Chris Uhlmann in the Daily Telegraph, following on from his Sky News Doco:
Energy illiterate politicians have built a green power disaster; Leading journalist Chris Uhlmann explains how our political leaders are delivering a breathtakingly expensive and unreliable energy grid that will make Australia poorer and weaker.
I’m fond of saying we are governed by idiots and ideologues. There should be more journalists saying what Chris is saying. The idiot pollies only get away with it through the complicity of their media mates.
The greatest scandal is the coverup. The greatest failure is that many people no longer see participation in politics as a pursuit in holding politicians to account, rather an opportunity to join the gravy train.
Chris is becoming the example of what role the media is supposed to play – factual reporting holding the government to account – being the watchdog not the lapdog.
vr
December 5, 2024 6:07 am
One of the best things you are likely to read today. Via The Daily Mail
Like the ABC, The Age actually represents the Greens. It’s always happy to take a swipe at the dog on which the Green fleas ride.
Bungonia bee
December 5, 2024 6:28 am
It’s amazing how journalists emerge from years of not finding much wrong with the awful Obama and then the Biden/Harris years to suddenly engage in paroxysm of hate for Trump’s appointees. Try Sam Clench’s latest, which heads today’s News lineup.
They all thought (to use the word loosely) that the shaved head cross dresser who spent more time stealing suitcases from women at airports than he did doing his job was soooo transgressive!
132andBush
December 5, 2024 6:31 am
I watched this Piers Morgan episode the other day where he and a guest (John Morgan, Dem mega-donor) agreed furiously that they both would do anything for their children, as Biden has. Up to and including “probably not” turning your child in if you knew they had committed a murder (13:30 mark)!
Call me old fashioned but any child of mine who I knew had/was committing a serious crime would be facing the full force of the law.
Not to do so would be further failing said child.
Very easy to see the different morals some people have in this clip, notably from a Dem donor.
BTW, the Biden pardon is not a pardon, it’s an admission.
Exactly this. I read some utter nonsense Australian novel recently for my sins where the mother lied for her son to escape justice for killing a pedestrian when driving drunk.
Chucked the book away in disgust. People read this crap and think that morals and values, let alone the law, don’t apply to them.
Biden’s pardon is to save his own and Jill’s a*ss. No doubt Hunter knew the Big Guy was showering with his teen daughter.
Bungonia Bee
December 5, 2024 6:48 am
Frogs Boiled!
French Government Falls.
The rightward march of European politics will continue. Left media will be in tears, always finding that only the right can be “extreme”. I won’t bother to listen to the latest BBC Hard Talk since it’s utterly predictable that it will try to savage “extreme” AfD person.
When did “populism” become a right wing phenomenon? Shirley it is (or should be) something praised by the left?
Its use as criticism by leftards suggests the reality of the Great Reversal, under which parties of the nominal left now support soft handed elites and oligarchs, while conservatives now support the working class?
French Prime Minister Michel Barnier has lost a vote of no confidence in Paris’ National Assembly, meaning the collapse of Emmanuel Macron’s government.
A total of 331 MPs voted for the motion. Only 288 votes were required. Overall, 574 MPs voted.
Mr Barnier, who leads a minority government, came under fire on Monday after he used special powers to push through a social security budget bill without MPs voting on it.
Both the far-left France Unbowed (LFI) and the far-right National Rally (RN) said they would support the no-confidence motion, despite being at the opposite sides of the political spectrum.
President Macron now has to try and form a new government as Paris’s political crisis continues.
A French government has not been toppled by a no-confidence vote since 1962.
Given how Barnier, who is Micron’s guy, stiffed the MPs by ramming his budget through via an undemocratic wheeze, I can’t see another government surviving a confidence vote.
A loathsome eurocreep who thoroughly deserves this. There had to get that off my chest.
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
December 5, 2024 7:15 am
Mossel Bay
Mossel Bay is the first port of call after joining our cruise following three days of recuperation (for me) in a flash Capetown hotel. We’ve headed around the Cape now and are travelling up the African east coast bound for the Arabian Sea and Dubai in three weeks time and did Mossel Bay yesterday. The origins of this town date to the explorations of the Portuguese explorer Bartholomeu Dias in 1488. It is one of South Africa’s oldest settlement sites, in the Garden Route of the Western Cape Province, set in a pretty blue bay. The earliest human people here may have actually evolved in situ, rivalling Olduvai, for a million years of hominid settlement has occurred due to the coastal bounty. A tourist feature is the Post Office Tree site, where sailors heading for the spice Indies would put letters into an old boot under the tree, letters which returning ships would pick up to take back to Europe from this furthest reach of Western civilization. It still feels like that, a small out-of-its time coastal town, where we take an hour-long bus ride to visit a private game park. We traverse some verdant countryside with dairy herds of Guernsey cows and I say to Hairy that this is rich peasant land now going slightly wild. Deliberately so, I suspect, as with climate craziness in Australia, which is rampant here too.
The game reserve is a genuine wildlife sanctuary covering many miles where native animals are able to roam free and live without being fed; some lions, but no cheetah or leopard, keep the population levels of impala, wildebeest and the many other cognate ungulant species under control, though I suspect they also have to cull. The park also shelters zebra, giraffe, hippo, huge buffalo, and elephant, all of which we saw in their natural habitat, including a cute week-old zebra colt and an hours-old wildebeest calf. Those calves can walk within half an hour of birth and now that one is fully capable of keeping up with the herd, though they keep him in the middle, says our guide, whom we were fortunate enough to have to ourselves.
I was late out of the toilet at the main reception area and restaurant and the nine-seater tiered land rover vehicle was full, so a sudden decision was made to take out another one for just me and Hairy, with a more senior Africaan’s guide – a young white bloke in his thirties yanked in at the last minute. Good to get his comprehensible English and none of the invented information favoured by local guides. The pride of the reserve is a number of rhino, protected from poachers. During our two and a half hour drive over bumpy terrain tracks we were very privileged to view rhino very close up – especially a magnificent territorial male, with two horns, the main one over three feet long. There was also a mother and calf rhino. Surgically removing their horns to protect them from poachers is cruel, says our guide, because rhino use their horns in daily living and territorial display.
This man turned out to be a treasure, very knowledgeable about animals and habitat. We noted some gum trees and Hairy said get rid of them before they take over. Our man agreed, saying they were slowly removing them, as they leached the watercourses. They also had a problem with introduced Australian black wattle which bled tannin into the streams. He was especially interesting as he told us about how elephants grieve and mourn their dead, returning to the site of a matriarch’s death with regularity to console each other.
As it was just us two, the guide was very willing to talk about the reserve and its place in South Africa, where tourism is the dominant export industry and a major source of local employment. We employ over 250 people here, he says, far more than we need, but governments compel us to be less profitable to keep employment up. Hairy’s face at this news is a picture of disapproval. Unemployment in the socialist paradise of South Africa is now running at 52% and underemployment is also rampant. Shanty towns litter all of the roadsides in towns and cities where large acreages of shanties also exist. Our talk turns to electricity, for the reserve runs off solar panels and night-time diesel generators. Don’t get me started, says our man, for we export our good coal to Mozambique but we aren’t allowed to use it for ourselves. Sounds familiar, we say to him, telling him of our similar situation in Australia.
I get bold. Actually, we are very strong supporters of President Trump and hope that things soon will start to change re the global warming scams, I say. We don’t see much science behind it all, I add. Yes, says our guide, we are all hoping for a change in this nonsense now. I am a Trump supporter myself, he adds, a committed environmentalist but sick of the way South Africa has been captured to such sectional interests and the corruption that this has entailed.
Lizzie you making me homesick…what do you call thes animals when there are more than one.
Was that a murder of crows or a convocation of eagles?
How many times do you think about what to call a large number of creatures gathered in one place? When was the last time you saw a pod of pelicans or a bale of turtles? Have you stumbled upon a generation of vipers or a congregation of crocodiles recently?
A gathering of zebra is called a zeal while woodpeckers form descents, warthogs join up in droves or sounders, and many finches form a charm. A troubling of goldfish is perhaps less worrying than a cloud of grasshoppers or a plague of locusts. A romp of otters might not seem threatening at first until you notice a confusion of guineafowl has vanished.
Never try to outrun a coalition of cheetah and make every effort to avoid bloats of hippo, leaps of leopards and prides of lions. A crash of rhino, an armory of aardvarks, and a deceit of lapwings I leave as mysteries for you to use this book until they become a clear as a flush of ducks or an array of hedgehogs.
When next you see a journey of giraffe, a rank of impala, an obstinacy of buffalo, or a cluster of rhebok call them exactly that!
This is from awonderful book that we were introduced to that causes endless debates on game drives. It was collated from old journals of what exploreres and hunters referred to the game and wrote down.
” … a more senior Africaan’s guide – a young white bloke in his thirties yanked in at the last minute. Good to get his comprehensible English and none of the invented information favoured by local guides.” A mate of mine (only a bit younger, originally english too) used to be a safari guide in Africa, and married a European lady who worked there. Later they moved to Australia. Unfortunately the missus is now in poor health but he is looking after her.
Bruce of Newcastle
December 5, 2024 7:47 am
MPs really hate it when prezzes try to bypass them.
South Korean lawmakers submitted a bill on Wednesday to impeach President Yoon Suk Yeol after he declared martial law before reversing the move hours later, triggering a political crisis in Asia’s fourth-largest economy, a major U.S. ally.
The surprise declaration of martial law late on Tuesday caused a standoff with parliament, which rejected his attempt to ban political activity and censor the media, as armed troops forced their way into the National Assembly building in Seoul. …
The military said activities by parliament and political parties would be banned, and that media and publishers would be under the control of the martial law command.
But lawmakers defied the security cordon and within hours of the declaration, South Korea’s parliament, with 190 of its 300 members present, unanimously passed a motion for martial law be lifted, with 18 members of Yoon’s party present.
His own guys voted to overturn the martial law declaration. That does not bode well for the impeachment vote, which is due tomorrow or Saturday.
Seems to be fault on both sides but my memory of SK Politics has been since I was a child always robust.
Too bad the president can just dissolve the parliament and call for elections. They can remove him but looking at raw numbers unlikely, Pres party has 108 & another conservative party 3 making 111. To move for impeachment they need majority national congress of 300 (Which they’ve done) and need two thirds to remove.
Assuming his party support him he would be safe. However another 4 years still before the next election which will be chaos.
BREAKING: Speaker Johnson rejects President Biden’s request for additional Ukraine funding.
“It is not the place of Joe Biden to make that decision now. We have a newly elected president, and we’re going to wait and take the new Commander-in-Chief’s direction on that. I don’t expect any Ukraine funding to come up.”
On the way back from Rockhampton, I pulled in to Emerald to get something edible.
Was wearing my “The Unvaccinated aren’t a threat to Society – they’re a threat to Authority.”
Multiple disapproving looks from some.
It must have been Old Farts Day.
Further down the mall, Pretty Young Thing starts on with pamphlets and rehearsed talk about millions of children who don’t have drinking water. PYT points out countries on a map where this is taking place.
