This article is a very stereotypical Bill Calcut piece. Bill immediately takes the high moral ground, claiming that the media today is not being fair about today's important issues. Of course, Bill would never have said that twenty years ago when there was almost no cultural diversity in either the free press or the government press, because in those heady days almost the entire media was populated by tertiary educated Artz students who were all Labor supporters.

But the times they are a changin', and Bob is aghast that the press today has become a bit more representative of what the electorate thinks. . Notice how Bill claims that today's media is writing news articles which strike an emotive chord in the reader? Bill would never do that, would he? Gosh no. Then he whines about how the media is denigrating politicians instead of concentrating on issues. But I don't remember Bill whining about Julia when she claimed that Abbot was a misogynist. And lefties can hardly claim to be squeaky clean themselves when they come to personnel abuse. One of the new definitions of a "racist" is "anybody who disagrees with a left winger."

Bob spends 757 words beating around the bush in order to prime the reader with an emotive moral argument before he gets around to what he really wants to say. He uses the last 69 words wagging his morally pure finger at Australians for our treatment of "asylum seekers" and saying how ashamed he is of us. Memo to Bob. The more that you sneer at your own people, the more they dislike you, and the less inclined that they are to take any notice of what you advocate.

It is instructive to remember that historically, real social progressives like Voltaire used to delight in mercilessly lampooning moral puritans. But today's so called "social progressives" have morphed into moral puritans themselves. Bill missed his calling, he should have been a priest

Hi Bill,

This article is possibly the best summation of the socio-political status in Australia I have ever seen on OLO. (Not that it is unique to Australia).

Much has been debated recently on other threads in relation to shallow, emotive, socialized and oversimplified issues. Our politics have been reduced to twitter.

You will no doubt upset the progressives because you have nailed them, their values, short attention spans, satisfaction of the immediacy, seekers of information rather than knowledge, reactivity to challenge, oversimplification of issues and appealing to over simplistic solutions.

The saddest part of this mantra is that it sets out to damage everyone and everything equally. It is almost as though it recognizes its own failures but defends and excuses itself by dragging everything and everyone else down with it. It has become corrosive.

All you have to do now is to speculate as to how and why we have arrived at this low point?

I’m sure you have already worked it out but may be saving this for another article.

An absolute corker.

Hi Bill.
A few weeks ago I was queuing for a popular concert. The queue was nearly a kilometre long before they opened the box office.
Some very well heeled gentry, rolled up in limousines and virtually shouldered their way into the front of the queue.
When the bouncers arrived, they waved their very fat checkbooks in their faces.
Apparently they believed their comparative wealth entitled them to a place in the front of the queue, for a limited number of seats.
Given I was one of a few that would've missed out, I applauded, when these interlopers were bum rushed to the back of the queue.
Our only obligation to asylum seekers is to provide asylum, nothing more.
Many nations provide that very asylum in tent cities!
We for our part are sending ours to a tropical paradise, where all they are required to do is eat, sleep and lay around.
Nowhere is it written we are obliged to offer them citizenship or permanent residence, nor are we under any obligation to offer any assistance to their other family members.
I'm sorry if that sounds mean spirited; and, I was once of a very different view.
The fact that this tide of humanity seems to be winding down to a mere trickle indicates to me, that most of these folks were actually economic migrants, rather than genuine asylum seekers.
That being so, they have other options open to them.
Student visas, 747 applications, and immigration via the front door, and welcome.
I believe you and others just like you Bill, would take extreme umbrage if squatters simply occupied your home, without so much as a by your leave or your personal invitation.
It seems to me, that is exactly what the bulk of this tide of human misery is doing.
For mine, the best solution for them, is to act to improve their conditions and economic circumstances at home!
Perhaps utilizing the Chinese economic development model, (that lifted nearly a billion people out of extreme poverty!)
Or if you will, trade not aid.
Rhrosty.

Why do the commentators deliberately ignore the facts. It is only labor and their sycophants in the media who are overwhelmingly negative, event driven sn spin merchants. The promotion of lies is their greatest feat.
The Liberals by comparison are angels. Name the liberal minded media personLities who do as the dozens of labor media sycophants do.

For eveyone you name I'll counter with many many more leftie lie promoters.

<<Constant questioning of the mandate and legitimacy of political representation has increased community uncertainty and eroded respect for both politicians and democratic institutions. For some in the community it seems that national leadership and moral authority have been divorced from the exercise of political power.>>

There is no questioning, no uncertainty, nor is it a fleeting fashion, shallow emotive socialized and oversimplified - it's a simple and moral truth: Political representation is illegitimate and political power is divorced from morality. Nothing gives certain people a right to control the lives of others. Period.

The fact is that the internet & blogs have rubbed a bit of the silver off the back of out political mirrors.

It has allowed many of us to see past the mirror, & the gloss, to find the scum that resides behind the façade of odious people like Rudd, & his predecessor. They are no longer able to drop the vale of secrecy, & get away with hiding what they really are.

Then of course, we have people like Bill, who through some strange twist of what passes for morals, think they have the right to try to give away that which is not theirs.

They want to give away our collective heritage, a heritage that others have worked, fought & died for. Most of us wont try to deny Bill his little bit of our heritage, even as he try's to deny us ours.

Bill, god knows what makes you think you have some special insight into how others should behave, but your presumption is unearned, & unwelcome by most intelligent people.