Western Sydney Voters Demand To Be Treated Like Asylum Seekers

Western Sydney Demands Fairness

Tuned into The Drum tonight and heard Miranda Devine describing how the voters of Western Sydney feel misunderstood. Miranda helpfully explained (see vid from 25:45) that the voters of Lindsay and Greenway are not xenophobes and are in NO WAY tuning into Scott Morrison’s nasty dog-whistles.

No.

Its just that asylum seekers get reams of welfare payments and Lindsay focus group participants do not. Its unfair. Unjust. Hurtful. Or as Tony Jones put it in an advert for Q&A, ‘In the Western Suburbs no one can hear you scream’.

How To Get As Much Free Stuff As An Asylum Seeker

Miranda and Lindsay can rest assured that the Australian government is committed to equity in the administration of welfare. To get as much free stuff as an asylum seeker you simply need to qualify as an asylum seeker. So first step, renounce your Australian citizenship, emigrate to Oruzgun province Afghanistan and become a Shia Muslim.

Your Taliban neighbours, who are genocidal maniacs, will then try to kill you. You may find yourself decapitated and lying in a ditch like these unfortunate 11 individuals found by an Australian Army patrol some time back, but maybe not. Soon ethnic Kuchi Sunni tribesman will turn up. They will be heavily armed and demand all your property. Never mind negotiating. They will take everything you own, all your flocks, land etc. then they will burn down your house and perhaps rape and/or kill you or several/all members of your family. If you again survive you may decide to become an asylum seeker. Congratulations! This is your first step to procedural equity.

Do not bother to apply for an Australian Visa in Kabul on your way out. Its location is kept secret for security reasons and it does not issue visas anyway. Scott Morrison will later ask you why you do not have a visa and describe you as an illegal. This is not personal. You just are.

Next you must escape through the rest of Afghanistan and Pakistan, also populated by genocidal maniacs. At any time you may be gunned down at a bus stop or perhaps merely kidnapped and have your eyeballs gouged out. Don’t worry, fabulous wealth awaits.

If you survive this you must then travel the thousands of kilometres overland to Indonesia. I’m sure you will find a way. In Indonesia, wait for an indeterminate length of time, do not pass customs, give all your remaining money to a people smuggler and board a horrifically crowded, unsanitary and unsafe fishing boat to cross the Timor Sea. You may or may not make it. C’est la vie!

If you do make it you may well be sent to Manus or Nauru Island for about five years for reasons of fairness to other refugees. Mental illness may help you while away the hours.

Once in Australia you will receive exactly $0 in welfare. After six months this increases to approximately $200 per week. After you have been recognised as a genuine refugee, after a long and highly scrutinized process, you are then entitled to the same Centrelink, schooling and health benefits as anyone else. No more, no less.

Yes, you may receive a household goods package worth about $10,000 while your claim is being processed but you can’t keep that stuff. It goes to the next family after you. Same with some temporary health care benefits during that phase too.

Congrats. You have now been treated as well as an asylum seeker.

One more thing. Do not speak English. As an asylum seeker you must obtain employment in a radically different language that you have never learnt before. Try Korean. Writing it is fun too.

Joe Hockey Says You Are Getting Too Much

Miranda, while empathizing with the pain of the Western Sydney voter, may also need to explain that Joe Hockey thinks you are getting far too much rather than not enough. Quite likely he’ll be the next Treasurer. Unless you vote Labor. Or Green.

So, What’s Scott On About Then ?

Miranda and Lindsay et. al. might also like to encourage Scott to pull in his dog-whistle. It appears no-one is listening. Scott is just missing the point when he describes asylum-seekers as parasitical, cunning, manipulative, violent, diseased, invasive criminals, who cause societal discohesion and overload public services and are unable to conform to respectable public behaviour without a system of local supervision by decent citizens. It is disgaceful that they should be assisted to attend the funerals of their parents.

Similarly other Coalition members are just talking to themselves when they claim asylum-seekers are a societal cancer similar to narcotics and not completely distinguishable from sexual predators.

Plainly all that is just WASTED in the Lindsay Focus Group.

Is Scott aware ?

Poor bloke.

Scott Morrison Appalls His Own Colleagues … Again

This past week saw Scott Morrison descend further into the sewer in relation to asylum-seekers, calling for Mandatory Behavioural Protocols to be applied to asylum-seekers housed in the general community while their security assessments are being completed.

Morrison took the opportunity to call for such protocols as a result of an indecent assault on a university student allegedly perpetrated by an asylum-seeker. Morrison saw this as a magnificent opportunity to further evoke fear in the community and ride further on the crest of xenophobia toward an increasingly likely looking electoral victory in September this year.

Morrison’s colleagues were appalled by his comments as shown by their distate in having to defend them to the press and public. Senator Eric Abetz looked decidely queasy as he stood before a press crew in front of Parliament House and Julie Bishop became tongue-tied to the point of almost complete stuttering incoherence as she tried to recast Morrison’s bile into something resembling reason in front of the general public during a broadcast of ABC’s Q&A.

Mind you, while Abetz and Bishop both nervously attempted to make Morrison’s comments mean something different to what Morrison plainly intended, Abetz further fouled the air by failing to make a distinction between asylum-seekers and sexual predators saying he would not necessarily put them in the same category.

SAMANTHA HAWLEY: Eric Abetz was also questioned whether the idea was akin to treating asylum seekers like convicted paedophiles.
ERIC ABETZ: I wouldn’t put the two in the same category necessarily.
SAMANTHA HAWLEY: In a transcript released by his office later, the word necessarily was missing.

Abbott, as usual, was shifty on the whole thing, saying that he had not seen Abetz’s comments, but neither did he repudiate the conflation of asylum-seekers with sexual predators

Mandatory Behavioural Protocols

Julie Bishop directly lied to the public on Q&A when she said that Morrison’s protocols were only meant to cover notifications to police, council and public that asylum-seekers had moved into the area.

Morrison plainly stated, and you can watch him say so here, that these protocols should apply to the asylum-seekers personally and that they should have an incident-reporting mechanism attached to them so that infractions can be reported. In addition Morrison has proposed a dob-in-an-asylum-seeker mechanism whereby members of the public can complain to the government about misbehaving asylum seekers, obviously so that miscreants can be immediately deported

Morrison’s comments carry the unmistakable ordure (not odour) of Securitate

Under the regime of Nicolae Ceaușescu, the Securitate employed some 11,000 agents and had a half-million informers

Here’s Julie Bishop lying on Q&A about what Morrison meant by Mandatory Behavioural Protocols:

TONY JONES: What are behavioural protocols because no one’s explained this yet.

JULIE BISHOP: [..] So we are rightly asking the question that the Parramatta Council asked. Why weren’t they told that people were moving…

TONY JONES: But hang on a sec, what are behavioural protocols?

JULIE BISHOP: Telling the Parramatta Council, for example, that a large number of people are going to be moving into accommodation. In this case…

TONY JONES: Sorry, one second. Behavioural protocols are to be imposed upon the people themselves, the asylum seekers, so the question is what are they?

JULIE BISHOP: Well, I believe he was talking about reporting requirements.

TONY JONES: Well, he’s talking about that, as well as behaviour protocols were imposed on the actual asylum seekers.

JULIE BISHOP: Well, I see it as a reporting requirement.

Not The First Time

This is not the first time that Morrison has appalled his own Shadow Cabinet colleagues, let alone small-l liberal backbenchers like Mal Washer and Russell Broadbent. At a strategy meeting in late 2010 Morrison advocated pursuing an anti-Islamic strategy as part of Coalition tactics to generate voter support among xenophobes.

Morrison’s proposal was rejected at that time by Julie Bishop (chairing the meeting in Abbott’s absence) and leaked, perhaps by Malcom Turnbull. Morrison denies he ever proposed an anti-Islamic strategy but the leak was reported by some of Australia’s most respected journalists such as Lenore Taylor, David Marr and Peter Hartcher, whose reputations have been too long- and too hard-earned to fritter away on mere gossip. Hence I conclude the reports that Morrison proposed an anti-Islamic strategy are true.

The scary thing is that Tony Abbott is not troubled by Morrison’s venom at all. In fact he encourages it. The sum total of Morrison’s remarks on asylum-seekers are that asylum seekers are diseased, cunning (because Document Destroyers), parasitical criminals who cause social discohesion and who do not deserve to attend the funerals of their parents; who are poised to swamp Australia and who will cause an overload, if admitted, on essential services thus causing a breakdown in the general amenity and comfort of society.

To this end they require extra policing and conformity to Mandatory Behavioural Protocols to be supported by the vigilance of decent citizens.

Others in the Coalition compare asylum seekers to a societal cancer comparable to illegal narcotics , predisposed to violent affray and not completely distinguishable from sexual predators.

Morrison does not contradict those colleagues. Nor does he contradict radio hosts who say, in so many words, that asylum seekers come here merely to sponge off welfare payments. On the contrary Morrison is an honoured and welcome guest on such programs and is treated by those hosts as a like mind.

Crime Wave

On Insiders George Megalogenis pointed out that the report rate (not the conviction rate) of criminal activity for asylum-seekers this year is 5 reports for 12000 asylum seekers. That’s 0.41%. The corresponding statistic for Federal Politicians this year is three reports for 226 persons. That’s 1.32%.

