Every country is a nation in transition, it s got a future. One of the clever things about Australia is that we ve been able to pick the good bits from our past and hang onto them but get rid of the bad bits of our past. I mean the contributions of people like McFarlane Burnet and Victor Chang to medicine. We ve always punched above our weight when it comes to medical science. We ve only got 20 million people, yet we contribute far more proportionally than that 20 million would suggest.
Balance is always important in a country.
You never want to go too overboard, and that s another good thing about being an Australian. We re not as gullible as other people and we re a bit cynical about people who try and take us for a ride down a particular path. I mean it s a very healthy scepticism. It s an election year. It s not a day of partisan political point scoring.