When they reached the mountain's summit, even Clancy took a pull,
It well might make the boldest hold their breath,
The wild hop scrub grew thickly, and the hidden ground was full
Of wombat holes, and any slip was death.
But the man from Snowy River let the pony have his head,
And he swung his stockwhip round and gave a cheer,
And he raced him down the mountain like a torrent down its bed,
While the others stood and watched in very fear.
He sent the flint stones flying, but the pony kept his feet,
He cleared the fallen timber in his stride,
And the man from Snowy River never shifted in his seat-
It was grand to see that mountain horseman ride.
Through the stringy barks and saplings, on the rough and broken ground,
Down the hillside at a racing pace he went;
And he never drew the bridle till he landed safe and sound,
At the bottom of that terrible descent.
He was right among the horses as they climbed the further hill,
And the watchers on the mountain standing mute,
Saw him ply the stockwhip fiercely, he was right among them still,
As he raced across the clearing in pursuit.
Then they lost him for a moment, where two mountain gullies met
In the ranges, but a final glimpse reveals
On a dim and distant hillside the wild horses racing yet,
With the man from Snowy River at their heels.
Banjo Patterson, The Man From Snowy River.
If he was free, if all the journeys had been brought to nought, if the raucous squawk of the black cockatoos meant anything, here at the end of days, in the infinite brush of wings. The group of black cockatoos settled in the trees. They were up there, wild, a part of our days but clearly from an ancient time, a different Australia, somewhere impossibly old. It began because I kept asking the tourist information girl at Bathurst, or was it Orange, is there anywhere cheaper, anywhere cheaper? And eventually she came up with Wombat Hilltop Cottages, which had recently listed.
I took my mother and my kids there, in the freezing cold, and we huddled there away from the storm of everything else that was happening, the evil that had overtaken our lives in an unforgiving city. To the victor the spoils, and we had not been the victors. We had stood out on the wrong side not just of thought fashion, but didn't have the money to protect ourselves against the consequences of unfashionable views; or simply to be on the wrong side of the great gender debate which was ripping families apart as pompous judges lied and lied and lied, leaving ordinary souls destroyed as they tried to pick up the pieces.
And so it was that they came to be at Wombat Hilltop, exactly halfway between Lithgow and Mudgee, on the top of the hill. There was a fence, and a road that led away from the main road. Even here there were remnants of the evil. One of the most corrupt, most shockingly dishonest psychs in the system, this cadre of so-called "experts" willing to say anything for money, willing to distort their biases in return for millions of dollars a year, appallingly dishonest people prepared to say or write anything as long as it satisfied the feminist lawyers and their extremist anti-male agenda in Legal Aid, owned a house out here. He had never confronted this level of corruption in public life before, not on a personal level; and was shocked to the core.
Why were they so slack, why did they write such rubbish, why did they lie so easily? Five thousand a pop for an interview that only lasted minutes and a report that couldn't have taken half an hour to write, that's why. And this was gathered into the court as evidence; and usually people gave up after these dishonest "wholly suspect" reports were delivered, often, as in his case, at the last minute, anything to throw him off. There was no recourse; for the simple reason that these were the court's favourite experts, nothing a mere lay person said would have any effect. Especially not a lay person with a history.
And so he became the victim of fate, the victim of a tide of circumstance that made it almost impossible to protect his own children, the children he had brought up. The same shonky arseholes who had caused him such grief retired with honours years later; with volumes of praise from even the Attorney General himself; these shonky idiots who couldn't even get simple facts like the date right. That was the level of incompetence and blatant dishonesty that we were dealing with; and hence sought shelter at Wombat Hilltops; away from everything, the threats of the traffic, the brutal nonsense that had destroyed our lives; and most certainly our faith in the judiciary.
It was not an isolated case. Around the world millions of dads were treated with the same contempt, dare to disagree with the prevailing orthodoxy and you would pay the price. But here it struck home even further; as he obsessively read everything on the topic and prayed and prayed that this couldn't really be so; that people really weren't this dishonest. But of course they were. High in the trees, the squawking of the cockatoos took them back to a different time, pre-European, even pre-man. The cottages were set in a stark, barren little valley that time forgot; and when the black cockatoos flew over each evening, as they had no doubt done for tens of thousands of years, it was as if they had entered a primitive, primordial time.