Thus, Federal Politicians are 33 times more likely to be reported for crime than asylum-seekers.

Scott, please explain to me again, why are Mandatory Behavioural Protocols necessary ?

What Motivates Morrison ?

Morrison is highly intelligent. He’s no redneck shooting his mouth off in the pub. He can count. He can understand law. But he misrepresents both law and statistics and deliberately vilifies vulnerable persons. Why ?

Morrison states that he is a committed Christian, a member of the Pentecostal Shire-Live Church in Sutherland. When I found this out I asked him directly by email if he was behaving this way to prevent the Islamisation of Australia. In other words I thought maybe he allows himself the sins of misrepresentation, distortion and vilification in order to serve a Higher Truth, namely to prevent Australia from becoming Islamic.

He said no. He said the reason he does it is for security concerns, to regain protection of our borders.

I say that’s rubbish.

Because there is no security issue.

The Australian Navy has indicated unambiguously through unofficial channels (as they cannot officially state a desire to refuse orders or potential orders) that they do not support TowBack. This is a clear indication that there is no security issue with asylum-seekers. If there was a true security issue the Navy, as always, would professionally respond. Who could doubt otherwise ? If the Navy does not think there is a security issue, there isn’t one.

Secondly, does Morrison really think that Gillard cannot prevent Indonesian fishing vessels from landing in Northern Australia ? This page describes the armaments currently operated by the Australian Armed Forces. One well-placed shell from the M102 Howitzer attached to any of the S-70A Blackhawks should ensure border security for some time at minimal taxpayer expense.

Any grimy, sodden, Hazaran refugees who enter Northern Australia on the floating death traps that labour across the Timor Sea with faulty engines do so because they are tolerated to do so.

Border Security? Porous Borders? That’s just Morrison invoking the deeply resonant Invasion Myth so beloved of the latent Australian xenophobic mind.

So its not Border Security motivating Morrison. And if not’s that then my bets are back on the anti-Islamisation horse. And if it’s not that, then Morrison is inflaming xenophobia simply to win a nice job for himself.

Which would be reprehensible.

Abbott Re-Institutes Turkish Towback Policy In Concordance With British Tradition

Towback for refugees is not new. Intolerant regimes have always needlessly harassed and persecuted minorities.

Scott Morrison and Tony Abbott would no doubt approve the actions of the Turkish government during WW2 when it denied transit to Polish Jewish refugees on the basis that they did not have the correct paperwork and were therefore ‘illegals’ to coin the Lib/Nats inaccurate and vilifying terminology for asylum-seekers.

Huge numbers of Polish refugees were generated by the Nazi/Soviet invasion of Poland in 1939 which commenced WW2. Having survived Luftwaffe strafing of the columns of refugees walking out of their ruined cities, the Polish displaced then sought shelter all over the world. 120,000 were accepted in Hungary alone and none rejected by that nation.

Turkish Towback

Thousands of Polish Jews sought to travel to Palestine, but were prohibited from transiting through Turkey because the Turkish authorities noted they did not have the correct paperwork (namely a letter from the British government authorising entry to Palestine).

Scott Morrison and Tony Abbott are big fans of paperwork, insisting Hazara from Afghanistan should be carrying valid Australian entry visas despite the fact that the location Australian embassy in Kabul is kept secret on security grounds and cannot issue visas anyway.

The Australian Embassy in Kabul operates from a number of locations that are not publicly disclosed due to security reasons.

The Australian Embassy in Kabul has no visa function. For visa information, visit the Australian High Commission, Islamabad, Pakistan.

The Turks, anticipating Lib/Nat Coalition approval from Tones and Scott, then instituted a tow-back policy for refugees, dragged the refugee ship out into the Black Sea with its 769 human cargo, where it was then sunk by a Russian submarine. All died except one. One can only say that gutless illegals get what they deserve.

British Tradition

Scott and Tony may also be gratified that the British government described the Jewish refugees as ‘illegals’ and that the British expressed ‘security concerns’ about the refugees. The British government was offended that any person, even its own Ambassador in Ankara, could object to their treatment of security-dubious illegals on spurious humanitarian grounds. As one Colonial officer complained:

… the first occasion on which … the Turkish Government … help in frustrating these illegal immigrant ships, and the Ambassador then goes and spoils the whole effect on absurdly misjudged humanitarian grounds.

Colonial Secretary Lord Moyne, passe Morrison, continuously asserted that the prime rationale for turning back every Jewish refugee was security concerns, specifically Nazi agents secreting themselves among refugees (a tactic also approved by John Howard), although not one instance was ever found.

The British High Commissioner, MacMicheal, endorses Tony and Scott’s arguments that the refugees are unproductive persons and a drain on State resources, saying they would be an unproductive element in the population.

Scott and Tony likewise approve of the forced takeover of the Struma by Turkish authorities. Said the only survivior of the sinking David Stoliar:

some of the passengers … came to blows with the police, but the police overpowered them and there were some 100 to 200 policemen.

Naturally, MacMichael held the view, shared by many of his government colleagues and Scott Morrison, that if a small number immigrants were permitted into Palestine, the floodgate would open and completely undermine our whole policy regarding illegal immigrants.

Scott and Tony would also approve that the British acted in contempt of international obligations, in the Brits case the Balfour Declaration, in refusal to honour the immigration of Polish Jews to Palestine.

Finally, Scott, a master of double-talk on International Refugee Law, would simply love the gobbledegook generated by the British on the status of Jewish arrivals in Palestine and indeed the entire paranoid and obfuscatory logic of British policy in this matter. As the pro-Jewish website EretzIsraol.org notes:

‘The Jewish immigrants who made it to the Jewish-settled area of Western Palestine under the status of illegal were in fact placed in a detention camp on arrival. Only if they passed the careful security check and were adjudged not to threaten the overriding principle of economic absorptive capacity would they be released. And then they would be “set off”–deducted-from the quota.. This meant that they were in fact not illegal at all, since they had merely taken some of the inconceivably few Jewish places that the Arabs had agreed to.’

The Ship

[NB Much text in this section cut-n-pasted from linked articles]

The ship carrying the Polish refugees was called the Struma. The full story of that vessel is told here. What follows is an excerpt. Similarities to Indonesian fishing vessels are obvious:

The Struma was unsafe (having engine troubles), horrifically overcrowded (built for 100, 770 persons were aboard), and lacked adequate sanitary facilities. Despite engine problems, it reached Istanbul on December 16, 1941. There, the passengers were informed they would not get visas to enter Palestine and, furthermore, would not be permitted entry into Turkey.

The boat was kept in quarantine in Istanbul’s harbour for more than two months. Turkish authorities denied the passengers permission to land without British agreement to their continued journey to Palestine. On February 23, 1942, the Turkish police towed the boat out to sea and abandoned it. The next day, on February 24, the boat sank, torpedoed by a Russian submarine.

More information on the Struma is here. Similarities to refugee voyages from Indonesia to Australia abound. For example, passengers had paid hefty sums to people smugglers, the passengers were not permitted to see the vessel before the day of the voyage. They discovered that the boat was a wreck, with extremely cramped sleeping quarters, only two lifeboats and a faulty engine which gave out several times after setting sail. Passengers imprisoned upon the Struma in the port in Istanbul began to suffer mental problems.

Just as Indonesia has firmly stated they will not permit tow-back, despite Coalition obfuscation on this point, the Romanians did not permit the Struma return to port of embarkation.

You Did WHAT?

Many British were ashamed of their governments actions in refusing entry to the Poles.

On June 9, 1942, Lord Wedgwood of the British House Of Lords opened the days proceedings by alleging that Britain had reneged on its commitments. He stated with bitterness:

I hope yet to live to see those who sent the Struma cargo back to the Nazis hung as high as Haman cheek by jowl with their prototype and Führer, Adolf Hitler

Anglo-Jewish poet, Emanuel Litvinoff, serving in the British army at the time, wrote a scathing poem, mourning the loss and betrayal of the Struma. Having volunteered in the British army to fight the Nazis, he now called the British khaki he wore a badge of shame.

Morrison, if true to form, would no doubt see these as the tired, predicatable criticisms of lazy, arrogant elitists.

Turkish Rationale

The Turks were by no means passive observers in the affair. Though the Brits denied visas for Palestine, the Turks prohibited the Polish Jews from proceeding overland. The full rationale for Turkish denial of overland entry to the passengers of the Struma is not yet known because the Turks have not opened their archives on the matter but some superficial evidence suggests that they too may have been worried that about a putative flood of refugees should they permit this group through. As Ira Hirschmann notes in her book, Life Line to a Promised Land (p.32)

The gateway of escape through Turkey had been technically open since 1941 to a small number of refugees moving by rail from Bulgaria. In order not to overload their trains, the Turks had made a restrictive limit of sixty persons to be carried each week from each of the
Axis satellite countries –Hungary, Rumania and Bulgaria.

Like Scott Morrison in his perenniel dog-whistle to Sydney’s West, the Turks were more concerned about the inconvenience of overcrowding on their train system that Jews being liquidated via Zyklon-B. Its nothing personal. Its just that we’re full.

