Thursday Open Thread

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251 comments to Thursday Open Thread

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    RicDre

    Michigan Gov. Whitmer: Hoisted by her own pipeline petard!

    Guest “irony can be so ironic” by David Middleton

    Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer has stood out as one of the most vocal opponents of Enbridge Inc.’s Line 5 project, which is the state’s main source of home heating fuels. Now, however, she’s declared a state of emergency amid a bitter cold snap in her state – and is warning that a spike in energy demand for home heating fuels like propane has put a strain on state-wide distribution.

    Enbridge Inc.’s Line 5 pipeline delivers about 65 per cent of the propane consumed in the state’s upper peninsula, and 55 per cent of Michigan’s total supply.

    Last November, Whitmer moved to revoke the pipeline’s permit, arguing the project – especially a section running beneath the Great Lakes through the Strait of Mackinac – presents an “unreasonable risk” to the state.

    How stupid does a politician have to be to try to shut down their state’s main source of home heating fuel right before winter? They would have to be doubly stupid to do this in a state with real winters, like Michigan. As bad as the Texas energy disaster was, the freezing weather that triggered it only lasted about 10 days.

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  • #
    RicDre

    John Kerry Disappointed Australia Wants to Keep Exporting Coal

    Guest essay by Eric Worrall

    What a shocker – Australia is not rushing to meet John Kerry’s request to give up one of our main export industries on the timeframe of Kerry’s choosing.

    Joe Biden’s climate envoy admits US and Australia not on ‘same page’

    John Kerry’s comments, including a call for a faster exit from coal power, add to pressure on the Coalition to do more

    https://wattsupwiththat.com/2021/02/23/john-kerry-disappointed-australia-wants-to-keep-exporting-coal/

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    • #
      Kalm Keith

      This is taking on a very serious look.

      Saw Kerry speaking in a newsclip yesterday.

      The cadaver image is irrelevant but the lack of understanding or concern for his fellow Man is like the work of the debil.

      What has America done to itself and the world?

      Last year despite the CV19, we had hope.

      The world is on a downward spiral.

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      • #
        glen Michel

        It is very unfortunate that Kerry has a face like a tombstone- something like his misanthropic demeanor, but I am concerned that this US administration in its climate zeal will bring a lot of pressure on other independent countries like Australia to conform to this madness. I can imagine Labor and the Greens applauding this d…head.

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    • #
      el gordo

      We won’t be bullied by the Alliance, we have a real democracy.

      ‘Senator Canavan claimed the Coalition would be betraying its voters if it went ahead with the plan.

      “We stood at the last election and were elected on a policy platform to oppose zero emissions,” he told Sky News.

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    • #
      David Maddison

      John Kerry looks like Herman Munster.

      https://www.pinterest.com.au/pin/389983648953838028/

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    • #
      Tilba Tilba

      John Kerry Disappointed Australia Wants to Keep Exporting Coal

      Almost the whole of eastern Queensland and the whole of eastern NSW are pure coal … so what are we to do?

      Do we join the climate change caravan, and limit sales or do we not? This is a really fundamental question for this country.

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      • #
        Klem

        I think old Boltneck will tell Australians the same thing he told the unemployed Keystone pipeline workers. In effect he told them to Learn to Code.

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      • #
        PeterPetrum

        A bit hypocritical really. US exports of coal to China has increased by about 350% since China stopped taking in our coal. He wants it both ways.

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        • #
          Frost Giant Rebellion

          Coal is actually our capital stock. And we are giving it away too cheaply. Some part of my heart rejoices when I hear of obstructions to our exports of our really great stuff.

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          • #
            Bruce

            Australian coal, especially the stuff from Central Queensland is some of the best in the world in terms of “purity”. It has very low sulphur content, for starters. The coal from the old Blair Atholl line was famous for its “heating” characteristics, to the point where, when Queensland Rail still operated serious steam locos (Beyer Garrets) on heavy haulage (including coal) crews were advised to NOT to bunker up with the stuff from Blair Atholl. Why? It burned so hot using the same grate settings as normal, that it damaged the fire-boxes and grates.

            Low sulphur coal is essential in the top end of the steel-making caper, especially when it comes to stainless steels like 416, etc. Traces of Sulphur will cause structural failure of stressed components made with such coal.

            THAT, and the price and availability is why the world, and particularly China, is snapping it up. Australian steel-making is a cottage industry compared to the rest of the world, and yet we are sitting on vast swathes of easily recoverable best iron ore and coal on the planet.

            And anuvver fing! Speaking of Sulphur, most Australian oil has a low Sulphur content. This is especially true of the stuff extracted from the Cooper Basin and projects like the Tintaburra wells. In some areas, the stuff that comes out of the ground has a “light fraction” such that, after filtration through an old sock, you can run the trusty Fergie or Lister on it. Might blow the warranty on your new Toorak Tractor, but ….

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      • #
        Sceptical Sam

        Fundamental question? Yes.

        Think about this:

        How does a government close down the coal industry without expropriating the industry’s assets?

        A double whammy. Massive loss of export income and compensation to the industry in accordance with Section 51(xxxi) of the Australian Constitution -the “just terms” provision.

        It could only be a proposition that comes from the gaping rationality void in the green-left brain.

        Perhaps that’s where Zac Kirkup’s idiocy stems from. The Western Australian Liberals are about to be sequestered so deep underground they’ll be digging against gravity for decades to extricate themselves.

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  • #
    RicDre

    ‘Problem of missing ice’ finally solved by movement of the earth’s crust

    A new global ice sheet reconstruction for the past 80,000 years

    ROYAL NETHERLANDS INSTITUTE FOR SEA RESEARCH

    During ice ages, the global mean sea level falls because large amounts sea water are stored in the form of huge continental glaciers. Until now, mathematical models of the last ice age could not reconcile the height of the sea level and the thickness of the glacier masses: the so-called Missing Ice Problem. With new calculations that take into account crustal, gravitational and rotational perturbation of the solid Earth, an international team of climate researchers has succeeded in resolving the discrepancy, among them Dr. Paolo Stocchi from the Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research (NIOZ). The study, now published in the journal Nature Communications, could significantly advance research into the climate of the past and help to make better sea-level predictions for the future.

    https://wattsupwiththat.com/2021/02/23/problem-of-missing-ice-finally-solved-by-movement-of-the-earths-crust/

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    • #
      Epicurious

      please forward to the kangaroo rat professor at his waterside property

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    • #
      shortie of greenbank

      So they are saying the predictions were not accurate before this? I wonder if the new predictions will be ‘worse than we thought’?

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    • #
      Kalm Keith

      It’s an old story isostatic rebound.

      Comments frequently made in the past, but no doubt there’s a grant there.

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  • #
    RicDre

    Rep. Bill Johnson: Democrat Efforts to Censor Dissident Media ‘Eerily Similar’ to Communist China

    Rep. Bill Johnson (R-OH) said that Democrat efforts to censor dissident media are “eerily similar” to communist China’s on Wednesday during the House Committee hearing on “Fanning the Flames: Disinformation and Extremism in the Media.”

    “Just two weeks ago, China’s national radio and television administration banned BBC World News from broadcasting in China, because it found BBC’s reports, I quote, ‘seriously violate’ broadcast guidelines, including, and I quote again, ‘the requirement that news should be truthful, and fair, and not harm China’s national interests,’” said Johnson during the hearing on Wednesday.

    “So I have to say, I am disappointed and seriously blown away by my House Democrat colleagues’ letter to the broadcasters, pressuring them to remove conservative news channels from their networks — a letter that looks eerily similar to the statement released by the CCP when it banned BBC,” the congressman added.

    https://www.breitbart.com/tech/2021/02/24/rep-bill-johnson-democrat-efforts-to-censor-dissident-media-eerily-similar-to-communist-china/

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  • #

    The media over here seem to be suggesting that Facebook gained more than the Aussie govt. how does the Oz media view the outcome and is news now being transmitted freely?

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    • #
      Tilba Tilba

      The media over here seem to be suggesting that Facebook gained more than the Aussie govt. how does the Oz media view the outcome and is news now being transmitted freely?

      It’s quite hard to say definitively. Facebook used its clout to block all Australian content, but copped huge backlash from a lot of smaller players, including government, emergency, local news, and non-profit charities.

      They quickly restored access, after the Federal Government amended the arbitration sections of the new code … there is a lot more “commercial space” in there now, rather than being strictly regulatory. And it seems that Facebook has achieved advantages on that front. Call it a tie maybe?

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    • #
      el gordo

      There were a few amendments, but Australia won.

      ‘After a last-minute round of senate amendments were added to the bill on Tuesday, the bill was sent back and quickly passed to the lower house on Wednesday. Under the new law, called the News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code, Google and Facebook are required to negotiate licensing agreements with publishers for the news articles that appear on Google search and Facebook’s feed.’ (cnet)

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      • #
        tonyb

        Thanks for that. Just seen this where the owner of the Daily Mail say The Australian Govt has in effect backed down

        https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9298533/DMGT-Chairman-Lord-Rothermere-condemns-Australias-surrender-tech-giants.html

        I don’t know the truth of it either way

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        • #
          Tilba Tilba

          From the Daily Mail story:

          The chairman of DMGT has condemned the Australian ‘surrender’ to tech giants and says its watering down of laws forcing them to pay for news is ‘bad for democracy’ across the globe.

          Lord Rothermere said the laws, which were given final approval by Australian senators today, will allow Facebook and Google to ‘decide what news is read on social media and what, if anything, is paid for it.’

          He added that politicians in democracies worldwide must decide if they will let tech giants choose what news the public sees in ‘secret deals with the publishers they favour’ – or act to ensure ‘fair and transparent treatment for all’.

          One always needs to treat with caution stories in the media about the media itself … their naked self-interest is usually not hard to pick. But if I had to bet, I would say the Australian (Tory) Government would have protected Murdoch, Seven West, and a couple of other really big players, but thrown all of the smaller content providers (including Daily Mail Australia) under the legislative bus.

          But I don’t really know – just speculation based on past experience.

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        • #
          Tilba Tilba

          There is a somewhat scathing comment on the same issue down at #43. It more-or-less supports my conjecture – that Facebook and Big Media can live with the deal made, but a lot of smaller players are not happy.

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  • #
    RicDre

    Nolte: We’re Telling Kids the Planet Is Doomed and You Can’t Succeed in America

    Thanks to my parents, my bullshit detector was fully operational as a kid. I still remember a hippie babysitter scolding me for flushing a toilet. “We’re going to run out of water by 1983!” — you know, as though I’d never seen a map of the earth with all that blue.

