Yet if any group is most to blame for the status quo, it is the ultimately pernicious group of left-wing intellectuals, whose ideas have dominated public policy on Aboriginal issues for the past 35 years.”
MrRight,
what you're saying is factual, so you won't get an argument from our Ostrich mates. It's always interesting how quiet they get when reminded of their shortcomings. In my area the Communities themselves are now restricting the sale of Alcohol because they realize how detrimental it is. Now if an official attempt were made to do that there would be one hell of an outcry of discrimination. Remember the years & years of claims of discrimination when indigenous people were either not allowed in pubs or severely restricted ? Well, those, including indigenous leaders who predicted that Alcohol was bad were shouted down as rednecks etc. Are they going to get an appology for being branded with bad character since they are now proven right ?
Come on all you Whitlamites & confess that your philosophies were & still are not synchronized with reality.

Adam Creighton writes "Yet if any group is most to blame for the status quo, it is the ultimately pernicious group of left-wing intellectuals, whose ideas have dominated public policy on Aboriginal issues for the past 35 years."
Well that is the usual political "cover" for the right wing. Creighton tries to imply the lefts are in control which is sheer nonsense and straight out deceit. (I am not offering here an appology for the Labor lefts who are scoundrels.) There are no "lefts" in the Liberal Party which was in power since 1995. As far as the Labor Party goes the so called "lefts" have pushed no policies through on aboriginals since the Whitlam govt. Even then, and that was during the boom, a few small reforms (crumbs)were handed out. Creighton wants to right things by giving them nothing and to take from them! Like the right wing Creighton is hostile to any or all concessions and attacks the problem from the right. Creighton follows the howling pack in-chorus using the unspeakable conditions which are the direct interventions of both Labor and Liberal governments as a justification for military style intervention - just offer the aboriginals more crocodillian appologies.

The 200 year ongoing genocide of aboriginals to basically clear the land is a right wing perspective and an ongoing perspective. This is what is posed in the Northern Territory - clear the land again for the mining industry and large beef stations - serve up the aboriginals as cheap labor with no rights - no mining tasks will be too onerous nor too dangerous. As well, in the political circles there has been discussions about every new contract of uranium ore for sale overseas assurances will be given to take back the depleted uranium ore tailings and dump it in the Northern Territory; strange, the government are keeping that issue quiet.
It is interesting to note the political types Creighton wrote the article for - the rightwing American Enterprise Institute

It is a pity that so much eloquence, brain, and acute perceptions of the disasters of past indigenous policy is expended on berating something called the Left. The issues are real and not something to be used as a club to beat ideological opponents. Let us put the intelligence and passion to work at solving the problems rather than squabble. My guess is that those of the so-called Left are ready to change failed policies. But it is easier to know that we need to change from than it is to know what to change to.

A formal apology is a beginning only. What better way to start?

No, the author got it wrong, trying to wing it: a small minority, about a fifth, of the Indigenous population live in remote settlements. Around three-quarters live in urban areas, and close to half now live in metropolitan areas. There are more Indigenous people in Sydney and Brisbane than in all the remote communities put together.

Yes, what is happening in northern communities is a scandal, a disaster, from which it will be touch and go if most people survive.

But on the other hand, in the urban areas, where Indigenous people do not have land rights, do not receive mining royalties, were most subject to removal, cannot get onto the CDEP no-work program, many have turned to education, including tertiary education (i.e. university education, i.e. enrolment in mainstream university courses), in huge numbers: since 1990, at least a quarter of all Indigenous adults have been enrolled at some time or other in tertiary education, two-thirds of them women: twenty two thousand have graduated (check out the Census 2006), and a total of fifty thousand could graduate by the year 2020. These are the people most free of control by Indigenous organisations and bureaucrats, and from harassment by academics and careerists.

So the focus should be kept on the predicament of Indigenous people trapped in the remote communities, particularly the women and children, who have been kept unskilled, and therefore unable to escape from what must seem the seventh circle of Hell.

The comment by the Nazarene Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount - Blessed are the Poor in Spirit - must fit most of our Aboriginals very well.

Certainly one wonders sometimes what any of us whites would feel in the same situation, especially when lining up for a job among whites

What I want to know is; who are all these 'leftists' responsible for the issues faced by Aboriginal people today. I can't see any leftists in the Labor Party and certainly not in the Liberal party. I can't see any leftists writing in our daily newspapers or involved in the tv news on 7, 9 or 10. I can't even see them on the ABC nor SBS for that matter. I'd suggest that any leftists who are out there aren't really in control of much to do with our the mainstream media and policy making bodies. Anyway perhaps the apology was a tad 'tokenistic'? Many Aboriginal people welcomed it, but perhaps many didn't. Who cares? The main issue I would have thought was that we all should get off our butts and do something. Yes ALL of us. Sounds simplistic? Well what good is all this squabbling and looking for 'reds under the bed', doing us? Just get on with it people!