To Bazz,

Why waste all that money mate when a few bullets would solve it? Surely that would be your preferred option as then we don't pay for them in jail, court and don't have to pay to fly them home, the non crew that is. Come on, be brave and say what you really mean.

Don't take into account the fact that other countries might return the favour and start jailng more Aussies, and for no reason other than because we take your advice. You are not worthy of the title Bazz as you are not a real Australian. From now on you will be simply Barry.

Frankly Barry, you are a complete idiot and I wish you would take a leaky boat to another island far away.

To the rest of you, so you can't explain where all this money comes from can you? It's because they don't pay that price at all. It's a media invention. A farce, a joke to make the refugees look like frauds. The real frauds fly in.

Wake up and stop listening to your racism and Liberal/National heart.

David Jennings, “going in to bat” on CJM’s behalf is admirable but your response is exposed to the same criticism. You have totally ignored what was “actually” said and responded to what your emotions “thought” was said.

The case I made was specifically that “By encouraging our politicians to apply ideological feel good policies, we let them off the hook from their responsibilities to fix the problem and allow them to continue fiddling with vote catching yet meaningless ideologies.”

I am not denying the tragic circumstances of refugees, their terrible plights or the inhumane acts perpetrated against them by their own governments. Nor am I condoning any breaches by any government, including ours, of the conventions signed. What I am opposing is the hypocrisy and schizophrenia that besets the appeasement industries.

You and CJM speak much about compassion, rights and the rule of law. This absolutely does not entitle either of you to imply that those of us who wish to see the “causes” addressed are less compassionate.

Your emotional appeal addressing the terrible crimes against refugees is not lost, it’s just counterproductive. You hit the nail on the head, albeit unintentionally, when you said sarcastically, << It couldn't possibly be the fault of the people who commit crimes against civilians.>>. Yes it could, yes it is, yes it is a crime and yes that is the whole point.

Now, what difference has constant western refugee advocacy made to those committing these crimes for the last 60 years? Diddly Squat!

These despotic dictatorships take our Aid, they abuse or slaughter our NGO and agency volunteers, they terrorize their own people, they terrorize neighboring nations and they terrorize us. To add insult to injury, where the west has intervened to try to improve the lives of these hapless peoples, our own “appeasement industries” howl at us from within.

As I said, this is the hypocrisy and schizophrenia.

Continued:

Continued:

The UN, IMF, ITO, WHO et al, are the established mechanisms and agencies charged with the responsibility and authority to put these failed States under administration, just as we do with failed companies in order to protect public interests. These are global political agencies charged with fixing the sources of these problems because that is why they were created.

By drawing the focus away from their political responsibilities through howling advocacy at the local “symptoms” end, we are letting these political agencies of the hook. The UN itself has seized upon precisely this mechanism to harness global advocacy and further protect itself from the imperative to act, that agency is called the UNHCR.

The world operates on the principle of “fix it at the source”, this is enshrined in the International Standards (ISO 9000) principles. It will never be perfect but it does acknowledge that a problem that is not addressed at the source requires a tenfold cost/effort to fix later. The seemingly endless refugee problem is a tragic example.

Advocacy focuses its efforts on the “symptoms”. It howls at us for our lack of compassion, accuses people of being racist and xenophobic. How does this help refugees?

IMHO, the number of boat people currently is trivial to Australia however; strong advocacy is making the wider population nervous because we are being vilified for not exhibiting the same response as advocacy. Not only is it wrong to bully the Australian public, it is wrong to reinforce the symptoms.

David, there is enormous energy and compassion within refugee advocacy, but it needs to focus on those who can fix it. It needs to stop putting its energy into the 90% symptoms and direct energy at the 10% causal factors and those charged with resolution, the UN.

Abusing fellow Australians will only diminish advocacy impact, release politicians at all levels from their responsibilities and allow despotic dictators to continue generating refugees.

When the Professor Brennan’s of this world “camp out” at the UN we will know they understand the real issues and are serious about doing something.

Of course, there's no emotionalism in spindoc's disingenuous efforts to divert attention from Australia's treatment of asylum seekers, is there? All of this bleating about "appeasement industries" and "howling advocacy" is clearly based on extensive research and dispassionate analysis, as opposed to to hysterical and mendacious hyperbole.

However, it is nice to see, buried deeply within spindoc's ranting sophistry, acknowledgement both that asylum seekers are generally genuine refugees and that Australia should meet its obligations under the UN Convention.

Spindoc,
you are so correct in all you post. These bleeding hearts are like do-gooders seriously searching for the clean end of the turd to hold it to examine it closely. No attempt to see the other side of the issue. We have no heart. But we do see the damage they would inflict on the rest of us Aussiies. Doesnt bother them at all.

socratease

Thanks to socratease for demonstrating the effectiveness of spindoc's dog-whistle. Socratease praises spindoc for being "so correct in all you post", then whines about "turds" and the "damage" that will be caused - while missing spindoc's admission that "the number of boat people currently is trivial to Australia".

Excellent dog-whistling from the self-styled spin doctor, if socratease's adherence to the script is any indication.