Struma v. Tampa; Abbott v. Fraser

The TowBack of the Struma was a notorious and notable incident of callous disregard for civilian life perpetrated by the British with Turkish force. It is illuminating to me to note how the self-serving arguments of the British are so exactly mirrored in the mouths of Morrison and Abbott and the Lib/Nat Coalition generally.

The Struma incident is well-remembered by Israel and the Jewish community as an act of betrayal, even murder, and disgusted principled contemporaries in Britian and elsewhere.

Now the British have this excuse: Jewish arrivals in Palestine were resisted by local Arab populations and neighbouring Arab states. It was fair of the British to consider this as a security factor. Morrison and Abbott have no such excuse. Note that the security issue the British faced is reaction to refugee arrivals in the local and neighbouring populations and not a security issue relating to the refugees themselves. Morrison, Abbott and the Coailition keep impying or stating that refugees themselves are a security risk because they are terrorists, violent or prone to sexual predation.

The supposed security concerns Morrison and Abbott cite are non-existent. The Australian Navy has indicated unambiguously through unofficial channels (as they cannot officially state a desire to refuse orders or potential orders) that they do not support TowBack. This is a clear indication that there is no security issue with asylum-seekers. If there was a true security issue the Navy, as always, would professionally respond. Who could doubt otherwise ?

Furthermore the fear and suspicion in the Australian community toward asylum-seekers has been inflamed and nurtured by Morrison and Abbott. While Australian xenophobia is always latent it can be overcome by principled bi-partisan leadership as proven by Fraser and Whitlam when Fraser admitted 150,000 Vietnamese to Australia during the late 1970′s to early 1980′s. (55000 as boat people, 95000 through family reunion). Though Fraser’s policies on asylum-seekers were far from fully idealistic, they are light-years ahead the xenophobic swill expectorated by Morrison and Abbott today.

A 1975 Gallup poll found that 54% believed Vietnamese refugees should be allowed to settle in Australia, while only 33% did not. Of those in favour, 61% were Coalition supporters. This was undoubtedly a result of the fact that Malcolm Fraser’s Coalition government argued that Australia had a moral responsibility to take refugees because of its involvement in the Vietnam War. The RSL pressed for more liberal entry criteria and criticised media attacks on those arriving by boat

The current Lib/Nat xenophobic impulse is tawdry, dangerous and getting worse day-by-day as the ALP follow them into this particular sewer.

What is the more distressing is that Morrison and Abbott are the most public of MPs about their supposed Christian values and yet enunciate the most inhumane policies without embarrassment and intentionally fuel fear and suspicion of defenceless persons.

Australia deserves better.

Lazy Hazara Should Fight For Themselves Like The Poles Did

This year’s pre-Christmas family argument was introduced by a Labor-voting female senior relative who said, guilelessly, it costs a lot to look after all the refugees, doesn’t it ?.

Male senior relative (SR) quickly outlined his position on Hazara asylum-seekers which was that they should not be here seeking asylum but that rather they should form an indigenous resistance front against the Taliban, remain in their country and defend it, similar to what the Poles did against the Germans in WW2 and that they haven’t done so because they are tribal people who do not have the initiative to do things for themselves and instead opportunistically accept charity from others and that this passivity would leave Afghanistan in the hands of the Taliban with Afghanistan inevitably becoming a wasteland. In this way the Hazara can be viewed as national traitors.

Sub-Human

I told SR that he was suggesting that Hazara were lazy and cowardly and indeed sub-human since they choose not to do what ordinary people have always done i.e. to defend themselves from aggression. SR said, no, Hazara are not really lazy or cowardly, but that ‘it’s just culture’ i.e. the Hazara culture being tribal is dominated by passive, lazy and opportunistic characteristics. This culture is to avoid work or fight, to expect others to work or fight for them, and to gratuitously seek and accept charity without contribution to their own well-being.

Myth

SR is ignorant of Hazara history and has simply constructed a racist myth based on his own lazy and superficial observations of the Hazaran predicament. That myth is a variation on the general form of the Hazara Asylum-Seeker Myth in the general psyche of the Australian right-wing and disengaged voter which has developed under the tutelage of the dog-whistling Liberal/National Party Coalition who have unashamedly inflamed and reinforced xenophobic stereotypes as a means of garnering voter support.

The myth, of course, exists to explain and validate cultural norms among xenophobic Australia. And that desired cultural norm is that Australia should remain white.

History Of Resistance

The simplest research (i.e. a visit to Wikipedia) soon shows that the Shi’a Hazara have a long national history of resistance against the continued persecution of the Sunni majority of Afghanistan. This resistance commenced as soon as the Pashtun Sunnis attempted annexation of the neighbouring Hazara homeland from 1880. Resistance was immedaite with three major uprisings in the period 1888 – 1893 and another in 1940. Sixty per cent of the Hazara were massacred in the 1888-1893 uprisings, the equivalent of twelve million Australians being liquidated by an invading force, of course with accompanying rape and atrocity.

Oppression of the Hazara by the Pashtun and their fellow Sunnis, the Kuchi has continued unabated to this day whenever the Sunnis had power. Relative safety for the Hazara only occurred when Afghnaistan was ruled or controlled by local Communists or colonial powers i.e. the English, Russians and Americans.

From the late 1980′s, following the expulsion of the Soviet regime, the Hazara faced intensely renewed attacks aimed at their genocide or ethnic cleansing from Sunni clans strengthened by fundamentalists recruited and financed by the USA to fight the Russians. Outright massacre of Hazara occurred in their major cities of Bamiyan, Yakaolang and Mazar-e-Sharif between 1998 to 2001.

The Hazara faced contidions of intended genocide until the overthrow of the Taliban in 2001.

Similarity To The Poles

SR offered the example of the WW2 Polish as a model of how the Hazara should resist Sunni totalitarian invasion. He, like his fellow thinkers, is unaware of the actual similarities that exist between the Poles and the Hazara in relation to their courage, their resistance and their determination to fight back against overwhelming odds.

The Poles were the first to suffer invasion from expansionist Germany, sharing an immediate land border with them, and immediately resisted the German invasion. Likewise the Hazara share an immediate land border with the Pashtun Afghans and as soon as the Pashtuns invaded under Abur Rahman Khan in 1888, the Hazara fought back. It is obvious that the Hazara must have formed a national resistance army to do so.

A century later, Hazaran national resistance was expressed through the Hizb-e-Wahdat, formed in 1987 (p. 728). Just as the WW2 Poles received assistance from Western Allied powers, so the Hazara Hizb-e-Wahdat received assistance from Iran which they used to fight against the Sunni fundamentalists (many bought to Afghanistan by the USA) and, sadly, fellow Hazara splinter groups, such fighting continuing through 1994 against the Mujahideen and from then until 2000 against the Taliban (who arrived in 1994) (Encyclopedia of the Stateless Nations, Hazara, p. 729)

National Resistance Army

SR claims that the Hazara did not form a national resistance army to fight the Taliban, but in fact the Hazara did and have done so. This rebuts the arguments voiced by xenophobic Australians that the Hazara do not deserve to come to Australia because they do not bother to fight for themselves. The Hazara have continuously fought for themselves ever since they were first invaded in 1888, more than 120 years ago.

As we have seen, the political/military resistance arm of the Hazara is called Hizb-e-Wahdat and was formed in 1988. Hizb-e-Wahdat fought the anti-Communist (and anti-Shia) Mujahideen who come to power in 1992 and, following them the Taliban who arose in Afghanistan in 1994.

Prior to the Kizb-e-Wahdat, the Hazara unified against the local communist government, under a body called the Council for the Islamic Revolutionary Alliance. The Council or Shura fought in alliance with other Afghani Islamic bodies against their Communist government until 1984 when they were expelled from the alliance by the Sunni-dominated membership

From about 2000, the Hazara fought alongside the Northern Alliance against the Taliban. With the arrival of the US-led anti-Taliban forces in 2001, Operation Enduring Freedom, the Hazara then fought alongside the US and allied western powers, just as the Poles have been commended for, (ESN, pp. 730-731), assisting in the capture of Kabul with US air support . Under the relative security of the US-aligned Afghani government and on-going Allied military action against the Taliban, large numbers of Afghani refugees, naturally including many Hazara, returned to Afghanistan.

As the respected US Council On Foreign Relations put it:

Made up predominantly of Tajiks, Uzbeks, and Hazara Shiites, the [northern] alliance opposed the Taliban after its formation and assisted U.S. forces in routing the group after 9/11

Resurgent Taliban

[This section uses much material verbatim from: Denise Phillips, 'Why Hazaras flee: An historical perspective of their persecution.'
Submission for the Government’s Expert Panel on Asylum Seekers]

If the Hazara gained victory over the Taliban in 2001 why are they still coming to Australia ? Doesn’t this prove they are merely economic migrants looking for a free handout ? No. Quite simply nothing much changed for the Hazara despite the capture of Kabul. Their enemies are still dominant.

After the Hazara in conjunction with the Northern Alliance and US Forces captured Kabul, there followed a time of relative security for the Hazara, but the Taliban had not been eliminated and progressively regrouped. In 2008 the US Department Of Defence described the Taliban operations as ‘resilient and evolving’. It was assisted by regional and elements of national Pakistani government allowing safe haven for the Taliban in border areas. In 2010 the Taliban, operating with the consent and assistance of local Pashtuns, demonstrated effective control over towns and regions in which Hazara lived.

