McAlmanac wrote:I sit next to a bloke at work who has been here less than a year from South Africa (Johannesburg, precisely). He has lived in London and has a Chilean wife with family in Israel. He makes the interesting observation (respectfully, I must add) that the kinds of things Australians complain about are inconsequential by international standards. They absolutely love it here. And he's taken the Australian cricket team on board.
Costello was, whatever your politics, a successful treasurer.
The current government is making a fair fist of the current circumstances.
How many of us can say that our lives have turned upside down due to government policy during the course of the last couple of decades (please don't cite interest rates or health insurance rebates)?
Absolutely correct. I have a colleague whose family is ethnically chinese, the grandparents fled China in the early 1950s for Cambodia only to be murdered by Khmer Rouge in the 70s, then her parents fled Cambodia in the late 1970s for Australia. My colleague is only in her mid 20s her parents are in their mid 60s because during the best years of their lives they could not risk having children. Yeah Rudd, Howard, Costello, Swan and Gillard are all bastards! I can say that and not expect to get a knock on the door later in the day! Australia is certainly a great country regardless of whoever is in power. Spare a thought for the Iranians, peaceful protests but some are murdered in the streets.
