Carr pushes racist "law and order" agenda

by Andrew Jackson

Photos of a bullet-ridden house wrapped up with a story of 
immigrants, drugs and guns have become the latest fuel to drive 
Bob Carr's eternal "law and order" campaign. There is no doubt 
that once again NSW residents already living under some of the 
harshest "anti-terror" laws in the world will be asked to 
relinquish further civil rights for their own safety and 
protection.

John Howard won the 2001 Federal election with racist scare-
mongering. "I don't want people like that in Australia", he spat 
on national television, as he told Australia how a boatload of 
refugees had thrown their children into the ocean.

We now know this story to be a complete fiction. There was a 
boatload of refugees, but the events as John Howard described 
them to the media and what actually happened were two completely 
different stories and John Howard knew it.

It was a deliberate campaign of racism designed to instil fear in 
the Australian people, win the election, and implement a raft of 
laws repealing civil liberties under the guise of "internal and 
external security". And it worked the more frequently and shrilly 
he repeated the story the higher he climbed in the opinion polls.

Now NSW Premier Bob Carr has sought to outdo Mr Howard with a 
racist diatribe the likes of which has not been heard since the 
early Hanson days.

"Obey the law of Australia or ship out of Australia", declared Mr 
Carr, commenting on an incident in Sydney last week where two 
people were killed when bullets were fired into their home. "We 
are not going to see, step by step, our civilisation dragged back 
to the medieval standards of revenge cycles. It's as simple as 
that".

The Sydney Telegraph — Murdoch's slavishly pro-Carr 
trash-tabloid — picked up the baton: "The violent and bitter 
break-up of a 12-year marriage, involving guns, attempted rape 
and death threats fuelled an escalating family feud which 
resulted in the murders of a man and woman this week", ran the 
front page article.

The Telegraph Editorial, illustrated with a photo of a 
very authoritarian-looking Mr Carr, gave pointers to the real 
issues behind the beat-up.

"If police have strong indications they know the identity of the 
people responsible for these crimes, but are powerless to act 
because of a lack of public co-operation, then that's 
unsatisfactory. Right now, what we need is action to make the 
streets safe .

"And officers can rest assured of the support of all decent 
Australians in whatever steps they deem necessary to rid us of 
the murderous menace that has become apparent in the past few 
weeks."

The Opposition spokesperson on Police, Peter Debnam, further 
upped the ante ranting about a "war against urban terrorists" and 
the "gun warfare crisis".

No doubt Mr Carr will now call for new powers to help fight his 
war against crime, just as Mr Howard demanded new powers to fight 
his war against terrorism.

However, these powers are not needed to fight crime or terrorism 
— their aim is to silence public dissent.

The past few years have seen a hightened level of political 
activity in Australia. From the tens of thousands that blockaded 
the Crown Casino in S11 actions against the WTO to the hundreds 
of thousands who marched against the war, the Australian people 
are taking to the streets and venting their anger at anti-people 
government policies.

And both Bob Carr and John Howard have demonstrated their 
ideological commitment to stamp this dissent with police-state 
authoritarianism.