Anyone thinking they can escape the fiendish reptile torture designed for this weekend's angertainment best leave now, and be quick about it.
First up is the foolish Bowen, thinking that supporting the reptile paywall and scribbling behind the taxpayers' backs is the way to go ...
Why does he do it, why does he bother?
The interesting thing isn't what he's scribbled, it's the way that the reptiles treat it as grist for the mill for the hive mind... come on down Geoff, chamber a round or two ...
Geoff fed that outing into the sausage-making machine and it emerges as an EXCLUSIVE ... and thus the beast can feed upon itself ...
All Bowen has accomplished is a way for the reptiles to keep on nuking the country: As coals are to burning coals, and wood to fire; so is a contentious man to kindle strife.
What the reptiles of the chambering kind do is take this sort of bog standard pollie scribbling and put their own take on it higher up in the page, and skew it how they will.
Suddenly he's the mansplainer stoking the climate wars ...as if the reptiles had nothing to do with such piffle ...
Bowen even embraces the same parlance, a blessing to the reptiles, with that note about it being of "a singular importance in the culture wars".
Immediately actual science steps out the door and Bowen is on reptile turf, and soon enough they'll turn to Captain Spud and Team Ted ...
To top it off, the reptiles get a chance to show the ersatz country boy from the central west in a snap with a diabolical figure only a few steps down from George Soros ...
Bowen might think he's bold and brave stepping into the reptile den but all he's doing is helping the reptiles keep the controversy alive. It's an age-old routine ...
Bowen might think he had a win, but out of that, all the pond remembers is the cunning way the reptiles slipped an alleged broken promise into the yarn ...or should the pond say the EXCLUSIVE way he's broken his promises?
This is just more of the same ...
The trick here is that in the lizard Oz Muslim speakers and writers have never been platformed, and so to use Polonial argot, it's simply not possible for them to have been de-platformed ...
Well that wasn't much of a relief. And now for some truly terrible news.
"Bugged out"? Amidst his flurry of fiery and furious alliteration, has the bro been reading survivalist literature? Has he been packing his grab & go bag in time for the end times?
The pond couldn't help thinking how much more enjoyable it would be to say reference that Politico yarn Alabama said frozen embryos are kids. The GOP isn’t sure what to do about it.
For no particular reason, the reptiles slipped in a snap of a long forgotten figure ...
The pond did a word search of the bro piece, and can confirm that, as with "Ned's "piece yesterday, there's not a single mention of the most singular threat to the country's, and the planet's immediate future ...
Instead the bro keeps wailing about the kit ...
There's comedy to be found, but with the bro it's inclined to be unintentional...
"Yikes!" ??
But it's hard not to get restless. Will the bro even mention Ukraine?
Guess the pond will have to hold off on AI and all that for yet another day ...
If that's where we're heading, the bro might as well give up on his dream of a war with China by Xmas ... but still he beats on against the tide ...
Oreskes calls their approach the "tobacco strategy" — the idea of keeping controversy alive. "The argument of this book is that these people deliberately cast down the science for political purposes and as long as they could claim there was a doubt that served their interests," she says.
"That approach, of course, is extremely hard to challenge and to refute, so part of what we see as the goal of the book is to show that is the strategy. We're tracking back to the start of a phenomenon that is now extremely large and now involves hundreds or thousands of people, a whole network of think tanks around the world including Australia, with a whole lot of funding from diverse sources..."
As with tobacco, so with the phantom SMRs ...and so saucy doubts and fears are the order of the day, because you know, faceless men and union leaders ...
And so to the usual Sunday serve of Polonial prattle, on a familiar subject ...
This too is a familiar reptile strategy. Deviation and distraction are the game.
Blather about cancel culture and deplatforming is just another way to avoid mentioning the genocide.
You can read about that elsewhere ...
The big Australian newspapers we looked at have failed to cover the Gaza conflict fairly, in terms of giving equal weight to the victims on each side, with the Nine papers not too bad, but The Australian failing in spectacular fashion....We think their coverage has been shameful.
This is just more of the same ...
Before that, Polonius's best argument was that surrender was the only option, presumably accompanied by collective punishment and collective displacement ...
