Forrest pondered the South Australian connection.

SA was where most of the wind farms were. And for good reason, too: that was where some of the best wind was, blowing for more hours out of 24 than just about anywhere else in Australia.

With the advent of the NEM the South Australian government effectively had access to a much larger grid against which to balance the nevertheless somewhat variable generation output of all those wind turbines. With SA having somehow cornered the market for determining the legislative and permission-giving environment within which these renewable energies would operate, it was a veritable haven for such developments. More investment opportunities for the 'little men (and women)' of Australian public life to take advantage of as they all reached the apogees of their individual and collective brilliant careers.

Most people didn't think too much of these 'little people', but that hardly made them into the 'forgotten people' so beloved of the great Ming in a former time when Aussies were real Aussies.

Somewhere along the pathway of the years the country had taken a wrong turn, and somehow kept doing it. Now here everybody was, in the middle of nowhere, at Inna-bloody-mincka, importing ever increasing percentages of their liquid petroleum requirements in the face of peak oil, and bloody nothing seemingly being done about it except the selling out of existing assets to foreign interests who could then charge the local market whatever they liked for energy. Brilliant careers indeed!

Of course the real problem, in the face of peak oil, was not that there was any shortage of renewable replacement energy, but that there was such a huge potential overplus of it! In Australia, few local interests were game to go first, because they knew they could be out-competed by the 'Big Boys' of trans-national corporatism if once those 'Boys' decided they wanted a slice (or all) of the Aussie pie.

It seemed anti-Australian interests must have somehow (and somewhere) got control of the ballot box.

"Had it happened first in South Australia?", Forrest wondered.

Belly wrote, "The next elected government from what ever side will sell the rest."

Why so, Belly?

Do you think we live in a democracy or don't you?

If you think we do, what makes you fear that the clearly expressed will of the majority is likely to be ignored following the next elections?

Do you think that acceptable?

If not, what do you think should be done about it?

Daggett - Belly is correct, we are on the slippery slope and the rest of our utilities will be sold off to a public private partnership at a vastly inflated cost so Macquarie Bank can make their million broking the deal [Why do you think they are called the millionaires factory?]

Our democracy is in the capable hands of News Limited run by crusty old Rupert who brags that Australia elects the givernment he wants. In the United States News Limited is trumpeting a McGain Victory. Old Rupert makes more money from privatised utilities he is rich enough not to worry about the common good.

On a more cheerful note have you read Nicholas Gruen's latest piece? http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=7881 "Iemma's power out"

billie read the link thanks, daggert I without shame am an activist and want much the same as you.
I was at conference and saw our betrayal.
I am not looking forward but back at what we have lost, I see no reason to think we will be treated Any better in the future.
But one day a word I regard as not dead just resting, solidarity will lead to people power, far too many forget just what past generations who lived by that word won for us.

And that was another thing about South Australia. Back in 2006 its Legislative Council had censored Hansard, the record of Parliamentary debates! OLO contributor Anthony Marinac had written an article called "Shaking the foundations of parliamentary privilege" about it. See: http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=4919&page=0 . Forrest had posted a comment on the article, here: http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=4919#71768

Forrest remembered having gained some sense of a special South Australian role or involvement in the early days of the (unlawful) centralizing and digitising of the keeping of the Commonwealth electoral rolls, back in the eighties. "That's right", Forrest recalled, "there was a discrepancy of several hundred thousand enrolments Australia-wide between the rolls as printed for the 1987 Federal elections and the published monthly certifications of total enrolments, and the separate keeping of the enrolments for SA on the SA government computer system had given the lie as to when that discrepancy had arisen. There had been a surge in total enrolments before the rolls closed, and the SA figures had constituted a benchmark which indicated that the surge had happened before the elections were announced, contrary to claims that the announcement was the cause of the surge!"

The OLO Article "Fencing wire and mirrors: the world of the National Energy System" by Gavan McDonnell, http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=7585 , had highlighted the effective disfranchisement of NSW, Queensland, Tasmanian and Victorian State electors so far as legislation affecting operation of, or participation in, the NEM was concerned.

"Could some unidentified anti-Australian interests effectively have nobbled BOTH sides of politics in Australia", Forrest wondered, "working through the ballot box?". It seemed incredible, but all the signs were there. If it was true that hundreds of thousands of somehow suspect enrolments could be moved about and then used to claim votes, then it was pretty much game, set, and match for the hijacking of Aussie public policy!

With respect to democracy, that all looked to Forrest pretty much like three strikes! Someone should be out.

Forrest looked out over the harbour to the heads, and beyond.

It was another perfect Aussie day, not a cloud in the sky from horizon to horizon. Just like yesterday.

September the 11th had come and gone without any aeroplanes flying into the building. Yesterday, too, had seen Forrest succeed in having the lift music changed. It was astounding how much influence, if not power, one could wield as the penthouse occupant with the building management without even having to pull rank. They had ever so willingly put the theme music to 'The Thomas Crown Affair' on in his personal express lift.

'Windmills of the Mind' was so evocative! Every time he heard it Forrest could just see (and hear) those gigantic blades that funded his lifestyle now rising, now falling, gracefully, smoothly, relentlessly, making dollar after dollar as they turned. The wind was no longer free: Forrest was able to charge for it, and that made him proud. And to think, he hadn't had to pay for a single one of those windmills! The Wind Garden of the Dispossessed in SA really was an absolutely capital wind farm. All in all it really gave one quite a lift.

Bungendore. It sounded like something out of J.K.Rowling. Perhaps it was the name of a wizard. That'd be right! Bungendore, the Wizard of Oz. "Gone with the Wind, more like", thought Forrest, "first you see him, then you don't".

Down in Macquarie Street the farce continued apace. The new government, or at least part of it, had been caught with its pants down! "Not my problem" thought Forrest, as he refocused upon the real issues confronting Oz.

All this recent talk of Chile and Allende and Pinochet that had infested the thread had somehow caused the penny to drop in Forrest's mind. Oz really needed for there to be a coup! How to have one, yet avoid the situation of the cure being worse than the disease, that was the problem.

Forrest had the answer.

Ta Daaa. The vidconf alert! Hu wanted to talk.