A Usurper of Power.

 

There is another usurper of power in these modern or post-modern times, and that is the wealthy merchant middle-class..; The inheritors of the once scorned ; ” Nouveau riche”…Oh they are still rich all right, some of them now “Old Riche” but they are no longer gauche or politically crass…they now rule “in absentia” through their proxies…the elite educated / advocate class…

This elite academic class has risen  through the “Old School Tie” network to graduate into Judiciary / advocates, Upper management / Ceo.s and economic speculators..these “Leaders” govern for the interests of both their Financiers and their own status or wealth, usually only a modicum of those they represent.

Their form of governance is that of “Rule of Law” , in essence a good thing. except one has to inquire ; “Whose interpretation of what is a good law?”…I think the result of such an inquiry will demonstrate how we end up with a royal commission that condemns the workers unions and drags three leaders of the ALP. before a Beak of the governments choosing, yet fails to act on the incriminating evidence of their own “respected witnesses”…eg; Like the Brandis “diary affair”.

The failing of universal protest against such obvious unfairness can be traced back to what can be described as a “defer to authority” or “defer to legal expertise” respect. Those of us who can only make vague or semi-informed opinion on the complexity of the legalese of the judgements and convoluted rulings will usually, perhaps ALWAYS defer to those better trained (we believe) to translate and interpret those findings..therefore once again, as in the old ; “ relying on a greater respected power” to guide our actions.

This “power of authority” , once it brings down a finding, can lean on that granted authority to legitimise the next action and depending upon that governing party that has called for “the umpires decision” , will deliver with a perceived “right” or mandate what it always was intending to deliver for it’s own or the vested interests benefit, a most convenient “placement” of one of those from the “Old School Tie” brigade.

Consider Thorsten Veblen’s analysis..:

“  By way of characterization of the Maecenas relation, it is to be noted that, considered externally, as an economic or industrial relation simply, it is a relation of status. The scholar under the patronage performs the duties of a learned life vicariously for his patron, to whom a certain repute inures after the manner of the good repute imputed to a master for whom any form of vicarious leisure is performed. (ie; “He who pays the piper calls the tune” ..my simplifying)  It is also to be noted that, in point of historical fact, the furtherance of learning or the maintenance of scholarly activity through the Maecenas relation has most commonly been a furtherance of proficiency in classical lore or in the humanities. The knowledge tends to lower rather than to heighten the industrial efficiency of the community.” (Ch. 14. Theory of the Leisure Class).

[ The Maecenas relation is a reference to that same servile Maecenas of the Equestrian Order (middle class) in the time of Emperor Augustus of Rome , who gave advice to Augustus as to how to organize and run governance for the Empire…A true conniving bastard of that class!]

The unfortunate mistake of the working classes down through the ages has been the need to rely upon these Machiavellian “operators” to interpret and enact the legal frameworks needed for a fair and just resolution of industrial conflicts in a civil society..Thankfully, there has been many legal fraternity graduates from the similar class or sympathetic to that class of working people to work for and with the common people to achieve decency and justice in the work-place.

But there must come a time when a complete overhaul of the process of selection and fit-to-sit on the judicial benches of our nation will be needed…because there now appears to be a situation heavily weighted in favour of what Thorsten Veblen so diplomatically calls : “The Maecenas Relation”.

“A Pox on The Masses ! “

That’s what “Reganomics” was ..; a pox on the wage earners..Economic rationalism, trickle-down economy, free-market capitalism..call it what you will, it all means one thing..A Big Fat Con on the producing classes of ANY economy.

It’s time for the Left to radicalize in a Big way!…I’m not talking pikes and barricades, nor marches and cries of ; “Waddawewant…?”..I’m talking radical policies that will scare the be-jeezus out of the right-wing loonies and lobbyists. I’m talking re-nationalising the essential utilities like energy, water (both domestic and agricultural), public transport, education, health, communications and even putting a brake on the banks by either re-establishing a “Commonwealth Bank” or having control of many smaller banking societies to service the lower income end of the market WITHOUT employing speculating policies!…forcing the big banks to divest of those smaller banking outlets they now control.

Making the taxation dept’ deliver the tax owing to the nation…and finally to break up the MSM. entities  and securing the public broadcaster is A-political..with a capital “A”..and while at it, since Murdoch is a foreign national as useless, really, to any political party as piles to a bicycle racer on the commencement of the Tour de France..Declare him ‘Persona non Grata” and f#ck him off out of the country once and for all.

