What you'll never read at the lizard Oz... and what you will read ... part II

 

What you won't be reading in the Oz:

The pond sometimes gets into fierce arguments with people who think King Donald is exceptional. He isn't.

For a chart showing how his path has been smoothed by decades, see Thomas Meaney's review in the LRB (not the Little River Band) of Sam Tanehanus's book Buckley: The Life and the Revolution that Changed America (*archive link).

At a thousand pages plus, and at 33 UK quid, there's no way the pond will ever meet up with that tome (up there with Kubrick's monolith), but here's a few grabs of Meaney.

The first gobbet explores William Buckley's enabling of McCarthyism...

Relevance? 

More here, not only but also ...

It might seem a far cry from Australia’s Adelaide Festival in the summer of 2026 and a West Virginian ladies club in the winter of 1950, but they both carry the taint of hysterical and unsubstantiated public accusations that ended in tales of woe. In his speech at a Republican ladies’ club in 1950, US Senator Joseph McCarthy laid claim to an assertion that would set the wheels in motion for a witch-hunt across the USA that occupied many millions in wasted government resources and ignited the unevidenced persecution and silencing of anyone deemed “un-American”. Feel free to transpose the word antisemitic here whenever you see the term un-American; it will make it more obvious to you, more quickly.

The second gobbet explores the long, slow march through the institutions - how Buckley, together with a vast array of barking mad right wing US loons, from the soft David Brooks kind to the more depraved mob housed in Heritage paved the way for the current madness.

For early soundings on this long march through feeble minds, see The New Yorker in 2017, Intellectuals for Trump, A rogue group of conservative thinkers tries to build a governing ideology around a President-elect who disdains ideology. (*archive link)

For even earlier soundings, see Peter Breinart in 2016 in The Atlantic, Why Are Some Conservative Thinkers Falling for Trump?A few themes emerge among intellectuals on the right about what attracts them to the candidate: his campaign’s energy, his impassioned following, and his eagerness to call out the establishment. (*archive link)

And now, after a hat tip to that MAGA cap donning Dame Slap, here we are, and here's what you will read in today's lizard Oz.

Oh wait, first the pond must go back a day, and congratulate Mein Gott. 

He's supposed to write about economics, but it's all hands on deck when the reptiles are conducting a jihad so he chipped in yesterday with ...

Commentary by Robert Gottliebsen
‘Culture comes from the top’: Unis on frontline of antisemitism
University leaders urged to show zero tolerance as antisemitism grips campuses
Jewish students were too scared to attend universities last year. Chancellors need to pick the right people for the job to protect them. (that's an intermittent archive link)

Impressive, all that can be expected from the Australian Daily Zionist News, and it goes without saying that the Bondi terrorist killers had an astonishing set of academic credentials to their name.

Apparently Sajid Akram worked as a bricklayer, while his son Naveed also worked as a bricklayer. 

No doubt university leaders will show the way in rooting out anti-Semitism in the bricklaying trade.

Also out and about yesterday was the disgraced swishing Switzer, always seeking rehabilitation in his hive mind home ...

The splash featured one of those uncredited appalling collages for which the reptiles are now notorious:

Knowing when to leave them wanting more: Could Albo ever do a Menzies?
As Anthony Albanese enters rare territory – 30 years in politics – should he do what no other Australian PM bar Sir Robert Menzies has done, and quit while he’s ahead? There are signs he’ll go on his own terms.
By Tom Switzer
Contributor

Already gone off to be digital fish and chip wrapping, but the pond has done its duty and provided an intermittent archive link, with a note that this outing confirmed yet again what an air head he is, what a blathering booby ...

Moving along, and remembering that Thursday is always the most dismal day of the week for reptile spotting, time at last for what you can read in today's lizard Oz.

The obvious question: how were the current jihads going this morning?

Luckily the Nats, and Susssan's plucky battle with the lettuce distracted the reptiles.

The always unreadable Petulant Peta was front and centre ...

Commentary by Peta Credlin
There’s really no secret behind One Nation poll surge
If the Liberals can’t come up soon with a strong and credible policy to get immigration down, they are on the same road to oblivion as established and complacent conservative parties elsewhere.

Sarah kept the affair bubbling along ...

NSIDE STORY
‘Jumping at shadows’: How Ley’s Liberals missed the Nats’ ambush
Liberals and Nationals began to fear the impossible could happen when they sat in question time on Tuesday. Could the Coalition split again? But the texts that were flying across opposition benches were heavily of the ‘it’ll be right’ variety.
By Sarah Ison

Truth to tell, the pond had quite given up on the lettuce's chances, but the reptiles had got the silly Nats excited about freedumb - having got the Libs all excited about the urgent need to take action - and there they all were ...

The bouffant one was left to mourn the result ...

Coalition chaos takes heat off PM’s failures in Bondi response
Just when Anthony Albanese was in dire trouble, the ineptitude, rivalries and delusion of Liberal and National MPs and senators has once again made the Coalition ‘the story’.
By Dennis Shanahan
National Editor

Rather than indulge the reptiles, the pond thought John Hanscombe in The Echnida (sorry, newsletter) summed it up best by invoking Wile E. Coyote and his ACME devices and ...

...The "unsalvageable" hate speech legislation was salvaged, the only leadership now under a cloud is Ley's because the cabinet solidarity she invoked to sack the troublesome Jacinta Nampijinpa Price is in tatters. If you can't control your shadow cabinet in opposition, claiming to be the alternative government is risible. And if your Coalition partner is singing from a different song sheet, you're even further out of contention.
The ACME device not only failed. It completely backfired. I'm no cartoonist but in my mind's eye I picture Ley covered in soot, her normally limp bob standing up in tonsorial surprise, and - meep, meep - the PM on his way into the sunset.
While that outcome might raise a chuckle among political cynics like me, for the nation, which is not a cartoon, it's not so amusing. Governments, especially those with thumping majorities, need to be called to account. And it needs to be done effectively - never more so than in times of national crisis or trauma like Bondi.
What we've seen from the opposition in recent weeks has been abject incoherence - apart, of course, from the win on the royal commission. First, it accused the government of moving too slowly on anti-Semitism. Then, it said it was moving too quickly. After horse trading to get the legislation over the line, there was the spectacle of three shadow ministers crossing the floor to oppose it.
The end result: the polls are showing a drift away from the major parties - especially the Coalition - to One Nation. For the first time, one poll has One Nation outstripping the Coalition on primary voting intentions.
Flubbing its responsibility to be a credible opposition, the Coalition has enriched the political fortunes of a fringe party at the expense of its own. As the PM says, that is a worry. Not because Pauline Hanson has a snowflake's chance of forming government but because her party now has the potential to seriously disrupt our political system.
Now, that would be Looney Tunes.

Well yes, and the pond always applauds any mention of loonery, but Handscombe should have added "what we've seen from the reptiles in the lizard Oz in recent weeks has been abject incoherence ... first the reptiles said the government was moving too slowly on anti-Semitism, and then it was moving too quickly", and so on, and so here we are ...

To celebrate, the pond believes this is the first sighting of the infallible Pope in the New Year ... and this was waht was in his mind's eye, with a meep meep here, and a meep meep there ...

Ouch, even Wile E. Coyote usually managed to avoid that level of damage ...

Only Jack the Insider remembered the jihad ...

This is the message every politician should shout from the rooftops
When you come to Australia, leave your ancient hatreds behind. It should be a message, a mantra, a motto for entry. It should appear on visa applications and be emblazoned on the walls of air and sea ports.
By Jack the Insider
Columnist

Apparently Jack is yet to catch up with the news that he's working for a foreign corporation that encourages seething hatreds of all kinds ...

Speaking of seething hatreds, as the murders in Gaza go on - including three journalists this time - the reptiles did feature a "news" EXCLUSIVE ...

EXCLUSIVE
‘Ruined it’: Literary doyenne blames Adler for festival calamity
Distinguished writer Kate Llewellyn has penned a poem condemning former artistic director Louise Adler for events that ultimately destroyed Australia’s oldest writers’ festival.
By Caroline Overington

It's a terrible effort - the pond's comments section routinely features better efforts by its correspondents - and thankfully that intermittent archive link thoughtfully eliminated it from the record.

Kinder souls would have walked on by, but this is the lizard Oz, home to ancient hatreds ...

Oh and another reptile jihad and ancient hatred resurfaced just in time ...

‘Invasion Day’ backlash
‘January 26 is a day for mourning – not for international politics’
An organiser of Sydney’s ‘Invasion Day’ rally says January 26 is a day for Indigenous Australians to mourn, not a day to platform international politics.
By Joanna Panagopoulos and Euan Kennedy

Oops ...

Mr Mashni told The Australian that “we need to refute any connection between what happened in Bondi and our rallies”. “Much of the conversation that has been had around this massacre has been that it has been the worst massacre in Australian history, completely negating the Frontier Wars and all the massacres that have occurred for First Nations people,” he said. “Our responsibility as allies of Indigenous people is to show up for our brothers, sisters and siblings. It’s not a day to celebrate, Invasion Day must be commemorated.”

Massacres? According to the pond's lizard Oz understanding, they were merely ways to tidy up the landscape so that colonial endeavours might flourish.

Speaking of colonials, luckily King Donald's obsession with neo-colonialism continued apace, and the bromancer was finally forced to emerge to confront the wildebeest and the gnus of the day ... (apologies, but the pond has to lighten the daily bleakness somehow).

The bromancer did his best to provide his usual balance in the headline:

The header: The madness of King Donald on Greenland on full display to the world; At his best, the US President is very, very good. But at his worst, he’s bloody awful.

The caption for the demented narcissist: US President Donald Trump could destroy the US alliance system if he continues with his stance on Greenland. Picture: AFP

Why is it that the bromancer always insists on this sort of rhetoric, for the worst US President in living memory, and possibly the worst US President in the entirety of Presidential history? At his best, the US President is very, very good

No, he's not, he's bloody awful all the time, but suddenly all that earlier reading about the long march through the far right institutions resonates even more.

The bromancer can never bring himself to say that King Donald is terrible, not without some verbal caveat, some deviant intellectual tic, some mindless gigantic billy goat butt ...

Confronted with this relentlessly bloody awful and demented president, brooding into the wee hours and barking into the ether, the bromancer could only muster a three minute read ...

There are times Donald Trump is a courageous president, taking righteous action no other leader would take, speaking hard truths no one else dare speak. At his best, he’s very, very good.
But at his worst, he’s bloody awful.
Trump’s position on Greenland, that it must become part of the US and he’s willing to use force to achieve this if necessary, is breathtaking because there is no justification for it at all.
It’s also the first time Trump has threatened to invade a peaceful democracy that is also an ally of the US, Greenland being part of the kingdom of Denmark.
The danger in Trump’s sudden burst of madness is obvious and profound.
Denmark is a long-standing NATO ally of the US. If the US persists with seriously threatening force against a NATO ally in order to acquire its territory, this will undermine, if not completely destroy, the US alliance system.
That would be a disastrous result for Australia, for almost no nation in the world is more completely dependent on the US alliance than we are.
And if Trump shatters NATO, it’s very difficult to imagine that AUKUS could possibly survive, not that AUKUS shows much sign of life anyway.
As an analyst, I have always tried to assess Trump’s actions more than his words. And a lot of what he does is pretty good. And some pretty bad. Whereas a lot of what he says is often bizarre.
But some things he does are damaging and ridiculous.

There he is, doing that 'twixt and 'tween routine again.

Pretty, pretty good? On what planet outside Curb Your Enthusiasm?

 ... and all the while with the bromancer never pausing to consider the source of the madness, never acknowledging that this mad King has got a lot to hide from his early days as a model molester... or should that be, molester of models?

Meanwhile, the reptiles slipped in an audio file to maintain the current distraction ...

Eventually the bromancer got around to doing a bit of slagging ...

Imposing tariffs on European allies because they disagree in principle with Trump’s position that Greenland must transfer its sovereignty to the US would be an action that is completely without any schmick of a justification at all.
If China did this, we’d rightly label it coercive economic warfare.
It also makes a mockery of any trade deal Trump has done with any nation. Annoy Trump and the deal is apparently thrown out the window.
This is different from Trump’s previous tariff threats and actions. They mostly at least arose from a US claim of unfair trading practices from partner nations.
This tariff coercion is threatened because allies of the US won’t agree in principle to territorial conquest to be carried out by the US.
This situation is without precedent and completely unimaginable.
Until recently, it would be right to assess this all as overwhelmingly likely to be just another episode of Trump bluster and verbal nuttiness designed as a way of gaining leverage in a negotiation.
But lately Trump has shown a new willingness to take military action. Yet military action directed at a brutal Venezuelan dictator against whom there are outstanding US arrest warrants, or against Iran as it slaughters its civilians in the thousands and with all its record of terrorism, nuclear delinquency and international assassinations and the rest, is completely different from unprovoked military action against a democracy and an ally that has done absolutely nothing wrong.

The reptiles interrupted again ... A protester lets his feelings be known outside the US consulate in Nuuk, Greenland. Picture: AFP

Then came a line the pond never expected to read:

The Albanese government has so far got its response about right. There is no upside in Australia getting into the middle of this dispute. At the same time, it’s right that we make a minimal statement in support of territorial integrity and against punitive tariffs with no justification.

Actually we're still busy shoving billions down mad King Donald's throat with a blind faith that AUKUS is still going to turn out alright ...

Never mind, never mind ...

In this matter, more than any other, it’s hard to make sense of Trump’s mind. His text to Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store is surely the single most deranged message ever sent by an American president to any foreign head of government.
It began with a sentence displaying the emotional maturity of a brattish 10-year-old who was given out in a game of backyard cricket: “Dear Jonas, Considering your country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace …”

Speaking of 10-year -olds, have a visual interruption courtesy Herbert ...

Despite invoking brattishness, the bromancer amazingly still held out hope for this caterpillar ...

It is still more likely than not that Trump will decide the path he’s on is unproductive, and he’ll start talking about something else, or get some minor agreement and claim that as victory.

Sure, sure ...

The bromancer finished his waffling with a final waffle ...

Short of US conquest of Greenland, it’s hard to know what Trump wants. Both Russia and China are getting more active in Arctic waters. Yet under an existing treaty, Trump could put any military bases he wanted to on Greenland. Neither Denmark, nor the good people of Nuuk, could or would oppose such bases.
The US already has one base on Greenland but could easily expand into more. Similarly NATO nations would certainly contribute more to joint patrols, co-operative surveillance and all the rest.
There’s nothing Trump could legitimately want or need in the security sphere that he couldn’t get right now.
But in this dispute, more than any other in all the long Trump saga, there is a sense that he is operating in some parallel universe in which logic, reason, balance, restraint, and ultimate effectiveness don’t somehow apply.
Any outcome is possible, though it’s more likely than not that Trump will simply drop and forget his most outlandish claims.
The alternative doesn’t bear thinking about.

Say what?

...there is a sense that he is operating in some parallel universe in which logic, reason, balance, restraint, and ultimate effectiveness don’t somehow apply.

Reconcile that with this if you can, if you will ...

At his best, the US President is very, very good

Being very, very good is being the compleat TACO?

n short, the bromancer is tragically out of his depth, his confusions on display for all to see, a bit like poor old Susssan and her mob ...

You have to hand it to the immortal Rowe, his cameo portrait of Tamworth's endless shame (and the onion muncher) is always spot on ...

How are the Canadians coping with all this?

In the usual Canadian way, if you happen to watch CBC's About That ...

Elbows up Canada, because the Ruskis just love the notion that mad King Donald is pretty, pretty good ...

What you'll never read at the lizard Oz ... and what you will read ...

 

You won't be reading this sort of commentary at the lizard Oz any time soon ...

The fate of the Palestinian people offers a warning about the future of humanity. When I recently visited the West Bank, Palestinians kept impressing the same point on me: Israel has turned their land into a laboratory. The technology of oppression that it has deployed – including in its genocide in Gaza – ranges from hi-tech surveillance to military drones and AI on the battlefield. These technologies have been exported to oppressive states across the world. And it doesn’t stop there.
This brings us to Donald Trump’s “board of peace”, now set to rule Gaza. In the sleepy Oxfordshire village of Sutton Courtenay, where George Orwell lies buried, the ground itself ought to be shaking. This isn’t peace. It’s naked neocolonialism.
Not a single seat is reserved for a Palestinian, let alone a survivor of Gaza. Trump will serve as chair in an individual capacity rather than as US president – in other words, as Gaza’s emperor. Its invited members include Tony Blair, who is despised across the Middle East as an architect of the illegal invasion of Iraq. If you’re curious about his skill set when it comes to rebuilding ravaged Arab territory, recall what the Chilcot inquiry concluded about that catastrophe: “the UK failed to plan or prepare for the major reconstruction programme required in Iraq”.
Who else? At least two property developers, including Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, who once boasted of the “very valuable” potential of Gaza’s “waterfront property”. Hungary’s far-right autocrat Viktor Orbán. An Israeli billionaire, Yakir Gabay, and an American private equity tycoon, Marc Rowan. Vladimir Putin, who helped pioneer reducing predominantly Muslim lands to rubble in Chechnya, also has an invite, according to the Kremlin. Sure, Israel isn’t happy, presumably because the Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been invited. Nothing but total control of Gaza would satisfy them – but that is little consolation for its traumatised Palestinian population.
The clues about where this is heading are hardly subtle. Trump is demanding $1bn from each country to be a permanent member, and the draft of the charter appears to suggest, as per Bloomberg, that he will control the money. A year ago, he proposed permanently resettling Gaza’s population: ethnic cleansing. He posted an AI-generated video showcasing Gaza as a luxury resort, featuring a giant golden statue of himself.
It would be naive to assume that he has abandoned such plans, even if pressure from Arab states appears to have had some effect last year, when he said “nobody is expelling any Palestinians”. That was clear in little-noticed comments he made at a recent press conference with
Benjamin Netanyahu – the Israeli prime minister wanted by the international criminal court on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity. Trump suggested that if Gaza’s population “were given the opportunity to live in a better climate, they would move. They’re there because they sort of have to be.”

And so on, thanks to Owen Jones at the Graudian ... with more here ...

Donald Trump needs helpers for his appalling neocolonialist project. What else is this ‘board of peace’?

Now on to what you will be reading if you tuned in to the lizard Oz this dismal Wednesday morning ....

Late-night vote
Major test looms for Ley after Coalition splits on post-Bondi reforms
Coalition rift exposed as Nationals cross floor on post-Bondi reforms
A dramatic late-night Senate rebellion has torn open Coalition unity after three Nationals senators voted against their own shadow cabinet’s position on hate crime reforms, which passed after a marathon sitting.
By Sarah Ison

Buck Stops With … Ex-PM?
Anthony Albanese’s antisemitism blame shift ‘delusional’, says Scott Morrison
Anthony Albanese has blamed Scott Morrison’s government for Australia’s antisemitism crisis, prompting the former prime minister to hit back calling the Labor leader ‘delusional and cheap’.
By Dennis Shanahan and Richard Ferguson

Phew, tricky turf for the reptiles, what with the lettuce gaining heart and the Libs complicit in the bill, and that left the the bouffant one to indulged in a two minute rant:

Commentary by Dennis Shanahan
Hypocrisy and politicking rule in coward’s castle
The Prime Minister has rewritten history by claiming the Morrison government failed on antisemitism while refusing to say sorry for his own delayed royal commission response.

This helps conjure up the reptile mood, thanks to Golding:

A pox on that boofhead ratbag bloody galah coward's castle full of ning nongs, he cried, as the Adelaide matter stayed on the boil, with the reptile jihad delighting in its new target with an EXCLUSIVE:

EXCLUSIVE
Facebook ‘excuse’ exposed: Abdel-Fattah kept paraglider photo for five months
The Anti-Israel activist kept a controversial parachute image on her account until March 2024, contradicting her public claims she had ‘no idea about the death toll’.
By Natasha Bita and Joanna Panagopoulos

Hah, gotcha!

They won't be satisfied until they've driven her from the country, as they've done with others...and Joshua joined in ...

If Adelaide mess is what accountability looks like, it’s worth it
Institutions legitimise speech. When festivals platform eliminationist anti-Zionism as politics, they normalise bigotry and violence—then feign surprise when its champions perform victimhood.
By Joshua Dabelstein

Here's a clue where the celebratory Josh is coming from...

...The most consequential form of anti-Jewish vilification today is not race-based antisemitism but anti-Zionism: distinctly permissible, distinctly dangerous.
By treating antisemitism as the sole test for anti-Jewish harm for so long, Australia has created a category error that leaves the primary driver of contemporary vilification untouched, and people such as Abdel-Fattah untouchable. The Adelaide Festival’s leadership fumbled a long overdue institutional reckoning: popularity, academic credentials and claims of victimhood do not mitigate one’s role in a violent ecosystem.
The boycott was more a clarification than a crisis. When people who insist on the moral necessity of eliminationist speech remove themselves from public institutions, they narrow the space in which that speech is normalised.
The cancellation of the Adelaide Writers Week is no loss. It’s an opportunity to observe just how pervasive bigotry and eliminationism has become.
Had the board stood by its decision, this could have been a moment of confirmation that language has consequences that institutions cannot launder anti-Zionist bigotry. If this mess is what accountability looks like, it’s worth enduring.
Joshua Dabelstein is a Sydney-based writer.

Bit of a clunky style there Josh, which could do with some eliminationism ... but all good, now it's on with eliminating Gaza, hey?.

Then the pond almost fainted in terror at this EXCLUSIVE:

EXCLUSIVE
Libs back push for gender quota, women-only picks
A radical plan to address the Liberals’ woman problem will be progressed, after the leadership of the NSW division supported a proposal to pursue gender quotas and women-only preselections.
By Lachlan Leeming

Oh that'll need a Dame Slap jihad ...

Meanwhile, the reptiles continued tormented, having themselves let this hare out of the box ...

Unlike China, Taiwan offers a partnership without conditions
Ambassador Xiao likens Taiwan to Tasmania. But Taiwan has far more in common with Australia than the beautiful Australian state of Tasmania – like Australia, Taiwan is a strong, proud, maritime trading nation.
By Douglas Hsu

See how easy it is to stir the possum and keep the fuss going by getting sundry countries into a 'he said, he said' situation?

Luckily, while there was no bromancer to hand, there was one reptile import who attempted to tackle King Donald ...

The header: US push to own Greenland a proxy for emerging order;Donald Trump’s renewed push for Greenland has shattered the status quo. As Washington pressures Nuuk and Copenhagen, independence stalls, NATO strains grow, and Europe confronts a harsher age of realpolitik with global consequences.

The caption for the entirely meaningless deep frozen snap: Greenland is no longer remote from great-power politics.

Liz spent four minutes contemplating the current Kind Donald debacle:

The Trump administration has hit the ground running in 2026 and Greenland is firmly in its sights.
Last September I published a book, So You Want to Own Greenland, in which I posited four scenarios for Greenland’s future, and landed on a conclusion that the status quo would endure. I was wrong.
From the establishment of a special envoy for Greenland to purposely vague offers (from $US10,000 to $US100,000 a pop) to the Greenlandic community, Washington is not backing away.
Meetings between the White House, Greenland’s Foreign Minister and Danish officials have been pulled together as all three seek to understand the parameters of exactly who has the most leverage. European leaders, meanwhile, have urged Trump to keep his hands off Greenland, only to receive threats of tariffs in response.
Speaking out the other side of their mouth, European leaders also have continued to demand US assur­ances of any peace deal struck in the ongoing Ukraine-Russia war, a war we’ve heard little of in past few days.
Europe has sent boots, 60 or so if you count both feet, to snap exercises in Greenland.
NATO has some pre-scheduled biannual exercises for the High North set to fall in 2026; time will tell if these go ahead.
My original scenario of the “decoupling” between Denmark and Greenland still appears to be a viable end point. But US strategy may yet delay the independence movement. Still, Greenland’s Prime Minister has stated publicly “if we have to choose between the US and Denmark here and now, then we choose Denmark”.
My second scenario based on an interrupted move towards independence has gained momentum. Denmark’s resistance to Greenlandic independence may harden amid an escalation of US intent to secure the island.

The reptiles interrupted with a snap of the King, Washington is no longer pretending to ask. Picture: AP

Whenever the pond sees the King, there's always a strong desire to reach for a 'toon ...

Liz stayed curiously restrained at the sight of a bully doing a copycat sociopathic Vlad the impaler routine:

Copenhagen’s deeper fiscal injections may be viewed as an enticement to coerce enduring patronage. Here, Greenland’s rural-urban societal divide among its 57,000 nationals may yet be a decisive factor in the speed or progress of Nuuk’s independence plans.
US refusal to take military action off the table has surely concerned Denmark, particularly in terms of losing its Arctic stake (and the resources) as well as its NATO standing.
No longer able to cite access to and use of Greenland as its contribution to NATO, Copenhagen may fear the real cost of having to contribute to the alliance.
A concession between Denmark and Greenland may be in the form of so-called hyper-autonomy. This may affect Copenhagen’s domestic sentiment with public backlash against enduring semblances of denial of Greenlandic independence.
In many ways the increased US interest in Greenland has sharpened Denmark’s enduring dilemma. But it will be the people of Greenland who suffer; investment firms and major resource multinationals are not going to take a risk on an emerging market characterised by instability.
And foreign investment is essential for a real, sustainable Greenlandic independence.
My third scenario, at the time, felt unlikely: Greenland to become the 51st US state. This scenario saw the US simply acting on securing Greenland. Such action could be taken militarily or non-militarily. Alignment on the back of an independent Greenland could occur, but it is likely Nuuk would have to cede further concessions to secure sustainable economic prosperity and strategic protection under the US military umbrella.
Becoming an overseas territory, of which the US has for example Guam and the US Virgin Islands, would afford Nuuk a similar deal to what it has with Denmark right now: under someone else’s sovereignty, albeit with significant self-governance powers. For Nuuk this is undesirable.
Forming a compact of free association, however, maybe an option. The US already has these with, for example, Federated States of Micronesia, Republic of the Marshall Islands and Republic of Palau. Greenland would be self-governing but, significantly, an independent state.
The US would then provide substantial economic assistance, defence provisions and security.

Oh yes, talk about unalloyed joy ...

Not to worry, it's all good...

This year may also see the fracture of NATO, but history is full of other pressures on the alliance that have not broken it. For now, Europe appears hesitant to will US exit from NATO. Indeed, provisions in the Washington Treaty (article four) for members to meet to discuss Danish concerns over US threats have not been used – despite having a window to do so since the first Trump presidency.
My final scenario – the status quo – is rapidly evaporating.
Congress may be able to stop Trump, but much relies on the November 2026 mid-terms. Europe may yet seek to buy time through negotiations and a strongly worded tweets until this point. That would be a mistake. Trump is likely to persist with securing Greenland in terms of hemispheric defence. We should expect a blend of actions taken across the spectrum of logistics, military-strategic investments, technological support, seabed cable infrastructure and resource extraction or production investments. America’s tech boys and leaders already are jetting in and out of Greenland.
What happens in Greenland is no longer simply a matter for Greenland. Greenlandic indigenous rights will likely gain prominence in the coming months. Opposition leaders and some community leaders in Greenland are now actively pushing for direct bilateral talks with Trump.
Diplomacy may have some impact, in that a firing war over Greenland is extremely unlikely, but diplomacy is no match for the tide of realpolitik that now washes over the international system.
Greenland is in some ways now a proxy for defining the characteristics of the emerging international order. Alliances and partnerships are subordinate to national interests and traditional ways of business are no more. This is of course a watershed moment for modern Europe; it must strike a deal, and the cost may be to sacrifice the Kingdom of Denmark. Canada has pivoted to Beijing and Australia remains blissfully ignorant to the world changing around it.
Elizabeth Buchanan is a senior fellow at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute and a polar geopolitics expert. She is the author of So You Want to Own Greenland: Lessons from the Vikings to Trump (Hurst, 2025).

Or might it be a watershed moment for the United States?

As for being blissfully ignorant? 

Why that'd be thanks in no small part to the reptiles, with even Dame Groan on hand to tell us, or at least the RBA, to keep shtum:

The header: It’s best RBA keeps shtum over US Fed showdown; Central bank independence is more nuanced than a letter from RBA governor Bullock suggests. Donald Trump, politics, and policy meddling show it’s never absolute.

The caption for the concerned figure doing a little finger-wringing: RBA governor Michele Bullock joined 13 other central bank leaders to defend Fed independence amid political pressure from Donald Trump. Picture: Bloomberg

Dame Groan spent a bigly four minutes urging head in sand ...

It’s an arcane world, the world of central bank politics. But for those who are involved, certain events can lead to a lot of huffing and puffing and group letters.
One of the most triggering events in this obscure realm is an attempt by a political leader to influence the decision-making of the committee that sets official interest rates. When that leader is US President Donald Trump, the passion of the response rises to stratospheric levels.
In recent days governors from 14 central banks, including Reserve Bank of Australia governor Michele Bullock, have issued a joint statement saying they “stand in full solidarity” with US Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell.
According to these wise heads, “the independence of central banks is a cornerstone of price, financial and economic stability”.
Jim Chalmers expressed support for Bullock’s intervention. Interestingly, New Zealand Foreign Minister Winston Peters criticised the governor of his country’s central bank for signing the letter. He warned her to “stay in her New Zealand lane and stick to domestic monetary policy”.
The precise impetus for this group letter was the opening of a criminal inquiry into Powell’s alleged mishandling of the refurbishment of the Federal Reserve’s headquarters in Washington DC and his testimony to congress.
For some time, Trump has been trying to remove Powell from the top job, notwithstanding the fact Trump in his first term had appointed Powell, a former investment banker.
Powell’s term as chairman of the Fed ends in May but he is entitled to remain on the board until 2028. (Typically, former chairs do not take up this option.)
Certainly, Trump’s attempts to influence the outcomes of the Federal Reserve’s decisions on official interest rates have lacked any subtlety. Indeed, Trump’s personal attacks on Powell have involved calling the chairman a “numbskull” and “being too stupid”.
The President became particularly annoyed when Powell pointed out the potentially inflationary impact of raising tariffs. Understandably, Trump is a fan of low interest rates, given his background in property development. The fact US government debt is so large and rising – fiscal restraint is not one of Trump’s strengths – adds strong impetus to his preference for lower interest rates.

Did anyone else enjoy that "Certainly"?

Certainly, in the pond's world, that would pass for a small billy goat butt, as the reptiles introduced a snap of the victim of King Donald's bullying, For some time, Donald Trump has been trying to remove Jerome Powell from the top job. Picture: AP

Dame Groan might have done a little tut-tutt, but it's important when seeing a victim of street crime to just keep walking by, perhaps a little more quickly ...

What should we make of this international war of words related to central bank independence?
The first thing to note is that Trump’s behaviour towards Powell and the Fed more generally is impossible to justify. Powell was Trump’s appointment and it’s appropriate that the former be allowed to get on with the job at hand. Confected criminal charges related to the refurbishment of a building are just bizarre.
(Interestingly, the Reserve Bank of Australia’s building in Martin Place, Sydney, also has been undergoing a significant refurbishment. It has not gone well. The costs have blown out and the completion date has been extended several times. No one is blaming the governor, Bullock, or her predecessor for this unfortunate outcome.)

Uh oh, time for another billy goat butt, dressed up as "having said this", celebrating  head in sand time ...

Having said this, it’s probably not appropriate for central bank governors, including Bullock, to be signing group letters. It makes a certain mockery of independence, the attempt to interfere.
There is also an implication that these other central banks are supremely independent and their decision-making is, and has been, close to perfect. In Australia’s case, for instance, the presence of the secretary to the Treasury as a full voting member on the board of the RBA is hard to square with the notion of full independence from government.
There was a case for this arrangement to be terminated with the recent restructuring of the bank to form the monetary policy board and a corporate board. But the Treasury secretary remains a member of the important monetary policy board.
Recall also that the restructuring undertaken by the Treasurer had all the hallmarks of an attempt to replace the existing board members with individuals known for their more dovish attitudes to interest rates. In the end, the existing board members were retained but the political rationale for tactic was reasonably transparent.
While Chalmers will often remark that decisions about interest rates are made by the bank alone, his economic commentary is not irrelevant.
His description of interest rates “smashing the economy”, a comment he made in September 2024, arguably crossed a boundary.
A more independent-minded governor would have responded by presenting a speech – or sending out one of her deputies – to the effect that the economy was not being smashed and the bank was firmly committed to seeing inflation return to the target band.
Bullock’s timidity to call out the role that excessive government spending has played in prolonging the inflationary cycle is also significant.

For some reason the reptiles slipped in a reminder of that demented coupling, now being used by the King's personal DoJ to take Jerome out, Donald Trump has repeatedly criticised Fed Chair Jerome Powell, calling for low interest rates and attacking his decisions. Picture: AFP

And then, with the consummate lack of irony and self-awareness she's always shown, the inveterate lane crosser, meddler and interferer suggested it was time to stay in lane ...

The lack of independence of the bank was on show by its decision in February last year to cut the cash rate by 25 basis points. This was the first cut in four years. It also was only months away from a federal election. It created the clear impression of the start of a rate-cutting cycle.
The fact was that the underlying inflation rate had not reached the annual target band of 2 to 3 per cent. The December consumer price index 2024 print had recorded a 3.2 per cent increase in the underlying rate and the bank also referred to the uncertain outlook.
It’s not as though the decision-making of the RBA has been faultless across a long timeframe. For many years inflation failed to meet the target band on the low side. The bank then probably overcooked its response to the Covid restrictions, including the facilitation of excess government spending through its policy of quantitative easing. The advocacy of higher infrastructure spending and high rates of immigration also can be questioned.
The bottom line is this: the independence of central banks should be measured in degrees, not in absolute terms. After all, governments make the most important appointments to central banks and this process itself will have consequences. Having the Treasury secretary as a member of the interest-setting board is a strange (and unusual) arrangement for a supposedly independent bank.
In any case, independence does not guarantee perfect performance. Our bank has made mistakes, both big and small, through the years, even with its relative independent status. To be sure, the empirical evidence shows that direct government determination of monetary policy settings leads to very poor economic outcomes, but this includes countries we would never wish to emulate.
The real message is that all parties should stick to their lanes.

All good ...

Then for a little fantasy, the pond wound back the reptile clock a little ... because in its time it made for a bigly splash ...

The read wasn't that bigly, more an idle fantasy ...

The source: Business The Wall Street Journal
The header: A look back at the war that is about to begin; The crucial precipitating factor that led to World War III was the brief and – or so it seemed initially – stunningly successful US victory in the Battle of Greenland in early 2026.
The author: Gerard Baker
The clock, proving the reptiles snuck this one in on the pond late yesterday arvo: January 20, 2026 - 5:21PM
The caption for the snap before the doomsday scenario begins: Donald Trump and the Greenland PM Jens-Frederik Nielsen.

It was only a four minute read, but the pond was puzzled. 

Apparently nobody had bothered to explain to Baker of the WSJ how his kissing cousins at Faux Noise had facilitated, enabled and generally egged on mad King Donald, and were, at this very moment, doing it, so that the Murdochian bank balance could keep growing.

So it's a bit too late for this kind of hysteria. And it's way too easy to run this sort of line, as if that absolves the power hungry Murdochians who kowtowed, tugged the forelock and bent the knee ...

Historians differ about the real origins of World War III.
Some think its roots lay in the disastrous US interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan in the early 2000s, which weakened American authority in the world, emboldened rivals, and sapped domestic support for assertive military projection overseas.
Some cite Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the first major land offensive in Europe since World War II, breaking an 80-year taboo on armed conflict for territorial advantage.
Some argue that the rise of China from the 1990s onward made conflict more or less inevitable, the world falling again into the Thucydides Trap of an emerging power posing an existential threat to the strategic hegemon.

The reptiles interrupted the snap with a still, Danish soldiers disembark at Nuuk airport, Greenland. Picture: AFP

Baker returned to his fantasy, a poor person's Fail Safe, or heaven forfend A House of Dynamite (the pond refuses to mention Dr Strangelove in this abysmal company):

But there’s general agreement about the crucial precipitating factor that led to the third global conflict in a little over a century: the brief and – or so it seemed initially – stunningly successful US victory in the Battle of Greenland in early 2026.
It wasn’t much of a battle, to be sure. President Trump, fresh off his swift and effective intervention in early January to topple and bring to trial in the US Nicolas Maduro of Venezuela and his wife (who were later pardoned by President JD Vance and now run a chain of retail cocaine stores based in Palm Beach, Florida), doubled down on his “Donroe corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine.
He insisted that the US needed to annex Greenland for its own security and that of the wider Western Hemisphere and initially sought to pressure Denmark, the Arctic island’s sovereign authority, to sell it. Deploying his favourite diplomatic tool, import tariffs, Mr Trump – not unreasonably – expected the Europeans to cave, as they typically did when confronted with the reality that decades of dependency and complacency had left them powerless in the face of strength.
But the Danes, a proud people whose soldiers had fought and died alongside Americans in Iraq and Afghanistan, refused. When Mr Trump ordered US forces to seize the island, Denmark enlisted a handful of nations to help with the resistance – a coalition of the willing, but not very able.

The reptiles interrupted with another snap: A large (not for) sale style sign in the Nuuk city centre. Picture: AFP

Mr. Baker continued with the apocalyptic hysteria, as if aiming for his apocrypha to be included in the Murdochian bible:

It was never a contest. In addition to Danish and Greenlandic forces armed for winter warfare, the allies included a shipload of British Royal Navy admirals; a Canadian armoured detachment hand-picked in compliance with the nation’s strict commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion; a German fleet of battery-powered armoured fighting vehicles that had to be abandoned when the only charging stations in Nuuk, the territory’s capital, broke down; and a Dutch infantry battalion that was forced to withdraw because of a shortage of ammunition, and discovered that shouting “bang-bang,” as they had been trained, was of little effect in battle.
Humiliated, the Europeans and Canadians retreated but regrouped, committed to do whatever they could to retaliate. The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation was formally dissolved in late 2026. Europe expelled American troops. Deprived of its forward operating bases there, from which vital missions had been conducted across the world over the last 75 years, the US tried to strike deals with Arab governments for bases in those countries. But domestic popular hostility to American military deployment, and continuing tensions over the US alliance with Israel, meant there was to be no Middle Eastern replacement for Ramstein or Lakenheath.
The European Union escalated the economic warfare. It banned all American imports; US-produced technology was regulated to within an inch of its life and eventually blocked completely. Baidu, TikTok and BYD replaced Google, Instagram and Tesla in European homes and businesses. Military procurement from US defence contractors ended. Only loyal Hungary agreed to take a couple of F-35s – on generous financing terms. The iconic McDonald’s restaurant on the Champs-Elysees became an interactive museum of American obesity.

There came a final AV distraction: U.S. President Donald Trump's intensified push to wrest sovereignty over Greenland from fellow NATO member Denmark has prompted the European Union to weigh hitting back with its own measures. Rachel Faber reports.

How is this helping? Well it conforms to a typical prepper fantasy, of the kind Ray Milland's family experienced in Panic in Year Zero!, as they fled town, a nuke going off in the car's rear vision mirror.

The trouble is, of course, is that we don't need this kind of silly American carry-on. The damage being done is more real, visceral, and immediate, and yet still Mr Baker's chums at Faux Noise suckle on the toes of the mad King:
The fallout did almost as much harm to the US as to Europe. The dollar sank, pushing up retail prices in America and causing a run on Treasury bonds that flattened mortgage lending and battered corporate finances. Seizing their opportunity, Russia and China demonstrated the value of allyship and pounced. Russia suspended its campaign in Ukraine and quickly moved on the Baltics. With NATO gone, Europeans were deeply divided about whether to offer support; but as a harsh winter descended, the desperate need for cheap energy soon forced them to assent to Russian control over large swathes of Eastern Europe.
China imposed a blockade on Taiwan. With US warships that once patrolled the strait now deployed chasing drug boats in the Caribbean and mopping up Inuit resistance on Greenland’s coasts, Taipei quickly capitulated. Then, in a devastating move, Beijing ordered the release for open-source access of all of its most sophisticated artificial-intelligence algorithms. The explosion of supply of the technology crushed the US market, cratering the valuations of the big US tech companies, which had been built on their supposed AI dominance.
America’s strategic superiority was constrained by the limitations of the new geopolitical realities, and it had no intention of starting a nuclear war. Instead, along with its remaining three allies – El Salvador, Qatar and Senegal – it struck an uneasy peace, a tripartite charter that replaced the American-denominated global order with a condominium of Russia, China and the US dominant in their respective regions.
Still, we’ll always have Greenland.
The Wall Street Journal

And the Murdochs will always have Faux Noise? 

Here's hoping that whole rotten empire gets taken out ...

And why is the pond being forced to read Baker of the WSJ? Where is the bromancer, why isn't he to hand to utter soothing words and tell the pond that everything's going to be okay?

Mmm, must make sure there's enough water and rice under the house for a long stay ... as the immortal Rowe was on hand to celebrate the wasteland ...

In which the pond whittled down the reptile offerings to talk of Tasmania, but did try to slip in as much King Donald as possible ...

Bored watching some slow uploads crawl up into the ether - thanks Malware's NBN - the pond yesterday made the fatal mistake of using idle time to check out the reptiles. 

Lordy, long absent lordy, do they know how to troll, they do it all day long, and the pond fell for it with several posts.

None of that today, and none of the reptiles' current jihad today. 

Pauline showed the pond the danger of reading lizard Oz polls and taking them and herself way too seriously ...

She might be ready, and luckily there will also be shrinks on head to deal with massive delusions of grandeur.

Of course there was plenty more trolling this day, an over-abundance of it ... EXCLUSIVES being sold by the yard ...

EXCLUSIVE
Labor’s hate group crackdown to pass
Antisemitism bill set to pass parliament despite Coalition concerns
Anthony Albanese’s antisemitism bill will pass parliament despite facing an 11th-hour Coalition hurdle over hate group powers.
By Sarah Ison

You'd swear from reading that EXCLUSIVE that the Libs were going all wishy washy and yellerbelly, and joining in to help out comrade Albo's mob, but it's just the Nats - according to the story. 

The Libs were in enabling mode ...

Anthony Albanese’s bill to combat antisemitism will pass parliament in coming days despite an 11th-hour hurdle thrown up by opposition MPs harbouring concerns over proposed new powers that would allow the government to proscribe and ban “hate groups”.
Despite the laws giving Labor the power to crack down on Hizb ut-Tahrir after years of Coalition pressure for the radical Islamic group to be listed as a terrorist organisation, fears were shared by opposition MPs on Monday afternoon that the reforms could have unintended consequences.
While the Liberal party room ticked off on the laws with amendments, the Nationals were understood to still be considering their final position.

They ticked off? So much for the lizard Oz jihad.

Meanwhile there was another EXCLUSIVE...

EXCLUSIVE
Top imams: antisemitism law is Islamophobic ‘in law and practice’
Muslim leaders have delivered a devastating blow to Anthony Albanese’s hate crime laws, claiming the legislation designed to combat antisemitism will actually discriminate against their own community.
By Noah Yim

Oh there's going to be all the fun of the fair for future reptile jihads ...

Meanwhile, the pond's hive mind favourite, the bromancer, joined the current jihad and so had to be sent to the intermittent archive cornfield ...

After Bondi, grim truth is Jew hate still flourishes
Federal parliament united to stand strong, yet the cultural left’s role in fuelling anti-Semitism remains unaddressed by the government.
By Greg Sheridan
Foreign Editor

The Federal parliament united to stand strong? 

Didn't the pond just EXCLUSIVELY read that the parliament was beset by saucy doubts and fears?

The bromancer was in exceptionally fine bigoted form ...

...Some 200 artists, some admittedly under monstrous pressure, withdrew from the writers week in solidarity with Abdel-Fattah. Did this herd of independent minds all reach this conclusion, that her statements were perfectly OK, individually? Truly, you’d find more moral courage in a fourth grade rugby league team in western Sydney than in the whole of the Australian arts community put together.
The bottom line is this celebration of anti-Semitic hostility, and simultaneous indictment of anonymous Jews and their malign and mysterious influence, is exactly how anti-Semitism proceeds in the real world.
The ABC is often, if unintentionally, complicit in anti-Semitism through: constant demonisation of Israel, failure to investigate seriously Australian anti-Semitism, and ready willingness to credit the “shadowy Jewish influence” line. Little said in parliament, beyond Leeser’s words, addresses the anti-Semitism of the cultural left.

Sssh, don't mention Gaza war crimes. And ... it's all the ABC's fault.

That's as much as the pond could take or stomach.

Never mind, there might be a chance down the track to get the lizard Oz listed as a hate group.

Speaking of that, ancient Troy also joined in the current round of hate speech, tediously going there yet again ...

Hypocrisy and hate: How Adelaide Writers’ Week ignored the limits to free speech
Adelaide Writers’ Week has been destroyed by the very people claiming to defend free speech who platformed hate speech at a publicly funded cultural festival
By Troy Bramston

A few whimsical notes:

Ancient Troy: Cultural institutions should be able to operate free from interference from government. This is an important principle.

Oh dear ...

Premier Peter Malinauskas warned festival board author’s removal was needed for ‘basic decency’
Premier Peter Malinauskas warned the Adelaide Festival ex-chair to not “ignore” the dignity of Australian-Jewish people still reeling from Bondi attacks. Read his full letter here. (that's an archive link)

Inter alia ...

The Premier warned Adelaide Festival’s ex-chair in a letter that the dignity of Australian-Jewish people still reeling from the Bondi terror attacks should not be “ignored at all costs” in the name of art.
The Sunday Mail has obtained a copy of the letter sent to Adelaide Festival chairwoman Tracey Whiting by Premier Peter Malinauskas days before a decision was made to remove Palestinian-Australian author Dr Randa Abdel-Fattah from the Writers’ Week 2026 program.
The letter, dated January 2, was sent after the Premier expressed his concerns about the inclusion of Dr Abdel-Fattah over the course of a few phone calls with Ms Whiting.
It is understood she then asked him to put those concerns in writing for the board’s benefit as they considered what to do. 

Quick, ancient Troy, diss that "important principle", save this cooked goose, make it right with a gigantic billy goat butt ...

...But governments have an obligation to ensure they are not used to put hateful rhetoric up in lights. And citizens have a right to demand that their taxpayer dollars are spent wisely and not used to advance radical and divisive political causes.

Quick, move on to rousing conclusion ...

Writers festivals should be places for robust debate and thought-provoking discussion. Attendees should have their views illuminated and challenged. They can be informed and entertained.
Writers festivals should be a place for civilised conversation and respectful dialogue. Adler and Abdel-Fattah ensured AWW was anything but this.

Um, perhaps that prime goose Malinauskas and a compliant board had something to do with it? Nah, ancient Troy and the hive mind ensured it was anything butthat.

Begorrah, it took Paddy to remind the pond that some reptiles were still diligently pursuing old jihads ...

PROFESSOR EXPLAINS
The NDIS has become a luxury liner. We need more, smaller boats
The National Disability Insurance Scheme offers only first-class travel and a permanent berth. The model must change, says Australia’s foremost expert in mental health reform.
By Patrick McGorry
Contributor

Hang on, hang on. A Prof explains? 

Isn't he automatically defined as one of those out of touch, dangerous, airy, bubble-headed boobies, a member of the wanky 'leet class that ruins everything for the hive mind? The sort that wouldn't prescribe Ivermectin when it was badly needed, or keep on rabbiting on about a climate change hoax?

Reassuringly, the reptiles took that metaphor and opened with a stupefyingly banal illustration ...

The pond confesses that it stopped reading at the opening gobsmacking literalism of that first illustration ...

Geddit? It's a luxury liner! What a metaphor.

Oh Prof, Prof, this is what happens when you consort with the lizard Oz hive mind.

The pond was rapidly winnowing down its list of candidates and topics for the day, and ended up stuck with Rowan rowing a boat, which really should have seen the bromancer behind the oars ...

The header: No, Mr Ambassador: Taiwan has nothing in common with Tassie, Since ambassador Xiao Qian highlights what he sees as parallels between Taiwan and Tasmania, it’s important to dig deeper, uncovering instead the deep disparities.

The caption: Chinese Ambassador to Australia Xiao Qian at the Embassy of the People's Republic of China in Canberra. Picture: Martin Ollman

It was only a three minute read, and contained the astonishing insight that Tassie wasn't Taiwan, and perhaps vice versa ... but nowhere in it did Rowan ask what had set him off.

Not once did he wonder why the lizard Oz had chosen to become a propaganda sheet for Chairman Xi and his minions?

Or why he decided to waste time and space on a self-induced troll of such epic futility?

The obvious answer is that the reptiles rolled that way because it was easy and cheap filler, and it could lead to easy and cheap follow ups, providing a chance for "eggsperts" of the Rowan kind to leap up and down, and be affronted and express wild-eyed indignation, not to mention some meaningless history of the Our Henry kind...

“Taiwan is a province of China, just as Tasmania is a state of Australia,” wrote China’s ambassador to Australia in these pages on Monday. Both Taiwan and Tasmania were inhabited by Indigenous people before Dutch forces in the first case, and British in the second, became involved in either. But that’s about as much as they share in common.
Since ambassador Xiao Qian highlights what he sees as parallels between Taiwan and Tasmania, it’s appropriate to dig deeper, uncovering instead the deep disparities.
Taiwan was first colonised by the Dutch (1624-1662). The Manchus who conquered China and ruled it as the Qing dynasty (1691-1911) took a sporadic but growing interest, eventually declaring it a province in 1887. But only eight years later the dynasty ceded Taiwan to Japan after military defeat.
Mao Zedong told American journalist Edgar Snow in a 1937 interview: “We will extend them (the Koreans) our enthusiastic help in their struggle for independence. The same thing applies for Taiwan.”

That's digging deeper?

This ranting allowed an ancient snap of the lad for whom the lizard Oz had been working, Chinese President Xi Jinping speaks in 2017 in Beijing. Picture: Getty Images

That's when it dawned on the pond what was missing from this tepid fare. 

Better to blather on about Tasmania than deal with King Donald and any one of a hundred of his recent absurdities.

For that sort of talk, you had to head off to the keen Keane in Crikey ... (sorry paywall)

Or take in a Herbert ...

Or head off to Kagan in The Atlantic (archive link):

Instead of any of that with the bromancer, the pond was stuck with Rowan, as he resumed his rowing of this wretched Tassie boat:

The Republic of China seized control of Taiwan following Japan’s defeat in 1945, then took the remnants of its army there following its own loss to Mao’s Chinese Communist Party, and the establishment in 1949 of the People’s Republic of China, which has never ruled Taiwan.
British whalers and sealers established bases in Tasmania at the very start of the 19th century, and the British governor in New South Wales built military outposts to support them from 1803. It became a colony, then in 1856 a state.
In 1899, 94 per cent of the Tasmanians eligible to vote supported its federation with Australia, the largest majority of the states. The Australian Constitution provides a complex route for states to withdraw, but secession moves in the 1920s petered out, and more recent straw-polling in Tasmania has failed to indicate significant support for this.
The Kuomintang (Nationalist Party) that ruled the Republic of China that succeeded the Qing dynasty, re-established itself in Taiwan following its defeat by the communist forces, but 35 years ago formally withdrew any claims over mainland China. The CCP’s insistence on recognition as ruling “one China” is not these days contested significantly anywhere including within Taiwan, unlike its own claim also to rule the island.

The reptiles decided that an AV distraction would act as seafood extender...

China’s ambassador to Australia is calling on the federal government to support the reunification of China and Taiwan. Xiao Qian says Australia cannot keep reaping the benefits of trade with China while seeking to block reunification. He has cautioned the government against pursuing dialogue on Taiwan unless they were committed to reunification, signalling economic consequences. “Taiwan is a province of China, just as Tasmania is a state of Australia. This is the only correct understanding of ‘one China’,” Mr Qian said.

Rowan then decided to diss Tasmania as a pimple on the rump:

Tasmania has a population of 575,000 and annual economic output of $44bn. Taiwan’s population is 23 million, its output $1.17 trillion. Taiwan’s average wealth per adult is 11 times higher than China’s. In a recent poll in Taiwan, 86 per cent favoured maintaining the status quo – also supported by Australia’s major parties – with 72 per cent disagreeing that Taiwan is part of China, and 83 per cent insisting that Taiwan’s future should be determined by its own people.
In Pew Research polling two years ago, 67 per cent of respondents described themselves as Taiwanese, 28 per cent as both Taiwanese and Chinese, and 3 per cent as primarily Chinese. Of those aged 18-34, 83 per cent see themselves as Taiwanese.
Ambassador Xiao wrote that “blood runs thicker than water”. Yet 56 per cent polled by Pew say they are not emotionally attached to China, and 66 per cent believe China is a major threat.
Ten years ago independent senator Jacqui Lambie said her “dream for Tasmania” would see the island leaving the Australian Federation. But while re-elected, she received little support for such a move, which she no longer advances. Ambassador Xiao says: “It is clearly stated in the official legal opinions of the UN that ‘the United Nations considers Taiwan as a province of China’.”
On August 21, 2024, Australia’s Senate passed unanimously a motion – proposed jointly by Labor and Liberal senators – that UN Resolution 2758 of 1971 “does not establish the PRC’s sovereignty over Taiwan and does not determine the future status of Taiwan in the UN”. Australia itself, while holding its own “one China policy”, has not formally committed to a position on Taiwan’s identity.
Many Tasmanians might preference their identity as Tasmanian first and Australian second, but very few would go on to disavow their Australian-ness or Australian citizenship. Tasmania is structurally dependent on federal economic support.

Oh come on Rowan, there was a valiant rebel movement featured in The Mercury ... (archive link)

The reptiles slipped in another snap ... Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te delivers a New Year’s Day speech at the presidential hall in Taipei.

But the pond was still deep in the deepest south, singing a rebel song ...

And again:

Stay strong, Tassies, elbows up Canada, stay defiant Taiwan ...

Taiwan has a standing military force of about 160,000, with a further 1.6 million reservists, up to 500 combat aircraft and a substantial navy. It polices and defends its own borders. Tasmania has a police force of about 1400.
Taiwan elects its own leaders. At the last election, 72 per cent of eligible voters turned out, compared with 60 per cent in Britain and 63 per cent in the US. Its legislature passes laws that are imposed through an independent judicial system. Tasmanians, via their elected government, exercise a wide range of authority within their own jurisdiction, compared with the PRC’s provinces, which operate within a unitary, one-party state. China is unique among large states in maintaining a centralised, not federal, structure.
Ambassador Xiao should be applauded for stating, in conclusion, “we hope Australia will keep ahead of the historical trend on the Taiwan question”. It’s historically intricate, it’s complex, but it’s also very important for our role in our own region that we all “keep ahead”, watch carefully what’s happening, and staunchly back peace and stability.
Rowan Callick is an expert associate at the ANU’s National Security College and an industry fellow at Griffith University’s Asia Institute.

Sheesh, Taiwan's just doing what everybody has been wanting to do since way back when ...

And now to be fair, the reptiles did slip in a yarn about King Donald while the pond was seceding from the hive mind and the world ... but it didn't come from the bromancer, it came from the WSJ ...

Why are the reptiles and the bromancer always outsourcing this gig?

Simple, they're too busy navel-gazing, fluff-gathering and carrying on their latest set of narrow minded jihads, while the world goes to hell in a King Donald handbasket.

Just for the record then ...

Having embarked on this journey, the pond decided to go full hog ...

Oh yes ...

Ain't he a wonder, and how much more interesting than Tasmania seceding ...

Just one more gobbet showing a rogue nation at work, giving comfort and aid to Chairman Xi in the matter of Taiwan.

You see Rowan? Blather about Tassie entirely misses the real Xi point and inspiration ...

If you happened to get stuck in the lizard Oz, you might have thought it was all about Tasmania.

And so to end up with the immortal Rowe where the reptiles sort of began ...