Saturday, April 30, 2011

“WHO IS THE LOCAL PIG?” – Part four

Inge, Lady Friday interviews the proprietor of PRS Defence again, again and again.

Sorry people, another editorial.
He’s a vexatious prick but I’m beginning to understand where he’s coming from.

“When will they ever learn?”
A prayer which seems to encompass the first three interviews admirably.

My victim/interviewee has chosen to relate incidents from his youth then expanded on that theme from the local, regional tiers of governance through to matters within the state and federal jurisdictions.

Meanwhile he’s supported his assertions whenever possible with documentation readily available to the reader, merely a click away on the internet.

As for the point he made about Queensland, injustice and ‘courts of no record’ – he’s absolutely right about the ‘no record’ bit – but that lack of transparency extends significantly farther than the courts.

The reader might not be surprised to learn that a great deal of anecdotal material has reluctantly been discluded from these articles chiefly in the interests of maintaining some continuity and relevance but also by way of lending some vestige of anonymity to a relatively small regional city nowadays reduced to badly managed tourism and a few smallcrops as its main sources of income.

Indeed, “The Night of the Ballistic Watermelons”, or “New Year’s Eve, a Night of Terror”, or “A Near Miss For Mr. Plod”, or “25 Pounder Artillery  - Attack On Police”, or “Right, That’s it; No Fun For The Next Thirty Years”, or “Naked Motorcyclists Rampage Main Street” might make for eyegrabbing headlines but we couldn’t find a trace of information about that long ago hilarious incident. (As mentioned below, actually we did – plus a stack more interesting press accounts - Inge)

What is the crossover point – where and when is ‘the line drawn in the sand’ in this society?

A highly respected member of the community and his dog are threatened with arrest (Can police in Qld actually arrest a leashed, registered dog?) for going for their regular, early morning constitutional.
The only difference between their ‘street march’ that morning and any other was that police had been informed of their intention to make that walk ‘in symbolic protest’ against an incredibly ridiculous and unenforceable regulation.

Another person is aggressively and dangerously intercepted by a police officer in an unmarked car.
The court record would prove (except that in Qld they don’t exist) that the cop was under intensive psychiatric treatment at the time.

But when an entire community is arbitrarily denied its traditional venue for new year’s eve celebrations for thirty years in result of little more than light hearted fun – when in the words of my victim/interviewee – “Oh, the bloody idiots (police) got pissed off when everyone blocked them off from catching the naked bikers. As usual they started acting like children then completely lost the plot.”

STOP PRESS RIGHT THERE –
We found it, a reference to this alleged riot recreated in a confection called “100 Years of News”.

Enjoy the precis-
“New Year’s Eve riots mar city celebrations”
Police drew batons in a bid to control crowds of youths – went berserk outside city post office – orgy of destruction and larrikinism.
January 2 eyewitness report – “really frightening – would have to see it to believe it – if this is a sample of our young generation then god help us.”
News report said – “five uniformed officers and two detectives were powerless to control surging struggling mass of people. Riot started at 12.15 am, Jan1 as police arrested two motorcyclists for speeding/undue noise – several young men who tried to intervene/help stop riot were attacked beaten – one knocked down between motorcycles, kicked, punched and suffered exhaust burns on arm – taken hospital, x-rayed.”

Other incidents included –
“Council rubbish bins around square set on fire – one thrown through front window post office – another on top, traffic lights signal box
Cast iron weight scale (sic) located on post office verandah, many years, smashed to pieces.
Youths climbed to top ‘soldier’s monument’
Young motorcyclist and his female passenger stripped and rode naked along main street.
Car with six youths on bonnet raced down main street.
Speeding motorcyclist, estimated 60MPH (100KMH) squeezed between two cars – touching both but not coming to grief.”

“Was suggested afterward – more police should have been on duty and fire brigade called to hose down rioters.”

Meanwhile this little century of headline grabs has proven to be an outstanding resource.
All sorts of interesting stuff in hindsight, now that it has been published in a reasonable neat chronology.

Hey look – here’s a bloke barricading himself in his shop protesting about being ripped off and made destitute by the same people ‘P’ has been telling me about off the record.
In his case what sounds like a perfectly reasonable protest employing signage in his own shop has been turned into a ‘seige’.
Boy, I wonder who HE annoyed?

And here’s that alcoholic magistrate – leastways a record, the bare bones, of one of his wacky court decisions.
Oh, I get it. The gentlemen convicted for being in possession of a female mud-crab were supposed to wait on the rock wall until the passing ship washed them off into the river.
Then, no excuses allowed; only THEN were they permitted to search for their missing fishing gear and crabpots – weigh and sex their crabs and reject those that were illegal – if they hadn’t drowned in the meantime, that is.
Wisdom of Solomon, that twerp – jurisprudence personified.

Here’s that dentist and his protest march with his dog. These days they’d probably taser him – and his dog, no doubt, judging by what I heard the Qld CMC have approved today.
Yep. The veil is definitely being lifted from my eyes about how this dump works.

But my victim/interviewee has just this minute arrived.
Let’s ask him.

