In which the reptiles, and so the pond, retreat into an ancient world of Caterism and Majorism ...

 

After the high drama of the weekend, it's a total bummer to have to report to the lizard Oz for the usual herpetological studies, with the usual suspects ...

Any chance, any hope of avoiding the usual suspects, was quickly dashed by the line up below the fold ...

Two lizard Oz editorials as chaff to fill up the space? Yet more blather about the voice from George and the 'here no conflict of interest' simpleton Simon?

Not even the bromancer? The lad didn't feel the need to break a sweat or tap a keyboard in response to affairs in Russia? How will the pond know what to think? Usually the pond can steer a safe course on the basis that whatever the bromancer says, he's likely to be 80% wrong ...

Sure the reptiles wheeled in Dr Malcolm Davis, senior analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, but he's just saying what many are saying ...

...Some possibilities to watch for include a purge of perceived opponents, especially anyone who was seen to show any support for Prigozhin’s insurrection. This could extend through all levels of Putin’s regime, including into the siloviki and the oligarchs – the elite of the security and intelligence community, and Russia’s super-wealthy business elite, which keep Putin in power in return for economic gain.
Putin may also adopt a tougher approach to the war in Ukraine, perhaps by announcing a national mobilisation, though that could then generate more opposition in the streets. The last thing Putin wants would be a popular uprising or a whiff of a “colour revolution” immediately after a military insurrection. 
Yet Putin’s goal is to wear down western resolve in supporting Ukraine in a long war, and national mobilisation would give him a much greater chance to achieve that goal.
Expect Putin to amplify his fraudulent narrative that Russia is at war with NATO and Western states, even to the extent of trying to claim the West had organised Prigozhin’s “march for justice” and ramp up nationalist diatribe against NATO that could be accompanied with more provocative behaviour along NATO’s eastern and southern periphery.
It’s also quite likely Putin will rattle nuclear sabres again, having deployed nuclear weapons to Belarus to implicitly threaten use of tactical nuclear weapons against Ukraine or even against NATO. He needs to reinforce his image as the strongman in full control, especially given he knows Beijing is watching closely.
All this probably won’t save him if Russia is ultimately defeated in Ukraine. The insurrection may be over, but it is perhaps best seen as the beginning of the end of the Putin regime. 

After a weekend's surfing of the web, there wasn't a single idea that hadn't already been canvassed at great length ...

So there was nothing for it, the pond would have to do the Caterist rag, such an inelegant, mind deteriorating rag, full of the usual ...

As usual, the pond can't quite get over the transition of the Caterist from full blown climate science denialist to covert denialist, with the feeble cover an alleged deep concern for emissions and the transition ... and as usual, to help cover the paucity of the thinking, what's left of the lizard Oz graphics department flung in a huge snap designed to make the readership tremble in fear ...

The pond's suggestion when it comes to the Caterist is to read something else, perhaps something in the Graudian, such as the Record-breaking Texas heatwave enters third week as thousands lose power ...

It's all the more piquant when it happens in US states dedicated to core GOP climate science denialism, and after that sort of horror story, it's possible to face up to the usual 'orror serve from the 'orrible Caterist ...

What is remarkable is the casual cruelty that can be involved, as in the Graudian story Texas governor signs bill rescinding water breaks as deadly heat grips state ...

The Caterist is a child at play when it comes to whipping up a decent scare-mongering story ...as he wanders of back into ancient times, perhaps because more modern examples are a tad difficult to contemplate ...

How many times must the pond note reptile hand-wringing about coal? How many times must the reptiles include an allegedly sinister snap of windmills?

Come to think of it, how many times must the reptiles carry on about windmills? It was way back on 16th September 2014 that the Graudian reported that jolly Joe Hockey blows up again over 'appalling' windfarms ...

And back in February 2020 David Hardaker fondly remembered the arrival of the Clover Moore fraud man, the beefy boofhead with an office in Goulburn, in Revealed: Angus Taylor's long history with bad maths ... (Crikey paywall)

It was July 2013 and Angus Taylor, making his run for parliament, was the star at an anti-windfarm rally hosted by 2GB’s Alan Jones.

Standing on the front lawn of parliament, Taylor gave a brutal assessment of wind power.

He’d seen communities in his nearby electorate of Hume “tear themselves to pieces, cousins versus cousins, brothers versus brothers” over hosting wind turbines on their farms. 

