Tuesday

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113 comments to Tuesday

  • #
    Skepticynic

    The Wait is Over—American Leviathan Documentary is Here

    https://www.americanleviathan.com/p/the-wait-is-overamerican-leviathan

    For too long, the American people have been lied to.

    They’ve been told they still live in the Republic our Founders built, that their government is accountable to them, that their vote alone is enough to keep the system in check. But what if that’s not true? What if the America you think you live in is nothing more than a carefully constructed illusion?

    The administrative state—the American Leviathan—wasn’t built overnight. It was methodically, intentionally designed to seize power away from the people and place it into the hands of unelected bureaucrats who now operate as an unaccountable ruling class.

    And now, for the first time, we’re exposing it all.

    What You’ll See in the Documentary:
    The roots of the administrative state and its ties to the Progressive movement of the early 20th century

    How unelected bureaucrats became the real power brokers in Washington

    The role of FDR’s New Deal, LBJ’s Great Society, and decades of bipartisan complicity in growing Leviathan

    The modern-day weaponization of government against dissenters and political opponents

    A battle plan for slaying the Leviathan and restoring self-governance

    Watch the full American Leviathan documentary now. Share it with your friends, your family, and anyone who still believes Washington works for the people. Because if we don’t fight back now, we may not get another chance.

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    • #
      Just+Thinkin'

      The exact same thing has happened in Australia.

      97% of Australians haven’t got A CLUE about what has happened
      in and to our great country.

      And, it started long ago.

      The final nail happened in October 2024 when “our King”, Charles 111, signed us away.

      Disowning us.

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      • #
        el+gordo

        Australia is different, we have the Westminster System.

        American exceptionalism is a class act.

        ‘Some proponents of the theory of American exceptionalism argue that the system and the accompanying distrust of concentrated power prevent the United States from suffering a “tyranny of the majority,” preserve a free republican democracy, and allow citizens to live in a locality whose laws reflect those voters’ values.’ (wiki)

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    • #
      Rowjay

      Sounds a bit like they are trying to model themselves on Western Europe, with many disparate States loosely connected?

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  • #

    Offshore wind construction in the Trump crosshairs:

    https://www.cfact.org/2025/03/24/offshore-wind-construction-is-ignoring-president-trump/

    Titanic fight looms with big billions at risk.

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    • #
      Peter C

      Why would they build these offshore wind projects if their subsidies are not guaranteed?

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    • #
      TdeF

      What choice do they have for all the money in the pipeline? Coal power plants? Solar? People are not going to fire themselves, hand the money back and go home. They have to keep the dream alive and hold on for 2026 so the Senate can stall for 2028.

      But it can end badly even without Trump. We have the same in Australia with Ross Garnaut’s wind company and the Spanish energy giant Iberdrola. Blew all their cash in a few weeks of wind drought while buying coal and gas power at absolute peak prices.

      Dunkelflauting donuts. It happens across places as big as Australian and Europe and the US. And as reliable energy becomes a smaller part of the shrinking supply, the revenge of the coal and gas people is maximum extortionist pricing for desperate dunces.

      And there is nothing the politicians can do about it because it’s their fault and doubling wind and solar changes nothing. Double nothing is still nothing. Shadenfreude, shadenfreude, every morning you greet me. To the sound of Eidelweiss.

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    • #
      David Maddison

      https://capitalresearch.org/article/wind-power-doesnt-make-sense-without-the-tax-credits-part-1/

      “I will do anything that is basically covered by the law to reduce Berkshire’s tax rate,” said Buffett in 2014. “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.”

      Shortly afterwards, he got really good at this.

      “Warren Buffett’s energy division has reported a negative income tax rate for five straight years, thanks to billions of dollars’ worth of tax credits it’s received for producing clean power,” reported Yahoo Finance in September 2023.

      For 2019 through 2022, the analysis showed Berkshire Hathaway Energy had severely turned the tables on the IRS, harvesting $6.1 billion in tax payments from the federal government. And for the first quarter of 2023 things got really silly when BHE reported a negative 163 percent tax rate, meaning the firm literally collected more harvesting tax payments from federal taxpayers ($363 million) than it made in profits for providing electricity ($223 million).

      But as Buffett implied in 2014, don’t hate the player, hate the game.

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      • #
        David Maddison

        Unlike the US, in Australia the subsidies are harvested, probably illegally as TdeF has previously pointed out, directly from consumer electricity bills.

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        • #
          TdeF

          And remember Gillard “there will be no carbon tax in a Government I lead” who legislated “Carbon Credits” in 2011, worthless bits of paper to send carbon taxes overseas. Now Albanese in 2023 has a 35% carbon dioxide tax on all goods and services. Again it is not a tax as it is theft and the billions do not go to General Revenue but the cash paid for transport, air, shipping,trucking, maufacturing, smelting, farming, even sewage all go to ‘investors’ in growing trees and such. Raw cash for nothing at all, to ‘save’ the planet. How?

