Your article takes a straw man approach to defending the indefensible by suggesting that the decision to refuse entry to the Tampa and opposition to illegal immigration are one and the same. They clearly are not. It was the Australian rescue centre that sent a message to the Tampa to pick up the refugees/survivors and "economic migrants". It was an Australian port that was the closest destination for an overloaded, unhygenic ship with over 400! refugees, some in need of medical attention. It was, first and foremost, a basic humanitarian situation, and the clear and obvious moral course would have been to at least allow those in need of medical attention to receive it in an available hospital rather than on the crowded, stinking deck of the Tampa. The failure to do so was clearly immoral.

The sophist argument that the people on the Tampa were not refugees and that denial of asylum to these people was the best policy may be ‘valid’ in some sense of the word. But Howard was not right’ as in correct. He was very wrong and immoral and it was unnecessary and dishonourable to use the methods he did to achieve this end. It diminished us all as individuals and as a country, even if many people like you do not take this as a serious point. It is short sighted and narrow-minded not see how much more we could have and be as a country if we were less focused on our own material welfare and more willing to embrace diversity. We need to trust our democracy to deal with the problems imposed by an influx of people 'not like us'. Our society would be more vibrant, more able to adapt to the future if it valued genuine intellectual debate rather than constructing arguments that score points and advocate for the simplistic dichotomy of right and wrong.