Still only the weekly Essential Research results to go on so far this year, and this week’s figures have made very little difference to this week’s reading of BludgerTrack, except that Labor gains an extra seat in Queensland. Also of note is that One Nation’s upward trend shows no signs of abating, with the party now level with the Greens. Nothing new this week on leadership ratings. The looming resumption of parliament suggests Newspoll’s end-of-year sabattical will come to an end either Sunday or Monday night.
Fess
I have seen that Rogue POTUS twitter account previously, and am of the view that they could be trolling
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-04/green-v-mundine-live-streamers-warned-to-brace-for-legal-action/8241276
..if Australians are uniquely evil, racist etc than that’s an issue which goes far beyond our treatment of refugees, and any refugee policy we come up with will have to take that into account. Arguably, settling any refugees at all into such a society would be counter productive.
If Australians are uniquely evil and racist, it’s hard to explain our multicultural society, which works pretty well on the whole.
However, if we are to deal with Australia’s unique evil and racism, then we need to work out where it comes from. What makes Australians different from the rest of humanity? What do we need to change about Australian culture?
Of course, I believe Australians are actually a fairly laid back and tolerant people, probably less racist than most countries in the world.
But then, I love the country I live in and its people. Both could be improved, of course, on the whole, it’s a great place.
I’m sure WWP and frednk are far greater human beings in every way than I can ever aspire to be. I’m sure their houses are filled with refugees and that large portions of their spare time and money go to making the world a better place.
Or, alternatively, they could be just fairly ordinary bods like the rest of us, who like to sound noble and superior on the internet but – like the rest of us – rarely have to put their principles into practice.
Comment for my previous: Not the sharpest tools in the shed!
Trump’s lies are not the problem. It’s the millions who swallow them who really matter
Compulsive liars shouldn’t frighten you. They can harm no one, if no one listens to them. Compulsive believers, on the other hand: they should terrify you. Believers are the liars’ enablers. Their votes give the demagogue his power. Their trust turns the charlatan into the president. Their credulity ensures that the propaganda of half-calculating and half-mad fanatics has the power to change the world.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/feb/05/donald-trump-lies-belief-totalitarianism
wewantpaul @ #192 Sunday, February 5, 2017 at 12:32 pm
Well said WWP.
IMHO a strong majority of Australians would not support this if they really knew what was going on. Hence the LNP need for secrecy.
I really don’t want to sound like I’m defending Nauru/Manus, but the idea that rape and torture of refugees is a uniquely Australian phenomenon is simply untrue —
‘People who fled to Tanzania are not safe from sexual violence in refugee camps, where the numbers of rapes are alarmingly high, including of children. Women and girls have been raped both inside the camps and in areas outside where they collect firewood or goods for market, often as many as three or four cases a week. Women said the attackers included both other Burundian refugees and Tanzanians. Humanitarians told Human Rights Watch they are concerned about high numbers of rapes of children.’
https://www.hrw.org/news/2016/07/27/burundi-gang-rapes-ruling-party-youth
‘What you also cannot tell from these photographs is that rape, violence, and crime within the camp is prevalent. Aid workers have reported a soaring number of rape and sexualized violence cases against the women and children at Zaatari..’
‘A UN worker told Wolfe while she was at Zaatari that the levels of domestic violence were as bad as anything she’d witnessed …’
http://www.womenundersiegeproject.org/blog/entry/as-violence-soars-a-photographic-look-inside-the-zaatari-camp-in-jordan
These are camps run by the UNHCR. They’re out of sight and out of mind for most of the world; ultimately we are all responsible for what happens there.
That doesn’t mean we’re not culpable for Nauru/Manus, either (and, as we fund them, obviously more so).
But to contend that Australians are somehow a different order of human being because of Nauru/Manus is a big call.
zoomster
Sunday, February 5, 2017 at 1:05 pm
….
If Australians are uniquely evil and racist, it’s hard to explain our multicultural society, which works pretty well on the whole.
So you now going full straw man.
The argument is our current detention facilities are inhuman; not unexpected as the aim was to produce something worse than the risk of drowning (or so it was said).
After trying to convince all this happened because Australians are so screwed up they demanded this in preference to drowning you give us this. Not sure where you coming from now;it’s starting to get hard to follow you argument.
victoria:
I haven’t decided either whether it’s a real insider or just some kind of parody/joke.
bemused
‘IMHO a strong majority of Australians would not support this if they really knew what was going on. Hence the LNP need for secrecy.’
I agree, which is why I’m disputing WWP and frednk’s view of the Australian people.
