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Terrifying misconduct : Comments
By Greg Barns, published 13/10/2006John Howard et al have shown they are prepared to throw out the rule of law when it comes to the war on terror.
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Posted by Chris Shaw, Carisbrook 3464, Friday, 13 October 2006 10:05:54 AM
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Why Our Politicians Turn a Blind Eye - Part 2
The use of high potency drugs for currency is well known. Drugs are an extremely compact medium of exchange, tradeable pretty well anywhere for any other commodity or currency. Unlike gold, drugs are destroyed by consumption, ensuring a constant demand value. Afghan heroin is presently worth 6 times the price of gold, weight-for-weight. The rapacious hunger for funds by the US secret service agencies long ago exceeded the limits of their bloated "black budgets". We saw this spectre emerge briefly during the Iran-Contra Affair, only to disappear again under the cloak of secrecy. The principal players retain their positions of authority to this day and there is no reason to suppose that they have not refined their craft under the amorality of the Bush Administration. Thanks to unbridled capitalism, money has become the bloodstream of humanity, while drug currency serves as the lymphatic system. The nervous system remains dulled by propaganda, omission and political correctness. "Only puny secrets need protection. Big discoveries are protected by public incredulity." --- Marshall McLuhan Phil - send my guitar to Guantanamo - Posted by Chris Shaw, Carisbrook 3464, Friday, 13 October 2006 10:07:35 AM
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David Hicks - hardly a suspect - I fail to see the Canadian "Arar" parallel.
David is a convert to Islam - a brutal supremacist regime, he has trained in islamic camps to become a terrorist against the west - perhaps against his own country Australia. As far as I am concerned any convert to Islam must be submitted to the same treatment since Islam as a political ideology (like communism before them) runs contrary and against our free democracy. Islam is not a peaceful religion. It has a definite mandate from Allah their god to invade and govern the entire world. A quick glance at history can verify this fact. There is no such thing as moderate Muslems and extremists. These are terms invented by our politicians and our leftist media. All Muslems are called for Jihad by Allah and their prophet - they must take part in the holy struggle against the evil west - that is against all non-muslems. If they cannot physically fight or blow themselves up in the name of Allah - they are to support those who are willing and able. Muslem PR spokespeople condemn terrorism in general terms but always deny specific incidents as Islamic. I am yet to witness a public apology from any Australian Imam about Bali (x2) or 9/11. Wake up everybody - Islam is here to destroy us. Can't you see it? Has anyone read a few pages of their Qur'an? What is more terrifying is the author's stupidity in naively defending Muslems - surely he must have one or two brain cells still functioning to honestly present a fair case. Posted by coach, Friday, 13 October 2006 3:24:56 PM
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A good article Greg.
Your questions are sometimes overly broad and rhetorical but, I think, some are on the money. I think there are two main aspects to Hicks endless confinement without trial at Guantanamo. 1. The Australian Government has said in the past that Australian laws are insufficient to have much chance of convicting Hicks. I can only deduce from that that under our laws the case against Hicks is too weak and the evidence too insubstantial. Basically the preferred political option is to relinquish Australia's responsibility and allow a foreign government to continually manufacture legal procedures to imprison an Australian citizen. This in turn is due to alleged (but unimplemented) crimes in a yet other countries (Afghanistan and Pakistan). No wonder the Government does not want to risk the ridicule of trying Hicks here. If it was any other country (but the US) Guantanamo would probably be deemed by Australia as legally and politically unacceptable. 2. Australia’s subservient, but hopeful, status towards the US also explains why we have put up with the Hicks situation. Australia feels so isolated and anxious about the current and future actions of Indonesia, China and now North Korea that we make every effort to stress our loyalty to our protector (the US). If true the Government should be more forthcoming about this motivation. So oddly Hicks may be a sacrifice to the US’ legal interpretation of the War on Terror and the our fond memories(?) of the ANZUS Treaty. Chris - Guantanamo and drugs? Maybe rendition = Air America? Stranger things have happened. You really need a blog mate. I'd comment. Pete http://spyingbadthings.blogspot.com/ Posted by plantagenet, Friday, 13 October 2006 3:29:16 PM
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Yeah Coach, and I am still waiting for the reds to reside under my bed or the yellow peril to invade my kitchen - hopefully to cook for me.
