In the article the writer questions the whole idea of governments making top-down decisions about the size of a country's population.

A question that often comes up when discussion population related matter is, "What should the population be?" or "What level of immigration/growth do you think is suitable?". I don't have an answer to that question, and I don't intend to provide one.

At issue: Is population size really a matter for the state?

In "What a Population Policy means to a People" we discussed the dangers of having a population policy. A government which imposes a population policy is doing more than simply deciding how many people exist within the geographic areas that it governs, its also making a determination on the composition of the population, which becomes unavoidable when any other population target than that which would have been arrived at naturally must involve. As we are subject to population policies which seek to increase the population, this means that the immigration program must unavoidably act to the detriment of the original populations, diminishing their representation and power in order to achieve an abstract target. The issue isn't whether a government decides to increase the population, decrease it, or keep it constant, the issue is the belief that the government has a right to decide this matter in the first place. The issue is the belief that population size is a matter for the state, and like interest rates, tax rates, tariffs and the number of taxi licences issues, is a matter for a bureaucracy to decide.

Also flawed is the idea that a government can set population targets democratically, if it puts forward its policies before the electorate and allows the population to vote for one which they prefer. This assumes that there are sufficient options put before the public, that the parties are given equal treatment in the media, and that the population vote according to their own interests and reason, instead of how the establishment pushes them with scaremongering and propaganda. This isn't what we observe, so if our democracy is anything less than perfect in offering a full spectrum of choices, each of which stand a change, we can't rely on a vote. But even if we were to vote, we still have a population policy in the first place. We still legitimise the right of the state to set a policy, which can very quickly and easily turn pathological. Even a sensible population policy doesn't solve this problem, as we are still ceding to the state the right to manipulate us, to displace and diminish us, or otherwise make judgements on the suitability of us as the population of the nation.

People vote democratically with their wombs

The alternative is to allow the population size to be set by the people by the most democratic means available, the individual reproductive choices that we all make. With cheap and readily available birth control, we more or less are capable of choosing or ourselves how many children we have. The birthrate of the nation is therefore nothing more than the accumulative decision making of all people manifesting itself. If people think the population is too low, they will choose to have more children, and the population will increase. If they think the population is large enough, and we don't need growth, they'll have fewer children and the population will stabilise or even reduce. Below replacement birth rates in the Western world are an indication that the people have voted with their ova and sperm, and don't perceive the need for a 'populate or perish' mindset. [This idea of below replacement is abused a lot by our masters. I suggest removing the 'The' which makes it sound like a widely established phenomenon, and just having 'Below replacement' which doesn't suggest such statistical dominance.]

So what should be the role of the state?

So where does the state fit in? It is the role of political and economic leaders not to force a population outcome that they desire or which suits their own objectives, but adapt that that chosen by the people. The low birthrate is only an issue because our political and economic ruling class cannot handle or adapt to this new reality. We have growth forced upon us because the dominant political class refuses to adapt, refuses to implement new solutions, refuses to reform and instead asks us to adapt and even to destroy ourselves, for their own security and posterity. In short, if a stable or falling population is a problem for the political and economic ruling class, then it is the ruling class which is deficient, which has the problem, not the people.

Immigration rate should be in line with birth rate

Immigration therefore has to fit in with this. As population policy is largely implemented through the immigration floodgates, and immigration is used to override the peoples' wishes, immigration policy therefore has to be synchronised with birthrate. Therefore, a sensible immigration policy would be in-line with the birthrate, and not seek to counteract it. Ideally, it the net population intake through immigration would be a function of the total birthrate. If the birthrate rises, then the immigration rate increases and conversely, if the birthrate lowers, then the immigration rate lowers. Immigration could be set at a fixed percentage of total births, where it represents at most, a small percentage. In Australia at the moment, immigration account for more than half of all additions, which is way to high. A better figure would be about 10%, allowing some people to enter Australia if they need to, but not being significant enough to override Australias chosen birthrate.

For those concerned about future population growth, such a stance should be acceptable, because birthrates being just below replacement in Australia (1.93 births per woman as of July 2016),[1] this should act as a limiting factor for future growth. Further measures can be taken to lower the birthrate by removing government incentives.

For Australia's pattern up to 2013 http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/[email protected]/Previousproducts/3301.0Main%20Features42013?opendocument&tabname=Summary&prodno=3301.0&issue=2013&num=&view=

A Patriot's Act is a legal novel by lawyer Kenneth Eades, exploring the impact of Bush's terror laws, based on case histories. In a legal investigation and then a trial, we see how US administrations redefined torture in the light of 'terrorism' and we learn what that could mean to an individual. This clear but sophisticated story dramatises what has been sacrificed for 'safety' and how much less safe it really makes us. This article by the author of the book, gives a history of how we got from there to here. Although the author writes about the United States, Australia has aped that country with its own terror laws.

After the release of the CIA Torture Report, we are reminded once again of the abuses that our own government committed in the so-called “War on Terror.”

Amnesty international has called the Guantanamo Bay Detention Camp the “gulag of our time.” Since President Obama’s order to close the camp within one year on January 23, 2009, it has remained open because the president decided to amass political capital to use for his domestic agenda, which included “Obamacare.” On January 7, 2011, Obama signed the 2011 Defense Authorization Bill, which placed restrictions on transferring prisoners to the United States. As of May 2014, there were 149 detainees being held, at a cost to the government of roughly $1.9 million per detainee. Some of them have been held, without trial and without charge, since 2003. 46 of them have been declared by the government to be too dangerous to release, but they cannot be tried for any crime because there is insufficient evidence to try them. Approximately half of the detainees held today have been cleared for release, but may never regain their freedom. Many of their native countries have refused to repatriate them, and, because of the new legislation, they cannot be transferred to prisons in the United States.

Courts have upheld detentions at Guantanamo under the Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) passed by Congress three days after the September 11th attacks. The reasoning behind this is to keep prisoners from returning to the battlefield until the conflict is over. But the current conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan show no sign of being over, especially with the rise in power of ISIS, which is a direct result of U.S. intervention and destruction of infrastructure.

When the United States military arrested the detainees and threw them into Guantanamo Bay Detention Camp indefinitely, they denied them the right to counsel guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment. They also denied them the right to a speedy trial, to confront the witnesses against them, to a trial by jury, and the right to be informed of what they were was charged with. They denied them the his right to trial by jury, guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment, his right to due process of the law by holding them indefinitely with no charge, and his coerced confession violated his privilege against self-incrimination.

Finally, and most importantly, by beating them, torturing them and treating them as less than human, depriving them of sensory input, overloading their senses, force feeding and torturing them, the Government denied them the Eighth Amendment guarantee to be free from cruel and unusual punishment. Not only were detainees denied the constitutionally guaranteed rights that any person imprisoned in the United States would be entitled to, no matter the heinous crime they may be accused of, they were also denied the rights that any enemy soldier captured fighting against the United States would get pursuant to the Geneva Conventions of 1949. Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions prohibits detention practices that are “cruel, degrading, or humiliating.”

The Government’s position that the Constitution had no effect at Guantanamo Bay has caused enormous separation-of-powers concerns in that the president was not allowed to simply “turn the Constitution off” simply because Guantanamo, which had been under U.S. possession and control for over 100 years, was located in a foreign country.
After September 11, 2001, torture was official U.S. policy under George Bush – authorized at the highest levels of government. Evidence of its continued and systematic practice continues to surface to this day.

On September 17, 2001, George Bush signed a secret finding empowering the CIA to capture, kill, or interrogate al-Qaeda Leaders.” It also authorized establishing a secret global network of facilities to detain and interrogate them without guidelines on proper treatment. Around the same time, Bush approved a secret “high-value target list” of about two dozen names. He also gave CIA free reign to capture, kill and interrogate terrorists not on the list.

On November 13, 2001, the White House issued a Military Order regarding the “Detention, Treatment, and Trial of Certain Non-Citizens in the War on Terror.” It determined that “an extraordinary emergency exists for national defense purposes that this emergency constitutes an urgent and compelling government interest and that issuance of this order is necessary to meet the emergency.” It defined targeted individuals as al Qaeda and others for aiding or abetting acts of international terrorism or harboring them. These individuals were to be denied access to U.S. or other courts and instead tried by military commission with the power to convict by the concurrence of two-thirds of its members.

On December 28, 2001, Deputy Assistant Attorney Generals Patrick Philbin and John Yoo, sent a Memorandum to General Counsel, Department of Defense, and William Haynes II entitled: “Possible Habeas Jurisdiction over Aliens Held in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.” It said that federal courts have no jurisdiction over and cannot review Guantanamo detainee mistreatment or mistaken arrest cases. It further stated that international laws don’t apply in the “War on Terror.” This laid the groundwork for abuses in all U.S. military prisons.

On January 18, 2002, Bush issued a “finding” stating that prisoners suspected of being al Qaeda or Taliban members are “enemy combatants” and unprotected by the Third Geneva Convention. They were to be denied all rights and treated “to the extent….consistent with military necessity.” Torture was thus authorized. The 2006 Military Commissions Act (also known as the “torture authorization act”) later created the Geneva-superseded category of “unlawful enemy combatant” to deny them any chance for judicial fairness.

On January 19, 2002 Donald Rumsfeld sent a memo to the Joint Chiefs of Staff entitled: “Status of Taliban and al Qaeda.” It stated that these detainees “are not entitled to prisoner of war status for purposes of the Geneva Conventions of 1949.” It gave commanders enormous latitude to treat prisoners “to the extent appropriate with military necessity” as they saw fit.

On January 25, 2002, Alberto Gonzales issued a memo to George Bush, which called the Geneva Conventions “quaint” and “obsolete” and said the administration could ignore them in interrogating prisoners. He also outlined plans to try prisoners in military commissions and to deny them all protections under international law, including due process, habeas corpus rights, and the right to appeal. In December 2002, Donald Rumsfeld concurred by approving a menu of interrogation practices allowing anything short of what would cause organ failure.

On February 7, 2002, the White House issued an Order “outlining treatment of al-Qaeda and Taliban detainees.” It stated that “none of the provisions of the Geneva Conventions apply to our conflict with al-Qaida or the Taliban in Afghanistan “or elsewhere throughout the world.”

A plethora of similar memos followed covering much the same ground, allowing all measures that had been banned under international and U.S. law, including the 1994 Torture Statute and the Torture Act of 2000, and the 1996 War Crimes Act, which imposes a penalty of up to life in prison or death for persons convicted of committing war crimes within or outside the US. Torture is a high war crime, the highest after genocide.

Two other memos were written by John Yoo, Alberto Gonzales, Jay Bybee (now a federal court of appeals justice in the Ninth Circuit) and David Addington, Dick Cheney’s former legal counsel. One was for the CIA on August 2, 2002. It argued that interrogators should be free to use harsh measures amounting to torture. It said federal laws prohibiting these practices don’t apply when dealing with al-Qaeda because of the presidential authorization to use force during wartime. It also denied that U.S. or international law applies in overseas interrogations. It essentially “legalized” anything in the “War on Terror” and authorized lawlessness and supreme presidential power.

On March 14, 2003, the group issued another memo entitled, “Military Interrogation of Alien Unlawful Combatants Held Outside the United States.” This became known as “the Torture Memo” because it swept away all legal restraints and authorized military interrogators to use extreme measures amounting to torture. It also gave the President as Commander-in-Chief “the fullest range of power….to protect the nation.” It stated he “enjoys complete discretion in the exercise of his authority in conducting operations against hostile forces.” In 2004, the head of the Office of Legal Counsel, Jack Goldsmith, rescinded the Memorandum, saying it showed an “unusual lack of care and sobriety in legal analysis and seemed more an exercise of sheer power than reasoned analysis.”

Nevertheless, other administration documents authorized continued use of practices generally reflecting Yoo’s and Bybee’s views. They authorized the infliction of “intense pain or suffering” short of what would cause “serious physical injury so severe that death, organ failure, (loss of significant body functions), or permanent damage” may result. The President’s July 20, 2006 Executive Order was one such document, entitled “Interpretation of the Geneva Conventions Common Article 3 as Applied to a Program of Detention and Interrogation Operated by the Central Intelligence Agency.” It pertained to “a member or part of or supporting al Qaeda, the Taliban, or associated organizations who may have information that could assist in detecting, mitigating, or preventing terrorist attacks….within the United States or against its Armed Forces or other personnel, citizens, or facilities, or against allies or other countries cooperating in the war on terror….”

