PDN...Chart...., page-277

Because we are weak.

I think it has a lot to do with our history also of being 'nuke free' and proud of it. (Ashamedly in hindsight). That window of political opportunity, I suspect has left us now. As labor lurches into Greenie territory and the Tories can't find a leader (or a party of) of mettle, there is no chance.

We sincerely have no hope here - but it is a terrific reminder that you really are 'on your own' (and that's a good thing in part), so don't rely on Gov't decisions to make a fortune off. They are truly inept. Always have been. I learned many years ago when I grew up in a cul de sac and played cricket on this awesome flat wicket in the street. Nothing wrong with the street at all. No potholes...almost perfect. Then one day the 'men came' and put new bitchumen down with pebbles and added 'mounds' that we'd never had before. Was like the Grand Canyon after that, although it made for classic catches for the wikkie.

My dad asked the Alderman what happened and off the record he said that "if they didn't spend the budget they had they wouldn't get allocated it again from state allocations from DMR". Wtf?

And governments (at any level) are for a common good? Pffffft. I learned that lesson long ago that this isn't the case if your able bodied, working, sensible and healthy. (Ie: the majority)

But if you look at it another away...across almost all the western world, if you took all our progress away but left the political climate we have now (inertia, beaurocracy, timidity, activist shills) we'd never have even got to the Gusher Age of digging for oil because it wouldn't have been economic or worth the effort.

While this notion of (lack of) progress might sit so well with some Greenies, they conveniently avert their eyes when demonstrated that the industrial revolution moved the greatest percentage of the population out of poverty and, with assistance of (proper) capitalism, created the incentive to not just survive...but thrive - for billions of others.

It's a sheet world if you can't get those facts straight before you start your day.

My rant for the day. Go PEN!

Cheers