The pond wasn't a great fan of Dennis Potter as a writer, but spotting one of his novels in a street library jogged the pond's memory and took it back to an interview with Melvyn Bragg, broadcast on Channel 4 on April 5 1994.
There's an edited transcript at the Graudian, but it was this bit what came flooding back:
Politics was - seemed - the door, until I actually stood as a candidate. By then, of course, illness had descended and I had a walking stick and I was drowning actually, drowning, felt that I was ... On the Daily Herald I hated every second of it. And that world of popular journalism, as I saw it then, and the Herald eventually mutated through the mismanagement of the Mirror Group, its eventual owners, into ...
There's an interesting thing: one of the favourite fantasy plots of a writer is a character is told "You've got three months to live" and - which is what I was told - and you, who would you kill? (laughs). I call my cancer, the main one, the pancreas one, I call it Rupert, so I can get close to it, because the man Murdoch is the one who, if I had the time - in fact I've got too much writing to do and I haven't got the energy - but I would shoot the bugger if I could. There is no one person more responsible for the pollution of what was already a fairly polluted press, and the pollution of the British press is an important part of the pollution of British political life.
And that was in 1994. Poor old Potter wouldn't believe the pollution that's gone on since.
Speaking of pollution, and desirous for the moment of avoiding the current disaster in Afghanistan, what a relief to the pond that the Major reported for duty this day.
When in need of a Murdochian lickspittle to rouse the ghost of Potter, to carry on the pollution, to give a name to cancer, so to speak, is there any better choice to hand any given day of the week in the lizard Oz? Oh well, perhaps the Caterist, but more of him anon ...
Ah yes, the Chinese burning coal like there's no tomorrow, but luckily for the Daily Snail, Australia can go on shipping coal to ensure there will actually be no tomorrow. It's the dinkum larrikin lizard Oz way ...
But the pond promised to not interrupt, especially when the Major wants to have a beer with Barners, who really is full of ideas for railways to carry coal into the indefinite future ...
And there you have it in a nutshell. As good a statement of reptile climate science denialism in two short lines.
It's natural changes to climate wot done it your honour, a little man-made variability is just a piffling trifle, don't your honour go worrying his head about that ...
Everything else the Major has to offer seems almost a bonus luxury item saturated in dinkum coal juice, but the pond will press on because that smug snap of the Bolter signals the joining together of sundry loons ...
Yes, you might think there have been records broken of late, and not in models, but in observations, but you've reckoned without the power of one of the most preeminent and most qualified of the Murdochian scientists ... the Bolter ... aided by Lloydie, saviour of the Amazon ...
And there you have it, the Major, the Bolter, Lloydie, saviour of the Amazon and sundry others, and some might ask, could there be any more, and of course there is, how could ye doubt, oh ye of little faith, because this day the man who understands the movement of flood waters in quarries, and who knows how to get cash in the paw from government, returned to offer his splendid insights into climate science ...
There's no point in trying to herd this bunch of denialist cats; better to stand back, and watch the water rush through the quarry helter skelter, and sort of the defamation payment later ...
Wit? Oh yes, the Caterist is always full of wit, because that's what you get from a sociological student who can move from Tolstoy to a bandicoot faster than a rat up a climate science denialist's drain pipe ...
Ah good old beefy Angus, still searching for the source of the altered document he sent to the Mayor, much like the Caterist is still wondering what the fuck went wrong with the flood waters, and the Major ceaselessly hunts for that long lost Order of Lenin medal.
Thus far the pond has successfully, if painfully bitten on its tongue, but in truth, it must make one final observation.
Anyone who starts a paragraph with "in truth" is usually lying, or in truth doesn't have a clue, or in truth, wants to beguile you into thinking a gigantic porkies will keep you content and deluded ...
The pond takes it all back. From Tolstoy to a delusional Xian of the C. S. Lewis kind - in truth you don't get better stupidity than the Caterist when talking of climate science denialism, and the Major might well need to lift his game if he's to stay at the top of the reptile climate science denialist tree ...
And so to a different form of denialism, courtesy of the Oreo ... and perhaps here the pond should introduce the reformed, recovering feminist by noting the dismal front page of the tree killer edition of the lizard Oz ...
Never mind that the rag is out of date, look, there's nattering "Ned", reporting on gold standard Gladys ... throw in reptile climate science denialism and we're all doomed ...
Well the pond dabbled with "Ned" and is pleased to report that there wasn't a sign of "Ned's" famous podcast featuring "Ned" reading "Ned", but in any case, the pond usually reserves a Monday slot for the reformed, recovering feminist ... and since "Ned" is talking of chaos, apparently unaware of what real chaos means - try Afghanistan - the pond thought that it was right to feature a scribbler doing her best to help bring about a Nimbin/Mullumbimby sense of chaos ...