          It is more blatant legislated theft and not taxation. So they can balance the budget by lying about their taxes by stealing the cash. And the tax jumps this year to 10%. Watch the companies collapse, the smelters collapse, concrete stop, glass making and travel prices soar and the cost of electricity while the cash flows unearned to China and the merchant banks like a river.

          And the media commentators somehow do not notice? And never mention at 35% CO2 theft and the impact on prices?

          Plus the ‘government’ starts taking control of the means of production, currently the entire smelting business of Whyalla. To ‘save’ the jobs. As with Alcoa’s aluminium plants. Government wages and government control. All caused by massive government legislated theft and we will have to buy our aluminum and steel from China. Job done. Total government control of Australian society. The Wuhan flu was just a foretaste of total power of a police state.

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          • #
            TdeF

            And Albanese is offering to help save Ukraine from Russia? What a joke! Send the army overseas. We could do with some help saving Australia from extreme publicly avowed communists Albanese and Bandt.

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          • #
            Skepticynic

            >Now Albanese in 2023 has a 35% carbon dioxide tax on all goods and services.
            And yet, Grok 3:

            As of March 25, 2025, there is no 35% carbon dioxide tax on all goods and services in Australia. It seems there might be some confusion or misinformation in your question, as no such policy exists currently or has been implemented in Australia’s recent history based on available data.
            Australia did have a carbon pricing scheme in the past, introduced under the Clean Energy Act 2011 by the Gillard Labor government. This scheme, often referred to as a “carbon tax,” began on July 1, 2012, but it was not a 35% tax on all goods and services. Instead, it required large emitters—businesses producing over 25,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2-e) greenhouse gases annually—to pay a fixed price per tonne of emissions. The initial rate was AUD 23 per tonne in 2012-13, rising to AUD 24.15 in 2013-14. This applied only to specific sectors like electricity generation and industry, not broadly to all goods and services, and it was designed to incentivize emissions reductions rather than impose a flat percentage tax across the economy. The scheme was repealed on July 17, 2014, by the Abbott government, ending Australia’s experiment with carbon pricing at that time.
            Since then, Australia has not reintroduced a nationwide carbon tax, let alone one at 35% on all goods and services. Current climate policies include the Emissions Reduction Fund and the Safeguard Mechanism, which focus on incentivizing emissions reductions and setting baselines for large emitters, respectively, rather than imposing a broad tax. The Goods and Services Tax (GST) in Australia is a separate 10% value-added tax on most goods and services, but it is not linked to carbon emissions.
            If you were referring to a hypothetical or proposed policy, no credible evidence from government sources, news outlets, or my search capabilities (including web and X posts) indicates a 35% carbon dioxide tax on all goods and services as of now. Could you clarify where you heard about this? I’d be happy to dig deeper if you have more context!

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            • #
              TdeF

              That’s obfuscation. Sophistry. Word play. I assume you are just reporting it. Not unexpected. What was called plausible deniability, nothing more.

              Sure the tax is not yet 35%. It will be in three years. A tax on the gas produced by all living things, the essential sign of life, CO2. So major pollution. You have to change the dictionary for this tax.

              And it is not on ‘goods and services’. No, not directly. People would scream. And not on petrol, diesel or gas because people would scream and the government would fall.

              So it’s on the people who use petrol, diesel and gas or the 250 ‘largest polluters‘. Like all smelters, manufacturers, transport companies, even the MMBW who provide sewage. And they will mark it up and pass it on in everything you buy, rent or lease.

              Qantas. Virgin. Toll. Fox. Glass makers. Metal makers. Farmers sending their produce to market. Miners providing all our wealth. Plastics. The biggest plastics group closed last year. 800 jobs. The ONLY plastics recycler. Now all our household chemicals will be in imported plastic bottles. Not Goods and services? Pure sophistry. Try not eating, not travelling, not working.

              It’s a scam. And where does the 35% CO2 tax cash go? You tell me. Not to the government, so it’s not legally even a Tax.

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              • #
                TdeF

                And I have to assume that the MMBW sewage is on the list because of methane. Anyway, in Australia you cannot go to the toilet without having to send cash overseas. And this is the law. Not spending a penny but likely spending a dollar. And in principle, somewhere in a fantasy far away communist country, like Britain, a tree is planted.

                This is sent up beautifully by South Park in the the Cycle of Pooh.. It applies equally to CO2. Tax the lot.

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              • #
                Skepticynic

                Yes, I’m reporting what Grok tells us it’s been told.
                I don’t have a detailed enough understanding of this 35% tax or how it’s levied so I was invoking Cunningham’s Law so as to get a more detailed explanation.
                There’s still time…

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      • #
        TdeF

        The Greens could end the wind and solar game overnight with Green legislation. Even Dutton would agree.

        As with Coal power plants, when wind mills and solar farms are obsolete, especially in National parks or the ocean, the company and share holders are totally financially responsible for complete Green remediation to the original state along with demolition of all now unnecessary infrastructure.

        It would stop overnight.

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        • #
          Skepticynic

          >wind and solar… Green remediation…

          And why on earth not? In Australia, mines are subject to environmental regulations that require rehabilitation and remediation of mining sites. Mining companies are legally and financially responsible for significant rehabilitation and site remediation.