Inge – Okay mister, raring to go?
Thanks for leaving me that “100 Years of News”. Interesting reading.
First, let’s put that ‘riot’ out of the way. I understand you were there?
P – “Oh yes. I was there, my Lady Wife was there and our six month old son was with us there too. Not only were we there, we were right there where, according to that stupid rag of a newspaper, this alleged riot happened.
I can tell you before we go much further that we didn’t stay there for too long after the police began acting in their usual brilliant way.
Let’s make that clear right now. There was one helluva lot of people about that evening and they most certainly were not all ‘youth’.
While I’m on that subject, the appellation ‘youth’ was used back then in the same way the new generation of control freaks these days use the term ‘terrorist’.
Childish and nauseating of them to do so, but fact that they did.
Maybe they thought it increased circulation to incubate unreasonable hate against the sons and daughters of their own community.
But I digress and I suppose that at least a few readers would like to know the truth – an expose’, shall we say, of small town mentality by way of living history.”

Inge – Well, relate your story to the condensed version I’ve compiled in my preamble.
P – “Wilco, Inge, here goes.
Police drew batons – highly unlikely, they only had one to share between ‘em. Orgy of destruction – orgy of incapacitating laughter was what we saw until the police began getting ugly.
Noisy – hell yes. Most of the town was there for the night including quite a few hundred whatchacallem  ‘squares’, ‘ho-dads’ ‘straight arrows’, ‘dorks’, their bovine women and their gawking kids –much of the bored-stiff population, like us, in town for the big night.”

Inge – Watchit fella !
P – “Wanted the truth, didn’t you?
As I was saying - speeding/undue noise – motorcycles then, usually broke-down before they could go very fast but were inevitably noisy. Even police bikes were noisy.
Go figure.
Riot – law abiding citizens helping police were bashed, etc.
Like hell they did.
A couple of drunken bums ran across the road in front of the traffic then tripped over the footpegs of parked motorcycles. A couple of the bikers had just arrived so it would not surprise me if one of the idiots managed to burn himself on a hot exhaust pipe. Nor would it surprise me if the ratbag who ended up underneath a scooter knocked off its stand copped a clout over his ear for the damage he’d caused someone’s sole pride and joy.
Burning bins in city square – for one thing we don’t have a city square nor do we, did we, have mobile or removeable rubbish bins. Back then we had these things bolted to steel pipes concreted in the footpath. They all had a flap in the bottom that swung down to empty them. They all stank to high heaven so there’s no way even a beer crazed biker was ever going to go near one let alone ignite any of those items of mystery.
They would have gassed everyone to death.”

Inge – Which reminds me. Nothing in that newspaper account of guns or explosives. Anything like that happen?
P – “Yeah. Now you mention it, but down the road in the toff’s part of town in front of the pubs. That has to be put into perspective. Fireworks were banned about then and were difficult to find let alone purchase. And remember that the bikers used to meet in front of the post office because most of them were younger than 21 – which was the legal drinking age back then.
So now you mention it some sort of booming and crashing was going on somewhere further down in that half mile long street party.”

Inge – So why weren’t the police after them, then. Why wasn’t that mentioned in the article?
P – Indeed. Good question. Why?
Put it this way. If you were a local cop in a small town would you interfere with the local ‘hard-men’? What, arrest one of the local sugar cane barons or trawlermen?
No way. They’d much rather pick on a bunch of zit faced kids on motorcycles.
And I can’t speak about what I couldn’t see so let’s get back to that newspaper report about the ‘riot’ and set the record straight.
Another way to put that would be to refer to another article very near by this one in that 100 years book. It mentions two fishing inspectors that went missing; the dismissive coroner’s report of ‘death by misadventure,’ then glibly comments on the remaining grave concerns about foul play. It might as well have concluded with – ‘but who cares anyway’.”

Inge – Okay, according to the newspaper – smashed scales, climbing monument , motorcycle streakers, petrol-head youths on bonnet, speeding motorcycle breaking laws of physics and some fire hose envy. Any comments or something else to add?
P – “In that sequence then - a new currency was introduced in 1966. Those old scales had been outside the PO since about then. I guess the old pennies were a bit rare and those old scales had rusted up sitting unused out in the weather all that time. Seeing as those crocked old scales had been used as a convenient seat for years it wouldn’t surprise me that they were discovered as ‘broken’ after the event.
Climbing monument? A couple of people did climb onto the base of that monument to gain a better view. Climb further up that polished granite greasy pole? Forget it.
Motorcycle streakers? Oh yes. You can take my word that there was more than one motorcycle streaker sending ripples of outrage through the honest citizens.
Ronnie revouts catching a ride or two sitting in the back of utes or on bonnets? Of course they were – as well as running between all the slow moving traffic and climbing on board vehicles uninvited. That’s the mentality of small town petrol heads for you, but gives an indication of the speed and congestion of the traffic that night.
Which leads to that speeding motorcyclist caroming, literally ricocheting, (or so is implied) between automobiles driven by shocked law-abiding citizens.
Personally, I find it impossible to speed in the middle of gridlock, especially with pedestrians milling about everyhere.
Mind you, motorcyclists aren’t averse to threading carefully between lanes of cars when conditions and common sense permit – but 60mph; would that newspaper tell lies?
Of course not – except when they’re told to.
But they did miss out on the ballistic watermelons.
I can’t understand why because that was the one incident that I really found remarkable. In those days watermelons were real watermelons – thin skinned, soft pulped, extremely juicy and would burst at the drop of a hat. Evidently someone brought a few beauties along to the party.
So, as it said in the newspaper, when the police started getting stroppy about a quarter of an hour after midnight these fairly large chunks of watermelon came hurling out of the crowd whenever police made an appearance.
Police ‘attendance’ on foot reverted to police driving slowly past in cars under a rain of watermelon chunks.
Then this motorcycle demon made a break for it through the traffic and came within a whisker of wearing about half a watermelon.
I have to say that I’m glad that one missed ‘cos that cop most definitely riding ‘without due care and attention to the traffic conditions’ at the time.
If you take my point it would have served him right to have worn that watermelon but if it had hit him on the side of his head he could have easily lost control of his scooter and gone under the wheels of those cars he was roaring past.
Ha – maybe that newspaper ‘eyewitness’ mistook that cop hurriedly decamping the scene for the rampaging slaloming bikie he reckons he saw.”

