With the freedom lovers restricting freedom even further to defend freedom, (oh, and don’t forget security), I am reminded of this from Peter Arnett about Bến Tre city in Vietnam on 7 February 1968.

He wrote that a US army commander said:

‘It became necessary to destroy the town to save it.’

Listening to our Prime Minister and Attorney-General recently on more ASIO powers and restrictions on the media I think what they are saying is that it has become necessary to destroy freedom to save it.

Apart from jailing journalists for the crime of exposing ASIO’s crimes, the legislation gives far-reaching powers to ASIO to hack the net and change material. As a parliamentary committee said:

The amendment would enable ASIO to use a third party computer or ‘communication in transit’ in order to access data held on a target computer. If necessary to achieve the purpose, ASIO would also be able to add, copy, delete or alter data on the third party computer or communication in transit.

So the kids of radical leftists will now be able to say that ASIO ate their homework. Any attempt by teachers to elicit information could then be met with the claim that to reveal more would render the children liable for prosecution under section 35P of the ASIO Act which makes it a crime punishable by ten years in jail to reveal details of ASIO operations. There is one small silver lining to these profound attacks on our freedoms.

ASIO ate my homework