You know ... Israel plans to build 3,300 new settlement homes. It says it's a response to a Palestinian attack (WaPo paywall)
Too late, that horse bolted long ago, and Polonius is just whipping the nag on ...and irony of ironies, Polonius has the cheek to scribble about a complete lack of balance ...
And for the lizard Oz to keep on supporting bigotry and genocidal behaviour?
At this point on a meditative Sunday, the pond always likes to take in a little cartoon relief ...
Some innocents thought that enduring "Ned" on defence was more than enough and so there was no need to waste time on the bromancer.
But the bro makes explicit what "Ned" dances around, and the pond will always feel compelled to follow the bro to infinity and beyond ...
At this point the reptiles slipped in a piece of kit designed to sent the bro into a frenzy of f words ...
Why do the pond's esteemed correspondents get the chance to flourish all the best links?
Justice Who Ruled That Embryos Are ‘Children’ Appeared On QAnon Conspiracist's Show
Alabama Chief Justice Tom Parker indicated on the show he was a proponent of the “Seven Mountains Mandate,” an explicitly theocratic doctrine at the heart of Christian nationalism.
If the bro would only let fly with his own barking mad brand of Xian fundamentalism, the pond could have run a cartoon that wasn't about preparing for the bro's war with China by Xmas ...
No such luck. It's a matter of grinning and teddy bearing it ...and that involves classic bromancer speak of the "Nuts, you think?" kind.
The pond frequently thinks it's nuts when caught in the middle of patented bro drivel ...
Couldn't he find it in his heart to slip in a mention somewhere?
You won't find "Ned" deploying that sort of word, it's more in the Bunter mode ...
“Yaroooh!” roared Bunter.
Crash!
Over went Bunter. Over went the bike. A yelling fat Owl, mixed up with a
clanking bike, sprawled on the road.
“Ow! Beast! Woo! Keep off! Whoooop!” roared Bunter. (pdf here)
"Yikes!" roared the bro of the lizard Oz ...
The pond guesses that coming across the odd nugget like "nuts" and "yikes" is what keeps the punters and the angertainment demographic hooked. So witty, so elegant, so intelligent ...
As usual there's a snap of the poo bah in a salary man suit to break up the text ...
What the pond believes?
Since he asked, the pond believes that all too often the bromancer manages to sound like a mad uncle down from the attic, someone who thinks he's on a dangerous mission to save the galaxy, but in reality who's had his brain fried by Uncle Elon ...
Meanwhile, the foolish Marles had set himself up for another ravaging ...
That's a striking comment?
That's an incredibly stupid comment, with the implication that a skirmish with the Houthis should be mentioned in the same breath and in the same context as Pearl Harbour, the battle of Midway, the battle of the Coral Sea, etc
But at last, a mention of Ukraine...
How's that going?
The only relief in all this is that the bromancer seems to be realising that his war with China by Xmas is already a diminishing prospect, as is his chance of getting appointed to Generalfeldmarschall to lick things into shape.
Of course the real point of all the defence fear-mongering is to get Captain Spud and his team back in office so they can keep on doing all the splendid work that was done during previous governments ...
It's always in the detail ...
And so to round out the Sunday with a thought from TT ...
It’s a bit jarring to peruse yet another stanza of “The Rime of the Ancient Bromancer” on a meditative Sunday; it’s hard to think of a Reptile less inclined towards self-reflection.
ReplyDeleteConsider - the Bro has been scribbling impassioned rants on matters related to defence for many, many years. He’s vehemently disagreed with almost every policy and action in these fields by successive governments of all complexions. He’s dismissed a long line of Ministers as being completely incompetent. Yet after all that, with the “National broadsheet” as his platform, there’s zero evidence that any of his pronouncements, calls for action and condemnations have had the slightest impact. It’s almost as though he was being completely ignored.
So, is there even a minimal possibility that it ever occurs to the Bro - even in the early hours as he lies awake, concocting new calls for massive military expenditure - that nobody in the corridors of power has any interest in his fevered fantasies? That most of his intended audience never even read his rants? That his only likely audience, other than Pond readers, are a few low-level Defence procurement clerks in search of a good laugh?
