Every so often, loon pond experiences a crisis.
So many loons, but none of them quintessential. No new Miranda the Devine, while Janet Albrechtsen is off devising some fresh, incoherent way to warn of the dangers of a world government run by leftists.
Just the common or garden ruck of ordinary loons, shrieking and cawing, but without that final finishing touch of loonacy, the feather in the cap, that lifts a column above the rabble of the lemming loon herd.
What to do? Well in case of emergency, break the glass, and reach for The Punch, Chairman Rupert's contribution to a virtual world he doesn't understand.
Every day there, you'll find a politician yammering away - for free - about nothing in particular, and today - an ill fated Friday the 13th - finds us in the company of Sophie Mirabella. Some might prefer a black cat to cross their paths, others will boldly walk under a ladder, the even more dissolute and reckless will open an umbrella inside the house, a few might toss salt, but we, being feckless, stupid, indolent and dumb, clicked on Tough on crime is an empty slogan for ALP.
If she'd just stopped at the header "Tough on crime is an empty slogan" she might have been going somewhere sensible.
But instead she goes down the path of a parrot taught to say a few words over and over again. Ty it with a parrot inflection: tough on crime, tough on crime, tough on crime, tough on crime. Squawk. Lock 'em up, throw away the key. Lock 'em up, throw away the key. Squawk. Liberals soft, liberals marshmallow, liberals gooey, squawk. Sorry, you might mis-read that. Do gooders soft, conservatives tough, tough, feel the biceps baby, hasta la vista baby, let her go bitch.
My suggestion for today? Get out a nice slasher pic, perhaps if you're an age one of the original Friday the 13ths, and enjoy a bit of serial killing by a monster.
Because if you rot your mind reading Mirabella, who knows where the brain damage might end.
Perhaps you might be expecting a substantive piece on the complexities of crime and dealing with criminals in a way that doesn't replicate the bizarre American tendency to put huge numbers of people in private prisons at vast expense to taxpayers without actually affecting the incidence of crime?
Sorry, you'll just get a political parrot demanding real toughness on crime.
But we've been down this path many times before, a path well trodden and usually defined by squawking shock jocks. Perhaps the most notorious 'tough on crime' carry on involves the wretched Tony Blair with his 1997 Labour Party manifesto of being "tough on crime" and "tough on the causes of crime" (here, and an interview here).
If you google the phrase - where would we and Rupert Murdoch be without Google? - you might come across Neal Lawson in the New Statesman, Where wealth disparities and violence meet.
There are two main features of new Labour's toughness. The first is "lidism": keeping a lid on problems, as with a rubbish bin and a nasty smell. The second is "initiativitis": the uncontrollable urge to follow one act of "lidism" with another. Each decision usually contradicts the previous one, and invariably is taken at such a pace that no one in the system has time to implement it.
Though it is only a noisy minority that feels let down by the criminal justice system, these critics are bolstered by a vengeful tabloid press. When Rupert Murdoch is in town, expect extra toughness. This happened when the Home Secretary announced that he wanted to test the feasibility of new laws to identify paedophiles publicly - a campaign that the News of the World has been waging for years.
Well we don't need Rupert Murdoch in town, not when we have Sophie Mirabella. How's this for a simple minded offensive equation:
The Victorian State Attorney General Rob Hulls is a case in point. His appointments now make up half the State’s judiciary – among them two “Lawyers for Labor”, a former Labor candidate, and four senior officials from the left-leaning “Liberty Victoria”, along with many other “activist” Judges.
Without commenting on their individual qualifications, I do question whether their collective views are representative of mainstream values. I wonder if the balance is skewed.
As a Barrister myself, I believe it’s important for the judiciary to maintain the confidence of the public by broadly reflecting the community’s concept of “justice”.
As outlined earlier, the Senior public prosecutor in Victoria also seems to think this is important.
As evidenced in some of his appointments, the Labor State Attorney General clearly does not.
Without commenting on their individual qualifications, I do question whether their collective views are representative of mainstream values. I wonder if the balance is skewed.
As a Barrister myself, I believe it’s important for the judiciary to maintain the confidence of the public by broadly reflecting the community’s concept of “justice”.
As outlined earlier, the Senior public prosecutor in Victoria also seems to think this is important.
As evidenced in some of his appointments, the Labor State Attorney General clearly does not.
Without commenting on their individual qualifications? Well of course she's commenting on their individual qualifications. They skew the balance, their values aren't representative of the mainstream (lord help us if Mirabella is the main stream), they're left leaning or liberal or activist, and therefore by definition soft on crime. When mindless meaningless toughness is required.
But take away the tabloid headlines, and where are things heading? Well let's not speak of Victoria - the Victorians can manage for themselves - but for some time now, NSW has has a nifty Bureau of Crime Statistics & Research site, wherein you can frolic for hours on a black Friday as the weekend looms.
Here's a brief grab from NSW recorded crime statistics quarterly updates: June 2009.
The latest quarterly crime report released by the NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research shows that, over the 24 months to June 2009, one of the 17 major offences showed a significant increase, nine were stable and seven were trending downwards.
Oh god help us all, we need to be even tougher on crime. And even tougher on the Labor party.
Many Judges, like the Labor Party itself, see the principles of restorative justice as the most “just and effective” approach. That’s certainly debatable – and I don’t have the space in this column to go into all the pros and cons. But one thing restorative justice couldn’t be described as is “tough”.
Well sadly I don't have the space to go into the idea that a simple-minded, knee jerk, reflexive parroting of 'tough on crime' is a coherent way to approach justice and dealing with crime and criminality. Because then I might get into substantive issues. Perhaps instead we can just keep slagging off Labor approaches?
