Red Rag

I’m confused. How does this…

The Department of Immigration insisted that the 300 detainees in Baxter, half of whom are from Iraq, were oblivious to the protests.

…tally with this earlier statement:

There were only 39 Iraqis being held in detention in Australia and 4200 were on temporary protection visas, he said.

At the time of the original comment, Labor criticised Ruddock for forgetting about those people he’s had locked up on Nauru. Has he forgotten about another 100-odd Iraqis in Baxter, too? Or is Immigration wrong?

Typical: “as protesters left, riot police charged at selected groups to clear them from the area.” Wait until it’s over, then charge people as they leave. Gutless fucks.

Two thoughts: Where is this right-wing student newspaper of which Manne speaks? Also, I’ve had Brock’s Blinded by the Right sitting on my “to read” pile for over a month now. Really should crack it soon…

For all their training, the Australian police forces sure are nervous about a rag-tag bunch of protestors. Apparently, a bloke messing around with a camera tripod (I’m pretty sure it wasn’t Graham) had them worried their helicopter would be shot down:

At the height of tensions between police and protesters today, Special Task and Rescue (STAR) Group officers stormed a makeshift campsite amid fears one protester was armed with a rifle.

A search of the site failed to find a weapon and instead turned up a camera tripod.

Elicia Savvas, a legal support team member with the protesters, said the officers pounced on the campsite with guns.

“We were just sitting around and the police came in, the STAR force people came, with big guns – MP5s,” Ms Savvas said.

“They said they were looking for people they thought might have pointed a gun at the helicopter.

“It was pretty provocative. But it turned out, if it was anything, it was just a camera tripod.”

Needless to say, the police are downplaying the extent of their over-reaction:

A police spokeswoman denied police were armed with machine guns but said they would have carried standard police equipment.

She could not provide details of what standard equipment was.

She said camera footage by police showed what appeared to be the rifle and the helicopter pilot told police it had been aimed at the aircraft.

“We didn’t actually confirm it wasn’t a rifle but we couldn’t find a weapon,” she said.

Hmm. Sounds like Iraq’s WMD. And if it’s not a machine gun, what exactly is this piece of “standard equipment”? It’s not an MP5, as one protestor erroneously claimed, but it’s certainly no pop-gun either:

Having said that, we should remember that the police are dealing with a well-trained outfit of violent criminals:

Mr Brown said no police were injured, despite being “purposely tripped and surrounded by protesters trying to intimidate them”.

For once the Democrats have said something worth hearing:

“The Democrats strongly oppose any sort of weaponry being used like that on what’s clearly just a civilian protest,” Senator Bartlett said.

“Obviously, the police need to do what they can to ensure public safety, but that sort of overkill is completely unacceptable and, I think, highlights some of the real lack of concern for any basic human freedoms and human rights that our Government has.”

… “We do think that some of the actions by police seem to be somewhat over the top, arresting people for kite flying seems somewhat extreme to me…”

Me too.

Oh, and if you want to save on police costs next time, I have a suggestion. Instead of sending in ten heavily-armed paramilitary officers, just use five. That ought to be enough to deal with one hippy with a tripod — and much cheaper, too.

Labor’s position on Australia’s role in post-war Iraq is completely inadequate and self-contradictory.

Here’s Kevin Rudd explaining why we need to have troops in Iraq:

Australia’s status as an Occupying Power has been confirmed by the UN Secretary General, the British Government and even Prime Minister Howard (albeit with great reluctance).

The Geneva Convention outlines what precise responsibilities Occupying Powers have towards the civilian population of the country they are “occupying”. These responsibilities include:

• The maintenance of law and order;
• The provision of health and hospital services to the local people; and
• The operation of basic infrastructure, such as electricity, water and roads.

Australia’s responsibilities are therefore clear cut.

Indeed. We fucked up by going into the war, but now we have a responsibility to clean up after ourselves.

