Ginger Up Gillard's Base*

CRAZY Clive Hamilton's yearning to see ATO auditors unleashed on climate noncomformists is a pretty low notion, about as foul a tactic as those accusations of incest and child abuse so often filed with authorities by estranged wives. It is also dangerous -- call it MAD, Mutually Audited Distraction -- as a Billabong correspondent demonstrated this morning by suggesting in a private email that the tactic might just as easily by turned against warmists.

"Why not start dobbing your favourite in to the ATO?" he wondered. "The revenuers should be making their lives miserable, instead of harassing small business owners like me." The flaw in that plan is that if, say, you informed the ATO that some or other settled scientist had been pocketing grant money or directing it to mates, if would be, for want of evidence, a filthy lie. Yes, it would be entertaining to think of some nob in a white coat attempting to persuade an auditor that his adjusted and normalised modelling of expenses and deductions is even more valid than a shoebox of actual receipts, but it is a pleasure conservatives must deny ourselves.

After all, we are about probity and truth, not the base enjoyment of another's pain, no matter how corrupt, dishonest and contemptible that person might be, nor how richly the torment might be deserved.

And if readers do not  heed the Professor's sermon, please do not inform the Billabong. It is a very uncomfortable thing to to be gripped simultaneously by laughter and revulsion.

There is, though, one little mischief which is ethically sound: Readers who believe, as does the Professor, that Gillard is the Coalition's best hope of a landslide might want to call local MPs and urge them to stick with Gingerella. Some vegetable representing Mt Druitt was just on Sky News to talk about the volume of calls he has received and the great weight he places on his constituents' sincere counsel.

So why not speak truth to power and pass on your firmly held belief that Gillard must be retained for the benefit of the nation?

It would be true and accurate and not even a venial sin, because a PM bogged to her Christmas ham thighs in questions about Craig Thomson, Tony Hodges and all those other lies and scandals is the surest agent to bring about an Abbott government. And there can be no doubt that such a change would be in the country's very best interests.

The full list of Labor members can be found here.

ADVISORY: It is a hot, hot day in Melbourne, and the Little Lorikeet has just called to see if the Professor is up for a swim. Absolutely! After that, dinner by the water and perhaps, if things stay torrid, a moonlit visit to the mooring. Amazing the friends one can make on the strength of a little advice about keeping the feet an appropriate distance apart.

Back later.

* Ginger should have better taste