Inge – Anything else?
P – “I’ll take time to mention here the lack of outrage in the paper about the petrol heads in the back of those utes flashing browneyes and waving their plonkers at the solid citizens. Funny set of double standards, that, and typical of the small town mentality that still operates here.
Let’s summarise; starting by looking at the flavour of the times –
  • Small town social event a spontaneous street party - not anything different to new year’s eve celebrations of decades before, except for the following tiny details -
  • chronologically, we were at the tail end of the Vietnam War but according to some were at the Dawning of the Age of Aquarius and right into the start of a new age of free love, heightened expectations and alternative lifestyles -
  • unfortunately were also dealing with a time when the baby boomer generation are just reaching the beginning of what passed for their adulthood -
  • while a certain Queensland premier and his pals are right in the midst of setting up what came to be recognized as a police state and a wowser society

It may well have been too much for the police and city fathers to experience a spontaneous public event of unprecedented proportions.
Sheer numbers would have been enough to startle them, but to see what was previously, usually an undemonstrative ‘spectator society’ becoming animated, proactive, and admittedly, in a few cases, slightly over-exuberant, must have strained their limited reason beyond limits.
As Arthur would put it – “They just couldn’t handle seeing people having fun. It wound up their rubber bands to snapping point, the dills.”
The mind boggles to think what would have happened if they’d had a few more police or had been actually stupid enough to call out the fire brigade.
And as we discussed, these days they’d try tasering everyone and when that didn’t work it’d be out with the Glocks.”

Inge – Okay deadline time. Lets wrap it and bring your points together next episode.
P - ” Fair enough. I’ll close this one by reminding everyone that for the next thirty plus years the main street of this town was barricaded and patrolled by police.
A no-entry zone where any trespasser would be immediately escorted out or have their heads kicked in by those people supposedly employed to protect the community.
Naturally this drove celebrations out of town to dispersed locations throughout the district making legitimate policing and emergency services an operational nightmare.
On the face of the record, the history of this sorry little town exhibits far too many decisions and verdicts having been made to the detriment of the majority and for the protection of a small self ordained oligarchy.”

History seems to be giving fair indication as to who the local ‘pigs’ are and their mentality.

Tuesday, April 26, 2011

“WHO IS THE LOCAL PIG?” – Part three

Inge, Lady Friday interviews the proprietor of PRS Defence again and again.

Parts one and two of this series of interviews has revealed Queensland for what it was from the latter half of the 1960s through two decades into what some would call the Bjelke Petersen heyday.
Queensland was apparently drifting, according to the inmates, into a continuum where many were beginning to wonder whether the regime would ever end.

‘Groundhog Day’ writ large and intermixed with an overstrong dash of ‘Catch 22”.

The reader might be skeptical about some of the allegations made earlier in this series since no corrobatory records are readily available.
But that isn’t surprising in Queensland even if the matters had been before a court of jurisdiction. http://www.aph.gov.au/hansard/reps/commttee/R7411.pdf
A reasonable person (as I’m sure my interviewee would say) would have no expectation whatsoever of discovering the truth if even the Federal Standing committee of Legal and Constitutional Affairs couldn’t cut through the obfuscation that is Queensland.

Somehow, the definition of ‘courts of no record’ has developed a rather nefarious double meaning in Queensland.

So let’s cut to the chase -

Inge – I’m sure that people can see where you’re coming from about that magistrate and his friends. Things began to go pear-shaped when Mr. Bjelke Petersen became premier. But  didn’t the FitzGerald thing fix that?
P – “ You tell me how a team of Australia’s most capable jurists could fix something so completely entrenched.
I’m told the people end up with the government they deserve and I reckon Queensland is a bloody good example of that.
Tony Fitzgerald did his best. To so many he was a hero.
You’d expect that hero would be living in Queensland now enjoying his retirement and sitting on the courthouse steps in the pleasant morning sunshine giving sage advice to all and sundry turning up for their day of justice – wouldn’t you?
But here he is in NSW –
and this is why -

Inge – But all that was up there with the power brokers and as far as the rest of Queensland was concerned, according to you, all up there with the fairies. Right?
P – “Depends what you call fairies, Inge. Are they fairies or demons?
Depends on a person’s private fears and expectations from life.
Seems to me that life reflected what people said – ‘we live in a white car-nation’ was a good one; another classic – ‘Oh well, that doesn’t concern me, I can afford that’ - seems to sum up the attitude of the clueless, spineless, unimaginative, conformist dolts populating the quarry the place had become.
All I can say is that if the Labor party was first established by unionists meeting under a tree at Barcaldine then it is no bloody wonder the tree has died.
It wasn’t poisoned – it died of shame.”

Inge – You’re proving yourself to be a bit of a hard man aren’t you mister? Complaining about corruption in the conservative side of politics and now you’re up Labor for the rent.
What’s left, the poor old Greenies?
P – “Hah. I was intending to say ‘all in good time’ for a sec’ but you’ve reminded me of something my Lady Wife discovered the other week.
Give us a loan of your laptop. Ah, here you go – trap these in the text –
So, Inge, what do you think of them apples, politically speaking, I mean?”