What a pathetic illustrative snap - the pond still can't get over how far and fast the lizard Oz graphics department has fallen, as if the Taliban had knocked on the door - but it's not as pathetic as the Oreo crying out "freedumb" ...
Yes, the United States does "freedumb" better, especially in Texas and Florida, and with the proud boys joining in with the fundamentalist clap happies, and old Disney stars ranting against mask-wearing, and yes that new genre continues with the NC rep who opposed masks and vaccines and ended up in hospital with Covid, and three Broward county teachers dying from Covid within 24 hours, and surely, as MTG sagely observed, we can't live forever, so why not get the virus and die, and who can count the number of weird and wonderful rants about freedumb and their right to kill others, but enough already, we have the reformed, recovering feminist to hand ... insisting that her right to kill you is the best kind of "freedumb" ...
The pond can recall a time when people were overjoyed that there was a vaccine to deal with polio - you could see the alternatives and the calipers around you - and assorted other diseases. It led to an attitude best summed up by John B Best (what a name) in a pdf here ...
...There are legitimate scientific reasons for not vaccinating a very small proportion of people. Such people should be protected by other therapeutic means.
However, there is no place for “conscientious objection” to vaccination. I received my first vaccinations when the world was at war and conscientious objection meant not wanting to bear arms. Now the conscientious objection under discussion is metaphorically not wanting to bare arms in a war against disease and disability.
Wilful objection to vaccination on the basis of spurious science should neither be encouraged nor rewarded, particularly by government. It is time for the whole question of conscientious objection to vaccination to be aired in Parliament if for no other reason than to find out which of our politicians are against vaccination, for they are as dangerous to continued Australian wellbeing as anyone who would challenge the biosecurity of our country.
Uh huh, and then there's the Oreo, sullenly refusing to understand that the way out of lockdowns is via vaccination ...
Actually the pond is all for freedumb, and the freedumb for the Oreo to take a flying fuck, or to fuck off, or to do whatever else she wants to do to encourage vaccine hesitancy, and makes only one humble request ... please, catch a dose of Covid as well, so that the irony might be enjoyed, and the genre maintained ...
In fact Broelman caught the mood of the reptiles well, not just in relation to Covid, but by extension, to climate science as well ...
And so inevitably and reluctantly to events in Afghanistan, top of the digital page this morning and making a mockery of jolly Joe's blather about there being no echoes of Saigon ...
Is there any upside to this? Well it does put "Ned's" blather about "chaos" into humbling perspective, and explains why the pond didn't waste time with his senile ramblings this day ...
The pond watched as much of the unfolding disaster, the chaos, the misery and despair as it could stand on Al Jazeera, including the journalist mourning not getting a shot of the chopper flying overhead, but assuring viewers that the choppers were flying back and forth from embassies to airport while all around was chaos and pandemonium, and jolly Joe's words about it not being Saigon kept ringing in the ears ...
At the same time, the pond was struck by the bromancer's enduring faith in the reptiles' ongoing war on China that the United States would be a splendid ally, a trusted ally, ready to rush to Australia's aid and stick with us through thick and thin ...
Things got decidedly thin ...
The pond decided it could do without the links and the click bait videos, or most of them at least, and just present undiluted bromancer ...
As usual, as the chaos erupts, the bromancer manages to be both condescending and insulting.
The pond doesn't count itself as feminist in any particular way - not at least like the Oreo's brand of reformed, recovering feminism, but the pond hasn't been able to find that many feminists enthusiastically endorsing Islamic regimes up to and including the Taliban ... or the fucking Wahhabists in Saudi Arabia, who have managed to export all sorts of appalling fundamentalism to the world, while the patriarchs of the west are attracted to the honeypot, and hobnob with killers of journalists ...
Oh the never-ending pollution. Poor old Dennis Potter ...
What can a feminist do against that form of deeply embedded corruption? But do go on ...
Never mind, now it's time for one of the great cleansings ...
We never had a strategic purpose in Afghanistan, never sought a strategic role and never had any significant influence on allied policy.
And so say all of them, and so say all of them ... and if Pontius Pilate ever returns in search of a role model, why, check out the bromancer, the pond says, he'll give you a tip or three ...
We never had a strategic purpose in killing Christ, never had a strategic role, and never had any significant influence on the Romans and the Jews and their Chris-killing policies ...
We just wanted to stay onside with the Romans for the big do we're planning with China ...
But hang on a tic, hang on a 'mo ...
Didn't we drink a beer or three from the hollow prosthetic leg of victory? And at least we now have a defamation action to watch, though rounding up certain witnesses might be a tad tricky in the future ...,
Dear sweet long absent lord, and there was silly old "Ned" nattering on about chaos, without the first clue as to what chaos is like, as those who helped Australians and Americans wander in the wilderness of desapir ...
