proud to be Aussie, Gary

What i said was correct, as in “almost”.

Considering that ADF has the 13th largest budget for any armed forces in the world today, the sheer quantity of items they use or sheer quantity of stores and ordinance used means that some is made off-shore. Even the US MIlitary uses things made out-side of the US of A.

The only high-tech part of the material in uniforms are the chemical treatments used for insect repellent, water-proofing and anti-luminesence, apart from that the material is relatively common and the cam pattern is even relatively well known so there is no secrecy issue.

Again, it has nothng to do with the topic at hand.

Regards,

Crimson

On 28 January you said “You also seam to forget that almost everything used by the ADF is actually made here in Australia.”

Well, in todays Daily Telegraph the following appears

AUSTRALIAN soldiers will be sent to war wearing uniforms with camouflage material made in China under a new round of Defence cost cutting.

The decision could put at risk the jobs of up to 400 textile workers and has raised national security concerns.

The hi-tech material for the uniforms, which are also worn by SAS troops, is currently made in Wangaratta in Victoria by Bruck Textiles.</em

So another 400 jobs sold to China. I'm sure our diggers will be proud to pull on their camouflage suits and see the label "Fabrique en Chine" hanging out.

And your point is?

Not exactly sure what it has to do with either Tony A or multiculturalism or Australia's genitic diversity or multiculturalism either.

As i have pointed out previous, the average wage in Australia is now over $1,000 a week, even the minimum wage is well above the labour rates in China. So of-course companies are going to go to where they can be more profitiable and of-course people are going to buy what is cheapest and governments are no exception.

Do you think the situation would be any different with Tony A in charge or anyone else? Do you think even the APP could justify the expense for expense sake to parliment? Do you think the APP could tackle the 20,000 personel strong procurement department?

Crimson

The ADF also uses MANPADs made in Sweden, UAVs made in Israel and many other items made in places all over the word (everywhere except Russia) and uniforms will only add another item of foreign sourced items to the list.

I could not disagree with you more on the notion that Australia’s early population was Saxon-Nordic, that would literally equate to most of our early migrants coming from the Baltic Region, an that certainly isn’t the case.

Most migrants and convicts who came to Australia were either Anglo-Celt or Anglo-Saxon with perhaps some viking era blood lines included.

As i said, Nord is not all encompassing, far from it.

Sandon,

As i said, genetics determin race, not geography or anything else. The idea of Nation is in one sense purely geographical or natural sense, this is certainly the case for Aboriginal People. Seconly, the United States of America is founded as a nation on the principle of shared ideal and not race or culture.

There is not one single notion of nation or national identity, it could also be argued that much of Australia’s national identity is geographical and our relationship with the geography as oposed to some sense of a single racial or cultural identity.

Regards,

Crimson

Here is not the place to have a lengthy discussion on the history and contemporary problems of India. Neither is it a place to get bogged down in pointless arguments about the DNA of “true Australians”. Who cares? Harking back to my dog analogy, a Labrador is a Labrador, even though 10% of its genes come from wolfs. And an Australian is an Australian.

Australians should indeed be focusing on the pressing issues and not be worrying about checking people against a colour chart or investigating their ancient ancestral DNA.

The pressing issues, as I seem them, are these (not necessarily in order of importance):

1. Australia should get out of the UN imposed “refugee” acceptance requirements. I don’t see any reason why Australia should accept any more 3rd world refugees. It would be better for the UN to fix the problems in the country of origin rather than insist that the West (and only the West it seems) keep taking the world’s flotsam and jetsam.

2. Immigration should be suspended until every able-bodied and work-ready Australian has a full-time job. That is, a “true” unemployment level of about 3%. Then we can think about immigration on a “skilled” basis only.

3. Australian primary and secondary industry must be protected so that there really is a level playing field. We should refuse imports from countries that allow child labour, waged slavery, and female exploitation.

4. The student visa rort and the fraudulent “vocational schools” should be closed down immediately.

5. Australian families should be encouraged to have more children and this should include a baby bonus, free education from pre-school to end of TAFE or 1st University degree; free childcare for working mothers; free medical and dental treatment; and a school uniform and equipment allowance for every child.

6. Cities like Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane should be “closed” and industries encouraged to relocate to regional areas.

7. The entire legal system should be overhauled and all contracts, laws, and legal documents written in “Plain English”. That is, if they cannot be readily understood by an average person with an average High School Education, then they need to be redrafted. Legal fees also need to be set by an independent body so that they reflect the actual “time” and “order of difficulty” involved i.e. just like any other worker!

8. The Family Law Act needs a complete re-think. I am very much in favour of bringing back “fault” divorces and treating the party “at fault” in the same way one would treat a commercial contract defaulter. The way it is now is just so wrong in the way many “not at fault” parents are treated – mostly men.

9. Homelessness must be addressed. There is no reason why, in a rich country like this, fellow Australians are sleeping rough. Many of the homeless are suffering from severe mental illnesses like schizophrenia. Years ago, they were treated in Asylums but “do-gooders” (and cheap State Governments) decided they should be “integrated” into society and closed the asylums. We should re-open the Asylums and see to it that the mentally ill are properly cared for – instead of wandering around the streets mumbling to themselves.

10. There should be one K-12 education system, and TAFE system, across the Nation. It is an absurdity to have 8 different systems with 9 bureaucracies running them. What a monumental waste!