Inge – I’m completely lost for words – hey, I’m the one doing the interviewing here –
P – “Sorry, rhetorical question.
Look, the point I make is this. People are a little less naïve than they used to be – leastways they do tend to become cynical when they finally work out than opportunists rarely practice what they preach. And, oh lordy, hasn’t there been a bit of that going on lately.
Agreed, it usually takes a hefty tap with a sledgehammer between their eyes to gain their attention but once gained they usually work it out.
Getting ‘em to actually READ something is admittedly a bit of a challenge but what the hell – we’re stuck with this medium for the time being.”

Inge – Well, if you want them to read this you’d better get cracking.
P – “What is the common denominator, then?
I’ll tell you. It’s an industry called exploitation. That industry is managed with industrial grade manipulation and is presented to the masses in various novel guises carefully calculated to stymie the peasantry. Politics, religion, culture, sport –
Hey, what a bloody joke it has become that our churchmen (notice rarely the women) are so completely morally compromised that our sportsmen have to sign off behavior clauses in their contracts.
Good god, what has become of us that our gladiators have to be so falsely and cynically presented as paragons of virtue.
Politicians – ever met one that has never breached his solemn oath to do this or that once elected? If one of those ever KEPT a promise his colleagues’d keelhaul him for exceeding his authority.”

Inge – And this leads where?
P – “Hopefully to a point where a few people who read this of the millions outside the privileged oligarchy begin to understand that they are being taken for a ride.
In parts 1 and 2 we covered in fairly convincing detail how Queensland government has treated Queenslanders for the best part of a lifetime.
The world has moved on but Queensland and most of Australia has remained, governance-wise, nothing but a penal colony with no proper constitution, no charter of rights at all and a complete travesty of a justice system.
I mean, what do you have to do to get them to wake up?
They sit there watching their horrormovie news right there on their TeeVee tut, tutting about all those ‘revolting wogs over there’ demanding constitutional chance and amendments to their respective bills of rights.
Imagine that.
Stap me; the bloody dullards are so completely ignorant that if it could ever be driven home into their consciousness that THEY can’t complain about THEIR friggin’ bill of rights ‘cos they bloody well don’t have one – they’d say something like ‘Oh well, that saves us a lot of bother then’.
They do believe in some things though.
They believe in their right to own their own home, a good car to get to work and three square meals a day.
Which makes me damned near puke laughing. Even if they ever managed to make the final payment on that boulder suspended from their necks they’d drop dead a few years later.
Meanwhile they’d be stuck driving a dangerous rustbucket to work and looking forward to the Sunday pot roast all bloody week.
And as we all know that dream is now unsustainable.”

“Here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4poWiKfg1MU – the dream collapsed -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Boxes - if you need an explanation -
- to be replaced with the bitter truth – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AXvyhqE_a38

“WHEN WILL THEY EVER LEARN?”

(Now, whatever you do reader – don’t click on to these or look for the Pete Seeger connection there.)”

Inge – Oho. Think you can stoop to ART to get your message across, do you?
Well, I’m gonna upstage YOU, mister - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDQnfF6-j48&feature=related
There you are, and there you are readers.
End of interview, Part 3.

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

“WHO IS THE LOCAL PIG?” – Part two

Inge, Lady Friday interviews the proprietor of PRS Defence again.

Inge – You were suggesting (part1) that Queensland was a rough and ready place when you were a young adult: that there are still plenty of skeletons in numerous closets . Where would you like to go from there?
P – “Back then a right bastard ran Queensland.
Funny that. He wasn’t supposed to be premier – a bloke by the name of Jack Pizzie http://adbonline.anu.edu.au/biogs/A160009b.htm (added by Inge) had been anointed but he died suddenly – for some strange reason.”

Inge – Some strange reason?
P – “Well, he looked as fit as a fiddle when he visited to pay his respects after learning of my grandfather’s death. That was a few days before he officially became premier.
Anyway, Jack’s replacement.
Like Hitler, I doubt whether he had any real clue what harm he engendered by his confident belief in the righteousness of his cause.
The politics of Queensland then were no more than the reflection of  a ‘TonkaToy’ mentality – he, a dozen or so of his mates and anyone else prepared to stuff cash into the coffers for a consideration ruled the roost.
If there was any difference between his tactics and the games played by the present mob was that in his day the cut-throat stuff was usually confined within the inner circle.”

Inge – Hang on one furry little minute. In your last interview you spent a fair deal of time talking about the harm ‘they’ caused.
P – “ Didn’t I. But then I was talking about the purely local situation and the bottom feeders taking advantage of the lack of oversight and accountability in governance and society then.
I mean, how in hell could he run Queensland for all that time without having a clue about the first principles of democracy? http://www.fedcourt.gov.au/aboutct/judges_papers/speeches_moorej7.html (added by Inge)
Those people I mentioned in part 1 were essentially ‘collateral damage’. They most certainly were not intentionally harmed – just that once they were harmed – how can I put it?
Regrettable, definitely avoidable, but once they were harmed it just didn’t matter.
Meanwhile, what the inner circle were up to defies description. http://netk.net.au/Whitton/Hillbilly24.asp - and
They made Al Capone look like a straight arrow but usually confined their skullduggery among their peers and government employees.
Unless, of course, some peasant came to their notice or pissed them off.
Then the cack hit the fan”