In Oruzgan province, the decapitated corpses of 11 Hazara males were discovered in the Khas Oruzgan district on 25 June 2010. Police official Mohammed Gulab Wardak reported that the Taliban killed them ‘because they were ethnic Hazaras and Shiite Muslims’. This occurred in the very province where Australia’s Defence Personnel have been deployed in a security and reconstruction role, showing the dire threat to Hazaras, even alongside a broader military presence.

Kuchis regularly arrive in Hazara districts heavily armed for conflict. In 2008, approximately 60,000 Hazara were displaced by Kuchi Sunnis who seized the fields belonging to the Hazara and burnt their homes.

Even in Kabul, centre of the moderate government of Mohammed Karzai, Hazara are killed with impunity. On 6 December 2011, a suicide bomber killed at least 56 Shiites pilgrims worshipping at the Abdul Fazal Abbas Shrine in the Murad Khani district in Kabul during commemorations for Ashura, the holiest day of Muharram. On the same day, a bomb attached to a bicycle exploded, killing Shiite pilgrims in Mazar-e Sharif and bringing the death toll to 60.

Neverthess Hazara resistence continues. These days Hizb-e-Wahdat posts videos of their exploits on You Tube, so you can follow them on a daily basis if so inclined.

No Escape

The Taliban, an indigenous Pashtun Afghani movement, was never eliminated from Afghanistan and neither of course were the local ethnic Pashtun and Kuchi clans. They live there, so they will always be there and connot be expelled except by the counter-atrocity of reverse ethnic cleansing involving half the population of Afghanistan. Unfortunately for the Hazara they are overwhelmingly outnumbered by local people who hate them and who are assisted in that hatred by the and well-funded Taliban who also happen to be supported by Pakistan.

This means that Hazara will always be subject to genocidal persecution including kidnap, multilations, random killing, systematic murder and the rest. And that’s Taliban or no Taliban. There is no escape.

No Excuse

For xenophobic Australians, the fact that Hazara live among genocidal maniacs who outnumber them five to one in count and about a thousand to one in armaments is NO EXCUSE. They MUST stay in Afghanistan and RESIST. Anything else is simply gutless, irresponsible cowardice. The staggering ignorance of the xenophobic position is monstrous. But they will not tolerate any Hazara leaving the killing fields to come to Australia and stand ahead of them in the queue at Maccas.

So it is in the xenophobic Myth of the Undeserving Hazara that the fleeing, cowardly Hazara refugees are juxtaposed against the brave, resilient Poles who all stayed and fought.

Tony Abbott Re-Institutes Turkish Towback Policy Toward Illegals

Xenophobes are therefore unaware that a vast number of Polish refugees during WW2. There were 120,000 in Hungary alone. They were tolerated and were not sent back to Nazi/Soviet-controlled Poland for execution, nor were they reviled in Hungary as gutless cowards. 1000 Poles ended up in Iran. About 12000 Polish Jewish refugees went to Romania, 2000 to Japan; another 13000 Jewish refugees went to Lithuania, thousands more went to Bulgaria.

More thousands sought to travel to Palestine, but were prohibited from transiting through Turkey because the Turkish authorities noted they did not have the correct paperwork, a fact which would be approved of by Scott Morrisson and Tony Abbott. The Turks, anticipating Lib/Nat Coalition approval from Tones and Scott, then instituted a tow-back policy for refugees, dragged the refugee ship out into the Black Sea with its 769 human cargo, where it was then sunk by a Russian submarine. All died except one. One can only say that gutless illegals get what they deserve.

To return to the point the Hazara have behaved exactly like the Polish. The Polish formed a resistance army, so did the Hazara. The Polish resisted the Germans for 5 years, the Hazara have resisted the Pashtuns for 125 years and counting. There were an enormous number of Polish refugees, there are an enormous number of Hazara refugees.

If the Polish can be commended for their actions, then the Hazara can also be commended for their identical actions. If the Polish refugees can be forgiven for leaving the killing fields, then so can the Hazara.

If War Then Refugees

To state the obvious, where there is war there are refugees. Polish males did not in toto form guerilla units, though many did. On the whole they left the fighting to the trained military. Can we not then afford Hazara the same consideration ? In any case I will wager that the proportion of guerilla Hazara is at least equal to the proportion of guerilla Poles. Why would it not be ? Hazara are human too. They love their homeland as much as anyone else.

They Should Just Work It Out

SR was keen to differentiate the Hazara from other people groups who have suffered war or persecution. His three examples were the Poles (dealt with above), the Irish and the Cambodians. The latter groups, he said, bravely stayed in their countries despite the troubles and did not passively nick off to other places and let someone do their hard yakka for them.

SR must therefore be unaware that there was a huge refugees exodus of Cambodians following the rise of Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge 150,000 went to the US alone. In the single year of 1979, 270,000 Cambodians fled to Thailand. Lastly, the Khmer Rouge were deposed by invasion from Vietnam, not by internal political settlement. The Cambodians did not work out a solution to their murderous government.

As for the Irish Troubles, this is the idealised model for SR as the sectarian violence was eventually dissolved into a political solution with not one immigrant coming to Australia as a result (that he is aware of). SR might be surprised to learn that of course the Troubles did indeed produce refugees with small numbers of Irish emigrating to New Zealand and Australia and a large number to Canada as a result of that awful sectarian violence.

Dr Raymond Russell, in his paper ‘Migration in Northern Ireland: an update’, prepared for the Northern Ireland government summarizes:

…during the 1970s and 1980s, Northern Ireland experienced a consistently large net population loss due to out-migration. This period coincided with the ‘Troubles’.

Stay and work it out ? Pol Pot was not negotiating with anyone. Let us recall that 1.7 million Cambodians died of starvation. SR speaking for xenophobic Australia says the honourable option is for those being starved that they should organise into guerilla units and fight back, presumably using straw brooms or office staplers as weaponry against Tanks in between scrounging for bark and spiders to eat.

Stay and work it out? The Pashtun and Taliban are not negotiating. In their view the Hazara Shia are infidels who can and should be killed. And doing so is no offence to God or man. So the Hazara must resist. And they have done for 125 years. Thing is, the Hazara have now been defeated and yet still face an implacable enemy unsatified with mere victory.

Taliban governor Mullah Manon Niazi publicly [incited the attacks on Hazara], preaching that, ‘Hazaras are not Muslim. You can kill them. It is not a sin’.

125 years of resistance should be recorded by any reasonable observer as an honourable effort. To insist the Hazara stay on to be daily massacred in cold blood is just macabre.

I say let them in. They’ve earned it.

But Why Should They Come Here ?

Its a matter of survival.

As Denise Phillips recorded, in summarising why Hazaras risk their lives on boats, an Hazara refugee says:

When the government and law enforcement agencies can’t provide protection, when your house is on fire, when your home country becomes hell for you, when you can’t go anywhere without the fear of being killed, when your religion and your facial features make you the easy target. When death is hovering over your head every day, then you don’t have options but to flee, seek refuge, knock at other people’s door for help, sit on a leaky boat, choose a dangerous journey that possibly leads to death. Today the Hazara Shias (boat people, the asylum seekers) are in a state of desperation and struggling for their survival as it is a basic human instinct.

Traitor’s Tryptych

I never thought I would see a member of the government openly consort with the Opposition while conniving to bring his own leader down. But that’s what Rudd is doing. Three cameos from this week’s media drove it home for me.

On ABC’s Insiders this week Mike Bowers showed footage of a clearly grateful Tony Abbott slapping Kevin Rudd on the shoulders in a friendly, congratulatory manner as he passed Rudd at some function or other. Rudd turns and smiles at Abbott, they shake hands, looking and behaving exactly as Cabinet colleagues would. In my view the whole cameo breathes common purpose.

Bowers put it this way:

MICHAEL BOWERS: David, Alex Ellinghausen took a fantastic series of pictures of Tony Abbott bumping into Kevin Rudd at a function. And you couldn’t say it was set up, but you would have to say Tony knew what he was doing as did Kevin Rudd.

Then, on Valentine’s Day the Liberal Party deluged Rudd during Question Time in Parliament House with chocolate roses (Insiders again has some images) The roses had been given, one to each MP, by veteran Liberal MP Warren Entsch as a friendly Valentine’s Day gesture. The Opposition decided to use the roses as a means of publicly thanking Rudd for his treachery in destabilising Gillard and sent their roses one-by-one, to the nauseatingly obsequious Rudd.

As the roses piled up around him Rudd again looked immensely pleased. Gillard must have been disgusted. It is hard to imagine a more contemptuous insult towards Gillard from the Libs than to publicly thank Rudd for his treachery toward her during Question Time.

Finally, Julie Bishop gave an interview on Sky TV, here recorded in the Sydney Morning Herald, where she basically confessed that Rudd is leaking information to her and stated the reward that Rudd will gain for his treachery, which is the diplomatic post of his choosing under a Coalition government.

Bishop positively preened as she said:

“Over a glass of wine together, we have shared some thoughts”

…and her face had the look of the Intelligence Controller boasting, in not so many words, about the entrapment of her Double Agent. Of the loot being offered for defection, Bishop said

…certainly he has talents and ability and experience in foreign policy that shouldn’t be wasted and I think that former prime ministers usually have a contribution to make.