David Hicks has been charged with guarding a tank. Actually since the US Supreme court threw out the trial and charges he hasn't been charged with anything at all. He converted to be a muslim but who did he bomb, kill or lock up? Australia locked up 4,000 refugee children and their mothers in hideous conditions with trial or charge, some of them for over 5 years. I don't remember David Hicks doing any such thing. Now to the story of the muslims being out to get us. Do you really believe this tripe or are you telling yourself stories around the table? It is the west that has invaded Iraq and Afghanistan even though neither country had anything to do with "terror'. Let's believe the Lancet report - 655,000 Iraqis slaughtered. That is over 200 Iraqis for every person who died in the WTC and Pentagon. Then we add in the 40 or 50,000 Afghans dead of violence - which excludes the 500,000 who have died of hunger and disease. Israel slaughtered 1300 Lebanese and 300 Palestinians since June alone and Russia has murdered 15,000 Chechyans. Yep those pesky muslims sure are out to get us aren't they? I find that the dismissal of the ancient habeas corpus, the ability to torture without being charged and other new laws to be crimes against humanity and mirror what the Israelis made legal 40 years ago, and Hitler did 60 years ago to the relatives of the Israelis who made them legal. This way lies sure madness. Posted by Marilyn Shepherd, Friday, 13 October 2006 3:39:30 PM
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Maher Arar, unlike David Hicks, protested his innocence at every stage of his treatment by the authorities. Acting in a different way, David Hicks and his family have regaled us with photos and letters which indicate that he was living an interesting life and saw no reason to lodge a protest. Where was his protest of innocence when he was photographed with the RPG7 on his shoulder? Was it a case of ‘hey, they made me do it?’ And David’s letters home have been bereft of persiflage. So earnest was the tone of his letters that I could imagine that if given the order he would probably shoot at a B747 with the flying kangaroo on the tail. Now, David Hicks is so simon pure that the day will soon dawn when we are told that, dressed in his altar boy’s costume, he was snatched on his way to church.
Just so that Mr Barns knows a precendent already exists in relation to locking people up without trial. ‘Fellow countryman’ Bruce Galea was locked up by Justice Wood for 27 months without trial. That drew no condemnation from Mr Barns. Even the activist high court judge, well known for his letter writing to newspapers on matters of human rights, had nought to say on the matter. I don’t like the term ‘fellow countryman’ applied to D Hicks. Any person who wants to get me in his gun sights is not my ‘fellow countryman’. When he lines me up in his sights he has judged me as the enemy. I feel the same about him Posted by Sage, Friday, 13 October 2006 6:51:02 PM
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Alfred W. McCoy is professor of Southeast Asian History at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. In his book, "The Politics of Heroin; CIA Complicity In The Global Drug Trade", the basic CIA modus operandi is laid out in plain view. On Lateline a few months ago, Prof McCoy pointed out that Guantanamo is in fact a node in the CIA network, ostensibly to receive the worst of the "bad guys".
Those of us who realise that the incarceration of Australia's David Hicks makes no sense, must look elsewhere for a plausible justification for the Guantanamo facility.
As a US owned "island" of lawlessness i.e. beyond the jurisdiction of US lawmakers, Guantanamo makes perfect sense if it is seen as a major node in the CIA drug network. Small wonder the Administration twists and turns in it's efforts to hang on to it's hapless "terrorists", against world opinion. The facade must be preserved at all costs.
Did you ever consider the utter idiocy of rendition flights? A whole fleet of aeroplanes burns tons of fuel carting poor patsies to and fro between "secret" prisons all over the world. Few or none of the prisoners ever end up being charged with anything. So we are asked to believe that this is the result of misguided or over-zealous intelligence agents in the "war on terror".
It is far more likely that rendition flights are actually part of the narcotics highway. We know that those flights pass through almost every country uninspected and officially "non-existent".
- and hey, if anyone gets the merest sniff of what's going on - they are hijacked by the very system that they uncovered. It's perfect!