Hi Maverick,

"I am Australian," has such a positive effect on most
people. And, it does unify. Isn't it amazing what music
and the right lyrics can do.

Hi Maverick and Foxy,

What a bloody awful song, nah, just joking.

What a terrific song is 'I Am Australian', with great words, I too, although I'm not greatly nationalistic, stirred by the words.

Just from a practical point of view, although the words are great, unfortunately the music score is rather low key and doesn't lend itself to be the music of a national anthem.

This is the stuff of national anthems.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5g4fhqCSdLQ

Although it does sound rather imperialistic.

Now here's a bunch of regulars guys getting into the swing of things. Not a hint of imperialism in sight here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQL0sBQHGzc

Good Morning Everyone,

I woke up to some very sad news this morning.

The lovely Olivia Newton-John has died in California
at the age of 73. She has lost her fight with cancer.
Tributes are flowing from around the globe and rightly
so. She was an amazing lady. Not only a wonderful
performer, and singer, but a genuine beautiful human
being who did so much for other cancer patients.

Her legacy is the very modern Wellness Centre that she
built for cancer patients here in Melbourne next door
to the Austin Hospital where patients were treated and
helped. She was personally involved in that centre and
she did so much in helping people with cancer. I know.
I was one of them.

She will be greatly missed. I wish her husband, and her
daughter and families and friends - my Deepest Condolences.
We've lost a truly beautiful human being. May she Rest In
Peace.

Republic-pusher, Peter FitzSimons, has told Senator Jacinta Price that she is giving racists a voice by opposing the Voice. According to the definition of that overused and misused word, people voting Yes to the proposal will be the true racists - believers in the dogma that people should be treated differently because of their race.

There is no model that is going to receive the full
approval of all Australians. But there is something
deeply disingenuous about the way in which those
white conservative MPs are opposing the Voice by
citing one or two Indigenous people's views when its
pretty clear that they were planning to oppose it
anyway.

Jacinta Price and other politicians who belong to
parties with dwindling memberships, local branches
stacked, candidates being parachuted into
electorates where they don't live and party
powerbrokers defying the wishes of the rank
and file who hand-pick their own candidates are now
trying to paint the culmination of years of
consensus building by our Indigenous people as
"racist" and "elitist." Which is laughable.

Racist prejudice has for a very long time fuelled
the anti-Voice sentiments and blindness.

My heart bleeds for our First Nations people,
especially the young.

These nay sayers will deserve the daming verdict of
history. It's ignorant and deliberate and all
decent Australians should oppose it with all their
strength.

BTW:

Yes, there is room for an Indigenous Voice to Parliament
without the 3rd chamber bollocks given that the
Australian Constitution has extra powers (section 51A)
to treat people differently based on race. It only stands
to reason that they should have a say in how those powers
are exercised.