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    • #
      Hanrahan

      Here the question of nuclear power is moot: While wind/solar have guaranteed first access to the market everything else is relegated to firming. That won’t pay for a new coal/nuclear station which needs to run almost continuously.

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  • #
    • #

      So, plenty of water to hit Lake Eyre in a few months time. Nice.

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      • #
        David Maddison

        Yes, but white people are no longer allowed to visit the lake. Access is now race-based.

        https://mr4x4.com.au/government-bans-access-to-lake-eyre/

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        • #
          David Maddison

          I have never visited the lake but always wanted to.

          I’ll cross it off my bucket list and visit somewhere overseas, and spend my money there instead.

          At least my presence is wanted overseas, unlike in Australia.

          Plus travel is much cheaper overseas. Even including the cost of airfares it is still cheaper. And no racial restrictions.

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          • #
            David Maddison

            Instead of Lake Eyre I’ll go to the US and visit the Channeled Scablands, a result of the Missoula floods between 15,000 and 13,000 years ago.

            No racial test for entry.

            Incidentally, “consensus science” never accepted J. Harlen Bretz’s explanation for the geology and geography of the area but he was proven right long after he passed away.

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            • #
              Stanley

              Great idea. I went there in 2007 for three days. One of the best sites is across a farm paddock where a canyon shows 15m thickness of slackwater sediments, including a layer of volcanic ash, likely from Mt Shasta. I can send you details of the location.

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          • #
            TdeF

            I flew over it in a Fokker last time the lake was full. Fantastic fast weekend trip from Essendon airport a few years ago. Cooper Pedy too. And lunch at the pub in the Birdsville pub. And above Lake Eyre, the fabulous Goyder ,Goyder Lagoon which feeds the diamantina and Lake Eyre, channel country, shamrock green covered in cattle with light planes in front of the pub. As beatiful as it is unknown and unexpected. A tourist phenomenon in the middle of Australia, best seen from the air.

            How long before aborigines tax the aircraft overhead? Polluting the sacred sky. The aircraft will have to be battery powered or gigantic rubber bands.

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            • #
              TdeF

              Burke and Wills did not find an ocean, but likely they found a green fertile swamp to rival the swamps of Africa, the Okavango Delta, but with beef cattle. If only we spent the money being wasted on the useless Snowy II in moving the water south, especially the Ord river which empties three Sydney Harbours a day into the ocean.

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              • #
                Graeme4

                A WA Liberal govt tried to promote bringing water south from the Fitzroy River up north to Perth via a channel. Couldn’t gain any traction. Phoenix uses a large channel to obtain water from I think a tributary of the Colorado River well north of Phoenix.

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            • #
              another ian

              Way back in BC TAA had a Fokker flight once a week that went west from Charleville, puddle jumped to Birdsville and then to Alice Springs. And then returned. A tourist opportunity – but you had to know it existed to get to book a seat.

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        • #
          Skepticynic

          >Access is now race-based.

          Race-based privileges in Australia, even though race is now merely a social construct.
          Privileges based on whether or not you’re related to the right families.

          The New Australian Royalty

          “…as it stands Aboriginal identity is a social construct.
          In many ways it parallels the idea of European royalty.
          Both groups are often heavily invested in their family trees, use traditional regalia, feel an emotional connection to cultural myths, exercise an influence over historical narratives, are recognized by governments, exercise moral authority, control land and artifacts, and lead official ceremonies.
          Both groups resist outsider attempts to claim membership or question their legitimacy.”

          https://quillette.com/2025/01/25/the-original-aboriginals-australia/

          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tNDivDf9XI

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          • #
            TdeF

            Aborigines never had Royalty. They barely had language or clothes or real tools or could count to ten. They repeated words for plurals, like Wagga Wagga, Wagga being crow. Or Yarra Yarra, where Yarra was the join of two streams. Largely wooden weapons. Not even flint for fire. They were small family groups, busy murdering their neighbours. Which was necessary as the land requirements of people prior to agriculture were square kilometers per person.

            As William Buckley wrote in his memoirs after nearly 40 years living with aboriginals in Victoria, everyone he knew or loved was murdered by aborigines. That’s not a civilization. No police, no armies, no laws, nothing. And in a climate which was not lethal, like Russia and with no natural predators, no lions, tigers or bears. No forts or buildings. So Aboriginal Royalty, Sovereignty, even Religion? How do you have Sovereignty without a sovereign?

            These are European projections on a day to day life with nothing to do. Terra Nullius was never overturned. Eddie Mabo effectively argued he was NOT an aboriginal. It was Labor Prime Minister Paul Keating who legislated aboriginal rights over Australia on a whim and with faulty legal logic. And the aborigines are far worse off. More Labor laws which need to be undone. There should be zero racial privilege in Australia. People should be helped purely on a needs basis, which was what Christians did until the government forcibly seized control of hospitals, health and education and taxation. The difference with communism keeps decreasing in Australia.