You can’t have it both ways – either Australians are fully aware of Nauru/Manus, and because they are inherently evil people, approve of them; or they’re unaware, and because they are normal human beings, would disapprove of them if they did know.
Boerwar
I like your attitude.
Zoomster
In your would I assume a mass murder of Aborigines is acceptable because of the rwandan genocide.
Back away from this.
frednk @ #208 Sunday, February 5, 2017 at 1:18 pm
Yes, Zoomster has a veritable army of straw men.
frednk
You don’t understand the argument because you’ve shifted the goalposts, which is not unexpected.
As I’ve repeatedly said I don’t approve on Nauru/Manus, then we’re in agreement.
Wanting to stop deaths at sea and approving of Nauru/Manus are not, as you constantly seem to assume, necessarily connected positions.
Frednk
No, but I would understand that human beings have violent instincts that lead, in some cases, to murder. I wouldn’t decide that the people who massacred the aborigines and the people who massacred the Rwandans weren’t human beings, but simply a subset of human beings who use violence against others.
Frednk
…to clarify: You seem to be confusing ‘human beings are capable of behaving in X fashion’ with “I approve of human beings behaving in X fashion.’
Those are two totally different concepts.
I understand that human beings can commit acts of genocide; I do not approve of them doing so.
However, if we don’t try and understand why it is human beings are capable of acts of genocide, then we will be unable to prevent acts of genocide happening in the future.
Boomy1
Poking a stick in the ants nest of evangelism during the dark hours I notice. 😀
zoomster
Sunday, February 5, 2017 at 1:23 pm
…
Wanting to stop deaths at sea and approving of Nauru/Manus are not, as you constantly seem to assume, necessarily connected positions.
My position has always been that they are not connected; and watching politicians who claim otherwise leads to a desire to rush of to the loo.
A risk of death at sea is not enough to stop you; ok we will make your life misery for decades because even though our for fathers took the risk we don’t want you too. Serious crap.
Stopping that line of bullshit would in itself be an improvement in the debate.
What are sticks for CTar 1?
I have no reason to believe Australians are uniquely racist and bigotted. It’s probably about 10-20% of the population. Other nations ae likely similar, depending upon the level of education (negatively correlated), standard of living. (ditto), historical background (ancient wrongs and hatreds, e.g Yugoslavia), level of insecurity (war, poverty, famine, terrorism, etc) and no doubt lots of other things. Australia is still a wealthy, healthy and well educated country by and large and therefore has less excuse than many.
Australia has a dark underside, like other nations. Australia’s dark side includes racism and bigotry. Now bigots and Coalition voters (two overlapping sets) are human of course. And they vote. But it’s the politics of the Right (and I mean right / far right wing political groupings like the Liberals, Nationals, One Nation but not Labor factions) have ruthlessly stirred up the Dark Side for political gain. For that, they should stand condemned. Labor have been no angels in all this, whiskey priests maybe, while the Greens, like the impotent, remain pure.
end rant
Boomy1 – I sometimes think I can hear ‘Onward Christian Soldiers’ in the background!
Bemused,
Being a little ‘picky’ or what!
It’s quite obvious C@ just means a navy combatant ship.
She was quoting a source who was supposed to be authoritative.
I don’t think her source is worth very much.
Way to miss the wood for the trees, Bemused!
CTar1 is absolutely correct. I was recalling from memory an interview I heard on the radio a few days ago about what the quid pro quo for Trump’s support of the Obama/Turnbull refugee deal may likely be.
I mentioned 2 credible options. You chose to pick on something extraneous to the central points.
The fact is that I have no interest in, no experience in, Naval infrastructure. If we have Warships, not Battleships, or just a Rubber Duckie with a few gung-ho sailors aboard, then I neither care nor care to know the difference it makes to get it right.
It seems America may want Australia to challenge China in the South China Sea with a Naval vessel. That is what the expert on the radio said and I believe them. For, if you also haven’t heard, Trump’s Defence Secretary, General Mattis, was in Japan today telling them to get more muscular with China in defending their contested territory.
That’s the sort of thing that is important to me. The other stuff is just intellectual naval lint. 🙂
Zoomster
Sunday, February 5, 2017 at 1:17 pm
I really don’t want to sound like I’m defending Nauru/Manus…
The point is that the thorough-going degradation of prisoners is an intended outcome. Their degradation is inevitable and is exploited by the authorities. They have no wish to prevent it. Indeed, they foster it. It suits their purposes for those in detention to be held up as examples – to be subject to exemplary punishments and deprivations.
This is what happens when people are deprived of their individual legal rights; stripped of their very personality and their rights to be heard. Their objectification commences when they are seized and trafficked into captivity and is completed when they are killed, raped or beaten or when they take their own lives.
