Alan Bond's financial failings came much later
in his life.

Most Australians are
sports-loving and have a strong desire to see
their compariots achieve. Most will
remember Bondy's sporting achievement - winning
against the Americans and breaking their 132 year
yachting history. Consequently Australians support
their tax dollars being spent to fund training
programs, furthermore they pay money to enter
stadiums where they can cheer encouragement.
All this is part and parcel of the Australian identity.

But of course if individuals lack affinity with other
people in their country, they will not have any desire
to support anyone except themselves.

The 'affinity' that Alan Bond and Labor PM Bob Hawke who cozied up to him had for the investors who lost their life savings?

Bond didn't win the Cup, rather he rode that wagon as frauds do to win credibility, using and risking other people's money to do so.

Full credit to the designers and yachtsmen. Commiserations to the sad old folk whose nest eggs were lost in Bond's failures. I wonder how many of them lived impoverished retirements and could not contribute to the education and care of their grandchildren either.

Fox, does your Googling provide any credible explanation for how Bond could show up in Court with that bevvy of Silks to defend his 'bankrupted' self and how he was able to continue that lavish lifestyle?

You might also Google 'WA Inc'. While you are at it, reflect on the sad reality that it took private individuals, NOT the 'fact-finding' media (what a joke that is!) or politicians to have anything done about WA Inc.

Bond University was a good idea and it is successful. Quite properly, Bond is remembered for that.

Bond University was bitterly resisted, sledged and defamed by leftists who bridled at the very mention of any education that isn't centralist and State controlled (and being public and taxpayer-funded, also lacking in performance measures for the teaching staff of course).

Alan Bond's support of Australia's America Cup
Dream made him a public hero and saw him
awarded the honour of Australian of the Year in
1978.

Mr Bond helped bankroll Australia's bid to break the
US stranglehold on the prestigious America's
Cup. His syndicate made history winning the Cup in
1983 with yacht Australia II. The win ended the hosts'
132 year winning streak - the longest in the history of
sport.

The victory transcended sailing, becoming the symbol
of a time when Australia came of age and made its
mark on the international stage.

Whatever else Bondy may have done later - this
win is something that he shall be associated with
in the history of the America's Cup. It was a first
and possibly the last win by an outside challenger.
And those who love sport and sailing will not forget
the event.

//Bond University was a good idea and it is successful. Quite properly, Bond is remembered for that.//

//Whatever else Bondy may have done later - this
win is something that he shall be associated with
in the history of the America's Cup. It was a first
and possibly the last win by an outside challenger.
And those who love sport and sailing will not forget
the event.//

I like universities. I like sport, and sailing.

I do not like crooks. Are we just going to forget the fact that man was as straight as a boomerang because he invested in somebody else's ingenuity and had a university named after him? Such convenient amnesia...

Bond was a thieving lowlife, and the achievements of other sailors and other engineers do not absolve him of his guilt.

Dear Toni,

Thank You for sharing your opinion with us.

You say it so eloquently (and precisely too).

I doubt that most Americans are even aware of the Americas Cup. I am an American who now lives in Australia. Shortly after I came here a woman asked me, "What do they do in the US when the Melbourne Cup is held?"

Since elections are held the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November we usually have elections.

Bond was a crook. We have many of those in the US. Many US crooks are also interested in sport.

Like Australia the US also overemphasises sport.

In Modern English Usage by Fowler p. 547.

“The writers most of all addicted to it [sobriquets] are the sporting reporters; games and contests are exciting to take part in, interesting or even exciting also to watch, but essentially (i. e. as bare facts) dull to read about; insomuch that most intelligent people abandon such reading; the reporter conscious that his matter & his audience are both dull enough to require enlivening thinks that the needful fillip may be given if he calls fishing the gentle craft, a ball the pill or the leather, a captain the skipper, or a saddle the pigskin, & so makes his description a series of momentary puzzles that shall pleasantly titillate inactive minds.”