A warming shot into the stop-butts

If I couldn't afford to go over for my old unit's fiftieth anniversary reunion then I'm damned sure I cannot afford to go to the Professor & Director Show in Canberra this April.

The immensely wealthy Commonwealth government - which squanders billions of dollars of OUR money on dodgy war-toys and on dead-loss schemes - was too mean even to supply bus or train tickets for participants [never mind flying!]: too tight-fisted even to supply dormitory accommodation for each with a camp-stretcher, a blanket and a pillow; too cheap & nasty to put on a pot of stew and and an urn of boiling water. Expenditure cutbacks and slash-&-burn austerity campaigns are one thing but just how mean and miserable can you get?

I wasn't knocked-back for a seat among the Best & Brightest One Thousand at the Rudd-Davis Australia 2020 Summit.

I didn't bother to apply - the 2008 version of the "No Dogs Or Chinamen Admitted" sign was hung out for all to see.

No sour-grapes or resentment here .... but plenty of annoyance and skepticism about the whole show.

So here I am.

Others can whinge or cry into their beer or wallow in their apathy.

Not me. I'm doing something.

The basic concept of getting together a crowd of knowledgeable and interested people together to discuss important matters about our future is a terrific idea. Pity about how that wonderful concept is being implemented.

Never mind, we can take that great idea and do something better with it.

Let's hear what ordinary people and unique individuals from The Other Australia think their future should be or, maybe, what it shouldn't be .... and what policies will help and what will harm.

Instead of the Rudd-Davis ten topics, let's have two dozen. [I'll put up a list later].

Instead of looking just twelve years into the future, let's look 2 or 4 or 8 or 16 or 32 years into the future - or fifty or a hundred years if you like. Why restrict ourselves?

Go on. Have a go! I won't laugh at you if what you suggest sounds highly improbable or silly or wild or impossible.

For example: when I was a kid, not many people imagined that one day you would be able to walk around with a telephone in your pocket, one that took pictures and played games. Or again, who could have imagined our current immigration system and all that has come from it.

Go on. Tell us. What does your future - or your grandkids' future - look like to you.? What policies would make things better or worse.