In which there's only Polonial prattle and the dog botherer nuking the country to save the planet to see ...

 

The pond overdid it yesterday ... it was that final eleven minute serve of stewed suet of "Ned" wot did it. Stuffed as full as a goog and fit to burst with just one more mint in the paw.

So the pond has decided that for the Sunday serving of reptiles, it would only offer an entrée of prattling Polonius, followed by a serve of the dog botherer nuking the country to save the planet. 

That meant no Dame Slap supper course, in which she rabbited on about courts and judges and what not, but the possibility of a gigantic Technicolor yawn has to be weighed against the dubious pleasures to be found above the Faraway tree on planet Janet.

So take it away Polonius, emerge from behind the arras to do your thing, with the reptiles advising that only four minutes of a diminishing supply of life will be wasted by reading ... Rudd has to do a Vance and soothe things with Trump, If Kevin Rudd is to perform to the greatest effect, he will need to do a JD Vance and have a change of heart. It’s the diplomatic way.

The graphics department helped Polonius on his way with a snap captioned, In a tweet in June 2020, Kevin Rudd described Trump as “the most destructive president in history; he drags America and democracy through the mud”. Picture: AFP

Indeed he does, but couldn't the reptiles have found a more specific snap than that mango look of eyes wide shut and mouth wide open. We all know what he's angling for ...

There, that sets the tone for genteel Polonius ... you know, the art of the tone, the art of being diplomatic..

It’s all a matter of tone – or the art of being diplomatic. The diplomatic problem right now is that Dr Kevin Rudd, Australia’s ­ambassador to the United States, has demonstrated a recent ­absence of tone. Along with an ­unwillingness to withdraw, or apologise for, ­undiplomatic ­hyperbole.
The second volume of Rudd’s memoirs, titled The PM Years, was published by Macmillan Australia in October 2018. At the time, Donald J Trump was president of the US, assuming office in January 2017. It contains only one reference to Trump. Namely, a political criticism which was a lead-in to Rudd’s attacks on his Labor Party colleagues – including Wayne Swan, Don Farrell and Stephen Conroy.
There is also a comment about a reference to the “Trump Party” having engaged successfully in “a hostile takeover of the Republican Party”. Agree with the author or not, this was a reasonable critique of the US Republicans.
And then it all changed. On Sky News last Monday, Sharri Markson revealed that, before he took up the position of Australia’s US ambassador in March 2023, Rudd had called Trump a “village idiot”.
The comment was made in a webinar discussion in January 2021 between Rudd and one-time Indian diplomat and current politician Dr Shashi Tharoor. In a ­realistic evaluation of the international interests of the Chinese Communist Party, Rudd stated that what was working in “China’s favour”, in this rivalry with the US, turned on the situation that “in the last four years the US had been run by a village idiot”. He added that the US was “increasingly incompetent in its national statecraft under Trump”.

At this point the hive mind probably couldn't remember former chairman Rudd - goldfish are that way inclined too - so the reptiles handily provided a snap of Former PM Kevin Rudd.

The pond had ignored various links in Polonius's piece but made the fatal mistake of clicking on the link embedded in this line:

This was the most recent example of Rudd’s attacks on the US’s 45th president.

Actually it wasn't, it was just a link to more reptile alarmism in the lizard Oz:

There was more, but the pond was already beyond weary, and trudged back to sup on more Polonial prattle:

Addressing the Oxford Union in 2017, he declared “Trump at present represents a political hostility for both sides of Australian politics … he is an objective problem for the world, for the region, for my country”.
The Oxford audience just loved the rhetoric and the fanging. And then there was the tweet of June 1, 2020, when Rudd described Trump as “the most destructive president in history; he drags America and democracy through the mud”.
On February 27, 2022, Rudd posted that “Donald Trump is a traitor to the West”.
As early as October 30, 2017, Rudd had mocked Trump – so much so that the official ABC TV Q+A transcript contains this reference: “Kevin Rudd (babbles theatrically)” before recording Rudd saying with reference to Trump: “The general consensus amongst anyone concerned with a public policy process, domestic or international, thinks he’s nuts.”
Last Thursday, Rudd issued a statement “from the Office of the 26th prime minister of Australia”.
He wrote that, in his previous role as “head of an independent US based think tank” he was a regular commentator on American politics. Now “out of respect for the office of the President of the United States and following the election of President Trump”, Rudd’s office announced that he had “removed these past commentaries from his personal website and social media channels”.