It authorized the Director of CIA to determine appropriate interrogation practices. Based on what is now known, they included sleep deprivation, waterboarding or simulated drowning, stress positions (including painfully extreme ones), prolonged isolation, sensory deprivation and/or overload, beatings, electric shocks, induced hypothermia, and other measures that can cause irreversible physical and psychological harm, including psychoses.

In a secret 2007 report, the International Committee of the Red Cross concluded that CIA interrogators had tortured high-level al Qaeda prisoners. Abu Zubaydah was one, a reputed close associate of Osama bin Laden and a Guantanamo detainee. He was confined in a box “so small he had to double up his limbs in the fetal position” and stay that way. He and others were also “slammed against the walls,” waterboarded to simulate drowning, and given other harsh and abusive treatment.
The report also said Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the alleged chief 9/11 planner, was kept naked for over a month – “alternately in suffocating heat and in a painfully cold room.” Most excruciating was a practice of shackling prisoners to the ceiling and forcing them to stand for as long as eight hours. Other techniques included prolonged sleep deprivation, “bright lights and eardrum-shattering sounds 24 hours a day.”

ICRC’s Bernard Barrett declined to comment but confirmed that Red Cross personnel regularly visit Guantanamo detainees, including high-level ones. They also “have an ongoing confidential dialogue with members of the US intelligence community, and we would share any observations or recommendations with them.”
The executive continued to deny all basic rights to detainees, including the constitutional guarantee of habeas corpus, and the Congress went along with it, in passing a series of Acts of Congress attempting to limit this constitutional guarantee. However, in 2004, the United States Supreme Court held, in Rasul v. Bush, that the habeas corpus jurisdiction of United States federal courts extended to Guantanamo Bay. In 2004, the Court also held, in Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, that due process mandated that an alleged enemy combatant held on U.S. soil be entitled to a due process challenge of his enemy combatant status.

In June 2006 the Supreme Court, in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld threw out section 1005a of the Detainee Treatment Act denying the right of an alien detainee to habeas corpus, and ruled that the structure and procedures of the military commissions established to try detainees violated both the Uniform Code of Military Justice and Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions had been violated. Congress passed and Bush signed into law the Military Commissions Act in October 2006, overriding the Supreme Court’s decision.

In 2008, the Supreme Court threw out the Act’s prohibition of the federal courts’ jurisdiction to hear detainees’ habeas corpus petitions as an unconstitutional suspension of habeas corpus in Boumedine v. Bush.

District Court Judge Aiken threw out two sections of the Patriot Act that modified the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act in Mayfield v. United States, but her decision was rendered moot on appeal when the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal decided that Mayfield could not pursue his declaratory relief claim after he had settled with the government.

The “War on Terror” is still on, and is still being used as an excuse to broaden or extend the broad brush of governmental power. The USA Patriot Act was designed to be temporary, but has been reauthorized in 2005 and 2006. On February 27, 2010, President Obama signed into law legislation reauthorizing three controversial sections of the Act relating to roving wiretaps, lone wolf surveillance and seizure of property and records. On May 26, 2011, he signed into law the Patriot Sunsets Extension Act to extend key provisions of the Act. On June 1, 2015, the Patriot Act expired, but the next day, Obama signed into law the USA Freedom Act, which restored, in modified form, the most controversial provisions of The Patriot Act.

James Madison said, “The means of defense against foreign danger have been always the instruments of tyranny at home. Among the Romans it was a standing maxim to excite a war, whenever a revolt was apprehended. Throughout all Europe, the armies kept up under the pretext of defending, have enslaved the people.”
When he said this, he knew that he and Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, and all the other statesmen who formed this country made the government to answer to the people, not the other way around. When they set up three branches of government with checks and balances, they did this so that no one branch would get any more powerful than the other. What we are seeing now is an abuse of power by an over-zealous president, and that abuse of power must be stopped. It is making the United States of America, once a beacon for liberty and freedom, and an example for every other democracy to follow, into an aggressive country that does not respect its own laws and does not play by its own principles. This is unacceptable, and we, as citizens of this country, need to send a clear message to your government with this verdict that the United States is a good and humane nation, who does not torture prisoners of war. We are a nation of laws, a nation who respects our fellow humans and the rights of our own citizens, as well as the rights of citizens of other countries.

Kenneth Eade is an attorney and the best-selling author of A Patriot’s Act, the fictional story of a naturalized U.S. citizen, captured in Iraq and held indefinitely at Guantanamo.

Australia is in a bad place. Our unemployment rate and our cost of living are rising. Youth unemployment is over 20%, the highest since we began recording such statistics. Candobetter.net Editor: Australian law makes general strikes impossible. This is probably the next best thing. (CFMEU) Take a sign about what bugs you.

Tony Abbott is wilfully destroying our jobs, our families and our communities through his policies on 457s and his free trade deals. He is letting the big end of town get away with dodging taxes and he’s destroying our living standards by increasing the pension age, cutting superannuation, slashing Medicare, and cutting wages, conditions and our rights at work.

But on the 4^th of March we'll be raising our voices as one. Throughout the country we’ll be fighting for our rights as part of a National Day of Action. And regardless of the Murdoch media, we will be heard.

Can you join us on the 4th of March and stand up against Tony Abbott's attacks?

We want everyone who goes to take a picture of themselves at their rally and tag it #SolidaritySelfie. It doesn’t matter if it’s on Twitter or on Facebook, we want to see social media light up with thousands of pictures of Australians rallying against attacks on our rights and conditions. And if you can’t attend a rally we want you to take a photo of yourself wherever you are, tag it #SolidaritySelfie and show that you’re with us.

#333333">There are events being held in 14 different locations around Australia. Even Tennant Creek in the Northern Territory is holding a rally. This National Day of Action could be the biggest show of strength against Abbott's agenda, but we need your help.

#333333">Find out where the locations of the rallies around Australia are and come along.

#333333">Together, we can win this fight and get Australia back on track.

#333333">In unity

#333333">Michael O'Connor
CFMEU National Secretary

#333333">P.S. Have you seen the Victoria Trades Hall Council commercial they're showing on TV yet? Watch it here or below.

Our rights at work are again under attack from Abbott's Coalition Government and big business.

We aren't going to stand by while they destroy our living standards.

The time to stand up and fight back is now.

Regardless of the Murdoch media, this time we will be heard. We want everyone who goes to take a picture of themselves at their rally and tag it #SolidaritySelfie.

Here are the locations and times that rallies will be held around the country - we'll be updating them as more are confirmed.

Adelaide - 12:00pm - Light Square, Currie Street, Adelaide
Brisbane - 12:00pm - Parliament House, George Street, Brisbane
Canberra - 12:15pm - New Parliament House, Parliament Drive, Canberra
Darwin - 4:30pm - Bennett Park, Darwin
Gold Coast - 1:00pm - Pratten Park, Old Burleigh Road, Broadbeach
Hobart - 12:30pm - Franklin Square, Hobart
Launceston - 8:00am - Prince's Square, Launceston
Mackay - 4:30pm - 2/21 Milton Street, Mackay
Melbourne - 10:00am - Victorian Trades Hall, Cnr Victoria & Lygon Streets, Carlton
Newcastle - 10:00am - Newcastle Town Hall
Perth - 12:30pm - Parliament House, Harvest Terrace, West Perth
Sydney - 12:30pm - Parliament House, Macquarie Street, Sydney
Tennant Creek - 4:30pm - Peko Park, Tennant Creek
Townsville - 4:30pm - 340 Ross River Road, Cranbrook

Block Wednesday 4 March in your diary and start encouraging your friends, family and co-workers to join us. Because the bigger the crowd, the stronger the message we send.

We can’t stand by while the Abbott Government destroys our living standards by:

• cutting wages, conditions and our rights at work,        
• slashing Medicare and hiking up the cost to see a doctor,
• introducing $100,000 university degrees,
• cutting the ABC and our public services,
• cutting the pension and superannuation,
• implementing harsh changes to unemployment benefits, and
• cutting community services that support our most vulnerable.

Times and location will be confirmed in coming days, but you can register your interest in attending and we will send you updates. 

Melissa Parke, ALP Member for Fremantle, West Australia, was the only MP to dissent against the passing of the new so-called anti-terrorism laws in Australia, which make huge changes to our privacy and civil rights. Ms Parke (10:45am) — I wish to start my comments on this Bill by making reference to a case that came before the House of Lords in relation to the detention of foreign terrorist suspects indefinitely without trial under the UK's Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act, where Lord Hoffman, in a dissenting judgement, said:

"This is a nation which has been tested in adversity, which has survived physical destruction and catastrophic loss of life. I do not underestimate the ability of fanatical groups of terrorists to kill and destroy, but they do not threaten the life of the nation. Whether we would survive Hitler hung in the balance, but there is no doubt that we shall survive Al-Qaeda. The Spanish people have not said that what happened in Madrid, hideous crime as it was, threatened the life of their nation. Their legendary pride would not allow it. Terrorist violence, serious as it is, does not threaten our institutions of government or our existence as a civil community.

Published on Wednesday, 01 October 2014 10:44

... The real threat to the life of the nation, in the sense of a people living in accordance with its traditional laws and political values, comes not from terrorism but from laws such as these. That is the true measure of what terrorism may achieve. It is for Parliament to decide whether to give the terrorists such a victory."

Tony Abbott made a speech to the IPA in 2012 in which he referred to the Coalition as the "freedom party". However, as Prime Minister Mr Abbott now believes that "the delicate balance between freedom and security may have to shift" and that "there may be more restrictions on some so that there can be more protection for others."

I do not support a number of key elements in this Bill, and I am aware there are further even more controversial Bills coming before the parliament in the near future.

I question the premise of the government's general approach to this area of policy, which is essentially that freedoms must be constrained in response to terrorism; and that the introduction of greater obscurity and impunity in the exercise of government agency powers that contravene individual freedoms will both produce, and are justified in the name of, greater security.

So far the debate on this issue has occurred within a frame that posits a direct relationship between, on the one hand, safety and civility in our everyday lives and, on the other, the powers that impinge upon and make incursions into individual freedom.

If we want to continue our lives free from terrorism and orchestrated violence — so the argument goes — we have to accept shifting the balance between freedom and constraint away from the observance of basic rights and towards greater surveillance, more interference, deeper silence.

Let me say that no one should be fooled into believing it is as simple as that.

The truth is that the remarkable peace, harmony, and security we enjoy in Australia is in fact produced and sustained by our collective observance of freedoms and human rights, rather than existing in spite of such values and conditions. It is wrong to say that we have been complacent about security on two counts. First, because we have strong, well-resourced, and competent security agencies, and second because our commitment to a way of life that puts faith in freedom, respect and tolerance, that puts faith in democracy and the rule of law, is itself productive of peace and shared security.

These are the reasons we must be so careful when we legislate to constrain those freedoms — because contrary to the reductive argument that says we're making a straight trade of less freedom for more safety, the reality is likely to be, and indeed has proved to be many times in the past, that constraining our fundamental liberties achieves nothing more than making us less free and in fact does ourselves harm through licensing the abuse of powers.

In the wake of the past few weeks' delivery by government, assisted by many media outlets, of "existential threat" and "panic/don't panic" messages, many people in the Australian community feel understandably confused and anxious. Members of Australia's Muslim communities may fear that the PM's 'restrictions on some' message applies particularly to them. If that is the case, then surely it is an approach that can only foster fear, mistrust and division, the very opposite of what is needed in terms of investing in community harmony, safety and human security in its broadest sense.

[Speaker], I recognise the process by which this Bill has come forward – and of course I understand that it contains a number of amendments to the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation Act that represent unobjectionable adjustments put forward off the back of the Report of the Inquiry into Potential Reforms of Australia's National Security Legislation.

I am also grateful for the recent consideration of the draft Bill provided by the Joint Standing Committee on Intelligence and Security (JCSIS), and I believe the amendments the Committee has recommended represent improvements – but not, in my view, sufficient improvements.

One critical point to grasp is the fact that the proposed laws are not a response to recent events involving the emergence of Islamic State, and the existence of people with criminal intentions based on their adherence to an extreme and deranged world-view.

