verging_on_random

Death and politics

October 1, 2006 on 10:20 am | In Uncategorized |

A year ago four Australians were killed by a terrorist’s bomb in Bali. This was a tragic event for their families and friends, as is the sudden death of anyone close to us. There will be a memorial service in Bali this weekend.

The Australian government has provided financial assistance to 40 people to attend the service.

This is another example of the way in which the Howard Government cynically exploits every opportunity to ramp up people’s hysteria about the Terrurist Threat …. and does it so cleverly that it’s almost impossible for anybody to object. I mean helping people to attend a memorial service is a nice thing to do surely …. although a ratio of 10 mourners to 1 victim makes you wonder where they drew the line when it came to handing out the money.

But what’s beyond argument is that a service in Bali attended by a reasonably large group of people will be a Media Event that makes the nightly news, giving Howard an opportunity to be interviewed and remind us yet again how we must keep supporting him and his government’s campaign to Make Australia Safe. Much more satisfactory for his purposes than leaving people to mourn privately at their own expense, as 99.9% of people have to do when sudden tragedy strikes their families.

It’s all a strange contrast to the experience of Kylie Russell, widow of the first Australian soldier killed in combat in Afghanistan, who not only didn’t get financial assistance to attend a wreath-laying service in honour of Australia’s war dead a couple of years back, she wasn’t even invited. Even though Howard’s bff George W Bush dedicated his wreath to Kylie’s late husband. Our PM had this to say about that incident: “As you may now know, Mrs Russell’s failure to be invited to attend the wreath laying ceremony at the Australian War Memorial last Thursday was a most regrettable oversight.”

He went on to say “that neither Mrs Russell’s activities nor criticisms of the Government in relation to war widows in any way contributed to her failure to be invited.”

Perish the thought Prime Minister.

I wonder if any critics of the government’s anti-terrorism practices missed out on a trip to Bali due to a “regrettable oversight”.

UPDATE: tonight the ABC reported comments that Howard made at a “spontaneous” doorstop interview earlier today:

“Could I just start by saying that Australians should today remember the four Australians who died in the 2005 terrorist attack in Bali a year ago and also many Indonesians who died in that same attack, it’s another reminder of the war against terrorism which we will have to wage for a long time into the future ….” 

The story was accompanied by footage of mourners in Bali. Nobody mentioned that the federal government had stage-managed the whole affair.

No I’m not gifted with second sight ….. it’s more that our Prime Minister has become unfailingly predictable.