Two shocking new moves against freedom and democracy:
If there is one thing that has been absolutely proven beyond a shadow of a doubt by state responses to Covid it is this: Western governments can descend into tyranny instantly and easily. Any crisis – real or imagined – can serve as a pretext for more government powers, and more politicians lording it over the masses.
Every day it seems another hideous form of creeping tyranny is being pushed. Let me talk about two Australian versions of this – one in Victoria and one national. Both are a real concern, and one really becomes overwhelmed with these continuous assaults on freedom, democracy and the rule of law.
Dictator For Life Dan
If you ever needed the perfect dictionary definition of what it means for someone to be ‘drunk on power,’ you would simply need to look at our would-be Dictator For Life, Dan Andrews. I have written often on this megalomaniac and his dangerous power grabs, and he gets worse each passing day. Consider a recent news item:
People found guilty of “intentionally and recklessly” breaching public health orders would face two years in jail or a $90,000 fine, under new pandemic laws proposed by the Andrews government. On Tuesday morning the government tabled its Public Health and Wellbeing Amendment (Pandemic Management) Bill 2021, which would curtail the chief health officer’s powers, giving the premier the authority to declare a pandemic and the health minister the role of making public health orders. https://www.theage.com.au/politics/victoria/two-year-jail-terms-loom-for-health-order-breaches-under-pandemic-laws-20211026-p59349.html
You can see the proposed legislation here: https://www.smh.com.au/interactive/hub/media/tearout-excerpt/4025/591316B.D12-(1).pdf
I have mentioned before how parliamentary democracy is rapidly dying in Victoria, and how Dan, a handful of bureaucrats, and three traitorous “independents” in the Upper House are running the whole show. For months now Chairman Dan has been doing grubby deals with the likes of ex-hooker and Sex Industry head Fiona Patten and two other dodgy parties.
It is the oldest game in the political book: they scratch Dan’s back and he scratches their backs. He has been getting his ‘temporary’ emergency powers passed by cutting deals with them. The Libs do not have the numbers to stop them, so whatever Dan wants, Dan gets.
Now he wants full-tilt dictatorial powers – forever! And anyone caught violating his will can expect a two year stint in the slammer, or be forced to bankrupt themselves with nearly a $100,000 fine. Sieg Heil Dan! And just a few days ago he was lying through his teeth when he said there would be no more lockdowns and the like in Victoria. If that is the case, why the need for these oppressive new powers?
Paul Murray is one of many who have warned against this ugly power grab:
Sky News host Paul Murray says the new pandemic laws being proposed in Victoria are “madness” from the premier who recently promised there would be “no more lockdowns”. “The health minister, not the chief health officer, would be the one making COVID rules,” he said. “But how’s this, it’s the government, not the parliament that gets the power to extend the powers.”
Mr Murray said the fines which could face ruler breakers are “extraordinary”. “Individuals could face $90,000 fines for breaking the rules that Chairman Dan wants to put inside this legislation for lockdowns he’s promising aren’t going to happen anymore. And for companies that deliberately break COVID or pandemic rules – fines that would destroy any business – $425,000.”
Please watch this short video for all the shocking details: https://www.skynews.com.au/opinion/paul-murray/victorias-proposed-pandemic-laws-are-madness/video/5547141867ddd6d2cd7f0e8eb6c8b4a4
And Peta Credlin recently interviewed Victorian Opposition Leader Matthew Guy on this. In part it says this:
Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews is “not just drunk on power” – he is “abusing it”. Mr Guy discussed proposed laws which could strip the Victorian chief health officer of power in a pandemic and allow the Premier to have accountability for public health decisions.
The opposition leader said this would be giving “the most power-hungry politician in Australia licence to declare a pandemic” and ultimately giving him “the power to determine what he wants to do for an indefinite period of time”. Accountability would rest not with “the cabinet, not his party room or caucus, not the Parliament but him,” Mr Guy said. “Giving one person that amount of power doesn’t appear to be … anything that I can imagine to be democratic about it.”
See the 7-minute video here: https://www.skynews.com.au/opinion/peta-credlin/daniel-andrews-not-just-drunk-on-power-but-abusing-it/video/62140de0f6d2842ffc4104af1ec4f42a
Also, listen to this vital 12-minute interview with Neil Mitchell and Matthew Guy: https://www.facebook.com/BradBattinMP/videos/1041420943279992/
Digital Identity Bill
The Federal Government is not much better than Dictator Dan when it comes to draconian Statism. This new bill, which like so many others has had little fanfare and very limited publicity for public comment, looks to be a real worry. The Federal website on it is found here: https://www.digitalidentity.gov.au/
Sadly, the deadline for submissions is 5:00pm today (27 October). Submissions can be lodged here: https://www.digitalidentity.gov.au/have-your-say/phase-3/submission-form.
Many have spoken out against this. Let me feature three. One begins by asking some important questions:
Australian citizens have no reason whatsoever to be “grateful” that the government will find it easier to access a comprehensive database of information on every single one of them. The legislation is little more than a very poorly disguised attempt to lay the groundwork for a loathsome Chinese communist style social credit system. A system that would be able to continually monitor in real time our movements, our spending habits, our interactions with commercial businesses and the bureaucracy, not to mention a whole host of other equally likely dangerous and sinister intrusions into our lives.
What will be included in this “digital identity”? Our financial records? Our medical records? Who will be able to gain access? Under what conditions? Is Facial Recognition Technology part of it?
Will the “digital identity” be used to monitor political, social and religious participation, comments on blogs, participation in protests, opposition to sacred shibboleths such as climate change and mass immigration, domestic and overseas travel and your reasons for going to a particular destination?