    Yes, my generation had to deal with eco-freaks, but in the 70s and 80s the fear-mongering was rightly marginalized. We weren’t hit with doomsday lies directly from the White House, which is what today’s Generation Z has been terrorized with since 2008, and we weren’t carpet-bombed with 24/7 doomsday propaganda from a fake news media.

    https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2021/02/24/nolte-were-telling-kids-planets-doomed-you-cant-succeed-america/

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  • #
    David Wojick

    Working on my Texas grid collapse article. My personal conjecture is that a frequency drop caused a mini-outage-cascade around 1:55 am Monday morning, automatically tripping at least four big gas fired plants. This instability may well have been caused by the wind turbines that were running, not the frozen ones. I have already written a good bit about how wind can destabilize the grid. With the four plants offline the system just spiraled down manually. Fortunately they avoided a total cascading blackout.

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    • #
      RicDre

      David:

      I had not heard about that frequency drop in Texas, but did find this article that confirms that it happened:

      Others in [Adam Sinn’s] office joined him, watching the grid as Sunday night turned into early Monday morning, Feb. 15. At 1:55 a.m. Central Time, Sinn’s colleague, Ramon Bocanega, saw the frequency across the grid drop to 59.308 Hz. Maintaining the frequency within a range at around 60 Hz is imperative to keep all of the power generation plants online and supplying electricity. That .7 Hz drop was enough to cause pandemonium, as the power plants will automatically shut down when out of sync with the grid, Sinn explained.

      https://sanangelolive.com/news/texas/2021-02-17/behind-scenes-februarys-texas-power-grid-disaster

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      • #

        Ric, thanks for that link. And Thanks David for starting the discussion. I too am looking with interest at the details. We need the millisecond type reports to know what triggered what.

        I hope they come out soon.
        Yes, David, my hunch is like yours. We’ve seen several big blackouts that were caused by a sudden departure of wind after some disturbance set off their “saftey” trips simultaneously.

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        • #
          David Wojick

          Exactly Jo. However, both the utilities and the Feds love wind so we may get a greenwash. Biden’s climate czarina Mary Nichols rushed out a video saying wind was not the problem. The utilities are making a fortune building wind farms. The combo, doing the definitive investigation, might not be honest.

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      • #
        RicDre

        “ERCOT directors already ducking for cover”

        The article says that the directors resigning are the ones that do not live in Texas. If board Chairwoman Sally Talberg, who lives in Michigan, is of the same mind set as Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (see #1 above), she is not someone you would want on a board whose purpose is to ensure a reliable power grid.

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  • #
    RossP

    OMG Andrew Bolt still has TDS , on steroids. Did you catch his introduction to the interview with Sebastian Gorka?

    Jo needs to send him a few of her articles on the election fraud. Bolt believes Biden won, not because of votes for Biden but because of votes against Trump –ie. he seems to believe the election was all above board.

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    • #
      Kalm Keith

      Rigid.

      Thanks for the warning. Haven’t watched him in a long while but won’t bother in future.

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      • #
        glen Michel

        Bolt,same old Bolt. Boring and repetitive during 2020 and maintaining the same emotive drudge this year. A disappointing character.

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        • #
          Frost Giant Rebellion

          What is the deal with that man? He summoned convergent evidence, that proved conclusively that, no matter what we may think about the deeper past of our friend Cardinal Pell, he was definitely not guilty as charged. Then he turns around and claims that Trump didn’t win. While we may admire Andrew for his street-fighting capacities really he’s turned on us. He’s let us down. He knows what evidence is. He’s just playing sillybuggers.

          10

    • #

      which of those articles has not been debunked?

      Also, maybe Bolt was as appalled by MAGA supporters storming the Capitol as most people were.

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      • #
        yarpos

        most people, appalled, yup

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      • #
        Richard Jenkins

        Rubbish GeeAye.
        Videos show police letting people hrough barricades whileTrump was still speaking.
        Police had evidence andaked for hlp before the 4th.
        John Sullivan and others admitted their planning.
        Pelosi’s plan was to avoid debate on 7 states and she won.
        True MAGA were trying to stop the invasion.
        Most Trump supporters stayedout of it and did not even pass the line where the barricades had been.
        The pipes were planted days before. Pelosi must have known.

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        • #

          Yeah. That convinces me more than the actual evidence.

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          • #
            Epicurious

            There is no vaccine for stupidity – Albert Einstein

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          • #
            Richard Jenkins

            I have seen the evidence.
            The emails are not denied.
            The videos of police allowing people through barricades are real and not denied.
            The police chief requesting help on the 4th is real. It does seem that he was unaware some of his subordinates were involved.
            John Sullivan and others are clearly shown in the building and suggesting fires and vandalism.
            Antifa and blm emails have instructions on how to dress.

            It is more difficult to see now as it got removed.
            I have saved the NEW MEXICO professor’s video that includes some of the above and his frustration of removal of the evidence I refer to above.
            You don’t want the evidence it proves you wrong.

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            • #

              You’re repeating nonsense. Maybe move onto Venezuela voting machines, seized servers in Europe and vaccines designed to kill.

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              • #
                Greg Cavanagh

                My God Gee, when you read these article, what do you do? Read them upside down or something?
                You’ve been proven wrong many times over the years with regard to the catastrophic anthropomorphic global warming, which you may not have noticed HASN’T HAPPENED!

                You either purposefully play Devil’s Advocate, Troll the place for kicks, or ?

                What is it that you read?
                What’s your source of all knowledge and trustable words of wisdom?

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              • #
                Richard Jenkins

                Gee Aye,
                Why haven’t Democrats agreed to a forensic examination of the Dominion?
                Why haven’t the Democrats agreed to an audit?
                Have records of envelops been saved as legally required. Have voting procedures been changed illegally? Legislature means legislature and the records show those laws were broken. To say there was no good evidence demonstrates stupidity.

                Trump went along with all sorts of nonsensical investigations. He had nothing to hide and let the stupidity prove his innocence.
                If the Democrats were honest they would want to prove the majority of Americans that believe the evidence that proves the election was stolen is rigged. Clearly the Democrats know they stole American democracy.
                The stop court cases and even prevented debate in the house.
                Before the election Biden reassured his supporters that the fraud was why he could not lose. It was a senile moment.
                This topic was the break into the building. Clearly the only purpose was to prevent any debate about 7 states.
                After the first debate the whole fraud would have been exposed and the rest would have collapsed. The evidence is overwhelming.
                President in exile Trump only needs one legal opportunity and the whole thing will be corrected.
                Perhaps he can get a day in court. So far many court cases have been avoided. Legal excuses is a terrible loss to freedom.

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              • #

                Gee Aye, it is obvious to all you have nothing. No response, not even a reason to doubt all Richard’s points.

                I posted many of those video’s. So the question is:
                Were the videos staged or fake?
                If they were real, then is there any possible context that makes them irrelevant or not supporting of the idea that the Capitol Hill event was not the organic grassroots event the media treat it as? Or that the election was honest, despite no one on the Democrat side supporting any call for investigation or virtually any court considering the evidence properly?

                Or are you not reading those posts because it hurts and the cognitive dissonance is too much?

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              • #
                Frost Giant Rebellion

                Bro you are in denial. And it just reinforces my worst and most unfair prejudices. Doctrinaire evolutionary biologists ……… (eg PZ Myers) have become the mentally laziest people in the world. People who would wake up from a deep sleep just to take a nap.

                And let me speculate where this mentally lazy idea might be coming from. A lot of these people might have really put the hard yards in when they were pre-teen and early teen, and figured out that the theology that they were being surrounded with ……… well lets just say it isn’t necessarily so. My experience that such precociousness can lead to feelings of superiority towards their fellow students, and then to feelings of intellectual superiority more generally. Then the brain just switches off. Then the process is no longer followed. Then the Christian humility that has always been necessary to solid science ….. Its no longer there.

                I used to jump on the trampoline with my much younger brother and educate him about all manner of things. But he got arrogant. He knew he was ahead of his class in so many areas. So the brain just switched off. And I think that is what must have happened to you. Supposing you are not just working some desk out of Tel Aviv.

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              • #
                Kevin kilty

                Considering the 2020 election was dominated by absentee or mail-in ballots, in whcih the usual safeguards were bypassed, ignored or modified ad hoc I suggest to skeptics of election/voting fraud that they read the story of the 1982 Illinois Gubernatorial election, which is, hopefully still online at “Salon” of all places. The title is “Election Fraud Chicago Style”. One-hundred thousand (100,000) fraudulent votes from the Windy City alone. Federal investigation, 26 convictions, all done using the Democratic machine down at the precinct level. The precinct captains know who regularly does not vote and fills in absentee ballots for them. Easy peasy!

                I don’t know that the 2020 election was “stolen”, but I am smart enough to know there is/was motive, opportunity and means for it to have been; and the intense stonewalling and hysteria surrounding the evidence or even mentioning such is highly suspicious.

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              • #

                Richard made no substantial points or substantiated them. He did not acknowledge the doubt around them or the continued and thorough debunking of all of them. It’s easy to parrot false information and just expect anyone who says it is false to be the one who has to come up with the evidence.

                re videos – any one of staged, fake, misleading, misinterpreted, out of context, moot, irrelevant, misplaced.

                05

              • #
                Sirob

                Cointelpro

                00

              • #
                Sirob

                Gee Aye = Cointelpro

                10

              • #
            • #
              Chris

              Richard all that you have said and more was on ‘The Epoch Times’ and ‘ Crossroads ‘ with Joshua Phillip.
              There might still be some back dated stuff. Joshua Phillip did an interview with a young Japanese reporter who was inside the Capital, she was there when the woman was shot. Her video shows Antifa people going down the stairs and changing their clothes from MAGA to Antifa. The man that bashed the glass window with his Antifa helmet just before the lady was shot also changed his clothes.

              She also records John Sullivan -antifa warrior at the scene.

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              • #
                Richard Jenkins

                Thanks Chris,
                I often browse Epoch. I find the suggestion that the facts have not been substantiated ridiculous.
                The declarations are admissable evidence. Staging the videos near impossible.
                Law Prof Clements spent days in New Mexico researching the evidence and found it authoritive.
                Prof was embarassed for his profession that the court cases were not conducted.
                Gee Aye knows his comments are ridiculous. People debunk things that are obviously true to objective minds.

                However Colombus was wrong. The congress of science agreed the world was round. To their credit they knew the radius. There argument was that Colombus could not make the distance.
                Also interesting was the Pythagarians search for over 100 years for square root of 2. Imagine numerator and denominator in Roman numerals.
                A clever mathematician explained the number could not exist as it would have to be both an odd and an even number. Their solution was to drown him and keep searching. Geeaye that would work.

                10

          • #
            Harves

            Please do post your actual evidence that anyone inside the building actually broke in (rather than being let in as shown in various videos) and that anyone doing more than standing around, taking selfie’s was a Trump supporter. Currently you are behind because there is video and audio evidence of non Trump supporter, Antifa leader John Sullivan trying to incite a riot. You know they guy? Paid for by CNN and your ABC.
            Oh, is your evidence an unarmed female shot in cold blood while climbing through a window?