Nearly all have muslim majorities or are Muslim countries.
“There would be enough frigging water infrastructure if the muslims stopped buying weapons to kill the Christians with, wouldn’t there?”
Mumbled “Racist”.
So watch out for this scam – no one outside of the flying horse faith will see that water money.
Indolent
December 5, 2024 8:27 am
Without a doubt. And luckily, Hegseth seems to have a strong backbone.
I’m doing this for the warfighters, not the warmongers.
The Left is afraid of disrupters and change agents. They are afraid of @realDonaldTrump—and me. So they smear w/ fake, anonymous sources & BS stories. They don’t want truth.
If Charles wants to save his head from the chopping block, he’d better withdraw Royal Assent from this duplicitous British government.
(I assume Charles can do this?)
BREAKING: Kash Patel just sent a legal notice to Mike Pence’s advisor, Olivia Troye, to immediately retract the defamatory statements she made about him or face massive legal action.
On Joyles Reid’s segment, Troye said, “Kash Patel is a delusional liar. And he would lie about intelligence. He would lie about making things up on operations. I think Mark Esper has talked about that as well. Where he put the lives of Navy SEALs at risk in an operation when it came to Nigeria.”
In their letter, Patel’s lawyers said, “Litigation will be filed against you if you fail to publicly retract defamatory statements you made about Mr. Patel on MSNBC on December 2, 2024… These comments include that Mr. Patel would “lie about intelligence” and would “lie about making things up on operations” to the point where Mr. Patel “put the lives of Navy Seals at risk when it came to Nigeria,” and that Mr. Patel was even misinforming Vice President Mike Pence.
“This is a complete fabrication, and you know it is false by virtue of your former position in the White House. At no point did Mr. Patel ever lie about national intelligence, place Navy Seals at risk, or misinform the Vice President.”
Last night my synagogue went into lockdown because leftist and Muslim Nazi scum decided to protest outside it, directly in front of the synagogue as a matter of fact. Yes, you read that right. NSWaffen Police permitted Nazi scum to protest outside a synagogue. Only a few months ago this same historic synagogue was vandalised by leftist and Nazi scum during one of their weekly NSWaffen Police sanctioned Sunday Jew hating festivals. One must ask the question, would the NSWaffen Police have allowed a similar protest outside a mosque? Don’t be silly, Cassie. I happen to know people who were inside the synagogue last night as the Nazis stood outside screaming their Jew hatred, all the while the NSWaffen Police did what they excel at, they stood by and did nothing, shades of October 9 2023.
I think it is high time the Jewish community took matters into their own hands. There are no words in the English language to describe my visceral loathing and disdain for the NSWaffen Police. But we shouldn’t be surprised, given what ensued in Caulfield last Monday and what happened in Woollahra just two weeks ago, it’s now open season on Jews.
I haven’t been here lately as I haven’t had the strength to post anything. My beautiful mother passed away on Sunday morning 24 November 2024 after going into palliative care only two and a half days earlier. She was in a Jewish care facility where the palliative care was absolutely beautiful and magnificent. She knew she was dying, she had told me she was dying. On the Friday night 22 November I slept next to Mum’s bed, by then she was already in a deep deep sleep. I hope she heard my words of love. I am devastated, I can’t stop crying, I am heartbroken, there’s a huge hole in my heart. I go to bed clutching her nightgown that only a few days before she had given me to take home to wash. I hold onto it, I can smell her, I can feel her.
One thing I’m happy about is that Mum was here to see Trump reelected. Just a week before the election she had told me she thought Trump would win, I was more sceptical. But Mum, as with everything, was right!
They say grief is the price we pay for love.
Mum was a very forthright and opinionated woman, traits she passed on to her daughters. She could not bear or tolerate wimpiness in people. But Mum also loved to laugh, and she was always the life of a party! People, particularly men, both straight and gay, adored her. My only hope is that my wells of tears one day become pools of laughter. Mum would insist on that.
I’m so sad for you Cassie and your mum, a lady I only know through your comments about her. Yet I have a tear in my eye. Hold your memories of her tight. May they give you strength.
Dear Cassie, my condolences and may your mother rest in perpetual peace. I can understand your anguish and grief and, as you say, hope that one day you will be able to laugh imagining what your mother would say about any particular situation. Hoping God will give you strength to endure this sad time.
I will probably never know you personally Cassie as we live a long way apart but your post brings back my feelings at a similar time. I wish you long life, as we say.
I rarely get to take holidays but next year I’m heading to Israel for a look round. I was originally going on a MEL-PER-SYD trip to catch up with friends and watch my team play – but decided I’d spend my hard earned somewhere else. State & Federal Labor want to condone anti-Semitism? Fine. I’ll take my money elsewhere.
My only hope is that my wells of tears one day become pools of laughter.
Take strength from knowing they will, Cassie. I can now laugh at things my mother said and did in her last months that previously brought me to tears. From the sound of her, your mother would want you to be strong, to live life and to laugh. Blessings.
Dear Cassie,
I can only multiply what others have said before.
There will be more laughter than tears. You have a bulging bag of wonderful memories of your mum. They will sustain you and bring you cheer when you need it most.
ps, if the Jews are going to fight back, I am more than happy to become a Rooftop Catholic if you need one.
One day the grief will lessen. It will always be there but the happy memories will overcome it and we will to be thankful that our parents lived to a ripe old age and passed away peacefully with us by their side.
Take care and remember that plenty of non Jewish people are just as outraged at what is being allowed.
Deepest condolences, Cassie. Try to dwell on the good things. It sounds as though she had a long and productive life surrounded by good friends and family.
So sorry to hear your news Cassie, I was wondering how things were going. Its a tough time for you right now, but it sounds as though your Mum has set you on the right path. Blessings.
Condolences Cassie, but be bloody careful what you post like this. I reckon you’ve given enough information just in this post for someone motivated to work out exactly who you are and where you go.
I am so glad you have now felt strong enough to share on the Cat so touchingly the sad news of your mother’s passing, Cassie, and to memorialise her life. You’ve had our condolences already before we left for this cruise, but may we multiply them again here, with those of others. Much love. Lizzie and Hairy
Cassie, we have not met personally, but please accept my heartfelt condolences from one who lost her own beloved mother a couple of years ago. I was unable to attend her funeral, being at sea in the wilds of the eastern Indonesian archipelago at the time, which still distresses me. I and my seven siblings and our families miss her still, but she is happy with God.
So very sorry, dear Cassie. May the memories always bring smiles, even through tears. Sending you much strength for the journey ahead, and light for the way.
Cassie, the pain and grief fades but never leaves. I wish every day I could speak with my mum one more time and she has been gone now two years. Don’t be afraid to roar your anguish, for it is real and raw. Bless you and your mum for your life force, the lion and the love in you.
Speak with her, in your mind, out loud, and yes, one day you will laugh again, not instead of grief, but through it.
#BREAKING: Biden White House considers preemptive pardons for those who may be ‘targeted’ by Trump – POLITICO
Names mentioned include Anthony Fauci, Liz Cheney and Adam Schiff.
Biden aides are “deeply concerned” about current/former officials who may face investigations and indictments from Trump’s DOJ – especially after Kash Patel was selected for FBI director.
White House considers preemptive pardons for those who may be ‘targeted’ by Fatty Trump
Am I missing something here – WTF is a “preemptive pardon”?
Needless to say, any such fictional concepts should be summarily ignored by the incoming Fatty Trump administration.
That pair of evil slags fauci and schiff need to be hounded into prison – although I’d advocate the death penalty for the former, given his monstrous, inexcusable (and undoubted) crimes.
Fauci deserves to die just for the torture he inflicted on dogs. He is the basest of Serial Killers and got away with it.
Exactly the same as that vile Abortion Doc who is serving time for his slaughter of innocents.
Bruce of Newcastle
December 5, 2024 9:32 am
Do not ever do a celebrity spot with Brett Lee.
Even if he’s retired.
That’s because a bail was “impaled” in Howard’s head with a massive, bloody mess stunning observers – and even Lee, who has sent down a few thunderbolts in his time.
“We were filming today, doing a bowling challenge. I bowled a ball, it went through the top of off, Howie was keeping, he’s caught the ball and I’ve heard two noises,” Lee told Code Sports.
“I’ve seen him hunched over and I thought, ‘geez, what’s happened,’ and I’ve realised the bail has flown through and impaled him right in the middle of the head and there was claret everywhere.
“He was bleeding pretty badly.
“But in all my years playing cricket at a professional level, I’ve never seen a bail travel that quick or that fast.
Someone should ask Piers Morgan what he thinks about this incident…
Piers who cringed in the corner of the nets. Lee kept following him with the ball for theatre, but I think it would have been even better if he just clean bowled him six times in a row.
Miltonf
December 5, 2024 9:37 am
Good that Howard and Trumbull can’t be expecting any invitations to the white house after the disgusting things they said. We now know the real John Howard thanks to DJT.
I would run to the kitchen and get a bucket of water.
Then I would go back and drink the bucket of water and wait for it to hit my bladder before pissing on him, all the while he would still be burning and screaming in agony.
No rush. Something worth doing is worth doing well.
My condolences to you and your family on your loss. The hole doesn’t fill, the empty chair remains, you close your eyes and think you hear a voice or a tune, or some other little reminder of the one who is gone.
You have been in my thoughts in this season of sorrow. Remember all the good times, let the tears flow, and don’t be surprised if you remember something funny that she said or did and laugh out loud at the memory. They are the very best ones, so hold them dear.
Roger
December 5, 2024 9:56 am
On the Friday night 22 November I slept next to Mum’s bed, by then she was already in a deep deep sleep. I hope she heard my words of love.
We know that hearing is the last sense to go when someone is dying slowly. I hope that’s some consolation.
Yes, Roger. The sister at the Conventist hospital where my sister-in-law passed told us that she could still hear us even though she appeared to be unconscious. The family eventually gathered outside, but I decided to stay with her, holding her hand. I am glad that I did, for she opened her eyes and said, “Hello Vic…..its time”. A great privilege.
Miltonf
December 5, 2024 9:58 am
Sincere condolences Cassie. Losing a parent is traumatic. Parents have always been there for you and then they’re not. I still dream about mine.
Last edited 1 month ago by Miltonf
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
December 5, 2024 9:58 am
Early morning coffee, and reading Simon Sebag Montefiore’s book “Romanovs.”
In 1547, One Ivan – who went on to be known as “Ivan the Terrible” became the first grand prince to be crowned Tsar. He had already launched his ritual search for a wife. Five hundred virgins – the daughters of the middle gentry – were summoned from throughput his realm for this Renaissance beauty contest, which was won by a girl named Anastasia Romanovna Zakrharina – Yurieva. She went on to bear him six children. (Page 15.)
Our anaemic private economy is in intensive care with a weak pulse
Tom Dusevic, The Australian, 4th December 2024
The engine of Australia’s long-term prosperity has broken down, with an ailing private sector propped up by government spending splurges and record population growth. It’s not a sustainable game plan to raise material living standards, which have fallen by more than 10 per cent during the past three years and in dollar terms are around the level they were five years ago. Jim Chalmers highlights rays of hope – inflation is down, tax cuts, wages growth, bill relief – but voters aren’t buying it.
