Oh wait, they've always been sodden and so this morning in Sydney, but lo, there among the 'leets of Holt street, a new vision arises from the ashes.
Behold, the Caterist turned caring environmentalist and concerned indigenous activist, giving a voice to the downtrodden. Not that Voice, but a voice of sorts, and the transformation is as wondrous and as transfixing as the late, barely remembered Lloyie of the Amazon... (last heard from on 19th April 2023).
Shade the eyes, because the transformation is likely to dazzle ...
To aid the Caterist in his deep environmental concern, the reptiles loaded up the piece with a set of huge photos. The pond is deeply bored by this gimmick from the reptiles' wreck of a graphics department and decided to get them out of the way in one go ...
There, that's better and now the pond can focus on the wise words of the deeply caring environmentalist ...
But if the lizard Oz snaps have been used up in one blow, what to insert between the gobbets?
How about a recent yarn from
The Atlantic, Lois Parshley and
Climate Collapse Could Happen Fast, likely outside the paywall if you've got clicks left, with the lede
As temperature and weather records fall, Earth may be nearing so-called tipping points...
Now it's back to the Caterist, turned indigenous activist ...
Has the Caterist turned deeply caring environmentalist and indigenous activist? The last short gobbet unfortunately gave the game away ...
It was all going terribly well until the Caterist mentioned quarries and the pond was reminded of his real skill, generating chaos and confusion and endless distractions as an expert flood waters in quarries whisperer, just another of the dirty secrets in the dirty energy game by an expert dirt shoveler ... (well he must have some expertise, and it ain't in science).
Meanwhile, on another planet, at least that piece in The Atlantic was a break from all those stories of record heat and record rain and all the rest ...
And so to the bromancer, still fixated on authoritarians, and so a must-read for the pond, though the pond understands that others will find it immensely wearying and extraordinarily irritating, if only because it's so immensely predictable, in an insane bromancer sort of way, what with him taking over the pond's patented term and misusing it, and dammit, the pond unable to take out a patent on the word ...
Was that use of "loon" a sign that the bro is actually a covert reader of the pond? Likely not. More to the point, what will console this traumatised bro?
Luckily the lizard Oz graphics department - or its tragic remnants - had a snap of flags, sure to lift the spirits of any lover of authoritarians, or far right loon ...
Inspired, the bromancer went on a full-blown subs and AUKUS rant ...
Meanwhile, in Israel, the deeply corrupt and far right Netanyahu government is in a profound crisis, but if Netanyahu manages to hang on, even the long absent lord won't be able to do much for Palestinians trapped in gulags by far right politicians and crazed settlers.
The pond every so often likes to
dip into Haaretz to see what's going down ... and there's plenty happening...
Naturally all the bromancer has to say about all that is this ...
And so to a bonus serve of Major Mitchell, if only because the parrot is in fine form.
The pond can hear lamentations and feel moist warm salty tears. Why always the parrot as a bonus, some wail? But just look at the alternatives ...
A variant craven Craven waxing lyrical about Kevin? Yeah nah...
As for the Bearup, while he's at the top of the tree killer and digital editions, the pond has always banned the Bearup and his never ending beat-up.
As for getting cracking on subs, the pond immediately adopts the style and manner of a turtle, and that's the right sort of creature to turn to a serve of the Major ...
Yes, it's bizarre, the Major preaching both siderism ... andyes, the Major has been reading the wrong sort of people ... and yes, the Major is still infatuated with adorably simpering Sharri ... but the pond promises at the very end a killer line by the Major which will render all that's gone before a gigantic hoot ...
It's too early for the Killer line. First there must be the Major war with Media Watch and naturally the lizard Oz graphics department, as it veered towards extinction, dragged in a snap of a terrifying monster designed to instil fear in the aging lizard Oz demographic...
Now for the next gobbet, which reveals the Major has been listening to the wrong sort of people, and a confession by the pond. It too gets regular updates from crazed loon Matt Taibbi on a junk email address where the pond's loons go to die ...
It's a racket of course and you have to keep up the angertainment and the conspiracy theories to make sure you can live in the style to which you became accustomed when doing more mainstream journalism.
The pond hasn't subscribed, but occasionally notes in bemusement the passing parade, with that one landing a few days ago ...
It seems the Major might have taken the bait ...
The pond is disappointed because the pond had a couple of killer kartoons lined up, but with no obvious way to segue to them. What the heck, the pond will do it live ...
And so, because the pond likes to keep it real, enough of that astonishing range of emotions, to the Killer line from the Major in the very last gobbet ...