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          • #
            glen Michel

            Evidence? Ha!

            10

          • #
            Len

            Sounds like one of Bob Menzies paid hecklers

            10

            • #
              Richard Jenkins

              Bob Menzies paid hecklers.
              Why?
              Was it an ALP suggestion to prove Bob Menzies was not quick witted?
              But that would draw attention to Menzies’ quick wit in the house!
              Are there theories that Menzies paid the opposition for heckling during question time?
              Petrov scandal was another incredible plot?
              I voted ALP In the 50- 60s but matured and cannot believe how bias handicapped my senses.
              I guess experience generates maturity.

              00

          • #
            broadie

            Actual evidence

            May be wise to get your Mummy down into the basement to stand by with the smelling salts.

            00

            • #
              Broadie

              Maybe a general warning as this appeared to have occurred within one of the shrines to US Constitution and under the direct control and observation of those sworn to uphold those principles. I can not think of any more disturbing series of images if these are a true representation of what has occurred on the 6th.

              Maybe Franz Ferdinand was alive and well at the end of WW1 living in a Dacha on the Black Sea?
              Does anyone have mobile phone footage of that shooting?

              00

      • #
        Kalm Keith

        ” MAGA supporters”

        Activists for activism sake.

        Were they really Trump supporters.

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      • #
        Kalm Keith

        Wow.
        In one week we’ve gone from Gee Aye to Auric Aye and now the one eyed Bolt enthusiast Bolt Aye.

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    • #
      PeterS

      I haven’t watched him for a long time and have no intention of watching him again. He’s a typical conservative who despises outsiders without doing his own research first to uncover the truth. I originally took him as an outsider until I eventually realised he’s a fake.

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      • #
        RossP

        I’m the same PeterS. I saw it when I was flicking channels –I only watched the start of it. The Epoch Times has the part of the interview which catches what Gorka says, ignoring Bolt’s bit at the start. Gorka obviously did not take the bait from Bolt and ignored him.

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      • #
        PeterPetrum

        No, neither have I, Peter. However, I do watch Peta Credlin on the hour before. Well researched, well presented and interesting guests. I can see why some of the Ministers in Tony Abbott’s cabinet were wary of her. She would not suffer fools gladly. I hope she gets into politics one day. We need people like her to lead us out of this mess.

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    • #
      Annie

      Sky News on Win aren’t letting us see Andrew Bolt any more; perhaps it’s no great loss?

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      • #
        Annie

        A pity really, he was good re. Cardinal Pell but I was taken aback by his TDS.

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        • #
          Peter C

          Same here Annie,

          Andrew Bolt was rock solid, but something happened.

          We all have our limits.

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          • #
            Sceptical Sam

            something happened

            Now, where’ve I heard that before?

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            • #
              Frost Giant Rebellion

              From someone who understood what happened in 2001 better than you did … I would assume.

              00

            • #
              Bruce

              “Something happened”?

              Heller’s follow-up book to “Catch 22”?

              A dud, like a lot of “sequels”.

              30

              • #
                Frost Giant Rebellion

                What did you expect her to say? That the Israelis did all the hard yards in New York that morning? You expected her to spell that out? You won’t do that and you aren’t even a public figure or anything.

                00

  • #

    (Australia’s) ABC Media yesterday proudly ran this article:
    Renewable energy boom could force coal power to close early, says new report
    It was an article chock full of (journalist’s) assumptions, as usual, without a clue on actual power consumption, let alone power generation, and there was a mention that there will be 70,000GWH of renewable power, so coal fired power WILL be closing down sooner than scheduled, and that even natural gas fired power will be out of existence.

    Don’t even think that Australia’s (AEMO coverage area of everything to the East of the WA border) total power consumption is 205TWH per year, and slowly rising, (205,000GWH) so that renewable total is just 34% of that total, just think of the absolute minimum power consumption on a daily basis all year round, that figure of 18000MW, that Base Load I always ‘harp on’ about.

    It’s really easy to write it in figures as text, but visualising it as it actually is ….. is not an easy thing, or even finding a representation of what it looks like is also not an easy thing, so let the following picture itself do the talking.

    Here’s the image of the year round average for power generation in Australia, and here, keep in mind that actual power generation is EQUAL to actual power consumption. All the indicators on that image are as close as is possible to the whole of year round average, so this one day is that closest for all indicators.

    Those indicators are as follows: The actual image indicators are shown, and the figures in brackets are the actual year round averages.

    Peak Power – 26,500MW (27216MW)
    Average Hourly Power Consumption – 23,125MW (23,166MW)
    Total Daily Generated Power – 555GWH (556GWH)
    Base Load – 18,000MW (18,000MW)
    Total Wind Generation – 50GWH (49.3GWH)
    Total Percentage Contribution of the Four Renewables – 26.2% (24.9%)

    Note here I have highlighted that figure for all those four renewables 26.2%.

    The article says we will get to 35% renewables by 2025, and can then safely close down coal fired and gas fired power.

    The 26.2% in this image is getting close to that 35%. However, note that hump in the middle of the day, when both versions of solar are at their peak. That same hump will also be the same when we reach 35%.

    Now note that even 35% will not even get (remotely) close to that absolute minimum power consumption. that line across the page at 18000MW, that (mythical, we are told) Base Load.

    That average daily figure of 18,000MW, on a year round basis, translates to 158,000GWH. That’s the absolute minimum power requirement to keep the Country operating, and that’s an ….. ABSOLUTE. Everything else on top of that, well, that’s just the power we consume after we all wake up in the morning.

    So, at 70000GWH, that wonderful 35%, let’s just turn off coal fired power then shall we. That wonderful figure of 70000GWH is just 44% of …..the Base Load.

    Texas will look like an isolated glitch!

    Why is it that journalists don’t do (investigative) journalism any more, and just rave on about things they have no comprehension of.

    Tony.

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    • #
      liberator

      I wish some journalists from the MSM would read your work Tony. So much information that shows the true picture of our energy needs vs what the unicorn farts and fairy dust can do for us. Sure, get the intermittent power generators up to plate capacity (not true capacity) add mega batteries, turn off the coal and gas burners and watch us regress to the dark ages. The outcry from the people would be phenomenal

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      • #
        Sceptical Sam

        Just get the intermittent power generators to sign on to a contract that requires them to supply the power they’re contracted to supply.

        That means if the wind isn’t blowing or the sun isn’t shining they are still required to deliver the contracted power.

        How do they do that?

        Lots of options:

        They buy it off those generators who have it.

        They put in peakers.

        They put in batteries.

        It not difficult. It just requires governments to apply standard contract processes.

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  • #
    Chris

    The overall percentage of Americans who identify as LGBT is on the rise, but the shift seems to be driven by younger generations, 15000 people were surveyed . This coincides with the new “equality bill” designed to obliterate women and christians from the public sphere

    https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2021/02/24/poll-nearly-16-of-generation-z-identify-as-lgbt/

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    • #

      sort of coincides with previous generations repressing their identity.

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      • #
        Kalm Keith

        The politicised hyping of this matter in recent years is as harmful as the original reason people hid their gender dysphoria.

        The truth is there, but as with CAGW that can be a problem for activists.

        The LGBQTIR designations are not useful but strangely the Rainbow meme does have some relevance to the science.

        Nine months is a long time during which a pregnant woman can be subjected to stressful events or alcohol intake which may interrupt stages of the phoetal development.

        KK

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      • #
        Kalm Keith

        The threat of P-Bashing was always there, strangely from the unionised left at that time.

        Now the left wants to be seen as their champions.

        Perhaps it’s politics at play.

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      • #
        Frost Giant Rebellion

        So this is just one more example of deep state engineering that you are going along with Gee Aye?

        10

        • #

          Just normal state “engineering”. The electoral process that elected the president was run by the state – in this case the state was the States. There is no evidence that it was run in a way that affected the election outcome.

          05

    • #
      Kalm Keith

      My concerns over the annual “flu shot” are still unresolved and after some serious issues in WA a few years ago and personal experience I am still concerned.

      This seems more like reality than what governments would have us believe.

      https://www.bmj.com/content/360/bmj.k15/rr

      I am very much pro vaccine when done properly but the current hysteria pushing the CV19 Non Vaccine is not good.
      It is Not a vaccine and to claim such is a deliberate misrepresentation.

      Governments are trustworthy: please send in your votes on that statement.

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      • #
        Kalm Keith

        Don’t know how this came to be under 10?

        10

      • #
        shortie of greenbank

        Thanks for that. I’d done some casual research, not wanting to head down the anti-vax rabbit hole back at the start of the pandemic last year. This was around the time of the first calls of we need a vaccine before we can travel again came up. I compared Californian children deaths to national vaccination rates (I could not find Californian vaccination rates just those who had a vaccination history that year they were in hospital). I found some years statistically similar to those not vaccinated dying from the flu they were vaccinated against and other years the results were statistically significant in favour of the vaccines. I had not seen the multi-year studies on this though so missing a flu shot if you get it every year might be a bigger issue than the people who never received one to start with?

        On the topic of children where was a study done in 2012 where children were given either the flu vaccine or a placebo. The paper you linked to mentions similar results in other studies but this one in particular breaks it down into how strong an association the issues can be. What they found was that there was a massive 440% increase in incidences of non-flu pneumonia in those vaccinated. The sample size was relatively small which is the limiting factor for this study. This is often the case with these types of studies, show something that is highly concerning to the powers that be that should get a larger cohort study done and not have ever followed up. Spain tested high dose vitamin D injections as part of their treatment for patients upon arrival fairly early on. They had 100 patients, 50 would be randomly allocated the vit d inject + standard of care and the other 50 would receive the standard of care. The control group on only the standard of care had 20 admitted to the ICU and 2 die while the vit d group had 2 admitted to the ICU and 0 deaths…. no further testing of vit d injections have been noted after this was released.

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        • #

          Just remember that death is not the only competing outcome.

          11

        • #
          Chris

          Shortie, There has been a lot of study on vitamin D in the nordic countries. In Norway bread and milk are fortified with vitamin D . If children are lethargic in winter , they are tested and usually prescribed Vitamin D. It is standard practice for families to go along to their Dr in winter and all be tested .

          It’s actually very easy to become deficient particularly if you are a vegetarian/ vegan and smother sunscreen on when you go outdoors . One case of Covid in Norway was a 20 something female, super fit and vegan, she was very ill and has not completely recovered after 3 months. Her vitamin D levels were practically zero. She is a work colleague and friend of my daughter.

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            William Astley

            The problem is the Vitamin D fortification is not sufficient. Vitamin D deficiency in children, ignorant adults, is criminal negligence, based on the life long adverse sad consequences of the deficiency. Odd civilization changing consequences.

