I have to say one caveat before I go into this one tonight.
I've always distrusted Midnight Oil and their posturing. All those songs about giving it back to the indigenous people and saying sorry and anti-nuclear activism and Anti-US rhetoric, never washed with me. I can't explain why, but I think it had three components. 1) Bogans and Westies in my school liked them and I was a music snob and they just weren't my band. 2) I have trouble with message songs for causes I don't believe the singer is actually into - yes, I thought he was a phony back then 3) Their music actually sucks.
So, Peter Garrett, the bald man with the idiotic dance moves was never a spokes person for me or my politics or ideology or whatever else he thought he was doing up there. I'm glad I didn't buy into his crap because I think the betrayals of faith are coming hard and fast these days as he potters around as the minister for Arts as well as junior minister for the Environment. He's turned into sort of a Cicciolina without the sex appeal.
So here's the headline today: "Garrett's Beds Are Burning"
Mr Garrett has approved a new uranium mine for South Australia - and some traditional owners aren't happy.
They are worried about their land "being raped by mining companies" and have called for the approval for the Four Mile mine to be deferred.
Adnyamathanha elder Enice Marsh has asked the SA and federal governments for an independent investigation into the Aboriginal heritage of the Four Mile site.
"What more can we do to protect our land from being raped by mining companies that are allowed to pollute the water and carve up the waterways, even contaminate the soil with radioactive waste?" Ms Marsh said.
"Aboriginal people have no rights under Native Title to protect our heritage."
Mr Garrett told reporters that approving the mine had not let down Aboriginal people.
"In fact, there is an agreement between traditional owners and Aboriginal people in South Australia and the proponents on this matter," he said.
"And I expect that Aboriginal communities will receive benefits as a consequence of the decision that has been taken."
Mr Garrett answered criticism from the Greens and the Coalition that he had sold out his principles in approving the mine.
"Look, that is an old song," he said.
"I approve a lot of decisions right around Australia and Australians can be confident that when Peter Garrett is the environment minister he will make sure that the environmental standards are the highest that they can be and that they need to be."
Meanwhile, nuclear advocates have used the booming uranium industry to call for a domestic nuclear power industry.
The number of Australian uranium mines will rise from three to five next year but none of the yellowcake will be used to generate electricity here.
Clarence Hardy, the secretary of the Australian Nuclear Association, said it was time to use the uranium domestically.
"We consider it's really ironic that the present government is very happy to export uranium to overseas countries for nuclear power but it just won't consider it in Australia," Dr Hardy said.
"It's what I call hypocritical."
Well, he's hypocritical in more ways than just that. The word on the street is that Midnight Oil gave nothing to the Warumpi Band even though they stole their cred and thunder on the way to stardom, and that Peter Garrett was the most opportunistic of the bunch. Let's face it, what they did was an appropriation of the Indigenous cultural standard and waving it around like it belonged to them, a pack of white-bread surf-nazis from the Sydney Northern Beaches.
And it wasn't like I wasn't telling anybody who'd listen back then that the whole 'Diesel and Dust' schtick was exactly that: a schtick to sell more vinyl.
The poison icing on the cake really should be the nuclear issue where Garrett spent years and years advocating a hard-line position against any more expansion of nuclear activities in or by Australia and here he is selling that legacy out.
'I have always maintained ... that our country is as far into nuclear activities as it ever should be,' Garrett said in a debate over uranium policy at the 2007 Labor National Conference. 'I have long been opposed to uranium mining, and I remain opposed to it. I am unapologetic about this. In fact, I am proud of it.'
Bob Brown, the leader who tried to snare Garrett for the Greens, denounced his former friend as a sellout.
'Peter has sacrificed himself to Labor politics,' Brown said.
Well, yeah. Not only has bent over and bared his buttocks to the ALP Machine, he's greased his own butt up and placed a welcome mat behind his ankles. Come on, how do you sell out your principles any faster than that without even a whimper? Where's the expected "I'm quitting this portfolio because I can't get my way" sort of stoush?
From all this, you can only conclude that he went into Federal Politics for the pension plan MPs get. If nothing else, he owes his old time fans a big apology for having been a phony. Or an Apostate.
Had I actually been a fan, I'd be pretty upset today. But because I held him in low esteem all these years as a musician and advocate, I feel strangely and rightfully vindicated to find out he's an unprincipled sell-out and a soul-less social climber.
Some, clearly were more the deceived.
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