It was a surprise therefore to see the editorial in The Australian on Monday where, under the heading 'Homegrown terror threat needs new tools to fight it', it rushed to conclude, "The new counter-terrorism laws are not an attack on free speech; they are a protection against an evolving threat" before acknowledging that "Any new counter-terrorism laws should be scrutinised by the parliament" and that "There is also a role for the media and other non-government groups, to offer analysis of proposed laws alongside laws currently operating".

That analysis and commentary certainly should be occurring, but it's hard not to have the sense that there is too much fierce agreement in this space at the moment as a result of people believing that we currently face some completely new and unprecedented terror threat.

The reality is — as we have seen from very well publicised operations recently — that law enforcement agencies have clearly been able to operate effectively on the basis of existing laws and there has not been convincing evidence of inadequacies in the existing legal framework that warrant the broad extensions of powers we see here. I am particularly concerned that this Bill entrenches and amplifies the lack of protection for whistleblowers regarding intelligence information and penalise with up to 10 years jail the legitimate actions of journalists and others doing their jobs in holding the government to account in the public interest.

There have been numerous examples of governments, defence, intelligence and law enforcement agencies here in Australia and elsewhere abusing their powers that have only come to light via Wikileaks, Edward Snowden and other whistleblowers regarding for instance the improper mass surveillance of civilians, the misuse of our aid program, and spying on foreign governments, including for the commercial benefit of corporations.

There are concerns that the legislation does not make any distinction between someone acting to sabotage a security intelligence operation and potentially putting security officers' lives at risk, which should rightly attract significant penalties, and persons disclosing information in the public interest where no such danger is present, but which may for instance be politically embarrassing.

It is no comfort from the Explanatory Memorandum that there will be a prosecutorial discretion to consider the public interest when deciding whether to prosecute a person — this kind of consideration should attract a specific exemption in the legislation — otherwise there is a very real danger that the provisions will produce a chilling effect on the willingness of the media to report legitimate matters of public interest.

We are assured that the significant impunity for breaking the law that is granted to security officials engaged in SIOs only applies when the officers are carrying out their duties as authorised and is not a green light for corruption or abuse of power. It is unsatisfactory in my view that the external oversight of special intelligence operations is limited to the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security, rather than the more extensive oversight that applies to the AFP's controlled operations. The Member for Denison has highlighted the deficiencies in Australia's oversight of intelligence services relative to other countries such as the UK.

On the question of press freedom and media scrutiny, the editorial in The West Australian yesterday took issue with the new specific provisions, arguing that "they fail to strike a balance that does not unduly limit the ability of journalists to report on matters of national security. Any controls of this sort must be carefully considered and minimised. In this instance, there is a concern that the impetus to act on the terrorist threat may have led to the proposed laws being rushed and not considered as fully as they might have been."

And I would contrast the curious yet telling gulf between the nicely timed, neatly packaged and government facilitated media access to the recent AFP anti-terror operations and the utter silence, stonewalling and denial of access to operations that involve asylum seekers.

On this I agree with Mark Day, who wrote in Monday's Australian that,

"Last week we saw much commentary about how state and federal police provided on-the-spot video and still pictures of their raids against a terror group believed to be planning a random beheading in Australia.

How fortunate it was for the government that the raids came precisely as the parliament was considering new anti-terror powers — tougher laws to protect our freedoms by removing them. Raids of this nature involving 800 coppers for one arrest are obviously newsworthy. Police PRs were beside themselves with delight. You want pictures? How many? They fed the narrative of a government alert and anything but insouciant.

Now make the obvious comparison. For more than a year the government has refused to give any detail about any "on sea" activity related to people smuggling or asylum-seekers. This is because secrecy suits it. Secrecy is the government's starting point."

I understand that one of the legitimate bases for this Bill is the necessary adjustment to cover the kinds of technological change that have occurred over the last twenty years and I note the considered comments of the Shadow Attorney-General in this regard. I nevertheless have concerns about the scope of the provisions, especially in relation to computers and computer networks, including access to third-party hardware or communications. These provisions are the equivalent of a physical search warrant for a house that allows you to search an arbitrary number of other houses.

The JSCIS Report notes that public submissions were made by the Gilbert + Tobin Centre of Public Law calling for two categories of improvement in this area: the first being a 'minimal intrusion' test requiring other options for acquiring the required intelligence to have been used before ASIO has recourse to a computer network or third-party asset or communication; and the second being a further refinement in terms of scope so that a warrant would only access those parts of a target computer that are reasonably necessary for the acquisition of the relevant intelligence.

Unfortunately neither of these sensible proposals were taken up as recommendations. Instead the broad requirement that access must be 'reasonable in all the circumstances' was considered sufficient.

In my view, this is one of the clear areas where we may be licensing the potentially improper infringement of privacy and the possible misuse of personal information and communications without due consideration to the dangers involved, and without due care and restriction when it comes to those powers.

For an example of how this government regards the so-called balance between security and freedom, one can look to the proposed abolition of the Independent National Security Legislation Monitor. The Prime Minister announced the abolition of this critical office and function earlier this year as part of its 'war against red-tape'. Other casualties of this bizarre war of self-harm include environmental protections, financial services safeguards, and the framework to address climate change and encourage the development of renewable energy. In this way, the so-called war on red tape is unpicking the vital threads of our social fabric, our social compact.

With this Bill, the essential oversight of security legislation and powers is being undermined when it should be strengthened.

As others have noted, the Attorney-General was an active member of the Joint Standing Committee on Intelligence and Security when the Committee issued a report with respect to the very legislation we debate here, calling for the assessment of the draft bill by the Independent National Security Legislation Monitor. Of course, thanks to the government, that position has been vacant since April, and was to be scrapped.

I am glad that as a result of the outcry on this aspect of security oversight in particular, the government has reversed its position – though unfortunately not in time for this Bill to have been appropriately scrutinised.

I believe that at the very least this legislation should incorporate sunset clauses so that the provisions can be subject to review and discontinuance if not found to be necessary.

[Speaker], I want to conclude by returning to the point I made at the beginning about what is really at issue when we expand the capacity and power of state agencies to infringe upon the privacy and freedom of citizens, and at the same time constrain the ability of citizens to examine and discuss the use of those powers.

There is a lot of talk about the danger of complacency when it comes to security threats, including terrorism. I don't see evidence of that complacency, and none has been put forward. Australia is a remarkably secure and peaceful nation. Our law enforcement, intelligence, and defence agencies and personnel do excellent work on our behalf.

If there is any complacency, it is in relation to the very real dangers that lie in failing to recognise, value and speak up for our fundamental rights, values and freedoms. We have seen what happens when state agencies exercise improper power without effective safeguards; without effective oversight and accountability mechanisms.

We'd do well to reflect upon this now as we consider changes in this Bill and in others that seek to re-set our laws and values in ways that may not only be ill-designed to protect us from the dangers and horrors we seem inclined to over-state, but might in fact wear and fray the fabric of our freedom, trust, and faith in government.

The plain truth:

- 10,000 years ago humans and our livestock occupied just 0.01% of all the land-air vertebrate biomass on earth.
- Now humans and our livestock occupy 97% of all land-air vertebrate biomass.
- Humans and our livestock now consume over 40% of earth’s annual green land biomass production.
- 1 million people born every 4½ days. People live longer.

What does this mean?
- 50% of All Vertebrate Species will be gone by 2040.

There is no embed function for the following film, but it is very worth looking at:

http://www.cultureunplugged.com/documentary/watch-online/play/7350/Call-of-Life--Facing-the-Mass-Extinctiony

What have we done?

- 90% of Big Ocean Fish gone since 1950.
- 50% of Great Barrier Reef gone since 1985.
- 50% of Fresh Water Fish gone since 1987.
- 30% of Marine Birds gone since 1995.
- 28% of Land Animals gone since 1970.
- 28% of All Marine Animals gone since 1970.
- 50% of Human Sperm Counts gone since 1950.
- 90% of Lions gone since 1993.
- 90% of Monarch Butterflies gone since 1995.
- 93 Elephants killed every single day.
- 2-3 Rhinos killed every single day.
- Bees die from malnutrition lacking bio-diverse pollen sources.
- Extinctions are 1000 times faster than normal.

What’s going to happen to us?

- Ocean acidification doubles by 2050.
- Ocean acidification triples by 2100.
- We are on track in just 13 years to lock in a near term 6°C earth temp rise.
- Mass Extinction will become unstoppable and irreversible in 40 years.
- Permian mass extinction of 95% of life took 60,000 years 250 million years ago.
- Dinosaurs mass extinction took 33,000 years after asteroid impact.
- Anthropogenic mass extinction will take 300 years max.
- This mass extinction is 100x faster than anything before us.
- Antarctic meltdown now irreversible and unstoppable.
- Arctic methane burst is irreversible and unstoppable within current system.
- It takes 10 times as much rated “green” energy to displace 1 unit of fossil energy.
- Efficiency and conservation only causes more growth within our current system.
World Bank says we have 5-10 years before we all fight for food and water.

What we are doing right now!

- We combine bacteria DNA with plant DNA and eat it.
- We are eating stuff that never, ever existed on earth before.
- We put man-made, computer designed, synthetic DNA into our food.
- We put nano metals and nano particles into our food.
- We put poisonous pesticides and herbicides directly into food cells.
- There are thousands of different chemicals in our foods.
- We are turning into genetic mutants because of our food.
- We are wiping out all life on earth because of our food.
- After mass extinction, genetically modified trees may be all we leave behind.

WHY THERE IS NO GREEN ENERGY

Our “green” energy hi-tech future requires:

- conflict minerals,
- rare earth elements,
- heavy metals,
- nano metals and graphite.

Search for “rare earth mining in China” on YouTube and see what special hell your solar panels and wind turbines produce in Mongolia. China can do this because they have undercut all the world’s production of Rare Earth Elements (REEs) with low wages, low currency and no environmental enforcement. They can do this because they ignore the radioactive thorium that comes with mining high-value, heavy rare earth elements. Rare earth elements can’t profitably be mined outside of China without using radioactive thorium, the mining by-product found with heavy rare earth elements. We can’t afford to mine REEs while treating thorium as radioactive waste instead of as a profitable energy source. Burning thorium will pay for heavy REEs and provide the low-carbon base power “green” energy requires.

Graphite is used in all of our so-called “green” powered batteries and is mined in China emitting deadly fine air particles resulting in a lethal smog that washes down from the skies in an ash laden rain that covers crops and water. China recently shut down several graphite mines because of the pervasive smog. Graphene, a nano-material produced for batteries, is water soluble and can cut through human/animal cells. Both graphite dust and graphene are deadly to humans because of their small size. You don’t want to breathe this stuff.

"The Catch22 of Energy Storage" (Energy Collective article)

Solar cell manufacturing produces 3 green house gases that are over 10,000 times worse than C02. They require all kinds of deadly liquid acids to manufacture. Solar panels lose efficiency at the rate of 1% per year lasting 20-25 years. The expensive inverters they require have to be replaced every 5 to 10 years up to 4 times over the life of the panel. The new thin cell panels use nano materials and are even more toxic with shorter lifespans. It doesn’t matter how “clean” the latest experimental solar panels are because existing manufacturing plants will stay open to recoup major investments. Manufacturing just five wind turbines produces 1 ton of radioactive residue and 75 tons of toxic, acidic water used to leach out the required neodymium. Wind turbines only work at 25% of their rated capacity 90% of the time. Over 2 million children died in the Congo for the conflict minerals green energy needs. Thousands of people die in Chinese mines every year for the minerals green energy needs. Prof. Jian Shuisheng of the Jiatong-University estimates the production of just 6 solar panels requires one ton of coal. Since green power is intermittent, it would take at least 10 times the rated amount of “green” energy to displace just one equivalent unit of 24/7 fossil energy because your so-called 100 Watt solar panel delivers zero Watts at night and batteries are heavy toxic $energy hogs. One company in the U.S. cut down 5 acres of trees to build a solar farm to power a plant for the production of plastic bags. Green power will not be enough. Part-time energy and billions of batteries adds up to death to all life on earth just from destructive ecological inertia.

