AKA Phillip Ruddock  AKA ‘Dock Vader

How dare ordinary ‘people’ have “views!” 

 

Asked on Southern Cross radio whether the case was a mess, he replied:
“No, what I think has happened is that people who have views about the nature of the law are determined to try and bring it into disrepute. That’s what I think is happening.”

Yes, that is exactly what is happening in some quarters.

Those who believe that they own the law and that the law is a tool for re-election, or for legal validation of unethical and immoral policy, or for the pursuit of personal agendas, are certainly bringing it into disrepute.

Elsewhere, what is happening is that — by revealing information about the way the law is being used and abused, and by debating processes and procedures — people who care about the law and its already tenuous relationship with “justice” are illustrating how the law is a bad law, how the law is being used disreputably and how the law in general is being debauched by the government and its stooges.

For your interest, if any, here are the relevant sections of the Crimes Act that relate to Haneef’s charge:

102.7 Providing support to a terrorist organisation…..

(2) A person commits an offence if:

(a) the person intentionally provides to an organisation support or resources that would help the organisation engage in an activity described in paragraph (a) of the definition of terrorist organisation in this Division; and(b) the organisation is a terrorist organisation; and(c) the person is reckless as to whether the organisation is a terrorist organisation.

Penalty: Imprisonment for 15 years.

_________________
terrorist organisation means:

(a) an organisation that is directly or indirectly engaged in, preparing, planning, assisting in or fostering the doing of a terrorist act (whether or not a terrorist act occurs); or
(b) an organisation that is specified by the regulations for the purposes of this paragraph (see subsections (2), (3) and (4)).

_________________

“member” of an organisation includes:

(a) a person who is an informal member of the organisation; and

(b) a person who has taken steps to become a member of the organisation; and

(c) in the case of an organisation that is a body corporate–a director or an officer of the body corporate.

_________________

terrorist act means an action or threat of action where:

(a) the action falls within subsection (2) and does not fall within subsection (3); and

(b) the action is done or the threat is made with the intention of advancing a political, religious or ideological cause; and (c) the action is done or the threat is made with the intention of:

(i) coercing, or influencing by intimidation, the government of the Commonwealth or a State, Territory or foreign country, or of part of a State, Territory or foreign country; or

(ii) intimidating the public or a section of the public.

_________________
(2) Action falls within this subsection if it:

(a) causes serious harm that is physical harm to a person; or

(b) causes serious damage to property; or

(c) causes a person’s death; or(

d) endangers a person’s life, other than the life of the person taking the action; or

(e) creates a serious risk to the health or safety of the public or a section of the public; or(

f) seriously interferes with, seriously disrupts, or destroys, an electronic system including, but not limited to:

(i) an information system; or

(ii) a telecommunications system; or

(iii) a financial system; or

(iv) a system used for the delivery of essential government services; or

(v) a system used for, or by, an essential public utility; or

(vi) a system used for, or by, a transport system.

(3) Action falls within this subsection if it:

(a) is advocacy, protest, dissent or industrial action; and

(b) is not intended:

(i) to cause serious harm that is physical harm to a person; or

(ii) to cause a person’s death; or

(iii) to endanger the life of a person, other than the person taking the action; or

(iv) to create a serious risk to the health or safety of the public or a section of the public.

Note that the law clearly requires you to satisfy yourself  that any person to whom you render a service or a “resource” which may conceivably assist a member of a terrorist organisation to perform, or conceive, or plan, or prepare, or assist a terrorist act — a packet of nails, say, or a bottle of Ammonia, or a map, or a tank of petrol — is not a member of a terrorist organisation. And the evidentiary burden that you took sufficient steps to satisfy yourself of this probably rests with you.

Luckily for the government, it could be argued (although we don’t) that the Government itself would be guilty of a “threat made with the intention of advancing a political, religious or ideological cause”, “coercing, or influencing by intimidation”, “intimidating the public or a section of the public” if it weren’t for subsection (3).

