Christian Kerr wrote this highly amusing and incredibly wrong post in today’s Crikey subscriber e-mail.
The unions have been nobbled, the student Trots been got, the rest of Telstra will be sold sooner or later – with Big Kev dead and Henry Kaye otherwise occupied there are plenty of mug punters out there – but when are we going to see the destruction of the last bastion of socialism in Australia? I refer, of course, to the Australian Institute of Sport.
Prominent members of the Howard Government often condemn the pernicious period that were the Fraser years. Now, here is their chance to end one of that unhappy era’s most baleful legacies – the East German sports system that was set up after Australia bombed at the Montreal Olympics back in 1976.
East German sports system literally. Look at some of the coaches and athletes we’ve scrounged up since the fall of the Berlin Wall.
And look at what exactly goes on out there at Bruce in the Australian Capital Territory. It’s virtually a taxpayer funded eugenics program – creating heroes for socialist realist art – at massive cost to the public purse. Sport should be user pays. After all, there’s no shortage of big money in the game. Why should the public foot the bill?
Prove that the VSU bill was about principal, not just revenge for being laughed at as student nerds. Storm the ramparts of the AIS!
Forget socialism, what Kerr describes is just a government created and supported corporate welfare program designed to create the perfect supermen and women who help those same corporations sell more breakfast cereal. And by now we also know that nothing ever comes between certain power marching fascists and their sporting symbols, heroes, corporate boxes and Olympic and Commonwealth Games photo ops with foreign heads of state.
Been saying for years that we can’t keep claiming how good we are at sport while we have this massive govt funded infrastructure advantage that so many countries don’t. Up until recently we were very much the New East Germany when you compared our sport spending with a lot of the rest of the world.
The more telling results will come when the other countries start building their own Institutes of Sport such as they have done in the UK. You watch how much better England does at the C-Wealth Boring Games now that they have received a huge increase in govt funding. Their dosh comes from some lottery, I believe. And you need look no further that The Ashes to see how much better The Poms have become since they’ve started with their Centre of Excellence (or whatever it’s called).
Still, we have no way of competing with America and their immense collegiate system without or runners, throwers, jumpers, swimmers, etc being publically funded.
I would like to see a HECS-style contributions scheme for those AIS athletes who make it good. If uni students have to contribute when their education provides them with good work and a high income, so should sports stars whose performance came from funded institutions.
agree with Liam with a caveat.
Earning above a certain amount they pay the full cost of the program.
people such a Ian Thorpe or Mark viduka could certainly pay that.
No question, before we go about defunding the shotputters and javelin throwers for which there is no financial rewards we should see the monetery winners like Thorpey et al throw in a few bucks to cover their support over the years and now.
As an aside, I seem to remember that there was a recent high court ruling on Olympic athletes paying tax for scholorships or winnings etc. I’ll have to look it up….not quite sure of the circumstances but I think it was the female javelin thrower who took the case the the high court.
Good to see satire doesn’t get past you guys at LP…
Of course it was satirical RB, and so was my response. Maybe I was too dry for you huh?
Perhaps rb’s response is itself an example of that keen RWDB satiric edge, Phil?
Sport is Australian for religion. Our morality, piety and deep sense of Australian self isn’t dictated from the pulpits…. but from how many gold “we” get at the next Olympics.
If we bag the gold and stick it up the godless Poms with their rocky beaches and piss poor summers….it’s all good. We are redeemed in the eyes of the maker of Gods-own country. The athlete’s victory is our victory.
And thus, if sport is our religion, then the AIS is our Vatican, our Mecca, our Wailing Wall. If we follow the Straussian neo-con model established in America…… The powers between church and state should be combined, not divided.
Thus the AIS stays as an integral part of the Australian Government under the top seekret “Department of Religous and Moral Doctrine Affairs.” QED.
Thus we aren’t paying tax we are merely doing the Godly thing and “tything”.
Personally, I’m just glad none of you good people picked on the lits in the piece.
And, yes, it’s rather rushed satire.
it is getting very satiring now by crikey
Today in The Age:
Nice to see you reading LP Christian.
Obviously I did enjoy the piece, and not to worry, here at LP we like reading rushed writings after all it’s the essense of blogging.