http://www.thepunch.com.au/tags/tampa/ Politics, political opinion, world news, sports news and the latest news and views updated live, daily on The Punch - Australia's best conversation. en Copyright 2012 The Punch penberthyd@newsltd.com.au penberthyd@newsltd.com.au Sat, 26 May 2012 20:00:40 +0000 Sat, 26 May 2012 20:00:40 +0000 Politics, opinion, world news, sports news, latest news, views, Barack Obama, Kevin Rudd, Julia Gillard, Nathan Rees, Malcolm Turnbull, Peter Garrett, Barnaby Joyce, Australian, federal politics, opinion polls, election, The Punch, thepunch, punch ExpressionEngine 1.6.7 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss 15 http://www.thepunch.com.au/images/punch-logo-rss.png http://www.thepunch.com.au/ 144 70 Politics, political opinion, world news, sports news and the latest news and views updated live, daily on The Punch - Australia's best conversation. Search The Punch keywords http://www.thepunch.com.au/search/ http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/compassion-is-a-quickly-expendable-commodity/ In the giddy afterglow of Kevin07, as the nation’s lefties rejoiced at exorcising the devil that was John Howard, it was assumed that the nation would become a more compassionate place. These same people obviously haven’t been paying attention. There are now more children in detention than there were under Howard. Right now there’s 1045 of them. Just 28 of them are in community detention; that is, not behind bars but being cared for in private homes, in keeping with the softer policy that Howard introduced in 2005. One of these children, Seena Aqhlaqi Sheikhdost, was trundled back to Christmas Island this week, a few hours after he had buried his parents. Whether you agree or disagree with mandatory detention, you’d be hard-pressed to argue that locking up a nine-year-old on the day he’s attended his parents’ funeral meets the dictionary definition of compassion. penberthyd@newsltd.com.au (David Penberthy) Article http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/compassion-is-a-quickly-expendable-commodity/#comments http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/compassion-is-a-quickly-expendable-commodity/#item5183 Sat, 26 May 2012 20:00:40 +0000 You learn a lot about people when the pressure is on. Some interesting facts emerged recently about what really happened during those extraordinary four weeks last year when the Oceanic Viking abandoned our Patagonian tooth fish to become home to 78 Tamil asylum seekers. During these events the debate raged about who knew what and when. Where would they go and on what terms? The answers to many of these questions came to light during recent questioning in Senate estimates. http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/rudd-fails-the-tampa-test/ You learn a lot about people when the pressure is on. Some interesting facts emerged recently about what really happened during those extraordinary four weeks last year when the Oceanic Viking abandoned our Patagonian tooth fish to become home to 78 Tamil asylum seekers. During these events the debate raged about who knew what and when. Where would they go and on what terms? The answers to many of these questions came to light during recent questioning in Senate estimates. penberthyd@newsltd.com.au (David Penberthy) Article http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/rudd-fails-the-tampa-test/#comments http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/rudd-fails-the-tampa-test/#item2552 Sat, 26 May 2012 20:00:40 +0000 You learn a lot about people when the pressure is on. Some interesting facts emerged recently about what really happened during those extraordinary four weeks last year when the Oceanic Viking abandoned our Patagonian tooth fish to become home to 78 Tamil asylum seekers. During these events the debate raged about who knew what and when. Where would they go and on what terms? The answers to many of these questions came to light during recent questioning in Senate estimates.