Just flying over the Surry Hills bunker. 300 miles of verbiage. Climate denialists!

As sure as Rupert Murdoch is a stunning example of the best of climate science at work, so the run up to Paris was guaranteed to bring out the denialists, some more closeted than others, but with the basic intent exactly the same ...

The news Rupert Murdoch buys National Geographic: Quotes from media mogul on climate change signalled an early start to the silly season ... but the reptiles of Oz are never laggards when it comes to celebrating the change of heart in the silly old goat.

Now part of the cunning of the reptile coverage is to trot out the odd bit of cover ... so that the lizard Oz can look even-handed and balanced ...

But the pond knows this is mere trickery, a bold as brass front, more front in fact than Myers used to have, until it became more like the front Anthony Hordern and Sons now presents to George Street ...

For the real thoughts of the reptiles, the brave reader has to step into the heart of lizard darkness, and read what the Oz editorialist has scribbled on the inner cave. 

It might take a Werner Herzog to venture into this bizarre, very deep and remote cave, but hey nonny no, here we go, and those who refuse to read the carefully curated gobbets can stay outside and look at the sky and hum a cheerful tune ...

Actual readers of this gobbet will find the reptiles at their very scientific best, cherry picking here, plucking a little fragrant herbal denialism there, and throwing in Paul Ehrlich for good measure, with bonus Jimmy Carter, so that we might arrive at an "everything's for the best in the best of all possible worlds" line ...

The way denialists of the covert, closeted kind work is to talk of "global alarmism" and "florid claims" and so on, and the surest sign that you are in the company of a denialist comes when they trot out the line that there has been a plateau or a pause for the past 15, 16, 17 or 18 years - the exact number varies according to the denialist - while painting China as an irredeemable villain, a tiger which won't change its stripes, just like the United States.

At some point then comes the song, "What about me, I have a lot of cheap coal at the corner shop, it'll be completely unfair if I can't sell dinkum Aussie coal to the worrrlllddd ..."

So how does the Oz editorialist perform in the rest of the piece?

Jolly well played sir, jolly well done, and that final line about the "ideological smugness" of activists would have been a tremendous winner, if it hadn't reminded the pond of the ideological smugness and smarminess of reptile denialists doing the bidding of their climate denialist master ...

It's no news that reptiles like to travel in packs, and so it just so happened that Dame Slap was also out and about and on patrol today ... and serving up a matching dose of denialism...

Speaking of global Dame Slap follies, whenever that happens, the pond likes to remember that this is the very same scribbler who joined "Lord" Monckton in alleging climate science was being used by the UN in service of a world government movement, always worth remembering and celebrating, at least if you want  remember real alarmist nonsense and piffle dressed up in the guise of commentary ... though if the pond wants another sequel to Red Dawn, perhaps Dame Slap would be just the writer needed.

One of the benefits of the Murdochian press has been to introduce Santa and ideology and theology and politics into the discussion, such that we now have the spectacle of CSIRO survey: Most Coalition voters reject humans to blame for climate change (with forced video).

Of course this is more than matched by the bizarre spectacle of Greg "the quisling" Hunt now roaming the world talking up renewable energy, when only months ago, there was much talk of the ugliness of wind turbines and the uselessness of renewable energy in general.

Now it's the business of quislings to be able to turn on a sixpence and sound as glib coming as going, and if you can have a creationist running for President of the United States, why then you can have a quisling Hunt rediscovering his faith in renewables.

Now the cunningness of Dame Slap is to mingle Bill Shorten with climate denialism, so to defend climate science must theoretically involve a defence of Bill Shorten, a bridge too far for the pond.

But first, she trots out the usual denialist guff, this time seasoned with chat about Philippe Verdier who was in fact put on leave on October 12, and immediately became a climate denialist martyr (Watt's Up, October 15th, France's Top TV Weatherman Suspended for Criticising Climate Dogma).

Throw in King John and Prince Chuck and we're well on the way into an epic bout of climate denialism, which sounds unnervingly like the reptile Oz editorialist - but then we all know that the kool aid in the water cooler is designed to produce a hive mind, so that the reptiles might swoop and soar like a murmuration of starlings ...

All standard stuff, and then Dame Slap throws in Bill Shorten, and those who refuse to read gobbets might seize the moment to take a walk in the park ...

Now defending the increasingly desperate Shorten isn't the business of the pond, any more than the pond would be inclined to step between a rabbit and a spotlight, but it would be just as easy to construct a column out of all the things that Malcolm Turnbull once said about climate change during his time in the wilderness, and what he now says, first in order to get to power, and then to mute criticism of his coup ... 

Which is why the real message, the true purpose iof Dame Slap's denialist rant only becomes clear in those last three pars ...

The hyperbole around global warming, Magna Cartas, last chances and moratoriums on coal will only ratchet up over the next few weeks. But the hyperbole won’t alter Turnbull’s commitment to take the Abbott government’s policy of a 26 to 28 per cent emissions reduction target on 2005 levels by 2030 to Paris. 
None of it will alter the fact, while China and India will happily extract money from the West’s promised $US100bn Green Climate Fund, they won’t agree to a deal that curbs their emissions, and therefore their economic growth. China is building a new coal plant every seven to 10 days and has plans to boost its coal power by 50 per cent by 2040; India is intent on doubling its coal production by 2020. 
In other words, none of the hype will deliver a meaningful treaty at the Paris gabfest that is legally binding, enforceable and verifiable. Unless you believe in Santa.

In short, like every other denialist, Dame Slap wants the Paris gabfest to fail, because believing in climate science is like believing in Santa, and wants Turnbull to toe the Captain's line and wants a grudging minimum done, and it's all India and China's fault, and Australia shipping dinkum coal to the world has nothing to do with it.

Science not being a matter of belief, the triumphant flourishing of Santa is the cream on the blind, irrational faith cake that motivates the average denialist, as they insist nothing can be done, and nothing should be done ...

And so at end of journey, we can see how far we've shifted away from poor old Geoff Cousins... far enough to fall off the edge of the world ...

Remember him? The bit of window dressing flung in by the reptiles as a distraction ...

We can expect much more of this caper, this reptilian carry-on as Paris draws near, and icy fear grips the reptile commentariat.

The reptiles have a deep anxiety that it might not just be the quisling Hunt wittering on about renewables that's going down.

The newly crowned emperor might have other moves in mind and could turn into our very own Prince Chuck ...

Oh wait, thanks to the monarchist reptiles, Prince Chuck is our very own Prince Chuck ...