Mark Simpson

This is how media lies to you in real time.

It annoys me that so many people are under the impression that this guy, Steven Bradbury, is some subpar goober who lucked his way into gold. That could not be further from the truth. This is one of the most satisfying victories in the history of the Olympics if you know the full backstory. This medal final was during his fourth Olympics, in Salt Lake City in 2002. Earlier in his career, he was among the best athletes in the world in this specific event, the 1000 meter short-track men's speed skate. But despite his talent, he just had some of the shittiest luck in the sport. We're talking a decade of shit luck. In the '94 Winter Olympics, he was considered the odds-on favorite to take gold, but he fell in his heat after getting illegally pushed by an opponent (who was later disqualified). He didn't get a re-do. That was it. He got shoved by some asshole, and his Olympics was over. Then in the '98 Winter Olympics, he was a favorite to at least medal in the same event but got caught up in a collision that wasn't his fault and failed to advance. In 1994, he got his thigh sliced open by a competitor's skate during a race, which required 111 stitches and 18 months of recovery time. In 2000, he broke his neck during training because a skater in front of him fell and tripped him up. That required a bunch of screws and plates being inserted into his skull and back and chest. And doctors told him that he should stop skating. But he didn't wanna give up. It meant too much to him. So, there he was in Salt Lake City in 2002, past his prime, a walking erector set, going up against opponents who were faster and younger and in their prime. He manages to win his heat and advance to the quarterfinal but then has the shit luck (yet again) of having to go up against the best two athletes in the quarterfinal and only the top two advance. He finishes third and thinks: "Damn, I gave it my best shot." But then, the second place finisher is disqualified, so Bradbury gets to advance to the semifinal. Now, at this point, he's thinking: Well, shit, I'm not as fast as these younger guys, and I got a bad habit of getting taken out by crashes that aren't my fault. So, he consults with the Australian national coach, Ann Zhang, and they decide that he should hang back from the pack and hope the pack crashes. That is a perfectly valid strategy. If you crash, you lose, but speed skaters risk crashing to gain an advantage in order to win. It may not feel exciting, but it is a valid strategy and just as risky: avoid crashes entirely and hope that pays off. It paid off in the semifinal: the pack, including the defending Olympic champion, jostled too much and crashed. Bradbury wins and advances. So, he's improbably in the final and takes the same approach, and it works: the entire pack jostles too much and crashes, and Bradbury's risk of hanging back pays off. This victory was not some un-athletic schlub lucking his way into gold. It was a journeyman athlete who never gave up and played smart after a career of shitty luck and finally got his due after it being snatched away from him so many times. Hands down, one of my favorite Olympics stories.

Reminder: ocean heat content is a BETTER metric of global heating than surface temperatures (which are far more prone to fluctuations due to El Nino/La Nina), and unlike surface temperatures, it set a NEW RECORD THIS PAST YEAR: link.springer.com/article/10.100…

Never forget: At breakneck speed we are leaving the stable Holocene climate in which human society developed and thrived. Weather extremes are outside historical experience. Sea-level rise is accelerating. Dangerous tipping points are ahead. Graph: ed-hawkins.github.io/climate-visual…

This needs some amplification, letter to the Age. #auspol .

Parliament House’s social sports club is sponsored by the gambling industry. This is Parliament House where politicians are charged with legislating gambling. The politician who asks about the integrity of that @DavidPocock gets banned from the club. Please, someone tell whoever was in charge of that decision, the emperor has no clothes on #sports #gambling #politics #auspol #wallabies #rugby #democracy

Brandolini’s Law (also known as the bullshit asymmetry principle): The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than that needed to produce it.

Ahem . . . The Aust Parliament Sports Club is now formally registered as a lobby group👇🏽 Anthony Albanese is the President of the Aust Parliament Sports Club. That means the Prime Minister of Australia is currently the president of a lobby group. Just utterly unbelievable.

My latest animation of the global surface temperature anomaly, 1881 - 2025 (current through September).

More Guts! (Ep. 416) out now: Gastrointestinal surgery in reptiles. NOTE: Refresh/retry if you cannot play episode (a bug, now fixed, at our end). Or play directly from VetGurus.com @VetGurus Vetgurus.com

Venom (Episode 417) out now. We discuss treatment of venomous reptiles. Also: book review- Heal The Beasts @VetGurus VetGurus.com

Need to prescribe a medication for a bird? We got you! This week (Episode 418) we discussion medicating birds. Also: Frog Saunas.

@DavidShoebridge @MehreenFaruqi @FatimaPayman @PeterKhalilMP @Tony_Burke @SenatorWong 12/ Call it what it is: ✅ Dogwhistling ✅ Propaganda ✅ Emotional manipulation ✅ Racial vilification in disguise They hope you'll just scroll past. Don't. ---

This is outrageous! Forestry Tasmania has logged highly controversial Masked Owl habitat in #Takayna, despite Tasmanian logging Minister Abetz assuring our foundation that the forest was off the logging plan. #politas bobbrown.org.au/endangered-owl…

Australia is being fleeced — on so many levels.

Unpacking the sudden, strangely synchronised media concern for starving Palestinian children. Why now? What’s changed & what still hasn’t?  A look at the caveats & spin still dominating the conversation. + imagine if journos weren’t chilled into looking away when I was sacked

I've found 10 logical fallacies in this article. Can someone tweet this to Karvelas? She's blocked me. ⛳️Frames concern for Palestinian lives and concern for antisemitism as mutually exclusive FALSE ⛳️Misrepresents critics as saying Jewish safety doesn’t matter if you care about Gaza FALSE ⛳️Uses isolated events to make broad claims about national moral failure or widespread societal decay. FALSE ⛳️Suggests that unless urgent action is taken, multiculturalism will collapse, without strong evidence FALSE ⛳️Relies on emotional imagery (e.g. the 13-year-old witnessing a fire) rather than reasoned analysis. ⛳️Compares attacks on Jews in Melbourne to hypothetical attacks on Russian churches over Putin — oversimplifies complex contexts. FALSE ⛳️Calls an act against one community “an attack on Australia,” blurring symbolic harm with national threat. FALSE ⛳️Implies criticism of Israel leads to or excuses antisemitic attacks, unfairly linking peaceful protest with hate crimes. FALSE ⛳️States attacks on Jews are antisemitic because they’re antisemitic, without deeper examination. FALSE ⛳️Repeats Burke’s framing as truth without independently justifying it. FALSE

I’ve got a really good tax idea to help with ur budget issues @JacintaAllanMP - maybe tax the developers who won’t sell homes that have been sitting there freshly built for literally years