            Throwing a tiny uncontrolled supplement at the problem is a pathetic response. Close to evil. On the dark side. Why? What is the objective of the conspiracy? Stop people from using more than 1000 UI/day. Stop knowledge of what Vitamin D does in the body.

            It is a fact, that 70% of our health care costs are due to Vitamin D deficiency. Logically to reduce healthcare and stop pointless suffering and dying, every child would be tested for Vitamin D deficiency and that problem corrected. 80% of the Black people in the US are severely Vitamin D deficient as compared to 42% of the US general population. 40% of the Canadian population in the winter are severely Vitamin D deficient. 25% in the Canadian population in the summer are severely Vitamin D deficient.

            For example, cow’s milk in US/Canada has been fortified with 100 UI Vit D per glass. What does that do? Food Vitamin D fortification, gives people the false sense that if they drink cows milk and take a multiVitamin that has the ‘daily’ fake Vitamin D amount (Fake Medical groups in the US ‘recommend’ Vit D 600 UI/day) in it they will not be Vitamin D deficient.

            The Fake US Medical groups have hidden the Vitamin D research. And there are Fake Vitamin D studies where everyone was given placebos to generate a Vitamin D ‘study’ which proved Vitamin D does not stop people from getting cancer. These fake studies (I believe there are five out of 100 studies) is an indication of the evil and organized evil. Vitamin D stops cancer because it enables/turns on evolutionary developed systems. Same with the US ‘health’ boards who issued Fake Vitamin D recommendations for the US population.

            To reach optimum Vitamin D, in our blood stream, requires supplements, 4000 UI to 10,000 UI per day, based on body mass and based on double blind scientific studies.

            ‘Vitamin D’ is a special chemical that is required by every cell in our body, to get the instructions to build chemical producing modules. Vitamin D enables the cells to produce hundreds of specialize biochemicals to protect the body from all chronic diseases. Vitamin D is the key that gives our body evolution tested chemicals to keep us health, smiling, and not fighting with each other.

            Ten thousand genes have been identified in our genome, that are activated by Vitamin D. It is estimated that 10% of the human genome is activated by Vitamin D.

            These chemical producing modules, right at the cell and organ level (heart cells produce different chemicals and amounts of chemicals than lung cells to protect the organ in question), produce biochemicals to stop most common cancers, most chronic diseases, stop most viruses, prevent periodontal disease, prevent most common cancers, stop ‘depression’, prevent arthritis, stop irrational ‘thoughtless’ pointless angry violence, and so on.

            People who are Vitamin D deficient become ‘nervous’, ‘touchy’, they get black circles around their eyes. They have strange pains in their body. They lack energy. They have problems sleeping.

            Humans evolved to live in groups of around 30 people. The human brain evolved before language was developed. How did humans avoid violence and depression, cancer, type 2 diabetes, periodontal disease, virus attacks, when we lived in small groups for hundreds of thousands of years?

            The Vitamin D average level in the US 26 ng/ml or 65 nmole/l. Vitamin D optimum is at or above 60 ng/ml or 150 nmol/l.

            It has been shown in human studies, that increasing Vitamin D blood serum level from 20 ng/ml (50 nmol/l) to 60 ng/ml (150 nmol/l) reduces the incidence of breast cancer by 60%. Same for all of the common cancers.

            The instructions for the chemical producing modules and other cell changes are encoded in our DNA. Every cell in our body has a copy of our genome in it. Vitamin D is the chemical that enables our cells to access the genome and get the instructions to build biochemical protecting.

            This is a lecture of from one of the lead Vitamin D researchers in the US.

            Vitamin D Overview Lecture Robert Heaney

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9SNfrE7P1s

            Coronavirus: Black African deaths three times higher than white Britons – study

            https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-52574931

            82% of the US black population, 69% of the US Hispanic, and 42% of the US general population is Vitamin D deficient.
            Prevalence and correlates of vitamin D deficiency in US adults.

            https://tahomaclinic.com/Private/Articles4/WellMan/Forrest%202011%20-%20Prevalence%20and%20correlates%20of%20vitamin%20D%20deficiency%20in%20US%20adults.pdf

            https://emerginnova.com/patterns-of-covid19-mortality-and-vitamin-d-an-indonesian-study/

            Patterns of COVID-19 Mortality and Vitamin D: An Indonesian Study

            Vitamin D Insufficient Patients 12.55 times more likely to die, blood serum 25(OH)D level from 21 to 29 ng/ml

            Vitamin D Deficient Patients 19.12 times more likely to die, Vitamin D blood serum level less than 20 ng/ml

            Vitamin D ‘normal’ for this study is 25(0H)D above 30 ng/ml.

            For Vitamin D status, cases were classified based on their blood serum of activated Vit. D 25(OH)D levels:

            (1) normal – serum 25(OH)D of greater than 30 ng/ml,

            (2) insufficient – serum 25(OH)D from 21 to 29 ng/ml, and

            (3) deficient – serum 25(OH)D of less than 20 ng/ml.

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            • #
              shortie of greenbank

              The highly suspect research by the likes of Rachel Neale (a Professor no less) in Australia does not help the discussion. She ran a multi-year survey supplying some people 1 vit d tablet a month and other a placebo then asked them once a year how they felt and any medical issues. She at least agrees that vit d deficiency needs to be treated and may help reduce issues associated with wuflu.

              https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-01-14/qld-vitamin-d-supplement-colds-flus-qimr-research/13057290

              By comparison other research on vit d did a comparison between those who took vit d every day and those who don’t in another country finding a 34% reduction on those testing positive (this can be affected by healthy user bias). Further to that vit d status is one of the highest predictors of wuflu death at over 15:1 low:high vit d status.

              10

              • #
                OriginalSteve

                Surge in serious respitory illness in kids…no surprise there. Another lockdown?

                2 likely causes –

                (1) by design the indended huge levels of stress placed on kids by the whole Covid PsyOp is taking its toll.

                (2) wearing masks is like drinking water youve swished aroud your mouth for hours, spat it in a glass then went back and drank it hours later…..

                https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/doctors-on-high-alert-after-surge-in-serious-respiratory-illness-among-children-20210224-p575cu.html

                “Doctors are observing an alarming rise in Victorian children presenting to hospital emergency departments with a potentially serious respiratory illness that can cause pneumonia.

                “Australasian College for Emergency Medicine Victoria faculty chair Mya Cubitt said hospital clinicians were on high alert after seeing “more than winter levels” of children presenting with respiratory syncytial virus (RSV).

                I’m just wondering when the population are going to start actually pushing back on the covid psyop?

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              • #
                shortie of greenbank

                Could be an allergic reaction to Chairman Dan….. the state needs to be vaccinated against communist morons.

                00

      • #

        Why do smart people fall for magic shot theory?

        Because they fear getting called names by sheep?

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        el gordo

        ‘My concerns over the annual “flu shot” are still unresolved …’

        Only two Australians died from influenza last year, avoid vaccination and isolate throughout the flu season.

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      • #
        Frost Giant Rebellion

        Why are you pro-Vaccine Kalm Keith? Apart from the rabies vaccine I find it hard to think of a vaccine that I could fully approve of.

        01

        • #
          Sceptical Sam

          Have you seen a child die of Tetanus?

          50

          • #
            Frost Giant Rebellion

            The T.I.G shot is a fine medical treatment. Its not really a vaccine though. It swamps the body with exogenous anti-bodies. Yes there certainly are some valid uses of vaccines. But you could probably count them on one hand. And another reason the kid probably died, without benefit of the TIG shot, is that other alternatives were likely demonised.

            11

            • #
              Sceptical Sam

              other alternatives were likely demonised.

              Interesting.

              What alternatives did you have in mind?

              10

              • #
                Frost Giant Rebellion

                Well to be sure if we were to fall for the “one treatment only” fallacy then there would be no close second to the T.I.G shot. But by your own admission you watched the child die and did not so much as give it a change with high-dose IV vitamin C. High-dose IV vitamin C would have killed most but not all of the bacteria. And would have neutralised substantially but not completely the neurotoxin produced by the bacteria.

                If you are an MD then for institutional and ideological reasons you could not bring yourself to save the child. Being as if you are an MD you are the product of trauma-based mind control, combined with a serious of carrots, sticks and indoctrination that is just about to get millions of Australians killed.

                Now the effects of the vitamin C, along with life support, may have bought enough time for the kid to get hold of the TIG or to allow the TIG to do its magic. But the MD’s let him die instead. Just like they are going to let Australians die starting from Monday.

                01

              • #
                Sceptical Sam

                The child was five.

                I was seven.

                It was 1952.

                10

        • #
          John R Smith

          The climate issue is the model of everything.
          None of us here are anti-environment.
          We are constantly pushed to rhetorical extremes by … name your villain.
          Alarmism.
          Medicalization.
          Vested political and business interest push extremes.
          How many injections does one get in a year?
          Is it possible to live without the ingestion and injection of multitudes of expensive manufactured substances?
          It is fun to pay heavy taxes to support the developed of these substances and then get the strong armed privilege of paying for them again.
          Best to spend one’s youth working like a dog to be able to pay for incredibly expensive (sometimes bizarre) medical interventions for a few more years of debilitated existence.
          I opted out.

          31

    • #
      Klem

      “The overall percentage of Americans who identify as LGBT is on the rise”

      Of course, people identify as anything nowadays, it has become meaningless. I identify as male most times, but sometimes I identify as female and other times ‘other’, just as a joke. I could care less.

      And in Canada, it is a federal offence to deny my gender identity, they could be prosecuted and go to prison. What a stupid law.

      30

  • #
    RicDre

    Great article as always Tony.

    Thanks for the link to Renewable energy boom could force coal power to close early, says new report

    Here are some of my favorite quotes from the article”

    Energy Markets attempts to quantify the mounting pressure on coal-fired plants, as a flood of cheaper and more flexible renewable power hits the grid.

    ‘Flexible’ is one attribute ‘renewables’ do not have.

    The report said the extra supply of renewable energy could make electricity prices more volatile but also cheaper on average, which would further impact the profitability of coal plants.

    And yet everywhere there is a significant amount of ‘renewables’ on the grid, electricity prices have become more expensive.

    Last week [Dr Kerry Schott] said renewables are making coal increasingly unprofitable

    Actually, its not ‘renewables’ that are “making coal increasingly unprofitable” its subsidies and regulations for ‘renewables’ that are “making coal increasingly unprofitable”

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    • #
      Peter Fitzroy

      Carmichael mine set to receive $4.4bn in subsidies, favourable deals and tax concessions over 30 years according to the Institute of Energy Economics and Financial Analysis

      So coal is already unprofitable.

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      • #
        Furiously curious

        I notice they include ‘tax concessions’. Every business gets tax concessions, including renewables. It would be interesting to know what percentage of the $4.4 bill is tax concessions? And remember 30 years would easily cover the need to fully replace the original solar panels, maybe twice? The Chinese are replacing wind turbines after 15 years. So they’re in for a bucket-load of subsidies.