It will take a few more quarters of household income growth, further drops in inflation and cuts in borrowing rates to convince families that better days are ahead…
Better days…not if we get a Labor-Green government.
Take the events in Syria, for instance. You’re notably soft on the Ba’ath regime while overtly hostile toward Islamist groups. Yet, you appear sympathetic to the Islamic regime in Iran—a government notorious for its habit of murdering women who fail to meet its clothing standards. This suggests that Islamism, in itself, doesn’t bother you all that much. It seems, instead, to hinge on the Russian connection.
Islamist is akin to Christianist, a completely nonsense term. If this wasn’t the case, Iran and Syria wouldn’t be allied.
mem
December 5, 2024 10:26 am
Another major failure in the so-called renewable rollout. But this ABC article fails to nail the underlying reasons. A product that was promoted enthusiastically by Government as a “solution” that was never ready for market. An opportunity for grift for the start-up. There will be some that lined their pockets along the way and will never be held accountable. https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2024-12-05/redflow-australian-battery-manufacturer-collapse-defects/104650074
Back in 1992 iirc I did a tour of the zinc-bromine battery project at one of the WA unis. They’re still working on zinc-bromine batteries more than forty years later, which says all you need to know about how good they are.
They AI altered a video from 2023 of Russian twin sisters Zhenya and Sasha, made them look Korean, and ran with the BS narrative of North Korean women soldiers fighting in Ukraine….
This and the Telegraph article in the OOT “diversity-friendly jihadists” are indicative of the extent to which the intelligence services engage directly or indirectly in psyops on their native populations.
Less than 24 hours after President Joe Biden pardoned his son Hunter Bidenand criticized his prosecution as a “miscarriage of justice,” prosecutors in special counsel David Weiss’ office defended the integrity of their work in a pair of court filings and fiercely rebutted the president’s allegation that their charges were motivated by politics.
“In total, eleven different [federal] judges appointed by six different presidents, including his father, considered and rejected the defendant’s claims, including his claims for selective and vindictive prosecution,” wrote prosecutor Leo Wise in a ten-page filing in Hunter Biden’s tax case on Monday.
In Monday’s filing, prosecutors urged the federal judge overseeing Hunter Biden’s tax case in California not to dismiss his indictment, and instead close the docket — which would allow the record to continue to exist.
“The government does not challenge that the defendant has been the recipient of an act of mercy. But that does not mean the grand jury’s decision to charge him, based on a finding of probable cause, should be wiped away as if it never occurred,” Wise wrote. “It also does not mean that his charges should be wiped away because the defendant falsely claimed that the charges were the result of some improper motive.“
The federal judge who oversaw Hunter Biden’s tax case blasted President Joe Biden for trying to “rewrite history” in his justification for pardoning his son.
District Judge Mark Scarsi wrote in a five-page order Tuesday that some of the “representations contained” in the president’s Sunday statement announcing the pardon “stand in tension with the case record.” Scarsi specifically took issue with Biden’s rationale that his son’s tax problems were all caused by his struggle with alcohol and drug addiction.
“The Constitution provides the President with broad authority to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States … but nowhere does the Constitution give the President the authority to rewrite history,” Scarsi wrote.
In many ways it is meet and right and proper that the disgusting old scrote goes into the history books in a blaze of ignominy – his personal corruption writ large and open.
Looks like the battles around Hama have been some of the most intense since 2012. Turks and HTS are putting in a great effort to take Hama. Every morning since the weekend I check the feeds and it always involves HTS advances followed by SAA holding and then regaining some ground. Hearing a lot of talk of UKR involvement on the HTS side in training them tactically in the use of drones.
The girls in the unaltered video? You better get to SpecSavers.
Still, isn’t the real story here a newspaper altering images so that it appears to confirm a Regime talking point? Getting caught, not apologizing, then playing dumb?
Last edited 1 month ago by dover0beach
Top Ender
December 5, 2024 11:16 am
Convicted wife killer Chris Dawson has launched an appeal to overturn a conviction over the unlawful carnal knowledge of a then-schoolgirl.
Dawson, who is serving 24 years for the murder of his first wife, Lyn, appeared via his solicitor in the Court of Criminal Appeal on Thursday after he was was sentenced last year to a further three years in prison for grooming and engaging in unlawful sexual acts with the 16 year-old student at a Sydney high school in 1980.
The lawyer representing Dawson, Stephen Eccleshall, confirmed the appeal related to the conviction, not the sentence.
“This is an appeal but the sentence itself is following on from the existing lengthy sentence,” Registrar George Galanis said.
“This is a conviction appeal but the sentence is really no issue,” Mr Eccleshall replied.
Sydney barrister Stephen Odgers SC is briefed in the matter, and a two-hour hearing was set for March 31, 2025.
As a result of the conviction, the former teacher and professional footballer with the Newtown Jets rugby league team, aged 75, also had one year added onto his earliest possible release date of August 2041.
Oz
Presumably he will hold on to the “I wuz framed” narrative because that gets him notoriety – and some respect from fellow crims – in prison.
Bradley Murdoch in the NT is the same – has never said what he did with Peter Falconio’s body.
Will they be calling McClellan to testify that any such behaviour by a state school teacher is as impossible as a square circle or a round triangle? That was the core assumption of the sham royal commission he delivered to Gillard, wasn’t it?
GreyRanga
December 5, 2024 11:20 am
Anyone see Angus Aitken, a stockbroker rip Blowen a new arsehole on Sharri Markson last night. He didn’t miss. Why the SFL’S haven’t outed Blowen every day as the stupidist person in Ausfailure I do not know.
Suspect it will be a random nut whose claim was denied. Used to be a few of them floating around the bank after they lost their home/farm/business. Sends a few people round the bend. Usually was 2 or 3 in the Supreme Court library as self represented litigants till their cases got thrown out.
Ivan became ‘the terrible‘ after Anastasia Romanov died. Ivan and Anastasia’s marriage had been a love match, she was able to counter and temper his erratic personality. He completely lost his mind after she fell ill and died, probably by poison.
The Romanovs were originally minor boyars from Kostroma, a town north of Moscow. They were not Rurikid princes. In 1613, during the Time of Troubles, the Russian throne was offered to the 16 year old Mikhail Romanov, the grand-nephew of Anastasia. Michael Romanov was coerced into accepting the throne whilst hiding in the Ipatiev Monastery in Kostroma. In July 1918, whilst imprisoned in the Ipatiev House in Ekaterinburg, the Romanov dynasty ended in a bloodbath.
calli
December 5, 2024 11:43 am
News from the nest. A bigger picture to showcase the tree that some here liked so much. The babies are a mound of fluff and pin feathers and can barely fit. There are three of them. The nest is just above the branch union.
Yes. It’s a low res image, you can get a clearer rendition if you open it in another window.
I have a few of them around the place. This one is “Lipstick”. Others are Old Apricot, Bucks Fizz, Twilight Time, Triple Yellow. They like a warm, humid, frost free environment.
I love Angel’s Trumpet. I did not know they came in such lovely colours. Sadly, I can’t grow them here. Happy though, that Camellia Japonica, Rhododendrons and Peonies love it here.
Could not grow them in Camden.
Do you do any distillation of your Trumpets, Amazon style? 😀
I currently have three young magpies following me around like lambs. It’s gorgeous. Today the first newly minted young kooka arrived with helper kooka (who is grandson of the new kid’s mum). Mum yesterday made my day when she flew down from the jacaranda and landed on my shoulder and accepted mince. Only the second time in fourteen years, she’s the only kooka to ever do it.
Secret Harbour resident Charis Bee experienced every pet owner’s nightmare on Wednesday when she found her two canoodles Bear and Bonney dead beside the mangled corpse of a baby dugite.
Ms Bee, whose dogs had attacked other dugites in yer yard in the past, told her area’s Facebook group: “Tonight both of my girls were killed by a dugite. Looks like they found and attacked it because it died too. Numb.”
OK not you Pogria since you aren’t a WA Cat. But it shows how deadly they are that two dogs mangled a baby dugite and died.
Bruce,
that is my greatest fear with my dogs. Three of them will stand and bark, but the mad Chihuaha cross dives straight in. He’s an excellent ratter, but he is getting on in years. Even when he was younger, I don’t believe he would have been able to take on a full grown snake of any breed.
What is with all the DEI for snakes and sharks? There is no shortage of snakes, particularly down the back of our ten acres. Shark attacks keep making the news too.
Rockdoctor
December 5, 2024 12:17 pm
Cassie, condolences.
Roger
December 5, 2024 12:20 pm
Michael Romanov was coerced into accepting the throne whilst hiding in the Ipatiev Monastery in Kostroma. In July 1918, whilst imprisoned in the Ipatiev House in Ekaterinburg, the Romanov dynasty ended in a bloodbath.
St Hypatius was a supporter of St Athanasius in his dispute with the Arians (ancient Unitarians) which was the subject of the First Ecumenical Council in Nicea in 325AD.
Last edited 1 month ago by Roger
Top Ender
December 5, 2024 12:42 pm
In fine form:
THE MOCKER
Chris Bowen’s renewables revolution is a big swing and myth
Buying Christmas presents is something I do not enjoy. I detest crowded shopping centres, am useless at selecting gifts and always leave it until the last moment to shop. But thanks to Energy Minister Chris Bowen, I have already finalised my list of purchases.
We had not even made it into summer last week when the Australian Energy Market Operator warned we had insufficient reserves of energy to meet demand. NSW residents narrowly avoided mass blackouts by heeding the pleas of Premier Chris Minns not to use dishwashers, washing machines, and airconditioners between 3pm to 8pm. But when asked about this in parliament, Bowen claimed it was “not an unusual circumstance”.
In a way he is correct. For example, is not unusual for power outages to happen in Liberia, Haiti, or South Sudan. It is not unusual for this to happen when political and environmental ideologues embark on a renewables binge while shunning reliable means of generating electricity. And it not unusual for this to happen in a country that has a bumbling fabulist as its energy minister.
So what has this to do with my Christmas list? Such is my confidence in Bowen I intend buying candles, generators, portable gas cookers, and torches in the way of gifts. As for Bowen and the public utility, all I can say is he would make an ideal bauble for the giant Christmas tree in Martin Place. Let’s be honest, its electric lights are an indulgence we can no longer permit.
But some people, particularly politicians, have no concept of honesty. “The least reliable part of our energy grid at the moment is coal-fired power,” Bowen told Sky News host Laura Jayes last week. This was news to many scientists, especially former Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation CEO Dr Adi Paterson.
“Coal has not been unreliable for 150 years,” he told The Daily Telegraph. “Why would coal suddenly become unreliable now?”
Contrary to Bowen’s claim, coal-fired power stations are not the “biggest threat to reliability in our energy system”. The biggest threat to reliability in our energy system is Chris Bowen.