Nah - of course not. In Greg’s mind he’s a mover and shaker. None of the former bureaucrats, self-styled analysts, industry figures, lobbyists, minor politicians and right-wing think tank representatives who count on him for a bit of publicity when he cites them as “experts” will do anything to disabuse him of that notion.
Perhaps the Gregeralissimo could turn his talents in communication to causes that his readers could more readily relate to - such as setting up that 'well regulated Militia' which our cousins across the water saw as 'being necessary to the security of a free State,'
DeleteWith now 27 million of us, or, for militia age, subtract the around 5 million under age 15, we could have 23 million with potential to bear arms. Round that off to 20 million for convenient calculation. The search engine of choice suggests that AK-47s can cost from around $A300 to c. $A7 000 depending on which country you are in, so the new Militia Australia Government Acquisition Authority (MAGAA for short; wouldn't want to confuse people there) should be able to do a bulk deal for, oh - $2 000 per militia member. Add a uniform - another $1 000 from suitable Chinese clothing company (you must be in uniform to receive P.O.W rights, and a Chinese label might help) - and the total budget comes in at that $60 billion that so concerns the Gregeralissimo, but it could produce results within weeks.
Oh, don't let anyone from Border Force anywhere near the Militia Australia command - they would spend most of the first year designing uniforms.
Anyway, over to you Bro.
I find it easier to think of the Bro, well all the reptiles, well most of the right wing media, as scammers and spammers - if you keep throwing enough stuff out there, only 1% needs to hit target. Ok, it's moronic, but then that's the purpose, targeting the morons, because let's face it, none of their stuff passes the IQ test, the acid test, the pub test, the sniff test, any test. I'm probably being a bit hard on the scammers and spammers - at least they try to be original; the reptiles share their motives but not their capabilities. Warning - best not to ponder the Bro's mind too deeply, it's a mysterious place. AG.
DeleteAny chance the Bro might be willing to head up MAGAA, Chad?
DeleteThe cost, as well as the lack of any benefit, is why the compulsory 176 day - 99 days full time - National Service conscription (aka 'nasho') was ended back in 1959.
Deletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscription_in_Australia
Anonymous - My guess is that the Bro would offer his best mate from university days, action man without equal - Anthony John Abbott AC - to head up MAGAA. Remember how he was going to shirt-front the current crazy dictator, Putin? That would also entice the Woman from Wycheproof to head up the women's militia.
DeleteGB - my dear old dad went through compulsory ”nasho” in the mid-1950s. Brief though it may have been, he still (at the age of 89) considers it to have been the most pointless, wasted period of his life. The one notable point in his term was being part of an honour guard for the Queen - and as dad was already Republican in his sentiments, this wasn’t really much of a buzz for him. A few years ago all the conscripts of dad’s generation were offered a service medal; he didn’t take up the offer, commenting “I didn’t want to do it in the first place; why the hell would I want a medal?”
DeleteOf course the current generation of young folk are different, and will doubtless gleefully join the war with China. If they don’t we oldies, led by Brigadier-General Onion Muncher and Lance Corporal Bromancer, will dutifully start mailing out white feathers.
I was just a bit lucky, Anony: too young for nasho, too old for Vietnam.
DeleteWell, like the Bro, talking about "the gravity of our circumstances", cop this:
ReplyDeleteQuantum physics makes small leap with microscopic gravity measurement
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2024/feb/23/quantum-physics-microscopic-gravity-discovery
Bicycle wheels are evrywhere.
Anonymous - if the reptiles get hold of this, they will be predicting the invention of Dick Tracy's anti-gravity transporters - in much the same time they would have us expect fusion reactors wired into the power grid. Looking at this -
Deletehttps://richardnilsen.com/tag/dick-tracy/
- we can see that much of humanity now carries something remarkably similar to a '2-way wrist radio/TV' - so why scoff at Bjorn-again speculators who tell us that the solution to this minor climate perturbation will come with technology that is probably being developed in laboratories, somewhere, right now?
That brings back just a few very hazy memories, Chad; especially the two-way radios worn like wristwatches IIRC. But Honey Moon ?