At this point the reptiles inserted the video seen above, with the tag One of Donald Trump senior advisers has issued an ominous warning to Kevin Rudd about his future as Australia's US Ambassador.

Even though Polonius was trying to be a little more genteel than the other baying hounds in News Corp, the pond was reminded of the venerable Meade's Weekly Beast piece, SMH declares war on ‘vengeful’ News Corp over ‘campaign’ against Kevin Rudd’s US posting.

Without it, the pond would never have known what went down at that Nine rag, because the pond rarely ventures there, and then only to read the real estate headlines. It seemed wise to forget Paul Sheehan days and indulge them:

Meanwhile, Polonius continued on his way with genteel FUD. Needless to say, he was most genteelly alarmed, but had a courtier's wise advice, honed after years at the Sydney Institute. Go the gigantic kow towing suck, down on knees:

Needless to say, they remain on YouTube and elsewhere.
It remains unclear why Rudd did not remove this material from his website when Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced his appointment in Washington DC in December 2022.
Moreover, it’s notable that Australia’s ambassador to the US made no apology for engaging in abuse, rather than considered argument, when expressing his displeasure with Trump.
Speaking on Sky News’s Erin program on November 1, Trump’s daughter-in-law Lara Trump told Erin Molan that there is a “problem – when people say those things and don’t have a change of heart”. Lara Trump holds the influential position of co-chair of the Republican National Committee.
It would appear that US vice-president elect JD Vance took such a road. In a private note to an associate on Facebook in February 2016, Vance wrote: “I go back and forth between thinking Trump is a cynical asshole like (Richard) Nixon who wouldn’t be that bad (and might even prove useful) or that he’s America’s ­Hitler.”
Note that Vance did not specifically say that Donald Trump was a born-again Adolf Hitler. 

(Sorry, the pond must interrupt, what with Polonius being slippery yet again. The comparison JD made was hardly flattering:

"I go back and forth between thinking Trump is a cynical asshole like Nixon who wouldn't be that bad (and might even prove useful) or that he's America's Hitler," he wrote privately to an associate on Facebook in 2016.

Tricky criminal Dick or a sociopath of the first water? And yet Polonius manages to dig up the most anodyne assessment to hand):

In an interview with The New York Times published on June 13, Vance said “I allowed ­myself to focus so much on the ­stylistic element of Trump that I completely ignored the way in which he substantively was offering something very different on foreign policy, on trade, on immigration”.

At this point the reptiles crossed to Sky News (Au) for a bit of cross promotion:

Deputy Opposition Leader Sussan Ley says she wants Australia's Ambassador to the US Kevin Rudd to succeed in the “national interest”. “Because a strong relationship is in our national interest both economically and with respect to our security and the security of the world,” Ms Ley told Sky News Australia. “I wish Kevin well … because when he does well as our ambassador, Australia does well with respect to our relationship with the US. “He’s been working hard; he needs to continue to work incredibly hard.”

Really? Best wishes for good work and future happiness? Isn't this closer to the mark?

And then as promised Polonius lurched to a close with that advice to do the kow tow and go the gigantic suck:

In any event, Trump and Vance became friendly and the rest is history. It is likely that criticism of Rudd by such Republicans as Dan Scavino, a leading Trump adviser, will diminish Rudd’s role as ambassador without some rapprochement from the Australian embassy in Washington DC.
The problem with Rudd’s past comments on Trump turned on the fact that they are just abuse designed to appeal to Trump antagonists and Trump haters. They contained neither wit nor cleverness. And this from a highly intelligent and well-informed man.
Had Rudd engaged in the level of critique that you expect from someone holding the position of president of the influential Asia Society, there would have been no problem.
Rudd was not the only prominent and intelligent Australian politician to fang Trump when they considered that he would not return to the White House. Appearing on Q+A as recently as February 26 this year, former Liberal Party prime minister Malcolm Turnbull said: “When you see Trump with Putin, as I have on a few occasions, he’s like the 12-year-old boy that goes to high school and meets the captain of the football team. ‘Ah! My hero!’. It is really creepy. It’s really creepy.”
Turnbull did not repeat this line of attack when he appeared on Q+A last Monday. But nor did he take back his shots of not so long ago. But then Turnbull is not one of Australia’s most senior ­diplomats.
No Australian prime minister is likely to recall a high-performing ambassador on account of ­previous indiscretions of the hyperbolic kind. Nor is an American president likely to demand the removal of the ambassador of an ally for past personal abuse. However, if Rudd is to perform to the greatest effect, he will need to do a Vance. It’s the diplomatic way.
Gerard Henderson is executive director of The Sydney Institute.

There is an upside to this ... the only mention of the ABC is a reference to a specific show.

The downside is the notion that we should become gigantic sucks to a con artist, fraud, criminal, inveterate liar and snake oil salesman, aka the diplomatic way, when we're really on the highway and going all the way ...

Apologies to TT, but the pond really needed that break before plunging off "the nuke the country to save the planet cliff" with the dog botherer.

Sure, it's just another round in the climate denialist lizard Oz wars, reheated from yesterday's pond because nattering "Ned" left no room for it, or sanity, but attention must be paid.

Sure, the header said it all, Nuclear power is the only solution to our energy dilemma, Labor’s impossible renewables dream is a nightmare that’s sending us broke, and there was no real reason for proceeding further, but the pond is a glutton for reptile punishment, a masochist of the first water, beginning with the very first snap, captioned The vast SunMetals photovoltaic solar power station near Townsville in northern Queensland is of little use without a substantial power storage capability.

The snap said it all, more trolling of renewables, and if nothing else, the dog botherer knows how to troll ...

The truth will turn up eventually, lies are exposed, reality has a tendency of crashing through any pretensions, even if it takes longer than we might like. Sometimes the facts impose themselves over spin instantaneously – like when CNN’s on-screen graphic and live-to-air reporter Omar Jiminez famously pointed to “mostly peaceful protests” after two days of rioting in Wisconsin in 2020 when there were burning cars in the background – but other times the truth can take a while to dawn.
Anthony Albanese and Chris Bowen have been saying for years that renewable energy is the cheapest form of electricity, but while tens of billions of dollars in subsidies and investments flow into renewables, prices keep going up. A reckoning must come and it will be ugly.
Not only is Labor’s plan to reach its net-zero goal by switching the electricity grid to 90 per cent renewable energy physically impossible (it has committed to get to 82 per cent within 6 years), the attempt is sending us a broke. At some stage the facts will break through the delusion.
Perhaps the absurdity of the “Defence Net Zero Strategy” released quietly last month will provide a turning point, demonstrating the phantasmagorical nature of Labor’s climate plans. Defence has gone to the trouble of mapping out a strategy for how we can run tanks, ships and helicopters to defend this nation without adding to carbon emissions – they cite trials of electric Bushmasters and biofuel for fighter jets.
The pretence is farcical – our adversaries will only have to attack at night to catch us without power, and during the day they can just wait till our tanks are recharging. While we lose the war, we will at least demonstrate a symbolic commitment to saving the planet – I doubt anyone imagines the Chinese or Russian militaries will be switching to net zero any time soon.
In his press release about the net-zero strategy, the Defence Industry Minister Pat Conroy said Defence would be increasing its use of “reliable renewable energy”. Say what? The central flaw of renewables is their lack of reliability. George Orwell would have been proud: “War is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength.” And now, renewable energy is ­reliable.

At this point the reptiles interrupted the Orwellian rant with a snap, Defence Industry Minister Pat Conroy. Picture: NewsWire / Martin Ollman

For some reason the pond began to wonder how long the dog botherer had been kicking this can down the road.