Three years ago Bowen, then in opposition, declared a Labor government would reduce the average annual household energy bill by $275 by 2025 (and $378 by 2030), based on 2021 prices. And he was contemptuous of the Coalition for questioning his predictions.
“These guys are liars, and they will continue to lie,” he said.
But it is less than a month until 2025, and annual electricity prices, far from falling, are horrendously high. On average, they have risen $609 above what Bowen promised Labor would deliver. In Queensland, that figure is $1000 higher than his pledge.
As this masthead reported this week, the Australian Energy Regulator has noted a record number of Australian households – more than 130,000 – are on hardship payment plans. Unsurprisingly, Bowen has absolved himself of responsibility.
“The former Coalition government’s decade of denial and delay left Australia exposed to a global fossil fuel crisis,” he insisted.
The Morrison government’s record in this field was mixed, but it is Bowen who has given us a fuel (and fool) crisis. Interviewed a month before the election of 2022 by then Nine News political editor Chris Uhlmann, he ardently maintained that the rollout of renewables meant a drop in power bills.
“The more renewable energy we can get into the system, the cheaper it is for everyone,” he breezily pronounced.
Let’s evaluate that claim. In 2021, when Bowen launched Labor’s energy policies, renewables generated 32.5 per cent of Australia’s electricity. That figure has since risen to 39.4 per cent, yet electricity prices have skyrocketed. The more renewables in the system, the cheaper it is for everyone, right Minister?
According to this babbling spiv, Labor’s predictions for lower power bills were based on “the most comprehensive economic modelling that any opposition has ever released about any policy ever in Australia’s history”.
Just days ago he was asked repeatedly by Jayes to detail when bills would come down. He would only say Labor would not “walk away from the policies that that modelling was based on”.
What other wondrous forecasts can we base on the Bowen modelling?
Well to begin with, the modelling shows that Bowen will secure the number one spot of the Reader’s Digest Australia Trusted People survey in 2025. The modelling also shows his performance as Energy Minister is so brilliant it will secure Labor a net gain of 26 seats at the next election. And the modelling specifies that upon his retirement from politics, Bowen’s next role will be heading up Mensa International.
The modelling also forecasts I will take a hat-trick in the first over of the Boxing Day Test. When it is my turn to wield the willow, I will hit six consecutive sixes in a single over. It also specifies that if it is overcast on the day, we can power up all of the Melbourne Cricket Ground’s light towers for a total of $1.25 per hour. Is this modelling great or what?
But for some unknown reason, Bowen’s modelling is not doing the trick. I cannot imagine why not, for he is doing all the right things to bring down prices. For example, he dons the hard-hat, the high-vis vest, and the tradie work gear for the publicity shots. If there is one thing that this and his leering grin conveys, it is sincerity.
He is fond of glib phrases. “The sun doesn’t send a bill,” he says. “The wind doesn’t send a bill.” Renewables are incredibly cheap, according to him. They are so cheap that Labor is raiding our $230bn Future Fund and massively expanding the Capacity Investment Scheme to subsidise them. And did I mention Bowen’s Future Made in Australia plan for renewables, a grandiose and bloated scheme otherwise known as picking winners? The sun doesn’t send you a bill, but you can be sure Bowen will.
In closing, let me quote an excerpt from the book ‘On Charlatans’, by one Chris Bowen. “Politics around the world is being turned on its head and the fakes, the fraudsters and the snake-oil merchants are winning,” he writes. “Why?”
The answer is obvious, Chris Bowen. They are winning because they have perfected the art of projection.
I am so worried that my fossil fuel powered car might become unreliable even though the tank is full of petrol. Better get a mast with a sail to help when that happens.
Here is the thing about calling fossil fuel generation unreliable – it seems to very reliably fill in the gaps (unpredictable in duration and occurrence) when solar and wind just…stop.
The gospel according to Numbers – A Two State solution, as he is urging for the Palis and Israelis was not an option in Vietnam, because the Vietnamese were nationalists, not religious fanatics..
Reading what’s been written, in the past twenty years, with access to the North Vietnamese records, I find his utterances on that subject rather amusing.
I’m thinking of investing in art.
What genre is best?
The fruits stuck to a wall or the Hunter shit paintings?
Vicki
December 5, 2024 1:21 pm
Sitting here listening to patient and determined husband debating our power bill with an officer of the Ombudsman. She is saying we are basically stuffed although she didn’t use those words!. She seems to be saying that legislation absolves the power company from being required to replace the “smart” meter with an old fashioned meter which is read either monthly or quarterly. Further, she says they are allowed to “estimate” even though she is acknowledging that the estimates dont correlate with the daily readings that my husband patiently takes.
Even worse, she says the company claims to have somehow “converted” the meter to establish estimates on a certain date. We are CERTAIN that on that date we were absent from the property and the gate was locked.
I am of the opinion that we will NEVER obtain justice in this dispute, and that the only solution for us is a battery. Husband is strongly resisting this as it will probably cost in excess of $20,000 for the size we need. I say “Damn them” & want “out” and a battery is the only solution.
Vicki, go off grid and damn them to hell.
Make use of your own solar, use more gas, and, obviously, firewood.
There are many off grid farmers out my way.
I agree. Just have to convince the husband who stubbornly wants to defeat the Big Energy scoundrels.
We use bottled gas for hot water system and gas cooktop, and combustion wood fire in winter. Our 10kw solar system supplies the rest of the house lighting, refrigeration, aircon, bore pump, electric fences, and workshop.
I am desperate to go off the grid, even though we have a petrol generator for blackouts.
Ok. I know my observations wont be popular but here I go.
If you are already on a smart meter why is there a need to estimate? Is it an older Smart meter. The ones currently being installed are read remotely via some special system.
Utilities do estimates based on prior years usage to save on reading a meter every quarter or in circumstances in Unit blocks where the utility room is inaccessible when the meters need to be read. However once they are read there is a realignment of charges to get back to energy used. Both gas and electricity do this. Regulators ensure Utlities dont win on this.
The meters arent owned by the Distributor. In my area Essential installed the smart meter, Smart meters allow time of use charging and the utilities show what you have used every day. If it on the remote read system.
You can have the meter checked if you are unsure of its accuracy. But the meter owner will charge a fee.,
Going off grid? You will still have to pay for the distribution/transmission grid youi are connected to. And if you export electricity from the solar panels you need the grid. Its hard to escape.
OK, I can understand your surprise, Jock. However, our circumstances are specific. We live in what is classed as a remote area – even though it is within 3 hours of Sydney. We can access Optus on our property, but we can’t get Telstra.
The “smart” meter apparently needs a level of reception (Telstra?) which cannot be accessed at the solar grid in our paddock. They apparently did not discover this until they installed the smart meter. As a consequence, they “estimate”. We, however, being in residence, we are able to record readings daily – which my obsessive husband does!
So……after almost a year of disputes, the energy provider conceded that there was a continuing discrepancy between our ACTUAL readings and their estimates. HOWEVER, they have conceded that they will consider having the meter read manually by a serviceman every 3 months.
As for your comments about going off grid – they are wrong. We would be going completely off grid ie we will NOT be exporting any solar. We will require changes to our inverters to do this. No problem.
Trust me, we have investigated this problem obsessively. The energy provider actually recently offered a sum of money to compensate for our inconvenience over the last year. That was amazing enough!
I do not, for one second, believe that they have “conceded” that they will have the meter manually read by a serviceperson every 3 months. It’s part of their obligations under the Act on sites that do not have communications.
All true, bar the last bit – I can’t see how they can charge you for “network fees” if they pull the fuses to your supply, and so you have NO grid connection, import or export.
You can get “island” inverters that don’t need the grid to run.
1) If their estimates are not correct, then let them on your property to do a read and the inaccuracies will be resolved.
2) Your knowledge of the electricity grid suggests that you might not know the difference between a digital meter and a remotely-read meter. To get remote reads, there must be a communications unit with/in/connected to the meter. In any case, if the communications network does not work where you are (not uncommon for rural or semi-rural properties, for example), then your meter will be face read.
3) Digital meters (including smart meters) are significantly more accurate and maintain that accuracy for longer than disk meters. If you have a problem with the accuracy of your meter, you can ask to have it tested. But I’ve already told you this in this forum. My conclusion is that you decided not to, because if you’re wrong (and you are), then you’ll be up for the testing fee.
Have you tried the equivalent of a lawyer’s letter saying “cease and desist”, implying you will sue for time taken up fighting them etc?
If you get the solicitor to say what you want it can win through when they realise a first-class fight is the expensive alternative.
Pogria
December 5, 2024 1:25 pm
The Gimp’s Fighting Fit and Alert Hero at an African Summit.
The Summit is at a place called the “Lobito Corridor”. It should be renamed the “Lobotomy” Corridor, in honour of this exceptional man. Lol.
In summary:
Diverse NZ navy crew untrained in fairly basic operation of survey ship.
Ship hits reef and sinks.
Ordinary citizens suspect said incident might have something to do with woman picked to captain said ship.
Fat female defence minister’s big takeaway is “Oh the misogyny”.
And:
”Why don’t you recognise how great I am because I’m the first female defence minister” .
And:
“We know who you are, all you people making nasty comments about us online”.
And:
”I’ll get you AND your little dog”.
OK, I made that last one up.
Suspiciously beta admiral standing next to defence minister “What she said”.
Women.
Women, lefties and politicians are generally incapable of understanding how anything works. Consequently, none of them should ever be in charge of anything more complicated than a washing machine.
Steve trickler
December 5, 2024 1:49 pm
Mad skills. Don’t ruin your records trying to copy.
Shhhh…your car is listening to you. If you have blue tooth connectivity in you car its recording and sending info. to unknown parties of conversations in your car.
Wally Dalí
December 5, 2024 2:07 pm
I’m thinking of investing in art. Get yer hand off it, Gough.
Morning all!
A Kindergarden in China. https://rumble.com/v5vmthq-a-kindergarten-school-in-asia..html
Pointless without the aboriginal fairytales for 2 hours first.
Flying back to Darwin for five days, and watched Midas Man on the plane – new film about Brian Epstein, the manager of the Beatles.
Worth watching.
Well, I’m Richard
Well actually the 4th
Johannes Leak.
Plibbers at it again? Stupid woman.
Mark Knight.
Why so many downticks? That seems like a great outcome.
Mark Knight #2.
Peter Broelman.
Brett Lethbridge.
Patrick Blower.
Michael Ramirez.
A.F. Branco.
Lisa Benson.
Ben Garrison.
It’s been a while since this song has tickled the cochlear.
It just popped into my head. These things happen with the brain. Ping!
There Must Be An Angel (Playing With My Heart) (Remastered)
Bloomin heck! Andre has been cranking out some beauties for years. I think my favourite has been pulled from the Tube. Will look tomorrow.
ELECTION MELTDOWNS GO METAL
Chris Uhlmann in the Daily Telegraph, following on from his Sky News Doco:
Energy illiterate politicians have built a green power disaster;
Leading journalist Chris Uhlmann explains how our political leaders are delivering a breathtakingly expensive and unreliable energy grid that will make Australia poorer and weaker.
