I see your point. But I think the current terror laws he brought in are fine. As long as we don't go down the same track as the USA have with the patriot act then I think we will be fine. I am not %100 sure if the new terror laws assisted all that much today as I read that they did the raids under normal search warrants but I can see how they would help us, the Australian public in the future with the correct intelligence. I am willing to give a little if it saves some idiot blowing up the opera house or setting off a bomb at the commonwealth games etc. I don't have anything to hide from the government. I am sure you would agree if you had to go to your wife's or daughters funeral after some dude set off a bomb in the middle of town. Don't get me wrong we should look at every piece of new law that the govnt brings in to combat terrorist carefully but all in all I do trust john Howard and his govnt to do the correct thing buy us. Why would he do anything else? I don't think we have the culture there is in the USA political system, for now.

As far a IR reform.......that's a whole new can of worms. The idea behind the changes are to allow small the medium businesses hire staff and expand which will stimulate the economy, the current system doesn't push that and scares employers off doing that. The majority of major change the Howard govt has brought in in the last 10yrs I think has been positive to the economy.

"I hope the IR laws soften further, I'm going to refuse to hire Liberal voters if the anti-discrimination legislation ever gets bypassed"


lol........if thats true my opinion of you will change, a man that stays to his convictions like that is good in my book.

Unless you live out in a totally remote area, there is nowhere safe. Living in or near any major metro area is risky unfortunately.

Think about the fact that there are over 6 million Muslims living in the US now. Even if 99.9% are nice regular folks, and just .1 % (1 out of 1000) are extremists that's 6,000 bad guys we have to worry about.

Put it this way.. I've got nothing against strong anti-terror laws. We briefly thought we lost a sister-in-law in the London bombings. And when I was in Sydney on business that weekend I caught a taxi everywhere and didn't go into the centre of the city. I'm mindful of terrorists.. I don't think they're a bogeyman, that the government is faking it or anything like that.
What I don't like however are new provisions preventing me from "urging dissatisfaction with the government." That goes FAR too far. Honestly.. it's unAustralian not to have a go at the government or politicians.

And no. Howard is a lying rat. How can you HONESTLY trust "never ever", "core promise", "no one told me", "children overboard" Howard. You do realise "Honest John" was a joke name right? like calling a redhead "bluey"?

The man's word isn't worth the nitrogen and oxygen molecules that bring the sound vibrations from his mouth to my ears.

You've got to acknowledge that surely. I mean every party and leader has their faults.. Even the guys i've met and voted for I'd never hold up as paragons of virtue or trust.

We don't have a bill of rights like in the states so we have to be extra careful.. we only have implied freedom of speech here. It's not enshrined in law although a lot of people think it is from watching too many US movies.

I've got no problem with terror laws as long as they're only used on terrorists.
Given that peace activist was deported the other week, Cornelia Rau and that other woman.. I've really got no faith this will be the case 100% of the time and that it will be used to silence dissent.

There are many things any government does that isn't in the best interests of the people.. eg Selling Telstra won't be good for the bush. Killing student unions doesn't do anything except square idealogical arguments from their own uni days etc. (I never went to uni although i hold a tertiary diploma)

And Labor is really not any better.. in fact economically you should be kissing Labor's feet for their floating of the dollar and deregulation during the 80's which has contributed in no small amount to our current econmic prosperity.. the economy was on it's current tradjectory upwards before Howard came to power.. and I don't know how old you are, but the Liberals also had double digit interest rates before labor did. Really, since the 80's Labor and Libs aren't that removed from each other.. which is why they call Labor the lesser of two evils... Liberals but with a better social agenda. Hell the Liberal Backbench is more Labor than Labor at the moment lol.

"lol........if thats true my opinion of you will change, a man that stays to his convictions like that is good in my book."

yeah im a pig-headed asshole at times but I'm easy to get along with so long as insults aren't being thrown my way :)

He almost always is. :2 cents:

i still feel safe up here in brisbane :)

why attack australia they hate the americans more than anyone!

lol - dont just go by what you see here.

Aus is more like the USA than any country I have seen - and thats the way they like it.

No.. the canadians hate us more than anybody else :2 cents:

Police in Australia had taken pre-emptive action, he said.

"We were not prepared to wait for an event to happen." Mr Moroney said.



this would be too dangerous if they will not take some serious actions. they must protect the civilians and not to take this terrorist attack lightly.

I don't know about that :Oh crap

But he seems like a pretty reasonable guy.

Oh and 50 lebs attacking camera men :1orglaugh

Rights and civil liberties are easily taken away, and almost impossible to get back.

The rate at which our rights and liberties are being taken away is quite alarming. The intention 'may' be good, but not enough care is being taken to look at the potential impact on Australian citizens.

Some could argue that cutting your whole arm off would solve the problem of an infected finger and I would have trouble arguing with it ..... but .......

So fucking true ... The sheeps tactics of Bush worked very well .

The new world order in full effect :disgust Governments have realized that they can scare us into believing what they want us to believe

They know people are basically dumb and will beleive what they are told.

I get a really really bad feeling that America is blackmailing Britian and Australia into turning both their countries into police states like America. God I hope I'm wrong :Oh crap

I saw how the terrorist friends beat up the camera-team. Mean bastards.

i would rather have howard then big kim........all he does it go for cheap shots and has nothing back it up.....the labor party is fucked both federal and state........