Sure..not all of those policies could be implemented (straight away!) but they could become a part of the public discussion and put the wind up those smug arseholes of the right.

Let’s face it, the ONLY way these economic rationalist policies could even get off the ground is with a hard-sell from the MSM. Murdoch has done his level best to prime divisional and aspirational bullshit in this country for years..using those personal employees still sucking from the newscorpse teat and others since employed in various “sleeper” positions in both the public broadcaster and other media outlets…low intellect commentators like Dean and Kenny..Jones et al..like low order pimps at a “Men’s only convention” licking their lips in anticipation of some piss-weak personal advancement (perhaps from outside the toilet to the curb!) overdosed on Murdoch-mothers-milk pushing the trickle-down line like it was gospel. Along with that viper’s nest of traitors ; the IPA. a covert operator if ever there was one, funded on secret donations from organizations that we all suspect or know about (why would you keep it a secret except it is from those corp’s or people you don’t want revealed!?) and foreign nationals, to undermine and destabilize any democratically elected govt’ not advantageous to those foreign national’s interests…all while sheltering under the protection and benefit of their Australian passports!..if THAT isn’t treason, then Lord Haw Haw can go laugh it off!

The Left must push loud and long to have justice BE SEEN to be delivered to these bastards who have scavenged from the bones of our national racism shame..a shame many worked at to redeem through honest, hard won policy to both the indigenous peoples and refugees…many now trashed and worse than they were before the LNP. came to power with it’s scheming filth and dirty mind. A continuous Commission looking into the connections between Big Business, Banking, Mining/energy and the LNP.  MUST be commenced..the connections are obvious. The damage to the economy is obvious. The culprits are obvious..let them face their judges and declare their national allegiance or be condemned forever as they have condemned so very many to a desperate fate !

I say turn around the “Pox on the masses” to those who most deserve it ; “ A Pox on the LNP.”

Julia Gillard. Herself, The Nation and Our Betrayal.

 

“I was Prime Minister for three years and three days. Three years and three days of resilience…”

Such goes the words on the back cover of “My Story”…three years and three days..yet it needed to be at least two terms of governance..two terms of governance by an honest, intelligent woman, to break the macho-mechanics of Australian politics…Julia Gillard was that woman…and she could well have done it, if not for treachery from both sides of politics…from many factions of the main stream media…from commercial media and, surprisingly, from even the ABC…why?..there is no accounting for a scoundrel’s actions…for the Murdoch media journo’s and commentators..well, they were bought..pure and simple..paid to write what their overlord dictated..AND no doubt given bonus’s for “extra base hits” on good days.

Some were fed rumour and innuendo from Gillard’s own party..for this there is no excuse..no mercy. We know their names, from the highest to the most mealy-mouthed…most are gone from politics now, but Fitzgibbon is one I single out, for his appearance on Ch 7’s “Sunrise” program, where he proceeded to mock both his own party and leadership to the whooping laughter of the compere ; Kochy..it was both a disgrace and a most sordid betrayal…He now must earn any respect by bloody hard work ,the sweat of his brow and the evidence of his deeds.

Of the ABC. journos’ and commentators, Uhlmann was to me the most oily..the most insidious..many an interview would contain the expression ; “shambolic Labor…” and who could forget his obnoxious “clinging to the trouser-cuffs”of then leader of the opp’n , even to the point of ,literally, sitting at the feet of his idol, in the sand of Alice Springs, while lapping up the “sage wisdom” of his oracle like Lazarus’ dog at the pustulant sores of his master…a disgusting sight…and Tony Jones, on HIS tv. show..a direct insult to the PM. Gillard to paraphrase ; “at least I didn’t stick a knife in their back”…low specimen.. vulgar animal.

Even Barrie Cassidy spent many Sunday morning shows delivering the “breaking news” of an imminent leadership spill…such pronouncements went on month after month so that even after three challenges, one of them a breath-taking no-show by the “challenger” that ought to have put paid once and for all to such eager prognostations..but NO!…there they were, the very next day , almost..trundling out the same old, same old….fools!

