'I see another female CEO, Kelly Bayer Mosmarin has fallen on her sword, to take the blame for yet another Optus Corporate stuff up. Isn’t it amazing that when the men fuck up, they go out with a $20 million-plus early retirement pay-out,’ said Janno,

'I can just imagine what happened,’ said Johno. ‘She would have looked to the SingTel chairman, the conspicuously missing *heretofore from Singapore*, for advice. “How will I answer, if they ask me at the press briefing, if I intend to resign due to the latest disastrous outage?” He would have smiled insincerely, and told her to stay true to the original Optus branding, “Just say Yes.”

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Back on AC, they had laughed derisively when he had told them. ‘The Aussie Saps have agreed to resettle over time the citizens of Tuvalu who become displaced by climate change,’ Alphy explained. ‘We knew they were up to their necks in it, now it appears that the impact of catastrophic climate change has sunk in, literally,’ replied one of the Guardians with disdain.

'So what do you think about the decision by the Australian Government regarding Tuvalu,’ enquired Alphy of Johnno. ’Well, it looks like it’s toodeloo to Tuvalu,’ he replied with raised eyebrows. ’Unfortunately, it’s just another in a long line of examples of the dominant industrialised cultures, destroying indigenous ones. Is this event a watershed moment in the ongoing debate about climate change? Alas, the answer is almost certainly no. The world is increasingly made up of people who don’t believe in science or facts. If they believe it to be true, then it is.’

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'The world is so depressing at the moment, so let’s go for a drive up to the Dandenongs,’ suggested Janno.

'What a great idea,’ enthused Alphy. Back on AC, they lived under an invisible protective dome, which also served to allow the Centaurians to control the weather precisely. So, every day for centuries ahead the weather was perfectly planned, with no storms, cyclones, or the like. Whilst achieving optimal climatic conditions on AC, Alphy since his arrival on Earth, or more precisely in ‘four seasons in one day’ Melbourne, had reflected that, to use a Johno expression, AC weather was in fact boring as batshit. So, much to his surprise he had learnt to love the changes of the seasons. But, along with his fellow Melburnians, he did find the unpredictability and inconsistency wearing at times.

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'Well, it looks like the yes campaign’s heading for defeat,’ said Janno.

'As soon as it became apparent that it wasn’t going to get bi-partisan support, it was well and truly stuffed,’ said Johno. ‘Welcome to the Land of Laryngitis.’

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'So Rupert Murdoch is stepping down from his role as co-Chairman of Fox Corporation and News Corp to become Emeritus Chairman,’ said Janno, reading from the news feed on her iPad.

'Yes, what a magnificent contribution he has made to journalism,’ said Johnno with a scowl. ‘Carl Bernstein, the journalist of Watergate fame, has repeated often that the role of the journalist is to obtain and deliver the best obtainable version of the truth. In contrast, we have Murdoch Media, who have consistently and knowingly perpetuated untruths in the pursuit of controversy and ratings. From phone hacking in the UK to the most recent saga, when Dominion alleged that Fox had damaged its business by spreading false claims that its machines had helped rig the 2020 election in Joe Biden's favour. And to no-one's bloody surprise, Fox ultimately paid Dominion close to a billion $US settlement to avoid a lengthy and potentially embarrassing trial.’

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'Listen to this,’ said Janno, reading a news story from her iPad. ‘Humankind struggled to survive during the early Pleistocene, according to researchers who used a computer model to discover a severe population bottleneck in our species’ ancient past. The bottleneck occurred between 813,000 years and 930,000 years ago, and reduced our ancestral human species to less than 1,300 breeding individuals.’

'If humans don’t seriously address climate change and nuclear disarmament, you could be back down to those sorts of numbers again, in the not too distant future,’ said Alphy curtly.

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'Well, we have just witnessed an incredible tipping point for Women’s sport,’ said Janno. 'Just listen to these statistics:

-Most watched TV program in Australia for two decades, with the semi-final match Matildas against England, having 11.5 million viewers;

-18.6 million Australians watched the World Cup series on the host TV network;

-Stadium crowds of over 1.9 million;

-And, a worldwide audience of over 2 billion viewers.’