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      • #
        robert rosicka

        What would the breakdown of the subsidies be Fitz ? Every business gets a subsidy one way or another and big business will surely attract larger subsidies .
        Until you can get a breakdown your comment is worthless but you knew that anyway.

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        • #
          Peter Fitzroy

          11.1.1.1

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          • #
            williamx

            11.1.1.1

            Quote from their site Fitz:

            The Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA) examines issues related to energy markets, trends, and policies. The Institute’s mission is to accelerate the transition to a diverse, sustainable and profitable energy economy.

            The Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis is a U.S. non-profit corporation, recognized by the IRS as a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt corporation.

            IEEFA receives its funding from global philanthropic organizations and individuals. We gratefully acknowledge our funders, including the Rockefeller Family Fund, Energy Foundation, Mertz-Gilmore Foundation, Moxie Foundation, Rockefeller Brothers Fund, KR Foundation, Park Foundation, The Heinz Endowments, Charles and Helen Brown Foundation, Just Transition Fund, Wallace Global Fund, The 11th Hour Project/The Schmidt Family Foundation, Sequoia Climate Fund and some who choose to remain anonymous.

            end Quote.

            Fitz,

            No wonder the IEEFA push for the demise of fossil fuels.
            It has nothing to do with climate change.
            It is all about ideology, control and enrichment to investors, bankers and the elites.

            I didn’t know that this was the purpose of the IEEFA.
            Thankyou for posting.
            Comrades like you and I should always expose the fascists.

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            • #
              Peter Fitzroy

              The message and the messenger are mixed in your reply – are you calling them out? Do you have an alternative source?

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              • #
                robert rosicka

                Alternative source could be WUWT or JoNova or Craig Kelly or Matt Canavan or even better still let’s go direct to the source and ask David Boshoff !
                Going by your metric these are all perfectly legitimate.

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              • #
                Peter Fitzroy

                Robert – if they have the data, why not. However the sites you mention are reposting from other sites, the reference I posted had done the analysis themselves. Do you understand the important difference?

                19

              • #
                robert rosicka

                David Boshoff is the boss of Adani , do you understand the important difference ?

                80

              • #
                Peter Fitzroy

                Sites not people, do you understand the important difference?

                010

              • #
                williamx

                The messenger and message are mixed in your reply, my fellow comrade.

                see 11.1.2.1.1

                It might clarify your thoughts.

                I don’t believe I need to give you an alternative source, Fitz..

                You were the one that gave me the original source I quoted from.
                at 11.1

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              • #
                robert rosicka

                What no comeback ? Poor Fitz you walked right into that didn’t you heh heh .
                As for the others if their info comes from Adani press releases I would imagine that beats your source which could gather their info from White Crow or Rosella who knows where !

                51

              • #
                robert rosicka

                “ Alternative source “ your words not mine Fitz and there is no better source than the boss of Adani .

                50

          • #
            robert rosicka

            So the source you get your info from is dated 2019 and it’s from a lefty bunch of fossil fuel hating greenies !

            https://ieefa.org/about/

            About normal for one of your links Fitz all it proves is why your here .

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        • #

          Whatever you do, don’t give Peter Fitzroy a link. He never takes them. It’s a ploy his handlers tell him to use, as it wastes your time looking for it, and makes you angry so he can use that against you.

          I always thought that in asking for a link he would take it, but he just doesn’t and I proved it for myself.

          He used my use of a screen name as a ploy for him to make personal and snide attacks against me, and as much as I linked to my bio where it was explained, as well as offering an explanation, he never took that link, proving to me that he just preferred to make those personal attacks.

          After a while I got heartily sick of it, and seriously that was his actual intent, to anger me to the point I might say something he could then use against me.

          So, as a joke really, when it happened again, I gave him this link. (to the actual history of the Edmund Fitzgerald sinking) It was a risk on my part, as it gave him the introduction to further attack me.

          However, there was no response at all. It intrigued me, because this was the perfect opportunity for him to ‘have a go’ at me, but there was nothing.

          The next time he asked for a link from me, I included that same earlier link to the Edmund Fitzgerald, and again there was no response.

          Now I was sure that he just was not taking the link, and when asked for links on five subsequent occasions, I used that same link, with not one single response.

          So I knew he wasn’t taking any links I gave him. Much earlier than this exercise, I linked to my bio at my home site, and he categorically stated that he wouldn’t visit ‘some blog’, as he said, as he had no idea what would happen if he did that.

          So, that’s why I won’t respond to him any more, other than my response the other day when he just flat out l1ed about me, another of his ploys he’s been told to use.

          So, a general warning here. whatever you do, don’t go chasing any links to post here for him.

          Again, to Joanne and the Moderators, I do apologise for the personal rant, but I have had enough with him calling me a liar with every comment he makes about me.

          Tony.

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          • #
            Peter Fitzroy

            So you present a link outside the discussion, and the wonder why it is not followed? How do you know?

            And I have never called you a Liar

            /poor baby

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          • #
            RicDre

            “I gave him this link. (to the actual history of the Edmund Fitzgerald sinking”

            Brilliant idea to use the Edmund Fitzgerald link.

            As a side note, living near one of the Great Lakes (Erie), I remember the Edmund Fitzgerald sinking being a big new item when it happened and it still occasionally shows up in the news here.

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          • #
            robert rosicka

            Tony Fitz attacks what he doesn’t understand and doesn’t want to hear , what do you expect from someone who thought he was paying about 12 cents a kw for electricity when in reality it was closer to double.
            He is the radical lefts best asset or is that the worst !

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            OriginalSteve

            Our resident trolls reminds me of the story of “Brer Rabbit and the Tar Baby”…people should look it up….

            00

      • #
        RicDre

        “So coal is already unprofitable.”

        Yes it is because, as I said above, of subsidies given to ‘renewables’ and regulations requiring ‘renewable’ energy sources to be used in preference to other energy sources. The Carmichael mine $4.4bn subsidies are a typical government attempt to fix the problems created by renewable subsides and regulations when it would be better to remove both the ‘renewables’ subsidies and regulations as well as stop the Carmichael mine subsides, but they won’t do that because, as Warren Buffet said, “For example, on wind energy, we get a tax credit if we build a lot of wind farms. That’s the only reason to build them. They don’t make sense without the tax credit.”

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      • #
        Hanrahan

        Premier Joh gave mining companies royalty holidays, built railways and power stations that allowed them to operate. Long after these concessions have been forgotten Qld has a thriving mining industry, so much so it is only royalties [mainly coal] that keep our spendthrift labor premiers out of debtors’ prison.

        In the meantime the state was a monopoly rail operator, making a motza outa haulin’ coal. Sadly labor governments went so far into debt they had to sell this cash cow, QRNational, to meet the bloated PS wages bill.

        Mining subsidies are delayed gratification, a concept alien to labor/greens.

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        • #
          RickWill

          Premier Joh gave mining companies royalty holidays, built railways and power stations that allowed them to operate.

          Joh permitted them access to the land so they could use their money to build government infrastructure, for which he then charged a throughput fee. The big four miners were falling over themselves to get a slice of the action after the success of Utah Development Corporation. Joh established a solid income stream for the government that cost them nothing, all on the growing market for coal. It was incredibly lucrative in the early 80s to be a coal miner in Queensland. Japan and Korea had little coal or iron reserves so needed both. China can supply much of its own coal needs but about half their iron ore comes from Australia. So the scales are no much more in WA’s favour.

          Conversion of trains from diesel to electric also provided economic benefit for Queenslanders.

          Under Joh’s rule, the Queensland Government always ran the risk of having to declare a dividend to citizens with its increasing income from coal operations as well as the royalties. He took on the unions in Queensland a full decade before the other States (and Hawke with the pilots) followed.

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  • #
    OldOzzie

    Trans-‘inclusive’ language is erasing women’s biology

    In the 1979 Monty Python classic Life of Brian, four people sit on the steps of a Roman amphitheatre, speaking in hushed tones.

    “Any anti-imperialist group like ours must reflect such a divergence of interests within its power base,” one asserts. They then proceed to debate a man’s inalienable right to have a baby.

    Stan: I want to be a woman. From now on I want you all to call me Loretta.

    Reg: What!?

    Stan: It’s my right as a man.

    Judith: Why do you want to be Loretta, Stan?

    Stan: I want to have babies.

    Reg: You want to have babies?!?!?!

    Stan: It’s every man’s right to have babies if he wants them.

    Reg: But you can’t have babies.

    Stan: Don’t you oppress me.

    Forty-two years later and Monty Python’s absurdist vision has materialised. Not only do (trans) men have the right to have babies but their right to not be offended in the maternity ward now outweighs a woman’s right to be described as a mother.

    The push to be more inclusive of trans men within maternity care has prompted an increasing number of hospitals, medical organisations and bureaucracies to alter standard language around pregnancy so that it is gender neutral and “inclusive”.

    In practice, this means midwives at two National Health Service hospitals in Britain — Brighton and Sussex — have been instructed to refer to breastfeeding mothers as “chest-feeders” and to use the term “human milk” in place of breast milk.

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    OldOzzie

    Indigenous treaty will be a marriage, not a divorce, says Mick Dodson

    Northern Territory treaty commissioner Mick Dodson has urged a national treaty, saying “just recompense is owed”.

    Professor Dodson delivered the annual Barry O’Keefe Memorial Lecture at Australian Catholic University on Wednesday, describing treaty as “a marriage, not a divorce”.

    “As a nation, we are at the crossroads when it comes to bridging the social and economic gaps between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians,” he said. “ I believe our country needs to take a different road than the ones we have previously travelled.”

    Professor Dodson said an Australian treaty could address both political and moral views.

    “To cater to the moral imperatives,” he said, “there has to be a recognition and acceptance by governments of two necessary truths: that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander societies have been injured and harmed throughout the colonisation process, and just recompense is owed. And, secondly, the status of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as First Peoples and the distinctive rights and special status based on prior occupation that flow from that.”

    From the Comments

    OK, so let’s start with “how much?” Then, “What else?” Lastly “Is that everything?” Once we know the answer to those questions then we can address them constructively and in good faith.

    BUT, once the ‘list’ has been defined and we get to the end of the ‘treaty’ negotiations, whatever they may be, it MUST BE THE END. No more coming back and demanding more in future generations.

    Previously the demand for “Sorry” was all that was asked for; we just want an apology. That was given.

    If the treaty doesn’t make clear and final that it is FINAL, then there can never be a true treaty.

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      yarpos

      The billions spent each year arent enough, but I doubt a figure will ever mentioned, because beyond that lay the twin dragons of the end of the gravy train and personal responsibility. Much better to try and keep the incremental victimhood bandwagon rolling.

