GUESS WHO ?

Can you guess who made the following statement reported in The Australian, 11 September 2003?

            " They want to create closed societies. They want a state governed by an interpretation              of  (a particular religion)  which distorts the core tenets of that religion. They reject              pluralism. And they reject the separation of religion from politics. In short, they stand              against the core principles of freedom and tolerance around which Australia has been built."

You would be forgiven if you thought it was the DOGS commenting on the part played by religious sectarian schools in Australian society.

You would be wrong. It is John Howard, the Prime Minister of Australia commenting on terrorists and terrorism.

DOGS suggest that Mr Howard is expert at the game of the pot calling the kettle black. A perusal of our Press Release No. 1, will illustrate the close relationship between Mr Howard and his party on the one hand and the wealthiest most influential religious group in Australia on the other. We quote:

"One of the major reasons for the Coalition's narrow victory was the deal at a meeting between five Roman Catholic bishops and coalition officials and the covert campaign waged by Roman Catholic clerics, bureaucrats, parent and teacher organisations. What occurred illustrates the effective operation of a Church State within a secular State for its own material advantage. This is contrary to the operation of a compassionate, cohesive, heterogeneous and democratic state."

This is a familiar story, charted again and again, at every election, by the DOGS.The Church school interest is now leeching billions of dollars every year, in direct and indirect grants, out of State and Federal Treasuries. And they never are, and never will be satisfied.

Perhaps, to use a religious analogy, Mr Howard should take the plank out of his own eye while looking at the mote in otherI