Ozzie Zehner explains “Green Illusions” in a series called, "Talks at Google":

Tim Garrett explains why in a three-part lecture:

- one dollar equals 10 milliwatts
- why we can’t decouple growth from emissions.
- why efficiency & conservation leads to more energy growth.

Did you know that the new $2 billion Ivanpah solar plant in the Mojave desert is a death ray that ignites birds in mid flight? When their bodies fall to the ground, they leave smoky trails in the sky called streamers. These birds are attracted to the bugs who are attracted to the shiny, pretty lights, just like us. It is estimated as many as 30,000 birds per year will die this way during huge migrations at just this one green power plant. Bigger solar plants of the same type are in the works including one near Joshua Tree, next to a wildlife sanctuary. During Ivanpah’s construction, up to 3,000 endangered desert tortoises suffered a temporary loss of legal protection and were allowed to be killed by heavy diesel equipment and materials. Thousands of slave workers die in China’s mines every single year to help produce the exotic minerals used in its construction. This is referred to as the “Green Economy”. If we changed the whole planet to green power, we would kill the earth we call home.

Civilization is slowly collapsing while the earth is quickly dying. My credentials? I cut grass in a trailer park in Canada.

I don’t have kids but I am disturbed about the Heart Foundation’s Active Healthy Kids very poor report card for Australian children last week. It said that Australian children are largely unfit because of a lack of exercise and that this deterioration has happened in the last couple of decades. Natasha Schranz author of the Foundation's inaugural report has graded Australian children at a disgraceful D minus. Contributing to this terrble score was a D for "active transport", meaning not nearly enough walking or bicycle riding to and from school.

Prisoners of chair and screen

81 % of Australian children do not get the required 60 minutes of physical exercise per day. 26% are not involved in organised sport, 71% are too sedentary, Discussion in the media focused on the seduction of screens such as tablets, computers television and phones. As an adult , I know how screen activities can sap the time in which one could be outside in the sunshine exercising, however there is more to this than the wonders and availability of very attractive technology.

Deprived of open space and adventure

A generation ago and before that, there was a lot more open space which enticed children outdoors when they were not in school. Incidental activity, exploring interesting places in nature or in the local neighbourhood is not just beneficial but essential to children in developing their imaginations, experiencing and dealing with unpredictable situations without rules and the directions and supervision of an adult. This used to be easy to access in the street, in vacant land, parks and the private backyard and friends backyards. There was plenty of space to explore in the suburbs.

There is a huge difference between sitting on the couch in front of a screen from 4- 6.30pm and actively playing in the local environment. It is not necessary to have a strenuous game of basketball for the body and mind to register a level of exercise and a 3 dimensional experience . Furthermore sitting is supposed be the most unhealthy thing to do for hours on end and it makes you fat! For that reason I will not make this a very long article.

Victims of blinkered planners and growth lobby

The push to make our cities more crowded by increasing the population very fast, densifying suburbs and removing private space including backyards is not going to help this terrible situation with the health of Australia’s children. It has to make it worse. Our politicians show no care at all for the welfare of Australia’s citizens. I understand that many of Melbourne’s’ private schools have built all over their playing fields and now have to bus their students to public areas to play sport. I suppose the children just sit during lunch hour because with no sports areas they could not spontaneously start a ball game.

Unnatural

It’s unnatural, anyway for children to sit all day at desks listening to teachers and severing all their avenues of expressing themselves physically adds insult to injury.

A child living in an apartment, will naturally turn to his/her tablet or phone for entertainment if the only outside alternative is a concrete balcony. A trompe l'eouil on the back wall of the 2x3 metre couryard, however far it backons cannot acccommodate the need of a child to run. We have not made Australia better over the past 50 years. The "age of entitlement is over" and for what? What really have we gained as a society?

Massive decline in children's fitness

Two generations ago, we had a nation very well represented in international sport partly because, I believe most children had a chance at participating even if it was just making a “100 in the backyard at Mum’s” or hitting a tennis ball on a broken -down asphalt court, but now it seems we have a generation of unfit young people unlikely to live as long as their parents. The social engineers and economists are always complaining about the aging population but if people start dying younger, the achievement of longer life expectancy will be just a nostalgic memory.

The problem is that once you entrust growth of the population and future direction to powerful individuals, whether in the government or in business, the ordinary people lose their right and ability to secure their own future. Having a system whereby a nation is subject to arbitrary population policy is a crime against that nation of people. Period. Policy which may influence birth rates through incentives or disincentives is different, as population in those cases is still determined by people’s individual reproductive choices. The future of a population of people is no longer in the hands of the people who share its future, but in those who may only see the people as a resource, or worse still, only see the state as a resource and people as merely human assets. People then become interchangeable and replaceable. A subtle, but very significant shift happens here. The identity of the people, the nation itself, the nation of people no longer exists in a political sense. The country has changed from being a tool of a people to organise themselves and to serve them, to a resource controlled by a few, whose make up is arbitrary and can be changed at will. All that matters now is numbers, and some will argue the population should be higher, others lower, but this is now all done from the perspective of the needs of the economy and the needs of the system. The people essentially hand themselves over and are now owned by state and government interests. Whether the state is a democracy or not, whether it has been popularly voted it or not doesn't matter. No individual should have the right to decide the fate of a people.

This has been happening for some time in the West and is so obvious, that no one sees it any more. But if, for example, you took control of Nepal and convinced them to have a population policy, and that the primary political endeavour would be to expand "Nepal" economically and structurally, then you would have essentially changed the nation to one which exists for its own sake because it is a nation of people, to one which is working for defined objectives (Growth, etc.). The people are now a means to an ends, rather than the ends in themselves. Now having established that, you can implement any legal population policy you like, even if it is one which results in rapid growth and in the original population becoming a minority or even being assimilated into the population you constructed and defined. You have also severely undermined the moral authority of the people to oppose you. You can even go further, and accuse those who object of undermining the country’s future.

This is an act of hostility against the nation, but by getting people to accept the premise that "Nepal" can and should be run as an enterprise, rather than be acknowledged as a nation of people, they've tacitly accepted this fate. If my goal was to engineer, modify the nation, or even completely change it demographically, I have targeted them, their way of life and identity for destruction. If one’s vision of 'progress' however involves destruction, destruction of suburbs, of parks, of heritage buildings and open spaces which people enjoy, why wouldn't it extend to include people? But there is a significant difference. One can own a building, and while it is a shame to allow people to destroy a building of beauty for gaudy apartment blocks, their ownership fits in with our morality.

But can one own a people? Does someone have the same right to engineer or change a population) the way they do their possessions? I argue they do not, and that being democratically elected does not grant one that right. Elected or not, no one has a right to decide for a people what their future is. Countries don't create nations. Nations of people create countries. Therefore the government which runs a country has no right to engineer a nation. Whether it is the Japanese nation, German or Kenyan, their respective government cannot assume the right to change the make up of the nations they are responsible for. The people of those nations must therefore call their governments out when they assume powers that aren't theirs.

We, however, are discouraged from looking at the issue in this manner. "Practicality" we are told, must trump all. But does economic benefit, growth or the housing industry justify this? Is it acceptable to reshape humanity, or sections of it for these purposes, or allow this to happen because of your policy?

We can see a more recent, clear example here.

This conference believes that the destiny of the natives of Aboriginal origin, but not of the full blood, lies in their ultimate absorption by the people of the Commonwealth and it therefore recommends that all efforts be directed to that end. Nobody who knows about these groups could deny that their members are socially and culturally deprived. We must improve their lot so that they can take their place economically and socially in the general community. Once this is done, the breakup of such groups will be rapid. [1] [2]

This was viewed by some as genocide, but not through killing or displacement, but by engineering the population. This was a deliberate attempt, but what if it was just promoted as an ideal? What if the government gave incentives for people to move to make this happen? What if the government marginalised Aboriginals who objected as being backward and intolerant of change? Are there any circumstances by which this goal could be achieved, and this be considered acceptable? I would argue not, and most people would likely agree.

We must be aware of the potential problems that can occur through poor 'population policy'. We should analyse it not just on economic and practical terms, but make those who promote policy accountable for the cultural and national impact that such policies have. If those policies pose threats to an identifiable group of people, then we must hold people who propose such policies morally accountable. This seems odd, as in the West we have been conditioned not to view ourselves this way. Populations always change over time, naturally, this is to be expected. But there is a smooth continuum from natural change, to forced change, from the migrations of people westwards into Europe prior to the establishment of civilisation, to forced assimilation to “breed out the black”. Between these two, there is a vast grey area, an area where it easy to move from acceptable to unacceptable. Where change can turn from natural to forced. Where demographic change can turn from natural evolution to forced engineering, as is happening in the West.

The idea of 'population policy', the tool that governments use to move masses of people can easily swing us from acceptable to unacceptable. It is this we must be wary of, and be willing to call our elected leaders out on.

NOTES

[1] http://www.stolengenerations.info/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=140&Itemid=109

[2] http://www.kooriweb.org/foley/resources/pdfs/52.pdf

The American people aren’t falling for NSA's propaganda. They want the rogue agency reined in. But Obama refuses to rein in the NSA, Dianne Feinstein says that Congress "doesn't have the votes" to do anything about mass surveillance, and at least some judges are supporting the NSA's spying (and it's not clear what the Supreme Court will do).

But states are trying to fight back ...

Legislation has been introduced in 10 states (and counting) proposing one or both of the following:

1. Cutting off water, electricity or other resources to NSA facilities within the state
2. Prohibiting the state's cooperation with the NSA; for example, sharing data about its citizens, or university research support for NSA

For information about the state legislation:

• Arizona
• California
• Indiana
• Kansas
• Mississippi
• Missouri
• New Hampshire
• Oklahoma
• Tennessee
• Washington

And see this.

While this may sound to some like a Republican approach, Democrats who support the NSA will be vulnerable next election, and progressives need to re-claim freedom from mass surveillance as a core issue.

#FBEFF2;line-height:120%;">All over the world right wing 'think tanks' will be commemorating the work of economist Ronald Coase, who died on the second of September this year (2013) at the age of 102. Unfortunately his work has been used as an excuse to marginalise civil and human rights by making it legally acceptable for the interests of big business and the wealthy to over-rule everyone else’s financial, social and environmental interests. Coase's work is largely responsible for many of the problems of democracy, overpopulation and overdevelopment that are ruining more and more peoples' lives and freedom today. Many of its lesser supporters are naive followers of fashion and don't really understand what they are losing through their innocent embrace of 'efficiency' any more, perhaps, than did the followers of Chairman Mao's 'Great Leap Forward'. (This article is based on an extract from Sheila Newman's forthcoming book, Demography, Territory, Law 2: Land-tenure and the Origins of Capitalism in Britain, Countershock Press, probably early 2014.)

Industrial Capitalism has become a normative ethic in Britain and Anglophone societies. It has been conflated and massaged to fit a political idea that it represents a positive evolutionary development which is inevitable in human societies unless artificially or accidentally blocked. From this stems the notion of ‘developed’ and ‘developing’ societies, promoted almost without question in schools, churches and mainstream media. The presumption about the ‘developing’ societies (which were generally stable non-industrialised ones prior to the disruption of industrial development with or without colonization[1]) is that they were deprived and ‘stunted’. Industrial development in such a construction is presented as a form of normalization; a restoration to health and a normal growth curve. From this view it becomes ‘normal’ to ‘develop’ into an industrial capitalist society. Social costs are minimized in a kind of “Coasian” equation (see citation below) where all changes which increase available capital are treated as a positive benefit to the whole society. This logic justifies almost anything which will assist that transformation, notably changes to the land-tenure or property-law system. [2]

“In the eighteenth century, when the British economy entered an unparalleled era of expansion, Britain’s Parliament began operating according to Coasian principles and reorganized property rights en masse. In the nineteenth century, when most common-law doctrines reached their modern form, doctrines of equity (enforced through the Chancery Court) dominated the conveyance of land. These doctrines were designed to protect beneficial interests, not to maximize productivity. Efficiency became a dominant doctrine in the English legal system only after Parliamentary intervention.”(Bogart and Richardson, p.7)[3]

Coasian economic theory was originated by Ronald H. Coase in “The Problem of Social Cost”, Journal of Law and Economics, 3: 144, 1960. The theory assigns value arbitrarily, according to the highest dollar profit probability. It takes no heed of non-monetary values and therefore is unresponsive to social cost or individual equity. [4]

To the inhuman 'invisible hand', is attributed the responsibility and authority for the impacts of such decisions. But there is no redress against the ‘invisible hand’. As Block points out below, referring to property law: “Whatever the judge decided would endure; there could be no opportunity for mutually beneficial exchange” [after the decision was made].