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        shortie of greenbank

        Prof Dodson is probably either a city type aboriginal or the usual marxist moron pushing race as they often do to create division. Pauline Hanson covers the former group here while making the later marxist group look the fools as one of their own try to ineptly interrupt. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8XyTF7oiikk

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      Len

      The whole debacle was started by the Australian Communist Party. Lenin had Joseph Stalin write a tome called “On the National Question”. In it their plan was to endeavour to start a Communist indepent Republic in countries with an indigenous populations. A delegation of Ausralian communists went to Moscow prior to World War 2. They were asked what they were doing to start implementing an independent Communist republic in Australia. After World War Two the Communist party started advertising for volunteers to work in Aboriginal communities to introduce communism. The best expose of thie is is found in former communist Geoff McDonald’s book “Red over Black”. A friend of mine mentioned this book several years ago. I did not obtain a copy until last May. I wish I had obtained it when he first mentioned it. I asked my friend who had told him about this book. His answer was the late Cyril Barnes. Cyril was an Aboriginal Elder from around Laverton area. Interestingly Cyril knew what the communist were planning for them. Treaties and consitutional recognition. All part of the communist plan going back to Stalin

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    • #
      Harves

      First it was citizenship and equality, then it was land rights, then it was ‘sorry’ then it was their own parliament, now it’s a treaty plus mega dollars.
      How about we just admit we did wrong and facilitate them all going back to the life they would have had if the first fleet had never arrived.
      Happy to give everyone of them $100k on the proviso they don’t take another cent from any ‘white’ government.

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    OldOzzie

    How to run for maximum effect: slow down and shuffle

    A shuffling style of running will prevent injury

    Devised by a team of human movement scientists at Ghent University in Belgium, in collaboration with American and Japanese researchers, a technique called “grounded” running is an approach to preventing injury in runners. Think of it as being somewhere between fast walking and running — more of a shuffle.

    The key is to have at least one foot always in contact with the ground and to barely lift your knee and rear foot. Studies have shown it reduces loading on muscles and joints by up to 35 per cent, reducing the risk of injuries. “As well as lessening the loads, it reduces the energy cost of running, lowering heart rate and core temperature, so fatigue is reduced,” says the exercise scientist Professor John Brewer, the author of Run Smart.

    Running can actually improve knee damage

    For those who think that their knees aren’t up to a daily jog, not only have researchers proven that long-term running offers joint protection, but also that long-distance running can help to rebuild middle-aged knees, even if the joints are damaged before they start.

    Although none of the participants thought they had knee problems, before they had begun training, several MRI scans detected underlying cartilage and tendon damage, typical of the wear and tear that comes with age. While it might have been expected that running would make matters worse, scans completed two weeks after the runners crossed the finish line showed that damaged cartilage was partially repaired and overall the knees were in better shape after the marathon than they were before.

    You need two pairs of running shoes

    What is helpful is having two or more pairs. Researchers reporting in the Scandinavian Journal of Medicine and Science in Sports found that runners who rotated their shoes had a 39 per cent lower risk of injury than those who ran in the same pair of shoes on every run. The authors suggested that “different shoes distribute the impact forces of running differently, thereby lessening the strain on any given tissue”.

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    liberator

    From the Shepparton News this week. (Sorry Pay walled)

    Billions of dollars in solar projects slated for the Shepparton region are on hold! Cry me a river…

    Because there is no capacity to plug them into the transmission network without the risk of instability in the grid.

    While more than a dozen large-scale solar projects have been approved, or are in the approvals process, there is little prospect of them starting as planned — and thousands of construction jobs are also on hold.

    “The Australian Energy Market Operator has determined that the grid in the West Murray Zone is effectively full, meaning there is limited capacity remaining within existing transmission lines,” he said.
    “This is the main reason for the slowdown in new solar farms proceeding in the region — it’s about their ability to connect to the grid.”

    There’s more to the article but I wont bother posting the rest, It’s just woe is us…

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      Annie

      I love that photo of Enceladus. Not sure I’d want to live there though!

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      Frost Giant Rebellion

      I accept your premise that planets create thermal energy but I have to caution you on this one because there are other forms of energy that the mainstream have ALSO made taboo. I think earth is creating a huge amount of thermal energy at its (voided) core. But Encelapus …. not so much.

      Electrical energy in my view comes from these sources

      1. Moving electrons
      2. Moving protons
      3. Moving ions
      4. Discharge of built up electrical capacitance.

      Jupiter has a proton wind. My understanding is that Saturn has an EVEN STRONGER proton wind than Jupiter. Another factor is that orbits of two or more large gravitational bodies are OVER-UNITY energy-wise. Despite all this conservation of energy error. We know this for a fact. Take IO. Its blazing away with volcanoes all the time. The mainstream says these are from tidal forces. Well a little bit of the energy comes that way but IO, like our moon, does not lose energy and fall into its alleged gas giant ….. Here we see that orbits being ENERGY-CREATORS is totally proven.

      Now lets list the sources of energy that Enceladus is getting:

      1. Solar wind from Saturn.
      2. Discharge of electrical capacitance from Saturn.
      3. Solar wind from the sun
      4. Discharge of electrical capacitance from the sun
      5. Tidal energy from Saturn
      6. Internally generated thermal energy.

      In this particular case, as opposed to in the case of earth, my best guess is that number six is a small part of the total picture. I say this because Encelapus is too small to have a significant voided area inside and therefore too small for a great deal of internal charge separation (as a side effect of gravity.)

      Unlike Earth its doubtful that she has quite hit her stride yet, in that department.

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      Peter C

      In Greek mythology, Enceladus (Ancient Greek: Ἐγκέλαδος, romanized: Enkélados) was one of the Giants, the offspring of Gaia (Earth), and Uranus (Sky). Enceladus was the traditional opponent of Athena during the Gigantomachy, the war between the Giants and the gods, and was said to be buried under Mount Etna in Sicily.

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    Tides of Mudgee

    In a Daily Telegraph item today (25.2.21) Sorry can’t provide link due to paywall, it states: Health providers and doctors will be banned from revealing which Covid 19 vaccine they offer ….. It also prohibits GPs, pharmacies and health centres from advertising which vaccine they offer. The guidelines bar them from revealing “the tradename and/or active ingredient of the specific vaccine or other information that might enable consumers to identify the particular vaccine or the manufacturer of the vaccine”.

    This is a directive from the TGA. So is this their interpretation of “consumers’ informed choice”? Anyone who is at all concerned by this vaccine would,no doubt, have looked into the different vaccines ingredients thoroughly so they could be informed. And they wonder why we’re sceptical. Disgraceful. ToM

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      C. Paul Barreira

      The source from the Therapeutic Goods Administration website is here.

      Such bullying is what government has come to in this God-forsaken day and age.

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      el gordo

      Tom, I live on the Central Tablelands and won’t be getting the jab, say no to big pharma if you want.

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      Annie

      In that case, I won’t be getting it. We have a right to be informed about what they propose to stick into our bodies.

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      greggg

      Without paywall:

      https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/health/health-problems/tga-bans-pharmacies-from-revealing-which-covid19-vaccine-they-offer/news-story/8bcf3dea974537050600d7f87eb8e13c

      I guess government is worried that many people won’t want the less efficacious Astrazeneca jab. Maybe the more harmful jab too if the French experience is anything to go by.

      ‘During the first week of the campaign between 20 to 25 percent of the recipients of the vaccine had to stop work because of influenza symptoms including bad headaches, high fever and sore muscles. The hospital authorities subsequently took the decision to stop vaccinations.’
      ‘In the town of Vannes 18 percent of the vaccinated health workers were reportedly compelled to take sick leave after receiving a vaccine.’
      ‘In Normandy, the hospital of Saint-Lô suspended vaccinations on February 11 after ten of the fifty or so employees vaccinated on February 10 presented symptoms of fever and nausea.’
      ‘In the Dordogne, near Bordeaux, hospital workers no longer want to get the AstraZeneca jab according to local media, since the “Hygiene and Security Committee” of the hospital of Périgueux reported that a “considerable number” – between 50 and 70 percent – of those who received it “experienced very heavy side effects’

      https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/france-considers-slowing-vaccine-rollout-for-hospital-staff-with-many-unable-to-work-following-jab

      Will adverse reaction reports include details of what vaccine was administered or will all vaccines be lumped together? People have the right to know which vaccines are more harmful.

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      STJOHNOFGRAFTON

      Can Australian employers or service providers legally mandate an experimental medical product, like the genetic therapy incorrectly lebelled vaccines, as a pre-requisite to employment or receipt of services?

      50

      • #
        Kalm Keith

        Probably not, but I heard a discussion on this and they were looking at ways and means of applying irresistible pressure.

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    • #
      PeterPetrum

      Mmmmm! I get the ‘flu jab every year, I just cannot recall ever asking for the name of the manufacturer or the active anti viral. What’s the difference. We have all been scared silly by this Covid thing and it just keeps on getting worse.

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    David-of-Cooyal-in-Oz

    Re vitamin D,
    I had my blood sample taken last Thursday and got the results yesterday. Am pleased to be able to report that my vitamin D level has reached 60 ng/ml (150 nmol/L), which my doc reckons might be too high. I’m delighted.
    I’ve been taking 10,000 IU per day, in two doses of 5,000 each, since September 30 last year when I increased my intake from 6,000 per day after finding my blood level was only 42 ng/ml.
    I’ve decided to maintain my 10,000 per day as I think it may be enough to maintain that level. But I’ll also do some revision and more reading around the question of an optimum blood level, which may be higher.
    Results for my zinc levels are not yet available.
    Cheers
    Dave B
    PS I still have not been in any environment where I consider I might have been at risk of exposure.

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      acementhead

      David-of-Cooyal-in-Oz on February 25, 2021 at 1:48 pm

      said

      “…my vitamin D level has reached 60 ng/ml (150 nmol/L), which my doc reckons might be too high.”

      Acementhead says get a new doctor. At least 70 is best and 80 is still fine but negligible extra benefit compared with 70.

      10

      • #
        David-of-Cooyal-in-Oz

        Thanks Acementhead,
        I thought I’d read that some bigger numbers were better, but the evidence seemed soft. Do you have a reliable reference I could access? I hope.
        Cheers
        Dave B

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          acementhead

          David-of-Cooyal-in-Oz

          Sorry I don’t have a “reliable”(I am not sufficiently expert to judge what is “reliable”) reference but there is much material available. I read studies and find errors in many. Below is an example(well the paper cites other papers with errors).

          The medical cabal is extremely antagonistic to dietary supplements. For example most countries are still recommending almost homeopathic(slight exaggeration) amounts of vitamin C. Even the scumbag Fauxi admits to taking a gram a day of Vit C(and 5000 units of D3). Linus Pauling(Nobel Prize in Chemistry) recommended 2 grams IIRC. Gorillas in wild 10 grams in diet.

          https://www.mdpi.com/2072-6643/7/3/1871/htm

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      shortie of greenbank

      would depend on the supplement. Vit D usually comes in an oil (often a vegetable oil which means you are adding large amounts of aldehydes etc).