For that’s what they were..fools…even worse, and this is the crux of this piece..where we, the public have really been wronged..badly wronged by those that manage the imagery of the MSM. “super-stars”. These media commentators are not smart, not in an intellectual way..they are not astute, not in a political way..they are “blunt instruments” to be “honed” with cue-cards and formulae questions…groomed and made up and lit up to appear and sound like they know what they are talking about..”suits with gravitas”. But in truth they are the dumbest bastards you could come across. So dumb, they spent three years at the beck and call of political manipulators, three years being the “Barbie and Ken” marionettes of more cunning masters..they were so fuckin’ D-U-M-B , they stood, sat , groveled in studio or in-situ , mouthing word-structures for a more cunning species than they would ever be..THREE YEARS betraying their country, betraying half the population of this country…betraying themselves..three years..and they didn’t even have half a clue they were doing it!

The Murdoch journos’ ? what can you expect from a sewer?..the smell of roses?..we know all Murdoch journos’ are traitors.

We have been wronged, we died-in-the-wool Progressives, because with the dismissal of Julia Gillard, it was not just the end of a decent , capable politician’s career, it was the discarding of us citizens!..For Julia Gillard, like Gough Whitlam, represented more than good policy, Julia Gillard was more than “the woman in The Lodge”…Julia AND Tim being there was , to my mind at least, us citizens being there…Julia and Tim were no bogans any more than the most relaxed, confident Aussie, migrant, indigenous, local born, reffo are..they were a reflection of  “everyone citizen”; show, not show-off..Plain, but not boor..ambitious, but not opportunist…and always looking forward to the weekend break at the beach, the peaceful bush or if you preferred.;the footy.

We have been wronged, badly wronged…all of us..and now it is time to reclaim that which is ours by right…So I say we ‘calm’ our anger, but maintain our rage. We ‘know’ our enemies, but restrain our vengeance till the time comes for the vote..and THEN…with the seething ferocity of a violated innocent, we wreak the most comprehensive defeat on the most vile conglomerate of foul beasts that ever crawled under the name of “Liberal / National Party “ politicians that make up the worst government this country has seen in a hundred and sixteen years of Parliament.

VOTE THE BASTARDS TO OBLIVION!

We have to have a chat about the Nat’s.

We, of the left, have a problem. The problem is the National Party and it’s adherence to the more cosmopolitan Liberal Party. It is an unhealthy allegiance in the fact that the Libs’ have the psychological upper hand over the Nats’…in short, they have worked out how the mind of the National party voter thinks and they move and manipulate it with all the dexterity of a master puppeteer!

Take those two recent major upsets in National Party regions…the SPC. cannery row and the “struggling farmers” thing…in the opposite corner we had the Holden / Ford / Toyota  fiasco….with the latter, no problems..cut, cut ,cut…..they tried it with SPC. and the proverbial hit the fan and now we see Barnaby weeping tears for the ;” wives and the kids and the heat and dust and the flies…” so the Libs’ soften somewhat with “drought relief”…of a kind…and no doubt the Nat’ voter out there in the “heat, dust..etc” will choke back those sobs and dry away the tears, tug the forelock and mumble a humble “thank you sirrrr..” and get the patronising firm grip on the shoulder “good man” touch and all will be forgiven.

You see, the Nats’ are god-fearing people at heart…they may not go to the church as much as their forebears, but they know where it is and they willing attend the fetes, fairs and collections for…because those country folk know that there is a system in place in the bush, they can’t articulate it, but they “feel” it is there…Their “lot” in life is a seesaw between punishment and reward…rewards do come, but first one must be punished…one must suffer, and suffer humbly, quietly and completely…then comes the reward…and this is where “Father” comes into the picture in the guise of the Liberal Party Prime-Minister of-the-day (It is never a National Party prime minister!) and the appropriate amount of largesse is distributed to the faithful…and the local Nat’ party-man struts through the district like Caesar on a Tour of Triumph and “mother” once again irons “Father’s” shirts with a hum and song and all is well at the local Ag. Supply store….the jokes flow once more.

I know this through my familial connections in this district where I live and through the work I do with the “approved” environmental group…but you see, there is no reference to the environment in the name, nor in the general literature, at least not blatant…it is all warm / cuddly, non-aligned stuff and THAT, I have been informed, is how it will stay!…this community know about the “environment”, of course they do, they farm it…have been doing it for a hundred years or so…I am tempted to point out the bleedin’ obvious on the collapsing condition of the town, the services, the salinity and the environs…but I know it would be wasted breath..They knows what they knows!

