More ‘Better life shoppers’ arrive

Australia intercepts third asylum boat this week but Rudd is adamant he hasn’t softened border control. Rudd denies weakening border controls and said today the surge in asylum seekers heading to Australia is mostly caused by Sri Lanka’s civil war. Australian authorities have stopped about 89 people-smuggling operations in the past year, he said on Melbourne-based 3AW Radio. Civil war….yeah right. They’ll be coming in daily soon.

53 comments

  • Peter W

    Apart from the usual abuse and name-calling, your post consists of one meme – about the spelling of Labor. You’ve not addressed any of the other five points raised.
    Why am I not surprised?

    Let’s look at your response about the spelling, given that it’s the only substance in your post. The significant factor is whether or not the capital “L” is used.
    In your post of Jan 7th, 2010 at 12:17 pm you wrote “non-Labour” and “Labour Movement”. You can’t have it both ways – either you’re talking about the party, in which case the Americanized spelling and a capital “L” is used, or you’re talking about the movement, when lower case is correct, and the “u” is present. Your only excuse could be that the text is quoted – but it’s incorrect usage anyway.
    And talking about having it both ways, the Labor party website that you referred to has a piece on Curtin –
    “Curtin became war-time Prime Minister in October 1941. He gave resolute and inspiring leadership to the Australian people during the war and a group of experienced and capable ministers provided the administrative back-up needed for a successful war effort. The Curtin Government also devoted considerable attention to drawing up a blueprint for post-war reconstruction of Australia.”
    Given your bias, you’d probably deny this as a reasoned account, yet you quote the same website as an authority on the name of the party. Strange indeed.

    “reposition the Vietnam conflict as a “meat grinder” on the same scale as the Great War”.

    Show me where I did that…I used the term “meatgrinder” – I didn’t compare Vietnam to WW1 in connection with casualty figures, but in reference to conscription. Vietnam was a meatgrinder, especially if you were Vietnamese. I doubt they (the Vietnamese) place much significance on casualty figures in WW1.
    It was your old mate Harry Buttle who got all apoplexic about any comparison between Vietnam and WW1 –
    Harry Buttle – Dec 20th, 2009 at 10:34 pm – “I’m quite stunned…..”
    My point (which you’ve both missed) was about Australian conscripts being used by Anglophiles to fight imperial wars. The Australian people won’t abide that. It took two referenda (in WW1) and a Labor victory in 1972 to ram that point home, and you still don’t get it. Read it again.

    You’ve completely ignored my reference to plagiarism except to say “Really, how little you know…” It reminds me of the response of a six-year old when he/she has run out of ideas “Ha..ha..I know something you don’t know…”
    Do tell… Reveal all….what are you afraid of?

    Bluster and abuse do not constitute debate – but I guess I’m wasting my time pointing that out. It’s still great fun.

  • “You’ve completely ignored my reference to plagiarism…” I wrote those posts idiot. I gave up that pseudonym when I discovered there were a number of people using it.

    “You’ve not addressed any of the other five points raised.” What the other red herrings like my egregious use of capitalisation?

    “The significant factor is whether or not the capital “L” is used…” Ha ha ha ha ha – what a feeble response – you really are the clown prince of red herrings. As usual when you’re caught out you’ve tried to build another straw man to hide from the argument you are losing. That you don’t understand the distinction between the name of a political party (the Labor Party) and a political movement (the Labour Movement) isn’t surprising given your lack of general knowledge evidenced in this thread.

    By the way pedant, both examples above are capitalised as they are proper nouns.

    You carelessly wrote the following in the same post; “The Anglophile Hughes tried to extend it to calling up Australians to contribute to the meat grinder which we call WW1.” And “Menzies remained consistent to the end, offering Australian conscripts to a foreign power in a different meat grinder (Vietnam) twenty years later.”

    Any reasonable person would draw the conclusion from those remarks that you were comparing ‘meat grinder’ WW1 to ‘meat grinder’ Vietnam.

    Harry Buttle called you out; “but you have excelled yourself. Actually calling Vietnam a ‘meat grinder’ in the same context as WW1. literally insane.”

    Amongst other desperate obfuscations you went on to try and justify your silly comparison with; “Not a meat grinder? Another relevant comparison – WW1 – Australian Conscripts killed – 0 Vietnam – Australian Conscripts killed – 181…”

    In the end Harry Buttle summarised your childish – shall we say “six-year old” harangue quite well with; “Its nice that you are grabbing at straws, the fact is that the reviewer gives examples of factual errors and sloppiness, he in no way suggests that he has identified all of them (that is hardly the objective of a newspaper review), the fact that he found or confirmed 3 other matters is interesting, but not relevant to your contention that total Vietnam casualties were on the same scale as those of WW1 (in fact you only moved onto that claim when your reference to Aust casualties in Vietnam and WW1 both being like a “meat grinder” got called), I’ll allow you the dishonest argument, because it doesn’t matter – you look equally foolish making either claim.”

    Foolish is an apt description.

    “It was your old mate Harry Buttle…” I’ve never met him, spoken to him or corresponded with him, but I enjoyed his demolition of your “foolish” argument.

  • Good post! I looked around for this… I located your site! :) I have a Political Commentary site of my own at White Rabbit Cult… Otherwise would you mind if I threw up a return link from my web site to your blog site?