Sunday 25th May 1997
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We will be there to cover the event - which starts at 10am. His supporters will gather at Queen's park in the centre of Ipswich.
The big four banks face a probe by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission following their "independent" decision to drop home loan rates by only 0.35% of the Reserve Bank's 0.5% cut.
The Commission chairman Professor Fels said, "We will be seeking to ascertain if there was any understanding over the fact that they all went down by exactly the same amount."
The big banks could face large fines under the Trade Practices Act if they are found guilty by Fels.
"If there were an understanding between banks about how little they would pass on the rate cuts, then under the Trade Practices Act an understanding between competitors is a breach and liable for large fines", Fels said.
On the home front home loan hot lines were flooded yesterday as interest rates hit a 25 year low.
The new lowest standard variable interest rates include ANZ Direct's and Super Member Home Loan at 6.6%.
Pauline Hanson's One Nation Official home page.
When they talk about baby boomers, they’re taking about me. The war ended on August 15, 1945 and I was born on May 14 the following year.
Maybe if the victory celebrations had been a day later, I would have escaped the conscription ballot 21 years later when Bob Menzies threw a crusade and nobody came. If they’d been a day earlier, I’d still have drawn the black marble.
This numerological nightmare is revealed in A Nation at War, volume six in the official history of the South East Asian wars (Allan and Unwin) which lists in an appendix all the birthdates drawn in National Service ballots from 1965 to 1972.
But most of all it reveals a culture of contempt for youth - that powerless, somehow scary, underclass that could be herded, sorted, culled and, if necessary, killed at the whim of their elders and betters.
And that contempt, that fear, is still at large in the land.
Make no mistake, that’s really what drives Pauline Hanson and her ugly supporters. It’s not the rich against the poor, single against married, European against Asian, white against black.
She is pitting the old and the fearful against the young and the hopeful.
Young and old are attitudes of mind, not necessarily measured in years. Some of her supporters are ossified in their teens, some of her opponents sprightly in their 70s.
Hanson is a mental Methuselah, seemingly progressing from primary school name calling and thuggery to feebleness without passing through an age of wisdom and grace.
This old, old woman peddles such a wide range of prejudice and fear that somewhere she has fleeting appeal for all of us (I’m fairly partial to declarations against the waste of Aboriginal funds).
But to accept any portion of her so-called platform is like forgiving Hitler his sins because he built the autobahns or rehabilitating Mussolini because he made the trains run on time.
The kids aren’t falling for that. That’s why they’re out there demonstrating every time she shows her face and opens her mouth.
Don’t give them all that claptrap about her democratic rights to speak; don’t give them mealy mouthed piety about violence in the streets.
They know that she’s out to get them; they know its a matter of life and death.
They know that she’s afraid of their world and wants to retreat into the past.
She wants to go beyond John Howard’s picket fence; she wants to go inside and barricade the doors, load the muskets and repel the Indians.
She says she’s speaking for the future - a monochromatic dull, internationally despised, fundamentally hateful future.
She’s not. She’s speaking for the past and the kids know it.
She’s speaking for a world where everyone ate mutton and mash, where intellect was despised, where mental midgets decided what you could read or view, where strong men fainted at the sight of a nipple, where everyone purported to be Christian, where men were men and women knew their places, where there was no Aboriginal problem because Aborigines were invisible, where strangers were wogs and newcomers were reffos, where Ashes cricket series passed for foreign affairs.
Most of all she’s speaking for a world where children were seen and not heard, where the youth did what they were told and ultimately they could be put into uniform and sent off to fix up their elders’ foul ups.
She has no place in her tiny world for get-up-and-go kids who can save a few bucks, throw on a backpack and go and meet the world on its own terms.
She has no time for kids who are willing to judge people on what they say and do, rather than how they worship, what they eat and the colour of their skins. She’s scared of them because they are smarter than her, so much braver than her, and, if they live to be 100, will always be younger than her.
If some of the whingeing and whining strikes a chord, tackle your gripes individually. Pester your MP, write to the blatts, demonstrate in the street, self immolate, if you want.
But don’t lend Pauline Hanson your support, even tacitly. Leave that to the Joh Bjelke-Peteresens and all their fellow fossils. And don’t leave it up to the kids. Don’t leave them to fight your battles once again.
Back them all the way, because this time they have right on their side all the way.
You owe it to your kids and my kids, and you owe it to yourself to stay young for as long as possible.
All I can say is that it is good to see company directors with the guts to stand up and be counted along with majority of Australians to support 'the chance for change' that Pauline Hanson's One Nation will give ordinary and bloody decent Australians a say in our law making institutions. In relation to the 'protesters' I say this to you, if you don't learn some respect for yourselves and especially others Pauline Hanson's One Nation's policy of National Service and the discipline you will receive will do you the world of good. By the way a good mate of mine went to see Pauline Hanson on the Sunshine Coast along with a thousand others. On the way in a protester yelled obscenities to which my mate replied 'Where do you come from mate?' to which the protester replied 'Melbourne' My mate then said 'So you are a rent a crowd.' The protester was dumb founded.
Regards
Chris Savage
Subject: Letter to Editor
In reply to Mr. Lachlan Bugarin
I am an authentic Hong Kong citizen with no Australian or foreign citizenship, though I lived in Australia for some 6 years for studies and work. In spite of my Australian wife, I understand I am in no position to comment on the Australian politics. I agree with you wholeheartedly that no foreigner should interfere with any Australian policy. Whether Australia is part of Asia is really up to her own people to decide.
I am dismayed to see the race debate and physical / verbal abuses on the streets since Ms Hanson delivered her maiden speech. I am angry not because she suggested to block immigration (it's an Australian internal affairs!), but she pinpointed Asians. If it does good to Australia by stopping all immigration from any part of the world, do it by all means! I am sure no Asians or Asian government would say a word if Australia, for the sake of its economy and future, halts all influx of migrants. Australia, though it may or may not be part of Asia, is nevertheless our neighbour. We certainly want to see the entire region grow together without singling out any individual.
As the One Nation Party agglomerates and gathers momentum, I am pleased to see the Aussies finally speak out their opinion in an honest way. Whether it is racism, nazism, fascism or whatever-ism is irrelevant, it is the truth that matters. Ms Hanson is telling the truth, the norm of the Australian mainstream. I am eager to see that one day Pauline (or any of the One Nation Party members) will visit Asia, especially Hong Kong, Singapore and Malaysia where the number of prospective migrants is enormous, and will inform the people here that Australia is already swamped by Asians and no more Asians are welcomed. This would be the final solution to keep Australia Anglo-Saxon.
Dr Wan Kai Tak, Singapore.
Late last night we received over 500 identical email as follows - I guess the anonymous author was "high" at the time:
Subject: We hate you because you are not a racist or a pot smoker....
Most of all we hate you cos you hate someone because maybe because you feel threatened, by us!
To Pauline; you are uneducated, extremely ignorant and very closed minded...
The worst things about it is that you think you are not racist like we are... we hate you.
His opening partner, Mark Waugh, had scored 29 runs off just 22 balls before Taylor fell. It was, quite frankly, a relief when he went out as Australia were then able to pick up their batting averages. At one stage Australia had only 12 runs after 6 overs - with Taylor not scoring one run in 3 overs.
The rest of the Australian team batted remarkably well in reaching 249 in the 50 allotted overs - but were beaten with just 10 balls to spare by England who reached 253.
If he doesn't give himself the chop now and give more rewarding batsmen a go he will have a lot to answer for in the Ashes series.
Have a great day.
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