What Kevin Wants

Rudd’s behaviour is utterly contemptible. For the second Federal Election campaign in a row he is setting out to deliberately disrupt the campaign and deliver government to those nominally in Opposition to him and certainly in Opposition to his colleagues.

It seems merely to be about revenge for Gillard’s knifing of him in 2010 . It’s hard to imagine he would seriously be aiming to return to leadership given the field day the Coalition would have over extremely hostile and negative remarks made about Rudd during their leadership spill of 2012, not least by Treasurer and Deputy Leader Wayne Swan.

Nah. Kev just wants to see them (Gillard and Swan) destroyed.

BUT

Kev being the narcissus that he is, he must just think he can outsmart all of Swan, Gillard, Abbott, Howes, Bishop and the Coalition and leverage off the remaining goodwill in the electorate for him (see Bob Ellis’s great take on it here) and yet again become Prime Minister.

And the Australian Electorate…just possibly they could be saying ‘Hey. We voted for that bugger, so just put him back.’. That would be Very Australian and I kinda like it.

But not Mr Rudd.

Him I do not like.

Update 23 March: Once Twice, Four Times Pictured A Traitor

On 12th March a few more of Abbott’s anti-Carbon Tax decent Australians slouched into Parliament House to yell abuse at Julia Gillard during Question Time. Unsurprisingly, Abbott was photographed hypocritically enjoying the abuse despite his oft and earnest claims to be devoted to the highest standards of compassionate human conduct or whatever. But, pertinent to this blog post, Rudd was photographed enjoying the abuse just as much and smirking about it with facial expression identical to that of Abbott. Insiders has the photography on their vid here from 3:07.

Tryptych plus one: is that a Quadtych ?

Boganism As A Spectrum And The Collapse Of Post-Decent Australia

Readers interested in Bogans and Boganism should turn in the first instance to Things Bogans Like, which has been fearlessly dissecting the Bogan phenonemon for some 255 blog entries now (as of last count).

This post is a small contribution to the field of Boganism which I hope will be received as a discussion paper by the wider Boganologist community. In it I would like to propose the concept that like Autism, Boganism should be viewed as a spectrum which may be inhabited at many point rather than a canonical syndrome of specific morbidity and then I go on to discuss the corrosive effects of Boganism on the political and social culture of Australia.

I Am, You You, We All Are (To Some Extent)

Holidaying with my wife’s family and primary school age children at a famous Australian family resort this summer, we all went down for the splurge Buffet Breakfast. As we ate, the carpet under the breakfast table (no we were not eating the actual carpet you nong) began to accumulate a film of semi-masticated scrambled egg. Indeed, it was only the deposition of my own contribution to that revolting layer, which spilled out of my gob during a pertinent observation on our souvenir’s value-for-money ratio, which caused me to even notice said film.

Disgusted by what I found under the table I felt a stab of self-awareness, especially as my subconscious recalled to mind the Kath and Kim episode set at a similar resort with certain dining room behaviours now horribly amplified.

Are we…? flashed my egg-empowered cortex…

Elation

Just then my Nephew returned to the table, elated at his mastery of the automatic Hot Chocolate dispenser. He was a little unlucky. As he approached the table a little too quickly, a woman with a particularly huge butt suddenly pulled her chair out in front of him. Young Daylon had no chance to dodge. He gloriously tripped over the woman’s chair and/or buttocks, fountaining what seemed like seven litres of foaming Hot Chocolate over himself, the chairs, the floor, but miraculously not butt-woman, who merely grunted and lurched off toward the Custard Croissants.

Now sitting not only in the residue of scrambled eggs but also a shallow lake of warm milky chocolate accompanied by an hysterical sobbing primary schooler, the unavoidable conclusion seared me.

I too was am a Bogan.

Not Really A Bogan ?

Now I know what you are thinking, you’re thinking ‘Bogans lack any concept of self-awareness, and any willingness or ability to self-reflect ipso facto you are not and cannot be a Bogan.’

Thanks for your kindness, but the evidence is obvious if not overwhelming. I am on the Bogan Spectrum, along with all my other fellow Australians in that dining room, and I supect most of everyone who wasn’t. Peruse the Things Bogans Like list of 255 Bogan Markers right now. If you don’t identify with at least five, you’re not trying.

So, I propose Boganism should be viewed as a spectrum with your Tribal Tattoo-sporting sufferers smack in the middle with zero chance of rehabilitation, through to those operating at the high-end Asperger-like such as Richard Wilkins (weird, but able to inhabit non-Bogan social constructs) and my own family who seem to have picked up elements of Boganism from environmental exposure.

Welcome To Post-Decent Australia

The entrenchment of Boganism as the central engine of Australian civic culture is correlated to higher incomes earned by Bogans due to the extended China-generated Australian resources boom and overlaps the following parallel social and political phenonema:

The rise of the Aspirational / Bogan-suburb voter bloc, the decline of Unionism (hence political consciousness), the decline of churches and other institutions inculcating social values, the corresponding rise of a nihilistic and naive radical individualism (selfishness), the determination of huge corporations to construct self-obsessed, reflexive and insatiable consumers (advertising), the availability of gargantuan amounts of easy credit, the obsessive use of corporate marketing methods by the major political parties and the corresponding nullity of meaningful political discourse in the mass media.

Now, to cut to the chase, Bogans at their core are completely self-obsessed, are complete puppets of advertisers and do not in the least care about any other individual on the face of the planet. Political parties like this, advertisers like this, Richard Wilkins likes this (as Bogans are his total audience) and Bogans like this. Its a win-win-win-win.

But the consequence is that Australian mass media has created in tandem with its allies ( the major political parties), is seeking to increase and is pandering to an ever growing proportion, now numbering 64% of Australians, who do not give the proverbial about anyone else apart themselves, their pit bulls and their jet ski. Welcome to Post-Decent Australia where those shocked by Road Rage assault just need to harden up.

Its Their Fault And Its Their Fault Too

At this point I would like to insist that you read Andrew Catsaras’s brilliant short article ‘Take Me To Your Follower: Into The Leadership Void’ which describes how the major political parties use corporate mass marketing methods to create, manipulate and (ironically) pander to Bogans.

Catsaras is the House-regular polling wonk on Insiders and a man of depth, which I infer from the fact his soul is alive to the beauty and wonder of Creation and that Catsaras has enough humility to be awestruck by it. Catsaras is also a highly-trained Strategic Marketing Consultant, which becomes obvious from the clarity with which he conveys, applies and explains strategic marketing to the Australian political context. Now go to his blog and Like it. Thx.

Catsaras discusses how Laberal use the marketing tool of Focus Groups, which is to ask Bogans what they want and then promise (or pretend to promise) to give the Bogans exactly that:

If we researched a group of young children and asked them what it is they wanted, many would most likely respond with: stay up late, don’t go to school, and eat chocolate and ice cream at every meal.

Now which responsible parent would agree to any of that?

Yet often the politicians [do exactly that] They would follow the marketing doctrine to the letter, that is, to give the customer what they want. They would agree that the child’s wishes were very reasonable and would proceed to develop policies that would support them.

Philosopher Kings

Now this would be OK if Focus Groups were populated with philosopher kings. But they’re not. They are populated by swinging voters, especially from Western Sydney, which means Bogans. Laberal are now dedicated to discovering what Bogans want and giving it to them ASAP.

So, what about things Bogan’s don’t want. Like Asylum-Seekers ? Well naturally Laberal promise Bogans they will never hear, see, share with, smell, look at, touch, give up a parking spot for or stand behind in a queue at Maccas anything remotely resembling an Asylum seeker. Says Catsaras:

Similarly, if we were to research what it is that children feared the most, a common response might be fear of the dark, especially when they were alone in their bedroom at night.

Again, the responsible parent would not allow such an irrational fear to overwhelm their child.

Yet our politicians again would often follow the marketing doctrine to the letter. Rather than try to dispel these irrational fears, they would legitimise them by suggesting that such fears were reasonable and acceptable regardless of the truth. There would be no attempt to educate the child.

Let me repeat and highlight Catasaras’s last statement: There will be no attempt to educate the child Bogan-voter-public.

And that’s where we are folks. A Bogan-led society ostensibly ruled by politicians pandering to Bogans. Bogans are prized by Laberal because Bogans do not think, which makes them easy to fool, wedge and bribe. Bogans love being bribed provided they are simultaneously told that they are being bribed for the good of the country or that it is their just recompense in order to amerliorate the existential agony of trying to survive on an income of 150K per annum.

How Bogans Vote

During the artificial moral panic generated by The Australian and the Liberal/National Party Coalition over the above-mentioned ALP decision to restrict Baby Bonus to those on incomes under 150K, The weekend Daily Telegraph printed an absolute ripper of a cartoon. It was entitled ‘Your Own Australian Voter’ and presented the Aussie voter, typified as a mildly overweight Anglo Male Adult dressed in a blue singlet vest and baggy shorts, in four panels.

The text showed the voter as a kid’s toy with two settings: ‘Whinge’ and ‘Vote’. The owner of the Aussie Voter toy is instructed to initially set the voter/Bogan to ‘Whinge’ whereupon the voter/Bogan bends, pretzel-like, from the waist, its head going down between its legs then upwards where it disappears into a tiny cavity in its posterior (if you get what I mean). Every three years, the text goes on, flick the switch to Vote whereupon the voter/Bogan stands up looking grizzly and unhappy and sticks out its hands for a govt. bribe / incentive / statutory free Pit Bull protein supplement then toddles off towards the polling station.