On the other hand, it could also be argued, surely (although we don’t), that the government’s invasion of Iraq was intended “to cause serious harm that is physical harm to a person and to cause a person’s death, and to endanger the life of a person, other than the person taking the action” (who was safe in Canberra), and “to create a serious risk to the health or safety of the public or a section of the public” (at least the Iraqi public).

Thank you for reading this far!  You might think producing a post like this takes a bit of work. 
It does! If you’ve appreciated it you might consider encouraging me. ( We all like validation! )   

Buy Me A Coffee

All posts

Categories

You might also like:

Life in Australia

One word: Durian   obert – a self-styled “foreigner” to our shores – is most upset to have been hoaxed by the false promise and dashed hopes of life in Australia. A few days ago Robert commented on an ancient post here at Values Australia and...

A Man’s a Man

Robert Burns statue in Writers Museum EdinburghWithin the first five seconds we were hooked   e were on the way to work, tuned in to Radio National’s Book Show, a replay of the opening address by Andrew O’Hagan from last year’s Sydney Writers’...

Migently Mountain Manifesto: 3

11.   Science is not a set of facts. Science is a process. The process is to — a) observe, b) speculate, c) propose an explanation (or “theory”), d) devise an experiment which i) can be repeated (“replicable”) and ii) can prove the theory false (“falsifiable”) e)...

Haneef “Not Uninnocent”

  The materials available to me While there are inferences that are available from the material I have, I am of the view that they are not sufficiently strong to exclude reasonable hypotheses consistent with innocence.” – Damien Bugg, DPP Did...

Happily, No

  To the – what, 12-year-old? – spammer who wrote: Hey forum members I just became a member of this forum (Great work by the admin, mods and seriously every member around.) [etc. spam spam spam and spam etc…]" we’d just like to say: No, you...

Blameshifting 101

You've got to hand it to our Prime Monitor. He is the absolute guru of blameshifting and that’s something to be proud of. You know, he has a position to maintain, an aura to protect, an air of infallibility to project. We can’t have him looking weak and fallible.  He...

You Can’t Handle the Truth!

  ... This was a lie and we could not let them publish it ...   e keep thinking of Jack Nicholson's character's justification for the secrecy that governments and their institutions maintain over their citizens – that is to say, their...

What is Arpa Narpa Narp?

A guide to Federal Electioneering     Q: What is “Arpa Narpa Narp“?   Where everyone’s bills are going, according to folksy, down with the biddies, Tony Abbott today.  Strangely enough Sir Roger don’t recall his bills ever going...

Only Thus?

  Let’s get one or two things clear: We are not against Jewish people in general. We are opposed to the actions of some individuals in particular. We are not opposed to their religion in particular. We are opposed to all religious belief (except, of course, the...

‘I’m Sir Roger and I’m Fucked’

  This is not for you   eally. We just want to acknowledge ourselves privately but publicly (it makes sense to us, anyway). It’s not meant to be onanistically self-congratulatory, except in the sense that we have achieved some things and...

A Brief History of Dog

  Clever Brainiac Shorthand   he (£1-a-day) Times has released excerpts of Stephen Hawking’s soon to be released new book, co-written with American physicist Leonard Mlodinow, The Grand Design. The universe can and will...

Keelty Must Go At Last

  Howard’s last ditch: a failure called Keelty    e wish to note the news this week that: ASIO has revealed it “consistently” advised the Howard government it had no evidence connecting Mohamed Haneef to a British...

M-m-m-My Corona

  What is it With Toilet Paper?   When age can, uninvited, link the distant poppy past of The Knack with the all too adjacent Present and come up with a pun, Sir Roger is delighted that there are others still living who appreciate the troubling incongruity...

Heads They Win, Tails You Lose

Whom the gods wish to destroy they first send mad — Euripides   n 2007  we pleaded  … tell me that America isn’t completely barmy, batty, berserk, bonkers, cracked, crazed, cuckoo, crazy, demented, deranged, dippy, flipped out, fruity, haywire,...

