Two weeks ago, when young Australian Jack Thomas appealed his conviction for receiving funds from Al Qaeda and holding a false passport, he was acquitted by the Victorian Court of Appeal. FURY AFTER JIHAD JACK WALKS FREE, headlined The Australian, although the fury was largely confined to Murdoch's newsroom. A jury had previously acquitted Jack Thomas of two more substantial matters. The Victorian Court quashed his conviction on the lesser charges, because police statements had been taken from the defendant while he was incarcerated in Pakistan without access to a lawyer and subjected to assaults. (A US interrogator told Thomas he would crush his testicles, rape his wife and put her breasts in a vice). When the Appeal judges freed Thomas, as they were obliged to do under Australian law, the Murdoch media called for public outrage and demanded "rapid amendments to ensure that no judge can make the same mistake". One of the first steps in the Third Reich's campaign to win over the hearts and minds of the German people was to attack the judges. Another step was to consolidate the media. A third step was to fan the flames of fear.
In response to criticism of its assault on the judiciary, The Australian hit back: 'what will it take to get Mr Thomas's apologists to take the terror threat seriously? Suicide bombers detonating aboard Melbourne's trams? A USS Cole-style strike on the Manly ferry?" And sure enough, as I write, another Murdoch missile hits the front page. SYDNEY WILL BE ATTACKED.
After interviewing 572 citizens, the Daily Telegraph has decided that "most Australians believe we are locked in a losing war against Islamic terrorists and an attack on our home soil ... is inevitable". The number who cite Murdoch's compulsive belligerence as a factor in the escalation of terror is not revealed. On the same day, Jack "Jihad" Thomas is arrested on the beach, slapped with a newly introduced "control order" and ordered home, where his movements are to be restricted. Questioning voices are merely a "civil libertarian lobby that believes John Howard is a greater threat to our way of life than bin Laden", according to MurodchWorld. No, the greatest threat is the control of information from the top. "Fascism ought to more properly be called corporatism", said Mussolini, "since it is the merger of state and corporate power." Beware of a global Goebbels.
FRIENDS, ROMANS, COUNTRYMEN
How Mark Antony might have viewed Murdoch's bloodlust:
Rupert Murdoch is an honourable man,
otherwise he would not be honoured so,
by other honourable men,
Like Mr Bush, Tony Blair and Mr Howard
Who, you all know, are honourable men.
Let's not do them wrong; I'd rather choose
To wrong the dead. And the dead are many.
If you have tears, prepare to shed them now.
Ran Rupert's dagger through a free and open press
Dismembering truth and good intent,
Then what a rent the cursed Bush-ites made
Upon the battered peoples of Iraq
Whose tears and gore besmirched the Tigris.
Mark how the blood of Afghans stained the sand,
And tearful Qana infants torched from sky.
Judge, free citizens, how loudly Murdoch brayed
To feed his oily thirst for power, growth and wealth
Beyond all proportion, cheered by underlings.
O, what a fall was there, my tarnished Democrats.
Then I, and you, and all of us fell down,
Whilst bloody mindedness flourish'd over us.
O, now you weep; and, I perceive, you feel
The dint of shame: Our good name squandered.
Our laws abused, our governance marr'd with traitors.
O piteous spectacle!
The evil that men do lives after them.
In response to criticism of its assault on the judiciary, The Australian hit back: 'what will it take to get Mr Thomas's apologists to take the terror threat seriously? Suicide bombers detonating aboard Melbourne's trams? A USS Cole-style strike on the Manly ferry?" And sure enough, as I write, another Murdoch missile hits the front page. SYDNEY WILL BE ATTACKED.
After interviewing 572 citizens, the Daily Telegraph has decided that "most Australians believe we are locked in a losing war against Islamic terrorists and an attack on our home soil ... is inevitable". The number who cite Murdoch's compulsive belligerence as a factor in the escalation of terror is not revealed. On the same day, Jack "Jihad" Thomas is arrested on the beach, slapped with a newly introduced "control order" and ordered home, where his movements are to be restricted. Questioning voices are merely a "civil libertarian lobby that believes John Howard is a greater threat to our way of life than bin Laden", according to MurodchWorld. No, the greatest threat is the control of information from the top. "Fascism ought to more properly be called corporatism", said Mussolini, "since it is the merger of state and corporate power." Beware of a global Goebbels.
FRIENDS, ROMANS, COUNTRYMEN
Rupert Murdoch is an honourable man,
otherwise he would not be honoured so,
by other honourable men,
Like Mr Bush, Tony Blair and Mr Howard
Who, you all know, are honourable men.
Let's not do them wrong; I'd rather choose
To wrong the dead. And the dead are many.
If you have tears, prepare to shed them now.
Ran Rupert's dagger through a free and open press
Dismembering truth and good intent,
Then what a rent the cursed Bush-ites made
Upon the battered peoples of Iraq
Whose tears and gore besmirched the Tigris.
Mark how the blood of Afghans stained the sand,
And tearful Qana infants torched from sky.
Judge, free citizens, how loudly Murdoch brayed
To feed his oily thirst for power, growth and wealth
Beyond all proportion, cheered by underlings.
O, what a fall was there, my tarnished Democrats.
Then I, and you, and all of us fell down,
Whilst bloody mindedness flourish'd over us.
O, now you weep; and, I perceive, you feel
The dint of shame: Our good name squandered.
Our laws abused, our governance marr'd with traitors.
O piteous spectacle!
The evil that men do lives after them.
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