Yep, thar he blows:
"None of this is proof of a lab leak."
What a Killer Konclusion. When the pond read that, suddenly the pond had a Major revelation. The best the Major could do was "looks increasingly probable", and yet self confessedly with no proof.
The answer for this? Pure stupidity, or perhaps pure indolence, or perhaps pure ability to waste the pond's time.
It seems the Major has nothing better to do these days than to wander off into the fringes of the United States, full of conspiracy theories, and throw money at the likes of Matt Taibbi...
Some might think it a fitting end for a man who spent so many years looking for those long-lost Order of Lenin medals.
Meanwhile, the pond was struggling for some vague relevance to events in the real world, until an immortal Rowe happened along to save the pond with a closer ...
Surely only the most cynical of herpetologists could see the sudden conversion of Uncle Cater, a proud Menzies man, to the causes of Indigenous and environmental activism as an act of cynical opportunism. His passion and sincerity flood from every line. If only there some body by which Indigenous folk could advise the Federal Government on issues that are of concern and relevant to them…
ReplyDeletePoor fellow my quarry.
Que?: "So weak-manning is replacing a strong position with a weak position to better attack it; motte-and-bailey is replacing a weak position with a strong position to better defend it."
DeleteNot sure that the wind turbine projects near Ravenshoe are a secret, since they have been getting some publicity and where else but in a quarry do you put redundant infrastructure such as that used in wind turbines when there’s no circular economy? But Cater would consider a nuclear waste dump preferable anyway. Only trouble is, there’s no chance of recycling nuclear waste.
ReplyDeleteAs for keeping on using fossil fuels, that darned thorn in the side of News Corp, the ABC, has been at it again spreading information on climate change:
The first was an article about the discovery of sediment from an ice-core which was taken from a secret US army base which revealed new information about the melting of the Greenland ice sheet. Here are a few excerpts:
‘Until recently there was a lot of uncertainty about the historical melting of north-west Greenland, with some speculating it had remained frozen under hundreds or thousands of metres of ice for the past million years or more.
The ice sheet there would be about the last to disappear from Greenland in the event of global warming because it is located at a very high latitude and is very thick, according to Taryn Noble of the Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies at the University of Tasmania.
….
That was during a period of moderate warming called Marine Isotope Stage 11 (MIS11), which occurred between 426,000 and 396,000 years ago.
So what's the issue?
"MIS11 was a time that was around 1 to 1.5 degrees Celsius warmer on average than pre-industrial records," Professor Bierman said.
"We are about to blow through that 1.5C."...
In other words, we may have already pushed the climate beyond a state at which the north-west Greenland ice sheet completely melted at Camp Century.
Modelling by the researchers showed ice-free conditions at Camp Century contributed a minimum of 1.4 metres to sea level rise.’
[https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2023-07-21/greenland-ice-core-secret-us-army-base-reveals-dramatic-melting/102609654]
Then today, this article [just the synopsis quoted here]:
“In short:
Antarctic sea ice has usually been able to recover in winter. But this year ice levels are at the lowest point in observational history.
What's next? Experts say if the sea ice trend continues, it will accelerate the warming of the planet”
[https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-07-24/antarctic-sea-ice-levels-nosedive-five-sigma-event/102635204]
The purpose of most of Mitchell’s articles seems to be to attack any media he regards as News Corp’s competition; the issue he uses appears superfluous.
ReplyDeleteIt is the time of year when people from the Cities of the Plain drive up to our heights to experience cold weather. Many are willing to pay substantial amounts for accommodation, so they might insist on taking their offspring out at crakka dawn to crunch through the frost.
ReplyDeleteSome are happy with the hospitality at our place. Having noted the absence of alleged major newspapers in our rooms, and as a kind of thanks for the free accommodation, they leave their copy of the weekend Flagship for us to read. So, last night I did wrestle with the edition for this weekend, in classic tree-killer form. Had to read contributions, because one of the guests tries to do some of the puzzles, and made a right botch of the ‘hard’ level sudoku.
It is useful to try to visit an entire Flagship once or twice a year. The thing that really registered with me from this one was the extent of internal, er - recycling - that the reptiles use. On p. 4, our Dog Bovverer rants under the heading ‘Banned Covid posts ‘totally factual’ ‘ It is, of course, red EXCLUSIVE (excuse upper case - that is their style). In spite of that heading, the first paragraph says many of those communications contained, at best, ‘reasonable arguments’, so take what you will.