He would wake up shouting in anger. The same voice went round and round and round i his head, obsessively. He reported the shonks as high up the food chain as he could; and got nowhere. He dobbed in the shonky psych to the Health Care Complaints Commission, and they thanked him for his contribution. The corrupt bastard just kept on going, writing rubbish, destroying lives, making millions. So many of the fathers, faced with the loss of their children, suffered post traumatic stress syndrome. They became slow, they stuttered, the same thoughts went round and round in their heads. Outraged at the injustice, disillusioned with everything they had once believed, paying taxes to pay the salaries of those who fought against them, treated them with contempt, waged war against them. All supposedly for the greater good. Or at least, for the "best interests of the child", the most dishonest, most brutally dishonest claim of all. While the black cockatoos flew overhead, squawking, their lonely, infinite cry disappearing into the ancient hills.
THE BIGGER STORY:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/burmamyanmar/2022402/Myanmar-cyclone-Burma-junta-tells-survivors-to-go-home.html
The Burmese government stood accused of fresh acts of callousness over Cyclone Nargis yesterday after claims that officials had ordered survivors to tear down temporary shelters built along roads through the disaster zone.
In the absence of proper help from their own government, tens of thousands of people rendered homeless by the storm have erected makeshift roadside huts along the raised concrete roads that run through the Irrawaddy delta. Their location means they are less at risk from further flooding, and puts them on hand for donations from any passing aid convoy.
Now, despite claims by the Burmese government that it is doing more to assist with relief efforts, aid workers say that police in the delta areas have been ordering destitute villagers to dismantle the shelters, apparently unhappy at the image which the sprawling roadside shanty towns presents to the outside world.
Occupants have been told to return to their homes in outlying areas, even though many are scared to do so for fear of another cyclone striking. "We are afraid of staying in our former villages – even the dogs are scared when the wind blows," one woman said.
http://business.theage.com.au/roll-up-folks-see-the-dollar-fly-20080524-2hux.html
WHEN American author Washington Irving coined the phrase "the almighty dollar" in his 1836 work The Creole Village it was a reference to his native currency. But these days, anyone quoting the saying might well be talking about the Australian dollar.
Driven up by strong commodities markets and high interest rates, the Aussie dollar is on a roll and is soon set to reach parity with its more famous namesake on the other side of the Pacific.
"I think it's a matter of 'when' rather than 'if' we reach parity with the US dollar; and it will probably be in the next few months, if not weeks," says Shane Oliver, head of the economics team at AMP.
And while most financiers say that parity is just an arbitrary figure that is essentially meaningless in itself, the results of a strong Australian currency resonate powerfully throughout the economy and touches everyone.
Depending on your view, the surging dollar is either a great chance to grab an overseas bargain or a worrying development that will rob local companies of the chance to compete effectively abroad and could endanger employment.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/arts/gallery-under-angry-siege/2008/05/24/1211183177189.html
THE owner of the Sydney art gallery at the centre of a storm over photographs of naked teenagers was holed up inside it yesterday after receiving violent threats.
Messages left on the answering machine at the Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery in the inner-city suburb of Paddington threatened to "burn the building down".
The owner, Roslyn Oxley, remained in the gallery yesterday after police on Friday seized photographic works by world renowned artist Bill Henson.
The seized photos depicted boys and girls, some as young as 12, naked in dark, moody photographs.
The police removal of the photographs provoked a nationwide outcry over the sexualisation of children in the media and art worlds.
Yesterday Tony Oxley, the shaken husband of Roslyn, spoke outside the gallery where his wife was rehanging the remaining photographs of the exhibition - for a possible reopening as early as Tuesday - before flying to an art fair in Switzerland.
"There are some crackpots out there," Mr Oxley said. "They have left threats on the phone. We have had threats to burn the building down. It is very worrying."
He said the artist was taking the issue very hard, and he and Ms Oxley were concerned about his welfare.
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