"...when the poor learn about contraception and have the discipline to learn and work instead of practising lawlessness/corruption,they too will progress".

Unlike us. Being superior, we just elect a properly qualified government to do that for us. In return, that government will fortify the myth that our pathetic lawn-mowing, paper shuffling, gridlock-negotiating, insurance marketing, mortgage paying, TV soaked, resource-wasting, cling-wrapped efforts are somehow worthwhile.

What a lovely symbiosis. Which pray is the tree and which the mistletoe? Maybe we are all parasites.

We will never see the natural resources like solar,wind and tide power being pushed as desirable. There's no profit in them. Far better to dig up big chunks of the Earth at great cost and sell it for a greater cost with tidy profit margins built in.
You cannot sell stuff that come's for free.

Selling yellow cake to China is a poor man's recipe for staying poor.
Australia is riding a wealth boom now, but as it is relegated to a simple mining province, pressures will be put on profits by larger countries like China and the US.
The fact that China is doing its own exploration within Australia's borders is a foretaste of things to come.

An alternative is to value-add Uranium and ship it as pebbles for pebble bed reactors (PBRs). This gives Australia better returns on its Uranium and renders bomb making a very difficult downstream option. It also promotes PBRs, which are Best Management Practice for nuclear fuel use and eventual disposal.

Australia does not have the populational leverage to afford nuclear power stations at this time. However it does have the wherewithall to produce value added pebble fuels for PBRs rather than just shipping yellow cake. It would also make it easier for Australia to become nuclear powered with latest technology at some later point in time.

First there was Pig-Iron Bob. And now ... Yellow-Cake Johnny.

Seems appropriate some how.

To Carl,

Respect mate, most sincerely. Good for you that you still have belief in them, the politicians. But I beg you to take a deeper and fuller look at the reality of it all. There's not a one in the entire trail of history that wouldn't have run a cold blade of steel through your soft underbelly had you ever stood in their way.

The John Howards, the George Bushs, The Tony Blairs, the Bob Hawkes, the Paul Keatings, the Kim Beezleys, the Julia Guillards, the Hillary Clintons, the Helen Clarks and the Peter Costellos - they'd all gladly put the blade into you should you ever dare to stand in their way. Not literally, you understand, but by means, they'd get ya. Oh yes they would.

Like they got Pauline Hanson. They and their media. They got her. If you confront them, they'll get you.

Mind you, that's not to say I am or was ever a Hanson fan. But it is the truth. They got her because she dared to stand up and she pulled credibility amongst the voters. She called their bluff. The media and the political system shut her down fast and then they rubbed her nose in it, putting her in jail with a publicly humiliating trial and sentence. They put the cold blade of steel into her, and bilaterally too.

And to Chris Shaw, Carisbrook 3464,

Mate, your cynicism is completely correct, you're very smart and you're clearly a very intelligent person. I hope you will not loose heart. But don't go subversive on us. Go full frontal and take the fight up to them, legally and properly. You know what's going on and someone's got to challenge them. I can't do it all alone. You take care. You're wise and they won't like that.

Maximus, I agree with most of what you say, except for the Hanson part.

Hanson was always a construct of the media and was used to generate money for them at every stage of her "career".

They actively promoted her, then fed off her during each phase of her subsequent decline, imprisonment and release.

It's just another example of creating something out of nothing (or somebody out of nobody) in order to sell newspapers and get TV ratings. Sort of an early version of "Australian Idol" but with less talent.