Government Gets ‘F’ on Values

Government Gets ‘F’ on Values

‘F’ is for Effed

 

We are devastated to have to report that the Government – which instituted the Australian Values campaign – has failed its own test.

A Government website, Values Education, has provided a list of the nine most important Australian values which should be taught to Australian kiddies.

Values Australia has assessed the Government, and the Groveller General, Lord Water Cunntiham, against these benchmarks and to our great embarrassment and shame they have failed comprehensively, by not a whisker but, really, entirely.

The key indicators include such core Australian values as a fair go, compassion, honesty and respect.

The assessor remarked that the Government failed largely on account of its policies regarding the Iraq War and David Hicks but also on account of its Industrial Relations legislation and its amendments to the Crimes Act.

For example, the Integrity test requires the applicant to

“Act in accordance with principles of moral and ethical conduct, ensure consistency between words and deeds.”

The Government was unable to provide any evidence to satisfy this requirement.

The full marking sheet is shown here.

Oh Pastor Ted, What a Jock You Are!

Oh Pastor Ted, What a Jock You Are!

There’s a Lotta Love in This Place

 

US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s little girl, Alexandra Pelosi, has made a doco, Friends of God, starring Crystal Methodist, Pastor Ted Haggard, about evangelical christians. And quite an eye-opener it is.

And quite disturbing.

We assume that Pastor Ted will one day release the companion film, Friends of Dorothy.

It’s ironic that the doco was shot when Ted Haggard was still pretending to be straight, before he was outed by a gay ex-prostitute and resigned in disgrace, and before he converted back to Super-Heterodom by the grace of god in a world-record three weeks.

It’s disturbing because Pastor Ted involves his two evangelical friends in some jockstrapping competitive locker-room “dick-measuring” which shamelessly implicates their absent, compromised, objectivised wives. (They did not discuss the advantages of Crystal Meth.)

Values Australia, in any case, was intrigued by the purported heightened libido of those whom the ghostly fire has touched. We had assumed that most evangelical bedroom gymnastics would be confined to the missionary position. So we went in search of the alleged polling. After all, Ted says, “ALL the polls say…” We didn’t find one such poll.

But we did find some interesting material. Like this suggested bisexual threesome:

“Learn How To Please God and Your Wife From A Chirstian [sic] View Point!” shrieks sexually-skilled husband.com (now for sale).

“Discover How Christian Married Couples Have Exciting Sex“ offers christian-sex.net (no longer active)

We liked:

“Steamy Christian Sex: Have Passionate Sex In Marriage – Techniques and Advice That Work!” promised by SteamyChristianSex.com (defunct)

We checked out:

Jamaica Gleaner News – Porn in the pews – Churchmen wrestle with …
…Male church members surfing for sexy pics, survey reveals one-in-five churchmen …

“Churchmen wrestle with” …what? Their members? We had the unsavoury vision of male members searching for internet lolitas in their one-eyed way, and were intrigued by Jollyblogger’s:

The Purpose Driven Sex Life, Part 1

Perhaps Part 2 is “The Orgasm Driven Sex Life” and Part 3 “The Chauffeur Driven Sex Life” starring Hugh Grant.

There was the raunchy (and somehow appropriate for Pastor Ted):

In and Out of the Corporate Closet – Whitepapers – Publications …”Why do I need to know about someone’s sex life?” …
Between one and ten percent of the … Among Evangelical Christians, 60% are in favor while 34% are not. …

and the grossly suggestive:

Fuller Online 2005-2006 Catalogue

And then there was this:

Christian Sex Toys
Discreetly to Your Door-Private
Porn Free-Lingerie-Toys-online shop
mybelovedsgarden.net (in full bloom)

So we had to look.

The homepage promises to provide

“a safe, non-pornographic place to shop, For all your Christian Sex toys and Romance needs, While keeping Christ at the center of your marriage.”

We have to report that we found the assorted Vibrating Bullets, Massage Vibes, Glass Phalluses, G-Spot Vibes, Erection Control and Enhancement devices, Hands Free Clitoral Stimulators and Anal Stimulators very christian and inoffensively plain-brown-wrapperly, although, while they are promoted as specifically christian sex toys, we did not notice a crucifix engraved or embossed on, or attached to any of the vibrators or other devices.

The lingerie was hot and swinging but the photos – of what we assume are the choir girls from the local temple – had been sensitively retouched so as not to arouse.

 

But there was just one problem. We looked and looked and, for the longest time, could not work out what was upsetting us about the pictures until we saw – or rather didn’t see – it.