“And what was the advice to the judiciary which emanated from this new outlook? Judges were to rule in such a way as to maximize the value of economic activity. Under a zero transactions cost regime, it really wouldn't matter -as far as the allocation of resources was concerned - which of two disputatious parties received the rights in question. If they were given to the person who valued them more, well and good. If not, the loser would be able to pay off the winner so as to enjoy their use. But in the real world of significant transactions costs, in contrast, the juridical determination was absolutely crucial. Whatever the judge decided would endure; there could be no opportunity for mutually beneficial exchange, ex post.” (Block: Property Rights: A Reply to Demsetz, p.63)

The impact on civil society has been enormous. No human value, no environmental value may prevail over a financial win. This is a recipe for corporate dominance. Block makes this clear:

“From these deliberations emerged, especially in the writings of his followers, the ‘Coasian’ public policy recommendation. The jurist must ignore tradition, property rights, ownership, and the niceties of Lockean homesteading theory upon which all were based, and instead make his award solely in order to maximize wealth. That is, he should find in favor of the disputant who values the rights in question more strongly; the one who, had he lost the court battle in the zero transactions cost world, would have successfully bribed the winner. [5]

NOTES

[1]
Newman, Sheila, Demography, Territory, Law: The Rules of Animal and Human Populations, Countershock Press, 2013.

[2] Block, Walter, 1995. “Ethics, Efficiency, Coasian Property Rights, and Psychic Income: A Reply to Demsetz,” in The Review of Austrian Economics, Vol.8, No. 2 (1995): 61-125, ISSN 0889-3047, http://miawa.org/journals/rae/pdf/rae8_2_4.pdf: “In this new view, property rights became the handmaiden of so called economic efficiency. The very determination of private property became dependent on cost considerations. Another way to put this is that in the pre-Coasian days, property rights were exogenous to economics. Thanks to Coase and his followers (Demsetz 1966, 1967; Posner 1986; Landes 1971, 1973, 1979),' this is no longer true. Now, if anything, economics is the independent variable; property rights have become indigenous on it.’ It is an indication of the ideological nature of the Nobel Prize of Economic Sciences that Ronald Coase (1910-2nd September 2013) won it in 1991 for work which has been used to argue for the primacy of economic ‘efficiency’ over social organisation in transaction costs and property rights for the institutional structure and functioning of the economy. His work has been used as an excuse to marginalise civil and human rights by making it legally acceptable for the interests of big business and the wealthy to over-rule everyone else’s financial, social and environmental interests. In other words, all conflicts can be resolved through money and if what you want to conserve does not make money, then if someone wants to destroy it to make money, then they will have that right. It is obvious that natural amenity, wildlife, houses with gardens, decent working conditions – anything that stands in the way of someone making more money – must fall away before the Coasian bulldozer. The theory does not stand up to natural science, the laws of thermodynamics and ecology, however it has been co-opted into everything from international aid and development to local planning.

[3] Bogart and Richardson, 2008, “Making Property Productive: Reorganizing Rights to Real and Equitable Estates in Britain, 1660 to 1830, NBER Working Paper No. 14107
Issued in June 2008. National Bureau of Economic Resarch, Cambridge, MA., p.2 http://www.nber.org/papers/w14107

[4] “Even mere preferability, let alone legal justice, runs into problems of interpersonal comparisons of utility. As we have seen, there is no warrant, anywhere within the corpus of value-free economics, for us to compare the utilities of one group of people-e.g., "worshippers" with another, "cancer patients'-and to claim that one outweighs the other.” Block, Walter, 1995, op.cit.

[5] Block, Walter, 1995, op.cit.

#FBEFF8;line-height:120%;">The author of the article suggests that the rule of law and federalism are no longer operating in Australia. As a result of three decades of Australian governments enthusiastically embracing neo-liberal capitalist policies, power is now concentrated at the central level. Government captured by the few: the two major parties in collusion with big business nationally and internationally. With no indication from the Australian people that they seek the radical systemic reforms required to reinstate federalism and reclaim a fairer and more just society, only small steps towards reform appear realistic. The revision of the Preamble to the Constitution as a precursor to further constitutional change and the reassertion of state powers supporting of local power are suggested as first steps.

Power centralised to Commonwealth means that Australia is no longer an authentic federation

There is general consensus among scholars, political commentators and others that over time a centralisation of power has occurred at the Commonwealth level in Australia [Bell, 2006 p171, Brown,2006 p12, Emy, 1997p387, Peters, 2006,p57, Twomey & Withers, 2007p.4, Wiltshire,.2006,p189]. Arguably, Australia is no longer an authentic federation. Federal structures legitimated in the Australian Constitution Act [ACA] (usually known simply as ‘The Australian Constitution’) are retained, established ‘norms’ of intergovernmental relations continue but power is firmly in the hands of the Commonwealth government and associated elites. I will argue below the Australian system of government thereby also fails to adhere to the principles of the rule of law and that Australian governments are failing to perform the primary function of government: to protect and secure the welfare of the people residing within their jurisdiction.

Power and authority

To have the power to govern is not the same as to hold legitimate authority to do so. In order to examine the ways in which the present system of government in Australia violates the principles of the rule of law, these principles will first be briefly described. How the Australian system of government violates these principles is then outlined. And, finally, strategies are suggested as preliminary approaches needed to break down the barriers to reform. If and how these violations can be corrected is conditional upon the successful removal of these barriers, with the Australian society finding a set of shared principles upon which to base a revised theory of government.

States and Governments

The concept of ‘State ’[1] is indispensable in the understanding of our current political world. States are the principal actors on the international stage and by far the most significant actors on their own territory”. [Skinner, 2011] It is also central to any understanding of the rule of law. Government is ‘state’-based. In mainstream discourse, government and state are often used interchangeably, as synonyms. They are not.

“Government is the means through which the authority of the State is brought into operation” [Heywood 2000, p40]. Hence ‘government’ is inseparable from the State: it cannot exist without a ‘state’.

According to the fictional theory of state as outlined by Skinner, “the conduct of government is morally acceptable if and only if it basically serves to protect the welfare and safety of the person of the state, that is to say our person – the fictional person – we are considered together as the person of the state. …. The duty of our rulers”, the government, “is to promote the good of that person”. This raises “the spectre of the common good… over and against theories of individual rights.”

The State, “the fictional person endures beyond the lifetime of any of us present” has, as originally posited by Hobbes, an artificial eternity of life. [Skinner, 2011] [Hobbes,1651]. This theory of the State places the common good to the fore and provides a specific meaning to the role of the demos in the state, a democratic state. The fictional person – every individual as one is the raison d’état - constitutes the state. According to the fictional theory of state, the legitimate authority to govern is to assure the well-being and security of the state’s ‘person’.

Pogge [1991] and [Held 1996] in outlining their differing views on cosmopolitanism share with many other theorists the view that the primary political unit is the individual and therefore the criterion for legitimate authority to govern lies in the observance of human rights. Is the State the collective in the form of a fictional person or a multitude of individuals? How can authority be vested in either the collective in the form of the almost eternal fictional person or the multitude of individuals? Power vested in the people as a whole is the sine qua non of democracy.

Rule of law and rule by law

Aristotle concludes government is better exercised through the rule of law than by the ‘rule of men’ “… it is preferable that government be by or in accordance with law, since (i) laws are products of reason(s) not passion(s}, (ii) the sovereignty of a ruler or assembly tends to tyranny [i.e. rule in interests of a section, not common good, (iii) equality demands that each mature person have some share in governing, and (iv) rotation of offices and office-holders is desirable and can hardly be managed without regal regulation.” [Finnis, J. 2010 paraphrasing Aristotle’s Politics III:15]

Not only is law based on reason, but it is based on reasoning applied and tested by many people to the accumulated experience of a society of people over time: hopefully accumulated wisdom.

Rule by law as protection against tyranny implies ruling in the common good, equality and political liberty, limitations on length of office, if not specifically representation and regulation: all elements of democratic liberal theory.
The ‘rule of law’ is then when primary and supreme authority of the state is vested in the law [Finnis, J. 2011]. The rule of law is independent of government[s]; it applies equally to the rulers and the ruled. It must be “administered fairly, rationally, predictably, consistently and impartially. Improper external influences, including inducements and pressures, are inconsistent with each of these objectives.” [Spiegelman2003]

The rule of law is different from rule by law. The rule of law “is not merely the opposite of the lack of law, of anarchy…. [it] is not the systematic and constant application of laws – that is rule by law” [Stephens1999]. It is based on reason, developing shared understanding over time: creating an accepted wisdom to protect the society/State/individuals as a whole. It cannot be imposed, requires nurturing and commands respect: the lore of binding rules.

As a self-proclaimed liberal democratic nation with a federal system of government, recent and contemporary governments in Australia are in flagrant violation of many, if not most of the principles inherent in those claims. The rule of law as outlined above is the overarching principle of good democratic government and it is not operating. In the Australian system of government, it is strictly rule by law as opposed to democratic rule of law. The two major parties, Labor and the Non-Labor coalitions have effectively captured the executive and legislature, the parliament, at both Commonwealth and state levels. Competition for executive power, increasingly adversarial nature of daily politics inside and outside of parliament, masks the fact that both ‘sides’ of politics share an interest in maintaining the level of power now acquired at the central level and face common challenges in setting agenda to govern when much of the decision making power over much of what was previously confined to the nation-states is increasingly in the hands of international ‘forces’ and they have lost the capacity to engage with and gain authentically the support of the public.

Power ever more distant from the people: Central government saps states of power

As stated in the introduction, there is little or no discernible authentic division of power between the Commonwealth and the state governments: power is firmly in the hands of the Commonwealth government in direct violation of this defining principle of federation. Federalism is a form of democratic government: it is premised on the sharing of power. The federal division of powers is one of the primary measures to prevent the concentration of power in the hands of the few. This polarisation of power in the Australian government is inextricably linked to a much broader upward spiral of power and wealth that is occurring globally [Pogge,T 2011]

Inaccessible justice system

The inevitable consequence of the concentration of the power and wealth in the hands of the few is the disempowerment and impoverishment of the many: this of itself is a form of tyranny.

“The fundamental rational of liberal democracy is to guarantee its citizens political liberty and equality of legal status… Both together entail measures to ensure all citizens have effective access to, and fair and humane treatment in and by the courts [Emy 1997 p. 393] This is put forward as an argument to advance the case of a limited bill of rights.

Neither of these ‘rights’ are guaranteed nor protected by the Constitution or by legislation. In the reality of the average wage earner, access to the justice system is severely compromised for most Australians due to the costs involved. Many in the legal profession and the courts are of the elites. While space prevents providing detailed evidence to this effect, the ex-High Court Judge Michael Kirby confirmed that access to the justice system is “the really central fault of our legal system” – “the problem really is a structural problem and if you want to do something really, you have to do something revolutionary.” It should be noted that, aside from the prohibitive costs of seeking redress in the justice system, the amount of legislation being passed by government has increased enormously over the last ten years. The amount, length and complexity of legislation contribute to a lack of understanding within the community.

Two party stranglehold on power makes change very difficult

If the above diagnosis is correct, how can these violations of the rule of law or democratic practice be corrected? “…any substantive amendment [to the Constitution] requires bipartisan agreement and the efforts by the major parties to mobilise consensual support amongst a sometime truculent electorate” [Emy, p.392] As stated above, the major parties have a shared interest in maintaining the level of power [and wealth] acquired as they are competing for the same prize. There is no incentive to diminish the power in the prize. Proposals for change to the current powers of the parliament are unlikely to be tabled in the current Commonwealth parliament. Even reforms not requiring constitutional amendment will require bipartisan agreement and are unlikely to impact or lessen the powers of the current parliament.