I was called to go to one of these local farmers place -to pick up some mulching hay for a community garden we are developing…; an old farming family (“been here for a hundred and thirty years”) that got nearly burnt-out by these very recent fires we had around here. the sheds, equipment and trees / garden all destroyed…only the piggery and the family house spared…but the patriarch was not deterred..he was a god-fearing man..  “…so you see, the house was spared..Now, I’m a humble man, but I am also a religious man and I believe (and you might think this a bit vain of me ) that god looked down and said ; “Look, there’s old Klaus S…he’s had a hard life”…and I have too..you know that , Dan’ ? (his son leaning on the kitch’ bench)…why, there’s that bad accident of yours (you look at ‘Dan’ and one eye is looking back at you while the other is staring at something 90deg’s to the right !)..too right and then your brother’s bad accident….of course I had that time when the post-drilling auger grabbed my clothes and nearly ripped my arm off…broke my sternum something bad…and the prostrate cancer…the heart attack NOT A BAD ONE!..just five by-pass…and of course the stroke hardly touched me and I think God looked down and said ” Ol’ Klaus…he doesn’t need his house burnt down and so he directed the fire around the house…(The reward, you see?)….and I thank God for that !”

He then went on to show me charity things and generous deeds fellow church people and industry people had given him…to finish up with a costing rundown of farming and how it was unlike the (Labor) govt’ that wastes money .

So there you have it, in a nutshell…the Lib’s know that to keep the Nat’ voter on side, indeed , to keep the Nat’ Party inside the “home”, you keep it ; “bare-foot, pregnant (with want) and chained to the kitchen” and give it regular beatings like an abused wife.

Sounds ghastly, sounds brutal and dishonourable….but as the man says’ in the Lamb advert…”You know it’s true”!

“Cheaper, Faster, Better NBN.”

The “Find out more about” meeting on the 16^th Sept’ (2015?)at Cambrai Council Chambers between the ; NBN. / Telstra / Local Govt.’

I was in the “audience” as both observer and consumer of the Broadband Promise…I say “promise” , because that is what it was..a pledge to deliver 25MB/s. To every home by 2020.

Let me just make an observation here about one of our near neighbours , “across the ditch” ; New Zealand, who I believe, still mainly produce, package and export butter and other dairy products, get Broadband coverage of ..wait for it..from between 200MB/s. –  1GB/s. ..??

But we are told we WILL…not ARE…but will, (it’s a promise., remember..not a reality) get a whopping 25MB/s..because THAT , it appears , is all we will need..after all. WE are not making that much butter any more, since it seems we outsource our total manufacturing industries to the cheapest provider..Thank you LNP.

So let’s break down that meeting a tad..:

Basically, there were four “players” in the room..1) NBN. corp’ ; the owner or the product. 2) Telstra ; once the owner, now the retailer of the product ie; another ISP (Internet Service Provider). 3) Local Govt’ representative..; the liason / customer between US; the constituents, the ISP. Provider and the NBN. 4) WE, the people.

The NBN. Corp’ gave a power point presentation of what , where and when they will (see that ; “will” again) deliver that 25MB/s to one of three mixes in the area.

• Fibre to the premises / node ?
• Fixed wireless via selectively placed towers in proportion to population.
• Satellite to the sparsely populated areas.

Telstra , now reduced to little more than a ISP (internet service provider), delivered a mostly sales pitch about how THEY will (“will”)deliver to us ; the customer a superior service depending on your location, YOUR capacity with up to date tech’ equipment to be able to use that capacity . Townies , of course will be preferred. BUT..you can purchase these new, you-beaut products that will enhance your reception.

I will note here that there was conciliatory admission of the problem with “punching” transmission reception through the many thick limestone walls of these regional “old pioneer” homes..hence the need for the customer to wander around the house , perhaps climb the roof (don’t laugh!) and property to get mobile reception . On this point, allow me a degree of levity if I point out that The Vatican , with it’s limestone walls at least 10 feet thick, has not deprived The Pope, for at least a thousand years, the capacity to receive daily instruction from God through, I presume , a sort of “Royal Telephone”!…a delivery system with apparently so much more power than Telstra.