None of the models has a belly-button! Is this for biblical eve-ish accuracy? we wondered. or are evangelicals more aroused by the navel than the unsaved?

And then we noticed that one of the girls appeared to have soiled herself. That’s when we understood that for evangelicals, the biggest turn-on is indeed the navel and the biggest turn-off is a pooey bottom.

Safe from pornographic lust as promised!

Ah, we’ve come a long way from Augustine and John Calvin!

Thank you, Pastor Ted!

John Howard: Strong or Weak?

John Howard: Strong or Weak?

Choose Your Favourite War Criminal

 

What extraordinary influence our Groveller General enjoys with US President Bush. 
Mr Howard said he will raise the Hicks issue when he meets the US President George W Bush on Tuesday…Mr Howard says he will urge the US Government to hear the case as soon as possible.

That was as recently as 2005 – 16 July – only a year and a half ago!

Mr Howard has been “relaxed and comfortable” that the Military Commissions process is appropriate, legal and being handled justly and sensitively. Because the Americans have assured him so.

“George, I am concerned.”
“Wha, don’t be concerned, little buddy.”
“George, do you torture people?”
“John, Ah am shocked! How could you aks such a thang?”
“Do you?”
“Little Johnnie buddy, I assure you we do not.”
“Then George, (mmm, I like it there, yes just there…) you will have a perfectly acceptable explanation for these photographs taken at Abu Ghraib?”
“John (would you mind just reaching around there for a moment? Aaaah! That is goood!) These were bad apples who should never have obeyed ma orders or revealed our secret and systematic interrogation techniques which we do not and never have used or sent people to secret prisons in Syria, Pakistan, Egypt and Poland and such, to render them speechful.”
“Really?”
“I promise! Would I tell a lie? Oh! Oh! Oh my God!”
“Oh! Oh! Oh George! Oh! I love you George!”
“Have you got a cigarette, darling?”

Guantánamo chief, Rear Admiral Harry Harris, has told the ABC’s PM program that Hicks poses a real security threat and there are no innocent detainees.

Greens leader Bob Brown says he is “outraged” that the head of the Guantánamo Bay detention centre has described David Hicks as a dangerous terrorist, prejudging him guilty without any legal process and

“the rights of Hicks have been removed, he’s had no legal rights – he’s been judged guilty by Admiral Harris himself.”

He should not be outraged. This is old news. Brown is so behind the times.

Said Hicks’s lawyer, David McLeod,

“This suggestion, that because detainees are there, that that is in itself evidence of terrorism, or their being a terrorist, simply puts the lie to any attempt to deal with them in a fair and open manner.

“To suggest that a prisoner in the Australian criminal courts is guilty would in itself amount to a mistrial or an inability to proceed appropriately and fairly before a court.”

They should not be outraged. It has all been said before. Charles Stimson, former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defence in charge of detainee policy at Guantánamo Bay said as much in an interview in January:

Jane Norris: Is there a possibility that there are some folks on Guantanamo that don’t belong there?
Stimson: Not now.

He claimed in the interview that the roughly 400 prisoners in Guantánamo Bay are

“the very terrorists who hit [American corporations’] bottom line back in 2001”.

This came as quite shock. The Australian Government had not realised that there were an additional 400 evil dudes plotting 9/11 and that the US had rounded up every last one of them and these ones are the very ones who slammed the planes into the buildings. But they said nothing at the time. Americans are so modest!

(Stimson says in this interview that

“something like 340 others have previously been released to their home countries”.

Countries like Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Britain. But John Howard has stood strong and insisted that a citizen of his own country should be made an example of to the recalcitrant …um…Saudis and Pakistanis…?)

In a previous interview, June 2006, Stimson said Guantánamo prisoners are

“not entitled to anything more than determining whether they’re enemy combatants or not, which we’ve done”.

See, what Brown doesn’t seem to get is that guilt or innocence has already been determined. There was no need for a trial. Hicks is guilty and that’s that. And we’ve known it for years. We decided it years ago. Even John Howard has been saying so for years.

Oddly enough, elsewhere the US is reported to be having trouble releasing detainees because of “the refusal of other nations to accept Guantanamo prisoners“. Strange that John could claim to be finding it so hard to have Hicks return home to Australia to be dealt with.

How Long Would Jesus Keep Hicks in Guantánamo?

How Long Would Jesus Keep Hicks in Guantánamo?

Love your enemies and be good to them” –

Direct Orders From the Mouth of God:

“Love your enemies, do good to them which hate you,

Bless them that curse you, and pray for them which despitefully use you.”

Christianity is one of the “revealed” religions, meaning that adherents believe the “truth” has been revealed through their sacred texts. Oddly enough, Jews, Muslims and Christians all share the same belief in the revealed truths of the same texts – the old testament.

