Gunning for Spuds

Poor Tassie spud farmers. Perhaps they should sell out to Gunns - they have no problem flogging Tasmanian chips overseas.

Our Most Vulnerable Community?

Their numbers dwindling, they eke out a bare existence in marginal land, often in remote and isolated communities. With little prospects of participating in the real economy - token cottage industries aside - they subsist on government patronage, doled out by a mainstream wracked by guilt at their elevated rates of poverty, hardship and ill-health (including suicide and substance abuse).

The government uses them as a political football, occasionally playing on their special cultural status, valued role in the nation's history or unique "Aussieness" - for marketing and tourism purposes. But there is no real effort to tackle the fundamental problem: exclusion from the productive economy and reliance on welfare.

Yes, our 21st century farmers won't have a lot to look forward to if they can't shake their hand-out mentality.

Yes, Commentator

You can almost hear Bernard's interjection: "Erm, sorry, Mr. Hunt, but a dog can't 'light up', no matter its colour. You see, fur doesn't glow ..."

Psyching Out the Competition

It's interesting to note that in his defence of psychiatry over psychology, Dr Alan Jager did not refer to better or quicker outcomes or improved efficiency (The Age, 16/7/2005). Instead, he mentions the 13 years of training. Given the first few years are largely concerned with cell chemistry and the bones of the foot, I'm not sure that this is something to crow about!

Surely the debate should move beyond who's the most over-qualified and on to who can efficiently deliver the best outcomes for patients? Performance alone should dictate access to taxpayer funds, not historical privilege.

Sadly, the huge struggle required to prise the prescription pad from the hands of the doctors' union indicates that they won't give up their Medicare slips without a serious fight either.

Bungling Vivian Solon

The DIMIA official who believed (wrongly) she was a beaten-up sex-slave tried to "bungle" her out of the country, rather than prosecute her assailant. Sickening.

Search for a Proximal Cause

It is a peculiarly Western narcissism that drives us to attribute the motivations of extremist Islamism wholly to the (in)actions of Western governments. Some seek to lay blame at the feet of our leaders over the Iraq invasion, or the support of the mujahideen in Afghanistan, or Israel, or European imperialism or poverty. This excludes the possibility that the Muslim world ("Ummah Al-Muhmini") - spanning much of Africa and Asia across 1500 years - is sufficiently complex, diverse and conflicted to initiate and sustain its own motivations. One such example is the desire of a significant minority of Islamists to impose a Caliphate under Sharia Law ("al-ummatun wahid") - a Taliban-style society running from Libya to Indonesia.

It's natural to seek understanding of a complicated world through the lens of our own experience. But when we deny the reality of a billion people it becomes a dangerous, indulgent conceit.