uh-oh

sad face

Well it has been quite some time, so perhaps it's about time...

I just read that Australian refugee policy is being described as 'inhumane' at a UN meeting in Darwin, and that we are going to have to cop environmental refugees fair on the chin.

I would have thought that both of these things were bleedingly obvious, but it is good to see someone vocalise this, given that it has been a non-issue for about 5 years now. Remember the Woomera and Baxter protests? I never went personally, but it made for good indymedia (another dead cause).

So now we have this wonderful new government, which does seem to have a genuine reform agenda, do you think we'll see profound change on these issues? Given that we can't get enough immigrants in on 457s to scrub our West Australian toilets, maybe we'll see another bout of populate or perish. We need Mexicans.

I know it has been said before but it would be fitting that the pacific island nations that are being submerged as a result of our disproportionate carbon stink and belch should have some right to asylum on our big, empty and at the time of writing, still-dry island.

I just went back to the ABC News Online page to link to the article and it's gone. How strange.

Maybe Rudd et al will be able to spin this as a humanitarian move, when really they're adding more human grist to the labour market mill that is our minerals and resources economy. Smart.

we all win in the end

2000-and-great

Well so far 2008 is off to a flying start, with a definite sense that there is some kind of positivity re-entering the great global psyche. Take for example, if you will...

• SORRY - say no more (time for action)
  
• Obama looking like the goods AND looking like he's got a good chance
• quitting jobs and pursuing dreams
• it's raining here
• Castro retiring of his own volition, rather than assassination/natural death
• The writers' strike and their win
• the subsequent reduction of shite american telly available for syndication

The only major negs so far are

• aUStrAlia day - put the flags away please
• Brendan Nelson - A-grade fuckwit
• that we have to wait until 2009 to see the back of GWB
  
• (and this just in...) our Cate being robbed for her sublime performance in I'm Not There

As you can see - so far, so good. Here's hoping that the rapturous global awakening (a la 2012) begins here.

Catharsis

So welcome to my blog... audience of me.

The idea behind this (at the moment at least) is for me to lubricate the gears that help my poor long-suffering brain write - hence the title. I know, genius.

I can't offer up a manifesto beyond what is contained in this post, which is to say - take this as a manifesto. I hope that we both get something out of it.

is this thing on?

more to come...