      Vit D can also come with added Calcium and added K2 Mk7. You need a genetic snip to take advantage of the later or it can get toxic in the blood and is uselss and the former is not the form of calcium we should receive in our body. the issue here is without enough K2 MK4 (notice the difference here, not 7) to help direct the D3 where to put the extra calcium this could lead to dumping of the calcium into joints, the spine and arteries rather than help protein fortify bone structure.

      10

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    OldOzzie

    Biden-Trudeau ‘Roadmap’ Commits to Fight ‘Systemic Racism,’ Climate Change; Excludes Keystone XL

    From the Comments

    With his dementia, it must be refreshing for Biden to talk to someone even less intelligent.

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    Greg Cavanagh

    Ok, just because it’s an open thread and I think this needs to be discussed more.

    I read a long thread yesterday, site not relevant, discussing what would happen if China made a move against Australia. Who could come to our defense, who would come to our defense?

    After much discussion and many thoughts new to me; the conclusion was, nobody and nobody.

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      el gordo

      China won’t make a move to take Australia, Xi is a fascist and naturally supports the free enterprise model. He is also on record as saying that war is a waste of resources.

      Australia would slump into a recession if China stopped buying our iron ore, Beijing can turn the tap on and off whenever they get miffed.

      They see Oz as a pristine tourist destination and quarry, we are not a threat so Beijing will play the long game. Ultimately, in the new world order, China and the US will compete to uplift the Third World. Through this friendly rivalry world peace should be restored and the US Alliance a thing of the past.

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    OldOzzie

    Nancy Pelosi says not to expect any form of a State of the Union address from President Biden until the COVID bill is done

    It really hadn’t occurred to us that President Biden hasn’t addressed a joint session of Congress yet, but there’s a fact-check in Wednesday’s USA TODAY informing us that there’s no deadline for delivering the SOTU, inspired by someone posting on Facebook that Biden was supposed to have given his address by February 20. (The Facebook user did not immediately respond to a request for comment.)

    Others have said the SOTU was scheduled for Tuesday, Feb. 23, and as a few people have pointed out, PBS NewsHour in New Jersey has the video feed up and ready to go: Watch Live: 2021 State of the Union Special — AIRED: 2/23/2021.

    Fox News’ Chad Pergram says Speaker Nancy Pelosi says there won’t be an address until the COVID deal is done.

    From the Comments

    Could be they’re trying to figure out how to get Ol’ Joe’s HUGE teleprompter into the House chamber without having to knock out a wall…I mean it’s ENORMOUS…Looks like the old Jumbo-tron at the Oakland Coliseum…

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    OldOzzie

    Submarine blunder: time to cut our losses

    Robert Gottliebsen

    We finally face up to the submarine disaster.

    The last week of February 2021 has become landmark for the Australian nation. The federal government has decided to review the disastrous $220 billion plus submarine agreement with the French.

    I want to thank all those who have helped me put together a countless series of commentaries on this project, which I understand played a big role in the government’s decision.

    It only seems like yesterday but it was actually back on October 1, 2018 when I wrote the lines: “The $220 billion plus French submarine proposal threatens to be the worst financial and defence decision in our history.”

    It’s important that all Australians understand how we came to make this blunder and to make sure we never do it again.

    But first, a word about Defence Minister Linda Reynolds. Countless past defence ministers have simply adopted the recommendations of defence personnel and then covered up their mistakes. It was like a game of musical chairs which eventually would end. Sadly for Linda Reynolds it ended on her watch.

    The French original proposal estimated a cost in 2016 dollars of below $25 billion. (Linda Reynolds doubled that figure and is stopping the written French material being made public for fear of exposing the mess). The French 2016 estimate did not include the combat system or infrastructure.

    The current forward estimate of cost is about $90 billion but I am told that it is likely to cost $130 billion and to that you must add the running costs, maintenance and upgrades which will take the cost way beyond the $220 billion figure I used in 2018.

    By ending the contract now we minimise the financial damage.

    Early this week I set out alternatives. First step is to upgrade the Collins submarines and then we need to buy working submarines which we will assemble in Australia and develop a parts industry around that assembly.

    We simply can’t afford to put money and time into pioneering new technology in submarines.

    Down the track we need to consider the nuclear option, which is what the French believed best suited Australia. The Navy agreed at that time. But it was not politically possible. That might change.

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    el gordo

    Scientists agree the greening of the planet is caused by carbon (sic).

    https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Greening-global-Unbenannt.png

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    David Maddison

    A lot of the evil that’s now happening in the Western World and throughout the world more generally is because President Trump is no longer in office due to his illegal removal.

    Trump was the only world leader prepared to stand up to the evil of the United Nations and without him, weak and immoral leaders throughout the world, including ours, will be adopting the totalitarian, anti-science, anti-reason and immoral policies of the UN with a vengeance.

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      shortie of greenbank

      Would’ve loved an Abbott/Trump period of extended leadership in the pacific, machinations of the corrupted certainly put down any idea of that happening.

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      Hanrahan

      You do not exaggerate when you call the modern “left” evil.

      Maybe it’s not “modern” so much. Tony Blair, the smooth talker, and Clinton, another smoothie, started the ball rolling each side of the Atlantic.

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    Frost Giant Rebellion

    “The wicked know that if the ill they do be of sufficient horror that men will not speak against it. ” (Cormac McCarthy)

    The main idea that all of us should be waking up with, is that we need to stop our family members from getting this VACATION (my spelling may not be up to scratch) Delay delay delay. I have a comment in moderation and I’m sure there is a good reason for it. But the success of your family is now up to the simple idea of making sure none of them get this VACATION. That means reassuring them that its okay to be unemployed. And that the rest of the family can look after them, their belongings, and maybe even their mortgage, while they find their feet again.

    When the American Indians were thinned out by various processes, the new settlers discovered this fantastic land of prairies full of animals, and rivers full of fish. But it was more hard yakka for us Australians. So the Americans had this ideal of individualism. But we Australians had this idea of never leaving your mates behind. And of helping each-other. Even some of our errant family members. So its within our heritage to make promises to our family members … Just to get them to delay delay delay this VACATION.

    Lets not be deluded that they are experimenting on us like guinea pigs. Thats not the case. The studies have already been conducted, the animals were hurt, and the big guys liked what they saw.

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    Furiously curious

    I’m working on a woke crossword, where of course, every word is spelt wong. Watch this spase.

    71

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    Hanrahan

    China still flexing its muscle. They have just refused to renew the export license of Australia’s largest live fish exporter based in Cairns.

    Is there a pattern with “expensive” products, wine, crays, coral trout being singled out? I have been reading that the CCP is trying to rein in conspicuous consumption of its yuppy class, who are the children of party members and favoured industrialists.

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      Frost Giant Rebellion

      We don’t need to sell them our coal. We don’t need to sell them our fish. Our coal and fish are valuable. We can use them here and tell the Chinese to get their own. We don’t need these people as much as we seem to think. We just need to be able to run surplus budgets. Find a few politicians who can balance a chequebook and we are fine. Part of economic warfare is to favour deluded Keynesian politicians.

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    WXcycles

    The so far weak La Nina is gradually building, cooler water is spreading at the surface and thermal partitioning across the Pacific is stronger every month also.

    The 10-day ECM rain forecast shows the northern wet season about to arc up, falls of 400 mm to 800 mm forecast for most of the tropical east coast. Starts right now and intensifies through the period. The end on it looks even wetter.

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    another ian

    Readers here would believe this could happen:-

    “Just one week after Texas: Buffalo Pound Water Treatment Plant renewal looks to green future”

    http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/2021/02/25/what-could-possibly-go-wrong-23/

    30

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    tom0mason

    I note that researchers have found that Lysine, a very cheap and widely available supplement, is very effective at protecting against viral infection.
    The research paper is available at https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7641537/pdf/main.pdf

    So now we have quite a list of natural and manmade agents to help protect us from viral infection — vitamin D, zinc, vitamin C, quinine based medicines(e.g. hydroxychloroquine), Corticosteroids, Invermectin, etc. So for the majority of people with functioning immune systems it looks increasingly like the untested ‘vaccines’ are an unwarranted and possibly dangerous intrusion on people.

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      OldOzzie

      As soon as I have a feeling of cold sore developing I take Blackmores Lyp-sine

      Blackmores Lyp-sine® is specifically formulated to include vitamin C, zinc and lysine to relieve symptoms of facial cold sores and support immune system health.

      Lysine is an essential amino acid that cannot be synthesised by the body and must be obtained from the diet. Blackmores Lyp-sine® is a combination formula including vitamin C, zinc and lysine which relieves the symptoms of facial cold sores and supports wound healing.

      works quickly every time.

      20

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    another ian

    The “Big 4” didn’t expect this.

    ““So thanks to Google, I now know of a New Site I really need to visit!”

    In a like vein, the progressive news are all hot about a new “alt-right” media platform.
    Coming tomorrow, from Al Jazeera, called “Rightly”.

    https://network.aljazeera.net/pressroom/al-jazeera-announces-launch-new-digital-platform-rightly

    Chiefio comment below that one

    And another fund here

    https://chiefio.wordpress.com/2021/02/20/w-o-o-d-life-goes-on-20-feb-2021/#comment-140095

    10

  • #

    In my opinion there only needs to be one motto above the door of every school:
    Ignorance is not Stupidity. We fix Ignorance here.

    Above the door of every parliament there should be the motto:
    Here we apply Stupidity.

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    Geoff Sherrington

    Discovery Channel from USA recently produced a series of 15 photographic and commentary booklets for school age people. They were sold to buyers of the local newspaper The Herald Sun at a few dollars a booklet.
    They are out-and-out propaganda.
    Here, for example, is the commentary on burning fossil fuels.

    Global warming can be directly linked to
    BURNING FOSSIL FUELS as the coal, oil or gas used to create electricity or power our cars
    causes carbon pollution. Australia is the number one exporter of coal and gas, surpassing China
    America and India, making it one of the world’s biggest climate polluters. To address climate
    change, in 2016 countries adopted the Paris Agreement—an agreement within the United
    Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) with the aim to limit a global
    temperature rise to well below two degrees Celsius. Australia’s Paris Agreement target is to
    Reduce emissions to 26-28 percent on 2005 levels by 2030. In order to help achieve this, the country needs to increase its supply and use of renewable energy sources, such as solar power and wind,
    and to take a stronger stance on climate change issues.

