looking back...
some 30-odd years ago when I first came to this land of Oz, I perceived a possible publishing opportunity: a newspaper dedicated to nothing but letters-to-the-editor! Throw in a few editorials if you must, but let the guys pay to get their say printed. Never did a business plan, but - and the cyberbrat has put my nose in it - what I saw as a dire necessity for disseminating ideas in this vast, dry island continent has now been provided by Blogspot et al!

It is still exceedingly difficult in this country to present points of view that diverge markedly from the prevailing political correctness. Archaic libel laws also play a role.

My experience is that rarely does a writ of mine make it through the media filters. But perhaps this is due to the poor quality of my simple ideas and uncouth way of expressing them, in a language other than my own?

You be the judge: I'll attempt, over the next few holiday weeks, to backfill my empty blog archives with letters I've sent to radios, magazines, newspapers of all types, one a wide variety of topics that then interested me, dated according to their original (non)appearance. If the odd one made it into print through the baleen of the media filters, I'll signal that accordingly.

I've cut out certain names to protect the guilty, instead, you'll see XXXs...

MTC