I’m fond of saying we are governed by idiots and ideologues. There should be more journalists saying what Chris is saying. The idiot pollies only get away with it through the complicity of their media mates.
The greatest scandal is the coverup. The greatest failure is that many people no longer see participation in politics as a pursuit in holding politicians to account, rather an opportunity to join the gravy train.
Overton windows shifting…. more stories like this leaking out…
Chris is becoming the example of what role the media is supposed to play – factual reporting holding the government to account – being the watchdog not the lapdog.
One of the best things you are likely to read today. Via The Daily Mail
Dan Andrews’ life in Melbourne turns into a nightmare as he is hit with fresh ban
I read that earlier. Karma is a bitch, baby!
Two very deserving pieces of filth.
Good news but hardly enough retribution. When he was in power these businesses were falling over themselves to kiss the ring. Fickle hypocrites.
Seat him and the missus, then clear the table of everything including the linen.
Let him work it out.
Apropos our discussion about the state of the economy in the previous thread.
‘Sad economy without hope’: Deepest hit to living standards on record
When the Liars have lost The Age …..
Like the ABC, The Age actually represents the Greens. It’s always happy to take a swipe at the dog on which the Green fleas ride.
It’s amazing how journalists emerge from years of not finding much wrong with the awful Obama and then the Biden/Harris years to suddenly engage in paroxysm of hate for Trump’s appointees. Try Sam Clench’s latest, which heads today’s News lineup.
They all thought (to use the word loosely) that the shaved head cross dresser who spent more time stealing suitcases from women at airports than he did doing his job was soooo transgressive!
I watched this Piers Morgan episode the other day where he and a guest (John Morgan, Dem mega-donor) agreed furiously that they both would do anything for their children, as Biden has. Up to and including “probably not” turning your child in if you knew they had committed a murder (13:30 mark)!
Call me old fashioned but any child of mine who I knew had/was committing a serious crime would be facing the full force of the law.
Not to do so would be further failing said child.
Very easy to see the different morals some people have in this clip, notably from a Dem donor.
BTW, the Biden pardon is not a pardon, it’s an admission.
Exactly this. I read some utter nonsense Australian novel recently for my sins where the mother lied for her son to escape justice for killing a pedestrian when driving drunk.
Chucked the book away in disgust. People read this crap and think that morals and values, let alone the law, don’t apply to them.
Biden’s pardon is to save his own and Jill’s a*ss. No doubt Hunter knew the Big Guy was showering with his teen daughter.
Frogs Boiled!
French Government Falls.
The rightward march of European politics will continue. Left media will be in tears, always finding that only the right can be “extreme”. I won’t bother to listen to the latest BBC Hard Talk since it’s utterly predictable that it will try to savage “extreme” AfD person.
When did “populism” become a right wing phenomenon? Shirley it is (or should be) something praised by the left?
Its use as criticism by leftards suggests the reality of the Great Reversal, under which parties of the nominal left now support soft handed elites and oligarchs, while conservatives now support the working class?
And isn’t so called democracy a form of populism?
What’s the opposite of populism?
Anti-populism?
“Populism” is a word coined by upper class and elite snobs.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=M-cXXtt81Zc&pp=ygUMcGllcnMgbW9yZ2Fu
Link re above comment.
Vive la France!
France politics LIVE: Barnier’s government collapses after vote of no confidence defeat (4 Dec)
Given how Barnier, who is Micron’s guy, stiffed the MPs by ramming his budget through via an undemocratic wheeze, I can’t see another government surviving a confidence vote.
A loathsome eurocreep who thoroughly deserves this. There had to get that off my chest.
Mossel Bay
Mossel Bay is the first port of call after joining our cruise following three days of recuperation (for me) in a flash Capetown hotel. We’ve headed around the Cape now and are travelling up the African east coast bound for the Arabian Sea and Dubai in three weeks time and did Mossel Bay yesterday. The origins of this town date to the explorations of the Portuguese explorer Bartholomeu Dias in 1488. It is one of South Africa’s oldest settlement sites, in the Garden Route of the Western Cape Province, set in a pretty blue bay. The earliest human people here may have actually evolved in situ, rivalling Olduvai, for a million years of hominid settlement has occurred due to the coastal bounty. A tourist feature is the Post Office Tree site, where sailors heading for the spice Indies would put letters into an old boot under the tree, letters which returning ships would pick up to take back to Europe from this furthest reach of Western civilization. It still feels like that, a small out-of-its time coastal town, where we take an hour-long bus ride to visit a private game park. We traverse some verdant countryside with dairy herds of Guernsey cows and I say to Hairy that this is rich peasant land now going slightly wild. Deliberately so, I suspect, as with climate craziness in Australia, which is rampant here too.
The game reserve is a genuine wildlife sanctuary covering many miles where native animals are able to roam free and live without being fed; some lions, but no cheetah or leopard, keep the population levels of impala, wildebeest and the many other cognate ungulant species under control, though I suspect they also have to cull. The park also shelters zebra, giraffe, hippo, huge buffalo, and elephant, all of which we saw in their natural habitat, including a cute week-old zebra colt and an hours-old wildebeest calf. Those calves can walk within half an hour of birth and now that one is fully capable of keeping up with the herd, though they keep him in the middle, says our guide, whom we were fortunate enough to have to ourselves.
I was late out of the toilet at the main reception area and restaurant and the nine-seater tiered land rover vehicle was full, so a sudden decision was made to take out another one for just me and Hairy, with a more senior Africaan’s guide – a young white bloke in his thirties yanked in at the last minute. Good to get his comprehensible English and none of the invented information favoured by local guides. The pride of the reserve is a number of rhino, protected from poachers. During our two and a half hour drive over bumpy terrain tracks we were very privileged to view rhino very close up – especially a magnificent territorial male, with two horns, the main one over three feet long. There was also a mother and calf rhino. Surgically removing their horns to protect them from poachers is cruel, says our guide, because rhino use their horns in daily living and territorial display.
This man turned out to be a treasure, very knowledgeable about animals and habitat. We noted some gum trees and Hairy said get rid of them before they take over. Our man agreed, saying they were slowly removing them, as they leached the watercourses. They also had a problem with introduced Australian black wattle which bled tannin into the streams. He was especially interesting as he told us about how elephants grieve and mourn their dead, returning to the site of a matriarch’s death with regularity to console each other.
As it was just us two, the guide was very willing to talk about the reserve and its place in South Africa, where tourism is the dominant export industry and a major source of local employment. We employ over 250 people here, he says, far more than we need, but governments compel us to be less profitable to keep employment up. Hairy’s face at this news is a picture of disapproval. Unemployment in the socialist paradise of South Africa is now running at 52% and underemployment is also rampant. Shanty towns litter all of the roadsides in towns and cities where large acreages of shanties also exist. Our talk turns to electricity, for the reserve runs off solar panels and night-time diesel generators. Don’t get me started, says our man, for we export our good coal to Mozambique but we aren’t allowed to use it for ourselves. Sounds familiar, we say to him, telling him of our similar situation in Australia.
I get bold. Actually, we are very strong supporters of President Trump and hope that things soon will start to change re the global warming scams, I say. We don’t see much science behind it all, I add. Yes, says our guide, we are all hoping for a change in this nonsense now. I am a Trump supporter myself, he adds, a committed environmentalist but sick of the way South Africa has been captured to such sectional interests and the corruption that this has entailed.
Good stuff Lizzie. Will be interested to see recommendations for who to go with for a similar safari trip we want to do.
Lizzie you making me homesick…what do you call thes animals when there are more than one.
This is from awonderful book that we were introduced to that causes endless debates on game drives. It was collated from old journals of what exploreres and hunters referred to the game and wrote down.
Enjoy you trip.
I think the hominids were replaced by the hominegos; like Hegseth being replaced by De Santis.
” … a more senior Africaan’s guide – a young white bloke in his thirties yanked in at the last minute. Good to get his comprehensible English and none of the invented information favoured by local guides.”
A mate of mine (only a bit younger, originally english too) used to be a safari guide in Africa, and married a European lady who worked there. Later they moved to Australia. Unfortunately the missus is now in poor health but he is looking after her.
MPs really hate it when prezzes try to bypass them.
South Korean President Faces Impeachment After Martial Law Debacle (4 Dec)
His own guys voted to overturn the martial law declaration. That does not bode well for the impeachment vote, which is due tomorrow or Saturday.
Seems to be fault on both sides but my memory of SK Politics has been since I was a child always robust.
Too bad the president can just dissolve the parliament and call for elections. They can remove him but looking at raw numbers unlikely, Pres party has 108 & another conservative party 3 making 111. To move for impeachment they need majority national congress of 300 (Which they’ve done) and need two thirds to remove.
Assuming his party support him he would be safe. However another 4 years still before the next election which will be chaos.
@WallStreetMav
Choose your fighter carefully.
Bloody Brilliant!
And your father too.
@cb_doge
BREAKING: Elon Musk’s $44 billion acquisition of Twitter was initially considered overpriced by critics, but it now appears to be a steal.
The American uniparty. Watch them block Hegseth.
@TPostMillennial
Senate confirms promotion for general who oversaw Afghanistan pull out after previous delay
Good
@IanJaeger29
@_johnnymaga
BREAKING: Trump announces that Monica Crowley will serve as Ambassador, Assistant Secretary of State, and Chief of Protocol of the United States.
@catturd2
They didn’t do it to me – because I refused to participate in their madness.
On the way back from Rockhampton, I pulled in to Emerald to get something edible.
Was wearing my “The Unvaccinated aren’t a threat to Society – they’re a threat to Authority.”
Multiple disapproving looks from some.
It must have been Old Farts Day.
Further down the mall, Pretty Young Thing starts on with pamphlets and rehearsed talk about millions of children who don’t have drinking water. PYT points out countries on a map where this is taking place.
Nearly all have muslim majorities or are Muslim countries.
“There would be enough frigging water infrastructure if the muslims stopped buying weapons to kill the Christians with, wouldn’t there?”
Mumbled “Racist”.
So watch out for this scam – no one outside of the flying horse faith will see that water money.
Without a doubt. And luckily, Hegseth seems to have a strong backbone.
@GuntherEagleman
If they achieve in taking Hegseth out, they will move on to Tulsi, RFK Jr., and Kash.
Either we stop them now or they won’t quit.
Standing by Pete Hegseth will show these deep state fcks that we will do everything in our power to make sure Trump’s nominations succeed.
A Supreme Court judge!
@greg_price11
Ketanji Brown Jackson just compared bans on sex changes for kids to bans on interracial marriage.
She’s the far-left f-wit who couldn’t even explain what a woman is at a Senate confirmation hearing.
Yet she is sitting on the highest court in the U.S.!
Comparing sex changes with interracial marriage is utter nonsense.
she’s dumber than dogsh!t
She epitomised the contempt the left has for the traditional USA values – and evidenced the ongoing attempts to tear it all down; hope and change!
Trump certainly seemed to get it right this time.