Kev’s Massive Package

  It takes Balls to Punish the Jobless   he thing about the unemployed is that, well, they’re powerless; or rather, they’re disempowered, particularly by the feeling of being unemployed in a culture in which what you do, not to mention...

Lord Roger Migently?

Back to the Regency Future   ir Roger Migently, as you must surely realise, has been quite unwell. He has been managed like an unlucky skier in an induced coma these many months since September 2013, when the floor of the Migently Mansions...

WTF

What do we want? Freedom!   hen do we want it? When it's ok with the police! Mr Howard, to his cheer squad at the Sydney Institute:    Freedoms and rights, especially for women and children, are little more than cruel...

Mouldy Media Pop-Tart

    ust a question: Why do we have to keep putting up with fatuous, mouldy, media pop-tart, Gerard Henderson, spouting all over the place? This pompous irrelevance who ludicrously has laid claim to being in the political centre, whose...

A Beautiful Thing

US Policy Adviser redefines “Beauty” We have noticed a report that Kenneth Adelman has claimed that what the Coalition has done in Iraq is “a beautiful thing”. And we agree whole-heartedly. It’s a pity so few people now are able to see it this way. It just takes a...

On War: Notes For My Son

  …and for yours, and for all of us.   ir Roger is currently in the land of the poppy (the other one) but not near Flanders fields. Yet there are poppies here in the South of France and the whiff of war and bloody conflict is inescapably,...

Let Us Prey

Sunday Sacrilege — Early Edition       Leader of the World’s Largest Organised Paedophile Ring Visits Britain he leader of the world’s largest organised ring of paedophiles has been greeted by Queen Elizabeth with all the courtesy...

Keelty

  Gone at long last   ow much time should one spend on this slug? We don’t even feel like woo-hoo. Just “at last” and “good riddance” and “what took you so long”. One of the things we really dislike about (not exclusively-) Australian...

The Ancient Marinara

  He's a Legend, and our friend   e wish he wouldn’t describe himself as “ancient”. That tends to put us at the edge of a category we fiercely resist. Richard Neville, one of the founders of homepagedaily.com, was the infamous, notorious...

Now LOOK ….

   Not this bloody time   W e have held it in for a very long time but today was the last straw. For seeming ages journalists have been describing people who defend themselves against legal allegations, or who mount arguments against legal charges, as...

Did Dick? Dick Did!

  My Dick dick is bigger than your dikdik   S Vice-President Dick Cheney has arrived in Australia. Dick is visiting to offer John Howard a reach-around for the upcoming federal erection. Values Australia staff report that Howard welcomed Dick...

Just a couple of questions…

  We have just a couple of questions. One older; one new   Firstly... Some economists get paid a lot, we assume, at least the “guru”-type ones who appear on television and write books. What do they get paid for exactly?  To divine the future, supposedly,...

A Moron in a Hurry – Part 3

  Or Worse – a Catholic Priest   Previously on Moron in a Hurry :   ir Roger, strapped to the rack by the Madam Intimidatrix of the Hooded Brethren of the Gruff Wiblam Edifice, shouted that “Freedom is a state of mind”, wondering...

Such Is Life

"Unemployed at last!"    e think this is the best Australian novel ever written. Yes, we know there are many contenders and perhaps The Tree of Man comes a close second. But to us, at least, Such Is Life by “Tom Collins” (Joseph Furphy),...

Rude Britannia & Australian Values

How Very Dare You!  Yes, we know, the British are the world leaders in "la politesse"  and "cortesia" (ironically*). They will never be impolite to anyone. They would never call a black person a "nig-nog". Not to their face. They would never call an Australian a...

Ike’s Insight

t seems so strange to realise that Dwight Eisenhower, a 5-star General and highly-respected Republican President in his day, would nowadays be regarded by most ordinary Republicans as a pussy, a commie and a traitor to “traditional” American...

0 Comments