It doesn't get much more totally awesome early 1990s than a picture of a pollie joining forces with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to fight drugs. This bodacious front page featured Raphael and Donatello and federal health minister Peter Staples doing his best to look cool holding three fingers up like a ninja turtle - and we have to assume saying "Cowabunga".
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But the stunt was part of an admirable campaign to teach kids that "drugs are uncool". More than 700 kids and their parents welcomed the rapping representations of the cartoon superstars at a launch of the Drug Offensive's new campaign.
The Turtles were chosen because of their appeal to children in the seven-to-14-year age group.
The message from Raphael, Donatello and their brothers Leonardo and Michelangelo were that drugs and alcohol were ""Brain Reducto Absurdo", "Mutant Pollutant", "Destructo Mento", "Ultra Unmondo" and "Turtley Unbodacious".
It might seem hard to believe now, but kids those days were speaking that way.
"We need to reach young Australians in all age brackets and talk to them in their own language," a Drug Offensive spokesman said.
Totally.
