Freedom…? That’s a furniture store isn’t it?

When I was a kid I didn’t know a lot about politics and the way it all worked, but I did know one thing. There was one indisputable fact that could be used to justify any annoyance that I wished to perpetrate on my siblings. I could stand where I wanted, could make whatever noise I wanted and I could follow or parrot whoever I wanted all with the one simple, straight forward defence, ‘it’s a free country’. We all seemed to believe and accept that fact and it was probably reasonably true back then. However, recent events in Australia may set a precedent that could remove the basic rights of children. It may no longer be possible for them to be annoying little brats under the ‘free county’ defence.

The events I am referring to are those surrounding Dr Haneef who has been detained in Queensland and charged with ‘recklessly’ providing material support to terrorists. The terrorists in question are the seemingly incompetent ‘bombers’ in London and Glasgow who obviously had more money than mathematical ability when they put petrol bombs into a Mercedes Benz and a Jeep Cherokee hoping to cause massive damage, death and terror. The plot failed. Nobody was killed and the only injury was to the driver of the ‘car bomb’. Terror experts said that there was little chance that the bombs could have caused anything more than a big fireball and it is laughable to compare them to the car bombs in Iraq.

So some guys planned and executed a failed attack. That’s enough to put themselves into a lot of trouble I’m sure. But what is going on with Dr Haneef? Dr Haneef is related to two of the arrested ‘bombers’, the driver of the Jeep Cherokee, Kafeel Ahmed and Sabeel Ahmed who is charged with foreknowledge. Dr Haneef has admitted to sharing a house with his cousin and when he left London in 2006 he left his pre-paid mobile phone sim card behind as it was of little use in Australia. It is alleged that Ahmed decided to use that sim card as a detonation device inside one of the cars.

Haneef was detained for 12 days without charge and then charged with ‘reckless’ support of terrorists because the AFP had no other evidence against him other than an old sim card. The judge in the case granted Haneef bail but now immigration minister Kevin Andrews has revoked his visa sending him to Villawood Detention Centre. It is bad enough that the AFP trashed Haneef’s home, causing him to be evicted and the charges have left him without a job, but now the Federal Government has stepped in and effectively labelled him a guilty man.

This may be sold by Mr Andrews as being in the public's best interest and to ‘protect’ us but how is side-stepping the basic principles of law ever good for the country? Dr Haneef may possibly be complicit in the attacks but the fact of the matter is that the AFP were not able to provide enough evidence to prove that. They have detained a man for no good reason and however they want to spin it, the truth is Dr Haneef has been assumed guilty with little chance of being found innocent. The damage is done.

The new terror laws on which Dr Haneef has been held fly in the face of freedom and fairness. They set a precedent that would allow any person in Australia to be arrested and detained without charge and for the Federal Government to override the judicial system at their will. These are the sort of unlawful actions that we attacked Saddam Hussein for. The ability to ‘disappear’ any person whom the government deems a threat should never be tolerated.

We are constantly told that the ‘terrorists’ hate our freedoms and want to change our way of life. It seems the government’s answer to that is to get in first and remove our freedoms and change our way of life first so the terrorists can’t. Good thinking!

If only Dr Haneef had thought to use the other great childhood defence. When they accused him of being a terrorist he should have said “I know you are, but what am I?”

Nah! It’s not about the Oil.

Finally, some words of truth from our government.

It seems that according to Brendan Nelson our troops are in Iraq to secure the oil supplies. After all this time the government admits something that we have accused them of all along. Of course Mr Howard is playing down this comment and insisting that our troops are there to support our allies in bringing democracy to Iraq. (Or at least ensuring that there won’t be enough of them left alive to feel oppressed.)

The amazing thing is that people are still siding with Mr Howard on this issue. Some even claiming that we need to secure the oil to avoid rising fuel costs and invading Iraq was justified. But how do you justify an illegal invasion?

Saddam Hussein was an awful dictator and the Iraqi people certainly didn’t deserve to endure his reign. But if it wasn’t for the oil would we have joined the fight to save them? It’s just very lucky for them that their country had something we need. There are many severely oppressed people in nations around the world and we are not in any rush to bring any of them democracy. Why not?

We pretend that we are the ‘good guys’ in Iraq. The media refer to the insurgents there as ‘Al Qaeda’ and ‘terrorists’ but ask yourself what would happen in Australia if a foreign country decided that we needed to be liberated and that our resources needed to be ‘secured’. If we were invaded for our iron ore or gold don’t you think that we would fight back? If our government, army and police were replaced by supporters of the invaders wouldn’t we attempt to unseat them? If the invaders were claiming that they were there to help when it was obvious that they wanted our resources wouldn’t we feel betrayed? If Australian civilians were being slaughtered and written off as collateral damage wouldn’t we be outraged and vengeful? Australia has assisted the U.S. in an unlawful invasion and has aided and abetted the theft of oil. In essence we are international criminals and I won’t be surprised if history views us that way.

For John Howard to pretend that his decision to send troops to Iraq had nothing to do with oil is arrogant and very revealing. Does he really expect us to believe that someone who has been a politician for as long as he has and who is such good friends with George W Bush doesn’t understand the realities of global politics? To believe that Mr Howard is ‘unaware’ of the corrupt nature of the global military machine and the corporate interests in the Middle East is supremely naïve. We are supposed to believe that he honestly thought there were WMDs in Iraq. We are supposed to believe that he honestly thought that the Bali bombings were connected to Saddam Hussein through Al Qaeda and that the U.S. government wasn’t using September 11 to justify pre-planned invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. If he did believe those things then he is seriously, too stupid to be running our country. If he knew they were lies then he is complicit.

So is Mr Howard stupidly naive or a morally bankrupt liar? I think that is a fair question to ask in an election year. Either way he has a lot of blood on his hands which even his clean image can’t hide forever.

And why aren’t these questions being asked by the media or the opposition?