Lexi,
Shahram Akbarzadeh article reminds me very much of the situation many Southern European refugees found themselves in when they first arrived in Australia after WWII. There was a substantial amount of suspicion and prejudice directed towards "reffo's". The saving grace at that time was the fact Australia was suffering from a labour shortage, so the economic pressure from "wogs, spicks, dagoes, garlic munchers etc" (a few of the more polite names the dinky-di Aussie had for these new arrivals) was not there. I must say not all treated migrants this way but it was fairly typical to treat refugees with suspicion. British migrants, pom's, got a better reception as they were seen as "like us" but they had their "bad habits" didn't wash, couldn't speak English properly, and was tight with his money, but was generally seen as okay.
To the 'usual Suspects' Joe said “New Zealand will take only 750 refugees this year." Why don’t you jump up and down about the huge number of economic refugees heading across the ditch from NZ, 57,000 last year . New Zealand is not too happy about it, they are losing a lot of skilled people, people they paid for to be educated and trained.
The comment from the Indonesian President highlighting the need for mutual cooperation between our two countries over asylum seekers may have scuttled the Abbott gunboat before he can get it into the water.

P'rot,

The more I see and hear about Kevin's tripping in Indonesia the more I am convinced that it's just a PR stunt.
You might recall, Julia made similar tough sounding noises just prior to the last election (but we later found it was just her empty stomach rumbling)

By special request just for you:

What Aus-tralia needs now are deeds, not deescussion
It's the only thing that there's just too little of
What Aus-tralia needs now are deeds , not deescussion ,
No no please no more of your window dressins.
Lord, we don't need another Kevin 07,
We've had showmen and charlatans enough to harm
There's been talkfests and confabs to waste our time ,
Enough to last till the end of tiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiime

(feel free to sing it to your friends --or your The Voice audition)

Paul

Your article reminds me very much of the situation many Anglo-Ozzies
often find themselves in when walk through some of our western suburbs.
They are get shouted at and called kaffirs, infidels and redknecks

Just caught up with the thread after a day of illness.

I looked at my earlier posts that Jayb referred to and I think I have learnt my lesson - don't try irony!

After 36 pages on this topic, it's clear there is an unresolvable stand-off. What's hard to tell is how much this replicates the difference of opinion in the broader community, or whether just those people with strong views (either way) actually post on-line.

Further, when does such verbal stoushing tip over into actual fighting? Would people make some of these statements if we were all face-to-face, rather than anonymous and on-line? Are we all still Australians together, ready to help each other in fire and flood, or could we end up like some of the countries we've been discussing, with physical violence between people of different views?

Dear SPQR,

This from the web for you:

1) On LOL -
How else would you laugh? Have you ever heard anyone LOS?
(Laughing out silent). You can smirk, you can smile,
you can be silently gleeful, but if you see a silent
laugh it's probably just a bad case of wind!

2) On DISCUSS -
Achievements are hammered out on the anvil of
discussion and debate.
A leader who's not taking part in discussions is like
a boxer who never goes into the ring.

Dear Paul1405,

Listening to the Coalition speakers on TV recently - they
are sounding rather desperate and looking foolish in
pursuing their usual mantras. They need to come up
with something better. People are beginning to question
what the same old rhetoric.

Dear Poirot,

Someone better tell SPQR that singing is not the same
as discussion.

Thank you, Poirot, what you say is quite appropriate.

Paul,

We have a special arrangement with New Zealand, and none of them are economic 'refugees'. They have the scenery, we have the jobs (for now) - I think that's how it's supposed to work.

I'm still trying to work out what's wrong with my brain-wave of flying people back, after medical etc care, plus a bonus per person for the Governments back there of, say, ten thousand dollars, for resettlement. How long might that have to go on ? Yeah, something's wrong there but for the live of me, I can't see it.

Joe