Most importantly, will the “digital identity” be used to restrict individuals’ movements, access to their assets (particularly cash) and access to goods or services based on their “soundness” and compliance with ridiculous and inexcusable government diktats?
He concludes:
To summarise, we are completely opposed to this legislation, the “digital identity” and the attendant Chinese communist style social credit system that would result. The proposed “digital identity” serves no useful purpose whatsoever. It is beyond unnecessary and will be inevitably subject to abuse by governments, the bureaucracy and malign actors such as hostile foreign governments and local and overseas IT hackers.
Over the last few decades in particular, Australian governments have ceased to act in any kind of good faith manner towards the citizenry. This proposed “digital identity” framework is quite simply an abomination that should never have been even contemplated, let alone come this close to being introduced.
George Orwell’s landmark novel “1984” was not an instruction manual. It was a stark warning about the horrors of an all-powerful utterly intrusive government surveillance state and the abuses it would visit on those unfortunate enough to exist under it.
This “digital identity” legislation must not proceed, not only for the reasons set out above, but also because the Morrison government has no electoral mandate to introduce it. https://newcatallaxy.blog/2021/10/26/guest-post-rabz-submission-in-opposition-to-the-exposure-draft-of-the-digital-identity-legislation-as-proposed-by-the-australian-government/#more-2185
Another piece begins this way: “COVID-19 has undoubtedly provided the staging ground for a new technocentric era for Australian society. Mandated QR check-ins, cashless businesses, vaccine passport apps and even a quarantine surveillance program with facial recognition are all part of an accelerated push towards a fully digitalised economy.”
The author looks at the proposal in detail, and then also speaks to the system in China – something I have often been warning about:
We have seen what happens when state premiers are awarded the power to govern autonomously; megalomania. Propped up by the ‘public health emergency,’ each Australian state, to varying degrees, has inched towards authoritarianism. By definition, authoritarianism is a form of government ‘favouring or enforcing strict obedience to authority at the expense of personal freedom.’
Is this not a fitting description for a regime of vaccine mandates, harsh extended lockdowns, bans on peaceful protesting, public reviling of dissenting views, excessive policing and censorship? The sad truth is that the country we are now living in bears more resemblance to communist China than a western liberal democracy.
In China, technology has been a highly effective tool of oppression and control for decades. The use of mass video surveillance, strict information control and internet activity monitoring are a few of the mechanisms employed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to ensure civilian compliance while identifying and penalising dissidents. The CCP refers to these control measures as ‘the eyes that safeguard China’ — necessary precautions taken for the safety and security of the nation.
Throughout the pandemic, Australia, like China, has also consistently used the rhetoric of protection to warrant government overreach. In the words of C.S Lewis, ‘of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive.’
Perhaps the most insidious of China’s digital initiatives is the social credit system; it began in 2014 as an opt-in program and to this day remains ‘voluntary.’ However, like ‘voluntary’ vaccination in Australia, there are incentives for participating and deterrents for not participating.
The social credit system collects and pieces together data into a unified record — the objective of which is to monitor and evaluate the ‘trustworthiness’ of businesses, institutions and individuals. It’s more than just a means of identification; it’s a metric for determining the ‘good’ and ‘bad’ people in society and treating them accordingly.
The exact methodology behind social credit rankings is unknown, however, your positioning can be affected by even the slightest of transgression like playing your music too loud, jaywalking, spending money frivolously, spreading ‘fake news’ or playing video games too much.
Punishments for poor social credit include increased audits and government inspections for businesses, reduced employment prospects, travel bans, exclusion from private schools, slow internet connection, exclusion from hotels, and public shaming. Rewards for positive social credit include fast-tracked approvals for government services, discounts on energy bills, better interest rates at banks and so on.
If your social credit plummets too far, you may end up on the ‘blacklist,’ which is comprised of those the CCP deems ‘untrustworthy.’ A deterrent for ending up on this unfortunate register is public shaming. The information of blacklisted individuals is deliberately made accessible to the public, and their faces and names are displayed on billboards and in venues alongside the word ‘untrustworthy.’
Chinese journalist, Liu Hu, was placed on the blacklist for writing about censorship and government corruption. The Supreme Court ruled that because of his work, he was “not qualified” to buy a plane ticket, and banned from travelling some train lines, buying property, or taking out a loan.
The social credit system in China is the ultimate merger of technocentrism and tyranny. It is what digitisation looks like in the hands of autocrats, and it is what the Digital Identity system has the potential to become.
It may seem that Australia is a still a world away from the blatant oppression of communist China, but make no mistake, we are hurtling towards that same fate at a frightening pace.
In under 2 years, our society has been restructured from the top-down — Australians are being openly discriminated against on the basis of medical status, freedom has become a privilege bestowed by the government, legislation can no longer be relied upon, extensive propaganda campaigns have invaded all forms of media, those with dissenting views are publicly reviled, shamed and silenced, and the tracking of citizens is not only commonplace but mandated.
The foundation of despotism has already been laid in our nation, all our government now requires is a more effective and streamlined system to implement their regime – could the Digital Identity scheme provide that platform? https://caldronpool.com/australias-digital-identity-program-a-pathway-to-the-social-credit-system/
Finally, please watch this short video on the dangers of this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eD71BKyciVU
The western world that we live in is becoming an evermore threatening, scary and unsafe place to be in. The powers that we have today to enslave the masses and placate the sheeple would make past tyrants drool. All the more reason to keep in mind – and act on – the old saying: “Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.”
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