Tim Blair

Tim "Robert" Blair still dissembles! Will he address the shocking charge that his middle name ia "Robert"?

Or will he not?

"Robert." Kind of . . .

French, isn't it?

In addition to her shocking spelling, grammar and punctuation, Margo has also managed to misunderstand the nature of the Australian Parliament.

The inquiry she speaks of is being held in the Senate. The Senate is the States' House, in that all States have equal representation regardless of population. The House of Reps, on the other hand, has members elected proportionate to population, so it is often known as the Peoples' House.

As Margo was the head of the Herald's Canberra Bureau for some time, you might think she would have worked out Australia's bicameral system of government by now.

Unless, like the rest of us, she can't bear to read her own work either.

Can't sleep! The people house will get me! And feed me to clowns!

Sorry to rain on Margo's parade. But Howard IS accountable to the "People's House" (ie the House of Representatives). All Prime Ministers are. Any member can move a vote of non-confidence.

Hilariously, the gay and lesbian lobby plans to air ads attacking both Howard and Latham for being anti-gay:

http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=5137

You can always rely on clapped-out lefties to be 180 degrees wrong on how this sort of thing plays in mainstream Australia. It's just a pity they included Latham in their assault. Otherwise the Libs couldn't ask for better publicity.

Any member can move a vote of no-confidence - which is then squashed according to party discipline regardless of the actual merits of the motion.

All prime ministers and premiers routinely mislead parliament, and with good reason. If any of them told the whole truth about what happens in cabinet or the bureacracy, they wouldn't last five minutes.

LMAO, Tim!

Well, at least you've got to give Fairfax credit for trying to reintegrate illiterates back into society. I would have thought a janitorial position would be more appropriate, though.

Apart from another appalling demonstration of her bad grammar, Margo makes mention of a forthcoming book by Tony Kevin - A Certain Maritime Incident.

She refers to Keith Windschuttle when she mentions that the "facts" as set out by Kevin will attract critics. If "facts" are indeed facts they will withstand any scrutiny whether it be by Windschuttle or anybody else. What Windschuttle exposed was fiction dressed up as facts. What he showed in his critique was that Lyndal Ryan and others invented "facts" to support their view of history.

It would seem that dear Margo is foreshadowing a similar situation with this book. It sounds awfully like a "what did Howard know and when did he know it" effort.

If the left want to make illegal immigrants an issue at this election the they should be positively encouraged.

The funny thing is that there have been few if any new attempts at entry since the government acted and that means far fewer people put in life threatening situations by people smugglers.

So go for it, Margo!!!

And Lyndal Ryan's response to being caught out by Windschuttle? "Two truths are told,is only one truth correct?"With a counter arguement like that why bother with facts,they just get in the way of a good fabrication.

Actually facts wouldn't get in the away of a good fabrication following that logic.

I know I'm just an 'ignorant, arrogant Yank', but I fail to understand how the actions of people on a boat can be blamed on anyone but themselves.

Why aren't the adults on that boat to blame? Weren't they the ones who threw the kids overboard? Were guns pointed at them to force them to take the actions they did?

Perhaps I've missed some articles about PM Howard storming onto the boat and chucking the kids over himself? Or perhaps he ordered other Australian authorities to do it?

My understanding is the people who threw the children overboard did so because they were blackmailing the Australian people into allowing them into Australia?

I can't see any blame attached to the Australian government in any way. These people did a terrible thing. It's one of the reasons you may not want them as citizens of your country. Who in the heck would want to allow people into their country that use children in such a way?

The only people I can think of who would want such a group are those people who earn a living advocating for them, or who retain a base of power based on advocating for such people. These are probably the same people who are trying to blame PM Howard for what happened and ignore the real perpetrators.

To me, again as an ignorant Yank who may not have all the facts, it seems as if the Australians who are blaming PM Howard are exploiting those poor children who were thrown overboard. I bet they care more about 'getting Howard' than they care about the kids tossed into the water.

Chris J., as an "ignorant Yank", you demonstrate a far better understanding of the events and their surrounding issues than do many Australian "journalists".

Chris,the point of the Howard haters is that the children weren't thrown overboard on that particular boat.They say Howard knew this and lied to the Australian people.An advisor has gone public with this claim and taken a lie detector test stating he told Howard that no one in the Defense Dept.believed the claim.

gubbaboy:

Some questions:

- There was *another* boat where children were thrown overboard? Or, were there no kids tossed overboard at all, on any boat? (Howard is just claiming children were thrown overboard?)

- What advantage could Howard possibly gain by such a lie?

- Who, in a position to know, supports Howard's version?

Seriously, why does Margo still have a job?