It was a beautiful encapsulation of the all-encompassing sense of entitlement, ingratitude, selfishness and vacuity of the Australian polity, political parties included.

Bogans, for their part, are at fault for the nullity of the political discourse by demanding that political parties pander to Boganism.

We are getting the country we deserve.

The Collapse Of Post-Decent Australia

Now a society ruled by Bogans in which no-one gives two hoots about anyone else, where selfishness is a virtue, where fears of our neighbour are encouraged and validated, where Laberal promise more more more to Bogan/voters, where education is intentionally ignored … that society must collapse.

And that’s where Laberal are taking us, via strategic corporate marketing in their accursed focus groups. Laberal are being led by Bogans while intentionally setting out to create more Bogans.

The preferred outcome of a Bogan society is maxxtreme Road Rage and govt. guaranteed and subsidised parking allocations for Jet Ski’s outside every Maccas.

An Alternative Story

May I suggest the following as an alternative to Boganized domination of Australian political and social culture which is told here (with some minor modifications made by me) by a Man I respect very much:

“There was once a man travelling from Sydney to Melbourne. On the way he was attacked by thugs. They badly beat him up, flogged his wallet, credit card and iPad and went off leaving him half-dead. Luckily, a priest was on his way down the same road, but when he saw him he angled across to the other side. Then a religious bloke showed up; he also avoided the injured man.

“An Asylum Seeker travelling the road came on him. When he saw the man’s condition, his heart went out to him. He gave him first aid, disinfecting and bandaging his wounds. Then he lifted him into his car, drove him to a hotel, and made him comfortable. In the morning he took out a hundred bucks and gave it to the owner, saying, ‘Take good care of him. If it costs any more, put it on my bill—I’ll pay you on my way back.’

“What do you think? Which of the three became a neighbour to the man attacked by thugs ?”

“The one who treated him kindly,” the religious bloke responded.

Jesus said, “Go and do the same.”

David Marr Discusses Political Animal At The Brisbane Writers Festival

I avidly read David Marr’s Quarterly Essay #47 “Political Animal” on Tony Abbott and attended his writers talk on the essay at Mosman Library. I was therefore gratified to discover his talk David Marr on Tony Abbott at the Brisbane Writers Festival 8 September 2012. I watched the video and took some notes.

Discardable Values Abbott

Those who have read QE #47 will know that Marr was motivated to write his essay in order to address the contradiction between the two personae projected by Abbott, the man of values and the political junkyard dog. Marr names these two personae ‘Values Abbott’ and ‘Political Abbott’. Marr’s thesis is that Political Abbott always trumps Values Abbott. Whenever Abbott’s value system is in conflict with the pragmatic need to win votes and power, pragmatism always triumphs and values are discarded.

In his Brisbane talk Marr was more explicit on this saying that he (Marr) finds it inconceivable that Abbott, the loyal and enthusiastic Catholic, should turn his back on Christian values in order to demonize and reject asylum seekers, being comfortable to fan the embers of racism while he does so. Marr also said that, in his opinion, a man of values would not turn his back on Science which Abbott has done in order to prosecute an anti-Carbon Tax and anti-AGW populist scare campaign.

I am in agreement with Marr. Abbott’s ‘values’ on these issues are non-existent. First on asylum seekers, Abbott’s ‘biblical’ justification for rejecting asylum seekers, that the flight into Egypt of Jesus, Mary and Joseph took the family to the nearest sanctuary, not across the seas to a distant land is theological giobberish cynically designed to wring political advantage from the sacred text.

In fairness to Abbott, I suspect his loyalty is not to Christian values or The Bible per se, but really to the institutional survival of the Catholic Church. This distinction means that Abbott is free to manouever how he will on ‘what the Bible says’ without contradicting his value system.

Abbott vs. Polyamorous Cisgenered Woman

To quickly view Jesus’s attitude to pushing-in (as if asylum seeking could be characterised in that particularly revoltingly insular position anyway) I find these tweets listed on Bluebec quite apposite:

zerogeewhiz ‏@zerogeewhiz
Ref 1: Mark 5:21-34 – woman pushes her way through the crowd, touches his cloak. She’s healed. No dramas. Not sent back to Indonesia.
zerogeewhiz ‏@zerogeewhiz
Ref 2: Luke 5:19 – man lowered in through the roof, Jesus heals him anyway. Does not send him to Nauru for processing.

Abbott may be shocked to discover that Bluebec

a white, middle-class, temporarily able-bodied, neuro-typical, bisexual, polyamorous, cisgendered woman

understands the spirit and intention of the scripture far better than he, self-styled defender of Western civilisation.

As to Abbott’s rejection of the AGW scientific consensus, Marr makes the simple point that in the nine months leading up to Abbott’s assumption of the leadership of the Liberal Party he had advocated six distinct positions on AGW and carbon pricing, including support for a Carbon Tax. Abbott’s approach to this issue as with asylum seekers, is entirely populist, entirely pragmatic to the end of winning power and entirely without value(s).

DLP

I found Marr’s Brisbane Writer’s Festival talk useful for fleshing out my understanding the role of the 1970′s DLP in Abbott’s political formation. This period is critical to understanding Abbott for it is here that Abbott’s Catholic values pertaining to family and human reproduction were edged, as a sword is edged, by Santamaria’s call to arms.

The DLP was a quintessentially conservative and reactionary organisation very much concerned with the defence of values it saw as foundational to Western civilisation. And it is the concept and romantic ideal of the values of Western civilisation of which Values Abbott pictures himself as the champion, gladiator and paladin.

By 1970 Santamaria and the DLP had changed its focus from rooting out Communism in the unions to rooting out Communism in the universities. As Marr puts it, the true danger to society lay on university campuses and Santamaria could be excused for thinking so given the events on European university campuses in the late 1960′s. So Abbott, freshly graduated from University, was recruited into the DLP by his high school priests and launched on to the campus of Sydney University fuelled by the furious scorn (as Marr puts it) of Santamaria against working mothers, sexual libertarianisn and the entire progesive agenda.

Abbott was here discipled along with Greg Sheridan and Eric Abetz to hold the line against fashionable beliefs and to hold the line against and roll back leftist evil and replace it with DLP good.

Romantic Protege

So, if values are so important to Abbott, why are they so discardable ? Even truth is instantly spurned by Abbott when it becomes a problem. Examples include his lies over the Ramjan punch, his lies in regard to Marr over how he portrayed Marr being fed information by a mythical Labor Dirt Unit (this is detailed by Marr himself in the correspondence section of QE #48), his lies over ‘Australians For Honest Politics’, the slush fund Abbott created to destroy Pauline Hanson, the fraudulent Budget Spreadsheet presented prior to the 2010 Federal Election and his lies over his meeting with Cardinal Pell during the 2004 Federal election.

I believe that the reason why Abbott’s values are so discardable is that in the end he doesn’t have very many. Abbott’s starry-eyed admiration for the values of Western civilisation, the Papacy, the Monarchy and the Enlightenment are a romantic fiction that Abbott tells himself, as he relives the ‘Prince Hal’ [QE #47 p.1] Ladybird books of his childhood, but not much more. Abbott’s heart beats faster at the excitement of imaging himself a new Crusader King, a new reforming Priest or a defender of Western values, but in the end he will not die for any of them. He will fight but he will not die.

Abbott vs. Nile

Fred Nile, the much lampooned leader of the Christian Democratic Party, is what a man of values looks like. Nile will spend his whole life leading a party which gains 4% of the vote or less because Nile will truly fight and die for Right To Life, for Christian values and The Bible. Abbott will not. 4% is for losers. Abbott wants glory without death.

In this I think Abbott’s instinctive role as protege provides an important supporting role to his romantic fiction. Abbott loves heroes: Santamaria, Paul Mankowski, Emmett Costello, John Howard, George Pell. And he loves being approved of (even admired) and liked by them. His mentors and his protege status under them give meaning and excitement to Abbott’s endevours.

In the end I think this protege mentality is what energises Abbott’s campaign to become Prime Minister. If he wins he will present the victor’s spoils (the Prime Ministership and reins of national authority) as trophies to his heroes, specifically Howard, Santamaria and Pell and, in my view, in that order. He will drink the praise and admiration of the Liberal Party elite for the rest of his life. This will be his glorious victory and his defence of Western civilisation. He will then quaff brandy with Pell and they will pretend it is also a victory for the Papacy, though it is not.

Some of Marr’s other points:

Mentors and Heroes

Abbott’s greatest heroes are Sanatamaria and Howard. Yet Santamaria despised Howard. But at the end of Santamaria’s life, Howard visited Santamaria on his death bed. Marr sees this as an important event for Abbott, allowing him to pursue the Prime Ministership in service of both of them. Marr thinks that Abbott learned government from Howard and politics from Santamaria.

Abbott and the Monarchy

Marr believes that the Monarchy, per se, is not ultimnately so important to Abbott. What is important about the Monarchy for Abbott is that Sir John Kerr, who was highly respected by the DLP and made him an offer of membership for his efforts as a lawyer in attacking Communist elements in unions, loved and defended the monarchy. So Abbott’s reverence for the monarchy is really a proxy for his deep commitment to Kerr.