There is no evidence of impending popular uprising only of disaffection, even alienation. The something ‘revolutionary’ mentioned by ex-Chief Justice Kirby to render the system of justice more affordable and accessible is not so easily identified. Power and wealth once acquired are rarely relinquished without coercion or struggle. The legal profession is unlikely to accept the basic wage for their services. There are some signs of a mounting number of issues causing increased activism in some quarters but effective mechanisms of campaigning in the public domain are lacking. Mainstream media are largely controlled by powerful elites with vested interest in maintaining the status quo. The ‘social media’, while effective in reaching those with declared interests in a given subject area, are in fact not very effective in reaching an audience as diverse as the Australian electorate.

Reasons to reform the Australian government system

The main reasons to initiate reform of the Australian system of government are a moral ones: the alleviation of preventable human suffering through better government; to improve the security and well being of people residing within the jurisdiction of the Australian state; to establish the rule of law with a system of government established with the consent of the people.

Reform is required to halt and reverse the current polarisation of power and wealth that has for corollary the disempowerment and impoverishment of many. As a willing member of the Anglo-US axis of power, Australian governments are complicit in oppression caused by the phenomenon of globalisation within and beyond Australian borders.

Structural reforms required to system

The structural reforms proposed in much of the literature – the creation of new states or regions, the strengthening of local government, tax reforms to redress the vertical imbalance by the reinstatement of state fiscal powers have been unable to demonstrate how they can be achieved in reality. The number and breadth of proposals indicate that it is structural reform of the system of government, of the political system itself that is required.

Strategies and starting points in the Australian Constitution Act (ACA)

Before forming a proposal for structural reform, it is necessary to identify a strategy to break down the barriers to reform. It is also necessary to find a starting point. The Constitution - the Australian Constitution Act (ACA) - is a possible starting point for two reasons. Firstly, it is the foundation document of the consolidation of Australia as a nation-state – for better or worse – it is a shared point of reference. While it may not have been accessible to all of the people all of the time, it must become so to legitimate any significant reform. Firstly, in order to assist with understanding as to why revision/reform is required and demonstrate respect for what has gone before in order to promote respect for the process and for the revised Constitution. Secondly, because the ACA enshrines principles that should be retained, if the Australian people wish to build on what is, to create a genuinely democratic federation. The principles of the separation of powers, of federalism itself, of electoral representation and referenda, based on sound reason, all aspects of the ACA can be revised to reflect that which has been learned from experience over more than a century and with reasoned expectations of political participation from all sections of contemporary society.

Constitutional Revision – The Preamble

A proposal to revise the Constitution – a task accomplished by the Helvetic Confederation in the 1990s - would not be welcomed by the major parties, which between them, have a strong parliamentary majority. Even if a proposal of substance to bring positive reforms were put to them, it still would not succeed if it impinged in any way on their current powers. It is in their vested interest to preserve the status quo. The only proposal to which they may be amenable – with sufficient electoral pressure and underpinned by strong moral incentive – would be a revised Preamble to the Constitution.[2] While a revised preamble may initially have no immediate ramifications, a preamble that clearly and succinctly outlines the principles of government supported by a wide audience would be a stepping stone to raising the debate for a revision of the Constitution itself as one coherent document.

Practical alliance of State with Local and Regional government and institutions

On another front, those with the most to lose or who have lost already, may fight the next battle better. Local government is subject to radical change through state legislation. State governments, despite appearances, have lost fiscal and other powers. The so-called residual powers that is the Constitutional powers of the states have been neutralised through High Court judgements ruling in favour of the Commonwealth.

If the States’ politicians wish to regain and retain power within an Australian federation, they need to ally themselves with, not try to control, the regional institutes and local governments that are effectively under their regulation. Winning hearts and minds in those areas by effective institutional support and improved service provision is something valuable of itself. It is a strategy that would assist both the powerful and the less powerful: with institutional and electoral support, State politicians could also better defend their position in the federation.

Focussing the assets that one has on doing what is required as opposed to wasting effort on lobbying and negotiating for that which may not succeed, is amounts to preventing losses and consolidating one’s own power.
An indication that there is shared interest across the States to initiate a strategy of some kind for reform is the establishment of the Council for the Australian Federation (CAF) in 2006. This represented a small step to draw attention to the fate of the federation. Setting up institutions, however, is the political equivalent to the bureaucrats calling a meeting. The impact will not be felt in the wider Australian electorate. A joint state level strategy faces nonetheless the barrier of the two-party system. Will politicians be willing to break ranks within their parties to support the reinstatement of state powers in the federation? Or does it require significant electoral success by smaller parties and/or a rise in the number of Independent Members to strengthen state-based initiatives for reform?

The need for reform is urgent; the scale of reform required is significant. The barriers will be difficult to dismantle. The successful passage of any reform to the federation requires a paradigm shift reversing the impacts and repercussions of three decades of neo-liberal capitalist practices. Success will be conditional upon the political good will and cooperation of current elites [parliamentarians, federal court judges, and major capitalist lobbies, [media moguls, business, mining, professional associations, etc.] and/or the art of persuasion or tools of coercion to elicit the requisite cooperation. Legitimate positive democratic reform will require the sound understanding and the good will of many of the diverse interest groups within the Australian community to identify and validate authentically shared values and beliefs that can underpin the principles for a federation reformed or a nation refocused on democratic government and a more humane society.

NOTES

[1] When used with a capital ‘State’ refers to the national entity: the nation-state. When used with a small ‘s’ ‘state’ refers to a federated unit within the nation-state.

[2] The Australian public is said to be more likely to accept a revised Preamble rather than change the main text of the Constitution. The former is symbolic and not enforceable by law where contested concepts are present. However, the recognition of Aboriginal people and of local government is a way to lead in to the need for significant Constitutional changes by ‘amendment’ or indeed the need for a new Constitution.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

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This article contains James Sinnamon's submission to the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security (PJCIS) which wants to pass new laws to make all your emails and other internet transactions up to two years back accessible to the Australian Government. "If Australian governments were serious about protecting Australians from terrorism, they would not have given transnational corporations with interests in every kind of industry including military total access to information about resources and infrastructure relating to location and operation of power, water supply and telecommunications, land-use planning, national statistics, scientific research institutions and banks. What is left, I ask, for terrorists?" (James Sinnamon)

Also published on Global Research.

Australian Government wants to read your private business and personal correspondence

The Australian Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security (PJCIS) paper claims that Australia faces terrorist threats and that, in order to defeat these threats:

1. It is to be made an offence for any citizen to fail to "assist in the decryption of communications". In other words, each Internet user may not refuse to give to government agencies a copy of his/her private encryption key so that all his/her electronic business and private correspondence can be read by police and security agencies.

2. It be required that data transmitted by all Internet users be retained for up to two years by their respective Internet Service Providers (ISPs).

So, if these proposals become law, Internet users will be required to allow police and security agencies to read all business and personal correspondence and data uploads, as well as any more going back up to two years.

Nowhere, in the discussion paper, has it been shown how these sweeping powers could have prevented past acts of terrorism or other criminal acts from being carried out on Australian soil.

In Chapter two, Interception and the TIA Act, the paper notes the greater power and sophistication of communication technologies made available to terrorist and criminal organisations since 1979 when the current Act was enacted.

However, no-where in the paper is the commensurate increase in sophistication and power of surveillance technologies available to police and security agencies acknowledged or factored in.

If the paper acknowledged that the government possesses equal and possibly superior surveillance technologies to non-government agencies, I believe that the basis of these proposed changes to the law would be nullified.

One-sided appraisal of technology fails to admit Government already technologically well-empowered

From their present one-sided appraisal of technology, the Committee has made a breathtaking leap of logic by claiming that only by, in effect, treating all Australian Internet Users as potential terrorists or potential criminals and by subjecting them to the surveillance that only criminal and terrorist suspects were previously subjected to, could the law enforcement authorities and security agencies provide us with the protection that they were previously able to.

The report shows how current targeted surveillance powers have been effective in thwarting numerous crimes:

"In 2010/2011 there were 2441 arrests, 3168 prosecutions (2848 for serious offences) and 2034 convictions (1854 for serious offences) based on lawfully intercepted material. 2 Law enforcement agencies made 91 arrests, 33 prosecutions and obtained 33 convictions based on evidence obtained under stored communications warrants.

"These figures may underestimate the effectiveness of interception because a conviction can be recorded without entering the intercepted material into evidence. Interception also allows agencies to identify criminal connections, ...

"Telecommunications data is commonly the first source of important lead information for further investigations and often provides a unique and comprehensive insight into the behaviour of persons of interest." (p14)

The discussion paper fails to explain why, if this was possible under existing laws, the proposed additional powers are necessary.

Four cases in which suspects have been convicted of conspiring to commit terrorist acts are also cited, but, again, the paper fails to explain why, if this was possible under existing laws, the proposed additional powers are necessary.

Australian participation in illegal wars

How can Australia expect other nations to respect our own sovereignty and territorial integrity, when it has failed to accord that respect to other nations?

Since 1991, Australia has participated in three illegal wars under false pretexts: Two against Iraq and, our longest ever war, in which we are still engaged, against Afghanistan. As a result of the wars against Iraq and sanctions in which Australia participated, some estimates put the death toll as high as one million.

The 1991 war against Iraq was launched after Iraq had been cynically tricked into invading Kwait by the then ambassasor to Kuawit April Glaspie, who has since disappeared from public view. In order to overcome opposition to that war, the "Incubator babies" story, in which cruel Iraqi invaders were said to have thrown babies out of incubators onto hospital floors was fabricated. In 2003 it was claimed that Iraq posed a threat to the world with its renewed Weapons of Mass Destruction program. This claim was demolished in 2003 before the US Congress of CIA by CIA agent Valerie Plame, who testified that she had found no evidence of Iraq WMDs.

False flag terrorism

No-where in this discussion paper is another source of terrorism acknowledged, that is false flag terrorism. False flag terrorism is carried out by governments seeking to justify repression and gain political advantage by blaming the terrorism on opponents. Earlier this year, although it denies this, the Syrian Government was accused of having committed the Houla Massacre, in which 108 men, women and children were murdered in order to blame their deaths on the opposition Syrian National Council.

It was because the Syrian government was blamed for the Houla Massacre that the Australian Government expelled the Syrian Ambassador from Australia and imposed sanctions against Syria.

In October 2005 the late former President of Indonesia, Abdurrahman Wahid said, in an interview with SBS, that he believed that either the Indonesian military or the Indonesian police planted the second larger bomb which destroyed the Sari Club on 12 October 2002.[1] 202 people including 88 Australians perished in those attacks known as the Bali Bombing attacks.

Many credible figures including Lieutenant Colonel Robert Bowman, the former Director of Advanced Space Programs Development for the U.S. Air Force in the Ford and Carter administrations, believe that senior figures in the Bush administration were complicit in the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 in which almost 3,000 residents of the United States died. I stated my agreement with Lieutenant Colonel Bowman in my submission of 7 September 2009 to the Australian parliamentary Inquiry Into Human Rights on 7 September 2009.[2] I include a copy with this submission. [See copy as Endnote 7.] Until earlier this year that submission was posted on the Federal Parliamentary web-site along with all the other submissions.

In 1963, the US joint Chiefs of Staff put to President John F Kennedy that the US military stage apparent hijackings of civilian aircraft, terrorist murders and apparent military attacks against United States military bases in order to put the blame on Cuba. this proposal was known as Operation Northwoods.[3] Fortunately, President Kennedy rejected that proposal before he was sadly murdered.

Privatisation of Institutions and information

Successive Australian governments, both state and federal, have deregulated and privatised institutions and their information and outsourced services from the time of Keating. They have done this without the permission of the electorate, which has never been asked, as Financial Review Editor, Laura Tingle, recently put forward in her Quarterly Review essay, "Great Expectations,".[4] Corroborating Tingle's observations, sociologist, Sheila Newman wrote that,

"With deregulation and privatisation (under Hawke and Keating), governments dissolved the very institutions that gave them power. Because of Hawke and Keating’s actions, Australian governments now have so little power that they are unable to satisfy the promises they make at election time to the electorate."

