Katter may not be mad. Perhaps he is not a bigot, either. The hat makes it hard to tell. He is one of those country men who is confident with misinformation. Who is used to being right even when he is not. Who trained his voice, one imagines, reciting Clancy of the Overflow at public functions. Who always speaks loudly.
Oh dear... just oh dear.
I'm afraid that the Sydney Morning Herald has just made it blatantly obvious that it doesn't just have a speck or a plank its eye but a whole sawmill.
Bob Katter said a great deal of things on the ABC's Q and A last night, including that he doesn't much like homosexuals and then was chided for his views. I think that the chiding is ridiculous. Mr Katter is not only perfectly entitled to express his views, but has the right to do so. Furthermore because of the United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights 1948 of which Australia was a signatory (and helped write), the right is enshrined by law.
Article 19 - Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.
Also because of the Bill of Rights Act 1689, the freedom of speech and debates or proceedings in Parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned in any court or place out of Parliament.
Think about that SMH.
Perhaps it didn't occur to the Sydney Morning Herald that the vast bulk of what Mr Katter had to say, was not directed at social law anyway. Most of what Mr Katter wants to achieve is to do with the steady erosion of Australia's manufacturing base and the utterly despicable state that we will soon be a net importer of food.
In 1987, 86 per cent of the passenger motor vehicles in Australia were made in Australia. Eighty-six per cent, Nick. As a result of Mr Keating's and your policies, now only 21 per cent are made in Australia and is there a single person here that believes we'll have a car industry in 20 years in Australia? A single person?
...
Four years ago we became a net importer of fruit and vegetables. Last year we became a net importer of seafood and I don't care what set of statistics you want to look at. Within 14 years we will be a net importer of food.
...
Four years ago we became a net importer of fruit and vegetables. Last year we became a net importer of seafood and I don't care what set of statistics you want to look at. Within 14 years we will be a net importer of food.
- Bob Katter, ABC1 Q and A, 6th Sep 2010
Think about that as well dear SMH.
Bob Katter has every right to have his own opinion, like it or not. He has the right to choose to represent the issues he holds dear to his heart in whatever order of priority he chooses, like it or not. He also has the right to represent the interests of whatever make of his constituents he chooses, like it or not. Coupled with all of this is that he is charged with the responsibility of representing the interests of the people in his electorate... and no-one else.
It is an act of political hijack to people to suggest or imply he should represent the interests of all. There are other candidates to cater for the interests of other views. Bob Katter does not have to agree with the moral or immoral majority nor every man woman or child in this nation.
As he himself said, which the SMH quotes in the very article:
“You probably don't consider it to be a small problem [but] in the bigger picture of things it's just not something that occupies my consciousness.”
Why should the issue occupy his consciousness? The people in his electorate are worried about the very existance of their livelihoods. It might be very well to talk about issues of social consciousness, but even more fundamental to that is the ability for people to put food on the table.
But of course the SMH from its little offices in Sussex Street wouldn't know a thing about what its like in rural and regional Australia. Their editors don't really care where their food actually comes from and probably would be content to drive around in European built luxury cars whilst the people who would have had jobs building cars in Australia have to look elsewhere for work.
Remove the planks from your eyes and start banging them over the back of your stupid pathetic heads dear SMH, it might knock some sense into you. Instead of chastising someone who is passionate and prepared to state the glaringly obvious, and what should have been fixed or even talked about for the last twenty years, you berate the man.
Dear SMH, today you have made me sick. I bite my thumb at you.
FOR SHAME.
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