Illegitimate Transfer of Inalienable European Rights via Convention(s) & Supranational Bodies Establishment of Sovereignty-Usurping Supranational Body Dictatorships Enduring Program of DEMOGRAPHICS WAR on Europeans Enduring Program of PSYCHOLOGICAL WAR on Europeans Enduring Program of European Displacement, Dismemberment, Dispossession, & Dissolution
No wars or conditions abroad (& no domestic or global economic pretexts) justify government policy facilitating the invasion of ancestral European homelands, the rape of European women, the destruction of European societies, & the genocide of Europeans.
U.S. RULING OLIGARCHY WAGES HYBRID WAR TO SALVAGE HEGEMONY [LINK | Article]
Who's preaching world democracy, democracy, democracy? —Who wants to make free people free?
[For quotation purposes, confirm audio or official version]
** NOTE **
Square brackets signify my edit, and the headings in the list of ten are headings I have devised re each of the points made by Wilkie (rather than spoken/dictated as headings by Wilkie).
Anything that diminishes the protection for the environment is obviously wrong and to be resisted, Deputy Speaker.
So, too, to deny some Australian citizens the right to access all aspects of the legal system — no matter what the matter is — or to deny some Australian citizens the right to judicial view, in particular, is self-evidently wrong.
In fact, anything that diminishes the protection of the environment — anything that diminishes the rights of our citizens — is so self-evidently wrong that it's quite remarkable that it's come before the parliament and that we're even needing to debate the rights and wrongs of these issues.
It is also wrong for us to look at these issues in isolation, because, Deputy Speaker, I suggest we need to take a step back at this point and have a look at the direction our country is going in a whole range of ways and, in particular, the direction we are going about the rights of our citizens and the way in which the rights of our citizens and our groups, be it environmental groups or any other groups, are slowly being diminished, in an incremental way; because, when you take a step back and you look at a whole range of decisions that have been made by this and previous governments, including the bill that's before parliament today, that would deny some Australians to access all aspects of the legal system, you can draw a conclusion that Australia has reached the stage of being almost in a pre police-state, where the rights of citizens have been diminished so far, where the power of the state has increased so much, that we are in, what I'll characterise as, a pre police-state.
Deputy Speaker, when I turned my mind to this issue today and to preparing this speech, it took me very little time to quickly come up with some ten (10) characteristics of a pre police-state which exists in Australia right now, and I will quickly rattle through them, if you don't mind, Deputy Speaker.
No. 1 - Australia Police State Characteristic
[MASS SURVEILLANCE]
For a start, the way all members of a community are now monitored by the state, on account of mandatory metadata retention, which passed this parliament some time ago, is already in law and will be implemented from next month.
The community needs to understand that from next month, every phone call they make, every website they visit, every location signal sent from their mobile phone or other mobile device — electronic device — will be recorded by law, and can be accessed by the security services without warrant.
This is something that has been rejected by many other developed countries.
The scale of the mandatory metadata retention, which is being implemented in this country from next month, is almost unprecedented around the world in any developed country or democracy.
No. 2 - Australia Police State Characteristic
[MANIPULATION OF PRESS / MEDIA]
Another characteristic of a pre police-state: the way the media is being manipulated in this country.
We have seen: the way funding for independent broadcasters, the ABC and the SBS have been reduced;
We have seen: the way government ministers have bullied the ABC, bullied the Fairfax papers, have bullied some of the News Limited papers, at least the tabloids;
We have seen: the way, in this country, the Australian spreadsheet [ie broadsheet / newspaper format] has now become almost like Pravda was in the Soviet Union, as the official organ of the Australian Liberal Party.
Again, this is a characteristic of a pre police-state, the way the media is being used and manipulated.
No. 3 - Australia Police State Characteristic
[MANIPULATION OF JUDICIARY]
Another characteristic of a pre police-state is the manipulation of the judiciary, and it is remarkable that the government, Deputy Speaker, sees nothing wrong — nothing wrong at all — in the fact that a Royal Commissioner would agree to go to a party political event.
No. 4 - Australia Police State Characteristic
[STATE SECRECY - OPACITY - LACK OF TRANSPARENCY]
Another characteristic of a pre police-state, Deputy Speaker, is the secrecy that we see with this government and the ludicrous level of secrecy that surrounds our response to irregular immigration, and the development of this term,'on water operations', whatever that is.
