Demand your liberties before they are taken [View all]

[Matilda]

Last week was a busy one for Attorney-General Nicola Roxon and a dangerous one for the citizens of this nation.

Ms Roxon announced on May 4 that she wanted to give law enforcement agencies the power to bug phones and intercept emails for up to six months, and on the same day she, and her junior minister Jason Clare, announced a series of agreements with the US secretary of homeland security Janet Napolitano on data sharing.

SNIP

When it comes to national security and sharing data with other nations, the need for protections, safeguards and redress by individuals wronged should be of paramount importance because the consequences for them and their family of being entangled in that shadowy and brutal world can be life-threatening.

Yet both of Ms Roxon's announcements seem not important enough for the media to pursue. They are too interested in the short-term low-hanging fruit of former Labor MP Craig Thompson and the Speaker Peter Slipper.

http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/4002944.html


We shouldn't be too surprised at this - look how tamely Labor rolled over when the Howard government wanted to pass laws that allowed children to be interrogated without either a parent or a lawyer present. But given the propensity of both ASIO and the AFP to get things terribly wrong, these laws are very disturbing.

And as Greg Barnes says, the media are simply not bothering. It's much more titillating to salivate over the sexual scandals of MPs.