Switch Him off

The best thing, I find, you can do with Jon Feine is switch him off. I am sure if the ABC were serious about his effect on their ratings and informed public debate , they would realise many thinking and professional people find his ignorant, arrogant, pontifications extremely annoying - and switch off. The problem is only as big as it seems,.... Jon
By pushing barrows that suit a low level of intellectual engagement in many areas of needed predjudice breaking , the needed respect for complexity , science and real rural livelihood matters ( eg how much oil and how much water - when!)does not get a look in. Worse , by 774 not challenging public predjudice, the public continue to make ineffective judgements about which resources to use when .
Its hard enough making a living out here without he and most of the quick fixers carping on about things they only half understand .

Today Jon Feine tells the cotton growing chief that the industry is very inefficent in water use - and therefore acording to ABCchurch rules - the industry should by implication in His trial.... condemned .
Cotton, rice and sorghum, like all seed crops , use a lot of water and are " inefficient" ' in purely one sector kindergarten arithmatic terms .

And, of course that only applies to the use of stored water - not the overall water use of such plants - nor their importance in sustainable agriculture .
Thank God for rain ( the missing link in His water cycle ) and something a little less predictable than Jon Feine!
Has Jon Feine stopped practicing law , or did the ABC extend his licence and opportunity to practice on his own ? Noone minds a good argument mate !

Perhaps Jon will get some real water conservationist./geomorphologist/scientist on his program to explain both sides better . Such a person could show how "inefficient" the cities use of fresh water is--- to get rid of our own salts: (About time the detailed salt story was told) . How the cities inefficency in the shower pales into insignificance as far as "efficient use of stored water goes" in agriculture. Careless criticsm by ABC broadcasters, and their apparent complicity in projection and reinforcing predjudice, in what is panicked to be a Euphrates paradigm of "disasters from irrigation" is a irrational fear( not real risk reality) We know enough to prevent that sort of long term damage from happening again .But will we?

Are your solutions sustainable Jon? .
If "jonnos" types can't be allowed to solve someone else's problems in 60 minutes , there would be nothing for them tomake a big noise about.

The majority of Australians may well thank such big talkers for giving them confidence to judge correct behaviour of othesr in matters we used to say were the combined clever of the country - but it doesn't give our public broadcasters or scientists a future that makes sense .

With "jon's" in charge, there is no point in training to teach our children science and maths . Such children will learn to disagree with those who identify solutions before they have properly identified problems .



Ongoing pressure to reduce careless irrigation in the MDB is indeed needed, but just as in Iraq, to focus on irrigators, is to miss the target. We do not need the carping careless criticsm of industry that leads us to kill off our own industry (Stopping native timber harvesting in Western Victoria in favor of more timber harvesting in the tropics) and causing the increasing stress in much less well managed and higher risk areas ( more food and fibre production in China and Middle America where soil and water degradation risks are greater )We need to encourage governements to work harder in planning and administration .
The question is one of sustainablity and where the present and future land uses...........listening to local radio, ..........you wouldn't really know, not only what the environmental target is not --- but what one should do about it!
Copyright Emperors Academy