I disagree with Marr on this. Abbott loves the Monarchy. It is one of the institutions which are essential, in Abbott’s woolly and romantic way of thinking, to Western civilisation.

Some Flaws, Some Positives

In Marr’s opinion, and I agree, Abbott is something of a coward. He rarely exposes himself to direct questioning by informed journalists. He would only give Marr one hour for questioning on this essay, and that interview was entirely off the record except for the self-serving deceitful denial of the Ramjan punch. As Opposition Leader he almost never appears on Lateline, Insiders or Q&A. Marr says Abbott’s timidity of him is ridiculous.

But Marr also said Abbott was decent and repeated several of the compliments he made in his essay at at the Mosman library talk.

Marr said, and I fully agree, that it is very important to Abbott that he not be laughed at and that he is discomfited by it . In my view this partially explains Abbott’s loathing of Roxon. She made him a laughing-stock. The ALP would do well to make him a figure of fun. Karl Stefanovic on Channel Nine breakfast television is showing them how to do it.

Just for fun, Here’s a touch more discomfit

Abbott The Intellectual

Marr says that Abbott sees himself as an intellectual, though he is not. Marr says Abbott’s primary intellectual muse is his fascination with Western civilisation which Abbott views as a product of Catholic Europe. Abbott’s special concern is how do hold it together which in Abbott’s view is achieved by seizing authority in order to safeguard it. Which is what he did on the SRC at university.

Who is Abbott ?

Marr opinied that Abbott is difficult to come to conclusions about. I disagree. Abbott’s current approval rating is 27%. Australians have thoroughly decided that they don’t like him.

Abbott has well and truly exhausted the public’s patience for his expectation of forgiveness following public confession of fault or mistake, which Marr notes is an important pattern for Abbott reaching to childhood. Marr does not go on to say this, but there is a plain inference that Abbott was somewhat indulged as a child and young man by dint of excessive admiration and that this has contributed to Tony’s concept that he may basically say and do as he wishes, apologize for any hurt en passant and then expect complete understanding and forgiveness.

Coalition Salivates Over Lawyers Picnic But Doomed To Insatiation

With the conclusion of the final Question Time for the year we can, in retrospect, see what the Coalition’s strategy was in the endlessly reheated Gillard-AWU scandal (so called).

After three days of monomania from Julie Bishop on whether or not Gillard had corresponded with the WA Commissioner for Corporate Affairs over the bona fides of the magisterially misnamed AWU Workplace Reform Association and three days of Gillard refusing to say one way or another if she had or had not, hard proof emerged on the morning of the last day (surprise surprise) that Gillard had indeed made such correspondence. In 1992.

Tony Abbott greeted this news with a statement that it appeared that Gillard had committed a crime and called for a judicial review into the matter, now 17 years past.

Plainly the materialization of documentary proof of Gillard’s correspondence had been pre-arranged beforehand with Nick Styant-Browne of Slater and Gordon and the three days of direct questioning on the point, (u MUTZ tellz us YESS!! ur NOES!! – anno fuling) were arrayed in hope that Gillard would say NO and therefore mislead the parliament. Since Gillard held her nerve and evasively refused to confirm or deny, the Coalition and its ally then settled for a second-best, producing the horror document on the last day (oh look a miracle and in the morning for best all day effect too), speciously claiming it constituted proof of a crime and then calling for a judicial inquiry on the HOL FING.

Now the beauty of a judicial inquiry is that it will drag on for months ideally up until the next election allowing The Australian to every day print ‘forced to deny’ stories beginning ‘Julia Gillard was today again forced to deny criminality in the matter of…’ and every day Tony Abbott could put on his best concern troll face and mourn the passing of decency in government, pledge a return to wholeness and purity etc. etc.

So that was Abbott’s strategy. Hold the documentary proof as an Ace-in-the-hole, spend all week in the muck, try and force Gillard to mislead, then, come what may, call for a judicial inquiry.

In short: try to parlay the innuendo into a year of dirt, Abbott’s natural habitat.

Foiled

The moment when the LNP knew that Gillard would not be suckered into misleading the house came at 2:39 PM on 28 November when Gillard answered the infamous Ventriloquist’s Doll question (watch vid here) uttered by Julie Bishop while Tony Abbott read along to the question from the very same words on a page on the table in front of him.

From Hansard:

Ms JULIE BISHOP (Curtin—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (14:39):
Madam Speaker, I ask a supplementary question of the Prime Minister. I refer to her answers in this House. Did the Prime Minister write to the WA commissioner for corporate affairs to vouch for the bona fides of the AWU Workplace Reform Association—yes or no?

Ms GILLARD (Lalor—Prime Minister) (14:39):
Given that the Leader of the Opposition read along with every word of that question from the Deputy Leader: get up and ask it yourself, and then I will answer it.

It is apparent that this particular question is the centrepiece and climax of the Coalition’s strategy for the week. Their whole team is hanging on it and their tension is palpable. Why else does Abbott drop his charade of indifference to proceedings and read along to the question ? Why else does Abbott nod meaningfully at Gillard and stare at her when the question is concluded ? And as you listen here from 38:14 – 38:57 notice how Christopher Pyne is unable to contain his frustration at Gillard’s stonewalling shouting out “Joke! You are a joke! You are a joke! How dare you … indistinguishable and ranting on for a bit longer …”

Gillard didn’t mislead. Tony and team had been foiled. They were spewing.

Your Picnic, My Essential Inquiry

Now conservatives are prone to describe legal protections for, let’s say, asylum seekers) as a lawyer’s picnic e.g Boat people win, lawyers celebrate, taxpayers mourn. An Australian Bill Of Rights was also so described by Bronwyn Bishop. Janet Albrechtson said the same about the forthcoming Royal Commission into predation against children.

So I will be interested to see if the Coalition’s proposal for a judicial inquiry into the long-ago rip-offs of the AWU will be similarly derided as a lawyer’s gorge-fest. I somehow think not.

Legal defence of society’s vulnerable: a complete and utter waste of time and money.

A platoon of lawyers trolling through the minituae of a twenty year old Union scandal: Only right and proper.

But There Will Be No Judicial Inquiry

Because Gillard has not broken any law.

Abbott was given 15 minutes under parliamentary privilege to say what laws Gillard had broken. He could not name any.

And the matter occurred 20 years ago. Before Gillard was an MP let alone PM.

So the Coalition will not get their inquiry.

Who Looks Worse ?

In my view Julie Bishop was the biggest loser this week, having to retract her more egregious overstatements about the matter and spending all week on TV (like Pyne and Credlin) looking anxious and frustrated. Simply Bishop was running an unwinnable line. There was no criminality despite Bishops continuous innuendo. Her willingness to dive deep into the muck has left plenty sticking to her and comparatively little to the PM.

Gillard was embarrassed by the proof of her correspondence but made a forceful counter to Abbott to table his worst. And he couldn’t. All he had, too, was innuendo. Most of the week Gillard looked in control of proceedings. Abbott only has perceptions to work with on this issue in the absence of any actual wrong-doing by Gillard and the pictures mostly showed Gillard looking confident and relaxed.

As for Abbott, well his approval is already in the cellar at 27%. That’s the rusted on, who would approve of the Leader of the Liberal Party if it was a can opener wired with a computer chip that simulated human speech. His public esteem cannot get any lower.

Truth

For me, the actual truth of the issue was best summed up by Craig Emerson, Minister For Trade, who told us this week he has not received a question from Julie Bishop his Shadow for more than two years and the Coalition has not asked him a question on Trade or any policy-related matter for more than three years.

Whatever Julie Bishop and the Coalition are actually doing in Parliament its not policy-related. They could be replaced, at much lower cost to the public, by a tape loop reciting the phrase ‘AWU Workplace Reform Association’.

What Motivates Nick Styant-Browne ?

NSB was the Slater & Gordon partner in charge of the conveyancing file associated with the mortgage on the property in Fitzroy partially purchased with funds from the AWUWRA slush fund.

That mortgage forms a centrepiece of the pseudo-scandal fervently wished for by Abbott, Bishop, and The Australian. Gillard has been directly accused by Bishop of facilitating the robbing of companies by the AWUWRA and personally benefiting from the heist. The so-called proof of this is that her name appears on some papers in the 425 page thick conveyancing file.

But Gillard was not in charge of the conveyancing. Styant-Browne was.

I suspect that NSB’s motivation in assisting the Coalition by revealing and providing internal Slater and Gordon documents proving Gillard’s communication with the WA Commissioner for Corporate Affairs is to distance himself from the whole stink try by trying to dump the lot on Gillard. NSB is not happy he provided conveyancing for a property purchased with ill-gotten gains. His preference is that someone else (Gillard) has to eat that particular cold frog. Abbott and the Coalition are only to eager to assist.

Postscript: Two Weeks later

Latest Newspoll 11-Dec-2012 shows a shift to the Coalition. Gotta hand it to Abbott – he does ‘sleaze and smear’ very well. So much for my belief that Gillard had won the week.

