Relax, the bro will fix it, and if not the bro, there's always the glorious return of "Ned" and the always present and incorrect mean girl Dame Slap ...

 

Good. Perhaps Nvidia can now get back to its main game, and upgrade the Shield, which has gone for years without attention being paid, and is now very long in the tooth.

Not that the pond is in any way bitter, and so to a first brief note on an act of unparalleled treachery, an epic betrayal for the ages, an act so demeaning and upsetting that the reptiles featured it in their digital news this day...

Yoni Bashan was on the case in Coal-fired ScoMo has seen the light in solar ...Life out of politics for coal-fired-up former PM Scott Morrison is all sunshine now and his plans for 18 rooftop solar panels on his soon-to-be home suggest he’s seen the light.

It was devastating stuff ...

Scott Morrison has been working double-time post politics to make a crust on the speaking and advisory circuit; hence his roles with Dubai engineering firm Sidara and Boston-based DYNE Maritime.
Extra cash has slid in from his roles as chair of Space Centre Australia and vice-chair of American Global Strategies, founded by former Trump White House national security adviser Robert O’Brien.
But now we know what he’s been saving up for since his retirement from parliament: he’s pimping out his Shire abode with a $1m knockdown-rebuild. The estimated cost, according to documents filed with Sutherland Shire Council, is $1.05m. Let’s call it $2m to be safe. Isn’t there a tradie shortage at the moment?
Morrison wouldn’t engage with us on his plans for the house but our spies clocked a bulldozer sitting in the yard, the documents in our possession pointing to a levelling of the joint with a two-storey, five bedder upgrade.
We were surprised, however, to note the presence of 18 solar panels due to be spread across the prospective rooftop, per the technical drawings lodged with the council. Morrison, as prime minister, showed an absolute commitment to the future of fossil fuels, spending billions on gas projects and oil refineries and embracing coal with the vigour of Matt Kean wrapping his arms around an EV charging station. Morrison even brought a lump of coal into parliament one time.
“This is coal!” he shouted at Labor MPs, brandishing the hunk at them. “Don’t be afraid! Don’t scared! It was dug up by men and women who work in the electorates of those who sit opposite!”

Ah the glory days...

And now an epic betrayal. The coal king gone solar. What will Dame Groan say? What will the reptiles do? 

Cast the liar from the Shire out of Valhalla into the pits of solar hellfire? Nah, just a little bit more snide sniping ...

Funny, as well, that the DA couldn’t be assessed by the usual council cardigans because Morrison was determined to have “affiliations with councillors within the Sutherland Shire Council”, which is a cute way of saying that the Libs on council probably owe him their careers. It’s also why external assessors and a senior manager were engaged to cast an eye over the application. YB

Local council at its finest ... but then who doesn't have a Sydney council deep in pocket with developers?

And so to the far right, and the deep panic that gripped the tech world, and the reptiles sent in their best and brightest to deal with the crisis ...

Such a font (fount if you like) of riches, but the pond knew where to begin, the bromancer, always ahead on the war with China, currently due by Ēostre ...

China’s DeepSeek is our generation’s Sputnik moment and the whole world has a lot of reasons to be concerned, The emergence of DeepSeek is no reason to panic. But it sure is a reason to get moving. Donald Trump’s early actions on the Chinese AI bombshell could not be more thoroughly justified.

No need to panic, the ultra high tech bro is on the case, and has an opening snap to help for those in the hive mind struggling to remember which emperor is which... Donald Trump and Xi Jinping. Pictures: AFP

Stay relaxed, let the bro handle it ...

The unveiling of China’s DeepSeek chatbot is the Sputnik moment of our generation.

In 1957, the Soviet Union shocked the US by launching the first satellite into orbit of the earth.

The Americans couldn’t believe it. They were richer than the Russians. They’d worked hard and long on space. They had a huge scientific establishment. Everyone knew that democracies and free societies fostered innovation and creativity and discovery and technology, while communism fostered grey bureaucratic monotony.

