Tamils and the Ocean Viking

What is wrong with this Australian labour government? More than three hundred Tamil people have risked their life trying to reach our shores and this government are refusing them entry. I thought that when the Howard government was kicked out of office some compassion would return to Australian politics, I was obviously wrong. Let me say straight up, I am not political. I have withheld my right to vote since Whitlam was booted out of office way back in 1975 and have virtually ignored politics ever since. But when a party so lacking in compassion as the Liberal (a misnomer if ever there was one) Party of John Howard rules over the land for as long as they did, you cannot help but take notice. Of course I still lean (maybe bend) to the left in my thinking, that will never change. I am going off topic here again. You'll have to forgive me, It's an age thing that is getting worse by the year. There is an argument that goes something like, these people pay "people smugglers" to bring them here. So what? My folks paid ten pounds each to come here (nothing for me) and were ferried here on a luxury liner. I wonder if we (encompassing the European emigrant in general) would have risked everything to come here on a leaky boat.

Why have our policies towards "boat people" not changed with a change of government; especially since the labour party, when in opposition, called for a more compassionate approach themselves. Is there a fear of being overrun by "boat people" if we allow these people to land on our shores? Would the view of this government be any different if these people trying to come here were not Asian?
There is a very good article in The Canberra Times that address these issues very nicely. Here is a quote from the article

The sea journey to Christmas island is indeed hazardous, and the fact that asylum-seekers continue to risk it suggests that they have very good reasons for wanting to leave their country of origin in the first place; something not all Australians are willing to recognise. It's regrettable that some politicians so easily lose sight of the human dimensions of the asylum-seeker issue as they seek to curry favour with xenophobic voters or to uphold dubious legacies.

These people seem to be genuine asylum-seekers. Fools, like West Australia's own Wilson Tuckey, make the claim that Tamil "terrorists" are among the common people on the boats. That maybe so, I don't know. But today's terrorists are tomorrow's "freedom fighters" depending which side our government (nearer the truth, the US government) is backing at the time, so let's not get over concerned about that. Politicians use these scare tactics all of the time. Why do they use them? Because journalists report their every word as the truth without checking for accuracy and of course the general public believe it. And they only need the public to believe them for a short while. For some reason our memory, when it comes to the utterings of pollies, is quite short lived. However I am immune to them , my yardstick for pollies telling the truth, if his mouth is open, he's lying.

Anyway, in my view these Tamil asylum seekers should be allowed into the country. I'll be buggered, a short while ago, it seems a pollie has just agreed with me. The Premier of West Australia announced that these people are our responsibility and we should allow them onto our shores in order to process them. All I can say to that is, and about time too.