There are those who believe that the bible is the inspired word of their god. Among these are some who believe that the bible is a guide to morals; others believe that every single word in it is literally true.

President Bush and his evangelical supporters are amongst this group.

Happily, the following passage works for both those seeking a guide and those obedient to specific instruction, all the more so because these words are the literal words spoken by Jesus Christ.

We offer this passage as a service to christians who are considering what their responses ought to be in relation to Iraq, the war on terror, and the incarceration of fellow human beings – even possibly terrorists – in Guantánamo Bay.

We offer this reading because it has come to our attention that there are very many christians whose hearts have been hardened against the heathen; christians who lack compassion and humility; devout christians who seem preoccupied with their own salvation at the expense of the lives of others, little realising that their selfishness and lack of compassion will see the gates to heaven slammed shut against them and cost them eternal life…

So here are the orders from the highest. It could not be more clear. These are the strict and literal instructions of Jesus.

Christians who disobey these direct orders without repentance will go to hell.

Luke 6: 27-38

27   But I say unto you which hear, Love your enemies, do good to them which hate you,
28   Bless them that curse you, and pray for them which despitefully use you.
29   And unto him that smiteth thee on the one cheek offer also the other; and him that taketh away thy cloak forbid not to take thy coat also.
30   Give to every man that asketh of thee; and of him that taketh away thy goods ask them not again.
31   And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise.
32   For if ye love them which love you, what thank have ye? for sinners also love those that love them.
33   And if ye do good to them which do good to you, what thank have ye? for sinners also do even the same.
34   And if ye lend to them of whom ye hope to receive, what thank have ye? for sinners also lend to sinners, to receive as much again.
35   But love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again; and your reward shall be great, and ye shall be the children of the Highest: for he is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil.
36   Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful.
37   Judge not, and ye shall not be judged: condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned: forgive, and ye shall be forgiven:
38   Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal it shall be measured to you again.

You Are a Threat to US Security

You Are a Threat to US Security

Boulleda Hadj

If you can use a computer,
you are a threat to the United States

 

 

Melissa Hoffer is one of those lawyers intentionally slandered in January by Charles Stimson, the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense, the subject of our next post. Hoffer, a Boston lawyer, represents six Guantanamo detainees. Read their story. Read her story.

This is a little known piece, at least to us. Just read it. It is chilling.

Read Hoffer’s description of how our “big friend”,  John Howard’s masturbation mate, really goes about “doing its business”. See how the US really considers the rest of the world, including us. Understand the difference between this Administration’s values, in practice, and the values it claims it wants to export to the Middle East, like the rule of law, like liberty, like human rights, like human decency, like human dignity. Compare the claims of the US Defense Department and the Bush Administration (with the collusion of the Howard Government) about the treatment of prisoners, with the reality of what they do.

The U.S. position is that it may seize anyone, anywhere, at any time, if there is reason to believe that person is an “enemy combatant” someone who is part of or “supporting” (even unwittingly) Al Qaeda, the Taliban, or forces “associated” with these groups.

The global dragnet cast by this definition is so broad that an attorney for the U.S., arguing before Judge Green in December 2004, admitted it would include a little old lady from Switzerland who gave money to an Afghan charity organization that – unbeknownst to her – funneled the contribution to Al Qaeda.

And equally, it should be said, you and I could suffer the same fate.

Hoffer’s closing words in an (unavailable) speech:

“If we extinguish that humanity with lawlessness and cruelty, we extinguish hope for the future of humankind. For when we degrade others, we degrade ourselves, and when we take away a another person’s freedom without just cause, we erode our own freedom. But as we join with others around the world, working, fighting, unjust imprisonment and torture, we honor and preserve our humanity. This is the lesson of Guantanamo.”

According to Wikipedia:

“The six men were formally arrested by Bosnian authorities, tried before the Bosnian Supreme Court, and acquitted of all charges. Even so, upon their release from legitimate Bosnian incarceration, following their acquittal, they were captured by American security officials who transported them to detention and interrogation in the US naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The conduct of the Bosnian authorities was formally condemned as illegal by the Human Rights Chamber of Bosnia Herzegovina, the relevant Bosnian court at the time.

The Associated Press has made the Combatant Status Review Tribunals of four of the six men available for download. Transcripts within these documents record the Bosnians reporting to their tribunal officers that interrogators did not believe that there had ever been any substance to the US allegations that they had planned to bomb the US embassy.

And according to the Washington Post:

Since then, the military has conducted annual reviews of the six men’s status.