Delete“Dick Tracy” went very odd in the last decade or so of creator Chester Gould’s tenure on the strip; interplanetary travel, moon people and the like. Gould also became strangely obsessed with magnetism and the concept “the nation that controls magnetism will control the world!” Hmmm - perhaps the Coalition might like to consider that in developing their you-beaut new energy policy?
DeleteTalking about something a bit odd from the past, how about this:
DeleteThink Taylor Swift can draw a crowd? The numbers pale in comparison to Billy Graham's 1959 Australian tour
https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/australia/think-taylor-swift-can-draw-a-crowd-the-numbers-pale-in-comparison-to-billy-graham-s-1959-australian-tour/ar-BB1iPCFe?
A crowd that "could have been as large as 143,750 as the crowd 'spilled onto the arena'." and that "The 1959 tour also had an impact." Yeah, right.
The past is a foreign country, they do things differently there.
Oreskes "That approach, of course, is extremely hard to challenge and to refute,
ReplyDeleteNO! It is NOT extremely hard to challenge and to refute!
Vaclav Smil says:
"NUCLEAR ELECTRICITY:
A SUCCESSFUL FAILURE
CThe age of commercial nuclear electricity generation began on 17 October 1956, when Queen Elizabeth II switched on Calder Hall, on the Cumberland coast of England. Sixty years is long enough to judge the technology, and I still cannot improve on my evaluation fromabout 10 years ago: a “successful failure.”
http://vaclavsmil.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/22.NUCLEAR-1.pdf
"Vaclav Smil and the Value of Doubt
"A ruthless dissector of unwarranted assumptions takes on environmental catastrophists and techno-optimists."
By David Owen
February 20, 2024 (a rare interview)
...
"the power under the direct control of an affluent American household, including its vehicles, “would have been available only to a Roman latifundia owner of about 6,000 strong slaves, or to a nineteenth-century landlord employing 3,000 workers and 400 big draft horses.” He was making a characteristically vivid point about the impact of modern access to energy, most of it produced by burning fossil fuels."
...
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/persons-of-interest/vaclav-smil-and-the-value-of-doubt
Oh dear, here we go again - the Bromancer: "That reduces our fleet to nine ships [what happened to the subs ?] at a time of maximum strategic challenge." But even if we tripled our fleet - and got the nuclear powered subs - by the middle of next week, we'd still be totally unable to defend ourselves against a very large Chinese fleet. Or does the Bro reckon we might be invaded by Thailand, or Myanmar or the Philippines or even by Indonesia ? Or Russia maybe - will Putin send his fleet, Bro ? We might just have a vague chance against one of them.
ReplyDeleteJust what is this "maximum strategic challenge" that the Bromancer never defines or describes but just moans about incessantly ?
So, Shoebridge via the Bro: "...we have an urgent need to produce something this decade." Yeah, so what exactly is going to happen early next decade that would be prevented by us producing "something this decade"? How big will the Chinese fleet be by "next decade"? Won't it have grown by much more than any pitiful "something this decade" that we could produce ? Unless, that is, the naval shipbuilders of the world have an 'off the shelf' supply of very up-to-date vessels we can just buy and sail off in right now.
Anyway, The Bromancer apparently knows "one of the most senior figures ever to work in defence" who has told him "the only defence dollars you can trust are those in the current six-month period because all governments endlessly change everything." Oh right, so that would explain the Stage 3 Tax Cuts too, wouldn't it - "endlessly change everything". Except for the lack of an Indigenous Voice - just couldn't seem to change that one at all.
A bit of a nothingburger contribution from Polonius this week. Sure, I suppose we should applaud his search for a slightly younger audience - the average fan of ‘80s band Do-Re-Mi and Deborah Conway’s solo career would be around 60-65, a generation or so younger than Hendo’s usual demographic. A couple of small petitions to the organisers of some writers’ festivals hardly represents a massive crackdown on free speech though - particularly given that they’ve been unsuccessful in having their targets banned. Even Polonius’ obligatory ABC references aren’t overly critical. Is he going soft, or just having a bit of an off week?
ReplyDeleteBTW in my personal view, Conway’s Trump advocacy (because of his Israel support) and vaccine & lockdown skepticism don’t really burnish her free speech credentials.