I mean, I support the rights of the mentally challenged to be treated with the same dignity as everyone else but this is just ridiculous.

High time to throw her overboard, says I.

Chris,several boats arrived around that time.The tactics employed by the smugglers were to destroy the boats motor or threaten to throw kids overboard(I'm not sure if they actually did or not)So basically they intimidated the Navy into picking them up so they could take advantage of our soft immigration policy.
The only advantage Howard had was to sway opinion against the people smugglers.He needed to because our left leaning journo's portrayed him and Australians as bigotted racists.
Howard received many opinions regarding the validity of the children overboard claim.He allowed video of the event to be released to the press,so he couldn't be accused of covering up.He also retracted the statement when it became obvious it was unsupportable(but that was after the election). Some public servents are not required to give evidence at the Senate enquiry.The Minister responsible supported the view of kids overboard.

an opinionated homeless person?
I can see Margo walking the streets with that other noted homeless person,Ralph Nader.Anyone in an RV spotting them,you know what to do.

Chris J.

Our sentiments exactly. The crux is that the leftist media people pushing the agenda ("Howard lied" even thought the facts show he didn't) are networked with the illegals' lawyers and civil righters, and further supported by the Greens and Socialist Alliance.

Bingo. Sanctimonious self-justification meets self-righteous egos.. therewith no facts, no reason, no logic, - nothing - will penetrate one nanometre into their stubborn close-mindedness. Under no circumstances could they entertain that they are anything but absolutely correct and that the rest of us aren't inhumane bigots.

I find it frighteningly fascist. I live in Newtown, Sydney where such thought is de rigeur. I put up with these people everyday, handing out really offensive handbills and plastering posters on poles, - last week it was why we should support the Iraqi resistance (Moqtada et al) against the US.

The bourgeouis hypocrisy of it made me gag. But it shows how closed they are to reality, and how adolescently selfish they are about their right to ram their sheltered opinions down others' throats.

God help us all if they ever get real power.

Romeo,
I live close by. I thought I was the only one gagging on these fascists.I'm starting a counter revolution if your up for it.Drop me a line if your interested,I have a cunning plan.So much fun chasing those handbill plasterers up the street.

It's good to see right-wingers haven't lost their 'moral clarity' on discovering Howard deceived the Australian people.

Or their 'Christian' values: ". . . whatever you did for one of these least of mine, you did for me" (Matthew 25:40).

I can't work out how that applies to boatpeople (90+% of whom are later accepted as genuine refugees), but I'm not a Christian like Howard, Abbot, Costello and Ruddock.

Leave Abbot and Costello out of this.

Hoo's on third...

Adam,
Does moral clarity require an open door policy for refugees?
If so would it be O.K to allow say 1 million people enter in any calender year?
Would it bother you if large groups of NESRefugees would be dumped in urban areas,on welfare,ghettoes in the making?
Of course in your perfect world we all hold hands and love each other deeply.
We have an immigration policy,we help the oppressed of the world,just not all of them.

I don't know.

Adam, word of advice. Don't quote the Bible. Considering God himself lies inside it, it kind of kills your argument.

But I'm sure you, being an intelligent person who's not a Christian or a "right-winger", would know this? Wouldn't you?

Anyway, I'm share Adam's outrage of the demonisation of these asylum seekers. Why they never threatened to throw their children overboard at all! All they threatened to do was scuttle their own boat in an attempt to blackmail members of the Australian navy.

That's nowhere near as bad.

Is it?

The tactics employed by the smugglers were to destroy the boats motor or threaten to throw kids overboard(I'm not sure if they actually did or not)

In fact some of them dangled their children overbaord, then dropped them into the water. So technically they may not have been "thrown", but for all practical and ,oral purposes, Howard was telling the truth.

Margo's wits would disgrace a calf.

Children overboard ? Gimme a break.

What about Her Majesty's Opposition who don't seem to have the nerve to release any policies (other than reading to kids) when an elections been on the cards for 6 months.

Will they try what they did last time and release them just before the election so they can't be costed. A hundred bucks to a bucket of shit says they will. Pathetic poonces.

As I recall, long after the so-called "childrenoverboard" incident but just before the election, another boat carrying illegal immigrants was destroyed when the crew set fire to the engine. Howard went on radio and read from the Navy report about the incident so that this time he would not be accused of lying.

This incident could not be explained away by the left which explains why it has been ignored while "childrenoverboard" has been done to death. To argue that the "childrenoverboard" made the difference to the last election result is a far worse lie than anything the Government may have said.

I for one, am extremely angry that the ALP wasted huge amounts of taxpayers' money and may do so again on a massive beat-up to cover Labour's shame at losing the last election.

