“There may have been no dams blocking the torrents of words. But those words were not advocacy, arguments or selling points. They were excuses, abuse of the opposition and rhetorical flourishes. One never got the impression that the King, or his economic ministers, were infused with and excited by ideas, or keen on the processes by which debate sharpened and improved a policy or a program. Indeed, particularly on economic matters (such as company tax cuts, the environment or kowtowing to the banks), dogma, not debate, seemed the guiding principle.”

Without any doubt Cotton is a significant cause of the death of the Darling River System. The cotton growers are correct though, its not their fault .. its the fault of successive governments who have prioritised what is called the Economy over the natural environment – which too is an economy. Its the fault of a the system that places value only in dollar terms. Even the lives of us humans, white humans that live around the rivers are valued only in dollars. We are only the dollar value that is attached to us.

David Littleproud, the National Party’s Golden Boy of the future has perhaps expressed it best for the generations to come. I quote, “Your moral compass must fall on the side of economics and not on the side of humanity.” – David Littleproud (The Nats would be King!”) He was talking here of live animal exports but it says it all.

Nothing more is required than to take a trip down the River – and I have taken this trip from the upper reaches of the system to the Victorian border three times over the past five years. I’ve been in Menindee when Lake Pamamaroo was filled for the first time in 6 years. It is empty now despite two flood seasons. I’ve followed all the streams that become the Darling and the Barwon and on into the Murray .. I’ve seen them in flood and I’ve seen them in reasonable condition (I say ‘reasonable’ because I don’t know what it is that is called good condition – I can only imagine) and followed them through Cotton Country and I’ve lost them. I’ve seen absolutely dead parts of the river with irrigation pumps working flat out all day pumping yellow silted mucus up into agricultural country channels. Economics.

Our problem is this land we call Agricultural Country is not agricultural country. It’s as simple as that. We force grow crops where we should not grow crops and where we can grow crops we don’t grow crops that the land can sustain. Its as simple as that. I see old bits of fence and wire and farmers junk blocking streams and rivers and even when the rivers and streams are almost dry no one even thinks to clean them up. And it would be so easy to do. But it costs dollars and no farmer is going to spend his dollars to clean his junk out of the silted river when that’s the only value the government puts on his life – dollars – regardless of whether this public river runs through his private land or not. Why? Because you don’t make money out of work you don’t have to do. Of course that’s not what we get told by the government .. the governments always harping on just how productive unnecessary work is. The government says that its not the work that counts, its the fact that you are working.

So while I like the fact that Pauline has had a thought about the environment – in this election year – and offered her 10c worth on the collection of toads. I think it would be much better to grab a few boatloads of refugees and migrants and send them up our river .. and give it a good clean out. Then, they can go back to their Pacific Resorts.

“I cannot separate the aesthetic pleasure of seeing a butterfly and the scientific pleasure of knowing what it is.” – Vladimir Nabokov