Hi Tim, let me start with a try to translate the e-mail my friend wrote. Of cause it has a context and the conversation had a refugee context too. It is a snippet I just want to use to illustrate where the comparison comes from. ---- Ja, aber ich kann den ganzen Humbug nicht mehr mit ansehen. Labor sitzt auf den Händen, wir haben eine Presse, da waere Goebbels Stolz drauf. ... Wie zu Hitlers Zeiten : Die Kommunisten ..... die Juden ..... nur diesmal Labor... The Greens... Fuer jemand, der die DDR erlebt hat und sich historisch mit oben genannten auseinandersetzen musste, ist das hier wirklich etwas zu nah an der Kotzgrenze. Gut nur, dass wir soweit weg sind vom internationalen Rummel... da kriegen die anderen ja nicht mit, wie weit wir gesunken sind... frustriert E Yes but I cannot look at all this Humburg anymore. Labor is sitting on its hands, we have a press Goebbels would be proud of.. It's as in Hitler times: The communists.. the Jews.. just this time Labor .. the Greens. For someone who had experienced East Germany and was confronted with this history, it is too close to the Kotzgrenze (the limit where you start to vomit). Just good that we are far away from the International attention, so the others may not figure out how far we have sunk. Frustrated E ---- What we experience here is not a replication of Hitler times but the tunes we hear and some of the policies are disturbingly close to what we have seen and what we are familiar with. http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/opinion/consign-rudd-to-the-bin-of-his... "Finally, you now have the chance to kick this mob out" The man who wrote it should be out of the job and probably being in jail for inciting hatred. But that counts as "journalism" here. For a German it is "Stuermer level" - we have not seen anything like this since Hitler (Stuermer was a Nazi tabloid). It's not a minor voice, it's the most read "newspaper" in Australia's biggest city. The way refugees get regularly demonisized and how they are treated falls in the same category. After 12 years I am really ashamed what's done here. I really do not know how far it all has to go before there is a change. For me 12 years are enough. 12 years.. To the practical "problem" - the neighbours of the failed states have regularly to deal with hundred thousands and millions of refugees. We are a rich country and can not deal with a few thousand people in a decent manner? That's hard to believe.. We can spend billion dollars on wars abroad.. Yep, there we fight for "our democracy" - and if it costs a few ten thousand lifes here or there and unsettles million people - it's okay but please do not come to us. Regards Peter