As our police commissioner warned us after the APEC meeting in sydney: this is how we do business in Sydney now. And so it goes. SMH is reporting that our elected representatives have once again invoked ‘emergency powers’ in order to protect the pope when he visits Sydney next July. Ter-fucking-riffic…

The emergency laws include unrestricted searches, vehicle confiscations, all the stuff which we can now begin to think of as ’standard’… as ‘business as usual’.

But it gets a whole lot more insidious. To quote from the SMH article:

The bill goes beyond access guarantees, with the inclusion of a controversial clause that can delegate power from Parliament to the Government.

Wait… can you hear that? It sounds like… well… what does it sound like when the checks and balances of power erode away? The sound of silence.

And even worse:

The new laws protect commercial agreements between the church and its sponsors by restricting advertising around buildings and structures at World Youth Day venues.

Oh right - because it’s about terrorism. Those terrorist advertisers! The church hires out a space and gets to sell the advertising real estate that it generates by coming for a visit. I guess they must have promised a little more than they technically could give - since all those rogue advertisers out there might sneak in an advert and ruin everything! But that’s okay… the government will step in and protect the deal. Cause that’s what governments are all about right? They are there to guarantee the revenue of religious organisations.

So it’s now a law preventing advertisements at this venue in July eh?

I wonder what would happen if I showed up with a big sign advertising my blog? I would then be breaking the law right? Perhaps it is stupid, but I got inspired by a little bird: