Open Thread – Tues 28 March 2023


Autumn (The Spies with the Grapes of the Promised Land), Nicolas Poussin, 1660-64

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Robert Sewell
March 30, 2023 9:57 pm

Lizzie:

His routine eye test this morning showed he had a rip in one of his retinas, so he was trundled straight to his ophthalmologist, who operated immediately with a laser beam. He drove home, which upset me, as he should have taken a taxi.

Stupid, stupid man.
I’ve had several tears/detachments repaired by laser, and frankly you’re functionally blind in that eye for at least two hours. Had he had a prang, he’d have lost his licence and his insurance wouldn’t have covered any injury/damage to whoever he ran into.
Give him a kick up the arse for me, will you?

Cassie of Sydney
March 30, 2023 9:57 pm

“Bolt is beyond redemption;”

Don’t watch him again. He’s a joke, a disgrace, a fair-weather person.

Gabor
Gabor
March 30, 2023 9:59 pm

there is a way of making matter go below absolute zero,

Does it mean that we got it wrong with the ‘absolute’ value then?

H B Bear
H B Bear
March 30, 2023 10:02 pm

As we discovered during the AIDS dry run (no pun intended) many homosexual practices are bettered considered in the abstract.

Dot
Dot
March 30, 2023 10:02 pm

foreign languages such as German, French and Welsh

That would really sting some Brits.

Mark from Melbourne
Mark from Melbourne
March 30, 2023 10:04 pm

But the banks do provide basic services.

Mum is 92 and a bit worried (and more than a bit miffed) that she has been told no more cheques after she finishes this chequebook.

How, exactly, do they expect her to pay her bills? Via an app on the phone she can just manage to make a call on, and read the odd text (sometimes)? On the computer or tablet she doesn’t own?

So she ends up doing her banking via one of her kids… so much for all that “privacy” they are always banging on about! I mean, she’s lucky in that I am a paragon of virtue and can be trusted, but some others may not be so saintly as my good self…

rosie
rosie
March 30, 2023 10:06 pm

I miss Geriatric Mayfly.
He went to school with Cardinal Pell, gave us a lovely potted bio of Pell the school boy.

Real Deal
Real Deal
March 30, 2023 10:08 pm

Just wait until they read up on ‘Felching”

Everyone loves a nicely tossed salad.

Well, not everybody.

You mongrel, KD.

I just looked it up on the Urban Dictionary.

Please, no one else do that. The verbal description means I will not have squeezed lemon on my snitty tomorrow night.

WolfmanOz
March 30, 2023 10:09 pm

Bar Beach Swimmer says:
March 30, 2023 at 8:59 pm
C.L., Kenny also reported that Obama thinks the world would be in a better place if women ran the place.

Is that blatant attempt to introduce the thought of Michelle announcing her candidacy for the Democrat presidential nomination?

(Perhaps a good enough reason for her looking especially p1ssed off since they landed in Australia.)

Well Kiwis and Germans would hardly endorse that view after the mess Ardern and Merckel have left their countries.

Robert Sewell
March 30, 2023 10:11 pm

Indolent:

Many of you were lied to for 3 years. Masks were useless and the 6 ft rule became stupid as soon as we knew the virus was aerosolized.
Watch this congressional testimony and think how mean many of you were to people who spoke truth. There must be accountability! Pls retweet.

Despite the masks being known to be useless, the main reason for forcing them on us was to criminalise those people who refused.
That’s it. That’s all that was desired. A means to treat a class of people as criminals, and to give the majority who obeyed, somebody to hate.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
March 30, 2023 10:12 pm

foreign languages such as German, French and Welsh

The English (post-Norman) kings didn’t even speak English until 1413.

I would have thought Frog and Kraut would have been staples for English kings for three or four hundred years at least. Doesn’t surprise me in the least that although he’s a tiresome dunderhead, Charlie III is multilingual.

Steve trickler
Steve trickler
March 30, 2023 10:13 pm

Mark Steyn Show:

March 28, 2023
Burning the Evidence.

Welcome to the Tuesday edition of The Mark Steyn Show. If you’re watching us in real time, immediately after today’s show, Mark will be back with his old EIB comrade on Bo Snerdley’s Rush Hour, live at 4pm US Eastern on New York’s legendary radio powerhouse, 77 WABC.

Today’s show begins with Mark’s take on the failures of Big Government these last three years, and why it is necessary to have a proper accounting.

Next, funeral director John O’Looney joins Steyn for his view of what’s going on, especially with regard to the excess mortality across the western world and what he’s seeing on the ground at his funeral home. Then, the Stats Man Jamie Jenkins is back to crunch the numbers on “Long Covid” and related topics. And we have another edition of Mark’s Mailbox.

https://www.steynonline.com/mark-steyn-show/13360/burning-the-evidence

Dot
Dot
March 30, 2023 10:14 pm

Please, no one else do that. The verbal description means I will not have squeezed lemon on my snitty tomorrow night.

Are you having a lemon party?

Gabor
Gabor
March 30, 2023 10:14 pm

I’m disappointed in Pauline- I thought she would show some solidarity.

Like her or hate her, “solidarity” is not in her vocabulary.
Why do you think she insists on calling the party P H One Nation?
With her it was always me-me-me once she got her foot in the door and attracted followers.

In Latham’s place I’d quit the party, he is old enough to retire in 8 years anyway but I think he would win on his own popularity if he’d run again.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
March 30, 2023 10:15 pm

You mongrel, KD.

I just looked it up on the Urban Dictionary.

Quite right. Nobody else look that up.

On Urban Dictionary.

C.L.
C.L.
March 30, 2023 10:17 pm

Re the demise of Old Cat, its passing was the first time I realised there was such a thing as an ‘online community’, the demise of which could be saddening. I understand Sinclair’s decision, though. Running a blog is not easy. I set one up (again) because writing about or discussing the news – especially politics and religion – has been part of my life since my mid-teens. But I still feel the pull of the late twentieth century – wondrous days without the internet. It’s weird that there are now mature adults with no experience of life without it.

I miss the great IT too – and others.

Onward, though!

Real Deal
Real Deal
March 30, 2023 10:19 pm

Are you having a lemon party?

No, but I certainly have grapes.

Dot
Dot
March 30, 2023 10:36 pm

https://www.legislation.act.gov.au/View/a/1991-2/current/html/1991-2.html

Section 36 Contempt of board

A person commits an offence if the person does something in the face, or within the hearing, of a board that would be contempt of court if the board were a court of record.

Maximum penalty: 100 penalty units, imprisonment for 1 year or both.

The Commissioner of the AFP has got some balls.

Also

Section 35 Application of Criminal Code, ch 7

An inquiry is a legal proceeding for the Criminal Code, chapter 7 (Administration of justice offences).

Note That chapter includes offences (eg perjury, falsifying evidence, failing to attend and refusing to be sworn) applying in relation to board proceedings.

Now, in the ACT Criminal Code:

706 Destroying or concealing evidence

(1) A person commits an offence if the person destroys or conceals evidence with the intention of—

(a) influencing a decision about starting a legal proceeding; or

(b) influencing the outcome of a legal proceeding.

Maximum penalty: 700 penalty units, imprisonment for 7 years or both.

Note that a PU is 160 AUD.

Now, for once I hope we do have a courageous judge.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
March 30, 2023 10:37 pm

Right. Wick IV review. I have given this some thought. If anyone’s expecting a Wolfman Oz-level dissection and symbolism analysis, you’ll be disappointed.

There’s a Ned Kelly reference early on, which was a bit weird. They possibly have the richest, youngest supervillain as well. The fillum itself was all right, but nowhere near – nowhere near – the bar set by I, II and for the most part, III.

There were enough killings. Certainly enough killings, but French traffic accounted for fully half of them. A blind Chinese assassin who seemed to have The Force, which was sort of cool but lost cred as the film went on.

No humour. A bit of dog-related activity, although it’s not Wick’s dog. Excellent – nay, outstanding scenery. A mystery black killer.

The bullet-proof and apparently kinetic force-proof suits were a bit much, even for me. Rounds were pinging off Wick and various villains as though they were Superman.

The action CQB scenes were too slow and too contrived, as opposed to the first three flicks. Way too slow. Move. Pause. Move. Pause. Completely lacked the essential dynamic element.

And then there’s a grave at the end with Wick’s name on it. Whether that means there’s a Wick V, I don’t know. But there shouldn’t be.

John Wick – the baba yaga – is dead.

Dot
Dot
March 30, 2023 10:40 pm

There’s movies about El Cid but there needs to be one about William Marshal.

Crossie
Crossie
March 30, 2023 10:41 pm

Sadly, for Pauline, these days I think Mark has more presence with One Nation, especially in NSW, than she does and putting down her best draw card to favour of any opposition player is not going to enhance her standing with One Nation supporters …

She has definitely gone down in my estimation. At last Saturday’s election I voted One Nation 1 above the line and would still do so now purely to get Mark Latham elected. One Nation without Latham does not get my vote, that simple.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
March 30, 2023 10:42 pm

there needs to be one about William Marshal

Damn straight. The Ser Barristan Selmy of his time, but better and served more kings.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
March 30, 2023 10:43 pm

Oh great. Now I’m getting my review dickless downticked.

Frank
Frank
March 30, 2023 10:47 pm

You mongrel, KD.
I just looked it up on the Urban Dictionary.

Should we tell him about the goatse.cx man you think.

Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
March 30, 2023 10:49 pm

You’re a champion, Macbeth.
Good to hear you have been all kitted out like a frisky eighty year old again.
Keep smiling and let those new teeth shine!

P
P
March 30, 2023 10:50 pm

Onward, though!

The protestant hymn Onward Christian Soldiers was considered too militant back in the ’70s.
My children attending a Catholic school in the ’70s had their school motto
changed from “In Christ We Conquer” to “Love One Another”, the other being too militant.

Bourne1879
Bourne1879
March 30, 2023 10:55 pm

A couple of months ago I mentioned a Club Grubbery podcast which involved 3 AFL people. One (Dixon ?) was a Director of one of the Adelaide teams. He said he heard of a vax related issue with one of the players indirectly and called a Board meeting to discuss the vax mandates. On the actual day of that meeting another player collapsed during training.

Unfortunately the club paid no attention to his views and he had to step down. He made the comment that it was important, particularly in VIC, to get all teams on board with the vax. This was becuase of their large following.

I have seen a cringeworthy clip of the West Coast Eagles team all saying how good the vaccines were.

dover0beachsays:
March 30, 2023 at 5:24 pm
sports cardiologist confirmed a diagnosis of pericarditis.

I wonder what the frequency of this has been in the past?

cohenite
March 30, 2023 10:55 pm
m0nty
m0nty
March 30, 2023 10:55 pm

Why am I unsurprised that there has not been a single voice on the Cat saying a word against Mark Latham today.

Never go the full Alf Garnett.

Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
March 30, 2023 10:57 pm

I think I might give Sky a miss for a few days.

Cassie, take some lighter relief with my Netflix suggestions for you. Or bury yourself in a book.

I’m currently reading Edward Rutherford’s book ‘Dublin’. He writes those sagas through time in a given place – ‘Sarum’ and ‘London’ are probably his best known ones – where a small genetic trait links characters to the development of the place down the ages from the ancestral times. It’s fairly stock stuff in literary terms but engaging and follows a reasonably historically accurate timeline.

My eldest son returned with it from his Thailand excursion and it bears all the thumbed wear and tear of a book that for years has travelled Asia with many a backpacker on many a filthy train and through many a meal. Present for you mum, he says, and of course I am very grateful for his thoughtfulness.

Dot
Dot
March 30, 2023 10:59 pm

Mark McGowan is an oleaginous shunt.

They just can’t LET GO of that power
Clown Planet

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vfmD0c8kbj8

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-03-28/wa-government-border-crossings-search-powers/102154988

“Hey guys if we become more and more like the old Soviet Union or East Germans, we won’t have as much crime…”

Sure, but your oppressive government is objectively worse than having slightly more crime.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
March 30, 2023 11:00 pm

Never go the full Alf Garnett.

mUntler,

What are your views on chicks dressing up as blokes and then killing children at their school before being splattered all over said school by toxically masculine men?

Dot
Dot
March 30, 2023 11:00 pm

Why am I unsurprised that there has not been a single voice on the Cat saying a word against Mark Latham

monty,

With all due respect to the man he insulted, I don’t give a shit.

Bruce of Newcastle
Bruce of Newcastle
March 30, 2023 11:01 pm

Why am I unsurprised that there has not been a single voice on the Cat saying a word against Mark Latham today.

Um, Monty, would that be because we agree with him?
I mean we do um, understand plumbing.
I just hope Mr Greenwich has had his monkeypox vaccination.
I could provide bible verses if you want…

MatrixTransform
March 30, 2023 11:11 pm

there has not been a single voice on the Cat saying a word against Mark Latham

same reason nobody says positive things about you mUnty

Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
March 30, 2023 11:14 pm

In Latham’s place I’d quit the party, he is old enough to retire in 8 years anyway but I think he would win on his own popularity if he’d run again.

Hitting back with an angry tweet at an aggressor is a sign of the stress that Latham has been under. I don’t condemn him for it. Everyone has a snapping point. M0nty’s just glad the attention has moved on from his Black Shirt sympathies. For the time being anyway.

Latham has done no more than forcefully albeit impolitely tell the simple truth of what our kids are taught in school health education, as Calli has noted. The tweet will go down the memory hole soon enough, and Mark can still do a lot of good in his Upper House position, whether with One Nation or not. I am glad he has a retirement future ahead because retirement is one of the joys of a hard won working life.

Barking Toad
Barking Toad
March 30, 2023 11:18 pm

Who’s got a link to Tub Girl? Can’t find it.
That’d get the hippies squirming.

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
March 30, 2023 11:25 pm

I’m currently reading Edward Rutherford’s book ‘Dublin’.

I’m reading David McCullough’s epic biography, of one time President of the United States, Harry Truman.

It seems that his wife, Bess Truman, was furious when the atomic bombs were dropped on Japan – Harry hadn’t told her of the existence of the weapons…

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
March 30, 2023 11:27 pm

I am glad he has a retirement future ahead because retirement is one of the joys of a hard won working life.

Look, I’m a fan of Latham but sitting on different-coloured leather and fanging all over the place at someone else’s expense can’t really be described as ‘hard won’.

Show me 40 year-by-year pictures of him putting trenches in with a pick, and I’ll change my mind.

P
P
March 30, 2023 11:30 pm
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
March 30, 2023 11:33 pm

Um, Monty, would that be because we agree with him?
I mean we do um, understand plumbing.

I clicked on that link here to some other associated activities.
Plumbing the depths of compulsive orality, I call some of that. Far too fetishistic.
An explorative sensuality is one thing, but messy slurping for the sake of it – erk.
Human sexual interest can be led down some very unpleasant behavioural paths.

Dr Faustus
Dr Faustus
March 30, 2023 11:35 pm

As we discovered during the AIDS dry run (no pun intended) many homosexual practices are bettered considered in the abstract.

Not wrong, there.
I once listened in growing amazement to a detailed expert explanation of the extraordinary lengths some gay guys go to in preparation for a poo-free weekend of freewheeling fun.

It appears you have to be very committed to avoid a Latham sadness.

Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
March 30, 2023 11:38 pm

Look, I’m a fan of Latham but sitting on different-coloured leather and fanging all over the place at someone else’s expense can’t really be described as ‘hard won’.

The stressors of public life and anything high-flying can be pretty soul-destroying sometimes, KD.
Retiring away from it all whole and in one piece psychologically is a grace that is hard won.

Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
March 30, 2023 11:41 pm

I’m off to continue with the tales of Dublin. Strongbow has just arrived from England, and the tribal kings think they can contain him within the eastern ports. Little do they realise … etc etc. Lives of the current characters, with all of their concerns, are about about to be thrown into chaos.

That’s history for you.

Colonel Crispin Berka
Colonel Crispin Berka
March 30, 2023 11:42 pm

Dot rumoured:

he reckons he can make small ones with the interferometer without using “negative energies”.

I do hope his first prototype run coincides with the passing of the T’Plana-Hath.

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
March 31, 2023 12:03 am

I’m off to continue with the tales of Dublin.

Dublin is one of my favourite cities. Picture an Australian tourist, looking at the statues in O’Connell Street, and thinking “Um yeah, they look like bullet holes” and then realizing that the General Post Office was just across the road…..

Viva
Viva
March 31, 2023 12:17 am

The great and the good prefer to celebrate the sanitised version of homosexuality, with visions of rainbows and fairy dust. Latham committed the cardinal sin of forcing them, if only for a moment, to contemplate the unsanitised version.

Gabor
Gabor
March 31, 2023 12:19 am

Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare says:
March 30, 2023 at 11:38 pm

Look, I’m a fan of Latham but sitting on different-coloured leather and fanging all over the place at someone else’s expense can’t really be described as ‘hard won’.

The stressors of public life and anything high-flying can be pretty soul-destroying sometimes, KD.
Retiring away from it all whole and in one piece psychologically is a grace that is hard won.

My work is pretty mundane, as most of them really are, but I wouldn’t swap it for politics even given the huge salary, power and perks.

My only hope is that in 7 years time I still have most of my super and we can sell the business at a fair price.
Others might be more ambitious, but we would be happy, have a paid off roof over our heads, kids independent, maintaining health is the main thing now.

rickw
rickw
March 31, 2023 12:26 am

Why am I unsurprised that there has not been a single voice on the Cat saying a word against Mark Latham today.

Future arse bandit.

Alamak!
Alamak!
March 31, 2023 12:29 am

Rise in popularity of anal sex has led to health problems for women

Just sharing what an unimpeachable source of truth is saying these days re downunder pleasures and the side effects.

rickw
rickw
March 31, 2023 12:31 am

Strongbow has just arrived from England

The cider or Longbow?!

rickw
rickw
March 31, 2023 12:36 am

My only hope is that in 7 years time I still have most of my super and we can sell the business at a fair price.

You are soooo f’cked !!! 🙂

win
win
March 31, 2023 12:41 am

If Mark Lathams description of male on male sex is factual , how would Andrew Bolt and the denouncers describe it.

Christine
Christine
March 31, 2023 12:42 am

That “unsanitised version”
Once upon a time, when promotion of the homosexual lifestyle began, a Courier-Mail columnist gave this description of the practice: “dabbling in the sewer of the body”.
A refined twin to Latham’s description.
This journalist/ex-footballer had character and good manners. Have no recollection of shock and indignation.

rickw
rickw
March 31, 2023 12:44 am

I once listened in growing amazement to a detailed expert explanation of the extraordinary lengths some gay guys go to in preparation for a poo-free weekend of freewheeling fun.

I used to manage Australia’s largest homo aircraft refuelling crew. “Just going to empty my vagina for the weekend!” FFS.

rickw
rickw
March 31, 2023 12:47 am

Rise in popularity of anal sex has led to health problems for women

Californian girls. Do you want to…. No! Why would I do that when there’s a perfectly good vagina an inch away?!

rickw
rickw
March 31, 2023 12:50 am

I think that’s a record, legitimate use of “vagina” in two consequitive posts. Now three.

H B Bear
H B Bear
March 31, 2023 12:54 am

My only hope is that in 7 years time I still have most of my super and we can sell the business at a fair price.

The erosion of savings through inflation is insidious. Coupled with bracket creep your house is about the only thing stopping most people from going backwards.

rosie
rosie
March 31, 2023 2:49 am

they now suffer the ‘immune fixation’ problem where they prioritise producing antibodies to the old (now extinct) spke protein every time they encounter a new variant.

What?
I’ve never, to my knowledge, had covid.
The vast majority of Australians would be in the so called ‘immune fixation’ category yet we are way down the worldwide deaths per 100,000 people numbers.
stats here

rosie
rosie
March 31, 2023 2:57 am

Why am I surprised to find Monty thinks Latham’s crude response to being called disgusting has to be universally condemned?
He’s a working class man, not a saint on earth.

rosie
rosie
March 31, 2023 3:00 am

Twitter has been a sewer of abuse since the get go, dish it out, expect to get it back.
Don’t dish it out, get it anyhow.
I’ve seen some of the comments Latham cops, day in, day out.

rosie
rosie
March 31, 2023 3:05 am
Tom
Tom
March 31, 2023 4:03 am
Tom
Tom
March 31, 2023 4:04 am
Tom
Tom
March 31, 2023 4:05 am
Tom
Tom
March 31, 2023 4:07 am
Tom
Tom
March 31, 2023 4:08 am
Tom
Tom
March 31, 2023 4:09 am
Tom
Tom
March 31, 2023 4:11 am
Tom
Tom
March 31, 2023 4:12 am
Tom
Tom
March 31, 2023 4:13 am
Tom
Tom
March 31, 2023 4:15 am
Tom
Tom
March 31, 2023 4:16 am
Tom
Tom
March 31, 2023 4:17 am
Tom
Tom
March 31, 2023 4:19 am
Tom
Tom
March 31, 2023 4:20 am
Tom
Tom
March 31, 2023 4:21 am
Tom
Tom
March 31, 2023 4:23 am
2dogs
2dogs
March 31, 2023 4:36 am

Thanks Tom. Leak was excellent!

Gabor
Gabor
March 31, 2023 5:19 am

Something to remember.

No comment on my part either way, just turned up in feeds.

WORLD
???? ?????????? · ·

The price of being alone.
“I remember that summit well.
He was left alone at the table, he was alone at all the G20 events in Australia, and when he finally realized his role, he just stood up and walked away, shaking the hand of the policeman escort.
How much dirt and gossip he received at his address during all his time in power. Dozens of Putin’s palaces, billions on Putin’s accounts … the world’s best intelligence agencies have been searching for the base assets of the President of Russia for many years, but without finding anything, they put all their efforts to pinch Putin’s “friends”.
And what about himself, why doesn’t he assemble a team of court journalists to refute the endless lies addressed to him? The answer is simple – his deeds speak for him.
He came in far 1999, when the country had only one name left. The humiliating “Russia’s default” just roared around the world.
GDP-195 billion, and State Debt-190 $ billion.
Putin accepted a bankrupt country whose asset value was practically equal to its external debt.
With what did isolated Russia of the era of the outcast Putin approach 2018?
Only in the “sanctioned” year 2017, the country’s GDP grew by 2.7% and amounts to $ 3 trillion 445 billion.
Just compare the two numbers…
-GDP 1999 – 195 billion $
-GDP 2017 – 3 trillion 445 billion $
… and you will understand the price of the President’s loneliness. ”
I will add from myself.
I remember Russia without Putin perfectly.
Shooting of Parliament, tanks and BTRs ringing at night under the window on Babushkinskaya, where I lived, the military is in full display throughout Moscow. Blood puddles on the sidewalks. The corpse of a passer-by with a crushed tank head on the road.
Have you seen? I saw it.
War in Chechnya, and several business trips there of my friends from the special forces with whom fanatically learned real aikido for Dynamo for 7 years. Roma nicknamed “Goblin”, a big guy under 2 meters. 2 injuries, just getting back on my feet.
The guys were telling how they merged Chechnya to international terrorists.
Treason and corruption of officers, drug trafficking, tons of dollars in bribes. The boys who were sent to the slaughterhouse by traitors to create discontent in the country died.
Didn’t you have to meet a hundred 200s in zinc and see the madness of mothers jumping hysterically on a metal box?
God forbid!
Did you forget the “Nord-East” that happened thanks to corrupt militia who let military trucks with terrorists, explosives and weapons to almost the center of Moscow for 2-3 thousand dollars?
Have they forgotten school in Beslan?
When hostages were drinking their urine to avoid dying of thirst, when closing the child who had escaped through the window killed our special forces officers.
Unemployment, thousands of enterprises are closed, professors are traded in the markets, budget workers have not received salaries for years.
Somehow in the center of Moscow I left the entrance hall and got into a bandit showdown. Automatic queues and gunshots, screams of the wounded, corpses near the cars. And you, in a clean suit and a white shirt, crawl on your stomach under the wall of the house in the mud on a flowerbed around the corner, so as not to add to the statistics of “natural depletion of the population”.
We lost more population in the 1990s than we did in the Great Patriotic War.
Don’t you remember? I – Remember.
Putin is not an angel and I do not idealize him. But I want to pay tribute to this man.
After all, I remember who stopped all this madness. And sometimes I want to ask those who criticize and throw dirt on this man:
AND WHAT DID YOU DO TO STOP THIS?
Excellent comment by Alex Krepchinsky:

Gabor
Gabor
March 31, 2023 5:22 am

Re. the previous post, I think it may be a repeat but I never saw it, so it’s new to me.

Pogria
Pogria
March 31, 2023 5:30 am

Tom,
the Gary Varvel toon of Jesus welcoming the children and the teachers is absolutely beautiful. A small but welcome comfort after their loss.

m0nty
m0nty
March 31, 2023 5:58 am

Why am I surprised to find Monty thinks Latham’s crude response to being called disgusting has to be universally condemned?
He’s a working class man, not a saint on earth.

He has never been a working class man. He went straight out of uni into politics, starting in the offices of Bob Carr and Gough Whitlam.

There were far wittier ways to phrase his rejoinder. Latham does not possess much wit.

The furore over his comment shows why you lot are now attacking trans people. Society has progressed far enough to see open homophobia as disgusting. It is still moderately acceptable to attack trans people in the same vein, but the more you extremists push the envelope the more sympathy that trans people will build up in wider society. By the end of this little moral panic, the general reaction to similar comments directed against transsexuals will provoke as much revulsion as Latham did. Because you will lose this culture war, too, like you lost all the others.

132andBush
132andBush
March 31, 2023 6:28 am

Mark Latham’s apology should read;

I apologise if some people were offended when I compared disgusting with sticking your d***k up a bloke’s a*** and covering it with s**t.

Cassie of Sydney
March 31, 2023 6:38 am

Oh look, the pervert apologist is here…..the same pervert apologist who can’t condemn violence against Jews and women but condemns Latham’s stupid words. We shouldn’t be surprised by the pervert apologist’s priorities. After, he does like punching Nazis, punching Jews, punchs women.

F*ck off pervert apologist.

calli
calli
March 31, 2023 6:44 am

Denouncing is the name of the game. We must be forced to denounce, regardless of the “crime”.

Pauline should have told the hand wringers to ping off – she’d denounce Latham for his rejoinder when Greenwich denounced the trans troops sent off to disrupt a political meeting at a church hall (and for the subsequent damage to a crucifix).

It’s all so very Soviet.

Cassie of Sydney
March 31, 2023 6:45 am

Last night the Jew hating misogynistic pervert apologist wrote the following sanctimonious guff…

“Why am I unsurprised that there has not been a single voice on the Cat saying a word against Mark Latham today.

This, from the same pervert apologist who laughs at women being harassed, threatened, intimidated and physically attacked (as more than one was in the park in Auckland last Saturday).

Further to “words”, I’m still waiting for the pervert apologist to retract his description of Cardinal George Pell.

Cassie of Sydney
March 31, 2023 6:52 am

“It’s all so very Soviet.”

Indeed, and the more outrage, the more sanctimony, the more I support Latham.

And actually, his description is 100% correct about gay sex.

MatrixTransform
March 31, 2023 6:54 am

The furore over his comment shows why you lot

but, but
aren’t you the wanker that pointed out that nobody here had a thing to say against ??

the same wanker that’s outraged,
arms akimbo and indignant
gibbering about ‘extremists’ … who have nothing to say against?

the very same wanker that thinks a ‘war’ is fought with words?

adding to the furore indeed.

try not to trip over your dick mate

MatrixTransform
March 31, 2023 6:57 am

It’s all so very Soviet

mUnty
always the first to start clapping
and the last stop

calli
calli
March 31, 2023 7:07 am

Next step will be the public humiliations and struggle sessions.

Oh. That’s right. They’re here.

Pogria
Pogria
March 31, 2023 7:13 am

Doug Mulray has passed. 🙁
Eighties drive time legend.

Bruce of Newcastle
Bruce of Newcastle
March 31, 2023 7:14 am

Monty doesn’t like it that the two PHON members of the NSW Legislative Council will both be ex Labor Party escapees.

Perhaps the Labor Party has stopped representing their base too?

Cassie of Sydney
March 31, 2023 7:18 am

Further of “wokeness”, I went to hear Peter Boghossian a few weeks ago, just days before that very odd event in Melbourne when some strange Nazis mysteriously suddenly appeared of no where and were ushered through by police so they could stand next to women at the Let Women Speak rally, and duly performed the Nazi salute. It was a stage production, perfectly choreographed.

Boghossian IS an intellectual, who’s brain power makes the pervert apologist’s brain look as though it comes from a snail, and that’s unfair to snails, is warning that this country is about to be flooded by “wokeness”. I fear Boghossian is right. When I heard him speak two weeks ago, he’d just arrived and he was a tad optimistic about this country and how entrenched the icy woke winds are. Speaking at the State Library, his words were startling, he said that at talks he gives in libraries and universities across the USA, there has to be guards at the door otherwise far-left woke protesters will gatecrash and storm the events. He said…”unlike in the USA you don’t have guards at the doors”…….hmm, well, I suspect that’s about to change. Remember, Boghossian comes from Portland, an epicentre of wokeness. Last night he appeared on Sky and he isn’t so optimistic. I feel this cold woke wind too, hence my struggle to “get a grip”. I work in a woke workplace where only progressives speak their mind, others, such as myself, stay silent.

Given that we now have a Labor government, federally and in all mainland states, our trajectory will be similar to what’s happened to NZ over the last six years under Horse Face. The cold woke winds are here, I think we need to rug up.

Bruce of Newcastle
Bruce of Newcastle
March 31, 2023 7:21 am

As for trannies Monty we don’t particularly care what people do with themselves sexually so long as they don’t harm others. But we really don’t like obnoxious fascists, which is what the trans activist movement seems to’ve turned into overnight.

And trans activists are seriously persecuting women and Christians and are grooming children. Which is ironic since the other religion that does all that would throw a tranny off the nearest tall building if they caught one.

John
John
March 31, 2023 7:22 am

Pauline has now proved herself to be a PHONy.

MatrixTransform
March 31, 2023 7:23 am

Next step will be the public humiliations and struggle sessions

https://jonathanturley.org/2023/03/29/wtf-is-wrong-with-you-columbia-center-and-students-protest-meeting-with-justice-kavanaugh/

Columbia’s own Center for Engaged Pedagogy, simply declared “WTF is wrong with you.”

What is Engaged Pedagogy?
Engaged pedagogy transforms education into a collaborative, holistic practice of knowledge cultivation that redefines what teaching and learning can mean. At the CEP, we explore the possibilities of education as an active process through which students and faculty can experience mutual growth and empowerment and establish meaningful relationships between class material and their daily lives.

calli
calli
March 31, 2023 7:29 am

Demarkation dispute, Bruce.

On the pursed lips – we have a new iteration of wowser. Tolerate, celebrate on the orders of the rulers – but do not describe such things!

And as for the militarised tranny movement demonstrating and monstering opposition, how are they any different from the people of a certain town clamouring at Lot’s door long ago?

MatrixTransform
March 31, 2023 7:31 am

PHONy

Pauline just got Hegel’d
exactly the same way Pesutto did.

actually … they both Hegel’d themselves

dumbarses

Sancho Panzer
Sancho Panzer
March 31, 2023 7:31 am

Rabzsays:

March 30, 2023 at 8:01 pm

The only thing Latham is “guilty” of is stating the bleeding obvious.

If Pauline Hansen apologised, it’s only because she’s got that mincing queen Ashby in her office, and couldn’t stand the hissy fit.

will
will
March 31, 2023 7:31 am

welcome to Venezuela

The Oz:

The government’s signature climate change policy, the safeguard mechanism bill, has passed parliament.
Climate change and energy minister Chris Bowen thanked the Greens and independent senators David Pocock and Lidia Thorpe as well as Jacqui Lambie Network members Jacqui Lambie and Tammy Tyrrell for their contribution and approved changes which focus on jobs and how it will interact with Indigenous Australians.
It passed the lower house on Thursday after the amendments were approved.
89 ayes, 50 voted no.
The opposition’s climate change spokesperson Ted O’Brien called the bill a “carbon tax by stealth”.
Greens leader Adam Bandt pleaded with the opposition to support the bill in a bid to eradicate “the cause of climate change – oil and gas projects,” Mr Bandt said before the final vote.

calli
calli
March 31, 2023 7:33 am

Maybe Ashby makes her coffee. I wouldn’t risk it either.

Farmer Gez
Farmer Gez
March 31, 2023 7:35 am

Latham’s crude but it’s free speech…for now.
Watch the straighteners use the comment to try and control all speech.
Now that’s disgusting.

Anchor What
Anchor What
March 31, 2023 7:36 am

If Pauline doesn’t handle this carefully her party will lose a lot of NSW upper house votes next time around, since Latham is the main man.

Sancho Panzer
Sancho Panzer
March 31, 2023 7:40 am

rosiesays:

March 31, 2023 at 3:04 am

where is the evidence that covid vaccination is responsible for high rates of VAED?

rosiesays:

March 31, 2023 at 3:05 am

the Expose has the real facts

Being the 31st they can’t have much time left.

calli
calli
March 31, 2023 7:41 am

Latham’s crude

Quite so. He should have used precise medical terminology for body parts and waste products.

That would definitely have soothed frazzled sensibilities. 😀

Sancho Panzer
Sancho Panzer
March 31, 2023 7:42 am

Gasp!
The 31st March.
It starts tomorrow!
The dropping like flies from the vax thing.

Sancho Panzer
Sancho Panzer
March 31, 2023 7:44 am

Quite so. He should have used precise medical terminology for body parts and waste products.

Quite so.
He should have said “No pee-pee thing in poo-poo hole.”

will
will
March 31, 2023 7:54 am

The problem is the lunatics are now running the place:

The Oz again:

Energy and Climate Change Minister Chris Bowen has promised that household energy prices will not increase as a result of the recent passage of Labor’s signature climate policy.
Mr Bowen told Question Time that the electricity sector was covered by the safeguard mechanism, which he said would create jobs, protect the economy and the climate.
“Zero because the electricity sector is now covered by the safeguard mechanism,” Mr Bowen said.
“What the parliament has done today is safeguard our climate, safeguard our economy and safeguard our future,” Mr Bowen told the lower house.
“What the parliament has done today is put an end to 10 years of dysfunction and delay.
“What the parliament has done today is start the Australian industrial economy on the right that macro did decarbonisation and we can now get on with the job of reducing our emissions by 43 per cent.”

duncanm
duncanm
March 31, 2023 7:55 am

JCsays:
March 30, 2023 at 8:34 pm
Gilas

Motelier is still around on Twitter as “Motelier”. Nice dude .

https://twitter.com/The_Motelier ?

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
March 31, 2023 7:57 am

she’s got that mincing queen Ashby in her office

The homo advisor lobby has become rock solid over time, as it became fashionable for Ministers, Senators and the like to recruit and maintain decliners* in those roles. This fulfilled two roles – one, it put up the facade of inclusivity; and two, it served as a shield: ‘How DARE you accuse me of rah rah rah – why look, I have a poof as an adviser’.

Mr Nathan Winn became the sacrifical offering after some careless footage was leaked of said advisers rooting each other in Ministers’ offices – sound familiar? – and blowing loads over lady Ministers’ desks. However, in no way did Winn going under the bus solve anything.

The cohort of KY cowboy advisors has been a perfectly-coiffed Mean Girls outfit for years, sashaying their way through Canberra like a camp Magnificent Seven and clawing to shreds all who dared disagree with their worldview – that is, that rampant poofery should run unchecked through the remnants of this wide brown land.

They have grown immensely powerful over time, and have no doubt acquired all sorts of their alleged masters’ secrets. The result is Hanson’s statement yesterday afternoon, and it won’t be the last of its type.

*Vagina decliners.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
March 31, 2023 8:01 am

It starts tomorrow!

0 – 30 months! Red time!

Pack your iodine!

rosie
rosie
March 31, 2023 8:05 am

Working class was how he was raised.
I don’t pretend his rejoinder was witty, I’m guessing he was angry, a very common failing.
Throwing around
Homophobia!
Transphobia! is so weak.
There are many many practices within the promiscuous gay community that are disgusting, I don’t wish to discuss them. I had a friend who once had to enter a gay bath house for work purposes (out of business hours), enough said.
As for trans, as many more articulate people have pointed out its a collision between the ‘rights’ of men identifying as women and the rights of women.
You yourself have conceded they should not participate in women’s sports or enter female prisons.
That puts you on team TERF.

The video Matrix put up of testimony by Kelly now Scott should make all pause their praise of transitioning.
What it really is, is sad.
I’m pleased that the Catholic bishops in the US have stood against the tide and said no to the mutilation and destruction.

Crossie
Crossie
March 31, 2023 8:05 am

Viva says:
March 31, 2023 at 12:17 am
The great and the good prefer to celebrate the sanitised version of homosexuality, with visions of rainbows and fairy dust. Latham committed the cardinal sin of forcing them, if only for a moment, to contemplate the unsanitised version.

How dare he? Their fear must be that this may start the kids to discuss it on Instagram with the main description being “gross”.

calli
calli
March 31, 2023 8:07 am

That’s our Mote! I hope he lurks here too. I see Gab and Slayer are on his followers list. I’m not on Twitter so I can’t see who else is there.

Always enjoyed his comments on Old Cat.

duncanm
duncanm
March 31, 2023 8:07 am

m0nty says:
March 31, 2023 at 5:58 am
Society has progressed far enough to see open homophobia as disgusting.

pull the other one.

One doesn’t need to be homophobic to find homosexual sex disgusting. There are plenty of heterosexual kinks that I’m sure would turn up your nose.

One of your problems is you refuse to distinguish disgust but tolerate from hate.

The world is not binary (see what I did there).

Crossie
Crossie
March 31, 2023 8:11 am

MatrixTransform says:
March 31, 2023 at 7:31 am
PHONy
Pauline just got Hegel’d
exactly the same way Pesutto did.

I think she has been politically mortally wounded. This is what happens when you are disloyal to your members for the sake of being loyal to your staffer.

Wasn’t it Ben Down who did that song Pauline Pants Down? And yesterday she sided with him rather than Latham. Good work.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
March 31, 2023 8:12 am

There are plenty of heterosexual kinks that I’m sure would turn up your nose

Yes. A thousand times yes.

The level of Batmansuitphobia in this country, and in this day and age is shocking.

Pogria
Pogria
March 31, 2023 8:12 am

I just had a heart starter while perusing Michael Smith’s blog.

You seriously need to see this.

Only 30 seconds.

Bruce of Newcastle
Bruce of Newcastle
March 31, 2023 8:17 am

The war on cash continues.

EU Pushing the ‘Criminalisation’ of Physical Cash with New Anti-Money Laundering Law (30 Mar)

“Dr Gunnar Beck, a representative for the populist Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, has warned that the EU appears to be pushing for the “criminalisation” of the use of physical cash with its new anti-money laundering (AML) laws.

Politicians in Brussels have long been pondering an upper legal limit on the value of cash transactions within the bloc, with lawmakers detailing plans to ban Europeans from spending over €10,000 in physical tender as part of a single transaction.

The European Parliament however has now voted for such a proposed limit to be dropped down to as little as €7,000 as part of efforts to clamp down on money laundering and tax dodging within the bloc, with officials also voting to see cryptocurrency transactions paying for goods and services that are valued over €1,000 to be banned.”

And crypto, which figures. Elites and governments don’t want you to escape from their control.

The cash thing though is funny, since the shady transactions they’re supposedly trying to stop are just going to increase, because if people are already dodging tax etc then they certainly aren’t going to obey a €7,000 limit. And the more angry people get the more they’ll lose any inhibitions from disobeying governments.

Crossie
Crossie
March 31, 2023 8:18 am

Pogria says:
March 31, 2023 at 8:12 am
I just had a heart starter while perusing Michael Smith’s blog.

You seriously need to see this.

Only 30 seconds.

It wouldn’t play for me. What is it about?

Sancho Panzer
Sancho Panzer
March 31, 2023 8:22 am

On Pauline Hansen.
The truth is, she is as big a grifter as anyone in Canbra, and will do what it takes to keep her place at the trough.
The only difference between her and Bandt is that they play to different sections of the low-info peanut gallery.
She would also be uncomfortable with the profile Latham has, and needs to bring him down a peg or two.

Crossie
Crossie
March 31, 2023 8:22 am

“Dr Gunnar Beck, a representative for the populist Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, has warned that the EU appears to be pushing for the “criminalisation” of the use of physical cash with its new anti-money laundering (AML) laws.

Stopping or preventing the actual crimes is just too hard. It’s so much simpler to suspect and then punish everyone.

Crossie
Crossie
March 31, 2023 8:25 am

It’s a bit nippy this morning. I suppose by next week I will need heating. Why is it that in Australia there are just two weeks between summer and winter when elsewhere in the world they get a proper season?

Cassie of Sydney
March 31, 2023 8:26 am

I’ve heard gay men say revolting things about female genitalia, particularly our vaginas. They’re hypocrites.

In terms of biology and evolution, a vagina is designed for an erect penis, an anus is not. An anus is designed to expel bodily waste.

Mother Lode
Mother Lode
March 31, 2023 8:27 am

Latham’s characterisation is irrefutable. Everybody knows the truth of it. His only offence is that he said out loud something everyone knows but out of delicacy does not say in polite company.

Same way everyone goes to the toilet, but they don’t talk about it.

But since Latham was responding to being accused of being a disgusting human being hitting back in kind makes sense.

Only issue I have really is that there are a lot of blameless gay people out there who were tarred with the same brush. Some of them might be gay conservatives and even PHON supporters. Anyone who already hated PHON or Latham already will just have had their attitude confirmed. But, again, even gay people who understand the provocation should understand the response – to lob the accusation of being disgusting back at the person who served it.

But it is not homophobia – he was directing it at one person specifically in response to a single event.

Besides, why should we call it ‘phobia’ when Latham says Greenwich’s proclivity toward a certain sexual act is distasteful, but not a ‘phobia’ when Greenwich says that Latham holding certain beliefs is distasteful. And this was after Latham denounced violence at the Church, so it was not the violence at issue.

The only reason I can see for Latham to apologise for the tweet is that it is distasteful to lump all gay people in with Alex Greenwich.

Boambee John
Boambee John
March 31, 2023 8:28 am

LOL. m0nty=fa acting all upset about Latham describing the mechanics of anal sex.

Depending very much on the luck of the educational lottery, his kids might already have been given a more detailed description of said mechanics by a “woke” teacher, before being taken to Drag Queen Story Hour at the local library.

Mother Lode
Mother Lode
March 31, 2023 8:30 am

Monty does not see why anyone would hold up pooh-jabbing as offensive.

But then his mental furniture is dough-mixers and fryers and such, and his only conception of the matters described is inserting a sugar-cinnamon churro through a chocolate-glazed donut.

What kind of sick freaks could have a problem with that.

Sancho Panzer
Sancho Panzer
March 31, 2023 8:32 am

Knuckle Draggersays:

March 31, 2023 at 8:01 am

It starts tomorrow!

0 – 30 months! Red time!

Pack your iodine!

I can feel the Nano-Wrigglers stirring already.
Jumping in their little self-assembled Jeeps and calling each other up on their little self-assembled CB radios.
And iodine won’t help you here.
It’s only good for dabbing on hurty bits after rough bottom sex.
Or so I’m told.

Real Deal
Real Deal
March 31, 2023 8:33 am

Wasn’t it Ben Down who did that song Pauline Pants Down? And yesterday she sided with him rather than Latham. Good work.

It was the gay lawyer Simon Hunt who had the drag character Pauline Pantsdown. He “performed” (if you call it that) his act at a Big Day Out music festival years ago. He was roundly booed and had cans chucked at him. Not because of homophobia but because he was rubbish and the punters knew it.

Sancho Panzer
Sancho Panzer
March 31, 2023 8:34 am

Cassie of Sydneysays:

March 31, 2023 at 8:26 am

I’ve heard gay men say revolting things about female genitalia, particularly our vaginas. They’re hypocrites.

Calling Peter Slipper and James Ashby to reception, please.

Sancho Panzer
Sancho Panzer
March 31, 2023 8:36 am

Wasn’t it Ben Down who did that song Pauline Pants Down? 

There is Bob Downe.
And also Ben Dover and Phillip McCrevass.
But no Ben Down as far as I’m aware.

Sancho Panzer
Sancho Panzer
March 31, 2023 8:38 am

Dividends from BHP, Wesfarmers, Coles and CBA dropped in the last couple of days.
Massive!
Yuuuuge!
Party time!

Frank
Frank
March 31, 2023 8:39 am

Next step will be the public humiliations and struggle sessions.

Next step, mobilise the students. Oh… wait.

rosie
rosie
March 31, 2023 8:40 am

Break out the piazza!

Mother Lode
Mother Lode
March 31, 2023 8:43 am

But it is not homophobia – he was directing it at one person specifically in response to a single event.

This should probably be clarified.

If Latham said this to Greenwich as one of many expressions of contempt for gays then it would be consistent with homophobia.

But he has not made a habit of this. This is one specific, reflexive eruption.

Crossie
Crossie
March 31, 2023 8:45 am

Sancho Panzer says:
March 31, 2023 at 8:36 am
Wasn’t it Ben Down who did that song Pauline Pants Down?
There is Bob Downe.
And also Ben Dover and Phillip McCrevass.
But no Ben Down as far as I’m aware.

Sorry, I didn’t google before writing my comment. Thank you and Real Deal for sorting it my faulty memory. The my point still stands that Pauline just threw her own party leader in NSW under the bus in order to defend people who have nothing but contempt for her.

Johnny Rotten
March 31, 2023 8:45 am

An Australian, a Frenchman, a beautiful blonde, and a comely brunette are sharing a compartment on a train as it winds its way through the Alps. Every now and then the train passes through a tunnel. As the compartment is plunged into complete darkness yet again a ringing slap is heard. The train passes back into daylight and the Frenchman is rubbing his sore, red cheek. The brunette thinks ‘I bet that dirty Frenchman fondled the blonde and she struck the pervert’. The blonde thinks ‘I bet that filthy Frenchman was looking to grope me in the dark, mistook the dowdy brunette for me and she slapped the beast’. The Frenchman thinks ‘I bet that perfidious Australian touched up the blonde in the dark and she slapped me by mistake’. The Australian thinks ‘I can’t wait for another tunnel so I can slap that French f@ckwit again’.

custard
custard
March 31, 2023 8:45 am

Trump indicted.

Pogria
Pogria
March 31, 2023 8:45 am

Crossie, go to Michael Smith News and see if it works for you there.

lotocoti
lotocoti
March 31, 2023 8:45 am

Commies are Grampian nasties too.
Who’s the counter-revolutionary deviationist bourgeoisie lickspittle now, mØnty?

GreyRanga
GreyRanga
March 31, 2023 8:46 am

Ben Downe and Phil Mc Cracken. Perfect Poo Jammers. Micheal Fitzpatrick and Patrick Fitzmicheal are another two.

Johnny Rotten
March 31, 2023 8:46 am

There is only one difference between a madman and me. The madman thinks he is sane. I know I am mad.

– Salvador Dali

Eyrie
Eyrie
March 31, 2023 8:47 am

Which is ironic since the other religion that does all that would throw a tranny off the nearest tall building if they caught one.
Trannies would be wise to retreat to a low profile. Same with gays.

Crossie
Crossie
March 31, 2023 8:47 am

I believe Pauline disavowed Latham in order to keep her gig at Sky. What good will it do her when most of the views will now disregard her?

rosie
rosie
March 31, 2023 8:47 am

Oh and a suggestion.
If the Hindu community want a Hindu school maybe they could buy and build their own.

rosie
rosie
March 31, 2023 8:49 am

Victoria is broke, public service to be slashed, infrastructure spending slashed.
What do we need?
More migrants!

Crossie
Crossie
March 31, 2023 8:49 am

All Pauline has to do now is turn her back on her party membership and she will get her own show on Sky like Cory Bernardi.

Indolent
Indolent
March 31, 2023 8:49 am

The New York Times is reporting that the Grand Jury has voted to indict Donald Trump. Paywalled.

Johnny Rotten
March 31, 2023 8:50 am

Mother Lodesays:
March 31, 2023 at 8:30 am
Monty does not see why anyone would hold up pooh-jabbing as offensive.

MontyPox Virus, please take note.

Mother Nature designed the Human bum for EXPORT and not IMPORT.

shatterzzz
March 31, 2023 8:52 am

It’s a bit nippy this morning. I suppose by next week I will need heating. Why is it that in Australia there are just two weeks between summer and winter when elsewhere in the world they get a proper season?

Yep, quite chill-ish out here in Fairfield, NSW this morning .. WINTER is coming ..!

GreyRanga
GreyRanga
March 31, 2023 8:54 am

A phobia is an irrational fear of something. I’m not homophobic, I find them generally irrational and disgusting. I really don’t want to have anything to do with them, but I’m certainly not afraid of them.