Then, on p 34, there is the same Bovverer, using much the same material about supposed sources of Covid-19, under headings that claim the current government seeks to control everything the honestly curious might want to see. The p. 4 rant was a touch awkward, because much of the suppression that he alleged there, was done by a previous government, yea of the freedom-loving Coalition kind, so he needed an expanded quiver of arrows, and the odd slings, to aim at the current government.
Great value for money there, particularly as, although the Bov. claims to be writing about ready access to information - there is not a hint of the steadily solidifying findings from regular scientists working out the RNA sequences across the wide range of Coronaviridae. Otherwise, I did think of Matthew 6:7 and 8; King James version, of course.
Oh - and, thank you Dorothy for not drawing our attention to the specious reasoning in Killer Creighton’s apologia for Robert Kennedy (is it still appropriate to identify him as ‘Junior’? - anyway, the one who is giving cartoonists so much great stuff). Having the tree-killer edition has again reminded me of the great work you do on our behalf.
You do live the rich, full life out on your country estate, Chad. But Matty 6:7&8 ? Who knows how to distinguish those "vain repetitions" - for we are all inclined to occasionally thoughtlessly repeat ourselves - from those deep and meaningful silences that are all we need to speak to God (who knows better than we what we need).
DeleteBut yes, do keep up with the 'Flagship' and apprise us of all the Murdochia that DP saves us from. I can't even find a table at a coffee lounge bif enough to fully open The Australian these days.
"The best the Major could do was 'looks increasingly probable', and yet self confessedly with no proof." But that's remarkedly reasonable for the Maj, surely. When before has he ever stopped short of "the Big Lie" ?
ReplyDeleteWell yeah, I guess it was about time for a change, DP.
ReplyDeleteCalling any vegetable, calling it by name, chances are good it will respond to you, call any vegetable, pick up your phone, think of a vegetable, lonely at home, some people don't go for tubers, I don't know ...
DeleteHmmm. - channeling noted Republican Brian Wilson there, DP?
DeleteJust a sample of some scientific research.
ReplyDeleteIn the last two decades, several high impact zoonotic disease outbreaks have been linked to bat-borne viruses. These include SARS coronavirus, Hendra virus and Nipah virus. In addition, it has been suspected that ebolaviruses and MERS coronavirus are also linked to bats. It is being increasingly accepted that bats are potential reservoirs of a large number of known and unknown viruses, many of which could spillover into animal and human populations. However, our knowledge into basic bat biology and immunology is very limited and we have little understanding of major factors contributing to the risk of bat virus spillover events. Here we provide a brief review of the latest findings in bat viruses and their potential risk of cross-species transmission.
While we contemplate our one and only flying mammal, we should also contemplate the only place on Earth, as far as I know, where they are sold in 'wet markets' for human consumption.
DeleteHardly a new thing but the Bro seems to resort more and more to a claims of "common sense" when spewing out various opinions. When someone does this they are tacitly admitting that they are unable to articulate an acceptable argument.
ReplyDeleteOf course, there are augments in favour of AUKUS, but they may be a bit less palatable than "enhancing our sovereignty and national power". As John Mearsheimer has been crass enough to point out, it's more about fear of the US and the inability to extract ourselves from the existing arrangements - "the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must"
"fear of the US", Bef ? Are we actually supposed to fear the US ?
DeleteNo, we are not supposed to be, but that’s the reality. Australia is a sub-imperial power and that is how it works in the real world. It really points up the simplistic, black and white thinking of the media that they have to dance around the geopolitical realities and pretend we are free to choose our own course.
DeleteJust as an aside, given Labor’s small target/shit-lite path to power, what’s the chance of any courage being shown on any objective. Mind you, they can really just coast along for a while due to the lack of anything resembling an opposition (ditto for Dictator Dan).
DeleteWell I dunno, mate: it's been so very long since the USA was last publicly - at least in my understanding - condemned as "the real enemy", that I'm not sure what we do about that.
DeleteBut then, if Yanquiland is the real enemy, who is the real ally ?
The Hydrologist.
ReplyDelete1. 'dynamite'. How 19th century, or is this a reflection on the demographic of his target audience? Would be lucky to find a single stick of the stuff on the entire continent these days.
2. STEM challenged, as usual. By my crude calcs, his 1200 ha soggy forest would have to be a solid block of wood up to 70 m high, depending on root-shoot ratios. Assumptions on calculations, available on request.
Floating coffins. (also a euphamism for aged opiniinistas)
ReplyDelete"Our nuclear subs fantasy adds up to military net zero
The Australian
7 Oct 2021 ·
"If people claim the French attack submarines would have been floating coffins, that must surely be even truer of our Collins boats."
AUKUS - smart expensive floating coffins.