not happy, Peter...

Peter Garrett, Labor Shadow Minister for, among other things, Climate Change and the Environment, was up here in the mountains at a community meeting last night, giving a little pep talk to help get Bob Debus elected...

Well, I had to go, didn't I? I mean, Blue Sky Mine and all that...

So there I was, getting really bored with the endless rhetoric about how we mustn't do anything bad to the economy while trying to protect the planet, an oxymoronic concept if ever there was one, when I got my question in:

"The old Peter Garrett used to have huge problems with uranium mining, but the new Peter Garrett seems to have far less of a problem with it. Peter, could you share with us the epiphany you had which led you make such a shift?"

Well, didn't that get him and Bob excited...

I was told in no uncertain terms that this question had been "dealt with" and that Peter was now a "team player". Peter went on to say something along the lines of "if you want to make a difference you have to get elected" or some such obfuscation...

So, is he saying that you have to sell out on your anti-uranium mining ideals in order to "make a difference"? Is he saying he couldn't have got elected to the senate for the Greens? Is he saying that it's better to bury your integrity than to keep uranium buried, if it means you get to play on "the team"? I'm not sure what he was saying, but I am sure he flared up like I'd pushed a really, really BIG button...