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'What’s it to be?’ enquired Janno. ‘ Oppenheimer or Barbie? Which one shall we go to?’

'Annihilation or Assimilation’, said Johno.

'Assimilation – how so?’

'The genius of Mattel,’ he replied. ‘They’ve taken what in the past was the embodiment of the perfect Caucasian, fantasy figure doll, best known for reinforcing conventional stereotypes of women, and assimilated all the present-day cultural complexities, to deliver a candy-coloured feminist; culminating in Barbie the movie. Brilliant!

'And speaking of Pinkos, coincidentally it’s one of the key themes of the Oppenheimer film. It was a pejorative term used in the US to describe a person regarded as being strongly sympathetic, affectionate, or supportive of communism; though not necessarily a member of the Reds, the Communist Party.

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'So we won’t be having King Charles coming out to open the 23rd Commonwealth Games. Having the Games take place in Regional Victoria was always seen as somewhat controversial,’ said Janno.

'An interesting example of Cancel Culture by the Premier,’ said Johno grinning.

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'Hundreds of Pakistani, Kashmiri and other refugees have died in the Mediterranean, from the sinking of an overcrowded boat, and it hardly rates a mention on Western media. Yet five people go missing on the Titan submersible and it gets non-stop attention for weeks on end,’ said Janno.

Alphy shook his head in affirmation.

'The answer is black and white,’ said Johno. ‘There is a spectrum, on one extreme end are WARP’s Whites of Anglo-Saxon appearance, rich & privileged. On the other end are the FUCD, Fortuneless, Unseen, Coloured and Defenceless.

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Alphy couldn’t quite believe it. He had spent the previous five nights watching the televised Ashes Cricket Test series with Janno and Johno – and had enjoyed it immensely! He was now a convert to the Cult of Cricket.

He wouldn’t dare report this to the Guardians back on AC. They considered sport to be vulgar and the sign of a primitive culture. Admitting to them he had enjoyed the spectacle, would have triggered his immediate recall, and they would have labelled him as having gone primitive.

Furthermore, if he had told them that Tests lasted five days, and this was the first of a series of five, and the winners become the ‘holders’ of a small Urn containing Ashes, (reputedly of a wooden ball, humorously referred to as the Ashes of Australian Cricket) – they would certainly have designated him as a suitable case for treatment and required him to attend compulsory exit counselling.

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Janno was reading out the reports of the findings, from the Judge presiding over the Nine newspapers defamation case.

'Ben Roberts-Smith, holder of the Victoria Cross and other top military honours, was also “not an honest and reliable witness in … many areas” and a bully towards other Australian soldiers.

Australia’s most decorated soldier was “complicit in and responsible for the murder” of three Afghan men on deployment. And while Justice Besanko could not find "sufficiently reliable" evidence the soldier punched a woman he was having an affair with, he found he was "intimidatory, threatening and controlling".’

'From hero to zero,’ said Johno. ‘Ironically he shot himself in the foot by bringing the case, from Defamation to Damnation!

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'So Indian PM Narendra Modi has arrived in Australia. Bit of a mixed score card there,’ said Johno. ‘In particular, the treatment of Muslim minorities and suppression of free media. Most recently the Indian government’s decision to block social media access to a critical BBC documentary on Modi before raiding the BBC’s Indian offices, for supposed tax irregularities, was a serious blow to media freedom.’

'I was just reading that since Modi came to power in 2014, India has fallen from 27th to 46th in The Economist’s global democracy index’ and is classified as a flawed democracy,’ said Janno.

’Well as they say, “the enemy of my enemy, is my friend,” and we’re all part of the Quad Squad now -pacifying the Indo-Pacific,’ continued Johno with a smirk.

