jjplug,

I doubt that an ill-mannered redneck like you would apologise to anyone; but, perhaps you could point out the section of the 1951 Convention where it says that it is OK for even bona fide refugees to enter a country illegally? Come on, front up or stop talking crap! Nobody has been able to prove me wrong on illegals yet, and I doubt that you can.

And stop the rubbish about being "ok with people disagreeing with me". Your tone and language gives the lie to that claim. You clearly hate anyone who disagrees with you. If I,a fourth generation Australian am an not, in your redneck view, a proper Australian but an "just a transplanted European", are you telling me that you are a black fella. If you are, you black fellas immigrated here from somewhere else too. Melansia is one guess by the 'experts' because you didn't have written language to record anything.

And, with your warped view of what an Australian is, we have to assume that your wonderful illegal entrants and even bona fide regugees waiting patiently to be taken in will never be Australians either.

You seem to be a real stumble-bum whose mouth rules his brain.

I also note that the usual crackpots are talking about 'haters' again. Of course, the 'haters' are those of us who believe in law and order and a controlled immigration system which is good for Australia in certain situations which certainly do not exist at the present time.

At least we don't hate our country, like the usual crackpots who want to see more and more people come here illegally and legally to lower our standard of living, and turn Australia into a cesspool no better, eventually, than where these freeloaders come from.

All immigration should have ceased years ago; and the con trick of asylum-seeking by people under no personal danger in their own countries should have been knocked in the head before it started, along with that corrupt, unrepresentative body the United Nations which is using so called asylum-seekers to 'globalise' the poor, the useless and the dangerous.

Even Labor voters are now preferring the Opposition policy on illegals (NewsPoll), and the few clowns on OLO who think it's OK for this travesty of Rudd's to continue, should realise that most Australians do not post on OLO or anywhere else, but they do have opinions and will act at election time.

Illegals, after destroying their identity documents, tell the same two or three obviously rehearsed stories, and our incompetent, untrained immigration officials are too dumb to see through their lies. Now, the dummies are even being told not to take into custody any visa-overstayers, because there is not room to hold them!

Rudd should be charge with treachery against Australia; and the Coalition, with its huge immigration intake doesn't deserve office either.

Looks like I was right, if our resident haters are anything to go by. I'm a bit surprised that absolutely nobody seems to be attracted by Rudd's embrace of the dog-whistle.

Which brings us back to

<< Why take such a path when events on the ground will inevitably prove the Australian government wrong, sooner rather than later? >>

If the new callousness is an electoral dud, why take that path at all?

I see that CJ morgan has reverted to type. Unable to provide a cogent argument for his sappy sweet "humane" stance especially why, since the war in Sri Lanka has ended, the refugee requirements should not be reviewed. (I notice no one has suggested that the situation in Sri Lanka has not changed)

Instead he has reverted to name calling. Since his inglorious stuff up of using the term "dog whistlers" exposed his ignorance and tactics, he has now after a few weeks found a new term for name calling and that is "haters".

Other than being clearly against the rules of this forum, it is reminiscent of school yard taunts resorted to by the thick kids who lacked the IQ for anything more complicated than tying their shoes.

If you cannot provide any more logical argument than "Na ns ns ns" then I am sure there is a kiddies forum you can play in.

"All immigration should have ceased years ago"

Yep, in 1788 would've been about right from the looks of things! [I'm kidding]. Btw so glad I'm retiring soon and won't be paying tax to fund your superannuation!

Banjo, I take your point about the name-calling. Though I normally agree with the substance of CJ's remarks. Of course then Leigh turns up with a response to JJ which shows that they're both on the same level... sigh there will probably never be a civilised discussion on OLO.

Honestly, I think Rudd's policy is a waste. Just let them in, over 95% of them will be genuine refugees just like the Tampa mob were.

Leigh, its article 31 of the Refugee Convention 1951 - basically where a refugee's first entry into a country makes them nominally illegal the host country cannot impose any penalties upon them.
http://www.unhcr.org/cgi-bin/texis/vtx/search?page=search&docid=3bf4ef474&query=illegal

Shadow,
How superior are you by following suit?
One might also note that your responses were somewhat short of logically realistic.
In context a 20 year internecine war is over so now there are no victims?

You really are totally imbued with your white middle class culture.

My father died 20 years after the war and still hated Japanese with a palpable underlying rage that was mostly controlled. He experienced 3 years on the Burma railway. Imagine if he had spent 2 decades of similar treatment ... Suddenly, the victor become a paragon of human rights, no ingrained lethal prejudices?

I dread the thought of if either an Japanese ex-prison guard moved into our street.

Its been how many years since the fall of apartheid in SA ...seen their murder rate? now imagine the Japanese had won.. that's similar to what the Tamils are dealing with.