How can Australian citizens trust governments which are now almost powerless against corporate interests to represent their citizens? How can the Committee ask Australians to cede yet more power and information to feeble government powers that have shown undeniable trends to privilege corporations like News Ltd with lax media ownership laws even when British parliamentary inquiries have exposed their management as condoning and encouraging spying at every level? How can the Committee ask Australians to cede yet more power and information to governments which have allowed a myriad of private fly-by-night organisations to take over our entire telecommunications system, power, water and other utilities, resulting in so many complaints that states have now replaced one omsbudsman with many omsbudsmen?

If Australian governments were serious about protecting Australians from terrorism, they would not have given transnational corporations with interests in every kind of industry including military total access to information about resources and infrastructure relating to location and operation of power, water supply and telecommunications, land-use planning, national statistics, scientific research institutions and banks.

What is left, I ask, for terrorists?

Surely Australia's best defense against terrorism lies in Australian citizens being able to protect their own interests and privacy from government and commercial organisations? Who else can they really trust?

Conclusion

To the extent that Australia faces a terrorist threat at all, the paper offers no practical proposal of how to meet that threat. In all likelihood, greater surveillance at the hands of Governments and security agencies, which have done so little to earn the trust of Australians, will only serve to make larger numbers more apathetic and less able to act if they see evidence of real terrorist threats.

Australians need more civil rights, not fewer, to ensure that dark or incompetent processes cannot proceed behind a wall of secrecy and ill-informed authority in the name of security. It has been suggested that Australia could consider adopting the European Civil Code, also known as the Napoleonic Code, instead of its 'ad hoc British system'. In the EU, only Britain has failed to adopt this Roman Law based model. Australia needs a Civil Code of citizens’ rights, legally defendable, modelled on the French one to combat the disorganising forces of the markets and perceived threats to security.[5]

There is a great deal more in the 61 pages of this discussion paper than I have been able to properly address in the limited time available to me. Nevertheless, I believe this submission demonstrates that the measures proposed in discussion paper pose an unwarranted threat to the democratic freedoms of Internet users.

The proposals have never been put to the voting public and had this been done I believe that they would have been rejected just as the Australian public previously rejected a proposal to filter Internet traffic.

Accordingly, I ask that either the proposals contained in the discussion paper be rejected by Parliament or that they be put to the public in a referendum.

ENDNOTES

[1] "Miscarriage of Justice: Who was behind the October 2002 Bali bombings?" by Michel Chossudovsky at http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=10931

[2] The submission I made to the Australian parliamentary Inquiry Into Human Rights on 7 September 2009 contained the following factual errors:

(i) Lieutenant Colene Robert Bowman did not serve on "President Ronald Reagan's Star Wars program." He had retired when Jimmy Carter was President.

(ii) Morgan Reynolds, who is listed in my submission, claims that the WTC Twin Towers were destroyed by particle beams from outer space and that the aircraft seen to fly into each of the respective WTC Twin Towers were, in fact, holograms, so cannot be considered a credible supporter of 9/11 Truth.

[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Northwoods

[4] Laura Tingle in "Great Expectations," Quarterly Essay, June 2012, p.34, writes: "Yet, here is the crucial point: voters weren't consulted about the changes - except belatedly at the ballot box, when both major parties were in fundamental accord."

[5] http://www.independentaustralia.net/2012/politics/tingle-verbals-australians-in-quarterly-essay

[6] Loose paraphrase from last paragraph in Sheila Newman, "Tingle-ing Australians," in Independent Australia

#appendix" id="appendix">Appendix:James Sinnamon's 2009 submission to the Australian National Human Rights Consultation

National Human Rights Consultation Submission

AGWW-7T293B

Name: James SINNAMON

The following is a verbatim adaptation of the three page submission I presented to the Australian Federal Parliamentary Inquiry Into Human Rights on 7 September 2011. On this adaptation I have corrected one relatively minor factual error and noted one misjudgement which appeared on the first. These are detailed in the Appendix at the end of this document. (This adaptation is four pages in length rather than three pages. This is because of difficulty I faced in copying and editing with the Open Source Libre Office Writer program the original PDF document.)

Submission Text:

This submission disputes the entire justification for the draconian anti-terrorist laws that have taken away from ordinary citizens, basic human rights and civil liberties that were once taken for granted in Australia.

As few cannot be unaware the justification for these draconian laws and the associated imposts upon our daily lives such as airport security checks and the banning of the ownership of megaphones, deemed by former Prime minister John Howard to be a terrorist weapon was the spectacular and deadly terrorist attack of 11 September 2001, the anthrax scare that shortly ensued and a number of other deadly terrorist attacks that have occurred since then - Bali, the Madrid bombing and the London Tube bombing. Much of Australian public opinion had come to accept that the curtailments of our rights are a price well worth paying in order to prevent similar tragedies from ever occurring on our own shores.

OFFICIAL ACCOUNT OF 9/11, THE BASIS FOR ANTI-TERRORIST LEGISLATION, DISPUTED BY MANY CREDIBLE AUTHORITATIVE PUBLIC FIGURES

However, a large number of credible, authoritative and well known figures as well as a substantial sections of public opinion in the United States, and even more so, outside the United States question the official explanations of these attacks. They argue that the evidence that the attacks were perpetrated by a ubiquitous world wide terrorist network known as 'al Qaeda' has never been produced. They also argue that the investigations by the 9/11 Commission and the US National Institute of Standards

and Technology (NIST) failed to ask many critical questions and ignored a great deal of evidence submitted to them.

The supposed evidence of Al Qaeda's guilt that was given to NATO by Colin Powell in order to win NATO's participation in the so- called 'war on terror' has never been made public and the evidence promised by Colin Powell to the United Nations, that would have legally made the United Nations a participant in the 'war on terror', was never produced.

Many have therefore called for the holding of a new and thorough investigation that would properly examine all the physical evidence, take account of all witnesses' statements and have the power to subpoena key players in the events of 9/11 including former President George W Bush, former Vice President Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Condoleezza Rice. Indeed, it seems as if the City of New York may very well soon be conducting its own investigation into 9/11 as the group New York City Coalition for Accountability Now (NYCCAN - http://nyccan.com) has succeeded in collecting, as of 14 June 2009, 47,767 signatures of residents of New York City which asks that New York City hold a ballot within 3 months to decide whether or not an investigation into 9/11 be set up by New York City. This number exceeds the number of 45,000 that would make the holding of the ballot mandatory.

Many who question the official version of 9/11 go as far as to argue that, because of mountains of physical evidence which contradicts the official story and the fact that senior members of the Bush administration have been caught out lying and contradicting themselves, there is a prima facie case that members of the Bush administration themselves were complicit in the September 11 attacks.

People who are calling for a new investigation include:

* Lt. Col. Robert Bowman, PhD, U.S. Air Force (ret). Colonel Bowman was a fighter pilot who who flew 100 missions in the Vietnam war. He served on the Star Wars program under Presidents Ford and Carter.
* General Wesley Clark, U.S. Army (ret) former head of NATO.
* Col. George Nelson, MBA, U.S. Air Force (ret). Colonel Nelson is an experienced air crash investigator who states that the physical evidence at the crash sites of United Airways Flight 95 flatly contradicts the official account. (see(http://www.physics911.net/georgenelson).
* Lt. Col. Guy S. Razer, MS Aeronautical Science, U.S. Air Force (ret).
* Raymond L. McGovern Former Director of the CIA's Office of Regional and Political Analysis, a 250-person unit responsible for political analysis of every country and region in the world.
* William Christison – Former Director of the CIA's Office of Regional and Political Analysis, a 250-person unit responsible for political analysis of every country and region in the world. 29-year CIA veteran. 29-year CIA veteran.
* US Senator Max Cleland Chief Economist, U.S. Department of Labor under George W. Bush 2001 – 2002.
* Morgan Reynolds – Chief Economist, U.S. Department of Labor under George W. Bush 2001 – 2002.
* Paul Craig Roberts – Assistant Treasurer of the U.S. Treasury under Ronald Reagan.
* Daniel Ellsberg – Author of “The Pentagon Papers” which told the world the truth about the Vietnam War.
* Paul Hellyer – Former Minister of National Defense of Canada.
* Michael Meacher – Former Under Secretary for Industry, Under Secretary for Health and Social Security, Minister for the Environment, and Member of the House of Commons (UK).
* Tony Benn – Former Member of British Parliament 1942 - 2001.
* Andreas von Buelow, PhD Former Minister of Justice (West Germany). Former Minister for Research and Technology.
* Horst Ehmke, PhD – Former Minister of Justice (West
* Germany). Former Minister for Research and Technology. • Francesco Cossiga Member, – President of Italy (1985 - 1992) and Former Prime Minister.
* Yukihisa Fujita – Member, House of Councillors (the upper house), National Diet of Japan.
* Jeanette Fitzsimons – Greens Member of Parliament, New Zealand, 1996 - present.
* General Leonid Ivashov – Former Chief of Staff of the Russian armed forces.

Many more who are calling for a new investigation are listed on the web site a href="http://patriotsquestion911.com/.

Abundant solid evidence in contradiction with the official account of the 9/11 attacks can be found on many sites including http://ae911truth.org (Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth) and http://911truth.org/.

If these people are right -- and I believe they are -- then Australia's efforts to combat terrorism are not directed towards where the real terrorist threat lies.

BALI BOMBING

In regard to the terrorist threat much closer to home, on 12 October 2004 former president, Abdurrahman Wahid said in an interview with SBS that he believed that either the Indonesian military or the Indonesian police planted the second larger bomb which destroyed the Sari Club. This allegation has never been properly investigated.

Before discussing the appropriateness or otherwise of the measures now in place to combat terrorism, the Human Rights consultation needs to evaluate firstly how real is that threat and secondly from what quarters the terrorist threat, if it exists, is likely to come from.

The Human Rights Consultation should therefore at least seriously look at the abundant evidence which stands in contradiction to the official accounts of terrorists atrocities in recent years and try to bring about renewed and proper investigations. Furthermore, it should give its full support to those people overseas who are seeking to bring about proper investigations into 9/11, the London Tube Bombings, the Madrid Train bombings, the Bali bombings etc.

Appendix to Submission to HRC: A correction to my original Submission and a comment

Robert Bowman: Of retired Lieutenant Colonel Robert Bowman who was the first person list as calling for a new investigation, I originally wrote, “He served on President Ronald Reagan's Star Wars program.”. In fact, he served under former Presdents Ford and Carter and had retired before President Reagan was inaugurated.

Morgan Reyolds: Morgan Reynolds holds views not shared by the mainstream of the 9/11 Truth Movement and which are easy for the 'debunkers' to debunk. These include that the WTC Twin Towers were destroyed by particle beams from outer space and that the aircraft seen to fly into each of the respective WTC Twin Towers were, in fact, holograms. Many people purporting to be 9/11 Truthers promote such views in obvious attempts to discredit the 9/11 as a whole. What motivates such a high profile 9/11 Truther as Morgan Reynolds to promote views which are damaging to the 9/11 Truth Movement is unclear. Had I been aware that he held these views I would not have included his name in this list.

Australians have found it very hard to protest against high immigration because of constant subtle messages from government and media implying that they had no right to object. They have been given the idea that there was nothing special about them that gave them the right to object. They only lived here. Although only Australians might vote in governments, the importance of this was subsumed to a cult of plutocracy, where governments prioritised commercial and corporate demands over the wishes of the actual electorate. The mainstream press (the ABC, the Murdoch Press, the Fairfax Press) promoted a cult of elite authoritarianism and the official alternative press never really encouraged questioning of this process on issues of real dissent. And the elite authorities all endorsed 'multiculturalism'. One has only to glance at the membership of the Multicultural Foundation of Australia to realise how true this is.

Pino Migliorino, Chairman of the Federation of Ethnic Communities' Councils of Australia, cited by John Marlowe in "Immigrants calling for more immigrants - dare one criticise and we will brand them 'RACIST'!", says:

"In 1989, we showed international leadership and created a National Multicultural Policy, the principles of which are still relevant. We then retreated from this vision and began a discourse about integration rather than about dialogue, which, similar to the principle of assimilation, implies that one side has more rights than the other simply because they were there first, or what is worse, because they are superior."

For me there are two problems created through the policy of multiculturalism as practised in Australia, and they are not really about 'culture' in the sense of 'ethnicity'.

They are both political problems to do with democracy and the civil rights that should go with citizenship.

