less, a number of much less concern.

Indeed. But if this is scepticism at work, where does it leave the likes of Nick Minchin, who deny any link whatsoever? What to call them, since they're not sceptics, they're unholy disbelievers?

Another Eureka moment ... so that's why they're called denialists ...

Now for a confession. We wandered down this picturesque lane because today is the day we usually contemplate the thoughts of that prattling Polonius Gerard Henderson, scribbling away in A beautiful set of numbers? It depends on how you look at it?

Is there a problem officer? Well yes, you see it takes the prattling Polonius a full 801 words - we counted them so you could nod off without worrying - to reach this devastating insight:

At the moment, Abbott and the Coalition have reason to be pleased with the polls. But there is time for Gillard and Labor to make a comeback.

Yes much has been done, but much remains to be done, and the coalition is a firm favourite, unless the Labor party becomes a firm favourite, and the odds are even, except if they're uneven and it's an each way bet, and you can catch the essential juice, the whiff of the scribbler from this remark:

As the German sociologist Max Weber said a century ago, democratic politics is about slow boring through hard boards.

Which is a roundabout way of saying that reading a scribbler on democratic politics like Henderson is the rough equivalent of slow boring through the soft tissue of my brain ...

Naturally in the first half of his piece Henderson flails away at the ABC. There's Virginia Trioili getting it wrong on ABC TV's News Breakfast, and then there's Canberra-based reporter Frances Bell misinterpreting the recent poll, and there's Deborah Cameron on 702 announcing that the poll favours Kevin Rudd and Malcolm Turnbull (did they only sample Phillip Adams, I wonder).

Announces the sage Henderson "This is all very superficial." He then spends the rest of his column arriving at the mind numbingly banal conclusion quoted above. While also arriving at the astonishing, remarkable, startling conclusion that the carbon tax might be an issue at the next election.

Henderson doesn't stick his toe in the water, Warburton style, and offer an opinion on the wisdom or otherwise of a carbon tax, he just asserts it will be an issue. Oh brave predictive Polonius ...

The only question arising from Polonius's piece is this.

Has Henderson spent way too much time watching and listening to the ABC, so that now he exhibits all the signs of Stockholm Syndrome? Out of sympathy for the cardigan wearers at the broadcaster does he he feel the need to show that he too can be depressingly tedious and dull?

Well here at the pond, we yearn for the day when Henderson spends an entire column commenting on and correcting the many factual errors, distortions, untruths and half-baked innuendoes emanating from commercial television and radio on a minute by minute, hour by hour, 24/7/12/365/∞ basis ...

Don't hold your breath. Stockholm syndrome requires that Henderson only watch and listen to the ABC and comment at extraordinary length on its fallible ways ... and always with the sense of humour of a desiccated coconut ...

Ah well, duty's done, and now we can return to Quadrant, where the unholy trinity promise in that, in part two of their guide, in the April edition, they will contemplate "the practicalities of an ETS and carbon tax, and the politics."

Will Dick Warburton still be in favour of a carbon tax? Will Quadrant publish a piece in favour of the Labor party's carbon tax policy? Oh the suspense, it's killing me ...

By golly, if you believe Quadrant will publish a piece in favour of a carbon tax, have Nick Minchin and I got a very cheap harbour bridge to sell you.

You see it's cheap because in the next cool snap, the sea water in the harbour will freeze, and people will be able to skate to work, which is why we can knock down the soon to be unviable harbour bridge at such a low price ...

Send all offers care of the pond ...

Update: It was remiss of me - as was firmly pointed out in private correspondence - not to have noted that man in the fabulous frock, Cardinal Pell, taking a firmly Minchinite stand on the matter, as reported in Pell row with climate scientist heats up. After all, what would the head of the Bureau of Meteorology known up against his eminence?

... Cardinal Pell told the Herald the statements by Dr Ayers, an atmospheric scientist, were themselves unscientific. ''Ayers, when he spoke to the House, was obviously a hot-air specialist. I've rarely heard such an unscientific contribution.''

The cleric, who has questioned global warming in his Sunday newspaper column, even likened himself to the federal government's climate adviser Ross Garnaut when he expressed disappointment last week that the public debate on climate change was often divorced from scientific quality, rigour and authority.

''I regret when a discussion of these things is not based on scientific fact,'' Cardinal Pell said. ''I spend a lot of time studying this stuff.''

Now there's a man eminently qualified to have an expert opinion on "stuff" ... to the point where some might sincerely wish he got stuffed ... or at least just quietly go about the business of wearing frocks while berating cross dressers for wearing frocks ...

(Below: are we there yet? Yes folks, you're here).