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            • #
              Skepticynic

              >Aborigines never had Royalty

              They do now. “Aboriginal identity is a social construct (which) in many ways … parallels the idea of European royalty” in the ways listed above at #3.1.1.2

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        • #
          Just+Thinkin'

          David,
          I can’t wait for reconciliation to happen.

          When ALL Australians are treated the SAME.

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    • #
      Greg in NZ

      Always read the final paragraphs:

      “It’s worth pointing out that computer models are struggling to agree…”

      Now THERE is a Johannes Leak cartoon in the making: Super Computer v Super Computer Battle It Out In The Ring Of 97% Confidence – Place Your Bets, Mad Dogs & Englishmen!

      WZ’s model has painted NZ blue/green, indicating rain, yet we’re in a DROUGHT – caused by the same climate change which is FLOODING Queensland – stressing farmers yet viticulturalists are claiming the best vintage evaaah! Cin cin 🍷

      It’s also what we call an Indian Summer here – calm, warm, blue-sky sunny days – may it linger long time.

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      • #
        farmerbraun

        ” . . we’re in a DROUGHT . .”

        The funny thing is that although my farm is in the Manawatu , which is the most recent to be declared a drought area, there is not the slightest indication that my farm is or has been in drought.
        Rarely has it been so green in March.

        Am I doing something wrong?

        My stocking rate ?
        My residual dry matter ?

        My rotation length?

        My choice of pasture species?

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    • #
      el+gordo

      The bend in the jet stream is significant.

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  • #
    Reader

    German police ‘forced to abort missions’ as their electric cars ‘drain too fast’
    https://brusselssignal.eu/2025/03/german-police-forced-to-abort-missions-as-their-electric-cars-drain-too-fast/

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  • #
    Lance

    Is Australia Set to Become a Security Threat for the United States?

    “In the short term, Australia is of strategic interest for the United States. Hence Americans need to look more closely at the state of tyranny in Australia before it becomes an even bigger problem than China’s potential for war against Taiwan.”

    https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2025/03/is_australia_set_to_become_a_security_threat_for_the_united_states.html

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    • #
      David Maddison

      A very scary article indeed.

      I suggest every Australian and American should read that article.

      This is why I think TRUMP is disengaging from Australia and the West in general.

      And I don’t think the fake conservative Liberal Party faction of the Uniparty will change much. After all, they are largely responsible for the initiation of the problem.

      Back in the day immigration was restricted to people with skills and/or were willing to work and assimilate. Now the focus seems to be importing people who will be lifelong welfare recipients and Labor voters for life. Just as the DemonRATs did in America but were fortunately stopped by TRUMP.

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      • #
        el+gordo

        Back in the day there was a White Australia policy, we have moved on.

        Worth noting that Chinese investors in Australia have roughly the same amount of agricultural land as UK investors.

        04

    • #
      Rowjay

      It would have been preferable for Australia to become a state of the U.S.

      Transactional colonialism seems to be the catch cry of the current US administration and its supporters – no security guarantee though…

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  • #
    David Maddison

    Get woke. Go broke.

    As expected the fully woke Snow White is a disaster.

    Every review says its appalling.

    If you have kids, show them the original 1937 classic.

    See review of the woke one here: https://youtu.be/VtTYySLiIvk

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  • #
    TdeF

    It’s a joke that the massive carbon taxes in Australia are ignored as Treasurer Chalmers fails to balance the budget and say nothing about the legalized theft of billions buried in retail electricity costs and 10% carbon credits on the way to 35%. The insult to Australians being a generous $150 cash each to compensate for the theft.

    Remove the 2001 Renewable Energy(Electricity) bill and the 2023 Safeguard Mechanism and electricity prices and goods prices would plummet. And major manufacturing employers would boom again. Otherwise we will have NO metals industry and even the cost of holidays will soar. Even the Trans Tasman ferry is being taxed at 10% to 35% soon. How is the ferry supposed to operate profitably?

    Legislated carbon theft is everywhere. The investors in Windmills and solar farms should pay for their own 30,000km of power lines, not the public.

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    • #
      TdeF

      And how is the $12Billion of Turnbull’s Snowy II going to repaid? Is the electricity going to be free? It costs 40% of the power just to pump the water up hill to charge the battery. And so double retail prices if we need the power. That’s not FREE.

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      • #
        RickWill

        And so double retail prices if we need the power.

        If Snowy 2 gets up and running, it will create a market for lunchtime power. Victoria has now mandated zero FIT from July and there is every prospect of the FIT going negative to discourage more rooftops from causing the inevitable grid collapse later rather than sooner.

        Snowy 2 will get paid to take power if it gets up and running by 2030. After 2030, when the RET ends, negative wholesale pricing will be rare but not much above zero will be common. Snowy 2 will export at high prices.

        Time shifting generation to match demand is a valuable contribution in a WDG powered grid. Over the past year, batteries purchased electricity at an average price of $33/MWh. The average selling price was $266/MWh. Snowy 2 could shift around 6GWh per day. So each day they buy 8.4GWh for $277,000 and sell 6GWh for $1,597,000. That is yearly revenue of $481M. If the project was a commercial project, it could earn almost enough to pay interest at a commercial rate on the capital spent. But government projects spend OPM so no accountability in that regard.