    While Australia passed Indonesia only last year to be number 1 exporter of liquid natural gas and is number one for coal, these are only two measures of Australia’s energy scene. They leave out oil, for example. Other countries are well ahead in other forms of fossil fuel exports, but more importantly, in use.
    The total CO2 emissions in China in 2019 were 30.3% of world total. USA, lecturing Australia here, was 13.4%. Australia was 1.1% of world total, behind even international aviation at 1.6%. These are the figures that matter for school children to read. Then they can see that anything done by Australia will have little effect on global CO2 levels, if that is their worry.

    Any lawyers out there, there used to be a Restrictive Trading Act. If it still exists, is this propaganda to harm fossil fuel producers and users criminal? Geoff S

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    Kim

    WA State Election: Zak Cockup has just thrown in the towel – completely vacant between the ears.

    50

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      Graeme#4

      Why he was ever put in charge I cannot understand. The sooner he’s gone the better. Surely the WA Libs can dig up somebody far better.

      30

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        Kim

        I guess it’s this stupid “bright young thing” thing that sometimes gets chosen without being thought through – shades of the 60s – without knowing what was going on then and now.

        30

        • #
          Chad

          …“Sacrificial Lamb” ?
          Libs knew there was zero chance of getting up , so they threw up a “expendible” to help clear the office.

          20

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        Bruce

        Did it ever occur to you that he was “put in” that place specifically to “achieve” what he has?

        30

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          Graeme#4

          If that was the case, then he has also significantly harmed the Federal Libs, and this viewpoint is supported by an article in today’s The Australian.

          00

    • #
      Brenda Spence

      Maybe he is just facing reality with a bit of honesty?

      20

      • #
        Len

        Zac won by 0.8% last time. Dennis Jensen said he is going to put the Greens last, the Liberals second last and Labor third last. Zac has gone further left than the Labor mob. Surely they can put in someone now. Zac won’t be there on Saturday night around 7 pm, 13th March 2021.

        10

        • #
          Brenda Spence

          Yep. It was not smart to go with the green dream. Out of left field came his energy policy…

          30

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            Graeme#4

            And apparently he didn’t consult with the other Liberal party members before making his statement. He’s just a loose cannon that needs to be gone.

            10

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    CHRIS

    Good chance that the Libs in WA won’t have a single seat in Parliament after the election. This is just part of the malaise that has infected the Libs, state and federal. However, the ALP ought not to be complacent…polls are showing that voters are becoming sick and tired of ALL major parties (Coalition, ALP, Greens). The major parties treat voters like sheep ie: no intelligence. This is where they make a big mistake, based on “advice” from morons who have never experienced real life.

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  • #
    UK-Weather Lass

    https://www.drax.com/technology/great-balancing-act-takes-keep-power-grid-stable/

    This article may help to explain the intricacies of an electricity grid and what sources of power are capable of doing what. It should be noted that ‘thermal’ and ‘pumped storage’ tick all the boxes while nuclear guarantees frequency and voltage management and inertia. It should be noted that for renewables there is much R&D work to be done if they are ever to be ready for a ‘black start’ and/or cover the other bases.

    My grandfather who moonlighted as a radio and TV repair and service engineer (when valves were king) to provide his family with a decent income once told me that if you watch lightning very closely you will see how wild and unpredictable it is and that the shortest route to earth is not always quite what you think it should be. He would say that electricity in a wire may seem tame but it is always looking for an escape route.

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    Jojodogfacedboy

    Jo,

    I should start collecting the stories that people killed by this vaccination.

    It really is quite stunning as our media promotion of safety experimental drug that is far from safe.
    And still catching Covid-19 to boot.

    Also some scientists are finding the vaccination is causing mutations of this virus.

    51

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    RicDre

    New Zealand to Impose Carbon Taxes on Tourism?

    Guest essay by Eric Worrall

    Given New Zealand’s effort to wreck manufacturing and farming with cow taxes and renewable energy rationing, why should the tourism industry be left unscathed?

    https://wattsupwiththat.com/2021/02/25/new-zealand-to-impose-carbon-taxes-on-tourism/

    30

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    RicDre

    Nolte: Poll Shows Republicans Care About Issues, Democrats Just Hate Republicans

    Starting with the most concerned, the top issues of concern for Republican voters are illegal immigration, lack of support for police, high taxes, left-wing media bias, the moral decline of the country, socialism, Antifa, China, late-term abortion, election fraud, tech censorship, and discrimination against Christians.

    To put this in perspective, 81 percent of Republicans are extremely/very concerned with illegal immigration. The bottom issue on this poll, Christian discrimination, still has 57 percent extremely/very concerned.

    Starting with the most concerned, the top issues of concern for Democrat voters are — no joke — Trump supporters, white nationalism, systemic racism, gun violence, healthcare coverage, domestic terror, police brutality, discrimination against the alphabet people, sexism, voter suppression, student debt, and capitalism.

    A full 82 percent of Democrats are extremely/very concerned with Trump supporters.

    So the thing freaking out the left more than anything else is the fact that … you and I exist, the fact that we Trump supporters share this country with them. It’s not Global Warming or world hunger, neither of which made the list. No, what is freaking Democrats out more than anything else is us, people who dare to think differently, vote differently, speak and believe differently.

    https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2021/02/25/poll-shows-republicans-care-issues-democrats-hate-republicans/

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    Peter Fitzroy

    Ecosystems all over Australian are failing:
    A groundbreaking report – the result of work by 38 scientists from 29 universities and government agencies – details the degradation of coral reefs, arid outback deserts, tropical savanna, the waterways of the Murray-Darling Basin, mangroves in the Gulf of Carpentaria, and forests stretching from the rainforests of the far north to Gondwana-era conifers in Tasmania.

    https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/gcb.15539

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      Travis T. Jones

      Worst apocalypse. Ever.

      Meanwhile, on planet earth, Australia …

      Australian Farmers Harvest Largest Wheat Crop Ever

      “The 2020-21 wheat crop was 5% larger than the previous record outturn of 31,819,000 tonnes in 2016-17 and compared with the recent five-year average outturn of 21.6 million tonnes.”

      https://www.bakingbusiness.com/articles/53020-australian-farmers-harvest-record-wheat-crop

      Note: CO2 is *not* the climate control knob; Earth isn’t too warm; the weather isn’t getting worse; there is no climate crisis.

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        Graeme#4

        The world’s cereal crop production has tripled since 1961, and the FAO estimates that it will continue to rise, despite these many predictions of doom and gloom.

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      Travis T. Jones

      And, undeniable further evidence that no amount of sea breeze and sunbeam collectors make any difference to preventing global warming.

      Q. How much colder would Texas have been if it wasn’t for the frozen windmills?

      Texas is vulnerable to warming climate – July 10, 2011

      https://www.chron.com/opinion/outlook/article/Texas-is-vulnerable-to-warming-climate-2079164.php

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      Graeme#4

      It’s not a “groundbreaking report” PF, just a collection of reports, mostly based on short-term natural events, with many of the quoted events associated with the long drought in the eastern states. It’s natural that anybody can obtain disturbing images of watercourses and land issues during a drought. To be a proper report, these reports should now include the “magical” recovery of these drought-affected lands, along with images of renewed watercourses and properties now covered in fresh grasslands.

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      Frost Giant Rebellion

      Yes you see Peter we need to take advantage of our favourable CO2 levels to restore our soils. The first step to this soil restoration process is establishing water retention features in the landscape. If you are worried about CO2 levels, let your heart not be troubled, because with tight animal herding and water retention features, the carbon follows the water into the soil. This would essentially solve all our problems. No more droughts and floods (ask me why). No more hunger. In a hundred years time more full-some rivers that can be converted into canals. So cheap cargo transport.

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    Travis T. Jones

    It’s a travesty, I tells ya …

    Morrison’s media code could be catastrophic for climate and energy news

    “It is a travesty for journalism and dangerous to climate and energy transition, writes Giles Parkinson, founder of independent media site Renew Economy.

    The core of their supplicant media is to receive millions to continue on their cheering from the sidelines, independent voices such as RenewEconomy risk being squeezed by the nature of these secret deals and decisions, even as big media companies and the competition regulator claim this to be some sort of victory for media diversity and the democratic process.

    It risks being nothing of the sort.
    As it stands, it’s astonishing, it’s dangerous, and it’s demoralising.
    From where we sit, it’s bad for climate and it’s bad for the clean energy transition – the great challenges of our time.
    And it’s bad for democracy.”

    https://www.michaelwest.com.au/morrisons-media-code-could-be-catastrophic-for-climate-and-energy-news/

    >> At first, I was gonna say it sounds good, but, on second thoughts, it won’t stop a@renweconomy.

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    another ian

    An Australian replication

    “Go woke. Go broke. Post Alan Jones – 2GB, 3AW, 4BC profit down. Down 62%. That number again, 62%.”

    https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2021/02/go-woke-go-broke-post-alan-jones-2gb-3aw-4bc-profit-down-down-62-that-number-again-62.html

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    another ian

    “Is the smart money on global cooling + SA importing power + the Great Reset”

    https://catallaxyfiles.com/2021/02/25/is-the-smart-money-on-global-cooling-sa-importing-power-the-great-reset/

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    Travis T. Jones

    Further evidence that ‘believing’ in 97% climate ‘science’ makes you more stupid …

    Burning forests for electricity: “Really Crazy Stuff” says Jack Thompson
    Media Release 02/05/2019

    “We’re in a climate emergency.
    We need to stop emitting carbon dioxide now!
    Who speaks for the trees?
    We all can!
    It’s time to Stand Up for the Forests Now!” he said.

    https://www.nefa.org.au/burning_forests_for_electricity_really_crazy_stuff_says_jack_thompson

    >> … uhm, Jack. The science …

    Photosynthesis requires sunlight, chlorophyll, water, and carbon dioxide gas.
    Chlorophyll is a substance in all green plants, especially in the leaves.
    Plants take in water from the soil and carbon dioxide from the air.
    Photosynthesis starts when chlorophyll absorbs energy from sunlight.

    Green plants use this light energy to change water and carbon dioxide into oxygen and nutrients called sugars.

    The plants use some of the sugars and store the rest.
    The oxygen is released into the air.”

    https://kids.britannica.com/kids/article/photosynthesis/353624

    >> I’m sure Jack is smart enough to know this.

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    Hanrahan

    You’ve got to keep your priorities right, Lady Ga Ga posts half a mill reward for the return of her two French bulldogs, no questions asked.

    Pity about her dog walker who was shot four times in the chest during the heist and is battling to survive. No reward for information about his attacker.

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    CHRIS

    Jack Thompson and the rest of his ABC-Zombies understanding science? LOL. Travis has a good point. Who on Earth would listen to these Z-grade “celebrities” and their babbling nonsense? (A la Lady Ga Ga, who puts dogs ahead of people). I’m always reminded of the “celebrities” who, in 2016, said that they would leave the USA if Trump won the election (still waiting for this mass migration).

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