Yet there was Sputnik 1, all alone in orbit.

Sputnik 1 turned out a Pyrrhic victory for Moscow. It galvanised America into action. Then there was a race for the moon. America not only won, but so much modern technology came out of that initial moonshot of Apollo 11 in 1969.

The Cold War finally ended 30 years later because the Soviets couldn’t match the Americans technologically, economically or militarily. Eventually they gave up.

China is vastly more formidable than the Soviets ever were.

And we have much more reason to be concerned than the Americans were after Sputnik in 1957.

Of course, we’ve got to be careful about what we don’t know. The Chinese say it cost them less than $US6m to train DeepSeek and they did it without access to the most advanced American computer chips, which the Biden administration prevented them from buying.

Well. hmmm. Let’s establish all those facts for ourselves. Either the American export controls weren’t as effective as thought, or this is an astonishing innovation. Probably both things are true.

One reason we need to be much more concerned than the Americans were in 1957 is that Chinese technology is infinitely more intertwined in everyday Western life than Russian technology ever dreamt of being. We depend on Chinese technology every day in batteries, solar panels, electric vehicles, all kinds of social media, refrigerators and a million other things, all of them increasingly connected online.

The pond can't help but think that the bro missed a trick here. 

It was Donna Lu in the Graudian that produced a laugh with We tried out DeepSeek. It worked well, until we asked it about Tiananmen Square and Taiwan ...

Instead the reptiles did the equivalent of turning the beast on and off, by flinging in another snap ... DeepSeek is shaking up the tech world, causing Nvidia’s shares to drop nearly 18% after its launch.

The bro was shaken but not stirred ...

If China establishes dominance, or even a clear lead, in Artificial Intelligence, this will have the most profound imaginable strategic consequences.

The competition across hi-tech between the US and its close allies on one hand and China on the other will be decisive in three key domains.

First, and most brutally, is the military domain.

Sophisticated warfare is already completely dependent on hi-tech sensors, electronic warfare, AI selection of targets and delivery of kinetic effects, information superiority in the battlespace and the rest. If you lead in hi-tech, you will lead in warfare capability. And if you lead decisively in warfare capability, you may very well be able to win without fighting.

Second, hi-tech dominance is central to the ability of a modern society to keep functioning in the event of cyber hostility. A fascinating feature of the Russia-Ukraine war has been Moscow’s inability so far to cripple Ukrainian infrastructure through offensive cyber operations.

Artillery has done much more damage than cyber. *

(* Pro "bro" tip. When you know SFA about AI, scribble about "cyber hostility")

But if your strategic adversary had planted “back doors” in even some of your key civilian infrastructure, anything from hospitals to dams to banks and everything else necessary to daily life, your society would be acutely vulnerable.

And third, it’s likely that the great power that dominates hi-tech will dominate the economy of the future.

There’s been a reassuring and complacent narrative lately that the Stalinist restrictions that Xi Jinping’s government has been imposing on China have weakened its economic performance and sapped its innovative energy.

Yet China has fused its military and civilian sectors, fused its government and private efforts, drawn all technology advances towards the purposes of the state in China Inc.

Plus, if you put hundreds and hundreds of clever engineers together, they will surely come up with stuff.

The emergence of DeepSeek is no reason to panic, but it sure is a reason to get moving in all these areas.

At this point, the pond should note that the immortal David Rowe was just as reassuring ...

The reptiles flung another great mind at the problem, a certain Jared Lynch, likely his first time in a starring role in the pond with Trump may be best bet to take on China’s DeepSeek, China has shown the world that it’s now game on in the artificial intelligence race, sending markets into a massive tailspin.

Ah yes, King Donald I will fix it, and so the reptiles indulged themselves with an AV distraction:

DeepSeek is shaking up the tech world, causing Nvidia’s shares to drop nearly 18% after its launch. Developed by a China-based startup, this AI model rivals OpenAI in performance while being significantly cheaper to train and operate. With its open-source design, users can download and run DeepSeek locally, bypassing data-sharing concerns. However, its rapid rise has sparked debate. Critics highlight fears of bias and censorship due to the company’s ties to China, raising ethical questions about its global impact. Despite facing a major cyberattack that temporarily limited registrations, DeepSeek has become the top-rated free app on Apple’s U.S. App Store, surpassing ChatGPT in downloads. Its success is challenging long-held beliefs about AI’s dependence on expensive hardware and U.S. dominance, marking a pivotal shift in the global AI landscape.

After all that, it was past time to take a breath with Jared ...

China has shown the world that it’s now game on in the artificial intelligence race, sending markets into a massive tailspin and sparking a new wild west.

More than $US580bn was wiped from the market value of Jensen Huang’s Nvidia after its shares tumbled 17 per cent on Monday – the biggest drop since March 2020 – while the Nasdaq has shed almost 3 per cent.

Australian tech stocks were also hit, with Data Centre operator NextDC falling as much as 7.8 per cent and investigations software company Nuix – which has been rebuilding itself around AI – diving 16.3 per cent on Tuesday morning.

What sparked the sell-off isn’t the fact that China’s DeepSeek AI model that is almost on par with America’s best. Investors are anxious given Chinese developers did so for a mere $US5.6m. This compares with OpenAI spending more than $US100m to train ChatGPT, which was launched in 2023.

If China can do it so cheaply, then this spells bad news for the likes of Nvidia, maker of the most advanced AI chips – technology that China is banned from accessing.

On this score, it is Silicon Valley’s turn to be disrupted. China has already upended the automotive industry after it surpassed Japan as the world’s leading exporter of vehicles by volume, rattling carmakers like Honda and Nissan, which now plan to merge to combat the new threat.

Now with DeepSeek, that disruption appears to be happening almost at the speed of light, catching the West’s best and brightest on the hop.

Or so Beijing would like the world to think.

It’s now time to take a breath.

Much of what has been reported on DeepSeek are untested claims. The exact cost of development and energy consumption of DeepSeek are not fully documented.

And some analysts are starting to call the proverbial BS on DeepSeek’s claims. “DeepSeek DID NOT build Open AI for $US5m,” Stacy Rasgon of Bernstein wrote in a note to investors.

Others have been more tempered, saying the launch of DeepSeek is the natural evolution of AI.

“DeepSeek is not a game changer, and on the contrary fits very well with the way we have now seen the industry evolving in the last three years,” Pierre Ferragu of New Street Research wrote to investors.

Indeed, Donald Trump foresaw this threat last week when he launched Stargate – a massive AI venture that aims to maintain the US’s dominance of the technology.

Trump’s project – backed by Larry Ellison’s Oracle, Masayoshi Son of Japan’s SoftBank, and OpenAI chief Sam Altman – committed an extraordinary $US500bn to build out a network of data centres and the energy infrastructure to power all the computing brute force needed to run generative AI models.

Hang on, hang on, didn't Uncle Leon himself call out that nonsense, in between Nazi salutes and Nazi-style addresses to the AfD?

Golly, he loves to salute ... and stir up a fuss ... apparently ketamine helps ...

And so on, and on ...see also Arwa Mahdawi's While Musk and Altman wage their silly little feud, China is making all the broligarchs look like chumps ...and now back with the lizard Oz, where Jared was blessed with another AV distraction...

DeepSeek, China’s answer to ChatGPT, avoids addressing sensitive topics like the Tiananmen Square massacre, Xi Jinping, the Cultural Revolution, or China’s human rights record. Despite relying on less advanced hardware, DeepSeek has shaken global markets, coming close to matching its US competitors. Hailed by one of Donald Trump’s advisers as “one of the most impressive breakthroughs,” this chatbot raises questions about bias and the future of AI in the global landscape.

Jared was sanguine and defiant ...

The sceptics – or those rattled by DeepSeek – will say why is such an investment necessary, given China appears to achieve the same result so cheaply, if its claims are true?

The answer is because, like in the space race between the US and Russia, more capital – not less – is needed.

As Ferragu said: “increased competition rarely reduces aggregate spending”.

The so-called Magnificent Seven tech stocks – which have been belted around by DeepSeek’s launch – have committed about $US200bn on AI investment this coming year. That’s across all kinds of infrastructure, from data centres, chips, research as well as energy.”

Microsoft – the shares of which sank 4 per cent on Monday – will be the first of the big tech companies to report its quarterly earnings on Thursday morning (Australian time). Investors will be looking to see how DeepSeek’s launch will affect its investment plans.

But Trump was clear about the motivation for a project like Stargate: “China’s a competitor, and others are competitors. We want it to be in this country.”

It’s going to be a wild ride. Trump has already rescinded a Biden executive order that had bound US companies too much to government red tape. Those companies are no free of those bounds to go forth and innovate - and crucially take on China.

We’re entering uncharted territory, akin to the wild west. The most important question is what role do we want AI to play in Western democratic societies? Will it be artificial intelligence, augmenting our own, or in the case of DeepSeek ‘autocratic intelligence’ becoming another arm of China’s communist regime?

So buckle up – it’s now game on in earnest.

What could possibly go wrong? King Donald is such a tech head. His ability to compute can hurt brains.

Never mind, at this point in the season, the pond announces with pride that nattering "Ned" has returned to the lizard Oz playing catch up, a bit like the Washington Commanders... with Stand back for the US President as king, By invoking the Almighty, Donald Trump has positioned himself and the White House within the most powerful idea that inspired the republic.

"Ned" was a little behind the times and burbled on for some five minutes, in the inimitable way that he has as a ponderous, portentous pundit, and the reptiles blessed him with a snap, Donald Trump is invoking the Divine Right of Kings doctrine as he remakes America.

Is that the best the reptiles could do? After all, if we're celebrating His Kingship ...

Still, "Ned" was on the right track, bore everyone silly, including King Donald himself, and things might settle down ...

You believed the Divine Rights of Kings doctrine was long dead. That’s correct – but it is staging a resurgence in the White House. Donald Trump’s statement in his inauguration speech was the signal, with Trump declaring “I was saved by God to make America great again”.

Trump claims to govern with divine instigation. He believes ”even more so now” that his escape from the assassin’s bullet in Pennsylvania was inspired by God to allow Trump to fulfil his mission to “reclaim our republic”, thereby making the 2024 election the “most consequential” in US history. The biblical invocation is obvious. Trump, like Moses, comes with a divinely ordained mission – to lead the American people back to their manifest destiny – a mission in which “we will not forget our God” just as Moses honoured God’s command in leading the Israelites out of Egypt.

Accordingly, Trump declares January 20, 2025, to be “Liberation Day” for American citizens. It is liberation from a “radical and corrupt establishment” that “extracted power and wealth” from the people while “the pillars of our society lay broken”.

Trump claims to have been “tested and challenged more than any president in our 250-year history” – but Trump has come through to make America “greater, stronger and far more exceptional than ever before”.

He declares a rebirth. By invoking the Almighty, Trump locates himself in the most powerful idea that inspired the republic.

In George Washington’s 1789 inaugural he invoked the “divine blessing” that guided the new nation and declared the American people were bound to that “Great Author” where every step towards their independence “seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency”.

Sheesh,  is "Ned"trying to do a Henry by invoking a slave owner? 

Never mind, another snap ... US President Donald Trump reviews the troops in Emancipation Hall during inauguration ceremonies at the US Capitol in Washington on January 20. Picture: AFP

Whenever "Ned" gets going like this, disremembering that he's kissing cousins with the folk at Faux Noise, for some reason the pond is reminded of David Brooks and is inclined to nod off to sleep ... but he's back, "Ned" is back in all his tedious glory, endless trudges up the "Ned" Everest await, and for that the pond gives thanks...

Trump’s second presidency rests upon the deepest origins of the presidential office. That great generation of American founding fathers, when they devised their constitution, were fixated by the British monarchy. While they denounced George 111, they created a presidency that combined the powers of both the head of state and head of government, and resembled an elective kingship.

From the start, the US president possessed a monarchical status – but the president, unlike the British monarch, was weaponised with real constitutional power. Benjamin Franklin said: “The executive will always be increasing here, as elsewhere, till it ends in a monarchy.” During the Civil War, Lincoln’s secretary of state, William Seward, said: “We elect a king for four years and give him absolute power within certain limits, which after all he can interpret for himself.”

This is exactly what Trump intends to do. He embarks upon a grand experiment – commanding the executive branch, with a majority in congress, a conservative-inclined Supreme Court and, in an alliance with the hi-tech billionaires of the age, Trump will push the powers of the presidency to their limits and beyond.

We are about to witness an extraordinary real-time test of presidential power and whether it can be constrained by the political, judicial and constitutional system in the cause of democratic balance.

Trump began by rewriting the law for about 1500 people who invaded and rioted at the US Capitol on January 6, 2021. He commuted prison sentences to time served for 14 people and offered blanket pardons for the rest. This included prominent leaders of radical groups such as the Proud Boys, whose leader had been sentenced to 22 years in prison. Hundreds were prosecuted for assaulting or resisting police.

For example, in the litany of individuals, Daniel Joseph “DJ” Rodriguez, sentenced to 151 months, is seen on video using an electroshock weapon against police by “plunging it into the officer’s neck”. The previous evening he pledged in a MAGA chat group: “There will be blood.” Many individuals attacked and sprayed the eyes of police, bashed them, and bragged about it.

Yes, yes, been there, done that, but "Ned" has always been a little slow and we should allow him to catch up, and get with the groove. DJ, play some gay tune for "Ned" ...US President Donald Trump dances as House Majority Whip Tom Emmer applauds following Trump's speech before the 2025 Republican Issues Conference on January 27. Picture: Getty Images

And finally to that savaging of the Emeritus Chairman, his spawn, and the dastardly way that Faux Noise enabled, and continues to enable, the tangerine tyrant ...

Trump abandoned his previous claim to do “case-by-case” assessment. His vice president, JD Vance, had said: “If you committed violence on that day, obviously you shouldn’t be pardoned.” Obviously – unless the President changes his mind and does whatever he likes. Trump exercised a constitutional power but his action was a direct assault on the US justice system.

That outgoing president Joe Biden had abused the same power with his pardons inevitably dilutes criticism of Trump but affords no justification for his actions. Trump’s actions invoke the divine powers vested in monarchs – the power to offer mercy or sentence enemies, deployed in ancient times to reward supporters, punish rivals and court populist approval. Sound familiar? Trump is playing a brutal political game. His message: if cops are bashed and criminal laws are broken in his good name, then the President as king has the power to forgive you.

Trump also changed his mind and wants to save TikTok, another example of the President deciding he will interpret the law to suit himself. Last year, in a bipartisan spirit, the House voted 360-58 and the Senate 79-18 to ban TikTok in America unless the China-based owner sold its stake within a year. TikTok is fighting the law, deploying its 170 million-strong users in the US – but the Supreme Court has just upheld the law. The US system and its intelligence agencies fear the US data held by Chinese owner ByteDance could be extracted on behalf of the Beijing government. Trump initially spearheaded efforts to ban TikTok, claiming it was a national security threat to America. But on returning to the White House, he has reinvented himself as TikTok’s saviour. Why?

Note that Trump used TikTok with immense success during the election. He has now issued an executive order seeking to suspend enforcement of the law while he seeks a solution that saves “a platform used by 170 million Americans”. In effect, he won’t enforce a law passed by congress and upheld by the Supreme Court, with Trump now floating a “joint venture” deal where the US would have a 50 per cent stake.

Yet this is contrary to the law that says TikTok must sever all ties with ByteDance and China. The Wall Street Journal said: “Mr Trump is relaying that he puts pleasing China’s Xi Jinping above a law passed by congress.” It argued: “Congress is a co-equal branch of government, not a subsidiary of the president.” But it is doubtful that Trump accepts this.

Ah, the pond was just kidding about Faux Noise and "Ned's" righteous indignation ... as if ...

Here, have another snap, US President Donald Trump holds an executive order stating the US withdrawal from the Paris Agreement that he signed during the inaugural parade inside Capital One Arena. Picture: AFP

And so to a final burst of "Ned", and no, Faux Noise and the Murdochian role in it all won't be mentioned... as Dione once sang, walk on by, tears and sadness are all "Ned" has to offer ...

The entire message of his first week is the overriding nature of his executive power. While the WSJ said Trump “can’t suspend laws like an English king before the 1689 Bill of Rights”, Trump clearly intends to circumvent or thwart the law, and is recruiting Big Tech, probably Elon Musk, to help him. “I have the right to make a deal,” Trump said. Implicitly, he is saying two things – he has superior power to congress and he can cut a deal with China.

The deluded pro-Trump commentators* can’t see what is happening before their eyes – the new rules by which Trump will operate mean he will intimidate and bully smaller entities (Mexico, Panama, Denmark and hopeless Colombia) but attempt epic deal-making with the big boys (China and Russia) to reduce military conflict and its threat. His inauguration was a gobsmacking classic. It was old-fashioned manifest destiny and imperial expansion rolled together. The 19th century is alive and well, witness his honouring of president William McKinley, whom Trump applauds for his “expansion of territorial gains” for America – a reference to the 1898 Spanish-American War that saw Guam, Puerto Rico and The Philippines ceded to the US.

Trump’s world has left behind the Labor Party’s sad mantra of a “rules-based order.” His vision is the world of American territorial, trade and sphere of influence expansion – from Greenland to Panama. That’s why he looks forward to dealing with those other like-minded nationalistic imperialists, Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping, dealing with them in his mode: the President as king.

* As "Ned" mentioned deluded pro-Trump commentators, the pond decided to overstay its welcome and note that "Ned" is also kissing cousin with Dame Slap, intent on reasserting the right of blondes to rule in Donald Trump’s war on DEI puts the wind up our diversity divas, There is no evidentiary foundation to DEI. From the get-go, it was built on sand. But just watch the advocates in Australian hold on to a flawed policy.

It's yet another tedious read in Slappian Trumphalism, a style Dame Slap long ago adopted when she slipped on a MAGA cap and strode into the New York night to celebrate ...

The reptiles helped out Dame Slap with a snap of bigotry and hate at work, Donald Trump denounced DEI policies as an ‘identity-based spoils system’. Picture: AFP

That got Dame Slap into bigoted gear ...

One phrase in an executive order signed by Donald Trump last week must have caused a collective inhaling of breath from diversity divas in Australia.

That Trump wants an end to the “diversity, equity and inclusion” fad was no surprise. What’s most agitating to DEI devotees is the language he used when announcing its demise.

Trump said DEI policies “not only violate the text and spirit of our longstanding federal civil rights laws, they also undermine our national unity, as they deny, discredit, and undermine the traditional American values of hard work, excellence and individual achievement in favour of an unlawful, corrosive, and pernicious identity-based spoils system. Hardworking Americans who deserve a shot at the American Dream should not be stigmatised, demeaned or shut out of opportunities because of their race or sex”.

In that terrific denunciation of DEI is one short phrase – identity-based spoils system – that exposes the racket. That kind of cut-through is enough to make Australian beneficiaries of DEI gird their loins for battle. Having secured the spoils from DEI, don’t count on DEI benefactors giving them up. Many are already circling the wagons in a highly public effort to hold on to the identity-based spoils system that secures them money and prestige. In their corner is Australia’s superannuation system, where huge investment funds dominating Australia’s corporate landscape have entrenched left-wing fads.

Industry funds, controlled by unions and beloved by Labor, hold the levers of corporate power and have no compunction in using them for ideological ends. Aided and abetted by proxy advisers, these funds are playing social engineers in the ASX-listed companies, DEI being just one of their engineering feats.

There is a confluence of interests between DEI beneficiaries and industry funds. The latter know they can rely on the former to help implement policies within corporations, far beyond DEI. To put it bluntly, many beneficiaries of DEI are unofficial loyal lieutenants of super funds. The claim that DEI helps rid boards of group think is, frankly, a joke. The opposite is true. DEI appointees tend to swing one way having come from the same political, social and cultural milieu.

Dame Slap, in her blonde way, loves to dish it out to trans folk, and difficult, uppity blacks, and other minorities, and it was a pity that the reptiles interrupted her with an AV distraction just when she was hitting her stride ...

US President Donald Trump has signed an executive order demanding that all federal employees in DEI roles be placed on leave. Political journalist John Fund claims the crackdown on DEI programs is a “great precedent”. “This would be a precedent not just to get rid of loathsome DEI programs but to spread this across the federal government,” Mr Fund said.

The point of course is that cruelty is cool, as noted by Parker Molloy in When Cruelty Becomes Cool, Trump's return to power has normalised offensive language among a new breed of young conservatives ...

With Donald Trump’s return to power, one of the most disturbing trends in public discourse has been the casual revival of what was, until recently, widely understood to be an offensive slur — the r-word. This resurgence isn't happening in some dark corner of the internet, but in mainstream spaces, and is now being promoted by influential voices who seem emboldened by Trump's victory.

Miles Klee at Rolling Stone documented the trend earlier this month, highlighting how the word has roared back into common usage across social media platforms. From podcast hosts to tech billionaires, from conservative influencers to ostensibly centrist pundits, the word is being deliberately deployed as a rejection of what they dismissively call "wokeness."

The Present Age is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

As Brock Colyar's disturbing dispatch from Trump's inauguration celebrations in New York magazine illustrates, there's a new breed of young conservative for whom offensive language isn't just acceptable — it's a way to demonstrate their bonafides with the ingroup. These aren't the stereotypical MAGA devotees. They're young, urban professionals who view cruelty as both entertainment and ideology.

"Six months into Biden being president, I was like, I can't fucking do this anymore," one 19-year-old told Colyar, explaining his political conversion. He, like others quoted in the piece, specifically cited the ability to use slurs as a key attraction to the MAGA movement. Another former liberal made the same point, telling Colyar he switched sides because he wanted the "freedom" to use offensive language.

It isn't just a new breed of young conservatives. 

Dame Slap has always been a mean girl ... long before there was any talk of a musical, Rachel McAdams' Regina George was her heroine, and she still knows how to sink a Princess slipper into minorities and the disadvantaged ...

She might be too cunning to come out with the "r-word", but she knows how to think it, and get it down, even if it turns up disguised as "zealots" ...

That’s why super funds have used their voting power to install a cadre of DEI advocates on listed company boards and inside influential governance bodies such as the ASX Corporate Governance Council. Given these stubborn homegrown forces, some horsepower is needed to defeat DEI in Australia: reasoned arguments, an injection of common sense, long overdue legal changes, and, let’s face it, a dose of public shaming.

DEI divas have never been shy about naming and shaming companies that haven’t drunk the DEI Kool-Aid fast enough or in sufficient quantities. They shouldn’t be surprised to have their names out there when counter arguments are put.

So, let’s get to work. First, there is no evidentiary foundation to DEI. From the get-go, it was built on sand, piled especially high in a 2015 report by McKinsey that claimed a connection between corporate profits and diversity in executive ranks. When its results were exposed as untrue by a number of academic observers, McKinsey tweaked its modelling and said: “We have also been clear and consistent that our research identifies correlation, not causation, and that those two things are not the same.”

Alas, zealots paid no attention to this. The McKinsey report was their corporate bible and its untrue claims about the benefits of diversity became religious dogma.

Despite the lack of evidence to support diversity as a profit-boosting policy, the McKinsey report turbocharged DEI: in 2015 the Australian Institute of Company Directors set a 30 per cent gender target for ASX 200 board seats by 2018. Likewise, the Australian Council of Superannuation Investors said it would be voting against directors on boards with poor gender diversity. AICD chair Elizabeth Proust called that a “game changer”. The DEI divas were in clover.

When Trump signed executive orders to dismantle DEI across government agencies, pointing out the pernicious nature of this spoils-based system, DEI divas in Australia went full throttle. Gone, however, is any mention of DEI boosting profits – because not even the original McKinsey said that. Now advocates have tweaked their language to talk nebulously, but still without supporting evidence, about “financial risks”.

Offensiveness is Dame Slap's schtick ... and she loves to keep elevated company ...

Never mind the perm, feel the aggro vibe...

Australian Council of Superannuation Investors chief executive Louise Davidson said: “Diversity – or lack thereof – is a financially material risk, so we do not anticipate that there will be a reduction in investor focus on how companies are planning for and managing diversity.” HESTA boss Debby Blakey said corporate cultures that don’t encourage diversity “pose a significant material risk to investors”.

Despite no evidence showing that DEI leads to higher profits, it’s time to call bulldust on DEI activists protecting their spoils-based system. ACSI and the Association of Superannuation Funds of Australia, representing some of the nation’s largest super funds and institutional investors, have thrown their weight behind the ASX Corporate Governance Council changes demanding ever higher quotas for female board members, along with tougher corporate reporting of diversity efforts beyond gender.

Alas, reasoning and logic are not part of the DEI ideology. The giant hole in the push for higher gender targets and tougher reporting about diversity is this: If the benefits of DEI for business are so blindingly obvious, why do we need to mandate quotas? If any halfway competent director should know that diversity increases shareholder value, why do we need prescriptive quotas, targets and reporting measures? If it is so demonstrably good for business, then a board that doesn’t ensure sufficient diversity is breaching its fiduciary duties to shareholders.

Why can’t diversity be left to the common sense of directors or, if that fails, their fear of litigation? 

Yes, kick it down the road, and bring in the lawyers. What could go wrong?

And then there was a final burst of fear and loathing ...

After all, there is a whole universe of feral litigation funders looking for opportunities to sue boards that don’t take obvious steps to enhance shareholder value.

Could it be that if diversity wasn’t mandated with a blizzard of quotas, targets and reporting demands, together with bullying from activists, some of those currently enjoying the spoils of quotas – and those hoping to do so in the future – fear their personal cash registers might stop ringing?

The spoils-based DEI system in Australia is almost exclusively for the benefit of women, and works heavily in favour of affluent, well-educated women. Are these middle-class women fighting so hard to hang on to quotas because, if they are abandoned and diversity left to the good sense of boards, they might have to share the spoils with say, bright but poor males of immigrant extraction? God forbid that blokes should benefit from DEI.

Indeed, the fact the defenders of quotas fight so hard to keep them might reveal, not only their motivations, but whether they believe their own story. Maybe they know that if logic won’t secure wealth generating quotas, then they need regulators to do it for them.

The other reason DEI is on borrowed time is the flow of capital. A revitalised US economy and regulatory system will expose corporate Australia’s fetish for increasingly stale corporate fads. There are already promises from Australian businesses to send investment capital to the US.

How long before we are forced to drain our corporate and regulatory swamps?

I's always projection isn't it. Talk of zealots or swamps while Dame Slap gaily swims in a reptile swamp while exuding her very own form of zealotry, not to mention bigotry, bile and prejudice.

Phew, the pond needs a couple of cartoons to take the stench out of nostrils, and the fetid mud taste away from mouth ...