        As an aside, in the past year batteries purchased 957GWh and sold 750GWh. So a round cycle loss of $22%. But they still made lots of money. Pumped hydro had an average purchase price of $16/MWh but their selling price is lumped in with all hydro.

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        • #
          Robert Swan

          RickWill,

          If Snowy 2 gets up and running, it will create a market for lunchtime power.

          It certainly should, but there’s a fair amount of wishful thinking in your domestic solar scenario.

          Let’s say it’s bright and sunny in Melbourne, and Snowy Hydro has a demand for a great gob of power while rooftop solar is going cheap. That great gob has to make its way through the domestic network and get collected and transformed up, and several more steps of collect and transform up, …, until you get 330 kV (or whatever) for long distance transmission northwards. I.e. normal transmission played backwards.

          That’d be ok if it perfectly mirrored consumption patterns, but it won’t. A hundred houses on Sunny Street all have big roofs and are each pumping out (say) 15 kW, but few of them ever draw more than 5 kW. If the wires hold up, there’s a good chance the street’s transformer is going to pack it in (even assuming the power is balanced across all three phases). And this problem is faced at each collect and step up stage of getting the power to the Snowy.

          Certainly there are ways the network might be modified to deal with this, but it’s not going to be simple. Quite a contrast with the traditional pumped hydro situation where it’s a proper spinning power station feeding more or less straight into the high voltage system and the power going efficiently all the way to the pumping station.

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          • #
            RickWill

            You are already contributing to the network upgrades needed to get solar power back up the grid. Why do you think the gap between wholesale and retail price keep rising and the service fee is going up as mush as the energy component?

            00

            • #
              Robert Swan

              RickWill,
              That still sounds a little optimistic.

              Rather than gold-plating the suburban networks, the network upgrade money goes to hooking up silly wind farms and the like, though I’m sure there are a few people getting around with gold-plated pockets too.

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  • #
    David Maddison

    https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-03-24/travellers-stranded-in-wet-outback-queensland-desert/105088652

    In short:
    A South Australian man is stranded in the Simpson Desert in far western Queensland as rain turns the tracks into mud.

    Authorities say he’ll be stuck there for at least five days but can be airlifted out if his situation worsens.

    What’s next?
    Birdsville police are making enquiries about another group of travellers who entered the desert days ago and haven’t been heard from since.

    SEE LINK FOR REST

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    • #
      Rowjay

      Not an unusual occurrence.
      “Mailman of the Birdsville Track” – the story of Tom Kruse by Kristin Weidenbach is a great introduction to early life in the outback – drought and flooding rains.

      Another good read are the two books “Adams Empire” and “Kalinda” by our greatest motoring journalist Evan Green.

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      • #
        Greg in NZ

        ‘Not an unusual occurrence’,

        or in Newspeak 2025: Unprecedented!

        I’m guessing Teslas are a rare and endangered species outback, they don’t float like VW Beetles.

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      • #
        Graeme4

        The Shell outback documentaries were great. Particularly the one about Tom Kruse. I believe that one of his original vehicle was recovered and is on show somewhere. He had two trucks, each side of a river bed that regularly flooded.

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      • #
        Vicki

        Its amazing how fast the Birdsville can deteriorate with even a smidgin of rain. We are seasoned travellers of the outback, having driven across the Yanami, Birdsville, Gibb River Rd, the road to Mitchell Plateau, as well as lesser known ,but even trickier roads. But we have encountered a 100% deterioration in road conditions after one light shower. Many times have had to face our trailer trying to overtake the car! And all occasions were within the “OK” dry season for travellers.

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      • #
        Hanrahan

        I never got to know my FIL at all well, the bride and I left on posting when we were married and he died before we ever got back, but he was a pioneer. At one time he did the mail run out of Boulia, the land of the min min light*, soon after the war so of course he had a Blitz truck. I have asked around the family but this story is not well known so vague.

        On one run he took MIL with him and the truck pooped itself. MIL was the loveliest lady but but knew nothing about trucks. As related it seemed Lou took a piston out of the truck, poured a new main bearing, scraped it to fit the crank shaft journal and completed the run.

        Legend has it that Kruse blew a clutch on his way way north, cut a new plate out of the lid of a 44 gal drum. It worked so well he did the return trip on it. What if these men had met.

        *https://search.brave.com/search?q=the+min+min+light&source=web&summary=1&conversation=08f5a6405e9962b2c1f7aa

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    • #
      Graeme4

      And they left the vehicle – that makes them a lot harder to find from the air.
      Have had to “walk out” twice on the Nullarbor. The first was 40 miles, and wasn’t my choice – the idiot I was with started to panic. Was quite happy to stay- it would have been a few days, but we had plenty of water, a gun to catch some bunnies for food. As folks knew where we had gone, they would have started looking for us after the long weekend.
      Always travelled on the Nullarbor with plenty of water, a night-lit compass, a gun, and always told somebody where I was going and what time I would be back.
      Participated in two searches for overdue folks, which both ended ok.
      A family was lost on a parallel track – did everything wrong – didn’t tell anybody they were coming, didn’t tell their last place of departure where they were going, no water, left the vehicle and tried to walk about 40 miles in the heat.