No, but they might seriously burnish any 'rationality and reason' credentials that she might otherwise like to claim.
DeleteAs will her comment from the interview that '"Palestinian children should not be considered children."
DeleteOk:
ReplyDelete"Our work shows the misinformation radicalisation process is a pathway driven by human emotions rather than the information itself – and this understanding may be a first step in finding solutions."
https://theconversation.com/how-people-get-sucked-into-misinformation-rabbit-holes-and-how-to-get-them-out-223717
So we're all just at the mercy of our "emotions" without any intervening sense or sensibility about our world. Got it - just like all of the reptiles.
Henderson’s mention of the First World War and the Vietnam War is evidence of his selective memory as he conveniently omits that the conscientious objectors in the former war were sent white feathers (in the UK they were barracked or imprisoned – at Dyce camp in Aberdeen, the objectors did hard labour for 10 years), while in the latter war conscientious objectors were jailed in Australia.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/jul/19/conscientious-objectors-of-first-world-war-their-untold-tales
Looking more generally, it is worth citing Josephine Bacon’s ‘The Illustrated Atlas of Jewish Civilization: 4000 years of history’ (Quantum, 2006):
“Karl Marx’s revolutionary socialist philosophy won a ready response from his fellow Jews, particularly those of eastern Europe. Many of the leading figures of the early Communist party were Jewish.”
and
“Karl Marx (1818-83) was the son of a baptized Jew and grandson of the rabbi of Trier. His writings formulated a new ideology and equality which inspired Jews all over the world: fiery Jewish revolutionaries Leon Jogiches (1867-1919) and Rosa Luxemburg (1870-1919) fought to bring Communism to Germany, but both were murdered by reactionaries. Another Jew, Bela Kun (1886-1937), briefly governed Hungary after the Communist revolution of 1919.
In Russia, many of the leading figures of the 1917 revolution were Jewish. The first Poliburo was overwhelmingly Jewish, and the first Soviet to be formed included an important delegation from the Jewish Bund. Jakov M. Sverdlov (1885-1919), allegedly the person who ordered the execution of the Russian royal family, became chairman of the All-Union Committee of the Communist Party. Lev Borisovich Kamenev (ne Rosenfeld, 1883-1936) was editor of Pravda when the newspaper was published in exile. He returned to Russia for the revolution, and in 1922, following Lenin’s stroke (which led to the leader’s death two years later), he and his Jewish colleague Grigori Yevseyevich Zinoviev (ne Rimysiski, 1883-1936) constituted two-thirds of the Triumvirate that, with Stalin, led the party and the country. As commissar for foreign affairs, Leon Trotsky (ne lev Davidovitch Bronstein, 1879-1940) negotiated the Brest-Litovsk treaty which took the Soviet Union out of World War I; as commissar for the war, he created the Red Army. (Kamenev and Zinoviev were both deposed by Stalin, who had them tried and executed in 1936; he had to wait another four years before he managed to have the Mexico-exiled Trotsky assassinated.)”
and also:
“An anti-Trotsky poster, produced in Russia in 1917. Though the revolution promised to end Jewish persecution, it was not long before anti-Semitism reared its head again. In Trotsky’s case, his Jewish birth was used as a tool to defeat him in the struggle for power that followed the death of Lenin.”
Since Henderson is on about anti-Semitism again, perhaps his continual disparagement of all leftist ideology and especially the reptile’s tendency to harp on the march of Marxism through the institutions could readily be construed as anti-Semitic.
Oh isn't human history such a wonderful, joyful adventure; especially for those who know little and understand less of it.
DeleteRussia, of course, is the home of the ROC, so rabid antisemitism is only to be expected.
Great contribution but how would Henderson worry about facts when he the others can produce misinformation.
ReplyDeleteWell they're not the only ones who can produce bulk misinformation, it's more their proficiency with disinformation that's the worry.
DeleteThe "New Solar Sunrise" - envisaged, although (un)de(r)funded and indefinitely delayed, by the Coalition's Direct Action Plan - seems to be proceeding apace; well done almost-forgotten World's Best (Former) Environment Minister, GHunt:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.energy.gov.au/solar