Whooaa.

Con is certainly waxing Churchillian in his last to 2 paras.

He pits the straw man (demonstrably incorrect over Bali) Evans against the "Iron Statesmen and Iron Ladies". I suppose Tony Blair will have to join the Conservatives straight away!

His central thesis is "In such measures, due legal process, i.e. the presumption of innocence, beyond reasonable doubt, and so on, is totally inadequate to deal with a fanatical enemy who would use weapons of mass destruction, including nuclear weapons, once they were in its possession, against Western societies."

Well if the proposed laws will solve the nuclear security problem why weren't they proposed and passed immediately after 9/11.

Con is wrong. The proposed laws would not stop the terrorist enemy he so fears - one that is capable of constructing and delivering a nuclear bomb. This is in the bin Laden arena. That is nuclear bombs on jets - no need to crash them into buildings or to endanger a terrorist operation by setting foot in Australia.

Cons fears are, therefore, more in the area of what the Airforce and external intelligence services are meant to counter, not ASIO and not the proposed legislation.

The proposed laws are a direct reponse to the London bombings - people who walk, carrying bombs. And in regard to that, the existing laws have been underutilised and until recently, when the Government recognised the problem, ASIO has been underfunded to handle this threat.

What worries me is when politicians bignote themselves by talking tough.

The implications of the proposed laws for liberty, freedom of speech and alienation in the Moslem community are frightening and have nothing to do with nuclear terrorism. The government is taking advantage of Federal Labor's loss of power in the Senate to ram through the laws.

Nobody wants to create a situation where alienated young men start hatching bomb plots. Sadly a tragic outcome will not damage the Coalition's future electoral prospects and legitimacy to govern, quite the opposite.

The criticism of Gareth Evans is spot on. But I would not refer to Mr. Evans as a “thoughtful person”, though. I recall him in his role as a left-wing politician promising to bring about a “coffee-coloured Australia”, and the fact he made the faux pas he did in relation to his terrorist statements disqualifies him as a thoughtful person. And, we most certainly do not need to fight terrorists with one hand behind our backs. Mr. Evans never had to deal with anything very hard, and he needs to catch up with the times.

For real thoughtfulness and telling it the way it should be, the author of this article gets top marks.

“Only leaders that are endowed with prescience, prudence and determination have the right to hold the rudder of leadership in their firm hands and pass the necessary and harsh anti-terror laws that can save western civilisation from the maelstrom of fanatical terrorism. Only Iron Statesmen and Iron Ladies are cast in this role.”, he writes. And, sadly, we don’t have those leaders at the present time.

Perhaps Con George-Kotzabasis could put his retirement to use in that area.

Con, (Con George-Katzabasis)

I read your article, but with some difficulty because you are extravagant in demonstrating your literary capability.

After wading through all that you wrote I find your perceptions to be generally realistic-- you write about the real world which we face-- a world where actions to fit the time must take priority over ideology, but without dismissing ideology as an essential part of social evolution.

I suggest that any readers/contributors to this forum do "wade through" your article.

Further, I suggest that you rewrite the article in language which the normal Aussie will find 'inviting to read', and to provide that article to the general media, for the benefit of Australia.

regards Gadfly

I disagree mate.

The same people who told us about the children overboard, about Iraqs WMDs and so on are now asking for extra powers. The group who oversaw a public service that managed to deport a citizen or two.

They need to improve their accuracy first.

"Only leaders that are endowed with prescience, prudence and determination have the right to hold the rudder of leadership in their firm hands"

... and only those capable of showing reasonable doubt in their elected representatives should be allowed to vote.

I find myself in agreement with gadfly - the language of George does not lend itself to an easy read and any message runs the risk of being lost in the rising tide of big and bigger words.

I can not accept his assertion that lawyers and academics et al are unconscious of the imperative lessonsof histroy - that they have a different perspective on the same matter does not imply any degree of unconsciousness - just a different take.

