Brisbane's Berlin Wall

Last year, a law was passed in Queensland parliament to "provide for the safety and security of persons attending the Group of Twenty leaders’ summit in Brisbane in 2014".

Having heard disquieting things about this legislation, I decided to download a copy and look for myself, and it's as bad as they say. It goes without saying that it won't provide any additional "safety and security" - you just can't do that in a city full of people. It seems to be there for three reasons:

1. The usual Security Theatre. Window-dressing that looks like you're "doing something". Arse-covering if something happens.
2. Extra powers for the police. An early Christmas present for the loyal Boys in Blue. Queensland coppers love their extra powers and, even though the powers are for a limited duration, they'll be sure to make full use of them while they last.
3. Last, and certainly not least, to criminalise any form of protest against the summit. Section 18 of the legislation purports to allow for "lawful assembly", however § 18 (1) (c) states that if two or more people violate any of the sections of the act (and, as we will see, this can pretty much be guaranteed), the protest immediately becomes illegal. Moreover, much of the legislation can be used to harass and intimidate people pretty much at will.

Parts of the inner city are being fenced off, and the rest has been turned into a "declared area", within which there are extended powers of arrest and search . These powers are very wide-ranging and quite worrying. Some examples:

§ 33 (1) give the blanket permission: "A police officer may enter and search any premises in a restricted area without a warrant."

§ 27 (3) gives police officers the power to conduct a frisk search of a person of a different sex if "a police officer of the same sex is not immediately [my emphasis] available".  I don't see how that one could be abused.

They can of course use detection dogs, and are apparently protected from liability under § 35 (a) (ii) if this dog "physically intrudes onto a person or the clothing of a person" or "causes damage to a thing" that "may [my emphasis] have had in it or on it, a weapon or explosive". Despite the diplomatic wording, I can't see how this can be interpreted as anything other than permission to monster people with dogs with no comeback.

There is a "prohibited persons list", a blacklist compiled by the commissioner. § 51 (4) says that the commissioner "need not give reasons for the commissioner’s decision to retain a person’s name on the prohibited persons list", even if this defies "any rule of natural justice to the contrary".

To me, a blacklist is a perversion of justice. A person can be denied their rights at whim without being guilty of anything.

Persons on the blacklist will be prevented from entering the area for the duration of the conference. If they live within that area they will not be allowed to live in their own homes but will be forced to find accommodation elsewhere. Truly! The state has to pay "the cost of reasonable accommodation", but no other compensation, to the innocent person being thrown out of their own home.

But when we get to Schedule 6: Prohibited Items, the law goes from outrageous to outright ludicrous.

Let us have a look at some of the items that are prohibited within the city of Brisbane.

"3 (h) handcuffs"
[Source]

"3 (i) a whip"
[Source]

"14 a thing capable of disguising or concealing the 

identity of a person including camouflage paint or 

cream, a mask or a balaclava, but not including 

headwear, worn by a member of a religious group, of

a type customarily worn by members of the group"

[Source]

I have a feeling that some of the G20 leaders themselves might be at risk here.

"3 (m) glass bottles or jars"
[Source]

The humble jar of Vegemite; now banned! Is nothing sacred?

"3 (n) metal cans or tins"
[Source] 

I hate spam as much as anyone, but I wouldn't go so far as to classify it as dangerous in the physical sense.

"3 (o) projectiles, including, for example, 
stones, ball bearings or eggs"

[Source]

This one was no doubt spurred by the "eggpocalypse" which occurred during the recent Scottish independence referendum; A politician got egged and it was hyped up by the British media as if it was the worst crime since the holocaust, and maybe even more newsworthy than Julia Gillard losing her shoe (difficult though that is to believe).

But then the real agenda starts to show through:

"4 a placard or banner to which a timber, metal or plastic 
pole is attached or a banner more than 100cm high by 
200cm wide"

[Source]

Shush! It's not meant to be that obvious! You're meant to at least pretend it's all about the dreaded terrorists, and not about quashing legitimate protest.

Or are the terrorists going to smother people with their over-sized banners?

"11 a communication device, other than a mobile phone or other
telephone, capable of being used to organise activity designed to
disrupt any part of the G20 meeting, including, for example, a
two-way radio or a loud hailer, whether powered or not"

[Source]

...or announce their presence using megaphones?

"13 (j) a thing capable of being used to construct a stage,
platform, tripod or tower or a structure similar to a stage,
platform, tripod or tower, other than a camera tripod"

[Source]

...or exhibit themselves on a stage?