Oh my God, I know this is off topic but it's just so awesome:

Then the shepherd, a poor and nearly illiterate young peasant, embarrassingly recounts how the Israeli solider at one of the wall’s gates forced him at gunpoint to have intercourse with his donkey before allowing him to return home.

The JEWS made me do it! I tell you THEY made me have sex with my donkey!!

http://www.minfo.gov.ps/view_point/english/03-03-04a.htm

Perhaps Margo has been reading Dr Seuss:

"In a People House"

http://www.harpercollins.com.au/title.cfm?ISBN=0001712764&Author=0000012

Please send Margo to America. Now that the Kerry campaign has used up Carville and Davis, they need a new spokesflake. Heck, if she plays her cards right, she could get Chris Matthews' job...

I recently read at Currency Lad's blog a very long and interesting article about the whole children overboard business.
There is a link to (I think) a DoD document about the SIEV illegal immigrant boats and their shitty behaviour. It's very intersting reading, the number and treatment of kids by these "poor downtrodden refugees" is utterly appalling.
Government/children overboard sceptics/critics should be bloody well made to read this stuff.

Doesn't Australia have laws against child-endangerment? If it does, why weren't the parents convicted and deported as criminals? (IIRC, Oz is no longer a penal colony.)

How long have Australians referred to one of their legislative houses as "the people's house"? I ask because US Dems started using that term after they lost their majority in the US House of Representatives.

I'm wondering who cribbed the term, and why.

The point about SIEV 4 was those on board deliberately sunk the boat with children on board, after sabotaging the engine, pumps and steering.

What is the difference between this and throwing children overboard? It is insignificant. The children end up in the water, in danger, as photographs of the incident plainly show happened.

It is like a good news/bad news joke "Oh, little Yusuf, the good news is that I am not going to throw you overboard, the bad news is ..." etc.

The lefties who try to make moral capital out of this are moral cripples.

I don't understand. Everyone here seems to be of the opinion that throwing kids off boats is a bad thing?. Talk about your partisanship. I'm here to fight for the right of parents to throw their kids to the sharks whenever they deem it appropriate. God knows most kids deserve it.

Andy,

About who used "people's house" first: It's rather like "Howard lied, children died!" sounding an awful like "Bush lied, people died!"

The important thing to know is that Aussie conservatives are American sell-outs, but Aussie leftists should stand hand-in-hand with American leftists. Solidarity through sloganeering, and all that.

Unless Australia took some covert action to sink the boat(s)(which I DON'T believe), I still can't see how anyone is to blame but the people ON the boat(s). To try and place the blame at the feet of anyone in the Australian Government is just nuts.

The only Australians that could be even remotely to 'blame' would be anyone/everyone who encouraged those people in the actions they took. If any of the various Australian groups who are 'pro-illegal aliens' helped these people believe they could have what they wanted by committing such horrible deeds, these people share some of the blame. But it is still primarily the fault of those *IN* the boat(s).

You're a mean, mean man, Tim Blair.

Bravo.

Absolutely correct Chris.
We had an industry in Australia encouraging illegals.Howard stopped it.The industry never forgave him.You are also correct in the assumption that it creates a power base, having bucketloads of refugees/excessive immigration,the Labor party under Keating perfected this.All subsidised by the Aussie tax payer and called multiculuralism and voting predominantly Labor.

Richard, if you get Margo sent to America, we get to send an equal amount of insanity, illiteracy, and incompetence to Australia. Otherwise, the Earth's spin might disasterously change.

I nominate Kurt Vonnegut, Al Franken, and Sean Penn as the American contribution to this "Down Under" Moonbat Exchange Program.

Amos's posting about the Jew complelling a poor Palestinian to have sex with his donkey raises some problematical things, apart from its whole new slant on the phrase "getting it in the ass."

I am just a girl and my understanding of male sexuality may be imperfect, but does a man ... er ... get and erection ... unless he wants to? And how with a rifle being pointed at him?

Sue,
It depends on whether the donkey is really attractive :)

The worst part of it for that poor Palestinian was when he got home and his camel gave him hell for screwing around on her.

Sue, erections can have minds of their own, but I'm pretty sure the donkey humper was lying.

It depends on how convincing the guy holding the gun is.

I think someone pointing a weapon would be a real 'downer', in terms of an erection. Then, of course, we have the whole other issue of the object of penetration for the erection. I think the idea of penetrating a donkey would cause all but an 'animal lover' to lose it real quick.

Interesting twist on 'BLAME ALL ON THE JEWS' meme. The sad thing is there are people who are more than willing to believe the Palestinian's version.