Bruce of Newcastle
Bruce of Newcastle
March 31, 2023 8:55 am

Trump indicted.

Here you go, Newsmax has just put the story up.

Trump Indicted in New York, a First for a US Ex-president (30 Mar)

Donald Trump has been indicted by a Manhattan grand jury after a probe into hush money paid to porn star Stormy Daniels, becoming the first former U.S. president to face criminal charges even as he makes another run for the White House, the New York Times reported on Thursday.

The charges, arising from an investigation led by Democratic Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, could reshape the 2024 presidential race. Trump previously said he would continue campaigning for the Republican Party’s nomination if charged with a crime.

Laughable that they have done this over Stormy, especially when Trump won damages against her in a civil suit when she breached the NDA her paid her for. Not even Mueller attempted to touch this one.

m0nty
m0nty
March 31, 2023 8:56 am

The New York Times is reporting that the Grand Jury has voted to indict Donald Trump. Paywalled.

Lock him up! Lock him up! Lock him up!

Pogria
Pogria
March 31, 2023 8:57 am

Via Ace,

Grand Jury Votes to Indict Donald Trump in New York: Live Updates

Mr. Trump will be the first former president to face criminal charges. The precise charges are not yet known, but the case is focused on a hush-money payment to a porn star during his 2016 campaign.

The unprecedented case against Trump will have wide-ranging implications.

A Manhattan grand jury voted to indict Donald J. Trump on Thursday for his role in paying hush money to a porn star, according to five people with knowledge of the matter, a historic development that will shake up the 2024 presidential race and forever mark him as the nation’s first former president to face criminal charges.

An indictment will likely be announced in the coming days. By then, prosecutors working for the district attorney, Alvin L. Bragg, will have asked Mr. Trump to surrender and to face arraignment on charges that remain unknown for now.

Here’s what else you need to know:

Mr. Bragg and his lawyers will likely attempt to negotiate Mr. Trump’s surrender. If he agrees, it will raise the prospect of a former president, with the Secret Service in tow, being photographed and fingerprinted in the bowels of a New York State courthouse.

The prosecution’s star witness is Michael D. Cohen, Mr. Trump’s former fixer who paid the $130,000 to keep Ms. Daniels quiet. Mr. Cohen has said that Mr. Trump directed him to buy Ms. Daniels’s silence, and that Mr. Trump and his family business, the Trump Organization, helped cover the whole thing up. The company’s internal records falsely identified the reimbursements as legal expenses, which helped conceal the purpose of the payments.

Although the specific charges remain unknown, Mr. Bragg’s prosecutors have zeroed in on that hush money payment and the false records created by Mr. Trump’s company. A conviction is not a sure thing: An attempt to combine a charge relating to the false records with an election violation relating to the payment to Ms. Daniels would be based on a legal theory that has yet to be evaluated by judges, raising the possibility that a court could throw out or limit the charges.

The vote to indict, the product of a nearly five-year investigation, kicks off a new and volatile phase in Mr. Trump’s post-presidential life as he makes a third run for the White House. And it could throw the race for the Republican nomination — which he leads in most polls — into uncharted territory.

Mr. Bragg is the first prosecutor to lead an indictment of Mr. Trump. He is now likely to become a national figure enduring a harsh political spotlight.

lotocoti
lotocoti
March 31, 2023 8:57 am

George Alexopoulos’ Trump.

m0nty
m0nty
March 31, 2023 8:58 am

A reminder that Trump’s bagman Michael Cohen was sentenced to three years in gaol for this crime.

GreyRanga
GreyRanga
March 31, 2023 8:58 am

Trump indicted? Will this trigger the Second American Civil War and the dissolution of the Union? I don’t think the Rat States would survive.

rosie
rosie
March 31, 2023 8:58 am
rosie
rosie
March 31, 2023 8:59 am

At least Trump has the financial resources to fight trumped up charges.

Indolent
Indolent
March 31, 2023 9:00 am
Pogria
Pogria
March 31, 2023 9:01 am

Sorry Bruce, or snap!

GreyRanga
GreyRanga
March 31, 2023 9:01 am

‘Lock him up’ is only one step from ‘Kill all munties’. It does have a certain ring to it.

Sancho Panzer
Sancho Panzer
March 31, 2023 9:01 am

rosiesays:

March 31, 2023 at 8:49 am

Victoria is broke, public service to be slashed, infrastructure spending slashed.

Conveniently, Dan Xi Man is off on a visit to HQ in China when the announcement of 10% job cuts was dropped.
Oh, and wasn’t he the one who ran on “Who is Matthew Guy? He’s the Liberals cuts guy.”?

Crossie
Crossie
March 31, 2023 9:03 am

Ooh boy, they really are scared enough of Trump to do this. Now I will not be surprised if they get a transgender to gun him down a la RFK.

m0nty
m0nty
March 31, 2023 9:03 am

Somewhere, Hillary Clinton is laughing her arse off.

m0nty
m0nty
March 31, 2023 9:05 am

Will this trigger the Second American Civil War and the dissolution of the Union?

Maybe, if they hang him in Times Square. That would be going too far. Anything below that would be fine.

Frank
Frank
March 31, 2023 9:08 am

Incoming… hyper-manic crowing from the fatman for the next few days as he dances a wobbly little victory jig.

Indolent
Indolent
March 31, 2023 9:08 am
Sancho Panzer
Sancho Panzer
March 31, 2023 9:08 am

Indolentsays:

March 31, 2023 at 9:00 am

This is not normal – or at least it wasn’t.

Mama June’s Daughter Anna “Chickadee” Cardwell Diagnosed With Stage 4 Cancer at 28

Once again, you read the full article and some awkward facts emerge.
That particular type of cancer is rare but affects children and young middle-aged adults (30’s to 50’s), so she was right in the zone.
Moron.

Sancho Panzer
Sancho Panzer
March 31, 2023 9:09 am

m0ntysays:

March 31, 2023 at 9:03 am

Somewhere, Hillary Clinton is laughing her arse off.

And that’s no mean feat.

2dogs
2dogs
March 31, 2023 9:10 am

An attempt to combine a charge relating to the false records with an election violation relating to the payment to Ms. Daniels would be based on a legal theory that has yet to be evaluated by judges

If Trump is convicted, this novel legal theory will get appealed all the way to the supreme court, where it will get overturned.

OldOzzie
OldOzzie
March 31, 2023 9:10 am

How Much Longer Can Western Governments Spit on Their People?

Labor strikes and fiery riots dominate French news after King Macron’s imperial decision to raise the nation’s retirement age without any vote from parliament. In reaction to spiraling inflation, German transportation workers shut down the country on Monday in one of the largest European walkouts in decades. In the Netherlands, a new anti-globalist, pro-farmer political party fighting back against the World Economic Forum’s climate change–obsessed “Great Reset” agenda just dominated Dutch elections. In “defiance of establishment elites,” Italians chose Giorgia Meloni to free the nation from subjugation to Brussels and “defend God, country, and family.” And as left-wing protesters in Israel threaten civil war, Prime Minister Netanyahu has been forced to temporarily suspend his efforts to reform the nation’s powerful Judiciary, which operates largely free from competing checks and balances. Clearly, revolution is in the air.

If you thought incendiary political turmoil threatened to combust only in the United States these days, then you have missed the growing protest movements throughout the collective West.

From belated pushback against government COVID tyranny in New Zealand and Australia to percolating hostility across the European continent stemming from the ruling class’s “Build Back Better” pipe dreams, State-sanctioned illegal immigration, and costly “green” energy–induced inflation, there is a powder keg of popular resentment against governing authorities just one spark away from a history-altering explosion.

If one were to diagnose the source of this amalgamating revolutionary fervor as succinctly as possible, two words come to mind: government haughtiness.

Western governments today have committed themselves to expanding centralized authority and global institutions, while dismissing individual nations’ concerns and the public’s cries to have their wants and needs be heard. Rather than recalling the lessons from two disastrous world wars that demonstrated, among other things, the dangerous consequences of glorifying empire at the expense of respecting personal freedoms, Western nations are galloping once again toward a renewed era of popular confrontation and rebellion.

Far from the delusions of dreamy internationalists and Big Government disciples who believe that “good intentions” and devotion to “public service” will generate policy decisions that cultivate “progress” for the “greater good,” government agents will always act to protect and expand their own powers without regard for the deleterious effects those actions might have upon the people.