Picked at random:

The more things change, the more they stay the same, unless you happen to be a planet in the grip of serious climate change. Here, have a cartoon to celebrate:

On and on the dog botherer yammered:

It is quite disturbing to see how these zealots take the central and undeniable failing of renewable energy – its intermittence – and pretend it away by using an oxymoronic phrase, “reliable renewable energy”. Is this calculated connivance or are they so evangelistic that they believe their own nonsense?
The unavoidable logic behind firming up a renewable energy grid makes additional costs unavoidable – a renewables grid demands two grids. You need to construct an expansive network of wind and solar generation plants, enough to cover about three times peak demand spread across vastly different microclimates in the hope that wind or sun will be available somewhere when you need it.

The reptiles did their usual cross promotion thing, carefully neutered by the pond:

Sky News host Chris Kenny has slammed the Albanese Labor government’s net-zero plan for the ADF. Mr Kenny said the government’s proposal is “insane”. “Defence requires machinery, powerful equipment, they need to use energy, and the idea that we can do this adequately arm ourselves, equip ourselves, and defend ourselves while making defence a net zero operation, it's plainly nuts.”

Have another cartoon to celebrate not having to watch the clip:

Back to the blathering botherer:

All this needs to be connected by tens of thousands of kilometres of transmission lines (which are regulated assets with guaranteed rates of return) and buttressed by expensive battery or pumped-hydro storage. It is a monumentally difficult and costly task on which we have spent well over $100bn in subsidies and capital costs, with much more to come.
On Friday, the Coalition released estimates from Frontier Economics putting the total requited spend for the renewables transition at $642bn – that is $500bn more than Labor has estimated, and about five times what we have already spent. All of this must be recouped with profit, so our power price pain can only ­increase.
The catch with renewables is that they will always require back-up, in effect another electricity grid, perhaps using much of the same transmission lines, but capable of generating peak demand without wind or solar. Most likely this back-up grid would be powered by gas.
And once we know there is enough back-up to supply peak demand, we then can understand that the entirety of the renewable asset build is an additional and unnecessary energy cost we have chosen to impose on ourselves. It alienates land, increases complexity and escalates costs without providing additional power, all so we can meet emissions reduction targets that other countries are not meeting, and which will make no discernible difference to global emissions or, therefore, the climate, anyway.

Interruption time again, how desperately needed they are, albeit only as screen caps:

The Coalition is pushing against Labor's net-zero defence strategy. Sky News host Chris Kenny discusses the Opposition's new "front in the climate wars". "The Coalition is opening up another front in the climate wars, their logical attack on this nation's energy self-harm along the road to net zero," Mr Kenny said. "Defence requires machinery, powerful equipment, using energy, and the idea that we can do this adequately, and we can arm ourselves, equip ourselves, and defend ourselves while making defence a net zero operation, well it's plainly nuts."

Too much dog botherer, and yet how much is too much? Here he is again, still carrying on back in 2018:

It's time now to nuke the country to save the planet (though the planet doesn't really need saving, everything's for the best in the best of all over-populated worlds). 

Who better to help the dog botherer than a doofus who ran a line in electronics gizmo stores and then inn failed white nationalist supermarket junk? You know this teary-eyed hawker of crap at a loose end and looking for a new angle:

Pleased to be reminded of "entrepreneurs" peddling feeble Vegemite imitations, not the sincerest form of flattery?

Here, have a cartoon to celebrate:

Now over to you, giant ego Dick ...

And whenever gas is needed to firm up the grid, the price the gas generators can charge will determine the cost of electricity. Two grids, a vast and inefficient renewable grid we could well do without, and an effective and reliable fossil-fuel grid needed to guarantee the energy that underpins our society.
The lies being told on renewables costs have been brilliantly exposed by simple observations and arguments run by entrepreneur Dick Smith in an, until now, private debate with The Guardian Australia. Smith responded after The Guardian ran a piece slamming him for running “ill-informed claims” about renewable energy costs and practicality.
One contested point was whether the CSIRO Gencost report, which compares the costs of various generation methods, includes an adequate cost for storage under the renewable scenario. The Guardian article criticised Smith for saying these costs are ignored, noting Gencost does refer to these costs – but in his correspondence to the paper Smith says the CSIRO has “greatly underestimated” the amount of storage required.

