In which the pond chills with the Bolter ...

First a confession ... the pond only set out on this journey because it wanted the vaguest excuse possible to run this immortal Rowe - more immortal Rowe here - referencing one of the pond's favourite movies ...

As Trump is for Colbert, so the demonic onion muncher with his volcanic goats is for Rowe ...

Where I'm going, you can't follow. What I've got to do, you can't be any part of. Ilsa, I'm no good at being noble, but it doesn't take much to see that the problems of three little people don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world of climate science. Someday you'll understand that. Now, now. Here's looking at you, kid.

Besides, over at the lizard Oz, things are quiet ... with the bromancer sounding like the Donald boasting that he's the smartest kid in the room ... or at least in Asia ...

Nope, the time was right, the mood was mellow, and the Bolter was in full climate scientist mode, and though the pond rarely visits the Bolter, the pond just loves the smell of climate science in the morning ...

What impeccable logic, what a compelling argument. If you poke a pig and it squeals, logically you've won the reasoned, rational discourse with the pig and it can be turned into bacon pronto ...

Now there were some considerable sacrifices involved in following the Bolter into climate science, not least his explanation of how Harvey came to be ...

Of course, why didn't the pond think of that. There the pond was, thinking Harvey was all the fault of Democrats or the left or perhaps Hillary or certainly Obama when all along it was the fault of women ... greedy bloody women! They gave Harvey too much power! Useless bloody women ...

But the pond turned aside - after all, with the Donald in power, who can complain about a little pussy-groping, as endorsed by Fox News and Murdochians everywhere? - because the climate science called ...

See a common thread?

What, the nutter loon is a common thread?

Now it's truly funny that the Bolter is so disdainful of Peter Hannam that he dare not mention his name as the person responsible for scribbling for Fairfax Five charts that show Tony Abbott is the one who has lost sight of the science ...

Hannam can look after himself, but the Bolter dealing with Hannam was truly rich comedy ...

The pond remains amazed that no Jesuit can claim a hand in training the Bolter in scientific argument and reasoning ...

Indeed, indeed. There's something rigorously polite about the way that the Bolter indulges in reasoned argument, from his talk of abusive warmists through "truly nuts" to arrive at "his rebuttal is trash."

Thank the long absent lord the Bolter isn't inclined to be abusive. Just look at the mellow tone of his headers ...

And so to a few more gobbets of the Bolter in most excellent form ... whether quoting himself ...

... in which screaming and abuse is the measure of great scientific argumentation, and then screaming at a screaming Probyn ...

Indeed, indeed. Because talking of sacrificing goats to volcanos is as scientific as anyone can get ...

If only Probyn had used scientific words like 'dumb', 'trash' and 'truly nuts' ...

And so to another miss ...

And so the pond was vastly relieved, with everything for the best in the best of all Bolterish climate science worlds.

The ABC and that wretched Probyn had been put back in his box, as if talk of sacrificing kids to volcano gods was anything less than scientific, when the benefits of turning a wafer into human flesh and wine into human blood and having a bloody good meal of it have long been proven to be top notch science at work ...

And as for that awful Street and his hideously selective way with quotes, how dare he carry on like that, and force the Bolter to be selective in his quoting, as Street dealt with a number of onion muncher claims, including but not limited to ...

Carbon dioxide increases agriculture yields 

• "There's evidence that higher concentrations of carbon dioxide (which is a plant food after all) are actually greening the planet and helping to lift agricultural yields."

This one would seem to fit with what you remember from primary school science — plants breathe in carbon dioxide and breathe out oxygen as a waste gas, having absorbed the carbon to grow. So you could be forgiven for thinking that more carbon dioxide means more plants means good things for the environment, right? 
The problem is that increased carbon dioxide seems to reduce the level of nutrients in food crops, for reasons which are not entirely clear yet. A study published in Nature in 2014 grew some of the most important food crops in the high carbon dioxide environment predicted to exist in 50 years' time, and the results were sobering. 
As The Guardian summarised, "Wheat grown in high CO2 levels had 9 per cent less zinc and 5 per cent less iron, as well as 6 per cent less protein, while rice had 3 per cent less zinc, 5 per cent less iron and 8 per cent less protein. Maize saw similar falls while soybeans lost similar levels of zinc and iron but, being a legume not a grass, did not see lower protein." Aside from the obvious nutrition issues, iron and zinc deficiencies are linked with birth defects and developmental issues for newborns and are a huge problem for the developing world — not regions where popping a few multivitamins are going to solve the problem. 
The study's lead author, Professor Samuel Myers of Harvard University, even seemed to predict Mr Abbott's claim: "There may be a little positive effect [from increased CO2], but the people who work in this area would not want to hang their hat on that in the face of the many other negative effects of climate change, including heatwaves, droughts and floods."

Well the Bolter would hang his Dr Seuss hat anywhere ...though it takes some considerable gall or agility to turn that little summary into a good news Bolterish story and claim Prof Samuel Myers as a supporter of your case ...

And so on and on, but at this point, the pond must make another confession. 

It really only embarked on this journey so that it could end with yet another perspicacious Rowe, with more onion munching Rowe here ...