Dirt n Dust back on track
I just wanted to extend a public thank you to your readers, many of whom sponsored or attended the recent Julia Creek Dirt n Dust Festival.
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Like many traditional events across Queensland, the festival re-emerged after a two year gap due to COVID. And re-emerge it did.
Upwards of 2000 people made the effort to come along, join in the events and have a good time just by getting out and getting together, and getting the Dirt n Dust back on track.
Thank you to each and every one of you, and thank you to each and every one of our dedicated sponsors, all well known names who have supported the pastoral industry and rural Queensland for many years.
You made it happen.
- Robbie Hick, Dirt n Dust Festival president.
Come on, accountant Barnaby
According to reports, over the next 50 years Barnaby Joyce's Hells Gate Dam in far North Queensland will more than repay its cost ($5.4 billion dollars).
It's therefore an investment worth making, says Barnaby Joyce.
This is so good to hear. Now the National Party can force the Liberals to find the money for a road over the Brindabellas from Canberra's Hindmarsh Drive to Tumut and down to the Hume Freeway.
This would cost only one twenty-fifth of the cost of Hells Gate Dam. In 50 years, the benefits it would bring to about a quarter of a million country people in the Queanbeyan-Wagga-Albury triangle would repay its cost several times over.
Not only in the taxes generated by the economic boom this road would bring, by the way, but also in the savings made in more effective fire-fighting. This road would allow the bushfires which rage into Canberra from the west to be fought from both sides.
I pointed this out in 2003 to John Howard's Minister for Territories Wilson Tuckey.
His reply was that such a road would cost the nation at least $120,000,000.
Even back then that was not a lot of money, and it was also only half the cost of houses destroyed shortly before in Canberra's 2003 fires.
This Liberal Minister didn't realise that the nation paid for those houses through its privately-owned insurance industry.
So come on, accountant Barnaby - do for Eden-Monaro and southern NSW what you want to do for northern Queensland.
It's easier and will be profitable much faster.
- Grant Agnew, Coopers Plains.
It's time for Australia to vote for change
Politics has drifted a long way left since the days of Menzies and Fadden.
Starting with Gough Whitlam, Malcolm Fraser, Don Chipp and Bob Brown, there has developed a monotonous uniformity in main-stream Australian politics.
Over the years, a green slime has infected all major parties - they now differ in details but not in principle.
This greening of politics has reached the stage when a politician like Malcolm Turnbull has trouble deciding whether to join the Greens, the ALP or the leafy-green Liberals.
The green revolution started with support for preserving cuddly wild-life, then progressed to "No Dams", "Lock the Gate" and "Save the Reef".
Then they added "global warming" to their political agenda.
When global temperatures did not obey their scary narrative, they changed to "climate alarm" and added "wild weather" to support their "kill coal, cars and cattle" agenda.
Then the COVID scare created a 'brave new world' controlled by a national cabinet armed with never-ending jabs and a lock-down/track-and-trace mentality.
Libs and ALP are both on the nose. It looks unlikely that either of them will hold a majority of seats.
But if voters are not disciplined in how they vote, a bunch of deep greens posing as independents will grab seats and hold the balance of power.
With thoughtful and disciplined behaviour at the ballot box (for both senate and house of reps) we can stop this green revolution.
It requires discipline to save Australia at this late stage.
- Viv Forbes, Washpool.
"Look-a-like" energy policies
I appeal to conservative voters who may, like me, be disillusioned with the government's energy policy, to exercise restraint.
We must acknowledge that there are only two "look-a-like" energy policies on offer to us; and we only have a choice between those two, not withstanding that they are both bad in our eyes.
The implementation of the labor policy would be by far the most damaging to our economy, and in particular, our region.
There is a great temptation to exact revenge by voting the government down but we must remember that Senator Canavan, and I suspect our new candidate for Flynn, Colin Boyce will continue to press for the abolition of this "net zero" nonsense.
Senator Canavan has shown great courage and has accepted personal sacrifice to enunciate the stupidity of this policy and deserves our support. He has shown himself to be a real patriot, in a time when he could so easily be "cancelled".
We have a responsibility to act with the same level of discipline and support those who will work tirelessly to defeat this "net zero" nonsense.
- Ray Ward, Monto.