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      • #
        RickWill

        When I did my first trip across the Nullabor on unsealed road, I was advised to not stop if a local waved me down. Just drive around them. So the locals had presumably survived there without piped water, guns and electricity for a long, long time.

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  • #
    David Maddison

    Almost all of the commenters here understand what’s wrong with Australia.

    Tragically neither the Liberal or Labor factions of the Uniparty are willing or able to address our concerns, and don’t even fundamentally understand what the problems are. And neither party believes in anything much except getting re-elected “whatever it takes”. Although I must say there are probably some Believers in something in the Labor Party, so many are avowed Communists but don’t admit to that in public.

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    • #
      Skepticynic

      >don’t even fundamentally understand…And neither party believes in anything much…

      That’s why they’re there. That’s how you survive in politics. That defines a politician. Don’t know, don’t care, don’t understand, and no beliefs scruples or principles.

      That’s why Trump and Musk are so rare and valuable.
      They’re not politicians.

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    • #
      Lance

      What AU does NOT understand is that there is a limit to denying reality.

      Imagine all that you might wish, but Reality has the final decision.

      Imaginary solar/wind, imaginary CO2 taxes, imaginary immigration without assimilation.. The list goes on.

      Reality will judge harshly and without quarter. That’s what the pollies are trying to avoid, just long enough to retire or get out of town. AU is being fleeced, and that, quite now.

      If AU doesn’t face reality, they will face national, fiscal, social, and personal, collapse.

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    • #
      Hanrahan

      David, you and the 14 up-tickers will be duty bound to remain mute for the next three years about politics if you allow a labor/green/teal government by default. The polls tell us that’s where we are headed.

      00

  • #
    KP

    The whiny Socialists in Australian “science” are still upset…

    “The narrative of partnering with those who share our values is no longer workable,” said Anna-Maria Arabia, CEO of the Australian Academy of Science.

    The CSIRO Staff Association demanded management “take all means necessary to protect the integrity and sustainability of the many joint projects undertaken in partnership”.

    Australia received about $386 million in US research funding in 2024, the Academy of Science estimates. ”

    All they have to do is fill out a questionaire that tells Trump’s Govt what they want to know. That sounds just like the Govt census we all have to fill out here..

    Of course Dutton’s mob are incapable of deciding if they are for or against, as usual.

    “Opposition spokeswoman for science Claire Chandler said the government must “explain what information it has about the Trump administration’s request and what guidance it intends to provide to survey recipients”.”

    I see no reason for the Govt to “provide guidance” at all, those receiving American money just fill out the survey telling the new American Govt how their money is being spent, end of story! Try telling the truth for once, this is meant to be science.

    https://www.smh.com.au/national/sugar-daddy-trump-comes-for-csiro-on-scientific-research-funding-20250324-p5lm24.html

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      RickWill

      And here I was thinking that it was the Australian government propping up this useless organisation. Their UN agenda was actually being partly paid for by the USA. US taxpayers have a lot to answer for as their money has supported the UN marxist agenda across the world. DOGE is making inroads into slowing the infiltration of that agenda.

      120

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    another ian

    FWIW – more on covid

    “Lies”

    “How scientists misled the world about Covid’s origins
    The suppression of the lab-leak theory is the mother of all Covid scandals.”

    “And it now includes a huge stack of documents – inadvertently made public and spotted by two open-source investigators, ‘Billy Bostickson’ and Gilles Demaneuf – that shows just how systematically we were deceived about this mother of all scandals.”

    https://www.spiked-online.com/2025/03/23/how-scientists-misled-the-world-about-covids-origins/

    “Lockdown: a reckoning”

    “Those who imposed or supported the lockdowns will no doubt insist that it was all for the greater good of saving lives. But the authorities’ actions in 2020 repeatedly gave the lie to this. Enforcing the rules became an end in itself, regardless of the actual risks of spreading or contracting Covid.”

    https://www.spiked-online.com/2025/03/23/lockdown-a-reckoning/

    Via https://www.smalldeadanimals.com/2025/03/24/lies-2/

    80

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    david

    Skepticynic

    Mines are essential as you would appreciate. Solar and wind are not necessary. That’s the difference mate!

    51

    • #
      Skepticynic

      >That’s the difference mate!

      That is certainly an essential difference, and one I feel most strongly about.
      But, as you undoubtedly know, that’s not the difference I was moaning about.
      Two similarities are that both mines and toxic Chinese intermittent feeble energy generating contraptions exist, and that they both disrupt the natural landscape.
      The difference I bemoan is that since mines have to remediate the site after closure, then WHY aren’t we subjecting ruinable energy generating industrial sites to the same requirements??
      Mate.