Inge – How?
P – Say, by being different or owning something someone ‘more important’ than you wanted for themselves. The tall poppy syndrome, don’t they call it?
Take custom vehicles.
I used to build my own custom motorcycles.
To keep the story short a certain person and his mate who reckoned that they were the only people in town allowed to do that sort of thing decided they wanted to ‘acquire’ one of my scooters ‘at the right price’.
It was only a hobby for me then – to them it was money.
To me it was fun – to them, serious stuff; serious enough to cause me grief compliments of another of their mates who happened to be a bent cop.
I was on my way home one evening when next thing I know I’m being driven into the gutter by some loonie in a car.
Indeed it was a loonie. A loonie cop (IF any cop wants to dispute this – when the dropkick was supposed to appear in court the first five adjournments he was in Brizzo receiving psychological treatment.)
So what do most people do when loonies try to drive them off the road?
Take evasive action, don’t they?
Anyway after he had his fun waving his gun in everyone’s face and had my scooter impounded it took six months, a thousand dollars of my money and an instrument signed by the Transport minister to end up with no conviction and to get my still road registered scooter back on the road.
All that to cover up the fact that he’d been in bloody LaLa land since someone less polite than me had shown him the error of his ways a few months before.
While that’s happening those smarmy bastard mates of that twitchy, corrupt, chained dog, cop offered to ‘buy’ my motorcycle ‘at the right price’.
That was back in 1980/81.”

Inge – Can you prove that?
P – “Doubt if I could directly, Inge, from court records or anything official – but I can tell you for free that the fat timeserver is retiring at the end of this week. Remembered his name and googled it last night. What a coincidence. Big writeup in a regional newspaper.
I’ll bet it’ll take the local bigwigs a long time to train up a replacement for that corrupt bastard.”

Inge – Oh come on. You’re being a bit hard on them and not backing it up with fact. Show me something that can be verified.
P – “ How about Harry Akers, then. More to the point, Harry Akers and his pooch.”
Hey Inge, how many Scotsman did it take to constitute a riot according to the Poms?
Don’t know?
Ah well, someone told me that Just after the battle of Culloden it was three.
Get that, three Scotsmen meeting in a public place was a riot.
Gee, they must have been scared out of their tiny minds about those poor, skinny little, underfed, Scotsmen.
So how many Queensla –“

Inge – You’re really trying to burr me up aren’t you fella? C’mon smartie – how many Queenslanders were a danger to the civil power? Ten? Fifty? C’mon then, tell me an’ then prove it, dammit!
P – “Delighted, and to provide the record –
Are you with it?
A police force on the one hand so completely politicised they’d do anything for their masters and on the other so completely stupid that they decided that one man and his dog going for a walk, in the middle of the night, down a one way road, leading to a cul-de-sac, was a subversive act and such a threat to the peace that the local wallopers had to turn up in force in order to prevent this act of terrorism.
We tough Queenslanders certainly make the rebellious Scotch look like a mob of woozes, don’t we Inge?”

Inge – I wouldn’t believe this if it wasn’t staring me in the face out of this laptop.
Can we have a break and a beer or ten?

Monday, April 18, 2011

“WHO IS THE LOCAL PIG?” - Part one

Inge, Lady Friday interviews the proprietor of PRS Defence.


Inge – We’re talking politics, Queensland style here; aren’t we?
P – “Let’s, at least, start with Queensland.”

Inge – Go for it.
P - “When I was young police used to be called ‘pigs’. Definitely a para-military organization in outlook. I’ll give ‘em one thing though – they didn’t go on the beat wearing guns until Bjelke Petersen completely politicised them.
Let’s stick mainly with traffic police so’s to stop it getting overcomplicated.”

Inge – I’d imagine their job load would have been different then - that they would have been under resourced.
P - “Their motto was ‘We Serve’ or something like that. We used to say that they served alright – served out traffic tickets to anyone stupid enough to stop for them.
Then Joh became premier and soon after introduced ‘on-the-spot-fines’ instead of a mandatory court session for  dealing with alleged traffic offenses.
Soon after that he gave police revolvers. All of a sudden revenue from traffic fines went through the roof.
Suddenly police were no longer merely authorized to oversee and uphold compliance with the traffic act – they’d become armed enforcers and began acting that way.”

Inge – Acting how and why?
P – “Think about it – in a few months the onus of proof – the concept that the cop had to prove in court beyond reasonable doubt that a person had committed a misdemeanor or offense was thrown out – was essentially replaced with a situation that a person had to prove themselves innocent. If you understand me, in jurisdictions that support the rule of law it is called a ‘reversal of the onus of proof’ and is therefore unlawful.”

Inge – The thin edge of the wedge you reckon. People found it easier to pay a fine instead of appearing in a court?
P – “No doubt about it. Queenslanders were conned but that was only the beginning.
Two streams, two pathways followed.
Firstly, the coppers were freed all that process work – summonses, filing documents, appearing in court: then along with that disappeared whatever judicial oversight ever existed surrounding those matters.
People soon became alienated from the concept that the courts were the source of justice while police, courts and legal service providers immediately set themselves up for different and more, shall we say, lucrative work.”

Inge - Surely you are not suggesting –
P – “My oath I am. Look at the history of it. Police became infinitely more corrupt and the courts have ceased being available for anyone except the wealthy.
Go research it yourself – its just a matter of record.”