All we know is that it is some sort of term that means, we're not going to tell you what's going on, even it is being paid for by you and even if it is being done in your name, even if is of very great humanitarian significance.
No. 5 - Australia Police State Characteristic
[NO EVIDENCE REQUIRED FOR ARRESTS - MERE SUSPICION OF 'TERRORISM']
Another characteristic of a pre police-state: the fact that in law, in this country now, you can be arrested on suspicion, in the absence of any hard evidence, when it comes to terrorism.
This, of course, is contained in one of the approximately [seventy (70)] separate pieces of legislation that have passed the Australian parliaments since 9/11 [ie 2001].
The fact that in Australia you can be arrested, in the absence of hard evidence, just on suspicion of thinking that you are going to do something in the future.
No. 6 - Australia Police State Characteristic
[DETENTION WITHOUT TRIAL / INDEFINITE DETENTION]
Another characteristic of a pre police-state — something that we see in Australia — is the fact that, in Australia, some people can be incarcerated indefinitely without a trial, and that's exactly what we are doing to some asylum seekers who are being incarcerated seemingly indefinitely, definitely without trial, in third countries where we send them to, when we send them to Manus Island in Papua New Guinea or to the Republic of Nauru.
No. 7 - Australia Police State Characteristic
[CONTEMPT FOR INTERNATIONAL LAW & INTERNATIONAL AGREEMENTS]
Another characteristic of a pre police-state, Deputy Speaker, is that — there's no shortage of things I can rattle off here — is the fact that this government now shows complete and utter disregard for international law and any number of international agreements, that previous governments have agreed to.
For instance, this government, ignores their own statute.
This government ignores the Refugee Convention; this government ignores the Convention of the Rights of the Child, and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
A healthy democracy, on that respects the rule of law, one that respects the rights of its citizens, one that respects the rights of the citizens of other countries, is a government that respects international law and international agreements.
No. 8 - Australia Police State Characteristic
[ELECTED REPS OF PEOPLE IN PARLIAMENT FORBIDDEN TO DEBATE & DECIDE
RE IMPORTANT STATE MATTERS — EG. WAR / USE OF FORCE]
Deputy Speaker, another characteristic of a pre police-state, is one in which the parliament, the elected representatives of the people, are forbidden to debate and decide on important matters of state.
I mean, we had this situation yesterday where the government, in secret, decided to start bombing the sovereign state of Syria, and the matter was never allowed to be debated by the parliament, [and] was never voted on by the parliament.
This makes Australia almost unique among our allies and among many developed countries: the fact that in this country the parliament is not involved — is not allowed to be involved — in decisions about waging war.
In the United States, the Congress has to debate and vote on declaring war.
France, Germany, the Netherlands, their parliaments all are required by law to debate and vote on the use of force.
Even in the United Kingdom, where it's not law, it's certainly convention, that the House of Commons, these days, will debate and decide on whether or not British military forces are committed to a conflict.
But not in Australia. Not in our pre police-state, where the parliament is not allowed even to have a proper debate — let alone a vote — about these sorts of matters.
No. 9 - Australia Police State Characteristic
[ATTACK ON DEMOCRACY / SYSTEM SAFEGUARD MECHANISMS]
Deputy Speaker, another characteristic of a pre police-state we see in this country these days is the way our safeguard mechanisms are disregarded, or even bullied, if they get in the government's way.
We saw the terrible treatment of the Human Rights Commissioner [Prof Gillian Triggs] when she spoke on the issue of asylum seekers.
A good government, in a healthy democracy, would have listened to the Human Rights Commissioner, would have listened very carefully and would have been very careful to take the Human Rights Commissioner's advice and be seen to take that advice, but, instead, what we saw was a conga line of ministers all lining up to have a go at her, and to bully her.
That is how an autocratic regime acts. It is not how a democratically elected government would act. It's not how our government should act. It was a shame on this government the way it treated the Human Rights Commissioner.
No. 10 - Australia Police State Characteristic
[SECURITY AGENCIES - EXCEED LAWFUL POWERS]
Another characteristic of a pre police-state, Deputy Speaker, is when security agencies start acting beyond their lawful powers.
Although it was eventually halted, in the face of overwhelming public concern and protest, the fact that the Australian Border Force (ABF) thought it was OK to conduct an operation on the streets of Melbourne, a few weeks ago now, where it would have acted unlawfully—
[ INTERJECTION - male voice ]
"You know that's not right. Stop telling lies."