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Alphy, together with Johno and Janno, had just watched the Coronation. He was wondering how he should report it back to the Guardians on AC. The British Saps, who often considered themselves to be superior to ‘foreigners’ (that is, any-one born outside of the UK, or more precisely had not gone to Eton or Harrow), had just installed a King as Head of State, whose only qualification to be such, was that he was the first born of the previous incumbent, who in turn...

Many Monarchists attempted to justify the Royal succession, by either implicitly or explicitly attaching to it, the notion that it is God ordained. Deity meets Inanity? mused Alphy.

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Alphy had just returned from a Dawn Service with Johno and Janno. Contrary to his initial expectations, he was surprised how moving he had found the experience, but he would not report this back to AC, as he could anticipate them making derisive Noble Savage remarks about the Saps, in response.

The experience had somehow drawn him closer to the Aussie Saps, so secretly he would henceforth think of ANZAC Day as ANZ A(Alpha) C(Centauri) Day.

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They had just finished watching the OJ Simpson-like, frenzied media coverage of Trump returning to Florida, post indictment hearings in New York.

'You know Democracy is teetering on the edge when magalomaniacs, many who claim to be religiously inspired, turn out en masse to protest the prosecution of their Porn Again insurrection inspiring presidential hopeful,’ said Johno in full rant mode.

'Surely he can’t become President again,’ said Janno despairingly.

'As ex-Prime Minister Keating once famously quipped, A soufflé doesn’t rise twice,’ said Johno hopefully, but actually fearing the worst. ‘Unfortunately, the current economic situation is not helping Biden’s reelection chances.’

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‘What a sad state of affairs,’ said Janno. ‘We have committed to spending up to $368 billion on building nuclear-powered submarines over the next three decades. Think of the opportunities we’ll forgo, in terms of education, housing, health etc that could have been done instead. Given the enormity of the decision, was there sufficient debate, both in the parliament and the public, so all were fully aware of the consequences, and therefore able to provide informed feedback before any agreement was finally made? It wasn’t a great example of participative democracy in action, was it?’

Alphy nodded in agreement. He never ceased to be amazed at how the Saps could spend so much of their resources, both intellectual and financial, on militarisation. Even the Saps themselves had previously described their supposedly deterrent strategy as MAD, Mutually Assured Destruction. More like SAD thought Alphy, Saps Annihilation Destined.

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'Isn’t it terrible that less than four weeks after the earthquake in Türkiye and Syria, which is estimated to have killed more than 50,000 people and it hardly rates a mention on the news any more,’ said Janno.

'Sad to say it’s because, a) They are not English speaking, b) they are predominantly Muslim, and c), it’s a long way from Australia,’ said Johno.

What was really sad, thought Alphy was that the Saps still hadn’t developed the technology to accurately predict earthquakes. They had developed sophisticated nuclear weapons that could kill the entire population of the earth many times over, but could provide no advance warning of earthquakes. Back on AC they had not only developed the systems to forecast earthquakes but had also developed the technology to mitigate the effects. All buildings on AC within an earthquake zone could literally rise and hover above the surface until the earthquake had passed, and then descend again safely, once the tremor had passed.

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'I’ve been playing with the artificial intelligence app, ChatGPT,’ said Janno, ‘It’s pretty remarkable.’

'What did you ask it?’ enquired Johno.

'What is the closest object to Earth in the cosmos that might have intelligent life?

'And the response was?’

'In terms of the closest known potentially habitable exoplanet, the answer is Proxima Centauri b, which orbits the star Proxima Centauri, located in the Alpha Centauri star system,’ replied Janno reading from her laptop.

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They had come down to Sorrento to stay a few days, taking advantage of Johno’s parents’ beach house. His parents were visiting Sydney, avoiding the crowds that came down for Christmas and January School Holidays.

‘The Peninsula freeway has made it too accessible, and we get inundated with CUBs (Cashed Up Bogans),’ his father would constantly complain. ‘Oh the trials and tribulations of having two homes,’ Johno would mockingly say, just out of earshot of his parents.

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