      41

  • #
    another ian

    FWIW – the latest Kunstler

    “The Last Resort
    “What is the alternative to presidential oversight and management of the agencies listed in this branch of government? They run themselves? That claim means nothing in practice.” —Jeffrey Tucker”

    “Surely you know the old joke: “What do you call a thousand lawyers at the bottom of the sea?” (Answer: “a good start!”). There’s a reason why lawyers are so broadly despised. Law is humanity’s instrument for creating order out of the terror and chaos of nature, where anything goes. The result of law theoretically, is a civil society, where only the good, true, and right things can go.

    These days, lawyers are hard at work to replace civilized order with the terror and chaos of nature — which is to say, the seeking of raw power: this is what I can do to you!”

    More at

    https://www.kunstler.com/p/the-last-resort

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    • #
      KP

      You fudged the difference between laws making order out of chaos, and lawyers, a totally unnecessary band of parasites inserting themselves between the people and those making the laws.

      Sure, you can put up an argument for having laws, but if you need lawyers then the people making those laws have failed in their job.

      10

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    another ian

    FWIW

    “Large-scale electricity generation”

    “Diversification of energy is a good thing. “Renewables” are good when part of a mix, but the problem with wind and solar lies in physics and energy economics that is not up for debate: low energy density, unpredictable nature of their intermittency, low capacity utilization factor and short operational lifetime equate to high costs. These attributes of wind and solar contribute to them having the highest system cost ”

    More at

    https://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=23405&page=2

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    • #
      RickWill

      “Renewables” are good when part of a mix,

      They only ever made sense as a Stan alone system off the grid or to conserve perched water in a perched water constrained hydro system. Beyond that, they have no economic merit.

      40

    • #
      Hanrahan

      The poison is in the dose. Generally it is best to use zero as the safe dose.

      Note: Clearly hydro is not a “renewable” in this sense.

      00

  • #
    TwiggyTheHero

    Is male pregnancy really a crazy idea if it enables impregnation from Musk?

    Here me out. This is not an argument from a leftist perspective. Instead, this is an Elon Musk argument for all the men that love and admire him. I do not think it is crazy for scientists to develop “male pregnancy” if it can enable us men to be impregnanted by Elon Musk. We all know that this is greatest possible honour and that it isn’t fair that it is an exclusive privilege for women. Just imagine giving birth to Elon Musk’s child in the back of your Cybertruck…

    211

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    another ian

    FWIW – re “rights and the USA”

    “On Judges, Jurisdiction and The Constitution”

    “Since you never had a right to liberty in the United States if you enter the nation illegally you are not entitled to anything other than immediate forcible removal as your entry was criminal in the first instance and, if you had previously been deported it is a felony. Now if we’re going to prosecute and imprison you here in the US for that criminal act then yes, you’re entitled to due process before we throw you in prison because now we’re retaining you here in the US against your will and thus Constitutional protections apply but in the alternative we can simply eject you from the United States on a summary basis as you have no right to be here and thus no liberty interest in taking so much as one step on our soil that you can be deprived of.”

    Much more at

    https://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=253047

    70

    • #
      Dry Liberal

      It’s a nonsense argument based on ignoring a couple of hundred years of legal precedent.

      Saying

      I don’t give a wet **** what some judge says whether its a district court judge OR A SURPREME COURT JUSTICE.

      doesn’t make it true.

      Cheers!

      10

    • #
      Dry Liberal

      The argument above is based on the notion that it’s already been proven that the person entered the nation illegally.

      This needs to be proven first. Without this the rule of law is being ignored which gives tyrants the power to do what they like.

      20

      • #
        KP

        “The argument above is based on the notion that it’s already been proven that the person entered the nation illegally. This needs to be proven first. ”

        Take 2minutes.. “Papers please..” or rather “papieren bitte”…

        20

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  • #
    crakar24

    Editor-in-Chief of Trump-Hating The Atlantic Claims He Was “Accidentally” Added to Signal Group Chat with JD Vance, Pete Hegseth, Marco Rubio, and Mike Waltz as They Allegedly Discuss Strikes in Yemen – What’s Going on Here?

    Having used signal extensively for the past 7 years I can tell you it is impossible to accidentally add someone to a group chat in addition only an administrator can add members to a chat group, so either this is another case of TDS and therefore never happened or they were added on purpose for a reason as yet unknown.

    81

    • #

      it smells of resistance to me. Some unhappy minion gleefully pushes a button.
      Just watching all the commentary, and wondering why no one was questioning how this name got on the list, just blaming amateur Trump officials. You’d think the FBI would be on the case?

      40

      • #
        crakar24

        Like i said only someone with ADMIN rights can add someone to a group and even then you will need their mobile phone number, so it should not be too hard to find out who added them.

        50

      • #
        Yarpos

        The people that actually know what’s going on wont be represented in the clowns running their mouths in the media

        00

  • #
    • #
      Yarpos

      But…but…”renewable superpower”

      That phrase rippled around the world like “build back better ” and “the ball is in Russia’s court” with pretty much the same effect.

      20

  • #
    Yarpos

    So I guess the Avalon Airshow is coming up. Within the last couple of hours we have been buzzed by a C130 (or similar) flying at a few hundred feet and had a whomp whomp whomp fly over by a Chinook just a tad higher.

