olive re: yak yo banjo bashir may be right
olive, you are trying to ties too many unrelated issues together. By Howard allowing himself to be drawn into a public slanging match with Bashir, he is acting contrary to everybodies interests. He will only build Bashirs profile. If Bashir is a danger to anyone, he is a danger to the Indonesian goverment and the majority of Indonesians themselves. This is all about politics, and nobody can seriously see Bashir a threat to Australian politics. The Indonesian authorities have to balance controlling him without allowing him to increase his support base. Howards public response will only increase Bashirs public profile. The ambition of Bashir is to first establish an Islamic state within Indonesia, to do that he needs to destablise the government. They better than anyone know how much of a threat he really is, and better than anyone will know how to contain his ambitions. To think that they will allow him to prevail is ludicrous, history shows that opponents of the government in Indonesia never prevail.