@PeteHegseth
@HOGGMAN_Memes
Bongino telling it like it is about Pete Hegseth.
Constitutional monarchy not looking so bad at the moment.
If Charles wants to save his head from the chopping block, he’d better withdraw Royal Assent from this duplicitous British government.
(I assume Charles can do this?)
@EricLDaugh
Pence the snake.
@BehizyTweets
Good to see. Maybe finally we will see accountability.
Probably be a big back log in courts from this.
Kash should include Sam Clench at News in that action after the article this morning saying that sort of stuff.
Last night my synagogue went into lockdown because leftist and Muslim Nazi scum decided to protest outside it, directly in front of the synagogue as a matter of fact. Yes, you read that right. NSWaffen Police permitted Nazi scum to protest outside a synagogue. Only a few months ago this same historic synagogue was vandalised by leftist and Nazi scum during one of their weekly NSWaffen Police sanctioned Sunday Jew hating festivals. One must ask the question, would the NSWaffen Police have allowed a similar protest outside a mosque? Don’t be silly, Cassie. I happen to know people who were inside the synagogue last night as the Nazis stood outside screaming their Jew hatred, all the while the NSWaffen Police did what they excel at, they stood by and did nothing, shades of October 9 2023.
I think it is high time the Jewish community took matters into their own hands. There are no words in the English language to describe my visceral loathing and disdain for the NSWaffen Police. But we shouldn’t be surprised, given what ensued in Caulfield last Monday and what happened in Woollahra just two weeks ago, it’s now open season on Jews.
I haven’t been here lately as I haven’t had the strength to post anything. My beautiful mother passed away on Sunday morning 24 November 2024 after going into palliative care only two and a half days earlier. She was in a Jewish care facility where the palliative care was absolutely beautiful and magnificent. She knew she was dying, she had told me she was dying. On the Friday night 22 November I slept next to Mum’s bed, by then she was already in a deep deep sleep. I hope she heard my words of love. I am devastated, I can’t stop crying, I am heartbroken, there’s a huge hole in my heart. I go to bed clutching her nightgown that only a few days before she had given me to take home to wash. I hold onto it, I can smell her, I can feel her.
One thing I’m happy about is that Mum was here to see Trump reelected. Just a week before the election she had told me she thought Trump would win, I was more sceptical. But Mum, as with everything, was right!
They say grief is the price we pay for love.
Mum was a very forthright and opinionated woman, traits she passed on to her daughters. She could not bear or tolerate wimpiness in people. But Mum also loved to laugh, and she was always the life of a party! People, particularly men, both straight and gay, adored her. My only hope is that my wells of tears one day become pools of laughter. Mum would insist on that.
My deepest sympathy for your loss, Cassie. She was obviously a lovely, tough woman. You can take pride in her life.
I’m so sad for you Cassie and your mum, a lady I only know through your comments about her. Yet I have a tear in my eye. Hold your memories of her tight. May they give you strength.
Dear Cassie, my condolences and may your mother rest in perpetual peace. I can understand your anguish and grief and, as you say, hope that one day you will be able to laugh imagining what your mother would say about any particular situation. Hoping God will give you strength to endure this sad time.
My condolences, Cass. She sounded like a true force of nature.
A beautiful and powerful piece of heart-felt writing Cassie.
Your Mum would be proud.
Deepest condolences on your loss.
My sincere condolences to you Cassie and your family – your Mother was a wonderful person.
Stay strong.
I will probably never know you personally Cassie as we live a long way apart but your post brings back my feelings at a similar time. I wish you long life, as we say.
My deepest condolences to you and your family, Cassie. May her memory be for a blessing.
Sincere condolences on your loss, Cassie. I know it sounds like a cliche, but stay strong, for your mother’s sake. Honor her memory.
Cassie – very sorry to hear of your mum’s passing. Take care and be kind to yourself. Best wishes.
P.S. Hopefully something will be done about the scum trying to intimidate worshipers at the synagogue.
I rarely get to take holidays but next year I’m heading to Israel for a look round. I was originally going on a MEL-PER-SYD trip to catch up with friends and watch my team play – but decided I’d spend my hard earned somewhere else. State & Federal Labor want to condone anti-Semitism? Fine. I’ll take my money elsewhere.
Good.
For what it’s worth, my personal experience is that you get there surprisingly quickly – even though you doubt the possibility.
Hope that’s your experience too.
Take strength from knowing they will, Cassie. I can now laugh at things my mother said and did in her last months that previously brought me to tears. From the sound of her, your mother would want you to be strong, to live life and to laugh. Blessings.
Love you Cassie. Your mum must have been so proud of you.
Dear Cassie,
I can only multiply what others have said before.
There will be more laughter than tears. You have a bulging bag of wonderful memories of your mum. They will sustain you and bring you cheer when you need it most.
ps, if the Jews are going to fight back, I am more than happy to become a Rooftop Catholic if you need one.
One day the grief will lessen. It will always be there but the happy memories will overcome it and we will to be thankful that our parents lived to a ripe old age and passed away peacefully with us by their side.
Take care and remember that plenty of non Jewish people are just as outraged at what is being allowed.
condolences Cassie
yr mum will still be smiling that you fight like her
Deepest condolences, Cassie. Try to dwell on the good things. It sounds as though she had a long and productive life surrounded by good friends and family.
So sorry to hear your news Cassie, I was wondering how things were going. Its a tough time for you right now, but it sounds as though your Mum has set you on the right path. Blessings.
Deepest condolences Cassie. Your eternal love for your mother stands tangibly in your posts. Eternal rest grant unto her.
Long life, Cassie
Sad news, Cassie. It is good a proper to weep heaps of tears at such a time. May God uphold you as you mourn for your Mum.
Our deepest condolences and sympathy.
Condolences Cassie, but be bloody careful what you post like this. I reckon you’ve given enough information just in this post for someone motivated to work out exactly who you are and where you go.
I am so glad you have now felt strong enough to share on the Cat so touchingly the sad news of your mother’s passing, Cassie, and to memorialise her life. You’ve had our condolences already before we left for this cruise, but may we multiply them again here, with those of others. Much love. Lizzie and Hairy
Cassie, we have not met personally, but please accept my heartfelt condolences from one who lost her own beloved mother a couple of years ago. I was unable to attend her funeral, being at sea in the wilds of the eastern Indonesian archipelago at the time, which still distresses me. I and my seven siblings and our families miss her still, but she is happy with God.
So very sorry, dear Cassie. May the memories always bring smiles, even through tears. Sending you much strength for the journey ahead, and light for the way.
So very sad, Cassie. Please accept my sincere condolences.
Deepest sympathies, Cassie.
Cassie, the pain and grief fades but never leaves. I wish every day I could speak with my mum one more time and she has been gone now two years. Don’t be afraid to roar your anguish, for it is real and raw. Bless you and your mum for your life force, the lion and the love in you.
Speak with her, in your mind, out loud, and yes, one day you will laugh again, not instead of grief, but through it.
French government toppled in historic no-confidence vote
Trump used ‘forceful hand’ to oust DEA pick after hearing ‘concerns’ about his arrest of pastor
Chronister is no loss. He was an American Dan Andrews when it came to Covid.
WE’VE BEEN LIED TO… Deep State EXPOSED | Cummings Reveals Who’s REALLY in Control of the UK!
@DanielAlmanPGH
Soviet Art Exercise bites the dust, because other people’s money.
Excellent. I hate the imposition of ugly corporate art on the natural landscape.
They simply kept counting until they won.
BREAKING: Democrat Adam Grey Defeats GOP Incumbent John Duarte ONE MONTH After Election in California’s District 13 by 187 Votes
LBJ was notorious in Texas elections for “finding” misplaced boxes of ballots. He kept finding them until there were enough.
Nothing suspicious about that at all!
Recount due.
EXCLUSIVE Disturbing surveillance video shows moment UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson was shot outside hotel
DOGE: Feds Waste Billions on Illegals, Race Studies
The Russian Economy at a Turning Point – Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik
Interest rates at 21%.
Could get worse too.
Russia economy crisis exposed as central bank threatens higher interest rates again (4 Dec)
As in higher than 21%. Ouch.
An admission that they’re criminals?
@EricLDaugh
How can they pardon someone who has not (yet) been convicted or even charged?
I don’t believe they can. It’s not an all-encompassing “Get out of jail free” card.
Macron about to find out what happens when you fudge the “popular” part of popularly elected President.
Arrogance is usually the downfall of the powerful.
Time to dust off the guillotine.
Am I missing something here – WTF is a “preemptive pardon”?
Needless to say, any such fictional concepts should be summarily ignored by the incoming Fatty Trump administration.
That pair of evil slags fauci and schiff need to be hounded into prison – although I’d advocate the death penalty for the former, given his monstrous, inexcusable (and undoubted) crimes.
It’s about as genuine as those 81 million votes.
preemptive pardon = corruption
Fauci deserves to die just for the torture he inflicted on dogs. He is the basest of Serial Killers and got away with it.
Exactly the same as that vile Abortion Doc who is serving time for his slaughter of innocents.
Do not ever do a celebrity spot with Brett Lee.
Even if he’s retired.
Fox Cricket host hospitalised after being ‘impaled’ in accident with Brett Lee (5 Dec)
Someone should ask Piers Morgan what he thinks about this incident…
Piers who cringed in the corner of the nets. Lee kept following him with the ball for theatre, but I think it would have been even better if he just clean bowled him six times in a row.
Good that Howard and Trumbull can’t be expecting any invitations to the white house after the disgusting things they said. We now know the real John Howard thanks to DJT.
https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2024/12/leak-is-brilliant-again.html
In the comments section that disgusting piece of filth and apologist for Hamas – 1735099 – is still pushing for a two-state “solution.”
Not once, on any blog AFAIK, has he condemned Hamas for 7/10, nor has he even mentioned the hostages.
A “Two State solution?” – the same as in Vietnam?
Even though 1735099 fought in Vietnam as a conscript (which he constantly moans about), he is ecstatic that Vietnam is only “one state” since the War.
A definite case of double standards.
Leak got Strap-on Wonk spot on.
Hypothetical Question time.
Dan of the Dead knocks on your door. He is on fire and asks for some liquid to put out the fire.
What do you do?
I wouldn’t even p1ss on him.
Rush out to the
laboratoryshed and get the bottle ofnapalmfire retardant you kept for just such a special occasionGet out the marshmallows.
Bingo!
I would run to the kitchen and get a bucket of water.
Then I would go back and drink the bucket of water and wait for it to hit my bladder before pissing on him, all the while he would still be burning and screaming in agony.
No rush. Something worth doing is worth doing well.
Slam the door hard.
Cassie, it’s good to see you back and commenting.
My condolences to you and your family on your loss. The hole doesn’t fill, the empty chair remains, you close your eyes and think you hear a voice or a tune, or some other little reminder of the one who is gone.
You have been in my thoughts in this season of sorrow. Remember all the good times, let the tears flow, and don’t be surprised if you remember something funny that she said or did and laugh out loud at the memory. They are the very best ones, so hold them dear.