Inge – We’re talking the early 1970s, correct? Leave the historical record aside and tell me what you know – a young man living in a small regional city.
P - “Okay then. Fashions change, don’t they Inge?
These days a cop looking for bother puts on his tactical blue overalls, tucks them into his boot tops, claps on his Batman™ utility belt and that stupid cap at a jaunty angle – then goes out Glock, taser and capsicum spray equipped to harass street kids.
Back then it was the Baron Von Richtofen look. Cops strutting about like prize turkeys – comic opera stuff. Not quite goose stepping idiots, but in their idiocy they were serious. Hence pigs, I guess”

Inge – You say dressed like the ‘Red Baron’?
P – Not the real police, not the older blokes. But yep. The patent leather floppy officer’s cap, the tailored jodhpurs and puttee boots.
What was that David Bowie song? “Boys”, was it? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6TSPmxfqA4  (Inge added this grab)
They might have been too young to have transferred from the SS but, by jingo, they looked and did their damnedest to act the part.
‘Intercepting’ motorcyclists was their main trade. Easy work, Just too easy to pick a single person on a motorcycle at a distance and far too easy pickings within the situation I’ve been telling you about.
In those days we had a fair manufacturing industry in town and lots of shift workers riding motorcycles to work.
These heroes in butch drag used to harvest those poor bastards for everything they were worth.
And more than once fired upon them if they hesitated before they stopped.
I hear they’re doing the same again these days. Importing pre-trained thugs from overseas; South Africa and the like.”

Inge – Are you serious?
P – Yep. But all that was the obvious along with the drink-driving lists and the escalating number of what we now call victimless crimes. The agencies of social exploitation zealously working hand in hand (hand in pocket?) with each other.
As I said, fashions change. To keep the system fed the legal blood alcohol level was incrementally dropped (still had to keep a bread and butter turnover in the courts) while new and interesting excuses for official home invasions were invented.
I’m very serious about this since you ask: I do not condone excess and substance abuse nor do I like drunken and incapable drivers but I don’t believe in innocent people being set up while the guilty get away scot free.”

Inge – Hang on. This sounds like one of those old movies about corruption in the southern states in the USA.
P – “Good girl. Now you’re beginning to get a handle on it.
On one side was the poor bloke in the street. He paid his dues and didn’t complain.
Face it: who could he complain to?”

Inge – So who was on the other side?
P – “Are you up to this? If I tell you will you publish it? There’s no record you know.
Try Googling ”--- -----” Qld magistrate, just for instance.” (name deleted, Inge)

Inge – Do you want me to delete what you’ve already said. Want me to call it all  a waste of time?
P – “Not especially; but let’s pretend I’m talking about people whose names I can’t quite recall at this precise moment. Wouldn’t want to cross the Lodge, would we?
A few examples then.
Remember that a stipendiary magistrate had to, shall we say, make enough in fines to pay his way.
They (you know who) used to let this particular stipendiary magistrate drive home every evening from the B----tt Club pissed out of his brain. This magistrate was a dead-set demon on drink driving.
I’m told that towards the end of his career they’d follow him and pour him into a police car if he couldn’t make it all the way home.
That’s what I’m sure you’d agree is a fine example to the community.”

Inge – Surely the poor man needed help?
P – “Of course he did, Inge. Exactly the same amount of help he’d offer his mates; wouldn’t you reckon?”

Inge – You’d hope so.
P – “Try this then,
They (police and our coroner/magistrate) covered up when a certain ‘big man’ in local  industry rammed, killed and maimed the best part of a car full of people on his way home from the pub.
It mightn’t be significant but for the fact that our aforesaid magistrate usually met up with this one for a few snifters on his way home from work.

Inge – Get out?
P – “They (you know who) also looked the other way when a drunken truck driver, on the wrong side of the road, smeared a friend of mine and his pillion passenger all over the grille of his truck.
I went there a few days later and saw with my own eyes where they’d thrown what small bits remained of his motorcycle on his side of the road.
They didn’t even wash their blood off the road.
You know a Triumph Bonneville had been well and truly centrepunched when you could find the kickstart lever and part of its housing lying there in the grass.”

Inge – Surely a few unrelated instances of oversight do not prove –
P – “Ah, exactly. If they were unrelated and spread over time a reasonable person could accept random misfortune – that, in the famous words of Mr. Abbott – “shit happens”.
But you did ask me to dredge my memory – to remember a few instances that happened ‘back then’ – instances that were linked and might indicate cover –ups by the old boy’s network. Isn’t that what we agreed?”

Inge – Yes we did. Since we’ve gone this far, best you explain.
P – “Thank you. Connectivity in this case surrounds watering holes, social status and shall we call it, extra-curricular activity – oh, and a certain sporting club.”

Inge – You’re pulling my leg?
P – “Look at it this way. Small town, comfortable existence, but the need to maintain a lifestyle unsustainable on a salary. You only need to ask a few recent parliamentary rejects. Try interviewing Gordon Nuttall, for instance.
Anyway here’s a Stipendiary Magistrate – remember his income is derived from fines he collects in court. You’d have to agree that he’d be motivationally inclined to hit anyone before him in court, in their pocket.
He had, would you say, a symbiotic relationship with those who brought him his ‘clients’?
Now this magistrate naturally sucked up to those who’d lend him some status and he’d tend to meet with them socially to reinforce the bond and shoot the breeze?
Wouldn’t it therefore be ‘natural’ for him to him to meet regularly with a bloke who had a managerial position with a local industry combine and a place on the management committee of one of our more prestigious (how may I put it?) gentlemen’s sporting facilities?
Now, if this gentlemen’s sporting facility happened to have certain cash flow problems caused by the refusal of ‘Toff’ members to pay their fees – but nonetheless had to meet certain facility maintenance/ development costs largely revolving around broad acre groundkeeping expenses –
Well, we used to call ‘em ‘foreign orders’. These days its called ‘theft as a servant’.
And when the theft involved multiple truckloads – scores of tons of highly fertile, fibrous biomass being spread over all those acres of that gentlemen’s sporting facility –“