None of this is accidental. It is deliberately done.
The blame for these wrongs is attached to the prisoners themselves, to the human smugglers, to the aid-workers and journalists, to the political opponents of the Government.
This is also part of the purpose – to produce shame, blame, guilt and remorse. These emotions are the currency of this insanity. They can be and are machined into political weapons.
We should be under no illusions at all. The populations we keep in detention are our political prisoners. They are held hostage purely for the political advantages they generate. We have become skilled in this. We have out-sourced our depravities to our clients in Nauru and PNG. Our neighbours in Indonesia and Malaysia have their own apparatus. Others are tempted to copy us. The refugee camps, filled with the displaced, are the other side of the same coin. They are “victims-who-shall-be-blamed”.
It is now the case that refugees and Muslims are almost interchangeable. They are in fact to be subjected to the same treatment. They will be denounced, criminalised and excluded or expelled. They will be stripped of their personality and their freedoms not because of what they have done but because of who they are.
This is the “inhuman condition” that we have conjured up in the name of pity.
ABC24 has even more John Barron on … check what else is on … Power Rangers looks good.
c@tmomma @ #222 Sunday, February 5, 2017 at 1:39 pm
Even under Obama the US wanted Australia and other nations to join them in ‘Freedom of Navigation’ exercises.
I recommend re-watching ‘Sink The Bismark’ to catch up on a bit of naval stuff and seeing what a Battleship is.
They are Naval Dinosaurs and were obsolete by WWII but few realised it.
These days a small ship like a destroyer armed with missiles packs more punch than the WWII behemoth Battleships.
Everyone has their own crusades CTar1, problem is this one might end badly. Like all the others.
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/weather/sydney-sweats-through-a-sweltering-sunday-on-way-to-smashing-120year-record-20170205-gu5ruh.html
And it feels like every minute of it!
Steve777
Sunday, February 5, 2017 at 1:36 pm
…
while the Greens, like the impotent, remain pure.
Given the Greens blocked the Malaysian effort (it could have been the start of something or a fizza; we will never know); I think their contribution has been less than pure.
Boomy1
My guess is close but no trophy.
Fess
I am inclined to think they are not insiders at all
bemused
Sunday, February 5, 2017 at 1:46 pm
I recommend re-watching ‘Sink The Bismark’ to catch up on a bit of naval stuff and seeing what a Battleship is.
They are Naval Dinosaurs and were obsolete by WWII but few realised it.
**************************************
It is interesting though that the great USS MISSOURI ( Mighty MO ) had a longish history beyond WW 2 – Missouri was ordered in 1940 and commissioned in June 1944. In the Pacific Theater of World War II she fought in the battles of Iwo Jima and Okinawa and shelled the Japanese home islands, and she fought in the Korean War from 1950 to 1953.
She was decommissioned in 1955 into the United States Navy reserve fleets (the “Mothball Fleet”), but reactivated and modernized in 1984 as part of the 600-ship Navy plan, and provided fire support during Operation Desert Storm in January/February 1991.
Buy – you are correct in that she was the last of the dinosauars
Frednk
Sunday, February 5, 2017 at 1:50 pm
Steve777
Sunday, February 5, 2017 at 1:36 pm
…
while the Greens, like the impotent, remain pure.
Given the Greens blocked the Malaysian effort (it could have been the start of something or a fizza; we will never know); I think their contribution has been less than pure.
The Greens exploit refugees too. They also traffic shame. As with the Liberals, for the Greens refugees are not a problem to be solved. They are a resource to be mined.
But – you are correct in that she was the last of the dinosauars – and replaced universally with carriers ……
CTar1
I heard that Lee Harvey Oswald was coming out of retirement to fight a cage match with John Wilkes Booth to find a final solution to the moron question in America. (a Canadian told me that.)
Awesome to see a battleship broadside
America’s Mightiest Battleship – USS Missouri
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_b4mVfTZ-XI
The quality media in the US are getting started.
phoenixred @ #231 Sunday, February 5, 2017 at 1:53 pm
Missouri could only operate in Korea, Desert Storm etc. because it had no real opposition.
Had a big role in a Steven Segal movie ‘Under Siege’ though.
phoenixred @ #235 Sunday, February 5, 2017 at 2:00 pm
I recall it being in Sydney Harbour some years (decades?) ago and regret not taking the opportunity to have a look at it. I was visiting Sydney at the time.
Briefly
Agree. There are better ways to stop deaths at sea whilst taking more refugees who are in more need.
It’s worth remembering that Nauru/Manus are the result of the Coalition and the Greens blocking the legislation needed to craft a regional solution. Gillard then ‘outsourced’ the issue to a panel of experts (including refugee advocates) who came up with offshore detention. It was not meant to be indefinite, but it was meant to provide ‘no advantage’ to those who came by boat (that is, they would be detained for the same length of time a refugee in a UNHCR camp could expect to be detained). Rudd then extended this to indefinite detention.
Of the three options – a regional solution on the lines of the Malaysian solution, detention which was indeterminate but not permanent (and included a raft of services and guarantees that don’t exist now) and permanent incarceration – I’m strongly in favour of the first.
PhoenixRED
Courtesy of RN Type 42 Gloucester which was chosen to go forward over available USN boats to clear the way for Missouri to be taken inshore.
Gloucester’s Sea Darts knocked down a Iraqi ‘Silkworm’ while doing it – the first actual missile-to-missile strike outside of testing.
The next day she scored a Mig.
(I just knew that sometime Sea Dart would actually work!)
PhoenixRED
I was lucky enough to get a tour of the Mighty Mo when it was open to the public in Freo. Highlight was seeing a plaque on the deck marking where the Japanese formally surrendered. I had seen the surrender pictures but did not realise she was the ship. Quite a thought to think of who was there and what went on at the very spot I was standing.
.
…I had a conversation with someone today (I mostly listened) who mourned the fact that the Greens don’t seem to talk about the environment much at all now, and that the shift to trying to tackle the same issues as the major parties is making them less relevant rather than more.
Is there any Turnbull government disaster that isn’t “Labor’s fault”?
‘No marriage vote Labor’s fault’
1:04PMRACHEL BAXENDALE
Christopher Pyne says Labor stood in the way of giving people a vote on same sex marriage by opposing the plebiscite.
Very recently I met a gentleman a few days after his release from prison in Northam. He is an Afghan who was raised as a refugee in Iran from the age of five. He is about 40 years old now. He spent five years in captivity in Australia though he had never committed any offence. He may be returned to captivity at any time. He has not been awarded permanent protection.
He has a son, now ten, who he has not seen he fled Iran, in 2011. His wife has passed away. The rest of his family are still in limbo in Iran.
This man was forced from his home as a child, though, as in Australia, he had done nothing wrong. Having lost his home through no fault of his own or of his family, he spent his life in a no-man’s land in Iran, without legal rights, able to work only occasionally, and having had only a partial education.
He is a kindly, whimsical and gentle fellow, and clever. I like him. It’s impossible not to admire his courage and his will to find freedom.
bemused Sunday, February 5, 2017 at 2:06 pm
phoenixred @ #235 Sunday, February 5, 2017 at 2:00 pm
“Awesome to see a battleship broadside
America’s Mightiest Battleship – USS Missouri
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_b4mVfTZ-XI”
I recall it being in Sydney Harbour some years (decades?) ago and regret not taking the opportunity to have a look at it. I was visiting Sydney at the time.
*******************************************
I saw the USS IOWA in LA …… just a HUGE ship ….
I think it was Poroti ??? the other day that spoke about elements of the US Navy he saw at San Diego, which is the principal port of the US Pacific Fleet, …. as I did …… and to see all these huge carriers and great harbour filled with battle grey ,warships of all types was a sight to behold ….
Boomy – 😆
Oh Poroti – just saw your post after I sent mine – good to see you on deck !!!!
Sinking the boot in:
Peta Credlin: A week Malcolm in a muddle would rather forget
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/rendezview/peta-credlin-a-week-malcolm-in-a-muddle-would-rather-forget/news-story/d28321c44bab9882ffaf965dc4affdd0
Regarding the talk of the USS Missouri. I was in Freo when she lobbed at the time of the America’s cup. She had to anchor way out because of her draught. Choppers flew the crews in to shore where they soon has fist-fights with all the Australian’s who didn’t like loud. Oh how they were loud , talk about throwing a spanner in the works, these guys were so up themselves I was glad to be Australian. So. I get Trump, I know where the dickheads are coming from.
Bemused,
Even under Obama the US wanted Australia and other nations to join them in ‘Freedom of Navigation’ exercises.
Yes, I am aware of this, however the distinction now is that Trump may attempt to coerce Australia into carrying out a Freedom of Navigation exercise in the South China Sea in exchange for the Refugee Deal being fulfilled. Or the other mooted suggestion of sending boots on the ground into Trump’s first military adventure.
Also, I think I’ll give ‘Sink the Bismark’ a miss because, as I said, I’m not really interested in that sort of stuff! 😀