Thoughts - Outsourcing Justice (or just Execution's)

The recent controversy surrounding the hanging of Van Nguyen by Singapore has (yet again) exposed the crass underbelly of the Australian psyche and the Howard government is using it to great effect.

A number of things have me worried about the direction (and again, failure in leadership) we, as a nation, are headed and it has me asking the question - "has the Howard Government decided to outsource our Justice (well, execution's at least)?"

Despite a long history of the Liberals voicing their opposition to Capital Punishment, we have seen an almost deliberate watering down of that long held position in recent months. Like "Tampa" before it, they aren't coming straight out and saying they support it, but the comments they are using are enough to tag at the heartstrings of the Hansonite's in our midst, further entrenching the government in the community. It's politics at it's lowest and dangerous to boot as the Libs go about selling out on what they stand for to secure their political future - and that can only lead us into worrying territory.

So, I'm starting to wonder, how can the government back capital punishment (and thus reengage with the Hansonite sympathisers) without appearing to change a long held Liberal policy? Well, I suspect they've taken a leaf out of Bush's policy of outsourcing torture to Eastern Europe which allows the Bush presidency to claim they do not support turture in America.

Similarly, we are seeing the Howard government outsource punishment for drug crimes to our Asian neighbours, without so much as a whimper of complaint. Proof of this?

• Despite Van Ngyen being sentenced in 2002, it has only been in recent months that anyone in government appears to have made any attempt to challenge this. Why weren't attempts made immediately for his transfer to Australia to answer charges here?
• Why dob the Bali 9 into the Indonesian's? If the AFP knew of their movements (and if I recall, even their flights back into OZ), why not simply pick them up off the plane back in OZ? Surely the deliberate act of informing the Indonesian's about their plans was tand amount to signing their death warrants.

Both appear to be deliberate acts to ensure these individuals are sent to their deaths. Now, I don't particularly have a problem with another country enforcing its laws as it sees fit. And we all know you'd be stupid to even consider touching drugs in any Asian country for fear of capital punishment - yet it still happens (so not much of a deterant).

My concern is that, in both of these cases, the most harm was not going to occur to the local population - no, instead these "mules" were returning the drugs to Australia for our population to suffer the consequences. So, why are we not insisting on setting the punishment? Why aren't we dragging them back to OZ to face our justice system? Why? Because many of us (and the this is the bit the government are sucking up to) clearly think this is a suitable punishment so Howard is playing the Hansonite card yet again to sure up his support base.

Other things that concern me about this include:

• The use of language - it's been very Orwellian again - remanicant of Tampa - not admitting they support Capital Punishment but doing everything in their efforts to suggest they actually do,
• The clear lack of leadership (by both sides of politics) to support our long held position against capital punishment. Again, this is reminicent of Hansonite politics - how Howard allowed Hanson to express her view unchallenged in the parliament.
• The move by the Lib/Nats in Queensland to boycott the minute silence as a protest. Again, it sets a tone in the community and offers tacit support to that ugly underbelly.

So where too now? I suspect/worry we're on a slippery slope. The actions we're seeing appears to highlight peoples desire for revenge over than justice. How anyone could believe that death was a suitable punishment for simply carrying the drugs is beyond me. We don't see the masses demanding the gallows for tobacco exec's? Yet their "legal drugs" kill many more Australian's every year (as the argument goes that the drugs they are carrying will kills Australian's after all).

So, given the recent turmoil surrounding Howard's devisive policies (IR, terror, welfare to work, etc) which will clearly work against the government, are we seeing a return to wedge politics to divert attention away from their current failures?

My concern with this is that we're playing with fire. Once we start to encourage the ugly side of the Australian Psyche out into the open, it will be a difficult to put it back into the box - and that scares me no end.