But Taylor’s opposition to wind was driven not by emotion but by the cold hard numbers — the “massive subsidies” which he said the government would pay.

Each wind turbine “built today” would receive “half a million dollars or more of subsidies every year for its life”, Taylor said.

“By 2020, the impost on Australian electricity bills will amount to about $3 billion a year,” he warned.

“It will be like the proverbial boiled frog. No one will notice because slowly the water is getting warmer and warmer. Three billion dollars a year by 2020.” 

Well, it’s 2020. Angus Taylor’s day has arrived. So how accurate were his numbers?

In short they are wildly wrong — by at least $3 billion.

And so on and on, but to be fair, the beefy boofhead has provided some fine comedy moments ...Huge wind farm that Angus Taylor rejected marks its official opening ...

...Needless to say, Taylor did not attend the opening ceremony for Collector – he has not attended any wind farm-related events, except protests, such as the Anti-Wind demonstration organised by broadcaster Alan Jones nearly a decade ago.

And yet, here we are, with the Caterist doing what floodwater in quarries whisperers must do...

So much time with the donkeys, neigh-saying away ... and yet the pond still wasn't finished, because the Major had issued yet another call to arms ...

Why the reptiles are obsessed with the ABC is a deep mystery to the pond. They have enough troubles in their own backyard, but still the Major carries on, as he carries on his endless search for that missing Order of Lenin medal ...

Yes, the pond has been over this turf many times before, and still wakes up to the BBC's news service, as faithfully rebroadcast by the ABC on AM. But that's mainly because the pond can't be bothered replacing its ancient clock radio. Vulgar youffs, if they really cared, are likely to have an app which can allow them to dial up whatever they like ... why, in occasional moments of weakness, the pond will even drop in to listen to James O'Brien on LBC, when the thought of listening to talkback on Nine radio produces convulsions and revulsions ...

Never mind, the reptiles are dedicated to the proposition that the ABC should be much as it was in 1932, and the pond is old enough to remember the days when Major predecessors were advising the ABC to stick to radio, and not get involved in television ... a device designed to reduce the masses to slobbering, slavering idiocy ... and then came the full to overflowing intertubes, replete with Musky smells ...

The real reason for the reptile carry on is never far from the surface, as noted  in this APH located report on the ABC ...

After noting how the BBC's digital activities produced protests about unfair competition ... (follow the link for the footnotes), the report turned to the ABC ...

..As a result of the Graf Review, the BBC closed a number of websites identified as not being sufficiently distinctive from its commercial competitors. Following two further reviews, the BBC Trust concluded that the BBC needed to cut back on its online scale and scope and endorsed a 25 per cent budget cut to the BBC's online services. [127]

The ABC's online activity has not escaped this type of scrutiny. It too has been criticised for increasingly resorting to delivering the same fare as commercial media, and thereby interfering in the commercial marketplace. One report urged people to contemplate how the ABC was using taxpayer funds 'to soak up bandwidth, attract eyeballs away from niche media operators and poach writers on the government dime to the detriment of those trying to earn a buck setting up a new media business.' [128]

The conclusions of some have been similar to those reached in Europe—it is a waste of taxpayers' money to continue to fund public broadcasters to provide services which are already more effectively provided by the commercial sector. Eric Beecher, publisher of the online commentary site, Crikey for example, has criticised the ABC for establishing the online opinion site, The Drum. Beecher has likened the move to seeing 'tanks roll up' on commercial media territory. [129]

The opposing view of ABC online activity maintains that the Australian situation is different from Europe and the United Kingdom. While there may be justifiable criticism that the BBC and European public broadcasters have dominated their respective marketplaces, this has not been the case with the ABC. The ABC has always been expected to operate alongside commercial interests and to compete with them for audience share, and online is no different. Hence, in media analyst Margaret Simonds words:

   ... the ABC should be able to adopt any platform it wants and pay no heed to the commercial impact. While the role of a public broadcaster in the new media world is certainly up for discussion and redefinition, I have never been convinced by the notion that the ABC should abandon a platform or a form of media content merely because others are already there. [130]

Not surprisingly, the ABC's current Managing Director, Mark Scott, has claimed commercial interests are critical of the ABC’s success in using online services because they are 'threatened by the pace of change, the inflexibility of their own business models and their reluctance to invest'. [131] Scott adds:

Sometimes we hear criticism that the ABC is expanding its services at the expense of commercial competitors. But the only expansion we're interested in is that which ensures the content the public has already invested in reaches its greatest possible audience. The motive is clear, to widen the impact of the content, making it freely available so that we deliver the best possible return. [132]

Well yes, is there any business model more inflexible and quaint than the lizard Oz, and is anyone more inflexible and quaint than the Major?