Citizens rights

1. The first problem is that, in a democracy, the incumbents -"those who were here first" - the citizens - are members of a community which should have the right to self-government. The right to self-government should not be limited, except by the citizens themselves. I believe that multiculturalism has been used as a way of blurring the fair expectation of civil rights for a citizen by implying that citizenship - or 'being here first' - carries no special rights.

Citizenship should be clearly different from the state of being an immigrant, tourist or visitor. In many countries (such as France) even being a 'permanent immigrant' means having the right to stay in that country only for up to one year. To be a 'permanent immigrant' with the same sense that term has in Australia, the person needs to become a citizen. It is problematic that being a permanent immigrant, according to the Australian definition, carries similar rights to citizenship in Australia, if it does not also carry the expectation of membership of a community that recognises itself as a political entity of members sharing responsibility for their community and its territory and is able to act to preserve these. An approach to this ambiguity is made in this article Rubenstein, Kim “Constitutional issues associated with integration: the question of citizenship,” Bureau of Immigration and Population Bulletin No 11, 1994, pp 41-43.)

Although citizens in Australia have far fewer straightforward rights than European citizens (who mostly have Civil Codes setting out their rights at law), an Australian citizen can vote. can run for office, (although our corporatised media dominates elections) has a right to primary and secondary education, and to hospital and medical treatment.

Australian citizens also did have, until recently, relatively good industrial relations laws. Premier Kennett in Victoria in 1996, allowed Victorian State industrial Awards to be dismantled and turned over to the Federal system, then Primeminister Howard undermined Australian industrial rights to conciliation and arbitration under s.51 xxxv of the Australian constitution, with his WorkChoices, which sought to bring as many people as possible under s55xx of the constitution, applicable to corporations and thus outside the jurisdiction of s.51xxxv. With this protection gone, Australian working conditions can now be easily undermined by labour hired overseas at lower wages and imported here as immigrants.

Australians used to own most of the resources in this country, as a group of citizens. Increasingly, many of these resources, assets and commodities have been privatised. This takes them out of effective control by citizens, see Justice Michael Kirby's skilful argument, here, in "Why privatisation is wrong." Population growth, in raising demand for resources, assets and commodities, makes them attractive acquisitions for corporations, political parties and wealthy elites. This is why those elites defend high immigration and why their media attack its critics.

Australians once also had chief rights to study in Australian universities, with only limited places allocated for foreign students, who were usually on scholarships, not coming as 'cash cows'. The commercialisation of universities contributed not only to lower ethical standards, but it also caused a preference for high fee-paying foreign students. This created competition for Australians who found that they had to borrow more to meet higher fees themselves. Where fees for Australians remained lower than those for foreign students, the numbers of places available for Australians declined.

In France and other European countries, universities are still free to citizens, places for foreign students are still limited, and they still come on scholarships.

Australians also used to have exclusive rights to purchase 'built property' , i.e. houses, in Australia. This right protected them from having house prices bidded-up by foreigners with better currency, such as happened with Japanese buyers in Hawaii. Unfortunately we have lost this protection recently as well. Just have a look at the National Foreign Investment Review Board's Annual General Reports over the years to see how much Australian Real Estate has gone into foreign hands. Over the past twelve years particularly, loosening of the foreign acquisition, land and house-buying laws, (begun under Primeminister Fraser) has seen Australian property flogged mercilessly via the Murdoch and Fairfax press property dot coms on the internet, and has also seen a huge number of solicitors, migration agents, bankers, real-estate agents, property developers and schools and universities touting property, migration and education in Australia over the internet.

Much of this seems to have been achieved by bringing in lots of immigrants to raise demand for Australian land, housing, jobs and education, thus pricing these things more and more beyond the reach of the majority of local people, who should be in control of what is happening to them.

Australians have found it very hard to protest against this high immigration because of constant subtle messages from government and media implying that they had no right to object. That there was nothing special about them that gave them the right to object. They only lived here. Although only Australian citizens may vote, a growing cult of elite authoritarianism - of a plutocracy - was promoted by the mainstream press - the ABC, the Murdoch Press, the Fairfax Press - and the official alternative press never really encouraged questioning of this process on issues of real dissent. And the elite authorities all endorsed 'multiculturalism'. One has only to glance at the membership of the Multicultural Foundation of Australia to realise how true this is.

In its turn, the policy of multiculturalism had been used to make citizenship ambiguous. The statement quoted above, from Pino Migliorino is typical in questioning the idea that "one side has more rights than the other simply because they were there first." This kind of introduced ambiguity has stifled protest by angry citizens at this obvious erosion of their rights, and the power of Australian citizens to govern their own country. To call the citizens of a self-governing community, "those who were here first," is to diminish the role of the community and thereby of its right to democratic self-determination; to imply that those who come here do not come to join that community, but some other community, governed perhaps by big business and the elite authorities, (who tend to own the very assets, commodities and resources for which population growth inflates the prices).

Erosion of democratic expression

2. The second political problem is the use of multiculturalism as a foil for growing the population without democratic consultation and implying that those who do not want more people must be anti-'multicultural' /racist.

As if it were not bad enough for Australian citizens to have their legitimate expectations of citizenship thus belittled and put aside, a second prong has been found for multiculturalism by the creation of a racist straw-man. The racist straw-man is trotted out and set on fire by the corporate press, the ABC, and the elite authorities any time that Australians object to population growth because of environmental and cost-of-living concerns as they see green spaces filled with houses, expensive and unwanted desalination plants replace clean and free running water, and native animals trapped by expanding infrastructure. And the elite authorities reliably receive support for this destructive process from the oddest sources.

Here is an example

Damien Lawson, FoFA [Friends of the Earth] National Climate Justice Coordinator, signed an open letter declaring that: 'We are shocked and angered that the ACF has supported Labor MP Kelvin Thomson's calls to cut Australia's migration rates". The letter concludes by calling on 'the ACF and Kelvin Thomson to withdraw their anti-migrant statements'. (28) The issue has since been addressed by the group's National Liaison Officer, Cam Walker:

[A]s always happens when population and the environment comes into the mainstream debate, it becomes a useful smoke screen for people
and organisations with racist agendas who can then call for limitations on population growth, while purporting to be concerned about the environments. [Source: Walker, Matthew P.A., "Population growth in Australia: how environmental groups are responding," People and Place, April 1, 2010.

If multiculturalism were simply a policy for giving people a fair go, no matter where they came from, whilst preserving the democratic rights of citizens to self-government, it would be a fine thing. But isn't that the purpose of human rights and citizens' rights in a functioning democracy anyway? And, can you enforce human rights without citizens' rights? No, you can't. So, why not have a policy for citizens' rights?

If one checks the policies of the Australian Greens Party ('The Greens') on its website the non-environmental conservation ones are shown with a * (see below).

Of The Greens' 44 policies, some 28 are NOT directly about environmental conservation. Many policies are about Left social justice issues such as civil rights. Nothing wrong with caring for people, but what's happening to the commitment to care for the forests - The Greens bread and butter?

The benefit of taking on a broader policy platform is that The Greens have shrugged off the stigma and core criticism of being only a single issue party (an environmentalist ('green') only party. In doing so, The Greens have become more mainstream.

The problem is that the 'green' effort has been diluted toward human issues with Left socialist and civil rights agendas, which means 'The Greens' label has become a misnomer. 'Green' has become 'Pink'. Many of its policies are now human pink.

Many environmental conservation groups seeking active support from The Greens are invariable disappointed by the thin on-ground support. The Greens do not have a mandate on conservation politics. They don't even in many cases have a contributing presence.

The Greens origins in 1972 with the United Tasmanian Group started out supporting the Lake Pedder Action Group (LPAG) in trying to save Tasmania's Lake Pedder from being flooded for hydro-electricity.

Lake Pedder was eventually flooded. The Tasmanian Greens went on to save the Franklin River in Tasmania

and on to bigger and broader causes. Many of the current policies have now nothing to do with environmental conservation and in so doing have diluted their commitment to environmental conservation.

It's no wonder that many traditional Labor voters are now aligned this political party. Conversely, it is no wonder that The Greens' dilution of conservation has created a political vacuum in environmental conservation politics in Australia.

But you be the judge...

GREENS POLICIES

(as at Halloween 2010):

* = policy has nothing to do with environmental conservation

Agriculture & Natural Resources
o Genetically Manipulated Organisms
o Natural Resources
o Sustainable Agriculture

Care for People
o Childcare*
o Children and Young People*
o Disability*
o Drugs, Substance Abuse and Addiction *
o Education*
o Health*
o Housing*
o Immigration and Refugees*
o Indigenous Australians*
o Multiculturalism*
o Older People*
o Sexuality and Gender Identity*
o Social Services*
o Sport and Physical Recreation*
o Women*

Climate Change and Energy
o Climate Change and Energy
o Nuclear

Environment
o Animals
o Biological Diversity
o Environmental Principles
o Marine and Coastal Areas
o Population
o Waste
o Water and Inland Aquatic Environments

Human Rights & Democracy
o Community Participation in Government*
o Constitutional Reform and Democracy*
o Global Governance
o Human Rights*
o International Relations*
o Justice*
o Overseas Aid*
o Peace and Security*

Media, Arts & Science
o Arts*
o Media and Communications*
o Science and Technology*

Sustainable Economy
o Corporate Governance*
o Economics*
o Employment and Industrial Relations*
o Global Economics*
o Sustainable Planning and Transport.

I make four summary observations of The Greens as follows:

1. The original environmental conservation effort of The Greens has been steadily diluted and distracted as the Party has (1) sought more mainstream acceptance and (2) invited under its wing those with non-environmental conservation agendas - I have collectively branded these 'pink' - which is intentionally open to interpretation - 'pale Red', 'alternative lifestyle', 'liberal values', 'civil rights activists', but distinguishably human focused, not environmentally focused!

Hence much of The Greens polices are now grouped under 'Care for People', 'Human Rights & Democracy', and 'Media, Arts & Science.'

The Greens are suffering a classic 'quality for quantity compromise' and in seeking mainstream popularism have become a clichéd jack of all trades and master of none. Worse, they risk alienating their original environmental conservation ideological support base.

2. Scores of socialists and humanists disaffected within Australia's dominant Left-wing party - the Australian Labor Party (ALP) have become disillusioned by Labor's gradual Center-Right direction and by its corrosive factional politics. Many have defected to The Greens. In turn they have influence the direction of The Greens and the Greens in their conciliatory habit have modified their policy effort to adopt more and more 'pink' social justice agenda. With this 'accommodation' The Greens core environmental conservation focus is being diluted by increasing 'pink' 'Left-leaning', social justice policies.

3. The core driver of environmental degradation (including pollution, habitat loss, species extinctions) is the exponential human population increase and the unchecked encouraged consumerism per capita. More people in the same area causes more pressure on the environment - simple logic!

Climate change is merely a background broad incremental consequence; it is the consequence, not the driver of the environmental problems!

Brown and his Greens have sided with the population control lobby but only in vague in-principled support. Reason for the token support is that the new pink allegiances and policies adopted by The greens have inherently compromised the ability of The Greens to achieve a consensus on a population control policy that would be effective in reducing its environmental impact.

The Greens are now beholden to its 'pink' policies on social justice, yet have failed to recognise that both social justice problems and environmental problems are compounded by excesses in human population.

4. The genteel, academic and legalese make up of The Greens leadership has shaped a group think culture of idealistic passiveness with any change management specifying a conciliatory approach. A lack of effective principled 'balls' has meant a failure to take the conservation fight to the protagonists - the selfish property developers, property speculators, stock market, the banks, the growth lobby, the big corporate exploiters, the self-sustainable captains of industry and industrialisation.

Is it then any wonder, with The Greens beholden to a 'pink' agenda displacing their environmental conservation core, that conservation groups are disaffected with The Greens and that we are experiencing the emergence of a fresh wave of political groups fill the political void?

* Australian Protectionist Party
* Stable Population Party of Australia
* Australia First Party (NSW) Incorporated of which I acknowledge being an active member.

Conclusion

If The Greens continue down their popularist vote grabbing 'pink' path, it is only a matter of time before the critical mass of environmental conservation disaffection in The Greens realises a need for an alternative genuine 'green' party to emerge. Personally, a political wing of The Wilderness Society has best chance of achieving that. There is logic in this assessment, but that is another article.