It's a long haul, but it's always a joy to keep the company of pre-Copernican obscurantists ...

It would be remiss of the pond not to acknowledge the clever way that climate science is practised by the reptiles of the lizard Oz.

First you must start with a graph, and preferably one that puts Australia well down the listings.

It would be absolutely wrong to contemplate a per capita listing, or perhaps a chart which expanded on Australia's contribution to the world by way of coal, remembering of course that Australian coal is exceptionally fine coal, the finest in the wooorrrllld and we have a moral duty to export as much of it as we can and to hell with the consequences:

Now that's an exemplary start.

Thereafter we must endure endless tedium, but wait, there's a point to the peregrinations, and that's to endorse India, and hope it may use Australian coal - the finest there is in the world - and who knows, perhaps that will allow it to rise up the charts to match the US and China.

But first we must start by contemplating the spectre of solar on the homes of the filthy rich:

Now the pond can sense a certain restlessness and much asking of 'are we there yet?' from the back seat, but we should note with admiration how uncertainty has already been seeded into the discussion, with Europe reeling and the superficial rich ponce from the eastern suburbs offering a bit of cheap comfort with a few trinkets on the roof of his filthy mansion.

Soon enough we will be able to move to to the experts, the Lomborgians and Judith Curry, who will help dismiss all this useless talk of renewable energy.

But first we must endure many more dances around the point:

And so after that bout of uncertainty and shifting sands, it's time to deliver the Lomborgian killer blow. After all, if it's been printed in the lizard Oz, it's holy writ and must be true, and certainly can't be questioned, and let us all hail fossil fuels until at least the twelfth of never ... (and that's a long long time, or at least many decades to come):

Now experts will have noted the astute balance and the caution ... on the one hand, acidification and catastrophic consequences for centuries to come ... balanced by reference to global cooling, and Judith Curry wheeled in as a leading climate scientist.

And then there's the repression of the denialists, a shameful crime against humanity and science.

Now it's time for more uncertainty and doubt and fear, and how handy that the IPCC and the UN are on hand. Mind, no frivolous nonsense about climate science being used to establish a world government - leave that to experts like Dame Slap and Screaming Lord Monckton:

By now, the screaming of 'are we there yet?' has reached an unseemly crescendo of pain, but please, be quiet in the back, because this is what is known in the movies as a slow build, and eventually and at last, we have finally reached the point where the pre-Copernican obscurantists may emerge in full flower:

And there you go, the pre-Copernican obscurantists emerge triumphant, with a reference to Marie Antoinette - how clever and astute to shift the blame for that remark to the "for many", rather than the scribe himself taking the credit - and how noble to celebrate India and Pope Francis and the IPCC saying that fossil fuels are with us for many decades to come, perhaps until the twelfth of never, and so it's coal, coal, coal for the wooorrrllld and not just ordinary, banal coal, but dinkum Ozzie coal, the very best that money can buy, and of course it's Australia's moral duty to bank all that moola while it can (cash in the paw allowed where banking facilities allow).

Well, if anyone has made it to this point, they probably are thirsting for a cartoon, and it just so happens that Fiona Katauskas of New Matilda  scored a Walkley nomination, along with the infallible David Pope and the invincible Cathy Wilcox.

You can also find more Katauskas at her website here, and now at 40k the pop, how pleasing that the world can be made safe by Tony power ...

That threshing machine got quite a work out:

Ah memories, how the pond misses the hey-day of the pre-Copernican obscurantists, but at least Graham Lloyd and the reptiles continue on his legacy ... and soon he will be paid handsomely to spread his words of wisdom, along with dinkum Aussie coal, to the woorrrlllddd...