Andras Smith posted on Saturday, 12 July 2014 7:23:36 PM a comment that "SPA, Bob Birrell et all have carte blanche access to the ABC, whether it's RN's Late Night Live, Science Show, AM etc."

That's certainly not my perception. Candobetter.net has kept tabs on the ABC's promotion of population engineering upwards here:
http://candobetter.net/?q=taxonomy/term/5364

The ABC toes the government line, which is growth, growth, growth.

Also, I note that Andras and a few others keep going back to the idea of anti population growthers as population controlers and eugenicists etc, although it is quite clear that it is the pro-growth side that is controlling population numbers against the will of most citizens. How about some honest discussion here on on-line opinion? I guess it's not an option because the only people who disagree with SPA et al are growth lobbyists and their propaganda writers are the only one's writing against SPA et al here.

I wonder if anyone has ever found what causes people to become Lefties ?
Is it simply one of those freak cases of evolution going wrong ?
Or is it indoctrination from day 1 ?

It IS possible to keep growing and growing and growing.
Technology can probably keep it all up.
But it comes at a price.

As the author mentioned:
"Greater population concentration forces social changes in the direction of a greater degree of organization"

In other words, more laws, more regulations, more regimentation is required in order to prevent people from stepping on each other's toes.

When we fly economy-class, we are faced with mounting restrictions. The intention is to keep everyone happy and comfortable, but there just isn't enough leg-room, etc. Fortunately it's only for a few hours, but those who serve on submarines face very harsh restrictions for perhaps a month at a time: only one book per person and two sets of clothing, can't bring own food (no space) or have a variety on the menu and there's a strict toilet regime (when serving on a ship, a sailor could possibly urinate overboard, but not so in a submarine).

So do we want to become a submarine?

The division therefore has nothing to do with 'Right' or 'Left', but is between those who wish to become organised and those individuals who wish to be free.

Subsequently, the author writes:
"changes are costly in the short term but in the long run, increase a society's ability to reach its economic and social objectives."

That's well and good for those who share those specific economic and social objectives - at the expense of others.

The author concludes:
"The de-populationists want to return us to a medieval village."

This assumes an "us". Submariners have no choice, a small capsule deep under the ocean, nevertheless, if they volunteered to the task then there's nothing wrong with their choice.

As a whole, however, we did not volunteer to squeeze in with each other, we didn't in general volunteer to accept living under regimentation for the sake of avoiding medieval standards. Let the choice be available to each and every individual: those who are willing to sell their freedom for technological gadgets - and others who rather live freely at medieval or even stone-age standards.

Malcolm King destroys his own credibility by claiming that population control advocates are "far right". That must surprise a lot of Green supporters, who also push the line that this planet is grossly over populated and that population reductions are the way to go. As a matter of fact, the Greens grew out of the old Zero Population Growth Party of the late 70's.

His claim that population growth is good for business and the economy is hardly a left wing priority. Since when have greenies ever worried about business or the economy? Of course, that particular assertion about being good for business is true, but almost everybody except the Catholic church and Malcolm King's peer group can understand that population growth is exponentially climbing. And that unrestricted population growth not sustained by economic resources is the primary reason for endemic poverty, high crime rates and even terrorism.

But the best argument against Malcolm King, is that he has threatened in a later post to shut up his opponents by hinting darkly about how they should be reported to the Attorney General for prosecution. Nice one Malcolm. You are a real Liberal aren't you? Multiculturalism is the official holy writ and anyone who disagrees should expect a midnight knock on the door by the multicultural Inquisitors. Probably to be re educated by being put in an ABC controlled Gulag to watch endless repeats of Four Corners. Who is the "ratbag" here, Malcolm? You have already lost the debate if you advocate that the best way to counter your opponents is through the repression of free speech.

If you claim that only right wing people support ZPG then you have just given us "right wingers" a free kick among your own left wing demographic. Thank you for that. You are enhancing our prestige by making befuddled lefties realise that us right wingers support a position which most left wingers regard as pure common sense.

This article by Malcolm King would have to rate as one of the most ignorant we have ever discussed on OLO.
If this mutt is being paid by our Tax Dollars then I want him off the payroll.
Anyhow, what's a Leftie mutt doing in a Coalition administraitin in the first place. I hope Tony Abbott's not doing a Campbell Newman on us by holding onto all the Labor bureau rats.
I mean talk about ruining everything at great cost for all of us, it's nothing short of idiotic.
Malcolm King is promoting cure rather than prevention. What an ignorant way of thinking ?
Let's get the wrong immigration rate down asap & scale the right immigration rate back to keep pace with demand as Australians become more stupid bring in more intelligent migrants.
We are obviously getting outnumbered by inbreeding Lefties & that's a really, really bad move.

An interesting article here where 108 people per day (about 38,000 per year) are moving to Perth.

This is congesting Perth, that now requires more roads.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-07-12/congestion-on-perth-roads-and-public-transport/5592000

So WA’s wealth is going towards building roads.

This seems very similar to Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne, and also other rural towns spread along the east coast of Australia.

It does seem that so much of the wealth from the mining boom went offshore (because so many mining companies are foreign owned), or it went into roads and other infrastructure to keep up with the growing population.

It didn’t go towards developing industry that is sustainable, and will provide long term and rewarding jobs for our children.

Just roads, desalination plants, sewage treatment plants and suburban jungles.