And while I would disagree that we should reject these laws simply on the basis that they are a departue from our culture, I still can not support them in their current form and still argue they are unnecessary.

The threat has been and is over stated - if the imperative lessons of history tell us anything they tell us the reponse to these atrocities is in no way propostioanl to the threat they offer or the carnage they have delivered -

I still press the point if you assess the threats do date on the basis of likely hood and consequences our responses universally are disporportionate with the real risk. I would stop short of saying they are a diversion but they certainly divert resources to an area of questionable need.

Equally his closing paragraph baptising this period as being a time of peril and hazard is certainly over dramatic - I am kicking myself for failing to recall the Australian academic heading up the study but the most authoratative assesment of the dangers posed by international armed conflict measures these times as relatively peaceful compared to earlier decades - and the loss of life attributed to terrorism, not withstanding the fact there is no international agreement as to what constitutes terrorism - has scarcely troubleed the scorekeeper

Georges contribution is best used as an example of how not to try to convey a message in the written word than as a reasoned analysis of the terrorist issue as it confronts Australia.

This terrorist issue has been blow out of all proportion. Why should political violence be treated any different to any other violent criminal act? Every year thousand of men and women are killed and injured in violent acts often with plenty of warning that it was going to happen. Why can’t there be preventative laws governing those crimes?.

Do people really believe that the current crop of political violence is any real threat to our civilization? The is no Germany or Japan we are facing here, it’s a loose small collection of religious fanatics with most of their violence directed at their own people.

As a atheist I must respond to the authors “And the Islamo-fascist movement is, by far, more dangerous than any secular fascist movement, as its existence is decreed by God hmself, in the eyes of these zealots.”
This really is a sill comment, secular movements have shown a willingness to use violence to get their ends with the same level of zeal as sectarian movements.

The defeat of terrorism in all it’s forms is to treat as simple crime not to legitimize it by declaring war on it. Political violence is an attack on the rule of law if you suspend that law in order to fight it then the terrorist have already won.

Thanks for your generous words Leigh. You are right,Evans isn't a thoughtful person. But I didn't want to be too hard to him. Imagine a thoughtless man 'managing crises'as head of the "Crisis Group"!

Thank you for your gentle and kind 'sting' Gadfly.And especially for your suggestion that readers/contributors "wade through" my article, and 'for the benefit of Australia', if more people were to read it. But I'm afraid I cannot write it in other words. As picking words from any language is a matter of temperament and taste,and I'm too old to change either.
Warm regards Con.

Thank you for your barb Sneekeepete-in your last para.-which however missed its mark, as it's obvious that you didn't understand my argument. What words one uses from any language is a matter of style and taste. I wouldn't pick on someone who used small words in the composition of his argument as long as his argument was not 'small'.
It's the substance that counts, not the French or Italian dressing that is 'sprinkled' upon it. The latter is a matter of taste.
I notice however that you are not totally averse to "big" words, as for a 'sneaky' nickname you use rather a big word.
Co

Well all the verbosity and the pontification... where are the premises on which one can convincingly argue that the new legislation is likely to to do more good than harm? Is there one?

Try this as an equally founded argument... anti-terrorism laws are to provide an arm by which the state can scare less preferred citizens, both by birth and by certification, into departing our shores. This is regardless of whether they have a tendency of oblierating themselves or not.

Carl Schmitt, of course, used the arguments put forward by Con George-Kotzabasis to justity his support of Hitler -- for example, in the German Law Journal of 1 August, 1943 when he supported the murders of Rohm and others as "the justice of the Fuhrur".

Oops, sorry. Not 1943, but 1934!

Con should read "In the Name of the Volk" by H.W. Koch to learn some history. Koch wrote about the Nazi’s “use of legal, even constitutional, means to thwart, imperceptibly at first, the course of justice” and the way in which “an important portion of the courts became a virtual arm of the state and its instrument in terror”.

