WUWT readers may recall that I asked for help in supporting this family back in 2010. The issue was an out of control agency (DEC) that granted, then revoked, an operating permit for a feedlot operation based on nothing more than a couple of neighbor complaints about “smell”. You responded, and it made a difference. Matt and Janet Thompson have provided this update which I repeat in entirety. – Anthony
Dear Readers of WUWT and Jo Nova:
We would like to give an update to all of you who have supported us in a variety of ways, including with donations (in-kind and monetary) for our children, writing letters, and contacting politicians and our bank.
For a refresher on the background to our story, please see the original YouTube we produced, including the important Part 2:
Part 1: http://youtu.be/tgFPDcPr5yA Part 2: http://youtu.be/pCsi1Inc-rE
We returned to the USA for Christmas in 2011 on frequent flyer tickets given to us by family. Matt’s dad had been having health problems, and had had a major surgery in July. After seeing our parents again, we were moved to reconsider our living situation; namely the fact that since our business was not operating, we could no longer afford to fly our family back to the States should something sudden arise. (Matt’s dad had another surgery in February, and we were thankful to be here for that.)
In addition to the desire to be within driving proximity to our families, we had become acutely concerned over the deterioration in political, legislative and regulatory circumstances in Australia. We worried that even if we were to win our case against the Department of Environment and Conservation (DEC) (a case that is still in progress), the passage of the Carbon (sic) Tax in 2010 made the possibility of ever operating our feedlot again impossible. It meant that even if we won in court, most of our efforts to profitably operate our business would have gone towards convincing some bureaucrat that we weren’t causing greenhouse gas emissions, when in fact we were. Productive people do.
Finally, while in the US, Matt was offered a job in Texas, and we felt, all things taken together, we should make the heart-wrenching decision to move our family to America. This was not a decision taken lightly. We had lived in Australia for 10 years. Three of our four children had been born in Narrogin, and the first had been only 11 months old when we moved down under. We have many close, stalwart friends, and our lives in Western Australia, despite the obvious problems, had been happy and rich.
After fighting through the court system on three fronts (bank, receivers, and DEC) since mid-2010 to save our business and attempt to pay back our unsecured creditors (who have been unbelievably kind to us throughout the ordeal), we came to an agreement with the NAB and Ferrier Hodgson (the bank-appointed receivers) last month. The details of the agreement are confidential, but we feel that concentrating our legal efforts on the DEC (bringing it down to a one-front war, if you will) is the most prudent thing for us to do.
So our property has been handed over to the bank and receivers.
Very importantly, we continue to pursue the case against the out-of-control, bureaucratic and inept DEC, still hoping to pay back our unsecured creditors. Still hoping that our story will make a difference to society. Still hoping for some semblance of justice for ourselves after losing our lives savings and thriving business due entirely to a government agency’s edict, after being told by that same entity in the beginning that we could proceed.
Our children were devastated when we broke the news to them in late January that we were not to return to Australia. Matt and I have both struggled with the fact that we were not able to say good-bye to our close friends, and we have been missing them and our life in Narrogin. Adding to the pain, the subtle nuances of our legal situation required us to quietly pursue our course without communicating publicly to the people who directly contributed to keep a roof over the heads of and food on the table for our children. Had it not been for your faithful generosity, our situation would have been impossible.
While that silence was difficult, it was necessary. Walking the fine line of dealing directly with our treacherous situation and communicating openly and often has been tough. We hope you understand. From our direct communications with many of you, we are certain you do. From the bottom of our hearts, thank you.
On the broader front of the hoax of climate change, we are very proud that we spoke out strongly and publicly — and early on — against the attack on productivity and productive people. We know that it cost us our business, our entire lives savings, and the life of one of our closest friends.
We continue to be concerned in the extreme about the situation and the fundamental factors that led to the birth and unobstructed growth of such an insidious and damaging monster. We continue to be involved with grassroots actions, hoping to make a difference. We believe our four children and their generation deserve better than to inherit the current financial and political mess. These concerns and our actions affect our ability to produce real goods and services as we would like to, but we will survive and do what we must while doing what we can.
Thank you again for your warmth, support, understanding, and patience. Please don’t hesitate to contact us through Jo or Anthony (with “The Thompsons” in the Subject line) if you feel moved to do so. Thanks again and again.
==============================================================
If this episode over some cow odors forcing a family to abandon their farm isn’t enough, I felt that it would be appropriate to post this video as a reminder of what sort of mendacity the government of Australia has been up to.
Sorry to hear they feel they had no other choice but to return to the USA, but best wishes for the future for them and the rest of us coming under the bureaucratic cosh.