Inge – You need a truckdriver accomplice with a muck-spreading truck who spreads this goop all day for the aforesaid combine. Correct?
P – “Well done. So let’s recap.
Two ‘toffs’, (archaic term, toffee nosed bastards) and one truckie meeting reasonably regularly at a pub in a little village about six miles out of town.
The pub, by the way, is only about half a mile away from a convenient break in the fence that surrounded that gentlemen’s sporting facility.
Our magistrate drives (?) past the door of the pub on his way home every day after being poured out of his club in town - but doesn’t usually resist the pressing need to drop in or, once there, spend some time with his managerial mate.
The managerial mate is usually at the pub after a round of –er- sport and supervising the fertilization of his facility.
The truckie often joins them for a free beer or ten himself before he drives back to town along the same route his boss takes. He doesn’t overly enjoy the company but he’s not so stupid that he doesn’t recognize patronage.”

Inge – Let’s do a summary and wrap up part one, shall we?
P – “It mightn’t have been unusual for the times. It was a less stratified society and the drink-driving limits were much more lenient back then. Even these days the truckie would have the defence of ‘mistake of fact’ about alleged misappropriation of all those tons of fertilizer.
But nothing excuses the confident hypocrisy of this little triangle of sots believing they were not only above the law but also protected BY the law.
Two young people, a young man and his pillion passenger. They’d only met that evening and after a short ride on a moonlit night – they were pulped.
The pigs couldn’t cover that one up so, as I said, they didn’t try.
The carload hit by our ‘manager’?
I believe that was in sight of the pub.
Witnesses never lie, do they?
Our magistrate?
What – was he going to lock himself up?
‘NO man is above the law’ - a prime tenet at law – except in Queensland.
It has been formalized since the Di Fingleton matter.
According to Queensland legislation they are indeed now above the law.”

Friday, April 15, 2011

“WILKIE CAN’T REMEMBER – BUT I DO” – or - man of straw

CATEGORIES –
No-one is above the law, except?
Hypocrisy
Even scum have rights
Forgetfulness
Bastardisation
Treating people badly
Turn over a new leaf
Mistake of fact
No jurisdiction X cross jurisdiction = no justice
Hubris
The end justifies the means
Plausible deniability
Privilege
More bastardization
So that’s what he’s like, then
Why bother voting
It takes a right bastard to get rid of those pokies
He doesn’t care – he’s not the one who died
What does he care about, then?

Author – Inge, Lady Friday

I’ve been detailed to write this one.
The team decided it would appear far too strange to have our Django writing about another.

Mr. Django Merope-Synge is about 21 years of age and works in the office of the federal independent, Mr. Andrew Wilkie.

As an author, electoral candidate, then as an independent MP, Mr. Wilkie has relied upon projecting attitudes and uttering supporting statements that a person might expect are his personal views and values.

In the event that Mr. Wilkie is nothing but a cynical pragmatist a reasonable person would still expect Mr. Wilkie’s word to be his bond and act ethically, honourably and lawfully as a parliamentarian and as a citizen.

Having read this speech - http://rawveterannews.com.au/wordpress/?p=162 – a person would realise that Mr. Wilkie wanted Australia to believe that he cared deeply about the welfare and fate of those with whom he once shared the vocation at arms. (as Arthur put it – “You’d have to be either a psycho or a lying bastard to make a speech like that then ignore what happened to Matthew. Want me to toss a coin?”)

Opening that document reveals that it was released from Wilkie’s office by Mr. Merope Synge.
To belabour the point – both of them would have to be astoundingly absent minded or culpably incompetent were they to pretend ignorance of the content of that document.

Yet they have proven themselves ignorant, forgetful and incompetent.
Certainly all the indicators are there for everyone to see and read.

The best part is that Mr. Merope-Synge has put it in writing for us in result of his replies to several requests addressed to Mr.Wilkie.
Mr. Merope Synge has been contacted by telephone and was asked if any reason existed why those communications should not be published.
He conceded that no such lawful reason existed however expressed a request that they should not.

For the time being we shall not so much respect that request – rather accede to his wishes to save him embarrassment.

Anyone reading the media accounts about Mr. Wilkie, his office, his previous career and the glaring disparity between his public persona and what has recently been discovered about him would agree that such would merely be gilding the lily.
So what the hell.

Mr. Merope Synge’s dismissive communications arrived over the last few days coincident with the cack hitting the fan in Mr.Wilkie’s office.
As usual with these things in our NON-representative cathouse passing for a parliament the poor inexperienced staffer had to fob off the citizen while his boss dealt with more important matters.

More important matters like damage-control.
Like working out how NOT to remember forcing Duntroon cadets to give the Nazi Salute.
Like NOT remembering giving a cadet a hazing for refusing an act of allegiance to a Fascist, totalitarian, warmongering power. (Yes. Does sound a bit over the top – nonetheless a legal fact. Try giving the Hitler salute in certain parts of Eorope. Try FORCING someone to do that there.)
Like NOT remembering much of that but somehow DEFINITELY remembering that he didn’t sexually fiddle with any of them.
Oh he COULD remember that he was indeed up on a fizzer along with his bastardizing ringmates back then.

But that’s okay ‘cos he’s turned over a new leaf. Or so he says.

We say in a pig’s eye he has.
We submit that he’s a bit of an opportunist and a hypocrite.
And can prove it.
Except that we’d have to reveal the identity of a father who insists his son’s death resulted from his defence service and qld health’s criminal incompetence.

