TRAILING THROUGH THE BREACHES

Sydney Harbour, the view from Double Bay Sailing Club.

The social engineers had set out to destroy the traditional culture of the Australia, and succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. Nowhere, now, was the traditional optimism which had shrouded the working class. Nowhere did reward equate to effort. If they postured as intellectuals, it was only to repeat the government propaganda of the Australian Broadcasting Commission. If they purported to believe in "diversity", all one had to do to watch them dissolve into hate spitting lunatics was to disagree with them.

The Tables of Knowledge were deathly quiet. 

The hotels which had once been the communal centres of a heavy drinking culture had been destroyed. 

Like the religious police of Islamic State, police cars, naked in their candy-colour authority or masked in plain clothes, cruised the few places of social interaction left. The Islamic ban on alcohol was being introduced step by crazy step. It was easier to stay home and watch the endless piffle on television, than it was to risk harassment or arrest after dark. Fear was settling through the bones of what had once been a suburban face, where everyone had assumed the future would be brighter, freer, wealthier.

In fact the living standards of Australians were settling by something like one per cent a year, and in the boiling frog syndrome, many had come to accept diminished circumstance, diminished horizons, broken places, a government which did not work, a vast bureaucratic edifice which did not serve but enslaved. Old Alex wandered, as best he could, through the remnants, heard the haranguing voices of those tasked to harass him, the surveillance teams which had misused their power, who abused privacy routinely, who spread false rumours and made it their mission to undermine and ridicule their targets, for no other reason than that they could.

Step by terrible step.

Is that all you ever wanted to be, he asked of his tormentors. A slave to career bureaucrats misusing their power at every step? An agent of harassment. A Secret police which had run amok, without integrity and without political oversight. 

It had once been deemed, or seemed, as if some kind of madness, to think one was under surveillance, a clear sign of a delusional, paranoid state.

All you had to do to realise the truth was read Dirty Secrets: Our ASIO files, where some of Australia's best known activists read their own files under the 30-year rule, where Australian Security Intelligence Organisation was forced to show their hand. Some, such as aboriginal activist Gary Foley, journalist turned academic David McKnight, gay activists such as Dennis Altman and Lex Watson, and others such as former High Court Chief Justice Michael Kirby and one of Australia's most famous communists Mark Aarons, he had met in various guises; disguises. 

As longtime activist Jean McLean wrote:  

In the parallel world of spydom the distorting mirror is, it seems, the only reality.

My Reflections on my ASIO files make me wonder if successive governments have lost sight of the rights of the citizen in this democracy 'If you don't have anything to hide it doesn't matter' is a commonly held heard view full stop comma especially when debates arise on issues such as a national identity card stop of course it matters. What could be more unsavoury then being followed, having your phone tapped, your letters opened and not knowing who Among Friends and colleagues might be reporting on you. In this Lives of Others world, inhabited by those who use the powers of the state for political purposes, democracy is the loser. While I may not have been irrevocably harmed by what the spooks did and may still be doing to invade my privacy, society as a whole certainly is.

Clearly at the very least there is a desperate need for proper oversight of the security services to ensure our rights are not trampled on, and a genuine debate needs to take place about why we need such an all-pervading secret spying machine.

 THE BIGGER STORY:

https://www.malcolmturnbull.com.au/media/national-security-statement-tuesday-13-june-2017

NATIONAL SECURITY STATEMENT PRIME MINISTER MALCOLM TURNBULL:

Mr Speaker, the global threat we face from Islamist terrorism has been cruelly brought home to us in the past two weeks with young, innocent Australians murdered in Baghdad, London and Melbourne.

In a relatively short period, we have also seen attacks in Iraq, Iran, Egypt, Jakarta, and – grave concern – growing ISIL activity in the Southern Philippines, with ISIL affiliated terrorist forces besieging a city.

We have mourned the loss of four Australians killed in terrorist attacks in the last few weeks.

12 year old Zynab Al-Harbiya was killed in a suicide bombing in Iraq.

Kirsty Boden and Sara Zelenak were murdered in the London Bridge attack which saw two other Australians injured.

And only last week, a violent criminal – known to have had past links to terror groups – murdered Kai Hao, a husband and a father in Melbourne. The killer wounded three police officers as well.

Our deepest sympathies are with the victims and their families.

And we thank the police and security services who rushed to the scene to keep us safe - whether on London Bridge or in a Brighton street. They, together with the men and women of the Australian Defence Force, put their lives on the line to keep us safe. 

The Brighton murder was the fifth terror-related attack on our shores in three years.

All of us have asked how such a criminal with such a long and well-known history of violence and terrorism could have been allowed parole.

We are all entitled to feel safe and secure in our own country. And we are all entitled to ask the question - what more must we do? And we must also be resolute. We must be united.

My unrelenting focus is to do everything possible to keep Australians safe and maintain our way of life, our values and our freedom.

We must be clear eyed and recognise that this is the new reality we face.

The national terror threat level remains at Probable and we are not immune from the global impact of the conflicts in the Middle East and the instability around the world. 

But we should also be reassured, our law-enforcement agencies, intelligence services and Australian Defence Force are the best in the world - they keep us safe and they enable Australians to do what we always have - enjoy our freedom.

We lead our Australian way of life on our terms and will not buckle or be cowed by this scourge of Islamist terrorism.