world is cool

Not for the first time, I'm confused.

Watching, mesmerised, the Tsunami breaking on Japan yesterday, on television an annoying yellow onscreen caption flashed regularly that "World is cooling, Minchin says".

"What", I asked my friend, "is a Minchin?". "Some government guy who wrote a report". It was a cool summer this year. I thought Uh huh. And back to what looked like a cult science fiction movie (but was the awful truth).

On the way home, and bored with trying to fit my Taxi's number into an imagined golden square , and trying to wrench my inner eye from another televised horror; "What" I asked "is a Minchin?

In seconds Google is telling me, more or less, "World is cooling, Minchin says". Which was a little disappointing because (losing a syllable) world is cool is an idea everyone can feel good about. And God knows we can all do with something to feel good about.

It is very disappointing, really, that after so much has been said and done about global warmness, none of the polemic seems to make sense any more.

A Polemic, you will recall, is a winner-takes-all debating strategy that strives to establish the superiority of one point of view over another. It often involves sledging the credibility of individuals making an opposing argument; more blood sport than debate.

And speaking of blood all this stuff about the Australian Prime Minister having blood on her hands is like something out of the Dead Sea Scrolls.

But. A Minchin is a South Australian Senator with a lot of friends who search-engine-optimise, Google is telling me. And driving over the Bolte Bridge through Docklands, and into the belly of the Burnley Tunnel, and feeling, not for the first time, like Lemmy Caution entering Alphaville, I wonder what it all means.