It is not a debate, as Howard for so long pretended, invented by ideologically driven academics about Australia's past.
Match of the Day was there right at the start of all this: and here it is now 50 years on gallingly the same, like Karl Benz still puttering around Mannheim in his triple-wheeled Motorwagen, leather helmet in place, while two streets away somebody else has long since invented the autobahn and the V6 engine.
All told, its operations suggest some real-life version of the fantastical mega-corporations that have long been invented by fiction writers; a more benign version of the Tyrell Corporation from Blade Runner, say, or one of those creations from James Bond movies whose name always seems to end with the word "industries".
We shall leave to the ironic peace of their tombs those disturbed minds that not so long ago invented a Day of the Race for the Portuguese, and instead reclaim the magnificent mixing, not only of bloods but above all of cultures, that gave Portugal its foundation and has made it last to this day.
This is a country whose music of choice is jazz; a country that long ago invented a genre called highlife that spread across Africa — and, more recently, hiplife, which is what happens when hip-hop meets reggaetón meets rhythm and blues meets Ghanaian melody, if you're keeping track (and you really should be).
It would be difficult to overstate how bananas all of this is when clever institutional designers long ago invented a way to perform runoff elections instantaneously.
"It's a pity for humanity that it took so long to invent this shoe," he said.
"For me, the concept of pilot season is an anachronism, invented a long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.
The English invented long recreational piers in response toa problem created by their earlier invention of seaside holidays as a glamorous options for the beau monde.
(I was wrong. It was invented long before that).