But now they've got their real reasons out of the way, time for a bit of weirdness.

"15 a manually operated surf ski or surfboard, kayak, boat or canoe"
[Source]

I have visions of insurgents, spear-guns ["3 (d) a spear gun"] at the ready, powering down the foetid swamp that is the Brisbane River on their surfboards, crying out "Cowabunga, you capitalist pig-dogs!"

"8 a reptile, insect or other animal capable of causing 

physical harm if released in close proximity to a person"

[Source]

Someone had some fun coming up with these.

"16 a floatation device"
[Source]

Seriously, I'm not making these up.

"17 a kite or other device suspended by airflow and
controlled by a string or cord attached to it"
[Source]

Truly...

But they didn't mention plastic oral thermometers with teddy-bear heads on them! Or did they?

"21 any other thing prescribed under a regulation"

This one seems to cover anything they want (note the use of "prescribed" rather than "proscribed").

So everyone, please take care when passing through Checkpoint Campbell this coming week.

Props for the Security Theatre

Cower in fear at the fiendish tools of death that appear in this airport display: A spoon, a miniature 1" long can-opener, and, worst of all, a pink plastic oral thermometer.

Weapons of Mass Destruction

Imagine the terror you would feel when confronted by such a horrifying weapon, peeping, barely visible, out of the fist of your assailant.

Terrorists STILL Don't Exist

The same people who brought you "weapons of mass destruction" and Dr Haneef, have done it again. An extraordinary attack on the Muslim community by the media, culminating in theatrical raids by hundreds of police officers.

Do not say that it is an insane overreaction; that is being too generous, because it implies that there was something to react to in the first place.

Every bit of this is based on outright lies. There are no terrorists, no bombs, no plots, nothing. Some innocent people have been arrested in order to further a political agenda.

Clearly, as an individual with no contacts in the security apparatus, I can't know this for sure. But I can't know for sure that you don't have a dragon living in your garage either, and one is as likely as the other. I'll bet you any money that no one arrested was guilty of anything worse than a parking fine, and probably not even that.

That the Murdoch/Abbott coalition is going down this Fascist* path is no surprise, but what is a surprise is that the Labor party and a large chunk of its supporters are goose-stepping along behind them.

[* = I don't user this term lightly, but it legitimately describes the situation.]

What is the point in going along with Murdoch's lies (and anyone in politics must know that this is all a bunch of lies)? You can't appease him; he will always be your enemy and he will always attack you whatever you do. You can't win by out-nastying the nasties (as Rudd tried to do on refugees), because the Coalition will always be perceived to be tougher in this area.

I hear people saying that Shorten is doing the right thing by maintaining a small target and giving Abbott enough rope to hang himself with. "Soon Abbott will go too far", they say. I call bullshit on this.

The ALP have been saying the same thing ever since Abbott became Leader of the Opposition in December 2009. "He's so obviously a brain-dead thug that soon he will do something so stupid that even Murdoch won't be able cover for him," was the theory.

Meanwhile, over the subsequent five years, Abbott has made disastrous blunder after disastrous blunder. Rarely has anyone called him on it, and always the media have covered things up or spun them to his advantage. If there was any theoretical line which could have been described a "going too far", he has long ago crossed it.

To complete the metaphor; Abbott has, with the aid of Murdoch, used the rope he was given to hog-tie the ALP.

You need to use different tactics because what you are doing at the moment isn't working.

The ALP only has a 1% lead in the polls at the moment. Given the absolute train-wreck the Murdoch/Abbott government has become, this should be at least 10%; even factoring in the mass of disengaged (and outright knuckle-headed) voters.

And then there is this insanity about going back to war in Iraq.

The Vietnam War spelled out in agonising detail just how stupid and counter productive it was to go around invading other countries. Do I need to point out the extraordinary human, environmental, financial and even political cost of this disaster? The cost was unbelievable and the benefits none.

You would have thought people would have learned from this, yet they happily marched off to repeat exactly the same mistake in Iraq (with, if anything, even worse motives and not even any clear idea of what they hoped to achieve).

The same lesson was therefore repeated; this time with the aid of glove puppets and slowly spelled out in words of one syllable.

If you don't get by now that it was a really really bad idea, you cannot be thinking at even a kindergarten level. To repeat this mistake before the blood is even dry from last time is something I find difficult to comprehend.

Please, could we just dial the idiocy back down to 11?