Which is why Chris Evans sounds silly when he says (in a media release that is not yet available on the ALP website):

The Government should immediately rule out any peacekeeping role for Australian troops in Iraq. The pressure now on Australia to commit further troops is the direct result of being one of just three countries that committed troops to the US led attack on Iraq.

He goes on to say (rightly) that Australia should press for the UN to take control of the clean-up. In that case, Australia should be involved.

What he’s saying is that if Australia has a legal obligation under international law to keep the peace, we should not provide peacekeepers. On the other hand, if that legal obligation is removed, we should provide peacekeepers. I believe the only morally defensible position is to insist on both.

This war has, like the Tampa “crisis”, driven a wedge through Labor. While they flounder about looking for a coherent and defensible position, the Coalition is free to consolidate its support among the community.

UPDATE [5:05pm]: Upon re-reading Chris Evans’ media release, I noticed that I’ve misrepresented him slightly. In fact, he argues that with the UN in charge, Australia should not provide peacekeepers, but should provide other aid: “Australia is best placed to provide humanitarian and reconstruction assistance, not peacekeeping forces.” Thus Labor’s position is not self-contradictory. However they still need to make their position clearer.

Also, Howard’s position is hardly consistent — we’ve gone from no plans for peacekeepers to a total backflip. If Labor wants to capitalise on this flip-flopping (which has been a prominent feature in Howard’s war plans), it needs to have a strong, clear position of its own.

1. waking up fresh
2. honours group beers
3. putting two and two together
4. laughing
5. walking home from the bus stop at night
6. listening
7. crossing things off lists

Thanks to Jill, whose different voices are all worth hearing.

Fucking disgrace.

“As the old saying goes, you can’t spell “shield” without “l” and “i” and “e” … ” And you can’t spell Blair without “l” and “i” and “a” and “r”…

Tim Blair says of the soldiers occupying Iraq: “They haven’t looted anything.” Um, yes they have. And they’ve also encouraged looting, which goes far beyond mere failure to prevent it.

There’s a theory going that the Pentagon-backed criminal Ahmad Chalabi collaborated with the US forces to stage the now-iconic statue removal. The link? One of Chalabi’s mercenaries was present at the media stunt.

Here’s a convenient pop-up graphic that puts the pieces together. Here’s another that fairly conclusively demonstrates that it’s the same man in both pictures.

So what does it prove (except that some people have way too much time on their hands)? Probably nothing. But possibly that the US is cooperating far more closely with Chalabi than the State Department or the CIA would like.

UPDATE: It seems that the flag used to cover the statue’s face “was the flag that was flying over the Pentagon on September 11.” This would suggest that the Pentagon is active on the ground in Baghdad, manipulating Chalabi into power.

While I’m editing this, I might as well give more prominence to something I wrote in a comment:

[The involvement of Chalabi in the media stunt] might be evidence that the Pentagon hawks may have more influence at the moment than the doves in the US Administration. That could have significant consequences for the future — not just because an corrupt fraudster with little support within Iraq might be propped up as the nation’s new leader, but because the “perpetual war” might soon move on to Syria or Iran.

I just received an interesting letter:

Please find attached a Cabcharge card that was requested for you, following your appointment to the staff of the Minister for Defence. For security purposes, I would be grateful if you could sign the back of the new card immediately on receipt.

For security purposes, perhaps the Minister for Defence should stop sending Cabcharge cards to random strangers?

The Arab News refers to “the coalition of two and a bit”. I guess Australia is the “bit”…

Marco has dispelled Gareth’s name-changing conspiracy theory. Oh, and he’s not in the ISO, either.

As our government applauds the overthrow of an evil dictator, their disgraceful policies mean a man faces 20 years in jail for helping people escape the same evil dictator.

Alan Anderson demonstrating his awesome intellect again: “Last time the US thought it knew where Saddam was, they fired in a few cruise missiles to try to take him out. The result was a deal of uncertainty over whether he survived. This time they decided not to take any chances… Four 2000-pound bombs! Was he in there? We don’t know.” So, um, “The result was a deal of uncertainty over whether he survived.”