We know that hearing is the last sense to go when someone is dying slowly. I hope that’s some consolation.
My condolences, Cassie.
Yes, Roger. The sister at the Conventist hospital where my sister-in-law passed told us that she could still hear us even though she appeared to be unconscious. The family eventually gathered outside, but I decided to stay with her, holding her hand. I am glad that I did, for she opened her eyes and said, “Hello Vic…..its time”. A great privilege.
Sincere condolences Cassie. Losing a parent is traumatic. Parents have always been there for you and then they’re not. I still dream about mine.
Early morning coffee, and reading Simon Sebag Montefiore’s book “Romanovs.”
In 1547, One Ivan – who went on to be known as “Ivan the Terrible” became the first grand prince to be crowned Tsar. He had already launched his ritual search for a wife. Five hundred virgins – the daughters of the middle gentry – were summoned from throughput his realm for this Renaissance beauty contest, which was won by a girl named Anastasia Romanovna Zakrharina – Yurieva. She went on to bear him six children. (Page 15.)
Yeah, well, she would, wouldn’t she. No TV in them [sic] days.
Don’t keep us in suspense, ZK.
What did the contest involve?
What did the lovely Anastasia do to win?
I’ll leave that to the low and depraved minds on this blog.
Hey!
I resemble that!
Better days…not if we get a Labor-Green government.
From the OOT:
Islamist is akin to Christianist, a completely nonsense term. If this wasn’t the case, Iran and Syria wouldn’t be allied.
Another major failure in the so-called renewable rollout. But this ABC article fails to nail the underlying reasons. A product that was promoted enthusiastically by Government as a “solution” that was never ready for market. An opportunity for grift for the start-up. There will be some that lined their pockets along the way and will never be held accountable. https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2024-12-05/redflow-australian-battery-manufacturer-collapse-defects/104650074
Back in 1992 iirc I did a tour of the zinc-bromine battery project at one of the WA unis. They’re still working on zinc-bromine batteries more than forty years later, which says all you need to know about how good they are.
I was going to make the same point
every 10 years or so somebody gets on the “flow” battery gig
and its money that flows rather than electrons
It used to be known as jobs for the boys, now we know it as subsidies for friends.
Google Magnis and Townsville City Council. Qld State Gov kicked in money too from what I remember.
The grift is deep.
This and the Telegraph article in the OOT “diversity-friendly jihadists” are indicative of the extent to which the intelligence services engage directly or indirectly in psyops on their native populations.
Russians seem to be really leaning in now in Syria. Good, they have a lot at stake here. I hope these strikes also hit the HTS’s Turkish advisors.
Condolences, Cassie. RIP to your mother.
In Pants on Fire news:
Following Hunter Biden pardon, prosecutors push back against criticism of charges
A beak agrees:
Judge in Hunter Biden’s tax case blasts Joe Biden for ‘rewriting history’ with son’s pardon
In many ways it is meet and right and proper that the disgusting old scrote goes into the history books in a blaze of ignominy – his personal corruption writ large and open.
With the side effect that it has neutered any attempts by the Democrats to go after Trump and his staff picks. Another Democrat own goal.
Russian names…but they look like Chechens.
Looks like the battles around Hama have been some of the most intense since 2012. Turks and HTS are putting in a great effort to take Hama. Every morning since the weekend I check the feeds and it always involves HTS advances followed by SAA holding and then regaining some ground. Hearing a lot of talk of UKR involvement on the HTS side in training them tactically in the use of drones.
The girls in the unaltered video? You better get to SpecSavers.
Still, isn’t the real story here a newspaper altering images so that it appears to confirm a Regime talking point? Getting caught, not apologizing, then playing dumb?
Convicted wife killer Chris Dawson has launched an appeal to overturn a conviction over the unlawful carnal knowledge of a then-schoolgirl.
Dawson, who is serving 24 years for the murder of his first wife, Lyn, appeared via his solicitor in the Court of Criminal Appeal on Thursday after he was was sentenced last year to a further three years in prison for grooming and engaging in unlawful sexual acts with the 16 year-old student at a Sydney high school in 1980.
The lawyer representing Dawson, Stephen Eccleshall, confirmed the appeal related to the conviction, not the sentence.
“This is an appeal but the sentence itself is following on from the existing lengthy sentence,” Registrar George Galanis said.
“This is a conviction appeal but the sentence is really no issue,” Mr Eccleshall replied.
Sydney barrister Stephen Odgers SC is briefed in the matter, and a two-hour hearing was set for March 31, 2025.
As a result of the conviction, the former teacher and professional footballer with the Newtown Jets rugby league team, aged 75, also had one year added onto his earliest possible release date of August 2041.
Oz
Presumably he will hold on to the “I wuz framed” narrative because that gets him notoriety – and some respect from fellow crims – in prison.
Bradley Murdoch in the NT is the same – has never said what he did with Peter Falconio’s body.
Will they be calling McClellan to testify that any such behaviour by a state school teacher is as impossible as a square circle or a round triangle? That was the core assumption of the sham royal commission he delivered to Gillard, wasn’t it?
Anyone see Angus Aitken, a stockbroker rip Blowen a new arsehole on Sharri Markson last night. He didn’t miss. Why the SFL’S haven’t outed Blowen every day as the stupidist person in Ausfailure I do not know.
That was an awesome interview.
I do have a problem with his “yes, but”, though.
He did add that “there was a place for ruinables”, in the system.
He couldn’t have said anything else if he’d given advice promoting it to investors.
Remember, the SFLs are still committed to Net Zero & a place for renewables. If they attack Bowen head on there’ll be some blue on blue casualties.
I wonder what that United HealthCare CEO hit in NYC was all about?
Someone protecting their own arse in an insider trading scandal.
Suspect it will be a random nut whose claim was denied. Used to be a few of them floating around the bank after they lost their home/farm/business. Sends a few people round the bend. Usually was 2 or 3 in the Supreme Court library as self represented litigants till their cases got thrown out.
Yeah, that was my thought. Apparently UHC is notorious for denying claims.
United Healthcare’s disturbing track record of rejecting claims as CEO Brian Thompson is shot dead in New York (5 Dec)
A mystery – explained only by the fact that the Coalition energy policy is itself a compost heap.
“Ivan the Terrible”
Ivan became ‘the terrible‘ after Anastasia Romanov died. Ivan and Anastasia’s marriage had been a love match, she was able to counter and temper his erratic personality. He completely lost his mind after she fell ill and died, probably by poison.
The Romanovs were originally minor boyars from Kostroma, a town north of Moscow. They were not Rurikid princes. In 1613, during the Time of Troubles, the Russian throne was offered to the 16 year old Mikhail Romanov, the grand-nephew of Anastasia. Michael Romanov was coerced into accepting the throne whilst hiding in the Ipatiev Monastery in Kostroma. In July 1918, whilst imprisoned in the Ipatiev House in Ekaterinburg, the Romanov dynasty ended in a bloodbath.
News from the nest. A bigger picture to showcase the tree that some here liked so much. The babies are a mound of fluff and pin feathers and can barely fit. There are three of them. The nest is just above the branch union.
Calli, is that an Angel’s Trumpet?
Yes. It’s a low res image, you can get a clearer rendition if you open it in another window.
I have a few of them around the place. This one is “Lipstick”. Others are Old Apricot, Bucks Fizz, Twilight Time, Triple Yellow. They like a warm, humid, frost free environment.
I love Angel’s Trumpet. I did not know they came in such lovely colours. Sadly, I can’t grow them here. Happy though, that Camellia Japonica, Rhododendrons and Peonies love it here.
Could not grow them in Camden.
Do you do any distillation of your Trumpets, Amazon style? 😀
Amazing where they can build a stable nest.
A very well decorated nursery!
I currently have three young magpies following me around like lambs. It’s gorgeous. Today the first newly minted young kooka arrived with helper kooka (who is grandson of the new kid’s mum). Mum yesterday made my day when she flew down from the jacaranda and landed on my shoulder and accepted mince. Only the second time in fourteen years, she’s the only kooka to ever do it.
Must clean my porch. The stick is for throwing at Indian Mynahs.
All three.
Peace didn’t last long though. They fight like hyenas.
Yes…the bloke definitely; seems to be speaking Russian with an accent.
And the girls don’t have Slavic features.
Be that as it may, women shouldn’t be fighting, whoever they are.
Now this is a snake whose head I would NOT remove if it were in my yard. 😀
https://x.com/AMAZlNGNATURE/status/1864445131824194000
This is a snake whose head I WOULD remove. If I had a massive Kato or equivalent.
https://x.com/AMAZlNGNATURE/status/1864401245835813146
Full tummy, there
Thank you to everyone for your kind thoughts and condolences. They mean a lot to me.
No surprises there, whichever side is in view: the first casualty of war…
Watch out for dugites.
Third dog killed by dugites in Perth’s South (5 Dec)
OK not you Pogria since you aren’t a WA Cat. But it shows how deadly they are that two dogs mangled a baby dugite and died.
Bruce,
that is my greatest fear with my dogs. Three of them will stand and bark, but the mad Chihuaha cross dives straight in. He’s an excellent ratter, but he is getting on in years. Even when he was younger, I don’t believe he would have been able to take on a full grown snake of any breed.
What is with all the DEI for snakes and sharks? There is no shortage of snakes, particularly down the back of our ten acres. Shark attacks keep making the news too.
Cassie, condolences.
St Hypatius was a supporter of St Athanasius in his dispute with the Arians (ancient Unitarians) which was the subject of the First Ecumenical Council in Nicea in 325AD.
In fine form:
THE MOCKER
Chris Bowen’s renewables revolution is a big swing and myth
Buying Christmas presents is something I do not enjoy. I detest crowded shopping centres, am useless at selecting gifts and always leave it until the last moment to shop. But thanks to Energy Minister Chris Bowen, I have already finalised my list of purchases.
We had not even made it into summer last week when the Australian Energy Market Operator warned we had insufficient reserves of energy to meet demand. NSW residents narrowly avoided mass blackouts by heeding the pleas of Premier Chris Minns not to use dishwashers, washing machines, and airconditioners between 3pm to 8pm. But when asked about this in parliament, Bowen claimed it was “not an unusual circumstance”.
In a way he is correct. For example, is not unusual for power outages to happen in Liberia, Haiti, or South Sudan. It is not unusual for this to happen when political and environmental ideologues embark on a renewables binge while shunning reliable means of generating electricity. And it not unusual for this to happen in a country that has a bumbling fabulist as its energy minister.
So what has this to do with my Christmas list? Such is my confidence in Bowen I intend buying candles, generators, portable gas cookers, and torches in the way of gifts. As for Bowen and the public utility, all I can say is he would make an ideal bauble for the giant Christmas tree in Martin Place. Let’s be honest, its electric lights are an indulgence we can no longer permit.
But some people, particularly politicians, have no concept of honesty. “The least reliable part of our energy grid at the moment is coal-fired power,” Bowen told Sky News host Laura Jayes last week. This was news to many scientists, especially former Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation CEO Dr Adi Paterson.