However, Hitler only came to power in 1933. The erosion of the independence of the judiciary and the march to a police state began over a decade before. Koch wrote that “the roots” of the National Socialist People’s Court (VGH) “lay in the Weimar Republic, when the judiciary had become politicized and the precedent for depriving an accused of his or her legal rights had been established”.

“In 1922, the Reichstag passed the Law for the Protection of the
Republic with a two-thirds majority. It’s justification was the wave of terrorism sweeping the country.” “The law politicized penal laws to an unprecedented degree.” “For the first time in German legal history, the judiciary was authorized to depart from the principle of nulla poena sine lege (‘no punishment without law’).”

Over a decade later, the Nazi Party “would be quick to capitalize on this precedent in passing its emergency legislation of 1933” which followed the burning of the Reichstag. The continued fear of terrorism (“Communist terrorism”, in Goering’s words), meant that “the Enabling Act (the legal basis of the Nazi police state) was passed by secret ballot by the last democratically elected Reichstag; with the exception of the Social Democrats, all Reichstag representatives voted for it.”

Koch wrote that "in Germany after 1933 law became preventive. It often struck before it had been broken."

"What words one uses from any language is a matter of style and taste"

That's true. Unfortunately - the words and language that others choose to read is also a matter of style and taste. Their style. Their taste.

You can't make money as a cook unless a wide range of people enjoy your style. Similarly... I'd suggest that you won't sell many copies of your book unless your writing is to the taste of consumers.

Now... consider the case where you are attempting to reach somebody who does not initially share your point of view. Unless you are very nice to them, they will change channel at the earliest opportunity.

For myself, I'd have spent more time on your article but I simply couldn't be bothered - and it made little sense. I wanted to give you a chance and examine all the detail behind your points, but you have to come half-way and make it an efficient and/or pleasurable read.

Jeff, you have made a mountain out of a molehill! Out of the two sentences that I wrote about Schmitt, you have extrapolated too much, which intellectually illicitly, and indeed, basely, attempted to inject into my argument. I used Schmitt as an intellectual 'treasure chest', as one writing a paper on philosophy would avail the wisdom of Heidegger, another supporter of Hitler.
Also, "Oops", your history is wrong. When Schmitt wrote his theory of "states of exception", he was trying to save the Weimar Republic, from the full-fledged Communists and the nascent National Socialists, not to support Hitler at that time. I used his "state of exception" to make a point,that in such 'states' the legal order was inadequate to protect people from fanatic terrorism. It was for the same reason that I used Loewenstein, an outstanding Liberal, not a supporter of Hitler. As a left-leaning aficionado you cannot make the distinction between the everlasting intellectual value of a thinker and his ephemeral politics.
Your argument has a cryptic, and indeed, a portentous subtext. Why your long discourse about the events in Germany? Are you seriously try to imply that the Howard anti-terror laws have some relationship with those passed in Germany and therefore could open the doors to a police state? And it's obvious this what you are trying to do. You say "Koch wrote that'in Germany... law became PREVENTIVE. It often struck before it had been BROKEN'.(My emphasis)This is impeccable farce! Jeff, would you wait until it had been "broken" by a nuclear device before you "struck"?

KOTZABASIS

Jeff, few other things which I was not able to say in my previous post as I had reached the word limit, and being self-taught in the techniques of the computer, I don't know how to do a wordprocessing package.

You should read Jan-Werner Muller's book "A Dangerous Mind" and learn something about the tremendous influence Schmitt had in post-war European thought, both among the Right and the Left, including The Frankfurt School and its luminaries, such as Adorno, and the younger Gunter Maschke, whom Adorno "lauded as a 'boy genius'", who however, soon made his salto libero, his jump to freedom from the morally, politically, and intellectually bankrupt Left and went to the other side.

Your quote from Goering for the purpose of casting your sotto voce nefarious association against my argument is quite revealing. Do you need a bugbear to make your argument? Your description of the events of the twenties are correct, but as Marx remarked, it's the interpretation that counts, not the description.. And in this exercise you fail completely. The fascist threat to Germany both from the Right and the Left in that period was as real, as Islamo-fascism is today. And ironically, the strawman Goering demolishes your argument from the right.

