G'day,

Up above (11 Jul 07 - 09:55 AM)
(Possibly) leeneia congratulated Rog Peek's:
"I do not believe one generation should be expected to 'apologise' for a previous generation's 'crimes'. After all, an apology carries with it culpability."

Well said, Rog Peek! don't today's children have enough fears and troubles without having to shoulder the guilt of their forebears?

---------------------

We need to remember this is not just about a previous generation's 'crimes'. As John Howard well knows, within his own time as a younger memebr of the Liberal Party (which then, as now, held the Prime Ministership) many Aboriginal people in rural areas were treated quite literally as slaves.

The traditional owners of areas taken by the whites for cattle and sheep stations (~ = US "Ranches") were employed in station work and issued basic "rations" by the ('white') pastoralists. If they tried to leave (for instance, to participate in traditional 'Walkabout' - with meaning in their religion - they were pursued, usually by the local Police, rounded up and brought back in cattle trucks to continue their unpaid work for their "owners".

This does not differ from slavery.

The Prime Minister, John Howard, has good reasons to deny, censor and whitewash ...especially to prevent any suggestion of reparations to the people we dispossed. He would, in fact, be the ideal person to bear any formal charges for what his party did ... and still stands for.

Regards,

Bob Bolton