Oh yes, that sort of loyalty is going to be a great help when it comes to the reptiles' war on China ...
So, it will take me quite a lot of effort to get quite this blind, deaf and stupid: from the Maj. Mitch: "Asten took the rational approach to over-hyped reporting: 'The world has already warmed 1.1 degrees since 170 years ago and the worlds a nicer place ... 170 years ago was a little ice age. If we warm another 0.4 of a degree I don't see that is a problem and no, I am not frightened'."
ReplyDeleteYou see what I was saying, Bef: they're not even linear much less exponential. They hit on a point and then that's it for all time. So we'll warm just 0.4 degrees more and stay stuck in that "nicer place" point for all time. And Asten was once a "professor" charged with educating young people. Quite appalling.
Does anybody know anything about this "little ice age" of 170 years ago ? First I've heard of it, though 170 years means it started(?) in 1850 and the Victorian gold rush began in 1851.
Just to be clear, I have heard of something fallaciously called a "little ice age" and I have heard of Dickens' winters, but:
ReplyDelete"The Little Ice Age (LIA) was a period of regional cooling that occurred after the Medieval Warm Period. It was not a true ice age of global extent." and
"The NASA Earth Observatory notes three particularly cold intervals: one beginning about 1650, another about 1770, and the last in 1850, all separated by intervals of slight warming."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Ice_Age
You'd think a "professor" would know that and be prepared to say so, wouldn't you.
Thanks for the wiki link GB. It mentions James Burke, who made a two part tv series in 1990 "After the warming". a view from 2050 on how we dealt with global warming https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxJLyPSRusc It's very depressing.
DeleteThe name looked familiar so I did a quick scan for Michael Asten which turned up entries at the likes of DeSmog and Skeptical Science. Even John Quiggin had a crack back in 2010 as a side issue on a post about . . . . The Maj!
Deletehttps://johnquiggin.com/2010/12/20/total-core-meltdown/
"Then we get this delusionist rant, notable for a couple of things
(i) Massive Godwin Law violations (or confirmations if you want to be pedantic)
(ii) The fact that the author, Michael Asten, is a bona fide academic, though with no relevant publications according to Google scholar which reports what we in the business like to call a ‘solid’ track record of work in mining-related geology. Sad to say, Asten makes a complete hash of the science."
So you have the retired geologist (or similar) with links to the mining industry padding his retirement income by writing what the industry is happy to pay for.
Nothing really changes, does it?
That wikipedia page has a graph that really renders any discussion unnecessary, the pure scale of the change tells you all you need to know - of course the accomplished liar could clip the graph a bit to remove that troublesome bit at the end of the 20th century.
Try also this, about an Asten yarn that turned up in the lizard Oz ...
Deletehttps://independentaustralia.net/environment/environment-display/the-australians-continued-support-of-climate-change-denialism,12088
Bishop: "...there are still scientists and "experts" who speak out against action to stop smoking." Oh no, no how could that be ? How many "scientists and experts" can the IPA afford to buy ?
DeleteBef is right, nothing ever changes, does it. Especially when it attracts rich patrons.
So Oreo preaches that: "Government mandated vaccination should be opposed on principle. It is an option of last resort when the risk a virus poses to the democratic majority is greater than the risk of eroding individual freedom and body integrity."
ReplyDeleteNow funny that because I suppose that Oreo will now tell us that she knows that Covid - very highly transmissible now with Delta - doesn't actually "pose a risk" to we, the "democratic majority". She goes on: "Yet Australian governments have not sought the consent of the people to introduce mandatory vaccinations."
Now strangely I don't remember government seeking the consent of the people to introduce mandatory road laws either. I guess they just assumed we'd rather not have freedumb drivers indulge in killing sprees on our roads. I say that, because I'd readily consent to a homicide law that sees parents charged with, at the very least, manslaughter if any of their children die because the parents didn't have them vaccinated against potentially fatal diseases.
I wrote ‘It is amusing to think of the equivalents of the Major and the Cater living on what we call Easter Island, during the time when it was obvious that the last trees would soon disappear.’ Then I thought - that is not really amusing - because the Caters and the Major are contributing to the likelihood of outcomes across the entire planet similar to what we can observe for Easter Island.
ReplyDeleteNo doubt, those few hundred years ago, anyone on the island who expressed concern for the diminishing trees was confronted with arguments like ‘Why should we abstain from erecting statues when them in the clan over to the other side of the island, even now, are cutting out the stone for an even bigger, and therefore more powerful, statue, which will stand on their patch. Won’t we look foolish when that statue is slid into its trench?’
