Is there anything that can distract the pond from the reptiles, or the spectacle of the rough Brough, hopefully slouching towards a reckoning, or even world-shattering events elsewhere?
Well Fairfax knows how to hit the pond's funny bone, strike a raw nerve, prod a sore spot, jab where it hurts ...
The Optus cable TV and broadband network bought by the National Broadband Network for $800 million is in such poor condition the NBN is considering replacing it entirely.
Replacing the network would see costs blow out by up to $375 million and 600,000 premises forced to wait until 2019 before connecting to the NBN, according to documents obtained by Fairfax Media. The NBN's Hybrid Fibre Coaxial (HFC) rollout will use existing pay TV cables to deliver high-speed broadband to Australians.
The leaked briefing presentation, dated November 3, 2015 and marked "confidential", canvasses moving to a "Plan B" for the HFC network, rather than upgrading the Optus network as had originally been planned.
The "Plan A" HFC rollout would see existing Optus infrastructure used for 470,000 premises.
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has spruiked the importance of Telstra and Optus' existing HFC networks to the Coalition's multi-technology mix NBN rollout.
In December, Mr Turnbull hailed the "landmark agreement" to buy the Telstra and Optus cable lines, saying: "The agreement allows NBN Co to take progressive ownership of the Optus HFC cable network and use this infrastructure in the NBN rollout, at no additional cost to taxpayers."
But the internal NBN documents state the Optus network is "not fully fit for purpose" and some equipment is "arriving at the end of life" and will need to be replaced. Other parts of the network are oversubscribed and don't have sufficient capacity to support NBN services.
According to the documents, building over the Optus HFC network with Telstra HFC or a mix of other technologies would deliver better results than upgrading the current network.
But it would require a peak funding increase of between $150 million and $375 million and see NBN miss its rollout targets by approximately 300,000 premises in 2017 and 330,00 in 2018.
It means these premises would not receive the NBN until 2019 at the earliest.
And so on. Fairfax has the leaked document here, with forced video, not that it any of it comes as a surprise to the pond, which is served - we use the word in lieu of more accurate terms like fucked - by Optus on a daily basis ...
Now the pond is equal opportunity here. Much of the stupidity began with Stephen Conroy and the planning of the roll out, such that now private businesses can cherry pick high density, likely high usage areas, such as fibre to the basement in apartment blocks, while the NBN studiously rolled out in godforsaken areas where take up was slow and the business model was sure to suffer ...
But at the same time, when Malware took over, he deliberately fucked over the sensible models for the NBN, on behalf of his then master, and now, not so slowly, the news of all his compromises and stupidities are beginning to appear in public...
Being blessed by a teflon coating, there's a good chance that a lot of it will slide away, but like the rough Brough, some day there will be a reckoning ... though hopefully not at the hands of the chief villain in the mess, Tony Abbott, and his cheerleaders at News Corp, a company which has done as much as reptilianly possible to thwart, degrade and defeat a decent broadband service ...
Meanwhile, these very same reptiles continue to offer advice to Malware ...
Actually the last two years were squandered totally and completely thanks to the reptile cheerleaders ... and so we see another body blow to the notion of an agile, mobile nation.
Meanwhile, some of the reptiles have turned to cheering on Malware ...
Well of course, anybody who would want boots on the ground in Syria or Iraq at the moment, given what's going down, would have to have rocks in his head ...
Speaking of a man with rocks in his head ...
Well yes, stupidity is contagious, and Abbott's entire imperium was marked by paranoia, resentment, bully-boy tactics and gung ho machismo.
And Luke Simpkins is clearly a man afflicted by the stupidity bug, but that mention of the coterie reminded the pond of this bit of appalling Joe Aston gossip:
Just look at that gallery of rogues, thieves, knaves, brigands and reptiles.
Why it's the the very commentariat that features on a daily basis in these pages ...
Lick spittle fellow travellers the lot of them, always ready to head off to the trough with the farmer, and by golly, by end of meal, it would have been hard to pick the difference between the farmer and the pigs ... and the climate scientists and Moorice ...
But enough of the Orwell breach - relax, the swear jar is full to overflowing - and please this is absolutely not the time to mention Global warming and El Nino set to make 2015 the hottest year on record, WMO says ...
You know how that sort of idle chatter gets Moorice and the Bolter, and Tony "climate change is crap" Abbott going ...
Professor Matthew England from UNSW's Climate Change Research Centre said the global air average temperature record had been "absolutely smashed in 2015". "This warming blows away the record-breaking 1997-1998 El Nino by a massive 0.2 degrees Celsius," he said.
"The cause of this difference between two similar El Nino years is record levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. "This should be a huge wake-up call in the lead up to Paris for urgent and binding deep cuts in fossil fuel emissions."
Dr Karl Braganza, the head of climate monitoring at the Bureau of Meteorology, worked on the report and said the heat would likely continue next year. "Australia saw record spring temperatures in 2013, again in 2014, and this may well continue for a third consecutive year," he said.
"These are significant changes for the climate system, with a likelihood that these are the warmest temperatures since before the last ice age, and the highest levels of carbon dioxide in more than two-and-a-half million years."
Amazing, and there was the pond fully briefed by Moorice and the Bolter that there'd been a pause these past 18 years
Now, as a matter of politeness, we should complete the offering by the bouffant one, who has the cheek to talk about dangerous divisions:
What a goose. We already know that News Corp is stuffed to the gills with treacherous white-anting hard core Abbott lovers who'd sit down at the drop of a hat to share the fear, hate, loathing and paranoia ...
Talk about entrenched and corrosive. Does it get any more entrenched and corrosive than Boris, the pompous one, the bromancer, Akker Dakker and the Bolter? Though wait, why were Dame Slap, Dame Groan and l'eau Devine missing?
Ah, already too many women at the dinner ... of course, how silly of the pond not to realise ...
Meanwhile, thanks to his bovver boy boofhead ways, the wretched Abbott has handed Malware a number of poisoned chalices, from the NBN to climate science to a macho stance that's going nowhere in the middle east ... while to get to power Malware relied on the helping hand of the rough Brough ...
And then Elizabeth Farrelly had to come along yesterday and give Malware the certain Medusa-like kiss of death with Why Malcolm Turnbull will be our longest serving PM since Robert Menzies ... (with forced video).
Ah, the eastern suburbs is strong in that one ...
And so to a Pope cartoon, more Pope here, which eerily reminded the pond of the culture of the country under Abbott and the conduct of News Corp under Murdoch ...
Yes, the pond blames itself for deeming the reptiles a fitting subject for study ... why it should have continued with its long ago abandoned thesis on the causes of world war one and the rise of Hitler ...
Where was Miranda at that meeting at the Australia Club? Perhaps she was out in the kitchen making coffee. Or washing up.
ReplyDeleteHi Dorothy,
ReplyDeleteI see you have awarded Georgie Porgie Christensen the premier position in the Loon Pond banner.
Is this in recognition of his latest brainwave, where possible suicide bombers will be dissuaded from action, by the possibility that they may fall foul of a reintroduced death penalty.
DW
Indeed DW. But the man comes up with a brainwave every day - he's the original bright gorgeous George spark - so the banner will be useful for many a day to come ...
Delete