We’ve mentioned some of this before -
Documents of record corroborating the facts have been forwarded to our esteemed parliamentarians and agencies of  jurisdiction but it appears this son’s father doesn’t have enough money to pay appropriate bribes.
Wilkie is just the last in a long line.

They used to call this ‘the lucky country’.

Yeah. Lucky if you are lucky or corrupt. No-one with skill or ethics need apply.


Further reading -
http://rawveterannews.com.au/wordpress/?p=162

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

“EVEN SCUM HAVE RIGHTS” – to segue that – in Australia, decent people don’t

CATEGORIES –
Defence
Politics
Propinquity
Human rights
Theft of life
Collusion
Deceit
Bastardry
I can neither confirm nor deny
It’s more than my job is worth
Now, you know what happens if you keep annoying us
Your story is distressing but it isn’t newsworthy
We don’t have D-notices
It’s not censorship – just the editor’s decision
The old boy’s network

Image – Scum have rights – this bloke doesn’t - according to defence, according to our governments, according to the timeserving, arse with ears, MP in his electorate – nor does he according to the likes of Mr. Wilkie – the latest. This bloke’s father is pleased to know that defence didn’t think his son was scum.

Author – A-NON-FARMER

Where to start?
How many vomit breaks will I need before I finish writing this article?

How about pinching a few lines from the news, then.
Can’t go wrong with a public statement from a bloke who knows the score -
SABRA LANE: The former Defence Department chief Paul Barratt says ADFA should expel the male cadets involved in this webcam sex scandal saying does Australia really want people like this in defence.
DIRECTOR, NEIL JAMES, Australia Defence Association: “Well, he's entitled to have his opinion and the Defence Association's view is that may very well be the result but even scum have rights and there will have to be some form of legal and administrative action taken before that.”

So, even scum have rights, eh?
Interesting concept.

Let’s see how it pans out -
Mr. James apparently refers to the seven young voyeurs of the defence academy.
I’d like to believe he wasn’t referring to the young lady whose pride, privacy and career they’d stolen.
Defence’s attitude -
Well, clearly they publicly agree that scum do have rights since, until our sickmaking press made the story world headlines, they intended, as usual, to punish the victim and ignore the gross actions of the perpetrators.

Think about this, good reader
A policy of ‘even scum have rights’ has the victim up on “unrelated disciplinary charges” while those who have caused defence and government this unprecedented nausea were going to get away with it without even six cuts from the headmaster.

Scum therefore have rights and non-scum have no rights at all.
Or so any reasonable person could readily assume.
That reasonable person, aware of the numerous cover-ups attempted by defence and other government agencies might be convinced that justice can only be achieved in this country by embarrassing the government of the day by featuring malfeasance and dishonesty as headline news. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malfeasance_in_office

The juicy headline versus the non-juicy, non-headline –
The media must inevitably reach the stage when they’ll cease publishing sexual misadventure in the ADF. It’ll have become so common as to be ho-hum, not worth reporting.
Maybe then, desperate for headlines, they might consider publishing national interest articles about defence killing their own people.

When parliamentarians lead by example -
That’s his pikkie above. He mustn’t be scum because he has no rights. He’s been dead since just before Xmas 2004.
There are just a few tiny details his father would like to sort out with the defence department and queensland health about why he died
His old man has been trying to have those questions answered since his son died.
He’s become convinced that the entire country is corrupted to the extent that death doesn’t matter here any more.

Do you read that people?
They’re hell-fire concerned to cover up that their officers and gentlemen are ‘pack-peeping toms’ (or as Neil James put it – scum) – they ignore the odd rape (and according to their affirmative action policy, that includes homosexual rape) – they gloss over the occasional bashing – they condone hazing and bastardisation as ‘character-building’ and don’t give a flying f—k when they kill one of their own.

Yet the media are equally keen to add more names to their “Who’s who of illicit bonking” files.
They’d move heaven and earth to get to the BOTTOM of any story about that (and likely keep and available pikkies for their private files).

But like defence (and our governments) they don’t give a f—k about my son’s death.
So how sick is that?
Wilkie has his 21 year old staffer, (believe it or not – Django) tell me that he doesn’t care.
The local pig doesn’t care.
Ministers don’t care.
Senators don’t care
The jokes they put in place allegedly to address complaints don’t care either.

Makes me think, it does, what to say next.

Paraphrase Mick Molloy maybe?
Who’ve you got to root to get a bit of justice around here?
Might be a bit deep for many of you how this article segues with that statement.
Persevere. You’ll finally work it out.

Image – Wilkie’s sycophant urges me to deal with the local politician.
Trouble is, I want justice. This would be a good start, justicewise. Him behind bars.


"While I do not intend to give a running commentary about each new accusation, what I will say is I was judged fit to graduate from Duntroon and went on to have a successful military career, reaching the rank of Lieutenant Colonel," he said
"There's nothing new in this. I described my Duntroon experience in a book I wrote in 2004 [Axis Of Deceit] and again just last month on ABC Radio's Conversations with Richard Fidler
"Importantly, during my military and subsequent intelligence careers, I was repeatedly security cleared and character checked to the highest levels in the country
"Further politically and commercially motivated attacks on my character will not be deserving of a reply.”

Amazing stuff, that admission of guilt.
In his time they dismantled your psyche and put you back together the way they wanted.
I wonder whom or what he really is?

Further reading -
- “but even scum have rights and there will have to be some form of legal and administrative action taken before that.”