James Bull
Jaggar,
Here in USA what I’d call Democrat-Complex Media is the worst when it comes to being objective. They try to help cover Democrats’ butts whenever they mess up but hellbent on trying to destroy Republicans/conservative/libertarians/anyone that are not Democrats. So much lies… You’d have to read Andrew Breitbart’s RIGHTEOUS INDIGNATION or visit Breitbart.com website to get an idea how much DCM is leaving out when it comes to Democrats. Thank goodness for Fox News as it is the only mainstream conservative media in USA to keep DCM on their toes. Obama’s administration is a joke. It’s like watching Idiocracy movie in real life…
So very sorry to hear of continuing pain for the Thompsons.
As Matt Ridley showed again and again in his blog we are all living better then kings centuries ago. We have tools and facilities kings could only have dreamed about. And this is due to the high productivity that people have achieved, to the fact that we have many people serving us. Through the efficiency that our industries achieved, we have hundreds of people all over the world working for each of us.
http://www.rationaloptimist.com/blog/room-for-all.aspx
There is only one thing that could derail the progress, bad policies – as he said:
“If there are three things I fear, as a passionate environmentalist who wants to see wild habitats restored all over the world, they are biofuels, renewable electricity and organic farming. Each would demand much, much more land from nature.”
Gary Hladik says:
When all else fails, vote with your feet.
Bernd Felsche says:
Australians understand the principle of giving others a fair go.
Which is NOT what the Thompsons got from the DEC.
The sad truth is that in the end, they were unfairly forced off their land by unaccountable environmental beaureaucrats. – We can’t just vote with our feet. Arounsd the globe, we need to vote out leaders who practice these scientifically unsound socialist policies.
“It meant that even if we won in court, most of our efforts to profitably operate our business would have gone towards convincing some bureaucrat that we weren’t causing greenhouse gas emissions, when in fact we were. Productive people do.”
I cannot think of anything more to add to their statement. Hopefully this greenhouse gas insanity has peaked and will end up in the dustbin of history.
Gary Hladik says:
June 6, 2012 at 10:37 pm
When all else fails, vote with your feet.
_____________________________________
I am afraid “THEY” now have that covered with the World Wide “Harmonization of laws” and “Global Governance” See: link The attitude and bureaucratic nonsense that bankrupted the Thompson’s exists here in the USA and was formalized when the food law passed in December of 2010. It also lives in Canada and in the EU. FOOD is the next big money making bubble and the power brokers are not about to let the likes of the Thompsons or you or me have a slice of it. What happened to the Thompsons has been repeated in different way millions of times but the bottom line is the transfer of farmland from individual families to large “entities”.
Remember Friday Mukamperezida
Good on you for coming to Texas, the most economically and politically free spot of ground in the entire world today!!!
You will find many Californians here as well, and more every day. That’s just fine, Texas wants all y’all! If you love freedom, liberty, and your independence, this is where you need to be!
(someone will point out that we have a couple liberal hellholes too, but don’t worry. This state’s so big that you can live any kind of life you want without having to ever set foot or even pay any attention to any of those. unlike California, they’re not big enough to ruin the rest of the state for everyone)
Glad you’re here, this is where you needed to be!
Welcome to Texas. As a native Texan I can say that it isn’t perfect but it is a pretty good place.
Be encouraged by Kippling’s poem If
As my fellow Texans have said WELCOME!!! If you are in the Houston area, give me a ring, I’ll buy you a beer. And don’t worry about raising your kids here, there are plenty of exceptional schools and neighborhoods all over this great state. We’ll be happy to help you look out for them, that’s what neighbors do.
Texas is a great State, the kids should love it. Welcome back to the USA!
Best Regards,
John from CA
Jenny L: You missed the part about Texas! Best state in the Union. Might try home schooling, though.
Pierre Gosselin reports on the NoTricksZone blog:
Alabama moves to protect private property rights, preventing the State from adopting laws which could unfairly injure private property rights.
More. Please.
Ah, Paris Texas, 100% better than the other one !
JennyL says:
June 6, 2012 at 9:29 pm
Socialists and tyrants are everywhere. What’s your paradise?
Parents need to retain their role.
Another out-of-control bureaucracy is education. We don’t think as much about it because we don’t live in that world, now that we are older. We remember schools that were better than they are now. The problems in education became far worse after local school boards lost control over curriculum. Parents and local communities have almost no say in what their children are exposed to.
The real evil in this isn’t the teachers or even the bureaucrats directly, The people behind the policy are in the NEA, people like Bill Ayers, Obama’s mentor and patron among the socialists. Ayers is a retired professor of education at the University of Illinois, Chicago. He’s a true intellectual dirtbag.
I found a fantastic resource of information about the NEA and its decades-long assault on children (see the link below). You’ll be amazed. More people should know about what they are doing. We need to take back our schools. That will help us teach real science, stop political indoctrination, and help our economy (by training people to innovate, or at least have basic competence to hold a job).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Ayers
http://www.crossroad.to/Excerpts/chronologies/nea.htm
Howdy and welcome yall from DFW!
Pick any city with population less than a few hundred thousand and you’ll do just fine.
