This decade's broken, I want my money back

Good morning, wondering if you can help me. I'm looking for the returns desk. I have this decade and it seems to be broken - badly broken - so I'm after a refund.

It's been brought to my attention it had been five years since COVID-19 was declared a pandemic and it will soon be five years since the first Australian lockdown was implemented.

The 2020s had already got off to a disastrous start with the Black Summer fires. We fled our home on January 4, 2020, when the fire that had turned day into night the week before returned. We'd been through a close call once and weren't prepared to endure it again. We scarcely noticed the other threat on the horizon.

On January 25, the first case of COVID was recorded in Australia. A week later, the rains came, dousing the flames but triggering a different kind of emergency. The road that takes me into town is still potholed from that deluge half a decade later - the endless patching has left it looking like a badly made quilt.

In a workplace debrief after the fires had gone out, I told the counsellor I'd navigated my way through Black Summer quite well despite the moments of fear but was more anxious about the pandemic. She had no answer, no suggestions, for dealing with the new emergency. She hadn't been briefed on it. None of us had.

The pandemic turned everything upside down. Homes became classrooms and offices and, for many unfortunate people confined to apartments, prisons. The goodwill that followed the fires quickly turned to selfishness and suspicion. The toilet paper brawl in the Western Sydney supermarket was emblematic of the dark time.

But compared to other countries we got through the pandemic relatively well. In the US in 2020 there were 1,219,038 deaths. Yet we saw the bizarre spectacle of then-president Donald Trump suggesting bleach might fix the problem. And in October, after his own bout of COVID, ripping off his face mask in a creditable impersonation of Benito Mussolini on the White House balcony.

Surely, we thought, it can't get worse than this. It did.

There was the January 6, 2021, insurrection in Washington. By April of that year, global supply chain disruptions caused by COVID began to be felt across the world. Inflation began to arrive shortly afterwards but galloped away in February 2022 when Russia invaded Ukraine.

We joked about bingo cards, but no one in 2021 would have foreseen a full-scale ground war in Europe turning up on theirs. Nor would they have expected the other war that followed in 2023 after Hamas murdered 1200 Israelis and Israel bombed Gaza back beyond the Stone Age, with a death toll climbing to 46,000 people.

And now the decade has delivered Trump 2.0 with its disastrous trade war, the intensity of which seems to change from tantrum to tantrum, and an obsession with annexing Canada and Greenland.

We're only halfway through and thoroughly exhausted by the 2020s. It's so bad that old hands like me look back fondly at the Cold War and the certainty of MAD - mutually assured destruction - which kept the superpowers and their leaders in check. In its place we now have chaos.

Which is why I'm returning the decade and demanding my money back.

HAVE YOUR SAY: Halfway through the 2020s, how's the decade working for you? Can you remember another time in your life when things felt quite so uncertain? Email us: echidna@theechidna.com.au

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IN CASE YOU MISSED IT:

- Treasurer Jim Chalmers has confirmed a budget deficit after posting two surpluses as he announces more cyclone-aftermath support. An additional $1.2 billion will go toward disaster payments and rebuilding local communities and forms part of a broader $13.5 billion natural disaster response package in the budget.

- A collection of famous paintings by notable Australian artists has been seized as police confiscated more than $11 million in assets from an alleged organised crime syndicate.

- Former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull has trashed the AUKUS partnership as a "bad deal" for Australia, amid concerns over the future of the trilateral security alliance.

THEY SAID IT: "A crust eaten in peace is better than a banquet partaken in anxiety." - Aesop

YOU SAID IT: We're right to be angered by the American influencer who snatched the baby wombat from its mother. But we should save some fury for the person off-camera who laughed through the whole episode.

Paul from Googong writes: "The woman and man involved did a stupid thing and should be held accountable under applicable laws for taking the joey wombat from its mother (although I note she did return the joey soon after). For Ms Jones to be condemned by the Prime Minister and Home Affairs Minister, to allegedly have received death threats, and to be encouraged to leave the country is punishment beyond the crime. It seems to me that in our social media-obsessed community, wombat abuse is on the same scale of severity as making offensive remarks against the Matildas, even if the remarks were meant to be a joke. Marty Sheargold lost his job over that, and now Echidna wants Sheargold's offsiders punished, too. But when queer comedian Reuben Kaye was allowed to make an obscene and offensive Jesus joke on The Project a couple of years ago, no one lost their job. There was an apology and the world moved on. So it would appear we are living in a society where wombats and the Matildas are seen as sacred but the Christian faith is not."

"As an American who absolutely loves wombats, I was appalled when I saw the video of that influencer snatching the baby wombat and running away from its mother with it," writes Carolyn. "The influencer looked like she was having a wonderful time. In our local paper today, the Minneapolis Star Tribune, there was a small snippet telling about her apologising for doing that, and her excuse for running away from the mother with the baby was from her fear that the mother wombat might attack her. Personally, in that case, I would root for the mother wombat."

Scott writes: "Insightful and correct as ever. The New Zealand media was also pretty quick to pick up that Sam Jones-Strable was recently videoed handling an echidna. She has no filter, and nor indeed does her mysterious Australian lamprey. She's not given so-called influencers any name at all, let alone a good one. As was pointed out elsewhere, let's see her pick up a baby croc and see how long she lasts!! And Miss Sam, it's not the Australian overnment's fault either that you chose to be an idiot, all for the sake of your millennial audience. Enjoy your flight home to the United States of Trump."

"Both she and the idiot who filmed the episode are disgusting individuals are deserve nothing more than disgust from the world's population," writes Veronica. "Yes, we all should stand up and call out this behaviour instead of laughing about it because someone doesn't have the guts to make known their disgust. Good on you for calling this out."

Jennifer writes: "Much appreciated, John, that you acknowledged that General Morrison did not create that phrase. Very glad that his timely public use of it has made it well-known and well-used, no matter his own previous attitudes. It is good when leaders change their views and their behaviour to better lead others in the right direction. We can all learn and grow throughout our lives if we wish to do so."

"That's spot on, John," writes Terry. "I've been waiting for somebody to point to the videographer whose comments egged on the bad behaviour. He should fess up and apologise for his egregious behaviour. Thanks for your good work."

Chris writes: "Thank you for your article about the wombat's stressful day. I was appalled by the video of that stupid girl taking the baby wombat from its mother! I totally agree with you about the creep behind the camera! What a pity he can't be found and held in contempt. My brother has more than nine resident wombats on his property along with many kangaroos, koalas, deer (not welcome) and sometimes echidna. We all feel so privileged that we get to share the land with them and they are treated with respect."

"I fully agree that the Aussie enabler showed as bad if not worse behaviour than the stupid influencer," writes David. "I just wish we would show as much righteous outrage about climate, housing, domestic violence, corruption, workers' rights, equal pay, and so many other issues as well as protection of our native fauna."

Sue writes: "Edmund Burke is attributed with saying: The only thing necessary for evil to flourish is for good men to do nothing. We can all think of many examples of this, from the every day to larger events. The enabler goes way beyond this, and technology allows, if not encourages this behaviour. It is very easy to stand behind a phone/camera, record something and have it instantly published, possibly to a preexisting audience. One wonders whether the "influencer's" audience would have responded so negatively if there hadn't been a wider audience of Aussie wombat supporters?"