“Coal has not been unreliable for 150 years,” he told The Daily Telegraph. “Why would coal suddenly become unreliable now?”
Contrary to Bowen’s claim, coal-fired power stations are not the “biggest threat to reliability in our energy system”. The biggest threat to reliability in our energy system is Chris Bowen.
Three years ago Bowen, then in opposition, declared a Labor government would reduce the average annual household energy bill by $275 by 2025 (and $378 by 2030), based on 2021 prices. And he was contemptuous of the Coalition for questioning his predictions.
“These guys are liars, and they will continue to lie,” he said.
But it is less than a month until 2025, and annual electricity prices, far from falling, are horrendously high. On average, they have risen $609 above what Bowen promised Labor would deliver. In Queensland, that figure is $1000 higher than his pledge.
As this masthead reported this week, the Australian Energy Regulator has noted a record number of Australian households – more than 130,000 – are on hardship payment plans. Unsurprisingly, Bowen has absolved himself of responsibility.
“The former Coalition government’s decade of denial and delay left Australia exposed to a global fossil fuel crisis,” he insisted.
The Morrison government’s record in this field was mixed, but it is Bowen who has given us a fuel (and fool) crisis. Interviewed a month before the election of 2022 by then Nine News political editor Chris Uhlmann, he ardently maintained that the rollout of renewables meant a drop in power bills.
“The more renewable energy we can get into the system, the cheaper it is for everyone,” he breezily pronounced.
Let’s evaluate that claim. In 2021, when Bowen launched Labor’s energy policies, renewables generated 32.5 per cent of Australia’s electricity. That figure has since risen to 39.4 per cent, yet electricity prices have skyrocketed. The more renewables in the system, the cheaper it is for everyone, right Minister?
According to this babbling spiv, Labor’s predictions for lower power bills were based on “the most comprehensive economic modelling that any opposition has ever released about any policy ever in Australia’s history”.
Just days ago he was asked repeatedly by Jayes to detail when bills would come down. He would only say Labor would not “walk away from the policies that that modelling was based on”.
What other wondrous forecasts can we base on the Bowen modelling?
Well to begin with, the modelling shows that Bowen will secure the number one spot of the Reader’s Digest Australia Trusted People survey in 2025. The modelling also shows his performance as Energy Minister is so brilliant it will secure Labor a net gain of 26 seats at the next election. And the modelling specifies that upon his retirement from politics, Bowen’s next role will be heading up Mensa International.
The modelling also forecasts I will take a hat-trick in the first over of the Boxing Day Test. When it is my turn to wield the willow, I will hit six consecutive sixes in a single over. It also specifies that if it is overcast on the day, we can power up all of the Melbourne Cricket Ground’s light towers for a total of $1.25 per hour. Is this modelling great or what?
But for some unknown reason, Bowen’s modelling is not doing the trick. I cannot imagine why not, for he is doing all the right things to bring down prices. For example, he dons the hard-hat, the high-vis vest, and the tradie work gear for the publicity shots. If there is one thing that this and his leering grin conveys, it is sincerity.
He is fond of glib phrases. “The sun doesn’t send a bill,” he says. “The wind doesn’t send a bill.” Renewables are incredibly cheap, according to him. They are so cheap that Labor is raiding our $230bn Future Fund and massively expanding the Capacity Investment Scheme to subsidise them. And did I mention Bowen’s Future Made in Australia plan for renewables, a grandiose and bloated scheme otherwise known as picking winners? The sun doesn’t send you a bill, but you can be sure Bowen will.
In closing, let me quote an excerpt from the book ‘On Charlatans’, by one Chris Bowen. “Politics around the world is being turned on its head and the fakes, the fraudsters and the snake-oil merchants are winning,” he writes. “Why?”
The answer is obvious, Chris Bowen. They are winning because they have perfected the art of projection.
Oz
I am so worried that my fossil fuel powered car might become unreliable even though the tank is full of petrol. Better get a mast with a sail to help when that happens.
Here is the thing about calling fossil fuel generation unreliable – it seems to very reliably fill in the gaps (unpredictable in duration and occurrence) when solar and wind just…stop.
Bowen is our Chemical Ali. An object of ridicule.
The gospel according to Numbers – A Two State solution, as he is urging for the Palis and Israelis was not an option in Vietnam, because the Vietnamese were nationalists, not religious fanatics..
He has worked out that Marxism is a religion yet?
Fish, water.
We know one thing for sure, Numbers don’t add up to much.
Have numbers and mutley been seen in the same room together?
Father and Son?
I scroll Bob, not worth the effort.
Sad when he is lucid and off the subject of Vietnam or education his comments can be worth the couple of minutes to read.
Reading what’s been written, in the past twenty years, with access to the North Vietnamese records, I find his utterances on that subject rather amusing.
NamBob was a real loss to the Qld education service. Possibly.
I really miss mutley making a fool of himself day in day out.
I don’t.
I’m thinking of investing in art.
What genre is best?
The fruits stuck to a wall or the Hunter shit paintings?
Sitting here listening to patient and determined husband debating our power bill with an officer of the Ombudsman. She is saying we are basically stuffed although she didn’t use those words!. She seems to be saying that legislation absolves the power company from being required to replace the “smart” meter with an old fashioned meter which is read either monthly or quarterly. Further, she says they are allowed to “estimate” even though she is acknowledging that the estimates dont correlate with the daily readings that my husband patiently takes.
Even worse, she says the company claims to have somehow “converted” the meter to establish estimates on a certain date. We are CERTAIN that on that date we were absent from the property and the gate was locked.
I am of the opinion that we will NEVER obtain justice in this dispute, and that the only solution for us is a battery. Husband is strongly resisting this as it will probably cost in excess of $20,000 for the size we need. I say “Damn them” & want “out” and a battery is the only solution.
Vicki, go off grid and damn them to hell.
Make use of your own solar, use more gas, and, obviously, firewood.
There are many off grid farmers out my way.
I agree. Just have to convince the husband who stubbornly wants to defeat the Big Energy scoundrels.
We use bottled gas for hot water system and gas cooktop, and combustion wood fire in winter. Our 10kw solar system supplies the rest of the house lighting, refrigeration, aircon, bore pump, electric fences, and workshop.
I am desperate to go off the grid, even though we have a petrol generator for blackouts.
Ok. I know my observations wont be popular but here I go.
If you are already on a smart meter why is there a need to estimate? Is it an older Smart meter. The ones currently being installed are read remotely via some special system.
Utilities do estimates based on prior years usage to save on reading a meter every quarter or in circumstances in Unit blocks where the utility room is inaccessible when the meters need to be read. However once they are read there is a realignment of charges to get back to energy used. Both gas and electricity do this. Regulators ensure Utlities dont win on this.
The meters arent owned by the Distributor. In my area Essential installed the smart meter, Smart meters allow time of use charging and the utilities show what you have used every day. If it on the remote read system.
You can have the meter checked if you are unsure of its accuracy. But the meter owner will charge a fee.,
Going off grid? You will still have to pay for the distribution/transmission grid youi are connected to. And if you export electricity from the solar panels you need the grid. Its hard to escape.
OK, I can understand your surprise, Jock. However, our circumstances are specific. We live in what is classed as a remote area – even though it is within 3 hours of Sydney. We can access Optus on our property, but we can’t get Telstra.
The “smart” meter apparently needs a level of reception (Telstra?) which cannot be accessed at the solar grid in our paddock. They apparently did not discover this until they installed the smart meter. As a consequence, they “estimate”. We, however, being in residence, we are able to record readings daily – which my obsessive husband does!
So……after almost a year of disputes, the energy provider conceded that there was a continuing discrepancy between our ACTUAL readings and their estimates. HOWEVER, they have conceded that they will consider having the meter read manually by a serviceman every 3 months.
As for your comments about going off grid – they are wrong. We would be going completely off grid ie we will NOT be exporting any solar. We will require changes to our inverters to do this. No problem.
Trust me, we have investigated this problem obsessively. The energy provider actually recently offered a sum of money to compensate for our inconvenience over the last year. That was amazing enough!
I do not, for one second, believe that they have “conceded” that they will have the meter manually read by a serviceperson every 3 months. It’s part of their obligations under the Act on sites that do not have communications.
“Jock
December 5, 2024 2:28 pm”
All true, bar the last bit – I can’t see how they can charge you for “network fees” if they pull the fuses to your supply, and so you have NO grid connection, import or export.
You can get “island” inverters that don’t need the grid to run.
You are right about the disconnection situation, Kneel.
1) If their estimates are not correct, then let them on your property to do a read and the inaccuracies will be resolved.
2) Your knowledge of the electricity grid suggests that you might not know the difference between a digital meter and a remotely-read meter. To get remote reads, there must be a communications unit with/in/connected to the meter. In any case, if the communications network does not work where you are (not uncommon for rural or semi-rural properties, for example), then your meter will be face read.
3) Digital meters (including smart meters) are significantly more accurate and maintain that accuracy for longer than disk meters. If you have a problem with the accuracy of your meter, you can ask to have it tested. But I’ve already told you this in this forum. My conclusion is that you decided not to, because if you’re wrong (and you are), then you’ll be up for the testing fee.
Have you tried the equivalent of a lawyer’s letter saying “cease and desist”, implying you will sue for time taken up fighting them etc?
If you get the solicitor to say what you want it can win through when they realise a first-class fight is the expensive alternative.
The Gimp’s Fighting Fit and Alert Hero at an African Summit.
The Summit is at a place called the “Lobito Corridor”. It should be renamed the “Lobotomy” Corridor, in honour of this exceptional man. Lol.
https://x.com/ClayTravis/status/1864355332291539250?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1864355332291539250%7Ctwgr%5Eb4f803f9e7bc7379512a73cfd7ac31f5719defcd%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Face.mu.nu%2F
In summary:
Diverse NZ navy crew untrained in fairly basic operation of survey ship.
Ship hits reef and sinks.
Ordinary citizens suspect said incident might have something to do with woman picked to captain said ship.
Fat female defence minister’s big takeaway is “Oh the misogyny”.
And:
”Why don’t you recognise how great I am because I’m the first female defence minister” .
And:
“We know who you are, all you people making nasty comments about us online”.
And:
”I’ll get you AND your little dog”.
OK, I made that last one up.
Suspiciously beta admiral standing next to defence minister “What she said”.
Women.
Slight correction.
“Useless” Women.
Not all women are like those worthless freaks.
And useless men let the useless women take over.
I think that was called democracy
Adam certainly has a lot to answer for.
I hope the incoming CO of 6Sqn RAAF is better value. I hear she is ex RAF, did a stint here, and converted to RAAF.
Women, lefties and politicians are generally incapable of understanding how anything works. Consequently, none of them should ever be in charge of anything more complicated than a washing machine.
Mad skills. Don’t ruin your records trying to copy.
Mix Master Mike, Drumming
Shhhh…your car is listening to you. If you have blue tooth connectivity in you car its recording and sending info. to unknown parties of conversations in your car.
I’m thinking of investing in art.
Get yer hand off it, Gough.