Local Govt’ and We the people can, I accept be bracketed in the one group on the subject : “What you see is what you will (“will” ) get” customer. In this age of the so-called “Free Market”, the one element of the equation that seems to always get over looked is the most important one..; The Customer….they , if the providers care to reflect are the reason the product is produced..THEY are the reason it will grow and become successful..if ..IF..the product is as good as promised and not just another crappy “just in time technology” that will have to be stitched and patched and band-aided over because of the ideological differences that demand a second rate product…Because, if we recall, under a Labor govt’ (and it can’t be either overlooked or denied!) the expectation from the original NBN. was fibre to the premises for every home in Aust’ except where physically unrealistic or impossible…but then with the LNP. govt’ the whole idea of a government owned enterprise was anathema to the ideology of the “free-market” principles of the LNP. and it’s succulents..so the NBN. was fractured, dissected, slaughtered to deliver what now looks like a dog’s breakfast of ; Multi mix, multi dates, multi ISP. Contracts and god knows when delivery with a MAX’ of  25MB/s!

In the end, I saw the whole exercise of the Information Day as a kind of “soft-sell” ..more of a reassurance that “it will come, it will come”..like the second coming and YOU will benefit ( there’s more “wills” in these promises than you’d find in the locked safe of any retirement village) ..But I will take a moment to make a sort of futurist observation..: In this high-tech’ shrinking world, I shouldn’t imagine it would be too difficult in the near future for a pirate broadband spectrum deliverer to broadcast from some inner-space platform, say; a all-weather balloon in the stratosphere or whatever, in another country’s air space , a broadband service to any who would like to hook-up and by-pass the local product for a “Better, Faster, Cheaper” broadband service..now wouldn’t THAT put the kybosh on things!

I leave the rest of the guessing to you, after all, you got till 2020.

But I’ll tell you what DID eventually happen out here “in the sticks”..

Our Wireless modem got switched off without our knowledge and we were told it must be broken and Telstra sent us a new one..BUT..it was no longer wireless, but Telstra Mobile Broadband !

In other words, the NBN (LNP govt’) , to concentrate its wireless transmission into large regional towns with the promised “Fixed Towers” wireless delivery, had abandoned us more isolated citizens to the “mercy” of Telstra’s mobile broadband ..a fuckin’ useless bit of shit!..A-N-D.. bloody extortionate in cost!…and with Telstra being the ONLY mobile broadband ISP provider in these isolated places (we are a fabulous 100kms. From the centre of the capital!) they got us over a barrel.

I can still see and hear that traitorous BASTARD ; Turnbull telling us all that there was many ways to deliver “Cheaper, Faster, Better downloads” of internet than FTTP.

You lying BASTARD Turnbull..you LYING BASTARD !!

The Girl in the Blue Dress.

Finally!…lunch time..I squeezed our basket shopping trolley between the seats to a table in the crowded Zuma’s Café there at the Central market. We come to this café for lunch every time we come to the market, which is about once a month..it is always crowded at lunchtime..a popular spot…lots of noise..lots of noise…

Michael, the tall Greek bloke who runs it, has a habit of looking around while he is talking to you..like he cannot stop keeping an eye on the running of the place..

“That girl in the blue dress” I button-hole him “ Is she crying or laughing or just shielding her eyes?”

Michael looks about as he answers..

“Oh she’s crying alright..” he nonchalantly answers…somehow , his dead-certain banality annoys me.

“You seem pretty certain of that”.. I frown.

“Yeah..cause it’s written on the back of the photograph … (he makes quotation marks with his fingers) ; “ London…Girl crying”….He wrote what and where it is on every one of the photographs…”

“He?”

“Yeah..old bloke a couple of houses down from me…I knew him just to say hello every now and then…well..he died and his daughter was cleaning out the garage…she was carrying this heavy box and I saw her and I went to help her…it was full of these small , empty picture frames..these ones here on the wall..and I suddenly got the idea to put some sort of pictures in them and hang them on that wall…so I asked her if I could have them to do just that…and she pointed to another box and asked if I wanted some pictures to put in them , because she was going to throw those out too..”

“Throw out his pictures?” I couldn’t understand that.

“Yeah..you see , they weren’t family pics or anything…just as you see here on the wall..The old bloke wandered aimlessly around Europe back in the sixties with a camera taking these random, candid pictures of people, places and things..anything..with no apparent theme in mind…just click, click, click!..and he wrote a name and location on every one…hundreds of them!”

I gazed along the wall of framed photos…buses, street-scapes..random people..strange little people with quirky dress and sometimes doing strange things..pictures from upstair rooms of dark or lighted corners of streets outside..cars going past…abstracts of anonymity..

“That one with the young man on the stairs fiddling with the model building?”..I ask.

