*Given the above correction perhaps you can show me where in history deterrents against desperate people has worked?*

Examinator, we saw it right here in Australia. When Howard clamped
down and made it highly likely that people were wasting their money,
the boat trade virtually stopped.

* Are you happy about the probable consequences of primary industry trade retaliation and worse?*

Frankly Examinator, you pulled that one straight out of your arse :)
Who has threatened Australia with trade retaliation? China? Japan?
Indonesia, Saudi Arabia perhaps?

Australia could change its policy tomorrow and announce that all
future asylum seekers would come out of camps, it would be accepted,
for Australia is not the only country suffering from a rort of the
1951 convention. Rudd won't do it as he wants to win the next
election and needs the bleeding heart vote, like yours. But it
makes perfect, rational sense.

Fraccy, CJ's point has been addressed long ago. People arriving by
other means, or overstaying visas, are returned to their countries
of origin when caught. Most even have the return ticket in hand,
or they would not have obtained a visitors visa. This discussion
happens to be about boat people.

*Refugees generally
can't travel through conventional channels because they
can't get a passport from the persecuting government.*

In that case Foxy, they could not board a plane and fly to Malaysia

A quick tip for Jayb and others: when you say that refugees should apply to emigrate from their own country, you're confessing to a complete ignorance of how things work in the real world.

Do you think an Afghani Christian convert - or woman of any persuasion - can just rock up to the non-existent immigration office and ask to come to Australia? How about an Iranian democracy activist? Can he apply to leave without getting a visit from the secret police for torture and biscuits? How naive.

Not only is there no queue to jump, but the people who'd most like to join one don't have a chance.

Same old canards, same old haters posting them.

Yabby, I know you're not stupid - so why do you persist in posting material about refugees that you know is untrue? Repeating a lie doesn't make it true, no matter how often you do it.

I'm not going to bother again to painstakingly refute each of the lies and distortions about refugees posted by Yabby and the other refugee-bashers, since I've done so about this topic several times in this forum.

Thanks to Belly for reminding us of the "10,000 boat people" beat-up from a couple of months back. We've seen 1640 in the last year - I wonder what happened to the other 8360?

"Do you really think that a Liberal govt would significantly increase O/S aid to where it's needed? Have a good look at the history. Ms Bishop is playing politics trying to tap into the low level racism in this country."

Examinator, I don't know if Bishop is playing politics or not. It could well be the case. Or it could be both a political move and a sensible logical move that she knows will appeal to the majority of sensible logical Australians. Or it might just be a sensible move regardless of what people might think!

But what was Rudd's weakening of border protection about, if not a political move designed to appeal to bleeding-hearter CJ Morgan types, regardless of common-sense?

Why on earth did he feel the need to tamper with Howard's entrenched and effective policy and risk triggering a whole new onshore asylum-seeking people-smuggling highly emotive and highly expensive saga?

What the hell did he think he was doing??

No commonsense in that move AT ALL. And while it no doubt appealed to a lot of people, it would have pissed a whole bigger portion of populace right off!

Absolutely mindboggling!!

Thanks to all those who have responded here, on both sides of the debate, except for old CJ, who just can't respond without the kindergarten-level crudities.

"refugee-bashing", "trolling", "Same old canards, same old haters posting them."

Dear o dear. What a fruitball!!

.
There is so much to respond to....and so little time when I'm just popping in to various internet portals as I cruise around the far north Queensland coast! [from Palm Cove this morning]

I'm going off to enjoy a run, swim and lie on the beach on this weird dust-shrouded morning. But before that, I note that everyone is discussing onshore asylum seekers and all have missed the vastly more important point that I raised in the opening post; about population and sustainability policy.

<< ...I note that everyone is discussing onshore asylum seekers and all have missed the vastly more important point that I raised in the opening post; about population and sustainability policy. >>

How wrong you are Ludwig. Please refer to previous posts and posters:

Yours truly:

"Of course none of this excuses the equally delusory track the Rudd government appears to be on regarding climate, sustainability, pollution and population.

What we need is a genuine Opposition that is able to ensure that the current federal government does govern for the good of Australia rather than make hollow claims to do so."

http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=3080&page=0#72508

Bronwyn:

<< In conjunction, I dearly hope they also see fit to increase our international aid effort directed at the causes of refugeeism, they increase our refugee intake within a much-reduced total immigration intake and they develop a population and sustainability policy for this country. >>

I'm in total agreeance on all these points, as we've established previously. :)

http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=3080#72437

Pelican:

"Ridiculous when you think of our water situation and the rampant growth of our largest cities and we are destined to repeat the mistakes of the US, Europe and Britain."

http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=3080&page=0#72496

On the subject of insults, you fail to notice Yabby's continual maligning of all he disagrees with, yet focus on CJ who is as fed up to the eye teeth as I am with refuting his and your arguments every time the issue of asylum seekers is raised.

Fact: Rudd has not weakened the Pacific Solution set in place by Howard.

"In fact Rudd’s refugee policy is still underpinned by the same ideology and policies as Howard’s—mandatory detention, offshore processing (Christmas Island has replaced Nauru, but asylum seekers still can’t access Australian law unless they get to the mainland), and border protection. The remoteness of Christmas Island means there is no transparency to its operations.

Rather than challenge the anti-refugee sentiments whipped up throughout the Howard years and still pushed by the present crop of Liberals, Rudd is still concerned to appease any lingering anti-refugee sentiments and outflank the Liberals from the right."

http://www.solidarity.net.au/16/rudd%E2%80%99s-anti-people-smuggling-hysteria-is-risking-asylum-seekers%E2%80%99-lives/