Fight Fire with Sapphire!

Jocelyn and I are very sad.  You see our fellow dancers -- and fellow travellers -- Graeme Murphy and Janet Vernon have now hung up their tights in frustration at John HoWARd's indifference to the arts in general and dance in particular.

Says Murphy:

 

"Funding bodies once dynamic now seem impotent in the face of a government's indifference to a force which could bring so much to the troubled culture of Australia's identity . . . How can the arts flourish in a society where war and sport take centre stage?"

I couldn' have put it better myself. 

And what does this artist-starving, baby-eating, bean-counting "government" have to say on the matter?

 

Federal Arts Minister Rod Kemp denied via a spokesman that "war and sport" had stolen the limelight from artists.

 

"In fact, the budget for 2006-07 for the arts alone is $652 million; for sport it is only $250 million," the spokesman said.

They just can't see that art isn't about money. 

Appalling.  Just appalling. 

Isn't it appalling that with half the world in flames because of his appallingly evil policies John HoWARd will still find time to try and dictate (and do mean DICK-tate) what we can and cannot watch. 

Peenie waver. 

Oh joy!  Joy and cat dancing.  The Supreme Court has confirmed what we all knew right along: the incarceration of fellow traveller David Hicks was (and is) an appalling violation of human rights (and I don't mean that in a speciesist way). 

Needless to say, our foes on the right are underwhelmed, to say the least.  Here's a typically coarse comment from the boorish Matt Hayden:

 

Still, he's just one guy.  Who gives a shit?  There are many far more severe injustices to get cranky about.

Don't speak so soon, Herr Hayden.  You may live to regret those words.  Next time, that "one guy" could be you.