“Rome..; Architectural student making finishing touches to his exam model.” Michael quoted from memory. “That interested me” he added.

“…and that one?” I continue..

“…er..can’t remember..I think ; “Leeds…; Lady waiting for bus”..

“Of course she’s waiting for a bus…it’s a bus stop!” I protest..but I see he’s tired of the game and is taking the mick.. We changed subject and he told me about his holiday to Portugal…

We ordered lunch..and from where I sat , I would look up from my meal and I would see the girl in the blue dress….The picture is obviously from the mid-sixties, as she is wearing a mini-skirt of modest proportions, while the older folk around are still dressed in the gloomy, frumpy style of the fifties..There is a fountain in the background and thousands of pigeons milling around on the ground ..a man stands behind a stall of a kind with a hand drawn sign on the counter requesting : “Please return these”..I cannot quite make out what “these” are, but I would guess from all the pigeons they may be small containers for grains to feed to the birds…

But the scene threw me back to a time in my youth, when I was a shy lad..I was an apprentice..about sixteen years old…I used to catch the train to work and about four stops before I had to get off the train, this young woman..a girl then, around the same age as myself, I would say..got on and used to stand at the opposite side of the compartment….

The “compartment” was the open-spaced baggage-car that was always in the middle of the passenger carriages. It was peculiar to the Sth. Aust’ Railways, being based on the American system of rail. As such, it carried those workmen in their overalls and their bags, or sometimes pushbikes in a loose aggregate of silence and styles and dirt…this is where that young woman stood out…she was pure “Carnaby Street”…from her petite shoes to her little red shoulder-strap bag…white stockings, mini-skirt and cute cap…I fell in love with that girl…but damn if I wasn’t too shy (in those days), and perhaps a bit too “working-class” in my overalls, to say a word..and she must have been as shy, the same, because for all that winter and into the summer, we would stand at diagonal point to each other across the carriage, and in that atmosphere of commuter stolidness and silence, we would pretend to be “cold-glancing” around the carriage and then ..our eyes would meet!…(I can close my eyes and see her now..god!..why oh why was I so flamin’ shy?…) and just for that moment we would melt into each other…any of you who have had that experience will know what I mean…our eyes would swim in the other’s lake-of-the-soul..for just that flashing moment..and oh!..the ache of want was almost unbearable..but you had to be careful, because while the commuting public does have the impassive stare of the “undead”, it is all eyes and all ears…”…the eyes are not satisfied with seeing nor the ears filled with hearing..” Ecclesiastes, I believe.

But you know, I never did get to meet her or even say hello..and perhaps it is better that way…for I do believe that for many years afterwards, I sought,( as we all seem fated to do, from when we grow from the child to the adult..we always seek THAT SINGULAR LOVE most denied…) in my male hunger for women , the ideal of that youthful desire.

They do say, and quite truthfully, I believe, that the journey is better than the arriving..so perhaps the “hunger” is better than the “feasting”…but I don’t know….there certainly is some regret…some deep regret…

The girl in the blue dress has her head bent down, with one arm crooked across her waist and the other with her hand cupped over her mouth and partly over her eyes…she looks like she is crying because of something..I can’t stop stealing glances at her..I try not to look too obvious..

I think I may be falling in love with the girl in the blue dress.

An Advanced Society.

Indigenous mollusc middens.

The Advanced Society.

We must write our own mythology.

There is an integral ingredient missing from the Australian story…and it is the awakening of a mythology for us newcomers to this land to hold as a kind of stabilising talisman to give us security of purpose and a direction toward the future…much like the Ancient Greeks held their mythology close to their lives as lessons of greater or lesser ethical or moral observation.
The Indigenous peoples have theirs solidly fixed to their skin…there are many whites who want to “sew” that ancient mythology to their own cloth…it may be a comfort, but surely it is a cold comfort in that the obvious differences of tribe or clan or ancient bloodline just cannot be compared.
But no…we settlers have been in this land for over two hundred years now, and it just may be time to take those first child-like steps to weave our own tapestry…and certainly it must be crossed and interwoven with those first peoples, because we have dragged them struggling and under restraint into our story-line…I am certain they are on the cusp of breaking free and resuming their own mythological destiny..but we too must commence to write the song-lines that willl tie us to this country..and secure for our children’s children’s future as secure a sense of “belonging” as those long-lived first peoples…

In his book The Road to Serfdom, Freidrich Hayek asserts that the economic freedom of capitalism is a requisite of political freedom… with continual growth being the mechanism that feeds such “economic freedom”.