11. Similarly, the Health System needs to be brought under a single National administration – and that includes the registration of doctors and other providers. The AMA and the “quota” system they impose also needs to be vigorously revised.

12. Careers in the Defence Forces should be made much more attractive and the size of the ADF should be doubled at a minimum.

13. We should invest in nuclear technology for power generation and should develop our own nuclear deterrent defence capability. Our near neighbours, China, India, Pakistan, North Korea et al have refused to sign the Nuclear Non-proliferation treaty and are nuclear armed. There was a time when we could rely on the USA and UK’s nuclear arsenal as deterrence, and our treaties with them, but one would wonder just how committed they would be to our salvation if push came to shove. The first thing they’ll look at is the “cost-benefit” analysis. We should never forget the lessons of 1942 when all that stood between Japanese invasion and us was the poorly trained and ill-equipped Australian Militia.

14. The taxation system should be overhauled and the top-end of town made to pay their fair share. All those loopholes like the Swiss Bank accounts, family trusts and Cayman Island registered companies should be choked off.

15. Australia’s natural resources belong to the Australian people and should never be sold off to multi-national companies – at any price. Similarly, they should be exploited by Australians for the benefit of Australians.

16. Foreign owned industries operating in Australia should be made to have a majority Australian ownership – as happens in China.

17. The rape of Australia’s finest agricultural land must be stopped. For example, the tax-evasion dodge of Managed Investment Schemes that bought up prime grazing and cropping land and replanted them to pines and blue gums, amongst other things, for the Japanese paper industry. Once good land has been planted to pines, it’s buggered for centuries. We have a much greater future need for beef cattle and fat lambs than we do for blue-gum chopsticks.

18. The great cartels in retailing, wholesaling, packaging, transport, and retail floor-space need to be broken up. Why is it that, whenever you go into a shopping centre, 95% of the stores are fingers of the hands of either Woolworths or Coles? The shopping centres all seem to be owned by either Westfield or Centro and this needs normalising as well.

19. The level of bureaucracy on small businesses and sole traders needs to be reduced by about 95%. It really is absurd how many Government agencies impose regulations about bloody everything. To give you an example, when I owned my little country Pub, some of the young people asked me to put on a New Year’s Eve dance. It sounded like a good idea so I contacted a local live-band Karaoke business. Well… For starters, I had to get a “live entertainment” licence from the Council wherein I had to specify the number of patrons expected to attend. If I said “100″, then I also had to provide an extra two dunnies on top of the 6 already at the Pub. I also had to employ a minimum of 2 “approved” security guards. Then I had to have the Health Inspector “inspect” the kitchen and the toilets – all at a fee of course. Then I had to notify the local Police sergeant in writing in case he had any objections. Then I had to notify the Licensing sergeant in Albury and apply to the Department of Liquour and Gaming for an “extension to trading hours” so that I could trade past midnight. Then I had to prove that the musicians had the “right” to play any “copyright” song and pay APRA a royalty as well. Then, of course, I had to get additional “one off” insurance cover because the proposed event was outside normal trading hours. Then I had to notify, in writing, everyone who lived within 300 metres of the Pub, and give them an opportunity to object. Needless to say, I didn’t bother.

20. Completely overhaul the banking and finance sector. I find it amazing that an industry, that arguably produces nothing, can make such outrageous profits, pay such huge and obscene salaries and bonuses to the elite, while mercilessly screwing their own workers and their customers. While small business was progressively regulated in everything, drowned in bureaucracy, and forced out of business, these skunks got de-regulated and licensed to do whatever they damned well like.

21. Media ownership in this country is a joke. A “flag of convenience” foreigner, Rupert Murdoch, makes and breaks governments at will and dictates policy at every level; not just here, but in the USA and UK as well. Similarly, the Fairfax and Packer inheritors, like Murdoch, determine what we read, hear and see in all forms of media. It’s time these cartels were busted up as well and we turned off the bullshit taps.

22. Progressive withdrawal of state aid to non-government schools. Why should I contribute to Islamic, Jewish, Catholic, Anglican, Baptist, Seventh Day Adventist, Lutheran, Hare Krishna, or Exclusive Brethren Schools? And have no say at all in what is taught or how it is taught! For example, a lot of these schools teach “creationism”, “Noah’s Ark and the Flood” and “intelligent design” as Science! They also, of course, promote sectarianism, elitism, cliquism, old-school-tie-ism, and fundamentalist fanaticism. In my view, all schools should be secular and state run. Science should be just that, not Bronze Age myth.

That’s just a start on what I see as the pressing issues. What’s the bet that not a single one of these issues is on the ALP/LP election Policy Statements in the coming election. They’ll be focused on gay marriage, climate change, whaling, apologising to some other minority group about something that happened last century, teenage sexuality, and their “economic records” (that is, how much of the family farm they sold off to foreigners and how much they borrowed from the Chinese).

Of course, we’ll also get to see both bum boys piously attending Church and pressing the flesh with old women in CWA Halls and ethnics in produce markets. They’ll knit their brows thoughtfully and pretend to take seriously comments made by the commoners and promise to “take it on board”. There’ll be the televised debate about things totally inconsequential and they’ll both tell their versions of the same lies and deceits. And then they’ll wait, like anxious pregnant fathers, for Rupert and his mates at the Club to decide who gets to move into the Lodge and keep his Parliamentary Pension.

So grease those sphincters folks, we’re about to get it up the arse again.