I intend nothing short of a compliment by saying Australia is – or was – a land built on physicality and pragmatism. Contemporary greenies may love to hug rare frogs or familiar trees yet even they probably stop short of embracing Blue Mountain funnel-webs or red-bellied blacks. This great land, of which I became a citizen myself about ten years ago, has always required large measures of toughness and commonsense of its citizens yet presents far too little evidence of either trait today as a variety of idiot ideologies jostle here for precedence and media coverage.