Comments on: Tug of Water: Can Kevin Rudd save the Murray?

By: JamesK

JamesK — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 10:00:00 +0000

Thanks Peter for your intelligent and reasoned contribution. I’m sure Mr. Keane will pass it on to Kevin Rudd ( I hear he is favourite in line to be offered the chief of staff position soon to be vacated by David Epstein). KR will act decisively to dismiss the various state governments and do exactly as you suggest which is clearly, as you so succinctly put it, the “only one solution”.
Thank you again for your ingenuity and brilliance. You, along with Rudd, will be acclaimed as Saviour of the Murray. I want to be the first to nominate you Kevin Rudd’s Special Adviser on Climate Change Management because Garnaud is soon to be on the nose. You are a great man.

By: JamesK

JamesK — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 10:00:00 +0000

Is this today’s joint communique?

By: Venise Alstergren#2

Venise Alstergren#2 — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 10:00:00 +0000

JamesK: You are quick to suggest to other people that they should allow their subscriptions to run out, then cancel. But it’s London to a Brick on-sorry I retain these racing terms against my better judgment-that you won’t be following your own advice. Who would read you then?

By: Miranda

Miranda — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 10:00:00 +0000

For God’s sake Bernard is correct. Who in the hell owes small towns a living or survival ?. City folk-the majority of Australians must deal with changing economics. lost jobs, re-possessed homes but the attitude that those in the country are some sort of worthy protected species is ludicrous. If you can’t survive-get up and leave and change just like every other Australian has to do. This “noble farmer” stuff is well and truly over. If the farm isn’t viable you cannot expect everyone else to prop you up.

By: Venise Alstergren

Venise Alstergren — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 10:00:00 +0000

Miranda is a little over the top, but not much. It’s thanks to the rurales that this country is so deeply in the s*it. Okay, so we were all ignorant once, but the farmers keep making a lifetime’s pursuit of stupidity. Surely they should be in the vanguard of cleaning up this god forsaken country. What do a few hiccup towns in what is now being regarded as the Great Australian Desert; matter? They merely happened to provide the farmers with their supplies: ‘Nifty Nev’s for ,”dog traps for dingos” Shed’. It was the farmers who clear felled the trees, and allowed the sheep to proliferate. Naturally they created a desert, like goats they bite deep down the root systems of grasses, thus loosening the top soil which then gets blown away in the nearest wind. It was the farmers who destroyed existing wind breaks, who poisoned the rivers, allowed irrigators to plant alien crops such as cotton, tobacco and rice, and reduced the Murray Darling River to the status of a town drain. It is the farmers who invented the Country Party/Nationals under the spectral banner, “Socialism for the farmers”, and who reduced the land to a desert. It is the same people who always claim special circumstances so they
can avoid another tax, etc. They are indeed the proud fu*king creators of the aforementioned ‘Town Drain’ Now let the people in the great urban centers watch as they start to f*ck themselves. Olé.

By: Peter

Peter — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 10:00:00 +0000

There is only one solution for the ailing River Murray.. All irrigation from the top of the Darling to the mouth of the Murray should be banned until the whole river is full again.

By: JamesK

JamesK — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 10:00:00 +0000

I think as usual Miranda has hit the nail on the head. Who needs those country bumpkins anyhow?
Next!

By: Brumby Kev

Brumby Kev — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 10:00:00 +0000

Might be the late hour…but doesn’t the cartoon show them both exerting effort on that rope in the same direction? Sad to say, towns come and towns go…with the ebb and flow of commercial activity. Take a look up the other river. It’s sad but the great shearing sheds - and the bustling communities of Cunnamulla and Charleville - that once served the woollen empires of south west Queensland are now shadows of their former selves. If the water is not there - then rice and cotton seem to face a ruthless logic that has been faced by other industries over time. That doesn’t make the towns that support these and other crop based industries “two-bit” - it just means that it is a national responsibility to consider how the towns and their people can be helped to redirect their skills, knowledge and talent to new endeavours. It’s painful and regretable but …it’s the great circle of life and commerce. Towns emerged in response to commercial mechanisms and they will decline as the commercial opportunity subsides - whether from competitors, loss of markets or diminishing resources.

By: Dave Liberts

Dave Liberts — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 10:00:00 +0000

Ah, JamesK, you’re loving this sarcasm thing aren’t you! This article is not so unrealistic. While Bernard’s left himself open by referring to ‘two-bit towns’ without defining them, the rest of the article is very sensible indeed. Compare the practices of South Australian irrigators with their Victorian counterparts. If the Vics could manage a similar level of efficiency, the river would be a damn sight healthier than it is.

By: Local Identity

Local Identity — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 10:00:00 +0000

“The problem with the “two bit town” aproach is htat Brumby thinks it includes Adelaide.”

Well, its not like anybody would miss it

By: JamesK

JamesK — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 10:00:00 +0000

“AUSTRALIA is the most over-governed nation on Earth and reforms should include abolishing the states, Defence Minister Joel Fitzgibbon says”
http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,23963988-29277,00.html

I’m tellin’ ya Dave: my sarcasm is Keane’s and Rudd’s reality………..My prediction: Rudd, with Keane as chief of staff, will call in the army and blow Rann, Brumby, Iemma and Bligh and their $4 billion to smithereens.

Finally Rudd is living his destiny! Man of action!