Only when the risks of public blame and accountability outweigh the attraction of new power will government agents temper what otherwise is their constant pursuit of stealing liberties from the people for personal gain. Government bullies use fear to expand

Perhaps most dangerous for Western stability is governments’ absolute refusal to accept any accountability.

– Ordinary citizens did not empower central banks to print money and manipulate markets, so as to create a ticking financial time bomb that will almost certainly unleash the world’s worst economic depression — governments did.

– Ordinary citizens did not spend taxpayer funds on biological weapons programs that may or may not have led to the release of COVID from a Chinese lab — governments did.

– Ordinary citizens did not choose to throw out common sense, the Scientific Method, and an elementary school–level understanding of medical ethics to impose draconian lockdowns, mass surveillance, and coerced experimental injections on a global scale before either the pathogenic disease or its reputed “vaccine” could be properly studied — governments did.

– Ordinary citizens did not choose to have their businesses shut down and livelihoods destroyed — governments did.

– Ordinary citizens did not choose to eviscerate Western economies in the name of “science” — governments did.

– Ordinary citizens did not choose the largest welfare and stimulus programs in world history, nor the unprecedented levels of inflation that were the obvious consequence — governments did.

– And ordinary citizens have certainly not chosen to have the World Economic Forum’s Western acolytes scoop up farmland, ban hydrocarbon mining, and impose strict carbon limits that have logically unleashed runaway food and fuel prices, economic insecurity, and depleted savings — that self-defeating strategy was the brainchild of Klaus Schwab and his merry band of WEF arsonists.

Yet from COVID to currency collapse, Western powers insist on escaping blame.

Indolent
Indolent
March 31, 2023 9:11 am
Bruce of Newcastle
Bruce of Newcastle
March 31, 2023 9:13 am

A reminder that Trump’s bagman Michael Cohen was sentenced to three years in gaol for this crime.

By a Clinton judge sitting in New York. And only after they got him to plea deal and plead guilty. Yeah sure Monty, nothing at all suss about that.

I think it’s ironic that a Clinton judge should do such a thing when Bill Clinton could easily been jailed for 10 years for sexual assault of Monica.

m0nty
m0nty
March 31, 2023 9:14 am

If Trump is convicted, this novel legal theory will get appealed all the way to the supreme court, where it will get overturned.

Corruption at its highest level.

We haven’t seen the charges yet, so it’s a bit early… oh wait, it’s SCOTUS, the law doesn’t actually matter.

OldOzzie
OldOzzie
March 31, 2023 9:14 am

Bearded man smashes women’s lifting record

A pro weightlifter entered a women’s competition in Canada and broke a record held by a transgender lifter, all while sporting a beard.

OldOzzie
OldOzzie
March 31, 2023 9:15 am

Global superpowers unite against US

Chaos as Brazil, China ditch US dollar

Brazil and China have agreed to bypass the US dollar when paying for trade goods – here’s why it’s a massive deal.

2dogs
2dogs
March 31, 2023 9:17 am

I imagine Trump’s defence in this case will consist of his accountant simply saying that he (the accountant) made a mistake.

“It was a payment to lawyer so I just assumed it was legal expenses. I didn’t think I needed to ask any more questions.”

OldOzzie
OldOzzie
March 31, 2023 9:20 am

Editorials

If only Deb Haaland’s blank stares could power vehicles

by Washington Examiner

Where do electric vehicle batteries come from? Interior Secretary Deb Haaland seems to think maybe they come from the Rare Earth Fairy.

This was the takeaway from her wide-eyed and persistently clueless testimony in late March before the appropriations subcommittee on the interior and the environment. Under questioning from Rep. Ryan Zinke (R-MT), himself a former interior secretary, Haaland repeatedly gave the impression that she knows nothing about the department she heads or the ramifications of the policies she is pushing through it. Her repeated blank stares and hesitant, sheepish answers suggested she was only for the first time hearing crucial facts related to the nation’s natural resources.

“Are you aware that China controls, by proxy production, the supply chain of critical minerals that are critical to both the [electric vehicle] world and defense?” asked Zinke. “Are you aware, by multiple studies, that in order to satisfy the present requirements of [electric vehicles] and critical minerals to defense, it would take an increase of 2,000% of mining for 20 years?”

Again and again, Haaland thanked Zinke for sharing his information as if she had never heard it before.

But these were more than fun facts. The Biden administration gives a great deal of lip service to energy independence and simultaneously makes policies aimed at a so-called clean energy transition. But the two are not compatible. The latter involves pushing everyone toward using windmills, solar panels, and electric vehicles, among other things. Yet at the same time, under Haaland, the Interior Department has been blocking domestic mining projects, without which any clean energy transition is just a fairy tale.

We noted previously, concerning California’s folly of pursuing electric-only vehicle sales by 2035, that “it is wishful thinking to believe that California,” and most other states for that matter, “will be able to produce enough electricity by 2035 to charge all the cars it is trying to force its residents to buy.” But as we pointed out, this isn’t even the biggest problem. A study by Scientific American found that even if the world’s production of lithium were to triple overnight, it would only provide enough of that metal to maintain, not even to build but just to maintain, the batteries of an all-electric American vehicle fleet. Keep in mind that this would be to the exclusion of the entire rest of the world, which presumably would want some of that lithium.

And it isn’t just lithium, either. Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY) pointed to a World Bank study that shows demand for the metals involved in electric vehicles alone — copper, nickel, cobalt, and a host of others — would rise so rapidly that it is hard to imagine ever meeting demand. For example, the world would have to produce in the next 25 years the same amount of copper as it has in the last five millennia.

In short, a green energy future is probably impossible under the best circumstances. And unfortunately, the circumstances are far from the best.

The first obstacle is the Biden administration itself. Haaland, as Zinke pointed out, has recently blocked off mining in northern Minnesota’s Duluth Complex, one of the world’s largest undeveloped mineral deposits.

Given the scarcity of domestic lithium mining — there is only one lithium mine in the entire country — a pro-electric vehicle policy only increases U.S. dependency on China and decreases its energy independence.

That might be inconvenient under normal circumstances, but senior members of the Biden administration believe the United States might find itself at war with China very soon. And in the nearer term, China is already aiding Russia’s war against Ukraine, which could soon force President Joe Biden to impose economic sanctions. Where will Biden’s electric vehicle materials come from once that happens?

Is Haaland up to the task of figuring this out? Given her clueless and hesitant responses, one must ask: Is Haaland ignorant of the Biden administration’s mining policy, its energy policy, its defense policy, or (most likely) all of the above?

One could say Biden’s left hand doesn’t know what his right hand is doing. But more likely, this is a reflection of the true nature and goals of the modern environmentalist movement.

This isn’t about saving the planet. It’s about destroying capitalism and lowering human living standards.

OldOzzie
OldOzzie
March 31, 2023 9:21 am
m0nty
m0nty
March 31, 2023 9:21 am

I imagine Trump’s defence in this case will consist of his accountant simply saying that he (the accountant) made a mistake.

“It was a payment to lawyer so I just assumed it was legal expenses. I didn’t think I needed to ask any more questions.”

Right, so frame the bagman. Nice.

There must be a trail of evidence proving that Trump knew, otherwise the indictment wouldn’t have been an issue.

calli
calli
March 31, 2023 9:21 am

A Day Of Visibility? I thought trans people made themselves highly visible in Nashville a week ago.

Perhaps they might like to stop now.

2dogs
2dogs
March 31, 2023 9:23 am

We haven’t seen the charges yet

You appear to be a bit out of the loop. The details of what could be charged has been extensively discussed.

I was referring to the legal gymnastics involved in trying to attach campaign disclosure felony to the falsified records misdemeanour – if that is what the intended charge will be.

Bruce of Newcastle
Bruce of Newcastle
March 31, 2023 9:24 am

Right, so frame the bagman. Nice.

Who? Alvin Bragg?

He’s not looking too good over this. I wonder if the Dems have something on him? They usually do, it’s that kind of party.

m0nty
m0nty
March 31, 2023 9:26 am

You appear to be a bit out of the loop. The details of what could be charged has been extensively discussed.

Sure, but what they leave in or out of the actual charge sheet is yet to surface. These things can be changeable until the last minute.

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