Each time, court officers have upheld the original decision.

Records from tribunal sessions in December 2005 show the U.S. military is no longer accusing the Algerians of conspiring to attack the U.S. Embassy in Sarajevo. No explanation for the change is given.

The military has listed other factors in its decision to label the men a security threat.

One detainee was judged a threat in part because he was a karate expert and had taught martial arts to Bosnian orphans, tribunal records show. He was also classified as potentially dangerous because he was familiar with computers.

Another detainee was flagged because he had performed mandatory service in the Algerian army more than a decade ago, as a cook.

Boudella was accused by the U.S. military of joining bin Laden and Taliban fighters at Tora Bora, Afghanistan, the mountain hideout where the al-Qaeda leadership escaped from U.S. forces in December 2001. In fact, at the time, Boudella was locked up thousands of miles away in Sarajevo, after his arrest in the later-discredited embassy plot.

One fresh allegation filed against Boudella last year was that he wore a ring “similar to those that identified the Red Rose Group members of Hamas,” the radical Palestinian movement, according to tribunal records.

Boudella’s wife, Nadja Dizdarevic, responded in an interview that the ring is a common anniversary band worn by thousands of Bosnian Muslims. She said she obtained an affidavit from the jeweler in Sarajevo where he bought the ring and submitted it to the U.S. military in hopes that they will drop the charge at his next hearing.

If it is a mark of belonging to Hamas, then 98 percent of the Bosnian Muslims belong to Hamas,” she said. “For every claim they make against him, I have proof to show them they are wrong, so they have to invent something new.”

The Defense Department declined to answer specific questions about the case, saying that some evidence against the men remains classified.

But a Pentagon spokesman defended the decision to apprehend the six Algerians.

“There was no mistake in originally detaining these individuals as enemy combatants,” said Navy Lt. Cmdr. J.D. Gordon. “Their detention was directly related to their combat activities as determined by an appropriate Defense Department official before they were ever transferred to Guantanamo.”

So be careful. You Are a Threat to US Security

The decision will not be made by a court of law, it will be made by “an appropriate Defense Department official” whatever that might be – you’ll never know or ever be able to find out – on the basis of unquestionable, unreviewable, “classified” information, which you will never be allowed to see. In fact, it is so secret that they can do what they like with no information whatever – because its existence cannot be tested – especially if to reverse a decision would be an embarrassment. There is no accountability whatever and that leads to the brazen corruption we see today at all levels of the Bush Administration.

This is American justice and American law at work under this illegitimate neo-con junta which is so beloved by John Howard and his toadying supporters in the coalition.  

 

Who are the true cowards?

The cowards are not those who “do not have the stomach for the war” (as Cheney puts it when blaming the American people for his own failure); not those who publicly oppose, or privately work against, an illegal, unjust, unsupportable, unethical adventure predicated on deliberate lies by an unutterably stupid President and his unbelievably cruel, greedy and dishonest Vice-President.

The real cowards are those in the administration, the bureaucracy and the military who are too afraid to stand up against obvious, monstrous injustice; who would willingly sacrifice other people’s lives in order to protect themselves from embarrassment; who would sacrifice everything that is, or has been, good and great about their country for the sake of their own careers.

The real cowards are those ordinary people who, although they oppose the war and the excesses of the American, Australian and British governments, do not speak up; who say, “she’ll be right”.

The real cowards include those leaders of nations, like John Howard and Tony Blair, who go along with a madman for the sake of the hope of a little better trade deal, and so are complicit in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of innocent people and the destruction of the lives of millions more; who have participated in and even applauded the ruination of an entire country, the creation of a more dangerous world, a surge in terrorism and the destabilisation of the entire Middle East.

These are the real cowards. These are the real “evil-doers”.

Thomas Paine on David Hicks

Thomas Paine on David Hicks

Thomas Paine, Criminal Subversive

The “Nazgûl” is believed to be seeking legal opinion on whether the following statement is seditious if it can be interpreted as relating to the Government’s (lack of) handling of David Hicks’ detention on Guantánamo, and the Coalition’s subversion of the justice system and the rule of law in Australia:

“He that would make his own liberty secure, must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach himself.”

~ Thomas Paine

If a case can be proved, the Nazgûl is preparing to posthumously imprison Paine’s bones without trial, or to request an anonymous, unquestionable, unfavourable ASIO assessment of Paine so that his bones may be indefinitely detained on Nauru without prospect of release.

Paine, the Nazgûl has learned, was a revolutionary who fought in the American War of Independence and the French Revolution and wrote several subversive books including The Age of Reason, Common Sense, and The Rights of Man.