    40

  • #
    Yarpos

    I didnt know the reactor at Lucas Hieghts is closing down. The story goes that we dont need in anymore as we can import required isotopes, commonly used isotopes can be produced by other means (cyclotrons) and the advance of other imaging technologies such as MRIs. May all be quite valid but what I see is another brick in the wall of local capability and self reliance gone.

    70

    • #
      Gob

      Yep, self reliance is the key characteristic we should be driving for; we’ll only get there by building coal-fired power stations which will enable us to reindustrialize.

      Today my friend was asking how she should vote and I was absolutely unable to provide an answer beyond spoil your ballots and thus deprive parties of the few dollars each vote garners for its candidate’s party. What a mess this country has become…

      30

    • #
      David Maddison

      I hadn’t heard that.

      Not all isotopes can be imported as their half-lives are extremely short and they will be inactive by the time they get here.

      Cyclotrons can’t produce all types of required isotopes.

      And since when has the Government wanted to close down a department? I wonder if this is about some anti-nuclear deal done with The Greens?

      30

      • #
        another ian

        Like that high strength steel that couldn’t be imported because the heat of crossing the equatorial region was enough to send it off?

        Though IIRC most of it was for the car industry and we got rid of the need for that use

        10

  • #
    • #
      Graeme4

      What “record”? The references I saw were to a 1985 temperature, which was recorded at a totally different measurement site in Perth. Perth has had four changes of official temperature measurement sites, the first not using the standard enclosure so is usually ignored. The second, on the top of Mt Eliza, was so cool that the TV weather news in the sixties provided two readings – the official cooler one and a temperature recorded in the CBD.
      Since the BOM never accurately compared the last site move to determine if it made a difference, which it does BTW, then you cannot compare the new inland hotter site’s readings with earlier readings – they will ALWAYS be hotter.

      10

  • #
    el+gordo

    Free market seems to be working well in the new world order.

    ‘A sale by Hong Kong-based CK Hutchison of its overseas ports, including two in Panama, to a BlackRock consortium continues to stir debate as to its eventual outcome. China has expressed unhappiness, suggesting the deal would hurt national interest, while CK Hutchison has said the transaction is purely commercial.’ (SCMP)

    21

  • #
    MeAgain

    Ground-breaking research here: https://www.essex.ac.uk/news/2022/10/03/covid-masks-impact-on-deaf-communities-revealed

    Can’t wait for the further research where they will ‘communicate with deaf people in sign language’

    All these calls for masks to care about the disabled – except for deaf people.

    “Mask mandates were vital in fighting the spread of the deadly coronavirus but meant some of our most vulnerable communities were left isolated. “The pandemic lockdowns were hard for everyone but even more so for the deaf and hard-of-hearing.

    “This research exposes the unexpected consequences policies can have in a fast-moving international emergency and how people can fall through the cracks.

    “If the world is gripped by a pandemic again Governments need to do more to be inclusive and engage with communities to find out what they need to thrive and survive.”

    00

  • #
    Hanrahan

    I just don’t believe that the polls say we are about to have a green/teal government by proxy in both house and senate and half here, including our Hostess, are advising against voting for the unaparty.

    How crazy must you be to dismiss the good because they aren’t perfect, leaving the door wide open for the crazies.

    10

    • #
      KP

      So, you’d prefer more of the same, forever? THEY ARE NOT ‘THE GOOD’ !!

      Only when the country has been driven down far enough to make people like you realise we need to completely wipe out the Uniparty and change how we sort out our governance, will we begin to advance again. Still, as JCII says, we have plenty of room to descend yet, another seven years…

      10

      • #
        Hanrahan

        More of the same means labor, so “No”.

        If we get a labor government dictated to by crazies I will remind you that votes matter every time you whinge about the government.

        00

  • #
    another ian

    FWIW

    “How much does it cost to back up solar with batteries?
    This turns out to be a tricky question. Here’s my current, partial understanding”

    https://newsletter.rootsofprogress.org/p/how-much-does-it-cost-to-back-up

    00

    • #
      Hanrahan

      In Townsville for the first few months: About 100 gals of diesel. We had a sunny day Saturday. YEA!

      00

    • #
      Graeme4

      Wrong solar CF figure, no mention of opportunity costs. Then we have the false IRENA figures, the wrong statements that solar and battery costs are falling, etc. And to top it off, the ridiculous claims about the need to “reduce carbon”, with CCS quoted.
      Forget it – far better ways to determine an actual system’s costs.
      In any case, each system design has to be tailored to your power requirements, panel area available.

      20

  • #
    another ian

    FWIW

    How not to read a room

    “Cultural Enrichment Strikes Again”

    https://fergusmason.substack.com/p/cultural-enrichment-strikes-again

    Or a village either

    00

  • #
    another ian

    FWIW

    “Disney Quietly Cancels Live-Action ‘Pocahontas’ Starring Dylan Mulvaney”

    https://babylonbee.com/news/disney-quietly-cancels-live-action-pocahontas-starring-dylan-mulvaney

    (Note the source)

    10

  • #

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