So how can Labor claim to be tough on crime when their party platform says the opposite? Moreover, and perhaps more significantly given our proud history of judicial independence, Labor are appointing more and more judges who conveniently share Labor’s “go soft” beliefs.
But hang on, some of the finest conservative minds have realized recently that the 'war on drugs' isn't all that it's cracked up to be, and even a few understand that the war in Afghanistan has been incredibly effective in providing a new boom in the domestic consumption of drugs in the western world (we fight so warlords can make a decent drugs trade profit - now there's a neat free market positive header).
Google the phrase 'war on drugs' - where would we and Chairman Rupert be without Google? -and you'll come across all kinds of interesting insights from all political perspectives, with fresh ideas on offer - like Johann Har's Accept the facts - and end this futile 'war on drugs'. Here's a taster:
The recent furore about the British government's decision to fire its chief scientific advisor on drugs, Professor David Nutt, missed the point. Yes, it is shocking that he was ditched for pointing out the mathematical truth that taking ecstasy is less dangerous than horse-riding, and that smoking cannabis is less harmful than drinking alcohol. But this is how the war on drugs has to be fought. The unofficial slogan of the prohibitionists for decades has been: The facts will only undermine the war, so invent some that show how successful we are, fast.
Look at the United States, the country that pioneered the drug war, and still uses its military and diplomatic might to demand the rest of the world cracks down. In 1998, the Office of National Drug Control Policy was ordered by Congress to stop funding any scientific research that might give the impression that we should redirect funding from anti-trafficking busts into medical treatment of addicts, or that there is any argument to legalise, regulate or medicalise drug use.
Back with Mirabella - oh god do we have to go back to Mirabella - here's the standard simple minded tough on drugs rhetoric in action:
This is where Labor’s rhetoric once again diverges from reality. Despite declaring a pre-election “war on drugs” in 2007, the Rudd Government has largely abandoned the “Tough on Drugs” initiative that was so successful under the Howard Government.
Funding has been cut for both the Tough on Drugs initiative and the Customs and border protection services that so effectively prevented tonnes of dangerous drugs from being imported and getting to our streets.
At the Annual UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs in Vienna in March this year, our “tough” Government actually protested that the term “harm reduction” had been pointedly excluded from a political declaration – effectively betraying Labor’s real “soft on drugs” approach and putting us at odds with our traditional ally, the US.
The successful Howard government policies? The success of our traditional US ally? What she be smoking? Crack?
Instead of wasting your time listening to a parrot, why not hare off to new matilda, and read David Hollier's interview with Norm Stamper, under the header Even Cops Think It's A Bad Idea.
And yes, of course, it's inevitable that we find space for our favorite, the inspiration of this site, conservative commentator Michael Duffy, here in the SMH under the header The cost of the war on drugs.
The debate in Australia could do with some economics. Dr Wodak said this week: "After 40 years, it's time to consider just what the war on drugs has really achieved, and at what cost. It would be very interesting to know just how much Australia has spent on drug law enforcement, and how much has been gained."
John Humphreys, an economist with the Centre for Independent Studies, says: "It gets interesting when you try to do a cost-benefit analysis on the prohibition. Basically, there aren't any benefits."
Ah yes, a cost benefit analysis. Well it sounds better than Mirabella's simple minded political analysis:
Rapke rightly pointed out that the penalties imposed by Courts in drug cases continue to be inadequate having regard to the insidious effect drugs have on society and said that sentences should reflect “the huge public disquiet about the prevalence of drugs”.
Fear mongering and mindless panic? Way to go.
But why should I have a huge disquiet about the prevalence of alcohol, or for that matter, the selling of tobacco? Sure they're the biggest killers in town, and fiercely disruptive of the efficient functioning of society, with profoundly insidious effects, but I guess there's not the same political upside in embarking on that kind of prohibitionist prudery when it comes to a booze and a fag. Because they tried prohibition and it was a total conservative Mother Grundy folly.
There's more in Mirabella's piece - full of the same kind of political point scoring, attitudinizing, fear mongering, and glibly superficial thinking - including a few lines about the concept of restorative justice.
If you want to pursue an understanding of the concept, why not Google the term. Lordy where would you and I and Rupert Murdoch's newspapers be without Google?
You might try the Wiki here.
Sure they're all mamby pamby soft do gooder sites trying to sort out society and detour us around the desire of 'tough on crime' conservatives turning the world into one giant privately run for profit prison.
Perhaps that explains why, when I hear the phrase 'tough on crime' I reach for my gun.
Enough already, it's Friday. Avoid the cat, walk around the ladder, throw salt over the shoulder, keep the umbrella furled inside a building, and do yourself another favor. Don't bother reading Mirabella.
Instead why not head on down to the local pet store, and have a friendly conversation with any hapless parrot you find cruelly trapped inside a cage. Hit 'em with a toke and mellow out dudes, the weekend is soon upon us ...
UPDATE: I so liked the first response by Dude to Mirabella's piece, I thought I might borrow it. Dude is inclined to be blunt - I fear I wasted way too many words on a rational approach to her squawking. Go Dude:
Now if only we had a society that is tough on the qualifications for being a politician. Then we wouldn’t have to put up with the likes of Sophie writing this sort of rubbish. Surely, we can do better than this waste of space. The coalition is littered with no talent wannabes. Please! let’s introduce some sort of commonsense IQ test to save us the pain of reading this sort of crap from a so called representative. Thank god she’s not my mine, what an embarrassment for her electorate and party.
Now back to a closing image.
Now back to a closing image.
Great article!
ReplyDeleteIt's funny but I wrote a very similar thing here.