So we have to propose the question : What makes an “Advanced Society”?

Could it be that as proposed by Hayek above?..Or is it something more basic…more durable…more sustainable than the capitalist notion of continuous growth / continuous consumption? Can it be presumed that a technological advanced society holds greater ethical dominance and therefore deserved racial dominance over the more stable tribal structures that once were spread throughout the Australian environment for tens of thousands of years?

Consider these examples..

Eucalyptus Largiflorens (Black Box) : Distribution and occurrence: Local community dominant, in grassy woodland on heavy black clay soils in seasonally flooded areas;

In this area of Sth. Aust’, primarily restricted to ex swamp-lands. This tree, like many that have evolved to an environment-specific location can be found near my residence in the Mallee. Like the Mallee trees everywhere, it has evolved in a stable, static environment over many thousands of years..indeed, you can see that a multitude of trees and understory in the Mallee bio-forest were reliant on such a stable environment for them to spread so wide, so far in such profusion. Any extreme disruption of climate or landscape would have changed the appearance and bio-diversity of the entire forest and it’s denizens..THAT is a “given”. We have to accept : The very existence of such a bio-forest system proves beyond argument that the geography where they settled, took root and evolved was stable, static and sustainable for a very long period of time.

This is an important point to my argument..we have to understand and accept that the Mallee bio-forest, from the dry-lands to the swamp-lands, from the canopy to the forest floor is a unique interconnected species specific / environment specific entity that relies upon a stable, static geophysical situation to maintain it’s integrity. Certainly, that integrity has been corrupted over the last two hundred years since settlement to the point where we cannot truthfully claim that pristine Mallee exists anymore at all. It has become a victim of “continual economic growth”…and one has to logically conclude that in the last resort of sustainable life ; if the environment fails, then so too will the society that killed it.

Likewise, if we look at the indigenous peoples who lived and thrived for many thousands of years along the Lower Murray and The Coorong in Sth. Aust’. I will not even attempt to disassemble the complex tribal structures that existed along the lower Murray River…it would be presumption on my part and liable to insulting error. Enough to point out that settlement is proven for many thousands of years. Indeed, carbon dating of one site of middens (discarded mollusc shell-heaps along The Coorong) alone put it back to 2.500cal BP. (2.500 yrs. Old)…so we have evidence that of the many sites scattered along the seaward-side of The Coorong there was regular gathering and consumption of a reliable food source by the indigenous peoples for thousands of years. I have seen these middens many years ago…scattered amongst the site were numerous camp-fire circles, denoting the practice of stopping, gathering, cooking and consumption of the food and presumably the social intercourse that accompanies such moments.

For such feasting to have taken place (these middens are huge!), would prove the reliable, regular supply of the molluscs and the reliable, regular harvesting by a group of peoples familiar with and capable of attending to such a chore on a continual basis for thousands of years. I know the geography of The Coorong well..on the seaward-side we have bountiful harvest of shell-fish, on the landward-side we have bird and mammal life…the evidence of indigenous people’s fish-traps on The Coorong, indicate regular harvesting of food there, the abundance of fresh water from the natural Sth. East drainage system then in place, guaranteed the presence of kangaroos, emus and sundry wildlife for food and clothing…in all, one must admit, that along with the temperate climate, not a bad place to reside…indeed, it could be considered almost an idyll..and reside here people did ..undisturbed for many thousands of years…mark that!…food, clothing, shelter of a quantity and quality that remained in-situ for many thousands of years…exploited but not over-exploited..harvested but not depleted..lived with but not dominated..and perhaps it could have gone on for time immemorial..like it already had…if not finally destroyed by the kind of “advanced society” lauded by Mr. Hayek at the start of this article.

So tell me..: What constitutes an advanced society?..is it the one who uses it’s developed technology to invade, subjugate, desecrate and finally, perhaps, annihilate that very environment it relies upon for it’s life…or is it the other who, with astute observation recognizes a “line” between sustainability and destruction, and by managing it’s population ,refuses to be tempted by the possibility of a gluttony of temporary riches and maintains a judicious, salubrious lifestyle and culture for many thousands of years, visiting the same locations for food, clothing, shelter without desecration nor selfish accumulation?

So YOU tell me.: Who has the most “advanced society” ?