Geography lesson:
West Texas means west of the Pecos (except for the town of West, TX – get food at the Czech Stop on I-35, exit 353!)
The Great Frozen North is anything north of the Red.
Vacation is anything south of the Grande.
(These are rivers if you’re not up to speed yet.)
Take your kids to the capitol, the Alamo, the state fair, and the Muslim outreach center, I mean space center.
Drink a Shiner Bock, Dr Pepper for the lil’uns, and eat some Whataburger.
Take an I-10 road trip. Shoot some guns. Enjoy yallselves.
Our politicians ain’t perfect either, but they tend to keep their hands out of your wallet, and boots off of your land.
Australia is an example to us all of the mad cow disease that has taken over the ruling class and bureaucrats hopefully/please there will be a mass clearing of the insane asylum with elections in 2013.
In the meantime all potential politicians should watch The Topher video.
The Topher video is brilliant and practicable. The rise of the left/socialism is the greatest threat to humanity and democracy. No matter where you live in the western world you see it and are touched by it. The freedom sucking vampires never sleep = Human rights councils – Agenda 21. Political (creepiness) correctness. Introduced under such nice sounding dictates as Sustainability = do it or be punished. Civil liberty councils are another dangerous subversive element that wants to destroy a free society they choose titles that suggest freedom-loving organizations trying to create fairness and balance but the are the exact opposite.
The morel is:
Watch out for the kinder gentle machine gun man – he will shoot you with a look of sympathy on his face but you still end up dead!
From Bernd Felsche on June 7, 2012 at 2:07 am:
You speak with your heart, not your mind. Or at least the part of your heart you reveal to the world, that you acknowledge exists.
Humans are territorial, just like any of the other Great Apes. It’s natural to frown on outsiders.
Ten years ago, what did Australians think Americans thought Australia was like? Crocodile Dundee, throw another shrimp on the barbie, Foster’s is Australian for beer.
So these Yanks swoop in like carpetbaggers wanting to make their fortune among the natives, who’d been working hard there for generations. Who do these Yanks think they are anyway? That must have ruffled a few feathers. Fine, tolerate them for now, they might not be so bad. But then they start handing out anti-government literature, feeling they have to educate the ignorant local officials and people? Enough of that, let’s throw those Yanks out! Shut them down and send them packing, we don’t need their kind telling us what to do!
I’ve been reading on Andrew Bolt’s blog about the great influx of “boat people” seeking asylum in Australia, at least that’s what said when they’re caught at sea, from primarily Muslim countries. (Those tagged boat people policy, many other pieces over months and years.) For the US, going by the descriptions many would be deemed “undesirables” and sent back, those without proper documentation whom we found on our soil would be called “illegal immigrants”, however the Australian Press Council warned journalists not to use that term lest they risk repercussions. (Censorship? What censorship?)
I can read the comments, see the attitudes towards these “outsiders”, also note how the concerns are justified. There may be the principle of giving others a “fair go”, then there is the practice of it.
It is true, and I know it, and so should you. When you see a common human social behavior you disapprove of and want to change, first identify the roots of it which are common to all humans. We have millions of years of hardwired animal behavior to contend with, you’d have to be a rare mutant strain to not have it. I’ve searched for and found those common roots within myself of being territorial and distrusting of outsiders. What about you?
How have I insulted Australians, when I’m just noting they’re human?
Texas, around La Grange, San Marcos and over past Brownwood is awesome. Lufkin and Nacogdo… yeah, Texas has a way of lifting your hearts. God speed! Best of luck.
Eddie
Bernd, there is an anti-American element in Australia, not from ordinary Australians but from the green intellectuals, who were the activists against the Thompsons. You can bet that if they were Afghan immigrant farmers they would not have been singled out, and the media would not have ignored them.
What happened was abysmal. We lost upstanding citizens, entrepreneurial business acumen, four promising kids, and two excellent parents.
The combination of skeptic, american, beef feedlot, and free enterprise was a red flag …
Most Australians would be appalled but they have not even heard of the Thompsons.
My thoughts: http://joannenova.com.au/2012/06/the-thompsons-fight-on-from-the-usa-a-business-ruined-by-green-tape-and-the-australian-carbon-tax/
We wish them every success and will follow their progress closely.
I’m so proud of them for fighting on, and not letting the sods get them down.
After further reading I understand now that they moved originally FROM Texas to Australia and have now moved back.
In that case, what was the point in leaving in the first place?
Anyway, welcome BACK then.
Thanks for this post. I have to agree with the decision even
though there will be sad repercussions for the children. I was
born and raised on a farm in Texas and there are great
opportunities there today.
This story really breaks my heart, and I wish you all the luck in Texas in the future. There is no better place to pull yourself up by the bootstraps. Blessings to all of you, especially the kids.
Sigh…
I have spent time with the Thompson family and heard their story, it cannot be allowed to happen to others. The Carbon Tax will ruin Australia, Julia Gillard will be voted out at the next election.
Best wishes for the future.