In the far east of Germany lie two infamous valleys. One is the far northeastern tip of the country, the other is around Dresden. During the Soviet occupation of East Germany, they were known as "Die Täler der Ahnungslosen", or the Valleys of the Clueless.
Not because the people there are unusually stupid, but because of the areas' topography which meant that West German television broadcasts couldn’t reach them. They were therefore cut off from the rest of the world, with only the East German state propaganda reaching them.
There are times when I feel I am living in the Valley of the Clueless, that valley being Australia. Here we all are, in an extreme energy crisis — although, if you listened to our clueless Labor government, you'd think that everything will be fine as long as we drive without our roof racks — and yet we maintain a full legislative ban on civilian nuclear power while sitting on nearly 28% of the planet’s known uranium reserves.
While China is building a nuclear empire, Australia is completely absent — zero operating capacity and zero prospective builds. While we are sitting on piddling fuel reserves, we are exporting gas. We also have oil but can't drill for it lest we upset our own homegrown bunch of Greta Thunbergs. And don't get me started on all those shut-down refineries.
While European investors still remember surprise bank holidays, limits on their ATM withdrawals, capital controls, double digit inflation and governments defaulting on their bonds, the stockmarket valuation of our country's biggest bank is greater than the world's biggest miner.
Our blissful ignorance is more ignorance than bliss.