Um, speaking of the AFR and profitability back in May this year... ‘Insipid’ ad market hits News Corp earnings as real estate stalls (yes, they've changed their paywall policies)

A “clearly insipid” advertising market, rising costs and lower property sales volumes dragged News Corp earnings down 11 per cent to $US320 million ($477 million) in the March quarter.

Revenue fell 2 per cent to $US2.45 billion at the Rupert Murdoch-controlled company, which owns Wall Street Journal publisher Dow Jones, runs book publisher Harper Collins, and newspapers like The Times and The Sun in London, The New York Post and The Australian. It is also the majority owner of REA Group and pay TV service Foxtel.

A “clearly insipid” advertising market, rising costs and lower property sales volumes dragged News Corp earnings down 11 per cent to $US320 million ($477 million) in the March quarter.

Revenue fell 2 per cent to $US2.45 billion at the Rupert Murdoch-controlled company, which owns Wall Street Journal publisher Dow Jones, runs book publisher Harper Collins, and newspapers like The Times and The Sun in London, The New York Post and The Australian. It is also the majority owner of REA Group and pay TV service Foxtel...

What about the Fox? Coat looking a little shabby ...

Foxtel’s revenue fell $US17 million to $US477 million, though increased 2 per cent accounting for currency changes. Price increases for Foxtel’s Kayo and Binge streaming services offset a decline in the number of higher-paying broadcast subscribers (those with the Foxtel set-top boxes), which fell from 1.52 million to 1.37 million over the past year. That decrease, or “churn”, was the slowest it has been since 2016 at 12.3 per cent.

What about the rags?

In the News Media segment, which includes News Corp Australia and News UK, revenue fell 3 per cent – and dropped 5 per cent in Australia alone. Adjusted for currency changes meant revenue rose 4 per cent globally and 1 per cent in Australia. EBITDA fell 13 per cent, hit by spiralling newsprint paper prices and “digital investments”.

News Corp Australia had 1.04 million subscribers, compared with 946,000 last year.

The reptiles never cottoned on to digital, in much the same way that the Major still clings to the notion of tree killer editions, perhaps so he can listen to the ABC segment on "what the papers say", as quaint as the tree killers themselves ...

And while there's been a small uptick in digital subscribers, the long absent lord alone knows why, that million is shared between the lizard Oz and each of the state based tabloids ...

It's a tricky business model, which is why the pond looks on the Major with the bemusement it feels when contemplating ancient fossils ...

Clearly the Major keenly feels for Probyn, and wonders why, when turfed out, he wasn't given a gig like the Major's ... get turfed, put out to pasture, then spend years bleating about your loyalty. Animal Farm couldn't have produced a richer irony ...

At this point the reptiles slipped in another distracting snap, this time someone from the ABC ...

How long has this been going on? Well there was Glenn Dyer in Crikey back in 2016, asking Oh, Chris. Why've you got to be so mean?,  Chris Mitchell calls us dweebs, throws shade at Hywood, generally gets it wrong (again) ...

It's like having a pet cocky that's only learned a few lines ... the same old ancient arguments trotted out again and again, only to come up against newfangled digital realities.

The pond confesses that these days it looks on remaining newsagencies with the kind of morbid fascination its aged uncle once reserved for cemeteries ... and the pond reserves for the Major ...

How tragic can it get? Even 'tragedy' can't describe the tragicomedy of the Major and prattling Polonius getting together to share their obsessive compulsive persecution complex ...

How the Major wishes the ABC would go away and leave the reptiles to their own ancient devices (perhaps a Nokia?)

 Each week the Major wishes ABC wasn't there, and yet each week it's there again today, and each week the Major wishes it would go away ... and you can keep that routine, and a column, running for years with such a simple wish ...

Meanwhile, there's an entirely different world out there, but for that you'll need to consult the immortal Rowe ...  Да