Another Monday Message Board. Post comments on any topic. Civil discussion and no coarse language please. Side discussions and idees fixes to the sandpits, please.
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John Quiggin 
Deir Al Zor and bombing of Syrian army troops.
Was it just an accident..bad enough. Or is something more sinister involved involving the US, ourselves and ISIS?
What was this “truce”stuff?
Just how filthy is this latest mid east war?
An astonishing poll. Australian immigration policy might reflect the desires of social romantics and the “unlimited-diversity” theorists living primarily on the left of politics but it does not reflect the views of most Australians. On Muslim immigration, most Australians seem closer to Pauline Hanson or Donald Trump than to the immigration policies of Labor or the Liberal Party. 50% of Australians favour a total ban on Muslim immigration to Australia.
To be clear I disapprove of these attitudes and do not share them myself. But I do recognise the attitudes as real. The question: when should a country pursue an immigration policy that is not backed by most people constituting that society?
A question without an obvious answer since immigration policy has not traditionally reflected a democratic consensus. The consensus there was lay between the two major political parties who agreed via an under-the-table not to be partisan on this. This will not last.
http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/half-of-all-australians-want-to-ban-muslim-immigration-poll-20160920-grkufa.html
@hc
The most astonishing part of the poll is that 1/3 of Greens voters want to stop all Muslim immigration. Or maybe it’s not so astonishing. Even (apparent) political progressives have visceral fears.
People are irrational and have voted against their own interests when they have voted for neo liberalism.
Fifty eight % of us didn’t want any Jewish refugees in 1947. Should our govt have listened to that?
I am surprised that it is so low. I’d guess that 80% of my neighbours would prefer no Muslims.
@Apocalypse
Seriously, or not, because it is cute – are you an X-man or a bringer of revelation? and where are your horsemen.
There is nothing apocalyptic about your astonishment at such easily understood events. It’s the vibe. Do you know any Greens voters? They are a diverse bunch of people.
Anyway, I read this yesterday and I’m hopeful for the future except for climate change of course.
“A change of heart by the region’s councillors means Muslims in Toowoomba will now be able to pray at their mosque before sunrise as required by their religion.
Toowoomba Regional Council approved an application for the expansion the Garden City Mosque today, which was the target of two arson attacks last year.
The intervention of Cr Megan O’Hara Sullivan, backed by Cr James O’Shea, led to a backflip from last week’s decision that would have changed the start time of prayers at the mosque from 4am to 6am.
Cr O’Hara Sullivan had voted against the motion last week and remained consistent today, but couldn’t explain the change of heart of her fellow councillors.”
Can’t supply the link because two links means moderation, but you can google if you want to read more. I voted for Megan O’Hara Sullivan in the council elections.
There was a time when newspapers talked about ‘the Arab spring’, then civil wars with international involvement.
Can we now talk about a “Black Lives Matter” spring?
http://www.smh.com.au/world/charlotte-riot-one-person-killed-during-protest-over-police-shootings-20160922-grlvmy.html
There is too much killing, too many guns, too little humanity.
@Apocalypse
Your #3
Would you believe that, starting in the very early 1900s there were active women’s anti female suffrage groups and leagues in the UK, the USA and even Australia (it was too late in NZ, female suffrage commenced in 1893).
I haven’t seen any definitive numbers – they don’t seem to have done much by way of national polling back then – but I’d expect that there was a fairly small number of women pro female enfranchisement, a similar number anti female enfranchisement and the majority were most likely “Don’t Know (Don’t Care ?) “. Should we then have not proceeded with female suffrage until we got a majority in favour ? And should women have had a vote in determining whether women should have the vote ?
But why do you think it astonishing that as many as 1/3rd of ‘Greens’ disfavour Muslim migration ?
@Ernestine Gross
Your #6
Maybe what America needs most is another Martin Luther King.
ProfQ
Recalling your fairly recent confession to having given up on the idea of ‘centrally planned (command and control) economies’, you might enjoy reading this:
http://jamiehall.cc/post/could-computers-make-communism-work
Jamie even links to a couple of your posts on Crooked Timber about Zombie Hayek. Most entertaining all round.
@Ernestine Gross
This isn’t really a reply to your #6 above, I just thought you might appreciate the sentiment. It comes from a Stumbling and Mumbling post titled: “Persuasion in a post-truth world”
“How should economists engage with a man who knows nothing about economics? Matthew Bishop says we should treat him as a “worthy interlocutor in a way that values his opinion”.”
I’ll second that, of course.
Anyone who has not seen Oliver Stone’s Snowden should not miss it. I think it is only showing at a few independent cinemas until Wednesday. I am going to see it for a second time tonight. Information about Snowden can be found here.
(Apologies that I have posted this twice, Professor Quiggin. The previous copy of this post included a second link by mistake, so is now awaiting moderation. Please delete that post – James)
Has Russia responded in kind to attack on Syria at Deir Ezzor?
paul walter wrote on September 20th, 2016 at 10:55 :
paul, links to other material about Deir Ezzor (you spell it ‘Deir Al Zor’) and the whole Syrian conflict will be found by following the link above.
In March 2011, after several dozens of police and soldiers, armed only with batons, were killed by supposedly unarmed protestors, the Syrian government rightly feared that, unless they acted decisively against the insurrection, Syria would soon endure what Iraq endured between 1990 and 2009 as a result of two criminal wars and the illegal sanctions in which Australia participated. Many hundreds of thousands of Iraqis died in that time including 500,000 children.
Just as Australia almost endured a foreign invasion in 1942, Syria has been faced with a foreign invasion in the last five and a half years.
In Syria, the situation is much more serious than anything faced by Australia in the Second World War: tens of thousands of takfiri terrorists, armed and paid for by the US, its European allies, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, etc., have entered Syria through Turkey, Lebanon, Israel, Jordan and Saudi Arabia. As a result of that invasion, around 400,000 Syrians have died, including 80,000 soldiers. Compare just the 80,000 military dead alone to the 27,073 Australians who died in the Second World War or the 60,000 Australians who died in the First World War.
Even if we were to accept the ‘explanation’ for Deir Ezzor – that they thought they were attacking Islamic State (IS) and not the Syrian Army – given by the United States, and their Australian, British and Danish accomplices for the Deir Ezzor bombardment, the attack was still a violation of Syrian national sovereignty.
However, as Syrian President Bashar al-Assad explained on 22 September in an interview with RT, the attacks, which lasted for one hour and which were immediately followed by a ground attack on the besieged Syrian Army defenders by IS fighters, were intentional: “How could they know that America was going to attack that position in order to gather their militants right away and attack it one hour after the strike?” he asked.
Clearly Australia and the US, contrary to their supposed abhorrence of IS, is supporting that very same IS against the Syrian government. The cover story for now siding with IS against the Syrian government, previously stated by some mainstream media ‘reporters’ is that for all its brutality, the “Assad regime” is even more brutal than IS.
According to reports which have yet to be confirmed or denied, immediately after the Deir Ezzor attack, Russia responded by taking out, with a ship-launched Caliber rocket, 30 Israeli, Turkish, Saudi and Qatari officers in an intelligence post illegally located inside Syria outside Aleppo. If this is true, the United States global bully may have learnt that there is a cost to be paid for such blatent acts of aggression.
Prof Q
Why have you closed comments on the Sandpit without opening a new one ?
We were only just getting started – or was that the problem: too much angst and anger and not enough ratiocination ?