—by stopping people on the street to check their papers, so to speak, something that is not allowed in the Act: beyond their legal power.
But was there any legal condemnation from this government over this? Was anyone sacked? Was anyone held to account? No.
All we heard from the relevant minister, in interview after interview, were attempts to try and downplay the matter and say that: ah, look, it wasn't that big a deal and it was just a badly worded press release.
Well, no, it wasn't a badly worded press release. It was worded exactly the way the Australian border force had intended for it to be worded. A press release that went to the Minister's office beforehand — we're not sure exactly how many times — it seems to have been at least twice, perhaps three times, perhaps more.
Now, Deputy Speaker, that's a long and pretty painful list to go through.
But if I could come up with ten (10) characteristics of a police state and jot them down in a matter of minutes this morning, and I'm sure I could add to that with any number of other ways in which our democracy is diminished right now, what does it say about our country?
And it puts this bill in quite a different light.
If we were a healthy democracy without that list of ten (10) characteristics of a police state, if this bill just came in fresh and there was nothing else going on around us, maybe we would respond to it differently.
I don't think we would, actually.
I don't think we would, actually, Deputy Speaker, because I think — well, I know it's obviously — it's self-evident we shouldn't diminish the protections for the environment; it's self-evident that we shouldn't deny some members of the community (or some groups within the community) the right to access all aspects of our legal system, including judicial review.
So it's a serious matter in its own right in this bill that's before the parliament. But when you put it in the context of all of the other things that have gone on in recent years in this country, you start to understand that this country, not only is going in the wrong direction, but we've gone a long way in the wrong direction.
And when you look back at history, and when you look at the lessons of history, when you look at once great countries that deteriorated over time, or their democracy deteriorated over time — and some even ultimately became police states — you see that often it happened incrementally. Often, it didn't happen with one seismic event where a dictator came to power.
Sometimes, these autocratic regimes were democratically elected and over time, bit by bit, the country deteriorated: its democracy deteriorated, it's democracy was diminished, bit by bit, and then one day the community woke up and asked:
How on earth did we get here? How on earth did we allow ourselves to now be living in a country that is so bad, that is so far removed from the wonderful democracy it once was? How on earth did we allow a democratically elected government to bit by bit, incrementally, one bill at a time, take us so far away from the healthy, wonderful democracy we once had?
One of the problems, Deputy Speaker is, bit by bit, things become normal. We get used to one little bit, then there's another little bit: another bill.
I've made the point that since 9/11 [ie 2001], there's been about seventy (70) separate pieces of legislation in this country to do with our national security, even though it could be argued that our laws at the time of 9/11 in 2001, were just about right: it was clearly as serious criminal offence to murder back then. It still is now.
There is now doubt that much of that legislation, contained in those seventy (70) or so bills, is unnecessary. We have gone too far in that regard.
We must, however, ensure that we keep our safeguards in place.
And that's one of the reasons that this bill is so bad: that we would think it OK to deny some Australians their lawful access to the [inaudible/cross-talk].
— END VIDEO / AUDIO —
---------------------- ꕤ ----------------------
Andrew Damien Wilkie
b. Tamworth, NSW (54 years)
appears very much a military man
(formerly married to fellow army officer)
Profession: Soldier, intelligence officer
Royal Military College, Duntroon (1984)
University of NSW, BA
Grad. Dips. Management & Defence Studies
Armed forces rank: Lieutenant Colonel
Office of National Assessments (ONA) intel agency - 1999-2000
Raytheon, US defence co. Raythoen world's largest producer guided missiles
ONA - again - (post 9/11 attacks) / intel agency / 2003 - resigned from ONA / (objected to Iraq invasion)
Later, provided evidence to British & Australian inquiries
re government involvement Iraq War
I'm sure I'm on my way to developing a military fetish. ;)
Was shocked to find he's a military guy.
Would have thought all the military personnel (or former military) would be really uptight pro police state types.
Apparently not. lol
Like the sound of Wilkie.
I'm not so much into the pro international laws & promotion of refugees' interests aspect; I'm more into the pro civil liberties and freedom from police-state aspect and pro interests of working classes, and am otherwise strongly in favour of strict immigration controls (which puts me at odds with the liberal left, humanitarians, and similar vocal others in the West).
EU-NATO IMPERIALISM ❌ 