My contention stands for what is its worth. Dare to topple it by logic and argument, not by associating it to the 'Nazi Connection'. That is the attitude and tactic of nipple-fed intellectuals of the old/new Left.

KOTZABASIS

Con/Thomistocles

With due respect to the venerable style of your arguments. I think you are off the track. You appear to see terrorism as some sought of concrete, monolithic Islamo-Fascist) movement demanding decisive statesmanlike solutions.

Churcill's struggle agaist the fascists constantly resonate but the matter at issue is NOT big time terrorism and it doesn'tt have a definite start and ending like most conventional wars.

If you see the terror enemy as monolithic, you are talking about a state of war, which we could have waged against "big terrorist threats" within Australia since 9/11 and up till now, but we didn't. This is because the security agencies didn't and don't see the high level of threat that you perceive.

Terrorism comes and goes and is unpredictable. There is always a threat so once laws are made its very unlikely that they would be repealed.

As I said in my earlier post your nuclear threat scenerio has more to do with a military style attack at the large scale bin Laden end of the spectrum and not much to do with the proposed pedestrian bomber laws at issue.

The high level anti terrorist posture that you are arguing for cannot be maintained in a "peacetime" society unless it is like China or North Korea because terrorists may not strike for years.

So while your words are rousing they are not necessarily helpful.

I think that Con is basically ignorant of practical history. Many fearful people have wished for an "Iron Statesman" ("a Man"!! -- to quote Hess, amongst many others) and regretted the consequences. Con might do well to read my forthcoming book, "Dictatorial CEOs and their lieutenants: the cases of Napoleon, Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini, Ataturk and Mao". He might even do a book review!!
Jeff Schubert

Jeff, why you continue to pick your quotes solely and so doggedly from Nazis (Hess)?

Who would you have preferred to have against Hitler, Chamberlain or Churchill (The Iron Statesman)? I notice however, that among your six bete noirs, Bismarck, the Iron Chancellor, is not among them. So maybe, not all 'iron-man' politicians are malign. And in the reading knowledge of YOUR PRACTICAL HISTORY, are there not any benign Iron Statesmen, such as Pericles, and Marcus Antonius, to mention two. I would suggest you read Plutarch's Lives, so you can cure yourself from your dolorous state of seeing ALL strong politicians as malign.

I don't know what you have written in your forthcoming book, but judging from your retorts from these posts, your book will be worthless. And therefore, it will not be worthy of a review, even from the lowest of reviewrs.

KOTZABASIS

Dear plantagenet

Please 'search' your mind and tell me if you can find anything more monolithic than religious fanaticism. Its danger is great and ominous because of its invisibility. It inreases in geometrical proportions, because it runs parallel to the 'leaps and bounds'development of technology. As the carriers of this danger are technically educated barbarians, with a PC in one hand and the Koran in the other. Do you doubt, that once these fanatics have possession of nuclear weapons they will not use them against the West?

CON

Con,

Dr Janet Albrechtsen plagiarises Dr Josef Goebbels -- and proves my point!
http://www.henrythornton.com/article.asp?article_id=3688
Jeff Schubert

You can not eliminate terrorism with laws and fortress solutions. Terrorism is only one element of our global problems. Laws encourage and stimulate the brain to circumvent the law, find loop holes and challenge legislation, examples of this brain activity being hackers, drug smugglers and corporate crime.
The concept of a “War on Terror” sends the wrong message. A war means at least two opponents and is therefore divisive, it separates people encouraging martyrdom.
Once terrorism reaches the martyrdom stage which is exactly where we are today, a whole new approach is needed. Our efforts must be compassion and massive assistance for poverty world wide. Dealing with terrorism by the ways proposed is counter productive and a distraction from the very necessary global solutions.Tamica

More info on abuse of power from Jeff Schubert
http://www.jeffschubert.com