from the battle front we call urban life, I have it from the most reliable sources that certain boats are being rocked big time by our “legal custodians”. Apparently the NCA has been changed/ disbanded/ or shaken up and the new management is going over the top with a massive spate of secret summonses issued for the secret trial of large numbers of Australian citizens. Here in SA the law is going full bore on anyone thought to have any sort of involvement with biker gangs or major drug dealing. In many instances cases closed up to ten years ago are being reopened and rehashed, and witnesses, accused and prosecutors are being summonsed to retrial. In some remarkable cases even deceased persons are being retried! If a person summonsed (or their legal rep) disclose anything about their trial to anyone else (including showing anyone at all the summons to court) they risk up to 5 years in jail!
Some consequences are: the underworld has gone into immediate shock and defence mode… class A drugs and other illegal goods/ services will be alot harder to get obtain whilst this kind of heat’s on, as seasoned criminals are all laying as low as possible.
Also a number of innocent people who have been declared ”suspicious” by some sort of association are now caught up in a pretty scarey operation with no recourse to publicity or help from any normal sources, they can’t even let their friends or family know what’s going on or they risk getting locked up for 5 years for breaching the “secrecy law”. They are also subject to alsorts of oppressive new laws under the “terrorist act” that tip the balance of power firmly in favour of the government, whilst weakening personal rights drastically. Not a nice situation to be in: a powerful institution with a large axe to grind and a huge chip on their shoulder coming down like a ton of bricks on you, you’re innocent and you can’t even make a noise about it.
A number of obvious conclusions must be drawn here. The terrorist act is being used on citizens exactly as it was always planned to be. These kind of laws were pushed through parliament with malice aforethough, the tacking on of the word “terrorist” were merely a thin cover to make gullible people think that it was necessary as an emergency act in the face of unstoppable terrorism. (Seriously, more Australians die of smoking and alcohol than the combined threats of terrorism and illegal drugs, and we’re not exactly prosecuting alcohol and cigarette makers secretly, are we? No, they’re socially acceptable and part of the regulated, TAXABLE economy.)
We also see an obvious trend here. First it was “terrorists” and refugees demonised by the Government, and large parts of the population were brought round with careful rhetoric and social engineering (ie. subtle fear mongering) into justifying and supporting The Governments actions: ”that’s OK, they’re protecting us from damage and destabilisation, it’s necessary they do this on our behalf.” Once enough people accepted that level of discrimination it was then slightly broadened to “radical unionists and eco terrorists” who were talked up as the next threat to “democracy”, because they are “radical, irrational and crazy and will stop at nothing to acheive their aims.” (These “terrorists” are generally passionate motivated motivated individuals concerned about outrageous stuff like fair work conditions and a healthy environment. Lots of my friends have been imprisoned for trying to stop the clearfelling of Tassies rainforests or the total depletion of the Great Artesian Basin by the Nuke industry amongst other things. A major threat to democracy? Or democracy in action by the people themselves when the democratic system has breached it’s basic duties?) Anyway, more recently carte blanche powers were broadened to attack Aboriginal communities, with the attendant media hyping of the “threat of bad aboriginals”, and now it’s “bikers and dealers”. Does anyone see a pattern here? Our government started targetting and demonising the groups that had low public acceptance as a method of gaining public support for excessive extortionate powers, and once that happened they got them thru and they’re not going to look back! Each expansion of these attacks carefully selects a wider and wider proportion of the population. Think about the years of media bleating about drug dealers and bikers and now look at what they’re doing. Sure, there’s bad terrorists, black fellas, dealers and bikers out there, it’s easy to sensationalise the human suffering that comes at their hands…but what about the bad police, magistrates, lawyers, pollies and clergymen? The powers that be seem pretty reluctant to target their own back yards with these rules!
Certainly, some of these “bad” people probably deserve “what’s coming to them” under these laws, but why has our traditional rule of law and accountabiltiy been erased to achieve this? Why has the rights of citizens been severely reduced to achieve “freedom”? If it’s a battle against corruption, anarchy and evil, and justice and goodness is supposedly on the governments side why the need for a total secrecy? Breaking the country’s laws and changing them at will, fear and intimidation, entrapment, secrecy and clandestine operations targetting civilians without public knowledge and consent: isn’t that exactly how organisations operate that these laws were supposedly set up to combat? More and more the government is looking like the biggest protection racket of all to me. With this ever expanding definition of “terrorist” I reckon it’ll only be a few years before I’m hauled in myself, knowing my track record in regards to rocking the boat. Me and alot of other decent people think there’s gotta be a better way than the current methods in operation, and soon we’ll all be regarded as the major threat to the security of our “established way of life”, which is generally a pretty shithouse concept of reality anyway, so why the fuck do we have to go along with it?
In conclusion: gimme the “terrorists” over the current government anyday. At least they can’t wield unlimited secret powers and they certainly don’t pretend to be acting in our best interests when they fuck us over. Oh, and at least their motives are transparent too!
Cheers, Lord Stompy