No doubt, also, if one were to put this speculation before the Major, citing all the work that Jared Diamond has compiled on the island, the Major would, so easily, fall back on ‘but the devil’s in the detail’.
Are we sure Jared got it right, Chad ?
Delete"Rats and European traders may be responsible for the mysterious demise of Easter Island according to research presented last week by a University of Hawaii anthropologist during an American Anthropological Association meeting."
https://news.mongabay.com/2005/12/easter-islands-demise-caused-by-rats-dutch-traders-says-new-theory/
GB - I did take down my copy of 'Collapse' before I put that comment up. Diamond does mention the several other factors, such as diseases new to the Rapa Nui, rats, slavers, missionaries - but it is difficult to go past the effects of change in vegetation, which reduced the supply of tree trunks that could provide good fishing craft, so, evidence of declining consumption of tuna, porpoises and other good protein sources, then reduction in crop diversity because there were not the sheltering effects of trees - and so on. I think he has covered every possibility and weighed-up the contributions of primary impact, and consequent reductions in quality of life. Of course, all such research now attempts to reconstruct events over many centuries, with limited sources of information. There is not even a consensus on when the Rapa Nui arrived on the island(s)
DeleteOh, and Benny Peiser's effort, in which he accuses Diamond of 'confirmation bias', is available through Wayback.
DeleteFrom Genocide to Ecocide: The Rape of Rapa Nui
by
Benny Peiser
Reprinted from
ENERGY & ENVIRONMENT
VOLUME 16 No. 3&4 2005
It is a familiar, rambling, Peiser effort. While it is in his actual professional area of training, his method is mainly ad hominem.
I'd never heard of Benny Peiser ere this, Chad, and I think I'll leave the former "senior lecturer in the School of Sport and Exercise Sciences at Liverpool John Moores University" that way.
DeleteGB - Benny has established himself with bodies like Heartland, Lord Lawson’s foundation, and related (because they tend to be related) ‘climate skeptic’ organisations. While regularly prefacing comments with ‘I am not a climate scientist, but . . . ‘ - he pours out a steady stream of alleged concern about how people are needlessly falling into hysteria about little perturbations in the climate. So, of like mind, or, at least, like writing, with our Cater, and the ‘Killer’.
DeleteThe attack on Jared DIamond’s account of Rapa Nui, through a ‘journal’ of dubious reputation, was part of his strategy.
For the sake of your own quality of reading, he is better left to the ratbag readership.
In which case, I'll happily accept your sage advice. So much to read, so little time ... unless you are Holely Henry: so much read, so little understood.
DeleteOh joy, here goes the Bromancer: "More than 40 Australian lives, billions of dollars of expenditure and no end of tragedy on the Afghan side, all for nothing, or near enough."
ReplyDeleteNo, no, not so Bro; our Yanqui suzerain killed Osama having already substituted Obama. Though, strangely, Osama was actually killed in Pakistan after an illegal sortie over the border. So why exactly did the USA and its running dog lackeys (eg Australia) stay in Afghanistan and in particular, why stay for 10 more years after having accomplished the kill ?
Did America really think it had acquired another Philippines ? According to the Bro: "But the particular way this debacle has played out also reflects monumental blunders by both Donald Trump and Joe Biden." Oh well, that says it all, then: just the usual playing out of American ignorance and stupidity. Nothing to see here.
So to conclude: "It's reasonable that the Americans had to leave at some point ..." Really ? Why is that reasonable ? The Americans invaded, and we Aussies tagged along as commanded by our suzerain, and the the Americans couldn't even find Bin Laden anywhere in Afghanistan because he simply wasn't there. So the Americans, and us, hung on for another 10 years doing, and achieving, precisely nothing. And then the Yanks just decide to walk away one Mar a Lago day and uncle Joe decided he'd follow. And, as usual, do it in the worst possible way.
Something that even the Bromancer has to admit.
Hi Dorothy,
ReplyDeleteHow depressing. Twenty years on and the West has been unable to rid itself of a reactionary, fundamentalist group of fanatics.
Every fighting season sees them leaving their stronghold in the (Surry) hills and continue their campaign of sniping at anybody who opposes their conservative medievalist outlook.
Every time it looked as if they had been beaten back, they returned stronger than ever, ready to blow up any individual who had the temerity to question their anti-science outlook.
Led by their spiritual leader Rupert ad-Din Murdoch, better known as the “Old Man of the Mountain”, they continue to wage their jihad against their hated enemy the Green Faction of Warmistas.
Now that the Reptaliban have taken control of the government they will purge any remaining moderates and rename the country the Fossil-Fuel Emirate of Australia.
DiddyWrote
DW - you are in fine form, and had me hooked! Well done, and thank you.
DeleteThe expected resistance from the ALP has failed to materialise, despite all the money and training they have surrendered without a fight.
Delete