Originally Posted by
megan
Not at all AP, plenty to complain about with all governments no matter the party involved, your words "the morally corrupt and reprehensible behavior of this government" can be applied to individuals within all governments, no matter at what level of society they operate (local council to federal), businesses too.
True, but I believe this government, in the federal sphere (acknowledge there have been corrupt governments at State and local level on all political sides) stands apart in my mind. I cannot in my entire lifetime recall such a prolific collection of not just corrupt, not just morally corrupt, but mean, nasty and deliberately cruel, behavior.
Obviously this is just a comment based on my view of why an organ of the State was able to do what it did to a gentleman like Glen, goes some way to explaining the environment of impunity the government has created - by the way, when I say mean and nasty I mean instituting not just one, but multiple programs of disgusting cruelty that was deliberately targeted to cause harm to the most vulnerable in our society - such as robodebt - a 'program' described by the High Court, when it ORDERED the government to cease and desist, as nothing more than an elaborate program of extortion by a government against the people it purports to represents. People were driven to suicide by that program.
My point being, that's a colossal line that has been crossed, with a number of reasonable parliamentarians even suggesting the country has crossed into a 'pre-Police State'. That, to my knowledge, has never occurred before under any federal government of either political persuasion. Isolated incidents, yes, but this 'mob' has not only cruelly pursued those who challenge it but has repeatedly used the organs of the state to punish, hound and harass. It even descends to the low level of victimizing and denying support to charities that dare to speak out against any particular government policy. That's not just isolated either, its a matter of policy, witness Brandis awarding grants to the arts HE personally liked and denying it to anyone such as comedians that mock the government. Juice Media is a good example of a ridiculous and badly written law that was aimed at nothing more than creating an offense 'impersonating a Commonwealth Entity" which was then used as an excuse for Federal Police to visit the studios of this well known satirical you tube operator and threaten him and his staff with charges under said law. There's some footage of a Senate Inquiry into the law which sounds like something from Yes Prime Minister, except it would've been considered too far-fetched for their writers.
Only thing I can think of to say is that Australia has the government it deserves - as Andrew Wilkie stated (Mr Wilkie being a victim of harrassment by Howard's government for telling the truth about Children overboard) if we're not careful and don't arrest this increasingly accelerating trend, we are going to wake up sometime in the near future and ask ourselves, how the hell did we get here.
I'm no conspiracy theorist by the way, nor politically allied to any party, but I do know something about the constitution and how government is supposed to operate and what 'responsible to parliament' means and what I see is an executive that is out of control and thumbing its nose at custom and precedent and just about any standard of decency. Dutton cancels a visa, High Court orders it be re-issued, so Dutton goes back to his office and cancels it again for a different reason. He goes off deporting people left, right and centre but enables his prominent mates to import their au pairs. That sort of activity is rife at every level of the current government. There have been scandals at the federal level before but never the level of behaviour we are now seeing.
Rant over.