I Fish And I Dogwhistle

Watching a fishing program called ‘Big Fish Small Boats’ featuring three blokey blokes trolling for Mako Sharks, I was amazed to hear the presenter suddenly eyeball the camera and issue a climate change dogwhistle. The presenter, Al McGlashan, said (to paraphrase):

‘The Labor Government recently tried to ban fishing for Mako Sharks based on false science, but the results of the tag and release program showed the Mako are still in plentiful numbers. Now we can continue to enjoy wonderful fishing expeditions such as these.’

What the..? False science ? That sounds just like the denialist phrase ‘Junk Science’ and coupled with the reference to the ALP and tied in with activities directly based on interaction with the natural environment…He’s not dogwhistling is he ?

He is.

Al McGlashan was No.2 on the NSW Senate ticket for the Shooters and Fishers Party in the 2010 Federal Election. Here’s how he went, with S&F gaining the highest primary vote of the minor parties, finally excluded on count 32 of 35 and pushing the Liberal Party candidate into a quota.

The Shooters and Fishers are AGW denialists. Their pamphlets and platform papers are full of references to deep-green climate alarmist extermists. In fact, their election materials mention the Greens as much as they do the S&F itself. The S&F could just as well be named “The Anti-Green Party” as that is largely how they present and publicize themselves and their objectives.

McGlashan described his decision to stand for the Senate in the Sydney Angler forum:

Basically guys I am running as a fishing rep for the Shooters and Fishers becuase I am sick having my rights to fish being eroded away by radical greenies who sit eating canned tuna talking about how bad fishing is!

The Proposed Mako Ban And Reprieve

As Fishing World reported in November 2009, the Mako Shark was added to the species listed in Appendix II of the international Convention for the Conservation of Migratory Species (CMS). Under laws introduced by the LNP Howard Government any species listed in either Appendix of the CMS was automatically banned from catch in Australia.

RecFish, the national organisation representing recreational fishermen, along with commercial operators, then lobbied the ALP government to rescind the ban which was duly done by Environment Minister Peter Garrett in January 2010.

The rationale for overturning the decision was that the listing in the CMS was on the basis of severely reduced Mako numbers in the Mediterranean Sea but that Mako in Australian waters do not migrate to the Mediterranean and therefore the reason for the listing was irrelevant to Australian Mako.

As a spokesman for Garrett put it:

“Noting the lack of evidence suggesting that Australian populations of these shark species face the same threats as other parts of the world, the government will be moving to make legislative changes to address the ongoing uncertainty for recreational fishers”

No False Science

Which leaves me wondering what McGlashan was on about. The CMS ban on Mako was not based on false science and was not based on ALP legislation. Mediterranean numbers were indeed down so the scientific basis was sound. Garrett listened to RecFish, took into account the Australia scientific data and lifted the ban based on that data.

McGlashan’s claim that the Mako ban was based on Labor shenanigans enabled by false science was itself false in both of its premises. Garrett’s department simply enacted the laws on the books, laws created by the Liberals uner John Howard. Garrett then modified those laws in the face of popular representation and scientific data. Isn’t that really a textbook example of the ALP behaving in responsible democratic fashion ?

McGlashan is close enough to the issue to understand the reality of what transpired and why but chose to be fast and loose with his telling of the story: anything the better castigate the deep-green extremist alarmists, even to injecting some anti-AGW, anti-Green dogwhistles into his otherwise highly entertaining television program.

Indonesians Reject Tow-Back. Coalition Visualises World Peace.

Scott Morrison has made it plain that Indonesia has said that under no circumstances will they accept tow-back of asylum seekers .

Which means that should the LNP win the next election they will have nowhere to storehouse asylum-seekers since Nauru and Manus prison islands will be full. Therefore in my opinion, from early 2014, following the 2013 Federal election we will see the implementation, by whoever wins that election, of Gillard’s Malaysia Solution as a means of achieving the revolting policy objective of ‘stopping the boats’.

Here’s Scott Morrison on Q&A ‘Folk Music, Five Years and Funding’ last night spilling the beans:

TONY JONES: Did you get any sense at all from the Indonesian officials you spoke to, including the Foreign Minister, that they would allow you or even welcome towing back the boats to Indonesia?

SCOTT MORRISON: Well, as I’ve said on many ABC programs over the last week, I left confident that the relationship we’re building and the knowledge of our policies and how we intend to work with the Indonesians, which is not to push the problem back to them - see one of the key issues up in Indonesia is they want support and assistance to work in protecting their borders as well. So they know that we will respect their territorial integrity. Tony said that very clear in his public statements.

Morrison’s admission came in the midst of a fair barrage of bluster about how the LNP will engineer a magnificent relationship with Indonesia, the fruit of which is that the Indonesians will permit tow-back. For example:

TONY JONES: Don’t we have the right the ask whether the Indonesians will allow you to do it?

SCOTT MORRISON: And what I’m saying is we are building that relationship and I’m very confident about our ability to get the job done that we’ve promised the Australian people.

But Morrison’s slip was to admit that Indonesia had insisted that the LNP not push the problem back to them and that Indonesia has a determination equal to that of the LNP to protect their borders as well.

Game, Set and Match for tow-back. Hello Malaysia.

So, now the Coalition will attempt to keep the one-finger salute they have privately received from the Indonesians under wraps, despite the fact that the Indonesians are publicly stating that the Bali Process incorporating a regional framework for handling asylum-seekers is their preferred means of addressing the asylum seeker issue. Said Bali Process of course happens to be the ALPs preferred policy position.

To this end Abbott and Morrison are now attempting to conceal the fact that the Indonesians have explictly rejected tow-back stating reasons of diplomacy-in-confidence, despite the right of the Australian public to know that the proffered policy of tow-back is now a logical impossibility.

TONY JONES: So it’s a secret, is it?

SCOTT MORRISON: No, it’s a private discussion.

JULIA BAIRD: Yeah, right. I do think we do need to know what the situation is with the Indonesian Government and towing back the boats. If that’s a key part of your policy, we need to know if it’s feasible or not.

Scott, Tony: Julia Baird is correct. Your conversation is not only with the Indonesian government, its with the Australian electorate. If you have been making undertakings you can’t fulfil, that is your problem with the truth and not ours. (Hint: Democracy)

Enormously Expanded

Having been firmly told by Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natelegawa that tow-back is not an option, the Coalition returned from their meeting with an enormously expanded border protection policy.

They have now undertaken to prevent asylum-seekers entering the entire area of South-East Asia. Said Morrison on ABC’s 7:30 on 16 October.

SCOTT MORRISON: I mean, our policies aren’t about pushing problems back to Indonesia. Our policies are about dealing with a single-minded approach to deterrence, both on our borders, on Indonesia’s borders, on the region’s borders.

The only way of stopping refugees entering the entire region would be to achieve world peace, since it is war that drives refugee flows throughout the world. It would seem the Indonesians so firmly boxed Morrison and Abbott around the ears that they emerged somewhat punch-drunk. This appears to be a now permanent condition with Morrison repeating his Visualise World Peace policy three days later in The Australian

Mr Morrison said the Coalition did not oppose regional co-operation, per se, but Labor’s regional diplomacy had become too focused on harmonising the processing of asylum-seekers already in the region and shepherding them through the assessment and resettlement process.

Instead, all efforts should be directed towards stopping them from getting there in the first place.

Good luck with that one Scott, Tony. If its any consolation our disgusting new seat on the UN Security Council may be of assistance to you.

TEH QUEUE … Agen

Getting back to last Monday’s Q&A, Amanda Vanstone repeated a common myth that brings a veneer of principled solace to the tow-back crew. That myth is the one that says ‘No Advantage Prevents Queue-Jumping’ or as Vanstone put it:

The Houston Committee, I think, came up with a reasonable notion of no advantage over others. Now, I’ve been, and others may well have, to some of the camps in Thailand where the Karen are, where you have third generation people living in camps and I’m prepared to say that I’m behind tough border policies that do not give advantage to people who can afford a people smuggler over some poor so and so who has been waiting for generations in a camp and hasn’t got the money for a people smuggler. I’m happy to stand up for that.

Vanstone champions the notion of ‘The Queue’ to state that wicked, cashed-up asylum seekers are preventing deserving third-generation refugees from getting selected in Australia’s v. generous Humanitarian Immigration quota. So NO DVANTAHGE RULEZ.

But, myth-busting here, if a person’s family has been in a refugee camp for two generations which is say 30 years then let’s face it, they are never going to be selected by anybody. They are not in a queue as much as permanent storage.

Vanstone may or may not know that TEH non-existent QUEUE is 135 years long with total world refugees at 10.4 million and 80,000 places made available each year by resettling nations such as Australia. Once in the predicament of a refugee camp there is precious little hope of getting out. Q.E.D I win the Internets agen.

Vanstone is a decent person. She has forgotten that the reality of persons fleeing war and persecution is that some are lucky enough to leave with money and/or papers and some are not. Our sense of fair play is indeed aroused by the thought of families sequestered in refugee camps to the third generation but the so-called queue does not exist as demonstrated by the very fact of those third generation refugees. Their childhoods have been robbed from them by circumstances beyond their control.

That fact is not made more palatable by then robbing the childhoods of other persons whose parents were fortunate enough to escape with money to pay a people smuggler, who indeed may himself be an impoverished fisherman trying to find some way to feed his family.

If indeed the queue did exist then Vanstone might have a point, but there is no queue.