Comments on: Asylum seekers and Indonesia

By: r4i software

r4i software — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 04:47:22 +0000

The problem in Indonesia is that these people are not allowed to work, the children have no access to education?—?there is no future. There are Iraqi and Afghan teenagers in Indonesia who have missed 8-10 years of schooling.

By: Elise

Elise — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 06:49:47 +0000

Gordon @61, mate you make a lot of assumptions, you generalise, and you take black and white positions.

If you had read what I wrote more carefully, you would see the word “often”, meaning “not always”.

“they often do not have papers, often need a lot of looking after (due to being illiterate &/or unskilled), and arrive uninvited.”

You generalised that to assume “always” in your reply.

As for your comment “That analogy is certainly dodgy. Firstly, if your cousin was in a life or death situation i dont think you would really care how he arrived, as long as he was safe. Secomdly, these people are coming here willing to work hard and not live for free.”

There are assumptions about what the boat people are thinking. Not all of them are particularly committed, as we saw on ABC/SBS (I forget which) recently about an Iraqi family. Lots of grizzling about the Aussie refugee and welfare systems, and he hadn’t even managed to learn english in 9 years. NINE YEARS, and still not learn the language of the country!! Some commitment that was…

Furthermore, you had a big fat IF on your amendment to the cousin analogy. Obviously if an extended family member is in a “life or death” situation then most people would take them in. That was IFFF.

However, there is no proof that this is the case, only your assumptions.

If they were just looking for an indefinate free ride and all expenses paid, then cousin or no cousin, I would not be letting them stay. I speak from past experience here, of a lazy bum of a cousin that is in the habit of being out of work and free-loading on his relatives.

By: Fran Barlow

Fran Barlow — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 01:38:37 +0000

To be fair myriad as Howard lost the popular vote in 1998 and with 4000 of those spread across a handful of seats would have lost to Beazley, and as Howard was able to get the votes of people who still hated Keating but thought the Dems would stop the sell-off of Telstra, the GST and other of Howard’s hardline policies allowing an impossible coalition to support him …

When the ALP went to water in 2001 over Tampa this also allowed him to recreate the same coalition. Had they shown some policy principle and run hard on Howard being a xenophobic wag the dog bigot he’d probably not have won that election either.

By: joe2

joe2 — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 01:30:59 +0000

Lefty E . Nothing of this swing showed up in the Essential Research Poll. There is something very weird about Newspol this time round and folks are coming to all sorts of conclusions. Nearly all are contradictory.

By: Paul Burns

Paul Burns — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 01:20:39 +0000

myriad74,
There’s always going to be a percentage of people fearing terrorists are abroad on the seas, on the Sydney City Circle, or hiding in the toilets at Flinders Street Station. But when it comes to actually casting a vote, the vast majority of Aussies are just not that cretinous. a couple of days before election day or on the morning of election day they sit down and have a bit of a think about how they’re going to vote. 9/11s + Tampas aside, they don’t usually vote stupidly – yeah, I know Howard was in for eleven years, still -
If a pollster asked me what I thought of the current lot of refugees descending upon our mangrove swamps, I’d answer Concerned. And I am concerned about them being dumped in hell-hole refugee camps in Indonesia for 10 years. Not sure exactly what that ‘concerned’ actually means.

By: Lefty E

Lefty E — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 01:17:40 +0000

I might agree Myriad – except that a/c to the pollsters themselves, the over 50s arent swinging, its the young ones moving.

That says to me Rudd is provoking cynicism by trying to please everyone, rather than those reserves of reflex exclusionism.

By: myriad74

myriad74 — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 00:51:39 +0000

agreed joe, don’t want to be hasty, just wanted to put the alternative perspective on it – grim as it is.

By: joe2

joe2 — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 00:49:57 +0000

I think it best not to rush to hasty conclusions on that poll.

I suspect Dennis Shanahan has been taking lessons from Karzai and Ahmadinejad and slipping into the Newspoll office undetected.

By: myriad74

myriad74 — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 00:32:26 +0000

Actually Lefty & Paul, I am far more concerned that the flip in poll numbers is because the Oppositions’s return to Howardia style language on asylum seekers combined with the MSM focus on the recent boats is stroking the country’s underbelly again.

When the Lowy poll finds that 70+% are ‘concerned’ at some level about asylum seekers and in the recent poll about 50% thought they might contain terrorists, I think it’s safe to say that unless we see definitive analysis otherwise, the drop in poll numbers is more likely due to Rudd et al being seen as ‘soft’ on illegal queue jumping terrorist criminal boatpeople.

By: Lefty E

Lefty E — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 00:11:03 +0000

I agree Paul: the pll result is bad BECAUSE Rudd’s trying to feign toughness, and it nauseates younger voters, who automatically assume their govt is now lying, and involuntarily retch at the reminder of Howard.

If Rudd is smart he learn a lesson here: take it out of the news cycle, stupid!

Previous pattern: Processed on Xmas island, Libs rant for a day, media loses interest, punters dont care, polls roll in gold.

Current pattern: Rudd pisses off the left (who know its all BS); the centre (who suspect its all BS),; and the Right (who will favour Libs on any “get tough” front).

LOSE LOSE LOSE for RUDD.