Because he's almost forgotten, except in his own nuking lunch time, the reptiles saw fit to remind us with a snap, Australian entrepreneur Dick Smith. Picture: Jane Dempster

Oh he turned a bit of coin, but I like to think of him in his last incarnation, as Failed Australian entrepreneur Dick ...

It turns out that the dog botherer has apparently seen the light, at least if he's with that other Dick ... we must reduce emissions, even if climate science is just alarmism, a cult, a religion, and climate change a delusion ... (go on, you remember those dog botherer days, even if he seems to have forgotten):

Smith does not contest the need to reduce emissions. His arguments are about whether renewables can power a modern economy and whether nuclear might not be a crucial part of the energy mix. In his letter, Smith says the underestimates from the CSIRO allow it to “falsely claim that renewables with storage is the cheapest form of energy”.
The electronics entrepreneur, adventurer and environmentalist made a killer observation that exposes the ruse. “No doubt you have noticed all the wind and solar farms that exist around our country,” Smith wrote to The Guardian. “If the CSIRO claim that wind, solar and storage is the cheapest form of energy is correct, these facilities would include batteries to supply power 24/7 – or at least for five hours. None of them do.”
This connects to a point I have made for a decade or more – instead of subsidising the installation of unreliable renewable energy we should have made any subsidies or targets contingent on generators firming up their own supplies, either with batteries or dispatchable generation. Smith provides a clear explanation for why this is impossible: “That is, the cost of even limited storage results in solar and wind power being so expensive it is unaffordable.”
Smith has also pointed out that when Broken Hill went dark last month because the main transmission line from Victoria was taken out in a storm, neither the nearby solar factory, wind farm or big battery were able to keep the Silver City in power. And he cites the real-world example of Lord Howe Island where despite a $12m grant for a renewables grid with storage, they have ended up with higher power prices and a reliance on diesel generators for 100 per cent of their electricity at times.

Why am I even listening to a failed Dick, a hobbyist and a Sky News (Au) pet? Why is the pond indulging in foolish rhetorical questions? Just go with the guru Dick flow ...

Entrepreneur Dick Smith says nuclear energy is the “only answer” for the future of Australia. “Renewables and battery are so expensive, they’re unaffordable,” Mr Smith told Sky News Australia. “You can’t run 1.5 million homes off intermittent wind power, it’s impossible.”

Back to the future with a final gobbet from that dog botherer of times or Xmases past ...

It could be worse, the pond supposes ...

Not to worry, the dream of the 1890s is alive and living in the dog botherer and Port Augusta, and soon enough we'll be nuking the country to save the planet from a non-existent threat ...

This is just the reality. No developed country has even attempted to run on a 90 per cent renewables model, and unless there is a watershed development in energy storage no country ever will – so what is Australia playing at?
A clue for a secure, prosperous, and clean energy future comes from our defence force. Not the inane net-zero strategy, but their plan to run nuclear-propelled ­submarines.
Instead of wasting government subsidies and burdening consumers with the investment costs of unproven renewable models and other “green energy superpower” hyperbole like green hydrogen and pumped hydro, the time is ripe for nuclear power. It is dense power with a small land footprint that can use existing transmission infrastructure,
Remember the Whyalla wipeout? A decade or more on, it is still on the way with grave doubts about the future of the steelworks, delayed only by taxpayer subsidies and green energy posturing.
A steel manufacturing centre established with the advantage of cheap and reliable coal power is struggling again, as it awaits some kind of “green hydrogen” saviour. Yet a couple of hours up the road is one of the world’s largest uranium mines, and Whyalla and Port Augusta are linked to the national transmission grid because of the now-demolished coal-fired power plants in the region.
A nuclear power station near Port Augusta would buttress power supplies for Whyalla, South Australia and the national grid. Any excess power at times of low demand could be used for desalination or hydrogen production.
It is a much more logical and efficient solution, with proven technology, than our current renewables-plus-storage experiment. The only thing stopping the nuclear option is an honest and truthful appraisal of our options – and the political will.

Phew, denialism duty done for the day, and with all the cartoons out of the way so that the pond could end with a clip that showed how low key Lidia Thorpe's protest was when she bunged on a minor do inside parliament's Great Hall.  

Must try harder Lidia, take a tip from the Māoris ...