“Woolworths, Cricket Australia, now a cyclone” bemoaned local AM radio shock jock Rod “Nuclear” Newcombe (fake name and story), on his fourth Australia Day rant of the morning radio show going out to the regional centres in Queensland. “Cyclone Kirrily The Woke Tropical Storm I’m calling it” announced Nuclear Newcombe to his listeners in case they missed his subtle hint in the previous sentence.
Rod “Nuclear” Newcombe had joined many of his peers and mainstream media in hammering the Australia Day is being ruined by everyone and everything in the past two weeks of his show which blasts out on car radio and garages from 9am every weekday. But you could hear the exasperation in his voice now that a weather system had contrived to ruin Australia Day for the people who “simply want to waive a flag, cook a snag and play cricket with a beer” as he can continually defended over this period.
Of course he joined in with Peter Dutton in calling for a boycott of Woolworths over their stance on selling Australia Day flags. The only issue for a lot of his regional listeners is that this came on the back of his call for a boycott of Coles for bringing out Hot Cross buns too early, a boycott of Aldi because of their German ownership, and even a boycott of IGA over their pricing of his favourite biscuits – Monte Carlo. Essentially leaving his audience with nowhere to shop if they obeyed all his boycott suggestions.
His fans and admirers do listen to him though. In 2022 at least 50 of his listeners refused to wear shoes into the local RSL on a particular Thursday afternoon after he claimed the licensed venue cancelled Happy Hour in “another moment of political correctness gone mad and a power play by the left-wing trendies of the town”. In 2020 and 2021 he also rode the Anti-Vax train along with most conspiracies.
“Cyclone Kirrily is going to crash into Queensland conveniently a day before Australia Day, and take away all the sunshine, and kill all those Australia Day BBQs and dampen our Australia Day flags”, he opined before adding more.
“Who knows, maybe Cyclone Kirrily has been created by those environmental protestors to highlight their bogus claims about climate change and ruin Australia Day. No one has come out denied it yet. Coincidence? Or maybe the Government are behind Cyclone Kirrily to push their renewable energy agenda and worsen the cost of living crisis for all those great Aussie battlers out there. And isn’t there is state election coming up in Queensland?”
Before he could go on with more he was reminded by his producer that there were sponsors to support. Like Sargeant Geoff’s Large Gents Clothing Megastore – from excellent to XXXXXXXL, the Mattress King Super Warehouse- giving you more bounce for your buck, Barry’s Meats – who supply only the choicest cuts of your favourite animal, the White Metal Table and Chair Factory Outlet – where the chat never starts.
