http://larvatusprodeo.net/2007/06/21/tampa-2007-edition/

Please also note a number of updates to the original post.

I should mention tigtog has an excellent post about this issue

http://viv.id.au/blog/?p=671

that is horrendous - it shows the human magnitude of what is proposed.

As I said above, this feels like another Water Plan. Cooked up pretty quickly to try to create a positive out of 11 years of inactivity by making a grandiose statement and stripping powers from states (or a territory). An effective wedge could also be possible.

It may well be as effective as that water plan, and slowly disappear up it’s own fundamental orifice as how it will be implemented starts having to be addressed. I actually don’t think the plan will be workable - or that it will not be tied up in court action for the foreseeable future - something Howard may well be banking on.

Production line invasive testing of young children would not be a good look at all, as well as being morally repugnant.

One thing, if Howard wins, next election the Coalition will not be able to hide from the success or failure of the grand plan.

What safeguards will be in place to ensure that non-indigenous abusers don’t get employment performing these examinations? Because you can bet that some of them have medical/paramedical training.

I’m assuming they’ll get the already overworked Community Nurse that job. But who will pay for the additional resources to process said tests - especially in areas a long way from major regional areas like Darwin or Alice Springs.

And my use of the term “Political Pedophilia”, in this case is totally justified as the Govt are using Abused Childrem as a power base to gain control of Aboriginal Communities from the Northern Territory - the exact same tactic used by Sexual Predators themselves.

Rudd is now in the same position Beazley was with Tampa. Damned if he supports it by his own base, damned if he doesn’t by a significant number of swinging voters.

I think you’re drawing a long bow, BigBob.

This is quite different from Tampa and its effect on voting intentions is likely to be negligible.

What made Tampa so potent was the threat of the ‘other’.

That element simply does not exist with this issue. People are likely to forget about this in a few days as it has no tangible or even perceived effects on swinging voter’s lives.

What Rudd should say is that he agrees something urgently needs to be done but he doesn’t agree with elements of the governments approach and he’ll form his own policy in government after careful consultation with the indigenous community.

He also needs to point out why the government has neglected this issue for 11 years.

They are seriously advocating rectal and cervical swabs for children who may never have been sexually active, just because they are indigenous and under 16? In an assembly line atmosphere?

What safeguards will be in place to ensure that non-indigenous abusers don’t get employment performing these examinations? Because you can bet that some of them have medical/paramedical training.

On a more optimistic note, I’m not ready to give up hope that Australians will see how blatantly OTT and cynical this policy is… or that they’ll ask, if the Government has had this authority all along, why didn’t they use it a long time ago?

But the question is: how suspending land rights and civil rights are going to address this successfully? It seems like the government wants to start violating all manner of UN conventions in order to secure the rights of the child. That, for me at least, is not good enough.

Ever visited a community and had grandmothers hanging off you, begging you to take their grandchildren away with you to protect from their parents?

Ever heard of the International convention on the rights of the Child?

Authoritarian, reactionary and extreme perhaps, but political peadophilia is a vile and opportunistic slur.

“Reconciliation Australia shares the community’s outrage at acts of criminal violence perpetrated against children who have the right, like all Australians, to be safe, and we welcome the sense of urgency reflected in today’s announcement by the Prime Minister.�

I also saw that grab on Channel Stokes (7) as well, talk about selective editing, and still there has been no official statement from rudd either, nor from Noel Pearson, whose “Ground breaking report” caused Ratty & Brough to react.

“up to 80,000 people will be required to join full time work-for-the-dole programs or lose their welfare payments because the Federal Government believes there has never been a better time for people to find jobs. From today, people who have been unemployed for two years or more will have to work for 25 hours a week on programs such as tree planting or building maintenance for 10 months of the year as a condition of receiving unemployment benefits.”

http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/job-market-never-better-so-80000-to-work-for-dole/2007/06/17/1182018939054.html

Today, Team Howard has a radical new plan to solve all infrastructure probs for indigenous peoples. They lose all control over all their land and are provided with new, revised, ‘public service positions’, called ‘work for the dole’, that will solve everything. First nation peoples’ will cop the 4 dollars an hour with the bonus of another 4, if they are good.

It is no way rascist, as the plan is to screw all people who are poor ,either black or white, because it helps excite focus groups with free textas.

Some other reaction:

‘Authoritarian’

Critics of the plan have questioned the timing and potential racism of the drastic changes.

Greens leader Bob Brown says years of inaction by Mr Howard have forced the Government into dangerous racial discrimination territory.

“It is a pre-election push which is action on a scale that is absolutely not needed,” he said.

Democrats Senator Andrew Bartlett says it is an outrageous authoritarian crackdown, and he is outraged Mr Howard did not first consult the Northern Territory’s Indigenous communities.

“If they aren’t involved in developing the solutions, then the solutions aren’t going to work,” he said.

Anger expected

The federal Labor Member for Lingiari, Warren Snowdon, says he does not believe the Aboriginal communities he represents will be happy to give up control of their affairs.

Mr Snowdon says while he welcomes the Commonwealth taking welfare issues seriously, some elements of the plan will not be popular.

“I don’t think it’ll be received very well,” he said.

“Effectively, if you look at it externally without commenting on the merits or otherwise of it, what they’re proposing is to remove permits and at the same time take the townships away from Aboriginal people effectively, thereby undermining some of the central elements of the Land Rights Act.”

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/06/21/1958547.htm

This is what’s been getting air on the TV as representative of Abl opinion. I saw it on one of the commercial networks this afternoon. The reservations expressed later in the media release aren’t being mentioned. The fact that Reconcilation Australia is not an Abl representative organisation wasn’t mentioned.

http://www.reconciliationaustralia.org/downloads/157/Family_Violence.pdf

Last Friday his electorate was nominated as the area for the Nuclear enrichment plant so his electoral stocks have not been high. Printgate has cast a pall over the whole Queensland Federal Parliamentary team with allegations of misspent printing expenses by some Federal Liberals.

For these reasons his seat was looking shaky and it will be out of character if this ambitious plan can be made to work by him-because on past form one would have serious doubts. He just does not inspire confidence in his ability to date.

Aboriginal legal groups need to take out injunctions preventing federal authorities administering their duties in a discriminatory manner.

If Howard wants to make use of the race powers provision in Australia’s racist constitution, then force him to pass legislation:

1. Garnishing entitlements.

2. Compulsorily acquiring land owned by Aboriginal bodies.

3. Banning sale and consumption of a legal product

4. Banning possession of certain classes of publications.

The most retrograde thing that can happen to Aborigines is that they are returned to a state of legal second class citizenship. Because if you don’t have your liberty, you don’t have anything.

Isn’t this ironic, that Faith Bandler has lived long enough to witness this.

This announcement has no effect on my thoughts. I just hope that others can remember more than a few days in the past.

… and what about Mal Brough? How does he feel about the sexual abuse of children being used as a tool to further his party’s political/electoral agenda.

I think I’d class that as Political Pedophillia